Living la Vida Loca

Now you have that song stuck in your head. You're welcome.

The year was 1998. Ya I'm old. Shut up. No laughing. You're supposed to be my friends. I was at Ozzfest and embarrassed my then boyfriend horribly. He has most likely not been humiliated to that extent since.

Oh you didn't know that I'm an Ozzy Osborne fan? Well, I am. Mostly 80s Ozzy with some Black Sabbath sprinkled in. Shot in the dark is my favorite song. The more you know and all that jazz.

Ozzy was talking about how awesome Ozzfest was because the popular music of the time sucked so horribly. He then made some Ricky Martin reference and I'm not sure what possessed me (liquid courage in grape crush form?) but I stood up, threw my hands in the air, and shouted WOOOOOOO Ricky Martin!!!

I swear to God all three thousand people at that venue turned their heads. A record may have scratched in the far distance.

My poor boyfriend wanted to die. To this day I have no idea where that brief moment of unbridled enthusiasm came from. I did like that ole ole song that Ricky Martin was singing often at that time. It was very inspiring to me.

Ozzy looked directly at me in complete and total disgust so it wasn't a total loss. I do have that one claim to fame.

Now that I've gotten that off my chest I can get down to business. Things are crazy right now.

My husband was gone on a pre mba recruiting/interviewing type conference for six days at the end of June. That was challenging but not too serious since I had already been alone in Ithaca a few weeks prior.

The kids were fantastic. We spent a ton of time at the park. I didn't eat much because taking care of two kids in million degree heat alone and in a jam packed tiny apartment is difficult. Very fun but absolutely difficult. I swear my kids are the exact perfect age difference to maximize difficulty for me. They are in the same size diapers so I can't complain much.

I crossed that obstacle and then we attended a wedding last weekend. We had a blast but the trip involved two three hour stretches in the car. The road trip gods blessed us for the most part.

My husband decided that since we were only staying in town for one night that a seedy motel was a completely acceptable option. It's only $80 Veronica! Sure fine. I'm thrifty (no I'm not).

We pull in and immediately I shout "No. Nope. I don't stay in motels with doors that face the ROAD!". My husband reminded me that it was $80 and only a twelve-hour stay. Fine.

We park. There is a creepy scraggly bearded man smoking a cigarette in a dimly lit corner of the motel. It's raining. I got all Whitney Houston and snapped my neck and said "HELL NO!". K (my husband. Lets call him that until I can think of what else to call him her) begins to laugh nervously and says "Veronica our room is probably nowhere near his. Please calm down".

I calm down. He checks in. He returns to the car and informs me that we are the new neighbors of Mr. Scraggly Beard Movie Serial Killer. HELL NO.

I am freaking out. No way. This is exactly how people in the movies die. I'm trying to save us all from an untimely unglamorous seedy hotel-y death and my husband doesn't care. He didn't care at all. He was probably in cahoots with the dude. I was so angry.

K then decides to check in with the front desk. Are you ready for this? He marches over and asks whether our neighbor is crazy. Oh because the front desk knows this for a fact. "Oh yes Sir that man just recently escaped from the forensic psychiatric facility down the street. Don't worry about it. Here's an extra towel". Nah. Not how it works.

My husband tells me that the front desk has confirmed that the man next door is harmless. He is currently between homes and is on an extended stay at the motel. Fine. I make my husband check the room extensively. I make sure that he didn't drill holes through the eyes of the picture on the wall scooby doo style to watch us while we sleep and then sneak into our room and kill us all by strangling us with his super beard. Everything checked out.

Much to my dismay K needed to run to the store for some bottled water. Guess who he runs into? What's he up to you ask? He's rearranging liquor bottles at the store. Totally sane behavior. My husband decides to engage him in a conversation. Our neighbor McScraggly informs K that he knows various forms of martial arts and then demonstrates something called the crane. Use your imagination. It required some elaborate hand movements. Perfectly sane.

K returns and tells me this story. I'm am very uneasy with this situation and begin to brace myself for a crazy middle of the night knife fight.

"Veronica. It is fine. What you need to understand is that *you're* crazy. He should be worried about you!" Oh well thanks husband. That is very rational of you but I don't look crazy and am not scaring anyone. That man has no business standing around menacingly with a scraggly beard at a cheap motel on a rainy night in a dimly lit corner smoking a cigarette! Who LOOKS crazy?

I gave up. I was going to stay up all night and keep watch and be a total raging maniac at the wedding the next day. Fine. Then K says: "Oh and I peeked into his windows on the way back to the room and there is an industrial sized bottle of cocoa butter in his window".

Thanks. Wait. WHAT? Why does anyone need a mega jug of cocoa butter?

Anyway I'm still here. McScraggly did not kill us so there's that. The wedding was wonderful and a good time was had by all.

Aside from all that my husband and I have been spending our time doing some shopping and eating at as many random regional eateries as possible. He starts school soon so we are trying to cram as much gorging, shopping, and sight seeing in as we can.

Pweezy's second birthday is next Saturday and I am a little behind on my planning. The theme is Thomas the Tank Engine and Pweezy is crazy excited so I have to make the party kick all sorts of ass. I can't wait. My family is coming to Ithaca for the first time and I know they're going to love it as much as we do.

That's what I've been up to. How are you doing?