Daily Diatribes

This is what I received from the junta today:

To All Homeowners and Lot Owners:

Lawn clippings and debris continue to mysteriously appear on empty lots within the subdivision. We’re asking all homeowners not to dump clippings again, but also to inform their landscaping companies not to dump ANYTHING. We have witnessed this in the past and have pulled over to talk to them.

Please, let’s be courteous to all our property owners.

Thank you,
The Junta

If the US military functioned like our homeowner’s association, we would have kicked Osama Bin Laden’s ass five years ago and been home in time for dinner. I have lived in this neighborhood for five years. I don’t even know where the empty lots are, let alone if someone is dumping their grass clippings there. Because I DON’T CARE!!! I don’t know how the presence of grass clippings devalues property. Someone clue me in here!! P />
The junta’s grammar leaves a lot to be desired. I believe the writer intended to say: we are again asking homeowner’s not to dump their clippings. Instead, the wording implies all the homeowner’s have already dumped their debris and that we shouldn’t do it again. If I am going to be pestered with stupid emails, the least they can do is make sure the letter makes sense!!

I am not complaining. I am fortunate to live in a neighborhood with such an observant and caring HOA. How blessed we are to have a group whose sole purpose is to track when and where lawn clippings are dumped. Why, my house has appreciated 110% in the last year, even in this market, and it’s all because our grass clippings are disposed of properly!! What the letter doesn’t address is the mysterious disappearance of those who have been warned about dumping their clippings. That’s right; what about the DEAD BODIES turning up on the empty lots????!

“Si senor, Manuelo was right here, dumping out his mower when a black golf cart appeared out of nowhere and grabbed him and drove off!! I ran; I am not ashamed of it. I think that’s one of his toes over there. The junta here is bad, senor, much worse than in Nicaragua.”

I expect to come home any day now and find barbed wire strung around the perimeter and a guard tower erected at the front entrance. We’ll all be issued neighborhood ID cards and woe to anyone who is stopped and doesn’t produce the proper documentation. It’s only a matter of time before the patrols run round the clock, monitoring our every move to make sure we are not doing anything not in the the best interest of the community. We are a family and the junta is our head. LONG LIVE THE JUNTA!!!

Oh my God, they’ve found me. I have to go; they have their citation books. If you don’t hear from me again, spread the word. One day we shall be free of they tyranny of the junta and….

I count today as my first official day of summer. The kids actually got out of school last Thursday, but MA left that day for Washington DC, the goddess went to the beach with Gina the next day and we left Napoleon at my parent’s house on Sunday. The goddess got back yesterday, so I am having to readjust to children in my life. I miss them, but silence IS golden!!

Today, Tuesday, the pool was closed since it was open yesterday for Memorial Day. That left me faced with the task of entertaining the goddess. So after swim team practice, we grabbed one of her friends and headed to McDonald’s for lunch. I sat in the smelly, nasty play area and watched them frolic around in the seething bacterial cess pool of a ball pit. After they were suitably infected with e.coli, we went to the movies.

It’s not enough that gas is approaching $4.00 a gallon. Everything else is skyrocketing too. One thing that has remained constant is movie theater prices; they have always been outrageous!! I gasped as I handed over my debit card to pay for the tickets. I swooned as I paid for our popcorn. $50 later, we sat in our seats and were swept away to the fantastic land of Narnia.

The movie was pretty good, although a lot of it went right over their little seven year old heads. At one point, the girls completely stopped watching the movie and engaged in a rather heated fencing match with their straws and I had to disarm them. In the end, the experience was not quite as relaxing as I thought it would be.

On the way home, I suggested washing my car as a possible late afternoon activity and they eagerly accepted. They have been outside for the last thirty minutes, washing with great enthusiasm. I believe they have used approximately 85 gallons of water and they only have three more tires to go. I can’t wait to get next month’s water bill. Still, that $200 may be worth a few minutes of peace!!

While they were washing, I went upstairs to care for Rocky the bearded dragon. When Napoleon is gone, I become the keeper of the dragon. I have now become completely immune to the feeding process and even enjoy the crunching sound he makes as he masticates the mealworms. We just got a new batch of worms because the old batch had metamorphosed into beetle thingys and had to be discarded. They do that if they sit too long; the first time Napoleon found out the worms were larvae and would mutate into something else, he went nuts. “Why didn’t you TELL ME they change into bugs???” he screamed. For a month, he refused to inhabit the same room with the mealworms.

So this is day one. For one day, I have been in charge of feeding/entertaining/transporting one little darling. How much fun will it be when they are all three home?? By the end of the summer, we will be bankrupt. The city water system will be facing a major water crisis because I let the kids wash my Suburban. Which I can no longer afford to drive; it will be sitting in the garage by itself as we hitchhike everywhere.

It’s a good thing I don’t have a whole lot of pride. Otherwise, I probably already would have committed suicide this week. A series of comments have left me reeling and questioning whether now may not be a good time to grab that bus to Mexico. Hey, I’d fit right in!!

Monday we were at a scout function. We were celebrating Memorial Day a week early and honoring those who have fallen to protect our freedom. Specifically, we were honoring Major Michael Green, the brother of a good friend, who was killed in Afghanistan in January. His nephew is four and is the cutest thing on this planet.

He ran up to me, gave me a big hug and then looked up at me earnestly and said “do you have a baby in there?”

Ouch. I would love to lay claim to the triplets that my belly suggests I am carrying, but alas, it’s not triplets at all, just too many Mexican lunches. Anyone see “Juno”?? It’s a ‘lunch baby’!!!

Luckily, I am past the point where this bothers me. I have been overweight most of my adult life and it would be foolish to pretend I’m not. So I just smiled at him and said “no honey, I’m just fat.” He looked at me like he didn’t quite understand; this is the same child who took my glasses a few months ago and said “there’s fog in these glasses! Why do you wear them??” What can I say sweety, I’m just a pregnant, blind freak of nature. I’ll probably be giving birth to ET shortly. 

This morning I went to sit on the steps with Napoleon to wait for the bus. He said “Hey mom, you know when you were out here the other day with me? My friends all thought you were black and you were the maid.” Bunch of damn racist snots!!

I have no problem with being black; it’s far preferable to being pregnant!! If you don’t know me personally, let me assure you I am extremely dark skinned. My dad’s heritage is native American and it runs very strong in his children. But why on earth did they think I was the maid?? It’s not like I was standing there in an apron with a bottle of window cleaner! What, I’m black and fat so I must be the maid??? Elitist little shits! Besides, anyone who has been in my house this week can testify that our maid is a completely worthless and lazy and ought to be fired immediately!! We have dust bunnies the size of T-Rexes skittering around the floor.

Being the good mom I am, when he told me that, I offered to go inside and get a feather duster and wave it at him as he boarded the bus. This earned me a withering glare and I was told to go inside immediately. I complied regretfully, wondering if it would cause him permanent emotional damage if I tied a red bandana around my head and started calling him ‘honey chile’ at school.

This morning, to soothe my soul, I am taking my fat ass off to Cracker Barrel with Gina. I am going to eat a double stack of pancakes with extra syrup and two orders of bacon. Then I’m going to get my hair corn rowed. Then it’s off to the obstetrician to see how ET is incubating. This is yore Aunt Jemima, signing off!!! Love y’all, honey chile!! 

I have an idea for a horror movie. It involves a mom who takes a group of 13 year old girls to spend the night in a luxury hotel. They check in to a suite with one couch, two beds and a mini bar. That’s the whole story; can you imagine anything more horrifying??? Nonetheless, it’s what I did Friday night. Once again, I was playing “COOL MOM”!

From now on, I am going to start channeling Joan Crawford. I am going to drink cocktails all day long, smoke unfiltered cigarettes and occasionally put them out on the children. I’ll feed them raw beef and beat them with wire hangers. “You want COOL,” I’ll shriek, “well I’ll stuff you in the freezer you ungrateful brat and you’ll see what COOL is all about!!!”

But on Friday, unable to connect with my inner Joan, I dutifully lugged MA and her little friends for a slumber party at the hotel that’s attached to the mall. The hotel offers a party package that includes a suite and pizza for 8. It does not include valium, tequila or Benadryl. My dear friend Teensy accompanied me, either because she loves me or because she is a masochist and likes to inflict pain upon herself.  Almost as soon as we arrived, the girls began screaming, something they continued to do all night. A 13 year old girl does not need a valid reason to scream. Apparently being in the same room with other 13 year old girls trips some primordial urge to scream. Especially if they are in close proximity to a mall filled with clothing to purchase and hot guys to ogle. And so it began.

First, I gave them the bottled water/mini bar lecture. “Do you see those bottles of water?” I asked them. “DO NOT OPEN THEM…AT ALL!!! They are $12.00 per bottle. If you open one, you better be prepared to pay me. AND DO NOT OPEN THE MINI BAR!!! DO NOT REMOVE ANYTHING FROM THE MINI BAR. A SNICKERS IS $7.50 PLUS TAX AND GRATUITY. DO NOT TOUCH IT!!!!! OR I WILL SEND YOU HOME!!! Once they were suitable cowed, the party began.

I had it all planned out; they would eat their pizza, we would do cake and then we would head to the mall for a scavenger hunt. MA’s soccer team did a mall scavenger hunt when we went to Mississippi and it was a riot. I figured keeping them in the mall as long as possible was the best plan. The pizza arrived at 5:00 and by 5:30, we had moved on to cake. At 6:00, we were heading out to the mall, armed with the scavenger hunt list, clipboards and cameras. I had some really great stuff on there. “Take a picture with a salesman named Bob”. “Sing Mary Had a Little Lamb to a cute guy”. “Run into the Bama Fever store and yell War Eagle!!” That last one is an SEC Football reference; sub in your own football/rugby/soccer/hockey team name for a similar effect. We all headed down to the first floor and the girls scattered, eager to begin their hunt. Teensy and I went to the food court to find a table where we could keep an eye on things.

But the girls returned almost immediately, tears in their eyes (exaggerating for effect here) followed by the mall cop channeling his inner Barney Fyfe. He hitched up his pants and puffed out his chest and said “We don’t allow no scavenger hunts here,” in an extremely pompous tone. He looked like he was itching to load up that one bullet and put an end to scavenger hunts forever.

“You’re kidding,” I said disbelievingly. Surely a scavenger hunt, that most innocent of games, was not a threat to mall security.

“Nope,” he said, “no scavenger hunts and absolutely NO RUNNING. It’s disruptive.” I looked around. The mall was sparsely populated for a Friday night, so I wasn’t sure who would be disrupted. And the girls had not been running. They hadn’t even started yet. I was going to argue with him, but MA hates a scene and I could tell the girls had lost their enthusiasm for the hunt. So I just turned them loose in the mall and told them to stay together. What could be more disruptive than a pack of 13 year old girls shopping?? Take that Mall Cop!! Teensy and I wandered around, watching for the girls to make sure they weren’t engaging in risky behaviors like running. 

8:30 they were bored, so we went back to the hotel to go swimming. The pool was outside and the water was freezing. We stayed about an hour, then headed back inside. I got on an elevator with three girls who immediately pushed every button. I immediately got off that elevator and grabbed another one, telling them I would meet them on our floor. My elevator went straight up without any stops and I got off and sat on a bench outside the elevator. And I waited. And waited. And waited. I knew they had pushed all the buttons, but I didn’t think it should be taking this long. I walked down to the room to see if they had somehow materialized there when I wasn’t looking, but they weren’t there. I was starting to panic, trying to figure out how I was going to explain their disappearance, in bikinis no less, to their parents, when I heard screams from the end of the hall.

Apparently the little geniuses had ridden up to the 15th floor. Once there, they decided it would be fun to run back down the stairs to the 11th floor where our room was. Only they didn’t realize the stairs were strictly for evacuation. The only exit was on the 1st floor. So they got stuck in the stairwell. I really wish I could have seen them. They were trapped like rats in a maze, cute little rats in bikinis. Running up and down the stairs, frantically trying to find a way out and getting more and more hysterical with each passing second. By the time they finally got out (a security guard heard them and opened the door) they were in tears. Idiots. I got them back in the room and settled down and then had to talk to one of the dads who had gotten several hysterical phone calls from his daughter. Fine, they were stuck in the stairs but at least they weren’t drinking miniatures from the mini bar. I do what I can, alright?? 

From that point, the rest of the evening passed in a blur. We watched a movie and then put them to bed. For the rest of the night, Teensy and I huddled on our couch, drifting in and out of sleep as the girls screamed intermittently for no apparent reason. At 7:00 a.m., I sat up bleary eyed and looked at Teensy. We had made it through the night. All of the girls were still with us. The mini bar was uncompromised. We fed them breakfast, and by 10:30, most of them were gone. I took one last look around the room. There were soda cans everywhere. A box of Cheezits had exploded under the bed….and I don’t even WANT to know how that happened. There was a single gummy lifesaver stuck to the wall. Every glass in the suite was dirty and half filled with some sort of beverage. All the bedding was on the floor. But the party had been hugely successful. All the girls were returned to their parents safely. For a brief moment, I considered flinging open the mini bar and drinking all the minis, but I restrained myself. I didn’t have $150 to spend on booze.  

I was recently asked to be the secretary of the swim team board. The phone call went something like this:

“Hi Jennifer, the board met today and we voted you and Nancy as members. Would you like to be secretary or treasurer?”

Me: “uh….uh……well….I…..uh……”

“No hurry, just decide which one you want and we will offer the other position to Nancy.”

“Secretary,” I said decisively. I am terrible with money, plus treasurer sounded like a much harder job. And since Nancy doesn’t have a blog, she has more free time so therefore, it made sense for her to be treasurer. Besides, I like to send bitchy emails. That’s more my style. It never occurred to me that I could just SAY NO!!!! To be fair, they played dirty. I wasn’t expecting to be asked to be on a board. The lady that called is also the PTO president, so I figured she wanted money.

Today we had our first meeting and I diligently took minutes. I don’t believe anyone in the organization had ever done this before, but I thought it would be kind of kitschy to do it. After all, what else does a secretary do? When it came to actually typing them up, though, I had to restrain myself. My inner smart ass wanted to take over and type them. I had to keep smacking her to get her to shut up. So don’t ask me about those bruises on my forehead, ok???

Here’s what I would have liked to type:
Meeting opened with a bitch session about the current club ownership. Board agreed club owner is a total moron with no soul. Debated various methods of castrating said moron, but unable to determine how to perform the operation without getting caught. Tabled the the idea for further discussion.

President volunteered to place swim team signs around neighborhood. Discussion ensued regarding the Homeowner’s Junta (this is Nancy’s term!!) and how to avoid having the signs removed by Homeowner Guerillas. The board agreed unanimously that placing signs advertising swim team registration would not be a crisis equal to the recent sub-prime mortgage debacle, although the Junta would probably disagree. The board decided to place the signs around the perimeters of the actual neighborhood to avoid reducing property values by 2/3.

The waitress came and took lunch orders. The board then spent fifteen minutes grousing about the waitress, her bad attitude, her inability to refill the drinks, etc. At one point, the secretary herself arose and refilled the drinks. The vice president regaled the board with her tale of the same waitress writing down the wrong order the week before and, instead of bringing the chicken salad sandwich with the bread lightly toasted, she brought the sandwich untoasted and the FRENCH FRIES lightly toasted, and still frozen in the middle. [I was secretly wishing this had happened to me because it would have made a great blog, but good stuff like that NEVER happens to me.]

After a thirty minute wait, lunch was finally brought to the board. There was no one else in the restaurant, but the waitress assured the board it had taken so long because there were so many SPECIAL orders. As the SPECIAL orders consisted of two requests for sandwiches without tomatoes, the board did not view this as a reason for the lunch delay. When the waitress left, the board unanimously mocked her.

Who says I am not busy and important??? Ok, so maybe the Dow Jones Industrial Average didn’t move when we decided to serve popsicles instead of water bottles at the registration night, but these are still important decisions!! I unfortunately did not send the above minutes. I was faithful to the substance of the meeting, if not the style. I am going to have to work on restraining the inner smart ass really hard, though, because that bitch is going to get me into A LOT of trouble!!

Most of you did not tell me happy birthday. You did not send me expensive gifts. I didn’t get stocks or bonds or even regular old cash. I didn’t even get sexy lingerie from Creepy Ole Don, although that’s likely because he’s buried at the bottom of my closet….IN HIS FANTASY LIFE!!! Don’t use the excuse that you didn’t KNOW it was my birthday. If you really loved me, you would have tried to find out when it was. You would have made an effort. But you didn’t. Jerks!!!! I love you Kathy at Birmingham Blues, who always remembers me. BTW, when is your birthday? I will send you heaps of cyber love on that special day!! Gina and Nancy both called me. Yes, I was keeping track. And thank God for Renee, who not only remembered my birthday, but even gave me a gift!

Renee is a healer, one who brings health and life to others.  In her spare time, she makes homemade cards, runs her church music program and probably knits blankets for the homeless out of recycled plastic bags.  She is one of those unsettling women who always thinks of others first and puts herself last.  She manages to have a successful career, plus take care of her friends and family.  If I didn’t like her so much, I would hate her guts!! 

 
Despite her packed life, Renee took the time to get me a gift for my birthday.  I don’t even know when her birthday is; I don’t have access to her medical chart and I am generally a contemptible person who plays Pogo all day and never thinks of anyone but the little gophers on Word Whomp!!   Anyway, it’s the weirdest freakin’ gift I’ve ever gotten, and yet, strangely, one that speaks volumes to me.  It’s a gift reflective of my personality and of my relationship with Renee.  I was repulsed, yes, but also touched.  I have scoured the internet trying to find a picture of it, with no luck.   So I tried to take a picture.  I couldn’t find my camera.  The second camera I tried was dead.  The third camera takes blurry pictures, no matter how steady I hold it.  It’s the one I ended up using however.  A blurry picture still conveys the horror.  Here it is:    
In what universe is a creepy, rat-like squirrel holding a votive candle an appropriate gift??  Apparently it’s appropriate in any universe that contains me!!  It scared the hell out of me when I opened it.  Like Squirrel Nutkin had come back from Hell to persecute me!!  I wanted to run screaming from the restaurant but I held it together and gave her a hug.  After all, it’s the thought that counts!!  I think the scariest thing about it is my husband really thought it was cute and it’s now on our table.  I get rid of one damn squirrel only to have another one show up to take its place.  Vermin! 

I have existed on this planet for 39 years and have stayed in more hotels than I can count. But it’s only in the last two months that I have been exposed to the joys of a fire alarm pulled by a young prankster. It’s happened twice in two months; how lucky can you get?

We were in Decatur for the soccer tournament and I was EXHAUSTED!! The goddess had been coughing all night for three nights running and it’s pretty hard to ignore it when she’s 10 feet from you in the same room. Saturday night I wanted nothing more than to sink into a month long coma. By 9:30, the children were nestled all snug in their beds. Hubby was snoring gently beside me. I had my I Pod on and was starting to drift away into nothingness.

The fire alarm in our room was conveniently located right above my head. When it went off, I believe I touched the ceiling. One minute I was listening to Michael Buble, the next minute my eardrums were being shattered by a piercing wail. Tim sat up and looked at me and I said “Some kid pulled it. There’s no way this place is on fire.”

However, it’s kind of hard to ignore the alarm when it’s right over your head, so finally I got up to see what was happening. I opened the door and looked out into the hall. Most everyone was standing in their doorway, looking around in disgust. However, there did appear to be smoke at one end of the hall.

Just as I was about to panic, someone walked by and said “some damn kid pulled the fire extinguisher.” I looked more closely and sure enough, the glass door that housed the extinguisher was wide open.

The alarm continued to wail and yet, there was no sign of anyone official. I was beginning to wonder if the alarm would ever stop. Finally, the stairwell door emerged and a curly head poked through the opening. It was attached to the funky black dude from the front desk. He looked around and then the rest of him emerged cautiously. Two guys started down the hall and I followed. I’m nosey that way.

The desk clerk was looking around bemusedly as we approached. “What happened here?” he asked.
This was not an auspicious opening line. I thought front desk clerks received emergency training for just such events. If I’m in the towering inferno, I want the guy in charge who can rig up the zip line to the helicopter and get us all out safely before the floor collapses. Steve McQueen, where are you when we need you????

One of the men said “some kid pulled the fire extinguisher.”
The clerk looked at him in confusion. “What?”

“Look here,” the guy told him. “See how the door is open? Someone pulled the fire extinguisher.”

This seemed to confuse him more. “Well, is the floor on fire??? Do I need to call the fire department?”

This shattered my illusion of security. The fire alarm had been blaring for fifteen minutes and Shaft hadn’t even called the fire department. Had there been a real fire, we would have all been cooked in our beds, Cajun style. That is, we would be BLACKENED!!!!

The man patiently showed him the fire extinguisher, explained how it worked, and showed him how the pin had been pulled. Told him that the stuff in the air was not smoke but was, in fact, discharge from the fire extinguisher. Shaft nodded and smiled, his confusion dissipating as the man drew him stick figures to explain how the kids had rushed up the stairs, jumped out, pulled the pin, and disappeared back into the stairwell.

The alarms subsided and everyone started to drift back into their rooms. The desk clerk strode down the hall, reassuring everyone it was a false alarm. He didn’t look anything like Steve McQueen and I was still worried for my family’s safety, but I was too tired to argue. So I went back into my room, shut the door and turned on my I Pod. And slept for three whole hours before the tornado sirens started!!!

It’s only Wednesday but I already feel exhausted and run down, ready for the weekend to begin. Oh, wait….I have to spend the weekend in Decatur at ANOTHER freakin’ soccer tournament. There is no rest for the weary, or for those stupid enough to indulge a child in her favorite pastime!!  Sunday I took MA to a birthday party. It was a skating party and there were lots of teeny boppers running around. It was dark and smelly and loud music was playing. In an attempt to display how cool I am….because we all KNOW I am the queen of cool…. I tried to perform the “Soulja Boy”. It’s one of those one hit wonders with a dance attached to it. The song itself only has a few distinguishable lyrics: ‘crank that soulja boy’ and ’superman’. The rest of it is mush, although it’s apparently pornographic mush. I’m not quite brave enough to look up the lyrics.  There I stood in the skating rink, and I thought it would be fun to perform the dance so the other moms would be impressed with me and my coolness. I have never outgrown the adolescent need to prove my worth. The beginning was fine. I criss-crossed sharply and segued effortlessly to the back kick/ankle tap. The side move was a little sketchy (I get really confused by dance moves, in much the same way I get confused by lyrics) but I winged it, figuring most of these middle aged women wouldn’t know the difference. I floated into ’superman’ with great style. It was when I did the side hops that I demonstrated exactly how uncool I am.  I hopped to one side with no problem. As I attempted to hop back, my flip flop folded under me and my backside connected with the ground rather forcefully. I went from “crank that soulja boy” to “meet the carpet with a thud”. I have now permanently marked hip hop dancer off my list of possible careers. I don’t think I will ever get asked to be a back up dancer for Fergie. Dammit. Monday night, MA had her soccer training session and then I had a girl scout leader meeting. We were skipping the goddess’s soccer banquet to go to the meeting because it was a special Cinco de Mayo party for all the leaders and their daughters. We drove all the way out there only to find an empty parking lot. Apparently they changed the meeting to Tuesday night and I forgot to write it down. Who has a Cinco de Mayo party on Seis de Mayo? Idiots. Yesterday, I had errands to run. I went all over the place because I am so very busy and important. I may not get paid, but I am the CEO of this house and it is hard to get everything done. As it is, I barely get to lunch out more than three times a week. Then, when the girls got home from school, we had to rush out to a soccer game. On the way I had to stop at the Publix to buy Oreo Cakesters. If you haven’t tried them yet, your life is more meaningless than I thought. They are that good. I had purchased a box last week to take for the goddess’s soccer game because I was the snack mom. However, the game was canceled and I had to keep sampling the cakesters to make sure they weren’t going bad. It happens you know. Quality control is very important when it comes to chocolate snack foods and I have very high standards. Anyway, after finding I had eaten half the box, I had to replace them. So I left the kids in the car and ran into Publix. Coming back out, it was very easy to spot my car. After the last soccer tournament, MA and her little buddies had cunningly painted all my windows with soccer slogans. Across the back windshield, they had proudly penned the motto: WE KICK BALLS!!! I had no problem with it; they won their tournament and they had a right to be proud. I was proud for them. And I’m the “COOL MOM” so I naturally I let them write on my windows. Alas, at least for me, every time I strive for “cool” I end up with “dumbass”. As I approached the car, I happened to really LOOK at the motto. I had become sort of immune to it since it had been there for two weeks. Imagine my horror as I realized someone had erased part of the “K” from “Kick” and my window now said, in VERY LARGE BLUE LETTERS: “WE LICK BALLS”. I died a little inside. I had been driving around with that on my window for who knows how long. No wonder those truck drivers were grinning at me and giving me thumbs up signs as they passed. They thought I was driving the “blowjobmobile”. I frantically spit on my hands and tried to rub out the offending words, but with limited success. That paint really sticks. I managed to eliminate the word “lick” entirely so my window merely read “WE BALLS”. Not optimal, but certainly less likely to leave me facing a gentleman with a twenty dollar bill in his hand and a smile on his face. As soon as we got home, MA was given a bottle of Windex and some paper towels and the offending motto was removed. And I am hiding the window markers. Today is Wednesday and it was fairly tame. Although as I write this, the goddess is in the throes of a coughing fit reminiscent of a lifetime smoker expiring from lung cancer. She also has a fever. Which means she will be home with me tomorrow. And we’re supposed to have bad weather which means the weather forecasters will go nuts and school will get canceled and everyone will be home by 1:00. If I leave right now, I may be able to catch the last bus out to Mexico! 

I am the only person I know who can go into Wal-Green’s to buy milk and end up spending $150.00. It’s one of my many talents. Today, after an extended margarita lunch with Gina and Blue Momma, I popped next door to pick up some dairy product. Needless to say, I found some other items begging to be purchased. Laugh now, but at least MY mother’s day shopping is out of the way!!

As I made my way to the front of the store, I found myself an unwitting contestant in…..the WALGREEN’S GAME!!!! I’m calling it the Walgreen’s game, but it can be played at any store. However, it works best at Walgreen’s because there are only two check out lines. Playing the game requires skill and concentration, as well as sharp mental acumen. It’s not for sissies.

Game Play: The game begins when the player approaches the check out lines only to discover the following scenario: Register A is manned by a cashier obviously hired to meet the store’s quota of mentally challenged Americans. His customer is an 85 year old woman clutching a fistful of coupons and three sale items. Register B is operated by the assistant manager who is dealing with the “I HAVE TEN RETURNS” woman who is accompanied by her four year old son pitching a fit because mommy will not buy him a $.37 pack of gum. As the contestant, you must choose a line.

I am an experienced player, so I held back and played both lines for a minute, while I debated my choices. Jerry’s kid was ringing up each item for Grandma Moses and debating with her what the correct price was for each item, crowing exultantly when it rang up correctly. Terror Tyke was sobbing and clutching his mother and threatening to walk out on her if she did not meet his demands; frankly, I would have been glad to see him go. The cashier was attempting to void the items and refund the money for each item. Plus, there were ten more items on the counter that had yet to be purchased. Which line would you choose??

If you guessed Grandma Moses and the Rain Man, you would have been wrong. Even though Grandma only had three items, she had all those coupons. Plus, she and the cashier were bonding on some existential level over the great deal she was getting on her Metamucil. Actually, I am filing that whole scenario away for the screenplay I am going to write one day.

I correctly chose my place in line behind the Returns lady. Even though I was itching to smack Terror Tot, I was able to control myself with Lamaze breathing and yoga chants. Eventually, the returns were made and I was being checked out before Grandma M. was able to get her hands on her Metamucil.

Unfortunately, the lady behind me was not as skilled at the game as I. She too, tried to play both lines, but “Pushy Woman With Cart Full of Wal Greens Goodies” jumped past her and got into the Rain Man’s line. A skilled game player recognizes that maneuver as a “Cheap Shot” and would have marched up to her and said “excuse me ma’am, but I was next.” However, not being possessed of my cunning, she shamefacedly slipped into line behind “Pushy.”

I did make one small error in judgement. The assistant manager was much fatter than me, and when she tried to ring up my milk, it wouldn’t work. “Did you know this doesn’t have a bar code?” she asked accusingly. Like I look at bar codes on milk!!! All I know is milk costs more per gallon than gasoline and that says A LOT! My fifteen year old son drinks about a gallon a day. I really need to get paid for this blog!

Anyway, Hefty had to walk her happy ass back to the refrigerator section to find some milk with a bar code, thus deducting points from my final score. As she huffed away, I thought about touting the healthful benefits of taking extra steps daily, but I didn’t think she would take it in the helpful spirit in which it was intended. She brought the milk back and finished ringing up my purchases. I escaped with my purchases, leaving the nice Asian lady who had chosen incorrectly still standing in the Rain Man’s line. And she’s probably still there

My oldest child, my only son, my BABY, has gotten his learner’s permit. This means he was able to successfully answer enough questions on the written test to con the state of Alabama into thinking he might be a competent driver one day. It means my hair will continue to turn gray at an alarming rate. It means my life may be prematurely terminated because we have smacked into a brick mailbox going 57 mph. It’s enough to frighten even the bravest of heart, the sight of my son behind the wheel of a vehicle.,

For one thing, he’s short like me, so he can barely see over the steering wheel. He looks a little like Granny from the Beverly Hillbillies when he drives. And if there is a better way to teach him how to drive than just putting him behind the wheel, please let me know. I just threw him in the seat and let him go. The first time I let him drive on an actual street, we almost took out a jogger. I figure the liability was on the jogger though, because if he wasn’t smart enough to realize the giant white Suburban bearing down on him was driven by a barely visible fifteen year old, then it was his own damn fault for not getting out of the way.

And do you remember your first driving lesson on a real street with real cars? The first time a car came at him, he lost his head. ”MOM WHAT DO I DO?????” he screamed.
“You keep driving son,” I said calmly. “He’s on the other side of the road.” His hands were white knuckled, gripping the steering wheel so hard I thought he might snap it off the steering column. He started veering toward the shoulder of the road and I said “It’s fine if you want to pull off to the side, but you CAN drive with a car coming from the other direction.” He nodded tensely and we managed to pass the car without any incidents. He was so excited he almost hit a mailbox. ”Son, stay toward the middle of the road please,” I told him gently. He yanked the steering wheel and moved us back over toward the line. “Small corrections please,” I said, visions of the Suburban rolling over and bursting into flames dancing in my head.

It’s weird, but I really am very calm when he is driving. I figure only one of us needs to freak out, and it might as well be him. The teacher must remain calm at all times to handle the unexpected. All I remember about learning how to drive is the dashboard caught on fire my very first time behind the wheel. I jumped out of the car and forgot to set the parking brake. I turned around in time to see the car rolling away with my dad trying to jump over the flames to get in the driver’s seat so he could put the car in park before it ran off the road into a ravine. Needless to say, that was the last time he drove with me. Like it was my fault the ashtray caught on fire; he was the smoker, not me!! A little more patience and understanding that day would have gone a long way toward improving my confidence. Although I can understand how the second degree burns on his hands prevented my dad from sympathizing too much!

Yesterday my son drove with my husband and blew through a stop sign. My husband was not impressed. I believe he overreacted a wee bit. Napoleon told me he preferred to drive with me because I was a little calmer. Yesterday, when he came to a complete stop 20 feet before the intersection, I merely sighed and said “pull all the way up to the white line honey.” No point in getting nuts, right?

I am scared to death at the thought of my child behind the wheel without me in the car with him. But I am also ready to have another driver in the house. I am more than ready to relinquish some of the driving duties to someone else. I am hoping a year of driving with me will help him learn to stop hugging the side of the road. He may run over every mailbox between us and the Publix before it’s all over!!