Sacrificing Virgins, Mermaid Cake and She-Devil

Now you have to stay tuned with a title like that. It will suck you in like a Dirt Devil, but nothing like a She Devil. I only mention that because one of the comments from the last blog about my pregnancy referenced She Devil. All I could think of was the late 80's movie with Roseanne Barr and if you weren't sure her acting was bad enough on the TV show waste 90 minutes of your life renting this one. Amazingly I remember Meryl Streep even being in it, please explain that combination of casting. I think it's the opposite of when when Rosie O'Donnell was in A League of Their Own (a great movie BTW) because she was such a terrible actress but they had her play an obnoxious gum smacking New Yorker it actually worked. I remember Rosie when she used to host VH1's comedy stand-up show on late night TV and I thought she was horrible back then. Somehow she even competed with Oprah for a bit. Now I would be remiss if I didn't mention Oprah retiring in a year after 25 years. Those of you anywhere near my age don't remember when she wasn't on TV when Donahue was all the rage. I think she actually ate him. I'm sorry that's terrible but because Hope loved Oprah and Kirk Herbstreit more then me I guess I still have lingering anger issues. Of course I thought of her as soon as I heard the news, I'm sure she knew before I did. I actually think she decided to stop haunting me even though she promised to haunt Oprah, Gayle King, and Kirk. Oprah didn't make enough money with Harpo Productions so now it's on to OWN, the Oprah Winfrey Network. I'll be the first week she breaks every cable TV program record. Goodbye Monday Night Raw and the Closer, hello Oprah which could pass for a professional wrestler. Now in the red corner wearing the pink and I'm every women tights (oooohhhh I shudder at the thought) from Parts Unknown (I think Baltimore actually and don't ask me how I know such useless information, I'm sure Hope tattooed that into my brain) weighing in at 1/6 of a ton (not a stretch for her) the reigning heavy heavyweight champion of money of the world, the Oppulent Oprah.

I started typing this blog last night but just got too tired to finish it so hopefully I'll wrap up tonight. I was inspired by the fact that after I tucked the kids in I did my usual quick conversation with Hope at the top of the stairs before I made my way down. As I passed each picture of Hope and the boys in the house I noticed something. I then started to go into each room out of my way to the Flipside crackers (I really should be getting some royalties from them) and looked at each picture of her with the boys more closely. What I found that really upset me was that the kids looked much younger in every picture. Then I started thinking that all of the pics were back when she was feeling good and doing things with us. That was a really long time ago and even though she passed only in January of this year it really got to me. I was responding to an e-mail from a friend Judy when I just started crying thinking about it. All of a sudden Nathan is standing next to me telling me he's thirsty and then immediately starts telling me he knows why I'm crying, it's okay, and gave me a hug. I'm telling you kids have more sense of their surroundings then any adult.

Another strange thing that happened to me recently was during my monthly non-happy ending because I hate when they're over massage last week, all of a sudden she just got started on my neck and it started to throb. Then the other side started to throb even worse. I started having an anxiety attack and only became more stressed. I then started crying and wasn't even really thinking about Hope. I've had probably a half dozen massages since she passed and nothing like this happened before. I had to ask her to stop, sat up for about 5 minutes or so. and then finally laid back down and was able to continue. That was the most stressed feeling I've had in a long time and it was during a massage! Please explain that one to me.

Thanksgiving weekend 2008 was the worst weekend of my life. Not only did we just horribly suffer through the actual day with Hope not even able to get up and later she admitted she knew the cancer was back but didn't want to ruin the holiday, but that was followed by almost her entire family at our house on Friday to celebrate her birthday early and I was so busy I didn't even notice how poorly she was doing that day, then Saturday morning I realized I had to take her to the hospital. Will and Anna were still in town so they took the kids. We checked into the hospital and by the time they completed all the tests on her and had the results only 6 hours before her 36th birthday before they even spoke I could tell the cancer had taken over and she didn't have long to live. I was so worried about how she'd take it that's all I could think about. I asked for something she could take to calm her down, a doctor and nurse to come in with me, and when I told her she calmly just shook her head and said she knew. She always knew her body best and I don't care what anyone tries to convince any of you in the future if you know something is different then what they tell you don't let them go in the wrong direction. Hope always did that. So this weekend I'm planning on being remorseful some because of last year, but mostly looking forward to starting a new tradition for the three Wisemen. Her birthday is Monday this year and I'm taking the kids out of school and hitting Sea World and hopefully the Gaylord Palms Ice Spectacular or whatever they call it.

This year is still very warm and humid down here. However the other day it was cool enough to open up the house so I started opening all the windows that hadn't since spring of last year. That's when I remembered I had to do the dead frog clean-up. That's when I have to go into each window and dig out the dried up dead frog that somehow got between the screen and window at night but couldn't get out. Come morning they dry out and I get to clean them all up. You've got to love the smell of nepalm (no idea how to spell --- who knows the movie that quote is from?) and dead frogs in the morning. I had to sell my Jeep earlier this year and this is the time of year I miss it most. It was an extended Wrangler with a soft top and there's no better time to have the Jeep on the road. I hope the 16-year old little punk driving it around appreciates it took me 34 years to afford that vehicle. Kids nowadays, that's a whole other blog for another day.

Hope's brother's daughter had her baptism the weekend before last. With all the travel, family reunions, school festivals, birthday parties, etc. we've had over the last month plus I just couldn't make it over to Tampa for the festivities. My sister-in-law I think was worried that I didn't go because it was a religious ceremony. Now please understand and I would love to have a much deeper conversation with anyone about this, but for the purposes of the blog I do believe in God and that God created life, I do believe anyone considering or following a religion should study the history of it before or at least at the same time as the teachings of it, I did not go to church much growing up because Sunday was the one day a week my dad watched us, and I think religion is great for so many people but to date is not an important part of my life. I also don't believe you have to pray to God or go to church to live an angellic life that is positive and helps so many others. Maybe some day that will change, I have been to quite a few churches in my time liking parts of each one, and I do believe anyone that tries to convert others into believing as they believe is a bit narcissistic. Look at the 100's or 1000's of religions across the world and why are you so sure yours is correct and a few billion other humans are wrong? Just something to think about. And one more time because I'm asked this quite a bit, I have no anger toward God at all because of Hope's passing. I don't think God picked her out of the human race and chose for her to have cancer as some kind of example or anything else. At the end all I wanted for her was to pass away so she could leave her failing body and let her spirit be free. I have no anger at all over any of this, just relief now and thanks that it all happened the way it did. She immortalized the strongest soul I will probably ever encounter, but it was her time to move on when she did.

Back to my point, and I do actually have one from time to time. I told Hope's brother and his wife that I have no problem with going to church, attending a religious ceremony, just because I said penis and vagina at Hope's celebration doesn't mean I don't respect churches or their services, and the only ceremony I could think of that I'm against is sacrificing virgins. Don't go wasting a perfectly good virgin for some silly ceremony to honor God. I'm pretty sure he (or she --- that was for you Mom) is either not paying attention or is going to get really pissed at anyone involved in the sacrifice. I do like the fact that after some really long services they let you eat a wafer (or cracker or whatever the proper term is) and drink some wine. I do the same thing when I need God's strenght I eat some Flipsides (come on Nabisco, give me some props) and drink some grape juice as I like to refer to it for the kids.

I am drinking plenty of grape juice during my pregnancy to help the devil child inside me build up strength. I think my hummus and popcorn dinner tonight really helped him and/or her out too. I think I'm starting to show a bit and I just want to thank all of you for not saying anything. There's nothing more uncomfortable then asking a man when they are due with their demon and then finding out they're not even pregnant. I really appreciate the respect you guys show me that way. Unfortunately it's an immaculate conception and no hot chick involved. I bring that up because Nathan one night when he was with my mom said something about hot chicks. Now mind you I never speak like that around him so I have no idea unless he's reading the blog where he heard such a thing. My mom didn't miss a beat though, she asked inquisitively "What do you think a hot chick is?" He immediately answered a pretty woman that men like to loook at. I was blown away by this conversation, his answer was absolutely perfect and he already has so much more class then his dad.

Speaking of hot chicks I was at another kid's birthday party yesterday and I realized my mermaid fetish was out of control. First of all ladies I was very upset none of you showed up with a tail on Halloween to show me a pretty woman that this man would like to look at. Anywho they had a mermaid cake and all I could think about but didn't dare say because none of the parents know me well enough was that scene in the first American Pie movie when Dad walks in on Jason Biggs (Jim Levenstein if memory serves) humping a pie because he was told it was like having sex. I just wanted to try the same to see if that would satisfy my mermaid fetish --- sadly it didn't and by the way I'm no longer allowed within 1200 feet of the Crane Creek park according to the Police report. How can they really enforce that anyway? By the way, that movie launched one of the all-time worst acting careers for Elizabeth Shannon (Nadia) but I'll still see anything she's in rated R. Wow, now that's a woman that men like to look at.

I know this weekend will be tough including Thanksgiving, memories of the worst weekend of my life just one year ago, and Hope's birthday but I'm actually looking forward to it. I was supposed to catch up with a friend tonight but that didn't work out ultimately, tomorrow night I have a friend coming by after the kids go to bed that I haven't caught up with in too long so I'm looking forward to that, Wed night we have a ton of friends/family in town coming her for dinner after we have a pot luck and close the office earlier in the day, Thanksgiving tradition at Mom's, Friday up to FSU/UF game weekend where I get to see if I can track down Kirk Herbstreit because Gameday is going to be there, Sunday back home before taking the kids to Sea World and hopefully the Gaylord Palms on Monday for Hope's birthday. We're busy, having fun, loving life, and even though we have our moments we know Hope is right here with us enjoying it all as well. Let's hope our Noles can keep the game close this weekend and I'm going to have a cookie decorating / please help me decorate my house with Christmas ornaments party like we did last year and Whitney and Tom have to put up the NOEL (spelled NOLE at my house) letters in the front yard.