During summer, my family has an exciting and challenging game we play. This game is called “Keeping the House Cool During a Heat Wave While Not Using the Air Conditioner.” I hate this game with a passion equaled only by my love for shoes.
You know, when I was growing up, we had momisms—sayings my mom yelled at us over and over. Of course, Dad was an equal partner in the parenting, so we had dadisms yelled at us as well. So for Father’s Day, I put together a list of my Dad’s Greatest Hits and my rebuttals. Because you know, I’m an adult now. He can’t ground me for talking back. At least, I don’t think he can.
“I walked to school in the snow, uphill, both ways with the dangerous abominable snowman lurking in the trees waiting to pounce on me and take my lunch.”
Dad, you grew up in Los Angeles. That’s not snow, it’s smog. And Grandma says that she drove you. Through the smog. And there were no hills. The worst thing that could have happened to you was an allergy attack.
“My name is Dad. Only my friends get to call me by my first name and you’re not my friends; you’re the fruit of my loins.”
Dad, enough with the fruit of my loins stuff. Can’t you just call us your children? Oh, wait, now I get where we inherited our love for drama.
“Do I look like a bank?”
Not since I’ve grown up. Now you look more like an ATM. Yikes! I’m just kidding, Dad. You look like Dad. You don’t look like a bank at all. Besides, Mom’s a much softer touch than you are, so I’ve always used her as my personal banker.
“I’m not lost. I just have a better way to get there.”
Dad, I love you. But you could drive across the country and somehow end up in Europe by way of China without once ever stopping for directions. For the love of Mike, Dad, please get a GPS. And use it!
“No daughter of mine is going out dressed like that.”
Dad, dad, dad. What we wore was modest compared to today’s teenagers. Besides, we always changed our clothes once we were out of the house, anyway. And you should have seen some of THOSE outfits.
“Boys are only after one thing. I know because I used to be one before your mother got hold of me.”
I don’t even want to know how that happened, Dad. I’m positive the visual will burn my retinas.
“I always obeyed all traffic laws and I never got in an accident.”
Um, Dad. You really need to talk to Grandma. She’s all about telling the truth. I know about your speeding tickets and that incident with the pole that appeared out of nowhere when you were driving your first car at 16. And I know why you had a different car at 16 and a half.
“I really like your new boyfriend. His tattoos are so interesting.”
All right, Dad. You are the King of Sarcasm. For the record, only one of my boyfriends had a tattoo. But you should have seen the piercings on Tiffany’s prom date. I know she’s the youngest and got away with a lot more than the rest of us…but wow. Who knew you could have piercings on so many areas of your body and still live?
“If ifs and buts were candy and nuts then we’d all have a Merry Christmas.”
Seriously, Dad. I have no clue what this means and I never did. Someday will you explain it to me?
“Don’t make me stop this car.”
I think it’s time to come clean. I NEVER wanted you to stop the car. It was my sisters. They had small bladders and would make up fights just so you’d pull over and they’d get to use the restrooms. What can I say? It was a long trip across country.
Recently a study from Northwestern University revealed that girls have a built-in neurological advantage over boys in that girls have better use of language. I swear, the people conducting the research had to have been a bunch of men raised on a deserted island who have never, ever talked to a female before. Because, frankly, you don’t need an expensive study to confirm what everyone on the planet knows. Women are more verbally communicative than men.
Seriously. Look, let’s say you’re a married housewife in a small city we’ll call Laurie’s Town (because honestly, what good is having a blog if you can’t name your own town). Your husband comes home from work, plops a bottle of wine on the counter and says, “I saw Joe today.” Now, to a man this conversation is done. He’s handed over the gift, the bottle of wine presumably from Joe, and he’s imparted all the information he believes necessary to accompany the gift.
The woman on the other hand, has many things racing through her mind. “What kind of wine is it? Who is Joe? Were the bottles properly sterilized before the wine was corked or are we all going to die of a weird disease the minute the bottle is opened? What time is it? Is hubby home early? Could that mean he lost his job? Or is he late? Is he having an affair? Is that wine purple? Or is it just the bottle? Do they even make purple wine? Is that dinner I smell burning or is it just the kids’ science fair project? Did hubby get the wine from Joe or is that completely unrelated? Should I open it now or is it good enough to keep and drink when our best friends come over? Or should I save it for someone really special like that PTA mom whose fanny I’ve been kissing all week in an effort to get out of doing the stupid cookie dough sale?”
Do you see what I mean? The researchers had to be male. And they had to never have been in a relationship with an actual woman. And it goes without saying they never brought wine home from Joe. And clearly they have never once spent an hour in my house.
You see, in my house, hubby comes home and I start to tell him a story. And just as I’m getting to the good part, his eyes will start to glaze over and he will begin fidgeting. And then I will suddenly have an urgent need to leave in the middle of my narrative because the smoke alarm is going off and that means dinner is ready. After dinner, when I remember about my unfinished story (the one hubby has spent all of the meal hoping I will forget), I resume my tale. It usually it goes something like this:
“Today, I went to Kohl’s. I wasn’t going to go, but Grandma called and she said it was the four days when you get 15%, 20% or 30% off if you use your charge card. You have to use these little scratcher things that look like lottery scratchers. Anyway, I went to Kohl’s and I found some really cute shoes, but they didn’t have my size. So I tried a couple more pairs and found ones I liked, but not too much. But I figured that if I got 20% off, they would be really cute. So I took them to the counter and I scratched off my card and I only got 15% off. Well, at that point, I just didn’t know. I mean, at 20% off they were cute, but at 15% off, not so much. So I decided to run into Target and they had a great sale on food containers. So I bought a ton because last week I noticed that all our old ones were getting yucky inside. And then I went to Costco and I got you a big tub of those carrots you enjoy. And while I was there, I ran into my friend April, who had on the very same shoes from Kohl’s that I had really liked and couldn’t find in my size. And she said that they had just restocked them. So I bought your carrots and ran back to Kohl’s. And they had them in my size. And you’ll never guess what else happened! At the register, I picked another scratch-off card and I got 30%! For the super cute shoes!”
And hubby will look at me, sigh and say, “so you got new shoes today?”
Okay, so we’re having some technical difficulties here at Manic Motherhood. And by that I mean, the site host and a bunch of other crap that I don’t understand was switched and now I don’t know what I am doing. Which isn’t all that new–since I never actually knew what I was doing. But be patient. I have a web guru. And shockingly, she hasn’t abandoned me since I believe I might just be her most stupid client.
But we should have updates soon. In the meantime, enjoy your weekend.
I’m going to tell you all right now that I don’t do construction. And by that I mean, I don’t like doing it, I don’t like being around when it’s done and frankly, just thinking about construction pretty much turns me into a big, old cranky-pants.
And that’s why I’ve been a cranky-pants for a while now. You see, when we moved into this house it had a yard that was mainly dirt with a few rocks, a dead tree and a couple of lizards thrown in. It was ugly, but maintenance-free. We lived with it for a while and then decided that maybe we should put in live plants and possibly some tacky yard art. And no, it didn’t have anything to do with the death looks we got from neighbors who were clearly jealous because we had the only carefree yard on the street and possibly the entire neighborhood.
Anyway, because Harry and I are both old and allergic to digging out dirt and putting in drainage and stuff, we decided to hire a contractor. I don’t know why they call them contractors, but I suspect it’s because when you hire them you sign a contract. Yeah, I’m smart that way.
Now, I read the contract. And I’m fairly certain that while the language used in it was at one point in time English, it was now in lawyerese. Which meant Harry and I signed it, paid some money to the guy and had no idea if he was going to landscape our yard or build an igloo on the roof.
That turned out to be the first of many things we didn’t understand about the contract.
For example, in it was something called a “start date.” Call me crazy, but wouldn’t you think that a start date would be the date the project would start? Yeah, me too. But it turns out the start date is just some arbitrary date the contractor throws in so that you never give up hoping that your project will actually start in your lifetime.
Instead, the start date came. The start date went. And still a landscaping crew was not sent. And when we finally called the contractor a month later to ask when he would begin, he sighed and said, “It takes time to create Eden.” This is contractor speak for, “someone else is paying more money so they got your start date.”
And then, just when we gave up hope that our personal Eden would ever be started, something wonderful happened. Yes, the porta-potty was delivered to our driveway! In fact, the porta-potty was dropped directly in the middle of our driveway so that we could no longer park in said driveway. How convenient was that? With our cars parked someplace else, all the neighborhood kids had room to line up to use our fancy outdoor plumbing.
Sadly, this was the last time we saw the porta-potty people. Nobody ever came by to empty the porta-potty. They didn’t even come pick it up after the project was finished. Instead, an entire colony of flies made the porta-potty their home. And once our yard was finished, the flies rose up and flew the porta-potty back to wherever it lived when it wasn’t stinking up our driveway.
But before the port-potty could leave, the project had to start. And that day finally arrived. On Harry’s day off, the crew arrived at 6:30 AM. And the first thing they did? Jackhammer out the walkway, of course.
But you know what, we didn’t complain. Because we knew that in four weeks we would have a lovely, dirt-free landscape. And four weeks came. And four weeks went. And it turns out that when we signed the contract and it said that the entire project would take four weeks to complete, what that actually translated to was “until death do we part.”
I know this because after ten weeks of jackhammering and planting and a stinking porta-potty relocated to just outside my dining room window, I wanted to kill the landscaper myself. With my bare hands. And possibly the jackhammer. Oh, I briefly considered death by drowning the man in the porta potty, but why should I be so mean to the flies?
But you know, it’s now over. And we have a lovely Eden. It’s not maintenance free, of course. But I like it better than the dirt patch. And I’m no longer a cranky-pants. Oh, okay. I’m not as much of a cranky-pants.
I’ll preface this column by saying I love my parents. Unfortunately, Mom and Dad recently retired and apparently, they left behind their brains and common sense to travel the country in their RV. Their plan was to spend the rest of their lives exploring the country. In the summers, the grandkids would join them on trips to see the Smithsonian, the Statue of Liberty and a really big ball of twine somewhere in Iowa. Or maybe Idaho.
But, after approximately 2.5 days of grueling travel with two dogs, two cats and very few places to get free WiFi so my mom could shop online at Nordstrom, they landed in a Texas town so small it doesn’t have a post office. Or a grocery store—although it has a bar and grill because in Texas it isn’t a proper town unless it has a place to suck down Shiner Bock and play pool. So my parents decided to park the RV and settle in a house with broadband and regular UPS deliveries.
Since then, they have been driving everyone insane.
First of all, they are determined to keep in touch with all of us. Now, of course everyone wants to stay in touch with mom and dad—but my parents don’t do this by conventional means. They don’t send emails or postcards or call. Instead they send gifts. Yes, this sounds wonderful. I mean, who in their right mind could refuse a gift? Well, let me think about that. Oh, yeah. I could. And so could everyone else in the family.
Since they settled in, my family members and I have been the bewildered recipients of many presents from my very enthusiastic, newly Texan parents. Among the gifts are a giant waffle maker that makes waffles in the shape of Texas, a resin armadillo beer holder, a “Spirit of Texas” beer bucket, a branding iron in the shape of a Texas Ranger badge so we can brand our steaks when we grill, and a doo-rag with the lone star on it. (Please, who sends their adult children doo-rags?)
Just two weeks ago, my sisters and I received identical gifts of instant grits, a miniature Texas flag and a copy of a forwarded email detailing how Ozzy Osborne had desecrated the Alamo fifty billion years ago (let it go, people; the man can’t even speak a coherent sentence anymore, let alone atone for peeing in a sacred spot). And the week before that we were all the proud recipients of a bottle of “Texas Badass” hot sauce with its very own miniature, horseshoe-shaped toilet seat attached to the bottle.
And it isn’t just my sisters and I that get the odd gifts. Recently, my grandmother received a 4-pound apple pie from someplace that billed itself as the “Capitol of Texas Apple Country.” Now, my grandmother is 87 and lives with her dog, Sugar. The dog is not allowed people food because the dog has a sensitive stomach which is my grandmother’s very polite way of saying that on a regular basis, Sugar passes green clouds capable of wiping out entire nations. So I ask you, who the heck do my parents expect to eat this pie?
In any event, I wasn’t very surprised to find a strangely wrapped box in my mail yesterday. I was surprised, however, when I opened the box and found a large plastic bag filled with what appeared to be some sort of dried up, wrinkly meat product that was quite possibly illegal to own or consume in California. So I called Mom. Our conversation went a bit like this:
Me: What the heck is this stuff in the bag?
Mom: It’s venison jerky. I bought it at the bar.
Me: They sell dried-up Bambi at the bar?
Mom: Well, yes, honey. But they don’t advertise it. That might scare away the wimpy tourists from California.
Mental note: Never again eat the chicken fried steak at the bar. I am a wimpy California tourist and it scared me away.
But you know, of all the gifts we’ve received, the worst one is coming. Apparently the deer in the part of Texas where my parents live shed their antlers. And any day now, I’m expecting a big old box of antlers that my mom said—and I quote—would look right fine above the mantle.
You know, I’m thinking of moving and not leaving a forwarding address. I wonder if Mom and Dad will let me use their RV.
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