This morning about 4:30am my sister called me (yep, phone was still on when I left.  Shouldn't they have shut it off like a week or more ago?).  She was going to be up my way this morning and was telling me that she was giving me a ride towork!  Yay!  So I actually got to sleep in for an extra 1/2 an hour AND I made it to work way early.  Ten till seven to honest, and I don't clock in till seven thirty.  This morning, everything went smooth… so far.  Now that I say that I've probably jinxed myself, but that's ok.  The boys got up the first time I went in and gently shook them awake.  Ally-tude immeadiatly got up and put her clothes on, even though she did want to wear her underware over her jeans.  Super-hero Princess!  They all brushed their teeth without fighting and the boys went up to the neighbor's house to go back to bed for a couple more hours.  My sister showed up as I was lacing up my shoes, and Ally-tude was completely dressed with coat, hat, scarf and gloves.  I walked out of the house with my coat not even zipped up.  Today I am ready to take on the world.  Today, I'm realizing that the world isn't such a bad place, just certain people that make it bad.  I am very blessed to have the love and support of my close friends and family.  Not everyone has someone that they can say would always have their back.  I have that, several fold over. 

I feel like the whole world is in my favor the past couple of days.  In fact, my favorite security guard, Dru, just brought me up 4 cinimon roll hearts.  OMG, they look so good!  I'll eat every single one of them, and watch my butt grow.  LOL, things seem to be going very well.  The bills are almost caught up, except the phone.  But rent is almost caught up again, and daycare if and has been paid up.  Electric bill is caught up again.  I've been saving every little penny that I  have.  It's starting to pay off.  I also have been taking the bus, which helps out a lot, especially with gas being so high.  I've almost quit smoking (like I smoked much before, pack for a week?!) 

I talked to my dad last night.  He's sicker than I've heard him in years.  He can barely talk.  He says that he sounds much worse than he feels, but I still feel really bad for him.  One time when I was a teenager, I had mono.  Somehow my dad got it (apparently, from me) and he was so sick that I didn't think he was going to be able to get better.  He had kidney infections, strep throat, a sinus infection, was severely fatigued.  Mono will zap you.  He said that this flu he had was almost as bad as that.  Guess who gave him that flu (raises hand guiltily).  My cousin Jimmy gave it to me, and then I in turned passed it on to my dad.  Am I a bad daughter or what!!

Sidenote:  Ally-tude will be 5 years old a week from yesterday.  My baby! :-(  She's not supposed to this old this quick  :-(  Almost time to clock in.

(the title is just to be mean, boys are stupid, then they grow up to be big stupid boys………. All except for my boys)

Last night, Ally-tude and I were standing at QT waiting for the next bus, we still had 15 minutes to wait.  It was so cold that poor Tude was shivering and her teeth were chattering.  I had her all bundled up, but apparently not enough.  So I took off my scarf and my gloves and put them around her all bundled up, I also gave her my hat, leaving her with her clothes, shoes, 2 pairs of socks, 2 scarves, 2 pairs of gloves and 2 hats.  Needless to say, I was freezing my butt off, but she was warm so that was the important thing.  Then the worst thing in the world happened.  I had to pee.  Ever had to pee when it's less than 5 degrees outside?  It's not a pretty site.  I held it the best I could but it got harder to hold the colder I got.  As I'm standing there bouncing around at the bus stop I'm probably looking like a fool, but it was keeping me warm.  Ally-tude was throwing ice balls at the wall of the bus stop, and I was telling her to stop (and getting a little irritated) when a lady pulled up behind me on the road. 

In a perfect black SUV, with shiny interior and big tires.  She asked us if we wanted a ride, and I told her we were fine.  Last thing I need is to kidnapped with my baby angel.  She pulled to the drive and got out and walked over to me. 

Her:  Lady I'm all alone and you're obviously cold
Me:  Yeah I'm cold, are you sure that no one else is in the car with you?
Her:  No all alone, I'm going to the end of the road, c'mon get out of the cold.
Me: Ok, let's go
Her: I see you every night standing there for the bus, I've been wondering why you don't have a car
Me:  Car's not feeling well, need to take it to the shop soon
Her:  I have never ridden the bus
Me:  It's not so bad, could be walking
Her:  Girl you are a soldier
Me:  eh?
Her:  Never mind
Ally-tude:  Yay we're home!

I tried to pay her a couple dollars for the ride, and she wouldn't take it, even though I insisted.  Tude and I got out of the car and went inside, the warm hit my hands, and I thought they had been lit on fire!  After a few minutes, everything was fine, and I was thawing out.  I'll be glad to get my car fixed.

This mornin, I decided at 4:30am when the alarm went off that I wasn't coming into work.  I hit the snooze and then I rolled over.  At 4:45 I decided, when the alarm went off again, that I would get up out of bed and get ready for work.  So I turned off the alarm and flopped back down on the bed and just enjoyed laying there on the pillows, dreading the 2 degree temps outside my bedroom window.  I heard the toilet flush in the bathroom upstairs and my eyes shot open.  It was 6:20am.  I had missed my bus and the kids were all still sleeping.  Still in jammies and in their beds.  I ran out into the living room and flipped on the light.  One of the kids had been up in the night, but I would deal with it later.  I grabbed the phone and called Smacktard, begging for a ride, telling him I didn't want to walk to the bus stop with Ally-tude it was just too cold.  He took pity on me (bless his coal black heart) and came and picked me and The Tude up. 

In the meantime I'm throwing clothes on Ally-tude and shuffling the boys upstairs to the neighbor's house.  I went to grab Doodle's glasses and the five bucks that I had to send to his teacher?  It was gone.  Along with the 20.00 that I left on the table beside it, but a bus pass for work.  Literally, our last 25.00.  I was dumbfounded.  I went upstairs and asked who was up in the middle of the night, Toad had been.  He swears he didn't take the money, but he pulled it out of the filing cabinet and handed me eight dollars and then a dollar in quarters.  I know for a fact that Toad doesn't have that much money laying around.  He tries to give it away all the time, anything that he gets.  He had been stealing from me.  When I have been catching the bus to get to work for two months now, in subzero temps, with Ally-tude in tow.  Walking home when I miss the late bus, that's a 3 mile hike! 

At first I was dumbfounded.  He had stolen from me, and not only from me, but from his sister and brother and HIMSELF!  I became more furious the more that this went on.  He stole from his family, and then he was still lieing about it.  He swears that he didn't take it, but I know that he did.  I can see it in his face.  He won't look me in the eye, and last night he had been in a hell of a funk.  Went as far as to tell me to "mind your own business mom, it's personal", when I asked him what was wrong. 

Finally, Toadman went to the sitter's house and I grabbed Ally-tude and we jumped into Smacktard's truck and he took us to her daycare and then headed off to work.  On the way to work, Smacktard was feeling talkitive.  He told me how his buddy took 54k from him.  In dollars.  54,000.00.  He let his buddy hold his cash because he didn't want child support enforcement to garnish it or take it from him.  So his buddy swindled him.  I wanted to punch him in the nose.  I'm freaking out over 20 bucks that Toadman took and he's crying about losing 54 thousand dollars.  I just looked at him, I knew better than to say anything smart or hateful, even though I wanted to. He has no idea what it's like to have to scrimp and save and budget to the nearest dollar.  He always went to mommy for anything he needs.  In fact she paid his bills last month.  My question?  If she's paying his bills, she can pay his child support too.  To date he's 8500.00 behind. 

Side note:  I talked to daycare last night, she's going to drop it to 100.00 a week, thank god.  I almost cried when she told me that, finally I got a break.  Now if I can just scrounge together five bucks, I can make it back and forth to work the next couple days.

This weekend was my kid-free weekend.  What did I do?  Well due to some depression setting in, the last thing I wanted to do was to stay home alone, twiddling my thumbs.  No kids, no phone, no internet, no car, bad weather.  A combination of those things is enough to make anyone need a jacket that gives them a little hug. 

Friday I called The Smacktard, and told him he could come get me from work, it was starting to drizzle and would you believe he actually did it?!?!  Of course I did have to listen to how I don't live my life right for God and that I will be roasting in eternal damnation (what else is new?).  After a quick stop by to pick up Ally-tude from daycare (I didn't want to walk her home in the sleet and freezing rain), he dropped me off at my apartment and I went up to retrieve the boys from the sitter's house.  All three kids jumped into their dad's truck, even Toad, who hasn't gone to his dad's in months.  I buckled in Doodle into his booster car seat and kissed all the kids goodbye.  Smacktard was outside the truck smoking and as I walked by him this is the conversation we had:

Smacktard:  Everyone ready?
Me:  Seems to be, take care of them, I'll call later.
Smacktard:  You look good, something's different.
Me:  I've lost 10 pounds
Smacktard:  Well you look good, then again I always did think you were beautiful
Me:  Well, that was a long time ago, it's cold I'm going in
Smacktard:  To bad you're such a bitch
Me:  (without speaking I turned around and walked back into my apartment to get my things to head to SBG's house)
Smacktard:  Tell Mom, bye kids!
Kids: "bye mom I love you"
Me:  (blow kisses and watch them drive away)

As I walked into the house, I tried not to think about the inevitability of being alone.  After a rough few weeks with Zero, he's decided that he wants to "Lay Low" and it really sounds like he doesn't want to be friends.  I cried most of the weekend.  Zero doesn't love me, he doesn't care.  He told me that he did over Christmas time, maybe he was just lonely too.  I don't want to blog about him, or think about him. So why do I constantly think about him?  My phone is shut off at home, I'm Blogging from work now (till the job is over at least, then I'm really up a creek without a paddle), and maybe that's not a bad thing.  Easier to concentrate on what I need to do, and not anything else.  After all, if he REALLY wanted me and the kids…. He'd find a way.  He obviously doesn't, so I'm going to try not to beat myself up for all of this, I'm going to try and put it out of my mind, let it go.

Good thing that’s going on?  Last night TiTi and a friend of hers straightened my hair.  It looks so different to see my shadow with flat hair.  It's still kinda "crimped" in places, but it looks kinda cool.  My hair is down to the middle of my back when it's straight, it's different.  People been doing a double take on my all day, keeps them on their toes about me, and I like that.  I had a great weekend with SBG, Taladega and the kids.  Break from the norm per say.

I called and checked on the kids when I got to work.  They are all doin great.  In fact Toadman is still sleepping, I talked to Bug and Lil Miss Tude.  Doodle was getting ready to go sledding with his friends at his dad's house, and Ally-tude was already playing with her new barbies over there.  The both seemed to have missed me, and I've missed them too.  I don't know if I'll get them back tonight, if they don’t have school, there is no reason to get them out in all this weather crap.  No reason why their dad can't watch them for another day if they don't have school tomarrow.  So I guess we'll see how it goes.  In the meantime however, I've been pretty lonely.  Then again, I should be used to that, seems like I'm always alone, even in a crowded room.