Color my world.

Do you guys know what Pantone is? Being in a designer-y, advertising-y, creative-y type marketing sort of career, I live by it - it's basically a universally accepted ink color that printers use. In the old days of graphic design, like before computers, I got my first Pantone Matching System color books, and they still sit on my desk.

Way back then, they were called PMS colors...for Pantone Matching System - because the other PMS hadn't been invented yet either. Nowadays, even brides use it so that their napkins match their shoes that match their flowers that match their hair ties that match their fiances boxers.

I love Pantone because it helps my little world make sense. My bulldog is Pantone 465C. The chocolate labradork is 469C. That's why they look so nice laying next to each other on my living rug, which is shades of both those tones as well as a graduated DM292-5.

My subconcious need to identify every color I see by PMS number is second only to my font neurosis, whereby I cannot read any text on any sign, book, magazine or T shirt without first identifying the font it's printed in. Now you know why I'm always late.

And, you can see why I am now obsessed with visiting this hotel. And living there. Forever. It makes my head not hurt.

The Pantone Hotel in Brussels.

Yes, it will be a long commute, but can you just picture a 465C bulldog on that bed?

Gently down the stream.

The giant linebacker kid is taking a year off from football and has joined the crew. As in rowing. I was going to say "crew team" but that's kind of repetitive. Like a neighborhood I once lived in called "Table Mesa" which is not only dumb, but stupid.

See how I did that? Try to keep up.

Four nights a week, I drive the hulking man-child to a reservoir 30 minutes from our house and he runs and jumps rope and works hard to glide across the water and make it look effortless. I think it's really the most beautiful thing in the word to see 8 people moving in synchronization on a skinny boat (or 4, or 2) and I'm proud he's taken it up. I've done it purely amateur-ly for several years - and only in a single scull because I am very muchly not a team player.  I'm glad that he's got the mental and physical fortitude to try something unknown - and I must admit that it doesn't suck to live vicariously through your children - something I haven't really experienced while watching him cream the living hell out of offensive linemen.

To make things even more bettererer than just watching the kid, he's competing this weekend 18 hours from our house at the Head of the Des Moines.

Which means, I not only get to see my boy living out my dream...

 Me on a big ol' trainer boat a long time ago. It's very difficult to take pictures of yourself sculling.

I get to see my high school partner in crime from high school who lives nearby...

 Partner in crime, circa 1990. As if you couldn't tell by the perms.

And I get to meet my sista-from-anotha-mista, Tracey, who I've never seen in person but I am pretty we were separated at birth, who...can you even believe it...lives right smack in Des Moines.

 She looks sorta fun, huh? I'm taking sturdy drinking shoes.

It is so freaking fate, destiny, coincidence and good luck that I cannot fathom it. We're going to Oktoberfest together. In Iowa. Talk about living out dreams.

This is obviously Karma's way of apologizing for smashing the hell out of my face last month.

Apology accepted, Karma.

Wherein I get a Brazilian. And provide photographic evidence.

Earlier this year, I spent an unholy sum of money for eyelash extensions. Not one single person noticed. I determined that either:

a) no one really looks at me,
b) they looked so ridiculous everyone I knew was embarrassed for me and didn't mention it, or
c) I have such incredible boobs that everyone I know, including neighbors and children couldn't look past them to see my luxurious puppydog/Brooke Shields lashes.

Pretty sure it's A.

So that's why when I considered getting a "Brazilian," I really had to think twice about it. I mean, is it really worth the time and money, and ahem, pain...if no one even really knows about it?

So - I figure - yeah, sure it is. You bet. Dealing with all that curly hair is a daily chore that I just don't have time for. And, if I put it out on the interwebs - people HAVE to notice.

So, without any further ado, the before and after pictures.

BEFORE

It's blurry. I know. Hoping you'll be too distracted by the sequined bulldog to notice. It's smooth enough, but it took 20 minutes, a gallon of product, a hairdryer and a round brush to get it like this.

AFTER

Sort of the same. A little less fluffy, but it only took, like, 3 minutes to dry it straight. Paired with a chartreuse naughty librarian cardigan to distract from the breastillary-region.

So I'm all cool and low maintenance with my Brazilian Blowout now.  You knew that's what I meant, right?

People better notice.

PS - you can totally tell my nose is broken, too, but it's okay if you don't point that out. 

PPS - I should've cleaned the iPhone lens for that first picture.

PPPS - I should've worn makeup in that second one. 

PPPPS - Or eyelash extensions.

Where to begin?

I should start by saying that I've spent a goodly amount of time considering changing the name of my blog to "Adventures in the ER" or "Super Fun Times Bleeding in Public"...but I know how mommy blogs  are kind of popular, and referencing drinking whilst mommying is also big...so maybe it should just be "Mommy's Bleeding - Get her a Cocktail!" Oh ha ha, that'd be rich.

Turns out, I'm just sorta clumsy. Or I go too fast. Or the bulldog wants me dead. One of those things. Or all of those things put together.

I won't go into terrible bloody detail, because if you know me in real life, I've already bored you with the slow-mo reenactment of tidily drilling straight through my thumb with a wood screw and the resulting fleshy hamburger that exited my body through the new hole as the drill bit reversed and returned. I've already relived in exacting detail stepping onto a dog toy, accelerating due to a combination of freshly polished hardwood floors and completely treadless Birkenstocks and slamming forward at Mach-3 stopping only when my already substantial nose broke my fall into the large DVD player I was carrying.

If you know me, I've described to you the five stitches it took on the outside of my nose, the crimson and violet bags drooping underneath my eyes for the week following, the vertical fracture of my proboscis that still throbs daily, the clouds in my brain as the concussion cleared. I've demonstrated the lack of feeling in my thumb by poking at it in front of you. I've shown you the bills from the ER.

What I have not done is post pictures of my temporary disfigurement like I did with my children. Ethical? Perhaps not, but it is afterall, my blog.

I will tell you, however, that after receiving three shots in my face to numb my nose enough for stitches, I will never, ever, even consider Botox.

And, I will tell you that none of it compares to the pain I experienced when my hard drive crashed and the online back-up system I've trusted for years didn't really do everything I thought it was doing.

In short, it's kind of been a mess over here in Little Girl Land.

But the stitches are out, the bruises are gone. I sort of remember most of everything, and I have a big fat shiny new hard drive with almost everything I want on it. Somewhere. And I have a new external harddrive that holds a terabyte of information and is so beautiful I want to have children with it.

Thanks for waiting on me.

PS to Cupcake Murphy: I think "Haiku Laureate" is the nicest thing anyone's ever said regarding the badass bulldog. Thanks for giving me the oomph to dive in again.