Sassy called me from school very excited. She’d received a letter from her school that she was one of 35 students chosen because of an essay she wrote. Obviously, I am super proud of her. She’s going to get to work on a massive mural that’s going up in the school. This involves field trips and all kinds of special privileges.

All because she wrote one of the best essays about being kind.

Kind. Being kind.

Not if you ask her brother.

“I’m so proud of you,” I told her. “You write fiction just like your mother!”

None of us has a Subaru. We’re not plugging this car unless the Subaru people are so impressed by our blog (we’re very influential by the way) that they would like to reward us with one.

Still, we love this commercial. This kid is freakin’ hysterical. Love the line at the ATM when he yells at the honker, “I’m FIVE!”

Another week gone by.  Another week of pain and suffering at Bank of No Forks.  Nope, nothing unusual happened just the ordinary nonsense of not enough to do and the trouble caused by us because of it. The good news is that we contained our misdeeds to IHOP (who totally deserved it) and the Torture Chamber (Skinjectables – seriously, that’s what they call that place where you give a woman a zillion dollars to rip your face off. Trust her, you’ll look

Wait! What the hell is happening here? We get charged $600 when we poke our finger in the cage and he gets to touch it?

younger. Amylynn thinks that’s because they’re growing new faces in an Igloo cooler in the back room). Aside from laughing at ourselves, we also laughed at the following:

1. A baby! We’re so excited that Kate and William, Duke and Duchess of Cambridge, are having another baby. We also bet that George will be excited about it, too, as soon as he’s old enough to figure out what’s coming. It’s all fun and games cause those babies are cute and they giggle and stuff. Then, Georgie my boy, pretty soon they start touching your stuff. Nothing is sacred, that baby won’t care if you are the Prince of Wales and going to be THE King of England someday. And they monopolize your mom. The Sisters also have some advice for the expecting parents, too. DON’T DO IT! The first kid goes super

Holy shit!

smoothly and you think that you totally know how to do this. How much more difficult could one child be? Oh, oh, oh. You have no idea the level of craptastic frustration you’re bringing on yourself. That second child is trouble. Trust us. We know.

2. Just stay no to snakes. This next story is another example of horrendously bad reporting in newspapers. In Thousand Oaks, CA. the police reported they caught a deadly albino cobra that had been on the loose for days. That alone poses several questions. It gets worse during the next sentence. “However it wasn’t immediately clear whether the albino snake – which apparently escaped from captivity – still had its venom glands.” Why would they think that might be a possibility? There are so many questions here. We say that if you’re missing a cobra and you call it in to the police and you KNOW that it’s missing a major viper component, don’t you think you

We bet if we were Prince George they’d let us touch it.

should fully disclose all that? We’re just sayin’.

3. More reasons not to go outside. In case you were thinking about venturing out into the great wide open, we’re suggesting that you reconsider. We have two very specific examples on why it’s a bad idea. A mountain lion attacked a 6-year-old boy while he was out hiking with his family. Everyone calm down. He’s expected to recover. Police stated, “We don’t know the exact circumstances of the attack.” We suspect that kid looked like a tasty morsel. The only way to avoid this happening in the future is to snatch all the baby mountain lions and make them love you. The Sisters are volunteering. We’d like hazard pay. The next instance involved an actress, Molly Glynn from Chicago Fire. She was out riding her bike (first mistake – Mr. Bright are you listening?) when she was killed by a falling tree during a storm (second mistake – why are you biking in a storm?) Who the hell thinks they are going to die like that? Who? Bicyclists should expect bullshit like this. Again, we’re just sayin’.

These are not our fingers. Ours photograph fat.

4. More lobster shenanigans. Remember last week we reported a blue lobster. This week two albinos and a yellow one popped up. The blue lobster was one in 2 million. The yellow one is one in 30 million and the albino ones are one in 100 million. What’s with the flurry of crazy ass lobsters? Either the scientists are completely full of hooey or the lobsters are just messing with our heads. That’s the theory we’re going with. They’re probably down there in the ocean, speaking with Northeastern accents and plotting their next escapade.  And arranging for their next dye job.

5. Jamberry. Sometimes we do our nails. Sometimes = damn near every day. We really don’t have anything else to do with our time. The World’s Greatest Receptionist had a friend come in who sells Jamberry. She brought in samples and we all did our nails with their products. They are these vinyl wraps that are water proof and last for weeks. There are 300 designs. Well, the verdict is in and we LOVE them. We’ll keep you posted on whether or not they last on Amylynn since she’s complete hell on nails.

I got to take part in one of the world’s most frustrating experiences yesterday. I got to call the Help Desk. Or the UnHelp Desk. Just like every where else, this has mostly been outsourced to India so I wasn’t the least bit surprised when the guy answered the phone with a thick accent. I was however surprised when he identified himself as John.

Riiiiiight.

Our phones go through our computers. It’s a giant pain in the ass.  I explained to them that my desk phone isn’t ringing. I can talk on it as evidenced by the fact that we were indeed speaking on it at that very moment. However, when someone called in there was no auditory signal to alert me that was occurring. I assured him my ringer was turned on and that I heard other noises coming from the magic box.

John: OK, can I have your call back number?

Me: I don’t have a direct line. You have to call the main customer service number, put in your account number and you’ll end up at my desk.

John: What’s the account number?

At this point I’m not sure if “John” has any idea where I work. I explained that one of the 70 gazillion customers would have to put in THEIR account number. Just any random number wouldn’t work.

Me: I want to remind you that the reason I’m contacting your department is that my phone doesn’t ring.

John: Hmmmm.

“John” proceeded to make techie noises and repeatedly asked me to hold. I gave answers that were sarcastic at best. Truth be told, they probably leaned more towards caustic. I agreed to hold.

Eventually when he returned, he informed me he was going to give me a ticket number and a specialist would call me back.

John: Can I have your phone number?

Me: (making a Herculean effort to control myself) John, do you remember the reason that I’m calling? My phone doesn’t ring.

John: Uh huh.

Me: Alright, I’m going to need you to read me what you have written down for my problem because I don’t feel like you have any idea what our conversation has been about.

I took down my ticket number. It’s been two days and I’ve heard nothing. Isn’t that shocking? Soooooo, if you’re calling me at work that’s why I never answer.

That and Dexter is on. I’ll be checking my messages during an intermission.

We’ve mentioned before that Amy and Ava are very, very different when it comes to the rigors of keeping up appearances.  Ava doesn’t consider pain or money when it comes to beauty self-torture and the World’s Greatest Receptionist agrees. (Amylynn here. She’s not exaggerating. I’m NOT willing to go through pain. I won’t even tweeze my eyebrows. Fortunately, my eyebrows are very tame.)

Today we went on a road trip for a treatment to make TWGR have a glowy face for a wedding she’s attending shortly.  Amy declined to go with us, but her refusal to go was ignored and she was forced into the car. (Me again. Yes, absolutely forced.)

At the appointment, treatment options were discussed.  One of them is known as the “vampire” facial.  That got Ava and TWGR all excited.  We like vampires.  As soon as blood and vampires were mentioned, Ava immediately looked at Amy’s face for the reaction she knew would be there.  Yup. There was that Amy horrified look.  Amy has that look anytime some potentially interesting beauty process is mentioned. (Guess who. These “beauty processes” like laser resurfacing, blood palette replacement, liposuction, injections, and chemical peel. No thank you. Ironically, I have 7 tattoos. I cannot explain that.)

No matter how horrified Amy is over this stuff – Ava and TWGR are in!!!  And vampires live forever.  Double bonus!

So, I bet you’re wondering, how our diets are going?

Let me give you a brief rundown in the form of a conversation that happened on Monday.

In case you’re not from where we live, it was a rainy morning. Really rainy. We had record rainfall and the governor declared us in a state of emergency.

The morning diet fiasco started with texts.

Amy: I’m gonna be late. I’m going home to let the dogs back in.

Ava: And to pick up donuts.

Amy: Seriously?

Ava: Isn’t today the day for those croissant donuts?

Amy: You understand that it’s fucking pouring, right? Broadway and Swan could only be described as torrential.

Ava: It’s not raining here. Come in and we’ll go somewhere.

Approximately three minutes later I arrived at work and it was indeed raining there. The World’s Greatest Receptionist and I arrived at the same time and parked next to each other in our assigned covered spots. The rain was so intense we could barely see the front of our building maybe fifty yards away. We sat in our cars and chatted for twenty minutes before we were brave enough to go in. Needless to say we did not go out to get donuts. This fact was much lamented for many, many hours. (On the bright side, we thought there was a real possibility that we’d have to build an ark. The first animal we’re getting is a panda.)

The rain continued unabated. By 1:00 we were starving. STARVING. The closest place was Smashburger.

Ava: Do you think it would be wrong of us to get milk shakes with our burgers?

Amy: No!

Ava: Really? (she sounded very hopeful)

Amy: You didn’t have donuts did you?

Ava: That’s the kind of logic that makes us sisters.

I had a Butterfinger milkshake and she had Nutter Butter. TWGR had strawberry, which was a mistake as far as we were concerned.

Anyway. That’s how the diet is going.

I just got the new cover for my December 15th release of Finish What We Started from Carina Press.

It’s available for pre-order now. You should go get yourself a copy. If you liked Mark and Holly, then you’ll love following up with his brother Lee.

Five years ago, Lee Bennett’s whirlwind romance with Candace Claesson ended as abruptly as it had begun, and just when he needed her the most. Since then, Lee’s built a successful construction company and a satisfying, if solitary, life. When he’s hired to build Candace’s new veterinary clinic, Lee finds her as irresistible as ever—but he’s never forgiven her and he’s sure as hell not letting her break his heart again.

For years, Candace has wrestled with regret and guilt over leaving Lee. At the time, nothing was going to stop her from achieving her dreams of studying in Scotland and becoming a vet—not even young love. They’d been inseparable for six months, but anything that intense couldn’t last. Or so she thought.

Reunited in their hometown, neither Lee nor Candace can resist picking up where they left off. But with so much from the past standing between them, how they can rebuild what they started so long ago?

These are so cute–and true. At least where our cats are concerned.

We watched Breakfast at Tiffany’s today at Bank of No Forks. The Sisters adore that movie. Holly Golightly was so charming. And lovely. In fact, we need several of her dresses, hats, and especially that pearl necklace she’s wearing in the opening sequence. Also, we appreciate the fact that she always collected $50 from her dates to take with her to the powder room. That’s genius and we wish we’d thought of it back when we were single and dating. If you haven’t seen that movie in a while, you should revisit it. You’ll be happily humming (or singing if your Amylynn) the

Kenneth Lacovara with the right tibia of dreadnoughtus schrani Kenneth Lacovara Photograph: Kenneth Lacovara

lyrics to Moon River all day because that song is beautiful. And Holly has a cat named Cat who looks like Jojo Kitty. Fabulous. Here are some other charming things this week.

1. Things that are fatter than us. Researchers have been in the news lately because of a new dinosaur skeleton. It’s called Dreadnoughtus Schrani – meaning “fearing nothing”. Awesome name, right? It’s the biggest animal they’ve ever found where they can actually determine it’s weight. They’re saying 60 tons. That’s 120,000 pounds. We did the math for you so you wouldn’t have to. That’s how we are. All about the math. We’ll also share a dessert with you, cause we’re super nice that way. Back to the dinosaur and it’s massiveness. It was bigger than a 747 jumbo jet. Seriously. We would not be willing to share a dessert with this guy, cause we suspect he’d be a hog. Also, the poop. We don’t mean to be gauche, but when you talk about an animal bigger than a passenger jet, you need to be concerned about the poop. It would be the size of a freakin’ condo. Just sayin’.

2. Joan Rivers. This lady was funny. Often you cringed at her zingers, but you also had to admit they were funny and you were probably thinking them yourself but were too polite to say it out loud (Yes, there are things we’re too polite to say out loud so just stop it right now). Like this one: “I’ve never seen a 6-month-old so desperately in need of a waxing” about Kanye West and Kim Kardashian’s kid. OK that’s an awful thing to say, and totally hysterical. We don’t know how the red carpet will ever be the same without her or Fashion Police, that can’t go on without her.

3. Lunch with friends. We love to meet with friends and gab and gab and gab. We met with a writer friend of ours today, Pumpkin, who we just never see enough of, and had a jolly good time. We didn’t even drive the waitress too crazy –probably because our attention was focused on Pumpkin and not on torturing the help. We debated ordering dessert to share and ultimately decided it was the way to go since otherwise we’d just get back to the office and regret it. So pecan blondies for everyone. Just let us know if you want to meet for lunch. We know where all the best places are.

4. Abso-freaking-lutely ridiculous titles. The Bank of No Forks is famous for its corporate-speak. It’s all gobbledygook and bullshit designed to make you feel connected. Mostly it makes us feel annoyed. Our boss’s boss’s boss just recently moved to a different department and got himself a whole new job title. The acronym is MRA (we’re also super big on acronyms). What is an MRA? you ask. That’s what we wanted to know. We’d seen it before and never figured it out. It means–we shit you not–Matters Requiring Attention. Yes, that’s a real job title for a real person. We can’t make up crap this stupid. It takes a corporation to do it.  We’re ordering business cards.

5. 16 Year Old Driving Boys. The boy who lives at Ava’s house is still (STILL) learning how to drive.  All of you know Ava hates to drive.  Hates it.  She’s not good at it and pays no attention whatsoever while doing it.  It’s really just best if she doesn’t do it at all.  Generally, she’ll let anyone drive her around, anyone.  Even strangers.  But even she has to give pause every morning when she has to decide if she’s going to let the boy drive to school.  It’s not that he’s unsafe or especially bad at it, but he’s not good at it.  Amy taught him how to parallel park so there’s that in the plus column.  Ava can’t parallel park so ultimately she just let’s him drive and hopes for the best.  So, if you’re in the desert and you see a car driving backwards, repeatedly parallel parking down the street – save yourself and stay out-of-the-way.

You’ve all heard this rant before. This is not a new argument. Still, I’m gonna have to do it. I hadn’t really had this problem until recently. Sassy is in the 6th grade and sometimes she asks me for assistance with her math homework.

I couldn’t be worse prepared.

The real issue is the way math is taught today. I have no idea what these bullshit methods are, but I have a hell of a time figuring them out.

You know what the real problem is? They make the kids show their work. This has been the case since the ancient Greeks figured out math. I’m certain Pythagoras assigned homework on marble slabs.

“Yes, I see you got the answer but where is your work?”

Now the teachers have all these wacky solutions to figuring math that is way more fucking complicated than

12

x12

144

Now they make them do all kinds of funky shit that I can’t figure out when the old way is so damn easy.

This seriously makes me feel like a moron. I read the instructions. I try to follow the examples. This is what I get.

Please tell me I’m not the only one.