Natural Instincts

Summer is such a sexy season.  With all the dewy exposed skin, succulent fleshy fruits and temperamental thunderstorms, it's nearly impossible to deny your natural instincts.  Like drinking water to stay hydrated and not die of heatstroke.  Oh, and that other one too.

Sex. 

Not that I can remember the last time I actually had sex.  Though I think about it a lot, I have kids who completely ruin the mood.  Especially now that they're teenagers.  Because it's hard to be in the mood when you're pissed at your kid for that thing they did.  Again.  Why the hell do they keep doing that thing?  Or when you're worried because they're driving home from work late at night.  Or they're getting a ride home from a party from some friend that you don't know.  Or every kid is home and accounted for, but they don't go to bed until later than you because they wake up at noon.   And if you get caught doing it with your spouse in the privacy of your own home by your kids they'll be traumatized for life.  

Which might explain why I'm a little frustrated.

Which got me extra excited about going camping a couple weeks back.   The thought that my husband and I could get frisky in the tent.  Until I saw the size of the tent pad at the camp site.  Which required us to set up my daughters' tent right next to ours with a zero lot line.  Making it an even worse option than getting it on at home.  But a better option than when my kids have friends  sleep over.  Because what's even worse than the prospect of getting caught mid sex act by your own kid is getting caught by your kid's friend.  Especially, if it's the sheltered kid with the overprotective helicopter parents who haven't had the sex talk with them yet.

I know what you're thinking. 

Especially if you're a guy reading this.  Just do the deed first thing in the morning.  Conceptually, I understand the functionality of that.  And while I consider myself to have a fairly androgynous personality, I must say I'm kinda girly about sex.  Meaning, I need to feel kinda sexy to have sex.  And being awoken to the sound of my partner farting, laying on the wet spot that is my own drool on my pillow, with breath of an 18th century peasant doesn't make me feel like a Victoria's Secret model somehow.  Plus, this is when my daily asthma coughing fit is scheduled.  

I know what you're thinking.

You sometimes feel like a Victoria's Secret model?  No, I assure you I never do.  Also, I don't even shop at  Victoria's Secret.  Well, I used to, but just for the t-shirts really.  I'm more of a GAP body girl, cause I'm androgynous like that.  I know I went off on a tangent there and that what you were really thinking is what about a nooner?  I have four kids at least one of which is always home at noon complaining about how bored they are. Which is a real effective birth control by the way.  Not that you need birth control when you're not actually having any sex.   

   

So I guess I'll have to wait until the kids go back to school when I force my kids to go to bed at a reasonable time and let my natural instincts take over.  I just hope it won't be the instinct to fall asleep on the couch at 9pm.  

It's going to be a spectacular 3 minutes. 

Crushed

I was invited to go to a ladies' weekend in Keystone for a wine and jazz festival.  It was just what I needed, time away from the kids, up in the mountains with girlfriends.  But, it was also the weekend of a huge milestone for my oldest; he was buying his first car.  I was crushed with guilt that I wouldn't be there to witness his proud moment.  But, I was also glad that I wouldn't be there to teach him how to drive it.  Because, although my son has his license, his new car had a manual transmission and we'd never taught him how to drive stick.

Maybe I wasn't so crushed after all.  

When I returned home from a relaxing weekend, I saw it in the driveway among the other classic cars.  After I looked past the '77 VW bus with a defunct engine.  The '66 International Harvester with newly refurbished but not yet tweaked DIY brakes.  And my mostly impractical '69 Karmann Ghia that seats two both uncomfortably and unsafely that my husband drives to work every day because the other two vehicles are still unroadworthy.  And my son's "new" '72 Scout.  Why didn't we teach him to drive on a stick?  Because looking at my driveway ornaments, it seems pretty obvious and inevitable that he'd fall in love with old cars just like his father.

I couldn't wait til my son got home from work so I could congratulate him on his new car.  He couldn't wait to work on his car.  So, my husband, my son and I went out to the driveway to help him check the timing.  That's when my son handed me the keys to start the engine.  I would've normally declined such an invitation anxious that I'd screw something up.  But, with my husband under the hood, I was the only other driver experienced driving a manual.  So I did.

You know how temporary insanity is a thing?  I suffer from temporary idiocy.  I'm normally a fairly intelligent level-headed person.  And then given just the right situation mixed with my anxiety and impulsiveness and I snap and become an absolute  idiot.  Like that time I bought my family super cheap tickets to London because I didn't actually purchase the return trip.  I have a pretty sizable stash of other examples of this debilitating condition, but I think what comes next will suffice.

I put the keys in the ignition and it started right up.  And began lurching forward.  Hurling directly toward the back of the Ghia my husband surprised me with for my 40th birthday that was parked in the garage.  And crushed it.  Did I mention the name of my Ghia was Crush?  I'm not even joking.

Clearly, something was wrong with my son's car.  

Except of course there wasn't.  Not only did I fail to check that the car was in neutral, I also had my foot on the brake instead of the clutch.  (Please note: I've driven a stick for 30 years.  I also learned on a stick at age 17.  And this is after I flew a plane by myself at age 16.  Amazingly, I didn't crash the plane because I'm actually intelligent and capable sometimes.  I SWEAR!  Also, I put this part about the plane in so I could feel better about myself right now.)  There is something inherently wrong with me.  And that thing is temporary idiocy.  

And I'm crushing it!

ADDENDUM:  The important thing is that no one was hurt.  My son's car is completely unscathed.  And the Ghia did not go completely through the wall into the family room on the other side of it where my girls were watching Baboon Queen on the National Geographic Channel.  Not knowing the real Baboon Queen was outside putting on her own show, until it was over and done.  

  

Bear With Me

PC: revelstokebearaware.org

Bear with me as I tell you the story of my family's latest camping trip.  After days of procuring enough sunscreen, bug spray, food and wine, and then almost forgetting to pack the kids something to drink, it was time to load up the car with bikes, sleeping bags, tents and hammocks.  And it was also my time of the month.  Which of course it is.  Because I always have my period when I go camping.  That should be the Always maxi pad slogan.  Which begs the question...

...is camping during your period more likely to attract bears 

or mountain lions? 

Wait, I hope we packed the bear spray.  Also, does bear spray work on blood thirsty mountain lions? And really, what are the chances that I'm going to be anywhere near any kind of weapon to defend myself in case of an attack?  Unless my defense is playing dead, which I'm guessing is probably near impossible to do when you're getting mauled by a wild animal.  Plus, is any menstruating woman going to go gently into that good night without putting up a fight? 

 Don't answer that; it was a rhetorical question.  

So, we're camping in gorgeous Ouray I get up extra early on the first morning to cook this amazing breakfast in the dutch oven I just bought over an open fire because this is how I get when I'm on my period, completely irrational.  It cooked it for over an hour.  And I made the kids wait for my Betty Crocker inspired egg, hash brown, sausage, cheese concoction that had enough calories to last an entire boy scout troop a week in the wilderness without food.  Except I burned it.  Except it was more scorched beyond salvaging actually. But yet, still sludgy and uncooked in the center.  I was so pissed off.  Although, I still tried to get my family to eat it. Did I mention I was on my period?  Then I tasted it and threw the entire thing in the trash. Including my new dutch oven.   

My husband didn't question the impulsivity of this decision.  

But there was something that both my husband and I did question.  An incident involving two of my kids who are archenemies.  Involving opportunity and a weapon.  That's how one of my kids got "accidentally" sprayed with bear spray.  But, the thing was, the stupid spray hardly slowed down an 11 year old girl.  Sure, she had some burning and stinging.  But who doesn't?  That's just how life feels.  How the hell is that impotent spray gonna deter a 400 pound bear?   It's not.  You know what's a more effective bear deterrent?  That charred breakfast casserole. So next time you camp, keep in mind that the best way to stay safe just may be cooking inedible casseroles that even the wildlife wouldn't eat.