The Homecoming

It's been a rough week around here after the horrid demise of two of the cats. The youngest son still isn't quite sure what to do with his anger. And honestly, I'm still devastated.


I'm a cat lover. Have been since I was an itty bitty thing. My mom has photos of me as a baby with a cat cuddled at my feet while I slept. Guess she didn't buy into that whole "cat stealing a baby's breath" thing.


A quick perusal shows even more photos of me always dragging around a cat, dressing it in doll clothes, and other acts of forcing the poor critters into submission by cramming my feline friends into doll carriages and highchairs.


Since we live in a small, rural sort of town, my home has become a revolving door of cat rescues and arrivals. If a cat shows up on my doorstep hungry, it gets fed. This drives my husband insane. It's come close to being grounds for divorce on several occasions. Yet, it doesn't stop me from taking care of strays.


About a month ago, Mr. Biggs came up missing. It wasn't so unusual not to see him for a few days considering he's a tom cat with tom cat business to see to from time to time. He'd show up for a few days, get himself a bite to eat, recoup, and hit the road again for a few more evenings out with the lady cats.


About a month ago, no more Mr. Biggs. Or Biggie, Biggie Butt, Biggsey Boy, or Nut Boy (which is what my husband called him). I'd more or less written him off as dead. It happens. And I know if you want to keep a cat alive and well, keeping it inside is the best place for it. But I figure if they're free-spirited enough to want to go roam about, I'm not stopping them. And if they were strays to begin with, well, I do my part giving them food and love. If they want to hang about outside, stop in for a while, then I'm okay with that, too. I've got a few "insider" cats, but most go out after they're done eating and napping.


Well, today, I was filling the outside food bowl when I caught a glimpse of a large tiger cat walking towards me. I paused as my brain tried to fill in what was wrong with the picture. It was then that I realized oh holy crap, Mr. Biggs is back!


I honestly didn't think I'd ever see him again. He'd been gone a long time. My son thought I was having some sort of fit at the back door, yelling and oh my gawding.


Biggsey came in, had something to eat, and plopped down on my son's lap where he proceeded to purr and drool incessantly. I guess he was so happy, he couldn't control his spit.


He got down and settled in for a nap.

He doesn't look too enthralled, does he? I think the look says, "Just what in the hell is that?"

That is Little Turtle, apparently the brother of the poor little yellow kitten who was murdered by the Pit Bull. Little Turtle is the new Shrek. My son is coercing the poor kitten into submission, trying to get him trained to sleep on his pillow and love him just like his poor ole cat Shrek did.

This is Gunter, or Gunnar, depending on whether you're feeling German when you call him by name. He's also Gunny, Gunny Butt, and Gunny Sack. Gunny was an orphan. His mother showed up, gave birth to him and five other kittens. She abandoned them, and he was the only survivor. He was taken care of by another mother cat. I also bottle fed the little crossed-eyed freak. God, I love him.

His look back to Biggs seemed to say something like, "Dude, I don't know where this thing came from."

Anyway, I've become one of those people who posts photos of their cats. Heaven help me, I didn't think I'd get this boring, but I'm glad Mr. Biggs is back. It warmed my heart to see him again, and helped to ease just a little bit of the grief.

Boys I Want to Marry

I'd been kicking around the idea of doing a weekly sort of thing here. This came about after I saw a photo of Haywood Nelson. He played Dwayne on the TV show "What's Happening."


It got me to thinking, as I'm prone to do. A lot. Too much.

The one thing I remembered was that he was cute. I had such a crush on him. Dwayne's "hey, hey, hey" could make me melt. I wanted to marry him. That's how I expressed mad, mad affection for any boy who happened to catch my eye when I was a youngin'. I was going to grow up and marry that boy.


This made me think of all the boys I found cute and wanted to marry, and what they inevitably taught me about myself, music, books, poetry, culture, or life in general.


I thought a moment and realized that Dwayne was not the first boy I wanted to marry. The first was Rick Dees. I'd been working on a write up about him earlier today. But as usual I got all sidetracked by trying to meet my column deadline and breaking up fights between these heathen children. Then I was totally distracted, so I started stopping by the blogs I read most often. I stopped by my friend's blog, Street Vein.



Mr. Street Vein and I happened upon each other on the internet. This is my favorite photo of him, and what I love even more is the caption, "Sinners Welcome."

He describes himself as a writer, progressive, thinker, intolerant of others, historian, left-wing, realist, humorist, skeptical, neurotic, pro-choice, anti-war, visionary, blind, dreamer, non-religious, out of style.

How could anyone read that and not want to be his new best friend?


He's even written a novel. And he's a fine writer at that.


One must go read his latest blog entry. Really, you must. Go ahead, then come back and finish reading. I'll wait.


Okay, now tell me how brilliant is that?


About a year ago, I got this wild notion to start stepping out of my comfort zone. I made it a goal to do something I wouldn't normally do at least once a week. I originally said once a day, but quite frankly, I tend to be wound as tight as an antique clock that's spring could inevitably inflict bodily harm when it finally uncoils. Throwing caution to the wind on a daily basis could have had me well on my way to a Xanax prescription.


Street Vein encourages everyone to make a list of rules we follow because they are conventional. Just sit down and start listing those things brought on by tradition. As the list becomes long, pick an easy one, and then break the rule.


He writes:

... Next, tell some jackass in your circle of “friends” that they are negative, unsupportive, and you no longer want to associate with miserable fucks like him/her. Admit to friends and strangers your deepest dreams and fears – screw ‘em if they think you’re weird. You are, but so are they.

... Speaking of uncomfortable positions – hang out with people you have nothing in common with and learn something about them, and yourself. The next time your gut says, “I’d like to try that,” but your mind says “No, you’ll look foolish,” go for it. Did I mention this will change your life?

Once a day, check off one of the stupid “rules” and begin to experience real freedom. You can thank me later.

I ask - how is that for a life changing revelation? Seriously.


So, Mr. Street Vein is hopefully one of many "Boys I Want to Marry" that I'll feature from time to time. No matter how cute Dwayne from "What's Happening" was, surely anyone can see why I made my choice today.


Get started on those lists. Let me know what you come up with when you decide to start breaking those traditions and what happens. I'm going to get started on my list, as well.

Note: "Boys I Want to Marry" is not to be taken in a literal sense. If your first thought is, "Oh my gawd, she's married and she's making blog entries about other boys she wants to marry, why I never!" you shouldn't be reading my blog in the first place. It was merely how I expressed myself as a young girl. When I was seven years old and watched Rick Dees perform "Disco Duck" on TV, I announced to my grandma that I wanted to marry him. Because of course, I was young, and when you loved someone, it was in my estimation that the logical thing to do was marry him. My immature mind and vocabulary limited my ability to express triggered emotions. Perhaps they still do.

You Talk Funny

For the past couple days, I've noticed my 17 year old doing some weird pronunciations.

"What am I supposed to do?"

"I don't know."

"We're going to go to a movie."

I can't exactly explain what was tipping me off that he sounded different. It was the "o" sound. It didn't sound normal in some words.

"Since when are you from Minnesota?" I asked him. Not that there's anything wrong with being from Minnesota, mind you. I remember once meeting someone from the fine state, and there's was something about their accent that caught my attenion.

"I have no idea what you're talking about, Mom," he said.

"Sweden? Norway? Who have you been hanging out with lately who talks funny?" I inquired. (The italics and bolds are foreshadowing, but I'll stop that now.)

"The same people I've hung out with all summer," he snipped, getting annoyed with his dear, ole mom.

"I don't know, but you're talking funny," I told him and let it go.

The next day, I noticed again his odd pronunciations, mainly of the letter o. I pointed out he did it again, and he pressed that I explain. I said "go" as a normal person from these parts would say it. And then I said it again, how I perceived he was saying "go" but with a Minnesota, some place north of here, Scandanavian twang.

"Uh, Mom, there's no difference in what you've just said. Say them again."

I did, and said ok, whatever, maybe I'm just hearing things, and let him go on his merry way.

It hit me. I'm the one he's been around who talks funny. I've been told that I have a very distinctive voice - to the point that it has given me a complex. I've been told that while someone doesn't recognize my face right away, they recognize the voice as someone they know. At my fifteen year high school reunion, someone I had been friends with through much of middle and high school, didn't recognize me. (It's safe to say that I did my blossoming way after I crossed the stage and accepted my high school diploma.)

"I didn't recognize you, but I knew that I knew the voice," she told me.

I've been asked, "Where are you from because you sure don't sound like a Hoosier."

I don't know how a Hoosier sounds, but I do know that if I fall into the right crowd of individuals, I can land's sake, pert near, reckon, and ain't got with the best of them.

I have, in fact, been told I sound like I'm from Michigan or Minnesota.

My mother-in-law, from upstate NY, told me once that I talk funny. She assured me that the children speak just fine. But me? I talk funny, and she didn't understand how the kids didn't end up speaking the way I do, but she was glad they talked normal.

I've come up with several theories on this phenomenon.

My voice is slightly deeper than would expect coming from me. I was plagued with many, many bouts of swollen tonsils and strep throat as a child. It was to the point that the last time my mom dragged me to the dr. again with tonsilitis, the dr. said the next time, we really needed to consider having the tonsils removed.

This scared the beejeebers out of me. The next sore throat I got, I grinned and beared it because I wasn't about to tell my mom and be taken to the hospital. A girl told me in first grade that she had her tonsils out. She brought the jar to show and tell that held the contents that once resided in her body.

At recess, she told us they put her to sleep. Dogs were "put to sleep," and I wasn't having any part of that.

"But how did they get them out?" I asked. I couldn't figure how anyone could get their hands into one's throat and get them out. It looked to be close quarters to me, so I couldn't even fathom how a dr. went about it. And because I didn't understand the finer dynamics of surgery in general, other than they typically cut someone open, I had to ask.

"They put a needle up my butt, and got them out while I was put to sleep," she said.

That was it. It was all I needed to hear. No one, and I mean no one was going to put me to sleep like a dog and stick anything up my behind, much less a needle. I'd gargle with salt water on the sly. I'd take cough drops and throat lozenges from my grandma's house and self-medicate. I would have done anything to avoid the needle-up-the-rump.

Is it possible this ended up damaging my vocal cords? I think it could be an explanation. It took great lengths to speak in such a way that my mom wouldn't say, "You've got another sore throat again, don't you?"

Also, as far as my pronunciation goes - I've been told on many occasions that I do a great job of enunciating. "Did you go to school for broadcast journalism?" one person inquired. "It sounds like you've been trained to speak clearly."

While I've never been schooled on enunciation, I did grow up with great-grandparents close at hand. Great-grandparents who were hard of hearing. I do remember being expected to speak up, not talk so fast, and to speak clearly. One great-grandma was not only hard of hearing, but also blind. I've remained close to grandparents, one of whom is still living and doesn't care much for wearing her hearing aide.

So I suspect that's a fair explanation of my ability to enunciate. Perhaps that has led to my strange pronunciation of the "o" sound and other vowels. I don't know why it's taken so long to pick up on my son's mimicking my accent. Perhaps, we've spent so much time together this summer, I'm noticing it.

Regardless, I'm the one who talks funny who he's been hanging out with this summer.

Bedlam, Pure Bedlam

A pit bull tore through our yard and killed two cats yesterday. The dog managed, somehow, to get into our garage and infiltrate our stockade fence. You know, the area of your property that you somehow have this false sense of it being a safe environment because you've spent a couple grand on a fence.

My husband was trimming some tree limbs out front. My youngest said to me, "I think I heard Dad scream."

My first thought was great. He'd managed to maim himself by cutting off an appendage. I went out to investigate, just in time to see him opening the gate on the stockade fence. You know, the privacy fence that is 6' tall, wooden, meant to keep our dog inside and things that don't belong out.

"Did you scream?"

"No, but I think there's a dog killing a cat in the yard."

"Which yard? This yard? How did a dog get in there? In here or out there?" I rambled, not sure which direction to run.

I ran inside the fence to see the youngest son's cat Shrek being torn to shreds.

The dude who was chasing the dog showed up about then. I'm screaming, "Oh god, oh god," and just sobbing without any tears. Primal noises fueled by adrenaline. The dude is apologizing as I'm screaming the cat's name peppered with profanity. Pure Bedlam.

It happened so fast I couldn't even tell you which way the dog went, where the dog's owner went, or even what the dog looked like. I only saw the cat. The one he's had for about 8 years that was inside our fence. Every time the cat tried to get away, the dog lunged at it again. I could only scream.

Naturally, I grabbed for the cat, and took a bite to my wrist. Less one tooth because in the fight, the poor old cat had one knocked out. I have three bite marks. I've seen a dog kill a kitten with a nip and a toss up in the air, but never, never had I'd witnessed something like this.

There were other cats that stay outside milling about. I figured I'd better do a headcount to see if any others were killed. I walked into the garage and there lay a dead kitten. It was a stray that had shown up, and being the bleeding heart that I am, I'd been feeding it and loving it. The poor thing didn't stand a chance.

I carried its lifeless little body to where my husband was already digging a hole for Shrek. That's how he deals with dying animals. He starts digging. I sit and bawl my eyes out talking to the animal. He digs a hole deep enough to bury a small child and hide any evidence.

I couldn't contain the tears any longer at this point, and I wept openly.

"It wasn't even our cat," my husband said in regards to the kitten when he saw me sobbing.

No, it hadn't been, but I was devastated by what I'd seen, and to find another critter destroyed made me lose what little self-control I had.

"No, but that dog came right into our yard. Inside our fence. He killed everything in his path. It's our yard. He shouldn't have been in here," I cried.

Shrek didn't die right away because that would have been too easy. There was some discussion of taking him to be put down, but I knew he wouldn't survive a 20 minute car ride.

My son being a 15 year old boy who doesn't cry and doesn't show much emotion, didn't know what to do as we sat vigil in the yard. So he yelled at me. Told me to stay away from his cat. Threatened to find the dog and kill it. Punched the fence.

My husband walked down the street and found who owned the dog. A young girl, 16ish, who was visiting her grandma and had brought the dog along. She came to apologize. My son ran inside because he didn't want her to see him crying.

She tells me she's sorry. The dog kills cats. He's killed her cat, and she knows how rough it was to sit and watch a cat convulse and die. I tried to explain to her that my problem was it was INSIDE our yard. The dog trespassed and treaded where he shouldn't have been. A place where my cats would have been safe otherwise. I understand dogs get loose. I would have been less pissed if it had happened in our back yard. She promised to never bring the dog back to her grandma's again.

I've got other cats, of course. But what hurts is to see my son's pain. He's not generally a loving child when it comes to animals. He loved that cat with everything he's had.

I'm sure half the town heard my rant from my front yard about puppy mills and people breeding these dogs to make a buck, and how oftentimes, they end up violent and aggressive animals. I'm not so naive to not know there are dogs that take a special liking to chasing and killing cats. But holy fuck. This happened inside my yard. Too many what ifs. Like what if my old 11 year old dog have been out at the time. What if we hadn't noticed right away and he killed my four kittens that live in the garage? What if the dog turned on one of us when we were trying to rescue the cat?

We wrapped Shrek up in a Spongebob pillowcase that my son used to use, but has since grown too old for - because Shrek had spent his life sleeping on the top of his pillow in bed with him.

I can't formulate the words to convey how pissed off and violated I feel right now. I feel as though I've been raped or robbed.

I know it's not the dog's fault. As I later found out, it had been mistreated before they got the animal. It also didn't just nonchalantly slip away, either. The dog broke either it's leash or collar while it was being walked.

I'm honestly one of the first people to say that others' freedoms shouldn't be taken away. If you want to own an alligator, knock yourself out, but don't turn it loose in the creek or local swimming hole. But I'll also say, in my opinion, that there are some animals that are not meant to be pets. Wild animals aren't meant to be pets. Animals bred, and then inbred, for the purpose of killing aren't meant to be pets, either. But if you must have one, be responsible, and don't be surprised when you can't control the forces of nature.

It's like the greyhound that has spent a lifetime racing and is adopted. Sure, they are gentle, often timid creatures. But a greyhound has to be watched. Who knows what will trigger their desire to run like the wind. A leaf blowing across a sidewalk. A sound from the neighbor's house. Responsible owners know the dangers of letting the dog off a leash in an unconfined area.

Who knows what might trigger the trait for which the animal was bred.

I guess that's what bugs me the most. The lack of responsibility for these dogs. I know as with any animal, a lot depends on the owner. Not all pit bulls are destructive creatures. I've known several Chihuahuas that I wouldn't trust around a small child.

It was an unfortunate event for an otherwise peaceful Sunday morning. No amount of demanding the dog be put down will bring back our old cat. And I do miss him. He kept post in the kitchen while I cooked. When I sat on the couch, he often sat on the arm beside me. He was a fixture in our household, and yes, eventually old age would take him from us. But the way he died, brutally murdered if you will, is what makes me mourn him even more.

The girl's grandma stopped by today to apologize once again. I appreciated it, but I'm heartbroken and it's going to take some time to get over what I witnessed.

Poor ole Shreky. My heart breaks for you.

Don't Talk to the Inmates or Believe Everything You Read

I've been known to play coy. Play stupid, if you will.

It's in my opinion that it takes a truly intelligent girl to play stupid. I don't do it on a regular basis, but the ability to bat my eyes and say, "My, I don't have a clue what you're talking about," does come in handy in certain situations. I'm not sure what those situations are offhand, but I'm just saying that yes, I've been known to play dumb.

Okay, one example.

Suppose someone is telling me something, and leaving me a lot of room to infer what they're really saying. That might be one time that I might say, "I'm really not sure what you're saying. Explain, please."

It's because I want whatever is being said to not be said in so few of words. Instead of coming right out and saying, "Spit it out," I do the gum-popping, hair twirling, la-la-la I'm soooo blonde" naive routine.

I was not pretending to be naive or dumb when I snapped this picture on Saturday, and then promptly locked the doors of the truck.

I'd ridden along to the salvage yard with my husband. He'd gotten out of the truck and nearly had himself an altercation with a toothless broad who declared she was next.

She wasn't next in line, but despite that, my husband let her go ahead and get her aluminum cans weighed. I half-watched, while eyeing any prospective inmates, when the woman in dire need of some dentures got caught trying to weight their bags with some wire.

I kept looking around. Surely if there were inmates working at the scrap yard, wouldn't they be wearing orange or had something indicating they were criminals? Maybe they were on work release from the county jail. Perhaps they were a low risk when it came to escaping. I wasn't taking any chances, however, and I kept the truck locked. My husband left it running with the a/c on. I wasn't going to be a hostage if I could avoid it.

"Why did you lock the doors?" my husband asked, giving me one of those looks that I'm slightly accustomed to getting in the last 18 years of marriage.

"I didn't want anyone hopping in," I told him.

"Ummm, okay," he said.

"I took a picture of that sign over there," I told him. I explained to him I was really surprised our youngest son didn't say anything about it when he'd rode along when we were getting rid of some useless junk.

"Oh, the inmate sign. He didn't even notice it," he said.

We were waiting on our turn when this conversation transpired, and I reached over and hit the automatic lock on the door again.

"Why in the hell do you keep locking the damn doors?"

"Uh, do I need to read you that sign?" I asked him. "Inmates, duh."

He laughed. He laughed hard.

"You know that's just a joke, right? There really aren't inmates working here. Sheesh."

How was I supposed to know it was only a joke? From the looks of some of the guys working the yard, they could've been inmates. Honest mistake showing just how gullible I can be at times.

My husband claims its part of my charm, though he still can't figure out how someone can be so bright (he says I'm always three mental steps ahead of him) and so naive at the same time.

Yes, I honestly did believe the sign was real. So much so that I took a picture of it.

I never have to play gullible, that's for sure.

Thoughts on Writing

Many moons ago, another writer and I decided we were going to write a book together. We were relatively new to concept of writing something longer than a weekly column, which is typically around 650-750 words. Your average book is about 300 pages. 250 words a page. When one does the math, that a hellva lot more writing than a copy in a newspaper.

We decided we were going to pen the next best seller about writing. After all, Stephen King did it. Yeah, we'll pause a moment here to realize that King might have actually had something to say about writing considering he'd been doing since the beginning of time.

For various reasons, the majority of them based on the fact the two of us had no business telling other writers how to do it when we weren't even sure what we were doing, it fell through. As Anne Lammott says, to paraphrase her brillance, few writers actually know what they are doing until they actually do it.

The thing about writers is that we aren't like others. Most creative sorts are much different than other individuals. I suspect we've been dropped on our heads one too many times, but that's just one theory why most writers, or even artists, tend to be the ecletic, if not eccentric.

I can't exactly speak for all writers when I say that I don't understand what it is that compels me to write. But...I think it is a general consensus with most writers. I can back up this theory by making an observation.

In books, even in movies, how many storylines revolve around a writer? Take King's work for example. In Bag of Bones, the protag is a writer. Lisey's Story is about a widowed writer's wife. Not to forget Misery, "1408" (a short story from Everything's Eventual), The Shining, The Regulators, Desperation, you get the idea.

Then there are movies like my favorite, "Something's Gotta Give." I could go on and on, but it doesn't take much brainpower to realize there are a whole lot of writers writing about writers in effort to understand what makes us writers.

I've been asked many times why I write. And every time, my answer is, "That's a good question."

I don't know why. While other kids were content with a box of crayons and a coloring book, I wanted a pencil and a tablet to write on. While other kids were hurrying off the bus to go watch TV or play, I'd run inside hoping I'd gotten a letter from one of many pen pals.

Writing has served as a means to preserve, understand, and express. Beyond that, I don't know what makes me tick or drives me to continue. But I guess I'm in good company because even Stephen King seems to be trying to flesh it out himself by writing about writers.

A Note to My Children

Dear Children,

First off, whoever took my dustpan and small broom, I'd love to have it back. I don't care what you were using it for. I don't care what you did with it. In fact, I don't think I even want to know. I want it back. It would come in dang handy considering someone took it upon themselves to dump sugar all over the kitchen floor at some point this morning.

But, you didn't tell me that either, whoever you are who did that. Oh, no. I found out when I walked barefooted to the kitchen and my feet were reminiscent of cake donuts with a sugary coating. This did not please me. Nothing like sticky feet and a sticky floor to say hello.

Speaking of floors and cleaning up, the next time I tell you not to give the cat a bath, I mean it. Honestly, I don't speak just to hear myself talk. I realize this old cat doesn't have the best personal hygiene, and grooming himself is not up there in the top ten ways to spend his time. But, I was not kidding when I said the last time I bathed the cat, he tried going out the kitchen window - glass, screen and all. When I mentioned I had to bandage a few scratches, I wasn't exaggerating.

I'd also love to know how the process, yeah, the one I told you not to do, took four large bath towels. I know it's not a kitten, but geez Louise, you weren't bathing a tiger in the bathtub. I found two towels in the tub and two on the floor that were sopping wet. I don't think it's worth my while to ask why there were a pair of wet underwear in the tub as well. There are somethings I don't want to know.

There's this thing called "brotherly love." Oh, I do know that most of the time the phrase is used in jest, like right after you two try to beat the holy crap out of each other. Honestly, I believe whole-heartedly that some day you two will grow up and understand you're lucky to have a brother. One of these days, you two might need to count on each other for support. I know, I know, you can't pick your family, but sometimes you have to make the best of what you've been given. I know you think I'm full of crap when I say you should count your blessings, but someday, you might see it for yourself.

Could we please keep the Kung-fu ninja moves to a bare minimum? Must we raise our voices to speak to one another from a different room? Really, there's no need to yell out a window when you're affixed with two feet that could carry you out front to your brother to ask him what he did with the DVD player remote.

As you both might realize, summer vacation is almost over. I've spent many hours with you two this summer, and as you might notice, mamma's running low on tolerance and patience for your shenanigans.

Mamma is weary. She's tired of four loads of laundry daily when you change in and out of your swim trunks, only to put on clean clothes each time. She might burst into a fit of tears the next time you open the fridge and lament, "There's NEVER anything good to eat," even though I've filled every request you've made since the end of May.

Point being, your mother is close to her breaking point. She didn't want to see the movie "Hairspray" the second time, much less the eighteenth time. Same goes for "Super Bad," "Harry Potter," "The Simpson's Movie," and "Knocked Up."

No, I really am not going to take it upon myself to open a can of whoop ass, as I might have promised to do. As one of you little smart-mouthed individuals said oh so eloquently, "Going to eat your spinach, little lady?" But is it the slightest bit possible you could cut your mother a break?

It's nothing personal when I tell you I anticipate the return to school as much as hitting the lottery right now. Dirty clothes, milk curdling in cups, candy wrappers, and various handtools strewn about do not make me smile. We have things like hampers, kitchen sinks, wastebaskets, and toolboxes located at many convienient locations throughout our home. Please use them.

When my temples start to throb, it's not my heart beating with mad, mad love for you boys. It's a warning sign. It says take cover 'cause she's going to blow. A few minutes of peace and quiet, an effort here and there to clean up after yourselves, and no knock-down-drag-out-fights would be muchly appreciated. It's cheaper than mood-altering medications, and it would definitely make me smile.

So how about it? If nothing else, could I please have my dustpan back?

With much love,
Your Mother

I've Got Bugs...and Other Confessions

I've got bugs. Not just any bugs, but horny bugs doing what is depicted in the picture. I've got Japanese beetles mating in my Chinese Elm hedges. At least it sounds like I've got some culture going on in my life. First Pearl Harbor, and now this.

This pisses me off. I discovered them last night when I was trimming the hedges. Because of course, if my hedges barely creep out towards the sidewalk, someone in this town will get bent out of shape because it somehow inhibits their ability to walk down the sidewalk. I'd just as soon prefer that no one walks down the sidewalk. Also, a little branch hanging out here and there slows down the retarded neighbor kids who must be on a mission to scratch the holy hell out of my car with their bicycles.

Hostile much? Why yes, I am today. Thanks for noticing.

I used no less than a half a can of flying insect killer last night on the little bastards. I went in search of some beetle bag to catch them, but wasn't about to drive to Lowe's from the south end of town when I couldn't find them anywhere. So I bought some more killer-in-a-can and saturated about a gazillion of the little suckers this afternoon.

Besides the fact that they are eating the leaves on the hedges down to nothing but a skeletal remain of a leaf, these things freak me the hell out. That green color. It's like something out of a bad B movie about alien invasion or nuclear warfare. Should one bite me, I imagine I'd transform into Beetle Woman, doing whatever it is that beetles do when they fight crime.

Speaking of being pissed, pissy seems to be the tone of the day.

When I went to the grocery in search of a beetle bag, and came out $65 poorer and beetle bagless, the young gay boy who was at the register did this nasally whine. "I've got alcohoool. Could you come over here and ring this up, pleaassse?"

You might have thought I'd asked him for a pint of blood rather than purchasing a twelve-pack of Bud Light with Lime. (Obviously, he wasn't old enough to sell me the booze, so he had to request help from someone over 18.) Well, freakin' excuse me.

And then, yes, then...he finishes bagging up my groceries, and leaves four bags setting there and starts ringing up the next customer. What the hell?

"Oh, don't worry about it," I said very sarcastically. "I'll get those and put them in my cart. Thank you!"

"No proooblem," he said, stereotyping himself without any help from me.

It's hot as a bitch today, and while it beats winter and being 30 below, I don't like sweating when I'm sitting still. I don't mind a little sweat from physical activity, but if only breathing is causing me to glisten, it puts me in a foul mood.

Think I'll go have a cold beer and kill some more beetle bastards.

T minus 28 Days and Counting

By my calculations, the darling children return to school ONE MONTH from today.

This saddens me in a way because it means that summer goes by much too quickly. It means that winter is just around the corner, and don't get me started on the price of LP gas and how I'm probably going to have to go donate an organ or sign up for some beta drug testing program that will make me grow a third nipple to afford to stay warm when the snow flies.

Don't get me wrong. I believe that there's such a thing as too much time that people can spend together. I think we hit that benchmark two weeks after school let out for the summer.

When the children were younger, my husband would load them up to go camping at the nearby State Park for the weekend. Actually, he would hint that he might like to go, and he'd come home to find that I had the truck packed, provisions purchased, and ready to hit the road. This is because I enjoyed those weekends alone during the summer.

He didn't take them last year. Oh, he threatened a time or two to go, but he met great resistance from the youngins' who thought they were way too cool to go camp with their old dad. They haven't gone this year either, and I don't see it happening since the tent got trashed when it was stowed in an area of the garage that is the breeding ground for mold and mildew under a leaky section of the roof. Coincidence? I think not.

I've not had 24 hours alone for well over two years. This is wrong.

Maybe I didn't exactly know what I was getting myself into with this whole motherhood thing. Perhaps I didn't think the whole "stay at home mom" thing through as well as I might have. I'm not saying I wish I didn't have kids. I'm not saying that I regret spending those formative years with my children.

What I am saying, however, is that I've had someone up my butt 24/7 for the past two months. I could get up early for a little alone time, but the oldest child gets up at the buttcrack of dawn. I could stay up late to garner some peace and quiet, except the younger child stays up all hours of the night.

I shouldn't complain, I suppose. But boy howdy, when my husband announced that he was taking a few days off before the 4th of July, I thought okay, I can handle it. I'll somehow manage to survive him in my hair for five days straight.

Except he came home on that Monday evening and announced, "I'm taking tomorrow off too!" I thought I might weep. Six days straight with a holiday thrown in for good measure. Oh be still my beating heart. I was not mentally prepared for it.

So, I'll be counting down those days. Looking forward to my days of quiet where I can hear myself think and not be mentally drained from constant interaction. Sure, I'll enjoy it for a few days, and then I'll be a little lonely, and then I'll get over that, too.

T minus 28 days and counting...

Linus Sings

Amazing. But then again, I'm easily amazed and amused.

Oh, That George Carlin

So, every where on the internet today, people are posting about the passing of George Carlin. I guess it is hard to believe he was 71, but I do have to say, he looked old when he played the conductor on "Shining Time Station," which my kids loved to watch because of Thomas the Tank Engine.

That was not my first introduction to Carlin, however.

Growing up in the rural area that I did, we didn't have cable television. The closest I came to music videos was watching "Friday Night Videos." We didn't have HBO or Nickelodeon. If the rabbit ears were bent just so, we could get six stations, two of them being PBS. Renting movies was a relatively new concept, and like most parents, mine wouldn't willingly rent rated R movies for their children to watch. It was a rather sheltered life.

But my step-grandma, she had cable. One afternoon in the early 80s, my step-mom dropped three of us off at her house. The younger two kids had baton practice or something. I don't know why we were all dragged along, but it was likely because we weren't allowed to stay home alone if it could be avoided. I'm guessing I was a freshman in high school at the time, and that would have made my other siblings 14 and 11ish at the time.

We walked into the step-grandma's house, and naturally, we turned on the TV. My favorite was "You Can't Do That on Television" on Nick, but since it wasn't on, my step-sister started flipping through the stations (by turning the knob on the cable box...no remote control technology just yet).

She happened upon HBO. We were hoping for another playing of "Clash of the Titans," which I think we'd watched a good dozen times. What a great movie that was for someone who'd spent a lifetime of watching network television. Instead, we found Carlin doing his HBO special "Carlin on Campus."

We tuned in about the time he started talking about driving. I don't know if he threw out a F-word, or two, or three, while my step-mom was still standing there, but she forbade us from watching it. "Turn that channel right now!" she screeched.

We continued to giggle.

"You are not watching this. Change it now. You better not put it back when I leave," she said.

So, my step-sister changed the channel, and as soon her mom pulled away, she put it back.

Now, I was always the good girl. I listened, and I never wanted to risk getting into more trouble. My step-sister, however, pushed her limits anytime her mother set any. But it was a bit rather like having some forbidden fruit dangled in front of our faces and being told not to touch, taste, inspect, etc.

The front door opened about the time that Carlin got up to his theories on having a screen on the back of your car. That way, you could type your feelings on the way others drive, and it would be displayed on the back of your car. "You drive like old people $^%&! Slow and sloppy," Carlin said just as we were busted.

The step-mom had forgotten something. My brother and I totally denied having anything to do with the channel somehow managing to get back to HBO. Oh yes, we didn't hesitate to let our step-mom know that her precious little cherub wanted to watch Carlin. "If I find out you turned it back, you are all three grounded!"

But I do have to admit I wanted to watch it, too. I'd never seen a comedian let the curse words rip. I'd never watched anyone who could take those minute observations on the human condition and make them so damn funny.

We knew our step-mom wasn't coming back. Otherwise, the two other kids would be late for practice. It didn't stop us from taking turns keeping watch at the door, but that was okay, because we could still see the TV from our post by the door.

We watched, and we laughed. We laughed until tears rolled down our faces. We laughed about things we probably didn't totally understand, but nonetheless, we knew he was funny.

I was a fan of Carlin since that day we happened upon his HBO special. I admired the man who's comedy pushed the limits. RIP, George, and thanks for the laughs.

Two Guys and a Lion

When I first started watching this, I thought no good is going to come from this little lion reunion. I was pleasantly surprised that I was wrong.

It makes me a little teary.

Crazy Neighbor Kid, Continued

I have a feeling there's going to be plenty to say about this crazy girl.

One afternoon last week, she stormed my porch and pounded the hell out of my door. This got my dog all worked up because go figure, when someone comes flying up the steps and frantically knocking, he thinks something is wrong.

I cautiously opened the main door and told her she best step back and close the storm door before my dog made an afternoon snack out of her.

"It's urgent!" she said out of breath. "I need your help! It's an urgent emergency."

Are there any other kind, I wondered. Oh hell, who is dead or dismembered, I thought. Because if it's an urgent emergency, I'm guessing there's blood and protruding bones involved.

"The post office," she huffed and puffed, "what time will it be open tomorrow?"

I craned my neck to look at the clock, "Uh, it will be open in 15 minutes after the lunch break," I told her.

Then she proceeded to ramble on something about her mom's birthday. She counted days on her fingers, lying her cash down on the steps to use both hands.

"Look," I told her. "You've got to stop running up in my yard like that. The last time, you scared a cat up a tree, and today, you've got my dog thinking you're an axe murderer. When you yell about urgent emergencies, which is redundant speech by the way, the dog and I both think there's something really wrong, and that's not nice when it's not really an emergency. Do you understand because I don't want you to get bit or knocked down by my dog?"

She nodded her head, gave me a vacant stare, and started prattling about heart or dog stamps.

I shook my head. "Pick out whatever you think your mom would like best," I told her. "I've got things to do. See you later." I shut the door.

On Sunday, my husband was outside raking up some fallen twigs and branches from the storm we had over the weekend. I heard him talking to someone and went outside. There she stood, again all flustered and having trouble breathing. She only lives about a block around the corner, so I don't know. Maybe she's got asthma or something.

I couldn't help myself when I asked, "Now what?"

There was a snake, apparently a dead snake, and she was quite animated. What she didn't realize is that my husband is the wrong guy to be asking when it comes to even a brief discussion about snakes. He doesn't like them at all. I don't care for them, but my dislike can't hold a candle to his.

I'm really not sure what she wanted from us, but I made it clear he wasn't going to go hunt down a snake for her, and I most certainly was not. She said she thought it was dead because it was bleeding.

"Well, what happened to it?" I asked.

"I killed it, but I can't cut it in half because they do have really tough skin," she told me.

My husband suggested she get a plastic bag and pick it up after she said that she and her mom were really afraid of them, but she wanted to prove to her parents that she was right that there was a snake in the tall grass behind her house, and that she wasn't lying.

Then she said, "My mom and I are voracious of them."

To which my husband said, "Huh?"

"My mom and I are voracious of snakes."

Again, he said, "Huh?"

"Voracious."

"Huh?"

"I think she means scared," I said.

"Yes, we're scared," she exclaimed.

"Get a bag and pick up the snake," I told her. "And voracious means eager or greedy. Like you have a voracious appetite when you're really, really hungry."

Hey, if she's going to show up at my house and have "urgent emergencies" and "be voracious of snakes," she might as well get an English lesson if she's taking up my time.

"You're the best!" she told my husband. "I just like you so very much," she called out as she peddled away on her bicycle. "I like you so very much."

I looked at my husband and said, "I like you so very much, so very, very much. Ahh, you've made a friend."

Scenes from the ER

My son, on the right, and his friend. My son commented, "Think I'm going to wear this bracelet thing to school tomorrow. Looks like I've been to the fair and bought a ride bracelet."


"Let me wrap the ice around your hurt hand while you text with your good one." Well, because we know how important it is to text.

Okay, okay, so I'm guilty, too. I sat there texting as well, but I had to hold onto some shred of sanity and not risk being whisked off for a psych evaluation and 72 hours of observation.
"Enough, Mom, put the cell phone away. Hey, why don't you go back to texting your friends and stop taking my pic?"

The Phone Call

When it was all said and done, my oldest son said to me, "Please don't write about this in your column, Mom."

Tuesday evening, the phone rang. It was right around the time my son would be calling letting me know he was leaving work. I'd told him before he left that I didn't think I needed anything from the store, so he didn't have to call before coming home.

Usually, though, he calls anyway and lets me know. He didn't that evening, though.

I heard background noise...wind, an animated discussion, and what sort of sounded like laughter.

"Hello?" I said into the receiver, a little miffed. It drives me just this side of insane at times when he calls and he's carrying on like a teenage boy in the background with his friends. Far be it for me to be bothered by things like that, but it does. If you're calling to speak to me, shut up the others in the background and talk to me. It's not that my time is oh so precious, but it's one of those pet peeves of mine.

"Mooommm, oh god, moooommm," he said. I couldn't tell if he were laughing or crying, but it's not unusual for him to be giggling. He's a spirited kid with a great sense of humor who loves to laugh. Conversations have started many times like those when he's calling to tell me something funny that he's seen or heard.

"My truck. I wrecked. It went on it's side and we rolled it."

"Are you okay? Is your friend okay?" I asked.

"We're okay. My hand, I think it's broken. My truck. I rolled it. I wrecked, Mom. I'm so sorry. I didn't mean to. I started to slide. I hit a wet spot," he continued.

"Where are you?"

"I'm up the road by grandma's house. I'm sorry, Mom. My truck. Oh god, mom, don't be mad at me."

"You're by grandma's?" It was becoming all like a bad dream.

"Out by grandma's, just up from her house," he responded. "We're okay, my hand, it hurts. I think it's broken."

"I'll be right there," I said, and tried to hang up.

"I didn't mean to. It was wet, I hit a slick spot."

"Okay, I'll be right there. I love you, I'll be right there," I said in my ever-growing panic.

Grandma's is only about a mile and a half away. My husband, of course, was out of town for work because no kind of disaster ever strikes when he's home. I'm convinced if he didn't work out of town, life would be smooth sailing without turmoil.

My youngest son had taken off on his motorcycle a few minutes earlier. I ran out the door, bellowing his name at the top of my lungs. Likely, if he hadn't been several blocks away, he would have heard me even above the roar of his engine.

The neighbor, I thought. I should let him know that something has happened so he can tell my youngest son where I went.

I think it took three steps perhaps to make it across the street to his front door. I'm not sure I didn't levitate above the ground. His girlfriend answered, and invited me in. They were hosting a birthday party for her little girl, and above the commotion of excited toddlers, she got his attention.

I managed to ramble something about a wreck, not knowing where my youngest was, over by grandma's, probably a broken hand, rolled truck. Since I wasn't speaking fluent English, he told me he would go along. I started to run to my car. "Get in my truck," he instructed.

I was shaking so badly I don't know how I managed to call my husband on my cell phone. The scenery flew by the windshield due to our speed, and I thought I might throw up. My hands shook so badly I could barely hold the phone to let my husband know what was going on.

When we arrived, a guy I knew from my youth was waiting with my son and his friend. I made sure they were okay, and got the low down on what happened.

The road is chip and seal. It had just rained. The tar that comes to the surface, making it shiny and slick, caused him to fishtail. I could see marks on the road where he lost control and never regained it.

The truck set in the edge of the field. They'd flipped it upright after they crawled out. The tires on the driver's side were flattened as it is set on its rims.

A few minutes later, the other boy's parents showed up. We stood there deciding what to do once we had assessed that neither of the boys were seriously injured. My son's hand continued to swell as we waited for the sheriff to show up to file an accident report.

The truck was really the least of my worries, but my son continued to freak out. He was worried he was going to be grounded. He was worried about having nothing to drive to get to work. I really didn't care about this. All that mattered to me was that the kids hadn't been seriously injured or worse. I was also thankful they were both wearing their seatbelts.

I called my brother, who was luckily home just a mile away. He arrived to help us out. While waiting on the sheriff, I was sent home to get ice and warm clothing. The temp had dropped dramatically and the wind whipped. I hardly realized that I had goosebumps and was freezing.

After the second phone call to the sheriff's dept., someone arrived. "You sure you don't want the EMS?" he kept asking me. "You really should get him to the ER," he kept suggesting.

Well, yes, I really should have 40 minutes prior to this, but I couldn't necessarily take my child and flee the scene of an accident.

On my trip home for ice, I found my youngest son. My neighbor's sister also drove me back in my car because I was still shaking and rambling on incoherently. Even in those early moment, the "what ifs" played in my mind.

What if they'd been going faster, flipped, and rolled repeatedly and had been really hurt. What if they hadn't been wearing their seatbelts. What if they'd been pinned and unconscious.

The "what ifs" can really mess with your mind.

By the time we finally left, half the town had been there at one point to make sure everything was okay and that we didn't need anything. There's a lot of negative things one can say about living in a small town, but in times like those, it makes it all worth while. My neighbor didn't leave until the truck had pumped up tires on it and they were able to drive it to my brother's house. He kept an eye on my youngest son until I got home. I thanked him repeatedly, and aplogized profusely for crashing the birthday party.

We got right into the ER. The x-rays revealed a broken hand, though they couldn't put a cast on it because of the swelling.

The accident happened around 7:30 that evening. It was after 11 when we finally got home. I tucked my son in, much like I had when he was a little guy, making sure his arm was elevated and he had what he needed. I returned to his bedroom a few times to check on him like I did when he was a babe to be sure he was still breathing. I peeped in on my 17 year old son, just as i had when he was a fragile, tiny newborn.

Sometime around 2 a.m. I finally drifted off to sleep, my head still full of those what ifs while I came down off that adrenaline high.

I had a similar call back in the winter, when he slid off a road and put his truck in the ditch due to icy conditions. Those phone calls are the ones that a parent dreads getting. Since Tuesday evening, I think I nearly jump out of my skin every time the phone rings.

I wonder if it's possible to direct both of the children back into the womb where I can watch over them, knowing where they're at, and protecting them.

The Big Race Was Cancelled

Back in the early spring, there was a knock on the door one Saturday morning. The rest of my family had headed out for a wrestling tournament, and I elected to stay home.

I answered the door, and this little girl, maybe 10ish stood there. Kids don't knock on the door unless they are selling something, looking for one of my kids, or telling on one of my kids. I get a lot of the latter where my youngest son is concerned.

I gave her my customary "Uhh, can I help you?" greeting when she stood there staring at me. What I didn't realize is that she was trying to reign in her brain and form a sentence.

"I've had it," she yelled. "That boy who lives here and that boy who lives there keep picking on my brother, and I've just had it."

"Umm, okay. Which boy are you talking about? Three boys live here. (I figured I'd include my husband in the count because he can be an ornery sort.) And who is your brother?"

"That boy with the blonde hair, and my brother is the little red headed boy, and they are picking on him, and they are picking on him, and I've had enough. I'm telling you that I've had enough."

There were a lot of grunts and various tics mixed in with her speech, and to be honest, she scared me a little. I was pretty sure my youngest son was involved as I continued to ask her questions. She answered me, and each response was peppered with, "I've had enough," and a move that I'm surprised didn't give her some self-inflicted whiplash. I'm guessing she's on medication for Tourette's or something.

Whatever went down, went down months before, according to my son who I later questioned. She went over to the neighbors' house as well to report her unhappiness with the situation before she talked to me.

I said I was sorry she was so upset, and mainly I was sorry because I thought she was going to blow a gasket on my front porch. Girls are unique creatures to me, even though I am one. I think sometimes when they get in that 'tween range you have to treat them like wild animals - as in sometimes not knowing if they'll attack.

She reminded me of the old woman in the "Wizard of Oz" when she peddled away on her bike with a basket and flag. She peddled with that kind of determination that no child that age should feel.

Flash forward to a few weeks ago when the weather began to warm. She was back out on her bike, this time riding by repeatedly. Sometimes, I'd catch a glimpse of her little red headed brother. My youngest was in the back yard working on his motorcycle when he came back to report that "that girl" freaked him out.

She kept riding by, and riding by. When he returned to the back yard, I heard a bit of a commotion as he had to chase both the kids away. The boy was sitting on his motorcycle and the girl kept asking him what he was doing. My son isn't a patient child, and he's prone to picking on others. I don't know where he gets it, honestly. No, not a clue.

"Mom, would you please tell her to go away?" my son pleaded with me. But what could I do? She was riding on the street. I couldn't stop her from doing that. I told him to simply ignore her, but no, that would be too easy.

Flash forward to the previous weekend. My husband and I came home to find both of our sons in the alley laughing their asses off. The oldest, who has a warped sense of humor like his mother, was laughing so hard that tears were flowing down his cheek.

The girl in question kept riding her bike down the alley, which really isn't an alley, but more like a grass path that separates our properties. The youngest yelled, "BOO," at the top of his lungs, which startled the girl, causing her to nearly wipe out.

This apparently didn't faze her because she yelled out, "Hey, you big jerks, I'm training for a big bike race on Sunday, so leave me alone."

I guess training for the bike race means stalking my sons. I think she's got a crush on them.

She continued to make her rounds this past weekend, this time, her little brother following behind her throwing rocks at my sons. He's a little guy, so this sort of surprised me that he would load up the basket on his bike with intentions of pelting my 15 and 17 year old children. This alone made me giggle. I didn't want any broken windows, but I had a good idea that my sons probably deserved it.

I was still outside when the boy pulled up on his bike. "I'm sorry guys," he said. "I know what I did was wrong, and I won't throw rocks at you anymore."

My oldest was biting his lower lip to keep from howling with laughter. The youngest didn't say anything beyond, "Uh huh," because he was trying to not laugh.

"That's nice of you to apologize," I told the boy.

"Do you boys forgive me?" he asked.

"Yes," my oldest said, and this time, he did chuckle.

I asked them what that was all about, and apparently, my oldest spawn said something like this to the poor kid, "Throw another rock at me, you little snot, and I'll call the cops on you if I so much as see you near our property again."

Then the girl comes riding up.

"Hey, lady," she said to me. "I've got a problem with your boys. They are telling me that this isn't my bicycle, and they won't let me train for my race. They are being mean to me, and I want you to make them stop."

"Is it your bike?" I asked her.

"Yes, it is MY bike," she yelled back at me.

"Well, if it's your bike, and you know it's your bike, why worry? How did the big race go?" I asked her, full well knowing there was no big race. I couldn't resist.

"It got cancelled because my dad had to do his race and there wasn't time for me to do my race, but there's going to be another one next weekend, and I'll take pictures for you because you just won't believe it. You just won't believe it."

"Well, okay then. How about you ignore my boys? They'll ignore you. Everybody will ignore everyone else, and life will be grand. How about you stop riding by taunting them, and then you won't have to worry?" I suggested.

"Well okay, how about it boys? Do we have a deal? If I ignore you, will you ignore me?" she asked my kids.

"I'm sorry, I don't know what you just said because I'm currently ignoring you," my youngest said doing his best Billy Madison impression.

Of course, these neighbor kids are home schooled, and I don't think they watch much TV. It went right over her head. Actually, they are home schooled because two years ago, when they were in kindergarten and second grade, they both were kicked off the bus because the boy tried to bite the bus driver and the girl called the bus driver a bitch.

"Is it a deal or not?" she asked, very loudly, and she threw her head to the side, and I thought she was about to have some sort of fit.

"Just go home," I told her.

A few minutes later, I glanced out the window to see her riding by with her father.

I get the feeling it's going to be a long summer.

Holiday Weekend, Part III

Last year for my husband's birthday, I got him a GPS unit. Shortly thereafter, we started geocaching. I can't say I get the same rush finding the cache tucked in somewhere, but it's worked well for us. He'll map out caches in rural cemeteries, and while he tracks down the treasure, I'll walk around looking at gravestones.


Sometimes, I take my camera with me. This used to bother him. If someone else was in the cemetery, he said it was disrespectful of me to be snapping photos of dead people who I don't know. I guess he's gotten over it because it doesn't seem to bother him as much.

We headed out Sunday afternoon to a few places. I forgot my camera, and being the dumbass that I am, I forgot that my new cell phone has a camera.

I remembered my digital camera on Monday, obviously.


I've no idea what this symbol is. Weeping Willow tree?

I'm always amazed when we stumble upon a well-kept, old cemetery. This wasn't the case, however. I didn't dare step too close to this for fear the ground would swallow me up.
There were several small headstones buried in this mass of raspberry vines and Tiger lilies.
I loved this tree. The geocache that my husband was searching for was tucked into the knothole.

I'd never seen anything like this tree, and there were two of them covered in these viney, root thingies.
I imagine the conversation went something like this.

"Hey Carl, what do I do with these pieces of field tile so I don't mess up my mower?"

"Just put 'em over yonder between those two headstones, Vern."

I would love to go back in the fall and see this Virginia Creeper in all its red glory.
I hope Sam doesn't mind being "creeped."
I wonder what happened to the fence that once attached to this great gate.

A lonely old-fashioned Columbine and some wild strawberries.
Wild mustard? I'm not sure what this yellow flower is that has been dominate in all the fields the last couple years. What remains of a fence row.
That stuff that grows on gravestones, except I was boggled by the color of it. This was a huge, newer cemetery. You could almost make hay, and apparently, weedwhacking wasn't a high priority for the holiday weekend. The smaller stones were almost hidden by the tall grass. It was disgraceful to see something like this in a cemetery that is still open for new arrivals.

Indiana this time of the year. I was snapping pics as we drove. Fields and woods, fields and woods. There's more than corn in IN - there's also John Deere tractors.

Holiday Weekend, Part II

I suppose it had to happen eventually. After 18 years of marriage, my husband and I have become one of those old, bickering couples who will argue about anything. I may have to start pummeling him with something when he starts getting senile and I get nothing done but reminding, correcting, and refreshing his memory.

I dragged him off to Walmart with me on Saturday. He sees it as a means of punishment, and I honestly think he thinks if he acts like it's his first day out in civilization, I'll stop making him go with me on the weekend. But that's not going to happen. I've pretty much grown immune to his antics.

He'll whip out his cell phone and make a documentary of our shopping adventures - complete with commentary about the other shoppers. He'll take pics of my butt as he follows behind me. Sometimes, I'll send him off to get something I've forgotten and I'll end up losing him. I'll spend as much time looking for him as I do shopping. Thank goodness, we got rid of the Nextel phones with the direct connect capabilities. He found it quite funny to say things like "nice butt" or "what a stud" so someone standing near me thought I was saying it.

He forgot his phone on Saturday, though. I guess since he didn't have his phone to distract his attention, he was going to ponder the shopping carts.

As soon as we walked in, he looked at the shopping carts and said, "Hmm, new carts."

"I don't think so. The last time I was here, they were in various stages of refurbishing. Some had those new brackets on them," I told him.

"Hmm, maybe they just reinforced them and spray painted them," he said.

We did our shopping, and he mentioned the cart a few more times. "I think these are new," he told me.

I don't know why it was important to me to repeat what I said. "I think they are just redoing them. I don't think they are new."

Obviously, he was not going to accept my theory that they were rebuilding the carts, fixing what was wrong with them, and slapping on a coat of gray, speckled paint. We got out to the parking lot, and I was handing him bags as he put them in the back of his truck.

"Maybe they just slapped on a new coat of paint on them," he said. "I don't know. They might be new."

"I told you that the brackets were on some carts the last time I was here. They are rebuilding them. Why don't you listen to what I tell you?"

"You might be right. Hey, the wheels are new," he said as he inspected the cart.

I stood there shaking my head, and I took over unloading the remaining grocery bags.

"Hey, your boyfriend is staring at you," he said.

"Uh, my boyfriend?" I asked. In my husband's estimation, anyone I know who I am not married to and male is my "boyfriend."

"Jody, whatever his name is. He's over there with his son."

I glanced across the parking lot, and sure enough I was being stared at and the guy did have his son with him. I returned his wave, because I'm always waving at my "boyfriends."

"See? Told you that your boyfriend was checking you out."

"Uh, you dork. That's my step-brother Jeff. Good god. My boyfriend? Yes, my step-brother is my boyfriend," I said, a little bit on the sarcastic side.

We got in the truck, and as we passed the cart return, he said, "I wonder if they are getting all new carts or replacing the broken ones."

Holiday Weekend, Part I

I must admit that I dreaded this holiday weekend going into it.

The previous weekend, our youngest son noted water standing in the alley and yard beside the utility room. It wasn't a lake by any means, but water was standing where water hadn't ought to be standing, and since it hadn't rained, I put on my ole thinking cap and arrived at the idea that it was probably the washing machine drain.

It helped to tip me off that I could smell laundry detergent and there were worms floating all over the place. (Soapy water drives worms to the surface. It's a neat little trick to use when you need some worms to go fishing. Soak an area of your yard in soapy water, and voila! You will have bait.) Another clue was when I grabbed the Y shaped PVC drain behind the washer, it fell through with a thump to the ground beneath the house.

I became quite an expert crawling under the house over this past winter. Something was always freezing up. The one thing about when it is cold is the fact that there are no spiders, snakes, and other creepy crawlies. So not only are we fully into spider season, but there was also the small fact this plumbing is under a different section of the house - a section of the house designed for anorexic plumbers.

I knew my husband couldn't fit under there. My dad told us to cut a hole in the utility room floor. (He grew up in this house, and as a child, he'd been sent under there a time or two and knew there was little wiggle room for an average size guy.) Really, I'm not kidding. Anyone over about 180 lbs wasn't going to fit. I started making a mental list of all the skinny people I know and put them on speed dial.

It was up to our 15 year old son. I crossed my fingers when we sent him under there. Thankfully, he doesn't have any claustrophobic tendencies like his mother. A piece of rubber drain had dry rotted over the years, and that was the problem. A new coupling was all it took. I reassembled the drain behind the washer while our son took care of the plumbing underneath.

I was so relieved that I didn't have to get under there and it was a rather simple fix.

You see, any time my husband has to get involved in something like that he does one of two things, and sometimes both - he will threaten to burn the house down or divorce me. I don't know how either really solves the problem at hand, but either way, I usually end up wondering if I'm going to end up homeless before the problem is remedied.

Also, our luck usually goes something like this - attempt to fix the problem at hand, and lo and behold, find something else that is wrong. I'm happy to say that wasn't the case. (Knock on wood.)

Anyway, I was so relieved and happy when it was taken care of, I could have danced on the coffee table. But, I didn't because I reserve dancing on the coffee table for the first day of school and the return to school after Christmas break.

The Dangers of Frozen Vegetables

I was doing the good wife/mom thing yesterday afternoon and cooking up some dinner. Supper, if you're from IN, I suppose, which I am...and I do call it supper sometimes, but it confuses my husband who is not originally from IN. Regardless, I was whipping up a meatloaf and decided I better get a package of frozen corn out of the freezer.

We freeze corn from the garden each year, so when that quart ziploc bag is full, it's full. And it's heavy. And when it falls several feet, it can be deadly.

Two bags were fused together, so I held them just below my chin and attempted to pry them apart. Okay, so probably the smartest move wasn't drying my hands well after washing them. When the bags broke free, they slipped out of my hands, and one of them hit my left shin. Boy, howdy, did that smart. But that wasn't the worst of it.

The other bag landed on the top of my right foot. So yes, not only did I try to mangle, multilate and spindle one leg, but I managed to do damage to both. It's a talent, I say. It hit hard enough I actually bled.

I didn't realize I was bleeding until after I finished seeing stars. I finally understood what that kind of pain was.

When I was pregnant with our oldest son in AZ, I saw a dr. named Duck Kwan Oh. I kid you not. I couldn't even make it up that my baby dr. was named Duck. Actually, he went by the name Richard Oh. That's not quite as interesting in the telling, however. He did give us a bib for the baby that said, "I was delivered by Dr. Duck Kwan Oh."

Back to seeing stars. I asked Dr. Duck one day, "When do I go to the hospital?"

I'd read plenty about contractions, timing them, and that different drs. had different ideas of when you should arrive at the hospital. I think my pregnancy bible, What to Expect When You're Expecting, recommended arriving when the contractions were five minutes apart.

"When you see stars," he told me.

I think maybe he was trying to be funny. I was not amused, however. I was pregnant. I was 1800 miles away from home. It was my first baby, and did I forget to mention that Operation Desert Storm was in full swing? My husband told me that he could be deployed at any time. He could get up one morning, go to work, and not show up back home. If I were lucky, the Army might give me a call to let me know that my husband had been sent off to Saudi.

Needless to say, what should have been one of the happiest times of my life was peppered with a lot of mixed feelings and emotions. I wasn't in the mood for Dr. Duck and his stand-up routine.

"Pardon me?" I asked. I asked him that a lot, as he spoke with a really heavy Korean accent. I didn't pick him as a dr. He was assigned to me by the Army. I couldn't understand half of what the man told me.

"Come to hospital when you see stars," he told me.

I asked him once about the RH factor and why I needed a Rhogam shot. I'd read everything I could get my hands on. Every book in the library. I owned every book the bookstore carried about birthing babies. I wanted it explained to me, in plain English, because my pregnancy bible only had a paragraph about the RH factor.

"You must get the shot or baby die."

Well, that was a helpful answer. I went home and bawled my freakin' eyes out. When my husband got home and saw the tears, he got on the phone and asked Dr. Duck what the hell was going on because I was crying so hard I couldn't explain.

I never did see stars, and I played it safe going when my contractions were five minutes apart. After our boy was born, Dr. Duck held up the placenta and asked, "Anyone want hamburger?"

I looked at him and said, "I don't eat red meat." My husband laughed. My husband thought he was hilarious.

But yesterday, I did see those stars. Wow, that hurt like a son of a gun. I really thought I'd broken my foot. It hurt so bad that I didn't even cry.

My husband came home and took a look at my foot and reported that it was very bruised, but not swollen enough to be broken. He put some ice on it, gave me a percocet, and I have to say at that point, I didn't really care that it hurt.

Today, it's quite tender and my toes look like vienna sausages. (How's that for a visual?) And the best part is that my husband told me I should probably try to stay off of it, keep it elevated, and iced for a few days.

Did I just hear an excuse to sit around on my ass? Why yes, I do believe I did.

Oooh, Eerie, I Must Say

When it comes to the things that go bump in the night, I'm really not too easily bothered. If I can't find a good explanation, I typically think "hmm" and go on with my business. Strangely enough, I'm slightly bothered by the afternoon's events.

The kids came home from school today. The oldest got ready for work. I was getting ready to run to CVS. The youngest decided that he wanted to go along so that he could drive.

Have I mentioned how scary it can be to ride with someone who's just learning to drive? Well, that wasn't the freaky part, but it's enough to make one want to drink heavily.

He has his permit, though he's only in the book part of driver's training. I've let him drive on gravel roads and around our little town, but not in traffic. He was trying to talk me into letting him drive to the store, and well, since I didn't have a sucking chest wound or need some other medical treatment, I thought ah, don't think I'm quite ready for him and traffic.

But, I told him he could take back roads part way there, and then we'd switch.

I could not find my car keys with the house key on it. I knew I had them this morning when I took him to driver's training at the school. I looked in all the usual places - purse, stand by the door, etc. I even looked in the pocket of the sweatshirt I wore this morning. I looked in the kitchen, and they weren't on either of the three built-in shelves at the corner of the cabinets.

I know they weren't there because I picked up a 5 and a 1 dollar bill and moved them to the second shelf, and thought okay, good there's lunch money for the kids tomorrow. The only keys there were some hanging on the nail, no clue what it goes to, and the old truck keys on a bright green key fob.

My car keys were not there. I know they weren't. I moved that money and looked under it. In fact, I'd moved the money to the second shelf.

I walked around looking for my keys and nothing. I went back to the shelf again, and the money was back on the first shelf and there were my keys tucked under the cash. I told the youngest and he kept saying, "Nu uh, that didn't really happen. No way. You're nuts. Nu uh. You're lying." Then he finally says, "That really happened?"

I was like, "Uh, yeah, weird huh?"

So, we get in the car and he does alright except I have to keep telling him not to take off like he needs to be going 50 before he's gone a block. We turned on my brother's road, which is gravel, and went by the old cemetery.

I noticed it looked like someone had been planted recently, so I told him to pull in. It's a big U- shaped drive and the bushes, mainly an evergreen variety which are huge, are dangerously close to the drive unless you ride a bike into the cemetery. I cautioned him to be careful because I didn't want the car scratched.

We looked at the gravestones from the car. I explained the old woman had died recently, and that big rock marking her and her husband's site had been there for many years now, even before he died. I noticed there was some straw down over another fresh grave, and I attempted to read the headstone.

"Pull up a little," I told him. He started driving forward and the doors in the car start locking and unlocking. He freaks and he's asking me did I see that. I saw it, and I had no rational explanation.

He locked the doors with the button that locks all four, and damned if they didn't unlock on their own again. The car does have electronic locks, and they will lock on their own if the car reaches 15 mph. He wasn't going 15 mph, we were creeping forward, and the doors unlocked instead of locking, regardless.

This really freaked the child out, and he's all panicky, and damned if he didn't sideswipe the bushes going out. It didn't scratch the car, but my mirror got some decorative greenery.

I was like holy shit, I told you to watch those bushes. And he said he was too worried about the doors locking and unlocking and such, and my keys missing and appearing, so that's why he hit the bushes.

As I was sitting here after getting back home, I thought I saw a white figure to my left out of the corner of my eye. It's overcast and dark, and no lights were on in the dining room where I saw it, and it gave off a "lighter than light" sort of appearance. Sort of like when I've seen something that was blacker than night, but just the opposite.

Cue the "Twilight Zone" music because it's been a weird a day.

VH-1 Junkie

I have to admit that I'm a VH-1 junkie. It doesn't seem like all that many years ago, if given a choice between MTV and VH-1, I'd be watching MTV. VH-1 seemed to cater to the "old people" in my estimation back in my 20s.

Last night, I was lucky enough to be flipping through the channels and caught the first episode of "Sex: The Revolution." It's a four-part documentary. Even a nicer treat was that part II followed.

I did fall asleep before it was over. I had a sneaking suspicion I'd matured when I started cleaning out the lint trap of the dryer and actually throwing the lint away instead of letting it pile up on the dryer's top. I'm fairly confident I've matured when I actually turn off the TV because I can't keep my eyes open any longer. (That doesn't happen too often, however. If I can make it past 10 pm, I'm usually wired for sound. Even when I have to get up early the next day, I can adjust to getting little sleep. But I suppose that's another blog topic.)

Part I started out with the sexually repressed days of the 50s. Alfred Kinsey and his "Kinsey Report" about the sexual habits of people, Hugh Hefner and Playboy, back alley abortions, and THE PILL.

I'd heard the stories about the early days of "the pill." My grandma told me the story about how the neighbor lady started taking "the pill" (grandma would almost whisper it like she'd said a bad word), and later died due to complications. I was young enough that I didn't question it, but I did realize they had to work out a few bugs with the high dosages of hormones that seemed to wreck havoc on one's system.

There's a slight sadness I feel that I didn't get the opportunity to discuss things of that nature with my grandma. But it's understandable. She was raised during a time where sex was for men, and women most certainly weren't supposed to enjoy it. As the old Virginia Slim ads stated, "We've come a long way, baby."

Remember there was a time when a couple couldn't be shown in the same bed on TV? Think Lucy and Ricky on "I Love Lucy." Then wham bam, the sexual revolution hits, and there are commercials for hair dye that question, "Does she do it? Or doesn't she?" Of course, they were talking about whether the chick colored her hair, but boy howdy, sex starting selling, and it hasn't stopped yet.

Part II started introducing the sexual revolution that I was more familiar with - the hippies, flower children, free love, naked party time in general. It was fascinating, despite the fact I started dozing during the commercials. It's okay, though, being the VH-1 junkie that I am, I'll undoubtedly watch each of the four parts no less than 3 times each.

It's definitely worth a watch, although they seem to jam pack as much information as possible into the hour-long show. It's only slight bizarre that Cybil Shepherd spoke of getting her first prescription to the pill, and how she and her boyfriend marvelled over the notion that they could be doing it like rabbits.