Sweet Sweat

I am a sweater -- not a soft, furry, warm thing to wrap around you. I'm talking about a dripping down my face, wet underarms sweater. I've always been a sweater. In high school, I didn't have an air conditioner in my car (in West Texas), and I had vinyl seats. I used to drive to school leaning forward off of the seat back so that my shirt would not show my sweaty back. After all, women aren't supposed to sweat -- we're supposed to "glisten."

I have been doing Bikram Yoga lately which I love because it embraces my sweatiness. We do yoga in a room that is maintained at 105 degrees, and sweating is highly encouraged. This, though, is one of the few times that sweatiness is a good thing.

In my last blog entry, I mentioned that I have started taking care of an older gentleman in his home. I went to his home to meet him and his wife as part of the interview process. I was a little nervous, their house was a little warm, and it was 101 degrees outside -- elements of a perfect storm for a sweater.

As we talked, I first felt my underarms getting hot. Of course, I had worn a cotton shirt that showed sweat. We stood up to go and look at something, and I felt a trickle of sweat go down the backs of my knees. Then I felt a spring of water sprout on my back. So, as I stood up, I realized that not only did I have big sweaty rings under my arms, but now I also had a lovely stripe of sweat going down my back, and I probably had little creases on my khakis behind my knees where the sweat had started.

They hired me. Amazingly, after all that sweating, they hired me. I can imagine the conversation after I left:

"She seems like a nice girl," the wife said.

"Mmm hmm," the husband answered.

Then there would have been silence until one of them said, "A bit of a sweater."

Then they would have both nodded and shaken their heads, in pity. But eventually the worry would have been overcome as they would have said, "But she'll be okay. We can't hold that against her."

I'm sweating a little right now just thinking about it.

Hey, I wonder if anyone is willing to pay money for sweat...

Selling My Body

My one desire in life is to stay home and raise my children. Okay, so that's a bit dramatic -- maybe not my one desire. I want to go to Antarctica, I want to go up in a hot air balloon, I want to get a book published. But I really, really love being a stay-at-home mom.

In order to stay home with my kids, I have to figure out a way to pay for my sons' college (yes, plural). I have two in college now. I am terrified of working full-time as a nurse, and I have not become the rich and famous writer that I dream of being, so I have to get a bit creative. Nothing illegal, just creative.

A friend of mine suggested that I write about some of these things. I think she thinks I'm a little crazy.

One of the things I do is get on focus groups. You know those people with the clipboards in the mall who want to know your opinion that you avoid eye contact with? Well, I walk up to them. I've made a few bucks here and there by giving my opinion on things like mounting tape and razors. It's kind of fun, and I've gotten really good at telling people exactly what I think. The pay varies, but if I actually get chosen to be on a focus group, I can make around $100 for a few hours of talking.

A month ago I entered a brain study. I did a bunch of memory tasks while the examiner did an MRI of my brain. $30 an hour. Not bad. I even got $10 to spit in a tube. I told the pastoral assistant at my church that I was selling my body. She shook her head. She knows me well.

I heard there was another study going on that they pay participants $10 a test tube for blood. I'm trying to get into that one. I wonder how many tubes they need... I think I heard the name of the study group was DraculaInc. Does that sound suspicious??

Now I'm going to help take care of an older gentleman one day a week. Yeah, it's actually nursing. But I don't think it's going to be scary. There are no open wounds and nobody is in labor.

I wonder how much I would get for donating plasma? Isn't that one of those things they pay you for? What about a kidney?

You know, things would be alot easier if I would just win the lottery...

A Funny Story

So, I’m supposed to be writing a synopsis for my romance novel. Writing synopses is not one of my favorite things. So what am I doing? I’m going to tell a slightly bawdy story. It’s not too bad, but if you’re squeamish, you might want to stop here.

I was waiting for my daughter to get out of her gymnastics class the other day. I don’t usually socialize – I’m the mom with the laptop fired up, typing away, occasionally glancing over my bifocals to make sure my daughter is still alive. I intersperse my romance writing “He ran his fingertips down her soft skin…” with mental commands to my daughter, “Point your toes!”

That is probably what got me in trouble.

The mom on the couch across from me was talking to her two-year-old son. He had just cleaned the floor with his hands.

“Come here, Timmy, and get some hand sanitizer,” she said. (I changed the names to protect the innocent.)

Timmy looked up at his mom, then looked at his hands, then shook his head. No hand sanitizer necessary, he had decided.

“Timmy, you’ll like it,” his mom said. “It’s new. It’s G-Spot scented.”

Okay. So right here was when my eyes shot up from my laptop and I accidentally swallowed my Altoid. I really, really wanted to see the woman who had bought G-Spot scented hand sanitizer. And a badly curious little side of me kind of wanted to know not only what a G-Spot smells like, but also how the manufacturer figured that one out.

Apparently the mom sharing the couch with the mom of the toddler was curious as well. For the record, both of the moms sitting across from me looked perfectly normal, very mommish in their decently lengthed shorts and t-shirts. The curious mom looked to her couch-mate and said, “Hm. I’ve never heard of that one.”

To her credit, her eyebrows were only slightly raised and her mouth was not letting in flies (unlike my own at the time).

“Oh, you haven’t? It smells really good. Here have some,” the boy’s mom said.

I was about to reach my hand out and ask for some when the curious mom asked, “What was that scent again?”

“It’s juice box scented.”

Ohhhhh. G-Spot, juice box. Whatever.

So, now back to my synopsis.