Cute Chaos

I’ve always thought the expression “herding cats” was particularly illustrative. But never more so then a couple weeks ago when I made the drive out to see niece #1 (being the oldest has its privilege’s, not least among them being labeled as niece #1, I’m sure.) in her soccer debut. 3 year olds playing soccer was pretty much exactly what I expected: mass chaos. But really really cute mass chaos. For the most part, the talent field was pretty level. Kids that age might like the concept of playing soccer, but in practice having all those adults on the sidelines watching them and cheering is pretty intimidating. This does not get better with age, sorry kiddos.

K was the best girl on the field. This despite a small break during play, spent sitting in the grass (hey! She was tired) and a 5 minute period where she and her friend tested an inventive strategy whereby they played soccer while holding hands. I don’t think the method is going to catch on anytime soon in the World Cup, but I liked their willingness to experiment. Seriously, though K was a regular Mia Hamm-Garcia-Parra compared to some of the other boys and girls she was playing with (yes I know Garciaparra is one word, but my way is more symmetrical). The fact that she showed no fear in taking the field was a testament to her outgoing little personality, and I was super proud of her. This might seem minor, but when you consider that they pretty much have to have a roster of 50 munchkins to find 5 that are willing to take the field at any given time, you can see why this was reason for excitement. In a related note: if anyone is looking for a new workout regime, might I suggest coaching the 3 year old set in soccer? These guys spent an hour running up and down the small field, trying to keep track of which midgets were their players, and encouraging them to kick the ball toward the correct goal. This involved lots of yelling and hand gesturing. I was exhausted just watching them.

I look forward to a long, decorated, soccer career from K. If there wasn’t a demographic known as “Soccer Aunts” before, I’m ready to start one. GO HOTSHOTS!

Random Things Sure to Drive Me Insane

Lately it seems I have read about, or been told about, some really horrific dates. "Maybe if I was still single, I would have more to blog about" I've been thinking to myself of late. Not that I'm willing to become single again for the sake of the blog. Sorry, there are limits. I even tried mining my memories for some stories to recap here, for the benefit of my faithful readers. But I can't really come up with anything good. Sure there was the guy that started every dance move with a clap. Or, come to think of it, just clapped a lot in general. Like "Who's ready for dinner?" clap. or "Did you see the news yesterday?" clap. But, explaining why this annoyed the ever living daylights out of me poses some literary problems. In short, it's a story better told live. Thankfully, ours was a long distance relationship, so my exposure to his clapping ways was kept to a minimum. Turns out I can stand just about anything for about 1 weekend a month. Perhaps not coincidently, the relationship fizzled when he expressed a desire to move to my city. (I feel the need to caveat that story with the detail that this person was insanely nice. I think I'm just a bad person, since certainly any sane person could deal with the clapping.) And then there was the time I was listening to a friend tell an anonymous bad date story and the punch line was "and he had forgotten his wallet" and I blurted out "was it Cheapy McCheapsalot??!!" (name changed to protect the chronically cheap.) Turns out I had been on a date with the same person, and yes. He had forgotten his wallet that time as well. But that's really it. Any other bad date stories I have would be the result of something I did, and who really wants to tell those? Its my blog after all.

Turns out, the Universe did the Halfstreet a favor and reminded me that I don't have to be dating to have amusing conversations with strangers. Say it with me: Thank you Universe.

This past week was the Avon Breast Cancer walk, an event I have been a part of in recent years. This year I decided to forgo the whole 'walking' thing and opted instead to cheer along the route. This enabled me to a. retain the use of my feet for the next week and b. assuage a teeny bit of my guilt. I figured "hey, I'm waking up before 9am on a weekend, so that's still a sacrifice." Work with me here people. I'm doing my best.

Anyway, there I was. At mile 10 in the parking lot of a CVS, wearing my participant Tshirt from last year (seeee? I did it last year!). I had taken advantage of the fact that the HSH was out of town and put Ripken in his fancy new Tshirt as well. Little did I know this would be the cause of my demise. Actually, the HSH would argue that any moron could guess that dressing your dog in clothes is a mistake, but it seemed like a good idea at the time. So there were we were, cheering, clapping, eating bacon (Ripken, not me). When, from behind me, I got a whiff of a cigar. Ha, I thought. Smoking at a cancer event. Klassy. Then the cigar smokers struck up a convo. I recreate the conversation for your benefit below (it's neither here nor there, but they were also holding beers in addition to their cigars)

Klassy guy 1: Is this your dog?
Me: (I'm holding his leash, and there is no one else around) Yup.
Klassy guy 2: What kind of dog is he?
Me: (He's wearing a Tshirt that says "Beagles for Boobies") A Beagle.
Klassy guy 1: Is he pure bred? He doesn't look like a beagle.
Me: (This always seems like a random question to me, but we get it a lot. I guess I'm not familiar with what beagles look like. Its true, he doesn't wear aviator glasses and live in Charlie Brown's backyard but good Lord) Yes.
Klassy Guy 1: What's his name?
Me: Ripken
Klassy Guy 2: Well, I hate to tell you Ripken, but you're chunky.

I stared at the guys and had a moment like in the movie High Fidelity with John Cusack. If you've seen it (all 2 of you), its the part where Cusack imagines he is beating the tar out of Tim Robbins only to blink and realize Tim Robbins is actually still standing right there in front of him. Only in my mind, Ripken was John Cusack and these two guys were Tim Robbins. After a moment I realized Ripken had not, in fact, turned around and gone straight for the jugular. And instead of sitting there bathed in their blood from his gruesome attack, he was sitting there in his stupid Tshirt looking at me thinking "Thanks a lot lady. Like its not bad enough you put me in a Tshirt, you had to put me in one that makes me look fat?"

This is what I get for waking up before 9am on a weekend. And going places by myself. And putting my dog in stupid Tshirts. clap.

All The Sequins You Can Handle

The name Britney Spears conjures up so many images in people’s minds. Saucy teenage vixen in a school girl outfit? Check. Unstable ex girlfriend to a pop super star? Check. Completely unhinged ex wife to a back up dancer? Yup. And that even leaves out the obvious head shaving, car beating, paparazzo dating, interview train wrecking nightmare that has been her last couple of years.

So after all this, I’m not sure what I was expecting from the concert last Monday. I can’t lie…a wee bit of me was thinking ‘well if she really is on the verge of another breakdown, maybe it will happen here and I can be a witness to it.’ I know. It’s so wrong. But I’m just being honest. We assembled the typical crew of lovely ladies, with the addition of M who came all the way from Philly to see Britney. Or maybe to see NKC. It was unclear who had more pull.

Before the concert tons of people were making a stink about Miss. Spears singing live. It didn’t take me long into the concert to think ‘who gives a flying flip?’ What a bunch of hooey. When I go to a Brit –Brit concert I want to see some great dancing, enjoy some fun costumes and listen to some great music. I would rather it be pre-recorded than have to listen to her huff and puff her way through the songs. This was a complete non issue for me.

What I did care about was that there were no cameras on her during the show, with footage projected to a Jumbotron. So we couldn’t see her close up. Or at least close-R up. I’m not sure if her ‘people’ (and man, I bet she has 100 of them to help her keep her shit together) are worried about the lip synching issue or about snarky comments regarding her physical shape but either way…who cares!? Give the fans in the cheap seats a chance to see her twirling tassels! Thankfully T had the forethought to bring some binoculars which all of us passed around like…well, like whatever you choose to share amongst your friends. The costumes were pretty fabulous; although I’m guessing they include a lot more netting and control hose than they did on her first go around. Also, I’m praying that the Wonder Woman cut of bikini bottoms (as one of our girls called them) isn’t about to make a comeback. Is that look really flattering on anyone, short of Wonder Woman herself? It was pretty obvious they were trying to avoid the MTV Music Awards nightmare of teeny-weeny bottoms and too much Britney and I guess it worked. Like I said, it was pretty hard to tell from our section.

So if that last paragraph should prove anything to Britney’s handlers it should be: HAVING NO CAMERA FOOTAGE DOES NOT PREVENT SNARKY COMMENTS SO GIVE IT TO US ANYWAY!

Anyway, all in all I’ve decided I’m proud of Britney for her comeback thus far. The concert was fun, and energetic, and she played Hit Me Baby One More Time, which was all I really wanted to hear anyway. Sure, it takes a staff of hundreds, and I’m sure what amounts to a traveling pharmacy, to keep her from derailing. And sure, she’s still a terrible role model for young girls (if I had taken a preteen girl to that concert I would have had a different opinion on the no Jumbotron footage thing. It would have been a blessing to NOT have to explain why the tassel outfit was not an appropriate choice for Halloween this year). But you know what? What person wouldn’t crack under the pressure that poor girl has been under. The biggest eye opening moment of the concert was when I tore my eyes away from a dance number and looked out into the crowd. All you could see were hundreds and hundreds of cell phones and cameras fixed on her from the crowd. If they were hoping for a meltdown, she left them wanting more.