Improper Poll: Publicly Peeved

I hate those lotion cults at malls. Or any mall worker not in a third world country who stands in the sidelines shouting at you to try their product or asking if you will answer just one question. They always seem to target me in spite of the fact that I am a very fast walker and intentionally use the most negative body language ever—eyes averted, skittering quickly along the wall like a cockroach.

I don't mean the grocery store sample ladies, either.  Those people never seem to be pushy and they never hard-sell.  And I've never had one behave rudely.  The ones I'm talking about stand in the mall and ask me to try their product as I race by.  Usually it's lotion.  After I’ve politely told them “no, thank you,” I’ve found that they nearly always argue. Argue! But it’s good lotion, they will say. As if it’s their job to tell me what it is I need and want to buy and not the other way around. I find it so disrespectful. Even worse, if I ignore them, they shout something snotty at my back. Yet if I repeat myself, they get snotty. In fact, come to think of it, I have never had a pleasant experience with these people and would rather put expired Crisco on my chapped hands than use their Attack Lotion, so there!

At one point the Survey People were so bad at the mall that I boycotted the stores near them. I wasn’t trying to be mean; I just don’t like to do business in establishments that allow their customers to be accosted. It comes across as cheap, and it’s easy enough just to shop in peace elsewhere.

And don’t even get me started on that local business with the word “Construction” in it who stands at malls and fairs and tells you that you will be entered to win a prize if you give them your name. No one I know has had a good experience with them, including myself. They managed to sell us a door once in the years before they resorted to shouting at passers-by like carnie barkers. When the patio door finally arrived, not only did it not fit, the manager to whom I spoke was so rude and unapologetic that she lost all future business right there. As if that weren’t bad enough, when we finally did get the door properly installed, it was of shockingly poor quality despite the exorbitant price tag. So what I shout back when they shout at me about their business is, “I had a bad experience with your company and would never buy there again!” I figure this is what they earned, and I truly wish I’d been warned the first time around.

What are your pet peeves that happen in public?

Sub Notes: So, Like, Not Hot

One of the bad things about subbing is that you have no idea how warmly to dress during any time of year. Today I spent the day in the coldest room I can remember, and I was pretty covered up to begin with. At the end of the day I ran to my car (dropping my keys because of the shivering), and just baked in the sun for a while. Then I drove home with no air conditioning and all the windows rolled up. I bet it was well over 100° in there, but I was so bone-chilled that it still felt good. Throughout the day, I thought of

Ten Ways to Get Warm in an Eighth Grade Science Room:

1. Steal all the lab coats and pile them on
2. Shut myself in my car over lunch (if I had time to get there and still eat)
3. Warm myself over Bunsen burners
4. Break glass and wrap up in the asbestos fire blanket
5. Teach class while jogging in place
6. Haphazardly combine chemicals in hopes that something generates heat
7. Threaten custodians with jars of pickled tape worms if they don’t turn down air conditioning
8. Try to evoke hot flashes (which refuse to occur when you actually need them)
9. Failing that, invite menopausal teachers to stand around like space heaters
10. Go to Lost and Found and dig up a hoodie that (ironically) pronounces me to be hot in some way

Question I got from a seventh grader, who was pointing to a portrait of Cher in a white wig: “Is this Lady Gaga?”

Not So Improper: Day for Moms

I was going to write about pet peeves before I realized it’s Mother’s Day.  Writing about peeves on Mother’s Day would just be wrong.

Although thinking about it did get me thinking about something my mother used to do that upset me.  She used to tell me I was too thin.  Can you imagine?  What I wouldn’t give to hear that now. Alas, who but a mother ever tells you that you’re too thin?

Anyway, this is a little story about my mother.

For years, I thought of her as huge.  Then one day in college I realized with a shock that I was physically bigger than she was.  She was 5’ 2” and weighed 105. 

My mother was what everyone called a strong woman.  She was tiny and fierce and political, with an elegance all her own.  She had a powerful sense of justice, and her character and honesty were to me on par with a superhero.  When she believed in something—and she always believed in something—you were either on her side or you stayed out of the way.

As an adult, I once told a friend about how my mother had been left partially crippled by a childhood bout with polio.  The friend seemed shocked I’d never mentioned such a significant thing before.

I laughed.  For most of my life, it wasn’t something I even noticed.  It was just how she was.

My mother had one leg that had suffered some muscle atrophy.  She walked with a limp. Once when we were buying shoes, a little boy loudly wondered what was wrong with the lady’s leg.  I was shocked when I realized he was talking about my mother.  That was how her leg was supposed to be, like the way some mothers have freckles or curly hair or long fingernails.

As a child, I could lie in bed and listen to my family members’ footsteps on our old house’s creaky stairs, and each person had a walk that was as individual as his or her fingerprint. 

My father went, “STOMP STOMP STOMP STOMP!”

My sister went, "Skip-skip! Skip-skip! Skip-skip!"

And my mother went, “Step-pause…step-pause…step-pause….”

That was how I thought of it.  It was her walk.

It wasn’t until I was grown that I realized how hard it had been for my mother in a world that wasn’t terribly friendly to those who were different.  Or how hard it had taught her to fight for the underdog. 

And when she died, it was the underdogs who turned up at her funeral.  In droves.  Turns out they were grateful my mother walked to her own beat, too. Funny that I still think of her as huge.  She was.

Happy Mother’s Day to you and yours.  If you need a pick-me-up, imagine a small, fierce woman saying the below quote to you.  You’re welcome.

Are you on a diet?  Because you are much too thin.  It isn’t healthy to be so thin!  Eat something! ~My mother  

Sub Notes: May 7-11

Normal people have no clue about teaching. None. Once a writer friend of mine went around to schools to speak to the children about writing.

The first time she did most of a day, she couldn’t believe it. Good lord! she said. She was wiped out. Drained. Sapped. Zapped. She went home and slept for hours.

Well, yes.

I’m just a sub, but I get to watch teachers work their magic.I see how some of them  feed children because no one else does. I see them fight—hard—for children no one else seems to care about.They do it because they know someone must.

The best teachers are “on” all day long. From seven AM to three PM, and then later for the planning and grading and coaching and conferences, they are on. No hour lunches. No noon-time errands. Sometimes no bathroom breaks, even. Every minute of the day, timed like a bomb that explodes bells and stampeding feet and slamming lockers.

The best teachers teach with their minds and bodies and hearts and souls—all at once. They are simultaneously divining rods of knowledge and wellsprings of empathy. They channel God and Einstein and Shakespeare and Leno and Oprah. They are demigods in these microcosms of society.

This is Teacher Appreciation Week. Have you hugged a teacher today?

Those who can, teach. Those you can’t go into some less significant line of work. ~Words inscribed on a teacher’s coffee cup

Improper Poll: Road Rage

Last week I enjoyed your comments so much, I’ve decided to do another traffic one. I knew you would mention my other traffic peeves, and you sure did not disappoint!

Last week I also mentioned my Sad Head Shaking gesture that I use in traffic and how it once almost got me attacked. I realized the effectiveness of the Sad Head Shake when I was a teenaged driver and did something stupid in traffic. I don’t remember what it was, but I do remember the way a man sadly shook his head at it.

It was a shaming gesture, and I was much more horrified than if he’d behaved angrily.

From then on I promised myself I would A.) drive more carefully, and B.) use the Sad Head Shake myself whenever the opportunity arose.

That opportunity has arisen many times since then. One of those times was when I was taking my son to pick out college bedding and supplies. We had to make a left into the bedding store, so I was in the left lane and driving exactly the speed limit. My son later corroborated this. But it was clear by the way the guy behind me was riding my bumper that he wanted me to go faster.

Normally I’d just let him pass, but I don’t usually drive in the left lane without a reason, and my turn was coming up. So the kid—who was somewhere around my son’s age or early twenties—screeched into the slow lane, passed me on the right, then angrily swung back in front of me.

I did the Sad Head Shake. I might have laughed a little, too, because my son made a funny comment about people who drive like idjuts.

It was right at that point that I pulled into the left turn lane, and so did Screeching Guy just ahead of me. And then this boy who was so anxious to get somewhere slammed on his brakes, parked his car right there in the turn lane, and got out and started heading toward my car.

Have I ever mentioned that I seem to attract crazies? I do. Always have. And this was not the first time a crazy guy has come after me in a car, so I’ve had some practice. I put my hand on the horn and left it there. It was the middle of the day and traffic was fairly heavy, so we were attracting a lot of attention. But it was when my son was obviously calling police on his cell that the kid thought the better of it and went back to his car and left. At least he didn’t appear to have any weapons that we could see.

So we opted not to call police. In the big picture, it was almost worth the bonding experience with my son; we talked about it for ages. “Remember that crazy guy…?”


Powerful stuff, the Sad Head Shake. Do you have a favorite traffic gesture? And have you ever experience road rage?

Improper Poll: Driven to Distraction

I’ve been feeling somewhat peevish, so I’ve decided to cover peeves in the next few weeks. Is that exciting, or what? So allow me to begin with Traffic Peeves. Sad to say I have only too many of those, but this one is inspired by something that happened Friday on my way home from work. Then in the next couple of weeks, I’ll be moving on to General Public Peeves and possibly Grammatical Peeves. So prepare your peeves!

This Traffic Peeve actually has three parts. No, wait—four. Part I is that the sirens on police cars in my area really are not audible until the cruiser is right next to you. Ambulance and fire trucks are audible, but police cars seem not to be. However, those redblueredblue lights are visible, and that’s how I first detected this one, flashing in my rear-view mirror in the other lane several cars behind me.

So I pulled over to allow him to pass. By the way, this was at the start of rush hour, since rush hour seems to start so early these days. But here’s Part II of the peeve: no one else pulled over even when he was right there and they could obviously hear the siren. In fact, it looked like no one was even willing to pull into the slow lane to let him pass. And there were a lot of cars.

I’m not being holier-than-anyone, either. Honestly, I almost didn’t pull over myself just because no one else did. I hate to admit that, but for a second it actually crossed my mind that maybe someone had changed the rule and I’d missed it.

But here is Part III of the peeve. When I did pull to the side of the road, the woman behind me honked. At me. And she kept it up until after the cop car had passed, so it couldn’t have been that she didn’t see him. This was no little honk, either. This was a what-the-heck-are-you-doing-you-idiot honk, accompanied by flailing arms. To which I flailed back even more angrily. I pointed to the police car. I pointed to the side of the road. I shook my head sadly (which has been my favorite traffic gesture ever since someone used it on me when I was a teenager, but which once almost got me attacked in a genuine instance of road rage; but that’s for another time).

I have to wonder if her own mistake finally hit her, because I noticed she abruptly stopped gesturing and honking. Then she actually stopped riding my bumper after that.

Or maybe she was afraid I’d come after her. Part IV of my peeve is me. I should have ignored her or maybe just done the Sad Head Shake. I don’t like it when I allow other people’s stupidity to have any effect on me.

What’s your worst traffic peeve?

Sub Notes: The Boy Who Died Outside My Window

I did not see the boy die, and I will forever be glad of that. What I saw—what was almost surreal—was the rescue chopper. Today’s schools are often built almost without windows (literally prison-style) in order to avoid distractions. But this was years ago, and beyond the wall of classroom windows, about 40 feet away, was the Flight for Life helicopter landing in the parking lot.

When I hear the phrase, “snuffed out,” I think of this boy. Sometimes I wonder how long he pondered the decision to huff Freon. Minutes? Seconds? Regardless, I imagine that his last deciding breath was his last one altogether. And then that presumably strong, healthy boy was snuffed with a sniff, blown out with a breath.

I’ve heard that it happens that way with inhalants—that you are stopped. Ended. Frozen, almost, which I suppose has a horrifying appropriateness in the case of Freon.

I think sometimes about how abruptly and unexpectedly life can end. I heard rumors about how hard they tried to restart his heart. I know they were there in the parking lot for most of the class period. Until at last the helicopter rose to the sky in no particular hurry.

I wish I could stop messing up but I don’t know how. What is it that mends broken people? Jesus? Chocolate? New shoes? I wish someone could tell me. I wish I had an answer. Once I asked Nathan what the answer was. I thought he might know, considering all he’s been through [the holocaust], but he told me I would have to find it for myself. That everybody has to. ~Jennifer Donnelly, Revolution

Improper Poll: The Nekid Truth

Don’t blame me for this. Blame Linda of Write from the Heart for writing from the funny bone a couple of months ago about the first time she saw a naked man. Her description of Bazooka Joe is hysterical.

So I confessed that, since I came from a family of sisters and was not even remotely privy to male privates, I once studied a picture in a figure drawing book with increasing confusion until I realized much later that what I’d been sneaking peeks of had in reality been…a fig leaf. (This was a black and white drawing, by the way. If the leaf had been green, I would have had a clue. Or maybe not.)

Never fear—I did not give up on my pursuit of the personal parts! Much later I discovered a big sister’s copy of The Godfather (I think) in our attic and read a description so terrifying that I would say that prose alone did more to protect my virtue than pretty much anything else. So yet one more reason to be a reader! What I pictured was very angry and not of this world and could have starred in its own horror flick.

Eventually my best friend and I got to talking, and she ended up stealing her big sister’s ID in order to buy me a copy of a “Playgirl” magazine.

I mean no insult to the male gender when I say that being underwhelmed can be good.  Whew.

Did you have any interesting thoughts on the other side’s nether sides?

Book Blurb Friday #59

Could it be? It is! It's Book Blurb Friday! Every week, Lisa Ricard Claro of Writing in the Buff posts a meme with a picture for a pretend book jacket. Our challenge is to write a blurb of 150 words or fewer to go with it. My blurb has 150 words.

~Riley was Here~

Sweet little Riley Kiley was not like other nine-year-old children. From the time he stopped breathing when he was five, he began talking to an invisible friend named Bosco. And when Riley talked to Bosco, he always seemed to slip out somehow and disappear. For three minutes and fourteen seconds at a time. Always left in his place was his penguin, Gwen. Riley said Gwen was Bosco’s promise that he was coming back.

How did he do it? No one—even the child psychologist assigned to work with him—could figure it out. Cameras in his vicinity at the time always seemed to go dead.

Then one day Riley told his parents that Bosco had something important to say…and he wasn’t back in three minutes. Or three days. Where was he? The press caught wind of his story, and the people began to gather, hoping for more than one miracle.

The unkown is something not yet found. ~James Van Praagh, Talking to Heaven

Improper Poll: The Mall Creature

I didn’t know from what hole the thing had crawled, but it was clearly not of this world. The hands were small and human, but the head was nothing short of disturbing. It was enormous and loomed above me with a perpetually grinning, funhouse mouth that stayed frozen when it talked with its too-happy girl voice like some great, furry pink mutation. The thought of this freakish hybrid sneaking around my house in the middle of the night hiding anything—even baskets of candy—was terrifying.

Bad enough they dragged you every December to sit on some strange, hairy man who smelled of sweat and old wool and moth balls. I told my mother that this creature didn’t look at all like the Easter Bunny, and no way was I going near it, least of all to sit on its lap. Then I dug in my new patent leather Mary Janes and braced for the fight.

But to my absolute shock, my mother agreed. Then she laughed. It was creepy, she giggled, and she was sure the real Easter Bunny didn’t look at all like that. So we turned [cotton] tail and left.

To this day, this is one of my best holiday memories ever, allowing Easter to remain a pure, no-frills holiday that brought lovely things, like candy you didn’t have to ring doorbells for and tiny daffodils and crocus that sprouted along the church sidewalk. And those hats, like sailboats for your head with kite tails that blew in the cool spring wind.

Happy Easter.  Do you have a favorite Easter or spring memory?

Book Blurb Friday #58

How quickly the week goes! Every Friday, Lisa Ricard Claro of Writing in the Buff posts a meme with a picture for a pretend book jacket. Our challenge is to write a blurb of 150 words or fewer to go with it. My blurb has 150 words.

~So, Like, Over the Moon~

By Stuffeny Mayer

You loved reading the first book in Stuffeny Mayer’s new series about Jacob and Renesme, The Cow Jumped Over the Moon:

“Dude, your prom date smells like vampire.”
“That’s not vampire; I think her diaper needs changing.”

And you clamored for more in Shoot the Moon, when Jacob and Renesme have their baby, Isadorbell (named after Bella and Jacob’s mother, Dora), and Jacob contracts distemper and fails to phase completely, leaving his bare human buttocks exposed when he becomes a wolf.

Now you will enjoy Stuffeny’s last in the Full Moon Series, So, Like, Over the Moon, where Renesme finds out that her accelerated aging continues until she is seven, which is the equivalent of 49 human years…leaving her in eternal menopause.

Now her hot flashes are even too much for Jacob, he is perpetually in the doghouse, and he’s afraid that his wife will bite his head off. Literally.

Take this letter that I give you/ Take it sonny, hold it high/ You won’t understand a word that’s in it/ But you’ll write it all again before you die ~Queen, “Father to Son” (from Queen II, one of the best albums ever made)

Improper Poll: No Foolin’

Don’t get me wrong—I can be plenty foolish. But I am sadly bereft of April Fooling talents. The best I ever did was pretend to be The State Messy-Desk Inspector for my sister’s fourth grade class. I was in costume, though one astute kid did notice there was no glass in my horn-rimmed glasses.

And it was probably very bad karma for me since I always had one of the messiest desks in grade school myself. Still do.

Friday at school, an eighth-grader asked me when April first was. Was it Monday? You could hear the hope in his voice. Those cogs were turning. The pranking ones. This is one holiday kids hope falls on a school day because of course it’s way more fun to fool teachers and other students than your little brother, for whom fooling is a daily occurrence. Plus chances are, little brothers know all of your tricks.

Do you have an April Fools prank?

Book Blurb Friday #57

TGIBBF! Every week, Lisa Ricard Claro of Writing in the Buff posts a meme with a picture for a pretend book jacket. Our challenge is to write a blurb of 150 words or fewer to go with it. I am in love with Sandra's work of art, below.  My blurb this week has 128 words.

~The Naked Ape Exposed~

By Dr. Darence Clarrow

The year is 2053, and the research is complete. The conclusion? Not only is society becoming more detached, we may actually be returning to our roots: evidence now suggests that our ancestors “planted” us here when they crossed their own hairless, big-headed, bug eyed genes with those of the warm and social apes of our own planet.

But a flaw in the alien gene means that the more we evolve, the more we become like our alien ancestors—and thus lose what it is that makes us most human. Could this paradox of enormous proportions really be true? And how delicious is the irony: what makes us essentially “human” is really due to our ape genes.

“A ‘Monkey Trial’ to end all Monkey Trials.” ~Sci Fi Journal Monthly

It is the creative potential itself in human beings that is the image of God. ~Mary Daly

Improper Poll: Not Quite Pinned Down

It’s clear that many of you were impressed by last week’s Slut Pin. Some of you even asked how one obtains such a thing…because you were obviously hoping to run out and get one for yourself.

As much as I hate to thwart a fashion trend in the making, I don’t think slut pins are still available. They were given out free before a movie I saw years ago with a friend and my daughter. I can’t remember the name of the movie, but it was about high school. The attendant held a basket of pins as we entered the theater. The idea was to choose one that represented the group we most identified with. My daughter and I both reached for the one that said, “Theater Geek,” so I let her have it.

I didn’t want the same pin, so at that point my hand hovered over the basket. There was a group of creative writers at my high school, but we were so diverse that we never could have formed our own cohesive group even when we worked together on publications. And what do you call that, anyway? There was never a group that seemed to encompass all of the arts, and besides, I never felt edgy enough to be considered one of the cool artsy people. It was one of the great plagues of my high school years that I identified with a bunch of groups, but none, really, in particular. I even made friends with that kid in the back whose name no one else knew, and I learned those people can be undiscovered gems.

I sit at a lot of tables at reunions, and at last I'm happy about that.

So this was what I was thinking as my hand hovered over the basket of pins and the movie line waited patiently behind me. “Here, take this one,” my friend teased, and scooped up The Slut Pin. There were a whole bunch of them. Apparently the coolness hadn’t yet caught on.

What pin would you wear?

Book Blurb Friday #56

Time for Book Blurb Friday! Every week, Lisa Ricard Claro of Writing in the Buff posts a meme with a picture of a pretend book cover. Our challenge is to write a blurb of 150 words or fewer to go with it.  My blurb has 150 words.

Photo courtesy of Scott Liddell

~Changes~

Ty was in for a shock when he awoke for school…and it was a paw the size of a baseball mitt—with claws—that hit his IPod radio.

Ty Munson had enough problems. He was thirteen and not exactly one of the popular kids. Now he had to come to terms with the fact that he was a weretiger—like a werewolf, but a tiger. And werewolves, Ty learned, have it easy in comparison. They have the predictability of a full moon and the night as a cover.

Ty went into weretiger during increased sunspot activity…which meant it was during the day, and with very little warning.Now he seemed destined to spend his time hiding out, often in the school’s science storage room, trying to avoid trouble.

Then a classroom was taken hostage and no one knew what to do.

Except, that is, the tiger in the storage room.

***

Have to say I was jazzed about this one. In my mind, none of the kids have cell phones because of a recent crackdown, which middle schools do in my area.  And the teacher’s phone is in her purse locked away. And Ty, of course, can’t dial or text with those gigantor paws of his, so it’s up to him to save the day. Oh, by the way, can you see his initials to the left of his eye? The “M” is easier to spot, and the “T” is above it.  Have a grrreat weekend!

***

If I were asked to give what I consider the single most useful bit of advice for all humanity it would be this: Expect trouble as an inevitable part of life and when it comes, hold your head high, look it squarely in the eye, and say, “I will be bigger than you. You cannot defeat me.” ~Ann Landers

Sub Notes: Fill in the Blanks

It was summer school, and it was in a rough part of town. I had them filling out pretend job applications.

A girl’s hand went up. “Under ‘Father’s Name,’ what do you put if you don’t know who your father is?”

Even for a tough school, some of the kids acted a little shocked. “You don’t know who your father is?” someone asked.

She lifted her chin several inches and looked him straight in the eyes. “No,” she said, a little too loudly.

I liked this girl. She was tough, yes, but she had a core of goodness in her. I felt a flash of protectiveness. If anyone was going to mess with her, they’d have to go through me first.

“Oh,” I said. “Yes, thank you. I forgot to mention that. If you don’t know who your father is, put N/A.”

N/A? It was a ridiculous thing to say, I know, but I was desperately improvising while trying to sound casual, and I’ve never been a quick thinker.

But at least nobody gave her a hard time after that. Maybe they sensed they would have had to go through me first.

Oh, and she inexplicably mails me a cactus every Valentine’s Day. And I’m like, “Thanks a heap, coyote ugly. This cactus-gram stinks even worse than your abandonment.” ~Juno MacGuff of her biological mother in the movie, Juno

Happy Saint Patrick's Day!

Hope you're having a wonderful St. Patrick's Day.  I'm off trying to get in some celebrating that I feel as if I've earned.  This is a re-post.  

Ten Seven TEN Things for Losers to Do on St. Patrick’s Day!

1. Don’t go to the bar on St. Patrick’s Day. Go to the dentist.
2. Wear a t-shirt that says, “Kiss me, too, I’m Portuguese.”
3. Kissing the wearer o’the green is so trite. Kiss the wearer o’the brown instead.
4. Kissing is so germy. Instead, go up to everyone wearing green and simply stroke their sleeve a bit. Don’t forget to use hand sanitizer afterwards!
5. Beer is so...working class. If you want to be REALLY classy, sip green wine instead. Make sure it's an Irish one. If you want to impress people with your wine drinking technique, gently gargle with it. Smack your lips and exclaim, “Ah!” This is called “embibing in the brogué.”
6. Parades get so darned crowded. Instead, stand on a street corner and wave at random people. When an interesting vehicle or weird looking person goes by, clap.
7. Instead of wearing shamrocks, wear a leaf associated with your ancestry. So if you’re Canadian, wear a maple leaf, and if you’re from Guam, wear a banana leaf, or if you’re from Nebraska, wear a corn husk, etc. Or if your ancestry is really mixed, simply wear salad. Or better yet, wear a fig leaf and explain to people that we’re all descended from Eve.
8. Can’t find your shamrock pin to wear? No worries! Simply wear your “slut” pin instead.
9. Spontaneously giggle at the dentist’s office because you suddenly remembered that you own a “slut” pin. Don’t ask.
10. Take a picture of your “slut” pin for your blog.

May the best day of your past be the worst day of your future. ~Irish toast

Improper Poll: Television Tribulations

For some time now, I’ve been forced to deal with television providers who seem to have decided that the way to deal with the bad economy is to trick money out of their customers.

I dealt with a company I’ll call Charmer Noncommunications, who not only boosted its prices every year while their packages shrank, but they overcharged my bill for eight—yes, EIGHT—months in a row. Every month they’d give me a convoluted excuse for why my bill was wrong—which essentially meant,“your bill is wrong this month because it was wrong last month.” One young customer service rep even sighed that…tsk…DUH!…if I’d just pay the wrong bill, I would straighten it all out!

Now I have one I’ll call Dish It Out Netword. Last night I saw a commercial where Dish It Out Netword was making fun of Charmer Noncommunications. Are you kidding me? They taught them everything they know. Because even though Dish It Out's salesman told me they “haven’t had a price increase” in just ages, my price went up after a year. Now they tell me what the salesman neglected to mention: It was a one-year deal only. So they’re not raising their prices! They’ll give me a new package! According to this salesman, the new package includes taking away CNN, A&E, and ABC Family (etc.) and replacing them with Hunting Channel, Country and Western Channel, and Gospel Channel.*

Nothing against folks who’d like those channels, but this caused me to try to think of

TEN CHANNELS I WOULD WATCH EVEN LESS THAN THE ONES DISH IT OUT NETWORD IS OFFERING ME (I have to say this was hard, because, although I’m not a big TV watcher, I will watch almost anything):

1. Animal Abuse Planet
2. Colicky Baby Wars: The Loudest Screamer
3. Hell’s Bathroom
4. Ice Loves Cocoa Krispies Way Too Much
5. Stuart Loves His Goat, Ester (Okay, I would watch this once but wouldn't admit it)
6. Grooming for Old Folks TV
7. Say Yes to the Pajama Jeans (This one’s for my critique group)
8. Shopping for Dickeys (Ditto)
9. Taxidermy TV
10. Nothing But Boils

What channels would you refuse to watch?

*Post note:  I contacted the BBB, and within two business days, Dish It Out Netword remedied the situation by giving me my agreed-upon package back.  Hooray for the Better Business Bureau!

Book Blurb Friday #54

Hooray for Book Blurb Friday! Every week, Lisa Ricard Claro of Writing in the Buff presents us with a picture for a pretend book jacket. Our challenge is to write a blurb of 150 words or fewer to go with it. I hope Sandra Davies will forgive me for the liberties I took with her beautiful and inspiring picture. My blurb has 150 words.

~The Upstairs Window~

1812: It seemed so long that she had dreamed of his return. Daily she watched for him, but all she saw was people who looked so strange. Occasionally they shouted and pointed up at her until she hid.

If he didn’t come back, she would jump.

2012: It seemed he had dreamed of her so long. Now he was looking for his first house. And when he looked at the upstairs window, there she was looking down at him. He turned to the Realtor. Someone was up there! A beautiful woman. Had she seen?

Oh, there’s a legend that the place is haunted, she said. A woman named Georgiana had supposedly waited in vain for her true love to come home and then threw herself out the window. Silliness, of course. What did he think—was he home?

“Home,” he whispered, looking up.

“Home,” Georgiana gasped, tears in her eyes.

"Of all the ways to lose a person, death is the kindest." ~Ralph Waldo Emerson

Improper Poll: Evolution of The Purse

I just switched purses…which means I cleaned out the old one. I had to announce this because it is, in fact, that big a deal.

When I got my first purse in junior high, I had nothing to put in it. So I stuffed it with tissues the way I’d heard some girls stuffed their bras. (Which I never did, by the way—only because I can think of too many potential disasters created by tissues-gone-awry.  And let's face it, I just seem to attract that type of disaster.)

In high school and college, The Purse became a place of sanctuary. Mysterious things may or may not have hung out in there, but I wasn’t willing to let anyone else see it. Except my female friends, of course, because theirs were just as bad.

When I had children, my stuff disappeared and the children’s took over. The Purse morphed into a diaper bag. It was huge—a mini suitcase, really—and contained all of the provisions necessary to sustain a toddler for one day while preventing as many tantrums as possible. It contained clothing items and snacks and toys. The only thing I carried for myself was money, and even then I can remember forgetting my checkbook once because I was so concerned with loading in emergency backup Nuk-Nuks. I still remember flailing madly in my purse with one hand as I drove because one of my children needed a tissue NOW—and it turned out that the emergency was that Barbie was cold and needed a blanket.

Now I’m embarrassed to admit that The Purse is becoming a traveling pharmacy. Granted, I’ve been sick lately, but I have medications to manage almost any imaginable illness, discomfort, upset, or eruption. I have glasses that make up for the fact that I can’t see close up and ones that help me see farther away. I have little note pads for jotting what I can’t remember, because, although my phone probably has an app for that, I'd have to mess with finding my glasses in order to see it.

But weirdest of all is the pens. I can never find a pen. I will dig, flail, and rattle around—nothing. Yet…guess how many pens I found? Just guess! Five? Ten?! NO!! FIFTEEN pens I found in there. I found them in crevices, under flaps, and in pouches I didn’t even realize were in there. I’d find some and think it was a lot and then discover another hidden cache of them. It was like a magician pulling rabbits out of a hat—impossibly large numbers of rabbits that just keep going and going. There were disposable pens and rhinestone ones and flowered ones and cheap and expensive pens and ones that attach somehow and little ones designed just for purses.

So I dumped all fifteen into the new purse where they magically submerged and disappeared, only to reappear the next time I switch purses.

What weird things do you carry with you?

Book Blurb Friday #53

Book Blurb Friday is a wonderful meme from our Southern Hostess-with-the-Mostest, Lisa Ricard Claro of Writing in the Buff. The challenge is to use the picture provided in order to “write a book jacket blurb (150 words or less) so enticing that potential readers would feel compelled to buy the book.” I am late this week because the storms that passed through were not exactly kind, and the resulting power loss left me without a computer. Or a backyard fence.

But others have it much, much worse, so am sending my best to all those who’ve suffered as a result of those storms.

Today’s blurb has 150 words.

~Tea with Miss Nabbity~

Lunden Tate was in trouble. At 18, she’d crossed the country in order to follow a man who promised to make her a famous model. Now here she was with nothing.

Miss Florence Nabbity of Wildwood Bed and Breakfast had a place for her to live and work…if Lunden could stand to live in the middle of nowhere with a woman in her sixties. Lunden had been searching for excitement. What on earth did she have in common with this woman?

Not much, it turned out. Because Miss Nabbity’s life had been far beyond anything Lunden ever could have imagined. She began looking forward to her afternoon tea with Miss Nabbity.

“Is this you in the picture, Miss Nabbity? Dancing topless?”

“Well…yes, sweetie,” she shrugged, sipping her Pomegranate Antioxidant. “I never should have done that.”

“Taken your shirt off?”

“No, dropped that much acid. But that’s how Woodstock was….”

And maybe one day, when the kids go to college and I get a divorce, I’ll embark on a journey someplace to which JetBlue does not fly. I will get a job as a foreign correspondent, wear hiking boots and a tan vest with many pockets. There will be others of my kind, smart-talking women, and probably, hopefully, men with English accents, and we will sit up at night in foreign hotel bars, drinking whiskey and trading outrageous anecdotes. Oh, the stories I’ll tell. ~Cynthia Kaplan, Leave the Building Quicikly

Sub Notes: Metamorphosis

I was subbing with mentally retarded high school kids. He fixed me with his winning smile and pointed in the direction of the book, asking me if I’d read it to him.

The other teachers and aides smiled. His favorite, they all said. He asked everyone to read it. So I got it out of the backpack he indicated at the back of his wheelchair.

It was a book about a happy puppy dog. The reading level was maybe first or second grade.

When I finished, he grinned, “Guess what? I was on TV once!”

“Wow!” I said. “How come?” I thought I was going to hear about Special Olympics.

“I was in a car accident!” he smiled. He might have been telling me about the toys Santa had brought him. “I used to be smart,” he said. “I got a 32 on my A.C.T.! But I got a head injury and got in this wheelchair. They did a whole special about me on TV!”

“Wow!” I said again. I mumbled something about what a great attitude he had and how he sure had reason to be proud. Then I busied myself with putting the book back in the carrier attached to his wheelchair. It took me a long time to put away.

It was a book about a happy puppy dog.

Enjoying the joys of others and suffering with them—these are the best guides for man. ~Albert Einstein

Improper Poll: Wave Away

Years ago, an elderly man used to stand next to a busy street near here and hold up a sign advertising roses. He’d wave as people drove by. It was quaint. It was sweet. And it was so impressive that a man his age could withstand the elements—not to mention holding his arm up all day—that he was a bit of a legend in my area. The local paper even did an article on him. We always waved back. He was our friend even though we’d never met him. He was affectionately known as The Rose Man.

I haven’t seen The Rose Man in many years, but apparently before he left, he went forth and populated our town with waving, sign-holding Progeny-from-Hell. They are everywhere.

Yesterday I drove down that same busy street, which is admittedly even busier. We passed dueling, dancing rival pizza slices on either side of the street, some tax people, the person holding up a sign advertising “We Buy Gold,” someone in a gorilla suit (no idea why), somebody holding up a sign that might have been for birth control services or possibly against them, I couldn’t tell which, and someone else whose sign was much too small for me to read and might have been picketing something. All of them were dancing around and/or waving.

At the risk of sounding crotchety, all that leaping and gyrating and sign holding and waving annoyed the hell out of me and made it hard to drive. It was like having a bunch of little kids scream at the top of their lungs at the same time, “Look at me! No, me! Me me me!!!”

The worst was one I saw the other day. I don’t know what she was advertising, but I got a good look at her from behind while waiting for my light to change. She was obviously so cold and so tired that she’d hold her sign up a while and then let it drop, then stumble out what might have been a half-hearted little jig or possibly a foot that had fallen asleep. Either way, it looked painful. And it made me hate the company she works for, honestly, for making a person suffer through that.

So my improper questions for today are, do you have those waving, sign holding people in your area? And if so, do you feel obligated to wave back? Do they really get your business, or do they drive it away? Do you wave at little kids going by on amusement park trains, and why do we pretend that’s a parade when it isn’t?

Improper Poll: You Might Call Him Mr. America

As a substitute teacher, I often find myself wandering around classrooms while kids work. School posters are frequent contributors to my beloved quote collection.

But often my mind wanders, and some things should never wander too far or they will just get lost. For example, when you look at a poster of all of our presidents, some of them were kind of cute. I know JFK was known for being adorable, and a lot of people think Clinton and Obama are good looking. And both Bushes weren’t too bad in their younger years. But if we’re talking about younger years, Google “Gerald Ford football” sometime. Oh, gracious!

I have to say, though, when judged at the time they served as president—James K. Polk wasn’t too bad if one is able to ignore his precursor-to-the-mullet-hairdo. And Franklin Pierce had almost an aged Johnny Depp look in some of his portraits. And really Thomas Jefferson was pretty cute in a distinguished way. But by far my favorite president either on currency or not is Andrew Jackson. Yes, he has that long face, but even the $20 bill captures that sort of rock star quality—a gentlemanly rock star quality. It’s almost as if someone off camera just said something of such great concern that he is readying himself to take flight via his enormous, winged eyebrows.

Today's Improper Poll question is, of course, should the presidential race have a swimsuit competition phase? And who do you think was our cutest president?

Book Blurb Friday #51

Book Blurb Friday is a great meme hosted by Lisa Ricard Claro of Writing in the Buff . The weekly challenge is to “write a book jacket blurb (150 words or less) so enticing that potential readers would feel compelled to buy the book.” My blurb this week has 145 words.

~Wieners and Losers: the Adventures of Special Agent McGee~

Special Agent McGee was Chicago P.D.’s greatest enigma. An absolutely legendary undercover officer, he was rumored to be, in civilian life, a Great Dane. Others whispered that he was really a wolf. Still others had heard he was a 46-year-old former marine from Milwaukee.

One other thing they didn’t know: who had murdered Oscar Meyer and dumped the body in Lake Michigan, and why. Was it notorious thug, Jimmie Dean, over an ongoing rivalry? Or was Mrs. Butterworth not nearly as sweet as she appeared to be?

And what about Mr. Meyer’s life partner, Colonel Mustard? True, the two seemed like the perfect pair, but they had supposedly engaged in quite an altercation in the library the night before Oscar’s death.

One thing was certain: Special Agent McGee, under the guise of a lovable wiener dog, was sure to sniff out the real killer.

People love to read about work. God knows why, but they do. ~ Stephen King, On Writing

Senior Sex(less) and the City: #21

The Old Boyfriend
The name was so familiar, it didn’t seem at all out of place in my inbox. Yet when I thought about it, I realized I haven’t seen that name in—could it be?—thirty years?! And when you figure how long I’ve known him, we go back even further than that.

He lived on the other side of my neighborhood, so we were practically children together. A friend of Joe’s, I think. What was I—15, 16 when we first met? I know I thought he was cute. But he had a girlfriend. Later, after they’d broken up, we dated off and on for years.

And now here he was emailing me. Did I remember him? Ha. To me, he looks exactly the same, right down to that scar I loved because it somehow added a slightly rugged defiance to those almost-too-pretty features. And how I loved his conspiratorial grin, the way he leaned in as if we alone got the joke….

What I remember most for some reason is the time he picked me up for a date and I asked him what he’d done all day. He told me he’d been mowing lawns after work. I guess I asked him if it was a job. His mother was widowed and I knew he mowed his own family’s grass. He answered that he always mowed his neighbors’, too. Wasn’t that a job, I asked? I still remember the way he said it. “No,” he shrugged. “They’re old.” As if that explained it. And it did. I believe I fell in love with him just a little bit at that moment.

After we emailed a few times, I sent him my number so we could catch up. He is recently divorced. Although neither of us is from this city, we both live surprisingly close now. And I could no longer use the excuse that I’m not ready to date someone new. Technically this isn’t someone new, is it?

It was really nice when I started to explain a situation with someone we both used to know…and I didn’t have to explain. Not only does he already know the people involved, but he went through something similar himself. He understood my feelings exactly, and from more than one perspective. It’s a situation not many people understand. He’s experienced his own losses, and they’ve given him depth and character. Wisdom.

Once again, it’s the scars I’m drawn to. What an unexpected comfort it is, this intimacy, like something we alone get. I believe I fell in love with him just a little bit. All over again.

My friends are my estate. ~Emily Dickinson

Sub Notes: Gallery of Youth

Homely little statue of the goddess Laurel, who is supposed to represent poetic inspiration

 I subbed in a high school library recently, which means I got to stand behind a desk sometimes and just watch them.

The librarian was watching them, too. “Aren’t they beautiful?” she asked, echoing exactly what I was thinking.

I was recently discussing this with a friend. “Even the not-so-pretty ones are still pretty,” she’d said.

Yes. They have fat, glossy hair and thin, glossy bodies. They are tall and strong and new and gorgeous.

They are works of art, these children, captured through the centuries, through eons even, firm in that age-old conviction that they are the first ever to be young. They are, and possess, every sense of the word, “ideal.” They are the infamous Waterhouse model and Queen Hatshepsut and sculptures of Roman gods riding off to war and Lord Leighton’s titian-haired princesses and Aztec sun gods.

“They have no idea how beautiful they are,” the librarian said. I think she was right. Youth has such irony to it. They know youth creates idols, worshiped in part because of its brevity, but they are still insecure in their newness.

Which is a good thing, I guess. And of course the not-so-new among us have beauties of our own that these children won’t discover until it’s their turn. And somebody else’s turn—for the briefest of moments, anyway—to make youth eternal.

High school boy asking me for a restroom pass: "Can I go number...." (Turns to friend and shouts across room), “ Which one is pee? One or two?”

Me: "That’s okay. You don’t need to specify. Really."

Improper Poll: Halleluiah

The sun is out, and I don’t get to see sun much during the work week these days. So I’m taking a break from true impropriety today…and maybe for the next couple of weeks. There’s a scene in Eat Pray Love (the book; haven’t seen the movie) where Elizabeth Gilbert describes a few hours when the pleasure she’s been seeking just seems to settle on her during the sweetest, simplest times.

That very thing unexpectedly happens to me from time to time. I don’t mean ordinary, run of the mill happiness, but an overwhelming thrill that threatens to bring tears to my eyes. I used to try to capture life in art. Now I’m starting to see life as art. What’s more, I used to think the goal in art was to channel the divine. Now I think the goal in life is to channel the divine.

Every now and then, out of nowhere that almost overwhelming happiness just seems to appear and flutter down and nest into my soul, and while it’s there, my heart just soars. This time of year, it’s the way the sun angles through the tree limbs and sends blue stripes of shadow on the road. Or it’s the sculpture of bare trees against a cobalt sky.

Or maybe it’s the little vase of hyacinths on my kitchen table. Or the damp-earth smell of early spring.

What do you see as art? What makes your soul soar?

Book Blurb Friday #49

It’s Book Blurb Friday! Lisa Ricard Claro of Writing in the Buff hosts this fun meme in which the weekly challenge is to “write a book jacket blurb (150 words or less) so enticing that potential readers would feel compelled to buy the book.” My blurb this week has 147 words at last count.

~Trials of a Salem Witch~

They had the technology, however top secret it was, to obtain proof. Pharmeceutical toxicologist Ivy Wilson was one of a team of researchers testing the theory that the events of the Salem Witch Trials occurred as a result of hallucinations brought on by ergot poisoning of rye crops. Ivy’s job was to go back to 1692 in order to collect grain samples for testing.

All she had to worry a bout was being seen.

But an error in calculations sent her back into the farmer’s home instead of his field. Not only was she seen, but a startled observer was nearly killed. So Ivy did the unthinkable: she brought him into the future to save his life.

And now what? Had she just changed the course of human history? Or was Ivy the original “witch” who had set into motion the deaths of more than nineteen innocents?

“For I have seen it and I have felt it and I know that it is love, not death, that undoes us.” ~Jennifer Donnelly in Revolution

Improper Poll: Way Past Prime Numbers

 

My daughter is a renowned expert on expiration dates. So when she isn’t here, I am defenseless against those little stamped numbers which are often hard for me to read even if I can distinguish them from mysterious product codes. Does 022012 mean February 20th of 2012 or just February in general? Usually I only remember to check during canned food drives, because I wouldn’t want to give someone else expired food.

Here is a confession: The other day I knowingly drank expired coffee. It was a powdered instant mix, and really, how much could powder degrade? Still, I was worried enough that I warned my daughter ahead of time in case that special, relaxing “me” time from the commercial became non-relaxing rush-me-to-the-hospital-time and she needed to know what to tell the paramedics. It smelled and tasted fine, though. And I lived. Oh, and the expiration date was a year ago.

I was going to have a contest to see who could locate the Most Expired Food Item in their pantry, but I was afraid no one would want to participate.

Or that I would lose.

You’ll be pleased to know I’m not going to tell you what’s in the back of my refrigerator. In fact, I am not even going to look! Instead, I’ll ask this: do you have expired food, or am I the only one?

Book Blurb Friday #48

Not only is it Book Blurb Friday, but gracious Southern hostess and Belle-of-the-Blurb herself, Lisa Ricard Claro of Writing in the Buff, has chosen my picture to use as this week’s cover! It’s an extreme close-up of ‘Miami Rose’ plumeria that bloomed for the first time this fall and has been brightening up my sunroom ever since, so it’s been fun to play with possible plots for it. The weekly BBF challenge is to “write a book jacket blurb (150 words or less) so enticing that potential readers would feel compelled to buy the book.” My blurb this week has 150 words.

~It Also Means Goodbye~

They couldn’t have been more different. But Connecticut accountant Charlotte Wilder and Hawaii nursery owner Mimi Rose Ebert began their internet friendship with a similar passion for plumerias.

Perhaps because they felt safe at such a distance, the unlikely friends began to share more than plumeria cuttings with each other. Mimi knew how much Charlotte hated her job…and Charlotte knew that Mimi was planning to leave her controlling husband.

When Mimi unexpectedly killed herself, Charlotte was shocked to find her friend had willed her a gift: a one-way ticket to Maui. Mimi’s grieving husband insisted it was Mimi’s last wish to have Charlotte come to the funeral and choose a plumeria to plant near her grave.

But when Charlotte arrived and met Mimi’s handsome brother Scott, she learned she wasn’t alone in thinking that Mimi’s death was suspicious.

Now that she was in paradise, was her life in danger, too?

Real friendship is shown in times of trouble; prosperity is full of friends. ~Euripides

Sub Notes: Science of Scary Hair*

Tarzan, or Newton's Untamed Descendant?

*Or:  Why English Majors Should Never Be Allowed to Teach Science

Today's Improper Poll evolved. Perhaps it's because I’ve been teaching science lately, so nothing has been normal for me.  But teaching science also means I am occasionally bombarded with pictures of various scientists from the past. I've developed a theory that science does weird things to your hair. 

Newton

Because have you ever noticed that scientists from a few centuries ago appear to have discovered interesting ways to sprout hair? Sir Isaac Newton, whom I suspect was a model for the cartoon Tarzan, has always reminded me of 80s hair bands or else 60s go-go dancers. His head is proof of Newton’s little-known discovery that a large mass of hair can actually defy gravity and therefore expand within the universe (m=1,000,000xhair²).

Copernicus

Copernicus, on the other hand, whose buoyant bob appears to have fallen in bouncy body-liciousness, spent many hours working on the hypothesis that the universe, in fact, revolves around his hair (otherwise known as the Hairiocentric Theory).






On the opposite pole is Charles Darwin, who was actually cute in the years before survival of the hairiest evolved him into Santa Clause’s scarier brother.

Darwin Before

Darwin After

And don’t get me started on Einstein. Discover a middle ground, people!

When red-haired people are above a certain social grade their hair is auburn.

~Mark Twain

Improper Poll: I have a dream

This morning I awoke with an extra weekend day. It is glorious, this beloved freebie plunked down right in the middle of January just when I need it most. It’s like a snow day, only planned, so that I can do things like make dentist appointments and not have to worry that I’ll get there at the end of the day when the dentist might be so sick of looking at nasty mouths that she’s grown hardened and insensitive to my worn enamel and tooth sensitivity.

I will accomplish so much! I will organize my photographs left over from March…of 2010! I will make helpful financial charts using Excel. I will learn how to use Excel! I will paint, glue and decoupage my old encyclopedias into attractive furniture items! I will clean out my underwear drawers and throw out the really comfortable underwear I’ve dubbed the “crotchless (but not in a good way) panties.”

I will read entire novels while lounging in the sunroom with a fat-free iced cappuccino. I will clean out my entire basement. I will see if my treadmill still works and then go out and buy a whole collection of Zumba dvds, and then come home and work till I lose maybe a pound or two. I will diagnose and fix the phantom flushing problem in my toilet rather than blaming it on ghosts. I will select, iron, color code and arrange clothing for the upcoming work week.

I will write a short story for a contest, revise and then submit those essays I’ve been meaning to get to and start my novel. And I’ll do this right after I finish putting down the mulch I’ve been meaning to finish since last fall. But first I’ll go to the hardware store and buy it. And replace the wheelbarrow tire while I’m at it. Maybe pick up a few paint chips because I’m thinking about repainting the hall. And then I’ll cook a whole gourmet dinner where not one single item came from a box, and only a few came from bags.

What I will NOT do is hang out in pjs all day reading blogs. No sir!

What is your dream?

Book Blurb Friday #46

It’s finally Book Blurb Friday again! This is due to Thursday’s snow day. Well, really it’s due to BBF’s talented and illustrious hostess, Lisa Ricard Claro of Writing in the Buff, but the snow day was welcome and beautiful for those of us who could stay home and get caught up without having to drive. There were times when it snowed with the sun shining so that the flakes looked just like glitter. One of many times I wish I were better with a camera. Anyhoo! The weekly BBF challenge is to “write a book jacket blurb (150 words or less) so enticing that potential readers would feel compelled to buy the book.” My blurb this week is 149 words.

~The Summer of Twilah Moon~

Summer at Lake Obochobi came alive for Kari and Brian the year that Twilah Moon moved into the next cabin. Not content to sit for long, Twilah explored everything. The reason, she confessed, was a secret alien microchip implanted in her brain that was designed to transport information about Earth back to her home planet, Nevaeh. Someday soon, her native people would be calling her home.

Kari and Brian weren’t sure how much they really believed, but life beside Twilah came alive with diversions they’d never known, from the things that happened in other galaxies to the Nevaehan scanners that had been placed under the pier. And there was no denying that Twilah was sent away for days at a time and came back looking awful. Was she really getting microchip placement scans that left her drained from the Cytoxian radiation, or did she have a more frightening secret?

Problems are the soul’s invitation to transform. ~Lynne Forrest

They Also Wield Blog Awards

Thank you to Lynn of Present Letters for the lovely and coveted Versatile Blogger Award!! Lynn’s epistolary writing, addressed to the mother she lost when she was young, is moving and inspiring in so many ways. Lynn is also a fellow W.W.W.P. (Wild Women Wielding Pens), described in more detail below.

I’m supposed to tell you seven things about myself that are not included in my blog. So here goes (and if I’ve mentioned any before, sorry):

1.  My mother used to put our Great Pyrenees puppy in the playpen with me, so I literally grew up with dogs. In fact, if I speak a language, it would have to be a very small amount of Doggish. But only if my teacher is very patient with me.

2.  Am not originally from Missouri. We moved around a lot due to my former husband’s job, and this was the place we lived the longest. A few years ago I chose to move back to the St. Louis area. It’s not just the “Gateway to the West.” To me it possesses a sampling of nearly every part of the United States, and I love that. St. Louis has so much variety, there is something for everyone—culture, history, sports, children’s activities, outdoor activities, scenery, weather (ha!—maybe a little too much weather variety, but I’ve definitely lived in much worse) etc. And it’s affordable. Love it.

3. When I was a kid, I used to play Cowboys and Indians with a little boy on the next block named Stevie. Stevie and I got along well because he wanted to grow up to be a cowboy and I wanted to grow up to be an Indian.

4. I spent every possible moment of my childhood without shoes and have always felt fortunate that my mother let me.

5.  Also when I was a little kid, I thought clowns were a race. People still used the phrase “colored people” then, and let’s face it, clowns are colored.

6.  I have Hannibal Lecter’s sense of smell (without his sense of taste—ha!) and collect fragrant plants. Below is a picture of one of the delightfully fragrant viburnums that’s been blooming out of season since December because our weather’s been so warm.  This one is burkwoodii 'Mohawk.'

 And below is plumeria ‘Miami Rose’ that’s been blooming in my sun room all winter, followed by the orchid that a dear friend sent me for my birthday over two months ago. Not only is it stunningly beautiful, it’s still blooming!

7.  I once attended something called Laughter Therapy. The idea is that laughter causes wonderful things to happen in the body and the brain, so you laugh without reason if necessary. It was supposed to provide the body with the equivalent of several hours of exercise and leave you feeling refreshed. The small critique group I joined last year is like laughter therapy, but way better because the laugher (and the people) are genuine. Although our senses of humor range from the naughty to the nice—sometimes all in the same person—those brilliant, witty, talented, spiritual, raunchy, silly, wise, genuinely fun women provide the reason for the laughter in addition to first-rate writing advice. And sometimes, they even provide chocolate…which is another thing we all have in common. So thank you again to Lynn, a fellow W.W.W.P.

I believe I am supposed to pass this award to four awesomely versatile bloggers. The problem is that not only are all of you awesomely versatile, but some people don’t like awards. So I've chosen two who've given me awards in the past and are also awesome and versatile, too.  I'm hoping two others will consider it passed to them as well.

I love Trying to Get Over the Rainbow  because Jules leaves me feeling uplifted and refreshed by her amazingly unique—not to mention hysterically funny—perspective.

Donna’s Book Pub always has advice, opportunities, contests, interviews and other wonderful tidbits for writers. I'm always glad I stopped in.

Enjoy!

Friends are those rare people who ask how we are and then wait to hear the answer. ~Ed Cunningham

Improper Poll: Switching Channels

I’m not a big television watcher, but over the holidays I watched a bit more than usual while wrapping Christmas presents. And I am surprised at what’s out there.

There’s “Ghost Adventures,” an oxymoronic show if I ever saw one, because, really, how adventurous can dead people be? But the show must be incredibly popular since it seems to be on all the time every evening. In this case, grown men appear to walk around shouting insults at dark buildings. Don’t get me wrong—I grew up in a haunted house, which makes it hard not to believe in ghosts, but these particular ghosts just never seem very lively. I watch, though, because I keep hoping at least one of them will show up for their television debut.

Then I discovered that there is such a thing as “Barbie Channel.”  Channel.  'Nuff said there.  

Weirdest of all was something called “Nighttime Programs for Baby.” Apparently television sets are now a staple of baby’s layette, and we must start training little crib potatoes as soon as they are just this side of the womb. I actually watched Nighttime Programs for Baby until the music made me feel colicky. It wasn’t too strong on plot, but it appeared to be made up of trippy little vignettes that were sort of artistically appealing in some cases. On the whole, though, I thought it insulted babies’ intelligence.

Of course, even that plot might just be better than the show called “Best Bra Ever,” but I can’t bring myself to watch that one, even as valuable blog research.

Last but not least of entertaining show names involved the Naughty Channels. I don’t subscribe to those, but apparently my satellite provider thinks it will tempt me by showing me the names. And I have to admit, some of them make me laugh myself silly. Problem is, I found very few I'd feel comfortable posting on my blog. Fortunately my personal favorite was the publishable “Naughty Golf Champ.” I imagine this one was specifically made for those men who wish to combine their passions, so to speak, much like the Seinfeld episode where George tries to combine sex and deli meats.

Have you discovered any weird TV programs lately?

Sub Notes: Noticed In Passing

The other day, Tom mentioned different aisle-blocking behaviors. He mentioned that women are the only ones who walk in a line, thus blocking those behind them from getting around.

I’ve been thinking, and that is not always a good thing. Because…I'm about to make poor Tom sorry for asking perfectly nice rhetorical questions.  Part of my job in high schools is preventing hallway blockages during passing periods. And those minutes add up. So I’ve begun to think of myself as somewhat of an anthropologist of adolescence. And what are schools but teenaged microcosms?

True, several males never travel in a straight line the way females do. I think it’s a dominance thing. A straight line is cooperative in nature.

Girls form cooperative packs. It’s what we do. Some girls do use those groups to dominate others. Movies like “Mean Girls” are legendary for portraying the negative aspect of girl groups. But I’m convinced that the tendency to form cooperative groups is hugely beneficial to women. It allows them an opportunity for mutual nurturing, protecting, and empowering of the members—and their children. No question those female groups encourage, in lots of different ways, successful child rearing. And anyone who doesn’t realize how vulnerable women can be on their own has never been sexually assaulted, groped, or harassed.

Girls and women will engage in cooperative behaviors that you’d never see boys and men do, like fix each other’s hair or whisper or apply each other’s makeup. They’ll also stand up for each other. Fiercely. And men know this.

Boys are just as legendary for tryng to establish dominance over other boys. When they stand together in a large group, their behavior is almost always competitive. They’ll give each other playful shoves. Or if a small group is sitting in the classroom in a casual mode, I’ve noticed one boy will often try to sit on the desk to raise himself higher than the others. (I never let them. Not only do I not want them breaking the desks, but I want to keep them in a psychologically cooperative group with myself as the one in charge.)

Mixed-gender groups have a whole different dynamic. Sometimes several boys will walk side by side if girls are in the group. I think it’s that they have to submit in a sense in order to join. If a girl tries to sit higher than a group of boys, sometimes I do let her for brief periods of time. I’m not trying to be unfair. I think there’s a weird little paradox going on that says she is accepting the boys by diffusing any threat. I don’t remember ever seeing a boy try to sit higher than a group of girls when no other boys are present. Groups of women are, as Tom mentioned, intimidating. And they are supposed to be. Groups wouldn’t give women a sense of safety if they weren’t.

Once I subbed in PE and a male teacher asked me to monitor the girls’ locker room “to make sure they don’t kill each other in there.” I laughed to myself. If a girl is mad enough at another girl to attack her, she won’t do anything as nice and simple as attack her. She’ll make her life absolutely miserable by attempting to ruin her social status and kicking her out of the group.

Anyway, Tom asked if those aisle-blocking women are trying to get attention or what. I think they’re just doing what comes naturally and are so focused on their little group that they just don’t think about the larger group out there. But what of those women who habitually block aisles on their own using just their grocery cart? I hate that! Or did, till I thought about it and realized I’ve caught myself doing the same thing—when I was so heavily focused on a small group that I was shutting out the rest of the world. That small group wasn’t even there, either. It’s called “family.”  Go figure.

“When you really know somebody you can’t hate them. Or maybe it’s just that you can’t really know them until you stop hating them.” ~Orson Scott Card in Ender’s Game

“We are no longer the knights who say ni! We are now the knights who say ekki-ekki-ekki-pitang-zoom-boing!” ~Monty Python

Improper Poll: New Year’s Resolutions!

People keep asking me if I’ve made my list of New Year’s resolutions. Perhaps it‘s a hint, but here‘s the thing. I’ve spent most of my life working on my worst faults. If whatever's left over isn’t fixed by now, it’s not likely to get there in one puny old year.

Besides, if this old dog is going to learn any new tricks, the reward had better be pretty big and juicy.

So I prefer either to think of resolutions for OTHER people…or else pick one easy thing for myself to do. I am happy to report that a few years ago, thanks to help from my daughter, I accomplished my resolution to overcome a Fear of Oatmeal. Want to know the secret? Here it is. First clear your mind of all thoughts relating to snot and boogers and paste and curdled throw-up. All clear, then? All righty! The secret is that you must pretend it’s a seriously undercooked oatmeal cookie.

Hoo boy, that was a lot of work! Frankly, I’m still working on it and have been too pooped to think of a new one till now. But here’s the new one I just thought of. I am going to scale back on my exclamation point use in personal correspondence.

Surprising, right?! I know!

I’m generally okay in public writing, but I am a closet over-exclaimer. And guess what one of my pet peeves is? You got it. I am a hypocritical, closet over-exclaimer. If I were editor of my own emails, they wound be bleed red ink.

Years ago, there was a book series that every high school girl carried. I won’t say the name of the series, but I once tried to read the first book and it was torture. The unnecessary exclamation points alone set my teeth on edge. It read like this:

I went down the stairs! I went into the kitchen! I sat down!

And that was it. Notice I am not exclaiming here, but I want to. Because what any idjut knows is that you just kept waiting for a creature to jump out and eat the narrator or anything at all that warranted those stinkin’ exclamation points, but there was nothing. Why we were supposed to be excited over the walking down the stairs and the sitting is still the biggest mystery of the book to me. I don’t think I ever finished it, either. Eventually all I could do was count those vile exclamation points.

So my fear is that people do that with my personal correspondence. Yet I once knew a woman—another writer and enthusiastic exclaimer—who used to hint that I must be depressed if I wasn’t exclaiming like a school girl. And I guess that’s what it comes down to. Like or not, in real life I have an exclaiming personality.

And after all, isn’t that part of what makes me who I am? Other than the anal retentive need to spell and punctuate text messages correctly? So on second thought, maybe a better resolution would be to ask my writing friends to forgive my over-exclaiming and be done with it.

By the way, happy New Year!!! Do you have a resolution for yourself or others?