There were goings-on afoot this weekend, which was kind of nice since being a shut-in gets a little boring.

I don't know if people lose their shit at sales everywhere, or if it's just a Pasadena thing, but I made what may or may not have been a mistake by going to Michael's on Saturday when they were selling off their Halloween inventory at 50% off.  I've learned, while living out here, not to wait for things to clearance at lower prices because--as I mentioned--people lose their shit the minute you start lowering prices.  I've seen an entire inventory at Target, both Christmas and Halloween, get decimated at 20% off.  That's just stupid.  Had I been left to my druthers I would have waited til yesterday to grab up my clearance items, at a whopping 70% off.

As it was, Michael's was pretty well destroyed.  Their Lemax Spooky Town buildings and accessories were all but gone.  I managed to get a tree stump, still in its package, for less than $2.  For what little else I got I had to ravage the village display, which was already picked clean.  I got most of a set of coffins for 99 cents a piece, which was kind of a ripoff because the set of three was selling for $1.99.  But I feel like I made up for it by getting the complete pair of monster mailboxes for $1.98, on sale for $2.38 that day.

Sadly, I couldn't find any headstones.

Yesterday was the day I'd been waiting patiently for.  Yesterday was the Orange County Market Hearse Show.  The Fixer and I have gone before, and it's always pretty fun.  We've probably seen the same hearses a few times before, but it really doesn't get old.

From tame...

to less tame.

Looks like Insane In The Mom Brain's kids hitched a ride.

That's reassuring.

Hug me!

There were even casket or coffin racers, though no demo.

Had there been an actual race, I know The Fixer would have slapped some wheels and a motor on our coffin a long time ago.

It currently houses excess glassware.

At one point our trip turned educational:

Those are embalming tools, in case you wondered.

There was even a blood-drive!

Pictured here:  Not a blood-drive.

And we were all reminded that while summer may be over in most of the country, here in sunny California temperatures can still reach the 90s all year round.

Don't leave your pets in the car guys!

Finally, and really the whole point of going when you're baby-laden, was trick or treating.

Give me your candy.

We had an excellent time, and toward the end I got to staple a five dollar bill to a guy's stomach and watch some sword swallowing.





And then The Fixer, myself, and a pooped Stinkbug went home.

Ah, another successful day of not being photographed! And for the record, that kitten/skull t-shirt was totes popular. Haters gonna hate.

Stuff Is Happening

Stuff is happening.  Just not right now.  But I'm hoping to have some bitching photos of hearses after Sunday, assuming I survive in the wretched Southern California sunlight long enough to take them.  And maybe I'll humblebrag my kids sweet-assed Pubert Addams costume too.  Did I mention I stitched the spider on myself.  I'm a paragon of domestic virtue. 

Those cobwebs are decorations.  No, you didn't just see that violent motorcycle gang of spiders move.  Decorations.

Loot Crate

As promised, here's mine and The Fixer of Things' unboxing.  Also, proof that babies and cats are basically the same thing.  And, further more, that I like tacky shit and cats.

Update! So, the Sharknado book turned out not to be exclusively about "Sharknado". It's more like a survival guide, maybe in the vein of The Zombie Survival Guide, for a variety of horror movie disaster scenarios. There's still a very real chance that it will end up in someone's Christmas stocking, but I'll look it over first.

It occurred to me that I should, perhaps, link to the video that I watched to spoil Loot Crate for myself. It's honestly a better video than mine, if only because his collection of junk is much better and more interesting (and less Wheat Thin littered) than mine. So, if you wish, check him out here.

The Terrible Responsibility Of Ownership

I'd mentioned, previously, that I was expecting a couple of subscription boxes in the mail.  I'd hemmed and hawed over ordering either of them because:

• I hate buying things.  Anything.
• I hate owning things.

 My mom is a recovering hoarder, and really the only thing keeping her in "recovery" is the fact that she's completely broke, has no car, and no one is willing to take her places to buy crap.  A huge mitigating factor in what I'm about to describe is the fact that she also suffers from severe clinical depression and a couple of sleep disorders.  She had the kind of childhood that would induce nightmares, and which I won't get into without her permission.  To say that she didn't cope with life very well would be a major understatement.

So, she slept a lot.  She took a lot of drugs, off and on and never in a typical addict's way.  She was on a lot of anti-depressants and anti-psychotics.  Through a solid chunk of the 80s and pretty much all of the 90s she was, for all intents and purposes, a zombie.  Housekeeping wasn't high on her list of priorities.  So garbage accumulated in the house.  If the dishes were dirty she'd go buy paper, and we totally had real dishes but they'd been unusable for years.  Eventually the used paper plates piled up, so we switched to styrofoam and she tried to get us to wash those to re-use.  We'd had puppies that were (poorly) paper-trained in a room toward the back of the house.  That room was simply closed up, and never entered again.  We had cats.  We had a lot of cats.  It goes on and on, but you're probably getting the picture.

Having things added to the chaos.  Wanting things made everything worse.  Now, as an adult, I seriously second guess every item I buy.  I've been tremendously careful, and on those occasions that I feel overwhelmed by the things I own, I purge.  I sell, give away, and sometimes out-right throw away pretty much everything I own.  It's a huge part of my aversion to buying new clothes.  It's also why I avoid hobby stores, comic book shops, and stores that specialize in various fandom collectibles.  You know those Pop! Vinyl figures that are so popular right now?  Of course you do.  Everyone does.

Want.

It's physically painful, how much I want this.  I don't know if I have hoarding tendencies because I won't let myself have things.  I want the above image, and I imagine having it along with all the others I like and want, and I panic.  I feel suffocated and claustrophobic and overwhelmed.  I can't handle owning things because the things begin to own me and I freak out.  And then I purge, the things I mean.  Whenever I buy a new toy or outfit for Stinkbug I have a mini-panic attack.  I have all of his old clothes, on the off-hand chance I decide to have another child, but their Presence weighs on me.  I feel them, taking up space--not space that could be better occupied by something else, but space that shouldn't be occupied at all.  I'm hardly a minimalist.  I'm extremely guilty of having a shit ton of books.  I have more crafting supplies than I actually use.  I don't know, maybe I wouldn't feel so much anxiety if I didn't find myself living with The Fixer Of The Things' mother, who could have her own hour-long special on A&E.  I wake up every morning and want to burn the house down. 

Laundry's done!

And as I type this, the instrument of my destruction (I'm not over-reacting at all!) has arrived at my gate.

I'll probably do an unboxing video, so stay tuned.

A Slightly More Halloween-Relevant Post

He Who Fixes The Things, or Jeremy for short, LOOOOOOOOOOOOVES Halloween, as do I.  If every day were Halloween we'd both be as happy as clams.  His fondest ambition is to create and operate a professional quality haunted house, because Jeremy doesn't just love the holiday, he loves the haunt.

He wants to make this happen for you because...love or something.

But there's trouble here in Halloweentown.  When Jeremy was married to his ex wife, they lived in a house with what passes for a yard here in sunny Hell-A.  He could, more or less, build his home haunt to his little heart's content.  Since living with me he's been confined to apartments, limiting how wild and scary he can get.  And now that we find ourselves in close quarters with his mother, a spooky Halloween is off the table.

No scary decorations.  No horror movie marathons, because they scare her.  She loves Halloween too, but she's more a fan of "cute" Halloween.  I mean, I guess it sort of works out--we've got a near one year old, so Halloween sort of has to default to cute for a couple of years.  You know, ease him into the good stuff.  The trouble is that My Lady Mother (in-law) and I have grossly differing opinions about what's cute.  Teddy bears dressed as pumpkins are her Halloween bread-and-butter.  Ok, yeah, that's kind of cute, but not nearly as cute as teddy bears dressed as Freddy Krueger.

That's fuckin' ADORBS!

I think this casts me in a bad light to her, and I know she thinks I'm more than a little weird when I come trotting home with Zombie Pets for my Baby Stinkbug.

Show me the child who doesn't love this.

She's bent and determined to convince me he's scared of things he's never seen--and therefor doesn't know to be so--such as monsters and what have you.  Really, the only thing Stinkbug is scared of is loud, unexpected noises and strangers to a lesser degree.  Oh, and restroom changing tables, which is super weird and inconvenient because then I have to take him to the van to wrestle him into a clean diaper.

She's going to be real bummed out when my first Horror Block finally makes it to my doorstep.  I hemmed and hawed for a while, trying to choose between that or the Box of Dread.  I may still eventually go for Dread, but for now I'll stick with Horror Block and Loot Crate.  Since it's all the rage, I'll probably make an unboxing video for each.  So if you're into that kind of thing, keep an eye out!

Shop 'Til I Drop

I hate clothes shopping.  I know a lot of people say that, but I really truly do.  I will go to absurd lengths to not have to go.  I don't mind shopping for my kid, because he's cute and stuff for him is cute.  But for myself, I'd damn near rather go naked than have to shop.  I will wear an article of clothing until it literally falls off of my body before I will replace it.

NO, GODDAMNIT, I DO NOT WANT NEW SLIPPERS!!!

It gets worse though.  Not only do I hate to shop, but I hate when others buy clothes for me almost as much.  I feel self-conscious when someone, like my mother-in-law, buys clothes for me.  I feel like they're saying "You poor thing, can't even dress yourself, welp!  Here's a bunch of stuff you didn't ask for!"  I feel to a certain degree like a charity case, which isn't a good feeling, having actually grown up one.  I want to say "Please don't.  I don't not buy things out of poverty, though I'm not exactly rolling in cash, I don't buy things because I hate stores and people and looking at tags and the whole experience.  And also, it would appear that I'm oddly shaped.

Not like Quasimodo shaped.  But I guess whoever decided how plus sized clothing is supposed to fit didn't take into account that not all plus sized women have breasts down to their knees.  They also seem to think that even a woman the size of Mama June should have spindly stick arms.  So, to summarize: larger women are huge, have large pendulous breasts, tiny t-rex arms, and did I mention the calves and ankles of a bull elephant?  And those are just the size 16s.

Plus, I don't know, Jeremy's mom seems determined to dress me like herself.  I'm a very t-shirts and jeans kind of kid, and she's very...sequins?  Crocheted collars and beaded accents?  Not like those elements were twenty years ago, the stronghold of little old ladies, but still older than my years.  I actually get this a lot, and weirdly only from guys parents.  My ex-girlfriend's mom never seemed to have this problem, she was still trying to cope with the fact that her daughter was dating a woman, never mind how I dressed.  But once a guy's mother had finally accepted that this very weird person was definitely here to stay for a while she would begin the process of trying to mold me into the only acceptable kind of woman for her precious little baby, herself.  The only exception was my first live-in boyfriend's mom, who was already like me in that she didn't have time or energy for that shit and, if we're being honest, wasn't picky about who took her piece of shit son off her hands.

But I digress.  Please don't make me go buy slippers.

It's The Great Pumpkin!

Tonight ABC will be airing It's The Great Pumpkin, Charlie Brown, as well as the Toy Story Halloween special that's kind of ok, but I'm not that excited about.  Pumpkin is where it's at!  I'm also excited, more so than ever, because it's my son's first Halloween.  I've seen all of the holiday Peanuts specials a million times over, and I enjoy them all, but there's something about watching them with your kid for the first time that is really special.  Stinkbug has no idea what's going on, he's not even a year old yet, but he'll probably like the colours and the fact that there's a puppy.  He'll love the music, because there's nothing he likes better than music.  He'll probably enjoy Toy Story more, because he likes the movies and he has his own stuffed Sheriff Woody (a sweet hand-me-down from my best friend's son).

I'll probably cry like a total psychopath.  That's my shtick now.  I cry at the drop of a hat over the stupidest things.  I don't know if my hormones never normalized, or if I'm still having postpartum depression, or something about having a baby permanently breaks something in your brain, but what makes me cry is very specific.  I cry over things I love, things I've been seeing or doing or experiencing for years.  I cry because Stinkbug is seeing and doing and experiencing some of these things for the first time, and not as a person who's been aware of something and decided to try it but as someone who's brand new to the world and everything is new and wonderful.  I cried the first time he giggled and smiled when he heard the opening lines of the theme for Mr. Rogers' Neighborhood as part of the theme for Daniel Tiger's Neighborhood, because I loved Mr Rogers as a kid, and even though he's gone his Neighborhood of Make Believe is still there and thriving.  And even now, I'm trying not to cry because I've become ridiculously maudlin.

But seriously, Fred Rogers is one of the best things to ever happen to children's television.

 

I nearly had a full-on meltdown when I remembered that Thomas The Tank Engine --now Thomas and Friends--was part of Shining Time Station. 

Holy crap, guys, it's Ringo Starr!

 I get stupid excited whenever characters from Sesame Street that don't get a lot of airtime anymore, in this age of Elmo and Abby Cadabby, have bit parts in larger musical numbers.

Did you catch the Two Headed Monster?!

I lose my tiny little mind because Stinkbug is losing his tiny little mind and I'm so excited with him.  I had a troubled childhood, and there wasn't a lot of happiness, but he's so happy and joyous.  In a way he's giving me what I never got: a chance to be a little kid without fear.

Have you seen this trend of fancy bento box lunches for kids?  Of course you have.  Every mom-blogger in the universe is talking about it, either to brag up their lunch making skills or to mock it altogether and make as frightening a lunch as they can for a laugh (those are my favorites).

But, really, it's all HILARIOUS.  All the cute animals and flowers made of veggies.  The kawaii rice balls shaped like...I dunno...Ninja Turtles or something, and the sandwiches folded into origami representations of the kid's astrological sign...

Ok.  I made that last one up.

But seriously, I can't even.

That shit's totes adorbs.  It's also not as new a concept as we all seem to think it is.  I remember fondly (cringing is how I show fondness, ok?) when the PTA moms would organize little Christmas or birthday, or hell, whatever parties for my kindergarten and first grade classes; all the special snacks that our mothers laboured over--sometimes for days--in an attempt to out-mom each other.  In this department no one worked harder than my mom.  Being an outsider in our genteel southern town, she had a lot to prove, an ax to grind, and some naysayers to kill.  I'd like to say with kindness, but I have reason to believe that our PTA doubled as an Antebellum Ladies Fight Club.

Honestly, she shouldn't have tried so hard because the tide was always going to be against her.  She was a Detroit native, transplanted to the deep south.  We weren't what you'd call "monied," though my mom was a business owner.  The fact that part of that business may or may not have included the management of a brothel has little bearing on this particular story, except to illustrate that my mom was way too interesting for a life of carefully shaped and decorated rice cereal treat Christmas trees and handmade centerpieces made of coffee filters made to look like angels (with real doll hair).  And besides, what money we had eventually ran out.  It was also no secret that my stepfather was a raging alcoholic, and if it ever was a secret that he had a fondness for beating the living hell out of her, it wasn't long kept.  A proper lady just doesn't let information like that be known.  She'd have known the correct application of foundation and concealer if she'd really been committed to her position within the PTA.

But it's not all traumatizing childhood memories every time I log onto Pinterest.  One of my all time favorite films is Mermaids with Cher and Wynona Ryder.  I always loved that meals in their home consisted of hors d'oeuvres and canapes.  The best Thanksgiving and Christmas dinners at our house looked very similar.  However, throughout the movie it was understood that adorable food was a sure sign of sub par parenting.  I'm sort of confused how this dichotomy has been flipped on it's head, and parents have taken to laboring in the wee hours of the morning to create practically inedible works of art to prove they're love for their children and their superior parenting skills, but I do love being reminded of how much I enjoy Mermaids and that I keep meaning to order it from Amazon.

Bitchin'.

Let's Try This Again

I've started and stopped blogging more times than I can count, mostly because I forget to get crackin' on these things.  But it won't be like that this time.  Probably.

So, just to break the ice, let's play:


Getting To Know "Werewolf Mommy"

I'm a relatively new mom, been at it for nearly a year now.  He doesn't seem worse for wear, so yay!  I'm a homemaker in an economy that doesn't allow someone on my financial situation be one, and it's definitely not by choice, but honestly, if you've ever seen the news here in the Los Angeles area you wouldn't be keen to send your kids to childcare facilities or school here either.  Which actually leads into the fact that I'm an LA transplant from...well, anywhere but here.  I've been around, and California is like another planet.  I'm a not-so-delicate southern flower that can drive in blizzard conditions, I hate palm trees and the sun, and that's just weird in California.

I'm a horror fanatic that got lucky enough to make a baby with someone who shares that passion.  It's part of how "Werewolf Mommy" became what I am.  The other part is for another post, and it is a rather odd story so let's hope I stick it out long enough for whoever is interested in this to find out.  I've got a system of questionable ideas and those change daily.  I'll try to write about a variety of things, because right now my son is still a baby, and babies are kind of boring to everyone but their moms.

Don't lie, you know it's true.