jock-olate chips

well, in case you hadn't heard - our food system in the US blows. we are being poisoned by food companies who are infiltrating our bodies with harmful ingredients. this really angers me and i vowed to take a stand. i'm going on month 4 of making dinner every night for my family that incorporates a clean eating menu (www.thefresh20.com.) and the other day i did my part by signing a very important petition urging kraft foods to stop putting food dyes in their mac and cheese. i've sworn off any dairy or meat that comes from antibiotic-ridden cows or chickens that aren't grass fed and cage-fee. and, in just 2 weeks tj and i will start using the nutribullet system to do the juice cleanses dr. oz recommends. the only part i'm struggling with all of this, however, is the fact that i fucking love cookies.

oatmeal raisin, chocolate chip, butterscotch, sugar, snickerdoodle, lofthouse, peanut butter... i'm pissed that kraft uses yellow #5 in their pasta, but god knows if they made a yellow #5 cookie i'd eat the hell out of it. it's not just cookies, either; i purposely stopped buying boxed desserts of any kind at the grocery. i used to have a box of betty crocker hershey kiss brownie mix in my pantry at all times. i knew that if the temptation weren't there than i wouldn't have a choice in the matter - but after a quick inventory check, this happened:

9,000 search results and an hour later i was shoving a brownie in my face

if i could just finish my book and get a movie deal then i'd be famous enough to go on celebrity rehab with dr. drew and he could help me with this sugar addiction i have. everyone would be tweaking out and taking their methadone while i inject my hip with insulin like a mad woman. i'd have tj sneak chips ahoy in his jockstrap and i'd get kicked out. 

well, this blog just got weird. of course none of that could really happen... tj doesn't even own a jock strap.

a thong gives more support

so exciting stuff with my blog yesterday. for a long time i've been following nicole at moms who drink and swear. as her title implies, we have at least 3 things in common. i consider her to be hot stuff in the blogosphere and i sent her a link to my blog. not only did she read my email, but she shared it with her 250,000+ fans and all of a sudden my day became centered around sitting in my pajamas hitting F5 every 30 seconds - completely neglecting my children and my real job. that judgy mom who wrote that overly-dramatic narrative about moms staring at their iphones while their kids twirled around annoyingly begging for attention would have been sporting a journalistic boner over my household on tuesday.

tj came home early and wanted to know what all the fuss was about. i explained to him that this was my version of a hole-in-one. (i have to talk sports terms to him or he just sits there with a derp face on). i told him all about the link being shared and how she thought i was funny and that she even commented on how much she liked my hair. here are tj's top 3 responses to my new z-list internet status:

1. "how many blogs do you have?"  tj only reads actual text if ESPN sends him a text message or if he is taking a shit while reading ESPN mobile. if i want tj to know what i've written in a blog i have to read it aloud to him in the same voice i read to my 2 year old. 
2. "do you ever blog about how your husband doesn't read your blog?" i am now.
3. "you should send her a picture of your hair right now and see what she says."  sorry i didn't spend 33 minutes rubbing $40 pomade all over my head like you did this morning. dick.

for the remainder of the evening i acted like i was a famous person and every time tj asked me a question i told him to call my agent and then, in my best dave chapelle voice, would scream "I'M RICH, BITCH." i explained to the girls that this was the boost of confidence i needed to get crackin' on finishing my book and told them when mommy becomes real-life famous she would set aside enough money to buy them each their very own tramp stamp when they turn 18. 

i could go on and on about my hopes and aspirations, but i have to get ready - i have zumba in an hour. 

zumbadoos and don'ts

so i started zumba.

zumba is so weird - at one point i'm doing sexy salsa steps and the next minute i'm doing some retard version of gangnam style. during the part in gangnam style where you look like your riding some kind of stupid animal, i noticed my tits flying up dangerously close to my chin. as i rode along on my fake ostrich i realized the huge contrast between the support of a sports bra, and the support of a nursing bra that looks like a sports bra. my nursing bra wasn't the only article of mom clothing i was sporting either - i was also wearing my black, stretchy maternity leggings. i still like to wear all of my maternity leggings because they have that big panel i can pull up to my collarbone in case i want to eat a steak or drink beer - or in this case, tuck my tits into them like some kind of weird zumbaroo.

because it's been so long since i've taken an aerobics class, i made sure to get the spot in the very back by the door. i figured i could hide my lack of coordination, plus have an easy escape in case of heart attack or stroke. this was a great idea until students for the next class started huddling up outside of the door with 10 minutes of zumba left to go. the next class happened to be a little girls' tap class and when "i'm sexy and i know it" came ironically blaring out of the speakers, these girls came like moths to a flame. there i am tripping all over myself trying to watch our instructor (who apparently drinks a cocktail of 5 hour energy, red bull and cocaine before each class) do some move i can only describe as having sex while standing up, and these little girls are laughing. they were laughing at us. more specifically, i was starting to wonder if they were laughing at me. i began some weird inner-monologue about how i was an adult and i wasn't gonna let those those little punk ass tap bitches psyche me out of zumba. i looked over to see if any of my classmates were feeling the same unbearable scrutiny and the first lady i glanced at had... well, she had a beard.

 immediately those little tap jerks faded out of my existence and i became enamored by the bearded lady. i know these things unfortunately happen... but it's like she doesn't even try to maintain it... just a thousand random pubic hairs kinda shooting out in every direction from her face.

anyways... i always end my blog with some type of joke or funny moral, but today there isn't one. i just wanted to write about my zumba class and how it turned into a bit of a hairy situation.

dark chocolate

well i've survived my first toddler preschool valentine's day. it took me no time to see that valentines are not for the kids - they are for moms to out-pinterest each other and those bitches were out for blood. when i was a kid you bought cheesy punch-out paper valentines. today's kids are making it rain with confetti and passing out conversation hearts that say "tweet me." not to be outdone, i joined the good fight and withdrew my mortgage to spend on craft crap at hobby lobby. what little money i had left was put into the "divorce attorney" fund i have set aside for times like these when tj goes raging around the house spewing obscenities like "WHEN DID VALENTINE'S DAY BECOME F&*#ING CHRISTMAS?!" and, my favorite, "WHERE AM I SUPPOSED TO EAT DINNER AFTER CUPID SHIT ALL OVER THE TABLE?!"

the idea behind my roz's valentines was simple: put teddy grahams in a cellophane bag with cute personalized idioms playing on the word "bear." trying to think of 12 different ways to use the word "bear" was downright... well... ahem... unbearable. after assembling all the bags and writing my beary cute valentines messages on them i had to fill them with the treats. well, i had just completed 10 of the twelve when i realized i was out of teddy grahams. i had to load up the girls and go to walgreens in the freezing cold just to get another stupid box of teddy grahams. (if i hadn't ate half of the first damn box, we probably wouldn't have had to do this...) anyways... i get back home to find that i accidentally purchased chocolate teddy grahams and what i should've got was the honey kind. "oh well" i thought to myself, "these two kids will feel special." i had just convinced myself that i was about to make 2 precious children happy when all of a sudden... "shit!" it dawned on me that one of the kids with the chocolate treats was black. not wanting the teacher to think that the KKK had infiltrated the 2 year old preschool class, i re-loaded the girls into the car and off we went back to walgreens.

here you see an example of valentines for white kids

i know that, most likely, the whole ordeal would have gone unnoticed. however, even the smallest chance that my innocent mistake could've been misconstrued as something bigger was just too much for me to bear.

sometime TODAY please

so i have been very excited about taking the girls downtown chicago friday morning for the live broadcast of the today show. i would like to get my face on national television before i die and i figure these two cute babies of mine are just what i need to catapult me into the spotlight. earlier this year, tj and i built a shitshack igloo with our friends and got it featured on the 11:00 news. (we know someone who knows someone that is banging the weather chick.) that 15 second clip was all i needed to catch the bug - now i'm dreaming big... like, today show big.

other than the igloo debacle, i've only been questioned by a news reporter one other time. nathan howard from wdtn came up to me outside of krogers to ask me what i thought about "this crazy warm weather." by "crazy warm weather" he was referring to the 60 degree march day that we randomly get in ohio every single year, and every single year people talk about it like jesus himself has blown hot air onto the chosen people of the miami valley. then they all update their facebook statusus about it... but i digress. anyways - the reason my answer never appeared on the noon report was because either: a) i asked him if i needed to have a bra on to be on tv or, b) my nipples were poking out of my shirt. (60 degrees is warm, but it's not that warm.)

i have been on the radio a few times when i worked at the car dealerships in high school and college. Those places are swarming with radio dj's on the weekends who give away concert tickets and other freebies to lure the public to the salesmen. i never could understand how people could show up for an umbrella and leave with a damn F1-50. every once in a while they would ask me to make the on-air plea with the public and i obliged every single time. nothing warmed my heart like begging the good folks of our community to come get a free nickleback cd and then watch them walk away with a 72 month lease on an '02 mercury sable. "oh that doesn't happen!" you might say. yes it does. ask my husband.

but, back to the today show: we have all of our supplies ready to go to make the oh-so-necessary sign. everyone who gets good air time in the crowd always has a good sign and i've come up with a great one. between that and that cute babies, i'm for sure going to get my 15 seconds of national fame. what does my sign say? well, you'll have to wait and see. for those of you that actually have a life, i will be sure to update with pictures and a crappy quality video of me taping my dvr playback.



**spoiler alert** just look for the crazy screaming lady and her two children with the sign offering al roker a diaper.

blue balls

just to recap my health, briefly:

miscarriage 2009

baby #1 2010

hospital stay for post-partum hemorrhaging 2010

miscarriage - D&C for 4 month fetus 2011

emergency removal of gallbladder 2011

emergency removal of appendix 2011

tooth extraction 2012

c-section baby #2 2012

now to recap, briefly, t.j.'s:

sore elbow from too much damn golf 2011

man cold 2012

for those keeping score: i'm down 2 organs, an incisor, vaginal elasticity, and a set of perky tits. t.j.'s down a night of men's golf league.

i feel like my body needs recovery time. i have designated 2013 as the year that larissa stays out of the hospital. i'm not going to need any one's assistance to go pee and i'm not going to have to fart in front of a nurse to gain permission to go home. i am swearing off anything requiring anesthesia; to which t.j. suggested i go on the pill. to which i suggested he go to hell. i'm 32 damn years old, i'm not going on the pill - unless it's a valium washed down with pinot noir.

so, i have given my husband a deadline for a vasectomy: march 1st... or as i like to call it: v-day. v-day was announced when london was approximately 32 seconds old. i told him there was no excuse - especially after i found out about "vas madness," in which urology practices offer special rates during college basketball's final four tourneys. t.j. usually spends march madness sitting in front of the t.v., not getting laid, and crying, so this is perfect.

he has many ways of deflecting talk of v-day including: getting mad, getting quiet, getting nauseous, and his latest... getting baby fever. yep - you heard me. t.j. has decided that the easiest way to avoid v-day is by planning another birthday. he was very convincing in his stance; so much so that i conceded. i agreed to let him out of v-day in hopes for getting the little boy he has always dreamed of.

when i find out who he's having it with, i'll provide an update.

keeping my cool

when i was younger i often wondered at what point my dad decided he would stop listening to music created after 1982. with each peter gabriel hit that blared through the speakers of our 1988 chevy safari i would re-commit myself to a lifetime of top 40 and sports cars. i didn't know when people faded from cool to parental, but i was never going to allow it to happen. i solemnly swore to never have jeans that covered my belly piercing; which was an easy thing to do since i made the pact to never, ever, ever - under any circumstance - shop outside of the junior's department.

now that i've become a mom, i am constantly evaluating and scrutinizing the actions and behavior of t.j. and i to make sure we are staying steadfast on the cool-ometer. (see, the fact that i just used the word "cool-ometer" shows that i slip-up every once in a while.) i live in a juxtaposition of being a great parent without seeming like one. every time i use the phrase, "because mommy said so" i justify it with a pair of purple skinny jeans. when t.j. and i have immature conversation like this recent string of text messages that took place while he was out of town for business, i revel in our hip-ness:

look how cool we are

t.j.: "sitting here working. bout to blow up this hotel printer"

lars: "better than blowing up the hotel"

t.j: "better than blowing up"

lars: "better than blowing... someone"

see, discussing innuendo about homosexual relations is so much cooler than talk of balancing checkbooks and preschool drop-off. and every time an exchange like this takes place i am reminded of how relevant we have remained in today's pop culture.

sometimes the fact that i'm horribly annoyed by the tourette syndrome caused by justin bieber's hair style makes me fear that i'm starting to lose touch. but just when i start to feel this way i tell myself it's going to be alright; one day when roz and london accuse me of being not cool i will reassure them i'm the bomb and drop a hook from whoomp there it is while flashing my tramp stamp. they wouldn't know cool if it hit them in their face - which is what i may do because i'm the parent here.