Month: September 2011

When The Teacher Girl moved back home to do her student-teaching gig, she got me hooked on Wheel of Fortune.  Every night, we’d watch it together, solving puzzles, shouting out letters, yelling at contestants.  It is a well-known fact around here, that I cannot be beat.  Why?  Three reasons.  I love words.  I’ve cracked the Wheel code.  I am The Mother of All Dorks.

Before & After………….Concentrate on solving the first or second half, not the whole puzzle.  As soon as you’ve solved half of it, the rest is easy.

Prize Puzzle……….Always has to do with a destination spot.  Think beaches and you’re going to Hawaii.

Final Spin……….If it’s one word you’re toast.  Hard as hell to solve, but think compound word.

The kids always tell me I should try out for the Wheel and win my fortune, and I’ve considered it.  However, it is also a well-known fact around here that I get diarrhea when I get one of my Nerve Spells.   If a Southwest flight I was on should have an outbreak of the scoots, I could supply every passenger with Immodium because I carry that much with me all the time for the Nerve Spells.

If I ever did make it to The Final Spin, I’d probably stand at the marker and get that uh-oh, pre-diarrhea feeling and end up shouting, “I’m about to crap my pants.”  Old Pat and Vanna would say, gosh, sorry, no, it’s A Pot of Gold.   Well, we don’t refer to it as that in Kansas, but okay.  Then Pat would open the envelope and show me that I just lost thirty grand, and I’d have to go back to the Land of Oz with nothing to show for my troubles but a purse full of poop pills.

The Big Daddy and I closed last week on the Refi.  We had to go to a title company to do it because banks don’t do that sort of thing any more.  They do the gathering of info, crunching of the numbers, stamp it approved, and then send you off somewhere else to close the deal.  Kind of like pimps.  Financial pimps.

We had an 8:30 appointment in a big office building with nice carpet.  Nicer than we have here at The Estate.  The Big Daddy and I get nervous in places that are too nice.  We like a little less perfect surroundings when we do business, like the back alley where we buy our drugs.  I kid, I kid.  More like the crappy liquor store we frequent on the way home from church.  Cuz sinners need alcohol.

We sat down with a very efficient-looking closer at a big conference table.  We were to sign in blue ink as that is a requirement these days, and she set pens in front of us.  The first piece of business was the HUD statement.  “This shows that we’ll be paying off your mortgage of $246,000.00”  WHAT THE WHAT?????? is what the what me and The Big Daddy said at the same time.  That ain’t right, sista.  “Oh dear”, she says, “I grabbed the wrong papers.”  Well, you sure did.  Maybe you should pay attention to your paperwork instead of buying more art for your hoity-toity office.

She apologized.  Many times.  We finished the deal and left feeling like oh great, a mortgage, but with a lower rate.  Yippee-ki-ay.

On the way home, we passed the dealership where we bought our car.  When the deal was done there, the salesman told us that all new owners of a vehicle get to hit the gong.  Oh, The Big Daddy doesn’t do that kind of stuff and said to me, “I feel like I’ve been gonged in the ass, why don’t you take a hit.”  For five years now,  we’ve both made it a point to give the finger to the place every time we pass it.  Cuz car dealers are right behind bankers on The Skank Meter.

We’re immature in that way.  Well, actually we’re immature in a lot of ways, and this is on the down low, but on the way out of the title company, I stole the blue pens.  Just slipped ’em right off the table and into my purse.  If The Man is going to stick it to me and My Big Daddy, well, we’re gonna hurt ’em where it counts.  In the blue pen inventory. 

Last week, I started writing a post about where I write.  Specifically, how the room that I write in is a hangout for the animals.  How, even at this very moment, the dog is licking the carpet driving me up the fricking wall.  How Beamer the Wonder Cat sits on the desk with all the papers and whacks at my hand when I move the mouse.  And how, I wondered, can a person write anything decent when THAT is going on?

I had a little more editing to do before I posted it, but for the most part it was close to being ready.  I have a fear of sounding like a goofy, old bat who leaves their estate to their bird or stores dead cats in the the freezer so Animal Control doesn’t bust me.  Therefore, charming stories about precocious pets are few and far between.

On Saturday afternoon, I was outside and my neighbor was telling me that Beamer has been eating the dog food.  Their dog’s food, in their house.  Beamer goes over every day to hang out with Dora and Bogey, and the other nite she kicked him out at 11:00 so they could go to bed.  She tells me these kinds of stories all the time, and then usually ends with, “I love that cat.  He’s so cool.”

This morning, instead of going to see Dora, Beamer went across the street where he was hit by a car.  We didn’t know about it until another neighbor was walking her dogs and found him dead on the side of the road.  Can I tell you how much we all loved this cat?  That last nite when I was laying on the couch, Beamer came and laid right with me, purring until he dozed off.  That Mallie Bee is heartbroken as this was her baby.   That Dora was pacing and crying this morning and they couldn’t figure out what was wrong with her.  That these lovely women who live next door to us both cried when they heard what happened.  That we put Beamer in a bag in the backyard until we could bury him and that another cat in the neighborhood came and sat beside him.

This pet who made a best friend next door, and brought out the wild in Dora so much that they both hopped a fence and laid on a picnic table taunting a Great Dane inside.  This pet who was a bit of a shit starter and a lot of a wild one that was a perfect fit for our family.  This pet that we didn’t get to have around nearly as long as we wanted, and will likely turn me into a batty, old lady who sits on a park bench telling stories about a cat she once had named Beamer to anyone passing by.

Sometimes when I read news stories, I scroll down to view some of the comments.  Geez Louise..  When my own piece ran in the KC Star, some of the comments were eye-opening.  I guess when you’re anonymous and sitting in your underpants at the computer all day, you can be an idiot, but here’s some advice.  Tip #1…..read the entire piece, and not just the title.  Tip #2……..if you can’t write past the 4th grade level, then maybe you shouldn’t.

I give you this example from a news story on Huffington Post………

“This is truelly awful and embarressing. “

Truelly awful and embarressing????   No doubt, Einstein, no doubt.

It’s been a long summer around here with way too much ice cream.  I said to Junior, “How about we all go out and get some exercise?”

 
I said, “Mullet, shmullet, put Sissy behind my behind and let’s get a move on.”

When we got home, The Big Daddy said, “Ya can’t wear that when you ride a bike.  Ya have to wear spandex or you’ll end up getting the Monkey Butt.”

Source: google.com via A Speckled Trout on

Oh, he’s a stickler when it comes to proper bicycle attire, so we loaded up the truck, trucks and went to the Wal-Marts.

Source: truckspickuptrucks.com via A Speckled Trout on Pinterest

It wasn’t until we got to the mouthwash aisle of the Wal-Marts that I noticed those damn shorts of his.   I got so mad at him I said, “Didn’t I tell ya not to be wearing white after Labor Day?”   Sheesh, I thought everybody knew that fashion rule.

Source: peopleofwalmart.com via A Speckled Trout on Pinterest

Them kids was taking forever picking out snacks, and then my bad knee gots to acting up.  I said, “Let’s get this show on the road or I’m gonna  fall down right here in the Funyuns aisle.”    Junior heard me and sure enough, he comes back a few minutes later with one of them Wal-Mart Jazzys.

Source: houzz.com via A Speckled Trout on Pinterest

Finally, we finished our shopping and headed home.  I just wanted to take a load off, but I needed to water the garden, what with all the heat and dry.

Source: ffffound.com via Tina on Pinterest

I was so tired from that long day, I conked out, and who should show up in my dreams, but him………

Source: None via A Speckled Trout on Pinterest

…………..and just when he was about to show me his cleats, these two appeared giving me the stinkeye like they was holier than thou.

Surce: google.com via Jennifer on Pinterest

Last week was twenty-one years since my dad died.  I can tell you in vivid detail what that day was like.  I can tell you about waking from a sound sleep by a ringing phone, that the soul can fly away before you even put your key in the ignition, that six siblings and their spouses crammed into a hospital room at four in the morning.   I can tell you about my heartbroken Mom who thanked God for taking away the pain.  That before I left that room, I leaned into my dad’s ear and said, “Just let us know that you’re o.k. when you get settled.”  I can tell you everything, but I can’t tell you what my dad’s voice was like because I no longer remember.

My parents lived in the same neighborhood for more than forty years.  Across the street lived Ed and Doll and their two girls.  Nancy and I were best friends (she says in utero), drifted apart in high school and then back together when we got older.  We were a big family, they were small.  My dad worked for the Edison Company as a safety manager, Ed worked for the same company as a lineman.  Their house was neat and tidy, ours was bursting at the seams and usually messy.   My dad was a DIYer with a garage full of tools, and he never hesitated to lend them to Ed, which wasn’t the case with other neighbors.  You can tell a lot about a person by the way they take care of their tools, is what Dad said. 

Dad’s last summer was a daily progression of life slipping away.  It was also filled with acts of kindness that can still make me cry all these years later.  Ed and Doll were acts of kindness.  Every day one or both of them would stop by, check on my mom to see if she needed anything, pop their head in to ask Dad how he was faring, offer to bring the garbage cans to the curb.  They showed up when showing up was not for the faint of heart.   Mom was always grateful, and when she cleaned Dad’s things out after he died, she gave his red tool chest to Ed.

Doll had health issues of her own.  She had suffered her first stroke in her 40’s, and years later, a series of mini-strokes followed by another major one.  After many weeks of watching her in a coma, Ed made the decision to remove her feeding tube and let her go.  Nancy would say that her father murdered her mother.  I didn’t see it that way, but Nancy wasn’t in a listening mood when it came to her father.  The last time she saw him was at her Mom’s funeral, and they never spoke.

A few years ago, Ed wrote a letter to Nancy in hopes of trying to find some middle ground in their relationship.  I made his case, said your mom would be devastated to think this is what became of her family, that you are showing your kids that resolving conflict is kicking somebody out of your life, and maybe they’ll do the same to you one day.   I begged her to hear him out, but she never responded.

I eventually gave up, and our friendship has withered away as a result.  I gave up because she told a story that made her dad out to be a heartless, cruel man who tossed his wife aside like a cigarette butt.  I gave up because I saw that same man stoically come into my parents’ home every day, cheerful and helpful, and then cry on his way back home.  I gave up because death is full of emotional landmines, and the ones surrounding the end of her mother’s life weren’t just targeting her. 

I gave up because listening to her litany of accusations was too much when all I longed to hear was the sound of my own father’s voice.

The Big Daddy was getting ready for work and turned on the t.v.  He likes to have the business channels on so when they interview the “financial analysts”, he can get pissed off first thing in the morning.  They can’t hear you cuz they’re inside the box.  Oh boy, he says the other day, I think the t.v. is going out.  Look at that picture, it’s all red.  Oh geez, oh my gosh, oh man, now there’s no picture.  And he’s pacing around all nervous-like in his bike pants saying, “Whadda we gonna do, whadda we gonna do?”  Watch the other two t.v.s

Then he gets real serious and says I guess this means we’ve gotta get a new t.v.  Hold your spandex there, Mr. Toshiba.  Maybe I can come home early from work, and gosh I guess we’re gonna have to bite the bullet and get a new one – maybe something a little bigger this time.  Here we go.  We don’t have to get one right away, I tell him.  Yes, we do, he says.  We do cuz I know how you like to have it on when you’re cleaning up here and I’d just like to take care of this for you ASAP.  Riiiiiiiiiiight.

Out of  habit I turned the t.v. on a few days later, and the purtiest picture you can imagine popped up.  It was like Jesus rising from the dead.   Oh yeah, that boat anchor of a t.v. was resurrected.  How long it lasts nobody knows, but now we’re back to The Big Daddy telling Rick Santelli he’s full of shit and me picking up coffee cups, towels and underpants.

It’s a grand life here at the estate every morning.