What did you all do for New Year’s Eve?  Ava hasn’t checked in yet, and it appears that Isabella was plotting bodily harm.  The lack of patience and general good will that the Sisters often exhibit makes me think that we should put bail money in escrow.  Fortunately, the Sisters also married well balanced and friendly individuals that keep us in check. 

I had a wedding to go to and then, after it was determined that The Bandit was no longer going to throw up,  we went to see Sherlock Holmes.  I enjoyed it by the way.  I’m so happy to see Robert Downey Jr back with us.  I’ve always loved him.  I couldn’t get My Honey to sneak into see Avatar.  What a wuss.  I can never get him to do that.  My mom, on the other hand, is my favorite movie-sneaker-inner.  We never go to see just one movie.  I remember one specific incident when we went to see Philadelphia with Tom Hanks and then snuck into Schindler’s List.  I swear we were dehydrated by the end of that day.  We have since taken more care in choosing our double features.  

Anyway, I’ve taken a couple of days to put this post together because I wasn’t feeling snarky enough.  There has been a resurgence.

After the movie, My Honey mentioned a house party that his friend’s band was playing.  Now like Isabella I also don’t want to be old, in fact I rebel against it in tiny little ways.  I could tell that My Honey really wanted to go support his friend, so I relented and agreed to be the designated driver.

Besides, the party was at the house of a guy named Phlegm.  As in mucus or snot.  How could I resist that?

I was warned about the house as we drove over.  I learned that Phlegm was a punk rocker.  Also, that he was married and had kids and they also were punk rockers.  I came to expect that his house was covered in spray paint – on the inside. 

His mother must be so proud.

Once we arrived, I thought the house looked alright – from the outside.  I followed the guys into the house and holy shit the entire inside of the house was spray painted with graffiti.  And it smelled.  I mean it SMELLED.  It smelled so bad my nose hair caught on fire and my lungs imploded.  I couldn’t even determine the cause of the stench it was so atrocious.  It wasn’t until we all fled back outside that I came to understand that it was cat pee.  In the 12.7 seconds that I lasted in that house, I noticed no discernable furniture and yet there were three broken refrigerators.

We stood around in the carport slowly freezing our tushies off.  My Honey kept asking if I was alright.  And for a while I was.  It was sort of like I was a member of National Geographic and I was there studying a native tribe or something. I even took notes on my cell phone.  If I thought I could get away with taking video I certainly would have.  I  watched   the girls with Mohawks and the many facial piercings.  I blended right in with my Tinkerbell sweatshirt and pony tail.

There was one particular guy there I recognized as the “Impressive Guy”.  There is always one at every party.  He’s the guy that says things like: “I don’t believe in belief systems.  They’re segregating and dividing”.  Well, I believe that you’re an idiot.  He felt the need to say to me as I fidgeted in the cold, “Oh, this isn’t really cold.”  My response was, “I’m not going to stand here, in the cold, and discuss the merits of ‘cold’ with you.  Go talk to someone else.”  Maybe I used up all my snark that night which is what took me so long to write this.

Well, by 10:45 I’d had enough.  My Honey arranged for alternative transportation home.  I kissed him good night and retreated to the warmth of the car heater.  My 11:07 I was home and  fairly desperate for some culture.  When midnight came, I was watching Emma from the Romance Collection.  Oh my dear Mr. Knightly – so much better than Phlegm.

As I promised, I shall tell you the tale of The Police and the Streaker.  I was going to name it The Naked Streaker, but that’s really rather redundant.  This story began long ago.  Back when I was relatively sane because my children were only 2 and 4 years old.  They hadn’t started mouthing off yet and the whining hadn’t broken down my central nervous system to the degree it is now.  I’m going to need a telethon before long.

We used to have a next door neighbor that we genuinely liked.  He was a good sort: the appropriate amount of friendly.  That means that he didn’t stalk us like some of our neighbors do now.  I know that they lie in wait and the minute they see us come home they sprint across the yard or dart across the street.  This is another reason that I want to be a ninja when I grow up.  Or maybe Mr. Wilson from Dennis the Menace.

After our good neighbor sold his house and moved with his new wife to Alaska (??? Why would anyone do that?  Kurt – can you tell me?  Are there more Sarah Palin’s up there?  I think Alaska might be sneaky like that.)  The house was then purchased by a foundation.  This foundation provides group homes for mentally challenged people.  This is a fine goal and I completely respect people who dedicate themselves to bettering other people’s lives.  I just would rather they didn’t do it next door to my house.  I generally abhor the “not in my neighborhood” mentality, but I do have my limits.

There is one young man, K, that has lived in the house next door (hereby referred to as THND) for several years.  He has the mental capacity of a about a 10 year old, so he’s functioning and such.  My Honey made the mistake of being nice to him and now my husband is his best friend.  He will literally knock on our door and want to know if My Honey can come out.  Serves him right for being so nice to people all the time.  I keep telling him that bitchy is the new black, but he doesn’t listen and now look what it got him.

ANYWAY, many of the residents of THND aren’t as functioning as K.  There have been many times when I will look out the window and literally see them chasing other residents down the street.  When I called to complain about someone removing my mail from the box, the lady at the foundation said that they weren’t allowed out of the house.  After I stopped laughing, I informed her that as I was looking outside the window at that precise moment, a resident was banging his head on the telephone pole.  I wish I was kidding.  The foundation in charge has been remiss in monitoring the residence and the staff.

Fortunately, all the visits from the police, including twice when I’ve called, not withstanding, there have been some funny moments.  Like the time two years ago. 

We woke up relatively early on New Year’s Day and made breakfast.  For some reason I no longer recall, My Honey had gone out to the front yard – it was probably to get the newspaper or something.  He then hustled back into the house rather quickly and shut the curtains. 

“Where is the phone?” he asked.  He had a strange look about him.

“In the kitchen.  Why?” So I’m a little nosey, but he looked strange.

“Hi, 911?” he said into the receiver, “I need to report a streaker.”

“What?!” I bellowed, racing to the window.  “Who’s streaking?”  I couldn’t see anything but a brief flash of white that slid out of my sight.  Stupid window.  I went to the family room to see if I could see any better.

My Honey gave the 911 operator our address.  Coincidentally, the man on the other line lived in our neighborhood, too.  He seemed appropriately appalled at the prospect of a streaker.  The operator began asking more specific questions while the police were in route.

Operator: Can you describe the gentleman.

My Honey: Uh, yeah.

Operator: Height?

My Honey: About 6′ or 6′ 1″. 

Operator: Weight?

My Honey: Maybe 350 pounds.  Yeah, it’s not pretty.

Me: Oh ew.  (I closed the blinds again.  Nobody needs to see that.)

Operator: Hair?

My Honey: ALL OVER!

By now I’m laughing pretty hard and so is My Honey and the operator.  I see a flash of clothes as the orderlies from THND chase after the streaker.

Operator: What’s he doing now?

My Honey: Running down the street, waving his arms in the air, and yelling ‘Wheeeeee’.

The police did arrive and the streaker was captured and clothed, which was mildly disappointing.  It certainly made for an entertaining morning.

I don’t have much to say this evening, but I feel that I must post something.  Some of the readers actually become a little abusive if they find nothing new on here in the morning.  You know who you are and you should be ashamed.  Do you want sarcasm and harsh reality here, or do you want me trying to straighten out the mess that Thomas and Francesca have made of their lives? 

We had a puke-a-palooza here tonight.  The Bandit had a VERY upset tummy.  It’s all that crap coming out of his nose.  I know – very icky, but I shouldn’t have to deal with this alone.  His daddy was on clean jammies detail while I just tried to keep the bathroom floor relatively clean.  Delightful.

This is my toothless wonder…

She seems to think we live in the frozen tundra the way she’s bundled up.  It was probably 60 degrees when we took this picture.  She is still no better at controlling her saliva.  I hope she gets a better handle on that before she goes back to school. 

My Honey gave me a fantastic collection of movies for Christmas.  I handily pointed it out at the Costco and waved it up and down and said loudly, “I want this.”  He’s good at taking a hint.  I try to leave little to the imagination.  Anyway, it’s an AMC/BBC collection of outstanding English versions of classic romances: Jane Eyre, Pride & Prejudice, Victoria & Albert, Emma, Lorna Doone, and a few others.

I’ve only had time to watch Pride & Prejudice (which was a miniseries so it took like 75 hours to watch) and Jane Eyre.  They are excellent productions as you can imagine considering who produced them.  After watching the stories again, I am reminded of several things:  I’m still in love with Mr. Darcy and Edward Rochester seriously needed therapy.

As for this weekend, I hope to have lots of hilarity and high jinx to tell you about.  I do have a very special post in mind for New Years Day.  I’ll give you a teaser if you like.  It involves the police and a streaker. 

Tune in Friday for further details.

My dog is…..well, my dog is….let me put it this way…..I lack an appropriate adjective.  He’s very handsome for a dog whose face is slowly melting off.  He also only has one eyebrow – on the left.  Don’t misunderstand – he does not have a unibrow.  There is one perfect, arched eyebrow over his left eye.  I have no idea what could have happened to the other one.  His muzzle is wonderfully velvety and his ears are as soft as satin.  He loves to cuddle.  He doesn’t smell too bad.  His nose works very well.  He is good natured.  He’s also terrified of the Bandit’s Star Wars Light Saber.  And still,  one of my favorite things is pestering him when he’s trying to hide his treats in the couch.  It makes him crazy when he hides bones in the cushions and I “find” them for him.

That’s a pretty good resume.  HOWEVER, I am concerned about his lack of intelligence and his ridiculous exuberance.  He’s a hound dog for God’s sake.  Doesn’t he know he’s supposed to be sleeping on the front porch, not racing around the house howling, molesting the cat, and using my children and their possessions as chew toys?  I’ve always believed that big dogs don’t even grow a brain until they are at least 2 years old.  They just stay puppies for a lot longer.  Roscoe is 2 in February and I’m not holding out any hope that anything is germinating in there.

The neighborhood in our town where my husband and I both grew up, and live in still, is like heaven for supporters of the Second Amendment (the right to keep and bear arms).  I’ve never considered it much, it’s just always been that way, and regardless of my personal opinion on gun control, it probably always will.  There are currently three gun shops within a block of my house.  The largest gun shop in the Southwest is 1/2 block from my front door.  Rumor has it that the original owners of that shop were busted for selling weapons to the guerrillas in South America.  My Honey remembers this event taking place, but I can’t find any evidence of it.  It’s still a really big store, although I have not been inside for over twenty years.

About two weeks ago, our neighbor intercepted my husband in the front yard.  She’s THAT neighbor.  Everyone has one – nosy, crazy, a “friend” of all the local police, and frequently drunk.  If you don’t have one, I recommend getting one – they are nothing if not entertaining.   Apparently the previous night there had been a lot of activity in our neighborhood and we missed all of it.  We usually do.  Someone had tried to break into that particular gun shop in the middle of the night by cutting a hole in the roof.  I’m sure they stupidly had visions of a great heist, but that stuff doesn’t usually work out in real life.  I’d imagine, gun shops as a rule have pretty damn good security.  Anyway, the criminals fled into the neighborhood in an attempt to escape.  I understand that there were multiple cop cars on my street and even in my front yard.  They had the police dogs out and I understand they were in my yard as well. 

We remained blissfully ignorant because my dog is useless.  He never made a peep.

Thanks, Roscoe.  I feel much safer knowing your on it.

An update because I know you all care.

There are hazards with having no front teeth.  As you remember from the events of this weekend, Sassy has now lost both of her front teeth.  The troubles as far as she is concerned is the inability to eat barbecue ribs, corn on the cob and whistle.  However, as her parent and someone who talks to her a lot, the real problem, at least for the innocent bystanders, is the spitting.  If she can’t learn to control her saliva, I’m going to start wearing one of those dentist spit guards.

Another byproduct of Sassy’s teeth coming out, was the early demise of my brand new Blackberry.  There was much moaning and gnashing of teeth and whining after I pulled it from the bathtub.  I immediately took it apart and applied the hair dryer to it on a low heat setting.  I put it back together several times and tried to turn it on, but nothing happened.  My Honey blew it out with a can of compressed air, getting out quite a bit more water, and still nothing.  I got on the Internet to see what kind of advice I could get and the first thing I see:  Do not use the hair dryer on it.  Great.  The second bit of advice: DO NOT turn it back on for 48 – 72 hours.  Freaking great. 

So I’ve committed the two cardinal sins of resuscitating a phone after a drowning.  My uncle and the Internet suggested that I take it apart and put it in a bowl of dried rice.  Apparently the rice helps soak up the water.  I walked by the little grave site several times an hour and paid my respects.  I sang southern bible hymns such as Swing Low Sweet Chariot and No Body Knows the Trouble I’ve Seen.  I whispered into the bowl of rice, “Don’t go into the light!”  As much as I wanted to, I did not try to turn it back on again. 

This morning I’m proud to say that when I walked by the little bowl of Uncle Ben’s I saw it’s little red head poking out and realized that I could try turning it on again.  This was an excellent sign.  It meant that I had successfully navigated through several stages of grief.

1. Denial.  The phone is fine.  It’ll be fine.  Mommy’s not mad.

2. Anger.  Dammit! Why didn’t I buy phone insurance. $&^*&#!&%^$&

3. Bargaining.  Take me. I promise I won’t play anymore Brick Breaker if you’ll just let me have one more day. 

4. Depression: Why is it always me? WAAAAAAAAAAAAA. 

5. Acceptance.  Oh yeah.  I wonder if it’ll turn on.

So I put it back together and hit the button and walked away so it could power on or not.  I knew that it was working because I could hear a choir of angels singing all the way from the back of the house. 

Obviously, I am very excited.  And the added bonus, whenever I take the back cover off and remove the battery, rice falls out.

Again, from The Dumbest Things Ever Said or Done calendar:

Isabella, the sixteenth century queen of Spain, vowed not to change her underwear until her husband and his army captured the Dutch city of Ostend.  The Dutch defenders held out for three years.

Uh huh.  I have some concerns about the European monarchy of yesteryear.  The last we checked in with them, an eccentric member of the Italian peerage was mummifying her lover to store in the kitchen cupboard.

But back to Isabella.

Three years.  In the same underwear.  One would think by then, said underwear might have grown self awareness and it’s conscious would have compelled it to demanded to be changed.  I’m guessing there was no such thing as a germaphobe back then.

I would like it to be noted here, officially, that our dear Isabella of these pages does indeed change her underwear.  At a minimum of everyday. 

I am positive.

Sassy and The Bandit are in their rooms blubbering.  I am in the office steaming, and My Honey and the dog are hiding in the back yard.  I don’t know how stay-at-home moms do it.  I’m losing my mind.  I just don’t have the temperament.  The constant fighting, the whining, the mess – Dear God!  It’s like the trifecta of misery over here.

I’m trying to get some writing done, but everytime I open the current chapter I’m working on, my brain glazes over. 

I’m drinking a cup of tea.  I asked for a tea pot from my mother and she put together a beautiful basket with a pretty cup, a gorgeous pot and a sample of several types of tea she thought I might like.  I’m trying to get off the soda.  I’m a junky and I know how bad it is for me.  Water is out of the question.  BLECK!  So now I’m trying tea: iced tea, hot tea, flavored tea, sun tea, chai tea, whatever.  I’m not a brewed beverage kind of girl.  I don’t like coffee at all and I’m trying to make myself like tea.  It’s been slow going.

Based on how well today is proceeding, perhaps the secret is tea with whiskey in it.

Another delightful and honest cartoon from Shoebox

We made it. We lived through another Christmas. Well technically there is still an hour and 15 minutes left, but I feel fairly confident that we’ll be alright. Due to my phone mishap yesterday, I am completely incommunicado with everyone. I miss you – each and everyone. I feel like I’m on Jupiter or something. 

Our day was pretty nice. At 6 am this morning, Sassy crawled in bed with us to snuggle. I didn’t say anything because I was hoping to eek out a little more sleep time. At 6:30 she asked if she could go in and watch cartoons. 

“Aren’t you even remotely interested to see if Santa and the Tooth Fairy came?” I asked her.

“Oh Yeah!” was her reply.

Oh, yeah? This can’t be my spawn.  My mom used to booby trap the living room when I was a kid to keep me from going in there in the middle of the night.

Since this morning, we have been opening toys. If you really wanted to make a killing in the stock market, you should have invested in that company that makes all the wire they strap around all the toys these days.  I don’t remember our toys being held down by 75 feet of wire when we were kids.  My fingers are killing me.

My Honey has been applying stickers to the GI Joe Command Unit that Santa brought The Bandit since 7 this morning.  There were approximately 37 sheets of stickers to put on this thing.

And as for me, I spent over an hour trying to put a Transformer back into the shape of a jet fighter.  These things are like Rubix cubes on crack.  I’m going to have to send them all to Ava’s house to see if her boy can “transform” them back.

I am writing this post on my new wireless keyboard.  I have my feet up on the desk and my chair tilted back to the furthest position.  Thank you, Santa.  I also got a bunch of book store gift certificates.  WAHOOOOO!!!!

Anyway, it has been a very nice day and I am so very thankful that I still have 2 days off before I have to go back to work.  We should petition the government or the Vatican or somebody to always have Christmas on a Friday.  It’s brilliant.

Much love and Christmas cheer to you all.  Eggnog and Jack Daniels for everyone!