Those who follow me on Twitter know that we've become smitten with a squirrel who lives in our front yard. And by "we" I mean everyone in this house who is not Josh. Josh may have a problem with the squirrel because we keep feeding him Josh's almonds. But the thing is that Simon loves almonds and we love Simon and we just want the damn squirrel to be happy.

One person wanted to name the squirrel Beauty and another person wanted to name him Beatle (as in, The Beatles, except there is only one, so he is simply Beatle) and has been campaigning hard for a name change. But Simon Liverspot suits this squirrel perfectly. I left a camera by the window so I can snap a picture when he comes to eat so you can see how Simon can only possibly be named Simon. It's as if he was simply born to fill this name. Simon Arthur Liverspot.

This is what happens when you don't buy your wife a pet and she can't procreate. She transfers all of her enormous love to a squirrel.

I think I'm becoming more grouchy in my old age. Someone sent me a blog post about Internet safety and I got all crotchety and up-in-arms, spewing and sputtering and was about to email the author of the blog because her book was on my to-read list and now it is off my to-read list because I'm just not impressed with her lack of actual discourse and her argument-style of name-calling when I realized how I'd feel if I got that email (and I have gotten that email). The "I'm not going to read your book" or "I'm not going to read your blog" because...

And it made me click away from email and look at pictures of puppies because life is just too short and nothing can be gained by telling someone why you're not reading them anymore. Usually.

(I mean, what is the point? Do I think in writing it that she'll gasp and say, "Mel won't read my book now? I should change the way I view the world and write about it because I must be a terrible person if I don't agree with her." Truly, if you don't like something you're reading, just click away).

Which brings us to a post from Citizen of the Month this week that started out about one thing and then swings into another but then really, without verbalizing it, comes back to the first point which is that when someone unfollows you, are they making a statement about YOU, and how well do they actually know you and what are they basing it on?

As I walked through BlogHer, I constantly heard from people, "you are exactly as I imagined you would be." I am like a skin-and-bones version of my blog, except perhaps shorter than you expect. And I always smell like shampoo because my hair takes so long to dry that it's usually still damp when I go for my next shower 24 hours later. What you see is pretty much what you get except that I'm probably a bit more brash on my blog than I am if you meet me face-to-face. I mean, on my blog I'm like LET ME TELL YOU ABOUT MY VAGINA! And in the face-to-face world, I'm more like let me tell you about my vagina. Please?

The way things differ is mostly the stories I tell which are fit for the Internet and the stories I tell in the face-to-face world because I have no filter. By which I mean that my face-to-face friends and family tend to get a 360 degree Melissa and the Internet gets a 180 degree Melissa because there are things I can't share online because they cross into someone else's privacy or because they're not thoughts I want to live on forever in the archived crevices of the blogosphere or because you would think soooooooooo much less of me if I told you things like how I tried to trade time with my Kitchenaid for a friend to come over and catch the cricket in the laundry room this week.

So, the online me isn't the total me, but it's somewhat close. So when people unfriend, unfollow, deblogroll me, should I be offended that they rejected me? Since a blog (or Twitter or Facebook) is like seeing a memoir written in real time? On one hand, there are so many reasons why someone would unfollow, reasons that have nothing to do with the person at all (time, a desire to avoid a certain topic, the fact that the person's blog continuously crashes another person's computer). Would you want to know why someone stopped reading your blog or is ignorance bliss?

If I'm not close with the person at all, my tendency is to simply stop reading. If they asked me, I'd give them an honest answer, but I don't believe we need to tell every single person why we do every single thing. If I'm close with the person, I do explain why. I've never stopped reading a person's blog, but I did have to unfriend someone on Facebook because they were crossing my privacy lines and after sending two emails about it, sent a third apologizing and saying while I'd love to remain in touch with them off Facebook, they weren't making me comfortable on Facebook.

In the case of the original blog I mentioned, I wondered if I could like the writer and hate the blog. And really, the answer is sort of no. I thought she came across as an idiot on her blog and I'm fairly certain that unless she is only a poor writer and can formulate arguments verbally, I'd also dislike talking to her in the face-to-face world. Which is to say, that if you like a person's blog, do you think it extends that you would like the person? And is picking which blogs to read sort of the same as picking friends in the face-to-face world? Sometimes we have something in common, sometimes we admire the person, sometimes we have a shared history. So here's another question: Do you read anyone you think you wouldn't like in the face-to-face world?

So, to sum up because I ask a lot of questions:

• When someone unfollows you, are they making a statement about YOU, and how well do they actually know you and what are they basing it on?
• Would you want to know why someone stopped reading your blog or is ignorance bliss?
• If you like a person's blog, do you think it extends that you would like the person? And do you read anyone you think you wouldn't like in the face-to-face world?

Oh, and one more question:

The Weekly What If: What if I met you in the face-to-face world--would you be like I imagine you to be from your blog, or does your writing only reflect a small element of your total personality? How close is the skin-and-bones you to the online you?

This is a week that has been in my head for five years. We were told that by age five, the twins' adjusted age should catch up with their actual age. Within five years, we wouldn't see a difference between the Wolvog and ChickieNob and their full-term peers. Melissa of now says "bwaaaaah!" to that fact, noting that we still clap when they're on the charts growth-wise at a doctor's visit. They are small kids. You can tell they started out small and they're still small. They are a very young five, developmentally. And that's fine--I get babyhood that much longer. But the earnest Melissa of five years ago thought the whole world would look different on this date, when the two ages meshed and I thought prematurity would be chucked out the window.

Wasn't that earnest Melissa so sweet? I just want to pinch her cheeks for a moment.

Of course, you can only have retrospect with time and the fact is that this date was the receptacle of my hope. I placed all my hope in it when footing felt off in the beginning. I knew there was an end in sight and while it may be far off, all would be okay at that point. Life doesn't truly work like that and I think my head knew that. But like so many other places in my life, my heart has a louder voice. And I'm glad sometimes that it does because I needed to have that hope then, just as I need to just be in the moment now.

Lindsay and my mother came over and we all had milk and cookies to celebrate.

So happy Mesh Date, ChickieNob and Wolvog. May you always grow strong and healthy and may you always be yourselves and happy in your own skin.

For everyone who was holding us in their hearts this week--thank you. We have emerged out the other side for the time being.

Back in college, there was one of those nights where we were up at 4 a.m. eating Pokey sticks, and wondering if my blue was my friends' blue, and "Watching the Wheels" came on. And someone commented that while the song obviously rocked, it had a limited usage. Like Peter Gabriel's "In Your Eyes" could be used by any mooning teenager. Or every Bat Mitzvah can be enhanced with a version of "Shout."

But how many people can use the song "Watching the Wheels" and have it work with their life? I mean, they'd have to not only be hugely and lastingly successful, but do so at a young enough age to have time to drop out and enjoy not being part of the game anymore. I mean, if Zac Efron drops out of life, he will all but be forgotten except for a few die-hards come twenty years from now. He cannot use "Watching the Wheels." And Dustin Hoffman could stop making movies and use it, but honestly, he's a little old for the song. When you're that age, it's called "retiring," not "dropping out."

Seriously, name me someone that it works with. The only one I've come up with is if Prince William stepped out of line for the throne to become a beach bum in St. Lucia. He has lasting fame and is young enough to call it dropping out.

Anyway, they used the song in Funny People and I grabbed Josh's arm and said, "I must call everyone from that night in college because I have found somewhere that it totally works." Wheeeew, sigh of relief. I have been waiting about 16 years to say that.

I was nostalgic for John Lennon after watching the movie so I threw his CD on in the car despite the groans coming from the backseat. "He's actually very important. He was part of the Beatles who were the first really big rock-n-roll band. Girls screamed when they performed. They got so excited they collapsed on the floor and cried."

This, apparently, was not a selling point for the music.

So they're yelling and I'm trying to convince them to listen to one freakin' song. And after that another freakin' song. And then "Beautiful Boy" comes on and how can you turn off the CD on "Beautiful Boy?" "He wrote this song for his little boy, Sean, who is not so little anymore. About how he...loves...watching...him...[sniff]...grow...[long pause while I collect myself]...up."

And I am crying as we drive down Seven Locks Road because of that bridge: "Out on the ocean / sailing away / I can hardly wait / to see you come of age / but I guess we'll both just have to be patient."

I should probably add that I have cried every time I've seen the preview for Spike Jonze's Where the Wild Things Are.

We get through John Lennon. That afternoon, we go out to get the mail and on the back of a magazine is an advertisement for the Princess Diana exhibit in Philadelphia. I tell the ChickieNob that we can go and see Diana's wedding dress because it is the dress of a real-life princess. If you think the girl gets excited over the idea of tricking her father's office mates with a worm cake, you should have seen the total body joy over the thought of seeing tiaras worn by a real princess.

"Where does she live?" the ChickieNob asked.

"Well, she doesn't live anymore."

"Why not? She looks very young."

"She was. She was in a car accident and the doctor could not fix her body."

"What kind of car?" the Wolvog asked.

"I'm not sure," I said.

"It was probably a TVR," he said confidently. "You can't get them in America because they crash up a lot."

We spent the next hour talking about Princess Diana and the work she did and her wedding and how she was the "People's Princess" and at some brilliant point, I turned on YouTube to show them pictures and we found a photo montage set to "Goodbye English Rose" and I am bawling BAWLING as I try to tell them about watching the funeral on television with my British roommates and how people filled up the space in front of the palace with a sea of roses. And they are looking at me like I am completely crazy, after losing it over John Lennon earlier in the day.

And then Ted Kennedy dies.

We took the twins to see their first movie last weekend--Ponyo. It's the story about a little fish who wants to be a girl, a weak plotted version of the Little Mermaid (where once the fish tastes human blood, all she wants in the world is to be a little girl. It's just like when you eat a hamburger and all you want to do, with all your heart, enough to leave your family behind forever, is to turn into a cow).

Absolutely necessary to watch a movie in a theater for the first time: three stuffed animals, two necklaces, a bracelet, and a bag of chocolate chips. The Wolvog watched the first 80 minutes from Josh's lap and finally decided that he could handle having his own seat even though movies are simply too intense to combine with eating. The ChickieNob handled the first 90 minutes in her own seat, but moved into my lap for the remainder.

The most exciting moment in the film came when the mother served the children ramen noodles. Ramen noodles! After our own successful ramen noodle chase which unfolded over Twitter last Friday night. There is only one vegan ramen noodle option out there and Josh drove to three stores to find it; a truer sign of his devotion than the sea king asking the little boy if, you know, he could love Ponyo whether she was a fish or human. Did you hear that, Fujimoto? My husband drove to three stores to buy me the saltiest food known to man. That is love; that is devotion.

Eating ramen reminds me of a spring in college where I boasted that I could eat for under $3 a day. And I did. Two meals of ramen noodles (which came to 40 cents), a cucumber (about 75 cents) and the rest on coffee. Such a healthy life.

But the absolute best part of the movie came when we walked into the theater. I am such a fucking wholesome person that I have only once stayed in the theater and watched a second film for free. I mean, I have seen two movies in one day, but I have WALKED OUT OF THE THEATER AND PURCHASED A SECOND TICKET. Because I'm that wholesome.

But once--once!--when I was pregnant with the twins, we went to see Shrek 2 and it was so awful that I started crying about how we'd never see a film again once the twins arrived and this was our last chance and it was a terrible film and we wasted it--we wasted it. So Josh told me that we were going to see Mean Girls too. And while I had a massive guilt complex, I went along with the plan, but bought extra popcorn to make up for the thievery.

Of course, I was seven months pregnant so I had to pee every few minutes and it order to get to the bathroom, I had to pass the ticket taker. I could tell that he knew that I had been in the theater and peed way too many times for a single feature, and I had such a huge guilt complex that my heart was literally beating out of my chest like the Tell-Tale Heart, but the man never said anything to me. He would just raise his eyebrows when I passed.

That was the man who took our tickets.

He was not as enthralled to see us as we were to see him.

So interesting how few of you want to have dinner with eighteen-year-old boys, even those who can suck out all your blood OR make your front teeth grow really long with a spell. What? These are not endearing traits?

Some of you know because you are very careful readers that Josh was a blogger long before I was a blogger. He started the site right after the twins were born and he called me the MOWA, the minister of wifely affairs. And I loved it. I mean, I lived it, but then I got to experience the day all over again from his blog. And I met a bunch of cool people via his blog and thought that it was amazing that people all over the world read his thoughts and knew about me (at least in the form of the MOWA) and left comments about our lives.

A while back, a reader of Stirrup Queens started noticing the similarities between Josh and this old blogger who disappeared into the ether one day. And the ChickieNob and Wolvog and the twins he used to write about. And this kosher, vegetarian wife and the MOWA. And she wrote me as if she were whispering the password at the speakeasy--"are you the MOWA?"

And I am.

The Stirrup Queen is also the MOWA. By which I mean, my name is Melissa and I write at Stirrup Queens and I am the MOWA.

It came up this year at BlogHer because Josh was there and it was fun to see some people's faces when we'd say that. I mean, no one knew where Josh had disappeared when he stopped his blog and suddenly they realized that he had been in front of them all this time, just in a different form as I had been for them so many years ago when they stepped into our lives and I was the MOWA.

So...in case you are currently gasping and remembering an old blog you read many years ago about a family living in D.C...well, that is us. And yes, feel free to write and get that old vegetarian pho recipe--we still make it from time to time. And if you didn't read blogs prior to 2006 when his ended, ignore this section because his old site is currently defunct and this story is probably not as interesting.

Though one single post still exists out there that was reposted on another person's blog. 10 points to whomever finds it?

If you follow me on Twitter, you know I didn't have a great retail week. Let's review. We'll start with the positive.

The Good: I went to Hallmark to pick up a card. I counted out the money and handed it to the cashier. She counted it again and handed back a dollar. She could have pocketed it and I obviously wouldn't have known the difference. I thanked her for counting diligently and walked out deciding that the next time I need a card, I will definitely head to Hallmark again instead of the other card shop that I sometimes frequent.

The Bad: I tried to order a pair of pants from J. Jill. Every part of the order was wrong--the billing address, the shipping address, the email address and the item itself despite the fact that the woman taking the order read back all the information to me. I called J. Jill and asked if they could ship the correct pants to the brick-and-mortar store nearby and I would exchange the wrong pants for the right pants. They insisted (despite the fact that this was their mistake) that they could not do that and the only solution would be for me to pay for the pants again that day (and have a second charge to my credit card) and return the other ones to the store whenever I could (and get the reimbursement on the credit card). They officially lost a customer.

I went to the mall to return the pants and the employee at the desk tried to make it right by reordering the correct pants for me, waiving the overnight shipping, and charging the original amount. Which was fine and they can keep the money from that purchase BUT they have lost me as a loyal customer of 9 years. In the end, though she fixed the problem, I received nothing for my trouble (due to their mistakes) and wasted another 2 hours of my life between phone calls and driving. Had they offered me anything for my trouble--a credit at the store, a coupon--they could have kept a customer. But there are too many stores that also have clothing I like and I don't want to shop with a company that makes me spend an additional two hours solving their problems with no nod towards the idea that they care if I stick around.

The Ugly: I wanted to get the twins a new sticker mosaic set, but we've exhausted the limited supply from toy stores in our area. I called A.C. Moore and asked if they carried sticker mosaics by Orb Factory (Orb Factory, if you're reading this, make more sets. We have literally accumulated enough sticker mosaics to wallpaper an entire room). The operator passed me first to a man and then to a woman. The woman went to check the shelves and came back to inform me that they had many sets currently in stock. I asked her if they had the mermaid one and she placed me on hold again to check. She returned to tell me that while they didn't have the mermaid one, they had many of the other ones. I was on hold for a total of 10 minutes. I thanked her and made plans to stop working early and drive to the store.

I went to the store and couldn't find the sticker mosaics. So I asked one employee and she didn't know what I was talking about. She asked a man who told me that he had been the first person I spoke to. He didn't think they carried sticker mosaics, but told me the name of the employee who kept me on hold for 10 minutes checking the shelves. He sent me to speak to a manager who told me they didn't carry sticker mosaics at all. She shrugged her shoulders when I told her the story and said, "I just don't know what happened." She had no other solution than shoulder shrugging.

I left the store and will not be getting art supplies at A.C. Moore in the future. The reality is that she could have assuaged my feelings by apologizing, or telling me that she'd be speaking with that employee to find out why she would tell someone to drive out to the store for an item that they've never carried, or offer to help me find a similar art project for the twins. There were so many things she could have done as a manager that could have (1) gotten the store a sale and (2) ensured that a customer didn't leave the store upset. But now they've lost a customer who shops at the store several times a month to keep the twins in art projects. Again, there are other art supply stores in town, and I'd rather drive out of my way or even pay more to have a better shopping experience.

Feel free to vent your own frustrating shopping experience. In fact...

This week is the three-year anniversary of the Friday Blog Roundup. With only one or two exceptions, for three straight years, every Friday, I have posted a taste of what I read that week. Over the last three years, I have highlighted 625 posts give or take. Some weeks, I do more than four, but one or two times I missed the roundup. Each year, I hit about 200+ posts. Hence why 200 is my goal for this week.

This is an open apology specifically to my father, but also to all fathers with daughters. I am so sorry for the music.

The Wolvog recently decided that he loves Joseph and his Amazing Technicolour Dreamcoat. Frankly, it makes me happy too, especially the song "Go Go Go Joseph" when they're chanting "go go Joe, go go Joe" and then the song explodes into the chorus. You know what I'm talking about?

I now own the CD with Donny Osmond (pretty much everyone in their thirties and beyond is probably considering their favourite Osmond right now. Seeing their last name does that to you. And there were so many to choose from. My favourite was Jimmy, especially on that Fame episode), but my camp did a production of the show back in the 80s and until the late 90s, that was the only copy of the music I owned.

And I subjected my father to it on a road trip.

I remember popping in the cassette, promising him that he was going to "love it" because why wouldn't he love it as much as I did, remembering our female Joseph whirling around the stage (there were no boys in camp who could hit the notes). My memories of singing the songs during a shaving cream fight with the other girls cabin were so strong that they must spill out of me and enter everyone in the car through osmosis.

Just to repeat, it was a tape of Joseph and his Amazing Technicolour Dreamcoat.

And if that wasn't enough, it was being sung by thirteen-year-olds.

And if that wasn't enough, it was recorded on an old tape recorder that I had placed on my lap during the performance so you could hear me laughing and talking with people over the music.

And if that wasn't enough, it was the entire score. A 90 minute tape.

I'm sorry, dad.