If you can't find it, brew it.

FACT: Coloradans love microbrews.

Since I turned 21 while living in Southern California... and since we bought our second house on freaking Wisteria Lane... I learned to drink a plethora of wine (would you say I have a plethora of pinatas? Sorry, I can't say the word "plethora" without referencing "Three Amigos") since there were a butt-load of vineyards and wineries. After I convinced El Jeffe (yes, I heart the Three Amigos, get over it.) to move to Colorado, we realized that the peeps here are serious about their brews. We have our Fat Tire, Breckenridge Avalanche, 1554, Hazed & Infused... and that's just the tip of the lushy iceberg. Yes, we also have the Coors Brewery out here, but nobody drinks that crap... I mean, it's not like we're a bunch of vatos watching a baseball game in Dodger Stadium. Yes, I just said that out loud.

Since Corona was the only beer I had ever tasted, my uneducated pallet came to the conclusion that all beer tasted like piss water. No, I've never had the pleasure of having urine in my mouth. I imagine that's what piss would taste like... like warm, bitter tears and chiclets that have been stomped on after a Tijuana donkey show.

Jeff and I struck a deal: he'd give coffee a second chance (he hated coffee) if I gave beer a second chance. Ah, it was magic in my mouth! Sweet, sweet beer... how could I have ever doubted you? We began to go on a microbrew frenzy! We toured all of the local breweries and drank to our liver's content. We tried a beer that had a cream soda taste to it, and for the life of us, we can't remember what it's called. We've searched high and low for this magical brew. Perhaps our memories were a bit fogged by its 12% alcohol content.

I recently told Jeff, "Hey, since I love to cook... and I love to drink beer... what if I brewed my own beer? Wouldn't it be cool if I could recreate that cream soda beer? It's not like I need a penis to brew great beer, right?" He instantly began to drool and stamped the El Jeffe Seal of Approval to purchase a brew kit. I have this friend, The Dude, who is an amazing brewer. He's been brewing for years and has taken courses from well-known brew masters. I gave him a ring-a-ling and he happily took me under his wing. (See what I did there?) I met with The Dude a few days ago and he helped me shop for an awesome brew kit... he even gave me one of his recipes! I'm going to attempt to brew my first amber ale this weekend. I figure, no matter what it tastes like, it'll probably turn out 100% better than that Corona piss water nonsense. Besides, El Jeffe doesn't believe in wasting beer. I guarantee that every drop will go down his belly--good or bad.

Nucking Futs!

Dear Lord Baby Jesus, looking at your Baby Einstein developmental DVDs, learning your shapes and colors... please help me to refrain from back-handing the crazy moms at my son's school. 

It's moments like these when I'm SO GLAD that I decided to write an incognito burrito blog.

[Insert sigh of relief here]

The best part of living in Uppity, Colorado is the people--or I should say parent--watching. I sit at the school events and just let it all soak in... the smiles they throw one minute, then the daggers they shoot as they walk away... the emails, oh the wonderfully versed (and terribly spelled, might I add) emails! It's pure entertainment for this curly-haired girl.

So there are these two moms... let's call them "Angela" (she's the self-appointed party mom from last year. I call her Angela because she's like Angela on the sitcom "The Office") and "Dearest" (as in Mommy Dearest... the lady constantly drives through my stop sign while talking on her cell phone with kids piled in her car). Okay, so Angela was the self-appointed party mom in my son's class last year and Dearest was the self-appointed party mom in her kid's class last year. The elements have aligned and forced these two women to be in the same class this year... it's a regular Clash of the Titans! These two women are currently having a pissing contest to see who is the best Martha Stewart party mom. I purposely use Martha Stewart as the example because I think she's full of shit and her recipes suck. Okay, so back to my story...

Angela sends out an email asking for the moms to have a party planning meeting at her house. Yes, you read that correctly: she wants to have a meeting at 6pm on Thursday to plan a Valentine's Day party for 4th graders. Dearest decides that she's busy that night, and God forbid she miss the BIG meeting, so we should all chat via "reply all" emails. My smart phone starts blowing up with emails about the VD party, so I begin reading the threads. Yes, I'm still talking about a Valentine's Day party for fourth graders. They're talking about crafts, games, prizes, red-colored food, a freaking chocolate fountain--the whole freaking nine yards! Did I mention that they also thought it would be fun to have the kids do line dancing?! Yours truly finally decided to chime into the virtual pissing contest:

Here's a thought: after asking Trevor about the previous party, he mentioned that it would be fun just to sit around and be able to chat with his friends. I know he's a boy, so it's not like he's the voice of the classroom, but I have to agree with the simplicity. The kids are at the age where having tons of craft projects and games can be a bit tedious. Plus, it seems like we always run out of time. What if we had food, a game and then let the kids hang out together and have some music playing in the background?

With parental guidance, and Mrs. Teacher's approval, what if we let the kids plan their party? We can coordinate the food and they can decide/vote on their activities. What do you all think?

-Curly Sue

I received a halfhearted, bullshit response. You know, the kind you give your kid when you're trying to appease them? It's not like I have the kids' best interest at heart. I mean, that would be crazy... to actually let the kids decide what kind of party they'd like to have... total nonsense! I actually had an out of body experience when I was floating above myself asking, "Are you being crazy? Are they the normals ones?" I then realized that I was the normal one, especially since IT'S A FOURTH GRADE VALENTINE'S DAY PARTY!!!

I've decided to be Switzerland. I'm going to watch the chocolate fountain make a mess, not offer to help clean it up, watch the kids not participate in the line dancing and report back with another awesome blog about how ridiculous the entire party turned out. Sometimes it's good to be a gangsta'.

Random Things I Hear While Eavesdropping On My Kids

Monday, January 17, 2011 (The kids had the day off school in honor of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.)

I heard laughing and the word "fart" coming from the bedroom, so I decided to sneak into the hall and see what was going on...

Chloe: "Smell my butt, brother!"
Trevor: "No, Chloe!"
Chloe: "SMELL IT!!!"
Trevor: "I'm beating (random team on his Madden 11 Xbox game) and you're getting in my way. MOVE!"
(I decided to peek into the room)
Chloe: (she's in the downward facing dog yoga pose with her behind in her brother's face) [fart] "Smell my butt!"

(I enter the room)

Me: "Chloe, what on earth are you doing?! That is NOT lady like!"
Chloe then put on her soap opera crying act, which usually works on her daddy, then stormed out of the room. She spent the next thirty minutes in her room, thinking about her actions.

I highly doubt this is what Dr. King had in mind when he delivered his inspiring "I Have A Dream" speech at the Lincoln Memorial.

The Truman Show

[NOTE TO SELF: When creating a blog that is so incognito burrito, please make note of fictitious email address and password to said blog so you can log in and write more blogs. Also, remembering fictitious blog/email address/password is much more difficult when you create it under the influence of several glasses of wine.]

Okay, so I live in this crazy, hardcore suburban neighborhood. Everyone drives huge SUVs, they proudly post their republican signs in their neatly manicured lawns, all the husbands work and the wives stay home. I swear, there has been many instances when several people back out of their driveways at once. Then there's my house... okay, so our lawn is always nice as well (in the spring and summer, anyhow... you can't really do much during the autumn and winter months), but our cars are a bit more realistic. Instead of driving ginormous SUVs and luxury sedans (BMWs, Lexus... wait, what's the plural of Lexus? Lexuses? Lexi? Eh, it doesn't matter because we don't own one.) I also have to admit that I felt a strange sense of excitement during elections when I proudly posted my democrat signs in our front yard. It was freaking invigorating!

"Why do you live there?" You might ask. Well, let me fill you in on a little secret: when you live in a bubble such as ours, the property values tend to stay high and the public schools are usually amazing. Any guess as to the percentage of how many Caucasians live in our city? Go ahead, guess. [Waiting for you to guess] If you guessed 94% [ding! ding! ding!] you're correct! I live in freaking WASPtopia. Here's a little factoid about Curly Sue and Mr. Jeff: we're crazy about public education. Most public educators (especially at my son's school) are phenomenal. Our son is GT (that's the fancy-pants term for "Gifted/Talented". In layman's terms: he's a nerd) so public education earns him extra time with the teacher, accelerated curriculum to fit his needs and teachers who are trained and have degrees especially for GT children... and we get all of this for the whopping price of $0! Well, not $0... we have some pretty high property taxes and I volunteer TONS at his school. I figure, if there's a teacher spending her free time so she can develop curriculum for my son, the least I can do is volunteer in the classroom to take some of the load off.

Sorry about the whole education rant. Allow me to carry on...

The Truman Show. Remember that Sesame Street song? The one where they talk about all the variety of people who live in your neighborhood? You know, the one that sings, "These are the people in your neighborhood, in your neighborhood, in your neigh-bor-hood, and, these are the people in your neighborhood... the people that you meet each day!" Yeah, that song doesn't really apply to Uppity, CO. I must admit, though, all of my neighbors have kids of their own as well as adopted kids. Our cul-de-sac is like the freaking UN. We have kids from all over the world, so I guess my kids get a little bit of the melting pot experience. ;) I'm sure our street is what accounts for the 6% in the "other" category of our city's racial diversity chart.

Don't get me wrong, I'm not bragging by any means about where we live. We've sacrificed to live here and we've paid our dues. Hell, I don't even fit in here most of the time! I grew up in the ghetto in the projects and low-income apartments. I was raised by a single mom who worked and put herself through school. My husband works his ass off every day so our kids can have better than we had. Ah, the American dream. Here's my goal for my kids: to be raised in Uppity, CO but not act like they were raised in Uppity, CO. And yes, there are much nicer, more expensive places to live in Colorado... this is just the tier we can afford. ;)

"Why are you telling me all of this, Curly Sue?" You may be asking. Well, I'll tell you why: in order to understand my stories, you have to know a little bit of the back story. Think of my blogs as the Star Wars movies or Pulp Fiction... I kind of tell a back story, a future story, bounce around a little, then end it in a way that's coherent. Okay, somewhat coherent.