Category Archives: Uncategorized

Many of you know about my love affair with peanut m&m’s. It’s been going on for years. I’ve tried some of the other candies in the m&m’s family…peanut butter, coconut, mint, pb&j, wildly cherry…and so far nothing has been able to steal me away from that bright yellow bag. I guess that’s a good thing considering most of those other flavors are for a limited time only.

As you know it is my job to find and report* on new food (ok…mostly candy) discovered in my stomping grounds. Well yesterday I ran across these babies.

Pretzel m&m’s.

Now I love me a good chocolate-covered pretzel. The combination of sweet and salty just does it for me every time. I am uber excited that m&m has decided to join the fun.

Inspecting the color palette*.

And I tasted them. Actually I ate all of the ones you see pictured. I would have eaten more, but that was the entire bag’s worth.

So how did they taste? Pretty much like you would expect a candy-coated, chocolate-covered pretzel to taste. I do think there was a tad too much salt flavor, which is surprising if you know me at all. I love me some salt. The chocolate to pretzel ratio* was completely in line with what an m&m should be, but I’m thinking they would have been better with a bit more chocolate on them.

Verdict* – I wouldn’t turn them down if they were offered to me, but when I’m standing in line at the grocery store making my own choice I’ll still be picking up the yellow bag.

*I realize that m&m’s are supposed to be a fun candy and that my post sounds quite serious. Product review…it’s a serious business. Of course it would be so much better and easier to remain serious if I got a paycheck for all my research. I could have a spot in my house to actually do reviews. There would be a photo studio so I wouldn’t be tempted to take pictures of the products on my unmade bed. I can’t promise I wouldn’t eat the candy in bed, but at least you wouldn’t see the sheets in the background.

This past week I was able to participate in an event of epic proportions.  I attended a nonsigning on Bossy’s (no)Book Tour.  Because of the monumental nature of the event I have decided to do something that I’ve never done here on this blog.  Get ready because for the first time in the history of Midlifenatalie I am going to post pictures of myself.  Pictures of myself with some of my adoring fans.  Wait…I mean pictures of myself with some blogger types I stalk on a regular basis.

Here you have me with the one and only Bossy.

Chookooloonks was a beautiful and gracious hostess.

And there was The Bloggess…a personal favorite of mine.  She’s funny and fabulous.

Now wait a darn minute.  Looking back at this picture now I can see that she was mocking me with her phone.  I can just hear her now.  “Look at my fancy, shmancy phone.  My phone’s better than your phone.  Like where did you get that thing?  Your grandma’s house?”

Seems like everyone was mocking my sweet little flip phone all night long.  The other phones gathered around and taunted her.  Called her names.  She was so sad that she didn’t ring all night.  No messages or phone calls.  Depression set in.  And things between us haven’t been the same since.

I blame the Bloggess.

This past week was a hard one for me.  I was miserably sick.  I had some tough personal moments as well.  As I look back on where my mind went during one particular evening I’m still amazed at some of the thoughts I had.  I was in a state of shock.  I could hear the air rushing around my head.  And it was in that state that Carmex and a promise brought forth such strong emotions that sleep eluded me.  All night long my mind wouldn’t stop.  I thought about things that are so personal that I can’t type them here.  The feelings connected to them made sense.  But then I thought about laundry detergent and the smell of Gain fabric softener.  And what about House of Pies and The Black Lab?  And Zushi…I can’t live without Zushi.  And Paris and snuglets, and Allison.  Jack dogs and Jesse dogs.  Empty drawers and make-up.  And what about those tennis shoes?  Mike’s Hard Lemonade and a bottle of Champagne.  All of those things while silly and seemingly unimportant kept me awake.  Individually they might not be a big deal, but all together they were huge.  Significant.  And by keeping me awake they woke me up.  I needed that.

Staying home from school sick today.  I hate to do it, but I didn’t sleep at all.  Not a bit.  I have a cold and no voice, but there’s other life stuff on top of it as well.  There was no way I could have functioned at school.

Normally I don’t read or care about these things.  Not at all.  Today’s caught my eye.

Remember this?

Well, I happened to be driving by that same billboard yesterday and saw this…

Much better!

Since it’s World Autism Awareness Day I thought I would write about a little something that’s been on my mind lately.

Right after spring break I got a new student.  He seemed to be having trouble adapting to our schedule.  After 2 weeks of teaching said student I’m almost positive he has Asperger’s Syndrome or some other form of autism.  My niece has it, and there are many similarities to the glimpses I got of her at that age.  I haven’t said anything to the parents, because I’m not sure why he transferred to our school.  I know he is closer to his mother’s job now.  I know they pay tuition for him to go to our school, because they still live in the district where his old school was.  I can’t help but wonder if the teacher at his old school mentioned that he might need to be tested because of his problems, and his parents didn’t agree or want to accept it.  From what I can tell he’s an only child.  He reads and writes beautifully (From what I’ve read good handwriting isn’t normal for autistic kids…hm…).  He can count better than most.  Based on those things he is a model student.  But something is definitely wrong.  I’ve talked to my principal, and she thinks we should wait to talk to the parents.  She told me to make notes.  Document behaviors that stand out.  I’ve started doing that.  I just wish I could call his old school and get some feedback from them.  I wish I could talk to my sister about it as well.

While looking things up online I came across this fictional story about a kid with Asperger’s Syndrome that I thought I would share.  Just in case anyone out there is interested.

I have never liked getting my haircut. I don’t like the amount of time it seems to take. It’s not like I think I have better things to do with my time. I’m not one of those people who has to be on the go all the time either. But for some reason when I’m getting my hair done the time seems to drag on and on. Waiting for that golden moment when you’re given the mirror to check yourself out seems like it’s never going to come. When the cape is finally removed and I’m allowed out of the chair all I want to do is throw my money at the counter as I run by. I feel as though I have to escape before my stylist sees an errant hair that he missed and pulls out those scissors again. I don’t though. I actually stand there and pay like a good customer.

When I lived in Turkey I really hated getting my haircut. And yes, hate is an extreme word, but it is the proper one here. I never knew what to expect at the salons there. After a couple of really bad haircuts (due I’m sure to my extremely limited language skills when we first arrived AND earning me the nickname Larry because one was SOOOO short) I was quite skittish anytime I needed a trim. And believe me the only time I ever got my haircut there was when the split ends were taking over and I had no choice but to get a trim. There was no way I was going to let someone actually give me full out haircut. I saved those for my trips to America. One of the things that seemed so strange to me in Turkey was the fact that it took 2 people to style your hair. One person was the hairdryer holder while the other used the brush and aimed the hairdryer. And even though I was only getting trims it still seemed like it took forever.

A couple of weeks ago I had my hair colored and highlighted. It was spring break and the only available appointment my colorist had left was on a Saturday. Let me bear witness here that Saturdays are crazy busy at my salon. After looking over my hair my colorist decided that it was time for some highlights and low lights as well as the normal root touch up. Being completely dense about these things myself I let her make those sorts of decisions for me. So far she’s never steered me wrong. She mixed her colors and set about foiling my hair. By the time she was done with that portion her next client had arrived. She passed me off to a girl who basically runs around the coloring station helping everyone. She applied the base color to my roots and wherever else it needed to be touched up. I waited. When it was time to rinse it all out another helper girl took me to the washing sink and rinsed. She applied a 2 part leave-in conditioner that needed to be heated so I sat under the dryer for 20 minutes, rinsed, was conditioned again and sat under the dryer for an additional 15 minutes After everything was washed out I was taken to yet another person who dried and styled my hair for me. 4 hours and 4 people later I was done. Finally done. All I can say is thank goodness I hadn’t planned to get my haircut as well!

Note…my hair was beautiful. I wish I had thought to take a picture of it.

Note 2…I made another appointment while I was there for a Tuesday night weeks in advance. I NEVER do that, but I don’t think I can handle another Saturday appointment again.

I am really quite amazed at this whole blogging thing.  I know that this blog has been discovered by people who know me in real life.  I’m sure many of them are quite shocked by what they’ve read here.  I can’t apologize for how I feel, but I can say I’m sorry if it hurts you.  I certainly didn’t want anyone to feel hurt by what I’ve written.  All I know is that I have to write it down.

I got my first diary when I was in grade school.  I think I wrote in it a few times, but I never kept up with it.  I have notebooks from high school and college where my scattered thoughts found a home.  Writing things down seemed like a good idea, but I never was diligent enough to keep a journal consistently.  As I’ve looked back over the things I’ve written I can see that my words came from emotional places.  Sometimes the emotions were sad, and other times I was elated.  Between 1991 and 2000 I don’t  think I wrote anything.  I was too busy having babies and doing the suburban mom thing.  In September of 2000 one of my aunts was killed in a horrific car accident, and my grief found it’s way onto 10 pages of 12 x 12 inch scrapbooking paper.  Front and back.  And really it wasn’t all about my aunt.  It was about legacies and friendships and various other topics.  The point is that the floodgates opened and I’ve been writing in some form or another ever since.

I started blogging in January 2006.  I was a slow starter…not understanding what keeping a blog would do for me.  I picked up the pace in January 2007 and have only had a few moments of writer’s block.  Blogging was so much better than just writing it down for myself.  It was out there for others to see.  I could get feedback.  I heard from others who could relate to what I was going through.  People laughed with me and cried with me and FELT with me.  I heard from naysayers and trolls as well as those offering encouragement.  The blogging community acted like a support group of sorts.  Even those people who disagreed with me were welcome to comment on my blog as long as their comments weren’t mean spirited.

I guess all of this is to say to those people who’ve found my blog…hi.  Yes, I’m still blogging.  You knew I couldn’t just stop.  You are welcome to comment here or to email me privately if you would rather.  You may just be here to find some answers.  That’s fine too.  If you are here to try to get me to change my mind or to build a case against me please go away.

Passed this sign today. Drove about a mile before I decided I had to turn around and take a picture of it. I decided to be nice and called the number for the academy to report the mistake. Since it’s Sunday I just left a message, but you can be sure I’ll be watching the billboard to see what they do about it!