I have to preface this by saying Of all the freakin' times to forget my camera!
Ok, now that that is out of the way...
Last month, I got an email asking me if I wanted to buy tickets for MixFest 2007. For those of you not in the know when it comes to San Antonio, we have a bis festival every year called Fiesta!
During this celebration, the local radio station does one of it's annual coinciding concerts. I like these concerts because they usually are headlined by bands that haven't quite made it huge yet so they are held somewhere relatively small, like Sunset Station. I have seen Hinder, Default, Ryan Cabrera, Gavin DeGraw & Switchfoot all at concerts put on by Mix 96.1.
So you can imagine my surprise (if you are a fan) when I got my email for MixFest and the headlining band was Blue October. I LOVE Blue October! Just ask The Cake Lady's husband, it's all we listened to like the first two months we carpooled together.
I forwarded the email to Jiffinner who immediately responded with: "Oh, my god. We totally have to go!" Yes, yes we do.
So, tickets were purchased and plans were made and all was well in the world.
Last week, as I was insuring that I would have someone to watch my children while I was gone, Amanda asked me where I was going. I told her and she said she wanted to come too because she loves Blue October. (Is she my kid or is she my kid?)
I was hemming and hawing when she mentions to me, ever so casually, that I was the one who implemented the No Concerts Until You Are In The Double Digits rule. I had indeed. So, I told her if the concert hadn't sold out that she could come and buy her ticket at the door. (I have to put in that the kid pulled two teeth in the last week so she would have enough money!)
Friday rolls around and the box office says they still have tickets so Amanda and I load up and head over to pick up Jiffinner, Jiffinner's brother Bubba & Bubba's new (or at least new to me) boyfriend The Amazing Adorable Boy (TAAB for short). Why is he TAAB? Because not even five minutes into the drive, when Jiffinner was questioning my taste in music as The Squirrel Nut Zippers belted out Blue Angel, TAAB not only knew who they were but also backed me up that they are quite rad.
So, we are all off to downtown SA.
I managed to get us there and parked with only one near death experience which will be forever known as The Second Time I Went The Wrong Way On A One-Way Road. Well, kind of. Technically it wasn't a one-way road. It was more of a two way road separated by one of those cement island thingies and I went on the wrong side of the thingie and THANK GOD no one was coming the other direction before all of my very concerned passengers managed to convince me that maybe I should JUMP THE FUCKING CURB ALREADY AND GET ON THE OTHER SIDE OF THE ROAD BEFORE WE ALL DIE! Which I did.
We parked and thus began the First Concert Experience for my eldest daughter.
I was really freaking out that we wouldn't get to the box office before they sold out of tickets and Amanda and I would listen to the whole thing from the sidewalk outside so when a scalper walked over to us and asked if we needed tickets, I went against what is normally my better judgment and asked her how much. Twenty bucks. That's five bucks less than they are at the box office... And she was promising me that they were real tickets (a promise that is about as good as a beer fart) so we handed her a twenty and hoped like hell Amanda wouldn't get arrested. Because we had indeed told her that she would take the fall :) She wasn't sweating it though. Plus, ticket looked real enough.


Tickets in hand, we went in and started to poke around. Amanda wanted to walk everywhere and look at everything so after I grabbed her a Sprite and me a beer, we started to wander around. A bunch of the Mix 96.1 people were holding signs that said "Free Hugs". I told Amanda that I was pretty sure that you got something if you hugged the right person and after she ate the biggest waffle I've ever seen, I was proved right. After Augustana finished their set, they announced that one of the Mix team had backstage passes for meeting the band. Amanda and I set out to find them. Amanda spots the chic right as she is picking out a very tall blond dude who has on a HATE ME shirt. As we are waiting to ask for backstage passes too, the tall dude reaches over and puts his hand on Amanda's shoulder and asks if he can bring her. The Mix chic, I think her name was Vanessa, looks at Amanda and I and says ok.
Holy shit.
We are carted off to the VIP area and made to wait for about ten minutes before being taken backstage. Right about then it occurs to me that I neither have a writing utensil of any kind nor a camera. Of all the fucking times to forget my camera. But the big blond dude, who's name was TJ, took pity on us and gave us one of his many Sharpies and we decided to have Amanda's shirt signed. A few minutes later, they announced that there would be no autographs - only pictures. It was starting to look like a bust since I hadn't brought a camera, but then they said that they would be taking pics of everyone and posting them on the Mix website. And they also announced that we would be meeting The Red Jumpsuit Apparatus and not Blue October, which I was a little bummed out about but oh well.
As we get closer to it being our turn, the guys from the band are all smiling and waving at Amanda (who was the only "kid" to make it backstage) and she is totally bouncing around all excited. So when she walks over with her Sharpie and her smile, they asked her if they could sign her shirt!


They were really nice to her, giving her hugs and asking her how she was doing. She told them it was her first concert and they all thanked her for coming to their show. I was really starting to dig them until one dude reached over and patted me on the shoulder and told me, "thank you for bringing her out."
Uhm - pardon me? What am I, like fifty? Made me feel very much like an out of touch mom. Just a nice reminder that I am not a cool rocker chic anymore, but whatever.
And then we got our picture taken with them.


When they finally took the stage, Amanda was starting to fade. It was nine something and she was pretty ready for bed. They played until about ten thirty and then we had to wait until around eleven for Blue October to get set up. But she stuck it out and Blue October put on an amazing show.
All and all, I think it was a pretty bitching first concert experience for her.

Labels: Amanda, Being Mommy, music, my crazy life, un-fucking-believable

“Well, they lost their first game last night.”

”Awww, that’s too bad. Did they cry?”

“Not when they lost the game, but Emilee cried the whole way home after she dropped her nachos.”

Labels: Being Mommy, Emilee, softball

Labels: Being Mommy, Emilee, The Universe

My house is full.
Like, full.
And because of it's fullness, Triniti is sleeping with me while Ruthie is sleeping in her bed. I am actually jazzed about this because Trin is a cool bed sharer. She doesn't kick me in the back or elbow me in the eye or snore too loudly. She is a great snuggler and last night as we were laying there going to sleep, she reached out with one grubby little hand and patted my arm twice before rolling over and crashing.
Plus, if Trin sleeps with you, you get to hear everything that happened that day. And a lot happens in a Triniti Day.
Monday night was the first night this week that Trin slept in my bed (because Ruthie came home from Austin on Sunday). Right before it was bedtime, she got an apple juice box out of the drawer in the fridge designated only for Trin's things (juice boxes, little baggies of shredded cheddar cheese, apples, yogurt, apple sauce, etc). While she was attempting to jam the straw through the little foil hole, my brother scooped her up and asked her what she was doing with his apple juice.
This was followed by Trin running through the house with her juice box while my brother chased her insisting that is was his juice box and he was going to get her.
Not exactly what I want my four year old doing at eight at night but it was sweet.
So, I get Trin in bed and kill the lights. A few minutes later she says she is done with her juice and can she get another. I tell her she can and she gets up and heads toward the kitchen. I followed to make sure she didn't need help with anything. A few steps past the bathroom and she stops, turns around and knocks on the bathroom door. Noah says he is in there and he'll be done in a few minutes. Trin says, "Uncle Doh-Doh? I guess that was my juice since it's in. my. belly!" and then heads into the kitchen for another one.
After throwing the empty one away and grabbing a fresh one from the fridge she heads back down the hallway where I am waiting for her. This time she stops in front of the bathroom and tells me, "I need to go potty Mamma."
So she stands by the door and waits.... and waits.... and waits....
The amount of waiting that she needed to do prior to my brother coming out made me cringe at the idea of going in after him. Two guesses as to what he was doing in there. Unless I could have left my nose in the hallway, I would have avoided the bathroom for the next hour or so.
He finally emerged and Triniti naively walked in and hopped up on the potty. I kept a safe distance and waited for her in the hallway. I could see her sitting there peeing and staring at her toes. She finished and reached over to grab some toilet paper and stopped suddenly, sitting bolt up right and exclaimed, "WHOA! Whooooaaaaaa! It smells bad in here!"

Labels: Being Mommy, my crazy life, Triniti

So, The Cake Lady and I took our families to the beach last weekend and had a blast (pics on my flickr account as usual).

This year, I wanted to build the big & bitchin' sandcastle that I don't ever seem to get to build.
So, Craig (TCL's son) and I got to work.
A few hours later, I was in some pretty yucky pain.
Today, the doctor informed me that I have Forearm Tendonitis.
WTF?
How old am I?

Info here: http://www.itendonitis.com/forearm-tendonitis.html

ps. This is, for a change, a completely valid reason for not posting. It hurts enough that I am using my left hand to operate the mouse.

Labels: Being Retarded, excuses excuses, missing in action, my crazy life, sandcastles, un-fucking-believable

I hate you.
Telling me the truth every morning wasn't fun enough for your sick & sadistic self... no you had to take it a step further and straight up lie to me.
And not in a holy cow [pun intended], I've lost weight!... no, you couldn't give me that! Instead, you have to tell me some OUTRAGEOUSLY low number that is obviously incorrect.
Like, "hey Kate, this is what you WOULD weigh, if you ever got off of your fat ass and worked out anymore."
I hate you.
I am planning to kill you when I get home and bury you in the dumpster.
Sincerely,
~Katehopeeden

Labels: Being a Chic, death, exercise, I'm a loser, self loathing