RAMBLINGS

sacrifices and stickers

2011-12-15T16:56:00.000-08:00

In case you haven't noticed, I have stopped blogging. Not necessarily rambling, just the blogging part. It became apparent to me that I no longer had anything to ramble about. Everything was a rant, a tirade, hysterics. I watch too much news. Read too many papers. Listen to too much 1010 WINS. I hate the world. No seriously, I hate the way we treat each other. I hate that things are so expensive. I hate the way.....see, this is why I stopped blogging. Today I went to the bank. There was a guy going in ahead of me. He let the door slam in my face. Thanks buddy! Once inside I went to an ATM next to a man that had to be one step away from making it onto the side of one of Willard Scott's jelly jars. He laid his finger aside one of his nostrils and blew. Yes, blew. A great big snot ball landed on the bank floor with a squishing thud. Ewwwwwwww. I finished my deposit and left side stepping HIS 'deposit'. I went next door to my nail salon. I had to cut my nails because I have started taking piano lessons and it just doesnt work with long nails.. (more on that later..) My nail girl who I adore is late for our 11am appointment so I sit and grab a People magazine. The people in People all have boobs and penises drawn on them. Assuming it must be the work of some unsupervised 10 year old and not feeling especially erotic at 11am, I put the magazine back and chose another. The woman seated to my right looks at me and says "why dont you make up your mind'? Excuse me??? She sucked her teeth and went on fighting with whomever she was on the phone with. ( Hurry Linh, before there is a fight.) My hands look ridiculously short and stubby without long nails but for the sake of my budding music career I will have to deal. It's the small sacrifices.

I had to buy gift boxes because for some reason the stores I shop in no longer believe in 'giving' you anything for free. Charge me an extra friggin quarter, I wont notice, and give me a box....you in turn will have my grateful patronage every holiday after that. My gift boxes, in 3 sizes, cost me more then two of the gifts I bought....which isnt saying much for those gift recipients. I bought bows which apparently I never affix to the presents since when I got home I realized I had 3 unopened bags. This year your're all getting bows....maybe two. The next stop was the post office. At the risk of being towed or at the very least having a sticker plastered on my windshield, I pulled into a spot in the McDonalds next door. I did my best to hide the fact that I was headed toward the post office instead of the Golden Arches. I did all but walk backwards carrying a two foot box I was shipping to my neice in Delaware. The box contained Christmas gifts. The line, always twelve deep in this always understaffed postal facility was no surprise. Nor was the slug like speed of the tellers. After each transaction the little teller light would ignite and a 'ding' indicated there was a open teller. After standing in line for better than 40 minutes you would think that they would fly to the light like a moth. But no...instead they strolled to the windows and only then began to remove the mail from their bags or purses or canvas sacks. Let's not have them ready to hand the teller, that might shave off 15 minutes of wait time! I inched along dragging my box and alternately rehearsed my excuse for the tow truck driver (who was probably impounding my car) and considering what would take the non-removable sticker glue off my windshield. Finally, a light....a 'ding'....it was my turn. I lifted the box into the safety cage that they designed presumably to protect the tellers from crazed patrons (good luck with that) and listened to about a minute recitation of questions. Anything flamable, breakable, liquid, fragile, etc., etc., etc. Did I want it sent first class, priority, 2nd day, media mail, overnight, ground? Certified, return receipt, delivery confirmation, proof of mailing? I chose media mail (cheaper) and delivery confirmation (so I don't have to call and ask if my package made it there before Santa). The teller felt obligated to tell me in no uncertain terms that they have the right open and inspect the box, and if it is found to not have strictly media items within, the recipient will be asked to pay the difference in premium thereby embarrasing the sender. I stood my ground even though I knew this troll was going to go straight to the package on his break and insist it be opened. Well guess what buddy, there are books and cd's in there. (and playdoh) (and a sock monkey) I will call my neice tomorrow and apologize in advance. It's the small sacrifices.

The next stop was my piano lesson. I paid for 4 weeks up front for fear I would stink and quit. I stink, but haven't quit....yet. My lessson is sandwiched between a 12 year old vocal prodigy and a 13 year old pianist that could put Liberace to shame. And through it all my instuctor tells me how good I am getting which makes it worth the $70 an hour he gets just to listen to me play When The Saints Go Marching In and Ode to Joy. There is just so much you can teach an old dog....two hands doing two different things doesn't compute for me.... G F E D C....C D E F G....and we didnt even get to the A and B yet. But playing the piano is on my bucket list....so practice, practice, practice. It's the small sacrifices.

I came home to find someone parked in my parking spot. Yeah, I know I dont really own that spot, but it is in fronf of my house nestled between my driveway and a fire hydrant. If you park far enough away from the hydrant to be legal then you are in my driveway...which happens often. I recognize the car and know that it wont be long so I park down the block a bit. 'You leaving the car there,' a neighbors tenant asks. (key word being tenant) Yes, why? 'Thats my spot,' he informs me. I thought of going into the whole...its no ones spot story....but since I know how it feels to be shut out of 'your spot' I pulled out and into my driveway where I should have parked in the first place. It's the small sacrifices.

I'm baaaack!

Captains and Kings

2011-11-08T15:12:00.000-08:00

Last week my daughter got tickets to the 9/11 memorial. Since my husband couldn't go there was enough room for me in my daughters car. ….and just to get this out of the way, YES I am the worst passenger in the world. In the drivers seat I will drive any where including cross country and taxi polluted mid town Manhattan...but as a passenger, forget about it. So for the sake of all involved, I positioned myself in the backseat behind my daughter so that I could not see out the front window. I could NOT see that my daughter was not braking when there were so many red lights up ahead....I could NOT see the kamikaze drivers weaving in and out in front of us and I definitely could NOT see the 18 wheeler mis-judging the turn ratio he needed. All things considered we arrived safely in Manhattan and in search of a parking lot. We asked the first uniformed person we saw directing traffic for directions to a parking garage in relationship to the memorial site. He babbled something, pointed somewhere and dismissed us somehow. My daughter turned and continued up West Street which used to be the West Side Highway until they, well ….removed the highway. Up Williams, down Greenwich, across Vesey and onto Warren and there it was a parking garage just off the corner. The sign said $12.75 from 4pm to 2am. Perfect! Too perfect! $12.75?? It costs more for a bottled water in Manhattan but the car was parked and with cameras ready we started toward the memorial.

It was just after work hours so the streets were bustling with parents scooping up their kids from after school programs and the multitudes trying to get to the trains for their trip home with cell phones ready, to photographer the gropers. At every corner people navigated the intersections by basically walking in front of the cars, who like us moments ago, looked lost and determined to find their destinations. We followed the blue signs that directed us toward the memorial site. 9/11 MEMORIAL --> In the distance, and I do mean distance, we could see the Freedom Tower surrounded by cranes and hoists as we made our way downtown. We came across a little park nestled in the middle of all the chaos with a sculpture that looked like something a clown could twist and maneuver into a flower or sword. Except this one probably weighed about a ton. After taking way too many pictures of my grandsons posing with the sculpture, pointing at the sculpture and running around the sculpture we made our way passed the park and down West Broadway. It was becoming apparent why the parking lot was so cheap...it was in another borough.

We continued to follow the blue signs North toward our destination elbowing our way through the masses who were anxious to get home and as would have it, were traveling in the opposite direction. My son in law and I took pictures of everything New York and everything American, and well....everything my grandsons could stand in front of. As we turned down Barclay and then Vesey and onto Church Street we happened upon Zuccotti Park with its protest signs and tents. The sight was overwhelming. The smell was worse! My throbbing knee pain was replaced with the eye-tearing sting of urine stench! There were signs, lots of signs…GOD HATES BANKS….. WE ARE THE 99%…..FREE HUGS. Yes we had encountered Woodstock in lower Manhattan. I coerced my grandsons into coming into the park with me for a picture. We walked around the woman offering FREE HUGS….(not enough penicillin on the planet for that one)…around some dude in a blue sleeping bag that looked like it had been slept in since the original Woodstock (circa 1969)…and stopped in front of a statue of a seated businessman where we posed and smiled. Click. The hugging lady looked pissed off, or maybe she just had to pee. We continued past the garbage piled higher than my ten year old grandson and down four more blocks following blue 9/11 MEMORIAL --> signs and arrived at the entrance to the Memorial. The view already breathtaking as the Freedom Tower towered above us. The line snaked right and left passed check points where we had to show our tickets. We arrived at what looked like the boarding gate at Kennedy where buckets accepted our change, metal objects and bags. We were scanned and wanded but unfortunately no pat down as at this point any kind of massage of my legs would have been appreciated. There is no way to aptly describe the feeling of being there at the site so I wont try, lets just say it is the closest thing to feeling like you are walking on hallowed ground.

The day sky turned into a night sky and the thought of ~~hiking~~ ~~trudging~~ walking back to the car in that shadowy environment loomed large. But hunger became the sentiment of choice…and we were off to find food. I pointed out a Panini place, a diner, and a nice Irish pub that I was sure had the most amazing burgers possible….but the kids eyed a Burger King and the choice was made. Across from Zuccotti park and the pissed off FREE HUGS lady. Of course this Burger King had upstairs seating. Twenty two (I counted) metal steps up to the dining area which had a lovely view of the park and its dirty denizens. Unfortunately our seats were feet from the bathrooms. I was too tired and hungry to move…so we found a booth and sat. There were signs that the bathrooms were for customers only, but of course a steady stream of dread-locked hippies from across the street came in to relieve themselves. I made my grandsons promise they wouldn’t pee until Brooklyn. Before we finished eating an even bigger stream of cops came in for the same reason. We continued eating and someone debated how a cop can sit on the toilet with his gun not hitting the floor. Our bellies full, my legs rested (sort of) and the consensus that a cop keeps his gun strapped on while he ~~shits~~ sits….we left Burger King, twenty two steps down.

En route to the car I noticed what looked like two large canisters marked Nitrogen which I only just found out are not flammable. Since I had yet to Google Nitrogen and assumed they were, I commented when a homeless lunatic (who probably got chucked out of Zuccotti) put a cigarette out on one of them. He immediately started waving his hands and asking me if I was the captain and in charge of the tanks. The kids were afraid and so my normal confrontational response was squelched. We walked faster (sorry, knees) as he continued to follow us babbling on an on about how I was not in charge. He definitely was not hugged enough as a kid…gee, where’s that FREE HUG lady when you need her.

Fa la la la BOO

2011-10-29T20:37:00.000-07:00

In the past week we have all pretty much been hit over the head with the fact that there are about 60 days until Christmas. The stores are already in the process of discounting the Halloween items, skipping over Thanksgiving altogether and getting us ready to don our gay apparel. I am not prepared to forfeit two fantastic holidays to get a jump on the holiday shopping rush. I would rather make a shopping list for Thanksgiving dinner than make a Black Friday holiday gift list. I want to eat cranberries before I have to string them. I still have my summer clothes crowding my drawers with nary a sweater in sight and even though it snowed today I have on a tee shirt and flip flops…..and the heat! My candles, yes the ones that I don’t ever really light, are scented Bahama Breeze and Sandy Beach not Cranberry Mist or Mistletoe Madness. My mail, now inundated with catalogues all offering a percentage off if I “ACT NOW” and then a not so subtle reminder that Christmas is around the corner! They offer me layaways. They offer me buy now, pay later. They offer me six months interest free. What they don’t offer is to wait until my giblets are cooked and my wishbone snapped. The first holiday scented Glade commercials have begun to air and Toys R Us officially has more air time than Michael Jordan. I have always loved my DVR but not as much as now when I can zip past any commercial that has someone or something in a Santa hat.

The front of my house looks like a cemetery…tombstones, skeletons, spider webs. There are pumpkins and purple and orange lights. I am just not ready to box up the bones and unpack the wreaths. My bowls are filled with candy corn not candy canes and I have no desire for the smell of pine other than from a spray bottle in my bathroom. I have ceramic turkeys waiting to replace the smiling ghosts on my dining room table and a chocolate cornucopia that my husband bought last year that no one ate. Not even the denizens of the attic….so it will adorn the table and all will be warned not to look…..not eat! There is no room yet for Mr. and Mrs. Claus, the Lenox snowman or the jelly bean pooping reindeer. My nails are pumpkin orange with white webs and a spider that took waaaay too long to paint on…..I therefore expect them to last through Halloween, Thanksgiving, Hanukah, Kwanzaa.…and yes then I will re-polish them red with green ~~spiderweb~~s wreaths for Christmas.

I have pumpkin spice, harvest blend and steaming cider in my coffee carousel and since the pods cost more than Starbuck's stock I will finish these before I buy ginger cookie, egg nog latte or nutmeg blend. Or I will just buy Maxwell House, make a 12 cup pot and save a fortune! Merry Christmas!

Aye aye Matey!

2011-09-24T19:21:00.000-07:00

As an anniversary gift our children ~~joined forces~~ chipped in and bought us a cruise around Manhattan. It came with a buffet, drinks and a DJ. There was a limited time to book which date you wanted so I went on line and looked at what was available. I saw that within the parameters of what time I had left there were no weekends and no daytimes so I booked a Tuesday night. I thought it might be interesting to see what other people booked late and settled for a weekday evening. As the day grew closer I started to get nervous, and while I am not afraid of the dark or the water, the combination of the two seemed ominous. That and the fact the website repeatedly announced it was a ’three hour tour’…now where had I heard that before?? I went on the website to look at the boat. There were three…two yachts and a paddleboat. Since the paddleboat didn’t port in NY it was one of the yachts. Yay! The Rendezvous or the Harbour Lights. Both looked like decent size boats and any reservations I had disappeared.

I looked through my closet for my ‘cruise wear’….and chose something light enough that if I ended up in the water it wouldn’t drag me under, and a jacket buoyant enough for the same reason. I considered testing it in the bathtub but knew that was just too extreme even for me. Now I’m not a great sleeper to begin with, but that night whenever I closed my eyes I envisioned icebergs and twin smokestacks snapping in the artic air. It is September…the nearest Iceberg is in my fridge and from the produce section. I felt the cold hand of my husband as he slipped into the icy sea….“never let go Rich, never let go”. Ok ok it was a river and it was 73 degrees...but it’s my dream! I woke up, peed, had a glass of water (counter productive to say the least) and fell back asleep just as ‘the weather started getting rough and our tiny ship was tossed.” I woke again to pee (see I told you…) only this time there was no sleeping so I began the ritual of clicking around the 1100 channels to find something that could hold my interest at 4am. The movie channels…Titanic. Great! Click….A Night To Remember…oh boy…Click! Poseidon Adventure….what the hell?? …some kind of cosmic joke….or was I still dreaming? I went on my laptop. I looked at the website again. The yachts looked smaller. I poured a glass of my husbands cheap ass wine and sipped it as I watched the end of the Poseidon Adventure where everyone was saved. Ok not everyone…poor Shelley Winters…but it ended happier than the Titanic. Poor Jack, Rose let go.

The morning of the day of the night of the cruise…(got that?) I woke to find myself thinking of things I should be telling my kids…like where the safety deposit box keys are….how to make fresh mozzarella which I only just recently learned myself….instructions to ignore some of the stuff they may find in my underwear draw….

Everywhere we go we are early thanks to my husband. He anticipates EVERYTHING. Maybe there will be traffic, a flat, traffic, getting lost, traffic, can‘t find parking…did I mention traffic? So for a 7 o’clock boarding we are planning to leave at 5 o’clock. Two hours to go one borough. But he has been right in the past, so 5 o’clock it is. I put on the TV for a distraction. Special Report….Ahmadinejad and Obama are in the city…at the UN for a World Summit…FDR Drive is closed from here to there, with random closing from there to here. OK so Mr. Wonderful was right again, we need to leave early….and hope no one blows up the FDR Drive or commandeers our yacht to annihilate the UN.

There was NO traffic, we didn’t need gas, no flat, there was a parking lot inches from the dock and getting lost wasn’t even an option…so we arrived at the boarding area at 5:35 giving me a whole hour and a half to recreate every water disaster movie I have ever seen. The parking attendant was a nice Arabic man who took $30 to park our car for 3 hours (technically 4 ½ since we were so early) Thankfully there was a bench and a veritable smorgasbord of characters to keep us entertained. There was the man who was rollerblading in a tee shirt and thong, the girl who jogged by practically knocking herself out with her umm, knockers……the humping dogs, and an array of lost foreigners who seemed to think we were the NYC Information Booth. We walked over to the dock to look at the boats that were moored. Harbour Lights and Rendezvous were both there along with several others that looked bigger and, quite frankly safer. Some well-dressed people began walking down a ramp toward a moored boat, so we followed them only to be told in no uncertain terms that it was a private party boat. Well!! How did they know we weren’t invited guests. Just then a Mercedes Benz pulled up and a girl got out in the tightest and shortest red dress with the best spray tan I have ever seen. She was gorgeous. I could see my poor husband attempting to avert his eyes. As she paid the driver a Lexus pulled up and the best looking, best dressed group of men I have seen got out all holding bouquets of flowers. After they all air-kissed each other they headed for the private yacht that we had just so un-ceremoniously been escorted off of…but at least I knew how they figured out we were party crashers. I think my sneakers were a dead give away.

It was almost 7pm and a small line began to form. I wondered out loud which side of the ship we should sit on. If we were going uptown the left would have the best view, downtown…the right side. Mr. Wonderful told me to ask the ‘mate’. Yes, he said mate! He then continued to babble something about starboard and port sides. I asked him to speak English…left or right? He said….starboard! F&*K you…I am nervous enough without having to decipher where the hell I am going to sit. The ‘mate’ turned out to be a black guy that looked exactly like Billy Blanks the Tae Bo pitchman. The ’mate’ said we were going downtown because we can’t go uptown because of the police presence by the UN. Uh oh… We sat on the right through dinner and then took our drinks up to the top outside deck where we stayed for the entire tour. The lighted skyline was unbelievable. The view of the Statue of Liberty breathtaking. The rising Freedom Tower spectacular. If there was anything to be nervous about I had completely forgotten it in the shadow of our magnificent city. (I did however notice the hole in the deck where the anchor is lowered and noted that my granddaughter could fall through) Note to self: do not take the kids on this tour.

After almost three glorious hours of tourist heaven, we were headed back to the dock. The captain announced that he was going to take us as close to the UN as he could without getting us shot at by the NYPD Harbor Patrol. Here we go again……..

Goodnight Irene...

2011-08-31T18:30:00.000-07:00

I have given you all a few days to digest from all the Hurricane Irene info we were force fed for days prior to, during and after the Hurricane of 2011. (so far) I have allowed a few days to pass so that all or most have their power back on and their lives back to normal. I have even waited until the headlines reverted back to more un-‘natural’ disasters, like the plummeting stock market and upcoming elections. But holding it is has almost caused me to bust…so allow me…..

Friday: Everyone went shopping. Everyone bought water, flashlights and batteries. Bread, milk and eggs. I bought Twizzlers.

For two days I lived on those Twizzlers. First black, then cherry. I didn’t have to, there was plenty of food. I had fried 3 pounds of chicken cutlets and there was steak and meatballs in gravy in the freezer. I had tuna and peanut butter and three different cereals. There were some cold cuts and several different fruits. But the logical choice every time I was hungry was….Twizzlers. Not only did my sugar go through the roof, I gained 3 pounds and my shit is green….ok, I know WAY too much info. Sorry…

The proverbial calm before the storm, the sun was shining and not a hint of wind but I was in prepared mode. I watched CNN, MSNBC, the Weather Channel, any channel that had a map with a swirl and a dotted line slowly moving up the eastern seaboard. I found myself doodling the map on napkins, mail and even my hand. (it was like something out of Close Encounters of the Third Kind) Friday night I had a play to go to just over the Marine Parkway bridge….in Rockaway. Yes, Rockaway the now being evacuated Rockaway. As we drove over the bridge and I looked at the waters surrounding us, I felt brave and daring. I stared Irene in the eye! Ok so that is a bit over-exaggerating….the water was calm and still…so far! I came home and spent the rest if the night watching Irene creep up the coast.

Saturday: I woke to find my husband getting ready for work.

“Where you going?“

“Work”

“Are you kidding, if you go in today you won’t be able to leave.“

“Nah, probably be home early”

Guess who was right?!

I spent the day no more than 15 feet from any TV in the house. I didn’t want to miss a single second. I wanted to hear who was being evacuated, what idiots refused to leave, and relished in the videos of newscasters being blown around. The storm was still three states away. By four o’clock it was apparent my husband wasn’t gonna get home in time for Irene, and although I checked that his life insurance policy was paid in full, I didn’t want him traveling in the midst of her wrath. I fried cutlets. Pounds and pounds of cutlets. I am not sure why, it just seemed like the thing to do during a hurricane. The wind was picking up just a bit and it was now raining, but the house was filled with the amazing smell of garlic and cheese, the air conditioning was keeping the stifling humidity at bay, and my all-channel Irene coverage was in full swing. My plan was to cut patterns, sew and generally keep busy ‘not’ cleaning. As the sky darkened and the storm was two, and then quickly one, state away….I text my husband. The storm was getting bad and if he was coming home he should do so now. It would be the last nice text he got until he got home in the morning. I organized my emergency plan. Candles in the kitchen, flashlights in the dining room, ice being made and of course, Twizzlers. I laid on the couch trying to position myself in a way so that if the tree in front blew in my picture window I could spring to my feet with cat like reflexes and dodge disaster. (yeah, ok) Bloomberg repeating not to go near the windows wasn’t helping matters. I sat up. I moved to the recliner. I turned the recliner around to face away from the window, which unfortunately was away from the TV. I laid on the floor. I relocated to behind the recliner by slithering like a slug. I was immediately joined by my stinky dog who remarkably doesn’t stink anymore. I fell asleep.

Sunday: I opened my eyes just as a bead of sweat was dripping onto my nose. The room was dark. The TV off. The dog (and me) panting. The worst had happened….the power was off. More importantly the AC was off. I sprung to my feet (ya didn’t by the whole ‘sprung’ thing did ya?) and made my way into the kitchen to light my candle. Should have figured on matches in my emergency plan! I dug through the silverware draw only slightly slicing my finger and found a book of matches. Candle lit….check! I went back into the dining room, found the flashlight and put it on pointing it toward and illuminating the TV screen. (I can dream can’t I) The rain was driving, the wind howling and I had no idea where I had put the Twizzlers. I sat at the far end of the couch staring at the miniscule amount of power I left on my cell phone and went on Facebook. Everyone, was there. Everyone with mobile capability and battery life. Mine was dwindling fast. I thought about going out to my car and charging it from there, but the tree above my car was swaying more than I cared to brave. I picked up my phone and used what little power I had left to tell my husband what a crud he was for being in the air conditioned, well lit hospital where he worked while I sat sweating in the darkness. Just then….. a huge thud. I looked out and saw nothing but swinging trees so I decided to retreat to the couch and stay there until morning. It was 2:30am.

I remembered that I had a battery operated radio in my junk draw. Not crazy about rummaging around there in the dark, but since I had already cut my finger looking for matches I dove in. I felt a cord that I was sure was part of the radio. It wasn’t. It was a personal alarm that screams an ungodly sound when the pin is pulled out. That cord pulled the pin out. The high pitched screams were only muffled by the high pitched screaming in my head and my god damn dog barking. I found the alarm, put back the pin, stifled the noise including the dog and used the candle to light my way back to the couch. I blew it out since I was afraid to leave it lit where the dog could easily knock it over. (I figure he may want to pay me back for the earlier alarm fiasco) I sat in the dark with my little pink battery operated radio that only got 3 channels…..two of which broadcast in Spanish. It didn’t, however, take a linguist to figure out ‘Mucho Grande Hurricano en Nuevo York’ meant the waiting was over. Irene had arrived. As I sat sweating and cursing my husband I remembered where I had left the Twizzlers and promptly and carefully made my way to retrieve them with the extinguished candle.

For the next two hours I sat there totally missing my eastern seaboard map with its swirling and dotted lines. I sat perched up with a snack tray in front of me that held my cell phone which was dead, my house phone which was equally dead, the remote for a TV that wouldn’t work and an empty bag of black Twizzlers. Things were going from bad to worse. And then as my dog growled, my front door opened. Was this really happening? Was I being robbed, now? Really? REALLY? Hadn’t I had enough for one night? The sound of the driving rain got louder as the door opened wider, and as the dog growled harder I grabbed the flashlight and shone it on the intruder. My soaking wet husband, lit up like a prowler, said “it’s just me!”. I wish I had been armed, I could have gotten away with murder. It was 530am.

The hours leading up to daylight were pretty mundane. By daybreak I was speaking to my husband again and in the light of day the wind and rain didn't seem quite so bad. We found the origin of the thud...part of the tree in my yard was now leaning on my neighbors house. The spiders that were trying desperately to get out of the plastic bags I had encased my hanging plants in when I brought them inside would soon be free to terrorize once more. I anxiously awaited the storm to pass so I could bring my patio set back outside and of course buy more Twizzlers.

shake, rattle and a buttered roll........

2011-08-24T08:13:00.000-07:00

Yesterday there was an earthquake in Virginia that was felt all the way up the east coast to New York City. Everyone has a story to tell about where they were, how they felt, how scared they got. Me, not so much. I was eating (what a shock!) lunch in the city with a friend after a rather boring exhibit in Times Square, and I missed the earth moving under my feet. (apologies to Carole King) The exhibit was, fitting enough, the ruins of Pompeii when Mount Vesuvius erupted back in 79AD and covered Pompeii in ash and lava. The exhibit was coupled with the Harry Potter exhibit which for an additional $14 you could see both. Never a Harry fan, we just opted for Pompeii and its molten residents.

The crowds lined up to see rocks…..basically. Not moon rocks, or even lava rocks…they were cement rocks…casts of people who apparently were too slow to out run the lava flow. And to add insult to injury, they were not the real bodies, (those were either melted or disintegrated) they were casts they made when they found that inside the hardened rock-like lava was an empty hole. So some genius archeologist said, ‘let’s fill it will cement to see what it used to be.’ And guess what, dead people! (“Let’s make an exhibit and charge the tourists and unsuspecting Brooklynites way too much and have an overpriced gift shop at the exit”) In fairness, there were two, no…three interesting things in the exhibit. One was the dead dog mold which looks like my dog when he is sleeping upside down, legs in the air….until I read the caption that said that the dog probably died climbing higher and higher to beat the lava flow and choked to death because his lousy Pompeiian owner never unleashed the dog before fleeing. Lovely. The second thing was the ‘sex for sale’ exhibit, cleverly hidden behind wall warning of its unsuitability for children where everything from paintings to plates depicted someone doing something to someone. Damn those Italians were kinky. Short, but kinky. The third thing was the Buddy Valestro (Cake Boss) life-sized cut out that we posed for pictures with. It was our free souvenier. I didn’t need a $12 coaster that looked like a broken tile, I didn’t want a imitation lava rock for $9 or even a t-shirt that wouldn’t have fit anyway with a picture of an erupting Mount Vesuvius for $26 (the same amount it cost to get in the exhibit) so the gift shop was a bust. We wandered into the Harry Potter gift shop and there were people dressed as wizards and owls. And they didn’t work there!! We left, looking forward to lunch. The earthquake was about a half hour away at this point.

Times Square was the typical circus it always is. We went into Lidz where I bought NY Mets hats for my traitor grandsons and was talked into buying a discount card for future purchases by a quick and savvy ~~salesboy~~ salesman, and then the Yankees store for my grandson who has stayed true to the pinstripes. $75 dollars later I have souveniers. (My granddaughter got stiffed!) Still no earthquake. We walked the two blocks towards the parking lot and found a rather interesting looking restaurant. We were offered a seat in front by the window, but after being seated we realized that the view was that of the side of a parked moving truck and besides, the wicker seats just did not sit well with my ass. (even with all my padding) We moved to the back of the restaurant with minimally better seating….ditto our view. At this point the earthquake hit and we had felt nothing. The waiter laughingly asked if we wanted bread. He brought a basket and a small bowl of….ummm, chick pea paste? Maybe hummus?? Looked like something beige and pasty in oil. Hungrily we buttered it on the bread and it was delicious. I had an omelet with asparagus and a glass of house merlot, my friend had fish and chips. (considering she is Irish I thought this a bit disloyal) We speculated about the men lunching at a discreet corner table…were the observably gay couple married, planning on getting married, or having an innocuous affair. Either way we never considered them to be straight which was terribly unwarranted since they could have been saying the same about the two woman sitting in the other corner…us! I went to look up something on my cell phone and had no service. Just then a phone call from my friends job informed us that there had just been an earthquake. And then the call went dead. I tried using the internet. Nothing. I tried calling my kids. Nothing. One by one all the calls checking up on us came through. And everyone of them had felt the earthquake. The most vibration we had felt thus far was during the fake volcanic eruption at Pompeii exhibit. Since we had missed the movement, we decided on dessert. Or at least that’s what I told myself. Two coffees and a Creamsicle Crème Brulee to share. (Let’s give the corner guys something to talk about!) Lunch was sumptuous and quite expensive considering I had what equated to a diner meal…except for the beige pasty stuff which I personally though classed up the menu.

We walked out of the restaurant and saw no evidence of an earthquake. No panicking, no running, no one looking skyward for falling buildings. Just tourists looking at maps and street vendors hawking cheap t-shirts. Had he thought quick enough he could have sold dozens of I SURVIVED THE EARTHQUAKE OF 2011. I’d have bought one, even if it didn’t fit.

Pillows and Peter

2011-08-16T20:24:00.000-07:00

So far the summer of 2011 has proven to be both fun and relaxing, exciting and restful. Yes quite a contradiction, but that seems to be my life. Highs and lows with no rhyme or reason.

My husband and I went with a friend to my condo upstate. For some rest, some fresh air, and for me quite frankly, Peter Lemongello. You remember Peter…his Love ‘76 album that sold millions long before Ron Popiel even knew what infomercials were. His face and smile was as much an attention-grabber as his silky sexy voice. He was performing as he has done in the past at a Catskill nightclub. For some reason my husband enjoys watching me make an ass out of myself elbowing old ladies out of the way to get the best seats in the house…front row, center. When I get to the front of the club there is a woman who I have seen many times at his shows. She is probably a bigger groupie than I am but since she is in a wheelchair she was able to get reserved seating. Bitch! Ok so we sat front row, off center. That will have to do. I text a picture of her to my grandsons who, like my husband, get a kick out of knowing that I am like a school girl with a crush when I go to his shows. As he sang and we both swooned, I considered things I could do to “Miss Wheelchair Groupie…but considered the karma aspect and refrained. Instead we ordered drinks and settled in for a great show. I’ll get her next time!

The next day my husband went to a financial seminar at the hotel. The financial wizard apparently also does card tricks and taught the class some tricks to entertain the grandkids. For the next two days my husband practiced his slight of hand, which quite frankly was slight of…well, skill. By the time he finally got to show off for his grandkids he was a master…trouble was they were more interested in whether or not my fish was dead. The distracted audience were only slightly impressed by Papa’s magical talents.

Even though it is only mid August, the Back to School signs are everywhere so I thought I would stop into Kohls to buy some things for the boys. Evidently so did every other parent and grandparent in the free world. The parking lot was full. I circled the lot a few times, eyed the handicapped spots but drove on, circled some more, even considered parking in the pregnant woman’s spot in front of Babies R Us (I can and do pass as pregnant unfortunately) but then decided to just park on the other side of the massive lot and use it as an exercise stratagem. I found a spot and trekked my way to Kohls. Found a wagon…busted wheel. Found another….squeaked like I had run over an injured animal. Found a third….another busted wheel. I’ll just carry my stuff. I headed for the elevator. When the doors opened there was an Asian family inside with baby carriages and unbroken wagons. They made no move to get out and the doors closed. I really gave it no thought until a line had formed behind me now as we waited for the elevator to return. The doors open and guess who is still in the elevator, and still not moving. I asked, nicely….are you getting out? No answer. The lady behind me said rather loudly, “what are they doing?” I had no idea so I asked again, less nicely…are you getting out? They looked at one another, said and did nothing, and then the doors began to close again. I put my foot in the door stopping it from closing just as a huge Russian man with a crew cut and a dragon tattoo on his neck came from the back of the line, and I kid you not, in perfect (I think) Cantonese asked them what they were doing. They smiled, answered him and simply got out. I have no idea what had just transpired, but I was now in the elevator packed with people and babies and working wagons on my way up to the 2nd floor. We all briefly commented on what the hell had just happened and wished that Igor had gotten on with us so that we could ask him how he knew Chinese.

I picked out ‘cool’ clothes for my three grandsons, at least clothes that I thought were cool….looked at sheets that cost more than my damn mattress and made my way to the escalator. Didn’t care to attempt another ride on the Oriental Express. The lines were long but thanks to my clever eye I spotted a shorter line at the very front of the store. I got on line and immediately regretted it. One guy in front of me, three pillows, how long could it possibly take?? One pillow had no price tag…the light goes on for management. The cashier rings the other two pillows as she waits for someone to come over and price the third. The man shows her that the pillows are all the same. She agrees but waits for a manager. As I watch the other lines emptying out one at a time I contemplate switching lines always worried that that one would come to a dead halt as the original one sped up. Decisions, decisions! When the manager arrives, agrees that all three pillows are the same and I think I am in the clear….she needs a SKU number and off she goes to get one. Like a football player with a playbook, I manuever with my pile of clothes from register 2 to register 4 only to be told she is closed and so I quickly regroup and move to register 7. One person in front of me with…no, can’t be….a pillow! (must have been a sale) I asked if there was a price tag on it and she looked at me like I had asked for her social security number. I started feebly explaining why I was asking and she simply turned her back and put the pillow on the counter. A tag….Eureka! One, two, three and I was next. I had just maneuvered myself to the head of the line while pillow-boy was still waiting for his SKU. A few minor glitches at my register and I still made it out before him. I smiled as I carried my bag passed his register.

As I walked out into the ridiculously humid air I realized that I had parked in God’s country. I trudged through the parking lot dragging my bag of school clothes snarling and sneering at the people parking in the handicap spots. ‘So your crippled…big friggin’ deal’ I thought….and then my hip decided to twinge a bit and I thought OK OK I get it, lay off the handicapped. I made it to my car, threw my bags in the back, turned the AC on super-throttle and went into my pocketbook for my phone. I eyed my wallet nestled inside and couldn’t recall putting my credit card back. I looked and it wasn’t there. Damn it…I knew that cashier looked shady. I was NOT walking back to the store so I drove hoping my card was there waiting for me. Of course there still were no spots other than the pregnant woman ones. It’s a boy! (guess where I parked) I got out of the car and went in ready to argue with the cashier for not returning my card when a smile suddenly crossed my face. Pillow boy….still there! When I got to register 7 I realized that she never had my card, that I swiped it in the little machine myself. I leaned on one of the broken wagons and checked my bag again for the elusive card. Not where it should have been, but there none-the-less. Dripping with sweat and feeling like an ass, I made my way passed pillow boy who was now waiting for his pillows to be squished into a not large enough plastic bag. I got to my oh-so-closely-parked car pretending to be pregnant. Two very really pregnant people gave me dirty looks. Hey, I beat pillow boy, found my credit card and not really pregnant…what more could I ask for. It was a good day!

Salty the surfer dude.......

2011-07-19T10:55:00.000-07:00

Today at 9am Salty the tree pruner came. His name is Danny, but the business card says Salty so that is what I am gonna call him as I imagine how he got that nickname in the first place. Since he has great sandy colored hair and a body to match, (great, not sandy) I have decided to go with a surfer dude who realized he had to get a paying job and didn’t want to completely leave the salty surf behind. That or he really likes pretzels.

My entire backyard had become a forest with a tree from a neighboring yard and my own fiasco of a purchase, the dreaded ‘it won’t get fruit’ but it did….walnut tree. Salty arrived on time with his crew which consisted of three guys with tank tops and arms the size of tree trunks. Oh yeah and chain saws, mile high ladders, ear protection that made them look like DJ’s and a ‘let’s get this party started’ attitude. Within minutes he was in the tree happily buzzing the shit out of the walnut tree from hell. As the branches fell and the ground men grabbed them up and whisked them out of my neighbors yard, I enjoyed the view from my kitchen window….Salty, complete with safety harness accentuating his bulging…..umm, biceps. He climbed higher and higher in the tree, tying himself off with each new limb and then WHAM a huge walnut encrusted limb came crashing down. Walnuts flew everywhere much to the delight of the squirrels who sat nearby watching as their favorite dining spot was reduced to fire pit logs. Their little beady eyes starred at me and I know they will seek retribution as soon as Salty leaves. My tomatoes would no longer be safe on my now sunny deck.

As limb after limb fell and was dragged away or cut into pieces Salty called out orders to his workers who, considering it was 94 degrees, worked at a phenomenally fast pace. I was sweating just watching them through the window from my air conditioned house.

Salty checked with me periodically on what I wanted. After 37 years of marriage, I knew what I wanted alright…..but instead I just told him what I wanted cut and what I didn’t. I honestly never saw so many overly happy, overly sweaty hard working men…they apparently loved their job. I began calculating a tip over their fee. They keep smiling’ like that it’ll cost me a fortune.

The walnut tree is done within an hour. It looks great. On to the neighboring tree. A mighty oak…or elm…maybe it’s a Dogwood …whatever it is, it is over my yard and blocking my sun. Now in the big scheme of things, taking away most of the shade I have when it is close to 100 degrees outside doesn’t seem too smart. But when I go to lay on my deck to take the sun, I usually walk away with an imprint of a shadowy leaf on my face. I am not one of those…:gee it’s summer, lets eat outside’ kinda people. I like air conditioning. I like saying, wow it’s like a refrigerator in here. I like the fact that I have no idea what the temperature is outside until I open the door. I live in the Bio-Dome and I am fine with that. I only use my deck to take the sun, grow tomatoes and basil and apparently not often enough, water my plants. So I needed these trees pruned. And pruned they are. I can now see my neighbors yard directly behind me. Although I knew they had a pool and I’ve heard them frolic in the pool, it is one thing to know, and quite another to see. I have dead grass and a trampoline…they have quarry pavers and a pool with a slide. Should left a few branches. Too late now.

Salty is in my neighbors yard now cutting the parts that they wanted cut. Great big waves of tree branches are falling outside my window. My kitchen is suddenly awash with sunlight. My poor little fish on the windowsill had to put his sunglasses on. I watch as his fins quiver and his eyes bug out then squint and I think maybe just a few less branches on the ground would have been nice. I can feel the A/C work a little harder to cool the house from the glaring sun. The last branch that fell from the neighboring tree allows me to see another neighbors deck. I can see she has a cleaning woman shaking rugs and windexing the sliding door glass. She is probably bobbing in her pool while her lady cleans. Can I ask the neighbors to stop the pruning? Do I really need to know that my neighbors are enjoying their yards more than I am? If I only had some shade…………

DINER 101

2011-07-09T14:09:00.000-07:00

Friday was my day off. I had already done all I was gonna do in the way of cleaning so I called my daughters and invited them and my grandkids to lunch. It was overcast and humid and looked as if a monsoon was coming so it was the perfect day to be indoors.

We went to a local diner and to their benefit I won’t mention which one. We walked in and were seated in the dining room since I haven’t comfortably fit in a booth in years. We were seven all together and for some reason they had pushed a square table up against a round table and handed us menus. There was no reason why they couldn’t push two square tables together, but I just figured the waiter was ~~stupid~~ being creative. That unison created a lovely little triangle of room for everything and anything fall. Four kids remember. I elected myself as guardian of the ‘space.’ I continually moved plates, glasses and silverware away from the abyss that was created by Mr. Creativity. As soon as we sit down my youngest grandson decides to hold his nose and announce that it smells in there, his older brother agreed, his mother said they had said this the last time and I asked why the hell didn’t you tell me this before we were seated?? I eyed the two gentlemen next to us who looked as if perhaps they hadn’t showered recently, and the table that had just been served some kind of fish platter and determined one of the two to be the reason for the odor that only two of the seven of us smelled. Collectively we decided it was safe to eat there and attempted to navigate the 2 foot menus. (this as I kept an eye on the ‘space’ that had already claimed a butter knife)

The kids were easy….chicken noodle soup (hold the chicken and anything else that wasn’t a noodle) and of course French fries with a quart of ketchup. I ordered a tuna salad sandwich and coffee, good old fashion diner fare. Of course I ordered the triple decker (the more bread the merrier) which came with hard boiled eggs and a blop of potato salad. At first I thought the blop was a bit sour and hesitated eating it so I put salt on it and tasted it again. I could eat a spare tire if it had salt on it so the sour went away and the salty stepped in. My quartered sandwich was held neatly together by three inch toothpicks with little frilly shit on the end that came off and I am sure I ate. The egg slices dropped out as I picked up the sandwich as did the half inch tomato slices. Just as well since I am not fond of tomatoes unless they are pureed, seasoned, cooked and ladeled over some kind of carbohydrate. (Hey I never claimed to be a healthy eater) One daughter ordered a BLT wrap which came with enough French fries to feed….well, France (ha ha I made a funny) A BLT wrap is the same as a BLT sandwich except they make it easier for you to pick up without the aforementioned tomatoes falling out. In fact, I am pretty sure the whole wrap idea came about when some slob had to wrap his sandwich in a napkin not to wear most of it and after consuming said napkin in error decided to make the ’napkin’ edible. My other daughter ordered the fried zucchini from the appetizer menu. She has always beat to her own drum. This hugely portioned appetizer went basically untouched. And since apparently no one thought to order the baby anything at all, she just shared everyone else’s.

The bus boy brought waters and pickles and cole slaw much to the delight of the kids although no one drank the water and no one ate the cole slaw. The pickles they devoured. As the abyss claimed a half eaten pickle and another butter knife I realized I wasn’t doing so good on ‘space’ watch and simply gave up. As I watched the boys fish ice cubes from their water and deposit them in their soup (for cooling purposes) the ‘space’ claimed a package of saltine crackers that accompanied the soup. The waitress came by enough times to ask if everything was alright and the bus boy gave us enough coffee to keep us in the bathroom for days.

The boys had eaten as much as they were going to, which wasn’t much, but considering it was chicken noodle soup with ice, umm they ate more than I would have. I asked them if they wanted dessert. With no menu I suggested jello or ice cream. They hemmed and hawed. One of my daughters suggested chocolate pudding which the other one immediately suggested was a mistake. I ordered 4...the boys and me….and a bowl of whipped cream for the baby. (she still thinks it is ice cream) The puddings arrived in large soda glasses topped with three inches of whipped cream. The boys all licked at the whipped cream, tasted the pudding and announced they were done. I ate mine all, even as I complained that it tasted like instant pudding. At $2.50 a pop I had spent $10 to buy one eaten pudding. (Note to self…. listen to the daughter that said it was a bad idea….next time.) Even the baby didn’t eat her whipped cream until it was a white puddle and cried when it wouldn’t stay on the fork.

The waitress brought a styrofoam container to take home the zucchini that wasn’t eaten. A covered soda cup to take home the pudding that wasn’t eaten. And foil for the fries that weren’t eaten. Looks like I was the only one who listened to my mother growing up….I cleaned my plate. And my dessert plate. At least my son in law would enjoy the pudding that my daughter insisted he liked….instant. I checked the floor beneath the tables finding that the ’space’ had eaten up a spoon, a breadstick that was never ours, and the sugar packet tray while I was off duty. I left a tip, paid the bill and got 4 blow pops for my grandkids from the cashier. Next time we are going to McDonalds or Wendys….I will squeeze into their booths. They have no noodle soup, no abysses and no pudding instant or otherwise.

punky pink and the pits

2011-07-03T21:13:00.000-07:00

It’s that time again…summer. The transition began with the bins of tee shirts, capris and flip flops being replaced with gloves, sweaters and those winter clothes that never got worn because I was apparently thinner last winter. After wondering why the hell I bought these tops, and noticed stains on those tops, I picked out which ones made it to the 2011 summer collection which are still waiting to be hung in my closet on hangers that I bought on QVC for a ridiculous amount of money. The rest either got bagged for donation, bagged for garbage, or put back in the bins in the hopes that next year I will be thinner. (or tanner....read on) The bins remain, inevitably, waiting to be returned to their dark little haven behind the door in the ceiling until my son comes to ~~do laundry~~ visit.

The plants on my back deck are always staring at me now, trying to remind me that I need to water them daily as I almost always forget until they are hanging over from thirst. My central air conditioning unit has not shut down since mid May and Con Ed has started sending me thank you cards. My legs and arms are covered with mosquito bites, some from hanging out on the back deck with my parched plants but most from my broken screen door. The door has been broken for almost two years, a product of an overzealous FedEx guy and a under-active husband. Whenever I threaten to call a handyman he suddenly becomes ‘handy’ and fixes something….but for some reason never the screen door. So as people come in and out the door stays a tiny bit open…just enough to let those blood sucking bastards in.

I have replaced my ‘merry wine’ color nail polish with ‘punky pink’ nail enamel. It is brighter and shinier (and more expensive) than any other nail polish I own. When I get my nails done every couple of weeks (much to the dismay of Lin, my nail girl) I do not get them polished. I have no patience to stay there and wait for them to dry, and if I do get polish I assuredly mess it up en route to my car. So punky pink will be the summer color unless one of my daughters (or more likely my son) will point out that I am not young enough to wear anything with ‘punky’ in the name. And they are probably right.

I find that during the summer months I turn into a lesbian. Well, not really, but I do find myself staring at scantily clad women or bikini babes at the pool and wonder where it all went wrong. I started out with the same amount of baby fat that they did….is there a chance I will still lose it? Is that really where my boobs are supposed to be? Where my belly button belongs? I go home and eat an apple for dinner. And then I forget how much hate wearing capris instead of shorts, and sleeves instead of sleeveless. And then I eat a Twinkie. It’s what I know. Remember the song Itsy Bitsy Teeny Weeny Yellow Polka Dot Bikini? The girl who wouldn’t come out of the water…that’s me. Except my bathing suit is black and it has a skirt. The water part is the same. Although I have found a way to navigate to the shallow end, up the steps and into my white cover-up with the mustard stain without drawing much attention. Of course there are the times when I don’t give a rats ass, and that is usually when it is 100 degrees out and the nearest lounge chair is a block away. (Eat your heart out skinny bitches, this is what you’d look like….if you ate.)

The smells of summer now surround me. It seems no matter what my neighbor barbeques it smells so much better than what I am cooking. She could be grilling an old sneaker and it still would smell better than my Omaha Steak burgers. I make franks she make burgers. I make burgers she makes steak. I make steak she makes something on a skewer. I skewer she smokes. I give up! I’ve often wanted to hop over the ~~net~~ fence and shake her hand in concession. But I don’t, I steal her figs.

Pretty much everyone around me has a fire pit. I guess it‘s a new thing….to sit outside in 80 something degree weather next to a roaring fire dodging ashes and smoke and melting marshmallows that we pretend are gonna actually stay on a graham cracker square without sliding off before the chocolate melts. The smell of burning wood, which normally would raise a red flag, now goes unheeded. As we sit sniffing the sweet aroma of firewood, someone’s house could be ablaze…here’s hoping their smoke alarms have good batteries.

Tanning is the best part of summer. Basking in the sun, sweaty and greasy from lotion that should have a much higher SPF, recalling the days when I had no idea what skin cancer was. The darker the tan, the thinner you get. It’s a fact. Like a little black dress, a tan takes pounds off. To date I am down about ten tan pounds….to reach goal I will need a rotisserie.

yadhtrib yppah

2011-06-08T08:33:00.000-07:00

No need to look for the fountain of youth. Tell Ponce de Leon he is off he hook. I have found it and it was at arm’s length the whole time.

Memorial Day weekend went to our house upstate. It was actually a Thursday night when we arrived and decided to go see the show at the hotel. The itinerary said it was an ‘entertainment duo”. That right there should have been our first tip off. The other was the fact that the little shuttle bus that takes us to the hotel was packed with seniors complete with walkers, canes and yes, oxygen tanks. Now at the risk of sounding horribly insensitive, especially since I will hopefully be around to even need a walker, I was not looking forward to a night of entertainment surrounded by click click click of the appliances they needed to get from point A to point B. That and the smell of desperately in-need-of-a-change, Depends. But here we are 4 hours from home, on our way to a nightclub show, to see an ‘entertainment duo’ with people who I wasn’t always quite sure were still alive as their heads nodded on the shuttle bus. (My 50 something knees felt better already.)

We arrived and as they shuffled their way to the nightclub I seriously considered rethinking the whole thing. But of course Mr. Wonderful wants to see the show, so we plodded on, found seats and began the grueling experience of a lounge singer and (I am sure) her accordion playing husband. Suddenly, as if God himself had decided to pull the plug on this dynamic duo, the lights went out and the dimly lit emergency lights went on. The scary part was that no one seemed to notice except us and the singer. I’m thinking most of them were asleep. Her microphone now dead, she did her best to keep order by singing at the top of her 80 year old lungs. Ummm, not so much a good thing. A staff member ran up to her and told her to announce that the nightclub was being evacuated because of a terrible storm raging outside and that the transformer had been hit by lightning. She told the audience to move in an orderly fashion out of the club and on to another portion of the hotel, still dark but obviously not in danger of…well I am not quite certain what they though might happen so we just complied. Now in the grand scheme of things, everything went well. He helped her, she helped him, we helped them and slow but sure we made our way down a minimally lit hallway and into the restaurant and bar on the other side of the hotel. Click, drag, click, inhale, click, click, click. As I watched each careful, hesitant, assisted step I felt my painful sciatica nerve relax….(I was in my 40’s again). We had to wait out the storm and although the ‘entertainment duo’ offered to perform in our new surroundings, no one answered when they asked. Again….asleep I am sure. By the time the storm was over most of the 150 over-75ers were ready for bed. Or embalming.

The next morning feeling chipper and spry in my new 40-ish body we decided to go to the local casino where I was run into by a motorized wheelchair with an oxygen tank strapped to the back. The man tried desperately to apologize between inhales. Not hurt, I told the gentleman that I was ok, not to worry and that a 30 something woman should be able to take a hit from a wheelchair. (I am sure God was punishing me for all the things that went through my head the night of the storm…like using one walker-bound guest as a lightning rod so that I could get back to my condo without getting electrocuted. Hey, It was just a thought!)

A week later we went to see Jackie Mason who my husband loves. We go to most of his shows, which may be the reason I could probably do his entire act…maybe without the great Jewish accent. We navigated through hundreds of cars, all with handicap passes hanging from their rear view mirrors or license plates with pictures of little blue wheelchairs all vying for the coveted ‘handicapped parking’ spots. Able bodied and with a spring in my step….we parked and began the trek to the auditorium. The theatre was packed and I truly believe that we were the youngest couple there. I could feel my blood sugar lower already. The row filled in and a man sat next to me who had the same Yiddish accent as Jackie Mason. He told me how he loved the comedian. He told me how he hated Ed Sullivan for black balling him years ago. He told me he gets confused sometimes. He told me he was 84. All this as he prepared himself for the show. He adjusted his hearing aid. He squirted something on his fingertip which he then inserted into each nostril and inhaled deeply. He sipped from a bottle of water and then poured a small amount on his fingertips (I assume to wash off the nasal shit). The water dribbled onto the crotch of his pants which he tried to brush off but I have a feeling it was better off leaving it there as concealer (if you get my drift….I know what can happen when you laugh too hard). The lights went down, Jackie came on the sweet aroma of Ben-Gay permeated the air. (I was unexpectedly 25 again!)

As we drove home I realized that here I was this healthy, agile young thing and sitting next to me was Mr. Wonderful….still ‘my old man’.

snip snip snip

2011-05-21T11:04:00.000-07:00

I know its been almost a month since my last ‘ramble’, but rest assured I have been rambling! So today, the supposed end of the world…the rapture, the apocalypse, I think it would be appropriate to post…just in case.

Yesterday I got a haircut for my grandson’s party. I was sick of sleeping in rollers only to have the hair straighten at the slightest hint of humidity and given the fact that I sweat like the proverbial pig when it is humid, I needed a change. The curling iron and straightener never did what they promised. I was always undecided between mousse, gel or hairspray. I must have invested over $100 this year alone in hair clips from dollar stores. When in doubt, clip it up. I used my eyeglasses as a headband more often than a visual aid. I trimmed my own bangs and it showed. I hated taking pictures, and while I could position myself behind someone to hide the failed diet, the hair was always front and center. So this time when the hairdresser asked what I wanted, I told her lots of layers and she could take some of the length. The key word being ‘some’. There is nothing so disturbing as to be in front of a mirror with wet slicked back hair and a cape tied around my neck leaving just me and my chins staring back. She asked again about the length. I told her I just didn’t want to look like a man. I don’t, I look like a Justin Beiber.

Last week I was tired from working all week, something I am not used to, something I don’t want to get used to. I usually work part time but with our only customer service person out sick I filled in. So 16 hours turned into 40 hours and I found new respect for those that always work full time. I had no desire to cook Saturday night and wanted to go out to eat, somewhere local, somewhere easy, somewhere I didn’t have to get dressed up. My husband made a suggestion to go to a place on the other side of Brooklyn that we used to frequent often and I agreed mainly because I was too tired to think of another place. Besides other than local, it fit the bill. We called a friend to join us since she lives practically around the corner, that and the fact that I think my husband likes that we talk and he listens…if you can call it listening. He hears about three words of each sentence and fills in the blanks…kind of like playing Mad Libs. We pull up to find that the place is packed and looks like a line is forming. Not what I had wanted. Easy, remember! We heard music and could see from the front window that there was a three piece band playing and a waitress was singing. Karaoke night?? When we went in it was close to impossible to hear anything other than the band which was surprisingly good even though they were currently doing a Monkees medley. We yelled asked if they had a table for three which we could clearly see they did not. Through a series of hand signals we determined she wanted us to wait while they cleared a table. A man who had to be in his 80’s got up to dance on a non existent dance floor with a woman who clearly had too much body for her little outfit. Another series of hand signals told us that the table would be ready in another minute. The band was now covering the Beatles and most of the restaurant was happily singing along including us. Ok so maybe not Mr. Wonderful but he was definitely enjoying it as he positioned himself so that his good ear was not being deafened by the amplifier he stood next to.

A young man in a motorized wheelchair was enjoying the music and the show the dancers were putting on when the waitress (who obviously knew him well) moved him to clear the table….FOR US! All I wanted was a quick easy night without cooking and here we were evicting the poor crippled guy so that we could eat calamari. With the apocalypse so close I felt it wasn’t such a good idea but the waitress steered him toward a spot at the bar, and the table was reset for us. There was no way to convey over the loud music that we didn’t want her to move him for us, so we just smiled as we sat down and avoided eye contact with him. Once I realized that he was just as comfortable in his new location I was able to concentrate on the menu. My friend and I sang and toe tapped as we waited for our meal. We discussed how impressed we were by the dancing man’s stamina and, of course, critiqued his dance partner’s wardrobe or lack thereof. My husband ate…and poured my wine. It was a good night….even for the crippled kid.

Last week, prior to my 40 hour work week, my civic organization ran their annual senior luncheon. A hundred and fifty 62 and older seniors in a church gym for lunch, music and raffles. And guess who was right smack dab in the middle of it. The usual complaints of too much salt, not enough salt….it’s hot, it’s cold….soda is warm…were overshadowed by the amount of praise for the lovely job we do each year. But of course we had the man who wanted to trade in for a ‘man’s’ basket, he had won a bath basket clearly designed for a woman. I told him we didn’t have one specifically for men and seemed quite hurt until I told him to give it to his special someone and he might get lucky. He looked at me and said….and a quote.. ”I couldn’t get it up if I tried and if I did I don’t remember what to do with it.” That visual being too much for me, I went to clean up the kitchen. We had the lady that wanted to know how come last years plants were bigger (they weren’t) and healthier (they weren’t) and could she have two. Sure, we had extra. And of course the afternoon wouldn’t have been complete without the lady who took the salt and pepper, sugar packets and butter before the meal was served. Twice. We had a lady fall off her chair and thankfully wasn’t hurt but she thought for her pain and suffering she should be given one of the raffle baskets. She wasn’t hurt and she got no basket….maybe I should have introduced her to the man who couldn’t get it up. She gets his basket and his…ok never mind. It was a good afternoon….even for the injured.

So tonight, at 6pm EST an earthquake is supposed to rock us into an apocalyptic state. My only regret will be that if I survive I will have to live with Beiber hair and my Yankees one game down to the Mets.

kiss me Kate...

2011-04-30T20:24:00.000-07:00

On April 29th along with the Royals, it was my daughter’s anniversary. Eleven years. Boy how time flies, seems just like yesterday I was trying to sell a kidney to pay for her wedding. I had seen Diana (Di to us in the loop...)and Charles’ wedding all those years ago….set the alarm, woke ridiculously early and watched it with my young daughters who could care less about weddings or even boys at that point. We laid on the bed and watched a small black and white TV and marveled at how long (and wrinkled) her train was. I remember attempting to explain to them that the back of the dress was called a ‘train’ as they voiced concern that a locomotive would be following her down the aisle. Fast forward to April 29th 2011...I DVR’d it, got up at a normal hour, pressed play and watched the wedding of Kate and William alone. The little girls who had joined me last time are all grown up with children of their own and I can assure you, none of them would mistake a ‘train’ for….well, a train! Children have gotten way smarter!

The TV I watched it on has 52 inches of high definition color where zoomed shots were probably taken from two blocks away. A quick sighting of Prince Charles, father of the groom, and I thought wow he looks good…his marriage to Camilla must be a good thing….kept him young looking and he certainly has more hair than his son. William that is, Harry has hair like a poodle…must take after his moms side. The wedding under way, the car pulled up and the bride emerged…her face obscured by her veil. As she pulled and tugged at her train to free it from the car, along came several valets and bridesmaids to help her with the 25 foot wrinkled mess. And I thought…it must be some British tradition. To have a wrinkled wedding dress. Diana had it too. And the Queen, she looked pretty good as well…and then it dawned on me. I was watching a recap of the Charles and Diana wedding from 1981. (I though my high def was looking a little grainy) While Diana dragged herself down the aisle I went and made a cup of coffee. By the time I returned, like Dorothy stepping out of her Kansas doorway into Oz, the high def-I-can-see-every-blemish-and facial-hair-you-have…..was back…and so was Kate and William….and a much older Queen….and the father of the groom was suddenly an old man.

Kate’s dress was beautiful and not at all wrinkled. An Alexander McQueen fashion house design. Even after a successful suicide last year, McQueen is making money. Her sister/bridesmaid wore a simple and elegant skin tight painted on white dress with about a hundred buttons down the back. Good thing she was as slim as her sister or that could have been one button popping disaster waiting to happen. I bet that would have kept the Royals hopping! William, though sporting the friar tuck balding pattern looked handsome in his ~~pajamas~~ dress uniform. (do the Brits not believe in tuxedos, vests, cummerbunds??) I wore a hat to my wedding. So did my bridal party. Ok they looked more like bonnets, but they were hats….I like to think I was way ahead of my time. At Kate and William’s everyone wore a hat. Some quite stylish and some frighteningly reminiscent of a side show I once saw in Coney Island. All the newspapers were heralding the hats as the best part of the British tradition. Then someone in the editorial department surely missed the one that looked like a bow or was it a pretzel? Sarah Ferguson (Fergie to us in the loop…) didn’t get an invite so it was up to her two daughters to embarrass the family a tad more and they did her proud with that hideous headgear.

They showed people singing, people pretending to sing and those that just held the song book in case the camera panned around to them. They showed Elton John singing. His partner next to him. Who was watching the newly adopted baby I wondered? The men all wore very colorful military uniforms that I have never seen on any battlefield in any country. (have to admit I haven’t been to many battlefields lately though) The Queen wore canary yellow. With a matching hat of course. And held onto her pocketbook like she was in a Brooklyn mall.

The bride and groom looked both radiant and nervous. I left them reciting there vows and William nervously trying to get a too small ring onto Kates finger, to make another cup of coffee and some toast. This whole British wedding thing was making me hungry for tea and crumpets or even scones….but I had to settle for two pieces of pumpernickel bread and a second cup of coffee.

I put on the TV in real time. I got to see them kiss. Well…peck. The crowd went wild. They pecked again. Again the crowd went wild. And for some reason all I could think of was when the newly chosen Pope came out on the balcony of the Vatican, his ring got more lip action from his bishops then Kate got from William. (Wills to us in the loop…)

I turned off the TV. I had had enough of the Royals for one day….and besides my pumpernickel toast was ready and my coffee getting cold.

me and julio.....

2011-04-10T18:37:00.000-07:00

I went to the mall Saturday to buy my nephew a gift. I know, I know…we’ve been through this before…never ends good. But since an eBay seller I originally ordered his gift from screwed me up at the last minute and I knew exactly what I wanted at the mall I attempted it prepared to fight the good fight and make it out unscathed.

I won’t bother to mention the store I went to since that would be giving them undue publicity and they recently “regrettably” informed me that they would not be renewing my credit card. (Seems I didn’t use it enough or pay on time…or both). I found a shirt for my son that looked interesting but it was hung way higher than I could possibly reach and the only people around were two Mexicans who made me look like I wore stilts. I made my way over to the cashier counter and asked an extremely tall kid who was busy texting even as he struggled to keep a bag full of hangers contained with his one free hand. I told him of my plight and he said he would be right over. As I stood there I watched him, still texting, drag the hanger bag in the opposite direction at a speed that defied logic. Any slower and he would have been asleep. He glanced once over his shoulder at me standing like the fool I felt under the sky high rack. Out of desperation I used a hanger and knocked the shirt down.

As I continued shopping I noticed that the line was relatively short and I thought to myself that the curse has finally been broken, my horrific mall experiences have come to an end. I found exactly what I wanted relatively fast and made my way to the cashier. The line suddenly was twenty deep. I sucked it up and got on the end of the line. Anticipating a longer wait than I expected I reached for my cell phone to catch up on some phone calls and to distract me from the fact that I was the only English speaking person within a 30 foot radius. Of course, as luck would have it I left my cell phone in the car. So I stood there as patient as I could possibly muster….waiting my turn. A lovely Spanish family with a twin stroller got on the line behind me. We exchanged several smiles (the universal language) as little Julio reached from his stroller to yank on my pocketbook. More smiles as he repeatedly and purposely kicked me in leg. And even more smiles as he threw his bottle filled with an odd green substance. I killed three minutes just trying to figure out what the hell poor little Julio had in his bottle and was it the reason I now had an urge to whack the little Hispanic rug rat. Thankfully little Juanita in the other stroller seat was asleep. The two slug-like cashiers got even slower. It was now 7 minutes on line with no movement. None. The Russian man in front of me started to loudly mumble in his native tongue. Since I am fluent in nothing but English, and can glimmer only a tiny bit of Spanish and Italian…I had no idea what Igor was saying but I am guessing it was something along the lines of…’what the hell is taking these slug-like cashiers so long….! I shifted the clothes from one hand to the next as the hangers imbedded themselves into my flesh. I shifted from one leg to the other hoping to distribute my weight so that my ‘good’ knee didn’t join my ‘bad’ knee in the throbbing that was now starting.

Oh goody….little Juanita woke up! She made Julio look like a choirboy. She cried and yelled and pinched her brother making him cry and yell and mom and dad still smiling those universal smiles started to sing to them. Yes, sing. In the store….on the line behind me. You have not lived until you have heard a Justin Beiber tune sung thirteen times….with a Spanish accent. Oh Babeeee Babeeee…jeez, kill me now! I was now the tenth person on line and saw that they added another cashier. Yay! or not. She wasn’t ‘another’ cashier, she was a ‘replacement’ cashier. So in the time it took for them to exchange the money drawers, sign out, sign in and organize the work space I could have brought about world peace. Igor was clearly agitated now and as he yelled into his cell phone I could tell he was planning to go back to his mother country and instigate a mall bombing. (that or he was just as pissed as me that we both thought it a wise idea to brave the mall on a Saturday afternoon).

As the concert behind me continued, Julio and his demon sister cried, and Igor stood huffing, I saw that I was now only 6 people from the register. The anticipation was maddening. After almost a fifteen minute wait, I noticed that the size on one of the items I bought was wrong. Since I had to go back and get the right size I needed to ask someone to save my spot in line. I turned to the singing couple and asked if they could save my spot since I picked up the wrong size. They smiled those blank smiles back at me and I wasn’t sure if they understood or not. OK? I asked. Nothing, just smiles. I tapped Igor on the shoulder and told him the same thing hoping for a clearer response and got a mouthful of words that meant nothing to me as I am sure mine meant to him. I got off the line anyway. I ran as fast as my now atrophied knees would allow, got the right size and went huffing back to the line. Nothing had changed. No one had moved. As I inserted myself back into the line I wondered if anyone even knew where I had gone. Or why.

Three people to go and Igor left. (Sorry Igor, was it something I said?) A woman with a ridiculous amount of clothes slung across her arm was at the register. As the cashier finished taking her cash she started the daunting task of folding each item before bagging them. She ~~wasted~~ spent 8 minutes folding and piling the clothes before jamming them into a bag too small for so many items. I knew this took 8 minutes, not because I had a watch or a cell phone to look at, but because I counted to 60...8 times. There was little else to do. I finally made it to the cashier, spent another minute telling her that I did not want to sign up for the charge card that I already had and somehow lost, paid and left. I had been in the store for 67 minutes….37 of them on line. I love my nephew!

Ooohh Oogoo!

2011-03-24T22:09:00.000-07:00

For years I was a smoker and wouldn’t even consider leaving the house without my little 5 inch pack of comfort. I quit years ago and in addition to kicking the nicotine habit, I needed to replace my crutch with another little 5 inch square of comfort….a cell phone was my drug of choice. Considering there is hardly a human being alive that doesn’t have a cell phone that might not seem like such a big deal, but I have tried to quit cold turkey….and the fact that it is harder to leave my phone home than it is to beat an addiction is a little upsetting to say the least.

Consider this: We have always found ways to communicate with each other. It started long ago when cavemen chiseled messages to each other in the cave walls, (a precursor to graffiti) alerting each other of danger, location of food sources and how to get Oogoo the cave slut to lose the loincloth. Since rock etching was time consuming, just plain nasty on the hands and Vaseline hadn’t been invented yet, a new form of communication had to be invented…..and as time marched on it was.

Smoke signals. Chiefs and squaws alike first had to learn how to make fire. After stealing Sacagawea’s blanket to extinguish the dinner fire, they fortuitously discovered that it made puffs of smoke rise high into the air where neighboring tribes could see. Puff puff puff…beware of white man selling beads. Puff puff puff….juicy buffalo nearing the watering hole. Puff puff puff….Oogoo the Indian slut likes warm Wigwams. Same story different medium! The tribesman could hardly breathe after one ‘conversation’ at the campfire so a new form of communication had to be invented….and as time marched on it was.

The telegraph….a series of dots and dashes that translated into words. The problem with the telegraph was that there were just too many wires and most people didn’t have one….therefore dot dot dot, dash dash dash and no one was listening. When Marconi finally invented the wireless telegraph it made communicating much easier. Dot dot dot….the ship is sinking. Dash dash dash….looks like we’re having shark for dinner! Dot dash dot….check out the humongous dots on Oogoo the seafaring slut. With so many dot and dash combinations to memorize it was just a matter of time before a new form of communication was invented…and as time marched on it was.

Sign Language. A series of hand gestures that convey a message without words. (Needless to say some ‘gestures’ are universal and used more often than others) Finger-hand-hand….wash hands before leaving rest room… Hand-finger-hand…..Betty Sue is serving finger sandwiches….Finger-finger-finger….Oogoo the deaf slut likes it LOUD! With all that gesturing, long conversations were exhausting so a new form of communication had to be invented….and as time marched on it was.

Telephones. First a crank, then a rotary, then a push button model that had glow in numbers. They came in several colors including beige, white and black. Cords, longer cords and then finally for us people that couldn’t possibly stand that close to the phone base for the length of a conversation, the cordless. Dial dial dial….Global warming is real. Dial dial dial….Key Food has a sale on canned goods. Dial dial dial….Oogoo the phone sex slut overcharges at $2.99 a minute.

And then finally they invented the cell phone. A variety of shapes and sizes, flip, no flip, touch screen, GPS, internet, wi-fi, sci-fi, hi-fi. Whatever one you have, it has become part of you. An extension of your hand….of your ear. Don’t try to deny it. Try leaving home without it. Go ahead, leave it on the kitchen counter, in the car…the ‘other’ coat pocket……Aside from feeling like you’ve abandoned your best friend…you’ll never know when you’ll need to dial 911, or directions to the great new Italian restaurant…or most importantly what Oogoo the bluetooth slut is doing on Saturday night.

#$%&!

2011-03-11T19:43:00.000-08:00

I gave up cursing for Lent. I don’t do it often, but when I let loose I am worse than a drunken sailor. (I don’t actually know any sailors but I have met a few drunks in my day) It was that or gum which I didn’t feel was very sacrificial….or playing Lotto like my co-worker did, or Facebook like my neice. (ok, so that ain’t happenin’) Thought about abstaining from chocolate but I already gave that up when my son got engaged and set the wedding date a mere year away. (at a pound a week I could be 52 pounds lighter….ok so maybe I can convince him to wait 6 more months…maybe 9.…a year tops!) I considered giving up texting which I think would actually be therapeutic but again, not something God is sitting up there saying…’Wow save her a spot, she put away her QWERTY keyboard for a whole 40 days’…..

I started off good. I didn’t curse or even think of cursing as the ashes were put on my forehead. I didn’t curse or even think of cursing as my dog decided it would be a good time to chew the insoles out of my sneakers while I was getting ashed. I didn’t curse or even think of cursing the next night when I walked 2 blocks in the pouring rain to see La Cage on Broadway (because my husband finds it necessary to street park, facing downtown or west…I don’t ask, I just drive and park) I didn’t curse or even think of cursing (ok that’s a lie right there, I didn’t but sure as hell wanted to) when the usher took us to our seats only to find out they added little bistro tables in front of us making our front row orchestra seats….2nd row I-cant-see-a-damn-thing-over-the-peoples-head seats. I said nothing as one by one men came out dressed like woman and had better legs than me. I smiled and clapped curse free as the woman in front of me tilted her head back and forth like some bobble-headed car ornament and as I did the same to see the stage, I am sure the guys behind me were cursing at me. And speaking of the guys behind me, as they held hands and nuzzled, they laughed hysterically and way too loudly as the men/women came out with their tucked up ‘jewels’ and yet not one curse came to my lips.

Today however brought a new series of circumstances I will ill-prepared for. I was driving on a service road and needed to merge into traffic. No one was letting me in. I guess all the rain had soggied their brain and now with the sun shining they were determined not to let another living sole in front of them, even if there was a red light up ahead. I put my blinker on. I nudged my bumper into the lane, and as cars honked frantically to let me know they were NOT going to let me in THEIR lane I felt an ever so slight curse bubbling up to my lips. I swallowed hard and continued to merge. I made it in front of a man who had decided that if he honked at me long enough I would simply pull out of his lane and let him get back in front of me. What the *&$!? When I got to the corner he zipped around me and open window to open window he let me have it. Both barrels. Names I haven’t been called in…well, ever! And here it was, the beginning of the end. My Lenten promise not only broken but destroyed. I started calling him names that would have had the gay guys from last night blushing. That the dancing men/women on stage would have giggled at. But Mr. My Lane wasn’t laughing. I added adjectives to every curse and verbs to every adjective. I told him what to do with what body parts and with who. (or is it whom?) And then just when I thought I couldn’t have sunk any lower, I wished him dead. During lent……I am going to hell.

I recovered from that debacle vowing to regroup and remain curse free for the remainder of the Lenten season. 38 more days, not counting Sundays. I could do it! I went to Key Food. The lot was empty. I parked, went inside for less than 15 minutes and came out to find a car parked three inches from my driver’s door. The lot was still empty. 30 spots and this one needed to park on top of me. (was this I test I thought to myself?) I kept my cool, looked at the make and model of the car and went to ask the manager to request the owner move the car. I went back out to wait for the owner. I had to pee. A woman came out talking on her cell phone, her keys and groceries in hand and walked over to her car. Before she got in I said, ‘you really didn’t need to park so close to me, look at all these spots….I couldn’t get in my car’........What I wanted to say was “you are so damn lucky that I didn’t just slam my door up against yours and squeeze my fat ass in-between leaving a nice fresh dent on your pretty little Nissan.” I refrained…God is watching I thought….it’s a test…it’s a test! Without blinking an eye she turned to me and accused me of taking up two spots, which I clearly was not…especially since there were 28 other spots for her to pick from. “Are you kidding me?” I said. (I know, I know… lousy come back, but when your hands are tied by this whole Lenten thing you are limited!) She got in her car and backed out, still talking on her cell phone, almost hitting my car and me….and then smiled! That was it…I failed the test. Hell, even God would have to understand this one. I let loose with a string of curses I didn’t even know I knew. I started off slow, calling her a jerk, an ass, a whore. Standing alone in the parking lot, I moved onto more descriptive words and just as I was whipped into a frenzy that even I was amazed at…..it started to rain. God’s way of marking my test paper…F!

I am giving up gum for Lent. God will understand.

Buckle up!

2011-02-20T18:59:00.000-08:00

After attempting three times to go to Macys to return something I got for Christmas that was too small (surprise, surprise), I finally made it there today. With two of my grandsons. Going to Macy’s which is nestled inside the Kings Plaza shopping center is an adventure all in itself. Going with two kids under ten is another. Before heading off to the mall we feasted (and I use the term loosely) on Papa John pizza. My husband saw a sign for $5 pick up only pies. So pick up only…he did! And he had a $15 gift card which meant he has over $4 credit still left on the card. Yee Ha! Made his day, free pizza and cash back…life is good! The grandson that weighs less than a hummingbird ate most of one pie…crust and all. My other grandson spent most of the time pulling most of the cheese off since he doesn’t like cheese or the crust. He made my dog very happy, my husband a little disconcerted and the starving children in Ethiopia more than envious.

We left for the mall with all good expectations of returning an item, possibly buying a bigger item and of course, the Cookie House. I asked them to buckle up, check the buckle and were they sure they were buckled up until they both said “you asked us already, Grandma”. Which was the polite equivalent of “shut the hell up you neurotic old woman.“ We pulled into the mall’s outdoor parking lot which a lot of people don’t know exists. It is called the roof. Still costs you $3 to park there, but you don’t risk being slaughtered for your fake but oh-so-realistic Coach bag. As we pulled into a parking spot a car pulled in along side of us. Now let me just preface this with the fact that I know I am paranoid nut when it comes to my grandkids, and as a true New Yorker, I watch who is next to me and behind me…tenfold when I have my grandkids with me. The car that pulled in next to me pulled in too close, too fast and well, too in synch with my car. (paranoid, remember?) I looked over to find that sitting in the passenger seat was a woman who looked exactly like the scary old woman in House on Haunted Hill. (For those of you who have never seen the original version, see it, worth the watch) My grandkids were instructed not to open the car doors until the Hill House woman was long into the mall. My hand kept locking and re-locking the doors just in case this woman who was probably just some sad ugly little woman having a bad hair day….turned into a psycho killer.

Clear of dangerous car parking patrons we entered the mall through the Sears entrance. The kids immediately ran to a Sesame Street display which goes to show that Elmo and Big Bird, like Mickey Mouse will never go out of style. They had fun playing with the figures as I kept a guarded eye out for any pedophiles, child snatchers and the Hill House lady who clearly must be lurking nearby. All no shows, we were good to move on through the exercise equipment and TV screens to the escalators. One time many years ago my husband and I saw a little girl get her sneaker lace caught in the escalator teeth. He knew where the off switch was, switched it off and went on his merry way allowing the parents to comfort their child after thanking him profusely. Like Superman turning back into Clark Kent. My hero……sort of! Anyway, ever since then no matter where we are, or with whom….he recalls that story and several others about kids getting their toes chewed off by escalators. It is for that reason if I had been any stronger I would have physically carried them on the escalator much to their embarrassment. Instead, I repeated ad nauseum (do you have your seatbelts on?) make sure your laces are tied (tricky when your sneakers have Velcro closures) you stand in the middle of the step, and don’t let your pants drag….and amazingly we made it to the third floor where we exited Sears and entered the mall. Phew!

Macy’s is on the exact opposite side of the mall from Sears. I planned our route giving the kids the option of which stores they would like to pass. They could care less. We passed a toy store where they ran to the display of wrestling figures. I offered to buy them. They politely refused. We passed a baseball cap store where my grandson immediately tried on a Mets cap. I offered to buy it for him. He politely refused. We went into Hallmark where their Easter display included a Donald Duck dressed as a rabbit that danced and quaked. Adorable. I asked if we should buy it for Easter…..they refused. What the hell is wrong with these kids?? I will speak to their mother later.

We arrive at Macy’s un-accosted and even survived the escalator ride with toes intact. Although the line was rather long the kids entertained themselves looking at a Macys display that changed pictures depending on where you stood. Back and forth in front of the display for the entire time it took Shalimarinka (I kid you not!) to do the return. Cards bought and returns done all that stood between us and the Cookie House was a final escalator ride and a possible encounter with the Hill House lady. We walked out of Macy’s and towards the Cookie House passed the kiosks that sold everything from jewelry to t-shirts and cell phones to CHICKEN LITTLE hats! That’s right, crocheted hats that looked like every character including Spongebob, Elmo and Chicken Little. The man selling the hats saw our interest and immediately came over and put hats on both of my grandkids as I protested apparently not loud enough. These hats, adorable as they may be, have probably been deposited on every passing head with reckless disregard for sanitary conditions of any kind. I envisioned little critters lurking in the woolen caps crawling out onto my unsuspecting grandsons heads not to mention the $30 price tag. I abruptly pulled off the hats without explaining my urgency and let them just chalk it up to grandma the neurotic. (I can live with that, I’m used to it!)

Finally the Cookie House! A banana-strawberry smoothie, bottle of water and half a pound of chocolate chip cookies $13.50 plus tax….now I know why they didn’t want the wrester, ball cap or duck! As they happily munched on cookies and slurped the smoothies we made our way back to Sears, up the escalator and to the roof. Hill House lady was never sighted and her car was gone when we got to mine. Put your seatbelts on. Are they on? You sure?

As Seen On TV

2011-02-10T20:21:00.000-08:00

Sooooo I have been sick for over a week. Flu, head cold, virus…whatever! Doctor basically had no idea and treated it as such. I took Tylenol for the pounding headache (because I couldn’t reach the Aleve), a Walgreen’s brand cold pill for the congestion (because I am cheap and believe that you really pay for the brand name), sugar free cough lozenges for the hacking sleep robbing cough and I drank more orange juice than a diabetic should. And I still suffered with a cough, headache and congestion for over a week. So maybe I could have saved my self some money and a diabetic coma….next time I am doing it cold turkey.

While I suffered through the symptoms of what ever the hell I had, I watched TV. I watched shows that not only had I never watched before but never knew they were on. There isn’t a lot to do once you drop the remote and can’t move a muscle to retrieve it. You watch what is on next. And next. And next….. until you fall asleep or someone comes to your rescue. No one did. They were leaving me alone. So I could sleep. Which I did. More sleep than I have had in the last two months.

As I watched TV through my drug induced, fever blurring, weakened state I began to take on a new life‘s goal. I wanted to donate everything I own to Marlo Thomas for the kids with cancer, I wanted to rent power tools and build something like a bookcase or basically anything that used a piano hinge like the TV guy that has a woodworking shop in his garage, I wanted to redo, revamp, or rearrange every room in my house like Nate Berkus, (an Oprah show spinoff) and I even wanted to learn how to play poker late late at night for high stakes with pseudo-celebrities. I wanted to be a Victoria Secrets model or at least make the cover Sports Illustrated. (drug-induced, remember?)

I was forced to watch commercials. Did you know that your average half hour show is really 26 minutes of commercials and 4 minutes of actual show? Ok that may be an exaggeration but it is pretty damn close. And the later the show is on, the more commercials there are. And the more commercials there are the more stuff they sell. And the more stuff they sell the shittier the stuff. And the shittier the stuff the more I wanted to buy it. I think their target market is the drug induced, fever laden, remote droppers. Gotta be, I bought two As Seen On TV items the minute I could reach the phone and my credit card. Shit I don’t need or necessarily want, but they said I should need it and I should want it, so I do. In my weakened state I caved.

I read the credits. I know the producer, co-producer, and executive producer. I know who the creative producer is although I am not sure what any of them do individually. I know the names of all the cameramen, soundmen and set designers. I know where they filmed, who they thanked for letting them film there, and who died and got the show dedicated to them. The scrolling words lulled me in and out of sleep. That, the Nyquil and the six pills I was now taking.

By day four I was upright but not mobile. My head no longer felt like I got hit by a bat. It no longer felt like I was swallowing razor blades, and my ears stopped ringing. But try to stand up and the room spun. I sat upright on the couch. The chair. The floor. But no matter where I planted myself, my head instinctively chose to flop over. It was easier to lay down than to prop my head up with pillows. I basically slept for two more days. By day six I was able to stand up although now my ears were closed and I could hear about as good as my husband.

“Sit up, your ears will drain” he suggested every fifteen ~~friggin'~~ minutes.

“Sit up, it works for me.”

(What part of you are still deaf don’t you get?…sitting up hasn’t helped you and it won’t help me. Leave me alone and hand me the remote….Obviously I get cranky when I am sick.)

Days 7, 8 and 9 are a blur. I had the audacity to leave the house for two hours and completely relapsed. (ok it was cold and raining and not the best choice I have made recently) Back again…the throbbing head, the raw throat, the chest rattling cough….and the TV. This time I hung on to the remote for dear life. I wondered what sick people did before TV. Before radio. I figured it was the reason peopled died so much younger years ago. If I had to lay on the couch or in bed without so much as a radio to distract me, I would have sucked down heart stopping doses of medicine just to pass the time. I loved having the remote. I zipped through the commercials and credits. I raised and lowered the volume just because I could and slowly I started feeling better….again. This time I did not go out and risk another set back.

I am back to normal (ha!) again with little more than a red nose and a lingering cough…..oh and a Slanket (the cheaper version of the Snuggie), the ShamWow economy pack and Easy Feet Shower Slippers.

may the force be with you.....

2011-01-27T07:55:00.000-08:00

Like the rest of New York City and pretty much the whole eastern seaboard I have had it with the snow. I don’t have to commute to work, I don’t have babies that need milk nor do I have a husband that works for the much maligned Sanitation Department…but still I hate THIS MUCH snow. I hate it for a myriad of reasons.

Since I was 12 I have never been able to get boots over my calves. Not the stylish ones anyway. Sure the hideous ankle length ones that look like snow tires on the bottom…the ones that leave just enough room for the snow to creep up and over the top and fill the boot with frigid snow and cause frostbitten ankles…those I can get.

The snow has scared the birds away from the feeder that my husband hung outside my kitchen window so that I can watch the cardinals, blue jays and even woodpeckers come and happily peck away. Instead I get to watch the damn rodent squirrels gnaw on the birdhouse so that they can get to the food that is meant for little beaks. I chase them so often that they are no longer alarmed by my idle threats and I think I even saw one of their grey little paws give me the finger!

I have never walked my dog. Well not never, but not often...he goes in the yard. Sad but true. It gives Mr. Wonderful something to do on Saturday mornings. Scoop the Poop. Sweep the Heap. Trap the Crap. No matter what you call it, that’s his job. I feed the dog…we’re even! However, with the snow, my faggy ass dog wont go down the steps to the yard. He pretends that it is his arthritic legs that keep from plotting a course down the snow covered stairs, but when my granddaughter has anything edible his arthritic legs work miraculously well as he chases her around the house waiting for a crumb to drop. Say Halleluiah!! Instead he wants to circle and squat on the deck outside my kitchen. Like the squirrels before him, he has learned that my threats to throw him down the stairs are idle ones. So as he circles, I leave the room so as to give him some privacy. I then throw snow on it. Hey, it works….til my pooper scooper gets home from work.

I look hideous in hats. Ditto ear muffs. Double ditto hoods. Some people look cute in hats, me…not so much! Ear muffs make me look like Princess Leia and while the 'brothers' can pull off a hoodie and look menacing, I just look like a mess. Dr. Oz says you lose a lot of body heat through your head…*&%# you Dr. Oz, have you seen me in a hat??

My gloves all have holes in the fingertips from my nails. Besides it is close to impossible to turn a doorknob, tie a shoe or text while gloved. I know they now sell fingerless gloves for that reason, but it seems a little pointless to have warm palms and frozen fingertips. So mainly I go gloveless and risk frozen fingers rather than have someone receive a text from me that looks something like this: hlsm dkeii fjsslklk : )

I have lost three scarves already this winter. I have no idea where I lose them, but I think that I leave them slung over diner chairs where they eventually become a nice gift for the waiter’s wife or they have fallen off the closet hangers into the bottomless pit of my coat closet. They will not be seen again til spring when the winter coats are packed away. Even the knitted one my niece made me, which grew longer and longer each season as it stretched under its own weight….missing! I especially liked that one because it was so long it hung out from under my jacket which for some reason annoyed my anal retentive boss. I wore it often, maybe for that very reason.

With this much snow, even if I dug out my car, even if I was able to navigate the street corners without sliding, even if I could find somewhere to park when I got to said destination….what do I do when I get home to find someone took the parking spot I exhaustingly dug out with frozen ankles, frostbitten fingers and a sub-zero skull? I know you can’t save spots (although I have tried with garbage cans which were moved…grrr) and I know that if I found a spot somewhere else I couldn’t give a rat’s ass who dug it out (ever wonder where that expression came from and what the hell it even means??) but the thought of being faced with that dilemma causes me to stay put. Which leads to another dilemma. I have no excuse not to clean my house. So as I watch the snow fall outside I see all my excuses fall away as well.

I have amazing neighbors. They are super shovelers and although I haven't really tried too hard, I can't seem to get out there before them. Before the last flake falls, before the weatherman says it is over, our walks are shoveled and salted. Our steps are cleared and even our WELCOME mats are hung over the railing to dry. The problem with this wonderful situation is simple...guilt. As I sit nursing my second cup of coffee they are shoveling and chopping. As I step from my hot shower they are back revving up the the snow blower for yet another go at it. I feel so guilty that I am not out there freezing with them, although apparently not guilty enough to don a pair of Princess Leia muffs and a shovel.

Morgan and me

2011-01-13T21:07:00.000-08:00

Some time ago I made a bucket list. A bucket list for those of you who‘ve never heard of one, is a list of things you want to do or accomplish before you die. Before you ‘kick the bucket’. I put things on there that were easily attainable, just so that I didn’t feel like a total failure on my death bed as I reviewed the list and fell miserably short of the accomplishments I had aspired to. I also put things on that list that I know will never come to pass….like climbing the stairs at the Parthenon ruins in Greece. Since I have trouble navigating the nine steps to my front door, that one will probably not have a check mark next to it. The most achievable ones I put first. The harder ones further down, and the ones that quite frankly ain’t gonna happen are last. Again I figured, struggling to read my list as I drooled my last drool….I would be dead by the time I reached the bottom of the list and never realize I missed a few.

Some people have New Year resolutions…promises that they will do something to better themselves, their lives or the lives of someone else. My list is totally self serving. It is stuff I want to do, because I want to do it. For me. Only me. Selfish. Nice resolution I have…to be more selfish in 2011.

The obvious ones made the list too, in no particular order. Lose a ton of weight. (…almost literally) I also want to write a book, play the piano, patent something, and skydive. (pity the poor instructor who will be strapped to me as we hurl towards earth) I want tickets for Saturday Night Live, see Venice before it sinks or the rats take over the entire city, share a song with Barry Manilow, a beer with Stephen King and a bed with Keifer Sutherland (in Jack Bauer mode). I want to buy something from an auction house like Sotheby’s or Christie’s, learn to do yoga correctly (without serious injury to myself or others), and I want to donate a million dollars to a deserving charity, which of course is preceded by…I want to win the lottery! Somewhere on the list is the need to learn to dance, the basics….the cha cha, samba, merengue and maybe even the hula. (god knows I’ve got the hips for it) I want to go skiing or at least find a pair of ski boots that will fit over my calves. And speaking of calves, I want to milk a cow and own a pot-bellied pig.

I want to learn to speak Italian, and while my Rosetta Stone DVD is a great learning tool I can still only say “L'uomo con il cappello nero siede sul cavallo marrone” which loosely translated means, ‘the man with the black hat sits on the brown horse”. And while I am quite proud of that accomplishment it will be rather hard to fit into a conversation. I want to start an online business selling something I invented and patented making me a millionaire which in-of-itself would take care of three listed items. I want to see the pyramids in Eygpt (are there pyramids anywhere else now that I think about it?), Mount Rushmore and Graceland. Tut, Roosevelt and Elvis....how's that for diversity? I want to write a column for a daily newspaper...maybe in Italian?

There was a movie (aptly named, The Bucket List) with Jack Nicholson and that wonderful black actor I always think is Samuel L Jackson, but it isn’t….ummmm he was in Shawshank Redemption, Se7en, Driving Miss Daisy …..got it, Morgan Freeman. Two men, terminally ill who because of one’s wealth get to live out their bucket lists. Unfortunately I am not wealthy, but fortunately not terminal either. So although my list will be checked off a little slower I am determined to continue to check things off. So far, I got…..nothing.

twinkling twinkling twinkling

2011-01-06T07:04:00.000-08:00

The holidays are over. Phew! While it was great fun loading and unloading the dishwasher over 63 times, arranging and rearranging furniture to accommodate dinner guests, and finger-bleeding gift wrapping sessions I had an epiphany! Christmas ain’t what it use to be! More work, more money and less wide-eyed anticipation. Even the reindeer have become high maintenance requiring glitter-laden food and organic baby carrots. To add insult to injury, I can’t remember the last time I was kissed under the mistletoe. (maybe it has something to do with the fact that the mistletoe adorning my doorway is faded plastic, missing a few berries and about 20 years old.) My nativity is gnawed and chewed by a dog I had some 30 years ago and for sentimental reasons I have not replaced it. I am never quite sure, as I place it under the tree each year, if I keep it because it was the first one we owned as a married couple, or I am glad the dog that gnawed it along with the woodwork is long dead.

I am carefully nursing my Christmas cactus that miraculously bloomed after sitting dormant on my windowsill since last year and now in order to keep those pretty pink blooms, well…blooming I had to devise a watering and fertilizing schedule. I wish it had died along with the pussy willow and ivy I tried to save from the winter frost. I now have three beautiful plants on my dining room table, two poinsettias and an orchid. They don’t stand a chance in hell.

My outdoor Christmas decorations are buried in snow. The littlest of my reindeer family blinks laboriously under the drift. The 50% off K-Mart snowflakes I bought after Christmas last year still twinkle in my window and although my tree is lit and standing it has shifted dangerously to the right apparently terrifying the angel tree topper. There are a sad few gifts left under the tree as I have put away everything but the holiday bloomers I get every year from my friend. (Nothing says Christmas like a bloomer with holly on it!) I waited for Little Christmas less commonly known as the Celebration of the Epiphany. (there’s that word again..!) Today, January 6th commemorates the last day of the Christmas holiday season. That is what I am waiting for…..that and the fact that my son, the one that moved to Queens last year, the one that takes the Christmas boxes out of the attic for me, is apparently busy. I used to do this myself. I climbed the wooden attic stairs that now creak under my weight, crawled on knees that just don’t do crawling anymore, and one by one brought up and down the multitude of boxes marked….what else, Christmas. My husband suggested that he get the boxes down, but then again he is the one that suggested he fix the storm door that the UPS man broke last year. The one that still isn’t fixed. So I think I may be in charge of box-getting this year.

I cannot listen to another version of Silent Night or Jingle Bells or even Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer without wanting to tear the ears off the side of my head. The life-sized Santa I bought in Target that terrorized my grandsons when they were younger has been unplugged so that his Ho Ho Ho doesn’t make me Heave Heave Heave him out with the trash. Christmas mugs, dishtowels and pot holders have over-taken my kitchen and I admittedly miss my embarrassingly soiled, burnt and ripped ones that got put away while snowmen and candy canes replaced them for the season. The decorative holiday pillows on my couch that I strategically placed for the first three weeks are now askew and I dare say slept on by my stinky dog. I will throw them in the wash and if some of them don’t fair so well in the rinse cycle, they will just never make it back into the attic boxes marked…Christmas. I am sick of avoiding the chocolate santas, the candy canes, and the honey balls (of course with the most honey) that are stuck to the bottom of the snowman plate.

I have stopped trying to figure out how recycle the Christmas cards. I have stopped trying to light the bayberry candle that has no wick left. I have stopped shopping the 70% off ‘all Christmas’ aisle in Walgreens. I have stopped believing my epiphany…..I love Christmas!

.......let it snow, let it snow, let it snow!

2010-12-27T15:39:00.000-08:00

It has been terribly hectic here for the past few weeks and although I definately needed to 'ramble' here and there, there was just no time. There was a blizzard last nite and since I can barely open my door more than five inches, and there is no way this overindulged 'holiday body' will squeeze through it, I am stuck here to continue cleaning from days of merriment....merridom....merryness....fun! So I will ramble on........

I love to shop. I hate to shop at Christmas time. I also hate lines....and rude people and an empty wallet and sales ploys that confuse me and make me think that I am getting a bargain when I am not. But I shopped right up til Christmas Eve, ran into rude people and out of money...and whether I got a bargain or not I finished my shopping in the nick of time.

I did alot of shopping on line this year. Amazon, Walmart.com, and some strange sites my son sent me for his mountain biking gear. I did make it alot easier and except for tipping my UPS man and the fact that I now know my Mastercard number by heart, a lot cheaper as well. Gotta love FREE SHIPPING!!! But good old fashion store shopping can't be beat so I went to Sears in the Kings Plaza Mall so that I had something to complain about. (And fodder for this blog I suppose) I park on the roof now since last year I wandered around endlessly looking for my car which I swore was parked on the blue level and wasn't. The roof also has an entrance directly into Sears so I don't get killed buying a wrench or some other ratcheting item for you know who. They were having a sale on some tools that my husband asked me to pick up. Why he finds the need to buy stuff for himself the week before Christmas is beyond me. Plan A...buy the items, tell him they were out of them, wrap them and slip them under the tree. Plan B...they really were out of them, look for another tool he doesn't have four of already.

I went to Modells. I wanted to buy something Yankees for my son in law. For some reason everyone in the store was 6'5" or better. I felt like Gulliver. I am short so looking up is nothing new, but this was crazy. I walked around looking for what I wanted, but it seemed that everything I wanted was hanging eight feet off the floor. I found the 'stick' that they use to get them up there in the first place and began the tedious task of finding the right size. Medium...too small and short Large...too big and you'd need to have monkey arms to see your hands...Youth Large...ummm, no! OK, gonna need help. Looked for someone to help. (They call them associates now...still get paid employee salaries, but it sounds more impressive to be called an associate I guess) The 9 foot 'associate' came over to help, looked a little pissy that I had taken down so many shirts to check for sizes but helped me find the size I needed. He mumbled under his associate breath as I walked toward the register and he re-hung all the wrong sized items without even having to use the 'stick.'

I went to Kohls...to Toys R Us....to Telco....to Century 21 and to Macy's. I went to Walgreens and Rite-Aid and CVS. I came home to find two messages from my credit card company. They were simply recorded messages asking me that if I hadn't been on some wild spending spree please call them because someone was clearly using my card in a reckless manner. Helloooo, it's Christmastime! If it was August 4th or May 9th I could see the concern....but it was December 15th??? But, I suppose, had I lost the card and someone was in fact shopping with the Modell associate without me, I would have appreciated the call. I also got a call that they were lowering my credit limit. Lowering! Are they crazy?

I spend most nights wrapping and recording what I bought. I have to make lists because I tend to forget and buy again for the same person. Sometimes I even buy the same thing for the same person. So my apologies to anyone who got two scarves or two Old Navy pajama sets, or two animal print Snuggies....try to keep in mind it's the thought that counts. Kids and grandkids gifts get wrapped, bagged and hauled upstairs to be hidden until Christmas Eve. After all the Santa believers are home and in bed, my son has the dubious task of carting all the bags of gifts down and arranging them under the tree. (and half way across the living room) This year I bought my stinky dog cologne CK-9 (hahaha) and a stocking full of squeaking dog toys. By Christmas morning not one thing squeaked and the living room had snow-like foam adorning every crevice. Note to self: Give dog one toy at a time!

Nothing says Christmas more than the Chia Pet Obama Head which went over well, as did Catch Phrase a game that allows you to make a fool out of yourself by not being able to answer simple questions in miniscule time frames. I got the Canadian tenors CD which I listened to all day as I cleaned and made it feel like Christmas morning all over again. I also got several books which although my husband bought me a Kindle last year, I miss licking my finger and page turning. I miss folding the page when I put the book down to get a snack. Jay-Z, Whoopie, Sarah and Stephen King all await my attention. Yes, it was a very eclectic Christmas. I got zip drives and bloomers. I got a keyboard and keychains. I got gift cards and tupperware. I got earrings and ear muffs, cologne, coffee and cash. And I loved everyone of them!

Christmas lasted three days this year. If we continue this way we will have to get a menorah just to keep track. Christmas Eve we did the whole Italian 7 fish dinner. Four courses, seven fishes (although there were really only 5 but since two were cooked differently I rounded it up to 7), two macaroni's (shells and spaghetti) and enough desserts to kill a horse. (or a diabetic!) Tons of food, tons of gifts and tons of dishes! Christmas day started with breakfast because apparently we didn't have enough to eat the night before. I cooked the bacon with my As Seen On TV microwave bacon cooker which is the best gift I have ever bought myself. We also had sausage and eggs and pancakes and waffles....so of course my husband wanted to know where the bagels were? More food, more gifts, more dishes. Off to my sister in laws for Christmas dinner for, you guessed it...even more food, even more gifts and even more dishes. Since my son was not at breakfast and we had yet to see my in-laws, Sunday the 26th was day 3 of our Christmas fare. Still more food (cold cuts this time), still more gifts and still more dishes (paper, yay!) Dinnertime rolled around and leftovers were reheated and re-served but thankfully there were no more gifts and all disposable dishes. Our bellies beyond full, the tree overcrowded with gifts, the snow started to fall. And fall. And fall.

......speeders and greeters

2010-12-03T08:58:00.000-08:00

The weekend after Thanksgiving my husband and I drove up to my house upstate….the air was cool and crisp when we left, colder and snowing when we arrived three hours later. I plugged in my candle warmer and Cinnamon Spice filled the air as the heat began to take the chill out of the frosty house. Families of deer walked softly outside in search of food …and I had just made a pot of hot freshly brewed coffee . Ahh life is good……..reality check!….I am here to fight a speeding ticket I got back on 4th of July weekend when Dudley Doolittle got me doing 54 in a 40. With the dog barking and one of my two grandsons crying in the backseat (he thought we were gonna be arrested), it was kinda hard to plead my case, so I took the ticket and decided to fight it. I am sure if I was doing 54 it was because the speed limit was 55.…that or I just didn’t see the cop car. I mailed in my plea and waited and when it took so long to get a response I hoped they had forgotten about it. Four months later I got the hearing date. Since it was scheduled for a Monday my husband and I figured we would make a weekend out of it….hence the three hours of traffic on Thanksgiving weekend, the most traveled weekend of the year. The house was cold since the heat was set on 50 and it was clearly going to take some time to heat up. The fragrant candle scent came from a candle warmer a friend had bought us when she stayed at our house (that or she left it by mistake and is too embarrassed to ask for it back) A candle warmer is just that….it melts the wax by warming it…no flame for the neurotic, paranoid husband who is convinced that as soon as a candle is lit, it will undoubtedly ignite the house. Forget the fact that there is now an entire jar of molten wax just waiting to tip over and sear the flesh off your skin.

The dog, seeing Bambi and company sniffing at the already frozen ground decided to bark incessantly. Oblivious to the fact that if my dog had been able to get out he would have his own venison Thanksgiving feast right there on our frozen little lawn, the deer simply moved on at their own pace. I got a blanket from the bed, my book (a Kindle which is nothing more than a rechargeable book) and a cup of coffee. Jeez, no milk….I hate black coffee but at this point I needed caffeine to lose the headache I got from the three hours in traffic and my barking dog. My book ended up shutting immediately after I switched it on….battery needed charging…..to add insult to injury, the blanket smelled like baby vomit. I threw the blanket in the washer, found a June 2009 STAR magazine in the bathroom rack and made my way to the couch with my black coffee. My husband was busy changing the outside bulbs to energy saving yellow bug lights. There are no bugs in December, but he was proud of his accomplishment so I said nothing about the fact that he should have done it in June. Before I was even able to find out what reality star was pregnant in 2009 I was asleep. I guess I needed a nap. I fell asleep with, you guessed it, a cup of hot black coffee. Thankfully I didn’t spill much on the couch or rug…most of the searing liquid puddled on my left breast. The rest of Saturday was actually quite enjoyable as we saw finally got to see the newly renovated hotel decorated for Christmas (I miss my grandkids), a firework display that we watched from my back deck (I really miss my grandkids) and a comedian in the night club that was quite funny, even considering there was no way to get a buzz on with the lethargic bar service.

The plan for Sunday was simple, I go to town (sounds quaint, but there’s a Super Wal-mart, K-mart…something-Mart) and do some Christmas shopping, he goes to the Jacuzzi and indoor pool to alternately melt and freeze his balls off. To each his own, I say! After breakfast and a shower I head for one of those Marts locked and loaded for some serious shopping. Would have been nice if I had remembered to bring money since my debit card had little buying power left in it. The store was empty. Me, sixteen checkout girls and two greeters. Yup, they have greeters. You walk in the store, they greet you. “Hello, Welcome to Wal-mart” going in, “Have a nice day” on the way out. I am from Brooklyn, if I don’t know you and you talk too nice to me I get suspicious. You tell me to have a nice day and I become down right paranoid. I made my way passed the greeters and into the toy section in hopes of getting some ideas for my grandkids. It was quite disheartening and a little enlightening to find that they have pretty much everything in 9 aisles of toys between them. I found a few things for their stockings but moved on to the clothing section for the older kids. What the hell size is One? First of all I have never been anything smaller than a 14 I am sure of it. I may have even been born a size 12 for all I know, but the entire junior section had three sizes…One, Two and Three. I assumed small, medium and large. I bought the One. Just because once in my damn life I wanted to buy a size One….who to give it to is another story. On to the Household items where I could have bought a cheap rice cooker or even cheaper potato ricer if only someone on my list had wanted one. I could have bought a fajita maker in the shape of a jalapeano if someone on my list had wanted one, but what I settled for was a bird feeder refill for a feeder my son in law hung outside the upstate house. 79 cents…I decadently bought two. It has been empty for a while now and I am sure I saw a few crows giving me a dirty look last time we were up there. I wanted to yell that it wasn’t my damn feeder to fill….but I restrained. I steered myself away from the fabric department which made me sad. I, am a fabric hoarder. Nearly two hours later I made my way to the cashier, her name was Viola. Viola had an attitude. She clearly didn’t want to work this day and made sure everyone on her line knew it. She tsk-ed and huffed as she pulled the hangers off the tops I bought and gave me a sideways “you-aint-fittin’-in-these” glare as she de-hangared the size One yoga pants. If she said one word I was gonna deck her right here at checkout # 11 of Wal-mart. But Viola said nothing specific and just continued skewing and ringing until it was time to pay.

“Debit or Credit” she asked….

”I’m never quite sure what the difference is....” I laughed.

“DEBIT OR CREDIT MA’AM?!!” she wasn’t about to start explaining.

“Debit” I said meekly for some reason.

Viola had clearly won this battle and oddly I was ok with that. I will just punch the greeter on the way out.

Back at the house, my husband was happily snoring on the couch (what a surprise, at least he wasn’t holding a cup of very hot black coffee) and awoke when the dog barked (another surprise) as I walked in.

“How was your shopping?“ he asks really only wanting to know how much I spent and not what I spent it on.

“I hit a greeter” I said with a straight face.

“Nice, who’s that for?“ Did I mention he has a hearing problem??

Sunday mostly everyone in the hotel left so the show that night, another comedian, was earlier than usual. It wasn’t until we got to the nightclub that I realized why. First of all there were about twenty of us in total, my husband and I were the youngest ones there by a good twenty years, and the only ones without a wheelchair, walker or scooter (although with the way the two of us currently walk that might not be far behind) The comedian probably started his career in the 20’s and could have used a walker himself. He wore a blue blazer looking very much like the captain of the Love Boat. His last gig must have been on a cruise ship. He was funny though and he repeatedly poked fun of himself as he adjusted his hearing aid if no one laughed.

Monday morning we went to traffic court. Traffic court was in the back of a Day Care. I prepared what I wanted to say, my defense if you will and got on the line that formed in the bitter morning. A police car pulled up, unlocked the door, put on the lights and thankfully the heat as we all followed him in. The officer asked if I was speeding to which I replied that I didn’t think so…he said I had an honest face (which was probably just frozen skin cells) and he plea bargained my speeder down to a parking ticket and told me to have a seat to see the judge. The judge reiterated what the officer said about my honest face and told me to pay a fine which when I thought about it later was quite excessive for a parking ticket. Oh well, next time I will do 40.…their plan worked. It is a week after Thanksgiving and all but a small, hard piece of pumpkin pie remains and some scar tissue on my left breast.

gobble gobble gobble

2010-11-23T21:23:00.000-08:00

It's that time again....Thanksgiving 2010. For weeks my Facebook friends have been posting all the things they are most grateful for, like family, friends and health. Since I feel truly blessed and therefore thankful all year long, I am here to say this is what I am thankful for this year:

I am thankful to my daughter for sharing with her friend the fact that I think I need a face lift, and will now be hosting one of those “face-lift in a bottle” party. Gonna take a little more than some lotion to lift all these chins!

I am thankful that I have a washer and dryer. Not that I love to do laundry, but whenever my son (the one that moved to Queens) finds his hamper overflowing he comes to Brooklyn. To see me. His laundry misses me.

I am thankful that I have a husband that snores like a pissed off bear. I am equally thankful that he has restless leg syndrome or some other freakazoid ailment that has him twitching for most of the night. Sleep is highly over rated anyway!

I am thankful for safety pins. (don’t ask)

I am thankful for my mother in law’s generosity. She shares, without hesitation her best bowel stories right down to the quality, quantity and I am sorry to say, color. Like a jeweler rating a diamond cut, my mother in law makes sure I know exactly how she went that day…and every other day for that matter.

I went shopping for my Thanksgiving dinner. We are 19 this year, counting the kids and a baby. I didn’t need a list since my Thanksgiving fare is basically the same each year.

Antipasto (with fresh crusty bread and smoked mozzarella cheese courtesy of the bowel lady),

Pasta (this year it is ravioli since the kids really don’t like lasagna, manicotti, stuffed shells or anything else I could have bought threw sauce on and baked….and it was on sale),

Turkey (Butterball, by default),

Bread stuffing (my mom’s famous sausage and chestnut stuffing which only half the people like but I love and I make as a tribute to Gracie….even though she wasn’t the best cook in the world her stuffing was amazing, although she did make a really neat lemon meringue pie with real merangue, not that sweet marshmallow shit they serve at diners)….breath 2,3, 4…

Vegetables…every one they’ve ever grown on Farmville and then some,

Sweet Potatoes (which I layer with brown sugar and marshmallows before I bake just in case my blood sugar isn’t high enough already),

Mashed Potatoes (which I would love to use the boxed instant shit but won’t because I would have to bury the boxes so my son and grandsons won’t find them),

Turkey Gravy (which I start with a canned version and then add bird ~~droppings~~ drippings to make it look and taste more like homemade), and of course dessert.

Pies (my sister in law makes one for probably every berry out there,

cookies (my neice makes amazing chocolate chip cookies that I refuse to put out until I have made myself sick in the kitchen huffing them as I plate the food),

the insanely overpriced Chocolate Cornucopias my husband buys from the bakery every year that start out as a table decoration get in the way, removed from the table, then forgotten until the next day where he enjoys them all by himself…maybe that was his plan all along),

Nuts (which I serve in my 50 year old wooden nut bowl that was carved by a neighbor when I was a kid and was bequeathed to me when they died…that or they bought it at one of those cheap souvenir stores in Florida and lied way back when to a trusting little girl),

Figs (which make me fart),

Thin Mints (which I just realized… I finished yesterday) and finally

Fruit (which oddly reminds me of my brother since he used to juggle the fruit while I hummed some melodic circus tune and my mother called us, 'wasters').

I got my wagon, geared up for the crowd and went shopping. The first stop was the produce…fennel (which no one but me eats), lettuce, potatoes and all the fruit. When did oranges start costing 89 cents apiece? Bananas (green so they can ripen in time for Thursday), apples and grapes (which my granddaughter loves and I cut into miniscule pieces for fear of choking) and a bag of tangerines which promptly tears open from the bottom sending orange orbs rolling across the store. Sliced Salami and provolone cheese from the deli, and just in case…pepperoni chunks. (You just never know when you will need a chunk of pepperoni!) The rest of the shop went pretty well until I got to the turkey. I am not a fan of Butterball, although I honestly have forgotten why specifically. They carried three brands….$2.39 a pound for a bird blessed by a Rabbi (was that before or after they whacked his head off I wonder), $1.99 for Butterball (which comes with a hot line number in case you want to call and reem out someone when the bird burns because the pop up timer didn't pop in time.) and .99 for Frank’s which came with feet and feathers. I opted for the unblessed, bald, footless Butterball. The Butterball’s were in the freezer case which seemed odd since the flyer said ‘never frozen’. I opened the door which was already slightly ajar and seven 20+ pound frozen turkeys came tumbling out barely missing my feet. (Damn, I could have had some viable law suit there!) The Mexican stock boy who was on a ladder trying to stack paper towels atop the freezer unit simply looked down from his perch and laughed. (Thanks Julio but guess what, these frozen projectiles will remain on the floor until you come down and help me.) He did, but before the birds were tucked safely back in their frozen nest I picked a 19 pound self-basting Butterball. I named him Al. Happy Thanksgiving to Al...I mean All!

my apologies to the great state of Delaware

2010-11-12T14:45:00.000-08:00

Last week my husband was sick. He stayed home from work for four days. When he is sick he does three things: moans; huddles on the couch wearing his Mr. Rogers sweater which he refuses to admit is two sizes too small; and he shops….on eBay. Day one he was too sick to even open the computer, by day two he had bought a bubble machine. The kind DJ’s use. An expensive DJ quality bubble machine. For all of our outdoor parties, he says. Oh yes, we are such party animals! On day three he asked me to Mapquest an address in Delaware. 230 miles one way, 4 hours and 22 minutes. By day four he had bought a truck….yup…in Delaware. 230 miles and 4 hours and 22 minutes away. I took off work to take him to Delaware to pick up his new ~~toy~~ truck. Now before you go thinking what an amazing, patient, understand wife I am (which I am, of course) let me explain. I love having something to hold over his head. I love having something to say like, ‘oh sure but I drove all the way to Delaware for you’ - you get the picture! That and the fact that my birthday and Christmas are just around the corner. I had not thoroughly thought through the prospect of spending four and a half hours trying to make conversation with a man that will only hear half of it and/or go into his repetitive mode where every 50 miles or so he will repeat a story I already heard and wasn’t that interested in the first time around. But Paypal already issued a deposit and so we were off by 8am.

Map and directions in hand we got in the car. My seat was moved. It takes me 53 moves to get the seat so that I can reach both the gas and brake pedals at the same time, while not having the steering wheel embedded in my stomach. I asked him if he used my car…yes…to get gas….which still has only about a quarter of a tank because he only put in enough to get us to Jersey where the gas is cheaper. (The man just bought an industrial bubble machine and he’s trying to save pennies on gas….did I miss something??) We make it to Jersey without killing each other or stopping for gas. The day was gloriously sunny and clear, and the air smelled like cinnamon, something Mr. Wonderful commented on pretty much every 20 miles. Uh oh, we were slipping into repeat mode. As we drove through Jersey and into Delaware the weather started to change. As did the scenery. Earlier, beautiful brown and orange leaves adorned the trees on either side of the parkways. If I hadn’t been married for 36 years it would have been down right romantic. The trees here were green…the leaves hadn’t turned yet as if no one bothered to tell them it was Fall. The sky had darkened. At least I wouldn’t have to hear what a clear sunny day it was anymore. The roads got smaller. Four lane highways because 3 lane routes which eventually became 2 land roads which were surrounded by flat non descript land. Farms surrounded us, the air smelled like manure. My shoulders ached from being crammed into the mal-adjusted seat for over 3 hours. My left leg throbbed and I drove envisioning a clot traveling from my poor leg into my brain or lung or…”Wanna stop and get pumpkins?” he interrupted my crisis. “Halloween is over,“ I grumbled. “Wanna stop and get corn?” No. “Wanna stop and get coffee?” Now your talkin’! We pulled into a rest stop which looked like every horror movie ever made could have been filmed there. I could hear the chainsaws in the background and worried what sedative they would put in the coffee to make us cooperate. The only saving grace was that it machine vended coffee, so while it tasted hideous it most likely wasn’t tainted. I had to pee but opted to live instead and we headed back to the car. We should have got coffee back in Jersey at the gas station where we saved 8 cents a gallon. (20 gals x .08 = $1.60 savings whoo hoo)

The roads narrowed even more and we eventually were on a one lane road which actually was a two way….and the locals thought it was hysterical to terrorize the black truck with the NY plate. We passed the car lot, and I use the term loosely, three times since we thought it would have been more than a trailer….each time u-turning in someone’s corn field. Bob, Bill, Bubba…whatever, came out hand extended and greeted us with more gusto than really necessary. In a southern twang that just didn’t go with the territory he asked how our ride from the ‘north’ was. No comment. I cleaned out my car while my husband went inside to do some paperwork. I turned to look for a garbage pail and ended up staring back at a snarling, drooling dog. I tried as gingerly as my fat ass would allow, to get back in the car before Cujo came running. He was barking and shaking his head and as I estimated the distance between me and the trailer, and how fast I could get there…the trailer door opened and Billy Bob yelled out. “Rudy…Rooooody… god dammit! c’mere ya mangy mutt” and with that Cujo’s ears went limp, his bark silenced and he followed his master into the trailer…where I hoped he was having my husband for lunch. I still had to pee but opted to live instead. A quick test drive later, we were back in the car…umm cars…for the long drive home. With him following me (since I had the map) the car was delightfully quiet. I put on my Peter Lemongello CD, sang along to his love ballads and pretended it was 1976 again. I checked my rear view mirror every so often to make sure Cujo’s lunch was still there and he was except that he drove like an old Jew (apologies to my Jewish friends). If the speed limit said 55 he did 45, 65 - 55, and god forbid we were in a work area where the speed limit was 30...he all but stopped. (The man has an unreasonable fear of speeding tickets. Must be something from his youth.) I found a great radio station that broadcast out of Philly and I sang along to Beatle songs I hadn’t heard in years. The time and miles were passing. Quick check in my rear view mirror and Mr. Wonderful goes rogue. I called his cell. No answer, can’t hear it…deafness will do that… told him to put it on vibrate! I changed lanes and found him behind a speeding 18 wheel semi that seemed determined to kill someone or at least himself. I made sure he saw me and pulled into an Arby’s. I was hungry and had to pee desperately and now death defying or not, I was gonna find a bathroom. Arby’s provided everything I needed for the rest of the trip home, food, coffee and a clean bathroom. My husband stole sugar (is that a senior thing?) and we left for a thankfully uneventful ride home. Ten hours after we left for Delaware we arrived home with a truck that looks exactly like the one he already has. All I have to say is Happy Birthday to me and it’s gonna be one hell of Christmas!

buzzzzz.........

2010-11-05T19:22:00.000-07:00

It’s 47 degrees out. The last two tomatoes perilously hanging from my Topsy Turvy tomatoe planter are all but frozen to the vine. The plants I painstakingly nurtured throughout the summer peer at me through my sliding deck doors begging to be brought inside. Most of them will sleep and wake next year, but for the few that will perish in the winter cold, I am looking for places in my house to relocate them. The overgrown ivy, which was technically my son’s until he decided to move out and leave her (him?) with me, is the most beautiful and the most un-relocatable. It has a huge lets-pretend-we-are-made-of-stone pot which just fits nowhere. It, unfortunately will perish on the deck. My pussy willow, which bore no pussies this year for some reason, will come back next year so she is on her own. No pussies next year either and she is history! The honeysuckles, of which I have two, were originally purchased to lure hummingbirds. (my husband’s favorite bird) But the few times a hummingbird came near our deck it took Mr. Wonderful so long to hear me announce their arrival, then to get up and go to the door that the bird simply flew off in search of another flower, leaving my husband certain that I had seen a bee instead of a bird. So for most of the day I brought plants in and out, trying not to get wayward soil everywhere. I found homes for two of the plants so far and the plan is to continue for the next few days until all or most of them find a niche in my house. If not I will simply have to let them go to that hot house in the sky.

I sat to watch TV that night and in the darkness of the room and across the light of the TV….there it was….the biggest mosquito I have seen in my life. I jumped up and switched on the light. It was gone. Of course. I tried to convince myself that I really hadn’t seen anything at all but then I heard that buzzing sound that my husband insists means it is a male and males don’t bite. Where does he get these things? Needless to say I wasn’t buying any of that and continued my search. I shut the light hoping to see it buzz past the TV screen again but it didn’t. It was hiding, stalking.. waiting for me to let my guard down, waiting for me to get involved in some trashy reality show and then…wham…an itchy welt! I started feeling bugs on me, scratching and twitching…of course nothing was there but the thought of this sucker….well, sucking on me had me itchy to say the least. The light back on I stood staring into the air waiting for it to fly by. Nothing. Then I went into the kitchen hoping it had decided to go near the Venus Fly Trap plant we had just bought during an outing with the grandkids. The plant stood there with its leaves positioned for the hunt, but no bug ventured near it. I took the plant and brought it with me into the dining room. Armed with my bug eating plant I sat at the dining room table waiting for the mosquito to surface, but instead not one, but two spiders walked across the table in front of me. They were tiny and white and although certainly not menacing enough at this stage of the game, I could tell they were going to find someplace to hide, perhaps behind my new white couch and emerge huge hairy eight legged creatures. They would never be cute word-webbing Charlotte’s. Whack! Problem solved.

I cleaned up the spider guts as the bug-eating plant sat there wondering why I had not offered up the spiders for dessert and since I was near the sink I gave my dog and two windowsill plants some water. The dog came running and so did the mosquito. It flew out of one of the plants I had generously taken the time to reposition in my warm kitchen. I flailed at it with the dish towel but it simply flew into the ceiling fan as the dog barked. I swatted with a newspaper but it just whafted into the dining room as the dog barked and knocked over his water dish. No time to clean up the water, I was hot on the trail now. I immediately regretted not feeding the spider babies to the Fly Trap since I now needed it to do its thing. Lure the damn mosquito over and snatch it up with it’s sticky trap door leaves justifying the $7.99 I paid for it. I followed the little buzzing blood sucker from room to room carrying my plant like Florence nightingale carried her candle. I zig-zagged in and out of rooms and although I was on a mission not to get bitten, I was tired. Having all but given up on the defeated and uninterested Fly Trap I sat down to watch TV. And there she was…flying past the Geico gecko. I followed her with the light off this time as she blindly went into the bathroom. I slammed the door shut and as the dog continued to bark I did the happy dance. Luckily I realized that it could get out under the door so I grabbed for a dish towel to block its exit as the dog circled in the water from the overturned water dish. I put my useless Fly Trap friend back on the windowsill and watched as a spider crawled out of the other relocated plant. I took both ungrateful plants and threw them back outside on the deck where they could now freeze to death for all I cared. I could finally relax. I cleaned up the water, made a cup of tea and went to the bathroom....oh shit!

saints and scabs

2010-10-27T20:01:00.000-07:00

Tuesday was my day off.... from work. The one where they pay me. This Tuesday, with my granddaughter attempting to play with the pins, scissors, anything else she could impale herself with, I began a sewing project to help out my neighbor. She had to make a Saint. Yup, Saint….as in Patrick, Francis and Nick. She chose Saint Lucy. Good thing she had a statue of St. Lucy because I personally had never heard of her and honestly, if there was no St. Ethel to go along with her it hardly seemed relevant at all. She had two days for this task although I rather suspect she had sat on the whole ’let’s build a saint’ project far longer. The saints were going to be part of a holiday celebration to impress the holy higher ups. St. Lucy had traditional blue and white robes that looked very much like the ones worn by the manger residents that hung out under my Christmas tree. She carried palm and a tray. The tray held her…. eyes. I never thought to question my neighbor why she chose a saint who carried her eyes in a tray, but I suppose as saints go, they must have had to give up something pretty important to become a saint in the first place. The saint on a stick had to be of normal height. Luckily our St Lucy was an Italian woman who stood maybe five feet. We could use a shorter stick than most.

While I gathered the fabric, eyes and other saint building necessities my neighbor set out to find something to use as a head. It was rather tempting to use the skulls my house is currently adorned with, being Halloween week and all. We opted for Styrofoam. I found canvas work gloves in the basement that need to ‘tan’ up a bit, so I made a pot of strong tea and laid the gloves in them overnight to dye them. (very ‘green’ don’t ya think?) I also left a note for my husband just in case he poured himself a cup of tea without noticing the floating gloves. (it could happen, trust me!) I sewed and stuffed, I glued and pinned and St. Lucy began to take shape. It felt a little sacrilegious as I impaled her with the stick that would serve as her lower half and feet. I asked her forgiveness and them jammed that sucker as far up into the foam body as it could possibly go. Lucy was looking good, headless of course, but her robes were well pleated and adorned with gold piping. The tea infused work gloves left a little too long in the Orange Pekoe and now a little too tan were dry, stuffed and attached. Her right hand held the palm which we had to substitute with some kind of ivy since craft stores just don’t carry fake palm. Her left hand carried the eye tray which was from my granddaughter’s Barbie tea set. Only something didn’t look right. I had dyed two right hand gloves. Yup, Lucy had two right hands. (hey look, her eyes were in a tray ya know, she could certainly deal with two right hands) I stitched the glove on in a way that hid the fact that Lucy was deformed and so instead of having two right hands, she had one hand with no thumb. She looked like a muppet. Who said life is fair?

My neighbor came with the Styrofoam head, complete with queen size panty hose to give her a skin tone color that did not match her two right hands at all, but at least she wasn’t foam white. A perfect nose protruded out from behind the stocking and her lips were pinned on. Lucy was seriously sporting her ‘hooker red’ lipstick. She had eyes which I had thought were already glued into the Barbie plate but I guess being a saint she was allowed two sets. One to see, and one as an offering or something. Her hair was the remainder of the pantyhose knotted atop her head in a Snooki-do and then cut in strips down the sides. Lucy was looking good. Sort of. Maybe. Ok not so much, but two days to make a life size saint is pushing the envelope…I’d like to see them do that on Project Runway. Lucy done and safely packed away in my neighbors car for the ride to the church, I turned my attentions to the rest of my fun filled day.

It was time to take the dog to the vet to get his allergy shots. The $150 allergy shots that last, at best, two weeks. But in those two weeks his stench ebbs a bit and it makes the cost a little more palatable. My dog, the free adopted mutt that I have had for the past 8 years, has something called doggy seborrhea dermatitis. Basically, dry skin. Having said that, on you and me a nice slathering of Oil of Olay would do the trick, on Stinky, not so much. This trip he was getting a bath, his ears cleaned, a cortisone shot and his nails clipped. I left to pick him up some five hours after being dropped off. I left with a bag of antibiotics for some fungal infection he got from the dermatitis, fish oil tablets he has to take twice a day to keep his skin supple, an astronomical bill and a dog that still stunk….maybe worse. Oh and they shaved him where a dog just shouldn’t be shaved. He looked like he had just escaped from Three Mile Island‘s nuclear site. If someone broke into my house now they would feel so bad for this dog they would crawl back out the window just not to get him in any trouble. I take one pill a day, two if you count the 'over 45' one-a-day vitamins I take. And I forget. This dog has six pills a day, and I'm the one that has to remember to trick him into taking them. Lord knows how I am gonna do this….maybe I should just pray to Saint Lucy. She owes me!

apples, and pumpkins and bees......oh my!

2010-10-19T18:51:00.000-07:00

Ahhh Fall….a time to enjoy the fall foliage, the brisk weather, packing away the flip flops and of course ~~the dreaded~~ apple picking with the grandkids.

The plan was simple….our families would all drive to New Jersey enjoying the aforementioned foliage, to an orchard where we would pick the apples right off the vine, umm I mean tree. Take 200 pictures of the kids climbing in the trees that are clearly marked NO CLIMBING and arrive home to start slicing and baking. The reality is that Route 9 has no foliage, Fall or otherwise, and besides isn’t New York called the Big Apple for a reason? And while the intention is always there, most of the hand picked apples remain in a bowl on the dining room table waiting to be transformed into pies as they rot and ferment.

The orchard had rows and rows of trees marked with white, yellow and green tags designating what tree held what apples. Obviously not a fruit connoissuer, I don’t know a Winesap from a Rome, a Delicious from a Granny Smith…what I do know is that yellow-jacks love them all. If I wasn’t stepping on rotten, yellow-jack infested apple, I was picking a rotten yellow-jack infested apple off the trees. Of course I had to taste one from every kind of tree (freebies!) and by the time we had finished ravishing the orchard I never wanted to see, let alone eat another apple. And yes, it is true…apples are definitely a diuretic! I peed six times in two hours. Although the trees were smaller than any tree in Brooklyn, the best apples (of course) were way on top, I am supposing where the yellow-jacks are afraid to fly. We rented a pole. An apple picking pole…which looked more like a bag on a stick, than the bag on a stick it actually was. By the time you got the apple positioned above the bag, pulled back the pole to knock the apple off its branch, you whacked two people behind you and the apple fell mindlessly to the ground where it was immediately covered with…yup, yellow-jacks! We took more pictures in the trees, in front of the trees, group shots, family shots, and me sitting in various places trying to rest my bad knee. I sat on a felled branch, inside a Winesap tree, and my personal favorite the inverted apple bucket. My knee well rested, my ass numb from the bucket handle, we moved on to pumpkins. With an upcoming family pumpkin carving contest, that has taken on a life of it’s own complete with voting rules and a trophy, we needed to get big pumpkins. The buckets filled with what felt like a ton of apples didn’t leave much strength for carrying pumpkins. Large pumpkins. Pumpkin carving pumpkins. Trophy winning large pumpkin carving pumpkins. So we shifted things around in a wagon someone had the insight to bring and loaded it up like a pack mule navigating the Grand Canyon. We carefully chose the ones we wanted, good shape, no rot, strong stem…however I had my own criteria….not more than 3 feet from where I stood and if I bent to pick it up I was taking it home. Luckily I chose well and my pumpkin was perfect.

The lines to pay for the apples/pumpkins looked as if they were giving them away….ten deep with people struggling to carry their apples and pumpkins, swatting yellow-jacks and screaming at their now tired and cranky kids. Not us of course, our kids were perfect. After we got our produce to the cars we decided to meet up at the store conveniently located on the way out of the orchard. Their claim to fame was their hot apple cider donuts which was evident in the line snaking around the store. Not a donut in the world could get me on that line, if Mr. Dunkin’ himself was serving me….but as I went in the store, my son in law got on the line for a bag of the coveted donuts. The store was absolutely packed…apples were cheaper than they were in the orchard which led me to believe we had just paid for the pleasure of yellow-jack swatting and our photo op sessions. They had apple flavored everything which made sense and chocolate covered everything which made less sense but got my vote. I bought a cup of much needed coffee and forgot to get one for my husband, I bought an apple muffin and forgot to buy one for my husband. (see a pattern here) I gave up both when we met up outside because I am an amazing wife….that and the fact that I had a bag full of chocolate covered things I was not prepared to share. Having not moved an inch on the cider donut line my son in law threw in the towel and settled for something apple flavored that my daughter bought him. Our cars were all loaded with the apples designed to become pies but destined to be left in a bowl on the dining room table as proof that we went apple picking. That and the 200 pictures.

burgandy...and I don't mean wine

2010-10-11T19:01:00.000-07:00

I am an impromptu shopper. If I see what I want I buy it. I don’t plan any part of a purchase because the few times I did, disaster. Example…It was time to get a dog. My beloved Sasha had to be put to sleep and my husband and I were ridiculously upset. I didn't want to make a rush decision since the commitment to owning a dog is a lifetime....at least that of the dog's. I made a list of things I wanted in a dog including getting her through a private adoption. My list included, female, really big breed, and not a lot of shedding. I got a male (with balls that I eventually had loped off), smaller than pretty much any dog I have ever had since I was 5, and the hairiest, sheddiest dog in the world. The only thing on my list was that we adopted him from a private breeder who but for the grace of God still walks the earth. I was told that his mother was a German Shephard and the father was a Chocolate Lab. We conveniently couldn’t see the parents because they would be ‘upset’ seeing their pup being taken away. (OK what was I thinking?) Liar! The vet said there is no Lab in him at all and wasn’t even sure about the Shephard part. He has an inherited skin condition that requires more attention than a leper, but we love him even though he sheds and stinks….not necessarily in that order. So much for planning.

I bring up the disaster that is my dog, because yet again I chose to make a decision based on planning rather than spontaneous logic. I need a new couch. I have needed a new couch for about 4 years. I bought my current couch many years ago in Levitz. I paid a small fortune for a couch, three tables and this huge club chair which the dog, yes the same one from the lying adoptee, ate three weeks after getting it delivered. He was a puppy back then and still cute and not yet stinky so I forgave him and threw out the chair….I did however have him fixed shortly after that….revenge is sweet! He never chewed another thing in the house!

The couch which was what I perceived to be a regal shade of Burgandy was recently described to me by my grandson as being….purple. Purple???? Not gonna make that mistake again…..first on the list, no Burgandy! I bought a fabric that seemed like it would wear well and repel stains….not so much when you have a husband that sits on the couch with clothes he has just changed the car oil in. We tried the whole ‘cover it with a sheet’ routine but that faded fast and I simply gave up. ~~Purple~~ Burgandy hides a lot and is the only reason it wasn’t out in the garbage shortly after the club chair….(and besides he wouldn’t have sat still for that whole revenge thing like the dog did) Fabric choice made it to the list….leather could work well and clean up easily too.

One Father’s Day a few years ago we bought my husband a big, comfortable, leather swiveling recliner. (yup, in….Burgandy) He never sat in it. Finally he admitted that the swiveling feature wasn’t his favorite and he creatively placed wooden blocks into the mechanics to stop the swivel. Unfortunately it also stopped the recline. Oh well, another piece of useless furniture in the living room. Looks good, just not functional. One Mother’s Day my kids bought me a chaise lounge (need I tell you what color?) which is in the room as well. It sits beneath my picture window so in case I decide to make a cup of tea, grab a book and sit by the window with sunlight streaming on my face as I relax…..ok I’ll stop lying….no one is allowed to sit on it except maybe the baby since I don’t want yet another piece of furniture screwed up by our fat, Jiffy Lube asses. Add to the list….nothing that rocks, reclines or swivels.

The tables that came with the set were perfect. Light wood with glass inserts and table tops. The middle glass on the three panel coffee table broke and we replaced it with Plexiglas which was fine until it got scratched moving a centerpiece back and forth out of the line of the remote. It has been replaced many times since the original breakage and probably cost more in plexi than it would have been to buy a new table. The glass tops were also not such a great idea once the grandkids came. So....no glass!

I went shopping…list in hand. (it was actually in my head, I am not that big a geek) The first store they had nothing in all leather…it was ‘leather where you touch’….what the hell? What if I wanted to ‘touch' the back of the couch? The second and third store had salesmen that knew very little about the furniture and had to ‘check’ on everything I asked. “Does this come in black?” Let me check “How long is the couch?” Let me check. “Can I get this delivered before the end of the month?” Let me check. By the time they came back I had checked...out! I re-visited the first store contemplating the crazy leather scenario, left again and finally found a store I hadn’t previously explored. The salesman, a handsome man with a clipboard followed me around the store just far enough away so as not to annoy me, close enough to not lose me to another salesperson. I walked around the store, possibly more times than I needed to, fantasizing that the handsome salesman following me was trying to work up the nerve to ask me to meet him for a drink and not simply stalking me for a commissioned sale, and suddenly I found the perfect couch. It was leather (even the back), it had no moving parts, the tables (cleverly called ottomans) had no glass and it most definitely was not ~~purple~~ burgundy. It was Ivory. Ivory??? See what I mean? I planned. I listed. And I still went and bought a friggin’ white couch.

windstorms and footlongs

2010-09-29T22:27:00.000-07:00

I had to take my state insurance test on Tuesday. I printed out the directions from the test center’s website and then I mapquested them, I also googled the address and printed that as well. I am anal. It didn’t help that my husband kept telling me to leave myself an hour and a half travel time…for a half hour drive…just in case there is traffic. He is the grand poobah of anal-ness. The letter that came with the registration receipt said that we had to be there a half hour before the test (which began at 10) or we wouldn’t be allowed to take the test and forfeit our test fee. I studied the night before more than I should have since I was totally burned out by the time I went to bed. I had dreams of floods and windstorms and every other peril I had just studied. And in my dreams I settled each and every claim before the next disaster struck or I woke up to pee.

After sucking down the last of a second cup of coffee I went through a mental checklist…2 pieces of ID, check….a #2 pencil, check….tissues in case I sneeze, check….cough drops in case I cough, check….2 Aleve in case I have a headache, check….all six printouts of the directions to the test site, check….and last but not least, my travel mug filled with coffee number three. The belt parkway was oddly empty and I knew this had to be a bad sign. It is never, ever empty at 8:30 am. When I got to my exit I turned on the radio. 1010 wins…needed a little news…didn’t want to over stimulate my already over stimulated brain with Lady Gaga this morning. An accident (which I am sure I could have settled expeditiously with my new found knowledge) on a parkway….three parkways away had caused a major back up all the way back to…you guessed it, my parkway. And there it was. Bumper to bumper traffic as far as the eye could see. I so hate it when my husband is right!

I finally arrived at my turnoff and needed to look for 80th street. 86th, 85th, 84th, 83rd, 77th…what the %&$! Since I couldn’t U-turn I kept going and in my perplexed state still located 80th Street even though it wasn’t in numeric order…(what is it with Queens??) and the complex that housed the test site.

The instructions clearly stated to pull into the parking garage, park and take the elevator to the 3rd floor and continue on to the test room. I pulled into the parking garage which was empty. Not a few cars empty, I mean empty empty…Omega Man empty….(for those of you too young to relate to the Omega Man movie, think I Am Legend with Will Smith....empty). I didn’t see any elevator on the first floor so I circled around to the second floor all the while bending my head down since it felt as if the low garage ceilings were going to behead me. The second floor was just as empty and no elevator there either. I went to the third and last floor of the garage…nothing! No elevator, no cars, no test site. I checked that my doors were locked and looked on the forms to see if there was a phone number. Again, nothing. I drove back down to the first floor still ducking but more confident that I wasn’t going to be decapitated and back up to the third floor where I saw a parked car that wasn’t there a few minutes ago and parked next to it. Right next to it. As close as I could, next to it. As I got out of the car I looked around to see if there was anyone lurking, skulking, hiding….you get the picture. I was alone. The instructions also said to look for a sign that said Test Site. No sign. I saw some doors. Locked. Out of the corner of my eye I saw a security guard and just like that he was gone…through a set of doors that said ‘employees only’. Not a soul around. I positioned my keys between my fingers the way I had been taught years ago in case I had to fight off an attacker. I could jab him in the eye and temporarily blind him giving me time to get away. Who was I kidding? With my short stubby arms the guy would have to be under 5ft for me to even reach his eyes and besides, I am sure I would be running and screaming….not jabbing and tai kwon do-ing. Another set of doors opened up into a mall. I felt like Dorothy landing in Oz. The garage, so grey in all its cement-ness and here was this super modern mall with amazing lighting and marble stairs. I was on the third floor and from where I stood could see clear down to level one. Not a soul. Malls obviously don’t open before 9. I called out a feeble unanswered ‘hello’. That’s it, test be damned, I’m outta here and I returned to Kansas and my car. Before I got in my car the elusive security guard came out of nowhere again only this time I was able to get his attention before he wafted out of sight again. I explained my predicament and he pointed me in the direction of a staircase I had previously avoided out of fear (ok maybe I just didn’t feel like walking up the steps). I went up those stairs, down a long outdoor corridor, around an inordinate number of overgrown planters and into a courtyard with stores, and office building and a Subways. Not the train stop, the home of the footlong!

The office building of course was my destination (although I did make a stop in Subways after the test) and I proceeded to the floor listed on the directions. It had to be the most humid day of the year and between the garage walking and the stairs and the corridors and the planters I was sweating like a pig. The elevator alone had to be over 90 degrees. I hadn‘t, until this point, seen a soul other than the shadowy security guard and a Chinese man behind the counter in the Subways but as the elevator doors opened there were all kinds of people walking back in forth in and out of offices all ignoring the sweaty fat chick that just got off the elevator. I started down the hallway and saw a ladies room which considering how much coffee I gulped down this morning seemed like a good idea. Locked. I passed a room with its doors open and lots of people crowding in…must be the test room….nope, Weight Watchers meeting. I continued down the hallways checking my watch (ok no watch, it was my cell phone), sweating and cursing until I finally found the room. It was 9:15...early with 15 minutes to spare! The sign on the door said it wasn’t opening until 9:45 with the test beginning at 10. Cutting it kinda close aren’t they? There was nowhere to sit. It was hot. I was early. There was no one else there yet. I had to pee. I walked down to the Weight Watcher room figuring to ask for the bathroom key, but as I neared the door I realized they might be thinking…‘hey where you going sweetie, get your ass on the scale”…so I got back on the elevator and went down and outside. It was raining. I thought about going into the Subways (I hear they have amazing breakfasts) but I had eaten at home and I already needed to be upstairs on that scale…so I passed. I sat on a wet metal chair grateful what little breeze there was. At least when I got back to the test site they would think I was rained on instead of just clammy with sweat. At 9:45 I went upstairs on the suffocating elevator, passed the locked bathroom and the Weight Watchers scale, down the corridor and to the test room. I tried the door, still locked and still no one waiting like me. Still nowhere to sit, I considered sitting on the floor but knew how long it would take for me to get up so I just leaned on the wall shifting my weight from one bad knee to the other. Finally a man came and jiggled the door, then another and still another. Then two girls. It was now 9:50. It had been an hour since I parked in the portentous garage. A woman sauntered up to the door, Subways bag in hand, opened it with a key, propped it open with a door stop and welcomed us. An hour later I was in Subways ordering a 6” Jared’s ‘healthy special’ on Garlic Parmesan bread. Oh, and I passed my test!

policies and painted toes

2010-09-14T20:14:00.000-07:00

Why can’t I go anywhere and just have it be a normal experience?? I was asked to get my insurance license. I was asked to take 40 hours of insurance instruction to work 16 hours a week….go figure?! I got to the class and immediately chose a seat in the front like the teachers pet I had always wanted to be in grammar school but never got the chance because a girl named Cindy who was always so cute and so smiley and brown-nosing…..oh, sorry.. lost control there. A very nice girl sat next to me, I mean RIGHT next to me which I found a bit odd since there were at least 30 empty seats in the room. But she was soft spoken, well dressed and looked sweet. She removed her bottled water from a bag and turned to me and said…”Don’t touch that.” I laughed thinking for sure she was kidding, and she proclaimed again, “I’m not kidding, don’t touch that.” No problem. I opened my books and got my pen and highlighter out of my bag. “We were supposed to bring a highlighter?” she asked me not even looking up from the bag she was rummaging around in. “No, I just brought one in case.” I answered her but really wanted to knock her precious bottled water off the desk. “Can I have yours?” OK is this chick kidding now or what? I started looking around for some hidden camera, some Punk’d personnel but instead I simply said, “No, sorry, I only have one.” I should have left it at that, but me always having to make a joke added, “Trade you for your water…!” With that she picked up her books and water and moved to the furthest seat away from mine. Guess she can’t take a joke. As we waited for the teacher to set up the dry erase board which he abandoned after three futile attempts, I began to wonder what the hell was in that bottle. I imagined it to be some high priced imported vodka, or some illegal propellant she was going to ignite and turn this tiny conference room into a fire bomb…and then I saw her drink from it. That ruled out the propellant at least.

I turned my attentions to the well dressed, handsome man that sat in the seat ‘water girl’ had abandoned. He smiled, I smiled, he smiled again, ditto ditto ditto….What the hell?! If he was Asian (which he wasn’t) I would have bet we would have still been bowing to each other rather than getting around to karate chopping each other. I wondered where all this smiling was going to lead us. The water girl raised her hand and asked where the bathroom was. The teacher who had finally accomplished arranging his books and was beginning the class told her where it was and she got up taking her coveted water bottle with her. She never returned. Was it something I said?

As the teacher asked us to read along with him I looked down at my feet to see if I had room to stretch my rotten, stiff, left knee out straight before I ended up in traction. I wished I hadn’t. The man in water girl’s seat wore flip flops and toenail polish. Five toes, five colors. Big toe, blue. Little toe, green. And a rainbow in between. Suddenly the stiffness in my knee didn‘t matter as the pain would have been a welcomed reminder that I was indeed still awake and had not fallen asleep during the boring insurance rhetoric. I attempted to read along with the instructor as I repeatedly glanced down at his toes. His right foot had one color at least, white, but they had letters on them and it infuriated me that I was not in a position to read what they said. I dropped my highlighter. Ooops. I bent down and saw that the letter on his big toe was an I but that was all I could see. I was getting distracted and the instructor was way ahead of me at this point and I was lost. I re-read from the book what I missed while reading toes and surprisingly was even able to answer a question he threw at me unexpectedly.

We broke for lunch. The little Spanish girl I met when we first got there leaned over and asked if I wanted to go to the diner with her. I was starving and thrilled to be with someone who as far as I could tell, had nothing painted on her toes and no bottled water. As we walked to the diner I told her about the water girl and the flip flop man. She said she saw water girl in the bathroom even before the class started and she was talking on a cell phone about how bad the weather was in New York. It was sunny, clear and mid 70’s.

On the way back from the diner water girl was outside the classroom still clutching her water bottle. She leered at the two of us and just as I thought we were far enough past her to avoid a confrontation she throws the water bottle at us. It didn’t hit us and it didn’t even open but my little Spanish friend flew into a rage. Suddenly she was yelling and gesturing at water girl who looked calm and quite frankly bored. I took her arm and told her to calm down, that the girl was obviously a kook, and the class was gonna start. Back in our seats we waited for flip flop man to return from lunch as she positioned herself so that as soon as he opened the door she could read his feet. Foot. He came in and sat down beside me again and did his I smile, You smile, I smile, You smile routine. I looked over my shoulder to see if she had been able to see what this guy painstakingly painted on his toes but she shook her head side to side and I knew it was up to me now. I put my bag on the floor between our chairs so that I had reason to bend down several times and attempt a reading. I managed to get another two letters….X an X….maybe this was just some design and not a word after all?? I caught up to the instructor again and decided to concentrate on insurance rather than worry about what design this guy had on his toes. When the class was over my friend reminded me that water girl could be outside waiting for us. We assured each other we had each other’s backs (I felt so…ghetto!) and walked to the parking lot. Thankfully she wasn’t there since me and my posse of one would have been taken down in a heartbeat by water girl. Can’t wait for class tomorrow!

....calling Dr. Bates

2010-09-03T19:34:00.000-07:00

It’s official, I limp. My leg, the one that I already had fixed a few years ago, is killing me again. Not the same behind the knee pain, not the pain that the doctor swore would go away if I lost weight, and definitely not the pain that two Aleve’s every six hours was gonna remedy. This pain is different. It starts in my cheek. To be blunt, my left ass cheek. Runs down the back of my thigh, gets to the knee then magically rotates to the front of my leg causing my shin to feel like I just ran the New York marathon. Or the Boston marathon. Or even just walked up a flight of stairs at this point. I complained to everyone, everyone that wouldn’t tell me to lose weight. Everyone says it sounds like sciatica. So I googled it. (while we’re on the subject, what do you get when you google, GOOGLE?) Sciatica is a condition caused by the sciatic nerve becoming inflamed…what inflames it, it doesn’t really say. Could be this, could be that, might be the other thing….so googling wasn’t the answer.

At the suggestion of another friend (who did hint at weight loss) I called the local chiropractor. He has been in business since the 70’s and is a character and a half. He lives above his office with his ‘Ma’. ‘Ma’ has never been seen so I am usually thinking 'Norman Bates' when I am on his table and if he ever starts a taxidermy collection I will find another doctor, pronto. The last time I was there which was for migraine headaches….he put his hands on both sides of my head and like a killer ninja twisted my neck around so fast that I thought I was destined to die within minutes. Instead the headaches went away immediately. Of course I had a stiff neck for like a month, but the headaches were gone and never came back. He was my hero back then, so I had no trepidations in calling him for an appointment. I got his machine and started to leave a message when he picked up mid message….chewing. Not his secretary, not a service, just him in full oral mastication. I explained who I was, what was wrong and that I would like to come in as soon as possible. In between chews he said “YES”. Just “yes”. After several more questions to ascertain when he wanted me to come in he told me his ‘Ma’ died. I am not even sure how he snuck that in to the conversation but it was out there now and I had to deal with it. After telling me that she had been ill for months, and telling me that she was in a better place, and describing how his world crumbled when she died and how he was sure he couldn’t live without her, I realized that he hadn’t told me when she passed on. So I asked. Bad move! Wednesday….this was Thursday! So ‘Ma’ died yesterday and two days before he wanted to see me. The man that doesn’t want to live without his ‘Ma’ was gonna massage my left ass cheek and potentially cripple me. I just know it! The pain in my leg was subsiding or was it mind over matter?! I told him I would be away for a few days and that I would call him when I got back, extended my condolences again, hung up and googled ‘chiropractors’. Dr. Bates would have to heal a bit more mentally before I let him manipulate, knead or twist any body parts.

I went back on the computer and looked up everything that included the words pain and leg and came up empty. I did find a website for sciatic pain exercises. Since my printer decided to fail at this crucial moment I drew small pictures of what I was supposed to look like when I got into the positions the website deemed miracles for sciatica. I got down on all fours only to immediately have the dog bound over thinking it was playtime. After distracting him with a chew toy (and threatening to cut off his already cut off balls) I began to arrange my legs into the positions I had drawn. Now the problem with my stick figure drawings is that I am not, I repeat...not, a stick figure. So when the bad leg has to cross underneath the good leg I had to wonder, where does my stomach go? I pushed the bad leg as far as it would go, heard something snap….waited, felt no pain…..so I continued. The pulling sensation on my left ass cheek told me that I was doing the exercise right and if the website was right, after a few times I should be good as new. Like bothering a bad tooth, it both hurt and felt good at the same time. I was ready to move on to the next poorly drawn exercise which involved pulling the balls of my feet toward my body while practically laying face down on the floor. Don’t bother trying to picture it, you can’t do it. Well I guess it can be done, but not by me and certainly not by anyone who has breasts or a stomach and an inflamed ass cheek from dreaded sciatic nerve disorder that I have come to self diagnose.

I attempted to go back to the first exercise that I had mastered only this time when I heard the snap….something snapped. The pain radiated down my leg, up my back, across my ass and then everything went numb. As the tears welled up, believing that I had just made myself a card carrying member of the Christopher Reeves fan club, my dog came over and licked my face. This is significant for two reasons…in his eight years he has never licked anything other than his own ass and for the first time I didn’t care that he stinks. I accepted his compassion until thankfully the numbness gave way to great big waves of pain which at least told me that my exercise program had not crippled me. I managed to get back onto my feet and ~~walked~~ limped into the kitchen to find my Aleve.

I am calling Dr. Bates in the morning.

....walnuts and prunes

2010-08-25T22:00:00.000-07:00

Sunday we pruned the black walnut tree in my yard. It was long overdue to be pruned, technically long overdue to be killed. It created shade where I did not want shade, it randomly threw walnuts at me, and worse than that it grew at such an alarming rate that I feared being ravaged by the branches with every windstorm. (ok so maybe ravaged is a bit strong, but allow me literary license here) I bought a tree pruner some years ago, giddy with anticipation of this day. It is basically a saw attached to a stick and a rope. You pull the rope the saw….saws. When my son pruned little trees around the yard it cut effortlessly. When my son in law used it to trim branches near his pool….effective and effortless. But of course when we tried to use it, nothing was effortless or effective. In fairness, the branch was much bigger than we should have been cutting with my little pruner. A chain saw would have been a better choice, but we had dug the pruner out of the shed and my husband was still game to give it a go. And if you know my husband, when he is primed and ready to go….you go….or it’s gone! And this applies to many aspects of our…..ok never mind! As the little pruner saw-teeth dug into the bark and then into the flesh of the tree I could almost hear it laughing at us, mocking our feeble attempt at such a large branch with such a small tool. I stood on the deck directing as my husband sawed from the ground. Not much progress. He ventured into the new shed with the old shit and came out with a ladder. He leaned the ladder on the side of the tree, climbed several rungs and began sawing with a hack saw. (which to me, is just a stickless pruner) Again, little to no progress. He climbed higher on the ladder as I remained vigilant at my post on the deck, ready to declare when the branch was ready to fall. I felt that leaning the ladder on the very tree you are hacking at is a lot like the dentist asking you to hold the spit tray while he yanks your tooth out. But my husband didn’t think that the fence would hold both him and the leaning ladder so the tree will just have to hold the spit tray.

With the humidity soaring the mosquitoes began devouring my arms and legs even as I stood inches away from a citronella plant. How they didn’t just drown in my sweat is beyond me. My husband sawed, rested, sawed and sawed some more. I watched, sweated and swatted. For two hours we (ha) worked on the tree until I came up with a great idea. Gravity! If I could get a rope around the branch of the tree and tug on it as he sawed, gravity would help pull the branch away from its trunk. (See why he married me?) I looked everywhere for a rope and the best I could find was bakery string, purple wool and lots of colorful loops. (The ones you used to make pot holders with when you were in camp) I went back out to a resting husband with the bad news. He said to use the hose. After flinging the hose and not even coming close to getting it around the branch, hitting myself in the face twice with the nozzle I thought it best we moved onto plan B. I found a stick that helped me pull the branch low enough so that I was able to hang on it. I held on and hoped that when the branch snapped it didn’t come down splattering my over-taxed brains all over the backyard. The walnut tree would have loved that!

I hung, he sawed and the branch finally seemed to give way. I could hear the snapping of the walnut wood which gave me a sick pleasure that I am sure I should check out with a therapist. The branch began a slow decent. I announced from my perch that it was indeed on its way down and warned my husband to come down off the ladder in case it doubled back. Of course my husband was not only off the ladder already, but half way down the driveway. I’m here hanging on the damn branch and he is bracing for an avalanche. My euphoria was short lived. The huge branch and its many branch-lets (?) fell straight into the lilac bush that had grown into a lilac tree. And just like that we were at a standstill. The tree was winning. I saw it smile. The bark curled up into a grin, I am sure. Or maybe I was just delirious from the 10,000 mosquito bites I had welting up. So the branch, now not quite hacked off, not quite attached was laying across my yard, over my deck and imbedded into the lilac ~~bush~~ tree. My husband, not quite exhausted, not quite so primed and ready anymore was laying in a beach chair pondering our next move. Me, I was just scratching and cursing.

I am a giver-upper. I know when I am beaten. I know how to throw in the towel. If it had been up to me I would have called our ridiculously overpriced gardener and paid to have the tree removed in the first place. But now it was principle. A friggin’ tree was beating me. Us. Two against one and we were still losing. My husband finally decided to get out of the beach chair and come upstairs to the deck where I hung precariously from the branch just moments earlier and help me get the branch out of the bush. He pulled and I pulled and yes, I think the tree pulled back. But in the long run that branch that housed rodent squirrels and gave shelter to pigeon coop escapees….went down. Feeling very vindicated (and sweaty and itchy) I opted to leave the branch sprawled across the back yard allowing the rest of the tree to suffer the indignation of its loss. Instead, as my husband cut the branch into manageable pieces, I came in to take a shower and maybe call a therapist.

stay! Nay!

2010-08-16T21:11:00.000-07:00

Some moron came up with a word for having no plans to go away on your week off of work….STAYCATION! A clever combination of staying home and going on vacation. And then there are the morons like me who, because they gave it a catchy name, thought it would make sense to stay home on my one and only paid week off of work. It didn’t.

Counting the Friday I don’t normally work in the first place, and both weekends I haven’t been back at work for 10 days. Ten. One week and two weekends. Guess what I did with those 10 days. Laid by a pool sipping Mai Tai’s? Nope. Frolicked at the beach while getting sun kissed? Not so much. Strolled on the boardwalk with my husband in the cooling night breeze? OK let’s not get stupid now! Here are my ten days off, and if you are jealous, god help you.

Friday - My dog needed to go to the vet because he has allergies that make him stink and scratch and apparently deaf. (yeah, him and my husband…good God!) I had to cover the car seats with towels, lift his stinky ass into the car and waste most of Friday sitting in the vet’s office waiting room waiting for stinky to get washed, shaved (don’t ask) and medicated. $364 later I leave with a wet and shaved (I told you don’t ask) dog who refuses to get back into the car. After much coaxing (ahem!) he gets back into the car and immediately pukes just missing the towels. After cleaning the car in the 92 degree heat I needed a nap. When I awoke it was time to start frying. I had my niece’s block party the next day and offered to make a chicken dish that basically involves cutting, egging, breading and frying. I cut, egged, breaded and fried til my feet fell asleep and my knees went numb standing in front of the stove.

Saturday - I had planned to start the renovations on my bedroom that have been in the planning stages for weeks. Unfortunately I got up later then I wanted to and by the time I had coffee, read the paper and showered all I had time to do was vacuum the living room since the stinky dog’s bath had caused most of his shedding hair to….shed. I threw a load of laundry in, emptied the dishwasher, unclogged the toilet, set my DVR and off I went to my niece’s. After circling the block thirteen times, finally finding a spot only a block and a half away I realize I do not have the chicken. Back home with only a whisper of hope that the spot would still be there when I returned. Silly me! I parked, walked and finally planted myself in a beach chair and attempted to get shit faced on homemade sangria slurpees. Didn’t happen but it was great fun trying!

Sunday- Did nothing and was mind-numbingly bored. I watched two DVD’s both comedies, both stunk! Anytime an adult actor attempts to play a child in a movie, break the DVD! As the day progressed and the boredom took over, I was able to find more and more things my husband did to annoy me. Not a major feat mind you, but I was definitely on a roll.

Monday - Made a list. Put all the things I wanted to accomplish that day so that I could cross them out one by one and feel somewhat productive. I threw away the list when I started adding things like refill hand soap dispenser and check if the lone tomato I was able to grow on my Topsy Turvy was ripe yet. (it wasn’t ripe, it was gone….the squirrels had struck again) I went to the dry cleaner, the bank and the post office. I topped off this rousing day of festivities by going grocery shopping. By Monday night I was exhausted from all the day’s activities so I stayed in and watched DVR’d TV.

Tuesday - After Monday’s dismal showing and babysitting in the morning, I vowed to do something exciting. It was 92 and I wanted desperately to be on a beach. Everyone was either working, busy with other plans or hadn’t worn a bathing suit since 1974. Although I will do a lot of things alone, laying on the beach isn’t one of them so I began the bedroom renovations. I made one of my famous lists. That, unfortunately, took more time than I actually devoted to the room itself. I pulled off two pieces of paper that were already jumping ship and took a mirror and painting off the wall. Ok enough for today, this was boring and not what I wanted to be doing on my STAYCATION! (I hung the mirror and picture back up when I couldn’t figure out what to do with them.)

Wednesday - My daughter and I decided to go to the Staten Island Museum. Me, her and the four grandkids. We arrived to find the kids were afraid to cut across the grass since they had found and tormented a snake the last time they were there. I suppose they were afraid it was payback time, so we took the longer route on the brick path. (ok so it was only like 25 extra feet but hey it was hot out) The museum was wonderful and almost air conditioned. It was hard to avoid the 25 little girls with pink camp shirts and big attitudes. If one more pink chick knocked my granddaughter down they would have had to eject me. If one more counselor pretended they didn’t see their commie campers knocking down the dominoes my grandkids carefully set up to knock down themselves, I would have been in cuffs. We carefully navigated the rest of the museum so that at no time were we and the disrespectful cretins in the same exhibit room.

Thursday - I have no idea what I did today. I can assure you it didn’t involve the sun or sand or UV rays. I probably had my ass on the couch in the A/C . Oh wait, I do remember downloading two songs to my ipod and a book to my Kindle. Yee ha! Look out, livin’ on the edge now! And yes, if my memory serves me correct, I made 75 lollipops for a friend’s engagement party.

Friday - I shopped for the food I would cook later for my block party tomorrow. I had everything but the eggs delivered. The delivery guy is rough with the bags and this time I bought jumbo eggs for my special deviled eggs. (technically are made by my friend but since I took them from raw to hard boiled, I took the credit) I dropped the eggs. Twelve jumbo eggs on the kitchen floor. I salvaged what I could and asked her to do the same with the ones I could boil. I sliced eggplant, breaded eggplant and fried eggplant. I cut chicken, breaded chicken and fried chicken. If I never see another drop of oil it will be too soon. (Unless I am slathering it on my body in anticipation of baking in the sun.) Another feet numbing fry-fest….I was shot.

Saturday - Happy Block Party! From 9am until 9pm we sat and drank, talked and drank, laughed, ate and drank with the neighbors….most of whom I never met in the 24 years I have lived here. We wrapped each other in toilet paper, threw water balloons at our children, dodged bikes and scooters and skateboards. We climbed, slid, and bounced as men with three teeth apiece made us snow and cotton candy cones. We danced and listened to the DJ Nazi who announced that he had to leave at 9pm sharp and literally unplugged mid song! The cooler empty, the uneaten food that hadn’t gone rancid in the sun divided amongst the guests, and my feet were ready to revolt and simply not function anymore. I all but walked on my knees to my house. Refusing to wash a dish or do anything that resembled cleaning I planted my exhausted self on the couch. Thanks to my daughter and son in law, the block party was a huge success.

Sunday - Recovery. Slow, slow morning, coffee with a friend and the realization that my son (yes, the one that moved to Queens..sniff, sniff) had left a duffle bag here which I whole heartedly offered to bring to him. I sludged around for most of the day until it was time to leave for my son’s. Directions in hand, I got lost….found my way and thoroughly enjoyed an hour or so with my son in his still curtain-less apartment. (good thing they are on the 2nd floor )

I never got to my renovation project, never basked in the sun and did nothing that necessitated a post card….but I did go back to work today and truthfully I already miss my couch.

...gotta a marshmallow?

2010-08-05T21:26:00.000-07:00

I have decided it is time to re-do my bedroom. My daughter bought me a beautiful bedroom set almost two years ago and as it sits in the corner looking sad as it peeks out of it zippered bag I wondered why I hadn’t used it yet. But I knew. It was because it would have been a sin to put such a beautiful set in such a crappy room. Many years ago I ‘decorated’ the bedroom. I sponge painted the eight wall-length closet doors to resemble a marbled effect. This was long before it was called ‘faux finishing’ and before Youtube had step by step instructions on how to accomplish it. It was also long before places like Home Depot held classes that no one attends on how to pull off this technique. So my closets look more like a sad mottled mess than the marbleized look I was going for. The walls were painted a light grey and I hung a border of pink and grey flowers. The curtains matched the border. It was a cross between Little House on the Prairie and My Secret Garden. Two pieces of border have started to show signs of mutiny as they hang on with ancient glue. The rug, before my dog added his little accent color, was grey on grey. How’s that for exciting??

Years ago we removed an air conditioner from the wall. The outside was covered easy enough by the new siding, but inside the bedroom was a void that I simply filled with crumpled newspapers and then plastered over. I think I saw that on This Old House, or maybe it was This House is Old…either way, it worked and I didn’t have to wait for or fight with Mr. Wonderful to get around to it. It wasn’t the best plaster job to begin with, but it got even worse when I wallpapered over the bumpiness. My solution, hang a mirror over the whole mess. And that worked too. Til now. The mirror with its, you guessed it…pink and grey flowers has to come down.

The ceiling fan that has been up pretty much since we bought the house 24 years ago has about 12 years of dust on it. (and they were worried about the air quality at ground zero…) I thought about taking down the fan and putting up some fun, sexy lighting…but then I thought who the hell has fun or sex in the…never mind.

I haven’t decided on a color yet. I thought maybe an accent wall, a nice bold green. Or burgundy. I went to Home Depot and saw colors like pistachio, mango madness and cappucino. It made me hungry. I avoided the section called Fall Colors since I assume come winter I will need to repaint. I found an entire section dedicated to Feng Shui and since I am pretty sure my Feng has no Shui left in it, I passed that up as well. There was the Zen section which is basically the equivalent of sitting around a campfire singing “Kumbaya my Lord” and making S’mores. Calm, tranquil, peaceful. I am not a very Zen-like person…for me it would end up looking the equivalent of finding out there are no more marshmallows and a bear has taken up residence in my sleeping bag. I found a wall of paint chips which were in the shape of Mickey Mouse ears. I took four of every color for my grandkids but saw nothing that worked for me. Paint shopping a bust, I came home to take another look at the room and considered wallpapering. Considered and then banished from thought as a momentary memory lapse allowed me to forget the bathroom wallpaper disaster.

My bedroom also needs corners…..there are no corners in my bedroom, at least none that aren’t filled with ‘stuff’. We have my husband’s valet that he bought because it had a pants presser feature. There has never been a pair of pants pressed or even remotely hung on that valet in 10 years. They sit puddled across the top. I would throw it out but then my husband would puddle his pants on the floor where the valet had stood. Trust me on this one. The other corner has a box containing a 20 foot Spongebob blowup, another of my husband’s idiotic eBay acquisitions. It has a hole so it sits in a box, in my room, in a corner, covered by a tablecloth, adorned with a vase. Spongebob is going down! (or maybe up…. into the attic) In another corner is a dress form which I bought years ago to facilitate my sewing projects. Since in order for a dress form to be useful, it needs to be adjusted to your exact measurements. I cried for over a week and then banished the portly dummy to the corner like some sick Time Out for being fat. There it has sat for over three years and other than scaring the hell out of my husband in the dark has few redeeming qualities.

The furniture will stay. It is still ghetto fabulous and besides all the drawers still work. I will need some artwork, some shelves and of course curtains. I am considering making the curtains since I do not need the assistance of my chubby assistant. Once I pick a color I will pick a fabric. Of course then I will need to decide curtains or drapes….single rod or grommet…swag or scarf….sheers or drapes….French or accordian pleats….or anything that doesn’t have little pink and grey flowers.

......leukemia and pig babies

2010-07-28T16:11:00.000-07:00

My mother in law was in the hospital….again. We blamed the pacemaker. We blamed an ulcer. We thought it could be depression. Stress. High blood pressure. Low blood sugar. You name it we guessed it. Better to be safe then sorry….off to the ER.

Six hours and a tuna sandwich later they admitted her for tests. They thought it could be the pacemaker or an ulcer, possibly depression or stress. Her blood pressure too high, her sugar to low…so better to be safe than sorry they admitted her. Gee, I could have told them that.

After a two weeks in the hospital with no definitive diagnosis she was released and told to follow up with her doctors. The orthopedist, the cardiologist, the gastroenterologist and now, a new one…..a hematology oncologist. She called it her ‘blood doctor’ but I knew better. Apparently so did she since she asked everyone she knew if she had leukemia. I assured her she didn't although I was just being optimistic and asked her if she had a health proxy. She said, just let me die. We both laughed.

We drove to the doctor who’s office was across the street from the same hospital she checks in and out of pretty regularly these days. There is never any parking, legal or illegal so we agreed I would just park in the lot. I pulled in and pressed the button and waited for the machine to spit out a ticket that in due time would be exchanged for somewhere upwards of $12. No ticket. Press. No ticket. Press. Nothing. I opened my window and motioned to the indifferent woman in the booth. She asked me to back up and use the other lane. The other lane wouldn’t give me a ticket either, and so, as if it was my fault she got out of her air conditioned booth and gave me a ticket and an attitude. I was on my best behavior for my mother in law, so miss attitude caught a break instead of my fist. We parked, took the elevator up to the ground floor and a second elevator bank. The doctor’s business card had no room or floor on it so I called the office. The exact conversation:

“Doctor’s office.”

“Hi, can you tell me what suite you are in?”

“Hold please.” almost 2 minutes later...

“Doctor’s office”

“Hi, I am downstairs, can you tell me what floor and room you are in?”

Silence. Dial tone.

“Doctor’s office”

“Hi, please, we got disconnected please just tell me what suite you are in?”

“I told you 4G ma‘am, I am busy here.” Click. Best behavior…best behavior.

The elevator door opened and we were hit with a blast of hot air. I flashed back on every fire safety lesson I have ever had as a child as I thought for sure there was a fire somewhere. I knew between my mother in law and myself, stop, drop and roll wasn’t gonna work as neither of us would ever be able to get up again and simply perish on the dirty carpeting in the hallway of the 4th floor. I peered down the hallway and saw no flames even though the heat was intense. We made our way to 4G which turned out to be a supply closet, but 4B had her doctor’s name on it so we entered. (So much for the busy little receptionist with the thick accent and lousy attitude)

The office had a small waiting room where there were 4 people already seated and waiting. A knitter, a snorer and I assume her husband and a woman reading a book called How Successful People Speak, and then proceeded to belch out loud. She's gonna need more than the book! As I filled out the new patient forms and sweat poured from my forehead, it was apparently clear what the heat was from….the air conditioning on this side of the building was not working. My mother in law who talks until you want to stick a metal rod in your ear and who is in denial about her hearing loss wanted to know why it was so ‘damn’ hot in there. After repeatedly explaining about the broken A/C, she turned to a me and said, ”I don’t think the air conditioning is working.” Best behavior…best behavior.

After over a hour of fanning myself with a mammogram brochure and being told by the knitter that I was exhausting more energy fanning myself and therefore making myself hotter, I was ready to scream. Thanks but no thanks for your unsolicited advice....go back to knitting your booties or blanket and let me sweat and fan in peace. Listening to my mother in law's stories about life as a kid, complete with the one about the lady who got scared by a pig while she was pregnant and had a pig baby, prompted me to ask the receptionist from hell if she knew how much longer it would be. I found it rather suspicious that no one had been called, and all too soon found out that the doctor wasn’t even there yet. Engineering showed up with a fan which would have actually helped except when they plugged it in it sparked and they whisked it away leaving us dripping and fanning ourselves once again. (Well, I fanned... the knitter, knitted.) My mother in law who decided to talk to her captive audience about how many times a night she pees asked what happened to the fan. I jokingly told her the air was fixed and she heartily agreed that it was feeling cooler already. We were finally called to the rear office where we remained for another 40 minutes before the doctor came in. This was an outing for my mother in law, a day away from her house....for me it was supposed to be my day off. She rambled and I listened to her stories as intently as I could considering I hadn't eaten since 7am and my blood sugar was probably 12 and my body could no longer even produce a bead of sweat.

The ‘blood doctor’ was about 4 foot 10 and looked disturbingly like the munchkin coroner from OZ. He was Phillipine, looked Mexican, had a German name and spoke with an Italian accent. Man I'd hate to see his family tree. And it got worse. When he spoke it sounded like he had just inhaled a helium balloon, and as he continued to talk I continued to look for a hidden camera, Ashton and the Punk’d crew. He asked her in his shrill, high pitched Italian articulation how she was feeling. I wanted to scream HOT! But I didn’t, best behavior. Best behavior. He gave her a clean bill of health, no blood disorders, no leukemia, nothing to warrant going to an oncologist, and no reason to make a follow up appointment. (ok I decided there was no reason for the follow up appt) As I hurried my mother in law out of the office before she began to tell yet another ''life in the hills of Illinois" story I realized this had actually been a good day. She was healthy, I had lost 6 pounds in the sauna office, I now knew not to expend energy by fanning myself and lunch was on her! Hmmm, too bad I don't like lobster!

i'm melting, melting..........

2010-07-21T20:49:00.000-07:00

I wasn’t born with the calm, cool or collected gene. I never said I was unshakeable, unflappable, or unexcitable. So it doesn’t surprise me in the least that it has taken me 4 days to even recount our Sunday outing to Madame Tussauds wax museum in Manhattan to see the Wizard of Oz 4D experience via the NYC subway system.

I think it was my idea. Maybe it was my daughter, the one that had the coupons. At this point I am willing to take the ~~blame~~, err... I mean credit for this wonderful summer day in the city. (Midtown. Times Square. 96 degrees…..just a few points to consider)

I didn’t sleep the night before. I had nightmare after nightmare but nothing related directly to our decision to take the train in. Nothing related to the fact that the weatherman was calling for hot sticky humid mid 90’s. And nothing related to the fact that the last time I was on a train was 7 years ago and 22 years before that. Seven years ago we ventured into the city for a friends 50th and proceeded to meander around the city via urine soaked subway cars and menacing dank train platforms. And while the birthday weekend was a huge success, it was then that I swore off subways, trains, railroads, railways and basically anything I needed a metro card for. (I did however score a really cool subway line t-shirt as a reward for my fortitude, or perhaps it was to shut me up.) This time there were eleven of us, including my four grandchildren and the birthday girl herself. This time no t-shirt in the world was gonna help.

With no sleep, I showered and ate breakfast like I was gonna walk the green mile. Not exactly a fitting way to start a fun-packed Sunday with the family. We agreed to leave at 10 and meet at the subway station…which would have been fine if my husband hadn’t insisted my son in law take a parking spot that was 2 blocks away. 90 degrees

We all met in front of the train station to buy our metro cards. Only the birthday girl had one already. Hmmmm?? Insert the bill, it comes out. Insert it again, nothing. Insert it upside down we get the screen to chose which card we would like to purchase. We chose, it can’t make enough change. We chose again and we finally have our metro card and the angry crowd building behind us is relieved. One by one we proceed to swine and enter. Swipe and enter. Swipe and….swipe and….swipe and nothing. Our metro card is not working and before my husband got locked up for defacing MTA property, birthday girl swiped her card and we entered. We opened the gate for the carriage setting off an ear-piercing yet unanswered alarm. So much for post 9/11 security. We climbed the stairs, which while still dank and foul smelling did not seem so menacing in the light of day. After a quick assessment of who had who’s hand and where each grandchild specifically stood, I took my first breath since the metro card purchase. And we waited for the train. When did they make the platforms so damn narrow? I think maybe, possibly someone said something to me, but I was vigilant at my post to protect my grandkids from becoming a horrible news headline….CHILD PULLED FROM TRACKS BY VIGILANT GRANDMA….. 91 degrees

It dawned on me that there was a possibility that the subway car would not be air conditioned but since standing on that platform any longer than necessary was not an option, no A/C and we were still getting on. Lucky us, air and seats. Not together, but do-able. My grandsons were further away from me than I would have liked when the entertainment entered the car. A homeless, drug addict magician who had metal rings that he attached himself to the poles with. Yay! Give the guy a buck and let him move on. My husband, who to this point was trying to look nonchalant with the whole experience (other than the metro card fiasco back in Brooklyn) was mesmerized by the digital map that counted off the stops we would be making. He stared up at it for most of the ride, announcing the stops much to the enjoyment of the other riders although it is doubtful that any of them spoke English. We were the only ’Americans’ and yet the only people who looked like tourists. Except maybe the birthday girl who remained just far enough away to feign anonymity. I blew her cover by taking her picture along with the grandkids, their parents and the magician. My husband announced our stop was next and I mentally prepared for the exodus and the hands that needed holding. Birthday girl was on her own. We made it up two flights of stairs, each one had exactly 13 steps. I counted. It kept me from screaming. The daylight and exhilaration of the 42nd street crowds made me smile. That and the fact that the museum was only a scant half block away. 93 degrees

For the price of the wax museum we could have gone to an all inclusive Punta Cana resort for the weekend, and that was with the coupons. The museum was packed with everyone from everywhere. Times Square is truly the crossroads of the world. Not a road I am too comfortable on, but I have bigger things to worry about…..like the trip home. Floor after floor we photographed the kids and ourselves hugging and yes at times grabbing our favorites. Birthday girl was disappointed that Rod Stewart had not made the waxing process yet and my husband admired Lady Di way too long. (if he told me once more about how he met her I was gonna shove him into her waxy figure) The 4D OZ experience was wonderful perhaps because I am a huge OZ fan or perhaps because we were sitting in air conditioning and for the first time in hours I wasn't dripping from any body parts.

All geared up for the gift shop and the kids didn’t want anything. I wondered why. I found out moments later. We were going to the Toys R Us in Times Square where there are floors of toys to chose from. I made a feeble attempt to buy a $10 bag from a vendor en route but the sweat dripping off my nose stopped me from even considering a transaction out here in the heat. We made it to the world’s biggest toy store, with the world’s biggest indoor ferris wheel and the world’s biggest crowds. As the kids picked their souveniers I once again strategized our trip back to the subway station. Armed with the metro card that didn’t previously work, I swiped, we entered. No one but me was impressed. Following the signs to our train, I held on perhaps a little too tight to my grandson’s hand (I hope he wasn’t planning on playing the piano any time soon) when we realized that my daughter had stopped to use the rest room. THE REST ROOM IN TIMES SQUARE! Had I taught her nothing?! Note to self: administer penicillin 94 degrees

The platform was so packed that people were actually standing within the yellow line. The one they painted so that people would know that they were inches away from being dismembered by a 200 ton speeding piece of metal. The one that my son in law thought would be a good place to walk with the carriage to circumvent the wall to wall people all set to get on the same train as me and my ten pack. The train ride home was as eventful or uneventful as the ride in. My husband playing conductor calling out stops, the birthday girl sitting as far away as possible, and the kids watching the entertainment which this time was a sad rendition of La Bamba. A woman started eating rice and bean out of a Styrofoam container completely oblivious to the reeking subway stench. I silently mocked her only to find my daughter, the one that would be getting the pencillin shot, eating out of a zip lock bag. A snack she had brought presumably for her daughter. 95 degrees

We arrived back at the Brooklyn train station, set off the same alarm, said goodbye to those who found a decent parking spot and made our way to the car with me sweating and swearing and planning our next outing.

sorry fellas.........

2010-07-17T20:31:00.000-07:00

On Wednesday evenings we put out the recycling in our neighborhood and other than having my green recycling bin stolen twice, I think it is very theraputic to clean out the old crappy magazines that are clogging up the magazine rack in the bathrooms.

For some reason I get like ten magazines a week. Some I ordered as part of a school ‘make the grandparents feel guilty” fund raiser, others were promotional ‘get one year free if you order NOW’, and others I have no idea where they came from but I am guessing my husband filled out one of those annoying little cards that they embed in the magazines. Mostly they are family type magazines filled with recipes and tips like how to look thinner in photographs. (Gonna take a lot more than standing sideways and bending a knee. At least for me.) Some of the magazines are craft magazines, which of course I ordered with all good intentions of becoming the next bohemian artist to show at a SoHo storefront. So that ain’t happenin’ either. I could have learned how to make a footstool in 10 steps or less a project I will never undertake no matter how few steps it takes. The only person I know that uses a footstool is my 82 year old Aunt Joy Mae from Illinois? A few of the magazines are my husband’s, all filled with Vettes, Lamborghinis and Aston Martins….he drives a Chevy Pick up and I have a Dodge….’nuf said. But my favorite magazine of all is my People, a gift subscription from a friend that I recently renewed. I can catch up on all the people that are getting married, breaking up, going to rehab, losing weight, gaining weight, looking good in a swimsuit, need to invest in a beach cover-up, ranted, raved, used the “N” word and crashed their car….and then when the neighbors and I are finished gossiping about each other I like to find out what the celebrities are doing. Hey, look at that….they are getting married, breaking up, going into rehab, losing weight…….

I found a few missing items at the bottom of the magazine rack. An earring that I swore I lost in a pool, which tells me that I was walking around for a few days with only one earring and no one bothered to tell me. I found an old wheat penny, which my husband collects and insists are worth money….yeah 2 cents. Maybe. And the biggest find was the stylus for my Nintendo DS game (and they say I’m not technologically forward, ha). I use the DS to keep my brain from atrophying by playing Brain Age while my legs and feet go numb from sitting on the bowl too long. (too much info, sorry!) The stylus has been missing forever and I had to use my nail to point and click to find out my true Brain Age. The lower the score the younger the brain. When I scored 39 I was happy…now if I get my true age I am thrilled. The brain has gotten old and tired in the wake of the missing stylus. Oh and I found a french fry. Since as far as I know my husband doesn’t snack in the bathroom I assume it was one of my grandsons.

I bundle the magazines with bakery twine and put them in my newspaper recycling bin. I take pride in the fact that the bin is almost half full already and I have two more bathrooms to do. I anticipate the finds at the bottom of those as well.

The bathroom in the basement which used to be my son’s apartment (she wipes a tear from her eye) has mostly year old magazines with naked women sitting on cars, naked women smoking cigars, naked woman wearing sports equipment, naked women in…well you get the idea. I dust them off and leave them there in the hopes that when next my son visits he will stay a bit longer…hopefully not in the bathroom the whole time. Note to self: Grandsons cannot use downstairs bathroom.

The bathroom upstairs, I suppose if it were more conveniently located within my bedroom, would be called the Master Bath. But since it is at the top of the stairs it is simply, the upstairs bathroom. That bathroom had the following: A Beavis and Butthead sticker book….his not mine, no comment. *SAVE* A book on coin collecting, which while I had it out checked out those wheat pennies he neurotically collects. Yup, 2 cents. One particular year, 3 cents. He lied. *SAVE* Union Life magazine….. basically a list of union workers who died that month and how much their widows collected. Seems a little gruesome to print a list like that, but I guess he just keeps checking to see if his name is in there. (when it is, he can stop collecting his god damn pennies.) *TRASH * A People magazine from August 2009 with Kate Gosselin, pre-Dancing With The Stars makeover bitching and moaning about Jon and the media. Hellooo…..the media is the reason you are in my bathroom magazine rack in the first place and without Jon there is no little tribe to exploit, *TRASH* A catalogue for sheds…oh no ain’t going there again. *TRASH* Another catalogue for sheds with things circled. *RIP AND TRASH* Three hard cover books made their way into the rack designed for magazine grade paper….The Life Story of Abbott & Costello, ditto Soupy Sales and TheYankee Years…his, his, mine. *SAVE*, *SAVE* and *SAVE* Two old Law Digest magazines that somehow made their way from the basement to the upstairs bathroom in pristine condition. I am guessing no one is reading them. *TRASH* Another earring appeared, a Spongebob toothbrush, 3 pennies (none wheat), something that resembled a huge dead bug or a petrified prune but turned out to be something made out of plastic that melted into a blob, sixteen rubber bands and my husband's comb which he has been looking for since April.

The bathroom purging complete I tied the remain bundles and deposit them in the green bucket. Sorry fellas, you’ve used up all your relevance and it’s off to the big salvage yard in the sky. But then I realized it was Thursday and missed my recycling day. Guess they will just have to wait in periodical limbo until next Wednesday.

...cramps and crackers

2010-07-09T19:50:00.000-07:00

I have a stomach ache. Don’t leave.…I won’t be dazzling you with tales of trips to the bathroom, won’t be subjecting you to mental pictures of bowl hugging and nausea. (I want you to know I spelled nausea all by myself, no spell check.) I do however want to vent about being sick, but not THAT sick, sick enough, but not doctor sick…you get the picture. Frankly it stinks. No one feels sorry for you, no one babies you, no one offers to make you tea. And everyone expects life to go on as usual, and of course it should and of course it does….

I have been hurting since Monday when I swallowed resort pool water that quite frankly I don’t think should have been ingested considering the amount of diaperless babies I saw swimming. Some days it is really bad, sometimes not so much. On Thursday I watched my grandkids so that my daughter could go to work for a couple of hours even though it was a bad day. (hope they remember these things when it comes to picking out my nursing home) I knew I wasn’t feeling well when I didn’t have the patience to put together the Dora puzzle for the eleventh time. I knew I wasn’t feeling well when I gave them animal crackers for breakfast and more telling, I watched Barney with them…twice! As soon as my daughter arrived to collect her kids I told her I needed to lay down and basically threw her out. I nestled myself on the floor amidst the toys and puzzles, grabbed a pillow from the couch, (yes the decorative ones I won’t let my husband use) and blissfully fell asleep. For 8 minutes….til the phone rang. The phone that of course was not nestled with me on the floor. I ignored the ringing figuring that by the time I got my sick bloated stomach off the floor and found the phone it would be too late. Back to sleep. Two minutes. Cell phone ringing from inside my pocketbook which was again somewhere other than nestled with me on the floor. I got up as quickly as my twisting gut would allow and found my pocketbook and my cell phone and then it stopped ringing…of course. I checked to see who it was and it said RESTRICTED which could only mean two things. It was Verizon calling to upgrade my service for an additional $20 a month which ain’t happening ….or….it was my brother-in-law who for some reason has it set up that his cell comes up restricted. (Like someone wants to get hold of his number and breathe heavy..?!) I checked the house phone and it was a RESTRICTED number as well so I guessed it was my brother in law and called his cell. His phone played a minute version of Louis Armstrong’s What a Wonderful World before he answered. My mother in law had to go to the hospital, that he was taking her now, and could I meet him there so that he can leave. ( he isn’t too well himself) I agreed, grimaced and beeped my husband. Yes beeped. He has a beeper…welcome to 1985. I cursed the bowel gods as I waited for him to call back. Of course today, the day I need to be asleep on the floor amongst tea sets and fisher price, he is in a ‘dead’ zone. He doesn’t get the beep for over a half hour during which time I am slowly getting dressed against all better judgement, to go to the hospital. (I better be in that will!)

I picked up my daughter (not the one I previously threw out) to come with me in case I ended up on the floor myself enroute to the hospital and so that I didn’t have to look for a parking spot which is virtually impossible to find. We got to the hospital, I found a spot across the street…ACROSS THE STREET…you have no idea how huge that is. As I made my way through the ER with over 60 cubicles filled with the sick, sicker and sickest... I held my breath. I felt that in my stomach twisting condition I was way too susceptible to germs. We found my mother in law, stayed til they gave her pain medicine and admitted her. I was jealous. Just a little of that pain medicine would go a long way for my sorry little intestines.

On the way home my husband called to check in on how his mom fared in the ER, to say he was on his way home and should he go home or to the hospital. He also asked what we were having for dinner. I hung up. We ate tuna that night. On crackers. Not the breakfast animal crackers, but on low sodium Ritz crackers which all things considered was worse than had we spread it on the camels and elephants.

I found my way to the floor once again. The toys were gone but my stinky dog decided I must want to play if I laid on the floor. He nudged and scratched and dropped balls on me. My husband, reminding me through it all, that he loves me. Not my husband, the dog. I gave up on the thought of sleeping. I turned on my computer and went on to Facebook to complain about the pain in my belly. My Facebook family all wished me well, and ya know I think it worked.

go ask Alice..........

2010-07-01T22:32:00.000-07:00

On June 30, 2010 Mr. Wonderful and I were married 36 years. I think that bears repeating....36 YEARS! 432 MONTHS! 1728 WEEKS! 12,096 DAYS! 290,304 HOURS! 17,418,240 MINUTES! (feel bad for me yet?) In our usual celebratory fashion (ha..!) we planned a night out...for him, a free Morton’s Steakhouse dinner...for me, a free Broadway play. (I promise I will explain all this free stuff later) I changed my hours from afternoon to morning so that I would be home in time to get dressed to leave for dinner. He had to take the day off....to rest up for the big night out. Going anywhere with my husband is always an experience. We have to leave way too early, get there way too soon, take roads no one else would and not a traffic jam in the world annoys him. My kids go every year to the Thanksgiving Day parade with him, where they are made to leave at the crack of dawn, drive down Flatbush Avenue with the kamikaze dollar vans and then park almost in another borough and always facing south. (don’t ask) But leaving him there to save a choice spot, sitting like the egg hatching Horton while they get their kids breakfast somehow evens the score. So on this night we will leave for dinner and an 8 o'clock show at........4:00pm.

The nightmare that is Flatbush Avenue doesn't disappoint. Dollar vans, crack heads, traffic. Ah, the start of a wonderful evening. We drive past Morton’s looking for a spot. Nothing. (I mention there is a parking lot next door in the hotel...no response) We circle the block. Still nothing. Twice. Nada (I mention there is a parking lot next door in the hotel....no response) A quarter of a tank of gas later as I circle and he navigates a look of amazement comes over him as he proclaims, "Look, there's a parking lot in the hotel next door." I applaud his discovery, park and say nothing. That, in a nutshell, is how we are still married after 36 years, 432 months.... (feelin' for me yet?)

We 'self park' I presume because the cheap bastard doesn't want to spring for the $1 valet tip. He will say it is because they will scratch the car. He has to choose the spot, not too near a turn or a wall or a crappy car. I drive a god damn Dodge! By the time we park and locate the elevator we are hardly speaking. Well I am hardly speaking, I don’t think he even knows I am pissed off. The elevator opens and we are on the convention floors of the hotel where there is a ballroom dancing competition. There are tables selling everything from jewelry to ball gowns, tiaras to tights. Every guy looked like a young Liberace dressed in oh-so-tight pants that left nothing to the imagination and showed their bulging...biceps? And the women had on more makeup than the gown mannequins. We headed for the nearest EXIT sign we could find. Through each EXIT door came another hallway, with another set of sale items, more Liberaces and several prancing high-heeled women. They sailed passed us practicing their passé dobles and Pechangas. I felt like Alice in Wonderland after falling in the rabbit hole with Twiddle Dee pulling up the rear. We finally reached a door that let us out into the 2nd floor lobby of the hotel. We headed for the escalator which of course was not working so we walked down the steepest and longest flight of stairs I have been on since I packed on these last 20 pounds. Who over tells you that going down isn't as hard as going up has never been on this gravity defying escalator from hell.

We walked into the restaurant and was instantly greeted by a hostess, a host, a waiter, three bus boys and a man in a suit, presumably the maitre d. We were shown our table, handed a menu and asked if we had ever been there before. They lit our little pig lantern and adjusted it to a romantic hue. (Of course I couldn’t see a damn thing since my gradient eyeglass lenses take forever to lighten in the darkness.) I couldn’t for the life of me figure out why the little lamp on the table was a pig, when there wasn’t a damn pork product on the menu. A cow I would understand, the pig...not so much. I found out later it has graced their tables since the first restaurant opened in 1978 and for $80 I could have my own pig light. Gonna pass, maybe next time. Every one of the wait staff that walked by said hello and asked us how we were doing? Every one. Every friggin' one.

A waiter that we hadn't seen yet or been greeted by came to our table pushing a cart full of steaks. Each was a different size and cut and I dare say, price. As the waiter held up each wrapped steak and described its cut and aging temperature, all I could think of was that I had a McDonalds Snack Wrap for lunch. We ordered drinks. We ordered salads. We ordered steak, a potatoe and creamed spinach for two. (insert any joke you‘d like here) The house Merlot was wonderful and served in an oversized wine glass which made me feel like Alice again. (one glass makes you larger…. one glass makes you small) The waitress anxiously, although not patiently, waited for me to open my present which my husband had put on the table next to the flaming pig lamp. He ordered the Porterhouse which looked like something Fred and Wilma would be grillin’ up, hanging off the plate on two sides. Mine was the ‘smaller’ Ribeye cut which was still about six servings on the Weight Watcher menu that I have long discarded. Deliciously cooked to perfection. The potatoes were steak fries and any sort of healthy preference in spinach was thwarted by the creamed part of that recipe. Full, and in pain, we ordered coffee and dessert. Upside-down apple pie Haagen Daz a-la-mode. Tell me you couldn’t have resisted that???

I opened my gift. A beautiful necklace that has the infinity symbol on it which leads me to believe he is either telling me we will be together forever or there is an Infiniti QX45 parked outside for me. SURPRISE!…nope, we’ll be together forever.

The coffee came. The irresistible and yet unfinished desert came. The bill came. A friend gave us a $100 gift card to Morton’s some time ago and we just got the opportunity to use it. And we only had to add $145. Two people, two drinks, two steaks, two hundred forty five dollars…tip included. The good news is they validated the parking ticket and therefore it only cost $12 to park in the hotel lot.

The Broadway show we went to was courtesy of one of my daughter’s friends who bought them years ago for someone who couldn’t go. With a few phone calls the tickets got traded in for anniversary seats. Thank you Lisa…both of you! Jersey Boys was so terrific and the seats were so good that I didn’t even mind the chatty little oriental girl next to me or the fact that she sang along way off tune…Shelli, Shelli baby…..!

Happy 36 years to us, and to another 36! (did I really just say that?)

A Tree Grows in Brooklyn...Damn It!

2010-06-28T20:32:00.000-07:00

Last night I went out on my back deck to water my pitiful little tomato plants and the other vegetation that I thought was a good idea to cultivate. I say pitiful because thanks to a humongous black walnut tree my husband decided to plant some years ago, I have very little sun. Since my deck is metal and I am always barefoot I guess it is a actually a good thing since prior to the Black Walnut I pretty much seared the soles of my feet every time I went out there. My husband tried growing an apple tree. It died. He tried a pear tree. Ditto. The peach tree didn’t fair very well either. So he basically needed a tree that he couldn’t kill. (Boy would that come back to bite us) When he came home with the tree about 5 years ago it was small and barely cleared our 6 foot fence. He said the garden center told him there would be no walnuts since there would have to be a female black walnut tree within close proximity. (I guess we had a male although I have no idea where to check…and no, the nuts IN the tree don‘t count) Year one the tree grew ridiculously fast and reached the second story of my house. By year three it was almost three stories tall blanketing my yard and my unsuspecting sun worshipping neighbors in shade. Last year it bore fruit. Apparently some other gullible moron went to the same garden center and fell for the same no walnut story and in time a polination…um, romance began. Now I love walnuts. I like them sprinkled on my cookies, crushed on my ice cream and especially imbedded in my brownies. But walnuts from the supermarket are not like the walnuts this tree bore. Key Food’s walnuts come in bags and cans. This tree grew clusters of green rock hard balls. The squirrels have figured out that inside those green balls are the walnuts. Black walnuts. So they told their friends. And they told theirs. My yard and the treetops in all the surrounding yards are full of walnut loving squirrels…and my neighbors glare at me when they think I don’t see.

These bushy-tailed beasts sit high in the tree breaking open the green rocks and with no regard at all for what lies beneath toss the pieces to the ground. They’ve hit me, my dog and my grandkids. They hit my awning and it sounds like we are under attack. They hit my car and worse, my son’s car. There are hundreds of these green rocks clusters and they make off with every one of them. I have yet to find one intact that I can pry open and enjoy. But the worst part is that inside the green rocks is the part that makes this a ‘black’ walnut experience as opposed to just your run of the mill walnut. A black tar-like substance that stains everything it touches. The now dented awning, the now dented car and the sidewalk from my house to the corner are covered with black gooey stains. To add insult to injury the rodent bastards now find the need to bury their walnuts in my postage stamp sized lawn. The very lawn I pay an overpriced gardener to mow has more holes than a golf course. One day my little Mexican gardener asked me why I made the holes in the garden. I told him it was the squirrels burying their nuts. He said, in the best English he could muster….“if I catch him I’ll cut his nuts off“ …he laughed and pointed at his crotch. I guess he thought I didn’t know what ‘nuts’ were or where they were located.

I tried to hire a tree removal service. They basically wanted my first born. (which I actually considered as payback for those terrible teenage years) So I Googled ‘how to kill a tree’. The squirrel gods must have been watching out for them since I couldn’t find any site that told me in 5 easy steps how to annihilate a tree. I even looked on Youtube hoping that some other clueless husband brought home a tree from hell and his wife made him get rid of it…..and they video taped it. And posted it. But no luck. So as the season progresses and the green rocks are growing and the squirrels are massing, as my neighbors are scowling and my husband is getting used to his permanent position on my shit list, I am determined to hunt down the garden center that got us into this mess in the first place. I’m not sure what I will do when he is found, but I assure you it will involve nuts!

Leonid had a little lamb...

2010-06-21T20:42:00.000-07:00

It’s gonna be a long summer. I have lovely neighbors to my left, to my right, across the street….and then I have my neighbors behind me. They are Russian. They are probably lovely people. I wouldn’t know since we have exchanged a total 12 words since they moved in 3 years ago. (read with thick Russian accent, please)

Leonid: What is dogs name?

Me: His name is Jerry.

Leonid: What kind name is Jerry?

Me: I don’t know, we just started calling him that and it stuck.

Leonid: People across street named dogs Charlie and Harry. Names for people, not for dog.

Two weeks later Leonid has a dog.

Me: Hi, What did you name your dog?

Leonid: Philip

Me: Philip? That’s more a people name than Jerry.

Leonid: Yes it is. You got problem?

So friends with the Russians, not so much.

They also love to party. They have a great pool (jealous), they have a cabana and humongous barbeque, (jealous, jealous) and they fight constantly. (not so jealous anymore) The also found probably the only radio station broadcasting Russian music 24 hours a day. No Mariah, Jay-Z or even Manilow. They have Yulia Savicheva, Igor Blaska and Adam Lambert (don’t ask) You haven’t lived until you have heard Lambert’s “Whataya Want From Me?” in Ukrainian. From 9pm on Friday nite they sing, dance, swim, eat and party until Sunday nite at 10pm. (jealous again)

On most Saturday mornings they like to use their power washer for like three hours at a time. I have no idea how dirty a deck can get from one week to the next, but every Saturday morning, in the vicinity of 9am, like clockwork the whirr of the power washer graces my every pore. The constant and loud drone of the motor is bad enough, but when it momentarily stops (perhaps he has to switch hands) lulling me into a false sense of tranquility only to have it start back up again, I want to peel my ears off the side of my head. My electric bill is astronomical since my A/C has to be on so I can close the door, at least until I have had my morning coffee.

By noon the deck is presumably clean and the festivities begin. Now I don’t begrudge them a day of fun in the sun, and I certainly don’t resent their all night swim fests….but I want to at least be in on the fun. With the language so indecipherable I can’t tell if they are laughing or fighting. I can’t tell if they are talking in a drunken slur or singing. And I can’t tell if they're enjoying the evening breeze or making fun of my dog’s name. It is worse than sitting across from the Vietnamese girl that does my nails…she speaks little English and all the smiling and head nodding in the world isn’t gonna help me understand what she always finds so damn funny while she is buffing and filing. Maybe she’s making fun of my dog’s name!

Sunday was Fathers Day. Their yard was full of…well, fathers. Leonid, his father Yuri, and if I am not mistaken, Mrs Leonid’s father Ivan a butcher from Brighton Beach. Whether he is a chop, chop which-cut-of-beef-do-you-want butcher or chop, chop who- told-you-to-screw-with-the-Russian-mafia butcher I have no clue….but either way I hope they don’t piss him off while he is in a Speedo on a deck that over looks my pool-less yard. When we left for the restaurant that we were taking my husband and son-in-laws for dinner, the Russians were barbequing something that looked like lamb. A whole lamb. Ya know, Mary had a little one. It was attached to a home made rotisserie and being tended to by the son, Semen (no comment), the daughter Anna which is short for Anastasya or as they call her, Nasty….(again no comment). It smelled hideous. When we came back from the restaurant where thankfully no one had lamb, the meat was off the grill and presumably being eaten or sacrificed. I wondered if they slaughtered the poor thing yesterday with the pressure washer. As I watered the plants on my own un-washed deck, Mrs. Leonid (and I am sure they have a last name I just don’t know and probably couldn’t pronounce anyway) was coming out of the house with a huge tray of what had to be over 10,000 cookies. With jealousy setting in, I reminded myself that we had just finished our own dessert….a $24.00 Carvel ice cream log that I bought in place of the ‘sorry all sold out’ Fudgie the Whale cake I promised my husband, a stale Entenmann’s crumb cake and watermelon.

I finished watering, poured a cup of coffee, grabbed my book and sat down to enjoy the cooled off evening air. The all-Russian radio station grew momentarily and eerily silent until they all began to sing what sounded like the Russian anthem, which had no words until the 2000 Olympics when the Ukrainian athletes complained they had nothing (like their American counterparts) to pretend to be singing on the medal podium. (just a little fact you might want to throw around at your next dinner party) I took my coffee, my book, Jerry my stinky dog and went inside to the air conditioning and my American husband who hates lamb and thankfully does not wear a Speedo.

Lemon Jello

2010-06-11T12:18:00.000-07:00

Today I had a colonoscopy. I have one every 3 years. They call it a procedure so they can bill the insurance company three times what it really costs The prep as everyone knows is the hardest part of the whole experience. Twenty four hours with no solid food (which I can do) just liquids (which I can do) but only clear liquids (which rules out milk which means no coffee for me…can‘t do!) Since I had to have something semi solid or lose my mind, I had the jello they listed as an OK food. Just not red or orange so I chose to eat Lemon Jello. (my close friends will definitely get the inside joke there). It was really Peach Jello but that wouldn’t have been as funny. Then you have to take 4 laxative pills. Who’d have thought those teeny pills could pack such a wallop…jeez! Rumble Rumble Rumble. I will spare you the details, but lets just say you could drive a truck through my colon and not hit any speed bumps.

I gave myself 45 minutes to do a 10 minute drive to the ‘procedure’ location. I knew it would be hard to park and I was right on the money. There was a mini van with Pennsylvania plates in front of me obviously looking for a spot as well and driving like he had no where to be anytime soon…I had 20 minutes now. I saw a spot on the corner at a muni-meter….now if I could just manuever around him and get there first. I honked, he pulled over, I passed him and I got to the spot first. Linda 1 Pennsylvania 0

I walked the few blocks to the office and went straight to the 3 person elevator. It opened and 5 people walked out. I got in and went to the procedure floor and when the doors opened it was like Dorothy seeing Oz for the first time…only different. There were no flowers and little people, no yellow roads or storybook houses. There were, however, Hasidic Jews in full prayer mode, people so old they didn’t look like they could handle a procedure of any kind except maybe an autopsy, and more Russians than the Kremlin has seen in years. I felt like I needed my passport just to get off the elevator.

I sat. I waited. The soccer game was on the TV. No one watched. I sat. I waited. The barely audible radio was playing rap music. I sat. I waited. I rumbled. A lot. I came to two conclusions in that waiting room. One - The Hasidics must be big sinners. Every one of them had a bible or prayer beads and they rocked as they prayed to their God and I thought, what could these good god fearing people have done so wrong, that after fasting for 24 hours and subjecting themselves to jello and black coffee they still had to pray for divine invention?? Perhaps they were praying for good ‘procedure’ results, in which case I hope their God gets so overwhelmed with prayer that he gets the charts confused and my results are blessed as well. Two - I am not fond of non-English speaking Russians. Understandably they can only speak to other Russians but, there is such a thing as the universal language…it is called a smile! But nope, unless Svetlana or Igor are chatting them up, not a blip toward the American gentile. Ok so I wasn’t there to make friends…just patiently wait my turn. I did however, make eye contact with a lovely little Italian man that reminded me of my father…funny thing was he was reading a Russian newspaper….hmmm?

My name was finally called by a little Irish nurse with a big broad smile who took me into a room, handed me a gown that wouldn’t fit me on a good day and told me the anesthesiologist would be in shortly. A nice looking boy, yes BOY, walked in and asked a few questions about my health and told me he was the anesthesiologist. I called him Doogie….he laughed. Brownie Point!! I asked him what kind of anesthesia he was using….he said, “not the one that killed Michael Jackson”. Uh oh! I considered trying to make it back to my car in the robe with my ass hanging out….but then he added..’only kidding’ and I mentally returned from escape mode.

In the operating (er, um ‘procedure’ room) my doctor who I trust with my life (literally, I guess) came in and told me I was in good hands and told Doogie to proceed. As Doogie put the IV in my hand, he asked me if I watch TV and what shows were my favorite. I assume that was done to distract me from the fact that my bare ass was hanging off the side of a steel table. As I was telling him I watch a lot of reality junk, he leaned way in and whispered, “I just started watching the show 24 but it ended. Jack Bauer is the Man!“ It was at that moment I wanted the anesthetic to kick in, blissfully allowing me to leave this odd conversation only to wake up in the recovery room happily farting along with the other post-ops.

The procedure done, the results good, fully dressed and ready to roll I headed for the coffee room, a faster’s paradise. Coffee from that pot with the little pods, cookies, peanut butter crackers, juice…ah, now this was OZ for me. I could see the sign before I even opened the door….Coffee Pot Broken Do Not Use….and a little jar of instant coffee. No milk either, powdered! I considered the instant with the powder and realized that I could wait til I got home for my coffee…but I grabbed a pack of cheese crackers and mini chips ahoys for the road. I returned to my car to find an expired muni-meter ticket on my windshield. Oh well, Linda $35 Pennsylvania 0

heigh ho, heigh ho its off to work i go.........

2010-06-03T19:38:00.000-07:00

My husband is on the verge of retiring at which time our marriage will be on the verge of expiring. Having him home all day, every day just isn’t gonna work. Since I only work part time, the 16 hours a week I am away from home wont be enough to restore my sanity. He recently started taking a day or so off each week just to see how it feels. He explains it is a big deal for a man to retire. (He should only know how hard it is on the woman.)

The first week it was kinda fun to have him home. I made him toast and eggs while he made the coffee. As we ate breakfast together...I read the paper while he watched the news. I did the dishes while he took out the recycling. A real Ozzie and Harriet moment. Week two…not so good. I did the dishes while he watched TV. I folded laundry while he napped. I vacuumed while he snacked. A real Archie Bunker moment. But by the third week I told him that if I saw him so much as sit down while I was washing, dusting or folding something I would have him killed. To his credit he did try. He waited til I was in the bathroom to sneak a snack. He waited til I was on the phone to sneak in a nap. With all this sneaking he figured it was easier to just go to work. Not as stressful.

We tried to figure out what to do with all our new found time together. I opted for making sure his life insurance policies were all in order while he suggested we could travel across the country in an RV. He suggested an RV! A recreational vehicle. The man has no recreation unless it is changing someone’s oil. I imagined myself trapped in one of those one room on wheels and thought of the endless hours of driving down some rural roadway as we discussed, ummm while we talked about the….errrr….yeah my point exactly. What the hell would we talk about as we motored across state after state.? And where would we be heading anyway? Graceland? Dollywood? I thought perhaps traveling abroad. He made some sexist joke…a broad…ha ha get it…(I hate him!) and it was dropped. And for that, I got out my pad and made him a list of things that he could do around the house. Things he started and never finished.

The barbeque ignitor. He ordered the part, picked up the part, and examined the part….that’s as far as it got. Three years that part is in the junk draw waiting to be an ignitor.

Clean out the shed. We have two. One was here when we bought the house and he immediately filled it with crap. At best the first foot in was accessible. So for a Father’s Day oh so many years ago the kids chipped in and bought him a shed to go with his Carvel Fudgie the Whale cake. He transferred the ‘old shed shit’ into the new shed making it ‘new shed shit.’ Several years later we bought another shed, for the bikes, lawn mower etc. It was a huge shed that cost way to much but I foolishly thought that the ‘new shed with the old shit’ was coming down when the new kid in town was erected. Wrong. He just filled it up with more crap. So we have two sheds that are totally useless as far as storage goes. I have no idea what is even in those sheds….but if my husband goes missing….well don’t look in the sheds!

Change the outlets. I am married to an electrician that from all accounts is a very good one. I wouldn’t know however since every outlet in my house is from 1970 when the house was built. To plug in my vacuum I have to use the outlet attached to the overhead fixture in the bathroom. Of course that outlet only works when the light is on. And when that light is on, the vent fan is on. Between the vacuum and the vent fan noise you could lose your mind. To plug in my cell phone charger I have to unplug either the microwave or the radio. If I unplug the radio I lose all my pre-selected stations, if I unplug the microwave the clock is never right. So even though my cell phone now works I spend countless hours re-programming and/or resetting an appliance that has no business being friggin' unplugged in the first place. So more times than I care to recall, I have charged my cell phone while I am ~~shit~~….um, peeing. When Christmas rolls around it becomes a nightmare of extension cords and twinkie lights. Fa la friggin’ la!

Throw out some papers. My husband has piles of papers everywhere. He thinks they are orderly because he hides them behind things. The windowsill in the kitchen has a foot deep worth of papers he thinks is hidden by a tiny 5 x 7 frame of my grandson. The decorative keyholder (cleverly disguised as a…key) is where he displays his collection of….rubbish. Theatre ticket stubs, motor oil coupons, faded receipts and anything that he can stuff between it and the wall. We have two file cabinets and one closet shelf that he also has stuffed with statements, directions, manuels and anything that can‘t fit behind the keyholder or my grandson. I have a paper shredder and an fervent need for confetti.

As I proceeded with my list, I looked up to see that my husband’s eyes were welling up. I felt bad for him, realizing that it was time to retire. As he walked towards the door and I asked him where he was going, he smiled broader than I have seen in a while and said…”work, I don’t have the strength to retire”. I stuck the list behind the keyholder!

rainy days and Mondays....

2010-05-24T21:15:00.000-07:00

Ever since I was a kid I hated Mondays. It meant returning to the doldrums of school or as I got older, work. It meant that my weekend had ended. It was over. Done. Such finality always bothered me but then 24’s Jack Bauer came along and Monday suddenly became the best day of the week. And this Monday it ended. It was over. Done.

Jack Bauer and his C.T.U. counterparts came along at a time when we needed a hero. Just months earlier our country had been attacked in the worst possible way, with civilian casualties. We needed someone who could run four blocks, scale a fence, climb a fire escape, blow off a door, run down three flights of stairs, bust through a steel gate and secure a warehouse without breathing heavy as he proclaims it to be “all clear.“ We needed someone who could snap the neck of a terrorist, torture an answer out of his brother or suture his own stab wounds all without even needing to use the bathroom. In eight seasons Jack didn’t eat or sleep for that matter. He said ’copy that’ more times than a Xerox salesman and rarely got laid. Sad part is, when he did the woman is usually dead before the ticking of the countdown clock begins. His female and less violent counterpart is Chloe Obrien. She can pull up a surveillance feed, move a spy satellite into position and track a cab in New York City (no easy feat) in less time than it takes her to put on lip gloss. She got married somewhere around season 6 but alas, him and the son she had all but disappear without even a mention in subsequent seasons. Keep in mind each season is actually only 24 hours otherwise her babysitting costs would have been astronomical.

If you have never watched the show (ahhhhhhhhhh!) I will get you up to date from the first season to it's finale so that when the movie comes out you will be ready. (or can at least hold your own around the water cooler) I will start you off slowly……….

Season One - Bad guys kidnap his wife and daughter, a senator and presidential candidate is threatened, the first of many Counter Terrorist Unit (CTU) moles is exposed, and Teri Bauer, Jack‘s wife is killed………….Jack gets angry!

Season Two - Bad guys plan nuclear attack on L.A., the first of many attacks on CTU headquarters, Middle Eastern countries blamed for nuclear threat, David Palmer become President (African American and pre-Obama)………….Jack gets even!

Season Three - Bad guys plan another attack on L.A. this time viral, Jack‘s heroin addiction is uncovered, Jack’s daughter dating CTU agent ……..Jack gets clean!

Season Four - Bad guys derail a train, a Turkish family has something to do with the missing US nuclear launch codes, Jack dismissed from CTU and dating the Secretary of Defense‘s daughter (uh oh, she‘s a goner), slimy President Logan makes his first appearance……………Jack evades capture!

Season Five - Bad guys kill ex-President Palmer (and Allstate spokesman), Jack still on the run under assumed name, Russian terrorists threatening US with nerve gas, President Logan admits involvement in assassination of President Palmer…Jack captured by the Chinese. (don't ask)

Season Six - Bad guys blow up bus in suicide bombing, CTU gets Jack released from Chinese prison after 20 months of torture but somehow stronger than ever, President Palmer’s dumb brother is now president and CTU has another mole….Jack questions his government. (do you blame him?)

Season Seven - Bad guys in the Senate question Jack about his torture tactics, meets Renee Walker who becomes his love interest in final season (bad move, Renee), President Alison Taylor (Hillary-ish) pulling help promised to Senagal, FBI moles uncovered, White House under seige (and they thought the Salahi’s getting into a party uninvited was a problem)…...Jack dying from biological exposure.

Season Eight - Bad guys threaten NYC with a dirty bomb, miracle cure saves Jack, Middle Eastern President Hassan killed by Russians, Agent Renee Walker called back into service but sleeps with Jack and dies before even getting out of bed, CTU has yet another mole, President Taylor asks crazy disgraced ex-President Logan for help with peace treaty gone terribly wrong, Jack makes Chloe shoot him so as not to implicate herself in his escape….. Jack must go on the run, again! Forever. (or at least until the movie comes out)

let them eat cake..........

2010-05-19T19:47:00.000-07:00

This week our civic association hosted a luncheon for 150 of the senior citizens in our community. It was a long day as I was yelled at, insulted and I am pretty sure one even growled at me. But I was also hugged, had my face stroked, and told by one lovely woman that I reminded her of her daughter who lived too far away to visit.

For the most part these lovely seniors enjoyed their lunch, the plants we gave as favors, the raffles we held. For the most part. We also had to deal with those that used their ‘senior’ status to vent about everything that ever annoyed them about getting older. As they filtered in, some in wheelchairs and walkers but most with just sure and steady steps, you could tell immediately which ones were gonna be trouble. It’s like going to the park and knowing that the snarky kid with the attitude is gonna push your kid off the slide. Ok so there was no slide and no pushing, but it came pretty damn close. All fifteen tables were identical. Colorful tableclothes, balloons, plants, place settings. Yet there was a mad dash for a particular table, and if they didn’t get the one they wanted….there was hell to pay. “I sat at this table last year” one man proclaimed. “The plants at this table are bigger” claimed a woman who should have used a little more poli-grip. With some well timed mediation skills, everyone found a seat and spent the next ten minutes getting comfortable. On to the fruit cup.

The fruit was too cold. Too warm. Not enough pineapple. Too much pineapple. And the best….and this is a direct quote…”I’ll eat it, but fruit makes me shit myself.” Okaaaaaay…so take the fruit cup away from her pronto! On to the salad.

He hates onions. She has more tomatoes. I need more dressing. Less dressing. Gives me gas. Wrong lettuce. And my personal favorite….my gardener could have made a better salad. On to the main course.

Are we getting rolls?

-Yes, with the main course.

Are we getting butter?

-Yes, with the rolls.

Will they be cut?

-No, they are small rolls that are easy to cut.

Oh, then I don’t want one.

-Ok so you can give it to your wife.

She’s not my wife, my wife is dead.

-Ooops

The main course was a lovely chicken francese with potatoes and two vegetables. Carrots and a mushroom pea medley.

No mushrooms for me, please.

-Sorry they are already mixed in with the peas.

What?….I have to pick them out?

-So don’t eat the medley, we also have carrots.

I don’t like carrots.

-*%##!

The plates were delightfully full with truly delicious food which, for the most part, they all loved and desperately wanted to take home, I am assuming to eat for dinner. It reminded me of my mother who could eat for two weeks from the leftovers at Thanksgiving. (Surprisingly she never got trichinosis or salmonella.) She would pick the carcass clean and make little individual packets to eat at a later time. Lunch is served.

Can I have some foil?

-sorry we don’t have any.

Can I have a plastic bag?

-sorry we don’t have any.

Can I have a paper towel?

-sure

She wrapped her chicken, potatoes and vegetable medley in a paper towel. Doubt that will travel well.

-Note to self: Where there’s a will there’s a way…next year bring foil for the seniors! On to coffee and cake.

The cake was a delicious indulgent vanilla whipped cream cake with a rum base. That might have been a mistake?!

His piece is so much bigger!

-sorry we cut them fast. Would you like another piece?

No, I can’t eat cake. I am a diabetic. Do you have sugar free cookies?

-ummm, no sorry

Are we getting coffee?

-yes that will be out in a minute

Can I get a decaf?

-yes, it is ALL decaf

Can I get tea?

-yes we have tea too

Decaf?

-no sorry, we only decaf coffee

Well that’s stupid! On to the raffles.

An initial mix up in the color of the raffle tickets set off a frenzy that rivaled the inquisition. They were so sure that their raffles weren’t in the basket until someone at their table won. They were so sure that the winning tickets were sold by the lady with the dark hair as opposed to the lady with the red hair because she ‘told them she had the winning tickets.’ Second note to self: don’t kid with the seniors, sometimes they don’t get it!

As the exodus began after the last raffle was called they were all handed a bag with two bagels donated by a local bakery.

Whats this?

-two little bagels

They have seeds.

-no they are plain

Good, last year the poppy seeds got under my dentures and I suffered for a week.

-no seeds, promise!

They were handed a bag full of goodies….a sports bottle, jar opener, pens and pencils…pads…..

What’s this?

-goodies!

Last year you gave junk.

-so this year you’ll have new junk. (I was tired and all out of people skills)

According to the consensus there was not enough butter or salad dressing. There was too much food and not enough foil. The coffee was weak and the cake too sweet. But they all had a great time and can’t wait to come back next year!