Trouble in Paradise

First of all, the title of this blog is probably a little misleading. My life, such as it is, could scarcely be called paradise considering the fact that I spend a part of every day chasing down my runaway dog, wearing slippers and calling after her "I'm not playing a game!! I won't chase you any further!!" but of course, I do, because what else can I do?? I am not sure what is more disturbing to me-- the fact that I can't seem to outsmart, outwit or outlast a seven year old, overweight dog-- eventually I kind of stop, squint pointedly in her direction, shrug my shoulders and return home, sans dog--- or the fact that I actually try to reason with her along the way. Another part of my day is often spent prying my fingers into my baby's mouth, trying to remove dog kibble-- a feat which I have given up on now after being bitten several times and then consulting the list of ingredients on the dog food bag-- doesn't sound too bad--- mechanically separated pork products, wheat, flour. Might be good for him, who's to say?? Anyways, my point. This isn't paradise. But whatever it is. Trouble lurks. First the laundry crisis, which has since passed, been sorted out and put away, like the laundry itself. A big shout out to everyone who supported me through the laundry crisis of '09. It feels good to know that I am not alone in my laundry woes. Things are better now, laundry wise, at least, and hey- I'm pretty happy because I bought Alex three new outfits at the Gap, so all's well that ends well I guess. There's no problem bad enough that a little bit of shopping can't fix.

Anyways. I don't really choose what I write about on this blog. I just kind of write whatever flits into my head, and somehow it always comes back to the same thing: my petty grievances with my husband. I guess more of my passive aggressive defense mechanism- I don't address things with him like a mature person might, but rather, rant about him privately on my blog. Like just now, I'm reading my book, he goes and gets an orange from the fridge, starts peeling it. And then he makes the comment "it's hard to get a good orange these days." And I look up from my book, and was like "how do you mean?," my defenses up already, and he was like "I don't know. They just don't seem as orange as they used to be. You know, back in the day, oranges were orange, and now they're this really washed out color, almost bordering on yellow." For some reason this observation really grates on me. Because as the buyer of the oranges, I take this as a dig- like I'm not selecting the oranges properly. Like, somehow, I dropped the ball again, buying the yellow oranges and not the orange ones. And it just seems like he's almost looking for something to complain about, to say that an orange isn't orange enough. But then, maybe I'm the one who's looking for something to complain about. Maybe he offered it merely as an observation. I don't' know. I choose not pursue the orange conversation and just continue on in my book with a cursory 'mmm' as though I'm thinking deeply on the matter, but of course, I'm not. I'm thinking to myself "Okay Mr. Ham Scented Candle, isn't that just the pot calling the kettle black" even though I'm not really sure where I'm going with that metaphor-- is the candle the pot and the orange the kettle or vice versa.

And then this morning, I go to get a shirt out of the closet, and notice that a few of his shirts are actually hanging on MY rack. And I was like 'this just doesn't fly.' I don't' want your crappy ass Coors Light shirts on MY rack and he was like "well, you have lots of room still" which made me even more mad because I was like "the only reason I have room in my closet is because I actually clean it out from time to time" to which he replies that he, too, cleans out his closet, not just from time to time, but all the time, and that he wears "literally everything in there". I pulled out a KISS 1999 Tour TShirt and was like "And this?? You're going to wear this?? When??" And he was like "well, that's a memento" And there's a hundred white button up collared shirts with the collars all yellow and frayed, buttons missing "And these?? You'll just throw this on, go to work??" So I pointedly removed the offending shirts from my closet and crammed them in between the KISS shirts and was like "you'll have to make do with what you have."
I mean, okay, I've compromised on a lot of things in this marriage. A lot. But come on. The closet. That's where I take a stand. Even though my side of the closet does look rather pitiful with it's few shirts lined up rather lamely. I probably, definitely, need some new clothes soon, but the problem is that nothing seems to look quite the way it should on me. I blame it on the shirt, and say, 'this shirt makes me look fat' but now I'm getting the distinct feeling that it might be more than the clothes. The five pounds I lost during the mouth infection week is now back. I need another mouth infection and I need it bad. Today I was walking with Payton to soccer practice (you see, WALKING-- I should be losing loads of weight right there, but it's like it just doesn't matter what I do)I caught my reflection in the window of a parked car, and had the odd thought that if I was a celebrity, I would definitely be seeing my face on the cover of some tabloid somewhere with a big red circle around my midsection, an arrow pointing at the offending bulge and bold capital letters screaming "BABY BULGE???!!!" But no. This is no baby bulge. This is just bulge. And not good bulge, either. Well, okay, there really is no good bulge.

Anyways. Not a problem. I'll just start eating right. Maybe I should remodel my living room. Feng Shui. Might help. I've heard good things.
And speaking of eating... today I tried sweet potato fries!! I've wanted to try them literally forever, and today I finally saw them in Superstore so I was so pumped to try it. But they really weren't that good. I don't know. Anyways, I must be going now.
Good night.