So, being a web designer, I’m in charge of the upkeep and periodic maintenance on several of my clients’ corporate and organizational blogs. One of my duties is to deal with the spam comments that come in to the blogs that are not updated regularly.

I’ve been highly disturbed by the turn that spam comments have taken lately. Gone are the days when I just had to perform a cursory scan for dirty words and genitalia and call it a day. Now, it seems, that they’ve resorted to creepy poetry.

Observe:

The sun may have defined how I lived, but it was him that defined how I truly would grow. My blood stained his clothes and hands a few times, from the mess I left on them, but never did it taint the way he would continue to smile privately to me.

Um, what?

Mind you, whatever this is has nothing to do with the website linked from the display name. I think it may have been knock-off designer jeans.

Seriously, I kind of miss the “let’s just leave a comment in which we repeat the various slang terms for our genitalia over and over” comments. They, at least, didn’t leave me feeling icky afterward.

Seeing as how I told the whole story of how my husband helped me overcome my crazy cake-hoarding tendencies, and then only included photos of the groom’s cake from our wedding, I thought I should post the photos of the other cake that got thrown out that fateful night, just so you can’t accuse me of being a tease.

You’re welcome.

Here is the photographic record of the life of Sadie’s first birthday cake.

The Cake, on the day of it’s tragic murder at the hands (and feet) of the birthday girl

And here is The Cake, after sitting in our freezer for almost two-and-a-half years.

Creepy how it looks almost exactly the same, huh? The pink just kind of took over everything that had been white (you can kind of see the icing that spells “happy” in the lower photo), but really, it was disturbing how it looked basically the same. Not too sure how I feel about that, knowing that we ate something that can last for upwards of two years.

Anyone want to venture a guess as to what this could possibly be?

Last October, after Ruby’s first birthday party, Kyla and I had the dreaded discussion about what to do with the cake.

See, I wanted to keep it, and he wanted to throw it out (after we got past the time when you can still eat it, of course…he knows better than to suggest throwing out a perfectly good cake in my presence).

Well, his argument was that, even though I was sentimentally attached to her first birthday cake, there was no logical reason to keep it.

Then I said “But we kept our wedding cake and Sadie’s first birthday cake! They’re in the freezer right now. Why can’t we keep Ruby’s?!”

Big mistake. Now the fates of all three sentimental cakes is in jeopardy.

He questions why we still have those. I have no answer other than “because I want to keep them, and I can’t bring myself to throw them away.”

That’s apparently not a good enough reason. He mentions the episode of Hoarders we had watched the previous week.

Then I pull out the big one…”I bet you can even still see Sadie’s little fingerprints in the icing! HER FINGERPRINTS! The only fingerprints of hers that we have other than the ones done in the hospital when she was born. That is important!”

About that time, I realize how completely insane I sound, and the future starts looking pretty rough for the cakes.

After some discussion, I agree with him that it is silly to keep all of these cakes. I mean, why keep a cake that you can’t eat?

So, we pull all of the cakes out of the freezer and decide that we should definitely get rid of the oldest cake, even if I can’t part with the other two just yet.

As you may have guessed by now, that creepy dead monster thing at the top of this post is actually a cake. More specifically, it is what was left of the head of the armadillo groom’s cake at our wedding, which took place in the summer of 2006.

You can see the “Bleeding Armadillo” red velvet cake on our big day, below (hate that we didn’t get a picture of it after a few pieces had been cut out, looking all bloody).

So, that night, I said my final goodbyes to the armadillo head that had been keeping watch over my frozen vegetables for over four years.

RIP bleeding armadillo head.

Sorry I’ve been a bit absent lately. Been working on lots of big changes in our lives, and trying to get things straightened out for the future.

How much does it suck when you wake up one morning and realize that you’re a for real adult and that you really need to deal with things like life insurance and retirement and debt and blood work and pills and schedules and…all of that other bullsh!t that is so not as much fun as all of that awesome stuff you got to do in high school.

So, as I said, been working on all of that, and trying to figure out what we’re doing with our lives and with our children’s lives. Yeah, maybe we should have figured all of that out before having them, but better late than never, right?

Yeah, we’ve been working on it, and I have some very awesome and exciting updates coming soon! I promise. That is, if you’re like me and it has gotten to the point in your life where you think life insurance is exciting.

And until then, a little gem from Kyla:

Kyla *running into the room, quite distressed*: WHAT DID BOOTS JUST SAY?!?!

Me: I think he said “I lost my teddy bear in Play Park”

Kyla: Oh, awesome. I thought he said he lost his teddy bear “playing cards.”

If only Dora and Boots were teaching our children about the evils of gambling…if only.

Yesterday I mentioned that I had some anxiety issues on the morning of Sadie’s first day of school. I could explain to you, in detail, how I was feeling, and how Kyla was being awesome, but I think this exchange is rather telling, and needs no explanation.

Me: What does this say? * walking into the room, referencing the outfit I has spent the last fifteen minutes picking out *

Kyla: Uh, that’s you’re wearing a shirt?

Me: I mean, does it say “responsible mother?” I really want to make a good impression

Kyla: It doesn’t scream “responsible mother,” but it doesn’t scream “irresponsible mother,” either.

Me: * visibly agitated * So what does it scream?

Kyla: Flowers?

* About ten minutes pass…and I come back in the room with a different outfit *

Me: What about this? What does it say?

Kyla: * without missing a beat * “I am a responsible mother who is very involved in her child’s education and I care deeply about her success”

…

He learns fast.

On Tuesday, I took the opportunity, while Kyla was home, to wash our car. It was looking pretty yuck, and I am too cheap to pay for a car wash when I can do it myself, even if I don’t have a sponge or a brush.

But I’m not going to bore you guys with the details of me trying to wash a station wagon with a wet t-shirt.

I want to tell you about why I hate Lincoln Town Cars.

In college, I had a job as a car prep at the local airport branch of a national rental car company.

It was kind of like working at a car wash…but not exactly.

See, this airport was technically an international airport, though I can’t remember ever seeing an international flight on the schedule. So it wasn’t a teeny tiny airport, but it wasn’t a big one either.

Anyway, my job was to take the cars that were returned, wash them, vacuum them, make them pretty, and bring them back quickly. The money was decent, hours were flexible, and I got to work on my tan (yes, I used to love going out in the sun…shocking, huh?)

Another cool thing that happened as a result of my working there was acquiring the skills to drive very large vehicles…like “packers” (13 passenger vans). To this day, I’m proud to say that I could 3-point-turn anything short of a tractor trailer with little anxiety.

When I first started working there, we washed the cars behind a gas station up the road from the airport. It was kind of weird and creepy late in the evening, but it wasn’t too bad. There was another car prep–a guy in his thirties–who always left the stereos on in the cars when he turned them off, which lead to more than one complaint from renters getting in the car and being blown away by the music blasting at full volume. Anyway, he talked the gas station owner into setting up a clothes line for him out back, and he would bring his laundry there and hang it up to dry during his shift instead of paying for a dryer at the laundromat.

Then one of the bigger rental agencies built a fancy new 8 bay wash and prep building, and we got their old building. It was pretty sweet having a real car wash to use, rather than a brush, a bucket and a hose. And there were two bays, so we rarely had to take turns.

I look back at that now and wonder why I didn’t take more advantage of using the prep building to wash my own car more. And it makes me feel old that I look back on that time fondly because of my tan and the free car wash.

Anyway, so this city was on the coast, and golf was H-U-G-E, so most of our customers were golfers. Which means we were always having to clean large cars and SUVs for the foursomes and their clubs. And if they did not have a large enough vehicle waiting on them the second they got out of the gate, you can bet they were going to be royally pissed.

So I learned to wash and vacuum an entire SUV in about seven minutes. The only hard part was cleaning the top of the car, since I’m what my father calls “vertically-challenged.”

But then there were the older golfers…the ones who insisted on Cadillacs and Lincolns, rather than the SUVs. I hated it when they would come in.

I always hated cleaning the trunks, mostly because they would be full of dirt and dried grass from the clubs, and they were a bitch to vacuum. Being as short and small as I am, I had to climb into the trunk to reach the most interior part, right behind the back seat.

Now, this one day, I was cleaning a Town Car. We had terrible storms all the week before, and it was evident by the mud covering the trunk carpet that the golfers who had returned the car has not let a little thing like inclement weather ruin their vacation.

I washed it first, as was my habit, and got the outside looking pretty spiffy. Then I pulled the car over to the vacuum, grabbed a wet rag for the dried mud, and climbed into the trunk to get to work on making that carpet pretty enough for the next foursome to dirty up again.

Well, while I was in there, the aforementioned coworker, who had a thing for loud music, pulled up and got to work on another of our cars. I heard him pull up, but didn’t bother greeting him, since I knew he couldn’t hear me anyway. Well, at some point, I dropped the vacuum, realizing that he may need it before I did, and that it would take me a while to get the mud loose enough to even begin vacuuming it up.

Sure enough, he did need it. When he didn’t see me at the car, he assumed that I was in the bathroom, and thought he would shut the trunk, in case someone pulled up after he left and tried to steal it (his words, as explained to me later that day).

Yes…I had just been shut in the trunk of a Lincoln Town Car.

I start yelling as soon as the lid closed…but he didn’t hear me. Between the vacuum and the stereo, there was no way he would hear me.

I listened for him to come back, maybe wondering where I had got off to, or for him to turn off the vacuum or turn down the stereo.

None of these things happened, and I listened to him drive away.

I started fumbling around to find the emergency latch, since I was sure this car must have one, being a luxury vehicle with a huge trunk. But I couldn’t find it. It was pitch black, and I could barely tell where the back of the car was, much less tell where the latch would be.

I was pretty calm the whole time, considering that I inherited a mild form of claustrophobia from my mom. It was more than half an hour before anyone came to look for me, which was shocking, sicne I was one of the fastest car preps we had. But the guy had told someone that he thought I must be sick, because I had been in the bathroom the whole time he was cleaning his last car.

But, someone finally came, and happened to check the trunk.

I refused to clean another Town Car for the rest of the time I worked there.

And I still hate them.

So the other night, our house got broken into.

By us.

See, what had happened was…

Earlier in the day, I had locked the bottom lock on our back door, which we never do because we have a massive deadbolt.

So I locked it, and then forgot about it. Then later, I went outside and realized I was locked out. Kyla Brown let me in, and I said I needed to go unlock the door before I forgot again.

Do you even have to guess what I forgot to do?

Dinner, bath time, etc etc. And Sadie goes to sleep, thanks to the wonders of modern medicine. And then Ruby goes to sleep, too.

We look at the clock, and it is ten after nine.

Both of our children were in bed BEFORE NINE O’CLOCK.

I thought I was going to faint. It was amazing. Since that magical day when Sadie came into this world, I don’t think we’ve ever had a night where every single one of our offspring was asleep by 9. Ever.

So there we were, for the first time in the three years that we have been parents, we were alone, with our children sleeping peacefully in their beds, at nine pee em, knowing that they were probably not going to wake up until the morning.

And we were giddy. We were overjoyed and beside ourselves, and we decided to go sit on the back patio with a glass of wine and a beer.

(See where this is going now?)

We get the baby monitor, the alcohol, my cell phone, and out the door we go.

And as soon as the door closes, I remember. Yep…locked. And I had just checked the front door before we went outside, to make sure that it was locked, since we would be out back.

We looked at each other and our eyes got as big as baseballs. We were so effed.

We start calling our friends with keys. Seriously, we obviously have amazing friends, since they were all were willing to come rescue us. Really, I’m glad they all like our girls, because I know that if it was just Kyla and I, they should have left our dumb asses out there.

So, they’re on their way, but we still try to get in. Because we’re still idiots, you know?

Rather than sit quietly and wait and listen for the girls on the monitor, we start messing with the windows. And Kyla totally got one open about six inches.

And Kyla made so much noise trying to get that window open, he woke up Ruby, who then starts whining a little. And as the seconds (which felt like hours) passed without Mommy or Daddy appearing in the doorway, the whines turned to cries and then blood curdling screams…at least that’s how I heard it, anyway. Because my baby is all by herself and she’s wondering where I am and and freaking out and OH MY GOD I HAVE TO GET TO MY BABY.

I’m a big ol’ panicky mess and I’ve got a wrench and a stick and a trowel, waving them in Kyla’s face as he’s standing on the chair in the bushes trying to get the window open. He tried to squeeze in, but it was just not happening.

Kyla’s all anti for me trying because I’m short and there’s no way I’ll fit through if he can’t…because he can wear my skinny jeans.

And I’m babbling about skeletal sizes and the squish-able properties of fat as compared to bone and beards and how this will ruin Ruby’s trust in us at such a critical stage of development. And I demand to try, but am embarrassingly unsuccessful.

More flailing around and pushing and poking and grunting, and Kyla gets the window back down a little, and thrusts that sucker up another two inches. He tries again to squeeze in, but I’m telling him his rib cage is too big.

Men never listen.

So I climb up on the arms of the chair, and stick my head in. Honestly, I don’t know how I got in that window…looking at it now, it just seems way too high for me, even standing on a chair. But I got my head in, and my shoulders. When my boobs were being squished between the window sill and the aluminum storm window frame, I really wished there was more padding there. But when I got the rib cage through, I knew I had it. And I knew I was going to get to my girl.

I’m pretty sure it hurt. It must have, considering the eight icky bruises I got from it (see the super flattering photo of my leg, below, for a sample).

But I did it…thanks in no small part to my recent weight loss, I’m sure, and ran to get my little girl.

She stopped screaming as soon as I picked her up, and looked at me like “It took you long enough.”

In total, we were out there about twenty minutes. From the time that Ruby woke up to the time we got to her was maybe a little more than five minutes.

But that was like the longest five minutes ever.

So, we learned that we need better security, since two idiots like ourselves can break in. We learned that we need lots more spare keys.

And we learned that when our children go to bed early…so should we.