The thing I love best about wearing glasses again after a long time off is that I acquire depth perception, which I sorely lack without glasses, and my first day or so is spent tripping up stairs, swaying into walls and almost but not quite throwing up all day.  It’s like riding the Tilt-A-Whirl, without all the Britney Spears and the whiplash.

Even better?  Getting your eyes dilated the day before.  Did you know they don’t give you those superfly glasses anymore?  They don’t.  They “suggest” you don’t drive and send you out into the world with your three kids, your husband, a mall on clearance sale, and the vision of a vampire bat.

You know what you should never attempt to do while dilated?  Walk around the mall.  Walk period, for that matter. Oh, and trying to watch after three kids at once?  Will make you barf.  But the good thing is this: You can’t see the price tag on your new frames, or the tears in your husband’s eyes when he hands over the credit card.  Don’t ask, don’t tell baby.

You know what else you shouldn’t ever attempt whilst dilated?  Talking to anyone you know at the mall, especially if that anyone happens to be the former PTA president and his whole family.  Really especially if it’s the same former PTA president who also happens to be the local church minister and the guy who’s face you shoved your boobs into last year.

Because as hard as you’ve tried since your porno-table-dance night to say not two unnecessary words to that man or his family, you’ll find yourself stuttering and stammering in the paper towel aisle of the drug store and then you’ll inevitably say, “And, um, yeah…just got my eyes dilated.  I’m totally not cracked out on drugs or anything, promise!” right in front of his two precious little children and his one saintly wife.

And then you might just die.  At least hindsight is 20/20.

Those are two of my children. They are at the doctor. Why do I care? Because the last time one of them saw a doctor, she looked a little more like this:

Yeah, it’s been 2 years and 4 months. The whys are too complicated to even begin getting into, so you’ll just have to trust me. I had a reason. That reason no longer applies. And we have some catching up to do.

Her baby book is empty on the pages for height and weight, though quite full on the ER visits, so I’ll call that a wash.  I’ve just figured that if she outgrows clothes on a regular timeline, she must be doing okay, right?  The one thing that I can’t reconcile is her immunizations.  Those are way behind, and it sucks hard when you get way behind.

You know what happens when you go 2 years and 4 months without immunizing your child, and the one time you do when she’s one year old it’s under ever so shady circumstances and there are no records anywhere of what shots she actually had?  Your doctor tells you to come back when she’s 12.

Or your newly found Canadian doctor will decide that he’s just repeating her 18 month shots.  ALL OF THEM.  There are 3 that he can’t repeat if she got them at 12 months, because of course Canada and the US have different immunization schedules.  What is a 12 month shot in the US is by no means necessarily a Canadian 12 month shot.  That’s just what I need, more complication.

The nice thing is that since I haven’t taken her to a doctor for 2/3 of her life, she doesn’t know that doctors stick things into you, and she thought that going to the doctor was just as much fun as going to Disneyland.

Poor thing had no clue what was coming.  Look how excited she was.  Until the doctor gave her a flu shot, a measles shot, and a couple more shots that I just can’t remember.  What I can remember is the screaming.  My boys were totally used to shots by the time they were three.  They flinched, they got their popsicle and we were on our way.  This baby?  Screamed like I have NEVER seen her scream before.  My heart?  Broke into 8 million pieces for her.

He wasn’t being seen that day, and WOW was he happy about it.  The doctor totally snuck a flu shot in on him when he wasn’t looking, though.  Spreading the joy, that’s what christmas is all about.

So everyone got an injection, my girl came home with a small case of the measles, and this is what we were up to at 11:45pm a few nights later.

That’s a Tylenol bribe.  A “Please child, for the love of god and all that’s holy, take some medicine so you can sleep already” bribe.  It didn’t really work, but now she knows that Tylenol gets her treats and that one in the morning is a super fun time to be awake until, and I know that I will never, ever skip another shot again for as long as we all shall live.

Guess who has the most awesome blog readers in the whole wide blogosphere?  I do, that’s who.

You guys are really, extraordinarily good at making complete asses of yourselves.  Really, I am in awe.  And I have to give someone that (fast as) Lightening Online t-shirt for making the biggest faux pas (which I will always pronounce as Foe Pahs, thanks to my darling step-mother, who thinks that’s really how you say it.  Maybe she should get the shirt.)

In true, blond, Pisces me fashion, I find myself unable to pick a winner, so I’m leaving it up to y’all to decide.  I have narrowed it down to 3 categories, with two entries in each:

In the Menstrual Disaster category:

Mutha, who was asked at the UHaul counter to show her receipt.  (I’ll admit, this one’s my favorite.)

I checked my pockets. Nothing. I went to my car and didn’t find it. Suddenly, I remember where I had put it. It was in my purse, which I had left on the counter. I ran into the store yelling, “I know where it is!” I reached into my purse, saw the pink paper, shouted, “Here it is!” and pulled it out with a flourish.

There, dangling onto the end of it, was a maxi pad, which had somehow gotten stuck to the corner of the receipt.

Ahem. It wasn’t fresh, I had wrapped it in TP, because the rest room didn’t have a trash can and you can’t flush those things.

Special K, who had the quintessential junior high slasher chick nightmare happen to her.

OK In the 6th grade I was the first girl to start her period. It was a horribly heavy non stop thing I finally had to get shots to stop it. They gave me some hospital ones, you know, the ones after you have a baby? Except I didn’t have a baby and I was 11 years old.

The boys in my class found them, stuck scotch tape on the backs of them just to stick them ON THE HALL WALL SPELLING MY FIRST NAME!!!!!!!!

In the Poop category:

DCUrbanDad, who is really lucky she married him later.

Had an unfortunate sharting accident in college whilst trying to impress the ladies in college.

Was actually heading to the library with my now wife for an all night exam cram session.

Had to let one out after a dinner of enchiladas. I thought it was going to be fairly benign but boy was I wrong.

Ended up going commando the rest of the evening and threw my boxers away in the men’s room.

Secret Agent Mama, who shit in a ditch once. Seriously.  More noteworthy; On her honeymoon.

“STOP THE FUCKING CAR!” I screamed.

He pulled over with diligence. I scanned the backseat, spotted and picked up a random towel, opened the door, and in one huge leap I was down in the swamp ditch with my jean shorts around my ankles, relieving myself. I didn’t care that I could be attacked by a gator. I didn’t care that there could be any poisonous plants. I didn’t care that a snake might bite me. I just didn’t care about anything, other than pooping, at that very moment. I dumped, I wiped, and I left the nasty towel. I wiped my brow and my upper lip, both of which were sweat drenched. When I looked at Michael, once I got back into the car, I saw this look of sheer, utter amusement on his face.

“Shut! Up! And, I swear Michael, if you tell ANYONE about this, I will divorce you,” I quipped confidently.

Oh, he told everyone.  EVERYONE.  And as luck would have it, every woman in Secret Agent Mama’s entire family has done this on their honeymoon.

In the Just Awesomely Stupid category:

Mrs F, who set out to walk with her newborn baby about a mile to a friends house.

When number one son was a few weeks old, I was running round to a friend’s house for coffee (also new mother). Remember those paranoias you used to have? About forgetting the baby? So, before I left the house I had a little mental checklist: Keys? Yep. Diaper bag? Yep? Baby? Got it. Looked in the hall mirror – Mascara? Wow yes.

Friend greeted me with snorts of laughter and “Think you forgot something?”. Ran through mental checklist….. nope, got everything.

Except clothes. Utterly naked from the waist down. Naturally, I had shoes on.

Matt’s is really long, but I can’t find a good way to edit it.  He’s on a treadmill, at a crowded gym, watching the Waco, Texas stuff going down on the TV, when….

I jerked my attention back as my left foot ran off the left edge of the motorized belt. Immediately my right foot tried to correct from the rapid change in speed and my ankle rolled a bit. My entire body was lurched back and I panicked. Without thinking I grabbed ahold of the little handrail in front of me, but it was too late. I heard a collective gasp from the hundreds of people watching behind me as my body laid itself out, white knuckles gripping the bar, legs and feet outstretched behind me, dragging on the treadmill with toes pointed. My shoes made a deafening “BRAP BRAP BRAP BRAP” sound as they dragged on the treadmill, capturing the attention of the few people who were not watching at this point.

My body gave up and I let go. My chin slammed onto the belt and I was jettisoned back off the machine into a large rack of dumbells with a loud crash. My face flushed and my heart raced as people begin to laugh. In an attempt to salvage what was left of my dignity, I quickly and confidently scrambled to my feet and raced back to the treadmill, jumping onto it with gusto. The belt was still moving at the same speed that it had been when I had fallen off. I realized this a moment too late and begin leaning forward, flailing my arms wildly around in a large windmill pattern, trying to right myself. For some reason, my breath was coming out of me in loud grunts as I was doing this, like “UH, UH, UH, UH!” Another roar of laughter went up from the crowd. Eventually, I stabilized myself and continued to run, the eyes of a thousand laughing faces burning tiny holes into the back of my head.

And now it’s up to you.  Vote for your favorite, and the blogger with the top votes on Friday morning needs to send me their address.  Which I will use for evil.  *wink*

(If you’re reading this through a reader, I don’t think you’ll be able to see the awesome poll thingy. Click through to vote.)

I have, stashed in a little wooden box, sticky notes that my friends left on my windshield in high school.

There is a very good chance that my friend Chris and I are going to a show at the end of March. Correction: There is a good chance that I am tagging along behind my friend Chris to go to a show at the end of March. One of my favorite musicians is in town on the 26th and I saw on Chris’ Facebook page (I can’t believe I just said that) that he was going, and so I invited myself along.

I asked him where the show was.

He replied, “Dicks on Dicks*.”

Now, I can tell you where every single kid thing ever in downtown Vancouver is, I don’t know Thing One about adult stuff. I do know where the Five Star Titty Bar is, thanks to my darling man having two months here without me one summer. A boy’s gotta do what a boy’s gotta do, you know?

Point is, I know nothing about the bar scene downtown, but I do know this is a pretty progressive town, what with the pink bus stops and all, and so I thought nothing of a bar called Dicks on Dicks.

And so.

I googled.

Dicks on Dicks, Vancouver.

Fish and chips, scroll down, sporting goods, scroll down, BAM. There it is. What any idiot knew was there, but I didn’t.

Fuck you, Chris.**

*Richard’s bar on Richard’s street, FYI.