Daily Diatribes

A few nights ago I was watching television with Tom, something I hardly ever do.  Usually, when the kids go to bed, I head for the computer or grab a book.  I am not a big TV watcher.  And I hate watching TV with him because he channel surfs.  And as soon as I get interested in something, he changes the channel.  But he stopped on National Geographic or something and actually started watching a show about truck stops.  I was hooked.

I fell in love with those fancy truck cabs that have a whole living space behind the seats.  How cool is that, to park your rig and step back through a door and be home for the night?  Some of them have granite countertops and nicer furniture than my living room.   The one they featured had a 42 inch plasma screen TV.   I am now on the market for one.

Ok,  I don’t do any distance hauling, but I haul my kids all over town.  Driving my children around from practice to practice is a lot like hauling livestock.  After being outside all day for band/soccer camp, they certainly smell like livestock.  So occasionally, I would like to be able to pull off, kick back and snooze in a recliner in front of the Weather Channel in between trips without having to go home.

Today John had to be at school at 7:00 a.m.  Amy had to be at soccer camp, located in the bowels of Mountain Brook which has no street signs, at 8:30 a.m.  I had to pick her up at 12:00.  I have to pick him up at 4:00.  She has to be back at 5:30.  He has to be back at 6:00.  Then they both have to be picked up at 9:00 and Tom has a meeting tonight.  I am tired just typing this.

The schedule repeats every day for the rest of the week.  Only, on Wednesday, I am taking a troop of Girl Scouts to Savannah to worship at the Juliette Lowe Birthplace.  Thanks to her, we have sit-upons and Thin Mints and all girl scouts are required to go and pay homage.  So we are leaving at 5:30 in the morning and we’ll be gone until Sunday.  I want to quit my life.

And the easiest way out of this is to get a CDL and be a truck driver.  Tom has been nagging at me to get a job, so he can’t complain about me driving a truck.  I can imagine climbing up into my rig, settling my ball cap on my head, and hitting the open road, just me and my truck.  No kids, no husband, just miles and miles of open interstate.

I feel sure I can learn how to drive a truck, as long as I only have to go forward.  There is no way in hell I am backing one of those things up.  I would probably take out an entire town trying to drive in reverse.  And I am only going to take flat routes in warm states.  No hills or ice for me.  So I guess I’ll truck things between here and Oklahoma.  That’s all pretty flat, right?

I’m not sure what I’m going to truck.  I used to like those “Smokey and the Bandit”movies with Burt Reynolds.  Maybe I’ll transport Coor’s.  Does anyone drink that anymore?  Or maybe I can haul something girly like beanie babies or mascara.  It has to be something light becuase I don’t want to have to pick up big things.  I’m sort of lazy that way.  Maybe Kiki or Teensy or Gina will hire on to be my sidekick (sort of like Dom Deluise or Jerry What’s Name) and they can unload the truck for me, while I sit in my Lazy-Boy after a hard day of driving.

As soon as I find a truck driving school, I’m enrolling.  You can keep your nice little white collar jobs.  I am going out to bond with Billy Bob and Earl.  I will be one of the people.  I will eat slabs of chicken fried steak at greasy truck stop diners and shoot the breeze with waitresses named Shirley.  So if you see a big rig weaving precariously down I65, you might want to pull off and head in the other direction in case it’s me.

Last night I reached the saturation point.  My house was filled with children last week.  My niece was here, two of Jenny’s girls, my children, Nancy’s child and maybe some other children that just wandered in at random, attracted by the mayhem.  It was as if a flock of locusts descended and they pillaged my pantry and raided the refrigerator and left destruction in their wake.  Empty Gatorade bottles piled up everywhere, tripping the unsuspecting.  Empty Doritos bags littered the living room.  Don’t even get me started on the basement.

But yesterday, the house slowly emptied out, leaving only me, the niece and my own offspring.  I heaved a sigh of relief.  I love having a house full of kids, but it is HARD WORK!!!  Just keeping up with the garbage they produce is a full time job, never mind the laundry and the cooking!!

So because niece has been so good and helpful all week, we went to the mall last night, just the two of us.  Amy was going to go, but Tom made the mistake of asking her to get him a pillowcase.  She went upstairs and returned with a Barbie pillowcase.  Tom is camping with the boy scouts this weekend, and he understandably did not approve of a pink, princessy Barbie pillowcase.  She subsequently began howling at the unfair burden he had placed upon her by asking her to locate a pillowcase.  He insisted she go up and bring another one , so she stomped back upstairs.  She returned thre minutes later with a flannel pillowcase decorated with Mickey Mouse and Goofy frolicking in the snow.  He nixed this one as well.  She then threw herself on the kitchen floor, moaning, so we left here there.  She might have actually been glued to the floor by a puddle of spilled syrup but who cares.

So niece and I went to the mall and had a fabulous time.  She was a bit worried at first, since Tom and I have been fighting about money for the last two days, but after I flashed my credit cards at her, she got into the spirit of the thing.  I only got a couple of phone calls.  One was John informing me that one of the dogs had bitten a neighbor child on the toe.  Since the child was in the process of kicking the dog, I decided to disregard the incident.  I would bite too if someone was trying to kick me.  The second call was the goddess, whining that no one would scoop her any mint chocolate chip ice cream.  She believes it is her Constitutional right to have mint chocolate chip ice cream daily and someone else must scoop it into the bowl.  I told her I would be home shortly and I was bringing her something from the mall, so she desisted.

So imagine my surprise when John and I took off this morning to purchase band shoes and he said “you know, that whole fight last night wasn’t my fault.”

I looked at him.  “What fight?

“You know, the epic fight between me and Amy and the goddess.”

I looked at him blankly.  “Huh?” I asked intelligently.

Apparently, because I had not left dinner instructions, John designated himself as head chef.  I am very grateful to him for that.  When I left, I did not care if they ate nothing but stale cereal and rat cheese.  I was completely over the notion that it is my responsibility to feed them.

Anyway, John made mac and cheese for himself and the goddess and he made seven chicken nuggets for Amy.  But after he made them, he tried to take one.  Personally, I’m on his side in this issue.  He made the nuggets, he should have first choice of the nuggets.  I think this is pretty much SOP world-wide.  But Amy felt that possession is 9/10 of the law and that they were her nuggets to do with as she saw fit.  And she did not see the need to share them with her brother.

Can you imagine these two peasants bringing this issue before the queen, she sitting benevolently on her throne and gently sorting them out?  Well, the queen was not there, so Amy grabbed the ketchup and squirted it at John.  He retaliated.  “I didn’t hit her mom, I swear, but there was ketchup on my hand so I just kind of did this…” and he demonstrated giving her a hard clap on the back.

Well, apparently the goddess was observing all this and when John hit Amy, it became too much for her.  So she grabbed the ketchup bottle, and chased John into the corner and gave it a good squirt.  Ketchup splattered all over the wall, but fortunately it missed John.

As he was relating the story, I was fighting not to laugh.  I can imagine the goddess grabbing the ketchup and stalking him through the kitchen and then squirting with all her might.  I can imagine the looks of horror as the ketchup slowly ran down the kitchen wall and my children’s lives flashing before their eyes as they took in the destruction.  I can seem them all, working as a unit, to clear away the ketchup before I got home.  It sounds a lot like a Hitchcock movie, with the perpetrators cleaning up the crime scene before Jimmy Stewart gets there.

Well I decided to let it go and not bother lecturing anyone.  After all, at least they worked it out without bothering me.  And it explained why the pictures on the kitchen wall were askew (apparently they were in the line of fire when the ketchup bomb went off!).  But I have already ordered a nanny cam off the internet and I am having it hooked up tomorrow.  So next time I can catch the  mayhem on video and reap the rewards on America’s Funniest Home Videos.

I am so tired of summer I could shriek.  Remember those first golden days when the kids slept in, there were no lunches to make, no bookbags to pack, no homework to finish at the last second and there was much rejoicing?  Well, I’m over it!  I am tired of summer and ready for the grind to begin again.

I know the WM’s (working moms) are insanely jealous, thinking that us SAHM’s (stay at home moms) lounge around the pool all day, watching the hot young lifeguards cavort while we sip on frozen maragaritas.  Well, ok, maybe some of that is true, but still, it is brutal to be at home during the summer.

For one thing, my young must eat constantly.  They stand in the kitchen all day, their mouths gaping open like baby birds waiting for mama to drop in the worm.  I produce a constant array of cereal, pop tarts, Little Debbie’s, grilled cheese sandwiches, ravioli, soup, potato chips, apples, carrots, Oreos, milk, popcorn, Slim Jims, cupcakes, peaches, frozen waffles, yogurt, and drop it into their little beaks and still they bleat “Moooooooooom, I’m Huuuuuuunnnnnnngry!!!!!!!!!!!!”  Talk about hard work!

When their bellies are full (which is really never) they then require entertainment.  Ok, sure, I know you’re all shaking your heads and saying “well, when I was a kid, we stayed outside all day.”  Well here’s the problem.  No one else in the world is outside.  And it’s hot.  And there are snakes.  And pedophiles.  And flesh eating bacteria.  So they stay inside and they fight with me for control of the computer.  And sometimes I lose and then my life is really bad. 

They want me to take them places and spend money on them, vast quantities of money that only Bill Gates could produce.  “Take me to the movies/mall/bowling/Alabama Adventure/movie store/laser tag/ice skating/roller skating/anywhere but here at home where there is NOTHING TO DO!!!  If there is no planned activity for the day, they stare at me in disbelief.  How could I be so crass as to suggest they entertain themselves?  Their constitutional right to be constantly stimulated has been violated!  Call George Bush!!!!

During the summer, I become a one woman Disney World.  I am a one stop source for food and entertainment.  And believe me, my house is a destination, judging from the constant flow of children through it.  Last night only two of the children staying here were not related to me by blood.  That number can get much higher.  I may start charging occupation taxes.

I really do enjoy my life as a mom.  And I am grateful I don’t have to get up every morning and put on pantyhose.  But by this point in the summer, I am ready to farm out my young to the highest bidder and make a run for the border.  Only I don’t have a passport so I guess I’ll have to stay put.  For now!

I know I haven’t had much to say lately, but that’s just the way it goes sometimes.  It’s either there or it’s not.  I no longer have a butt boil, my children are only marginally annoying and I haven’t fallen down any stairs lately.  In CNN speak, it’s a slow news week!

But here are the pieces of weirdness that have crossed my path lately, thanks to my ever vigilant readers:

Thanks to Kathy at Birmingham Blues, I now know all about CDD, or Christian Domestic Discipline.  Check out www.christiandomesticdiscipline.com.    In a CDD marriage, the wife submits to her husband and he lovingly disciplines her when she strays from the path of righteousness.  I assume this means when the wife talks back or refuses to cook Hamburger Helper.  The site never really defines what constitutes a punishable offense, but there is an excellent dissertation on the merits of the different positioning for spanking: over the knee spanking versus over the the thighs.  Personally, I feel safest and most loved over the thighs, and I also find it an excellent position for punching my husband in the balls. 

If you go to the site, make sure you check out Sir Don’s FAQs.  If the husband feels himself losing control, he recommends putting the wife in the corner in time out until he cools down enough to beat her more gently.  Time Out is not just for toddlers anymore!  I sincerely hope Sir Don (and it better not be our Don at Dr IQ) is emasculated by a marauding pit bull on steroids.    And check out the selection of crotchless pantaloons in the online store!  Think Little House on the Prairie meets Frederick’s of Hollywood!

Nancy S. sent me a story about squirrels being used to spy in Iran.  God Bless Squirrel Nutkin, George Bush has gotten his hands on him now!   Here is the link: http://www.ananova.com/news/story/sm_2412412.html.  I hope you all don’t think I had anything to do with this.  When the CIA approached me and asked my opinion, I just told them the truth, that squirrels are minions of Satan and would therefore be glad to do Bush’s bidding.

My only other observation for the day is that the exterior of my home is beginning to truly resemble the abode of a person who wears a mullet.  I sat on my porch yesterday with the puppy who was in deep disgrace for having peed on Tom’s lap.  It’s not her fault; he’s never nice to her and she was so overwhelmed when he started petting her and speaking kindly to her that she lost all control.  So I had to remove her before he put her to sleep the old fashioned way, with a hammer!!

Anyway, you pull up in my driveway, and there is a collection of coolers arranged attractively around the retaining wall.  I yelled at Tom last week because they were all stacked in one corner, so that was his solution.  I guess he figures the feng shui approach is better than simply putting them away.  There is an old grill hanging out by the basketball goal.  Presumably it’s there so when the kids have games, we can grill hotdogs and sell them to the crowd.  A couple of white plastic chairs complete the look.  Thank God we don’t live in a gated community because we would have been asked to move long ago.

On my front porch I have two beautiful planters filled with dying flowers.  Truly, I mean to water the flowers.  I desire to water the flowers.  I just forget to water them sometimes.  And besides there’s a drought and it’s sinful to water flowers.  I am being a good custodian of the environment.  I care about global warming as much as the next yokel.  

To complete the look, there is a pooper scooper at the bottom of the steps.  Disgusting, some say, but I say it’s art.  It’s the seminal work of a middle-aged housewife, a primal scream of despair at the direction the world has taken.  The pooper scooper expresses my contempt for the larger, global situation of poverty and famine and war.  That the jaws are half open suggests the action of scooping up all that is diseased and foul and disposing of it.  Then again, maybe it just suggests my family is too lazy to put the pooper scooper away when they’re done.

So that’s what’s going on in my head right now!  Stay tuned for an exciting dissertation on my upcoming trip to Savannah Georgia, birthplace of the founder of girl scouts!

I read Harry Potter yesterday, all in one day.  And this old woman was there at 12:01 a.m. on Saturday to receive her reserved copy.  And I was at the front of the line, something that has NEVER happened to me before.

Here’s how the evening progressed.  I got there at 8:30, like a total idiot, convinced I would not be able to park.  I figured swarms of black clad Harry Potter look-alikes would have all the best broom parking spots taken.  So my strategy was to arrive early and entrench myself.  Have I ever once claimed to be a genius?

Well, once I was there, it was sort of boring.  I sat in the coffee shop area for a few minutes and tried to read a book I picked up, but I couldn’t really get into it.  My niece was with me, so I offered to buy her a drink.  As I was standing in line, a woman came up behind me, and her BO was powerful, overwhelming really.  She tried to strike up a conversation, and normally I’ll talk to anyone, but it was too much for me.  So I made Kiirah stand in line while I hid from the smelly lady. 

I spent the night wandering around Books A Million with Kiki and her kids, and Kiirah in tow.  John was there with his friend, and he alternately annoyed me and amused me.  At one point, he forced me to eat a Bertie Bott’s Every Flavor Bean.  Against my better judgement, I bit into it and nearly upchucked right there in the middle of the store.  Turned out to be vomit flavored; it’s amazing how they duplicated that taste!

There were quite a few people there in costume, and one lady in particular, really stood out to me.  She was dressed as Professor Umbridge, the evil woman who treats Harry so badly in Book 5.  This lady had an amazing pink hat on, bedecked with pink flowers.  She had obviously made it herself in honor of the book.

I finally made my way over to her and complimented her on it.  We chatted for a few minutes, and I was uneasy because she seemed very familiar and knew my kids.  Finally, I touched her arm and said “I’m so sorry, where do I know you from?”

She looked at me like I was crazy and said “I work for your husband.” 

I am sure I looked like I had just eaten a vomit flavored jellybean, I was that embarrassed.  I laughed and laughed and pretended I had been joking and knew it was her all along.  Then I slunk away and avoided her for the rest of the evening.

At 10:45, I was flagging.  Kiki’s youngest had made it to the finals in the costume contest for his portrayal of Draco Malfoy (the resemblance was uncanny!).  I was standing with Kiki, waiting for the final judging when who should come up behind me but the smelly lady.  We were in a narrow space and the smell was overwhelming.  I am not just talking about unwashed armpits.  I am talking about the smell of someone who has been sleeping in her clothes for the last two weeks and hasn’t touched soap this decade.  I mean it was a serious, funky smell.

After a few minutes, it became evident she was going to stand there next to us, so I told Kiki I was going to the front of the store to wait for the line to form.  I headed up there and to my dismay, there was already a long line.  The store had announced the line would start at 11:30 and it was only 11:15.  I was seriously annoyed.  I dropped back to look at a shelf, grumbling and muttering to myself about the unfairness of it all. 

This is my luck though.  I always pick the longest grocery store line.  I never have good seats at anything.  So it was par for the course that I would be at the back of the line, picking up my Harry Potter book at 1:30 a.m.

So you can imagine my delight when at 11:25 the Books A Million people came and plopped a sign down nearly in front of me and told all those people lined up that the line started behind the sign.  Readers, I was number 14 or so, depending on how you counted us all crowded in there.  We were literally shoulder to shoulder.

I had to stand there for 45 minutes.  STand.  On my feet.  CRushed next to people I didn’t know.  It was actually a lot of fun.  We talked about the books and our theories and our favorite characters.  I was next to a couple of weird, nerdy, teen-age girls, one of whom was wearing a shirt emblazoned with Alan Rickman as Severus Snape.  Snape has always been one of my favorite characters.  I always thought he got a bad rap, and I was ABSOLUTELY thrilled to be proved right in my devotion. 

However, my devotion paled in comparison to these girls, one of whom expressed a fervent desire that Mr. Rickman would dump his live-in girlfriend so he would be on the market again.  I looked at her and said “you do realize that he’s around 60?”

“So what,” she said, “he’s Alan Rickman.”  Well, there you go!

Anyway, at 11:45, they dimmed the lights and a hush fell over the room as the books were wheeled up to the front.  The anticipation was a tangible thing, and the crowd became restless.  The nerdy girls were talking animatedly, one of them telling the other she was going to buy a Transformer onesie for her young niece and keep her from becoming too “girly”.  “Yes, Megatron is powerful,” intoned the other girl.  One can only presume Megatron is a Transformer…

Finally, we counted down and at 1, we surged forward to receive our books.  I was number 3!!!!!!  I got my book and rushed out the door, then remember Kiirah was with me, so I had to rush back in the door.  I called her on her cell phone and told her to get out now so I could get home to read.  We were home in record time and I had the book finished by yesterday afternoon.

I have never been so tired in my life!  But it was worth it, the book was fabulous and I am glad she ended it.  Because I don’t think I can ever do that again!! 

I stole this from Blue Momma’s blog, Life in the FishBowl.  I bolded the books I have read.  I bet Kiki has read over 3/4 of them!!

From the list below:

-Bold the ones you’ve read
-Italicize the ones you want to read
-leave the ones you aren’t interested in as they are
1.The Da Vinci Code (Dan Brown)
2.Pride and Prejudice (Jane Austen)
3.To Kill A Mockingbird (Harper Lee)
4. Gone W9ith The Wind (Margaret Mitchell)
5. The Lord of the Rings: Return of the King (Tolkien)
6. The Lord of the Rings: Fellowship of the Ring (Tolkien)
7. The Lord of the Rings: Two Towers (Tolkien)
8. Anne of Green Gables (L.M. Montgomery)
9. Outlander (Diana Gabaldon)

10.A Fine Balance (Rohinton Mistry)
11.Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire (Rowling) -
12.Angels and Demons (Dan Brown)
13.Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix (Rowling)
14. A Prayer for Owen Meany (John Irving)
15. Memoirs of a Geisha (Arthur Golden)
16.Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone (Rowling)
17. Fall on Your Knees(Ann-Marie MacDonald)
18. The Stand (Stephen King)
19. Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban(Rowling)
20. Jane Eyre (Charlotte Bronte)
21. The Hobbit (Tolkien)
22. The Catcher in the Rye (J.D. Salinger)
23. Little Women (Louisa May Alcott)
24. The Lovely Bones (Alice Sebold)
25. Life of Pi (Yann Martel)
26. The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy (Douglas Adams)
27. Wuthering Heights (Emily Bronte)
28. The Lion, The Witch and the Wardrobe (C. S. Lewis)
29. East of Eden (John Steinbeck)
30. Tuesdays with Morrie(Mitch Albom)
31. Dune (Frank Herbert)
32. The Notebook (Nicholas Sparks)
33. Atlas Shrugged (Ayn Rand)
34. 1984 (Orwell)
35. The Mists of Avalon (Marion Zimmer Bradley)
36. The Pillars of the Earth (Ken Follett)
37. The Power of One (Bryce Courtenay)
38. I Know This Much is True(Wally Lamb)
39. The Red Tent (Anita Diamant)
40. The Alchemist (Paulo Coelho)
41. The Clan of the Cave Bear (Jean M. Auel)
42. The Kite Runner (Khaled Hosseini)
43. Confessions of a Shopaholic (Sophie Kinsella)
44. The Five People You Meet In Heaven (Mitch Albom)
45. Bible
46. Anna Karenina (Tolstoy)
47. The Count of Monte Cristo (Alexandre Dumas)
48. Angela’s Ashes (Frank McCourt)
49. The Grapes of Wrath (John Steinbeck)
50. She’s Come Undone (Wally Lamb)
51. The Poisonwood Bible (Barbara Kingsolver)
52. A Tale of Two Cities (Dickens)
53. Ender’s Game (Orson Scott Card)
54. Great Expectations (Dickens)
55. The Great Gatsby (Fitzgerald)
56. The Stone Angel (Margaret Laurence)
57. Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets (Rowling)
58. The Thorn Birds (Colleen McCullough)
59. The Handmaid’s Tale (Margaret Atwood)
60. The Time Traveller’s Wife (Audrew Niffenegger)
61. Crime and Punishment (Fyodor Dostoyevsky)
62. The Fountainhead (Ayn Rand)
63. War and Peace (Tolsoy)
64. Interview With The Vampire (Anne Rice)
65. Fifth Business (Robertson Davis)
66. One Hundred Years Of Solitude (Gabriel Garcia Marquez)
67. The Sisterhood of the Travelling Pants (Ann Brashares)
68. Catch-22 (Joseph Heller)
69. Les Miserables (Hugo)
70. The Little Prince (Antoine de Saint-Exupery)
71. Bridget Jones’ Diary (Fielding)
72. Love in the Time of Cholera (Marquez)
73. Shogun (James Clavell)
74. The English Patient (Michael Ondaatje)
75. The Secret Garden (Frances Hodgson Burnett)
76. The Summer Tree (Guy Gavriel Kay)
77. A Tree Grows in Brooklyn (Betty Smith)
78. The World According To Garp (John Irving)
79. The Diviners (Margaret Laurence)
80. Charlotte’s Web (E.B. White)
81. Not Wanted On The Voyage (Timothy Findley)
82. Of Mice And Men (Steinbeck)
83. Rebecca (Daphne DuMaurier)
84. Wizard’s First Rule (Terry Goodkind)
85. Emma (Jane Austen)
86. Watership Down(Richard Adams)
87. Brave New World (Aldous Huxley)
88. The Stone Diaries (Carol Shields)
89. Blindness (Jose Saramago)
90. Kane and Abel (Jeffrey Archer)
91. In The Skin Of A Lion (Ondaatje)
92. Lord of the Flies (Golding)
93. The Good Earth(Pearl S. Buck)
4. The Secret Life of Bees (Sue Monk Kidd)
95. The Bourne Identity (Robert Ludlum)
96. The Outsiders (S.E. Hinton)
97. White Oleander (Janet Fitch)
98. A Woman of Substance (Barbara Taylor Bradford)
99. The Celestine Prophecy (James Redfield)
100.Ulysses (James Joyce)

I’ve read 52, just over half the list, not bad!!  I really need to get started on Crime and Punishment now!!  But “The Notebook”????? Gahhhhhhhhhhh!!!!!!!!!!

I was watching Brokeback Mountain on Saturday.  I love that movie because it’s such a beautiful love story.  However, there are some extremely graphic and disturbing scenes with which I am not comfortable.  I am not talking about the gay sex which is a tiny blip on my mental radar.  Hey to each his own.  Who am I to worry about how people have sex and with whom?  I don’t like to imagine men and women having sex, or two men or even two labrador retrievers for that matter.

No, what bothered me was the sex scene with Anne Hathaway.  Anne Hathaway was in The Princess Diaries.  Anne Hathaway was in Ella Enchanted.  Anne Hathaway is pure and good.  So what is she doing rolling around in the back seat of a car, groping Jake Gyllenhall??  Not that he isn’t grope-worthy; that’s not the point.  The point is that Princess Mia cannot be doing the deed in the backseat of a Chevy with a gay cowboy.

But the most disturbing moment came when she unbuttoned her blouse and her bosoms sprang free.  Ewwwwwwwwww!!!  Gross!!!!!!!!!!!!!  Ella Enchanted doesn’t have bosoms!!!!!!!!  That is soooooooooo disgusting!  I imagine this is how audiences felt when Julie Andrews, fed up with her Mary Poppins image, decided to bare her breasts in the Blake Edwards movie SOB.    Good girl screen icons are not supposed to have boobies and if they do, their audience is never supposed to see them.

So that is the number one reason to avoid watching Brokeback Mountain.  Gay cowboys are the least of your worries.  No, the real issue is the visual of Anne Hathaway’s nipples springing free into Jake G.’s face.  That’s enough to send me screaming to therapy!!  Keep your shirt on Anne and get back to ruling Genovia!!

Great.  I just discovered that “Goddess Patty, which is the google term people are using to find my blog,  is an overweight dominatrix with her own, um, web-based business.  I am gonna have to come up with another term of endearment for my child!  But go ahead and google the term if you want a good laugh.  It’s terribly sacriligeous and yet, I think she’s on to something!

Here’s a list of her rules, as posted on her site:

Goddess PATTY Worship Temple

RULES

You have to follow my rules
You will spoil me.
You will pay my bills for me.
You will not waste my time.
You will always treat me with respect calling me “Mistress”, “Goddess”, “Ma’am” etc.
Always be Honest and never ignore me.
Tribute, Spoil & Pamper A LOT
Nothing comes for free so don’t waste my time asking

Hell, I might start my own website and be a goddess.  Or maybe I’ll just post this list on my refrigerator for the family.

Wow, I sat down with a totally different post in mind, but then I happened to check out my stats.  I LOVE Wordpress!!!  It shows you what terms people typed in to find your blog.  What a hoot!!  Here is the list which I cut and pasted:

These are terms people used to find your blog.

Today

stein mart…..1 view

goddess patty squashing…..1 view

my friend the squirrel gone wild…..1 view

who sang vocals for REO candle in the wi…..1 view

Yesterday

bad mullet photos…..1 view

get cleaning in minutes + bedroom + list……1 view

recurring abscess in butt…..1 view

mommy’s gone wild…..1 view

Hmmmmmmm, goddess patty squashing” does not sound even vaguely familiar.  I know I have NEVER written about squashing goddess patties.  That doesn’t sound nice.  I have my guesses as to what a goddess patty might be and it ain’t pretty!!!

I love “recurring abscess in butt”.  I never said mine was recurring.  It was a one time thing.  I fixed it, it’s gone, let’s move on people.  That’s almost scarier than the person who found me by googling purple ear wax.  She posted a note to let me know she and I had the only two known cases of purple earwax on the internet.  Hers, however, was not caused by cleaning her ears with a BIC pen.  I believe it might have come about when she stopped taking her lithium.

“My friend the squirrel gone wild” is self explanatory.  Obviously, some poor soul was trying to have a relationship with a squirrel and was betrayed by the base nature of the beast.  Little buck-toothed imps from hell is what I’m talking about.  I think I am going to hire Joe and we will spend hours videoing squirrels in their ongoing attempts to seize power and control the universe.  Our “Squirrels Gone Wild” franchise will make “Girls Gone Wild” look extremely pathetic in comparison.

And then we have “mommy’s gone wild” which will be our next video project.  This would describe me yesterday as I entered the goddess’s bedroom with a wad of garbage bags, a rake, a shovel, and a bottle of Wild Turkey.  It disturbed me slightly when I found Snow White in the closet with no head.  Within minutes, I found Sleeping Beauty, also decapitated.  I was sensing a disturbing trend here and I was not amused.    There is a serial killer on the loose, one who preys on innocent Disney princesses, luring them into the closet and then pulling their heads off.  Be afraid, be very afraid!!!

The “who sings REO candle in the Wi” confuses me slightly.  REO didn’t sing candle in the wind.  But maybe they meant that lyric ”you’re a candle in the window….la la” but what does that have to do with me?  I don’t burn candles.  Last time I burned a candle, it was in the bathroom and I had it to close to the wall and all the wax dripped down behind the toilet.  Seriously, next time you’re over, look behind the toilet.  There’s a big glob of pink and yellow wax back there!! 

After seeing all these google searches, I am going to make sure to include an entertaing search term in every post.  Today’s theme will be “funky butt loving chickens”.  Everyone start your search engines and see where I rank!!  And no cheating Joe; keep the Spider away from me!!   

I’m sorry I have been incommunicado; apparently the router Tom installed so he could use his fancy little laptop interferes with our internet connection.  And did he leave the fancy little laptop at home for me to use?  Oh no, I am not worthy!!!  So if you have a gripe, please direct it to him; it’s his fault!!

I took the girls to Alabama Adventure today.  We went with Teensy and her children.  It was raining when we got there, but once the rain cleared, it was actually pretty nice.  The temperature was in the 80’s and the cloud cover kept it pretty cool.  The kids went to the bumper cars first.  There is a height requirement and one little boy, probably around 7 or 8,  was most distressed when he realized he would not be able to smash other people to his hearts content.

He burst into sobs and his mama rushed to him and picked him saying “aw baby, that’s just shitty.  Just shitty.  I’m so sorry honey; it’s just shitty.”  I nearly swallowed my tongue.  I have a potty mouth extraordinaire, but I don’t use profanity to comfort my young.  Usually I am using it to threaten their lives, so this was a totally new context for me.

From the bumper cars we went to the log ride and then to the wild river gorge and then to the ferris wheel.  Then it was time for lunch.  Teensy and I stood in line forever to purchase overpriced chicken fingers and overcooked hamburgers.  Normally, I would bring lunch, but today it was just too much. 

While we were in line, Amy was experimenting with the jet propulsion properties of ketchup packets.  The goddess came running up to us with ketchup globs on her face and squealed “Amy shot me with ketchup on purpose!!!”

I called Amy over and of course she claimed that she never meant to hit the goddess, that she had “accidentally” fired it right in her face.  Yeah, right, and Scooter Libby “accidentally” outed Valerie Plame.  (That was my insightful, political humor; aren’t you proud of me Kathy??)

After lunch, we lurched onward through the amusement park.  Teensy and I were both feeling slightly over-full, but the children were not so encumbered.  They proceeded to ride every spinning, whirling, twirling thing possible and amazingly, lunch stayed down!  We split up briefly, with Teensy taking the older girls to check out the Zoomerang and I took the younger kids over to the kiddie coaster. 

I rode the kiddie coaster three times straight and that was enough amusement for me.  I collapsed on a bench and prayed for an early frost while the kids continued to whiz around and around.  Teensy came back with the older girls and the news that the Zoomerang was closed for cleaning.  When Teensy asked why it was closed, the attendant told her “some kid vomited on the ride….. A LOT!!!!!”  This was confirmed as we were walking away when an employee leaned over the side of the ride and hollered down “NO, WE NEED A MUCH BIGGER BUCKET THAN THIS AND MORE DISINFECTANT!!”  Needless to say, we didn’t linger.

We hit all the kiddie rides and then wound back around for a couple more turns on the spinning things.  Then it was back to the river gorge and the log ride, and finally the bumper cars.  In other words, we put in a FULL DAY!!  We had a hard time peeling the kids away from the park; the big kids couldn’t get enough of the bumper cars, but finally, we got them out the front gate.

We were in the car five minutes before the goddess started moaning that she had a headache and she was thirsty.  “Mommy, my head is beeping,” she moaned, which is goddess speak for “beating” or “pounding”.  (Her heart “beeps” too.)  Uh oh, I thought to myself, trouble is a comin’!  Sure enough, five minutes later, she was heaving her guts out in a plastic bag.  It was then handed to me and I was forced to hold it through the long commute home in rush hour traffic, which was fortunately very light!

We got to Tom’s office, I transferred the girls over to my car and we rushed home….to attend a birthday party at the pool!  That’s right, I hadn’t been outside quite enough hours, so I went and sat for two more!!  By now, the goddess was fully restored to health and was ravenously hungry.  She swam for two hours and put away three pieces of pizza.  Ah, to be young again!

That was today and nothing else has happened this week.  I did fill my bird feeders yesterday and I swear, I must be under 24 hour squirrel surveillance because 30 minutes after I filled them, one of the enemy appeared in my backyard.  He acted all casual, like he was just out for a stroll, but he was surreptitiously making his way toward my bird feeders.  Like I wasn’t gonna see his beady little ass!  I waited until he was almost to the sidewalk before I popped out on to the deck and chucked a crayon at his head.  When that didn’t work, I did a sort of high karate kick and screamed.  That got him moving.  No squirrels in the bird feeder on my watch!!!!!