I’m back from BlogHer and, yes, I had a great time. I’m still trying to process it all and as soon as I do, I will write up a post for those of you who are interested. For those of you that are not interested, I’ll include a link to some free porn.

In the meantime I thought I would share this little story about my daughter and what an absolute asshole she is.

While I was at BlogHer the kids stayed with my parents for a few nights. One of those nights Cindy-Lu was playing the Wii and, when Eeyore asked her for a turn, she refused to share. My mom, having really never had to discipline my kids much before (they’re usually actually very well-behaved), repeatedly asked Cindy-Lu to give up the controller. Cindy-Lu knows that her Granny is just a sweet old lady (okay, minus the old part) that pretty much lets her get away with anything from eating cookies for breakfast to picking all the flowers in her garden, so she refused to hand over the controller. Finally my mom got down and tried to physically remove the controller from Cindy-Lu’s hand, and, well, Cindy-Lu kicked her in the boob.

My daugther kicked her grandmother in the boob.

I have obviously instilled a deep respect for their elders in my children and I win at parenting.

When I got home today I started lecturing Cindy-Lu about hitting and kicking and being kind to our family. Cindy-Lu responded by lying and saying that she never kicked her Granny. I told her that Granny had called and told me about it.

“Well, Granny wasn’t mad that I kicked her. She thought it was funny.”

I told her that Granny was very mad that she had kicked her and that was why she had gotten a time out.

Then I had a brilliant parenting idea and decided to lay on the guilt. I went on to say that not only was Granny very angry that Cindy-Lu had kicked her but her feelings were hurt too. I told Cindy-Lu that Granny called me and she was so sad that it was quite possible she was crying because family should never hit or kick each other and we should always treat each other with love and respect, and how was Granny supposed to know that Cindy-Lu loved her if she was kicking her in the boobs?

“You don’t want to make the people you love sad, do you?” I asked.

“But, I don’t love Granny,” she replied. “I only love my one girl, Cinderella.”

And, yes, I totally told her that Cinderella doesn’t like little assholes so she better start at least PRETENDING to love her Granny. Like I said, I win at parenting.

Wrapped.Around.Her.Finger.

Cindy-Lu’s most prized possession, the cupcake maker.

Now, if you’ll excuse me, there are many tiny pieces and parts that I need to go scrub “cupcake” and “frosting” from. (Cupcake and frosting are in quotes, because seriously, that shit ain’t right.)

Sometimes I watch my daughter and wonder where she came from. She is this amazing little girl with such personality. When I try to describe her I use words that are generally negative: defiant, stubborn, headstrong, moody. But those words? They all come together to make this wonderful little person.

I was watching her during tap class the other day and one of the other little girls kept getting in her space. Cindy-Lu does not like people in her space. At one point the little girl brushed up against Cindy-Lu’s belly and CL got this DISGUSTED look on her face and violently wiped her hand down her stomach like she was trying to wipe off the touch. She just looked so OUTRAGED that some girl would TOUCH her. I don’t know what I’m going to do with her when she’s older, but for now? She’s just so hilarious.

I don’t really have a point to this, other than to say that I love age three and three quarters. I wish I could freeze her right here for a little longer.

In other news, I’m thinking of starting a daily feature* here on the blog. Maybe something titled “Today’s Tragedy” or “Reasons Not To Get Cursed” or “GOD, MY LIFE SUCKS SOMETIMES.” Today’s submission? My kitchen faucet just fell off in my hand. It just FELL OFF.

*Not really. That would be too depressing even for me.

Seriously, people. Is it even LEGAL to be this beautiful?

No? Not legal?

I didn’t think so either.

1. My husband losing his debit card. It will take over a week to get a new one, which means that I will be using cash. I hate cash. Cash is, like, so 2003. Or something.

2. Me forgetting to turn the grill off (seriously, how do you forget that? IT’S FIRE.) and burning through a BRAND FUCKING NEW propane tank. And in case you haven’t heard, that shit ain’t cheap.

3. My husband backing his car into my van and scratching the shit out of both. Yes. Really.

4. Driving allllll the way to the mall in another city to purchase stupid effing makeup and then buying the wrong effing color.

5. My daughter’s attitude.

6. My attitude.

7. Driving 10 miles, realizing that Cleatus took my debit card AND credit card out of my purse since he lost his, turning around to go get them and then driving alllll the way back to the mall to get my make up exchanged.

8. Being in such a pissy mood I couldn’t even find one cute thing to buy at Target. Not one!

9. Finally fixing some spacing issues in my side bar only to realize that it only looked right in Firefox. I wish all you IE users would SWITCH already. WHAT THE HELL ARE YOU WAITING FOR?

10. Cleatus’s car not starting because of some issue with the security system and him backing in to my van and blah blah blah it’s working now. Finally.

I did, however, have a good time Saturday on my brother-in-law’s boat. Cleatus and Eeyore went tubing and Cindy-Lu worried about fishies eating her daddy and then she took a nap while I took pictures and enjoyed the sun. Fun!

My favorite picture from the day:

You can see more pictures here.

Now that it’s Monday and that shiteous weekend is over I’m expecting lots of rainbows and sunshine and all around happiness.

You know how you’ll be reading a bunch of blogs and having a grand ol’ time and then someone will mention something about their hard drive failing? It usually goes something like this: ZOMFG!!1! YOU WILL NEVER GUESS WHAT HAPPENED TO ME. MY HARD DRIVE FAILED AND I LOST ALL MY DATA AND WAAAAAAAAH! I HAD YEARS AND YEARS OF INFORMATION, VERY IMPORTANT INFORMATION, INFORMATION LIKE PICTURES OF MY PRECIOUS BABIES AND IT’S GONE, ALLLLLLL GOOOOOOONE!!! WHY ME, GOD, WHY ME?

Yeah.

Well.

ZOMFG!!1! YOU WILL NEVER GUESS WHAT HAPPENED TO ME. MY HARD DRIVE FAILED AND I LOST ALL MY DATA AND WAAAAAAAAH! I HAD YEARS AND YEARS OF INFORMATION, VERY IMPORTANT INFORMATION, INFORMATION LIKE PICTURES OF MY PRECIOUS BABIES AND IT’S GONE, ALLLLLLL GOOOOOOONE!!! WHY ME, GOD, WHY ME?

You see, I’m like one smart motherfucker and stuff, so I asked for an external hard drive for Christmas last year, because I did not want to lose YEARS of information and pictures and OMG, DID I MENTION THE PICTURES? OF MY BABIES? YES? I DID? BECAUSE THERE WERE YEARS OF PICTURES! OF MY BABIES! So, I got the external hard drive, the WESTERN DIGITAL MY BOOK ESSENTIAL EDITION hard drive and I happily transferred FOUR MOTHERHUMPING YEARS worth of STUFF, VERY VERY IMPORTANT STUFF on to it. And then I felt all safe and secure and I was so proud of myself for being grown up!

But then? Then I noticed how SLOW my computer was running and OMG, IT’S TAKING ME AN HOUR JUST TO TURN THE FUCKING THING ON and so, well, you see…I deleted all the pictures off of the computer because they were SAFE AND SECURE on my external hard drive.

Today I tried to access my hard drive and grab a couple of those pictures off of it and my hard drive started cackling like a fucking maniac and I said WHAT? ARE YOU LAUGHING? THAT IS WEIRD, DUDE. WHAT’S SO FUNNY? THE PICTURES OF MY CUTE BABIES ARE FUNNY? YOU ARE GIGGLING AT MY CUTE BABIES?, but the hard drive cackled a little louder and said HUH UH, BITCH, I AM SICK AND TIRED OF SITTING HERE BEING IGNORED ALL DAY LONG AND YOU KNOW WHAT? I QUIT, MOTHERFUCKER, and so I said BUT MY BABIES! MY CUTE BABIES! DO YOU SEE THE PICTURES OF MY CUTE BABIES? and the hard drive said …. NOTHING.

So I called WESTERN DIGITAL regarding my MY BOOK ESSENTIAL HARD DRIVE and they said, and I quote, “Bummer dude,” and gave me the phone number of a data recovery service. (Okay, so they didn’t actually say bummer, but I don’t know what they did say because THEY DID NOT SPEAK THE ENGLISH.)

I called the data recovery service and do you know what THEY said? They said “Oh, sure! We can fix that no problem! Just have your bank call us with the loan information!” and I said “What? Loan information?” and they said “Oh, you didn’t know? WE CHARGE 9 MILLION DOLLARS PER HOUR AND IT WILL TAKE AT LEAST 800 HOURS TO RECOVER YOUR DATA.” and I said “OH! AWESOME! BECAUSE I HAVE LOADS AND LOADS OF MONEY!” The only problem was that what I said was a lie.

After that I called some local guy who was CHIPPER about the whole fucking thing and he said “Yeah, WESTERN DIGITAL is the worst! People bring me WESTERN DIGITAL hard drives all the time because they’ve failed!” and then I said “JUST GET ME MY PRECIOUS BABIES” and he happily explained all the reasons that he probably wouldn’t be able to recover the data himself and that probably the 9 million dollar per hour company would have to do it, but HEY, GO AHEAD AND BRING IT IN AND WASTE YOUR TIME AND MINE! I’D LOVE TO TAKE A LOOK!

And so I brought it in and he started LAUGHING because the situation, it was…funny? I guess? No. NOT FUNNY, MOTHERFUCKER.

He ran to the back and brought out a WESTERN DIGITAL MY BOOK ESSENTIAL EDITION hard drive that was identical to mine and said OH, LOOKY! SOME OTHER DUMBASS BOUGHT THE SAME PIECE OF SHIT HARD DRIVE AS YOU! AND HIS IS BROKE TOO! AND I CAN’T FIX HIS! NOW LET’S SEE IF I CAN FIX YOURS? HEEHEE HAHA! and I said DO YOU HAVE A RAZOR BLADE? I THINK I NEED TO SLIT MY WRISTS.

So here I sit. Waiting for him to call me with news and wondering if I am going to be taking out an extra mortgage on my house just to recover the pictures of my PRECIOUS BABIES.

All of this to say: BACK UP YOUR MOTHERFUCKING HARD DRIVES, DUDE. Do not be like me. Just don’t.

Oh, I know. You are sitting there thinking “I should really just do it. I should just back this shit up,” but in the back of your mind YOU KNOW that you won’t. And I just have to say FUCKING DO IT, MAN. I’m tellin’ ya. You have no idea what it feels like to realize that FOUR YEARS OF YOUR BABIES LIVES are now gone. Seriously. Like you are going to remember what your PRECIOUS BABIES looked like without photographic evidence? Doubt it.

Oh, and I’m not sure if I mentioned it or not, but the hard drive that TOTALLY FUCKING SUCKED was from WESTERN DIGITAL.

Time for another round of Weekly Winners hosted by Sarcastic Mom.

But! Before I show off my pictures I thought I would tell you WHAT I USED TO TAKE THESE PICTURES. A Nikon D40. FINALLY! Cleatus succumbed to the whining and begging and promise of blow jobs (for his co-workers) and let me go get my camera. It makes me a little sad, because I am still in love with my older camera and I promised I would sell it if I got the new one. So. I may end up taking the Nikon back if I don’t love it as much as I love my (6 month) old Kodak. So far though? I LOVE MY BABY.

Now onto the good stuff.

My younger cousin graduated from high school last night, so I got to take lots of pretty pictures of her in her graduation dress. She looked so pretty. See?

Hot.

Pretty dress, huh?

The graduate and her mama.

Enough with the pictures of the pretty girl. More are on Flickr if you wanna see.

On to the pictures of my little family.

There’s just something about a man in a white t-shirt…

That makes me wanna lick him…

It’s possible that Eeyore came about after Cleatus wore a white t-shirt. Just sayin’.

So much energy.

He looks like he’s considering spraying me, doesn’t he? I better back up.

I just love my little family.

Tonight was the big night, y’all. Cindy-Lu’s first ever soccer practice. Would she get on the field and kick that ball like a pro? Or would she get on the field and cry like a little bitch because her mommy wasn’t there?

OH MY GAWD, DAD! They want to put a name tag on me! Hold me!

She actually did a lot better than I expected. She cried for a couple of minutes after the coach dared to put a name tag on her back. Stickers. They are EVIL.

She got over it though and Cleatus left the field and she started walking off towards the middle of the field like the coach told the kids to do. The coach (hereafter called “Coach” because I don’t want to keep typing THE COACH and because she is not actually a coach because SHE SUCKS and is therefore in quotes) (Also note there are actually TWO coaches. But they sucked so much they are just being called “Coach” together.) completely ignored MAH PRESHUS BAYBEE and focused on all of the other kids. I might sound a bit whiny and annoying when I say that, but seriously. Neither one of them said ONE WORD to Cindy-Lu. She stood to the side by herself and stared at them while they worked with the other kids. At times they would just wander away and leave her on her own.

“Coach?” Where’d ya go? Anyone? Bueller?

After about twenty minutes of Cindy-Lu being completely ignored Cleatus went out on to the field and helped her out.

Dat’s a ball, Daddy. “Coach” helps the other kids kick that, but maybe YOU can help me?

So he did. Because he’s a good daddy.

Hmm. Dat ball wants me to kick it.

Okay, maybe I will. But gently. So I don’t hurt my piggies.

After Cindy-Lu kicked the ball to her Daddy a few times and was continually ignored by “Coach” it was time for everyone to come and get a drink of water. All the kids were herded over to the water coolers and given drinks. Except for Cindy-Lu. She just stood there and made faces.

You got water? I don’t got water.

What? I don’t look thirsty? Or I’m just invisible?

After all the other children were given water and Cindy-Lu was not, it was time for the parents to come and collect their children. Luckily I was paying attention, because “Coach” wandered off and left Cindy-Lu alone in sea of people by herself. Because, you know, Cindy-Lu is, like, totally easy to miss. She’s practically invisible.

Me? I not invisible. I just playin’ soccer. All alone.

*Obviously, the bitch is the coach.

Me: Cindy-Lu! Come here and get dressed on so we can go outside and play!

Cindy-Lu: Are these my big girl pants? They have bow on ‘dem! I love bows! Look at da bow, Mommy! Dat’s my bow!

Me: Ooh, that bow is so pretty.

Cindy-Lu: I love dat bow! It makes my heart happy.

Later, after I recovered from the sweetness….

Me: Cindy-Lu, tell Daddy what’s on your big girl pants.

Cindy-Lu: A bow!

Me: Do you like that bow?

Cindy-Lu: Yeah! It makes me heart happy!

Me: You make my heart happy.

Cindy-Lu: Noooo! Daddy makes your heart happy when he hugs you!

And, once again, she’s turned me into a puddle of goo.