Am I Wearing Pants, and Other Irrational Fears

Between sleeping with two small dogs who have to pee before the sun comes out, and the fact that I have the bladder of an 80 year old, I'm up between 5:30am and 6:00am most days.  Either I'm getting up to pee, or the dogs need to go out.  It's a damn urination fest at my house during the wee hours of the morning.

Rarely do I fall back asleep.  I use to grab a cup of coffee and take it back to bed with me. I'd sip my Hawaiian Dark Roast, and do some reading while the dogs would go back to sleep.  These days I drag my ass to the gym, and the dogs go back to sleep because they are lazy and lack discipline.

They aren't morning pups.

I'm not sure what the name is for my irrational fear.  I'm sure there is some clinical name for it.  Kind of like how "Arachnophobia" is the fear of spiders, or "Amathophobia" is a fear of dust.  That's a real thing by the way.  Hmmm maybe my irrational fear isn't so bad after all. 

When I leave the house early, and I'm tired, I become convinced that I'm not wearing any pants.  I arrive at the gym, jump on the elliptical and spend the first 15 minutes checking and rechecking that I have pants on.

This is the conversation I had with myself just this morning, for the first 15 minutes I was on the elliptical at the gym:

"Crap it's hot in here, they should really open the door. Shit do I have pants on?

God I love Joan Jett's music, I wonder if she is still alive? OMG do I have pants on?

I should really Instagram a photo of that flag in the parking lot. I have pants on right?

Wow this row of machines cleared out fast. Shit, is it because I'm not wearing pants!"

This goes on and on for about 15 minutes, which seems to be how long it takes me to calm the heck down, return to sanity and be confident that I do in fact have pants on.

I don't have a logical explanation for this fear, which is probably why it's referred to as an irrational fear.  If there was a logical explanation it wouldn't be irrational.  I've had nightmares about showing up naked in grocery stores, maybe that has something to do with it.  I'm trying to talk my sister into asking her therapist about it.  Lana is getting tired of having to address my issues with her therapist.  She knows I have crapy health insurance. She needs to just take one for the team and address this with a mental health professional so we can get to the bottom of it.

Maybe it's just because I don't like to wear pants?"  If I could spend the warmer months wearing one of the Stud Muffin's XL t-shirts, I'd be a happy camper.  I've taken to wearing summer dresses around the house because I got tired of hearing "Mom put some pants on my friends are over!" from the kids.

Even the pups give me crap about not wearing pants around the house.  Their look here says it all.

Bitch please put some pants on!

Surely I'm not the only one with such an irrational fear.  What's yours?

Who is Your Celebrity Boyfriend or Girlfriend?

I realized this morning that I had three bottles of Kraft dressing in my pantry closet.  I don't eat Kraft dressing. I only bought it to support my newest boyfriend, the Zesty guy.

This hunka, hunka is number 3 on my"Celebrity Boyfriend" list, behind Joe Manganiello from True Blood who is number 1, and my favorite little person Peter Dinklage from Game of Thrones who is number 2.  The Zesty guy and I have only had a thing for a short time, which is why he is number 3.

My celebrity boyfriends in order.

My significant other isn't bothered by my celebrity boyfriends because he doesn't think I have a shot and I'm crazy. Today I reminded him that stranger things have happened.  The Zesty guy could wake up tomorrow and say "I have an insatiable need to be with a 42 year old Hawaiian mother of three who snorts when she laughs, and eats pop tarts in bed!"  Ya just never know.

He is not a jealous man.  Sometimes it would be nice if was, even if just a touch. After letting him know Zesty guy is number 3 on my celebrity boyfriend list he says,

"Wait, he is behind Peter Dinklage, the midget?"

Me: "First off it's dwarf or little person, you are so offensive. Yes, he is behind Peter because we are just starting out."

Him: "You have psychological problems."

Me: "Well, duh!"

Now I'm on a mission to sleep with Joe Manganiello, Peter Dinklage or the Zesty guy just to prove my point.  When Joe Manganiello is helping me out of my spanx,  or the Zesty guy is ripping off my granny panties, then we will see who the crazy one is!

Do you have a celebrity boyfriend or girlfriend?

Mommalicious Takes to the Sky and Sets a Record!

Several weeks ago Excelsior-Lake Minnetonka Chamber of Commerce Director Laura Hotvet, asked me if I would go up in a stunt plane with stunt pilot Michael Wiskus of Lucas Oil Air Shows.  Laura has known me for a couple of years and knew to ask me at a party when I had been drinking.  My love of red wine and committing to crazy acts of insanity seem to go hand in hand.

Michael Wiskus is the stunt pilot doing the air show during the upcoming Lake Minnetonka 4th of July festivities.  He has been flying for a couple of decades and has over 24,000 flying hours.  Winkus does full-time air shows March through November all over the country.

Keep in mind that I'm afraid of heights and I get motion sickness.  I don't go on roller coasters, I don't climb tall ladders, I'm the furthest thing from a thrill seeking daredevil as you can get.  I don't even like to drive up steep hills.  To say that going up in the air with a stunt pilot is outside the box for me, would be a huge understatement.

My producer Chris Vogt from the "Out and About" Community TV show I do for the Lake Minnetonka area, was also coming and going up in the stunt plane before me. Local photographer Susan Craig came along to document the craziness.  Susan is quite the thrill seeker.  The woman has jumped out of planes, gone deep sea fishing and more.  She should have been the one going up in the plane.  My sister Lana tagged along too.  She came mainly to see if I chickened out or threw up, true sisterly support.

Despite my fears and anxiety, my plan going into this was to remain calm, cool and collected and look cute while doing it.  What actually occurred couldn't have been further from what I had envisioned.  When you hit "play" make sure there aren't any kids around who can read lips.,

After we landed Wiskus told me that in all the years he has done this, he had never  heard such a long string of F bombs being dropped during a loop.  At least I set a record for something.  I was like Linda Blair in the Exorcist.  I stopped just short of puking up pea soup, or having my head spin around.  I had taken one dose of Dramamine, which is probably the only reason I didn't toss my cookies.  Winkus said  only about 1 in 20 people throw up.

Dont' get me wrong, there were parts of the flight that were amazingly beautiful.  Mostly the parts when we flew straight and parralel to the Earth, where I could take in the sights.  For a bit I thought "Well, this isn't too bad." Oh how wrong I was.

Lana, Stunt Pilot Michael Wiskus and me "before".
Photo by: Susan Craig Austin

   

If you look closely you can see me begging for rescue with my face against the glass.
Photo by: Susan Craig Austin

Straight on up.
Photo by Susan Craig Austin

At one point I was wondering why I couldn't hear Winkus over the headset. It wasn't till we landed and chatted that I realized I couldn't hear him because of my own screaming.  At one point I could hear "Relax, relax, I need you to relax."  After we landed he said I had grabbed the controls while we were in a loop.  What happened was I had slammed my thighs together with the control stick between them, and tensed up like a man about to get a Prostate exam.

In this video we go straight up a couple of times. At about the 45 second mark you can hear some kind of alarm going off, which didn't help to calm me down.

All in all, I'm thankful for the experience and I'm amazed that I followed through with it.  I'm in awe of the talents of Michael Wiskus and his team at West Metro Aviation and Lucas Oil Air Shows.  If you live in the Twin Cities area be sure to check out an event they are having on June 16th called "Fly In and Breakfast".  They will have airplane and helicopter rides, along with a pancake breakfast.  More details can be found at www.WestMetroAviation.com 

Don't miss the Lucas Oil Air Show at the Lake Minnetonka 4th of July celebration on of course, the 4th of July in Excelsior.  More details of what else to expect that day at "Lake Minnetonka 4th of July".

Now I'm off to Sunu Wellness Center for some much needed Chiropractic care.  With all my tensing up and screaming, I'm pretty sure I popped a rib out of place.

Bitch, I'm Hawaiian and I'm Fabulous!

Today I had a very bizarre experience.  I went to a local make-up store, I won't say which one. It's one of those stand alone larger ones.  I'd never been there before, but my friend Julie Swenson, who is also an amazing make-up artist, recommended a product I thought I could find there.

I couldn't remember the name of the product.  I'm having to combat not just wrinkles, but CRS syndrome, "Can't Remember Shit" syndrome.  I approached the first employee I saw and asked her if she could point me in the direction of products which would help minimize or conceal the dark circles under my eyes. The woman looked at me and said "Your dark circles are hereditary because of your dark skin."  Her attitude seemed to be that there is nothing we can do about it, due to my dark skin and all.

Now, I know for fact that something can be done about it because I've worked with multiple make-up artist who do a great job covering up those dark circles.  The woman had nothing left to offer, and quite frankly left me kind of stunned by her attitude of, we can't help you.

So, I turned to another employee nearby and said the same thing to her.  She took me over to a line of products, which she thought may be helpful.  Everything would have been fine, except she looks at me and says "Your wrinkles are because of all the tanning you must do.  You look like you do a lot of tanning."

Excuse me?  This woman just assumed that I must spend hours at a tanning salon because I wasn't as fair skinned as she was.  I'm darker than most Minnesotans, but I'm far from looking like that crazy, leathery "Tan Mom" woman.

My sister Lana and I. I'm in the grey.

 I looked at her and said, "I'm dark because I'm Hawaiian.  20 minutes in the sun and I get darker. I don't do "tons of tanning", I'm multiracial.  Additionally, I think the fact that I'm 42 years old has more to do with the wrinkles that I'm here to address."

She was making an assumption, never considering that I may be dark because of my nationality or in my case nationalities.  I was born and raised in Hawaii and I'm Hawaiian, Chinese, American Indian, Portuguese, Scotch and Irish.  Hawaiian being my dominate nationality.  I don't think either of the women were trying to be mean.  In truth, I think they were both just incredibly ignorant.

Running into one ignorant person at a business like this would be one thing, but two of them?  For a minute I thought I was probably on one of those hidden camera shows and Chris Hanson from Dateline was going to jump out.  Not the case, they were just two ignorant women who shouldn't be working at a make-up store.

This incident reminded me of something similar that happened to a good friend of mine.  She is half German and half African American, she is truly stunning.  She did a pageant and received her judges feedback afterwards.  One judge wrote "Too tan".  Seriously? Yes, it was all over her bio that she was multiracial and this idiot judge no doubt took away points because she was "too tan".

People are not just black, white, asian, or hispanic.  When filling out paperwork requiring me to check a box for race, I could pick a few: Pacific Islander, Asian, or Caucasian, sometimes all of the above.  No one box describes what I am anymore than one personality trait can describe who I am.

Recently General Mills put out a commercial with a mixed race couple with a multiracial child.  The dad is African American, and the mom is white. I greatly applaud this!  It's about dang time.

I purchased two items and went to my car.  There were tears in my eyes as I tried to make sense of what had happened and my own feelings about it. I realized that the comments, assumptions and looks of disapproval by those two women made me feel somehow wrong for being what I was.

Looking at myself in my rearview mirror, I realized that I'm lucky to come from a line of people who chose to love each other despite race, or cultural differences.  People from six different parts of the globe came together to eventually create my family.  I wiped away my tears, gave myself a smile and said out loud "Bitch, I'm Hawaiian and I'm fabulous!"

My sister and I with our Dad back home in Hawaii

Kamikaze Squirrels and Visits From the Dead

Lately I've been sleeping fairly deeply. I'd like to think that it's because I'm at such a peaceful place in my life, but in truth it's probably due to my use of Benadryl to combat my allergies.  Once in awhile I remember my dreams, at least for a bit after I wake up.

The other night I had a doozie of a dream.  I posted it on Facebook when I woke up so I wouldn't forget it.  First, each time I came and went from my car in my cul-de-sac, large flying squirrels would swoop down and try to attack me and whoever I was with.  For some reason I wasn't parking in my driveway, but in the cul-de-sac closer to my neighbors house.  An odd choice as it gave the flying squirrels more time to attack me.

They looked like this but bigger

Don't be fooled by how cute these creatures may look.  Trust me, when they are dive bombing your head like the Japanese at Pearl Harbor, it's scary.  Once I made it to my house I went to my backyard.  My deceased mother was there.  At first I assumed I was seeing a ghost.  She told me that her death was faked by the government and she had been in a witness protection program for the last 19 months.

She insisted that she was there for real and was not a ghost.  My sister came over and saw her too, as did a few other people who I can't remember.  We realized she was telling the truth and was real.  I woke up before I could find out why my mom was in the witness protection program.  In hindsight I should have asked her that right away.  I mean, she really had to have seen some shit go down to leave her family and fake her own death for 19 months.

After a day of trying to analyze my dream with friends, and via various dream analysis websites, I think I figured out what it all means.  By the way, dreams of being attacked by flying squirrels are not as uncommon as you might think.

My mom's birthday is in a little over a week.  Since she died in October of 2011 I've broken down on each birthday, Mother's Day, anniversary of her death, my first birthday without her etc.  We were very close.  She is one of the few people who really got me.  She use to say "You can't fool me. I know you better than you know yourself."  She also often said "What the hell is wrong with you!?" But, that was usually after I played some kind of prank on her, like the time I threw fake dog shit at her, which she thought was from her dog, or the time I put magnetic bullet holes all over her car and convinced her gang bangers had shot it up.

A few weeks ago I decided that for her birthday, anniversary of her death, Mother's Day, my birthday or any significant date that reminds me of her, where I might loose it, that I would do something that scared me.  Some kind of bucket list item that I wouldn't want to do because I was scared, or afraid of trying for fear of peeing myself in public.


I'm deathly afraid of heights. When I'm on an airplane I pretend we are still on the ground. I can barely climb a ladder.  On June 11th I'm going up in a stunt plane with stunt pilot Michael Wiskus of Lucas Oil Air Shows.  Here is a little video to give you a taste of what he does.

I've known about this for a few weeks now, and I've been stressing about it.  It's obvious that the Kamikaze flying Squirrels in my dream represent going up in the stunt plane and my fears attached to it. My mom showing up represents my mom, whose birthday is only days away.  So, it all kind of makes sense now.

Though I feel comfortable with my dream analysis, I'm going to have my sister run it by her therapist just to be on the safe side.  I'll be sure to share the experience with all of you.  I have faith, and am pretty certain my safety will be assured.  In the unlikely event that something happens to me, please remind my sister to go clear out the top right drawer by my bed.

My Quest to Rescue North American Dwarfs

Some of you may have received a couple of odd text messages from me over the last few days.  First let me start with saying I am NOT creating a non-profit nor a 5K to benefit North American Dwarfs.  For two days I was sick at home, fighting the latest plague that my 14 year old son brought home.

For some reason I react strangely to certain cold medicines, often resulting in me coming up with strange ideas, which I'm convinced I must share with the masses.  It's one of the reasons I've always stayed away from drugs.  I shudder to think what cocaine or LSD would do to me.

The worst of my cold med induced craziness occurred on Wednesday.  While in a semi coma on the couch I decided to get caught up on a few episodes of Game of Thrones, which I think played a key part in my unhinged text messages.  Now track with me, as this will all tie in and make sense.

Though I've always had a weakness for tall men, there is one man short in stature who I think is incredibly sexy.  That man is Peter Dinklage, and he is in Game of Thrones.

Peter Dinklage

I know that sounds odd coming from the woman who only watches basketball to see the tall hotties getting all sweaty.  For whatever reason, Dinklage floats my boat and is number two on my "Hall Pass Cheat List".  My Hall Pass Cheat List is a list of men who the significant other will allow me to sleep with if the opportunity ever arises.  I'm pretty sure he only agreed to this because he is convinced my chances are slim to none.

Number one on my Hall Pass Cheat List is True Blood actor Joe Manganiello.  Quite the difference between the two.  Manganiello is 6' 5", Dinklage is 4' 5".  I can't explain it, the lust wants, what the lust wants.

Joe Manganiello

Anyways I digress, back to my crazy text about saving North American Dwarfs.  The combination of being hopped up on cold medicine while watching Game of Thrones, along with a dash of my own brand of mental illness, resulted in me becoming convinced that something needed to be done to improve the plight of North American dwarfs.  When you think about it, it all kind of makes sense.

It would appear my significant other took the brunt of my texting outburst.  Thankfully he was smart enough to have our son hide my phone at one point, which was good because I was about to post a video making a plea for support in my new endeavor to save North American Dwarfs.

So again, my apologies to anyone who was on the receiving end of my craziness.  I'd also like to make a special apology to the little people/dwarf community, who do not need me to rescue them.  I'm definitely going to have my sister talk this all over with her therapist.  You may recall that because I lack decent health insurance I often provide my sister with a list of issues to go over with her therapist.

Sexy Siren or Deranged Nut Job?

Yesterday I had an "incident" which reminded me that I'm more goofball Lucile Ball than I am sex pot Sophia Vergara, though this fact does not stop me from finding and trying new ways to explore my sexuality.

Sophia Vergara Vs. Lucille Ball

At 42 I'm way more comfortable with who I am today, over who I was at 22, which is why I think I'm not afraid to try new ways of expressing myself, despite the mishaps that often occur as a result.  Today I'm going to share with you my three most memorable mishaps in my attempts at being sexy, which resulted in me being more Lucille than Sophia.


1. Sexy hair or concussion?

Let's start with what occurred yesterday, which got me thinking about all this.  I was working on an upcoming column at my desk when my significant other walked into the room.  I thought it would look super sexy if I flipped my head and hair forward, whipped it back so it looked all full and luxurious, then gave him a sultry look.

Instead, when I flipped my head forward I hit it on the desk.  He yells "Oh my God are you okay!" I start laughing despite my throbbing head.

2. Did I just give myself crabs?

Once upon a time a long time ago in a suburban cul-de-sac in the Lake Minnetonka community, there was a woman who decided to do her own landscaping, down there.  This is before I discovered how much better it is to wax than shave.  There are reasons why people go to school to learn how to do this.

After spending a creative 15 minutes in the shower with a razor and soap (I know horrible mistake!), I thought I had done a pretty good job cleaning up the baby making area.  I was going to surprise the Stud Muffin with my new look, but by the time he got home the itching and irritation was so bad, I thought I had somehow given myself crabs.

It was three days before I found the right mix of hydrocortisone and aloe to calm things down enough to not be scratching at my crotch in public.  Lesson learned, a professional waxer is your friend.

3. Come here often?

So I'm sitting in my car parked at the longest stoplight in the Western Suburbs.  I was twirling my gum around my left finger as I often do when I'm trying to do math in my head.  I think I was trying to figure out if I was having ovulation pains or gas pains, so I was counting back the days from the first day of my last period.

Out of the corner of my eye I notice my favorite kind of driver on my left, the tall dark and handsome kind, and in a BMW convertible to boot.  I do the classic touch my hair and brush it out of my face on my left side, using my left hand, turning my head slightly to get a better look, maybe even give him a little eyebrow raise and smile.

What ended up happening is the damn gum was attached to my finger still, so I of course ended up tangling into my long hair.  I should have just quietly sat there pretending to lean on my hand, but no.  I yell "Shit" and start pulling at my hair, which only attached the gum more firmly.  Mr. tall, dark and handsome gave me a confused look before the light finally turned green, and he drove off. I'm sure with the way I was clawing at my own head I looked like a crazed woman doing battle with a headful of lice.

Personally I think being sexy has more to do with being comfortable with yourself, Lucile Ball moments and all.  At 22 these things would have mortified me.  At 42, I know that things get better with practice.