The Bissextus, Meeting My Soul Mate, and Other Random Stuff

Anybody have any big plans to celebrate the bissextus? Yeah, me neither.  What is a bissextus, you ask?  Why, it is the extra day added to the Julian calendar every fourth year.  I’m so glad you asked.  I am a vocabulary geek.  I LOVE new words.  Some of my favorites are from a 12th grade vocabulary list and they all begin with “O”:  obstreperous, ostentatious, obsequious.  I wish I could find a way to work them into my every day conversations a little easier.  My best friend and I have a little game we haven’t played in years where we begin taking turns listing words that begin with “V”.  Last person to say a word is the winner.  Not geeky enough for you?  I have the dictionary.com app on my phone so I get a nice little word of the day.  Some I save and others I say, “Oh, that’s nice,” and I immediately forget the word completely.  Here’s another one for you:  poikilothermic.  As in:  Cousinfucker is a poikilothermic snake and I hope the karma bus visits him soon!  I learned that one when I accompanied said best friend to a biology lecture.  The poikilothermic part, not the karma bus.

As I referenced above I believe I met the love of my life/soul mate on Saturday.  OK, so I didn’t really meet him and I know nothing about him.  He’s probably married even.  My kids and I were out to dinner celebrating my birthday.  Our chef was telling us that the guy at the table next to us had eight kids.  I didn’t think anything about it at first but eventually I happened to look over there.  Here was a guy at a Japanese steakhouse with SIX kids- all by himself.  I don’t know what happened to the other two if he did indeed have eight, but there were six with him that night.  I counted.  At least three times!  The oldest didn’t look to be much more than 8 or 9, and he also had a baby with him- maybe around a year old.  I’m looking at this scene and thinking, “OMG!  I love this man!  If I were still capable and not so old I would have his babies!”  Cousinfucker couldn’t handle TWO- AT HOME.  If I had told him he had to take our two out to dinner his head would have exploded.  I remember throwing up and having diarrhea and he was going out to the drugstore to get me some medicine.  He actually asked me if I wanted him to take our two with him.  And when I looked at him like he was dumber than a potato and said, “Yes!” he whined, “I was just asking!”

Anyway, I say that stranger is my soul mate but is he really?  I briefly thought about stopping at his table and commending him on taking six kids out by himself but I didn’t.  Shortly thereafter I was telling my mom that men are always applauded for that kind of thing.  Had I seen a woman there with six kids on her own I probably would have thought, “Wow- that’s really brave!”  But I’m not sure I would have lauded her as a hero or thought about becoming a lesbian because I had met my “soul mate”.  A man volunteers at school and it’s headline news.  I make SpongeBob cupcakes complete with homemade frosting, chocolate candy figurines and an entire underwater beach scene and it’s just something moms do.  Let me tell you, those cupcakes were work!  I had to make the separate royal frosting so the seaweed would be stiff and stay upright in the cupcakes. I think I gave up on the royal icing flowers and just piped in a flower.  The candy figurines had multiple colors so I had to do one color, spread it in the mold, chill it, and then work on the second color, finish all the different colors, and then fill the mold.  It took me HOURS to do this because the mold only held 5 figures and I had to do that probably 5 or 6 times to account for all the kids!  Did any man say, “Oh, my gosh, that woman is my soul mate!  I want someone who spends hours hand designing cupcakes for my children!”  No!  A man takes his six kids out to eat and I’m suddenly willing to marry him.  Do you think he would be impressed if I had taken six kids out for dinner?  Probably not.

I will go on to say, however, that it was fantastic to see a father who was capable and involved.  It once again shows that Cousinfucker was full of shit and was a lazy, selfish, entitled sonofabitch who cheated his kids out of way too many experiences.

Speaking of piece of shit fathers, have any of you seen Kelly Clarkson’s performance on American Idol?  I saw her song was #1 on iTunes and I started to listen to it.  It didn’t do much for me.  Then, it kept popping up on my Facebook feed:  Watch Kelly Clarkson’s moving performance.  See what had everyone in tears.  So I watched it.  And I cried.  I’m a sympathetic cryer to begin with but this was just heartbreaking.  I’m really listening to the words this time around because I want to know what has everyone so choked up. Keith Urban has tears in his eyes.  Kelly has to stop at least three times towards the end of the song because she’s getting choked up.  In case anyone hasn’t heard it it’s a song about a father who abandons his child and now that child has a child of her own.  The last verse is:

Piece by piece I fell far from the tree

I would never leave her like you left me

She will never have to wonder her worth

Because unlike you I’m gonna put her first

She told Ryan Seacrest that she wrote it for her own daughter.  I’m sure it resonates for many children.  I’ve watched it twice and each time I think of my own kids who have been left behind by their father.  Then I think of Harley and how “happy” she is and I wonder how it is that anyone can find happiness at the expense of children.  Finally, though, I think of myself and the fact that I’m not going to leave them.  I do know their worth and I will always put them first.  All is not hopeless.  I think that kids can learn how to be an awesome parent simply by refusing to repeat the mistakes of their own mother or father.  My brother is a shining example of that.

Our dad was not around much.  I wouldn’t go so far as to say he abandoned us but we certainly weren’t a priority.  My brother on the other hand is an excellent dad.  He loves his kids.  He likes spending time with them.  He is interested in their lives.  He’s a lot more understanding and patient than any of us thought he could be when he was a young hothead.  My son has said he wishes he had a dad like his uncle.  To my brother’s credit he did say he is willing to step up for my two, knowing they don’t have an active father in their lives.  My hope is that my son emulates my brother and not his father.

Other random stuff that has been happening in my life- more bad dreams/night time experiences.  I’m sleeping better if you count sleep interrupted by rude dogs who demand to go out at odd times of the night as good sleep.  I’m still, however, having bad dreams.  Actually, I’ve had one bad dream and two bad/eerie experiences.  Two nights ago I fell asleep on the couch.  I don’t know why I don’t just go upstairs when I’m getting sleepy.  Instead I “rest my eyes” and it inevitably ends up with me waking sometime in the middle of the night. So, the other night I fell asleep on the couch early- like 9:00.  I woke up because one of my dogs wanted to go out.  Looked at the clock and found out it was only 11:00.  Great!  So I let the dog in, I go upstairs, get ready for bed, and go back to sleep.  Sometime after I fall asleep I hear a door creaking open.  For a minute I forgot I was in my bed and thought I was still on the couch so I begin to freak out because I think someone is coming into the house through the door in the living room that leads outside.  Fortunately, it took only a few seconds for me to remember that I was indeed in my room, upstairs, and I realized it was my son peeking in to see if he could sneak into bed with me.  Unfortunately for him the dogs were spread over the bed and there was no way he could comfortably sleep with me so he went on back downstairs.  That was bad/eerie experience #1.

Last night I had a horrible dream.  OK, it was one part horrible and one part awesome.  Anyway, in the dream two men broke into my house, raped me and slit my throat.  Not pleasant.  I told you it was a horrible dream.  The awesome part comes from the fact that this violent death led me to have a Highlander moment.  For those of you who have never seen the movie the protagonist discovers he is immortal when he is killed on the battle field.  I, too, became immortal.  That was awesome, especially because the two rapists/killers decided to come back a second time and I ended up killing them.  Now, why they would come back is beyond me.  On some level I’m thinking if they’re going to try to kill me again they obviously know I can’t be killed.  Duh!  Regardless, that was the awful dream.  Then on top of that I had once again fallen asleep on the couch and a dog wanted to go out.  I let her out, she comes back in, goes to the laundry room where their food and water is, and then she begins to BARK!  WTF?  I had no idea what she was barking at.  I thought possibly a cat had slipped upstairs but she probably wouldn’t have just barked at it; she would have tried to chase it and there was no chasing.  Only barking.  I did briefly think maybe someone had broken into the house but I didn’t hear anything else, plus I had another dog soundly sleeping despite his sister’s noisy antics.  He’s pretty protective of me so I didn’t think a human was in the house.  That’s when my mind raced to SNAKE!  I’m terrified of snakes.  I don’t live in the country; I’m in a subdivision, in fact.  But the two landscapers from the past summer told me they saw a snake in one of the trees and I have been terrified ever since.  I faced my fears, however, and have done two loads of laundry so far this morning.  Unless the snake is hiding behind the washing machine or dryer then there was nothing there and my dog is simply crazy.

And that is all I have for you on this glorious bissextus!  Enjoy and go do good things!

Hey- Another Recipe!

I like to cook.  I like it more when I don’t have to clean up after myself and I really love it when everyone eats what I’ve made and they all think it’s fantastic.  I made this the other day to rave reviews; however, it’s not anywhere close to the first time I’ve ever made it.  This is one of those tried and true recipes.  The best part (aside from it cooking in the crockpot) is that is only has 3 ingredients- pork chops, an envelope of ranch dressing, and a can of cream of chicken soup.  Ta-da!  I give you Ranch House Crock Pot Pork Chops.  I got the recipe off of Pinterest and she obviously got the recipe from yet another site.  I only do the pork chops so if you go to the site you’ll see something much more complicated and which requires more than 3 ingredients.

This is another one where I’m not going to even list out ingredients in order for you.  Simply take 4-6 pork chops (bone in, boneless, center cut, whatever) and place them in your crockpot.  Then combine one can of cream of chicken soup with one envelope of Ranch dressing mix.  Pour that over your pork chops and cook on low for 6 hours.  I believe I have it noted that you can also cook this on high for 4 hours.  Feel free to substitute chicken in place of the pork chops.  That’s also tasty although I think I prefer the pork.  Many people commented that the sauce was so yummy they wished they had doubled it.  As my kids would say, “You do you, Boo.”  If you’d like extra sauce and want to try it over mashed potatoes then use 2 cans of soup and 2 envelopes of dressing.

Enjoy!

Bad Dreams

Why won’t I stop dreaming about him?  Good grief!  I’ve been a nervous wreck ever since the 15th when my support money was not in my account and when I found out Cousinfucker resigned from his job and moved out of state.  Lately I’ve had one horrible dream after another about him.  They’re usually very short but they bother me nonetheless.

The first dream I remember involved texting him.  I don’t recall what I texted to him; it must have been something about him coming back and me cooking for him though because in his reply he was mocking me and being very disdainful.  He wrote back something along the lines of:  Like you’ll cook dinner anyway.  Just something truly shitty when I was being sincere.  That’s all I remember.  More than the dream the feelings stayed with me.  It made me feel bad.  Like somehow I’m the bad person and he’s the poor downtrodden soul.

The second dream I had involved my attorney.  I dreamed she subpoenaed his bank records and he only had $319 in his account.  What a weird but precise number!  Obviously I was freaking out over the money situation and it was manifesting itself in my dreams.  He had spent every dime in this dream.

Here’s hoping I don’t have anymore dreams about the asshole.  I’m falling asleep around 9 or 10 most nights and then waking up around 2:30, 3:00 to take my contacts out and get into my jammies.  From there I usually sleep fitfully until around 6:30 or 7:00, unless I have a dog that wants to go out at some random early hour.  So it would be really nice if I could have him out of what little sleep I do manage to get.

Update:  Be careful what you wish for.  I didn’t dream about him last night.  Instead, I dreamt about Donald Trump.  I think he was at a political rally.  What I do remember is someone throwing him a top hat and him putting it on before doing a soft shoe tap dance routine while he sang.  Turns out- he’s not a bad singer.

A Conversation With Rock Star

“Mom, do YOU think he’s crazy?”

I pause, giving great thought to this question my daughter has just asked.  She has already freely said she believes her dad is legitimately crazy.  She’s not a psychiatrist though so I’m not sure how much stock to put into her diagnosis.  After weighing my words carefully I give her my answer.

“No, I don’t think he’s crazy.  I think he’s living in a fantasy world.  I don’t know for certain where he’s working but I do know his big dream was to work side by side with his best friend.  He once told me he should have taken the job at Best Friend’s plant when Best Friend tried to get him to come work with him and that was one of his biggest regrets.  If I had to bet I would place money on the fact that Best Friend managed to get him a job at his company and they are now working together.  So he thinks he has his dream job and he thinks he has his dream woman.”

She turns up her nose at that comment.  I can’t say that I blame her.  But he does. I don’t tell her this part but he thinks that Harley and her performance are the real thing.  She loves him for who he is and she would never be with him for the money.  Oh no!  That was the evil, awful Sam who stuck around for the money.  Harley is going to be the perfect mate.  She’ll text him every time she takes a shit and let him know all about it.  She’ll tell him how handsome he is and coo over every little thing he does.  Best of all, every weekend it’s nonstop sex!

Here’s the thing.  I’m sure that for a period of time, maybe even a decent period of time, this will play out just fine.  He will live far enough away from her that he can’t live with her, thereby giving him four days to decompress and do whatever he wants.  Then for 3 days (2 1/2 if we want to be technical) he puts on his Dad of the Year/Companion of the Year mask and is all smiles and grand gestures.  When things start to bother him it’s time to return back to his home where he can chill in front of the television, drink some wine, and not have to deal with anyone.  He doesn’t have to help her get kids to activities.  He doesn’t have to help with homework.  He doesn’t have any of the daily grind you have when you actually live with someone day after day.  But eventually the newness will wear off.  It’s also quite possible that he will find out sooner, rather than later, that the love of his life is cheating on him.  Ouch! Again, not things I say out loud to her.

I do go on to tell her that I think eventually his perfect fantasy life is going to implode.  His best friend has switched companies quite a few times and I don’t see them staying at the same company, together, for another fifteen to twenty years.  I also don’t see Cousinfucker taking it too well when and if Best Friend becomes his boss.  I also don’t see Best Friend taking it too well if the situation was reversed.  I think they have this vision of what life is going to be like, them working together, and I don’t think reality is going to play out anywhere close to this dream of theirs.  They are two alpha males and I see them either clashing with one another, or them trying to take down their boss, which probably won’t go over well with him.  Even if my theory that he’s working with Best Friend is incorrect and he’s actually working somewhere completely different the same rules apply.  He will love it at first and then when he doesn’t get to dictate every single thing he’s going to begin pouting and decide he hates it.  Only now he’s stuck.

What I say to her in summation is that once the newness of his relationship wears off and he realizes what kind of a person Harley is, and once he realizes that working with Best Friend isn’t the dream he believes it will be, I think he is going to look back at everything he has given up- his wife of over 20 years, his two kids, a job that he’s held for more than 15 years, and he’s going to realize how severely he has screwed himself.

At this point in my “journey” I’m not sure if I’d rather see that day arrive and smirk knowingly, gleeful at his misery, or if I would prefer to truly not give a damn and just be able to shake my head and say, “Sucks to be you.”  Only time will tell, I suppose.

Today Is a New Day! Thank God!

Today’s post is going to have a religious slant to it so I apologize in advance to any atheists or agnostics I may offend.  Actually, here’s a quick tip if talk of God offends you:  Just skip over today’s post.  Thanks!

I believe I have mentioned how we have started going back to church.  We like the new church.  It’s fun.  It’s interesting.  Great coffee bar.  I’m not heavily involved yet but I enjoy going and look forward to it on Sundays.

As many of you may have realized yesterday was not a good day for me.  I broke my mother’s heart (I’m sorry, Mom!) and made someone else cry.  I was doing a lot of crying myself.  Where am I going with this?  I swear there is a point!

I browsed through Facebook yesterday and a woman with whom I went to church years ago posted this:  Don’t worry about anything; instead pray about everything.  Tell God what you need, and thank Him for all He has done.  If you do this, you will experience God’s peace.  Philippians 4:6-7a

Being a smart ass I decided to give it a try.  I swear to you this is my prayer almost verbatim:  Dear God, Could you please make my jackass soon-to-be-ex husband pay me my damn money?  Thanks!

I didn’t thank Him for all He has done.  I intend to get right on that though because let me tell you- my prayer was answered!

For those of you not following along in the comments section I did get my check finally.  Hooray!  Now I can breathe for another 2 weeks or so.  I also found out this morning that Cousinfucker DID indeed get his bonus check.  Now, he could try to screw me over and insist he got way less than last year but I have faith my new lawyer won’t let that happen.  So, the pool will be paid off soon and I should be receiving a lump sum of money that I intend to set aside for taxes and lawyer fees.

I’m back to my original plan of staying here until Rock Star graduates.  I’m hoping to hear soon from a vocational rehab specialist (I think that’s the title) to see where I should put my energies.  I have a degree already but I never used it.  Cousinfucker moved us around so much in the first 5-6 years of our marriage and we intended for me to get pregnant and stay home with our kids so I did mainly secretarial jobs.  That’s great when you’ve got a husband making decent money.  Not so great when you’re trying to support yourself and two teenagers who have had everything on that salary. I don’t want to go back to school for a more viable degree only to find out no one will hire someone nearing her 50s.  So I want to find what fields are hiring, if they hire older entry level people and what kind of money we’re looking at.

The next step is to figure out if I’m going to try to work full time and go to school part time, go to school full time and work part time, or any other combination. I’m still a fair distance away from my family, I don’t have a huge number of friends here, and Cousinfucker has moved out of the state so I don’t have a big support network to help me out.  I’m also very cautious about repeatedly asking for favors.  Because of that I’m going to be juggling all of this on my own- school, job, kids.  That’s ok, though.  I am woman, hear me roar.  I’ve got this once I can finally get on a road to somewhere.

To all of you who checked up on me, thank you!  I truly appreciate it from the bottom of my heart.  Yesterday was a bad day.  Here’s to today!  And to Philippians 4:6-7a.

A Letter to My Kids

Hey Kids,

The time has come for you to find out that your mom is not all powerful.  That I am, in fact, human and I make mistakes.  So I want to apologize to both of you.

I’m sorry I picked such a wretched excuse for a human being to be your father.  He has failed you in ways I couldn’t even begin to imagine.  For years I listened to him whine on and on about his father and how he was rejected by him.  But you know what?  He always financially supported him and that’s more than I can say for your own dad.

I’m sorry I chose to be a stay at home mom instead of working a job so that when this time came I could support you without his help.  Don’t get me wrong.  I loved being at home with the two of you.  I loved being the one to take you places and plan school parties and volunteer at your schools.  I loved going on field trips and being here at home at the end of day.  I loved being able to watch you at all of your meets and games, being the one to drop you off and pick you up, being able to travel with you.  I truly did.  In hindsight, though, I never should have done it.  I should have worked.  I should have told your dad that his career wasn’t more important than my own job.  I should have followed my passion and done something with my life aside from being your mom.  I know that sounds like a shitty thing to say and I don’t mean it to be because, again, I loved being here for you.  I still do.  But I’m stuck between a rock and a hard place now.  I’m sinking fast and I’m taking both of you with me.

I’m sorry I didn’t stand up to him more and baby and cater to him less.  Maybe if that had been the case he would have left sooner and I would have more options.  Maybe it would have helped and he never would have done any of this.

I’m sorry I can’t keep you here through graduation, Rock Star.  I cry every time I think about it even though everyone tells me you’re going to be fine.  I’m going to end gymnastics for you forever.  I’m going to take away you being captain for your team.  I know high school gymnastics was not what you wanted and won’t take you to college but it was better than no gymnastics at all.  I’m taking you from a place where you are a very big fish in a pretty small pond and I’m going to turn you into a goldfish in the ocean, if goldfish could survive in salt water.  I feel like I’m ruining your high school experience and I am so so sorry for that, my sweet girl.  Once again, I listened to your dad whine for years about how he was constantly moved as a child and never attended the same school each year.  He never switched high schools though, a privilege he is denying you.

I’m sorry I couldn’t do whatever it was that I needed to do to stay married and give you two a stable home, even if one of your parents wasn’t always sane or even around much.  If I knew what I did wrong, or what I didn’t do that he wanted me to do, I would have taken the appropriate action.  But I have no idea what it is I did or didn’t do that made your dad choose to have an affair.  Honestly, I know  that I can only be responsible for my own actions and he is responsible for his.  I am truly sorry, though, that I couldn’t make this marriage work.

Finally, I am so sorry I agreed to this move.  I am so sorry I tore your lives apart for this shit storm we are in now.  I’m sorry for the pool that we are probably never going to swim in even though we’ve spent a crapload of money on it.  I’m sorry about your friends and your sports and your schools.  I’m sorry about everything that you’ve had to lose and all that you’re still going to lose.  I’m sorry I don’t have a home of our own to move us to.  I’m sorry for all the dreams you have that aren’t going to come true because we have to leave.  I’m sorry for all the plans that you are making that aren’t going to happen.  I’m sorry we’re going to be poor and your lives are going to be turned so far around you aren’t even going to recognize them.  I’m sorry for everything.

Your uncle tells me every time I say that that it’s not me who is ruining your lives- it’s your dad.  I’m here, though, and he’s not.  So I’m the one who is apologizing.  I cannot apologize enough for what is going to become of your lives.  I would say I should have picked better but then I wouldn’t have you two.  At any rate, I failed you both, and for that I’m sorry.  I’ll do my very best to make it up to you somehow.  I promise.

Love,

Mom

Is My New Lawyer Psychic?

I saw another lawyer last week.  I liked her and I decided to switch.  I have many reasons for making the switch but key among them would be communication and the fact that I think my previous attorney botched my case.  Not an all out, Oh my God, I’m ruined, kinda botched.  But he definitely did not do me any favors or get me the best deal possible.

First interesting moment of the conversation with her was when she told me that everything in the court order is modifiable.  And there is a lot I’d like to see modified.  The funny part though is due to Cousinfucker quitting his job and leaving the state I now have a material change in circumstances.  Of course, I can be granted anything by the court but it doesn’t mean shit if he’s going to defy the court order or believes he’s untouchable because he’s out of state.  He probably thought he was going to screw me by getting everything excluded from his annual salary except his base pay and then turning around and getting a new job with a potentially higher base pay, even if the bonuses aren’t as good.  He thought he would screw me by promising half of his bonus check and to pay off the pool with that money and then leaving his job and doing neither of those two things.  Turns out the joke’s on him because with him taking this new job I can now go back and ask to have support re-evaluated.  And this time, when he has to throw in extra to cover marital debt my attorney is going to have that excluded from spousal support.  It will show up as a contribution to the marital debt, which it is, instead of as spousal support to me.  And as far as the bonus check is concerned I still have hope that he actually received it before leaving his company, but if he didn’t I would love to drag his ass before a judge and have him explain why he agreed to something only to turn around and voluntarily resign from his job no more than six weeks later.

The second moment was when the lawyer told me she was concerned for his mental well being.  She said there were a lot of red flags coming up for her and she was very concerned that he was going to have a complete mental breakdown, especially when Harley dumps him.  I explained that two years ago when he was confiding in Jezebel about his affair he told her that Harley made him happy and I remarked that according to Harley he is Daddy of the Year and she’s never been happier.  This is where it begins to get really interesting.

She looked at me and said, “Are you really going to take her word for it?  She’s a married woman with four kids having an affair with her cousin.  He’s a paycheck to her, a sugar daddy.”

Wow!  Here is a woman who has never met me, Cousinfucker or Harley and yet she has said the exact same thing that I have said, that family members have said.  I’ll admit that sometimes I wonder if I’m wrong and that she’s not the real love of his life.  I wonder if I say she’s just a gold digging whore to make myself feel better.  But here is a woman who has seen many, many divorces over the years.  She’s been doing this a long time.  And she has made the same observation.  In many ways it’s validation.  I continue to wrestle with the idea that this is not my fault.  Rationally I know it is not.  But in my insane moments (yes, I do have those!) I keep coming back to the old, “What if I didn’t do this?  What if I did that?  Maybe I should have done this.”  This lady put it all in perspective.  I am correct!  He’s a paycheck to Harley.  She’s a desperate, gold digging mother of four who has found a sugar daddy.  I’m hoping to help him run out of sugar quite soon.

The other thing she said that really resonated was I am the one that kept him grounded.  She had already told me how there were a lot of red flags for her when I told her my story.  She then mentioned that he has this nice little fantasy life going on and once things crumble she’s not sure he’s going to be able to keep it together.  She is very worried that he will end up having a complete breakdown and lose his job.  As she put it (and I’m going to paraphrase here):  When things come crashing down you’re not going to be there to help put them back together this time.  And I have a feeling you were that person- you kept it all going, even if he refuses to acknowledge it.  Again, I have to pump my fist and shout, “Yes!”

I was indeed that person.  I don’t think he has any idea how much bullshit I put up with in order to keep things going.  I took care of the house, the pets, the kids, him.  I cooked.  I cleaned.  I did his laundry.  The man never had to put away his own clothes for crying out loud!  I washed them, dried them, folded them, and put them away!  He never had to wash a dish.  He was the pampered king.  When he would freak out over something small and insignificant I was the one being the soothing voice of reason.  I was the one who would take charge, make the phone calls, get the job done, and interact with the people.  When he got sick I was the one taking care of him, calling the doctor’s office, taking him to the doctor’s or the ER, sitting with him, running interference for him.  In short, I was awesome.  He no longer has me around to do all of those things.  I can’t be certain but I have a definite feeling that Harley is not going to do those things either.  She’s in it for the money, the good times, the attention.  She is not going to be eager to deal with the real him and she’s certainly not going to be standing by him if he ever loses his job and spirals down into a heap of self pity.

So now in addition to being left after twenty plus years, abandoned in a new town that he insisted we move to, him deserting his two children, and him quitting his job and moving out of state I also get to wait for the inevitable breakdown.  I’ve gotta be honest here.  I’m kinda looking forward to it on the one hand.  On the other hand, he’s not going to be of any use to me in a psych ward, or as an alcoholic who can’t keep a job.  It’s a real quandary, I tell you.  I’d love to see him suffer (hey, I’m only human!) but I’m beginning to think that if he suffers the kids and I will suffer as well.  What to do…. What to do….

Welcome to the Jungle, The Grand Finale

Note:  This is the final installment in this five part series.  Click on the link to see Part 1, Part 2, Part 3 and Part 4.

Did I ever tell you about the time I had dinner with a convicted killer?  Yeah, that was fun.  Tammy Faye has an interesting assortment of siblings.  Some have done very well.  Some have led very hard lives.  She has a sister who has had not one, but two, husbands land in prison.  Both for murder.  I’m a little murky on the details but I think one of them is (or was) actually on death row.  It is possible he died in prison.  Again, murky on the details so don’t take this as gospel.  I do know, however, that death row or not, he was in prison for murder.  The second husband who landed in prison (and truthfully I don’t know if he was the first or second husband) was there because he stabbed a guy.  In self defense.  Twenty some times, I believe.  Now, you would think that would not be a relationship you wished to rekindle but you would be wrong.  He got out of prison and Tammy Faye’s sister remarried him.  He was over at Tammy Faye’s brother and sister-in-law’s house, hanging out and chilling.  I remember meeting the guy, although I’m not sure when.  I do know it was handled like it was no big deal. In fact, the way we found out he was even around was when Zack had called home and was talking to his mom.  At the time, she and Pastor Fake were living with the brother and sister-in-law who had come and moved them from the small town where he had pastored a church into their own home.  They were passing the phone around when suddenly “he” gets on the phone and announces, “This is the second degree murderer.”  Note:  That’s not actually how he announced himself.  He used his real name.  Yep, this guy was over there drinking coffee and playing cards.  Absolutely no big deal.  Jesus loves us all, right?  Eventually, they divorced once again because of his drinking and abusive ways.  Shocker, I know.

Of all the stories I think this final one is my favorite.  Zack is the only child of his mother and father.  His mother has one other child by her first husband, Jezebel.  His father was 20 years older than his mother and he had been married twice before and had 2 different sets of children with each of the previous wives- 4 additional siblings from him.  Got that?  Good, because now it’s going to get really complicated.

His mother is one of 10 or more siblings.  Her dad (sperm donor) had 6 kids, I believe, with his first wife.  She died when the youngest was just a baby and all the kids, except Tammy Faye, were adopted by various relatives.  Tammy Faye was adopted by family friends (this is also why Cousinfucker claims that Harley is not really his cousin- because of this adoption that occurred many many years before either of them were even born!).  He then went on to have 4 more with another woman.  Didn’t raise any with her either.   They do keep popping out of the woodwork so it’s hard to keep track.  Plus, at one point he was trying to lay claim to John Mellencamp as possibly being his son.  Anyway, Tammy Faye has a sister.  We’ll call her Harriet.  Tammy Faye marries Big Daddy, Zack’s father.  Big Daddy has a son from a previous marriage.  We’ll call him Harry.  Cousinfucker’s Aunt Harriet ends up getting married to his brother Harry.  Yes, his aunt married his brother.  That cousin fucking thing doesn’t look so bad now, does it?  It gets better.  Harriet eventually leaves Harry for another woman.  This woman had a job as Cinderella or Snow White at DisneyWorld.  Oh, but wait!  It gets even better.  Cinderella leaves Harriet for Harriet’s brother.

I swear I could write a telenovela based only on his family and their hijinks. The good news is it’s no longer my circus and they are no longer my monkeys.  No more shit eating chimps for me!

Welcome to the Jungle, Part 4

Note:  This is Part 4 of a five part story.  Click on the link for Part 1, Part 2, and Part 3.  And as always if any of these stories are not true blame the lying liars who lie.  I’m just repeating what I’ve been told, although some of them are recited from personal experience.

Next up we have my STBX-MIL.  I’ve debated what to call her.  Dumb bitch just seems crass.  Judas would be appropriate.  Afterall, she sat in my kitchen last spring and told me how much she loved me and valued me and our relationship; she really wanted to get our relationship back on track because I had been her daughter-in-law for 20 years!  I’d been around longer than any of the other spouses.  All the while she’s saying that crap she has either already contacted Harley, urging her to get in contact with my husband, or she left my house and urged her soon after to call him.  You know, because he’s sad.  After the first affair with her.  Alas, Judas was a male and my Judas is female so I’m going to keep the religious angle and go with Tammy Faye Bakker.

Oh where to begin?  I suppose we could start with all of her misdeeds first.  Warm you up to the insanity before plunging you directly into it.  First, she almost cost us our 2nd house.  When we moved the first time we rented.  After we bought a house and sold it less than a year later we didn’t want to make that mistake again.  Our landlord ran a credit check on us and told us we had a credit card that had been rescinded. Turns out Cousinfucker gave his mother a credit card in his name when he got out of college.  She used it for around 5 years before getting into trouble with it and not being able to pay the bill.  She never bothered to tell him.  I don’t know whether she was trying to fix it on her own or if she simply thought he’d never find out.  I do know she claimed she gave the card back voluntarily and then after a period of time the credit card company turned the matter over to a collections agency.  Upon first hearing about it he told her to take care of it; she promised she would.  On Christmas Eve that year he got a phone call from a collection agency threatening to take him to court if he didn’t pay the balance.  That made for a fun holiday because you all should know by now how well he deals with stress.  Add that on top of the fact it’s a holiday *and* he has to go socialize with my family… It was lovely.  Four months later we’re moving and trying to buy a house.  When they do the credit check they find this delinquent credit card that has been turned over to collections and she keeps forfeiting whatever deal they make for payments.  He was livid.  I ended up getting a cash advance on an unused credit card we had and paying the damn thing off.  She promised to repay us but I think she ended up making about 3 payments before that nonsense was forgotten.

In another wise financial decision she decided to quit her job at the state, cash in her retirement and go into business with her brother-in-law.  That’s risky enough when you’re in your 40s.  It’s especially risky when you have had numerous health problems and you end up spending more time in the hospital than the attending doctors; seriously, the woman was in the hospital at least once a year, if not more.   Add on the fact your brother-in-law is a known embezzler and it’s flat out stupid.  People warned her repeatedly not to do it but she would not be swayed.  She didn’t like her boss and she wanted OUT.  She handed all of her money over to him and he spent it. On himself and his family.  Then he turned around and told her all the money was gone and she needed to get another job because that’s what he was doing.  They never recovered from that.   In the months leading up to our wedding she lavished us with cash and gifts.  After the wedding we were the ones helping them out- loans that were never paid back (including the credit card she ran up and then couldn’t pay), care packages, rent paid, car payments, groceries… It’s not like they were a line item in our budget but we did help out whenever we could.  They never paid for an airline ticket to come visit us and they rarely paid for a meal- Zack made sure of that.  We would go visit them and we still always paid.  Again, not a huge deal because we had it and I don’t have a problem with helping out family.  In an ironic twist, the boss that she left her job over, retired or transferred within a year or two.

The best part though is Pastor Fake became a pastor for a small church several hours away from where they had always lived.  They moved into a trailer on someone’s land and as always Tammy Faye was very excited about this new life.  Her landlord’s wife was going to teach her how to can and she was going to have a garden.  Eventually the embezzling brother-in-law who has cost them everything comes back with his family, having been run out of town and run out of money.  He and his family move in with them in this trailer they are renting.  Tammy Faye and Pastor Fake ended up getting kicked out because of letting another family live with them.

Similarly, when they moved back to their “hometown” Pastor Fake eventually became the pastor of Tammy Faye’s family church.  This came with a house adjoining the church.  Things worked out fine until once again they decided to let his sister, having finally divorced the embezzling husband, and her kids move in with them.  He eventually lost the church but before that I think they were required to start paying their own utilities.

In another act of stupidity she ended up getting fired from yet another job at the state, procured for her by a family friend, when she decided to take off from work to sit by her father’s bedside when he had surgery.  Now, first of all, Tammy Faye had already missed MANY days of work due to illness.  She even had co-workers giving her *their* sick days and vacation days so that she could still get paid.  Secondly, this father was her biological “sperm donor” for lack of better word.  She was adopted as a toddler after her mother died (this is covered in Part 5).  Suffice to say, this “man” never stuck around for any of his kids.  Yet when she’s faced with the choice of going to work and keeping her job, or sitting in a hospital waiting room all day while she waits for the results of her sperm donor’s surgery, she chooses to get fired.  She simply HAD to be there!

There are many stories of poor decisions just like this- the time she paid out over $100 for a life size Barbie doll for a grandchild instead of paying the electric bill, which resulted in them almost having their electricity turned off.  Why would she make such a stupid decision?  Well, because “God would provide”, of course!  Come to think of it, we bought the damn doll for her because they were sold out in her area and she sent us a check to cover the purchase.  The check bounced, of course.  So we ultimately bought the doll.  And I think, although I’m not positive, that someone else gave them the money for the electric bill.  I guess God did provide.  He provided people who provided for them.  Then there was the time Pastor Fake bought tires for someone when they could barely scrape together enough money to buy groceries.  And the time my mother loaned her $1000 to help her out with her car payment since they were behind.  The car ended up repossessed anyway and she only paid my mom around $150 of the money back.  I’m sure there are more but there have been so many over the years I can’t keep up with all of them.

Tammy Faye is another one who loves to live life through Facebook.  Every time my daughter posts a picture Tammy Faye is there gushing about how beautiful she is and “that’s my blood” and “I love you so much!”.  Yes, she loves her grandkids so much she saw them one time after we moved closer.  For years they claimed her various illnesses prevented her from traveling and yet she was able to travel 5 hours for a plate of what was supposed to be the best BBQ.  I’ve heard of them traveling hours for watermelon and bacon.  Now, perhaps Pastor Fake is going alone, or going with his current brother-in-law and she’s not part of this.  That could be.  I just always find it amazing how they can manage to take trips to see other people but could never travel to see us.  Even when I would drive over 20 hours to visit my family they couldn’t be bothered to meet me halfway between our towns which would have been a 2 1/2 hour drive for them.  Nope, I had to drive the full 5 1/2 hours down to their house because she just couldn’t travel. And Cousinfucker *demanded* that I take the kids down to see her.  His mantra for the last five-ten years has been, “I don’t think she’ s going to be live another year.”  So how could I deny a dying woman a last chance to see her beloved grandchildren?

Her grandchildren are so dear to her that one year when she came back home with us unexpectedly she said to me, “Well, now I don’t have to come out later on in the summer.”  We had arranged to fly her out to see the kids (kid?  I don’t remember if we had one or two at the time.).  I remember telling her, “The idea was for you to be able to see them more.  This visit will allow you to see them twice this summer.  It’s in addition to, not instead of.”  Make no mistake- this was not a woman who had better things to do than be bothered with her children’s offspring.  She helped out with Jezebel’s kids quite often.  She still does, to this day.  Unfortunately, seeing our kids meant traveling so they didn’t see them often.  In the last ten or so years it rarely happened unless we came to them.

For Christmas this year they gave my son a basketball.  A deflated basketball.  My son has never been into basketball.  He loves hockey.  He loves Legos and Star Wars.  He is an avid artist and video game player.  But a basketball player?  No.  He looked at me and said, “It’s like they don’t even know me!”  Son, I hate to break this to you but they don’t know you.  That might take time and effort.

She didn’t bother to come visit her son when he was in the psych ward either.  She called.  She didn’t come after he was released either.  Now, he would tell you that he told her not to come because she was getting sick and he was worried about her.  But I don’t care if I were on my death bed.  If my child was going into an inpatient facility I’m going to be there!  And if I think his horrible, evil wife is at the root of it I’m definitely going to be there!  But not them.  Nope.  Too much trouble.

My mother is still appalled at the time Tammy Faye went into rehab only days after I had arranged a surprise visit for her with the grandkids.  Yep, I drove both kids (ages 2 and 4, maybe?) the 7 1/2 hours down there.  Surprised her (with the full knowledge of Pastor Fake).  Two or three days later she goes into rehab for addiction to painkillers.  She had been addicted for years and yet she chooses this moment in time to get clean.  Now, it is possible that she couldn’t get her hands on anymore and therefore had no choice but to get off of them.  She and her various family members would frequently “share” medications.  Another lovely moment in this flying monkey circus.  I will say she is clean and has been ever since that happened, and the Lord has apparently performed a medical miracle because she is no longer on oxygen like she has been for the past ten years or so.

I think the best story about her is a tie between using her son’s bank account as an ATM or treating his paternity as a family joke.  I’ll let you decide.

Cousinfucker served in the first Gulf War.  While he was away he put his mother in charge of his bills so she had access to his account.  She and Jezebel both used his bank account as a freaking ATM while he was off fighting a war.  He came home thinking he would have thousands in his account and instead it was almost empty.  She swears she paid him back but I find that hard to believe.  And there is still a huge difference between being given a lump sum of $20,000 or something close to that, and being given small amounts of money over months, if not years.  Ironically, he tells me he gave his sister a large amount of money before he even left to help her pay off bills and leave her and her husband debt free.  Still wasn’t enough.  But I’m the one that spends all his money and wastes it.

The other contender for top fucked up story is how she treated his paternity.  To her credit she was not married and fooling around on her husband.  She was, however, seeing and sleeping with two men at the same time.  Two men who knew each other.  She got pregnant, named one of them as the father and married him.  They were married/divorced/married/divorced for around 11 years, I believe.  She always maintained she wasn’t certain she had named the correct man but he was a family man and the other guy was more of a player so she went with the “safer” choice.  Typing that out I’m not sure if this guy was married or not when he got her pregnant.  There is a substantial age difference between Cousinfucker and his dad’s next youngest child but that doesn’t mean anything.  Over the years family members would joke about this (on her side, of course).  Several of them would claim that CF looked just like the other guy.  It was not a secret.  It couldn’t have been any more out in the open if they had tried.  Then finally a few years after his dad died she supposedly told him that the other guy was his father and that she had known all along.  Why on earth she would wait 40 plus years to tell him this is beyond me.  I personally don’t think it’s true.  He shares way too many freak medical traits with the family he was raised in.  And of course he won’t get a DNA test done.  That might eliminate drama and Cousinfucker is nothing if not a drama queen.

I didn’t spend a lot of time with Zack’s father so we weren’t close.  But the things I heard about him were not great.  For starters, this “family man” she had chosen as her baby’s father was living with another woman at the time of his birth.  He denied him as his own in the beginning and supposedly, he called Zack up when he was in 6th grade and told him that he was not his father and Zack was no longer his son.  He also, if Tammy Faye is telling the truth, threatened to burn down their house if she tried to take it in the divorce.

The bizarre part is that Tammy Faye can be quite charming and likable.  Most people, in fact, DO like her.  I think it’s because most people don’t know about the incredible dysfunction that seems to follow her around.  You know who really likes her, though?  Harley.  Harley has gushed that she and Pastor Fake are two of her most favorite people.  Then again, Harley is a whore and we don’t value her opinion.

 

Welcome to the Jungle, Part 3

Note:  This is the third part of the story.  Here is Part 1, and here is Part 2.  As always, I am as truthful as the information given to me.  Some information is thanks to Google, some due to her husband, and some I have directly experienced.

Harley’s bio will be brief.  She’s been arrested at least 3 times according to my Google search- once for writing bad checks, once for failure to appear, and the third arrest is a mystery.  I have no idea why she was in that time.  Her husband has pretty much accused her of being an alcoholic and says she has a savior complex.  She is going to be getting her money’s worth with Cousinfucker.  Her husband also said she was sending “inappropriate pictures” to the neighbor this past summer.  This neighbor was quite perturbed when she began a full fledged affair with my husband but they are now once again “friends”.  I wouldn’t be surprised to find out she’s sending him “inappropriate” pictures once again. Oh yes, and she is, according to her husband, still having sex with him.  Isn’t she just the cutest thing ever?

Harley’s most favorite thing to do besides screw married men, is to block people on Facebook. She blocked me the first time around when Cousinfucker came back from Jezebel’s wedding.  He told her about the pictures I had around the house.  She told him she thought that was strange and then promptly blocked me.  After DDay I remember telling CF that blocking me was a stupid move because it put her on my radar.  Gradually I came to realize that was exactly the purpose.  I believe she blocked me hoping to incite a divorce.  I think she figured once she blocked me I would realize they were still involved and I would either be so livid I would throw him out, or I would confront him and demand that he choose between us and he would, of course, choose her.

This last time she set her sights on my daughter.  Rock Star (my new name for my daughter) laid into her dad because of Harley’s insipid message on Facebook about missing him.  He defended the whore and Rock Star ended up sending him a screenshot of her rambling.  He must have said something to the whore because she ultimately ended up blocking my child so that she could no longer see what was being written and “tattle” to her dad.

Looking back on their first affair and her subsequent actions I believe Harley is a manipulative, deceptive, gold digging whore.  As Rock Star says about her Facebook page:  It’s like she wants a Twitter account but doesn’t know how to operate it.  Rock Star has actually said she sometimes felt like she was reading a high school mean girl’s Facebook page back in those days before the whore blocked her.  I did a little research and found out that she didn’t start communicating in earnest with any of Zack’s family until after he dumped her the first time.  After that she couldn’t comment on pages enough.  She was everybody’s friend and she was always front and center.  And now, since the exhumation of this great romance, she has added on pretty much all the family members on Cousinfucker’s father’s side of the family. Let’s add attention whore to her resume, shall we?  My favorite part, though, was finding out from Tammy Faye that Harley had called her and checked on her several times after Zack dumped her the first time.  What a brazen bitch!

Here are some more priceless gems from Harley: The first time she and Zack were involved she kept leaving her phone out so that it would be found by her husband.  Now, I don’t know that she intentionally, or even subconsciously, left it out, but how stupid do you have to be to get caught TWICE?  Once again, I think she was hoping her husband would do her dirty work.  The second time she was discovered (again, still the first time they were involved) Zack asked her what she was going to do since her husband (I shall call him The Saint) knew they were involved again.  Harley’s loving response:  I’m not going to do anything.  I don’t care if he knows.

Much like Zack lied to her about his marriage and how awful and evil I am Harley has lied to him about The Saint.  Now, keep in mind this is a story Zack shared with me when we were “reconciling”.  She apparently told him that The Saint, a stay at home dad for over ten years, had put her into bankruptcy three times. I would bet money this came about when Zack was whining about how I spent all of his money.  When DDay #2 came along and The Saint was willing to talk to me I asked him point blank if that was true. Was poor, little Harley working 60-80 hours a week, working her poor whorish little fingers to the bone while that big bad Saint recklessly spent her money?  Turns out, according to him, they filed bankruptcy once- because a business they started up failed.  I again, point blank, asked him, “So you weren’t out there spending all her money, putting her in the poorhouse?”  He laughed and told me Harley didn’t even know what a budget was and that she and their daughter spent money like it was water.  I guess that explains the arrest for writing bad checks!  And why she was so eager to get down on her knees and suck her cousin’s dick.  She’s going to make all of her and her kids’ dreams come true, one blow job at a time, all the while managing to stay out of jail!