…To hear my husband on the phone talk about how he’s dying and I’m here wondering how to wrangle as little contact with him as possible? Like…can I manage to get the kids packed up for tonight without actually entering the house?

…To worry about how to make sure all of my shows are going to record? Should I go into the house just long enough to check the DVR and possibly do so covered in plastic? Or would it be even more evil to ask MrZ to do it for me between trips to the bathroom?

…To consider getting a hotel in Birmingham over night to avoid the germs instead of coming home and taking care of my husband?

…To take his moment of weakness to interrogate my sick husband about the whereabouts of my missing Lil’ Debbie’s?

So. Very. Tired. I’m going to recap you in bullets since I only have six minutes left before needing to wake-up NikkiZ.

• When it comes to NCAA sports - I am a Tennessee Vol Fan. I will always root for the Vols above and beyond every other team. BUT - after yesterday? I am totally in love with Auburn University’s campus. It is gorgeous. The buildings are fantastic and there is tons of greenspace and few roads with loads of walkways. I loved it. We found several great shady places to just let NikkiZ play. I can’t wait to show you all the pictures.
• Even if a child would normally sleep until 7am, if you put them in the car at 3:30am, they will likely only sleep a tad bit longer. Luckily, I could entertain my child with the promise of “We’re going to see brother!” And I stuffed her face with hashbrowns.
• The ride home, on the other hand, did not have as enticing of a prized at the end. We told her we were going to Mimi and Grandpa’s house and that we were ALMOST THERE. In Montgomery. Three-and-a-half hours away. We hoped she would simply fall asleep and not even remember that promise. But, no. The entire ride home she was making sure we remembered our final destination: Mimi and Grandpas house. So what did we have to do first before heading home? Go by Mimi and Grandpas. Luckily they were up and didn’t mind the drop-by.
• I only thought I was tired before. A day driving 600 miles and walking for hours around a campus full of energy made me truly understand the word “tired.”
• How do college kids actually live in dorms the size that I saw yesterday. My sister-in-law has made excellent use of the little space she has, but still! I would get severe claustrophobia. I lived in the dorms my first year but I went to a small school and the dorms were much bigger that the ones at Auburn. Hers is, literally, the size of my walk-in closet. And she has a roommate.
• The next time I’m ever pregnant and saying I’m going to drive 300 miles away and come back in the same day with a toddler in tow - will you smack me? Remind me about how tired I am today. Remind me that I actually cried when my alarm went off. Thanks.

Well, I made it home with enough time yesterday to love on my kids before passing out from exhaustion…and that’s about it. I didn’t unpack, shower, or anything. I did spend some quality time with some alcohol and sterile blister popping instruments - but other than that - nothing. I was digging for my suitcase for my deoderant just now thinking, “Eh…maybe deoderant is not entirely necessary today…” Lucky for the poor souls in my office - I found it.

(I have not, however, found my facial lotion. Have you seen it?)

This was my first extended trip in the desert and I was fascinated by it all. They have rocks instead of grass! There are those tall cactus-things (saguaros) everywhere! AND THEY’RE NOT FAKE. They offer rattlesnake training for your dogs. There are tumbleweeds. And a whole hellofalotof stucco. EVERYWHERE. I was the most entertained by the various signs of Christmas I spotted around town. I mean, if you know for damn sure it’s not going to snow you might as well fake it. It was awesome. But also weird. I like my frost in the morning during Christmas season, thank you. I may bitch about the cold, but it’s hard to imagine the holidays without it.

LilZ is kinda sick with some sort of cold/nastiness but he’s at that age where the last thing he wants is for me to baby him. I’m all, “Want me to rub your back?” He just looks at me like, “Touch me, and die.” He wants to wallow in his feverish misery.

Time to get caught up at work and at life. Which, will probably take a few days since I’m still kinda hobbling around from my post-race aches and pains. (Did I mention the blisters? I did? Oh. Okay.) I’m hoping I’ll maybe even find time to unpack sometime before Christmas. But probably not.

I am up and trying to get ready for my very early flight. I just thought I’d pop in to tell you how the dance went last night. Evidently it was AWESOME. His only complaint was that the 6th graders were ordered to leave before “Money Maker” came on and they were bummed because, well, they wanted to shake theirs, of course.

(Now I’m going to have that song stuck in my head all day.)

His friends all planned to have their parents take them to Krispy Kreme after the dance which, of course, I was totally up for. I drove LilZ by himself because his date’s Mom was there to take her. I still hadn’t gotten to meet her, so I was looking forward to the chance at Krispy Kreme. On the way there, LilZ said this:

She asked me if you know she was black and I told her that it didn’t matter because you were a Democrat and believed in gay marriage and stuff…so you wouldn’t care.

How awesome and hilarious is that! I was talking to her Mom, relaying the story, and she said that she tells her daughter to ask that now because recently, at another post-dance shindig, the parents of her daughter’s date were freaked out and insulting and rude to her daughter. She said, “We just don’t want that to happen again, so we like to provide fair warning because the boys don’t mind - but it’s the parents we have to evidently worry about.”

It’s sad that a girl in the sixth grade has to worry about that crap in today’s day and age. Seriously. Why is this an issue for this girl? She’s a gorgeous straight-A student. I’m so happy that she’s a smart one that I’m thinking about asking her to marry my son to avoid the masses of morons he may try do date down the road. I guess I should run that by LilZ first.

Anyway - he had fun, I actually had fun hanging out with her Mom even though I should have been packing. And now? To the packing.

Hopefully I’ll be able to post pictures from the race tomorrow - and from the gorgeous landscape of Tucson. Keep an eye on my family while I’m gone.

We stopped in Tuscaloosa, AL on the way to Slidell this week. Bryant-Denny stadium has been renovated and my Crimson Tide Fan husband wanted to check it out. We also thought it would be a nice place to take some pictures with our fancy new camera. Since the campus was dead for the holidays, we were able to enjoy some solitude to take pictures. It was nice, even though as a general rule the Crimson Tide sucks donkey balls.

NikkiZ has this quirk that makes her fascinated with bags. She plays with purses and bags all the time, trying to drag them around with her. While we were taking pictures of the new courtyard, she kept going to try to bring the bags with us. It was almost like she was afraid we would leave them behind. She’s been talking to my Dad and hearing stories of my forgetfullness, obviously.

At one time she had my purse in one hand and my camera bag in the other. Since they are both bigger than she is, it was quite a site to see her dragging them around. I picked her up to spin her around, thinking she would just drop the bags. Obviously, from the picture above, she held fast to our prized pocessions even as I was twirling her around. It was hilarious. She’s more responsible than I am at 31.

All of the pics we took can be seen here.