Friday Frivolity

It's finally Friday on the second Hell Week at work. All my work is done for the week, so I'm going to play on the Internet all afternoon - *shhh*, don't tell my co-workers. (I'm just kidding.) (No, I'm not.)

Since I'm not in the mood to think anymore today, I have some fun stuff to share:

On Wednesday, I was driving in the car with the two kids. The song "Renegade" by Styx came on the radio. Supergirl pipes up from the back seat, "Momma, did you put in the Styx cd?" AWW YEAH! Motherhood: I am totally rocking this gig. (Later, the Rolling Stones came on and I taught her their name. She remembered it at the end of the day, too!)

Where do you rank on the seven deadly sins? Here's my score:

Greed:	Medium
Gluttony:	High
Wrath:	High
Sloth:	High
Envy:	Medium
Lust:	Medium
Pride:	High

Discover Your Sins - Click Here
I had a feeling it would be either Sloth or Gluttony and I was right. Should the fact that I'm "high" on two other sins worry me? Nah, I'm too lazy to worry about that!

AND, since my company has fixed our Internet to not crash on any site that has Flash animation, I can now make a Superhero! Presenting The Superhuman Lasered Jones:

Try it yourself at The Hero Factory.

Flipping Out: The Contest

So! *brisk clap* Who's in the mood for a contest? Oh good, I am too! Why a contest? Well, over the weekend, this blog turned two. And true to form, I didn't even notice slash completely forgot. So to make up for that, we're going to have an extra big contest with lots of prizes. However, a comment on this post is not going to be enough to enter you in this contest. No no, you're going to have to work for this one. In order to be entered in the contest, you must send a question for Marshall Karp, author extraordinaire, to be asked and published in our multi-blog interview of him which will be posted on April 14th. Send your questions to askmarshallkarp@gmail.com, and don't stop at just one question - I'll be giving a prize to the person who asks the MOST questions. And a prize to the person who asks the BEST questions (in my humble opinion, of course.) And a random prize to a questioner picked at random. So you have lots of chances to win. (And don't worry if your question is random or weird. Marshall is a total smartass and lots of fun, so absolutely anything goes with the questions.) And what do you win? Why, I'm glad you asked. The first prize is an autographed copy of the best book I've read this year - Flipping Out! (Does anyone else love autographed books as much as I do? Aren't they just the coolest things EVER?!)

(Doesn't that cover just scream AWESOME!?) I'll be posting a full review of the book on April 8th, but here's a sneak peek - I LOVED it! The next prize is what I'm calling the "Mystery Package". There'll be another copy of Flipping Out, which is a murder mystery, and then other "mystery" items - whether they have a mystery theme or are just a surprise to you. (Read: If I can think of items with a mystery theme, they'll be in there - if not, it will just be a fun prize pack.) And the third prize will be a fun prize pack. I will try to find some Mr. Pickles chickens, but given that I haven't even looked at the craft stores yet, I have no idea if there are any Mr. Pickles available around me. So! Get cracking on those questions, and increase your chances to win a fabulous prize. I'm assuming we'll close the email for questions a few days before the interview is scheduled in order to give Marshall time to answer them, so I would recommend having your questions in by midnight on Thursday, April 9th.

Perspective

So yesterday, I came in here with balloons and streamers and a plan to throw myself a pity party. I was going to tell you all how work has been "alternately making me homicidal and suicidal" (tm Alice), and how I'm fairly sure I have at least one, but probably two, kidney stones and no time to go to the doctor. Basically, my life has been stinking it up in here. And I was feeling MIGHTY sorry for myself yesterday. But then, something happened that put my life into perspective. I made a business call - just a regular, ordinary call to a business associate whom I had just met. He explained that he could not come to my office this week because there had been a death in his family. His 14 year old daughter had died suddenly, unexpectedly, the night before. I don't have many details and I have no idea what caused her death. I think she died at home, in bed. But the man was devastated. And while I don't believe in the, "shut up about your little problems, there is always someone worse off" school of thought, I have to admit, it DID make me see that despite some little difficulties, my life is damn good. My husband and I and both of our beautiful little children woke up this morning. Maybe we didn't pop out of bed with sunshine and rainbows streaming out of our asses, but we're all here. So for this week, we will be focusing on the positive here at Notthedaddy. Tomorrow, there will be fun and games. But first, today, we're going to have a moment of silence for a 14 year old girl who is no longer with us and her grief-stricken family. May God give them comfort, because I can't think of any available here on earth.

How I'm Weird, Part Two Trillion (Really, Couldn't This Be the Title of EVERY Post?)

Personality quirk that I like least about myself:

I HATE talking about personal situations with co-workers, especially bosses. So much so that I end up sounding weird and feel like I sound like I'm lying. I hope I really don't sound like I'm lying, but I suspect I do. I tend to just blurt out whatever is going on, offer little to no detail, practically cut off the other person if they try to say something comforting or nice (not intentionally), and lead with the fact that I need time off or whatever other work-related piece of the information that I can scrounge up. The ONLY time I have ever felt genuine when I was telling a supervisor about something bad happening to me was the day I found out my grandmother had passed away. I sent my supervisor an email letting her know what had happened, she called right away, and as soon as I picked up the phone, I started sobbing. Not graceful or dignified, but genuine. Oh, and when I broke my ankle, I called my supervisor and said, "I have a funny story to tell you that's not really funny at all." But that supervisor was a close friend (still is, actually). So that one doesn't really count.

So tell me - how do you tell bad news about yourself or your life to your boss? Is there a graceful way to do it?

Fun Fact Friday

Alright, that's enough gloom and doom on here. Thank you all for your kind words. I'm feeling much better, physically and emotionally.

Fun Fact Friday: (tm Tess)

1. Today is my mother's birthday. See last year's post as it is still applicable.

2. Impromptu movie review: Changeling. A-freakin-mazing. I'm still glad that Kate Winslet won the Oscar, and I haven't seen The Reader, but she better have BROUGHT IT to have beat Angelina. Her performance in this movie is awesome. The movie itself is very well written and the story unfolds nicely. As a modern woman, it will drive you crazy. Be prepared to yell at the characters on-screen and have your jaw drop open in disbelief at some of the things that happen.

3. Great classic book that I just finished: The Good Earth by Pearl S. Buck. It's a rags-to-riches story set in China. Very, very good. A quick and compelling read.

4. Great book recommended by a blog friend: Third Degree by Greg Iles. Very suspenseful thriller. Recommended by Fiona Picklebottom.

Happy weekend everyone! What are your plans?

The Bad News

There's no good intro to this, so I'm just going to jump right in. I had a miscarriage over the weekend. Saturday evening I started bleeding pretty heavily, so we jumped in the car and went to the hospital. There, they did an ultrasound and determined that although there was an amniotic sac and some "stuff" in it, it was not developing into a baby.

The biggest consolation, for me, is that it was not caused by anything I did or didn't do. I can't beat myself up about it, which I would totally do. I'm sad, of course, and disappointed. I wanted a baby, dammit. The weirdest thing I feel is lonely. I feel like my body is a big house, with lots of rooms, and I'm all alone it in. And someone used to live there with me, but they moved out, suddenly, without even saying goodbye.

I'm back at work today, though I'll probably take tomorrow off to follow up at the doctor's office (I was supposed to do that yesterday, but they were closed due to snow). It's odd, but I feel like I'm thinking about it more here than I did at home. I guess without the kids to distract me, I have too much time to think. I'm mostly okay, with periods of melancholy. I'm glad it happened now, instead of later in the pregnancy. I HATE that I told so many people (not you guys, OBVS, but my whole freakin' office, oh my hell WHAT was I thinking), because it is so hard to keep telling people that it's over. I wish everyone already knew, because I don't really mind talking about the details, but somehow just saying, "I Had a Miscarriage" is a total beat-down.