The Brattychick

Thomas , David, & Melanie were raving about the movie Where the Wild Things Are . So last night I went to the movies all by myself, for the first time ever, I think. For those of you that are not familiar, Where the Wild Things Are is a well loved children's picture book by Maurice Sendak. The book is certainly less than 100 words long, and so Max and The Wild Things are not given their full personalities by literature alone. The pictures, and what your imagination does with them, fill in the gaps and reach places that words cannot. I was really curious as to how writers Spike Jonze and David Eggers were going to go about stretching this short book into a movie. Especially a book that wasn't theirs. Not one of The Wild Things in the book says anything that isn't in unison with the other Wild Things. I would be terrified to expand on a character that was another writer's vision with only illustrations to go by. And they had to create several in addition to fleshing...

In high school no one needed sleep. I could go knock on a friend's window any time of the night and they would get up and party with me. Then everyone gets old and responsible and they're all "I need my eight hours." Except I still frequently stay up all night. Last night I was up until 4 am. I'm not saying that my thirty year old body doesn't hate me for it the next day. Also, I'm not able to rally like I used to. I had Cole when I was 18 and all the older biddies said "Now sleep when the baby sleeps, honey." But I was young and pretty used to four hours of sleep. I couldn't understand the fatigue that all the other new mom's were complaining about. By the time Miles and especially Dexter came along, I understood. But when I do stay up all night, I find myself alone in my endeavor. Jamie occasionally will be irresponsible, but he is infrequently up past midnight. A quick walk around my neighborhood at 9 pm shows the depressing si...

SocialInterview.com asked me "If you ran away from home, who would you turn to?" I answered ''Ha ha ha. I lol-ed at this question, having been in legal trouble at one point in my adolescence for being a "chronic runaway". Umm, so I'm not telling. Because I run away sometimes. And I don't need people to find me when I do so. But the people I would turn to know who they are. If I've ever said to you "let's runaway" or "rescue me" or "Mexico?" or "If we leave now we could probably get to _____ before anyone noticed.", then you are someone I would turn to.''

This post is rated NC-17, you've been warned IM Conversation with my girl, who's shy, so I'm letting her keep her anonymity. Heidi: I snuck out to your house last night even though you wouldn't sneak. I snuck without you. shygirl: So what's your next step? Heidi: cry shygirl: i like your status; poo throw poo at him. brb. potty time. Heidi: k shygirl: i'm back all this talk about throwing poo.. so i was thinking... Heidi: nice shygirl: giggle shygirl: so get your mind out of the gutter. :) Heidi: ok i'll try I totally sat in the gutter last night for an hour or something It was actually really nice I wrote my blog out there using someone's unlocked wireless network shygirl: were you ever a cheer leader? Heidi: hell no I was UNDER the bleachers shygirl: nice Heidi: smokin pot smokin pole lol shygirl: wowowowowow Heidi: I'm kidding. Sorta.

Ask me, preferably in a song, if I want to get in trouble with you. I'm married now, so depending on the trouble, I will probably say no, but I will still swoon. If you are my husband you can ask me to get in trouble any day and I will say yes and swoon also. Especially if said trouble involves a water balloon launcher, a totaled car, or anything that could result in a surprise baby. Heidi: Do girls think Danzig is hot? Jamie : I don't know. Why? Heidi: Cause he's so not hot. Except he's kind of hot in a wouldn't-be-hot-if-he-weren't-Danzig kind of way. Jamie: What do you mean? Heidi: Like, when the song "Mother 93" came out, I almost creamed my jeans, cause I was like "I wanna find hell with you. I don't even know what that means, but it sounds like it would get me in lots of trouble." Jamie: You're a funny girl. Heidi: Well, if a guy came up to me in high school and said "Do you wanna find hell with me?" I would have said...

"I think I've caught up on the sleep I missed in high school."

While we were reading our yearbooks. Liz: 'You are a little weird, but sweet...' Heidi: Hey, all of mine say something like that. 'You are weird, but nice'...or 'You are odd, but fun.' Do people say that to everyone? Or am I really that weird? Liz: Yes. Heidi: Ha ha ha! No hesitation, huh? And all this time I was thinkin' I was kinda regular. Liz: Yeah, well, people that are a little weird understand you, but normal people do not get you. Heidi: Really? Do I know any normal people? Wait, they're real boring, right?

Which obscure holiday was I born on? a) Earth Day b) Cinco De Mayo c) Labor Day d) Memorial Day e) Arbor Day Where was I born? a) Washington DC b) Virginia c) Nepal d) California e) Tennessee How many siblings do I have? a) 10 total. 6 halves, 4 steps. b) 3 brothers. c) 2 brothers and a sister. d) 6 total. 5 halves. 1 step. e) 2 brothers I was almost named..... a) Chrysanthemum b) Tammy c) Venus d) Kelly e) Sapphire How old was I when I went on my first date? a) 9. I was totally boy crazy starting in 4th grade b) 14. We went to a church dance in our Sunday best c) 13. And I had to sneak out to do it d) 12. My mother trailed us all over the mall e) 16. I wasn't allowed out of the house until then Which (school approved) extra curricular activities did I participate in? a) Choir and Sports Medicine b) Band and Track c) Debate Team and Cheerleading d) Drama and Dance Team e) Junior Republicans and Lacrosse I've known my b...

Mom: The Eyre's are speaking next week at the visitors center. Me: I don't know the Eyre's. Mom: You do know the Eyre's! Brother Eyre was your nursery leader! Me: I was three in nursery! Mom: You STILL remember him! You talked about him all the time. You were totally running the nursery. He is 6' 2"! You will remember him when you see him. Me: I was THREE! Mom: You were almost four! What do you mean you were 3?!

2/18/2008 From age 5-18 I lived in a little gray house in McLean, Virginia. We moved there almost exactly 24 years ago after my mom and dad married. The house was old, but roomy. It was a corner lot with a huge yard. There was a plum tree, three crabapple trees, an apple tree, 2 evergreens, at least 4 dogwoods, and plenty of other trees I can’t name. I climbed all the climbable trees. The evergreen in the back wasn’t climbable because it had thorny leaves, but it was so large that the branches made a canopy that you could go under and be alone. There was a little hill near the house in the front. At night if you stood at the top of the hill, you could see the buildings in Tysons Corner. Sometimes when we came home at night I used to run over there and wish I were doing something exciting over there with all the lights. There was a large area along the side yard where there weren’t any trees. There was a patch of wildflowers that grew there. There were white and sometimes purple clover...

"What's all this?" -George Banks from Mary Poppins I don't know why but this quote cracks me the freak up. You probably don't feel the same way, but since when has my blog been about you? Unless you are, like, anybody I know. In any case, I've decided to incorporate this phrase into my vocab. If you care to listen to a blast from your childhood:

I have now been tagged thrice ( Jennifer , Jeramie , Kelly) for this little exercise, so I suppose it's time to do it. I'm struggling to think of things that I haven't already written about, especially since I did something similar to this a while back, but here goes. I usually care more for people than they do for me. This is hard to swallow. I would probably be a lot more devastated if you died then you would be if the tables were turned. So you can rest assured that when you think no one cares, that I love you to pieces. Part of it has to do with... ...the fact that I have an incredible memory. I remember a lot more than most people do about each relationship, no matter how insignificant it was. Ask me what I remember about you. You'll be surprised. Sometimes I can even remember conversations verbatim. I am very candid and forthright. I do have some things that are secrets from most people, but I have told all of my secrets to at least one person. Just not the sam...

My church has an informal basketball team. A friend asked me to come to practice and somehow I forgot how much I hate sports. Nothing strikes The Fear into me like team sports. A lot of it has to do with gym class. The competitive boys in gym class were horrible and ruined sports for me. They would scream at you any time you made a mistake. The worst was Brooks Hunt. I don't know what was wrong with that kid, but he was purely hateful. He couldn't stand to lose, and would have a screaming tantrum any time a girl didn't execute something according to his standard. I can't take the screaming for something I didn't even mean to do. Ms. Ronemus was our elementary school P.E. teacher and Brooks lived in her back pocket. I don't ever remember him getting reprimanded for his constant loud verbal abuse. Somehow that boy ended up in my gym class almost every year of my life from 4th grade on. Usually when he did his screaming I would completely ignore him, even though i...

I took Cole to see Surf's Up today. It's a cute kids movie about surfing penguins. There was an old washed up surfer penguin who had faked his own death because he didn't knew he was going to lose a surfing contest and he didn't want to disappoint his fans. He became a fat hermit in the woods. So his biggest idol is this novice surfing penguin and of course they meet. They end up at the hermit penguins old beach shack. The old penguin begins reminiscing and he looked so sad as he touched his old surf boards and picked up his ukulele out of the sand. I understood how he felt. I feel old and washed up and fat too. There are memories from my past that I miss so much . I probably spend way too much time visiting those memories. I can play them back like movies in my mind. Things have been different for me. I got pregnant immediately after high school, and within a year I was married with a family. Even after all this time, every once in a while I grieve over the lost car...

Heidi: I dated a boy down that street...It was Will. Heidi: Oh and I dated a boy down that street too. Jamie : Um, yeah. I had a feeling that would happen. Heidi: It was Jon . Jamie: Right. Heidi: And I have an ex-boyfriend, Lukas , that lived down there, and Tim lived that way. Jamie: it's the tour of Mommy's ex-boyfriends! The tour that takes forever . Miles : Why does it take forever? Jamie: Because Mommy had all the ex-boyfriends. Heidi: What does that mean? That I had all the boyfriends that were to be had? Jamie: Yes. Heidi: That's not nice. Jamie: There are like, what, 5 boys that you were friends with that were in date-able age range that you didn't go out with. Heidi: I'm sure I can think of 10.

The Ladies' Section I shall be ending each paragraph of this blog with a one word sentence. It will serve as a palate cleanser since this is the most disjointed blog I ever writ. Word. As I write this a pill that makes me sleepy is coming to get me, so forgive me if it goes astray. I feel crummy today. There aren't enough hours and I don't have enough energy. Today was a waste. It was one of those days where at four-ish I realized that I was going to do nothing productive and wished I could just fast forward to tomorrow. Wah. I had my ten year high school reunion this past weekend. It was really fun and a pretty good cross-section of those kids. I liked hanging with old friends and catching up with acquaintances. I especially liked talking to all the shy kids who ended up coming out of their shell as they grew up and are the witty and charming people I suspected they always were. In the end I felt like I recovered some old friends and made some new ones. Yay. So I am feelin...

"Have you ever been in a fight with a liar? I mean a real liar--not white lies. I'm talking about real lying. You have to walk away from them. You can't win with liars." -Fran Kessler I read this article about Fran Kessler, the special assistant to the editor in chief at Esquire . This quote made me think of my most hated trait of all time, lying. I try to be as candid and forthright as possible and I appreciate it when others do the same. In early high school, I dated a boy named Phil. I hardly knew Phil when I started dating him (no surprises there), and about 2 days into the relationship I realized that he was a liar. Now and then you run in to a boy who tells white lies to impress you, but not Phil. Phil fabricated anything and everything whether it was of consequence or not. I've never fallen out of an infatuation so quickly. As fast as you can say "Oh, hell no!", I had dumped a bewildered Phil. Avoiding The Liars proves to be easier when you are ...

This movie theater near us is playing free kid's movies on Tuesday and Wednesday mornings at ten. They're all old, but we sure don't care. We went to see Fat Albert last week. This teenaged girl cries a teardrop onto the remote control while watching a Fat Albert rerun and the characters all come through the TV to help her out. Initially it seems that she is upset 'cause she doesn't have any friends and because her foster sister is cuter and more popular. Then the movie took an unexpected turn. We find out that the girl's grandfather has died and she hasn't been the same since. Then Fat Albert visits Bill Cosby who tells Fat Albert that his character is based on her grandfather. At this point the movie starts hitting a nerve inside of me that I wasn't prepared to protect with my Walls That Defend Sensitive Things. One of these Sensitive Things being that when all the pieces go together to make up me there's one missing where fatherly love goes. I ...

Erika Tagged me The Rules: Once you've been tagged you have to write a blog with 6 weird/things/habits about yourself. In the end you need to list 6 other people to tag and list their names. Don't forget to leave a comment saying, "You've been tagged." in their comments and tell them to read your blog. 1. I am afraid of animals. I think it's 'cause they can't talk to you. I'm always scared they're gonna bite me or something. I have been afraid of animals since I was a little girl. I am especially frightened of dogs. This does not mean I hate animals or want bad things to happen to them. I just want them far away from me. I will never have a pet because then they will die and it's like a freakin' family member dying and I will be forced to be devastated for a long time. 2. I am often accused of being a huge flirt. I was actually voted "biggest flirt" once. I have a certificate to prove it. Oh, and my mom grounded me because of...