Guilty Pleasures...at Home

I have a few guilty pleasures when it comes to being a domestic hero. Although I admit they are guilty pleasures, I do not have enough guilt, at the present, to quit them. I like them. They make me happy. Hence the name midget head...I mean, guilty pleasures.

Guilty Pleasure #1: I buy paper towels. I'll sometimes use one as a napkin. This is shameful as paper towels are much more expensive than your average napkin. I also use them to clean stuff. It's wasteful, I know, to carelessly use a paper towel when I could very well use a dish rag or towel. But I don't like laundry. Either that or I'm lazy. Or maybe it's a combination of the two.

Guilty Pleasure #2: As well as using paper towels to clean stuff, I went even farther and bought Clorox Wipes. I use these to clean my bathroom. It's a real pleasure to clean the counter and then throw the "rag" away. It's an even bigger pleasure to clean the toilet and throw the rag away.

Guilty Pleasure #3: (And, I might add, the greatest and guiltiest of them all.) I buy birthday cakes...from the bakery. I was taught the frugal way to have cake as a child: Buy a mix and a container of frosting. This costs maybe 2 or 3 dollars at the most. It's the most cost-effective way to do things. It's what we all should do. (We should all take cake decorating classes so we can learn to lavishly decorate our cakes with flowers, ribbons, caligraphy, and Alf.) But I love the store-bought cakes from the local grocery store. As my cousin would say, I HEART them. Especially the chocolate ones with chocolate frosting. So, my guilty pleasure is that I will willingly pay $15 for a cake instead of $2 or $3.

That's all for now. I would add more, but my fresh, homemade meal is almost done. I made it all from scratch and that's the honest truth....today.

What are your guilty pleasures?

For All Your Scratchy, Rough, Uncomfortable Needs

So, I've spent, roughly, the last 7 hours on the computer. I'm a little computer brain dead and my wrists are threatening carpal tunnel. So I'm not in the mood to write about my 4th of July right now. But don't worry, I will fill you in on the splendid details at a later date.

Right now my thoughts are on the commercial I saw a few days ago as I was folding laundry. (Yes, I still watch T.V. on the rare occasion. One of those times is when I'm folding laundry and need some NOISE.) I saw a commercial for, and I quote, "New! Tampax Cardboard!"

Say whaaa?
Is it just me, or does anyone else feel the need to cringe?
CARDBOARD?!! Now I do understand that cardboard goes into the making of these items, but it's not a real selling point, is it?

I can picture the men in the board room right now:
Board Room Guy President: "We need a new product in our line of tampons. Something new. Something women will like."

Smart Board Room Guy: "Well, I think women really like a product that absorbs well."

Smarter Board Room Guy: "Hey, I've got it! Cardboard's pretty absorbant. Why, when I'm working on my car out in the garage and I need something to keep my oil from spilling on the cement, I use a big old piece of cardboard. It really does the trick!"

Reeeaally Smart Board Room Employee: "Say, Herb, you've got a point there. Cardboard IS really absorbant!"

Herb: "Yeah! And the best part is, we're already using it in our tampons! But I don't know if women really KNOW that. We need to come up with a new product that really shows the cardboard off."

(High fives all around and big raises coming in the near future...)

I'm A Grown-Up?

When I was a younger version of my current self I would often wonder what I would look like when I was "a grown-up". I wondered how I would act and what I'd do. Just what would it be like to be "a grown-up"?
Since then I've learned a few things about being a grown-up. One requirement for achieving this status, that no one can escape, is time. You need time to grow up. In the eyes of the land, 18 is the official age of "grown-up". I'm sure many of us know 18 year olds who we would firmly declare grown-up. And I'm sure there are many of us who know 18 year olds who are FAR from that status.
For me being a grown-up implies that I can take care of myself. I can do things. Not only that, I can do HARD things.
It also means I can manage myself, my time, my energy, and my health. The epitome of being a grown-up, I imagine, is when you have to do that for someone else, namely, children of your own.
Today being grown-up meant that I went to the dry cleaners.
I currently own one dress that needs dry cleaning. I've managed to avoid cleaning it for the past (ahem) 5 years. One fateful Sunday last summer when it was 100 degrees outside, it was my day to teach in Relief Society, we decided to walk to church that day, and I forgot deodorant finally put my dress "out of commission". Since then it's been in my closet, stuffed on a shelf in a pile of "clothes that I need do something extra with besides wash and dry them". This pile doesn't include ironing. I have separate, special pile for those things.
Then, a few months ago, we were at a family thing where we were all in our Sunday clothes. While Zack was holding one of the little tykes (who shall remain nameless) the monkey managed to leave a damp spot on his suit pants.
When we got home I promptly put his suit and my dress in a new pile: "Stuff to be dry cleaned soon." I even put the pile in a conspicuous spot so I wouldn't forget to do something with it. That was three months ago. The pile has remained intact, though it has been moved occasionally when company came over. Don't worry, when the company left, I remembered to put the pile back in it's official spot on the banister.

I've been putting it off because, to put it in D'Nellie-esque fashion, I'm kind of scared of dry cleaners. Today I decided to just do it. With encouraging words from Zack who said I could put minutes on my emergency phone and talk to him the whole time (Thanks SOOOO much, Sweetie. I know you feel my pain.), I set off. I had visions of a tiny, cramped looking shop with a no-nonsense Asian lady behind the counter busily doing ...something dry cleaning-ish. Don't ask me why the lady was tiny and foreign. Maybe I've watched too many Seinfeld episodes. Anyway, for some reason I was nervous to go. But I went.

I pulled up to the dry cleaners and walked inside the large spacious room where a teenage girl smiled from behind the counter. I confidently put the items on the counter and said, "Hi. I just have these four things...er, items." She asked for my name and number and told me how much it was. I tried to look nonchalant as I pulled out my check card. I've done this a hundred times at least. Used my check card, that is. She gave me my receipt and said my clothes would be done tomorrow at 5:00. I said thanks and as I was walking out the door I glanced to my left at what appeared to be the other half of the shop and was startled to see myself. Duh. I was looking in a mirror. My reflection looked exactly as I felt: someone who wasn't a teenager, but who wasn't a "grown up". I had a pinched, almost mean-looking expression on my face. That's my look when I'm concentrating on something or when I'm nervous. (I won't say it hasn't come in handy at teenage dances when someone asks me to dance and I don't want to. What appears to be indifference and meanness is really shyness and fear. But at least I look strong, right?)
As I was pulling out of the parking lot, right next to an intersection, a car slowed down so I could pull out in front of them. I said "thanks" out loud and gave them the "courtesy wave". And there it was. I was a grown-up. I gave someone a courtesy wave. Only grown-ups do that. Success! And, also like a grown-up, I'm picking up my dry cleaning tomorrow. I think I'll try and squeeze that into my conversations between now and then so everyone else will know how grown-up I am. "It's been great talking to you, but I've got to run. I have to go pick up my dry cleaning before they close. You know how those places are, if you leave your things...er, items there for more than a day they lose them..."