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Tuesday, March 26, 2013

All innocence is lost on the Internet

So sometimes, where I work, my Partner-in-crime (front desk cronnie) and I have to find things to keep us from falling asleep. Usually we are very busy and running around like crazy, but every once in a while we have one of those days were it just seems nothing can keep our interest too long and everything is just dragging. Those are the days we usually have the most interesting conversations. Yesterday just so happened to be one of those days. This is what happened when we decided to browse the internet for a few minutes while waiting for the day to end.

Me: Do you ever wonder if you would recognize anyone on the Craigslist  male seeking female or vise versa?

PIC: No, really hadn't occurred to me.

(both decide to log onto our local Craigslist and browse)

Me: Did I just see that?!

PIC: Oh my god! What is that?

Me: (Quickly closing the browser) I don't think we should have that up. That is wrong on soooo many levels.

PIC: Did you see what I saw?

Me: Most likely, I thought it was fake at first then I realized........Oh My God! Why? My eyes burn now!

PIC: Was the one you saw.........black?

Me: Yep.

PIC: I don't think I am ever going to look in that section again.

Me: Why? Someone tell me why would you put a picture of that up on there? They seriously need some help. I think I was just mind raped.......oh my...oh my......

PIC: Oh look! It's time to go home!

Please people, Don't put pictures of your genitalia on Craigslist. You might be mentally scarring someone.

Monday, March 25, 2013

Random rubbish I did over the weekend

What to write! Gah! There are so many little things going through my brain right now but the question is, what do I share?

First off, the entire weekend was just great. I needed some much deserved mommy down time and so I shipped the kids off to Grandma's house. It was also good for them, they needed time away from me just as much as I needed time from them and were actually excited to see me when I picked them up.

Friday night after we had pawned the children off with my parental, we pretty much just vegged on the couch. We played CoD, watched some TV, and munched our munchies in our pj's.

Saturday, we spent the morning zoning out and getting ready to go out to the Amtgard field. We had been expecting visitors from another field and it turned out to be a very fun day. I saw some old friends and met some new. Our brothers in arms brought our fledgling group some much needed items and when it was all over no one wanted to say goodbye.

I had made Mr. Fluffy promise to take me on his bike later after everything was done. I told him "I don't care where just ride!" Sounded romantic at the time but the temperature wound up dropping dramatically while we were on said "ride". He decided to take a pit stop at a local "gaming" store that recently opened up and I hadn't seen yet and to show me the awesome flyer that had been made for our amtgard group. Don't get me wrong, I love all kinds of gaming and gamers I just don't do well at roleplaying games like D&D. I enjoy watching people play it but I am just not very good at it myself. This place happens to cater to this type of gamer. Wooo! I love that I really do. So while I was waiting on Mr. Fluffy (he had gone to say hi to some friends) I was at the front counter looking at their wares. A man (who I am going to assume is the owner) came up to me and started a conversation about gaming. He politely asked if I gamed, I told him that yes I did. He then asked what my poison was, I kind of stammered because I mean where do you start? I was shyly trying to name off some games when he was all "Magic? D&D? hmmm?" I told him "Oh, I don't do very well at those, I mainly stick to PC and console games" You would have thought that I had spilled grape juice on white carpet with the look that came over his face. He quickly got himself together and said "Oh a video gamer" as if he was mentioning something filthy. I on the other hand quickly got over my surprise and was trying hard not to guffaw in this fellow's face, because honestly he seemed like a pretty cool guy even if he doesn't like us video gamers. Soon after that we rode over to a very pretty park to scout out an area for a gathering we are going to be hosting in a month. It's very pretty and I am hoping the weather will be nice.

Sunday was pretty relaxed. I worked on making the ugliest bag in history to hold our new treasures. Mr. Fluffy calls it the "Santa Bag", I told him it was more like "The ugly bag of shame." I also posted some pictures of me in "Garb" (term used to signify our medieval dress) so that our new people could see examples.

I was really frakin cold. Thus the smile of "hurry the frack up!"
Yep that is me. Freezin my butt off while Mr. Fluffy took his time using my phone to take the picture.He insisted that we couldn't take the picture in the house "Because they wouldn't be able to see the details" and also he kept having to adjust my hood because at one point I looked like a headless monk from Doctor Who. I think he was just having fun seeing me freeze. There are some other things, but like I said earlier, I am still struggling with if I should or should not share them :)

Friday, March 22, 2013

Having a mini-me isn't always flowers and sunshine

You know what no one tells you when you get pregnant with your first child? How hard it is going to be when you two fight. Let me tell you, Little Man and I fight alot. Don't get me wrong, I adore my son. I love him beyond anything in this world. When he smiles and looks at me with his giant chocolate colored eyes and eyelashes any girl would kill to have makes my heart positively soar. He is the black sheep of our children, but he is the apple of his mother's eye. Someday, some girl is going to have a problem with how much of a mamma's boy he is, but I can deal with that later. The problem now is that he is too much like myself. While I can see all the good things about myself in him, I see all my flaws as well. I want so badly for my son to be a better person than I that it leads to some awful arguments between us.

I see in him the debilitating shyness I always endured. Except, whereas I would shutdown emotionally and hide when I felt "cornered" by other people, he reacts with aggression. I cannot tell you how many times Mr. Fluffy and I have been called to the school because he hit another student. I see the temper that I inherited from my own father in him. Both my father and I are quick to anger, though we don't usually hurt anyone physically. I try very hard to be a good example for him, to show him how to effectively deal with his anger so he doesn't hurt anyone else and even put him in counseling. I see in him the same way that I react to something that seems insurmountable. When I feel overwhelmed I usually break down and rebel against it. He does the same thing.

I want my son to be a better person than me. I see in him the ability to be better and do better than me. This is where many of our arguments start.

This week has been a test of my ability to cope with someone so similar to myself. Last weekend my son decided that he wanted to fight in Amtgard. Mr. Fluffy and I set down two rules. He wanted Little Man to keep up on his chores, I wanted one week without him getting in trouble at school. The first day at school, he gets his phone (it's for emergencies only) taken up at school, because instead of listening to his teacher he decided that his phone was more interesting and took it out of his backpack and had it in his desk. We told him that he would have to earn back his phone since I have to pay them to return it to me. I was willing to let that slide as to the getting in trouble at school rule. What was his reaction when we told him all this? He immediately told us how unfair we were being and then stoutly refused to do any chores at all all week long. I let his father deal with the chore issue because I just wasn't up to arguing about it. Then yesterday, I got a call from his teacher informing me that the rebellion had continued at school. She said that all week long, my son had only completed one assignment of his homework and schoolwork. Feeling like a failure of a mother  for trusting my eleven year old to not lie to me and not hovering over him every minute until he had finished his homework, I resolutely told her to send everything he didn't get done that day home and I would make sure he got every bit of it done. Needless to say he was not very happy with me. I then proceeded to call my mother and inform her that she needed the kids there this weekend or she was going to end up without a daughter.

This morning we both got up and eyeballed each other. Who would be the first to make a move? Who was going to bring up this weekend first (I hadn't informed him at this point he was spending it at grandma's house)? Then the sword to my heart was delivered with these words "I'm really really looking forward to fighting on the field this weekend mom!" How do I deal with that? So I slowly looked at him and said "You are going to Grandma's this weekend with the other two." All hell broke loose. The tears came from both of us and the claims of how unfair it all was tore my heart apart. I knew that if I backed down for one minute I would fall apart and he would never learn the lesson I was trying to teach him. Eventually he stormed off to his room and cried to his brother about their cruel, cruel mother. I patiently waited until I couldn't hear anymore sorrowful pleas of understanding and instead heard them giggling. I called him back downstairs. He slowly walked down and gave me that look that said he was pretty sure I was going to send him to a remote island. I calmly asked him if he understood why he was being denied the privilege of getting to go out his weekend and if he understood that it wasn't anyone's fault but his own. He said he did realize that it was his fault he was in trouble, he shouldn't have played with his phone and he understood how important his schoolwork is. You see, he wants to be a game designer when he grows up (squee!) and he is smart enough to do so. I also believe that with his proclivity to be alone it would be a career that would suit him perfectly. We hugged, we cried a little more and then I sent him on his way to school. I know this won't be our last fight as it certainly wasn't our first. What I do know is that as much as it hurts for us to fight, I can't back down because I am making him a better person than I am and someday all the tears and hurt feelings will pay off. In the meantime, all I can do is stand my ground while making sure he knows I love him.

Wednesday, March 20, 2013

Huzzah to the Shire of Skywatch

So as I have said before, I am into all sorts of "gaming". I quite enthusiastically enjoy MMORPGs and am not all that bad at first person shooters and the likes. I have been known to play role-playing games as well, but have been hampered by my lack of social graces and unfailing shyness. What I neglected to mention is that a long time ago, when Mr. Fluffy and I first got together, I joined a rousing group of individuals for LARPing. For those of you who do not know what LARP is let me break it down.

Live Action Role Play.

Now, some of you may be thinking "Wait, this chick can't sit at a table and tell someone else what a character written on paper will do but can act it out in person?" Why yes, yes I can. I can do this because of one important thing.

She is me. My persona on the field is just an extension of myself. And it gives me a reason to dress up in period clothing :)

The particular group that I participate in is called Amtgard. Amtgard is all over, there are even chapters overseas. When Mr. Fluffy first brought me in on this, we were participants in a very large and well established group. When we ended up where we live now, there was no group to speak of at all. We made an attempt to establish our own group much to no avail.

A few months ago, Mr. Fluffy had an assignment in his college public speaking course to do a speech about a hobby he had. Even though we had not been active participants for years, he still followed what was going on in the community so he chose to do his speech on Amtgard. Not even an hour later he was having fellow classmates approach him about how to join. When these guys learned that there was no active group here they resolved to fix that. I have never seen a group of people so excited about something before. Before I knew it, they were having weekly meetups and just this week there has been talk about getting us a larger sponsoring group.

I would like to give these guys a big thumbs up. You did a great job.

So go visit these guys on Facebook or on the field and make sure you give them a great big huzzah!

Tuesday, March 19, 2013

Whistle of Doom

Where I work I see plenty of things to make your toes curl. I can't go into gory details because alot of it is from our clients and well there is that whole HIPPA thing and stuff. What it all boils down to is that with all the freaked out crazy things we see on a day to day basis, the one thing in our day that makes us want to curl up under our desks and weep silent tears of horror is a simple whistle.

The way we are set up, me and my partner in crime (co- front desk goonie) face the one and only elevator in our building. we have a full service lab upstairs so all day long we have several couriers coming in and out. Two months ago, our last courier of the day switched people on us. We didn't think to much on it when the new guy walked in and without saying one word, walked into the elevator and pushed the button. That is when the whistling began. 

This isn't your normal everyday whistle of some funky or uplifting song. That of course would just annoy us. No this is on par with the creepy whistle song from Kill Bill. Here is a snippet for those of you who have yet to be exposed to it. 



Yeah, that one. Except a little slower. 

This man walks in quietly never saying one word and strolls his way to the elevator, patiently waits until it opens to allow him entrance. He then slowly turns around and waits until the door has closed halfway then he starts with the whistling. He whistles loud enough that we can hear him after the door has closed and the elevator has started moving. One of two things is going on here. First, he thinks he is whistling a dandy little tune to himself in a receptacle worthy of his fine skill and is unaware of just how creepy he is being or he has in his deranged psyche figured out just how unnerving his ditty is to us and plans to keep doing it to wear us down into a complete mental breakdown before he unveils his evil plan.  

I prefer to think it is the former one and that he isn't patiently planning our demise in some presentation worthy of a B rated horror flick. 

Sunday, March 17, 2013

Hi there, let me entertain you :)

So I know I have been away from the blog for a week but I wanted my family to have my undivided attention for the time that they were here. After they left Mr. Fluffy and I were cleaning our hall closet to make room for some stuff we had acquired and needed to store.

Mr. Fluffy: Ok almost done, what else do we have?

Me: I want this box put in there, I packed all our PC game boxes away.

Mr. Fluffy : ok bring it over.

(I grab the box which had been sitting against a wall for 2 weeks and lugged it over to him)

Mr. Fluffy: (eyebrows raised and giggling) wow.

Me: (setting box down for him) What? Why are you laughing at me?

Mr. Fluffy: There is a huge spider on that box.

Me: WHAT!? And you let me touch it?

Mr. Fluffy: I didn't want you dropping it. (setting box up against the wall in the closet)

Me: I think you are pulling my leg, where is this monster spider?

Mr. Fluffy: On the side against the wall, see the leg sticking out?

Me: (kicks the box against the wall, sees offending leg twitch) Squish, squish. I killed it

Mr. Fluffy: You spider murderer!

He knew I would kill it. Spiders and I get along fine as long as they stay out of my territory. If they wander into my territory they are free game.

Wednesday, March 6, 2013

My Black Ops battle chatter

I don't know how many of you have actually played any of the Call of Duty series, but I love them. My favorite ones so far are the Black Ops games. I seriously have way too much fun on these games. My father and niece say that I'm a bit bloodthirsty and the kids know that is mommy's special time and not to disturb me. 

Mr. Fluffy and I were playing one day and decided to make our own battle chatter based on the game's chatter. Battle chatter, for those of you who haven't played, is something called out by your character while running around and shooting people.  It isn't something you control yourself, it is controlled by the environment and what is happening in the game at the time. A good example would be when one player with a sniper rifle is seen by another player on the opposing team, their guy will yell out "Sniper!" very loudly to alert all the nearby players. The actual player doesn't have to do anything to trigger this other than sight the sniper. Most of the time I ignore the battle chatter. Sometimes though, you can't help but laugh at it. 


Yep just like that


In the first Black Ops, there is a faction called The Vietnam People's Army. Keep in mind this game takes place during World War II. Part of the battle chatter is "Tao thấy nó!", which apparently means "I see him". It does not at all sound like it looks. For the longest time, Mr. Fluffy and I thought they were yelling out "You die now!". So we often yell it out when playing the game. 

Our new favorite happened by boredom. We were playing the new Black Ops 2 and my character just happened to spot an enemy player. I was completely giggle ridden when he yelled out "Enemy with weapon!". Now yes I know they were trying to keep the battle chatter authentic and this is probably something said quite often by real soldiers but I couldn't help but yell out, "Oh my gosh! Enemy with a weapon? What else would he have? A cupcake?" I then proceeded to constantly yell out every time "Enemy with cupcake!" Needless to say, Mr.Fluffy was having a hard time playing because he was laughing too much. 

Now pair my own brand of battle chatter with how I can't help but talk crap to the game and you may get an inkling why Mr. Fluffy wants to secretly record me (and why I am not allowed a headset). 

Tuesday, March 5, 2013

Comments and love

I know I don't have many readers as of yet, but I am grateful to those of you who are reading me and please feel free to leave comments and any advice that you want. I do want to hear from any of you and hopefully get better at this.

Friday, March 1, 2013

Just a little fun

Sometimes the funnest part of my job is using this and imagining I am beheading tiny little people.

Attack of the Slime!

I bet some of you think I chose the name Little Gamer Mommy to be cute. Well I was being quite literal. I'm not little as in toothpick proportions, I am short. 5'3" to be exact. Being short has its pros and cons. Such as, I can't reach things on the top shelf of the cabinet, but I don't have to worry about knocking my head on a door frame. I don't like heights, so being short is a blessing. Sometimes though, being short can be a real bummer, as I learned this morning.

We have two TV sets set up at our entrances at work. They have been showing people how to put on a mask for months now.
This thing is like three feet taller than I am. The top of my head comes to the bottom of the TV
My boss has tasked me with making sure these are running every morning. The DVD player is in the back behind the TV  This presents a problem as I have to scroll through some stuff to choose the right program so i need to see the TV as well as point the remote at the DVD player. You can probably see where this is going. See that white thing on the side? That is an automatic hand sanitizer dispenser. You stick your hand under and get a handful of gloopy sanitizer in your palm. My usual routine in the mornings is to use my left hand to point at the DVD player while precariously balancing around so I can see the screen of the TV. This morning however, I just wasn't getting a good look so I leaned in a bit towards the whole set up. 

The first thing I heard was the mechanical fart sound of the dispenser. My brain however, still being caffeine deprived this early, didn't register what this actually meant until I felt a cold, wet slime puddle in the crook of my elbow and start sliding down my arm. I had hugged so close to the dispenser that I had actually put my arm under the sensor and set it off. 

Now I know that it was just hand sanitizer and that it wasn't going to hurt me, but I dare you to glob a handful of that in the crook of your elbow first thing in the morning and see how well you deal with it. My reaction was to cry out in surprise and then let out a very fluent string of curse words while my boss sat back and giggled his butt off. Don't worry, I will get him back for that. He knows it too, that is why he is now avoiding me. Oh and yes, it did occur to me afterwards that I could just roll it away from the wall and go around the other side, but you know it's that whole path of least resistance thing.


P.S. There is nothing that can cheer you up like seeing a big burly biker come in and have to use one of your frilly rose pens to fill out his forms. : )