Texting Up a Storm

The recent tropical storm, Irene, caused us all to think really hard about what is important. Like, how do we text during the storm so that our friends will understand what kind of crisis we are in? Well, Becky is here to save the day with some new texting abbreviations, should another catastrophe of this kind strike. Please share this with your friends so that we will all be on the same page next time!

1. SNP: Still No Power

2. FFKICBIM: Force Feeding Kids Ice Cream Before It Melts

3. TOLA: Tripped Over Legos Again

4. DDCF: Dropped Deuce Can't Flush

5. BTW: Buying the Wood

6. LAMRL: Listening to A.M. Radio Losers

7. ITMB?: Is This Milk Bad?

8. CSDTOT: Can't Shower, Doing The One Two

9. NDBAJL: No D Batteries At Job Lot

And my personal favorite, donated by the Mr:

10. FML: Fix My Lights!!!!

(Or, Find My Lantern)

Parents with Power

So, Hurricane Irene didn't do much damage in my hood but it did knock out our electricity for 6 days now (and counting). On Day One, we awoke to no power, a little earlier than we anticipated. I was hoping I'd squeeze in at least one last load of laundry, but oh well....

Who thought it would last this long? We hunkered down for the 1st 2 days of darkness with neighbors; cooking, drinking, eating, more cooking, laughing, and (finally) sleeping to the hum of nearby generators. Then we learned it would be days before getting the lights back so we packed the kids up and headed to my parents' house. (I honestly don't mind "roughing" it but I have my limits. If I can't do my laundry at least every other day, I start twitching. For more history on this click here. ) Plus, I am a big fan of fresh, cold food, something that is hard to keep when your fridge has been emptied and ice is nowhere to be found.

So, it was off to Manny & Ginger's house. ("Manny" is really "Kenny" but I nicknamed him Manny cuz he loves to read manuals to EVERYTHING, and "Ginger" is "Ginny", more on that in another blog.)

Thank goodness for parents, especially ones who don't mind a family of four invading their space. These 2 would really move the Sun and Earth for you....generous, kind, and beyond crazy.

Just a few tidbits of my last week with Manny & Ginger:

• No matter what time of day, my father is eating. Standing at the kitchen counter. Eating. One night at 11pm, he was eating chopped onions and tomatoes with fresh basil. Still standing. Never sitting. Jars of pickled mussels, jalapeno peppers, Cheerios, topped with blueberries, milk and wait for it....crumbled blue cheese on top. I gently advised him that he shouldn't eat so late at night and his response was, "How is it eating late if I don't go to sleep until 2 a.m?"


• Ginger: " Who the hell eats tomatoes and onions at night? Beck, what time does Dr. Drew come on? Is it after Nancy Grace and before Joy Behar?" Yes, mom. We'll watch in your bed and then Billy will come in to talk about Chaz Bono.


• Cut to a commercial with the K girls. Ginger: "Ooh, I'm so sick of those Kardashian girls. They look like whoas."


• My mother's obsession for sweet corn is worse than I thought. She cooks it at every meal and when she eats it, a lone kernel rests on her chin, waiting to be snacked on later.


• My father writes down his doctor's appointment times on the sides of Kleenex boxes and then can't remember when he has to go. Until he sneezes.


• Every conversation with my mother includes the words "RiteAid" and "Lottery Number"


• My parents never use a door to exit the house.


• Rubber bands are used on everything; from bagged salad and pasta boxes to bottles of pills.


• And lastly, now I understand why Becky is the way she is.

Thank you to my wonderful parents! You guys are the best.

Come on Irene!

Ode to Irene....sung to the tune of "Addicted to Love":

The lights aren't on
And I'm not home
This gal named Rita, is on my phone
My pits are sweatin'
My food is spoiled
The kids are wired
The gridman's boiled

Ohh, you might be thinking that it's fun in the dark
But just wait until you're wiping and your underwear sparks

And you might be thinking that your ice will be fine
But just open up that cooler and your hands will be mine

(There is no end to this song, just as there seems to be no end to our power outage. Feel free to add your own ending to this song in the comments below!)

Why all Moms should take their little boys bathing suit shopping

I normally don't enjoy taking my kids clothes shopping,especially if those needed items are for moi. However, sometimes it's unavoidable and usually a little bribery (in this case, Trident gum) was enough to keep them happy. Considering what these 2 boys had to witness today in the dressing room, a better choice would have been Dove Chocolates or a trip to the Magic Kingdom.

I needed a bathing suit.

Yes, they did sit there watching; the 3 year old enamored with his gum wrapper, and the just turned 8 year old perched like an Olympic judge while I squeegied my way into the Land of Lycra.

Is it inappropriate for a mother to subject her sons to this? Maybe. But in my defense, I kept my bloomers on (like the sign says), and my eldest has already seen what's on the top shelf since his baby brother took up residence there for 15 months. They're just extra skin and stuff and someday all women will be allowed to mow their lawns shirtless like men do. I demand it! Wait, I don't mow the lawn.

Anyway, back to Lycra. The dressing room in any department store is a cruel, cruel place. For some reason, they still haven't realized that the lower the lighting, the better the sales. Why must the lights rival those of an operating room? Are they performing appendectomies on the off hours? Do we really need to see our facial hair, our spider veins and our cellulite all at 5000 mega pixels?

No. Which is why it's good to take your children on these adventures. You see, they don't judge. They don't critique that mass of veins on your legs, or the extra baggage you are carrying around on the lower shelf, or the less than perky top shelf. All they see is the pretty coral bathing suit and their Mom. Bingo. You are the most beautiful girl in the world to them.

I tried on 6 bathing suits and with each one, "Mom, that looks nice!" Not, "Mom, you have a short waist and should really try to e-longate it." or, "Your legs are so jiggly. You are so not buying THAT!"

Even though I couldn't find just the right suit for me, I still left the store with my head held high. The bribe gum remained intact and I was already looking forward to my next shopping trip with my kids.

Fuzzy Memories

Parents of this generation are big on creating memories for their kids. They overspend and overstress on making the kids' childhood rosy, glowy and supercharged with fun. And for some strange reason, they believe that the kids will remember all of the back breaking work they did.

I'm here to tell you, as a 43 year old mother who was a child once too, they really won't remember all of the minutiae that you are orchestrating. Every time I question or angst over a parenting dilemma, I think to myself, "He won't even remember this. Why am I bothering?" This gave me pause today as I tried to remember some things from my childhood, like before the age of 14. I remember nothing prior to age 4 or 5.

Here is what I came up with:

1. My siblings teaching me that if I stirred my Coke long enough it would turn to root beer

2. Spaghettio Saturdays

3. A tick in my head in kindergarten

4. Wearing my underpants under my bathing suit at a summer day camp because I was too embarassed to undress in front of the other girls

5. The way my mother sprinkled paprika on my tuna fish sandwiches and how special I thought that was

6. Getting hit in the boob (12 year old ones) with a line drive shot while I was pitching a softball game

7. Playing Manhunt into the dark of night with the neighborhood kids

8. Making chocolate chip cookies every Friday night with my sister while we watched Dallas and The Dukes of Hazard while our Mom went to Bingo

9. Playing a barbaric game called "Step on Stomachs" with my brother and sister

10. Winning a spelling bee in the 5th grade

11. Lite Bright and Spirograph

12. Kissing the TV whenever David Cassidy and the Partridge Family show started

13. My mother experiencing one of the worst foot cramps in history making my dad take her to the hospital, only to end up at Burger King since the cramp disappeared en route

14. Cutting my bangs in the 3rd grade so I could look like Olivia Newton-John in Grease but ended up looking more like the other girl with the buck teeth

15. The beach every Sunday from morning til night

16. My sister throwing up on the Block Island Ferry and my mother grabbing a lady's newspaper right out of her hands to catch it

17. My dad hiding all of us and our cousins in the back of his van (like illegal immigrants) so he wouldn't have to pay by the kid at Lake Mishnock

18. My grandpa Rico, giving all of us kids shots of beer and peanuts in his basement so we could all raise our glasses and shout, "Salute and Drink!"

19. My first AA meeting at age 10

That's pretty much all I remember. Do you need to create memories for your kids? Nope. Life has a way of doing that for them!

Not Yo Mama's Maytag Repair Man

This story happened almost a year ago. But it doesn't matter. My rage is still there.

The pizza crust was still an albino color after being in the oven for 20 minutes. Something was definitely not right with the oven. It was a hot day but I didn't care. We have a.c. and nothing stops me from making pizza when I get the hankering.

What to do? Who to call? Times like these I wish I married an appliance repair man (other times I wish I married a plumber, electrician, or auto mechanic!) After a few calls, I found a reliable repair man who has done work for other family members. He came the very next day. A bit on the grouchy side (complained about having to walk up my front steps, quite the hardship) but then got right to work. While diagnosing our problem and only $125 later, he joked that I probably called Dominoes during my prior pizza emergency. I twitched only slightly.

Then he started talking about his wife and grown kids. His crusty attitude resurfaced again as he referred to his daughter as a "Big Fat D". At this point, my husband and I looked at each other, totally confused. So hubby turned to him and said, "She's a Diva?", to which Mr. Oven Saver replied, "No, she's a Dy**." I can't even bring myself to type what he said. I am hoping you are intelligent enough to unlock the mystery.

Instead of unleashing on him, I said something like "As long as our kids are happy, then that's all that really matters", knowing full well that I could not change the spots on this leopard and just let it go.

But on that hot summer day, I was dually offended. I am not sure what upset me more, that he thought I, a direct descendant of the Pizza Therapy guru of all time, would call Dominoes Pizza or that he referred to his own flesh and blood as the "D Word".

Would you keep this repair man for future use? I won't. And if you know of anyone reliable and who doesn't use either "D" word, would you please post it here?

Forrest Gump was Right

Every time I reach into the box, my heart skips a beat. As my hands lightly caress the silky smooth, perfectly shaped square, my mouth begins to water. I pull it out of the box, giddy with excitement. I carefully open it.

Oh crap. They've done it again. They've somehow replaced the Ghirardelli chocolate square with a Kotex pantyshield. How could this have happened, again?

This is my recurring living nightmare each month. First it was the Always camp telling us girls to "Have a Happy Period". After discovering that their products do not have a built in tickling device, I boycotted, and switched over to Team Kotex which now markets their products like Forrest Gump.

If they really want us all to have a happy period, they should include a chocolate interspersed between all the pads instead of making each individual pad wrapped in jazzy, multi-colored plastic, only to disappoint yet another crazed woman. Why has this not happened yet? Why are they not getting it?

If you are a boy and cannot stand Ladies’ Days talk, then go scratch yourselves in the other room. But for my gal pals, read on.

The monthly Curse, Ant Flo, or your “Time” is up there with Death, Taxes and Laundry, so I know you all can relate.

My poor Portuguese friend got hers on her wedding day. My husband refers to her unfortunate event as her “Portuguese Wedding Present”(PWP). My friends and I like to speak in PWP code. But now the secret is out. You can use it too!

The PWP has been a major part of my life since I was 12. When she arrived, I was in complete denial and thought that brown color was a result of eating too much chocolate. And I refused to tell anyone until a few days had passed, even though my mother had prepared my sister and me by showing us a book about “Creation”. From what I gathered, chickens laid eggs and the man physically took his sperm (which I envisioned to be like holding a toothpick) in his hand and handed it to the woman. They both looked so happy in the picture and I never understood why.

After my brother read the book he said to my mother, “So your mother (our grandmother), had sex 12 times with your father?” She did have 12 kids so it all made perfect sense.

Over the years, Ladies' Days products have made some great strides since the “belt” era. And let's not forget what the cave women and my mother endured during GenRag. Envisioning her house of 12 kids (6 of them girls!) with a makeshift RagLine just makes me oh, so grateful.

The pads have taken off with wings, walls and channels. They can fly to the moon, win the Tour De France, and scale the Great Wall of China. The Tampons come in fluorescent colors and fold in half so you can fit them inside a Tic Tac case.

But no matter how jazzy you make Pretty Paddy or Talulah Tampon, they both end up in the same crime scene.