Some day, her prince will come. Let’s hope he’s a mind reader.

MP has started getting up at 5 a.m. This is a relatively new development, beginning without rhyme or reason, about two weeks ago. This, in and of itself, is an incredible drag. Add to it the fact that Mommypie’s not getting to bed until 3 a.m. most mornings (late, late, long distance phone calls with The Boy) and you have one crabby mama. Not to mention an exhausted, overly-emotional nearly-5-year-old.

Case in point — this morning, after fighting the good fight as best I could on two hours sleep, and losing pathetically, I gave up, raised a white flag, and let MP watch cartoons. I went back to bed. I overslept. I managed to pry my eyes open at 8:30, at which point I shot out of bed and emerged from my room in a panic, making a beeline for the shower.

Five minutes later, I’m lathering, I’m rinsing, and I hear a tiny, high pitched series of whimpers most definitely meant to get my attention. I peek from around the curtain and see MP sitting on the bathroom floor, in tears.

“What’s wrong?” I ask.

Brace yourself.

“You just walked right past me, and I didn’t even get a HUG.”

(Pouty, arms folded)

“I shouldn’t have to TELL you to give me a hug.”

(Higher pitch. Definitely louder.)

“You should just KNOW I need one!”

(pout)

She’s such a chick.

What a girl wants. Or not.

So, Facebook ads. Tailored to my profile. A 40-year-old single woman.

Really?

No. Reeeaally?

Is THIS one of those great guys? Do you think his mom knows he’s in his room with the webcam right now? ‘Cause, OMG, he’d be, like, soooo busted.

Thank goodness he has enough sense to keep that v-neck on.

I know there’s a lesson in here somewhere.

Once a month I volunteer at a local elementary school. United Way provides an after-school program for kids whose parents have to work, and I help out with whatever they may need that day. Sometimes it’s helping kids with homework, sometimes it’s playing with them on the monkey bars.

This week, as I’m pulling up to the school, I see flashing lights in my rear view mirror. Totally taken off guard, I park in front of a chain link fence bordering the playground. Two cops get out of their cruiser — one of them, I kid you not, crept up the side of the car, hand on her holstered gun like she was ready to take me out. Keep in mind, the lights are still going. And now, the kids are starting to gather along the fence.

Apparently I “blew through the school zone going 29 MPH.” I said the sun was in my eyes. I said the school crept up on me — I can never remember how to get there. I said I had no idea I was going 29 MPH. All true. The best part, though?

COP: Are you a parent? Are you picking up your child?

ME: No. I’m a volunteer.

COP: Oh, really?

ME: Mmm hmm — for the United Way After School Program? I’m here to help the kids with their homework until their parents can pick them up.

Ooh yeah Baby. An even BETTER answer than “I have diarrhea.” (Which I’m SO going to use someday.)

Now the kids are waving.

We talk a little longer, he checks my license, registration, insurance, etc. and tells me he’s letting me off with a warning.

Schweet.

Mommypie. Model Citizen. Example Setter.

Newsflash!

This just in.

Elmo’s a perv.

P.S. Thanks QB for makin’ my day.

Gettin’ Pippi widit.

It was brought to my attention that one of my Tweets Thursday sounded a bit … odd.

You’re right, it does sound like code. (You and your dirty minds.) Unfortunately, my life is not NEARLY that racy.

Here’s the poop. The company I work for puts on an annual business conference, complete with workshops, exhibitors and a cocktail hour. One of the showcase vendors was a massage therapy center. I’ve had some serious back pain for a few years now (helluu Mommy Back), which has escalated over the last few months, so I asked the guy manning the booth for a massage.

I went to lie on the table face down when he told me to turn over, saying something about not being able to form a relationship with the back of a head. Mkay, different, but I get it.

Before the guy cracked everything from my toes to my fingertips to my neck, he told me my back pain stemmed from my feet. He pointed out that I put my weight on the outside of them, which throws everything off. Which I’d never noticed before, but is totally true.

He brought my knees up to my chest — up and out. He told me to relax. To which I replied in my head, “Dude, unless you wanted me to push some major wind, you do NOT want me to relax.” Seriously. I went into this thinking I was getting vanilla. Not spumoni. I was fully unprepared for Yogi-in-a-Box-Contortions.

And then, at one point he started pushing on my stomach with one hand while the other cradled the small of my back.

“Are you cycling?” he says.

“Yeah.” I answer.

I thought he was asking if I biked. I was just about to tell him all about MP’s bike trailer when he says, “I can tell. Your ovaries are swollen.”

Umm …

“Are you cramping?”

“Uh, no …”

“Well, this should help …”

AWWWWKWARD.

Despite this completely uncomfortable exchange, by the time he was done, I was ready to pledge allegiance to his Body Shop. I WAS in Heaven. I literally had NO pain. I told everyone I saw to “Go over to this guy’s booth and get a massage OMG it’s amazing and incredible and I’m totally making an appointment first thing Monday.”

Until Saturday morning when I’m feeling like I’ve been hit by a train. And I literally cannot get out of bed. So much for blind allegiance. The back is just as bad as before, if not worse.

Not so bad that I couldn’t make it to the theater. MP and I went to see a local production of Pippi Longstocking.

And back cracker be damned, all was right with the world.

Howling at the moon and other country activities.

It happened last year and it’s happening again. A week before Halloween and MP’s waffling. Just a few weeks ago she was PSYCHED to be Bat Girl. Her costume is seriously kick ass.

And suddenly, now she wants to be a werewolf.

I have no idea who or what is responsible for planting this thought. Who knows what crazy randomness lurks in the mind of a 4 1/2 year old? I suspect MP’s brain looks something like a Froot Loop strewn McDonald’s PlayLand. With toy catalogs and lots of Chapstick and Spongebob serving ice cream. Surprisingly, it appears to be a place where mythical hairy monsters aren’t so scary afterall. Mean foxes and dinosaurs on the other hand … THOSE are the things nightmares are made of.

(At least lately.)

So, the whole werewolf thing has spurred kind of a crazy routine.

(At least lately.)

We howl at the moon.

We don’t just stick our heads out the door and give a couple ‘owwws.’ We go out on the lawn, get down on all fours, throw our heads back and HOWL Baby.

I can’t take credit for THIS particular crazy idea. This one’s all MP’s. A few nights this week, I’ve put her to bed without howling, only to have her tiptoe out to the livingroom in her footie PJs.

“Mommy, we forgot to howl at the moon.”

So we bundle up in our coats and winter hats (yes, we have SNOW) and run out to the yard. And as off-the-wall as it sounds, I think it’s actually empowered her a bit, and made her a little less fearful of the night.

Living in the country has its advantages.

We just don’t do it on Fridays. That’s when the ‘neighbors’ get naked and climb into their teepee sweatlodge. This is also a new development. I’m SO not kidding.

At any rate, I’m still pushin’ Bat Girl. As much as I love the whole wolf vibe, I have NO idea how to make a werewolf costume.

A day at the patch with Al.

Yesterday, as is customary this time of year, MP and I made our way to the Pumpkin Patch with Grammy and Poppy.

Shortly after arriving, we ran into one of MP’s friends from school. Together, along with his 2-year-old brother, they were inseparable.

Just like MP’s hand and butt.

It’s the latest phase. The Hand-Down-The-Pants one. It’s constant.

When I asked her to please take her hand out of the back of her pants, she replied with an amiable “okay,” and moved it to the front.

Al Bundy’s got nothin’ on this kid.

Can’t we all just get along?

Things in my office have been a little tense lately. I work with five women and one man, Conservaboss. (I think it’s about time for more BO bumper stickers …) I’ve worked with TONS of women before and NEVER experienced the catty, nosy, jealous, backstabbing BS that goes on in my office nearly every day. Seriously. Women are absolutely ridiculous. I don’t know how lesbians do it.

In all honesty, it really comes down to just a few bad apples who get off on trading negativity almost as much as two hormonal teenagers swapping spit. And I’ve learned the best way to avoid being peppered with the BS is to stay buried in my office.

Until Monday.

Remember my Social Media Presentation last week? On Monday, one of the Apples (who takes great joy in finding fault with me, my ideas, my work, etc.) rolled into my office, sat down, and gave a backhanded compliment before tearing it apart.

And I lost my shit.

Just thinking about it exhausts me. Needless to say, when the smoke cleared and all was said and done, I felt like a weight had been lifted. I was completely honest. And it was completely harsh. But 100% deserved.

What it comes down to is this. I would love nothing more than to spend each day with MP. Being the sole bread-earner, that’s not a possibility right now. But if I can’t be with her, I damn well better like the people I DO spend time with. Because thinking that I spend more hours each day with a few downright nasty beyotches than I do with my daughter makes me angry.

So tomorrow, the entire staff will be going on our annual day-long “retreat.” Which really just means we go somewhere, recap the past year and talk about plans for the next. AWESOME timing. Should be a BLAST.

I’ve decided to take the high road however, and attempt to be a uniter.

I’ll be passing out Pop Rocks and Diet Pepsi. If THAT doesn’t get a laugh, I’ll be throwing in the proverbial towel and heading to an ashram somewhere in India.

It’s all about the little things.

Five million things on my mind, and unable to place any of them into on coherent post, so I’m going with the piecemeal theme this morning.

First, I need to say I’ve been totally consumed with vampires, thanks to the combination of my new favorite show True Blood on HBO and the Tweeple’s suggestion I read the latest hot novel, Twilight. Finding it in the Young Readers section at the bookstore left me a leettle worried and wondering just WHO you people are. I almost passed. I was skeptical at first, but ultimately, I trust the Doogs, because I do know you’re a bunch of smart cookies, and gotta say … lovin’ it so far.

Now I want a vampire lover. (Methinks I smell a post brewin’ …)

And since I got nothin’, I’ll leave you with these little time capsule nuggets.

Notable Moments in Pie Town Last Week

Dropping MP off at preschool, she looks up at me, and holding her stomach says, “My tummy hurts.”

A four-year-old classmate, sitting nearby, looks up at me, and holding his crotch says, “My balls hurt.”

MP stripped nekkid and on her way to the bath, catches a glimpse of herself in the bathroom’s full-size mirror, stops, poses and says admiringly,

“Humina, humina, hhhumina.”

MP speeding down the front walk on her pink and purple HotWheel.

ME: (yelling from the front step) Be careful, crazy driver!

MP: (screeching to a halt in front of me) You don’t need a license to drrrive a sandwich.

Aw. My little Spongebob.

Put it on your list and maybe Santa will bring it.

MP has joined Amway. And while Sarah Palin may be making political history, MP’s making a little history of her own, becoming the youngest sales rep in the history of the organization.

Today when I picked her up at preschool, I found her seated at a table, going through the latest catalog with her classmates and encouraging them to “Think Globally, Act Locally.” And the kids were LISTENING. Hanging on her every word, even. Which TOTALLY blew me away until closer observation revealed they were, in fact, mostly interested in a boy named Jermaine’s elbow scab. Or more accurately, Jermaine’s Scooby Doo BandAid.

When MP spotted me, she stood up and asked if I had change for a twenty. Dazed and confused, I dug into my pockets, barely mustering a weak,”I don’t think …” before she disappeared into the kitchen and promptly returned wheeling a Radio Flyer wagon full of product.

A few teachers began writing checks. Some kid was telling another kid how much his mom loved Amway detergent.

All the way home, it was “Diamond Level” this, “Diamond Level” that. Apparently I’m having a few potential recruits over this weekend. MP says if they join, eventually it’ll boost her numbers. And then we get to go on a cruise!

*drums fingers on table*

Okay, not really. But she DOES have the trademark “visualize what you want” concept down.

Here’s my door.

Here’s her door.

The elbow scab part though? Totally true.

Except the name. Jermaine.

His real name is Tito.