"Behind" the scenes of the Turkey Tutorial

For those of you who have come to Operation Shrink Charlie’s Big Butt to see the highly acclaimed Turkey Tutorial (stepping away from the computer momentarily to avoid the inevitable lightning strike…) let me warmly welcome you to the blog!!! I promise you that if you are on a diet, (or need to- but we don’t point fingers here) you will find OSCBB is a common gathering place for a world of dieters. Which is good, because we can’t meet at the donut shoppe anymore. Too risky.

Please explore and wander ‘round the new and improved site. (just got my blog did. Nice, huh? All the good looking credit goes to April Showers Blog Design. I would say that she is cheap and talented, but that wouldn’t be very polite!) The Turkey Tutorial is on the post below this one. But if you have a few minutes, stick around and keep reading this post. I vow on my evil scale that it’s a good and funny one.


For those of you who have been here for a while, and are now stalking me (*cough* April!) welcome back, and the post you are about to read is one you are sure to love. Classic Charlie moments below.

I want to tell you about behind the scenes of the Turkey Tutorial. You read about my Sunday preparing for the filming of my tutorial, which was a disaster. But what you don’t know is the painful torture I endured to present you with my pathetic (yet highly amusing) attempt at a cooking show. The drama of post production. Editing. The cherry on the fat free yogurt sundae. Spraying the hairspray on hair that hasn’t frizzed out yet. I hope you get it because I am stopping the analogies now.

Brace yourselves.

So Sunday evening, shortly after pulling the turkey out of the oven, my husband kindly offered to edit the video for me, since he’s the computer whiz with the theatre degree- and I accepted. Which was great. I had stuff to do. But when the video he pulled off our digital camera was not converting correctly so he could edit it (because our camera isn’t meant to be a camcorder but it works in a pinch), he got frustrated. And he got a headache. So he went to bed. And I REALLY wanted the tutorial to be done. (Turned out he had the flu and would be out of commission for the next 2 days.)

I decided that determination had worked for the diet, so it would work for editing stubborn video clips too! And I messed with it. And twiddled. And fiddled around with numerous programs promising to convert with ease. But nothing worked for 2 clips in particular… one was a commercial for the Proverbs 31 Girls Get Away Cruise and I really wanted a commercial break in the show. Before I knew it, it was 4am, and I still wasn’t done. Or even close. In fact, I was not one second closer to the finish line than I had been at 10:30 the previous night. So I laid on the couch for a moment to think. With my eyes closed.

Tap..tap…tap…

“Mom, are we going to school today? It starts in 10 minutes…”

My daughter Amy woke me up the second after she did. Mind you, my other 2, who were seen in the tutorial, had no intention of waking me up. They were too busy playing Club Penguin on the computers. I shot them dirty looks as I ran to the kitchen to see the time. 7:51am. School starts at 8.

CRAP.

The next 15 minutes were a flurry of activity. I pulled wrinkled uniforms out of the overflowing clothes hamper, found 6 random socks that didn’t feel “too crunchy” for wearing, counted out $5.25 in nickels for lunches since I didn’t have time to pack any, grabbed book bags to inspect for toys and ice cream (and there is a blog for another day to explain THAT!), signed agenda books, made sure kids had a granola bars and bananas to eat in the car, and made sure the girls brought a hairbrush for the drive to school. Also gave each of them a stick of gum to chew right after eating in the van. I shoved the kids out the door and grabbed my keys.

“Mom, you will have to take us inside and sign us in since we are so late. You can’t wear your robe and slippers!”

CRAP. CRAP.

(And yes, I have driven the kids to school before wearing that same outfit. I have no shame and I hate mornings)

SO- I grabbed sweatpants from the hamper, an exercise muscle shirt (no time for a bra), and a red zip up hoodie. (I love my sweatshirt- dit dit dit, my red hooded sweatshirt) (Sorry, I couldn't help myself!) I grabbed a generic plastic croc type shoe and looked for it’s mate. But to no avail. So I grabbed another generic croc type shoe. Both were right footed, one pink and one blue with rainbow swirls. I chucked a hat on my head and we all scrambled out the door and headed for school in the van. Oh, I should mention here that it is POURING DOWN RAIN.

If you are laughing at this point, I strongly suggest that you stop and take a quick moment to empty your bladder. You have had fair warning.

The time was 8:20 when we got to school, had parked, and the kids had all spit out their gum. The school doors were locked. As we waited outside in the rain to be buzzed in, I realized that the leg of my sweatpants was soaking wet from dragging on the ground. They are men’s sweatpants, and I am short. ‘Nuff said. I shook my leg to try and remove some of the moisture before I dripped all through the hallways of my children’s educational establishment.

We got inside and started walking towards the office. Apparently the previous shaking of my leg was just enough to launch the pair of yesterday's underwear (conveniently stored in the leg of my sweatpants) loose. They fell right out onto the floor as we entered the office. I quickly hit the deck, and tried to hide the bright blue panties in the pocket of my hoodie while laying down. I stood up and the secretary was looking at me kinda funny. Which could have been about anything, really…me dropping to the floor in her presence, the mismatched-both-right-footed shoes, the kids in wrinkled clothes, the crazy woman hair sticking out under from the hat, the pair of blue undies I thought were hidden but were really half hanging out of the pocket of my red jacket…take your pick. I was a disaster smorgasbord.

Finally the kids were signed in, and I slunk back to the van to go home where I belonged. Then I remembered that I needed to hit the bank and pick up cash to pay for the kids guitar lessons. Since the bank has a drive thru, and I was already on that side of town, well- why the heck not get it overwith?

The very nice lady at the bank offered me a free calendar. I said sure, and she showed me the options. There were two that weren’t hideous, and without coffee coursing through my veins, I was powerless to make a decision.

She smiled and whispered, “You can have two, hon!”

“Thanks! You are making my horrible Monday a little less horrible.”

“You are having a bad day? Why is that?”

(And I really did this. This is not an exaggeration in the slightest.)

I reached down, pulled off my mismatching generic "just right" crocs, and held them up for her to see. She started laughing. And I quickly gave her my schpeel about the day’s events and she took pity and I took her pity.

“I think you might need 3 calendars instead of 2 today.”

As I began to pull away, she called out, “Be thankful, it could be worse!!!”

I smiled back and said, “Good point!”

And I was genuinely thankful that things weren’t worse than they already were.

I got home without any more collateral damage, grabbed a Special K protein shake and a thermos of coffee, and set out to at least edit the video clips I could start with. My tummy was a mess, but I figured all the stress was giving me thunder down under. Not to mention I was starving. So I sucked down both the shake and coffee, and set about my editing task.

About the 3rd time that my computer locked up and crashed and I lost all the work I had done in triplicate, to say I was on edge was an understatement. And my tummy kept cramping. I thought that maybe if I simply passed a little wind, I would feel better.

So I tooted. There in my comfy computer chair (that reclines, thank you very much!) I just let one little stinker. And I felt better. But it smelled bad. We are talking “put a frat boy to shame” bad. And it kept getting stronger. And STRONGER. Then I realized I was experiencing a little extra humidity in the south regions. Yep. It was not just a fart. I had - how to put this delicately? Pooped my pants. Yes, that's pretty delicate. And it had leaked onto the upholstered computer chair.

NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
(NO POINTING FINGERS. EVERYONE HAS DONE IT BEFORE!!!!!!!!)

Add an extra load of laundry to an already great day. Plus I had to clean the chair.

In total, it took me about 15 hours to get all the editing done, and it was frustrating as all get out.

But the end result was totally worth it. (although I could have lived without the pants pooping part.)

So to validate all the work, drama and (quite literally) crap I went through to get the Turkey Tutorial to you, would you be a friend and forward it to everyone you know? Maybe tell them it will make their day or make them smile? Because that would ease the pain and suffering. A little.

Who knew that this video would be such a stinker???