We did a little bit of sightseeing and went to the zoo but for the most part, we stuck around the house and ate Korean food while talking. It was awesome. It was so awesome that I cried the whole way home because I hated to leave and return to regular life.

My plane landed in Orlando about 20 minutes early and I took that time to cry in the bathroom in the hopes that I could turn off the waterworks before Sweety picked me up. Sweety later told me that when he saw my crying ass sitting outside the airport that his first thought was that I looked homeless and miserable and maybe he should just leave me there. Yeah, that would have been great!

Before I left, Sweety asked me to put together a schedule for when the boys would be here and at the coaew’s this summer so he could give it to her and once she saw it they would both be looking at the same thing if she wanted to change anything about it. It’s nothing set in stone – just an idea. Well, her panties got in a wad after she saw it. It was done on the computer so I guess she assumed it was me that typed it all up and that pissed her off. She called Sweety ranting and raving about how the boys are her and his kids and I shouldn’t have any input in their lives. (hmm, I wonder if it’s ever occurred to her that I’ve lived with them quite a bit more than she has the past 9 years? and would it have been better if Sweety would have written all of it out by hand?)

So, they’re not MY kids but the motherfucking cunt wants me to change MY fucking vacation to suit her. How about a big glass of “go fuck yourself with a smoldering garden spade”? We’ve taken our family vacation the same time of year for the past 4 or 5 years to suit her. We used to go on vacation in June but that interfered with one of her crotchlings birthdays and the party she likes to have so we moved our vacation into July, the same time in July, a few years ago.

She’s all pissed off that our vacation time is overlapping with the time her husband has taken off for vacation and she wants to take the boys camping. I’m planning on leaving to head to Oklahoma on Tuesday night after I get off work but she wants me to wait til Wednesday.

I’m thinking of being a bitch and not waiting. Dammit, I’ve planned on leaving on Tuesday evening. *I* don’t have any kids so what makes her think she can tell me when to go on vacation to accommodate *her* kids?

Yeah, fuck it. I’m leaving on Tuesday night like I’ve planned and everyone can suck it and deal.

I really hope a bear eats her ass when they go camping. I hope it fucking rains every day they’re camping and mosquitoes descend like a plague of locusts. A crazy ax murderer that likes women that look like Walter Matthau would be nice too.

I’m afraid that I’m going to get to the end of this journey of raising the boys and just be like “wow, that’s it.” I need a family of my own. I need kids that will call me “mom” and give me hugs. Kids that I can raise how I want to. Kids that I don’t have to walk around on eggshells with because they aren’t *my* kids and OMG what if I do something to upset them and it gets back to the coaew?

A new tattoo. (By new, it wasn’t there the last time I looked at her a few months ago.)

A Jesus fish. Because nothing says “I’m a Christian!” like drawing a fish on your foot. I think if she was really dedicated, she’d slam some nails through her hands and feet. I volunteer to do the nailing.

Sweety says that I said, “Oh my god. She’s got a Jesus fish on her foot.” loudly enough that she heard. WTFE. It’s not that I have a problem with tattoos (Hi! I’m marked up!) or Jesus fish. Whatever she would have stamped onto her foot would have drawn the same reaction from me.

Don’t say you don’t have gas money to get your kids and then do frivolous shit.

She called Sweety this morning to try and project some guilt onto him.

This weekend (the boys are at her house on the weekends) BB overheard his stepdad saying that his exwife wanted them to come to her house for a party. After hearing this, BB pulled coaew aside and told her that he’d rather not go. That functions are awkward because he doesn’t know where to sit or what to do.

So coaew tells Sweety that she thinks BB is talking about his and LB’s baseball games and school functions. Because we don’t all sit together at the baseball field or at school things (Not usually anyway. Today I saved that twat and her spawn seats at LB’s class awards ceremony. This was before I knew about this conversation or I probably wouldn’t have bothered.) and that it makes BB uncomfortable.

Um, no. I don’t think so. I’m pretty sure that he was referring to the situation at your house that had just been mentioned! School functions? The boys sit with whatever parent they came with. Baseball games? The boys don’t sit with any adults. They wander around (under my eagle eye) and network with their friends. Yeah, coaew, I’m pretty sure that he was talking about the party that he’d just told you he didn’t want to go to.

If she was in the hospital – I’d step on her ventilator hose.

My job makes me want to poke bamboo shoots under my fingernails but at least I have a job. I get plenty of paid time off and health insurance. The insurance is the main thing that keeps me there. If Sweety were to carry the boys and I on his insurance plan, it would cost 3 or 4 times as much as what we pay now under my plan. I work inside. I can surf the internet at work to read the news and whatnot. I know what the fuck I’m doing so I’m left mostly alone. That is a good thing.

Living in Florida. Well, I hate the weather but we are close to all sorts of fun things. It’s been neat to take the kids to theme parks and different places. When my sister and her family were down last week, I let LB miss a day of school and we went to Kennedy Space Center. He’d never been before and he’s pulling all As in school so I didn’t think it would kill him to miss a day. BB is not doing as well with this grades so he didn’t get to go. (And he’d been to the place before on a school field trip.) He was bummed about it but he understood why he didn’t get to miss school.

Now that I have a GPS, I can always find my way home if I get turned around in this stinking town. That is nice. I do not like being lost. Um, sometimes though? I forget that I have a GPS and drive around aimlessly, looking for something familiar. I think my brain cells are dying quicker than they should.

This concludes my personal pep talk.

Last night I call Sweety on my break at work. And he tells me that I will be picking the boys up from baseball practice tonight after I get off today. Okay. Fine. I’d planned on maybe going to do something (but, uh, since I was going alone it’s not like I had to cancel with anyone or anything.) but this is okay. I’ll get the boys and then we’ll go to a movie or something. It’ll be fun. I miss having them here on the weekends because we never do anything “fun” anymore. It’s just school and work Monday through Friday.

I tell Sweety to tell the boys to take a change of clean clothes to change into after practice and he does.

This morning, after he’d dropped the boys off and they’d been told that I was picking them up, the coaew calls to let him know that she will be picking them up so as to not inconvenience me. Since BB doesn’t have practice on Saturday (she’d originally thought he had practice Saturday morning) she will pick them up to not trouble me.

Um, no. She’s not doing it to save me any trouble. It was perfectly motherfucking fine to inconvenience me when she thought she was going to have to pick them up at 9 p.m. and then get back up to bring them to practice at 10 a.m. the next morning. It was easier for her I picked them up and then we took them to practice the next morning. Don’t try and fucking say that you’re concerned about bothering me.

If she wasn’t able to pick them up when she thought there was a practice the next morning, what makes it any different if there is no practice the next morning? Nothing except now she doesn’t have to get up early and tote them over to our town so it’s okay to get them the night before. In actuality – it was easier for her to pick them up tonight than to drive out here early tomorrow morning like she had said she would. Fried cunt.

Sweety didn’t understand why I got so pissed off at the change in plans. Don’t tell me that I’m doing something and then 12 hours later tell me “nevermind, coaew said she’d pick them up so you wouldn’t have to.” My point is that she was completely okay with me going out of my way if it made things easy for her but now that it wouldn’t make things easier for her she wasn’t. Don’t bullshit me and say she gives a rat’s left nut as to my plans.

I told Sweety that I’m not an on-call taxi service and to not volunteer me for fetching anymore if it’s her day. I told him I’m perfectly happy to take them to practice when they’re here but I’m not going to do her a favor and “swing by” and get them on my way home from work on Friday night.

A couple of weeks ago, BB missed something baseball related because they were doing volunteer work somewhere to get a Disney ticket in exchange for volunteering. coaew called Sweety and told him, “I deserve to take them to Disney World before they’re eighteen!” (Hey! You also deserve to pay for some fucking school lunches, medical appointments, braces, shoes and how about the occasional field trip! Wanna do that? No, I didn’t think so.) What. The. Fuck? This just shows how much she does not know her kids. Those boys have no desire to go to Disney. We’ve asked them. They want to go to Universal or somewhere for the thrill rides. Not to Disney.

I’d like to kick her in the coochie until my foot breaks. Seriously, if I could have that opportunity I’d totally sacrifice a foot.

To put it mildly. I am fucking pissed. Kind of makes me wished I’d jumped on the baby bandwagon so our family would be “equal” to hers.

Sweety had called her to work out what time he’d get them Christmas Eve night or if she was bringing them over when she made the announcement. He tried to talk to her but ended up getting pissed off, telling her “whatever” and hanging up while she was still yammering away.

When he first told me I just started to cry. She gets them on Thanksgiving and we do on Christmas. This is just how it’s been. She hadn’t told the boys about it because BB asked me today where they’ll be Christmas Eve (for some reason, he asks me this every. single. year. and I always tell him, “Here!” and he says, “Just checking.”.) and when I said, “Your mother’s house.” he gave me a sideways look. So I elaborated with, “She’s bringing you here Christmas morning or day or whenever it is she feels like it. Wasn’t my idea and I’m not a fan.” And he said, “Okay.” and shuffled on out of the room.

This is the only time I’ve ever said anything in front of him that would be taken negatively about his mother but I just couldn’t hold my tongue. Sue me.

Anyhoo. In INSANELY HAPPY NEWS!

Bekah (don’t let the sign-in scare you! sign-in and check out her adorable photos.) and her daughter Sam (aka The Artist) are coming to see me! The weekend before Christmas! I won two parkhopper tickets to visit The Mouse and Sweety was going to go with me but he can’t because of bowling obligations. I won them back in the summer and we’ve been meaning to go and just keep putting it off and the tickets expire at the end of this year. So Bekah and Sam are coming and Sweety is being an awesome guy and buying us two more passes so we can go two days! Yay! Sam isn’t three yet so she’s freeeeeeee! I like me some free.

Tiny Sammy hugs!

Very excited. I am very excited!

And!

My Mom, sister and fantastic niece are arriving on Christmas Eve! They will be staying until January first or second! I can’t wait to see my niece and tell her bedtime stories and hug on her! I love my niece more than I like to breathe. She is an awesomely odd human being.

See this? This is one of Bekah’s hedgehogs all decked out for Christmas.

Now, it is nice and festive but do you know what I think when I look at it?

Hedgehog coochie!!!

I’d like to gently poke it with a pencil eraser.

He told her to ask the boys how much they wanted for them. He paid around $110 each for them 3 or 4 years ago and they’re pretty outdated. She called him back and said she was giving the boys $70 EACH for them. He laughed (a strangled laugh of disbelief. not an evil chuckle. he’s nicer than me.) and said we had planned of just putting them by the curb to let anyone pick up and she said she’d already told the boys she’d pay them.

Well, I say fuck that. I dropped those fucking monitors at least a dozen times on the garage floor last night when I saw that they were by the front door waiting for her to pick them up today. I hope she plugs those bitches in and they catch on fire.

And if they do work and the boys get paid? I am damn sure making them kick in on their Dad’s Christmas present this year.

I wouldn’t be so annoyed if she hadn’t called him last week with all kinds of stupid-assed questions. She wanted to know what all she’d need to hook up wireless internet service to a PlayStation3 if she got the boys one for Christmas. (she started the conversation with, “Hey, I got an unexpected check…” hey! maybe she could use some of that cash to buy some supplies for all of the motherfucking school projects I have to help with.) He actually told her that she needed to talk to her husband and hung up on her.

They are never going to love me like they do their parents and it’s making me tired to try and be a supermom when I’m not super or a mom. I’ve spent 8 years going out of my way to be at every game and chaperon every field trip that they needed me on.

I have discovered something more embarrassing than telling a man that you love him and he says nothing – saying it to your stepsons and they say nothing. I know they can squeak it out. I hear them tell their parents all of the time. I used to tell them that I loved them when I tucked them in at night and they never said it back so I quit saying it. A few weeks ago, I thought that was no reason to not tell them since I do. But since it’s just followed with awkward silence – I give up. I know the boys love me but it’s frustrating that I put forth as much effort in all around raising them as their mother or Sweety and I’m not the same.

Last Saturday, for the first time ever – I didn’t go to a baseball game when I would have been able to. I had company and I just really wasn’t relishing the idea of sitting at the game for 3 hours with the coaew a stone’s throw away. And the world didn’t end. The boys didn’t even wonder where I was.

This weekend’s game is going to be a dramafest. They play about an hour away and they have a wedding to be in on their stepfather’s side of the family that evening. After the game, Sweety has to meet the coaew somewhere with the boys. I know what the day will be like.

They’ll get beat in the baseball game. Sweety will be annoyed. The boys will be pissy. The coaew will be calling or texting constantly trying to find out where they are. I will be pissed off that we’re having to take them to meet her because she didn’t come to the game. It’s her time with them. Yes, she has a wedding that night but if they have time to go to the game then why the fuck can’t she take them?

So I told Sweety I didn’t want to go. I have absolutely no desire to even be around the aggravation that will ensue if the game runs into overtime or Sweety can’t meet her at the appointed time. Or if he shows up at the meeting place and she isn’t there yet.

He said that he’d like for me to go but understands why I don’t want to. And guess what? I’m not having any anxiety about this Saturday since I’m avoiding it. If I was going, I’d spend all week dreading it.

I also told Sweety that I probably won’t be going to their games if he isn’t there. I’m uncomfortable being around the coaew and even more so if Sweety isn’t around to talk to.

That flaming twatwad called him this weekend to ask what size pants did BB wear because she needed to buy him dress pants for the wedding. It wouldn’t have been so bad but BB was at her house. On the couch. Watching t.v. He didn’t want to miss the football game on t.v. to go shopping so she was calling for his pants size. WTF? How hard is it to either A) Tell him to get his ass up because he as to go or B) See what size pants are on his ass? Gah. Sweety let the call go to voicemail and didn’t bother calling back.

Maybe the next time she calls crying about money problems – he can tell her to talk to her husband about a mortgage bond. It’s nice that she’s never had a pot to piss in but always manages to hook up with someone who does.

Basically, I’ve decided if something extracurricular is going to stress me the hell out or make me want to cry then I’m not doing it.

For the past year it’s been a pain in the ass. Sometimes it wouldn’t start or would be so slow that it wasn’t worth fooling with.

A few weeks ago, the laptop had another accident with a piece of heavy equipment. (That laptop is one klutzy bitch.) A big enough accident that the hard drive was crushed into pieces and instead of putting the hard drive in a new laptop case – a refurbished laptop was sent as a replacement.

In an act of true karma – the new laptop won’t go online with it’s internal wireless thingymabob. I can plug a wireless usb device in and it’ll go online but I shouldn’t have to do that. I’ve already called tech support and it sounds like I’m going to have to call somewhere else and probably send it in to be fixed. I won’t be able to call them until I’m off again next Wednesday because they work regular hours and will be closed when I get off of work.

I’m not gonna bitch too much. At the most, I’ll just end up getting a wireless usb thing for it if they can’t fix it.

The neighbor’s cat is going to get a cleansing with some waterless shampoo. It’s foam that you rub in and then towel off. I’m really afraid he’d have a heart attack if I got him wet and I do not want to deal with that. They are going on vacation for a week so I’ll take that opportunity to clean him up. If Sweety would allow it, I’d tell them that he died and we buried him while letting him live out his life in our garage.

So the boys have been here for almost 2 weeks because the coaew had a weekend getaway this past weekend. The plan was that they were going to be here til Friday and then she’d pick them up from school on Friday and have them over the weekend.

The boys had a baseball game tonight. She came and told Sweety that she was going to pick them up from school tomorrow because she “deeply missed the boys” and will wake them at the fucking asscrack of dawn on Friday to take them to school. Because she misses them. The whole point of this exercise of them being here during the school week was so they wouldn’t have to get up super freaking early to get to school. She left the game after maybe 1.5 innings. If she missed them so fucking much you’d think she’d stay longer.

I have an internal bet with myself over whether or not she’ll drop LB off here after taking BB to school on Friday morning so we can take him in an hour and a half later. You know what? She has my permission to park her damned car in the driveway and sleep while he does for that hour and a half and then SHE can take him to school. I have to admit that Sweety knows that the fact that she drops him off on Monday mornings (Why can’t she take him to eat breakfast? Spend time with him? Probably cuts into her gym time. I’m not bitter.) chaps my ass so he comes home from work to take LB to school. I’ve adjusted to taking him being here on Mondays and have taken him to school if Sweety isn’t able to because that is the schedule. If she just assumes that it’s okay to do it this Friday I will probably set her on fire.

Actually, it just occurred to me that I could really fuck up someone’s day by scattering roofing nails in my driveway.

People, I have got to find a happy medium with this cunt. As it is, it’s been over 2 years since I’ve spoken to her and honestly? I’m okay with that. But today she walked behind me with her crew of crumb-crunchers and one of them was saying my name to try and get my attention and I ignored him because I didn’t want to turn the fuck around and have to say hi to her too. Because just seeing her makes me get hot and mad. I feel like I had a good 7 years of her being a complete douche to me while I said not one bad word to her so I’m entitled to at least 7 years of her staying the hell out of my way.

Sweety told me that I was being kind of harsh to take my annoyance out on the kid. I say I didn’t really take anything out on him – perhaps my ears just don’t pick up the frequency of small children shrilly saying my name. Either I’m going to have to start talking to this bitch and her crew or else move my chair to the far side of the field so there’s no chance of them getting close to me.

I’ll probably move.

I want them here for two weeks at a time and then at her house every other weekend. I’m greedy and selfish and I miss them on the weekends. It kind of sucks to only see them during the week while we are all busy with work and school. I like doing fun things with them too. We’re not even a month into this schedule and she needs a weekend away. Good. It will prove that she can go two weeks without seeing them when it suits her.

I’m a bitch and have no care for the feelings of their biological mother. So fry me.

BB has a weight lifting class this year and I know he’s fixing to get huge. Like, Jolly Green Giant huge. He’s already a bit over 6 feet tall and over 200 pounds and he sleeps a lot now. I swear, I can hear him growing. The boys just started the fall baseball season and are able to be on the same team with the way their ages fall. This happens every 3 years or so. It makes it so much easier when there’s just one practice or game to go to. I’m glad that they aren’t always on the same team because they are so competitive when they are that it’s crazy around here for a couple of months. They were comparing things that they had done years ago on the drive to ball practice the other day and BB said to me, “Don’t you love sibling rivalry?” and LB remarked that being on the same team really brought it out in them. At least they notice.

The cough that I spoke of a couple of posts ago is going strong. I’m going to the doctor this week to knock whatever shit is in my head out. I’ve taken to sleeping on the couch in the area of the house that’s the farthest away from the bedrooms so the boys and Sweety aren’t disturbed with my all night coughfest. Tiny Dog doesn’t even want to sleep with my sick ass. But it’s okay, I outweigh her and am able to put her in a headlock and force my love on her.

My Mom is on Facebook. That is so weird to me. She left me a message. Hi Anna I read your facebook.Love Mama I think it’s cute. I just taught her how to save phone numbers on her cell phone this summer and here she is mastering the internet. Now, Facebook is the sanitized version of me. I was on the phone with her over an hour yesterday. I think I’m a little homesick. We start doing our vacation bids for next year tomorrow at work and I’ll start daydreaming about my next vacation home. And yes, yes…I like my life here. But it’s always nice to go back to where I came from.

*For crying out loud, man! Breathe!

Do you listen to books on tape or audiobooks? I have become addicted to Scott Sigler. I used to worship at The Altar Of Stephen King but no more. Seriously, click on over there and download one of the free audiobooks. Ancestor and The Rookie are my favorites so far. He’s doing a tour to pimp out The Rookie and I am so there. Sure, I preordered my book long ago and requested that he sign it but won’t it be so much cooler to have him sign it again in person? Or is it just stalkercrazy? Sweety says stalkercrazy with a dash of aren’t you a fucking nerd? I don’t give a rat’s left nut. I’m going and if nobody can go with me I’ll go alone and sit against the wall like a weirdo.

School started Monday and it looks like we’re doing things a little differently this year. Instead of the boys being here half the week and then at the coaew’s, they’re going to be here Monday through Friday. She will pick them up from school on Friday and take them to school Monday morning. So we won’t have them every other weekend. Sweety brought the idea up to her because if we kept the schedule as it is, LB would be getting up at 5:30 or so but doesn’t have to be at school til 8:30. He’d have to get up so early because BB’s school starts at 7:20 and their mom lives about 45 minutes away. Of course, the conversation he had with her wasn’t drama-free but at least she sees it’s better for the boys.

Anyhoo. It has been settled. Unless she changes her mind. But I don’t think she will.

* The title has nothing to do with any of this but that song has been in my head for a week now. I may have to sing it to you like the last one. Sweety has even been singing the ant song with me and LB chimes in when he hears me muttering it to myself. Insanity: It’s a family affair!