A Wee Little Storm OR You're Welcome, World

I don't think there are any pictures of me from the age of Born to the age of Five where I am not trying to put things in my mouth. Seriously. My mom has a bunch of pictures of me where I'm either stuffing my face, about to stuff my face, hovering over my food like an animal, or trying to put toys in my mouth. In a very few, I appear to be offering food, but I know that can only be a cruel trick I'm about to play on someone because Storm does not offer her food to anyone.

Around the time mom was finding all these awesome pictures of me my parents remembered a fun game they used to love to play when they were drunk-slash-high-slash-both where they would put my pacifier in upside down and I would flip it right side up in my mouth without using my hands. Apparently they thought it was the neatest thing ever and they would entertain themselves and their friends for long periods of time. They would show me off like a dog who's just discovered a laser pointer and chases it relentlessly in circles. "No seriously, check this out. She does it every time!"


This is the environment I grew up in folks. Praise and attention for doing things with my mouth. It's lucky I turned out as awesome and psychologically stable as I did. (Side note: My parents are amazing, and this is me joking.)

So here's a little sampling of adorable tiny Storm, and her oral fixation (I so wish I had a copy of the one where I'm walking out of a public restroom in Alabama, toddling after mom, in my cut-off jean shorts and messy hair, a toy in each hand cause I fucking can, and no shoes. It's priceless.):

 This one is called "Linoleum and Bread Crumbs"

P.S. check that stance.

This is the trick I mentioned. Look how pleased my face is. Someone is clearly going to fall for this. 

The action figure Sleeping Storm now comes with pacifier accessory and safety harness. 

This is my very personal favorite. I call it: Sleepy Old Man Storm... with pacifier.

There's a picture of my mom's parents on their 25th wedding anniversary, where they both look like they're trying to reach California from Oklahoma (that's a Grapes of Wrath joke for you well-read types, and consequently a Depression Era/Dust Bowl joke). They look absolutely miserable, and nobody knows why. Anyway, I look exactly like my grandfather in the last picture here, except a little sleepy. And I have a pacifier. Not even kidding.

Written Word

I've recently been informed that I've offended/upset some people with a few of my posts. My intention of keeping this blog in particular was never to offend or insult anyone. It's basically a train of thought, or a few trains, whatever happens to be on my mind at the time, and I stop only to fix a punctuation or spelling error. Then I hit the Publish button. And I don't go back to it again.

I don't write drafts, or proof-read (aside from the punctuation or spelling, which are errors that I see as I go), or have someone else tell me if they think I should change anything here or there. I just write it.

So I absolutely guarantee that I've said some things that are rude, inconsiderate, impolite, crass, insulting, completely offensive, etc., etc., etc., about family, friends, people I don't know at all, family, people I do know but not that well, family, that asshole who passed me on my way home from work and laid on the horn because I guess the speed limit just isn't fucking good enough (I will cut his face if I ever see him again. Straight up. His face.), family.

There are many things I could say to excuse my behavior. I won't say those things. I could easily just start filtering what I say, and plan out my posts so as not to offend people. I won't start doing that. I could apologize for the things I've written, but to do that feels hollow to me. It feels insincere. These are my thoughts and opinions, and it's important to remember that they are constantly changing. My opinion of you as a person doesn't stay the same from one moment to the next. I never completely make up my mind about a person. (ED NOTE: I just went back to put in the word 'say' in the first sentence of this paragraph, and in the time it took me to do that, I got distracted by the TV for like, ever. (I just did it again.) )

I will say that, since I'm not apologizing for my thoughts or opinions, I would like to apologize for the way in which I expressed those thoughts or opinions. Maybe I could have been more direct, and discussed the issue personally, or maybe I could have been more polite, because I'm often quite bitchy. But I didn't. And unless the issue is something that is sincerely bothering me, I probably won't in the future.

The above paragraph also pertains to this post, and all future posts.