Racism was the new black.

Raise your hand if you were forced to have a conversation with a racist, old lady about "funny" names while getting the blood sucked out of your arm through a giant syringe. Just me, then?

I put Michael in daycare for a couple of hours today so that I could go get my bloodwork done and the flu shot I was supposed to get at my appointment last week. That meant a cranky Mommy left the house at 8 sans showering and coffee to drop off a screaming 1 year old to the poor daycare workers at the gym. Unfortunately, the extended care program doesn't start until 9 a.m. So I had to go to the nearest park and let him root around in the wet wood chips for half an hour.

Once I finally made it to the lab, there was a wonderfully talkative woman in her 70's to keep me company as the techs took, what felt like gallons, of my blood. She had a thing or two to say about "those funny names. Especially those black girls." Her technition happened to be black, but thought it was just fine to lump all of the people of the world with long or hard to pronounce names into the category of black, Mexican, or Chinese. Somebody even mentioned coming across this name "La-a," to be pronounced "Ladasha." The hypen is apparently no longer a silent article.

It made for an eventful morning. Now, I have around a bajillion kajillion things to do before we leave for the Xmas break tomorrow. That's just an estimate though--it could be more. First on the list is to fix up my playlist and burn some car music. But because I love you all, I decided to blog first. It's probably gonna be your last one for the next couple weeks. I might get a chance to update at the various stops along the tour of Arkansas and Mississippi, but we'll see.

I'm sure I'll have plenty of stories about my drunken karaoke endeavors at Christmas with my folks that I'll want to share as soon as possible. Speaking of which, Dom and I exchanged our gifts yesterday because we wanted a chance to have our own holiday before it got steamrolled by our collective family Christmases. Is that seriously the plural of Christmas? Anyway, Dom got me this:
and this to go with some of these and make me do this in front of my family.

I also got a tea set and a homemade coupon booklet good for services such as babysitting, laundry, cooking, and cleaning. It's a cute, romantic gift and I'm super stoked about using it! Now I can force him to do the dishes, take me shopping, or any of those other husbandly duties that were implied but not spoken in our wedding vows...without feeling guilty or overly naggy!