spilled beans

it's no secret that i love surprises! when i was pregnant with littlebean, there were a few ultrasounds that i was adamant about reminding them that we didn't want to know if it was a boy or a girl.
when i was younger, i would help my sister out by wrapping my own christmas gifts. she'd have all the boxes w/ our names on them & never once would i peek. i knew once i did, the fun of it would be over.

The Mr. is fantastic at keeping surprises for me. he's been privy to both a wedding & a baby shower on my behalf. he has given me surprises of his own over the years.

and i guarantee i can keep a secret myself. i know how horrible it would be to ruin someone's surprise.

yet i've done that, too. by accident. 3 times.
twice to the same man. (ouch!)
me & my big mouth.

i will admit total fault to one of them. i just didn't think things through.

the three times that i have spilled the beans:

1. an assistant manager at piggly wiggly where i worked & his wife were expecting their first child. his parents were friends of my family growing up, and oftentimes they would come into the store and shop through my line. they learned of the good news because i had congratulated them. oops! but, really- how was i supposed to know that a mere cashier would know about this days/weeks before his parents!?!
2. i also told them on another shopping trip that this manager had finally gotten his own store. oops. completely my fault. this time.
3. sadly, i told my best friend's brother that their dad was having health problems. it had been several weeks (months??) when i casually asked him how his dad was doing. confused, he answered "fine". when i delved a little deeper, it was apparent he had no idea of the issue. i still feel plagued by this one from time to time.

The Mr. says i have a big mouth. in these instances, i guess i do. but really i'm a loyal secret-keeper myself.

actual conversation with The Mr.

...so mother's day was nice. The Mr.'s parents were in town to see how much littlebean has grown (and flourished). after they left on sunday, we went and grabbed an ice cream. ok, i was the only one eating the ice cream, but yummy. it was my first cone in over 10mos. i promised LB that when she's older, we'll be sure to go more often.

anyway, i got some sweet cards and a nice gift.
but it was odd, because the week prior to them coming, The Mr. mentioned needing to call his dad. which he never does. he wanted them to bring hedgeclippers or something. and when i suggested emailing, he said, "i'll call him tonight"....

flashforward to sunday night, and witness a conversation between The Mr. & me:

• Me: can i tell you something without you thinking i'm judging? (great convo opener, huh? try it sometime.)
• Mr: sure.
• Me: i'm NOT saying that you should've, or that i wanted you to get Clemson for me, but i was surprised that you didn't, is all.
• Mr: ??? ok?
• Me: I thought you were going to...
• Mr: why?
• Me: well, it's just that a few days ago, you mentioned needing to call your dad instead of emailing. on the same night i was going out to dinner.
• Mr: oh, ok.
• Me: and then, when you didn't call & yesterday you said you had to call your mom right around the time they'd be leaving, but not right then because you were feeding LB and you needed 2 hands (???)...
• Mr: i was feeding her.
• Me: no, i know. but i thought you were making an excuse b/c i was around. you ended up calling them when i was upstairs getting dressed.
• Mr: yeah. hmmm.
• Me: so since you never call them, i assumed it was b/c you had to get Clemson sent to them b/c obviously you couldn't send him here if you were surprising me, since i'm home all day. and also because you knew i didn't buy him & there was only one left.
• Mr: right. funny.

so Monday, The Mr. left for a business trip, and what gets delivered?? yes. Clemson. HA. it was already on the way.....

so, see- he's excellent at gift giving AND surprises! i think i'll keep him.

happy (belated) mother's day to any of you who may fit the bill.
this was my first (official) day of "my own".
i have too many thoughts surrounding it, but none as poignant as these that i read this morning: here & here.

there are things i celebrate about being a mom.
there are things i worry about being a mom.
there are things i fear about being a mom.
there are things i shouldn't even think about being a mom.
there are things i miss about my own mom; especially since becoming one.

i'd like to share some fantastic thoughts. i'd like to open up (a little) & get new viewpoints. i'd like to commiserate with all of us who are missing their own mothers & motherfigures.
i just don't have the words.

enjoy your kids today. & tomorrow too.

are you a googler?

The Mr. has an interesting "talent". he can google better than anyone i know. admittedly, i don't usually bring this up in conversation, so i guess i don't know how other people fare at the art of googling.

he's always been a great researcher. when he'd go to the library in college, he spent a lot of time using it correctly. so it comes as no surprise that he would be good at this current form of research.

me? notsomuch.

i never know if i should be "formal" in my search for something (and just state the terms w/ some boolean crap in there for good measure) or if i should just "ask" my search. [The Mr. will have fun "asking" google all kinds of stupid stuff using horrible grammar on purpose].

i have always sucked at research. to this day, i'm not sure how i managed writing papers in HS & college. (no surprise i hated english).

google confounds me, but obviously it's not that big of a deal since i'm not graded on my googling performance.

i really want to do better. i like to try to prove to The Mr. that i can find something too. sometimes, it works in my favor. sometimes, he shows me up. (ok, that happens a lot)

here are 2 recent examples:

i had asked The Mr. what show it was where the dad died while eating an ice cream cone. he was astounded at that absurdity & maintained he never saw that show, because he'd have remembered. i had some vague notion that some "supposedly hot" guy was in the show... like zack from saved by the bell or something like that. i thought it was from some cheesy show that we had sorta watched together, like the old 90210 or something. but i was pretty sure it wasn't a show that i watched with any regularity. that was about all i knew.



i was bound & determined to find out for myself.

and I DID. i probably had to ask google in about 3 different ways, and click on maybe 5 links to get the right answer.



YAY. success! i shared w/ him what i learned (dawson's creek)

and a little while later, he wanted to challenge himself. having only going on what i told him [guy dies, dropped ice cream, car wreck]- he picked variations of a logical search & his first result was the answer. seriously.

having spelled all that out, it seems ridiculous that i'm even posting about this. it seems so obvious how to search for that. but when you are searching based on a vague memory, it's quite different.

this happens often. it's quite frustrating.

so imagine my smugness when i was finally able to do something myself:



i had a picture of something in my head. that's it. of "Clemson". an old stuffed animal pillow i had in the early 80s. that's it. just a random tiger pillow. i googled some terms (ok i will admit- The Mr. suggested the term "vintage" which i believe helped tremendously).

first result was someone's etsy shop. i've never been to etsy, know very little about it. but i clicked it anyway. AND THERE HE WAS. in all his glory.

& just as i was shouting a woo-hoo, The Mr. was about to say "well that can't be it".

finally! i was a googler. tho' i still needed his help.....

i'll get it one day.
or maybe i should stop trying to google randomass memories.

so, what about you?

how do you fare in the googling department?