The Ways In Which I Have Been Wronged This Weekend

This has been one of those LONG weekends... not the restful kind... the kind that starts off on the wrong foot and you never recover, you just keep limping along and crashing about hoping it will be over soon.

Part One:
On Friday evening I had to head over to the airport to pick up my niece. I had to be there in time to get an "unaccompanied minor" gate pass and get all the way though security and to her gate by 6:20. Kid got out of dance at 5:05. I forgot my cell phone so had to double back to the house adding an extra 10 minutes on to the trek. So now it is 5:15 and I have to get on the highway during rush hour traffic to drive the 30 minutes or so to the airport. (Now it is important to remember that I have both kids with me.) I get to the airport at 5:50. I park in short-term parking and start to unload the kids. I'm more than a little stressed because I can't be late and I still have to get both kids into the airport through to the check-in and through security and I don't even have half an hour to go. I get out my bag and realize that I have Kid's medicine... which is a gel... and we don't have tickets because we're not flying we're just getting gate passes. Ugh... what to do?!? I decide I have to have it and hope it isn't going to be an issue. I make Kid run... she insists on running in a shuffle which is more than a little annoying... and we get to the terminal.

Now it just so happens that when I got there they actually had an "unaccompanied minors" lane and I got right up to the counter... and I had the nicest most cooperative check-in lady of all time. Here is the problem: when they updated my niece's ticket with my name they didn't put it in the computer so NWA doesn't have a record stating I'm allowed to pick her up. It is 6 PM. The only thing they can do is wait for the plane to land and then call the gate agent and see if the updated info is with my niece. Well there isn't anything we can do but wait. I'm a little worried about my niece not being met at the gate right away but at least someone would know I was there.... right? Okay we wait... and wait... and wait. The plane lands but no one answers the gate phone. My niece waits. Baby, who has now been strapped into either her carseat or her stroller for the past hour and forty-five minutes, is losing it and I haven't even attempted the whole security nightmare.

Finally they get clearance for me to go ahead. It is 6:45. Now I have to get both kids through security. You all know the drill.... shoes off... strollers folded... medicine searched... shoes on... stroller unfolded... etc. Gate C35.... let me see.... Gate C35..... I am not kidding when I tell you this is literally the furthest gate (of course). You actually have to walk through a tunnel to another terminal and then to the VERY END of the terminal. Please remember that I have two tired kids with me and that it is dinner time and that Kid has to walk the whole way... um... I mean run. It took us 15 minutes to get to the gate. I'm trying to verify this but I think it had to have been at least a mile. We got there just as they were about to take my niece to a "holding room". Thirty -five minutes later we were back at the car.... another 45 and I was finally home tired, stressed, and starving. I spent 3 hours trekking through an airport with two little kids by myself (including security) and didn't even get a vacation out of it....what a way to start the weekend!

Part Two:
A little later Friday evening while walking around with her little bare tushie out (what else is new?) Baby had an accident of sorts. It turns out that one really can eat too many raisins. And the results were....well... disgusting. Because you see it seems that the raisins resulted in something akin to anal leakage (I'm sorry about this I really am) and she was apparently unaware that anything was going on and proceeded to march around the house spreading ooze and rehydrated raisins in her wake... including down the heating vents:

Let's just say that Q-tips were involved and that it was a laborious task.


Part Three:
On Saturday afternoon... after wrestling Baby to sleep for over a freaking an hour!... I headed to Target for some needed supplies (Unisom). While I was there I picked out some new sandals for the girls. This is no easy task since Kid has some kind of tightness OCD... Nomar Garciapara style... when it comes to shoes. She cannot tolerate any looseness. Shopping with her is akin to sticking your finger into one of those old-fashioned fans... it won't kill you... but it will hurt like a hell. It has taken me a few years but I no longer let her shop with me. I pick out what I think will work and then bring that pair home for her to try. When they don't work I return them and try again. I'm wrong 75% of the time but I avoid the tantrums and fallout that occurs when she has to try on more than one pair. Well on this particular day I saw a pair of really cute sandals... and they had them in Baby's size as well.

The thing is Kid likes her shoes TIGHT... but there is a very fine line between tight and too small. Last years sandals were a size 10. Her feet are bigger... but... by the end of the summer those sandals had stretched and were too loose. I'd like a 10.5 but of course they have a 10 or an 11. I debate this for a considerable amount of time and then bring the 10 home. She puts them on. She loves them. She loves that they match "Sissy's". She tightens them. She re-tightens them. She stands up. I notice that her foot pretty much takes up every millimeter of the foot bed... but whatever they are her feet. She says she wants to keep them. I ask her to be sure. She is. I cut off the tags. An hour later we get ready to go to a party and I ask her to put her shoes on. She then informs me that they are "too tight" and that she won't wear them. I want to bludgeon her with those stupid shoes. This is the 2nd time this has happened in the last few months and sure they are only $12 shoes but it really pisses me off. Mr F butted in that we can just return them... not once we've cut all the tags off!

Part Four:
Having barely recovered from the shoe trauma I quickly clean up after some stuff before we head out the door. I pull the cap off a marker and it explodes it's marker juice all over the dining room and all over my shirt. Perfect. Now (and I should note that we were already over an hour late for this party) I have to wash out my shirt and find a new one.

Part Five:
Apres party we decided to check out a new grocery store on that side of town. It is kind of like Whole Foods but locally owned. Why people.... why would I think shopping with my whole family... including Mr ADD was a good idea... at dinner time!?!?! Kid was immediately losing it and Mr F was off wandering about the store when all I wanted to do was to scope it out quickly for price comparison purposes and go home. Mr F felt the need to keep telling me everything they had in the store and say things like "Did you check the diapers?" No I did not check the diapers! Mind your own beeswax Mr F! I would never buy diapers here! I don't know why but shopping with him makes me want to shoot myself. He has no clue how to shop efficiently (nor does he have any freaking clue what is or isn't a "good" price) and he meanders all about... meanwhile I was just like "we have to get out of here before this trip explodes in my face!"

Then Kid starts asking me for sushi. I'm just going to say straight up that she had been really annoying and I did not feel like getting her sushi. We would have been home in 5 minutes and I had food to make for dinner already. But Mr F had shown her the sushi and was encouraging the matter... fine... way over-priced in my opinion but FINE... we're out of here. We get in the car. I open up the sushi container so she can stop freaking whining about how hungry she is and hand it to her. Not one second later she is flailing about in her booster and... and....AND... the fucking sushi is all over the back seat of the damn car. The overpriced sushi, I didn't even want to get her, is now all over the floor and she is pitching a fit. I just wanted to slam all the doors and march back into the store grab a giant cinnamon bun and shove my face into it! But I didn't. I drove home telling Mr F: "Next time I think I want to go grocery shopping with the whole family at dinner time remind me that I don't want to!"... and then I made dinner.

The end for now....