Last night I didn’t want to cook, well there was really nothing appealing to cook in the house, it was just me & my son for dinner, who by the way is 16 and ALWAYS hungry, I asked for 1/2 more work time and we’d run out and pick something up for dinner – his choice.

A 1/2 hour later, I came downstairs, yelled for him to get up & go, and we took off.

I had on sweat pants, a t-shirt and slippers. I figured I’d be in the car so it wouldn’t matter. But, as we’re driving the 7 miles it takes to get anywhere from our house I remembered we were out of coffee, eggs & butter – the super essentials – and I would need to run in to the grocery store. Then I realized what I was wearing. Could I go into the grocery store in slippers? What the hell, I was going in. I was officially ‘that mom’ dammit. But it wasn’t the slippers that were my biggest concern, no, what shamed me the most was my t-shirt. Normal, plain heather gray v-neck from Wal-Mart, cleanish, only a couple wrinkles… but the kicker, it was 40 degrees out and I was going to freeze to death. And, then what would people say? Meh, I survived. No one really looked or cared, at least not that I noticed.

I quit Diet Coke a couple of years ago, but was going to pick some up at the grocery store – on the down low – only to discover when I got back in the Jeep that I had forgotten my sneakiness and totally dropped the ball on my super secret treat. There may have been curse words involved. Wait, it’s me, of course there were lots of curse words. I needed this for the day I had had, and now I was S.O.L.

My son told me to relax, it’s just soda… coming from a kid who will not drink soda (this is very weird, and if I didn’t see him come out of me I would question if he was mine – that kind of weird) So, I sent the kid in to get dinner, my California roll and his chicken bowl with no mushrooms, with instructions to grab a diet Coke out of the fridge they have next to the register. I got the typical teenager answer “I know what I’m doing, ugh.” He came out with some caffeine-free bullshit, and after a moment of sadness that lasted the whole way home, I happily drank it with my dinner. It tasted the same and I fell asleep last night without problems… ’cause you know after you hit a certain age sleep becomes very important and also very elusive – funny how that works. But, it just wasn’t the same ‘sneaky treat’ I was craving.

Here’s to a better day, one where I can accomplish everything I set out to do and look presentable doing it.

Ha.

{Photo via – this is how I think I should be dressing casually…. at least I have on tennis shoes today. Progress!}