In honor of yesterday’s no more negativity post, I’m going to talk about some of the things make me smile.

1. Yesterday I took the daughter in for her five year checkup. (Doc she’s absolutely perfect, FYI.) She had to pee in a cup, which meant me holding the cup under her while she did her business. While I was trying to get over the grossness, I learned that sometimes when she has trouble peeing, she tickles her belly button. Now, if you’ve never squatted in front of a toilet, holding a cup under your kid while she giggles from tickling her belly button–well, you just don’t know cute.
2. I am obsessed with the Flax Seed. No, not the actual stuff, it tastes kind of oily. I am obsessed with saying Flax. Say it five times fast. See? It feels funny.
3. My parents are coming home! They’ve been in Miami for the last couple of years, and I’ve missed them big time.
4. Me–Treadmill–2 Weeks straight. Oh. Hell. Yeah.
5. Back when I taught kindergarten, we used to have pajama day. (Just occasionally, as opposed to now–which is every day.) All the kids came in the cutest little jammies, except this one girl who borrowed a t-shirt from her dad:

When I called her mom to tell her it wasn’t exactly appropriate for school wear. She couldn’t understand why, because it’s not like the kids could read yet. Far be it from me to argue with that rock solid logic.

So, what’s something that makes you smile?

I read a lot of blogs. Writing blogs, mommy blogs, decorating blogs, cooking blogs, and even gaming blogs.

They all have something in common though, they’re interesting.

Why are they interesting?

Well, some of them tell me things I didn’t know before, some of them are funny, and some of them just put me in a better mood.

Do you see what kind of blog is missing from there? The negative ones.

Now, I am not talking about the witty, sarcastic blogs that take the everyday and give us a different, hilarious perspective on the normal. Those blogs rock.

I’m talking about the whining blogs. More often than not they’re some mom down on life, hating the stay-at-home gig, complaining about her kids, her husband, or her latest anti-depressant medication.

What the hell is up with these blogs? Why do they exist, and how on earth do they have an audience.

Look, I’m not saying I’ve never been in  a bad mood. Heck, I had a horrible week last week, and you didn’t see me taking it out here on my blog. (Now, I may have taken it out on a friend’s blog–but that was probably a mistake.) What I am saying is, why on earth would you want to air out your dirty laundry all over the internet for everyone to see? Why not keep that in a private journal you keep in the drawer of your night stand? (Or, if you prefer to type over hand write, then maybe a password protected blog.)

Those blogs never stay in my reader for long, and I almost never click through to comment.

How do they find an audience, and how do people write in them day in and out without letting all the sadness of the blog wear off on them? Aren’t those people worrying about losing their jobs are screwing up their families with blogs like that?

So, what I want to know is–how do those blogs exist?

First, let me just say that the word anal gives me the willies. I don’t like saying it at all, and I am a little worried that writing an entire blog post about this is going to warrant some unfriendly search traffic–but I just can’t stop myself.

I feel like when people talk about anal, they are actually talking about being anal retentive. But, In one of my psychology classes in college, we learned what it was to be anal expulsive.

Yeah, that’s right–I just said anal expulsive. I’ll give you a minute to really let that sink in.

Now, it isn’t at all what you think it means.

It all goes back to good ‘ol Freud. You see, the thing about Freud is that a lot of the stuff he said was dead on. We’re talking so freaking right that there was just no way he wasn’t a genius, but then other times-he was talking so much crazy that it pretty much makes anything he says laughable. So, one of the big parts of psych classes is listening to your professors pick apart Freud’s theories and telling you which ones they think are total bullshit and which ones are absolute truths.

So, what’s anal expulsive?

Well, Freud believed that a child who doesn’t take control of their sphincter at the anal stage will become fixated and end up with a anal-expulsive personality – which includes being disorganized, messy, careless, rebellious, and on rare occasions, cruel.

So basically, with the exception of the cruel part–Freud thinks all those free thinkers and artists out there can blame their carlessness on the fact that they couldn’t get it together back when they were potty training.

So, let’s just think about this for a second–does this mean that if I’d been more in control of my–um–butt at the age of 3, then maybe I would have been an accountant instead of a writer?

Man, I’m glad I had all that Mexican food…

When my husband and I got married, we did the responsible thing and registered for silverware.

I don’t remember where, I don’t remember the NAME of the set, and I don’t even remember how much we ended up with.

What I do know is that most of it’s gone missing…

Yeah… that’s what my silverware drawer looks like. I don’t know where all the little spoons and forks have gone, but I am guessing they’ve been sacrificed to the great takeout box in the sky.

So, I need to do something so that we stop sitting down in our formal dining room with plasticware, because that’s not only bad for the earth, but kind of trashy as well.

I’m kind of loving these. Maybe it’s time to break down and order a new silverware set, eh?

Does your silverware disappear? Where does this stuff go?

As most of you know, I’ve spent the last few weeks driving around in a Chevy Malibu sponsored by the North Texas Chevy Dealers.

heh, I am sponsored by the North Texas Chevy Dealers… that’s pretty cool, right?

The thing is, I wouldn’t normally pick a four door sedan type car to drive, I wouldn’t normally drive a red car, and I wouldn’t normally drive something so smooth.

But, I love it. It’s all super suave and makes me feel like a total grown-up. People compliment me on my cool car all the time and I just smile and say thank you.

You see, it’s cool playing the role of fancy Chevy Malibu car girl, and I love that it makes me be a different person for a month.

I have to give it back soon, and I will be Jeep girl again… but for now, let’s just pretend like that doesn’t have to happen.

So, when Chevy and the North Texas Chevy dealers asked me to take my family out to eat, I decided to go to the most magical place on earth…

The Combination Pizza Hut and Taco Bell

(now what am I going to do with the other 96 dollars they gave me)

Okay, so Chevrolet gave us a hundred bucks to spend on groceries so we could show you all the trunk space in the Malibu.

So, naturally, I spent it all on soda…

Then I made a stop motion video.

If you love me you will comment and tell everyone you know, because this took me like four days to make. Amateur film maker I am not.

I’m busy today, so I am going to take a page from Rachel Bateman’s book and throw out a quick Fast Five Post.

1. I’ve totally screwed up my sleeping schedule. My parents had the kid over the weekend, and I stayed up all night long both nights. Why is it so easy for me to stay awake at night and sleep during the day, and if I was on the other side of the world–would I not have this problem?
2. I have a lot on my plate right now. Remember when summer was a time for relaxing? That so isn’t the case here. Don’t get me wrong, everything on my plate is amazing. But, I am still a little stressed and wondering when I will get to take a little breather.
3. I refresh my email a lot. Like somedays it’s like nine bazillion times. There are things I am waiting on, and I can’t help it. *clicks refresh*
4. Laundry overwhelms me. I feel like if I would just do one load a day every day, then it would be all good… but by the time I get done doing piles and piles of it, I don’t feel like doing it again for a long while. It’s a never ending cycle–I really hate never ending cycles of suck.
5. The daughter and I are having a TON of fun driving around in our Chevy Malibu. The blog launches next week, and I can’t wait. My favorite part is that it’s forcing me to finally get some video editing skills–that is something internet-ish that I have totally been lacking in. So, thanks Chevy~!

I’m not very good at making friends.

Well, that isn’t exactly true, I am okay at making them–I’m just not very good at keeping them. You see, friendships take work. You have to call people, send thank you cards, bring them meal when they’re sick–you know be a friend. And, since I suck, I hardly ever do any of this. So my friendships usually fade away, and it’s just sort of whatever.

I was thinking about this yesterday when I ran into my online friend, @texasholly.

Thing is, I talk to Holly via the internet all the time. We chat about our kids–if she’s having a bad day I send her a shout out (that’s pretty much the internet equivalent of making someone a casserole), and she does the same for me.

This internet friendship is a whole different kind of friendship, except that, in this case– I’ve met Holly.

We haven’t seen each other in person a lot or anything, but when we do, it’s not awkward or weird like it would be with a new friendship, it’s like we’ve been hanging out a few times a week for over a year, because we actually have. Just we did it online.

So, is Holly a real life friend or an online one? I don’t know–I mean, I met her online, and that’s where we have the majority of our interaction, but I’ve also had drinks with her, so does that change things? Should that change things? Does that even need to change things or does it matter what kind of friend she is?

So, tell me, online friends– are we really friends, or are is it just not the same?

*Count up how many times I say ‘friend or friends’ in this post, and leave it in the comments. I’ll draw names and send someone a present.

***EDIT***

Holly randomly posted about this SAME thing! AND if you go to her blog and leave her a comment on the post, she’s giving away a gift card to Barnes and Noble!

Something kind of cool is going on this month. I’ve been picked as a Malibu Mom. Basically, Chevrolet is giving me a Malibu to drive around for a month and I have to go on secret missions. We were asked to make a video biography of ourselves.

Maybe you remember me freaking out about it last week. Well, with the help of a friend, I think it’s time for my rap star debut.

Fresh Mom of Dallas from Jamie Harrington on Vimeo.