Month: September 2011

My mom is a dog lover and has had a dog most of her life.  Mom’s last dog had plenty of health issues as she got older, and ended up costing her a whole lot of money.  The dog eventually was put to sleep, and Mom announced that she no longer would be a dog owner.  Anybody who even thought about getting her a dog was going to have to march it right back to the pound. 

She’s changed her tune of late, and my sisters have been taking her around to look at dogs for adoption.  They found a Shihtzu rescue group, and Mom decided to adopt Maxwell.  The process involved a three page application with references and a home visit.  Yeah, for a dog.  After all that was completed, Max ended up being adopted by a young family with kids, even though his bio said he wasn’t good with kids.  

The Dog Nazis made a house call to make sure Mom didn’t barbecue dogs, and brought another dog for her to consider.   A ten year old blind dog.  The Helen Keller of dogs.  The I’m going to cost you a fortune dog.   It seems Mom didn’t meet their age requirements to adopt a younger dog, and they were making a hard sell for the healthy senior to adopt the disabled senior.  Mom was patient and hospitable to them, while my sisters delivered the stinkeye and whispered the snark.  When they didn’t get anywhere with that plan, they suggested that my sister, Ann, fill out an application to adopt Maxwell (who hadn’t been adopted after all) and then give him to my mom.  She submitted a new application, and got an email first thing the following morning saying you’re never going to believe this, but Maxwell has found a new home.   Again?

Mom ended up adopting Duffy from the Humane Society, and he sure knows how to rock the cute.  My sister sent an email to the Dog Nazis saying what a farce their organization was, and implied that Mom has a vast fortune of money that she likes to give to to dog rescue groups, despite pleading from her kids and attorney to scale back her contributions.

Those sisters of mine make it their job to look out for Mom, and they’re not amateurs.  Getting into a bullshihtzu match with either of them is a fight you don’t want to have.

It has been an eventful week, best described in photos……….

The whole family has been anxiously waiting by the phone for the bank to call to approve our refi.  I read the Bible to keep my mind off The Troubles.  Or maybe it was Tina Fey’s book.  I can’t remember now cuz my headpiece was so dang tight my brain hurt. 

The Big Daddy got mad that it was taking so long and shouted to the banker, “I pity the fool who doesn’t give us a mortgage.”  And he tried to make a fist to show he meant business, but he’s got arthritis in that one hand.

“Calm down”,  I said.  “I think I know of a way to make them understand the situation better.”

Finally, Mr. Potter putted the “approved” stamp on our papers.  I was so happy my curls tightened up and I said, “Now with the savings I can get a new crown on that tooth way in the back there.  See?”

“Let’s have the whole clan over to celebrate and I’ll make my famous Jesus Pizza,” The Big Daddy said.

“What about your cousin,” I asked.  “One and all”, he said.  “One and all.”

Even our moms got to come until the cops found them and took ’em back.

The Big Daddy and I are trying to get in better shape, along with making better choices when it comes to food.  We figured with both of us committed to the same goal, we’d be likely to have more success.  

The other day, BD was eating a bowl of ice cream.  Wow, that’s a lot of ice cream.  It’s a small bowl, he says.  It’s like the Leaning Tower of Mint Chocolate Chip.  I gave him a talking to in my mom voice about our agreement.  Which married men just loooooooove.   This is all I’m having and then I’m done, he tells me.  Well, what about the Twix bar you had?  Jeezus, he says, how’d you know about that?

How’d I know about that???  The guy leaves evidence wherever he goes.  Candy wrapper on the counter.  Dirty dishes in the sink.  Lid off the cookie jar.  I can figure out everything he’s eaten in about 15 seconds just by investigating the crime scene.

I eat my ice cream right out of the carton.  Standing at the kitchen counter.  With the lid in my hand.  As soon as I hear footsteps, the spoon gets shoved in my pocket, the lid gets popped on and voila……….ice cream back in the freezer and nobody’s the wiser. 

Men have such commitment issues.  If they only paid closer attention to the women they love, they’d see the light. 

When I turned 50, I intentionally decided to shake things up a bit.  There was a group of women I knew that were writers, and met every month for several years.  I pleaded my case to join them and have been with them for four years.  Throughout the first year when it was my turn to read something I wrote, I wanted to throw up.  Every. Single.  Time.  It is still something I hate to do, even when I’m satisfied with the finished product, in fear that they’ll find out that I’m such a hack at writing that I have no business being there.      

A few weeks ago, I told The Big Daddy that I had a good writing week.  I was happy with what I was posting, the stories were still swirling in my brain, and the daily numbers of hits on this blog were decent.  Then there was this week.  In one way or another, I heard from every person in my writers group, either through email, Facebook or in the comment section, for no reason other than to touch base and cheer me on.

I was walking my dog past the house of one of my writing friends and she came out to chat.  She walked me home and we talked about kids, work and writing.  I told her about something I wrote a year ago, and she insisted that I get to work on finding someone to publish it and She Would Not Let It Go.   Right now, she said, get in the house and send it off.  I decided to send it to our paper for a column called “As I See It.”  The next day I heard back from them and I am about to be a published author for the very first time.    

Oh my, this was a piece of the dream, and Cinderella feels like she got asked to the ball.  All of those fairy godmothers of hers worked night and day to make sure she looked pretty, and she is very, very grateful.

This summer has been a disappointment for The Big Daddy as far as crops.  The heat was brutal and killed off much of what was growing.  A raccoon pulled down every stalk of corn for a late night snack, and as soon as the tomatoes start to ripen, the squirrels eat half of them and leave the rest to rot. 

He has, however, reaped a bumper crop of potatoes – so far more than 50#.  I love potatoes.  I would eat potatoes every day.  Whenever I have made dinner, The Big Daddy says what’s with all the damn potatoes, have you ever heard of rice.  Yes, I’ve heard of rice, but my people worship at the Altar of the Potato.  Do your people know that the Potato Famine is over, he asks.  For my people, the Potato Famine will never be over.

Now we have Big Daddy Reds coming in by the buckets and all of a sudden, he’s discovered the potato.  I’ll make extra to heat up the next day and they’ll be gone because he ate them all.  Man, these taters are good, he says.  They’ve always been good.  Ya can’t beat fresh taters right out the ground, can ya?  No, Big Daddy Farmer, you’re the best Tater Man in the state.

It’s like all these years of me telling him how good they are, and and he never heard a word I’ve said until now.  I bet he had taters in his ears.  Or ears in his tater.

This is Beemer the Cat.  He’s a wild child.  He likes to roam the hood, killing chipmunks and scaring squirrels.

When he’s not doing that, he’s hanging out with his woman next door, Dora.  He and Dora used to hate each other, and I don’t know when that changed, but now he goes to see her every day and they nap together on the screened in porch.   Yeah, a “nap” is what the young people call it these days.   Dora can push the back door open, so when they wake up, she lets her man into the house.  They like to play in the bathtub.  So did me and The Big Daddy until we got stuck one day.  When Beemer gets bored, he comes home for awhile, eats some of his own food, takes a nap, kills a rodent, and then heads back over to Dora’s house.

I’ve never had a cat that wanted to be friends with another cat.  First thing in the morning, he’s crying to get out the door and over to Dora’s house in a big, fat hurry.  I look over in that yard and wonder what in the hell  those two are up to, and they look back like mind your own business Gladys Kravitz.

Either there’s some crazy, wild cat sex going on every day or they’re talking about me.  I’ll never know, but the one thing I’m sure of is that the day you spend two hours writing a story about cats is the day you realize you really need to get a life.

The Big Daddy and I watched the Republican debate tonite.  The whole day was a shitstorm for me, so I thought I’d end it the same way it began.   Since the paid pundits analyze the daylights out of these kinds of things and bore me to death, I decided I’d make notes of my own……….

Ron Paul.  Believes the private sector is capable of regulating itself, and dogs and cats should be living together.

Rick Santorum.  I seriously had no idea he was still in it.  

Newt Gingrich.  Dumped Wife #1 and Wife #2 and loves his country even more than the soulmate he found in wife #3.  

Jon Huntsman.  Overdid the tanning bed and looked like he rolled in a bag of Doritos.

Michelle Bachmann.  Got knocked from the #1 spot this week, but hair is holding up well.

Mitt Romney.  If you put a cap and a neckerchief on him, he’d look just like Thurston Howell III.

Rick Perry.   Smiles more than a preacher with his hand in your pocket.

Herman Cain.  The Pizza Man knows a little something about job creation of the minimum wage kind.

It was some kind of show, and midway through I had to open a window to get some air into that room.  We’ve got a long way to go until next November, but I bet I’ll sleep like a baby knowing that the best and the brightest wealthiest of our patriotic idiotic citizens longs to be my next president.