They say the first 72 hrs are the hardest...

And I am finally past that. I have not had a cigarette since Tuesday night. Hopefully this time I have quit for good, but I guess only time will tell that, since I have quit at least 10 times. Sometimes for long periods of time - I quit when I got pregnant with Little Bit and didn't start again until she was 7 mo old, so that was 15 mo of not smoking. To be honest, I don't want to quit. I actually really like smoking. I just wish there was a way to smoke that wouldn't kill me or hurt my kids. But, since there isn't, I won't. Thankfully, I am on Wellbutrin to help me quit, so my level of irritation atm is pretty much PMS level, although if one more thing gets screwed up after the past 2 days that I have had, I may hit the level of tearing out the kitchen sink and throwing it through the patio door : ). Speaking of screw ups, I paid allot on my car loan last night, but they put some towards interest instead of all toward principle, so I can't re-fi my car today like I planned, because my financier is closed on weekends. So I can't do anything until Tuesday (stupid holiday weekends!!! Without the hubby here, they mean nothing to me, since no there is no one here to get the time off for them, so they are nothing more than an irritation at this point.) GRRRRR...

I am going to do it....

I am going to get on the game show "Are You Smarter Than A 5th Grader?". I am not trying to be conceited, but I watch this show allot, and can answer most of the questions. It would be so awesome if I could win enough money to keep Rozen from having to go back. So I am going to fill out my app (I downloaded it a bit ago), and get it sent in. Wish me luck, I really think I can do this if I can just get them to pick me up as a contestant.

Welcome to my world.....

So, yesterdays hiatus. Yeah.... I had the Direct TV installer at my house to fix up a previous installers screw-ups, and when he went to run some wire through my crawlspace, he discovered that there was a foot and a half of water under my house. So I called housing (I live on post). They said they would send someone out. 2 hours later, they finally showed up. They poked around for about 20 minutes, then said someone else would be coming to actually fix it. 2 hours later, the contractor finally showed up. I had been told I couldn't leave because I don't have a PTE (permission to enter, I don't want random strangers in my house when I am not there, regardless of whether they are employees of housing or not. They are still strangers to me. *Digression* Why is it that parents would NEVER EVER let a stranger walk away with their brand new baby, but if it is a nurse (or who they think is a nurse) it is totally ok. I never let my babies out of my sight after they were born, if they did have to leave me for any reason, I sent someone I knew with them. Yes, it may be a nurse or even a doctor, but it is still a person you don't know who doesn't love your kid like you do, and who may be having a bad day or not really like their job or whatever. And if they are mean to or hard on your baby, you have no way of knowing. *End Digression*) So I waited and waited and waited. An hour and a half later, I asked the contractors if they needed anything done inside the house. They looked at me like I was nuts. They said no, that I could have left any time I wanted to go. It is now 6:30pm, and I HAVE to go get diapers. I had also promised Ivy we would go to the popcorn store (Target). So, by the time we were done getting gas, going to the commissary, and going to Target, it 9:30 by the time I got home. So it is 9:30 at night, I have 3 kids to get out of the car and into bed, groceries to unload and put away, and a dog to take outside. It was 11 pm before all of that was done. Then this morning, I hear people outside of my house. I go outside, and it turns out, they had accomplished NOTHING yesterday. Not even pumping the water out from under the house. So about an our later I go outside to find out if it is safe to shower. The guy says I can if I absolutely HAVE to, but he would prefer if I didn't. So now I have to get 3 kids and a dog out the door to go to my friend preggo's house to shower. I went outside just before I left to find out if the project would be done today or not, and they had pulled up all the sewer piping in my lawn, and it was laying next to the 3 ft deep, 20 ft long ditch that was now in my yard. (This is also when I found out it had, in fact, been a sewer pipe that burst under my house. Apparently my house was not the only one in my neighborhood with that problem, there were at least 2 others yesterday that I heard about. They think it has something to do with the torrential rains we had this week.) The piping was in pieces, and I have never smelled anything as horrific as my yard was this morning. Plus you could see all the lovely stuff that resides in sewer pipes. I dry heaved just trying to put the kids in the car. So I am now at preggo's house, wondering if I will ever have plumbing again. Also, once I found out that it was sewage under my house, I wanted to walk on my tiptoes. Seriously, there needs to be more space between the sewage and I than the floor. EEEWWW.....

Spoiled brats and their "parents"; The best dog ever; There goes another $10 into the therapy jar....

I love how some people seem to firmly believe that their only job as parents is to keep their children alive. God forbid we should discipline them, they might turn out to be productive members of society, and that would totally show mommy and daddy up so we can't have that. GRR. This is a big pet peeve of mine. Today, while I was at the bookstore letting my girls play with the train set, this mom shows up with her son and daughter (probably about 6 and 2, respectively). First, the daughter throws a fit because Bear-Bear has the train she wants. Bear-Bear didn't take her train, this kid has just decided that is the only one that will suit her. Bear in mind, there are 10+ trains on the track unused. Her mom offers her one of the aforementioned unused trains. She slaps it out of her mothers hand while whining at the top of her lungs. What does mommy do? Offers her the train again. Now, my kids can be royal brats. I have had Bear-Bear pitch fits in stores that were so bad I pretended she wasn't mine (really). So I understand that kids will be kids. However, this was not the last of it with this kid. A few minutes later I was dangling my keys for Little Man to swat at and I hear Bear-Bear's battle cry. I look over, and she is coming toward me w/4 train cars in her hands, and the other mother says "She just took one of those from her." So I assume she means that Bear-Bear pilfered her kid's train car. I start to get onto her and she says "No, my daughter took it from your daughter, but since your daughter isn't crying it's ok." I just looked at her and said "Well, let me know if any of my kids do that to one of your kids because that is never acceptable behavior in my house." I wish I had a camera. Her face was priceless. She really couldn't believe I had just gone there. Her kid continued being such a brat that we left about 5 minutes later. But I think I should get my first silhouette for that : ).

*Fun experiment you can do at home!*
Look everyone directly and steadily in the eye as you talk to them. You will notice that most people don't hold eye contact, and it will freak them out that you are. It is really fun.

So, yeah, my dog rocks. I was "interviewing", so to speak, another dog today, because I think Jasmine needs a buddy here. So this woman brought her dog over to see how the dog got along with Jasmine and my kids. Now, Jasmine is a purebred American Bulldog. She is short (her shoulders are about knee-high on me, her head hits about mid-thigh), but stocky. She weighs about 80 lbs. She is also the sweetest dog ever. Bear-Bear has stepped on her, fallen on her, tried to ride her, puller her hair, pulled her whiskers, pulled her lips, twisted her nose, pulled her ears, pulled her tail, poked her eyes.... and this dog has never growled or even flinched. She just looks at me like "Can you make it stop? Please." (Which I always do.) She is also very intelligent, yet really stoopid at the same time. If you have ever seen the movie The Emperor's New Groove (best Disney movie ever), she is Cronk. Big, brilliant, yet somehow oddly tarded. Well, this other dog walked over to sniff Little Man, she got about 18 in from him and Jasmine gave her a warning growl. She got about 12 in from Little Man and Jasmine came off her couch and tore into that little 40-ish lb dog. This dog wasn't real bright because about 2 min later she walked over to Bear-Bear to sniff her. Same thing. 18 in was a warning growl, 12 in Jasmine came off that couch and tore into that puppy again. And as soon as she got the puppy far enough away from the kids that she was comfortable with it, she would back off of the puppy. This really makes me feel much safer, knowing that she is that protective.

Now for the biggest frustration of my day / life atm. My Little Man always seems to get the short end of the stick. He does not cry alot, but it seems like every time he does, 15 un-ignorable things happen at the same time, so he has to sit and cry for a bit until I can get there. Yes, I know that occasionaly letting them cry for a minute is good because it teaches them patience and to not expect instant gratification as they get older. But it seems to happen EVERY SINGLE TIME HE CRIES!! Tonight for instance, he started to fuss while I was attempting to clean up dinner. So I abandoned my efforts and went to get him. I picked him up, sat down on the couch, he starts rooting around, and the dog wanders over and whines. Not a "I will probably need to go out soon" whine, but instead a "You better get me outside in the next 30 seconds or you and your carpet will regret it" whine. So I put Little Man down and take the dog out. I get back in about 5 min later, pick him up again, get my shirt up, and Little Bit yells "Mommy, I'm done!". This is after yet another hour-long potty session with her. (We have been dealing w/chronic constipation w/ her for 3 yrs now, but that is another gripe for another day.) So I have to put Little Man down again, and go clean Little Bit. But this is the stuff I am talking about. This happens to him all day long. At this rate he is going to grow up convinced that he is not worth as much as the other two. Or even the dog for that matter. *sigh* He is going to have to choose between a college education or therapy to undo the damage, I won't be able to afford both...

*sigh*

I would just like to state that I would sell a kidney right now for a bag of fritos and some chocolate chunk brownies... I hate PMS.

Wow...

Isn't it amazing what the human mind can rationalize? (You have to read the whole thing to understand my comment, the last paragraph pretty much explains it). If you are a woman reading this, take a moment to be grateful that, however much our country might suck (not getting into that atm...) at least we have some freedoms that women in other countries couldn't even imagine. My father would never agree to something like this, let alone support it.... In fact, he would kill someone for even considering the possibility of pulling a stunt like this.

http://www.frif.com/new2005/brid2.html

And how did this end up becoming a necessity? It seems to be required fairly often from the gist of the article...

http://sports.espn.go.com/oly/trackandfield/news/story?id=2701018

Target Aquired; Why a certain ice cream chain sucks; I am tired of bittersweet moments.

So I have determined my first long-term victim, er study case. She is an Air Force wife, whose daughter attends preschool in my daughters class. Her daughter is 3, just like mine. At the open house on Thursday night, she nagged the teacher continually "is the a 2 and 3 yr old class?" She must have asked this 5 times. The teacher told her every time that no, it was not a 2 and 3 yr old class, this was the 3 - 5 yr old class. She replied "Good, because I don't want my 3 yr old in a class w/ a bunch of 2 yr olds." Seriously? You have to be that much of a snob? I wanted to look at her and say "Well, I don't want my 5 yr old in a class w/ a bunch of 3 yr olds." Really, 2 and 3 yr olds are much closer developmentally than 3 and 5 yr olds are. So how can she be so snotty about her precious daughter being in a class with *gasp* 2 yr olds, but think it is ok for all those 5 yr olds to have to put up with her daughter. She is also all sorts of preppy (insert spirit fingers here), not a sin in and of itself, but if you don't have the body of a 16 yr old, don't dress like you do. She doesn't and she shouldn't. So she is going to be one of my long term experiments. I am going to see how long I can irritate her before she snaps. Should be fun.

Now, I would like to explain why a certain ice cream chain, which rhymes with "Raskin Bobbins" sucks. I went there w/ "nee-nee" and her hubby while they were visiting, and got into a general b.s. conversation with the manager. It started when he told me not to expect a military discount from "RB" because they don't even give employee discounts. I then asked him how much employees in general make there. Starting employees make $6/hr, if you are lucky enough to make manager, you make $8/hr. Really. "RB" is a huge national chain that charges way too much for mediocre ice cream ($2.09/scoop is the regular price), and yet they pay their managers $8/hr? Tonight when I went in to take my girls out (it was dollar scoop night) and was talking to that same manager, I went to order and I was informed I would need to wait 15 minutes because they could not give me the ice cream for $1 ea until 6 pm. No exceptions. (Fortunately for me, the manager I always talk to got us the ice cream right then but let me wait 15 min to pay for it.) So my beef is with "RB" Corporate, not my local one. Because the people at my local one rock. Even if they don't get paid enough to care. (Sidenote - that same manager brought me a wet washcloth while I was trying to clean my incredibly sticky 20 mo old with the worst paper napkins in the world, and I hadn't even asked for one.)

Finally, my last issue for today is the fact that nothing in my life is just good right now. Every single thing that happens causes a small amount of pain because the hubby isn't here. This relates mostly to stuff with the kids, but I can't think of anything right now that his being gone doesn't affect. Now, I am not one of those women whose lives are only made complete by their husbands presence and approval. Both of those things are very important to me, but it isn't my end-all-be-all. But every time one of the kids does something cute, I think about how they wont be doing that anymore by the time he gets back. Little Man is starting to really develop his personality, and he is so cute. He smiles and is starting to reach for things and recognizes my voice and so forth. Babies change so quickly at this age, that by the time hubby gets back, he will be a whole different kid than he is now. I hate this. I am sure the hubby and kids will be able to bond just fine (he missed the first 6 mo of our oldest daughters life, and she thinks the sun rises and sets on him at this point), and everyone will live; we certainly are not the first nor the last military family to go through all of this. But you really can't imagine how much this sucks until you are right in the middle of it. At least we are on the downhill side though. He will have to go back, but I refuse to think about that right now. Another thing that makes this suck: I want to be able to slow down and really enjoy these ages with the kids, esp little man, because I love the first year, and I will not ever have that again, but at the same time I want time to fly by until he gets back. *sigh* At least we are all healthy *knock on wood*. Have you ever noticed that when you want to knock on wood the entire world seems to be made out of brick, plastic, aluminum, and concrete?

Why it is easy for me to make people explode.

Some background on me will probably help everyone understand why I am doing this. When I say I am Army Wife Anti-matter, I am not exaggerating. First off, I keep my hair the blood red you see in the picture. (In the interest of honesty, it is currently purple. That is because I had to dye my hair back to it's natural color for my pregnancy, and when I was ready to dye it back I was to broke to buy the red {it takes 4 bottles @ $10 ea to do all of my hair}, and my friend "nee-nee," as the kids call her, was generous enough to give me some purple that she had so I could get rid of the God-awful brown/grey. She was also wonderful enough to put the dye in my hair, which is a 2+ hr process because my hair is very thick, not to mention down past my rear.) And I have my lip pierced. And I tend to wear allot of black (What? It is slimming... lol). Add to all that the fact that I am very crunchy. For those of you who are unfamiliar with that term, a more general term is hippie. I cook mostly organic, I am about 70% vegetarian, I do not immunize my children, I even buy mostly organic body products - IE shampoo, soap, lotion, etc. I have proven that I know more than most nutritionists about REAL healthy food, and I also know more about effective natural treatments/cures than most doctors. I am not saying that all modern medicine is bad. Nor am I saying that all "natural" equals "good". Hemlock is totally natural, but I don't suggest you make tea with it.... and I have personally witnessed natural medicine cure what medical science could not. In Dec of '05, my husband was diagnosed, via biopsy, with Chrons Disease. He was put on 3 different meds, which, without insurance, would cost $1000+ / mo. The meds made him tired and bitchy, and did not help the Chrons at all. So we decided to go the all natural route. $1500 and 2 mo later, he felt great. He was re-biopsied in Aug '07, and was found to be completely free of Chrons. I am not a big conspiracy theorist per-se, but the bottom dollar is all most people/companies care about, so of course they would want him on $1000/mo meds for the rest of his life as opposed to 1 $1500 treatment. Think about it. I think this is why allot of people get aggravated with me. People don't like being pulled out of their comfort zone, and the thought that modern medicine prefers us to be sick is scary. People really hate it when you point out the obvious. I also tend to be very blunt, esp after someone talks down to me like I am automatically ignorant because of how I look (like 90% of the doctors at the MTF {military treatment facility} do). I am sure most people's next question is "If you get harassed all the time without working for it, why are you actively seeking out more irritations, when shutting up would relieve most of the stress from your life?" (My mother asks me this constantly). I could go the pedestal route and say it is because I want to be able to help people learn to think for themselves and question everything (our world would be so much better if people asked more questions instead of blindly accepting what is handed to them). But at the end of the day, the true answer is much more narcissistic than that - I like to irritate those who deserve it. And, yes, it is up to me to decide who deserves it. Because I said so.

The Beginning

Well, since we only have roughly 1 year before we go on terminal leave, I thought I would start a blog on the daily life of an Army Wife. Not just any army wife though. I am special. Why? Because I don't fit the "good" army wife mold: I know what I am talking about, I will get up in peoples faces (only when justified - though it is justified more often than you might think), and I don't look like the barbie doll image so many military wives try to maintain. I realize how conceited this sounds, but bear with me. I am actually not conceited at all. I do have a general disdain for humanity (I think Tommy Lee Jones said it best "An individual is smart; people as a mass are stupid, panicky animals." {Quick - name the movie}), but I don't hate everybody. Just stupid people. I am a bit of a sociopath that way. No, I do not believe that everyone who disagrees with me is stupid. I have learned allot from listening to people who disagree with me. But I think most people are sheep and that irritates me to no end. People need to learn to think for themselves. So this blog is not only a "diary" of sorts about our last year in the army. It is also to document the results of an experiment I am conducting. An explanation of the term "antimatter" will help. Now, I don't know if this is an actual scientific theory or some random star trek reference, but the idea is that for all matter there is anti-matter, and if matter comes into contact with the anti-matter, it explodes. So for the next year, I am going to attempt to make as many army wives explode as I can. I will also try to see how many high ranking people I can make explode (although none who have direct influence over the hubby - I am bored, not stupid). During slow weeks I will probably post stories about people I have made to explode in the past.

A few ground rules:
1. I will not be putting my name, my kid's names, or my husbands name, unit, troop movements, deployment schedules, etc., in this blog. I will not even be putting in here which post I live on. It will be referred to as "post". Do not email me or comment to this blog with requests for such info. If you are reading this and you know the answer to any of the above, then you are one of the chosen few. If you don't, then you are not nor will you be. Sorry, but I will not risk the safety of anyone in this blog. If you know what the term "OP SEC" means this makes more sense. "OP SEC" is the military term meaning "operational security". For the purposes of this blog, that is a blanket term for the security of my family, my husbands unit, and so forth. Some people may think I am a bit anal about it. Tough.

2. Please do not comment with hate speech about the military, this war, goths, or anything else you may feel like bitching about. If you have a rant that pertains to this blog, feel free to post it. But please understand, regardless of how you feel about this war, our soldiers are here obeying orders. Yes, there are some "bad eggs" among our troops, and the media LOVES to blast their stories for God knows how long while the stories of the troops who really care and want to make a difference are ignored, our troops as a whole are not murderers, rapists, or baby-killers. You are entitled to your opinion and are free to express it nicely. If you are going to express a strong opinion, it would be nice also if you had evidence to back it up. But that isn't a requirement. I will just make fun of you if you don't.

Here is the "cast of characters" so to speak that you will hear about often:

myself (obviously)
my hubby, referred to as "Rozen"
my oldest daughter who is 3 and 1/2, referred to as "little bit"
my second daughter, who is 20 mo, referred to as "bear-bear"
my son, who is 3 mo, referred to as "little man" or "the little dude"

Before anyone asks - Yes, they are very close in age. No, we did not do it on purpose. Yes, we do know what causes children (it starts out an inexpensive hobby...). No, we are not having any more (I had that problem fixed. No I did not kill my husband, although the thought did cross my mind when I found out I was pregnant and my second child was only 9 mo old... {and before anyone gives me the "it takes two to tango" line, it was my husbands fault in this case. I will not go into detail here as to how it is, but trust me on this. It was totally his fault.} But I am now fixed. YAY ME!)

So, if you have enough time on your hands to read about my adventures in spouse-land, it should be an interesting year. Starting with my daughter's first day in preschool (Tuesday) because it is parent-orientation day. Lots of wives to use for my experiments : ).