the care bear prophecy

At some point in my early years I was given a handmade Care Bear, the Bedtime Bear to be specific.  In my opinion, the aunt that bestowed this gift upon me might have also greatly impacted my passion for naps.  I like them lengthy, and I like them often. I sometimes think that if she had given me the Love-A-Lot Bear I wouldn’t be such a judgmental bitch but where is the fun in that. 

Through what I can only describe as some sort of miraculous phenomenon, I still have this bear.  If hoarders are at one end of the spectrum, then I’m on the polar opposite; everything in my possession gets thrown out, given away or auctioned off on eBay.  This happens mostly because I hate packing things and then subsequently moving them.  I’m on my fourth mattress in six years because I always just leave them behind. Hey, grab that bag of stuffed animals and those 38 pairs of shoes I’ve worn all of one time but go ahead and leave the bed? 

Taking this small memento of my past and making it part of my future was just too great an opportunity to pass up.  Also, how freaking cute are these pictures?

Happiest of Halloweens to you!

the great mitten caper

Like most people, I have a travel coffee mug.  Unlike most people, mine has been repurposed as a travel booze cup.  Sure I’ve put coffee in it on occasion but mostly it’s used to bring mixers into unsuspecting places like: homecoming football games, the movie theatre and on celebratory occasions, work.  In a past life I would just use water bottles but that came to an abrupt halt when I mistook a spiked bottle for run-of-the-mill H2O and guzzled vodka water on my way into work one morning.  Nothing quite like getting the dry heaves for twenty minutes to convince you to spend a few extra bucks on a more distinguishable cup.  

Not surprisingly, my cup and I have had very few outings together since my son has come into the picture.  Mostly because I no longer go anywhere and a little because people would probably frown upon me caring for my child in a constant state of intoxication.  People can be so weird.

So when it came time to take Rinn to the pumpkin farm, the travel mug stayed behind.  And it’s a good thing too because carting around pumpkins after consuming a hot tottie can be a little challenging; speaking from experience of course. Not to mention that I ended up having to fight off a goat who snatched Rinn’s brand new mitten thru the fence and tried to eat it.  I am not above kicking some farm animal ass if they come between me and clothes but should I have been forced to choose between holding onto my cup or chasing down that mitten, I can promise you that I would’ve been ordering a new pair when we got home all the while secretly hoping that goat choked on the stolen goods and got what he deserved.

Weeks later and with this memory freshly emblazoned on my brain but knowing that the chances of us encountering a thieving beast while trick or treating were slim to none; I filled my cup with wine for the occasion, to the brim. And to hell with it, if we do stumble across the path some bat shit crazy wombat whose sole purpose in life is to eat my hat, well he can have it.  Hats aren’t a good look on me anyway. 

Rinn's first trip to the pumpkin farm and my husband pretending he enjoys eating my hair.

Pumpkin proud.

The great mitten caper.

Robbery in progress.

no, you stfu

The news is depressing. But I refuse to live a world and not have a clue as to what’s going on outside my front door, that’s just irresponsible. So I watch a watered down version, read: Good Morning America. I mostly watch it for the “deals and steals” segment and Josh Elliot and his adorable grin but occasionally I learn things.  Like the fact that Julie Bowen has an uncomfortable crush on Stephen Colbert, she’s aware he’s a persona, yes? 

Anyway, GMA recently informed me of the riotously funny and extremely controversial blog: STFU,Parents.  For those of you who aren’t fluent in leetspeak, STFU loosely translates to “shut the fuck up,” ok so it literally translates to shut the fuck up but that’s no matter.  STFU, Parents is an internet platform for an annoyed 30-something year old by the name of Blair Koenig, to ridicule parents who overshare in the realm of social media (aptly called “over-sharenting.”)  From what I gather, blog readers can submit examples of oversharenting they find via their newsfeed (i.e. status updates about bowel movements, moms who refer to their babies butthole as a “chocolate starfish,” minute-by-minute labor details, etc.) and Blair than provides hilarious commentary.  I’m guessing she might have something to say about the little write-up detailing my first encounter with a baby boner.

The flack that this blog has caught is extraordinary; headlines read “Snarky Blogger Targets Proud Parents” and “Meet the (childless) woman behind vicious baby blog that has the mommy set up in arms” and up in arms is right, some mommies are trying to pursue legal action.  Unfortunately for them, they are idiots.  Ms. Koenig did not break into their home to steal top-secret photos of your children or force you at gunpoint to post a status about your pregnancy pains.  You elected to publish your word vomit in a social network, deal with it.  As a self-proclaimed mommy-blogger I think people expect me to defend mothers the world over against such cruelty but quite simply, I don’t give a shit. 

While I’ve never uploaded pictures of my son’s excrement, and my tweets are usually about how much I hate my hair, I’m still guilty of over-sharenting. See: my blog, duh.  I’m sure there a few people out there that would rather remove their own eyeballs with a melon baller than see another picture of my baby but that’s a two-way street asshole. Do you really think I am interested in the fact that you plucked your nose hairs, wrapped your nephew’s birthday gift and are now updating your Facebook status from the toilet? Absolutely not. And the gym check-ins, come on. You guys do realize that you can run on a treadmill and not advertise it to the world, yes?

My conclusion: your updates, photos, check-ins, tweets, etc. are always being judged and ridiculed, mine included (probably more than others) whether it’s from the privacy of someone’s home as they roll their eyes at your burning narcissism or in a very public and humiliating way.  Ms. Koenig chose the latter and to her I say, “ku-fucking-dos.”

we all scream

I’m not a fan of Rachel Bilson, so I was totally fine with her becoming completely irrelevant after The O.C. wrapped its final season.  Then she became Karl Lagerfeld’s pet project and the face of Magnum Ice Cream and suddenly she has her own show on The C.W.  Why can’t I be Lagerfield’s pet; we both consider diet Coke to be a sort of life blood and I admire him for making clean-sheet-day every day. Bilson, that whore.

I vowed to stop eating those wonderful ice cream treats in protest, but seriously, have you ever had the white chocolate ones? They make me weak in the knees.  So Rinn and I watch Hart of Dixie only to scoff at Bilson while indulging in the very thing that probably initiated her comeback. Meh, as long as I have my dessert. 

of mice and young men

I try to make exercise a part of my daily regimen. Sometimes those attempts are laughable at best; I’m referring to the fact that I consider“rigorous vacuuming” to be physical activity and on off days I prance around in front of my television to the Dancing With the Stars: Latin Cardio Dance DVD. What a joke. I only bought it because Maksim Chmerkovskiy is a fine piece and I thought if I concentrated hard enough it would be like he were giving me one-on-one lessons in my living room but he wears this creepy black tank top the whole time and it’s extremely off putting.

Most days I knock out a few push-ups and either dance around my living room in a recital fashion till I’m on the verge of collapse or I hit the bike path for a run. Ok so it’s a jog. Fine, you got me, it’s a brisk walk with short intermittent bursts of running which I almost always regret.  The goal is to sweat enough that when I get home I can eat a pot pie and not feel guilty afterwards.

On my most recent run/jog/brisk walk adventure I was making my way down the bike path when I spotted what appeared to be a 6-year-old boy alone on a bicycle without training wheels nailing some pretty solid figure-eight maneuvers.  Initially I was impressed; then slightly concerned because he’s all by himself on a trail which has been rumored to have men exposing themselves and attempted sexual assaults. As I get closer I start mentally rehearsing some lines that inquire about the whereabouts of his parents but don’t make me out to be the hypothetical predator that I’m trying to protect him from.  And as I get closer I see him jump off his bike and hover uncomfortably close to the pavement.  I’m now close enough to see what it is that he’s so intent on protecting from view.

Dead mice.

Two of them.

A 6-year-old alone on the bike path is a little disconcerting but a 6-year-old on the bike path playing with dead mice registers at about a 9 on the what-the-f@ck scale. So what do I do in response; break into one of those short bursts of running I described earlier.  I say nothing.  I don’t look back. My flight instinct kicked in and I wanted to put as much distance between myself and the rodent carcasses as possible.  Immediately I was replaying, in my head, the episode of Dr. Oz featuring the young girl who contracted bubonic plague from a half-eaten, decayed squirrel and nearly died. There was that and the fact that I’m almost positive I read somewhere that children who kill and maim animals will allegedly evolve into serial killers. In my mind I was about to either contract the black death or become the target of a future Ed Gein and my nipples would one day be a mere two on a belt of many.  I am nothing if not dramatic.

I would feel guilty roughly a half mile down the road; I mean, I have no proof that this boy actually killed those mice and it’s more likely that he just happened upon them when performing his stellar bike tricks and deemed it necessary to give them a proper burial. Enjoying the company of animal corpses is probably one of those things that I can look forward to when Rinn is that age; here I thought I would avoid this when we rehomed our cats.  I had just eased my panic when I see him again! This time, standing in what I have to assume is his driveway staring intently with his little eyes as I ran past. “IMPOSSIBLE, he should’ve been behind me!” “Did he just draw his finger across his throat?” 

Definitely serial killer. So much for walking the bike path,guess I’ll be taking a few more lessons from Maksim this week. 

Tweets: @RebeccaRinn

Instagrams: hotmessmommy

sick day

I woke up this morning a mouth breather.  Apparently “mouth breather” is now used as an insult in verbal altercations, similar to calling someone a moron; so I should clarify that I did not in fact wake up a moron but rather, I woke up seriously congested. But really? Dude, you’re such a mouth breather. Who comes up with this stuff? Damn you kids.

First thing I do upon realizing that I’m sick is decide whether I’m still capable of shopping since my mom and I had a date to peruse Macy’s for winter coats.  I stretched my old coats to their limits by forcing the zipper the entire time I was pregnant and now my parka has a permanent stomach bubble and will have to be retired.  The last time that I felt this close to my demise I had just been diagnosed with bronchitis but headed to the mall anyway convinced that retail therapy was the most logical remedy.  Logical because I was high on codeine cough syrup; not logical because I would buy no less than 12 of the same Banana Republic tank top and later, be hospitalized with pneumonia.  With that in mind, I called my mom to cancel.

Her response: “Oh, that’s too bad. You and Rinn have a pajama day and get some rest.”

I breathed a sigh of relief (through my mouth,) folded to my mothers’ words and settled in for a sick day; which I then realized is frighteningly similar to every other day. Now, nothing about being a stay-at-home mom is glamorous. Most days I shower and do my hair just to put on my fourth pair of yoga pants in a week and spend the day rolling around on the floor prompting my son to crawl. This is all a far fetch from the days when I would run around town in a shirt I had mistaken for a dress and thigh highs; attending magazine launch parties and judging cocktail competitions.  I knew these things would be referred to as “a past life” when I got pregnant but I wasn’t aware that the only difference between an average day and a sick day would be some Sudafed and awkwardly huffing air through my mouth. 

Has my life really become one perpetual sick day? Maybe tomorrow I'll try putting on real pants. 

thank you congress

Like most ex-boyfriends would, mine will tell you I’m "crazy." One watched me jump out of a moving vehicle because he wouldn’t share his cheeseburger. I lit another’s shoes on fire when he got too drunk to walk me home after a night of bartending.  And then there was the boyfriend who watched me simultaneously break both of my feet when I jumped off a two-story balcony after a night of heavy drinking thinking I was going to cannonball into a pool.  I missed the pool.

As you can see, this is totally out of the “my girl be trippin’” realm. 

I’m going to take this moment to issue an open apology to all of them.  You see, this was before I was properly diagnosed with bipolar disorder II and subsequently sought treatment.  Apparently there are variations of this mental illness, of which, I have the one that doesn’t reach full psychotic or manic episodes.  I have a feeling that the ex whom I tried to run down with my car would beg to differ on that, but I’m going to trust the professionals.  

While I tend to make light of the impossible situations I find myself in, mental illness is absolutely no joke.  My promiscuous tendencies and inability to control various impulses led to a very confused adolescent/young adult who only learned to cope through the abuse of drugs and alcohol, which in every instance worsened my already erratic and risky behavior.  It was during my pregnancy and forced sobriety that I was finally able to come to terms with my condition and begin the search for a treatment plan that would best work for me and my new family.

I share this information with you, not to frighten you or reinforce the plethora of inaccurate and hurtful representations of the mentally ill but to raise your awareness; to abolish the stigma surrounding maladies such as depression (postpartum or otherwise,) borderline personality disorder, schizophrenia, or bipolar disorder.  

Therapy and medication has largely helped in controlling my cycling between hypomanic and significantly depressive episodes but there are still instances in which my behavior raises questions or is misunderstood.  I’ve always been hesitant to share this part of myself with those around me but therein lies the problem with mental illness; it lacks the very necessary open and unashamed conversation that would help society to better comprehend the daily struggles faced by not only those who suffer from mental illnesses but their families as well. Should I have continued to stay quiet about my disease then I am not doing my part to eliminate the social stigma surrounding the “crazy,” the “psychotic”, or the “insane.”  If I can help shift society’s views by exposing my battle with bipolar disorder yet demonstrate my ability to function within the parameters of a parent, a wife, a daughter, a friend, then perhaps others needn’t feel the need be embarrassed about mental illness.

Next week, Oct. 7^th-13^th, is Mental Illness Awareness Week. This awareness week was established by the U.S. Congress in 1990 in recognition of the National Alliance on Mental Illness’ efforts to raise mental illness awareness.  Visit NAMI.org to learn more about the organization and how you can help support their mission. 

shop till you drop

Rinn and I are used to staying at home. Yoga pants. Puff grain snacks. Daytime television. You get the picture.  Anything above and beyond diaper changes and walking to and from the refrigerator is considered an outing. So when we decided to do some extensive shopping and then attend a meeting of the minds (also known as book club) all within the same afternoon overwhelmed wouldn't even begin to describe our state when we returned home. I sat down to collect myself and nurse some blisters and well, Rinn jumped himself into a nap. 

busta says it best

It’s hard to believe that one year ago today my husband and I were married in one of the most charming shotgun weddings I’ve seen to date.  We opted for close friends and family and a ceremony on board a yacht in the middle of a lake in Branson, Missouri (this ensured that neither of us could make a run for it without literally jumping ship.) My husband will tell you that it was the second best day of his life, the first being the day our son was born (cue awes); while I have a very different perspective.  I was five and a half months pregnant, sober and wearing a dress that made me look the Michelin tire man (you know the one, the character that looks like he was constructed solely of marshmallows and spit.) Because being as big as the yacht itself isn’t bad enough, let’s add a sinus infection and a double ear infection just for shits. I would rather hurl myself in front of a bus carrying nuclear weapons and covered in poison then repeat that day. Let’s just be clear; I hated my wedding, I love my husband.

This is obvious when I tell you I was very adamant about selecting our own vows.  Not writing them, God no. Mine would’ve echoed this blog and my husband probably would’ve said something about my “phat ass.”  I wasn’t willing to take that risk but I did want something beyond that “lawfully wedded” business.  And it’s a good fucking thing I did because part of the full service wedding package was that they provided a local officiate and check out the prize we got:

Ready for her close up:

Okay so she was incredibly sweet but how do you trust a woman in a white cowboy hat and excessive rouge to preside over something as sacred as your wedding vows?  You don’t, you let her speak her piece and then send her back to the wax museum she was on loan from.

So how does a couple celebrate 365 days together?  Drink a year-old bottle of Missouri wine that we received as a wedding present out of a travel coffee mug and bump and grind like we're auditioning for a role in a rap video till 1am, that's how.   We were so inebriated that each time I tried to "drop it like it's hot" I would just sit down on the bar floor and my husband spent a lot of time staring at the ground so he wouldn't fall over.  Basically, it was a fairly accurate reenactment of our first few years as a couple.   

Because of this, I feel as though only one song is totally expressive of our love and adoration for each other. Here's to you lover, cause I'm your chick, and I'm the shit.

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