Goodbye Christian Boys!

So often Christian's embarrass themselves (myself included) when in the eye of the public.

Andy and Tommy were the exception.

You know me and my "Where Have all the Cowboys Gone" mantra... good Christian men are few and far between.  And in this culture, Christian or not, it seems you are hard pressed to find men that don't whine, snivel and complain over challenges that life brings them...

Andy and Tommy were (are) the exception.

How bummed we were tonight to log on to cbs.com only to see the "rad" Christian, pro-snowboarders eliminated thanks to cab drivers with flapping jaws.

How badly we wanted them to win.

And yes, I've still got it bad.  After what, 19 seasons, I still lust over going on the Amazing Race.  I never, ever tire of this show.  I never ever tire of imagining how Joel and I would handle each and every Road Block.  I never tire of imagining how viper-like competitive I would be...

But anyways,

Andy and Tommy - thanks for not coming off like total Christian morons - which is how television usually portrays believers - thanks for being normal, kind, competitive and totally inspiring human beings.  Joel and I are truly sorry you aren't in the final three.

  It's been a pleasure.

Not So Happy Trails...Warning: Amazing Race Spoiler

Being Easter Joel had the night off so we plugged in the telly instead of waiting 'til cbs.com tomorrow...

"Bummer" or should I say, "Shucks" does not even come close.

Sorry - call me a looser but I got tears in my eyes.

Tonight - by no fault of their own The Cowboys, brothers Jet and Cord got eliminated off The Amazing Race.

I am not one to wave the "not fair" card... 

After all, we have a saying in this house...

"It's not Show Friends, it's Show Business!"

But that doesn't take the sting out tonight.

Poor Jet botched his kilometer guess of his moped travels thru Lichtenstein and just about EVERYONE ELSE would have too had one person not shared the correct answer... causing it to spread like wildfire... no one told Jet though...

Then, horror of horrors,

The Cowboys got U-Turned

 and that was that.

Now the bizarre Mallory (and her cool, kind Dad) and the effeminate Kent (And his pink haired, Amazon, pitiful, could-pick-him-up-and-toss-him-and-should girlfriend Vixen) are going to have a chance at a million dollars.

Joel and I rooted for The Cowboys last year and did again this year as they took their second chance.  We thought the idea of those hard working, God fearing, nice boys taking  a million dollars back to their wives and babies back on the ranch sounded really sweet.

Sigh.

They were the real deal.

I wouldn't even be mad if the producers gave them a third chance.

They were fantastic competitors.  

The best ever in fact and I know the other teams breathed a sigh of relief when the realized that they were gone.

So now, still in shock all I can say is, 

If Kent and Vixen win I'm gonna barf.

She should take the million all for herself and run for the hills.

My Dream - The Amazing Race

Come Monday there are two things I am strumming the kitchen counter top for...

The latest sermon from Mark Driscoll at Mars Hill Church in Seattle, not Michigan.  AND...

The Amazing Race.

What can I say?  I don't watch T.V.  But Monday night you can bet your bootie I am on CBS.com to watch the Amazing Race.  This is season seventeen and I am no less enthused.

 Passion Alert:  Here me out...

There are a few things in life that bring tears to my eyes... My desire for my kids to know the Lord, my love for my Hubby, my desire to know Paris/France better, my desire to Tango, my desire for a farm of our own and... I know this is corny... but my desire to be a contestant... WITH JOEL on the Amazing Race.

Back when this show débuted we watched T.V. and I became totally hooked and since then I have not missed a season.  I can tell you every stupid mistake and every BRILLIANT move over the years.  And lest you think I am an ego-maniac (said the blogger with her own photo on her header!!!!) I think we could kick some BOOT-AYE on that game!

One of our Favorite teams... and we loved the Cowboys too!

First and formost I think my completely jaded attitude would come in handy.  As mentioned in many previous posts, I am not a gushy, ra-ra type woman... though I was a cheerleader in high school.  If I was on the Amazing Race, you would NEVER, I mean never hear me gush about someone being "so sweet" that I wanted to team up with them, I would NEVER wait around for another team to finish so we could "work together"... (ok, probably never) I would NEVER wuss out on a task... I mean NEVER!!!!  Remember that D-U-M-B girl last year that was so scared she would not even go down a WATER SLIDE!!!!


In all seventeen seasons of The Amazing Race there have been two tasks that I wondered if I could do mentally or physically:
1.  IT was a LONG time ago but it had something to do with walking past chained tigers.  Yeah, I have nightmares about giant cats.  Yikes.  I would not NOT do it, but man, I might puke.

2.  The one time they had to crawl into one of the Great Pyramids.  Long time readers remember my post about crawling into the trunk of my car to fix it... I am claustrophobic and I tell you what, I don't know what the rules are, but I might have to have a pint of whiskey in my giant back pack in order to do me some Egyptian treasure hunting.  It's called, Liquid Courage.

Joel and I watch the show together and we discuss who would take each challenge in a particular situation.  For example, if eating crispy, fried bugs somewhere in Africa were on the menu (which is pretty tacky and not often a tactic of the Amazing Race) I would do it, cause Joel would never make it,   I would also handle any clues having to do with unscrambling Cyrillic letters and what not... but he would handle feats of great strength or those having to do with something gross like Wasabi.  Barf.

We would of course be the obligitory, long time married, white, "born again" Christian couple... and I PROMISE the rest of you Christians out there, we would NEVER ask Jesus to "help us win a million dollars."  I would be more prone to drop an F-Bomb in an exhausted fit of frustration than ask Jesus to help me win a million dollars.

For protection yes, for wisdom yes... but come on... "help us beat that other couple" ??? I don't think so.

There are reasons I think we would rock it and not embarrass ourselves at least not too bad:

• We don't speak louder when talking to someone who doesn't understand.
• We DO understand, "it's not show friends, it's show business" (brownie points if you know what movie that is from)
• We DO understand that my personality is stronger but that he deserves respect... ain't gonna be no bitchy drama coming from our team.  Ok, at least not TOO much.
• We know that in many forgein countries you have to use DIESEL in your rental car... DUGH.
• I would be smart enough to befriend EVERY stinking person I could on the airplane to give us any information about where we are headed.
• I would NEVER leave my backpack behind.  Those people drive me nuts!!!!
• I would bring a compass.  (Just in case my brain stopped working )
• I would bring a calculator (remember that Dubai gold task from a few seasons back???)
• I can swim and run and the drop of a hat no matter how long it has been since I did either.
• Joel is laid back and full of steady common sense, and he is not totally mule-headed or glory seeking.
• We each have pretty good street smarts and with our strengths and weaknesses we could run pretty tight.
• We have driven in foreign countries together and have figured out a way to communicate when navigating a round-a-bout.  
• I can read a map.  And though I would love to drive, Joel would most likely be our driver while I read the map.
• Joel would NEVER get in a cab without taking a peak at his gas tank and tire pressure.  I know this would take a long time, but there has got to me a way to glance at these two things to make sure you aren't getting in a Flintstone mobile.

Things that do freak me out -

• I have a "bad back" - IE, it hurts all the time and the thought of running around with that backpack really freaks me out.
• I would miss my children and it would be so difficult to be apart from them.
• WHO is going to believe in us enough to watch our children for up to three weeks?
• I get emotional when I am over tired.  Surely this race is exhausting,  I wonder if I would break down and cry at some point.
• I am not too much of a princess (IE: I can leave the house without makeup) but I have to take care of my skin, would I cram little skin care bottles in my backpack?  If I don't watch my face I turn into a giant zit.  Even at 35.
• Joel and I are a great team but can have two VERY different ways of thinking.  Could I, in the heat of the moment, stay kind.  Just being honest here.  I can get pretty competitive.

I can assure you though that the other teams will hate me!!!  I PROMISE!  That's just how it works... show a little confidence... don't pass out the mushy-ga-ga hugs = they don't like you!!!

I promise you, my friends, family and sweet readers if I ever make the Amazing Race I will not run around the planet in skin tight black capri leggings... I would stink bad enough in Thailand, let along in skin tight lycra.  And I won't push Lucy and Ethel up to my nose for the world to see either.

I LONG to run this race... and hopefully I have not given away enough of my strategic ideas... but really, I know what fricken Stonehenge is for Pete's sak, I know how to swim and would never mistake QU II for Jaquline Kennedy... OMGOSH some people are so clueless.

Our family... well, we don't think it's done growing... but Hubby did BLOW MY MIND the other night when I was expressing my heartfelt desire to compete in this game... he said, "You may just get your chance"... now, that is a really big deal... so all you wanna be T.A.R. hopefulls better watch out!!!!

Friday's Adventure

Ok, So I am a little behind on the "Laugh Your Arse off Thursdays" though the Rolling Stone Cover I suppose would have been sufficient - I do have a few side splitting "You Tubes" that I keep forgetting to post.
But now it's Friday and I am feeling pretty good.
Not really afraid of much. Homebirth, bad weather, fires in my stove. I would love to go storm chasing and can calmly soak a dishtowel and throw it into my burning oven without any hysteria.
"I was so scared" are words you will probably rarely hear me say. But there are a couple situations I would be happy to pass on - being lost in the ocean for example and cramped spaces...
I love that show The Amazing Race. It is my DREAM to be on it. In fact, the night before I found out I was pregnant with Aidan we were filling out the paperwork to audition. Every stunt save two I thought I could probably gag, think or maneuver my way through. I have a great sense of direction, can read a map, drive a stick and don't raise my voice when talking to people who can't understand me! There was once a task that involved tigers - I'd have probably had a little panic attack and there was one that involved crawling through the passages inside of the Pyramids in Egypt. It was while viewing that that I turned and said to Joel, "I don't know if I could do that without freaking out."

Last week we painted a friends kitchen cabinets (sa-weet) and packed up our car to retrieve Aidan from TaTa Ruthie's. Upon arriving at her house we went to throw his bag in the trunk - no such luck. Our trunk, full of smelly oil based products, drop cloths and a small plank ladder would not open. NOT cool when you have two kids, car seats, strollers, pack and plays and need to go grocery shopping.

Our car is almost 10 years old and has been a GEM of a car except for one irritating feature. The seats do not fold down to access the trunk. There is a little opening in one of the seats. I swear it can't be more than 12x18 inches. Well, if you have seen Joel's painters shoulders you know there was no way he was getting in there to assess the situation, Aidan would not have known what to do (let alone would I shove him in there in this weather with all those fumes.) So, you guessed it. It was pay the dealership to try to figure it out (NOT!) or I had to conquer my "thing" with cramped spaces.

I tried it last weekend and thought my heart was gonna pound out of me chest. I got in a little past my waist, pulled on every tub and wire Joel thought would fix it but it was to no avail. It was so hot and so smelly, Joel was crabby, it was not good. But then we managed to pull everything except the plank ladder out through the hole and gave it a few days to air out.

This morning. I get pretty cranky when stuff doesn't get done around here. I need more hours in the day and my poor husband needs an assistant to keep up with me. I needed my fricken trunk. Yesterday we went to Costco and had to pile all our crap up and around the babies. Ridiculous. So, this morning I said, "I'm going in again."

I hate to let anything lick me. There was no way I was going to tell people I was too chicken to get in the and have another go at it. I hopped in the internet and found someone had a similar situation and they shoved their 10 year old in there with a wrench thing and unhooked the entire locking mechanism. Joel found an extension wrench of sorts handed it to me, I hummed the theme song to The Amazing Race and crammed my shoulders and upper half of my body back into "the chamber" I extended the wrench, unbolted two bolts...ET VOILA!!! Unhooked the contraption, Joel opened the trunk from the outside, fixed it and I can say to myself that in some way I conquered my "fear" of cramped places. Would I have to "sike" myself up to shimmy around King Tut's tomb? Probably. But for now I am very pleased.