We had to go to the craft store this weekend to get supplies for the boy’s social studies project. We took the opportunity to look at absolutely everything in the store. We can’t help ourselves, especially at Halloween. We LOVE Halloween.

They had pet costumes. I’ll bet you can see where this is going.

There was one I particularly liked-a shark for a small dog or a cat. Oh, I decided with my hands clasped to my chest, Jojo Kitty would look so cute as a shark. I was already humming the Jaws theme music as I carried the thing to the cashier.

“You’re never going to get that cat of yours into that costume,” My Honey said to me.

“Sure I will,” I noted with confidence. “That cat lets me do whatever I want to him.” It’s true. I scoop him up all the time and zerbert his belly and force him to be cuddled whether he wants to or not. Sometimes he’ll push my face away with a foot, but I don’t. He’s a cat. What other appointments could he possible have?

The instant we walked back in the door from our outing, Jojo was bundled up into my lap. Before he could get up a decent meow of protest I’d squished his head into the shark’s mouth.

Here’s where things started to turn.

Joe’s middle was too…broad for the straps to go underneath. And his back was too long for the dorsal fin to be in the right place. The shark’s tail hit him well before his own tail started.

The whole thing was too small. I often forget that my baby is quite a bit bigger than a Yorkie and a hell of a lot bigger than a Chihuahua. I’m so, so disappointed. I’m completely certain Joe is equally disappointed.

Just look at that face. Does it not spell disillusionment? No candy for you this year, Jojo Kitty.

I was pretty excited about the eclipse tonight. Looked forward to sharing it with my family because the last one came in the middle of the night and I watched it alone, in the bed of the pickup, with a cup of coffee.

This time I wanted them to see how cool it is.

So when I hopped off the couch at 6:20 and ran out to the front yard, Sassy followed me. It was just starting. I sent her back in to fetch her father and brother.

We all stood by the street and watched the moon rising and simultaneously disappearing while cars drove by and the drivers looked at us weird. Neighbors came in and out of their homes. Still we stood there.

Things were moving very slooooooowly. Seriously, slowly.

The Bandit called his sister fat so I made him go sit with his father. Someone complained about getting a sticker in their foot.

The Moon was just about half way covered when Sassy wanted to know when the cool stuff was going to start. I sighed.

“What happens with an eclipse again?” she asked. I briefly explained the science. She got back on Facebook.

By this time, the Moon was more than half covered. A bit of red tinge was appearing around the left side.

My Honey played on his phone while sitting on the tailgate of the truck. In all fairness, this whole thing was moving really slowly.

Finally the moon cleared the trees and we all climbed up on the tailgate to watch.

The Bandit sat too close to Sassy so they fought about that. Loudly.

My Honey farted.

Then Sassy was breathing too close to The Bandit, so they fought about that. Loudly.

“You’re ruining the eclipse for me,” I told them. More than 3/4 of the moon was dark.

Sassy threw The Bandit’s shoes into the street. Guess what they did. Yep. Loudly.

My Honey mentioned that we needed a soundtrack for the event. “Some Credence Clearwater Revival,” he suggested. We sang as much as we could remember while he found it on the internet.

My children found that annoying. So they fought about it.

“Seriously, you’re ruining the eclipse for me,” I said again, but no one cared.

My Honey said that there was something he probably should tell us. “I’m going to become a werewolf after this.”

“Cool,” I noted, staring up at the sky. “I need a good excuse to call in for work tomorrow.”

I told him how the crazies out there were certain all of this was a harbinger of the apocalypse. Which, I might point out is also an excellent reason to call in sick for work.

We made it until the moon was completely covered. My children were unimpressed with the “blood” part of the eclipse. Then they fought about whether it was cool or not.

Next time I’m watching my amazing astronomical events by myself with a nice quiet cup of coffee.

So, how’s that First Day of Fall treating you? It’s supposed to be in the upper 90’s here today. With wind. That’s how we do autumn in the desert - hot wind. Yay. It doesn’t matter though. There’s still plenty of pumpkin spice flavored crap if you’re into that sort of thing. Honestly, the mystique of that flavor is lost on us. We don’t have a problem with pumpkin pie, but that’s really all we’re interested in. And maybe pumpkin cheese cake because, cheese cake. But we don’t need pumpkin spice flavored donuts or coffee or pizza. For Zeus’s sake. When will this trend peter out? Enough already. Of course the other way to know it’s fall is that there’s Christmas decorations up in the Hallmark stores. The craft stores have had that crap out now for three months. Rather sickening. Anyway, we’re going to drink our regular old five dollar latte. Whatever you chose to imbibe is your business. Get a cup of it and settle in. Here we go.

1. Puppies in purses! This card came in the mail to the Sisters and we immediately went on line to order two. We love the color! We love the styling! We’re over the moon about the silver hardware! We’re crazy about the triangle ears! What a steal at $595.00! Imagine the crushing disappointment when we discovered that, after ordering the purse online, no puppy was shipping with it. What the hell? Not such a bargain now, huh? We’d already named our puppies and everything. We were prepared to

buy little Coach collars for our babies - every little thing Coach offers for the stylish Yorkie. The Sisters have decided we’re suing Coach for false advertisement and pain and suffering.

2. Seriously, nothing better to do? A student from the University of Oregon, who just happens to be classically trained in the art of tuba playing, has made the Guinness Book of World’s Records. No, he didn’t play the tuba for seventy-two straight hours or anything spectacular like that. No, Sean Turner toted his tuba all the way up Mount Kilimanjaro. Once atop the highest peak in Africa, he played the school fight song, “Mighty Oregon”. All of this was documented by his university professor (who, it turns out, is also his father) whom he conned into coming along to film it. There is no further explanation in the story we read for why any

of this happened. We Googled it and a tuba weighs somewhere between 25 and 32 pounds. Okey dokey then. We hope he got free tuition.

3. Here kitty, kitty, kitty. We’ve talked about this handsome fellow before - here and here. It turns out the Fish and Game people are holding a contest to name him. They hope that by doing so it will encourage people to care more about him. You better believe, Fish and Game People, that the Sisters care plenty about this kitty. We have all kinds of suggestions for naming him. Back in April 2014 we suggested Carl. It’s got a nice man’s man ring to it. How about Arnold? Bernard seems like a dude that likes a nice cuddle. Weldon isn’t even too far off the beam. Mostly we’d like to call him ours. There’s all kinds of ruckus because his habitat is right where some people want to build a mine. We’re sure you can imagine how

that’s going. Anyway, we’re happy to let him hang out with us. We’ve already got experience owning a Jaguar. OK, it’s a car, but it’s still big and requires a lot of attention. Give us a call. Percy can move in any time. (We’re not sure about that last one. We were just trying it out.)

4. Wait a minute. What? We read the following story and had a immediate reaction. “A 24-year-old man has been charged with elder abuse after authorities say he punched a 78-year-old man over free Nutella waffle samples at a Los Angels-area Costco store.” Wait, just a damn minute. Are they saying there is such a thing as Nutella waffles? We’ll bet that was exactly what you were thinking too, because - HELLO! NUTELLA WAFFLES. The story continues like this: “…say he was hoarding samples of the waffles at the Burbank Costco on Sunday morning when the 78-year-old told him to take just one. Prosecutors say Derrick Gharabighi then punched the older man in the face.” Yikes. When they say “hoarding” how many is that exactly? Are we talking like five? Fifteen? Forty-seven? This is an important bit of information left out. Maybe what it comes down to is that Costco should train their people not to interfere with crazed people when it comes to Nutella waffles. You can pretend all you want that you’re civilized internet people, but you don’t know how you’d react when it comes down to it.

5. Meet Sheldon, Get it? This adorable little thing must have gotten lost and wandered into Ava’s driveway this week. He looked tired so Ava let him stay, and now he’s going to live there! You can only imagine how surprised Ava was to see him. She didn’t even know there were rogue Mini Coopers running around loose in the neighborhood. Here’s the exciting thing. The only people who know how to drive him are Ava’s husband, Ed, and Amylynn! Oooooh! So much excitement. Look, we just want him to feel welcome in his new house. We feel like that might be best demonstrated by finding out just how fast he can corner.

As you all know, the Sisters work together toiling away at a mortgage company. They have slightly different positions but today they were supposed to do the same thing. It was supposed to be a fun thing – but it never is. Once a year, the realtors in town have an Expo for continuing education classes. Part of the Expo includes a vendor area. So, being in mortgage, the Sisters are expected to attend this annual event. That wouldn’t be so bad except each year a “theme” is selected and all of the vendors have to show their spirit by decorating their booth and themselves to match.

This year’s theme was baseball or something to do with baseball – the Sisters hardly paid any attention. Well, they should have. (Amy here - actually the theme was movies. I paid attention because I was forced to). The next thing you know, they’re being asked to purchase WHITE skirts. WE saw you shudder – don’t pretend you didn’t. The only people who should be wearing white skirts are tennis players and golfers, and frankly, some of them shouldn’t do it either.

Amy again: I did most of the shopping for the white skirt while drunk. Actually that’s a lie. I only wish I was drunk. Mostly I cried by myself in dressing rooms. It was ugly. Amazingly enough I wasn’t alone, crying in the JC Penney dressing room. Isn’t that a sad, sad commentary?

The rest of the outfit consisted of a GREEN baseball shirt emblazoned with the company logo, green socks, a white and green baseball hat, a green belt, and VOILA! A League of Their Own! It was as dreadful as it sounds. Now, some people insisted it was “cute” but you know this was said by the folks who didn’t have to wear said get-up.

Turns out, Ava had a lot of fun this year. Fun making fun of Amy that is. Ava’s manager told her she couldn’t go because there was too much work to do in the office. Ava did not put up a fight.

Upon arriving at the office this morning, she found Amy in the parking lot looking simply darling in her “baseball” uniform. She immediately went to take a picture for this blog but Amy said some very bad words and threatened Ava’s life.

Luckily, a baseball bat was not a part of the costume!

We love Beaker and Bunsen Honeydew over at the Bright Compound. Honestly, this gives a whole new perspective to this song. I never really thought of it as sad, but Beaker has made me see the light

Oh. My. God. I am so irritated.

I got a ticket in the mail today from one of those blasted red light cameras.

BAH!

Here’s the thing. I totally did it. I can’t complain. The picture taken of me as I skated through the intersection on the end of a yellow light clearly shows me at the wheel. It also looks like my mouth is in the middle of forming an epic, “Oh SHIT!” I’d also like to point out that I look like crap in the picture. Is it possible that I always look this bad? Cause I’m not depressed enough about getting a ticket and now I have to look at this photographic proof? There’s a link to a video. I don’t think my psyche can stand that.

The cost of the ticket is $337! Sweet Mother of Zeus! Can you believe that? I haven’t gotten a ticket in at least 15 years, and I knew the instant this one happened. Also, I’d like to point out that the tickets states I was traveling at 16 mph in a 40 zone. Shouldn’t I get brownie points for that?

Here’s the thing, though. They sent it to my maiden name, a name I haven’t had legally also in 15 years. Do I have to pay this ticket if they don’t even know my damn name? My driver’s license is in my legal name. What the hell?

OK - since this is not the reason I want to go to jail…

My options include Driver’s School - in person or online. I went to the website to see how much THAT was going to set me back and this is what I found on the list of Certified Driving Schools.

Sir Waldorf Bentley’s School for Naughty Drivers

Slow Your Pony

Comedy Traffic School

Easy Peasy Defensive Driving

Piece of Cake Traffic School

Super Fly Defensive Driving

Obviously I’m going to select the one that references dessert. This whole thing shouldn’t totally suck.

I can almost guarantee that I’d do this on accident. It’s also entirely possible I’d do this on purpose, because wouldn’t you be dying to know? I would. Still, the odds are that I’d stick my hand in my purse for my wallet and I’d go down twitching at the local Target.

Preach, Calvin.

For Sale: Two children with excellent hair. Also, astounding ability to converse with compatriots while in an educational establishment. Overachievers in the skills of eye-rolling and procrastination. Unusually good at fiction fabrication and bearers of enlarged persecution complexes.

You might wonder how things are going at the Sister’s various houses, but despite the Craig’s list ad above, you can assume things are going as well as can be expected considering that we’re proud to be the World’s Most Okayest Moms. At this point, that all four of the children are alive is something to be proud of. Or at least it’s the best accomplishment we’ve had this week. There were funny things however, and we’re happy to share. Here you go.

1. Why is it always Florida? This time it’s Miami, but you know it could have been anywhere in that state. Saying that they’re odd down there is an understatement. Maybe it’s the humidity. Whenever we have been in Florida, we’ll admit, we get a little sketchy, too. This latest incident involves 52-year-old Eddy Juan who was arrested in the library at Florida Internal University. His crime? Yeah, Mr. Juan was crawling around under the tables in order to smell women’s feet. Take a moment if you need to. We understand. We wish we could explain this to you, but we can’t. Perhaps we’re all being short sighted here. We’re always trying to figure out a way to get out of our day jobs. How bad could letting perverts smell your feet really be?

2. Bad News, Bears. Some seriously upsetting news has come out of Washington this week. If #1 pans out like we think it might, then we’re going to have to cozy up to a banker. The IRS has stated they will no longer accept payment in checks if your tax payment is $100,000,000 or more. In case you got lost there in all those zeros, that’s 100 million. Apparently, the checks processing equipment at the Federal Reserve bank can’t handle checks that big. We wondered, exactly how often does this happen? Seriously? More than you think apparently. This year the IRS accepted 14 checks for more than $99,999,999. ***Eyeroll*** Oh to have this problem.

3. A perfect example of poor planning. The FBI arrested a flight attendant with Delta Airlines. He is charged with among other things, fabricating a hoax about a suspicious package. We’re not sure what he was hoping would happen, but what he got was an emergency landing in Bismark, North Dakota. We can’t imagine that North Dakota was his intended destination. North Dakota is no ones intended destination. Honestly, if you’re planning this sort of thing, plan it over somewhere good. Hawaii anyone? Not that we want to offend the North Dakotans, or specifically even the

Bismarkians, but we’ll bet they wish they were somewhere else, too. Maybe even Miami - see #1. Think, people. Think.

4. More poor planning. A 62-year-old man in Anchorage, Alaska was mauled by a bear while walking his neighbor’s dog in the woods. The man stated he was able to call for help on his cellphone. Thank goodness. Unfortunately, he wasn’t carrying a gun or bear spray. That seems like a very bad idea especially when he was in the WOODS with bear bait on a leash. We’ll bet he’s better prepared next time. Or he gets a bigger dog. Whatever, once again the Sisters offer proof that one should stay inside.

5. Someone up there loves us. Look what Ava found at the grocery store. Can you believe it? Us neither. YUMMY! It’s not exactly like eating actual Swedish Fish but it’s darn close. And, to make matters even better, there are <5 calories and 2 grams of carbs per serving. Gum for everyone. This gave the Sisters a whole lot of ideas - Trident Layers with Jordan Almonds! Trident Layers with Chik Fila Frozen Lemonade! Trident Layers with Chipotle! Okay, maybe not the last one but you get the point.

20 Reasons Why the Sisters are Never Climbing Mount Everest

1. Ummm. Outside. Hello?
2. Have you seen how cold it is there?
3. As much as we’ve wanted to hire our very own Sherpa, this is frankly not enough incentive.
4. **shiver** Snow.
5. They won’t let us bring our cats. We tried shoving Jojo Kitty into a back pack and it didn’t go well.
6. We have too many television shows were dedicated to.
7. It’s mostly all up hill, and we don’t really like up hill.
8. We aren’t even willing to walk back up the Grand Canyon. Seriously. 29,000 feet. Right.
9. There isn’t a Starbucks up there.
10. Or a Chipotle.
11. Frostbite is not attractive. We can’t type our books if we have no fingers.
12. We don’t sleep in tents.
13. Snow Leopards? Hmmmm, maybe. Nope, still no.
14. No cell phone reception.
15. We have very deep concerns about where a person pees when it’s that cold.
16. If we went to Everest, who would do all the laundry? Who?
17. Apparently it’s very crowded up there.
18. And littered with debris. We can stay home and yell at people to pick up their stuff.
19. Surely you’re not serious
20. We’re so sorry. That’s the month we wash our hair.

This is by no means a comprehensive list. We reserve the right to add reasons up to infinity.

It’s Amylynn’s boyfriend’s birthday today.

Amylynn has already told Her Honey that should Sandra Bullock wander into his eye line, he has her permission to get whatever he can out of that fortuitous event.

On this day in 1977, Edward Thomas Hardy was born. You know him as Tom.

Look at how pretty.

So, so pretty.

Even from the back. Holy Moly.

And one last ovary cramping gif.

Maybe one more .

Happy birthday Tom. If we weren’t prohibited by law from getting within a thousand feet of you, The Sisters would give you a birthday kiss.