Pin This.

I remember hearing a ventriloquist in Branson as a teenager. A real Boston Terrier was on the stage and he was making him talk. I remember him asking the dog about his day. This was the dog's response: "I went outside. I came back in. I went outsiiiide. I came back in. I went outsiiiiiiide. I came back in," and so it went.

I remember laughing loudly, inwardly pondering how boring being a dog must be.

And then I grew up.

And then I went to work. And came back in. I went to woooork. And came back in. I loaded the dishwasher and loaded it again. I unloaded the dishwasher and unloaded it again. I folded boxer briefs. And then they were dirty again.

Lately, instead of striving to be the Proverbs 31 woman, I have gotten pretty caught up in being the Pinterest 31 woman.

Per raving reviews, I concocted a baking soda/water paste that was supposed to make my kitchen shine. By the time I was through, it looked like Frosty and the abominable snowman had both blown chunks all over my stove and sink. I went to wipe it off the next day and it was like trying to crack rock candy with your baby teeth.

I finally chipped away until there was a cloudy, milky glaze all over my appliances.

Fail.

I have tried all these things. I have bought all these things. I have read all these things. I have most likely driven Justin crazy. And for what? To feel even worse about myself. So-- for those like me, I have created some "How To's" that even you can handle.

Here's some of the articles people should pin:

1. How to get your stove drip pans squeaky clean again:

• Go buy more. 4 pack. Wal-Mart. Do it.

2. The best way to fold a fitted sheet:

• Do you make your guests make their own beds? If your answer is no (which it should be) then WHO CARES? They'll never know it was wadded in your closet.

3. An easy lipgloss recipe:

• Go to the dollar store. Buy a tube of it for a dollar. That is unless you have Vaseline and Kool-Aid super handy and you want your lips to taste like they did at VBS.

4. How to pre-prepare your work lunch for an entire month:

• Get a Wal-Mart sack. Stuff two loaves of bread, a pound of lunchmeat and a package of Kraft's singles in there. Put it in the company fridge. Tah-dah!

5. How to make a reminder board with chalkboard paint:

• You've got a smartphone, right? Go to reminders. Set a bunch of them. Then set reminders to set reminders. Then set reminders to remind other people to be reminded. Less messy and you look important.

6. How to do neat nail designs:

• Paint your toenails. Leave for 4 weeks. Stub your toenail against your coffee table a few times. Re-paint toenails with a similar color without removing previous polish. Forget that you just painted them and then chip the tip of the color off on your big toe.

7. How to Make your Bathroom Floors Shine:

• Buy a really weird-tinted lightbulb on accident. The blue tint will twilight zone the place out and no one will notice there's a hair on the floor.

8. A Quick Fix to Kitchen Floor Dirt:

• Move island on wheels over clumps of dirt as needed.

9. How to be Frugal:

• Don't have teeth. Don't have a sinus cavity. Actually, just don't breathe at all.

10. How to Stay Happily Married

• Engineer constant flashbacks of when you were single, moody and crying out, "Why, universe, why me?" Insert a tub of Rocky Road if flashbacks do not immediately become clear.

Truth be told, if I worried about my marriage half as much as I worried about how much sucking power my vacuum has, it could be an even bigger blessing.

If I worried about what visitors thought about my spirit more than I pondered what they thought of the inside of my toilet, maybe I could be an even bigger blessing.

So just drop some of those burdens.

After all, we all know they'll be waiting right where you left them. And they've probably multiplied and had sock babies.

"...Charm is deceitful, and beauty is vain,

but a woman who fears the Lord is to be praised.

Give her of the fruit of her hands,

and let her works praise her in the gates."

The Tale of Te'o

Anyone who follows sports or follows sports by default has heard of Notre Dame linebacker Manti Te'o and his non-existent girlfriend. Whether he was hoaxed or part of the hoax, the fact remains: she ain't there.

The butt of many jokes, I kind of feel sorry for the guy if he was in fact misled. Maybe that's the former online dater in me talking.

Laugh on, dudes. Because I think, in the end, he may be onto something with that whole invisible thing.

Invisible Women...

... Don't beg you for a steam mop (P.S. I love it!)

... Eat at nasty buffets every day.

... Don't cry because you "changed your tone."

... Never gain a pound.

... Don't ask if you're wearing a belt.

Invisible Women...

... Don't write blogs at your expense.

... Don't clog up your shower with long hair.

... Don't fill up your DVR with "The Bachelor," "Pretty Little Liars," "American Idol," and every other singing competition on air.

... Never ask "Are you planning to wear that?" when you are clearly about to wear that.

... Don't decline dessert and then eat half of yours.

Invisible Women...

... Want the TV on ESPN all day.

... Understand the comedic genius of Comedy Central shows.

... Only own 2 pillows, and you can sleep on both. 

... Don't switch up body temperatures every 15 minutes.

... Like the house just like it is. Renovations, shmenovations.

 

“Here's all you have to know about men and women: women are crazy, men are stupid. And the main reason women are crazy is that men are stupid.”
― George Carlin

The Earring

I had every intention of going to TOWN on the entire house today. I was going to be a trash-dumping, garment donating machine. Considering my closet and guest room took several hours, I think this may be a project-a-weekend kind of thing.

I am a happy little hoarder-- which is not as freakin' scary as those of the leave animal feces and dirty diapers in a pile on your bed persuasion.

I just can't get rid of a scarf if I ever had a good experience whilst I wore it. And I keep pictures that have faded and smeared over time in the bottom drawer because I was tan and skinny. And I liked that.

In a box of random jewelry odds and ends, I found a lone earring stud. I smiled when I realized what it was from. It was from the day I randomly got a cartilage piercing many years ago. My friend got it done, her parents were mad and she insisted that I do it too so that we were in the same boat. So off to Merle Norman's we went.

Sure enough, when I arrived home, Trey Reely was not pleased. I think the word "hootchie mama" even escaped his lips. He asked what the boys were going to think and lamented that a nose ring was probably next. While my friend with a nose ring sat at the kitchen table.

'I wonder if this will still go in my ear up there,' I wondered. So I tried it. And it slid right in like a day hadn't passed since my "rebellious" youth. I have worn it every minute since. Justin even commented, "What is that? I didn't know you had that."

Most hoarders become hoarders because they don't want to let go of how things used to be. They become entrenched in objects that represent a certain period of their life.

Sometimes I mourn the loss of the Ashton of Christmas past. The girl who went through a car wash in the back of a truck. The girl who would stick a slab of cookie dough onto a cookie sheet, bake it whole, and eat it. The girl who would lock the door, sit on the floor and karaoke all by herself. The girl who made up an extensive Facebook profile for an imaginary boyfriend. The girl who would scream when Flo Rida's "Get Low" would come on. And she could get low. So low.

I have stood at the sink, spatula in hand, and cried over her absence. I have thrown a pair of pants across the room and wished they could hit her in her skinny face. I have sat at my desk and wished so deeply that I wasn't sitting there.

But I got to thinking today. We thought we were so hardcore back then. Like letting an old lady shoot a nail gun through your ear was the peak of maturity.

But guys-- I have friends that have fought and beat cancer. I have friends who nurse screaming babies at 4 a.m. I have friends who work all day and then taxi kids around all night. I have friends who have recovered from relationships that rocked them to their very core. I have friends who battle depression but still find a way to bless others. I have friends that don't let incredible loss kill their spirit.

And I thought earrings made us tough stuff? Oh please.

So stop surrounding yourself with piles of junk and worshipping your former self. Because if you're truly honest with yourself, you'll realize you are more courageous than you ever were back then.

"Nothing is so strong as gentleness, and nothing is so gentle as true strength." Ralph Sockman 

Guns N Snow

There are two things Southerners get pretty crazy about. Like hide yo kids, hide yo wife crazy about.

Guns. And snow.

I'm pretty sure if it was snowing and you took away their guns, their macaroni-battered hearts couldn't handle all that mess.

Just the talk of snow flurries in surrounding towns has everyone at the office clinging to weather.com for the latest scoop. I think I see it myself until I realize that it is a foggy, steak-scented mirage being emitted from Ryan's Buffet next door.

Everyone is focused. Everyone is on a mission. Everyone efficiently works to stay alive.

Where, my friends, is this urgency the other 365 days of the year?

Northerners get a bad rap for their fast-paced, no nonsense way of life. I'm probably going to get my Cracker Barrel card revoked for this, but I wish people in the South would be in snow mode all the time. This is what that world would look like:

• K-Mart Kathy would scan your items in record pace. She wouldn't tell you a story about each item or make you wait for 17 feet of receipts. "Oh, honey, my lane is open. My light is on and today it means I am checking people out. And I'm happy about it."

• No-blinker Bob would actually think twice before cutting in front of you. He would drive cautiously and at a reasonable speed. And he would remove all of his Christian bumper stickers-- because life is too short to be a hypocrite.

• The revenue office ladies suddenly realize that they in fact can handle the issue you are there for and that cooperating...and sort of smiling...makes things go by more quickly.

• Miss "Cheeseburger plain have a nice day come back and see us" from the Burger King drive-thru doesn't make you pull forward and wait for your special order. She realizes there is more to life than wearing a tongue ring and not using verbal punctuation.

• The frat boys that congregate around the only chest press talking about their beer intake will decide that hurrying to the next machine is efficient and allows others to finish their workout on time. Move it out, Testosterone Club.

• The lady who tells you her life story will summarize utero through college in two sighs and a foot tap.

• The sous-chef wannabe at the table next to you will realize that maybe, just maybe, he can live with ice in his cup. First, that poor waitress is 16 and trying to pay for her car. Second, just wait a few minutes and your cup will have no ice.

Despite what this may sound like, I am not abandoning the land of Dixie. I'm not. I am simply proposing that we live every day, work every day, interact every day as if we are protecting the world from freezing rain.

Only then will I get out of Wal-Mart and pretty much any parking lot in this town with some version of sanity.

Diary of A Mad, White Workout Lady

[The mental anguish of a new gym member]

5 p.m. I can't believe I'm changing in the work bathroom right now. Did I bring socks? Just grab the handicap bar. Don't fall. Don't. Fall. French Fries.


5:05 p.m. Shoot. I left my coat at my desk. My boss is still out there. I'm wearing a racerback shirt from early college. I can't walk back to my desk like this. What if I ran into the Bank President? I'm sealed vacuum-tight in this thing. Snickers bar.

5:15 p.m. Ok, I'm here. There's like no parking spots. All these "New Years Resolution" losers. I guess I am now one of those losers.

5:20 p.m. Must.find.correct.keycard. I've got like 3 of them from gyms gone by.

5:22 p.m. Wait. No one told me a dude was leading this class. A big dude. And he's got an Affliction shirt on. Probably because he's about to afflict a lot of pain on me. I probably would have coughed up my math homework to him in high school. And now he's in charge of me for the next hour. Whopper with cheese.

5:30 p.m. March up and down. I've got this. Happy music is happening so it can't get too bad.

6:00 p.m. Mayday. Mayday. Why is he walking over this way? Why does he have a huge grin on his face? He better not touch me.

6:03 p.m. He just asked me if I moved my leg like I was supposed to. I did. He is shaking his head. I think I know if I moved my own leg or not. Geez.

6:05 p.m. We're spinning our arms rapidly into the air to a techno version of "Rolling on the River." Clever, Arnold Schwarzenegger, very clever.

6:15 p.m. Uh oh. It's getting more technical. I'm out of step with the women around me. Maybe as long as I jump at the end he won't notice that I'm skipping the first part. I think I'm jumping really high.

6:17 p.m. I am not jumping really high. In fact, I looked down and I am barely leaving the floor.

6:20 p.m. The music concludes and I am out.of.here. I haven't been this hot and sweaty since I cut down a shrub this summer.

6:22 p.m. He just told us to get a mat for "stretch time." Seriously? Seriously? You're going to have to Lysol this mat beyond recognition when I get off of it. I get to wrap my legs around my head and put my face there? Oh lovely.

6:25 p.m. You want me to put my leg up there? This chick in front of me has legs that are like a foot long. That's got to be an advantage. Do these people not sweat?

6:30 p.m. I'm free! I'm free!

6:32 p.m. Sonic blast.

A Pessimist's New Year

As most of you have probably gathered, I am-- despite all efforts-- a pessimist. January is a tough month for pessimists. We read your peppy statuses about leaving last year behind and focusing on what lies ahead and we...to be honest, we cringe.

You are led by Bible verses like 2 Corinthians 5:17: Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation. The old has passed away; behold, the new has come.

We sit in our recliner, watching the news and get all King Solomon on everybody: What has been will be again; what has been done will be done again; there is nothing new under the sun. [Ecclesiastes 1:9]

Let's face it. It's hard to have a fresh start when it appears that your surroundings haven't been desperately sprayed with Febreeze. Like put on a blindfold and go to a meat factory Febreezed.

These unfortunate enigmas continue to plague your yesterday, today, and tomorrow:

1. The Gym Bo [Bimbo]: Whether it's 2007 or 2013, GymBo will continue to haunt your resolutions. No high school basketball shorts for this fashionista. She glides on the elliptical like an African gazelle and her ponytail only bobs up and down, like a perfectly timed Whack-a-Mole at Chuck E. Cheese. She looks at you with a combination of pity and deep satisfaction in her perfection.

2. The Walgreens Whack: You know how you wanted to be more patient in 1998? Well, man who doesn't understand why the lady can't double his coupon at 11:30 p.m. is still around. Oh they won't take his coupon? He'll show them and buy his toothpaste using 3 different payment forms while you sit there hiding two boxes of Tampax. And he can't believe they don't take the bags out to his car.

3. Man vs. Food: Calorie counters sound so awesome in January. Then it's March and you're going, "I don't give a flip what kind of rice this is! It says a cup of dry rice is less calories. Maybe I'll eat it dry. No, no, I won't. I'm getting a cheeseburger."

4. Informed Insanity: We're all going to be more informed and passionate the next year. Then you scroll down your Facebook newsfeed. And you see that passion is separate from information all together. And that people like guns... a lot. And that if someone can scrap together a poorly-written post about how evil Wal-Mart is, they are automatically an expert on entrepreneurship and the economy.

5.  Quality Time: I'm going to put down my cell phone more. I'm going to turn off the TV and read. Then you'll read the same paragraph four times and decide that it's easier to vicariously not think through the Kardashian family. And when that weird dude in the waiting room wants to talk to you, you begin to play Words with Friends...anything with friends as long as you don't have to be present.

Despite my "Why isn't there more milk in my glass?" perspective on life, I can say that goals are attainable and a new year really can be a "new" year. But realize that the battles will be there waiting for you.

So pick the elliptical on the other side of the gym and avoid Walgreens late at night.

"We cannot change our past. We can not change the fact that people act in a certain way. We can not change the inevitable. The only thing we can do is play on the one string we have, and that is our attitude." - Charles Swindoll