I suppose if you've never taken it you might not be familiar with Coumadin, it's that rat poison they give you after heart surgery to thin your blood.
Well, that's what they call it, but of course your blood is really no thicker or thinner than it ever was, your clotting time is either short or long, with coumadin it's long, and so you don't form clots around your grand, artificial heart valve. Welcome to the world of the cyborgs.
Anyway, as I may have mentioned, I have some TIAs now and then and my short term memory is toast since that time they froze my brain and I was dead for fifteen minutes.
I just bet Jesus didn't have to go through all this after HIS resurrection, but then he was God, so that might account for it.
Anyway, I forget things, like that my latest coumadin prescription was for three milligram tablets not two, and I was supposed to take one three and half a one to make 3.5, but I blithely forgot all that by the time I got home and just remembered take one and a half tablets.
So I did. Thus taking four and a half milligrams of coumadin a day.
When I dropped the pliers on my toe and it wouldn't quit bleeding for three days, you might think that would have given me a clue, but no. I can't remember exactly what I thought the explanation for that was, but I am sure it had nothing to do with blood thinner.
So, not knowing I was ready to bleed to death from a shaving nick, I also had a fit of the "I should lose weight and get in shape" bug. So I got a little enthusiastic with the exercise and did something really wretched to my neck.
It's taken a long time to get here to the point, but that is the reason I'm taking the muscle relaxer and so am just a little relaxed. Like if I drank and had decided to have a fifth of Jack, that kind of relaxed.
I remember now why I don't drink. Emma has one of those little princess beauty kits. You know the ones, some pink paste for rouge, some colored wax for lipstick, some nail polish that's guaranteed to wash off in the tub (it doesn't) a lot of blue eyeshadow and some purple glitter fairy dust.
So, I let her give me a makeover right before I went to the quickstop for tootsie rolls, and it was only after I got home that I remembered to look in the mirror. At which point it became apparent why all those people were smiling at me.
Up to then, I just thought they were really friendly and hospitable folks. But now I suspect it's because I had purple fairy dust all over me, my blue eyeshadow reached above my brow line and while one hand and foot had some creatively polished pink nails, the other hand and foot did not.
I bet they don't wonder anymore why I quit wearing makeup.
I'm thinking I may let Emma do all my makeup from now on. I bet that fellow from the beer tent who is opposed to weeds would be a lot less vocal if he had to express his opinion to a woman who glittered purple from head to toe.
And no, I'm not going to weed the flower bed. Anyone who is offended by it is welcome to come right over and weed to their heart's content. I like it the way it is. And I have way more interesting things to do than weed flowerbeds. Also, since I am opposed to vitamin K injections, I am forbidden to go near anything sharp until I see Tammy again on Wednesday morning.
Tammy is my PA.
I can't do the dishes, cut vegetables, open cans or do anything else that might involve puncturing my skin anywhere. Which, had I know about it, would have caused me to overdo the coumadin a long time ago, because a muscle relaxer and a nice book is a great way to spend a Tuesday, let me tell you.
Oh, and I bruised a lot, really rather alarmingly. I can't decide whether to tell the neighbors Jimmy beats me or to say Jean pushed me down the stairs.
I think I'll go with the Jean story, since she's moving out Friday and taking my grandchildren with her. Before you know it Aiden and I will be making forts, singing songs about the school bus and having popcorn for breakfast to our heart's content.
Every cloud has a silver lining, you just have to look for it.
Tuesday, September 22, 2009
Monday, September 21, 2009
My house (is a very, very, very fine house--not).
So, I was posting pictures of Ashley and Matthew on her birthday, over there on facebook, and I got to noticing my house as background, and I noticed a few things.
It's not that I had any grand illusions that I was living at the palace, exactly, but I was a little shocked to see how closely Grandma Helgeson and I had managed to live in the same house. Well, hers was cleaner, and it had fewer animals and children, and I'm pretty sure she made her bed everyday and I only make mine if I don't forget I have a bedroom the minute I leave the room. But still, there are a lot of similarities.
You know, like the walls are lumpy and the floor is uneven and I think we may have a really serious problem with the roof. Grandma would have learned to shingle and fixed the roof herself, but I got half my DNA from Grandma Clark and we just don't give a damn.
My Grandma Clark side is good for singing and raising children I didn't give birth to, and my Grandma Helgeson side is industrious and thrifty, but neither of my sides can make me care enough to go shingle a roof.
Anyway, back to the pictures and my bed in the background.
I forget sometimes that I moved downstairs and made the front parlor into my bedroom when it became obvious that coming down the stairs in the dark, locating the only bathroom, which the Victorians hid behind the staircase (I don't know why) and then getting back to my bed was likely to result in my death after I fell down the stairs for the tenth time. And so now it's a lot more "public" than it used to be.
You might think that would incline one to keep it in perfect order, but anyone who thinks that has clearly never met my family. Aiden likes to "help" me make the bed. He has some highly original ideas of how a bed should look. I don't fix it because I don't want to hurt his feelings and discourage him from doing chores on his own.
That and I'm as lazy as sin, but still. It's a good policy and it makes me sound so...well, either insane or saintly, I don't really care which one.
Also, until I saw it in pictures I had forgotten what a really creative mix of furniture I acquired so that kids, dogs, husbands and teenage boys fixing cars could sit on it without anyone giving them the stink eye in case they got something dirty.
Screw dirty, I always say. If I want to entertain someone who's too good to see the furniture I'll just keep them on the porch. The Pastor comes in here and even has tea on occasion so if it's good enough for him I think the rest of you can just learn to deal.
Not counting Thanksgiving I choose to entertain by picnic. No one expects anything from you and everybody gets to have a good time, most importantly me, since I don't have to worry about the decorations as God already did such a fine job what with the grass and the trees and the sky and so forth.
The weeds in the flower bed are my own contribution, but weeds are just flowers with a bad reputation and since I have a deep and abiding fondness for strays of all kinds, it stands to reason I would encourage weeds.
In fact this year for Horse and Colt Show, which is our annual festival here in hillbilly hell, I have commissioned a lovely hand painted wooden sign from those hippies up the street that says, "Weeds", just so there will be no doubt that I am aware they are there.
Some helpful fellow invariably shows up an hour after the beer tent opens and asks me if I know there is nothing but weeds in that flower bed. Usually I tell him yes, thank you, I planned the garden after all and worked on it very hard and me and the field mice are right fond of purple thistles, but this year the sign will hopefully forestall him so we can avoid the ensuing discussion of his family tree. And the monkeys therein.
Also, I have an ongoing campaign to teach the village about freedom and what it means to be an American and how everybody gets to be free not just you, so really, it is my civic duty to continue to maintain the weed garden.
I feel a certain responsibility. If you lived here, you would, too, because I am pretty sure the village president did his internship with the KGB. He was my high school English teacher and just trust me, there is something about a failed Seminarian that just causes you to question his principles.
Since we have a nearly forty year history of mutual contempt I feel it is incumbent upon me to maintain certain standards, one of them being that whenever life around here tends to lean toward oppression I have to stand up for us little people.
Mother Teresa said so. Well, not the part about me hating the village, but definitely the standing up for the poor thing. And I try to always listen to Mother Teresa. And Saint Francis. And Jesus when he can get a word in, but I talk a lot.
I shouldn't be so hard on the village, they're not really as bad as I make them out to be. Usually. Occasionally they reach new heights of unreasonable, but they are very amenable to listening to reason and lawyers and stuff like that, so you can't fault them too much.
Anyway, I had a swell time at Ashley's birthday and while the cake was definitely lopsided it was also very sweet, and now that I think of it, that pretty much describes my life as a whole.
And you can't say fairer than that.
It's not that I had any grand illusions that I was living at the palace, exactly, but I was a little shocked to see how closely Grandma Helgeson and I had managed to live in the same house. Well, hers was cleaner, and it had fewer animals and children, and I'm pretty sure she made her bed everyday and I only make mine if I don't forget I have a bedroom the minute I leave the room. But still, there are a lot of similarities.
You know, like the walls are lumpy and the floor is uneven and I think we may have a really serious problem with the roof. Grandma would have learned to shingle and fixed the roof herself, but I got half my DNA from Grandma Clark and we just don't give a damn.
My Grandma Clark side is good for singing and raising children I didn't give birth to, and my Grandma Helgeson side is industrious and thrifty, but neither of my sides can make me care enough to go shingle a roof.
Anyway, back to the pictures and my bed in the background.
I forget sometimes that I moved downstairs and made the front parlor into my bedroom when it became obvious that coming down the stairs in the dark, locating the only bathroom, which the Victorians hid behind the staircase (I don't know why) and then getting back to my bed was likely to result in my death after I fell down the stairs for the tenth time. And so now it's a lot more "public" than it used to be.
You might think that would incline one to keep it in perfect order, but anyone who thinks that has clearly never met my family. Aiden likes to "help" me make the bed. He has some highly original ideas of how a bed should look. I don't fix it because I don't want to hurt his feelings and discourage him from doing chores on his own.
That and I'm as lazy as sin, but still. It's a good policy and it makes me sound so...well, either insane or saintly, I don't really care which one.
Also, until I saw it in pictures I had forgotten what a really creative mix of furniture I acquired so that kids, dogs, husbands and teenage boys fixing cars could sit on it without anyone giving them the stink eye in case they got something dirty.
Screw dirty, I always say. If I want to entertain someone who's too good to see the furniture I'll just keep them on the porch. The Pastor comes in here and even has tea on occasion so if it's good enough for him I think the rest of you can just learn to deal.
Not counting Thanksgiving I choose to entertain by picnic. No one expects anything from you and everybody gets to have a good time, most importantly me, since I don't have to worry about the decorations as God already did such a fine job what with the grass and the trees and the sky and so forth.
The weeds in the flower bed are my own contribution, but weeds are just flowers with a bad reputation and since I have a deep and abiding fondness for strays of all kinds, it stands to reason I would encourage weeds.
In fact this year for Horse and Colt Show, which is our annual festival here in hillbilly hell, I have commissioned a lovely hand painted wooden sign from those hippies up the street that says, "Weeds", just so there will be no doubt that I am aware they are there.
Some helpful fellow invariably shows up an hour after the beer tent opens and asks me if I know there is nothing but weeds in that flower bed. Usually I tell him yes, thank you, I planned the garden after all and worked on it very hard and me and the field mice are right fond of purple thistles, but this year the sign will hopefully forestall him so we can avoid the ensuing discussion of his family tree. And the monkeys therein.
Also, I have an ongoing campaign to teach the village about freedom and what it means to be an American and how everybody gets to be free not just you, so really, it is my civic duty to continue to maintain the weed garden.
I feel a certain responsibility. If you lived here, you would, too, because I am pretty sure the village president did his internship with the KGB. He was my high school English teacher and just trust me, there is something about a failed Seminarian that just causes you to question his principles.
Since we have a nearly forty year history of mutual contempt I feel it is incumbent upon me to maintain certain standards, one of them being that whenever life around here tends to lean toward oppression I have to stand up for us little people.
Mother Teresa said so. Well, not the part about me hating the village, but definitely the standing up for the poor thing. And I try to always listen to Mother Teresa. And Saint Francis. And Jesus when he can get a word in, but I talk a lot.
I shouldn't be so hard on the village, they're not really as bad as I make them out to be. Usually. Occasionally they reach new heights of unreasonable, but they are very amenable to listening to reason and lawyers and stuff like that, so you can't fault them too much.
Anyway, I had a swell time at Ashley's birthday and while the cake was definitely lopsided it was also very sweet, and now that I think of it, that pretty much describes my life as a whole.
And you can't say fairer than that.
Wednesday, September 16, 2009
Being Old
And believe me, I am. Old, I mean.
It turns out I really shouldn't sling a baby under my arm and run after two toddlers, because that shoulder they destroyed during my heart surgery takes exception to being used like that and now I look like the hunchback of Notre Dame.
It's not that I'm vain, what with that grand red hair I acquired and the fact that I am inclined to bundle my hair up into an untidy bun and just get on with the day, and the fact that I dress a lot like Ma on Little House on the Prairie (but without a discernible waist) no one could accuse me of being vain.
The hair is really Jimmy's fault. He wasn't there when I bought the hair color, on account of he was in New York, and it turns out that Matthew doesn't go crazy being in the hair color aisle, and since he was the one who was with me at the time, you might think I couldn't blame Jimmy but you would be wrong.
And the boys, too, it's also their fault.
Years of shopping with the menfolk has taught me a few things. A man who has hurt his back and therefore must hurry through grocery shopping so fast that he could qualify for the three minute mile can still, ten minutes later, meander through Cabela's looking at animal mounts and fishing equipment long enough to grow a beard.
That doesn't hurt his back, it's just grocery shopping that hurts his back. You might ask why I didn't send him to Cabela's and go grocery shopping alone. That's what any woman would do. But this is men, and they "never get to help pick out the food" and therefore cannot exist on marshmallow cookies and coffee for the next two weeks.
There's a good reason not to let Jimmy shop for groceries. We have always had a grocery budget. When properly planned, a person can feed five children and two adults on a modest amount of money, provided one plans meals, snacks and treats in advance and only buys what is on one's carefully crafted list.
Jimmy, on the other hand, has the breadwinner approach to grocery shopping, as in, "I earned the money so why can't I spend it?" I'll tell you why. Because if we let you run the budget we would be homeless and starving, that's why. And that would be on account of the man has not bought so much as a loaf of bread since 1972 and refuses to accept that the price has risen a little since he last went shopping.
So, at the grocery store as I attempt to concentrate on my list and the job at hand, I have a 52 year old toddler with me who can't understand why we can't just buy cookies and donuts, and also why seven gallons of whole milk is both unnecessary and a really bad idea. He also has trouble with the concept that not everyone wants to live on Polish sausage and Port Wine Cheese.
And, incidentally, he's not a good person to take to Wal-mart either. There again I use a budget plan. I know how much shampoo, conditioner, dog food, laundry soap, cat litter and so forth that it takes to get through two weeks and that's what I want to buy.
I use a calculator so I am not tempted to make impulse purchases that screw up my budget. Mr. fixit won't use a calculator because, well, I don't know why but he won't. He also won't stick to the list and he tends to go into long soliloquies on the price of bath soap at the drop of a hat.
The rest of us all know what soap costs, we almost never feel the need to expound upon it at length in the soap aisle at Wal-mart. And he hates the hair color aisle. Not because of the money in that case, I'm not sure what goes wrong with him in the hair color aisle, I only know if it takes longer than ten seconds to find the color you want he breaks out in hives and goes into a seizure.
So that's why I hurried over the hair color and got this lovely hair I have now, and blessed if I will waste another ten dollars to change it before my next scheduled shopping trip. I could, but it would cut into my book budget and frankly, I might die without more books. If I don't like the hair I'll just avoid mirrors for two weeks.
Anyway, as it happens Matthew doesn't have seizures over hair color and he doesn't even mind helping you pick a shade. He's a swell guy, that Matthew, I'm glad Ashley is marrying him.
So, anyway, Jimmy and shopping. He thinks of things he needs, like a saw blade for a saw he hasn't picked up since 1995, because he's sure he's going to build me an oak fireplace for Christmas, even though everybody but him knows that his last seven gajillion projects are still unfinished and gathering dust in the garage.
But it would hurt his feelings to be made to face that, so you buy him the saw blade which he takes home and promptly loses forever while looking for his saw. And then he gets tired of looking and goes to have coffee with Ida, and you're good until the next time he goes to Wal-mart and thinks of some other thing he needs for a really good idea he had.
He has made me some lovely things, but he forgets that he made them when his ankle was broken and he had unlimited time to mess around with them.
So, anyway I hurried over the haircolor, ended up with Bozo the Clown's hair, and am now extending the lives of others by giving them a good laugh. Laughter is very healing, you know. And Saint Francis said, well, something about humility and not taking one's self too seriously.
So, I never do. Not because I'm good like Francis, just because I am so extremely lazy and it would be too much work to care about that.
So, refuse to take life seriously. Keep life in it's place. Third from the left, that's life's place.
It turns out I really shouldn't sling a baby under my arm and run after two toddlers, because that shoulder they destroyed during my heart surgery takes exception to being used like that and now I look like the hunchback of Notre Dame.
It's not that I'm vain, what with that grand red hair I acquired and the fact that I am inclined to bundle my hair up into an untidy bun and just get on with the day, and the fact that I dress a lot like Ma on Little House on the Prairie (but without a discernible waist) no one could accuse me of being vain.
The hair is really Jimmy's fault. He wasn't there when I bought the hair color, on account of he was in New York, and it turns out that Matthew doesn't go crazy being in the hair color aisle, and since he was the one who was with me at the time, you might think I couldn't blame Jimmy but you would be wrong.
And the boys, too, it's also their fault.
Years of shopping with the menfolk has taught me a few things. A man who has hurt his back and therefore must hurry through grocery shopping so fast that he could qualify for the three minute mile can still, ten minutes later, meander through Cabela's looking at animal mounts and fishing equipment long enough to grow a beard.
That doesn't hurt his back, it's just grocery shopping that hurts his back. You might ask why I didn't send him to Cabela's and go grocery shopping alone. That's what any woman would do. But this is men, and they "never get to help pick out the food" and therefore cannot exist on marshmallow cookies and coffee for the next two weeks.
There's a good reason not to let Jimmy shop for groceries. We have always had a grocery budget. When properly planned, a person can feed five children and two adults on a modest amount of money, provided one plans meals, snacks and treats in advance and only buys what is on one's carefully crafted list.
Jimmy, on the other hand, has the breadwinner approach to grocery shopping, as in, "I earned the money so why can't I spend it?" I'll tell you why. Because if we let you run the budget we would be homeless and starving, that's why. And that would be on account of the man has not bought so much as a loaf of bread since 1972 and refuses to accept that the price has risen a little since he last went shopping.
So, at the grocery store as I attempt to concentrate on my list and the job at hand, I have a 52 year old toddler with me who can't understand why we can't just buy cookies and donuts, and also why seven gallons of whole milk is both unnecessary and a really bad idea. He also has trouble with the concept that not everyone wants to live on Polish sausage and Port Wine Cheese.
And, incidentally, he's not a good person to take to Wal-mart either. There again I use a budget plan. I know how much shampoo, conditioner, dog food, laundry soap, cat litter and so forth that it takes to get through two weeks and that's what I want to buy.
I use a calculator so I am not tempted to make impulse purchases that screw up my budget. Mr. fixit won't use a calculator because, well, I don't know why but he won't. He also won't stick to the list and he tends to go into long soliloquies on the price of bath soap at the drop of a hat.
The rest of us all know what soap costs, we almost never feel the need to expound upon it at length in the soap aisle at Wal-mart. And he hates the hair color aisle. Not because of the money in that case, I'm not sure what goes wrong with him in the hair color aisle, I only know if it takes longer than ten seconds to find the color you want he breaks out in hives and goes into a seizure.
So that's why I hurried over the hair color and got this lovely hair I have now, and blessed if I will waste another ten dollars to change it before my next scheduled shopping trip. I could, but it would cut into my book budget and frankly, I might die without more books. If I don't like the hair I'll just avoid mirrors for two weeks.
Anyway, as it happens Matthew doesn't have seizures over hair color and he doesn't even mind helping you pick a shade. He's a swell guy, that Matthew, I'm glad Ashley is marrying him.
So, anyway, Jimmy and shopping. He thinks of things he needs, like a saw blade for a saw he hasn't picked up since 1995, because he's sure he's going to build me an oak fireplace for Christmas, even though everybody but him knows that his last seven gajillion projects are still unfinished and gathering dust in the garage.
But it would hurt his feelings to be made to face that, so you buy him the saw blade which he takes home and promptly loses forever while looking for his saw. And then he gets tired of looking and goes to have coffee with Ida, and you're good until the next time he goes to Wal-mart and thinks of some other thing he needs for a really good idea he had.
He has made me some lovely things, but he forgets that he made them when his ankle was broken and he had unlimited time to mess around with them.
So, anyway I hurried over the haircolor, ended up with Bozo the Clown's hair, and am now extending the lives of others by giving them a good laugh. Laughter is very healing, you know. And Saint Francis said, well, something about humility and not taking one's self too seriously.
So, I never do. Not because I'm good like Francis, just because I am so extremely lazy and it would be too much work to care about that.
So, refuse to take life seriously. Keep life in it's place. Third from the left, that's life's place.
Tuesday, September 15, 2009
Keeping Emma
I spent most of today sitting with Emma and Ada, which was a treat but now I'm exhausted.
Did you ever sing until you lost your voice? Emma now knows every old song Ireland and Scotland ever produced and if you want to hear a rousing chorus of "The risin" of the Moon", she's your girl. Remind me to never take her to Belfast.
I imagine Grandfather MacDaniel would roll over in his grave, as I am pretty sure he was an Orangeman through and through, but me and Em are not. IRA forever.
Nothing like teaching revolutionary politics to toddlers. Tomorrow we may have to fight off the wicked English again. Actually I like the English very much, not counting Mr. Payne, my neighbor who is one. A royal Payne. He and Jacob the Irishman once spent a very interesting afternoon. Me and the Irish won.
I ususally do win because I insist upon it and after awhile I wear the other guy out.
So, anyway, Ada was content to bounce in her jumperoo as long as it was outdoors, which would have been delightful were it not for the fact that when Aiden got home from school he and Emma decided they wanted to be anywhere but the front yard.
I am the only old woman I know who can still sling a baby under my arm and chase down two little people headed for the river. Of, course, right after that Jean had to watch everyone on account of I was having a stroke, but still, it's good to know there's life in the old girl, yet. Me, I mean, Jean's a young girl.
We had chocolate pudding for lunch. Jean thought we should have macaroni and cheese, but I can get the pudding out faster than she can cook something healthy. Pudding's healthy, it has eggs and milk. It's just more fun to eat than eggs and milk alone. So we had pudding.
Then we wrote cat four hundred times because that's Emma's best word and she'll only consent to sound out other three letter words like mat and sat and bat if we stick cat in there after every third word. It was the first word she figured out and she's right fond of it, let me tell you.
Then I took the dry erase board and drew barns (Emma insists they are the cow's house and that's all they are) until Ada drooled so much she washed the board and we had to quit.
So now I'm exhausted and that's why this is a short blog entry but after my nap, who knows what might come to me?
In the meantime, I strongly encourage you to go wading, it's a wading kind of day.
Did you ever sing until you lost your voice? Emma now knows every old song Ireland and Scotland ever produced and if you want to hear a rousing chorus of "The risin" of the Moon", she's your girl. Remind me to never take her to Belfast.
I imagine Grandfather MacDaniel would roll over in his grave, as I am pretty sure he was an Orangeman through and through, but me and Em are not. IRA forever.
Nothing like teaching revolutionary politics to toddlers. Tomorrow we may have to fight off the wicked English again. Actually I like the English very much, not counting Mr. Payne, my neighbor who is one. A royal Payne. He and Jacob the Irishman once spent a very interesting afternoon. Me and the Irish won.
I ususally do win because I insist upon it and after awhile I wear the other guy out.
So, anyway, Ada was content to bounce in her jumperoo as long as it was outdoors, which would have been delightful were it not for the fact that when Aiden got home from school he and Emma decided they wanted to be anywhere but the front yard.
I am the only old woman I know who can still sling a baby under my arm and chase down two little people headed for the river. Of, course, right after that Jean had to watch everyone on account of I was having a stroke, but still, it's good to know there's life in the old girl, yet. Me, I mean, Jean's a young girl.
We had chocolate pudding for lunch. Jean thought we should have macaroni and cheese, but I can get the pudding out faster than she can cook something healthy. Pudding's healthy, it has eggs and milk. It's just more fun to eat than eggs and milk alone. So we had pudding.
Then we wrote cat four hundred times because that's Emma's best word and she'll only consent to sound out other three letter words like mat and sat and bat if we stick cat in there after every third word. It was the first word she figured out and she's right fond of it, let me tell you.
Then I took the dry erase board and drew barns (Emma insists they are the cow's house and that's all they are) until Ada drooled so much she washed the board and we had to quit.
So now I'm exhausted and that's why this is a short blog entry but after my nap, who knows what might come to me?
In the meantime, I strongly encourage you to go wading, it's a wading kind of day.
Monday, September 14, 2009
Absolutely Nothing
What to write about, as I am not feeling particularly funny, I am not outraged about anything and I am running low on Granny's homespun wisdom....Oh, yes, that incident when I went to pick up Matthew from his job at the resteraunt.
I have taken Matthew to work and collected him from work every time he has been there--he manages a little restaurant and one of his waitresses is the owner's daughter, incidentally--it's true that I was driving a different car, but I am rather memorable since I don't look like anyone else in the world. I dress in a particularly distinctive and peculiar fashion (thank you, Asperger's) and also there is that recent hair coloring experience that went sadly awry and now, once again, my hair is exactly the color of Bozo the Clown's fright wig.
I believe she was aware we had met.
It's also true that I was accompanied by my daughter-in-law, and it seems she and the waitress were not what one could call friends in high school, but that was a long time ago and, barring the possibility of severe mental illness, most of us forget high school ten minutes after leaving it.
Not this girl, but still.
So, as it happened, the waitress sailed out of the restaurant, noticed my car and announced in a very cavalier fashion that they were not open.
To which I replied, with a smile, "That's okay, honey, I'm here to collect Matthew." I said that on account of I wasn't raised by monkeys and MY Mama taught me some manners. But clearly we aren't all so blessed.
What I would liked to have said was, "How sad for you. We, on the other hand, ARE open and always willing to solicit new business. We're the Clark and Clark Corporation for the Correction of Little Snotty Girls with No Manners, would you like to take advantage of our daily special?"
The daily special being the part where I get out of the car and kick your skinny little ass from here to Christmas, and don't think I can't do it, Missy.
I taught my children manners. We're poor, but not ignorant. Didn't you teach your child manners? Assuming someone reading this answers no, why not?
In a civilized society, nice people recognize each other by the exercise of manners. Money will never substitute for that, because money can be gained or lost at any time, but civility is forever. I know I sometimes suspend civility to be funny, but I do that in print, it's part of my job, it isn't who I am.
I would never suspend civility in real life unless I was entertaining someone, and they understood it was part of the act.
I would like to make the study of manners obligatory for everyone. True civility is a system where "me" is never first. I stand up when you enter a room to indicate that I will give you my seat if you want it. I do that because I was taught to put your comfort ahead of mine.
No matter who you are, I will make you feel welcome in my presence, no matter where we are, because it's more important to me to make you feel comfortable than it is for me to feel better than you. Or to impress anyone who's watching, up to and including the President.
It is always better to be perceived as gracious than it is to be perceived as important.
I am not, nor will I ever be important. I hope I will always be gracious, patient, tolerant and kind.
I am not saying I succeed at that always, but it is what I aspire to. When did we, as a society, stop aspiring to those things?
A rich snotty bitch is still a snotty bitch and a poor gentleman is still a gentleman.
Remember that. And be the kindness.
I have taken Matthew to work and collected him from work every time he has been there--he manages a little restaurant and one of his waitresses is the owner's daughter, incidentally--it's true that I was driving a different car, but I am rather memorable since I don't look like anyone else in the world. I dress in a particularly distinctive and peculiar fashion (thank you, Asperger's) and also there is that recent hair coloring experience that went sadly awry and now, once again, my hair is exactly the color of Bozo the Clown's fright wig.
I believe she was aware we had met.
It's also true that I was accompanied by my daughter-in-law, and it seems she and the waitress were not what one could call friends in high school, but that was a long time ago and, barring the possibility of severe mental illness, most of us forget high school ten minutes after leaving it.
Not this girl, but still.
So, as it happened, the waitress sailed out of the restaurant, noticed my car and announced in a very cavalier fashion that they were not open.
To which I replied, with a smile, "That's okay, honey, I'm here to collect Matthew." I said that on account of I wasn't raised by monkeys and MY Mama taught me some manners. But clearly we aren't all so blessed.
What I would liked to have said was, "How sad for you. We, on the other hand, ARE open and always willing to solicit new business. We're the Clark and Clark Corporation for the Correction of Little Snotty Girls with No Manners, would you like to take advantage of our daily special?"
The daily special being the part where I get out of the car and kick your skinny little ass from here to Christmas, and don't think I can't do it, Missy.
I taught my children manners. We're poor, but not ignorant. Didn't you teach your child manners? Assuming someone reading this answers no, why not?
In a civilized society, nice people recognize each other by the exercise of manners. Money will never substitute for that, because money can be gained or lost at any time, but civility is forever. I know I sometimes suspend civility to be funny, but I do that in print, it's part of my job, it isn't who I am.
I would never suspend civility in real life unless I was entertaining someone, and they understood it was part of the act.
I would like to make the study of manners obligatory for everyone. True civility is a system where "me" is never first. I stand up when you enter a room to indicate that I will give you my seat if you want it. I do that because I was taught to put your comfort ahead of mine.
No matter who you are, I will make you feel welcome in my presence, no matter where we are, because it's more important to me to make you feel comfortable than it is for me to feel better than you. Or to impress anyone who's watching, up to and including the President.
It is always better to be perceived as gracious than it is to be perceived as important.
I am not, nor will I ever be important. I hope I will always be gracious, patient, tolerant and kind.
I am not saying I succeed at that always, but it is what I aspire to. When did we, as a society, stop aspiring to those things?
A rich snotty bitch is still a snotty bitch and a poor gentleman is still a gentleman.
Remember that. And be the kindness.
Sunday, September 13, 2009
Oh, Hell
Because I'm pretty sure I'm headed there.
If you knew you could manipulate someone, and you saw them headed for a cliff they were going to run off of, and you knew they would not listen to reason but would defy you on general principles if you told the truth, but you could stop them by pretending to share a belief of theirs and convincing them the cliff was dangerous because--something you made up on the spur of the moment that fit that belief--and they followed you like a lamb away from the cliff, would you say God would be for or against that?
I already know the answer, I'm just trying to convince myself that sometimes the end justifies the means. But I'm pretty sure it doesn't.
And speaking of hell.....the rear of my property abuts an old building with a driveway access to my backyard. For as long as I remember, using that access didn't hurt anyone, it didn't block anything the owner might like to do with his abandoned lawn ornament shop and, in a small community, it was generally regarded a courtesy to allow people to use the ten feet of gravel between the street and my yard as a point of access.
But the new owner appears to be unaware of the courtesy of small towns and asked that no one use it. And that was okay, because directly to the right of that gravel is the property of my friend, Cowboy, who spends much of his year in Alaska.
I asked for and obtained his permission to use his driveway as access, and assumed the problem was resolved.
Silly me.
It seems our abandoned lawn ornament factory owner just can't rest if I have access to my backyard. The children and I often walk that way to and from my daughter's house and the playground, it's shorter, there are no fences, no signs and no one has ever spoken to me and indicated I shouldn't walk that ten feet of gravel as a shortcut to the street behind my house.
And now we come to my advice of the day for the Village of Viola and for any of the rest of you who don't think things through to their logical conclusion.
Never start a war unless you are prepared to fight one.
Ask yourself, if I do A what will the reaction likely be? Am I prepared to deal with that? If it occurs, should I escalate things further or retreat? How important is this to me? Is it worth what it will cost me to "win"?
I advise you not to sharpen wires and plant them in the ground level with the grass and then post no warning signs. I advise you of that because if you do it twice, my reaction is not likely to be quietly removing your trap and suggesting graciously that what you are trying to do is probably immoral, possibly illegal and just a damned good thing to refrain from doing.
I say that because I try to be a good Christian. But I don't always succeed. You can't count on me always doing what Jesus would do, or at least, what I believe he would have me do.
Jesus loves you. I, on the other hand, do not.
Jesus will not harm you, can you say with confidence that I won't either? One thing I will most assuredly do if I step on your wires and injure a foot, thus risking endocarditis to all my artificial heart parts, is to sue you without mercy and for a very long time. Over and over. For many reasons. As soon as the lawyer thinks of something, wham, we'll be in court once again.
And there is always a lawyer my friend, always. Don't just assume the poor have no resources. If it's important enough, if it's likely lucrative enough, there are always resources.
Also, I would like to warn the rest of you. Not to stay away, but to visit. Get injured, let your dog get injured, or your kid, or your mother-in-law. I will gladly help you see that there are consequences.
And those are just the obvious consequences. We should always remember that beyond a certain point what a person has to lose is negligible compared to what he can gain in personal satisfaction.
I only suggest that so that you will remember that even the meek have their limits.
Having said that, now let me encourage all of you to be wise, love your neighbor, be reasonable.
Ask yourself, "How important is this? Just because I CAN do a thing, does that necessarily mean that I should do it? Am I so pathetic that I can only feel big by exercising 'power' over something very childish? Do I want people to know or learn that about me? Am I proud of the fact that I can only feel large by making others feel small? Am I REALLY the better person if I can only feel bigger in that fashion? Would I want that written on my tombstone?"
Don't hide your light under a bushel, even if it's an ugly light. If you are not ashamed of what you are, you should not mind at all advertising it to the community at large.
Fence your property. Use razor wire. Post a lot of signs, not just "No Trespassing" But, "I'm a big jackass" as well. Why pretend? In a town this size you're going to look somewhat stupid, unreasonable and petty, but hey--that's what you are, right? So why hide that.
Encourage your inner asshole. You've been doing fairly well thus far, why not go all the way? Take out an ad in the local paper, you know that smudgy two sheet rag that still has columns devoted to the fact that Betty Smith paid a call on Amy Jones this past week-end.
It's not CNN, but everyone has to start somewhere. This could be your springboard to becoming as big an obnoxious old white man as Bill O'Reilly!
Seriously, let's try to be kind, have consideration for others, share, be reasonable. In short, do all those things that used to indicate one was an adult who had been taught some manners.
As opposed to being that ill bred, thoroughly uneducated, probably raised by monkeys thing we've got going on now.
The true test of a man's character is not in how he treats those he considers his equal, but in how he treats those he believes to be somehow inferior to him.
Be the kindness.
If you knew you could manipulate someone, and you saw them headed for a cliff they were going to run off of, and you knew they would not listen to reason but would defy you on general principles if you told the truth, but you could stop them by pretending to share a belief of theirs and convincing them the cliff was dangerous because--something you made up on the spur of the moment that fit that belief--and they followed you like a lamb away from the cliff, would you say God would be for or against that?
I already know the answer, I'm just trying to convince myself that sometimes the end justifies the means. But I'm pretty sure it doesn't.
And speaking of hell.....the rear of my property abuts an old building with a driveway access to my backyard. For as long as I remember, using that access didn't hurt anyone, it didn't block anything the owner might like to do with his abandoned lawn ornament shop and, in a small community, it was generally regarded a courtesy to allow people to use the ten feet of gravel between the street and my yard as a point of access.
But the new owner appears to be unaware of the courtesy of small towns and asked that no one use it. And that was okay, because directly to the right of that gravel is the property of my friend, Cowboy, who spends much of his year in Alaska.
I asked for and obtained his permission to use his driveway as access, and assumed the problem was resolved.
Silly me.
It seems our abandoned lawn ornament factory owner just can't rest if I have access to my backyard. The children and I often walk that way to and from my daughter's house and the playground, it's shorter, there are no fences, no signs and no one has ever spoken to me and indicated I shouldn't walk that ten feet of gravel as a shortcut to the street behind my house.
And now we come to my advice of the day for the Village of Viola and for any of the rest of you who don't think things through to their logical conclusion.
Never start a war unless you are prepared to fight one.
Ask yourself, if I do A what will the reaction likely be? Am I prepared to deal with that? If it occurs, should I escalate things further or retreat? How important is this to me? Is it worth what it will cost me to "win"?
I advise you not to sharpen wires and plant them in the ground level with the grass and then post no warning signs. I advise you of that because if you do it twice, my reaction is not likely to be quietly removing your trap and suggesting graciously that what you are trying to do is probably immoral, possibly illegal and just a damned good thing to refrain from doing.
I say that because I try to be a good Christian. But I don't always succeed. You can't count on me always doing what Jesus would do, or at least, what I believe he would have me do.
Jesus loves you. I, on the other hand, do not.
Jesus will not harm you, can you say with confidence that I won't either? One thing I will most assuredly do if I step on your wires and injure a foot, thus risking endocarditis to all my artificial heart parts, is to sue you without mercy and for a very long time. Over and over. For many reasons. As soon as the lawyer thinks of something, wham, we'll be in court once again.
And there is always a lawyer my friend, always. Don't just assume the poor have no resources. If it's important enough, if it's likely lucrative enough, there are always resources.
Also, I would like to warn the rest of you. Not to stay away, but to visit. Get injured, let your dog get injured, or your kid, or your mother-in-law. I will gladly help you see that there are consequences.
And those are just the obvious consequences. We should always remember that beyond a certain point what a person has to lose is negligible compared to what he can gain in personal satisfaction.
I only suggest that so that you will remember that even the meek have their limits.
Having said that, now let me encourage all of you to be wise, love your neighbor, be reasonable.
Ask yourself, "How important is this? Just because I CAN do a thing, does that necessarily mean that I should do it? Am I so pathetic that I can only feel big by exercising 'power' over something very childish? Do I want people to know or learn that about me? Am I proud of the fact that I can only feel large by making others feel small? Am I REALLY the better person if I can only feel bigger in that fashion? Would I want that written on my tombstone?"
Don't hide your light under a bushel, even if it's an ugly light. If you are not ashamed of what you are, you should not mind at all advertising it to the community at large.
Fence your property. Use razor wire. Post a lot of signs, not just "No Trespassing" But, "I'm a big jackass" as well. Why pretend? In a town this size you're going to look somewhat stupid, unreasonable and petty, but hey--that's what you are, right? So why hide that.
Encourage your inner asshole. You've been doing fairly well thus far, why not go all the way? Take out an ad in the local paper, you know that smudgy two sheet rag that still has columns devoted to the fact that Betty Smith paid a call on Amy Jones this past week-end.
It's not CNN, but everyone has to start somewhere. This could be your springboard to becoming as big an obnoxious old white man as Bill O'Reilly!
Seriously, let's try to be kind, have consideration for others, share, be reasonable. In short, do all those things that used to indicate one was an adult who had been taught some manners.
As opposed to being that ill bred, thoroughly uneducated, probably raised by monkeys thing we've got going on now.
The true test of a man's character is not in how he treats those he considers his equal, but in how he treats those he believes to be somehow inferior to him.
Be the kindness.
Saturday, September 12, 2009
Mary, my Mainstay
If you woke up early to drive your nephew to work and you fall asleep easily, reciting the Rosary while you drive home is a very bad idea. I don't know about you but I find the Rosary very relaxing.
Cradle Catholics tend to be better at the Mother of God than converts, or so I have found, and speaking as a convert I would be in a position to know. And yet, sometimes even converts can come to some amazing things.
Cradle Catholics may have the advantage over converts because they are raised with an understanding of and relationship to Mary. It's kind of the difference between being adopted and being born into a family.
But sometimes I think Mary, being a mother, senses which of her children is in the greatest need of her love and help and reaches out to that person to draw them near. A lot of people don't seem to understand how reciting set prayers can bring you closer to someone, but the Rosary is a rosary--a collection of roses.
And sitting at your mother's feet, talking over all the things in your life (which is what your mind has a tendency to hare off and do when reciting the Rosary--at least, mine does) and handing her a Rose every couple of minutes as you are overcome with love for her seems to result in a close and intimate relationship with one's mother.
Like all good mothers, she is never too busy, she goes on quietly with her work as her children sit at her feet. She listens, commiserates, comforts and cares. And like with all good mothers, the touch of her hand smoothing your hair back as she smiles at you with love is immeasurably comforting and reassuring.
I think she is fundamentally a Jewish mother, which means she cares about you out of all proportion to your worth and sees things in you that no one else can. I like to think of her practicing HER faith. Did Jesus stand and watch as his mother covered her eyes, lit the candles for Shabbat and recited the prayers? Was he proud and happy and glad to be who he was, then when he was small?
I think so. And best of all I like it when, for a little while, I am a child again and stand by my brother, who holds my hand, and watch as our mother lights the candles for us, welcoming in the Sabbath.
And then we are fed, and loved, and made whole by the traditions of our faith which, even though I am an adopted child, is every bit as real and important and welcoming to me as it ever was to a birth child. I know she doesn't distinguish between her birth child and her adopted child, she loves us both the same.
I know that because I am a mother, and a mother who has raised children she didn't carry in her body, and because her son asked her to love us, and for that and for her own holiness and goodness, she does.
I don't worship her, anymore than any of us worships our mother. Frequently I take advantage of her love, take her for granted, act in a perfectly horrible way and occasionally, when vexed, cry, "You don't love me!"
But she does, and I know she does, even when I am being a brat. And she never turns from me, she smiles her gentle smile and points me to where I should go and what I should do and makes me behave and teaches me how to be her child and a sister to her Son.
She is patient and tolerant and kind, she doesn't forgive me my faults, she never sees them. She's my mother.
She's yours, too. And she would so like to help you and love you and comfort you and speak for you, but she can't unless you ask, you know. And it's okay to ask, Jesus said so. Like all children, he is eager to share his mother with us, he grabs our hand and pulls us in to where she sits and says, "Ask her. Go ahead, she loves you."
And it would be nice if, now and then, you thought to take her a flower. She likes roses.
God's peace.
Cradle Catholics tend to be better at the Mother of God than converts, or so I have found, and speaking as a convert I would be in a position to know. And yet, sometimes even converts can come to some amazing things.
Cradle Catholics may have the advantage over converts because they are raised with an understanding of and relationship to Mary. It's kind of the difference between being adopted and being born into a family.
But sometimes I think Mary, being a mother, senses which of her children is in the greatest need of her love and help and reaches out to that person to draw them near. A lot of people don't seem to understand how reciting set prayers can bring you closer to someone, but the Rosary is a rosary--a collection of roses.
And sitting at your mother's feet, talking over all the things in your life (which is what your mind has a tendency to hare off and do when reciting the Rosary--at least, mine does) and handing her a Rose every couple of minutes as you are overcome with love for her seems to result in a close and intimate relationship with one's mother.
Like all good mothers, she is never too busy, she goes on quietly with her work as her children sit at her feet. She listens, commiserates, comforts and cares. And like with all good mothers, the touch of her hand smoothing your hair back as she smiles at you with love is immeasurably comforting and reassuring.
I think she is fundamentally a Jewish mother, which means she cares about you out of all proportion to your worth and sees things in you that no one else can. I like to think of her practicing HER faith. Did Jesus stand and watch as his mother covered her eyes, lit the candles for Shabbat and recited the prayers? Was he proud and happy and glad to be who he was, then when he was small?
I think so. And best of all I like it when, for a little while, I am a child again and stand by my brother, who holds my hand, and watch as our mother lights the candles for us, welcoming in the Sabbath.
And then we are fed, and loved, and made whole by the traditions of our faith which, even though I am an adopted child, is every bit as real and important and welcoming to me as it ever was to a birth child. I know she doesn't distinguish between her birth child and her adopted child, she loves us both the same.
I know that because I am a mother, and a mother who has raised children she didn't carry in her body, and because her son asked her to love us, and for that and for her own holiness and goodness, she does.
I don't worship her, anymore than any of us worships our mother. Frequently I take advantage of her love, take her for granted, act in a perfectly horrible way and occasionally, when vexed, cry, "You don't love me!"
But she does, and I know she does, even when I am being a brat. And she never turns from me, she smiles her gentle smile and points me to where I should go and what I should do and makes me behave and teaches me how to be her child and a sister to her Son.
She is patient and tolerant and kind, she doesn't forgive me my faults, she never sees them. She's my mother.
She's yours, too. And she would so like to help you and love you and comfort you and speak for you, but she can't unless you ask, you know. And it's okay to ask, Jesus said so. Like all children, he is eager to share his mother with us, he grabs our hand and pulls us in to where she sits and says, "Ask her. Go ahead, she loves you."
And it would be nice if, now and then, you thought to take her a flower. She likes roses.
God's peace.
Thursday, September 10, 2009
PAY ATTENTION
I came across a standard bus form for Kickapoo Area Schools which states that your child maybe photographed or videotaped at any time while riding the bus.
DO NOT SIGN that form.
No one--certainly not the State--has the right to photograph or videotape your child without your written consent. If consent is a condition of riding a bus to a public school, refuse and be prepared to challenge it in a court of law.
If anyone tapes or photographs your child without your written consent, SUE THEM.
Your children are YOUR children. Not the schools children, not the State's children. YOUR children. It is an obvious sign of a fascist government to take control of your children at any time for any reason whatsoever.
Do you think governments kindly inform you if they plan to indoctrinate your child? No, they don't. Safety is always a good buzzword for stealing the rights of a free people. I have very little hope that America will remain even as free as it currently is for long, as we seem to just disregard our rights and merrily give them up for the mere asking.
Because safety sounds so good, doesn't it?
But America is not the land of the SAFE it's the land of the free. Or it was, once. And it might be again, but not if we don't pay attention and stand up for ourselves.
Your child is entitled to a free education. Is he getting one? How much money does it cost you to send your child to a public school? Who defines free and public? Is it you? If it isn't, why isn't it? Shouldn't it be?
Remember when schools were answerable to parents instead of the other way around? What happened? Why? Can you change it back?
No teacher needs to make a "home visit" as part of his curriculum. It's an invasion of privacy. Remember privacy? When what you did in your own home was your business? Remember when parents raised children instead of just handing them off to anyone who would keep them busy for eight hours or so?
This is how the Hitler Youth worked, remember? The State took over the education of children, pretty soon children were encouraged to tell all about their home lives. The children grew up very loyal to a lot of things and people that had nothing to do with their parents. And then they joined the SS. It was a natural progression.
Do your child's teachers limit themselves to their subject? Or do they manage to pass on a lot of opinions about morals, judgements, religious values or the lack thereof? Do they express political opinions or value judgements or make it clear whose dad is contributing money and is therefore going to have a happy school experience?
Nothing was ever perfectly fair, but we used to pretend it was. We used to give lip service at least to all men are created equal and that everyone had the same opportunities in our educational systems.
I already hear you calling me an alarmist and a lot of less pleasant things, and you're right. I AM an alarmist. Wouldn't you pull the alarm if the school was on fire? Even if people chose to believe it was just a warm day so they wouldn't have to drag out the hoses and actually do something?
WAKE UP. Ask questions, demand answers, threaten to sue, actually sue, question everything and don't assume the "school can do that" just because they say they can. Do you think they're going to admit they can't if they can bully you out of calling a lawyer?
At least LOOK. Pay attention. Document. Find out.
Or, if you can't do that, call me. I'm not afraid of anybody and I know the name of a good lawyer. Together we may accomplish something and raise an American or two and send them to an AMERICAN school and teach them some AMERICAN values.
And if you think it's unnecessary, I've got some people you can talk to. They lived in Poland in 1939. They didn't think it could happen, either. They'll be glad to tell you what they see happening here.
DO NOT SIGN that form.
No one--certainly not the State--has the right to photograph or videotape your child without your written consent. If consent is a condition of riding a bus to a public school, refuse and be prepared to challenge it in a court of law.
If anyone tapes or photographs your child without your written consent, SUE THEM.
Your children are YOUR children. Not the schools children, not the State's children. YOUR children. It is an obvious sign of a fascist government to take control of your children at any time for any reason whatsoever.
Do you think governments kindly inform you if they plan to indoctrinate your child? No, they don't. Safety is always a good buzzword for stealing the rights of a free people. I have very little hope that America will remain even as free as it currently is for long, as we seem to just disregard our rights and merrily give them up for the mere asking.
Because safety sounds so good, doesn't it?
But America is not the land of the SAFE it's the land of the free. Or it was, once. And it might be again, but not if we don't pay attention and stand up for ourselves.
Your child is entitled to a free education. Is he getting one? How much money does it cost you to send your child to a public school? Who defines free and public? Is it you? If it isn't, why isn't it? Shouldn't it be?
Remember when schools were answerable to parents instead of the other way around? What happened? Why? Can you change it back?
No teacher needs to make a "home visit" as part of his curriculum. It's an invasion of privacy. Remember privacy? When what you did in your own home was your business? Remember when parents raised children instead of just handing them off to anyone who would keep them busy for eight hours or so?
This is how the Hitler Youth worked, remember? The State took over the education of children, pretty soon children were encouraged to tell all about their home lives. The children grew up very loyal to a lot of things and people that had nothing to do with their parents. And then they joined the SS. It was a natural progression.
Do your child's teachers limit themselves to their subject? Or do they manage to pass on a lot of opinions about morals, judgements, religious values or the lack thereof? Do they express political opinions or value judgements or make it clear whose dad is contributing money and is therefore going to have a happy school experience?
Nothing was ever perfectly fair, but we used to pretend it was. We used to give lip service at least to all men are created equal and that everyone had the same opportunities in our educational systems.
I already hear you calling me an alarmist and a lot of less pleasant things, and you're right. I AM an alarmist. Wouldn't you pull the alarm if the school was on fire? Even if people chose to believe it was just a warm day so they wouldn't have to drag out the hoses and actually do something?
WAKE UP. Ask questions, demand answers, threaten to sue, actually sue, question everything and don't assume the "school can do that" just because they say they can. Do you think they're going to admit they can't if they can bully you out of calling a lawyer?
At least LOOK. Pay attention. Document. Find out.
Or, if you can't do that, call me. I'm not afraid of anybody and I know the name of a good lawyer. Together we may accomplish something and raise an American or two and send them to an AMERICAN school and teach them some AMERICAN values.
And if you think it's unnecessary, I've got some people you can talk to. They lived in Poland in 1939. They didn't think it could happen, either. They'll be glad to tell you what they see happening here.
Monday, September 7, 2009
Cabbages and kings
Some people don't like the smell of cabbage cooking, it reminds them of harder times. Of being poor. It never reminds me of that, it makes me think of home and Grandma Helgeson, who taught me to make good vegetable soup from almost nothing.
She didn't teach me to make the bread that goes with it, because no one can teach me to bake bread. My bread is so dense you could build houses using my bread for bricks. Mother, now, makes excellent bread.
Cabbage doesn't make me think of being poor, because i have never been poor. No one who can feed seven people for a week on forty dollars is poor. Smart, canny, thrifty and careful, but not poor.
I like being free and I like to make do. Use it up, wear it out, make it do, do without. Those are good things. I like to think Saint Francis would approve.
I hear so many people grumbling about the economy, and I thought about how nice it is if the economy doesn't matter to you. I can do all the same things I ever could do, I enjoy them as much as I ever did, and I don't have to be afraid of anything.
I could manage perfectly well with a wood stove instead of a furnace--in fact, I wish I had one, it would be nicer than natural gas. I would be as happy with an oil lamp and a book as I am with electricity and if push came to shove I know how to make a button lamp and my own candles out of stuff I already have in the house.
I do love my computer, but if I didn't have it anymore it wouldn't severely impact my life.
I can clean a house without running water, bathe every day, wash my hair and even live with an outdoor bathroom. Privys are not something to aspire to, but they don't ruin your day either, unless you're kind of a Diva.
Americans are so spoiled. We have such an outrageous sense of entitlement. Like we're somehow entitled to all the things I just mentioned and will die if we can't have them and the world will come to a screeching halt if we suddenly lost all our conveniences and luxuries. Actually, I do know a few people who would likely die of the shock if they suddenly have to rough it.
And as a rule we don't give a fig about people like the homeless who have learned that being sure you're entitled to things is not a guarantee that you'll ever get them. I worry about us sometimes.
It's true that poverty you choose is easier than poverty that is thrust upon you by circumstances, But either kind means assessing those things most important and applying your energy in the right places.
You don't have to compete with anyone if you don't want to, life is not a contest. You can make it one if you insist upon it, but usually the only person hurt by a profound need to be better, richer, bigger, smarter than someone else is the person feeling the need.
It almost never bothers the person being competed with because he usually doesn't even know he's in the contest. And he wouldn't care. Ask yourself how much you care about how well the man that runs the bank is doing. You don't. And he doesn't care about how well you're doing either, unless he's the guy holding your mortgage.
Most people are concerned with their own lives, they don't often think about you and yours. I hate to tell you, but you probably don't matter much to anybody but you. No one is envying you, nobody even wants what you have. They're pretty busy with what they have. And who they are. And where they're going. And why.
So take a deep breath and smile for me. There you go. Wear what you like, say what you like, go where you like, do what you like and you know what will happen?
Absolutely nothing. That's why it's okay to do it. Cook yourself up some nice vegetable soup, eat it around a table with people you really like, get to know the people around you and afterwards, you can take your grandchildren wading in the river. Even if all the neighbors see you.
And if they see you, they might laugh. I hope so, because laughter is such a good thing. An outward expression of an inner contentment and security and sense of fun.
If I could ask God for anything for every person who reads this, I would wish he would send you joy. And cabbage soup.
Hugs from Pilly.
She didn't teach me to make the bread that goes with it, because no one can teach me to bake bread. My bread is so dense you could build houses using my bread for bricks. Mother, now, makes excellent bread.
Cabbage doesn't make me think of being poor, because i have never been poor. No one who can feed seven people for a week on forty dollars is poor. Smart, canny, thrifty and careful, but not poor.
I like being free and I like to make do. Use it up, wear it out, make it do, do without. Those are good things. I like to think Saint Francis would approve.
I hear so many people grumbling about the economy, and I thought about how nice it is if the economy doesn't matter to you. I can do all the same things I ever could do, I enjoy them as much as I ever did, and I don't have to be afraid of anything.
I could manage perfectly well with a wood stove instead of a furnace--in fact, I wish I had one, it would be nicer than natural gas. I would be as happy with an oil lamp and a book as I am with electricity and if push came to shove I know how to make a button lamp and my own candles out of stuff I already have in the house.
I do love my computer, but if I didn't have it anymore it wouldn't severely impact my life.
I can clean a house without running water, bathe every day, wash my hair and even live with an outdoor bathroom. Privys are not something to aspire to, but they don't ruin your day either, unless you're kind of a Diva.
Americans are so spoiled. We have such an outrageous sense of entitlement. Like we're somehow entitled to all the things I just mentioned and will die if we can't have them and the world will come to a screeching halt if we suddenly lost all our conveniences and luxuries. Actually, I do know a few people who would likely die of the shock if they suddenly have to rough it.
And as a rule we don't give a fig about people like the homeless who have learned that being sure you're entitled to things is not a guarantee that you'll ever get them. I worry about us sometimes.
It's true that poverty you choose is easier than poverty that is thrust upon you by circumstances, But either kind means assessing those things most important and applying your energy in the right places.
You don't have to compete with anyone if you don't want to, life is not a contest. You can make it one if you insist upon it, but usually the only person hurt by a profound need to be better, richer, bigger, smarter than someone else is the person feeling the need.
It almost never bothers the person being competed with because he usually doesn't even know he's in the contest. And he wouldn't care. Ask yourself how much you care about how well the man that runs the bank is doing. You don't. And he doesn't care about how well you're doing either, unless he's the guy holding your mortgage.
Most people are concerned with their own lives, they don't often think about you and yours. I hate to tell you, but you probably don't matter much to anybody but you. No one is envying you, nobody even wants what you have. They're pretty busy with what they have. And who they are. And where they're going. And why.
So take a deep breath and smile for me. There you go. Wear what you like, say what you like, go where you like, do what you like and you know what will happen?
Absolutely nothing. That's why it's okay to do it. Cook yourself up some nice vegetable soup, eat it around a table with people you really like, get to know the people around you and afterwards, you can take your grandchildren wading in the river. Even if all the neighbors see you.
And if they see you, they might laugh. I hope so, because laughter is such a good thing. An outward expression of an inner contentment and security and sense of fun.
If I could ask God for anything for every person who reads this, I would wish he would send you joy. And cabbage soup.
Hugs from Pilly.
Farmville
I really like farming on farmville, but I would like to point out to the developers that when I am maniaclly fencing, that is not the time to send me a message to ask if I wouldn't like to post something on my wall about having become a Jolly Rancher.
At that point anything I would write on my wall would not be suitable to be read by anyone with a delicacy that causes them to have sensitivity to the word f**k. Just so they know. I might also have a few things to say about their ancestry, their likely IQ and what anatomically impossible things I would like the to do so I can fence.
What idiot interrupts a farmer when he's fencing?
Farming on farmville is a lot easier than I recall it being in actual life. For one thing you only have to milk the cows every three days or so. That beats that twice a day thing I remember in real life.
I would like to point out that my raspberry crop should not ripen in only two hours. If you plant raspberrys invariably you get company and by the time you get back to them you get that snotty message about how they have withered and you just know the farming association won't be handing you any Jolly Rancher awards anytime soon.
It is only safe to plant raspberries at two AM when you can't sleep and the pain in your bad hip pretty much guarantees you're going to be up two more hours. And of course you're going to spend that time on facebook because where else would you be?
I don't know if you've ever tried to read when your hip is acting up, but don't waste your time. Also, if you are me you are trying not to smoke and you ran out of tootsie pops two hours ago and even though Wal-mart is open 24 hours can you really justify driving 14 miles with a bad hip just to get more tootsie pops?
Not if you don't want your husband to give you that speech about the price of gas and the fact that the quick stop here in town will open at six. Screw him and his gas, as I recall he's not the one quitting smoking although I distinctly remember we had an agreement that we would both quit smoking on April 15 and only one of us did.
It's true I started again in July but at least I keep at it. Not like some people who have a fit of apoplexy over spending three dollars for a gallon of gas but have no problem at all paying eight dollars for a pack of cigarettes.
I get a little testy when I first quit smoking, bear with me, I'll get over it as soon as the urge passes. Probably. If not you can write to me in prison right after I murder someone. Or just attack somebody with a brick which is that other thing I keep wanting to do a lot of.
So, anyway, farming. There I was harvesting the grapefruit trees and de-feathering the ducks (no, I didn't make that up, I didn't invent the game) collecting eggs from the hens and stealing the truffles from the pigs when, out of nowhere, it occurred to me that the farm wasn't very neat.
So I dug up all the crops and started building fences and little plots of fields,. Which, incidentally is exactly what I would do in real life, which is why I don't farm anymore.
Once, when I was young and both my children were under four I was in my farmhouse washing clothes with a wringer washer in July--which is why I was wearing my bikini--and some Jehovah's witnesses apparently took a flyer on our dead-end, quarter mile dirt driveway and decided to take a shot at my soul again.
As it happened I didn't hear them knock, on account of the wringer had a safety feature that caused it to snap apart with a noise like gunfire if you fed it anything thicker than a dishtowel, so I was wearing my earplugs.
I quite enjoyed washing clothes with my wringer washer, so I was also singing rather loudly (I think it might have been, When the red, red, robin goes bob, bob, bobbin' along) as I sailed off to the clothes line with a basket of wet clothes, and ran smack into the Christers right outside the door.
Of all of us, I would have to say they were more surprised but I was more determined and since I never did anything half hearted, I ran over some little old lady as I made my way deliberately to the clothesline. The gentleman with her took exception to me stomping over his companion in my bikini and my tennis shoes but i wasn't hearing him because of the earplugs.
Which may account for the fact that I threw the laundry in the air and tried to help her up. Jacob had taken that moment to remove his clothing and sit naked on the kitchen table with his feet in the butter that he was attempting to feed to the cat, who didn't care for any, and that was the exact moment that Scott--my second husband the musician who worked late and didn't like to be disturbed before afternoon--came downstairs to find who had awakened him and kill them.
So there I was in my bikini and earplugs stepping over a little woman who was on the ground while her husband yelled while I attempted to get to the naked toddler on the table and rescue the cat. Which was when I noticed that Lacey had decided to sample the remains of Scott's drink on the end table (which fortunately was just a sip, but still not what you want to put in the cup of a small child).
I don't believe anyone tried to save me for awhile after that, though I do think at some point Scott and the Witnesses had a brief discussion about the Pope which ended badly.
I used to feel kind of bad about that until last week when the Winresses showed up to discuss the state of mother's soul on her fron porch and made the grave and ireversable error of suggesting to her that pastors should not pray for soldiers as they were all going to hell anyway because something to do with war.
Mother is nicer than I am and also a better Christian so the fellow is still breathing ( I would have knocked him in the head with a few of those tomatos my dad grows so well and driven him into the street in front of a passing car, and then if he had wanted to continue discussing his views on war and how it relates to the souls of those people serving in Iraq I would have been quite willing).
She just ended her conversation and graciously went back into her house. Mother is nice like that. Since I had my brain frozen for that fifteen minutes I was dead I have a lot less self control myself, I find.
Anyway, Jesus fortunately looks out for my soul--which is good since I obviously shouldn't be trusted with it--and I'm hopeful he's looking out for both the Witnesses and the soldiers, as well.
Mother, now, I'm pretty sure is a Saint, so I don't have to worry too much about hers, which gives me more time to farm.
At that point anything I would write on my wall would not be suitable to be read by anyone with a delicacy that causes them to have sensitivity to the word f**k. Just so they know. I might also have a few things to say about their ancestry, their likely IQ and what anatomically impossible things I would like the to do so I can fence.
What idiot interrupts a farmer when he's fencing?
Farming on farmville is a lot easier than I recall it being in actual life. For one thing you only have to milk the cows every three days or so. That beats that twice a day thing I remember in real life.
I would like to point out that my raspberry crop should not ripen in only two hours. If you plant raspberrys invariably you get company and by the time you get back to them you get that snotty message about how they have withered and you just know the farming association won't be handing you any Jolly Rancher awards anytime soon.
It is only safe to plant raspberries at two AM when you can't sleep and the pain in your bad hip pretty much guarantees you're going to be up two more hours. And of course you're going to spend that time on facebook because where else would you be?
I don't know if you've ever tried to read when your hip is acting up, but don't waste your time. Also, if you are me you are trying not to smoke and you ran out of tootsie pops two hours ago and even though Wal-mart is open 24 hours can you really justify driving 14 miles with a bad hip just to get more tootsie pops?
Not if you don't want your husband to give you that speech about the price of gas and the fact that the quick stop here in town will open at six. Screw him and his gas, as I recall he's not the one quitting smoking although I distinctly remember we had an agreement that we would both quit smoking on April 15 and only one of us did.
It's true I started again in July but at least I keep at it. Not like some people who have a fit of apoplexy over spending three dollars for a gallon of gas but have no problem at all paying eight dollars for a pack of cigarettes.
I get a little testy when I first quit smoking, bear with me, I'll get over it as soon as the urge passes. Probably. If not you can write to me in prison right after I murder someone. Or just attack somebody with a brick which is that other thing I keep wanting to do a lot of.
So, anyway, farming. There I was harvesting the grapefruit trees and de-feathering the ducks (no, I didn't make that up, I didn't invent the game) collecting eggs from the hens and stealing the truffles from the pigs when, out of nowhere, it occurred to me that the farm wasn't very neat.
So I dug up all the crops and started building fences and little plots of fields,. Which, incidentally is exactly what I would do in real life, which is why I don't farm anymore.
Once, when I was young and both my children were under four I was in my farmhouse washing clothes with a wringer washer in July--which is why I was wearing my bikini--and some Jehovah's witnesses apparently took a flyer on our dead-end, quarter mile dirt driveway and decided to take a shot at my soul again.
As it happened I didn't hear them knock, on account of the wringer had a safety feature that caused it to snap apart with a noise like gunfire if you fed it anything thicker than a dishtowel, so I was wearing my earplugs.
I quite enjoyed washing clothes with my wringer washer, so I was also singing rather loudly (I think it might have been, When the red, red, robin goes bob, bob, bobbin' along) as I sailed off to the clothes line with a basket of wet clothes, and ran smack into the Christers right outside the door.
Of all of us, I would have to say they were more surprised but I was more determined and since I never did anything half hearted, I ran over some little old lady as I made my way deliberately to the clothesline. The gentleman with her took exception to me stomping over his companion in my bikini and my tennis shoes but i wasn't hearing him because of the earplugs.
Which may account for the fact that I threw the laundry in the air and tried to help her up. Jacob had taken that moment to remove his clothing and sit naked on the kitchen table with his feet in the butter that he was attempting to feed to the cat, who didn't care for any, and that was the exact moment that Scott--my second husband the musician who worked late and didn't like to be disturbed before afternoon--came downstairs to find who had awakened him and kill them.
So there I was in my bikini and earplugs stepping over a little woman who was on the ground while her husband yelled while I attempted to get to the naked toddler on the table and rescue the cat. Which was when I noticed that Lacey had decided to sample the remains of Scott's drink on the end table (which fortunately was just a sip, but still not what you want to put in the cup of a small child).
I don't believe anyone tried to save me for awhile after that, though I do think at some point Scott and the Witnesses had a brief discussion about the Pope which ended badly.
I used to feel kind of bad about that until last week when the Winresses showed up to discuss the state of mother's soul on her fron porch and made the grave and ireversable error of suggesting to her that pastors should not pray for soldiers as they were all going to hell anyway because something to do with war.
Mother is nicer than I am and also a better Christian so the fellow is still breathing ( I would have knocked him in the head with a few of those tomatos my dad grows so well and driven him into the street in front of a passing car, and then if he had wanted to continue discussing his views on war and how it relates to the souls of those people serving in Iraq I would have been quite willing).
She just ended her conversation and graciously went back into her house. Mother is nice like that. Since I had my brain frozen for that fifteen minutes I was dead I have a lot less self control myself, I find.
Anyway, Jesus fortunately looks out for my soul--which is good since I obviously shouldn't be trusted with it--and I'm hopeful he's looking out for both the Witnesses and the soldiers, as well.
Mother, now, I'm pretty sure is a Saint, so I don't have to worry too much about hers, which gives me more time to farm.
Sunday, September 6, 2009
Life is Good
Well, I haven't driven Jean completely out of her mind, yet, but I am still working on it. After all, she's the one who decided she needed her own house and had the audacity to want to remove my grandchildren from my house. I consider it justifiable war, now.
Did I say anything when the State made Aiden start school? Well, okay, I said a lot, but I didn't blow up the bus or anything. I should get some consideration for that. Nina is fun but she's not much use at building forts in the Lilac bushes or fighting off the giant triangles or being superman.
Anyway, I called this post "Life is Good" because yesterday my Father-in-law was admitted to the hospital, and I've been reflecting on life a lot since then--not that life is good because my Father-in-law is sick, just that he has enjoyed life so much.
He's eighty two and his kidneys are failing, so I'm worried that this might be the penultimate crisis, the last but one, the one being death, of course.
It is very hard to lose someone who has been so much a part of the fabric of your life, so much a part of the geography of your heart. If you asked anyone to describe him with one word, it would be happy. Everyone says he is the happiest person they ever knew, happy in all circumstances, all the time.
And they are right. He has never been afraid to try anything, the worst thing that could happen, he used to tell me, was that you might fail, and who cared about that? If you failed, you could go try the next thing, and the next until you found a thing that worked for you.
He was never worried about what the neighbors would think about his successes or failures, I'm pretty sure he has always been secure enough not to care about any one's opinion but his and God's. I admire that.
He wound up being the richest man I have ever known. And no, not in dollars.
He is the richest man in the world because everybody loves him. The most amazing number of people called him "Dad" over the years. He is a plain person but there was always room at his table for one more. Always a way to stretch the house to accommodate one more, and always room in his heart for one more.
He wouldn't hesitate to put you to work, or to give you the rough side of his tongue now and then if you needed it. But he's never turn you out, either. He drank a little more beer than he should have, maybe, but he never hurt anyone by doing that, and he really didn't ask for much which may be why God poured out such abundance on him.
His children are devoted to him, his grandchildren love him, his great grandchildren pester him mercilessly and people are always dropping in to see him from all the places you could ever imagine.
He has the kindest heart and the sweetest smile this side of heaven. The world needs that smile, it will be a much colder and emptier place without it, and I hope I don't have to do without it just yet.
I could tell you all the things I know about him, but that would take too long. So I will leave you with just one.
When I was very small I greatly admired horses, my mother was not all that crazy about them herself and I think she wasn't too anxious to have me tackle any (and knowing me the way I do I can entirely see why she felt that way) but one of my happiest memories is Uncle Clyde putting me on old Duggan--quite possibly the most placid horse that ever lived--and letting me ride him around and around and around the pasture no matter how long it took until I was completely satisfied and all horsied out.
Not everyone was delighted when Jimmy and I finally said screw public opinion and got married, but it was a good day when my favorite Uncle became my best Father-in-law and nobody was happier than he was when we arrived home from Tennessee and he was the first person to proudly kiss the bride.
I shouldn't have been surprised, he had welcomed me to his home all my life, welcoming me as a daughter was pretty much just the next natural step, I'm sure. No one is as precious as my own father, but it is very nice to see the men I love best in the world gathered together at a table and know that not only is my heart there, but my blood, too.
I have been blessed.
Did I say anything when the State made Aiden start school? Well, okay, I said a lot, but I didn't blow up the bus or anything. I should get some consideration for that. Nina is fun but she's not much use at building forts in the Lilac bushes or fighting off the giant triangles or being superman.
Anyway, I called this post "Life is Good" because yesterday my Father-in-law was admitted to the hospital, and I've been reflecting on life a lot since then--not that life is good because my Father-in-law is sick, just that he has enjoyed life so much.
He's eighty two and his kidneys are failing, so I'm worried that this might be the penultimate crisis, the last but one, the one being death, of course.
It is very hard to lose someone who has been so much a part of the fabric of your life, so much a part of the geography of your heart. If you asked anyone to describe him with one word, it would be happy. Everyone says he is the happiest person they ever knew, happy in all circumstances, all the time.
And they are right. He has never been afraid to try anything, the worst thing that could happen, he used to tell me, was that you might fail, and who cared about that? If you failed, you could go try the next thing, and the next until you found a thing that worked for you.
He was never worried about what the neighbors would think about his successes or failures, I'm pretty sure he has always been secure enough not to care about any one's opinion but his and God's. I admire that.
He wound up being the richest man I have ever known. And no, not in dollars.
He is the richest man in the world because everybody loves him. The most amazing number of people called him "Dad" over the years. He is a plain person but there was always room at his table for one more. Always a way to stretch the house to accommodate one more, and always room in his heart for one more.
He wouldn't hesitate to put you to work, or to give you the rough side of his tongue now and then if you needed it. But he's never turn you out, either. He drank a little more beer than he should have, maybe, but he never hurt anyone by doing that, and he really didn't ask for much which may be why God poured out such abundance on him.
His children are devoted to him, his grandchildren love him, his great grandchildren pester him mercilessly and people are always dropping in to see him from all the places you could ever imagine.
He has the kindest heart and the sweetest smile this side of heaven. The world needs that smile, it will be a much colder and emptier place without it, and I hope I don't have to do without it just yet.
I could tell you all the things I know about him, but that would take too long. So I will leave you with just one.
When I was very small I greatly admired horses, my mother was not all that crazy about them herself and I think she wasn't too anxious to have me tackle any (and knowing me the way I do I can entirely see why she felt that way) but one of my happiest memories is Uncle Clyde putting me on old Duggan--quite possibly the most placid horse that ever lived--and letting me ride him around and around and around the pasture no matter how long it took until I was completely satisfied and all horsied out.
Not everyone was delighted when Jimmy and I finally said screw public opinion and got married, but it was a good day when my favorite Uncle became my best Father-in-law and nobody was happier than he was when we arrived home from Tennessee and he was the first person to proudly kiss the bride.
I shouldn't have been surprised, he had welcomed me to his home all my life, welcoming me as a daughter was pretty much just the next natural step, I'm sure. No one is as precious as my own father, but it is very nice to see the men I love best in the world gathered together at a table and know that not only is my heart there, but my blood, too.
I have been blessed.
Friday, September 4, 2009
Early
I used to do some of my best work early in the morning. Not anymore, but still.
I'm having empty nest syndrome, because those horrible parents of my grandchildren--you know, my kids--are moving to their own apartment. I tried to get them to leave the babies, but no. It seems they want to keep them.
I'm considering kidnapping, how many years of prison do you get for stealing two grandchildren? Jean never rises before sunset so if I start early enough in the day I can get a pretty good head start.
Okay, they're only moving down the street, but that's still too far away. I tried to get Mandy to move home with all of her children, but she said no. Something about an actual life with children who haven't been completely ruined by their grandma.
On the other hand, she has catastrophic morning sickness right now so I'm biding my time, sooner or later someone will need help with the children and I like to take care of Mandy, she's my best daughter-in-law.
Nicole would tie for best daughter-in-law but she never comes to live with me, so she loses a lot of points for being independent and self supporting. She's married to my son the businessman. He travels a lot, wouldn't you think they'd need to stay with me? Okay, it's true they have a better house than I do, but full time nannying should count for something and I'm good at that.
Chad refuses to get married and reproduce despite the fact that I have encouraged him and encouraged him since he graduated high school. He's big on college, Chad is. Doesn't care at all about marriage. I don't know where I went wrong with that boy.
Obviously he took in the condom lecture, since he never got some nice girl in trouble so I could force him to marry her.
Well, you can't have everything, I guess I'll just have to learn to live with it. I suppose there is some consolation in getting the television back, I am kind of tired of the brainy babies dvd. Also Spongebob, who in my opinion should be forbidden by law.
What does Spongebob teach children really? That you can light a campfire on the bottom of the sea. Doesn't that violate some law of physics or nature or something? And that sea creatures enjoy snowball fights right after the big blizzard that hits the bottom of the sea. Same question.
Is Spongebob a child or an adult? He lives alone, which would tend to indicate he's not a child, and he has a job as a fry cook. Okay, then why does he enjoy playing with Patrick the retarded starfish? Is he just a good person or is he retarded too? And if he is retarded, why are we letting him work around a hot grill flipping burgers?
I can accept that miserly Mr. Krab is willing to hire the retarded kid to save money, but even misers must know that there is something appalling about a cook who falls in love with his Krabby Patty.
And then sometimes they go to the beach. On the bottom of the ocean. Next to (apparently) another ocean. Once they buried a fish up to his neck in the sand at low tide, and he died when the tide came in and he drowned. He's a fish, presumably one that can't breathe under his ocean but is great at breathing under ours.
What message does that send to children? First, are we saying it's okay to drown our friends, and second will our kids ever be able to enjoy the aquarium after they know fish can drown?
Spongebob has imaginary friends like Bubble Buddy that he created out of his bottle of bubble blowing solution, in the end of that episode everyone is so fed up with the imaginary friend they try to pop him with a needle.
Thus causing Spongebob enough emotional trauma to guarantee he will be spending much of his adult life in therapy. Then we discover Bubble Buddy is actually a sentient being who decides to take the bus home. At what point did he assume actual life? We saw Spongebob create him. And we wonder how schizophrenics are made.
And let's not forget Sqidward, the neurotic squid with six tentacles that lives next door and has a highly questionable relationship with his clarinet, wears a shower cap in his bubble bath, gets completely anal on the subject of interpretive dance and goes into spasms of joy over art appreciation. Except he has no taste and isn't the least bit gay.
And I'm not being mean about being gay, if you are gay you should write a letter to the obnoxious homophobe who created Squidward, he's so stereotypical someone should get sued.
Maybe he and Spongebob are secretly lovers, God knows Patrick is never going to figure out sex. Patrick can't even figure out home, he lives under a rock and has furniture sculpted from sand.
Come to think of it, it's really time those children got out on their own and I can go back to watching scary movies, I'm clearly way too informed about Spongebob.
I'm having empty nest syndrome, because those horrible parents of my grandchildren--you know, my kids--are moving to their own apartment. I tried to get them to leave the babies, but no. It seems they want to keep them.
I'm considering kidnapping, how many years of prison do you get for stealing two grandchildren? Jean never rises before sunset so if I start early enough in the day I can get a pretty good head start.
Okay, they're only moving down the street, but that's still too far away. I tried to get Mandy to move home with all of her children, but she said no. Something about an actual life with children who haven't been completely ruined by their grandma.
On the other hand, she has catastrophic morning sickness right now so I'm biding my time, sooner or later someone will need help with the children and I like to take care of Mandy, she's my best daughter-in-law.
Nicole would tie for best daughter-in-law but she never comes to live with me, so she loses a lot of points for being independent and self supporting. She's married to my son the businessman. He travels a lot, wouldn't you think they'd need to stay with me? Okay, it's true they have a better house than I do, but full time nannying should count for something and I'm good at that.
Chad refuses to get married and reproduce despite the fact that I have encouraged him and encouraged him since he graduated high school. He's big on college, Chad is. Doesn't care at all about marriage. I don't know where I went wrong with that boy.
Obviously he took in the condom lecture, since he never got some nice girl in trouble so I could force him to marry her.
Well, you can't have everything, I guess I'll just have to learn to live with it. I suppose there is some consolation in getting the television back, I am kind of tired of the brainy babies dvd. Also Spongebob, who in my opinion should be forbidden by law.
What does Spongebob teach children really? That you can light a campfire on the bottom of the sea. Doesn't that violate some law of physics or nature or something? And that sea creatures enjoy snowball fights right after the big blizzard that hits the bottom of the sea. Same question.
Is Spongebob a child or an adult? He lives alone, which would tend to indicate he's not a child, and he has a job as a fry cook. Okay, then why does he enjoy playing with Patrick the retarded starfish? Is he just a good person or is he retarded too? And if he is retarded, why are we letting him work around a hot grill flipping burgers?
I can accept that miserly Mr. Krab is willing to hire the retarded kid to save money, but even misers must know that there is something appalling about a cook who falls in love with his Krabby Patty.
And then sometimes they go to the beach. On the bottom of the ocean. Next to (apparently) another ocean. Once they buried a fish up to his neck in the sand at low tide, and he died when the tide came in and he drowned. He's a fish, presumably one that can't breathe under his ocean but is great at breathing under ours.
What message does that send to children? First, are we saying it's okay to drown our friends, and second will our kids ever be able to enjoy the aquarium after they know fish can drown?
Spongebob has imaginary friends like Bubble Buddy that he created out of his bottle of bubble blowing solution, in the end of that episode everyone is so fed up with the imaginary friend they try to pop him with a needle.
Thus causing Spongebob enough emotional trauma to guarantee he will be spending much of his adult life in therapy. Then we discover Bubble Buddy is actually a sentient being who decides to take the bus home. At what point did he assume actual life? We saw Spongebob create him. And we wonder how schizophrenics are made.
And let's not forget Sqidward, the neurotic squid with six tentacles that lives next door and has a highly questionable relationship with his clarinet, wears a shower cap in his bubble bath, gets completely anal on the subject of interpretive dance and goes into spasms of joy over art appreciation. Except he has no taste and isn't the least bit gay.
And I'm not being mean about being gay, if you are gay you should write a letter to the obnoxious homophobe who created Squidward, he's so stereotypical someone should get sued.
Maybe he and Spongebob are secretly lovers, God knows Patrick is never going to figure out sex. Patrick can't even figure out home, he lives under a rock and has furniture sculpted from sand.
Come to think of it, it's really time those children got out on their own and I can go back to watching scary movies, I'm clearly way too informed about Spongebob.
Thursday, September 3, 2009
Pathwords
I really love pathwords, it's just the kind of thing I do well. Except for those times when I challenge Lacey, Jean or Ashley to a game, because the universe is against me. I know God is up to something.
If I play alone I could go on for hours without interruption, but set a timer and announce you've just challenged someone and invariably people I have not seen since the third grade will call me and want to chat.
Or the Jehovah's Witnesses will decide to bring reinforcements and have a go at saving my soul one more time. Sometimes they bring the Mormons. I am beginning to thing that I must be the Holy Grail of strange religious groups. I think they have signs for new recruits that read "Save Pilly."
I'm as saved as I'm going to get, people. I appreciate your interest but if you interrupt me one more time I'm going straight to hell for killing you and burying you in the backyard.
Just so you know.
I would also appreciate less paper. The Baptists are bad for paper. Not the real Baptists, those new ones that the real Baptists say are heretics on account of they made up their own church. I think Jack Chick is their Pope.
I know they are way more fond of his smudgy little tracts than anyone should be. So far I have had enough respect for them to just use the tracts to start fires, in future I plan to use them for toilet paper. Just once I would like to buy a book on some aspect of my faith without finding that some person has chosen to do his witnessing by crapping up Barnes and Noble's merchandise with tracts.
And not a nice, "I just want to convert you" tract. I am willing to be generous in my thinking toward someone who only wants to convert me. It's the people who issue invitations to watch me burn in hell and make plans in writing as to who should bring the potato salad for the wienie roast that are beginning to irk me.
Since they all seem to have memorized the Bible, I would like someone to show me even one place where Jesus salivates and approaches orgasm over the thought of everybody but him burning in hell.
Oh, for God's sake--don't go look. I made it up. We call that sarcasm, I know they don't have it at your church. We sell it with the Holy Water, that's why you never saw it.
They keep telling me I have a different Bible because I'm Catholic. If theirs does not omit why they personally are more qualified than God to run the final judgement, I am certainly in agreement with that.
I've got "Love thy Neighbor" in mine, at no point does it add, "Right up to the moment you tie him to the stake and light the fire'.
And if you're going to e-mail me about the Inquisition, just don't. I insist you read at least three books before we discuss it and they cannot have been written by Bob the Bible Thumper and endorsed by Jack Chick.
My church made a few mistakes too, seeing as how it has existed since Jesus founded it, but we have tried to learn from those mistakes and improve. Unlike some people who plan to roast marshmallows in hell. It's just a thought, but if you're bringing potato salad to the picnic in hell, doesn't that mean you'll be there, too?
And isn't hell supposed to be eternal? Are you really wiling to wait through eternity for the marshmallows to toast? Doesn't that strike you as odd?
I'm going with Love God and love your neighbor as yourself, which I suppose means I can't kill any baptists, but I still don't want to discuss religion on my front porch on hot days.
Cold ones either.
If I play alone I could go on for hours without interruption, but set a timer and announce you've just challenged someone and invariably people I have not seen since the third grade will call me and want to chat.
Or the Jehovah's Witnesses will decide to bring reinforcements and have a go at saving my soul one more time. Sometimes they bring the Mormons. I am beginning to thing that I must be the Holy Grail of strange religious groups. I think they have signs for new recruits that read "Save Pilly."
I'm as saved as I'm going to get, people. I appreciate your interest but if you interrupt me one more time I'm going straight to hell for killing you and burying you in the backyard.
Just so you know.
I would also appreciate less paper. The Baptists are bad for paper. Not the real Baptists, those new ones that the real Baptists say are heretics on account of they made up their own church. I think Jack Chick is their Pope.
I know they are way more fond of his smudgy little tracts than anyone should be. So far I have had enough respect for them to just use the tracts to start fires, in future I plan to use them for toilet paper. Just once I would like to buy a book on some aspect of my faith without finding that some person has chosen to do his witnessing by crapping up Barnes and Noble's merchandise with tracts.
And not a nice, "I just want to convert you" tract. I am willing to be generous in my thinking toward someone who only wants to convert me. It's the people who issue invitations to watch me burn in hell and make plans in writing as to who should bring the potato salad for the wienie roast that are beginning to irk me.
Since they all seem to have memorized the Bible, I would like someone to show me even one place where Jesus salivates and approaches orgasm over the thought of everybody but him burning in hell.
Oh, for God's sake--don't go look. I made it up. We call that sarcasm, I know they don't have it at your church. We sell it with the Holy Water, that's why you never saw it.
They keep telling me I have a different Bible because I'm Catholic. If theirs does not omit why they personally are more qualified than God to run the final judgement, I am certainly in agreement with that.
I've got "Love thy Neighbor" in mine, at no point does it add, "Right up to the moment you tie him to the stake and light the fire'.
And if you're going to e-mail me about the Inquisition, just don't. I insist you read at least three books before we discuss it and they cannot have been written by Bob the Bible Thumper and endorsed by Jack Chick.
My church made a few mistakes too, seeing as how it has existed since Jesus founded it, but we have tried to learn from those mistakes and improve. Unlike some people who plan to roast marshmallows in hell. It's just a thought, but if you're bringing potato salad to the picnic in hell, doesn't that mean you'll be there, too?
And isn't hell supposed to be eternal? Are you really wiling to wait through eternity for the marshmallows to toast? Doesn't that strike you as odd?
I'm going with Love God and love your neighbor as yourself, which I suppose means I can't kill any baptists, but I still don't want to discuss religion on my front porch on hot days.
Cold ones either.
Wednesday, September 2, 2009
One of Those Days
Did you ever have one of those days where you were only ten minutes into it and so much had already gone wrong that you just knew it was one of those days?
This is definitely one of those days.
Me and Aiden are already in beau coup trouble for playing outside when he was supposed to be in his room being punished and also, we had donuts for breakfast, which apparently can cause things only just short of complete Armageddon. Go figure.
So anyway, now I'm bored and there's nothing to do but this while I devise a plan to break Aiden out of prison. Okay, it's true he was wearing his school clothes while we were making a fort in the lilac bush, but really. There is such a thing as laundry and a bath.
I considered completing the fort by myself, but then I remembered how weird the neighbors get after something like that. So I guess I'll just wait til Emma comes over.
Also, me and the village office are having a difference of opinion. They are of the opinion they should keep breathing and I am of the opinion that they don't need to. Unless, of course, they are willing to rethink that whole water issue, in which case I would rethink how nice the world would be if they were dead.
I don't care what the DNR says about what the village does about it's groundwater. Screw the village and it's groundwater, I never wanted to live in the village, anyway. If the village is that worried about it's damned water let them purchase and install the new equipment.
Were they concerned about the water when the built the sewage treatment facility on the banks of the Kickapoo? No, they were not, so why should I care what they do now? Also, I have decided not to believe in the DNR. Clearly they are just a figment of the village's imagination and should not, therefore, be allowed to make any rules.
I wish that I had had the good sense to experience life with the village office before I went and did something crazy like buy a house. Alright, it's true that I went into raptures over the pocket doors and don't remember a lot after that, but you would think people would have learned by now that you should not let the person having raptures about architectural details make the decision.
Also, I wish I had remembered Jimmy's approach to home repair, like that time he removed the entire roof and then went to Texas and we bought a really big tarp in case it rained. I don't let him roof anymore.
I also don't allow him to re-wire the electricity, apply insulation or fix the plumbing. I am the only person I know who has to remember to turn on the cold faucet to get hot water and I do not even want to think about what he did to my washer.
And that time he decided to surprise me with a new bathroom after heart surgery. He has promised to restore all the walls and the closet and never hang drywall again in this lifetime and I have promised not to kill him. We're still waiting to see how that one turns out.
I liked the old bathroom, I had just redecorated and I did a better job than Mr. Early Primitive. On the other hand it keeps me from being pretentious, so it may shave a few hours off that seven million years I plan to serve in Purgatory after I'm dead.
Anyway, I can hardly wait to see what's next. Aiden's sentence should be up, I think I'll serve cake for lunch.
This is definitely one of those days.
Me and Aiden are already in beau coup trouble for playing outside when he was supposed to be in his room being punished and also, we had donuts for breakfast, which apparently can cause things only just short of complete Armageddon. Go figure.
So anyway, now I'm bored and there's nothing to do but this while I devise a plan to break Aiden out of prison. Okay, it's true he was wearing his school clothes while we were making a fort in the lilac bush, but really. There is such a thing as laundry and a bath.
I considered completing the fort by myself, but then I remembered how weird the neighbors get after something like that. So I guess I'll just wait til Emma comes over.
Also, me and the village office are having a difference of opinion. They are of the opinion they should keep breathing and I am of the opinion that they don't need to. Unless, of course, they are willing to rethink that whole water issue, in which case I would rethink how nice the world would be if they were dead.
I don't care what the DNR says about what the village does about it's groundwater. Screw the village and it's groundwater, I never wanted to live in the village, anyway. If the village is that worried about it's damned water let them purchase and install the new equipment.
Were they concerned about the water when the built the sewage treatment facility on the banks of the Kickapoo? No, they were not, so why should I care what they do now? Also, I have decided not to believe in the DNR. Clearly they are just a figment of the village's imagination and should not, therefore, be allowed to make any rules.
I wish that I had had the good sense to experience life with the village office before I went and did something crazy like buy a house. Alright, it's true that I went into raptures over the pocket doors and don't remember a lot after that, but you would think people would have learned by now that you should not let the person having raptures about architectural details make the decision.
Also, I wish I had remembered Jimmy's approach to home repair, like that time he removed the entire roof and then went to Texas and we bought a really big tarp in case it rained. I don't let him roof anymore.
I also don't allow him to re-wire the electricity, apply insulation or fix the plumbing. I am the only person I know who has to remember to turn on the cold faucet to get hot water and I do not even want to think about what he did to my washer.
And that time he decided to surprise me with a new bathroom after heart surgery. He has promised to restore all the walls and the closet and never hang drywall again in this lifetime and I have promised not to kill him. We're still waiting to see how that one turns out.
I liked the old bathroom, I had just redecorated and I did a better job than Mr. Early Primitive. On the other hand it keeps me from being pretentious, so it may shave a few hours off that seven million years I plan to serve in Purgatory after I'm dead.
Anyway, I can hardly wait to see what's next. Aiden's sentence should be up, I think I'll serve cake for lunch.
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