Psh- I WISH I was OCD about SOMETHING. I am definitely NOT a neat-freak or a germ-a-phobe or anything like that.  I don’t care if my vacuum lines are walked on or not straight. I’m ok with my random piles of papers on my desk.  My family probably wishes I had just a little OCD, but alas… they are out of luck. I tried to think of something I do a lot or worry about on a regular basis. This is what I came up with:

• I brush my teeth. A lot. I have ever since I got braces back when I was 12. I mean, I brushed them before that, but now I brush them at least 4 times a day. I don’t like to have a not-clean feeling in my mouth. I brush right when I wake up, after I eat breakfast, another random time during the day, when I shower at night, and usually again after that. I CANNOT go to bed without having just brushed my teeth. It feels gross.
• I check locks. I lock and re-lock my car doors when I get in the car. I lock them on my way out– I inadvertently lock my kids in the car before they can get out on a regular basis.  I deadbolt the front door immediately when I come home. And it bothers me that my backdoor isn’t locked all the time because the dog and kids are running in and out. I like things locked. It’s safer. I guess I am pretty OCD about my safety in general. Ask my husband. He’s the cop and I helped him prepare a class on personal safety. He taught a bunch of my tricks.  

All in all I guess these aren’t bad things to be “OCD” about, if you’d even call it that. I honestly couldn’t think of anything else. What are you OCD about?

Sorry y’all. It’s one of those days, weeks, whatever. Maybe I just have PMS, but I am tired. I am tired of my house always being a mess no matter what I do to change it. I am tired of being expected to WANT to clean up after people. I am tired of doing the same things over and over again, sometimes several times a day and no one notices or care enough to say anything. So, here’s my list. It’s a list of crap I’ve done in the last 5 hours that no one either notices or cares to acknowledge. I know it looks like I do nothing all day. You know why? Because I have the tazmanian devil and his sister living here constantly dragging out new things after I’ve picked up other things. I have a dog who likes to lie in the dirt outside and then come in and lie on my wood floor. I have a husband who apparently doesn’t remember where our closet is. Nothing against him- he is awesome and I am lucky to have him. He works hard at 2 jobs so that I don’t have to work outside the home. The difference: He gets paid at both jobs with money, nice lunches, letters of gratitude, awards, and he also gets a lot more sleep than I do, contrary to popular belief. I don’t even get a “thanks!” That’s why I loved school so much the last 8 months. I made straight A’s for all 16 hours I took. I made the Dean’s list AND the Chancellor’s list!! I never cared about grades before, but wow- I felt like someone was acknowledging my hard work. I worked hard and my teachers said “Thanks for working hard!” by giving me an A!

So, here’s the list. I am starting this at 7:48 am on Saturday, July 30. These are things I did that I am positive no one will notice. And let’s not forget the school supply shopping trip yesterday, watching the movie “The Smurfs,”– I wanted to see “Cowboys and Aliens…”, the 3 hours I spent creating a photo album online with all our pics from Florida- a book everyone will love looking at, but never think to thank me for making. I was up til 3am doing this because it was finally quiet and I could concentrate.

• Broke up Taj and Liv fighting– the 1st words out of my mouth this morning were: “Guys…please stop.”
• Picked up seven- yes 7- pairs of shoes out of my bedroom floor. None of them belonged to me. 6 of them belonged to the person I share the room with and 1 belonged to Liv.
• Swept the wood floor.
• Mopped the wood floor.
• Broke up Taj and Liv fighting.
• Swept again.
• Cleaned the tv so it’s free of hand prints.
• Cleaned the floor of the 1/2 bath on my hands and knees. This is the room where our dog sleeps. I do this on a daily basis.
• Broke up Taj and Liv fighting.
• Taught Liv 10 new words to read.
• Fixed breakfast and lunch for Taj and Liv, including a sandwich “cut like a puzzle.”
• Changed the scentsy scent- I think this helps calm the house.
• 1 load of laundry. (3 oldest are at the exes so this may be all the laundry today! Did 3 loads the other day…)
• Swept kitchen floor.
• Wrote Taj a talk for sunday school at church.
• Helped Taj practice his talk.
• Helped Liv log in to Webkiz… she forgets her user name sometimes.
• Helped her find the “princess games” on Disney.com
• Washed Indy because she got muddy outside.
• Showed Taj the new Dog 101 shows I dvr’d for him.
• Counted how long Liv can dribble the basketball.
• Yelled “Shhhhhhhh!! Dad’s asleep!!” about 300 times.
• Cleaned the “White out” out of the carpet…. grrrr
• Loaded dishes in the dishwasher
• Wiped sticky cereal off the table.
• Collected about 40 movies/dvds that had been brought downstairs from the a closet upstairs.
• Dusted a lot in the living room.
• Rearranged the shelf in the piano room.
• Framed a pic of Seiuli’s grandma
• Broke up Taj and Liv fighting.
• Broke down crying because I am so tired of the fighting!!
• Made my bed.
• Wiped pee off the toilet seat several times.
• Tried to figure out how to get onto Xbox Live chat so Taj and Liv could chat with Alec– you know, because a cell phone just won’t be fun enough!
• Took Taj and Liv to the pool. Not really that relaxing when you’re taking a 5 and 7 yr old. So thankful they are both good swimmers!!

The house still looks like crap and I’m still grumpy.

Requirements to win the Bad Wife Award:

** Send your husband, who is surfing in Hawaii, text messages that say things like, “There’s no way you miss me as much as I miss you.”

** Tell your husband, who is surfing in Hawaii, to have someone take a picture of him surfing so you can blow it up and hang it up in your surf-themed bathroom. And then add, “So everytime I go in there to pee I can get pissed off at you.”

** Thank your husband, who is surfing in Hawaii, over and over again for giving you a whole 36 hours notice before taking off to Hawaii for a week and rub in the facts that when you went to Oregon for 4 days you 1) Gave him 4 months notice. 2) Bought tickets to 6 Flags for him and the older kids (and his brother) 3) Arranged for your mom to watch the 2 youngest so they could all go to 6 Flags 4) Arranged sitters in case he was scheduled to work 5) His brother came in town to visit.

** Basically ruin your husband’s trip to Hawaii by acting like a whiney bio-tch everytime he calls.

———————-
Acceptance speech:

Thank you. Thank you. I’d like to thank my husband for going to Hawaii and giving me the opportunity to act like this and win this award. I’d also like to thank my kids, especially Liv, for using up my patience last week, before the Hawaii trip, making me even more psycho than usual this week. And most of all, I’d like to thank Mother Nature for the huge case of PMS I have had. Thank you.

**Yes, that’s 2 posts I’ve written today. I’m on a roll.