• Marilyn is scheduled to have her baby today! If you’ll recall, I’m the father of this child since she seemed to have gotten pregnant right about the time we were sharing a room in Chicago for BlogHer. (Don’t tell her husband. He doesn’t know.) I am so excited for her. She is one of those women who has had serious fertility struggles and serious loss and yet - here she is - about to have her miracle baby. She is now one of those stories I used to hate to hear about but now love to tell. The infertile who actually got pregnant without trying that one time. And it could not have happened to a more awesome person. And it’s a GIRL. She finally gets some estrogen company in that house of hers! And most importantly, a new reason to embrace March. So - keep her in your thoughts today.
• As some people on Twitter know, MrZ finally finished the last Harry Potter book last night. You have no idea how much this last year has tortured me because I swore I wouldn’t do my review until he and I could talk about it. So, in a few days, I hope to finally sit down and do my review of it. In short? MrZ loved it and considered it a great way to end the series. He was also quite impressed when I pulled the Stephen King review of it out of my bag that I had been saving for him since it was written. (MrZ loves Stephen King and loves that he loves Harry Potter.) FINALLY. I can move on with my life.
• I woke up in the middle of the night with my throat on FIRE. I’m sure it’s just one of the many awesome symptoms of allergies or pregnancy or any other number of annoyances in my life right now. But still - PAIN. So, I did the smart thing and fell asleep with cough drops in my mouth. Not safe - but effective.
• Please don’t forget about my Giveaway which ends on Friday. After finishing the book myself (SO VERY GOOD!) I added a few extra prizes to the giveaway to encourage more entrants. Also - as an excuse to buy an extra copy of the book since LilZ and I were not sharing properly.
• I am so sick of being pregnant it’s bordering on NOT AT ALL FUNNY. I am past the point where I feel guilty about hating being pregnant and have moved on to the point of Constant Bitching which makes my family want to shoot me to put me out of my misery. One the way home from work last night I got that AWESOME ass-pain caused by the sciatic nerve that had me really wishing NikkiZ’s teacher wasn’t needing to tell me about the Chicken Pox Girl at that very moment because while she was telling me, “I’m sending home all blankets to be washed…” I was simply thinking, Oh My God - My Ass Hurts So Bad I Want To Cry.

• What’s eating you, Mother Nature? Is it us? | Macleans.ca - Columnists
  This is why I live in the South. Even one day of the weather described here would make me want to kill myself. Thanks dooce for the link.
• amalah . com: THROWDOWNUP with Amy Storch
  Just in case there are some of you left in the world not reading amalah - this entry is one of the funniest I’ve read in a LONG TIME. She’s such a rockstar.

Can someone please explain to me why I’ve developed this incredibly outrageous addiction to bubblegum? And not the sugar-free kind. No, that stuff does not satisfy my cravings. I mean - GUMBALLS. It started with a bag from Fresh Market that I demolished in a few weeks. But now? I’m working my way through what may be my 57th bag of Rain-Blo Easter Eggs. Those things have the shortest taste-span of any gumball I’ve ever eaten. 5 seconds and the sugary goodness is GONE. So what do I do? Pop in another. I seriously can not stop chewing these stupid things. I even threw the bag away the other day! And then the next morning, what did I do?

I dug it OUT OF THE GARBAGE.

And chewed some more.

(Disclaimer - it was not a garbage can with food in it. It was a paper garbage can. It’s not like I’m now chewing gum with last night’s dinner dripping on it.)

(Or am I?)

Send help. Quickly.

(Please don’t forget about my Giveaway which ends on Friday. Come join the Young Adult Fiction Loving Frenzy!)

Even if you don’t have a teen/tween in your life to call your own, you probably know that this generation of Junior High kids are very dependent on the texting as a means of communication. There are commercials and news reports and comedy punch lines to tell you if you don’t have the luxury of seeing it for yourself. And it’s all true. With very little (if any) exaggeration. TRUST ME.

LilZ got a cell phone later than most of his friends, but has since become quite the Texting Madman. Part of it is because that’s what they do, those darn kids with their rock-n-roll. But the other reason is because he has limited minutes to use every month, so his safest bet is to text instead of talk. BUT - there is something that has been shocking for me to discover along the way and I thought - I must share this with the world!

Did you know that there are TEXT CHAIN LETTERS? SERIOUSLY!

First of all - I remember getting a real chain letter in Junior High. One someone mailed me using a real stamp that I was supposed to mail to 10 other people so that I would end up getting something like 19 million letters in my life. Or something weird. I don’t remember the point. I do remember my Dad informing me that this was kinda lame and probably not going to work. He was right. Then - 10 years later - I started getting the “Send This Email to 10 People Or Tiny Tim Will Be Eaten By Rabid Squid!” type of emails. I never fell for those and have been ignoring the Email Chain Letter ever since.

But LilZ? Gets them on his CELL PHONE. Some of them are your typical “Send This Text To 10 People Or You’ll Never Get A First Kiss” type of text messages that you would expect. If I were 12 and got that message? I would have sent it to 20 people just to cover my bases. But - there are others that come with scary pictures attached and are creepy and say things like, “You’ve Got 10 Days to Live. If you Don’t Send This Text To 15 People You WILL DIE!” It’s very strange. LilZ is pretty good about ignoring most of them (I think) but still. CAN YOU BELIEVE IT? The Chain Letter has become some sort of cultural transitional piece throughout the last 30 years. It’s always there in SOME FORM.

Anyway - for those of you still not privy to the teenage world of texting - I had to let you in on that small little fact. Chain Letters are alive and well and being transmitted in 160 characters or less to today’s youth.

The Bradford Pear trees are in bloom right now. This is an interesting time of year because they are beautiful trees that line the entire city, but they smell like dirty socks. So, there is this general stale must to the air which actually creeped into our house last night (they are used all over our neighborhood) and had me cursing Spring.

Of course, along with the blooms, come the allergies. Everyone in my family suffers from allergies in different forms and extremes. My allergies faded with my youth so mine don’t ever get too bad. And mine rarely end up in my chest. My throat gets a bit sore, but mainly it stays in my head/nose. NikkiZ, on the other hand, sounds like she’s been smoking for the last 25 years of her life. The cough…the raspy voice…it’s damn sexy. I’m hoping that hers stay as moderate as mine do because I can function fine through allergy season with little-to-no intervention. There are others in our family not so lucky. I’m not sure how allergy season manifests in your neck of the woods, but in Northern Alabama? It’s not a pretty scene. You constantly find yourself praying that the person who just blew their nose behind you in line at Target is simply reacting to the pollen and not spreading a cold germ all over the back of your neck.

How is allergy season in your neck of the woods? Do you suffer? Do you treat your allergies in anyway? Do you think Bradford Pear trees also smell like dirty laundry?

(Please don’t forget about my Giveaway which ends on Friday! Come join the Young Adult Fiction Loving Frenzy!)