Isn't this the cutest bunny ever?

We had a great Christmas. Except for the shooting in the living room. Dakota shot Phoenix with a Pellet gun. So needless to say, no more pellet gun. Joshua did not come over, he had to work. Brittany got me a grundle of presents I loved. Tobi got me a new calendar and a book. Yippee, loved those too. Kale made me a Ducky necklace. I wear it a lot.
Happy New Year.
As per usual, I will NOT be celebrating new years eve outside my home.
I call it amature drunk night. The one night a year when you are guaranteed to see at least 1 drunk driver every block or so. Also guaranteed to see at least one arrest if you are out after dark. People puking on the side of the road while being arrested is not that common but in 34 years of New Years Eve driving, I've seen it a few times.
When the kids were little, we stayed in our house and had a big party.
Now a days lots of people do fireworks during the parties at midnight so there is incentive to go outdoors. However, we don't go out in my neighborhood as there are also guns going off on New Years. (Cheaper than fireworks and slightly less illegal).
But we will have a great new year... you have a great one too!

It came without packages, boxes, or bags

When all is said and done the only thing you really have are your loved ones. You can be the best at whatever interests you and
have EVERY whatever you collect. Your proficiency in what you study and/or practice will get you earthly pleasure and if
you work it right earthly treasure, but nothing else.
When I leave earth I want my Kids and Grand kids to remember me. Not my house, not how good I was at (wow I just realized I have no exceptional talents) whatever, not how much $ I had or how I spent it, just me. My character, my love of them, and
most especially my spirit since that is all I will have in the next life to be recognized by.
This Christmas we do not have much but I want to be remembered as the Grandma who made not having much enough.
Happiness is a condition you decide to have. You can't change some things, you can change how you react to them.
So sing that carol a little louder and share your spirit with every one of your loved ones.
It may be a slim Christmas, but that is enough if you want it to be.
Merry Christmas to all and kiss those Grand kids for me please.

Ho Ho Ho

Here is my last years Christmas wish list (in all fairness to my children, not made until after Christmas):
all the Harry Potter Wands
Jingle Cats CD _ got it from Tobi
Decorated Basement
Home Theatre
Go to Hawaii
Mattress for my bed - bought it with taxes
Puppy Doggies - 1 wandered in, 1 for birthday from Joshua
Computer chair
Computer speakers
Video Camera
As you can see I got 3 out of 10 by hook and crook during the year
This is my wish list for this year:
A foot massager (I have seen it at Wally World in the pharmacy check out)
A new tv (The techno-whore in the family says it must be LCD)
Shoes
Yes it is shorter and more possible this year as I know I won't get most of last years list. Notice how no where on it is a root canal or an EKG?
So far this holiday season I have paid the dentist for 2 crowns and a bridge. Now my doctor would like me to come in and have a checkup. OHHHHH Could I? And I get to pay for this? Right now during the Christmas rush?
By the time Christmas is here we might be caught up to November with the bills.
Could I please just have one more $$$ emergency??? No wait, I take that back. The weather is 40 below here. Hell has frozen over and I will no doubt wake up to a frozen vehicle or something. Actually it was negative 15 when I woke up and now it is a balmy 13 degrees here at work. You can really feel the heatwave.

An old womans perspective on sox

When the girls were all in grade school they decided that these sock rolls were the way you do cool socks. Their brother did it too. No matter how many times I rearranged their 8 little socks on 8 little ankles and told them NEVER do that again, I would pick up my darling little angels with sock rolls at the end of their school day. I was mortified that all 3 of my girls and my son would NOT follow the 80's fashion dictate and scrunch their socks like everyone Else's kids were.
At least I was embarrassed for a few days//// Then I chalked it up to another "Mothers Curse" item.
In case you do not know how this works, let me enlighten you: While your child is doing whatever they are doing which is causing you to be A: embarrassed as a mother. B: Causing everyone else including your spouse to question whether or not you should have had kids at all. and/or C: Making you wish the earth would crack open under your feet and swallow you whole. You reach deep inside yourself and grasp the last shred of hope left and say "When you grow up I hope you have some children who act EXACTLY like you are acting right now". That's it. It works.

Now you wait about 2 decades and keep doing this through the teenage years when you keep wishing you had raised poodles or pit bulls. I promise when you get the first call from one of your kids that starts with "Mom, you'll never believe what (insert child's name here) did today. Your curse will have reached fruition and you will feel a little tingle of calm come into your life which can only be caused by FINALLY seeing the child with the rolled down socks get theirs.

I chuckle and chortle and snicker with glee! Sometimes, it gets so good that as the child who tortured me is telling the story of the latest bad thing their offspring has done I get light headed with happiness. You have to understand I have waited decades for this stuff!
So, you son threw a fit in a very public venue? The girl destroyed what? No, he did not say that in public? He ran out naked? You had to go see the principal again?
Oh yes, the mothers curse works. Every one of those thousands of moments when my patience was tested to the limit and I did not kill one of them has been vindicated!
Grand kids are your reward for not ripping off all of their socks and making them wear sandals in the snow till they got over the sock rolling thing.

it's beginning to look like Christmas

A quick little Holiday helper Blog which won't help you until next year:
I have NOT participated in "Black Friday" for the last 25 years! Shopping among other people on a normal weekday evening makes me crazy. The average stop to any store during the Holiday rush just gives me hives.
Yes, I have missed all the door stopper deals and 4am specials in exchange for relative sanity and a work free day to put up my tree. I am not particularly bothered by missing these "one time only" deals and don't expect to be bothered this year either.
I will share my secret with you:
I shop for Christmas all year long beginning with the day after Christmas clearances. When the store clearances out everything having to do with whatever the latest sale has been called I continue to clearance shop. I do this right up to Black Friday, then I stop. The money I could have saved by standing in line for 3 hours at Ultimate Electronics pre-dawn crowd (which in late November, Colorado means -10 degrees) does NOT make that big of a difference if you already bought this item. Plus, would you have bought this particular item if it weren't such a spectacular deal? There are always large odds that you will NOT get what you came for during the big sale as the stores usually have VERY LIMITED quantities and the crowds are huge. The frostbite coupled with the trauma just can't beat the satisfaction of seeing it all done months and months ahead.
Of course this is not a perfect plan as you can never tell what item will become the MUST HAVE item for someone you love during the Christmas commercials between the Sponge Bob underwater special and the Chairman's Christmas Cook off. In this case I usually go to the store at 5 am before work on a Monday. That way you are sure to be the first one there and alone in the store. The chances you will actually get the item are on par with the chances you will see this item on "Black Friday" and the clerk won't be alert or awake yet and you may get it 1/2 off anyway!
So go out and shop all you bargain hunters. I'll be eating turkey sandwiches in front of my tree with my toes and sanity intact.

Remember the tooth

What a special week! I got 3 new teeth for $1,800.00 (plus the $ 1,700.00 donation my insurance will make). All I had to do is break one and then after the three hour debilitating session with the dentist ... PRESTO.... a bridge and 2 caps! Why do I feel so sullied?
The dentist was nice and everything, but I am bruised for crying out loud and really swollen in my jaw, and in a lot of expensive pain.
Also, no Virginia there will be no eating with this mouth for a lonnnnnnng time to come as that big red spot and the lumps in the picture are NOT my tongue. That is the dentist's damage in there. I have bruises and a great amount of swelling. I look like someone beat me. And I got to take out a loan to pay for it!!! Yay ME
However I did get a loan so I don't have to wait 7 months to get the final bridge and caps. They will be installed December 12th.

Hippo Birdy Ewe Ewe

Time for the birthday blog!
Today I am 54. My sister is 56 today too. Would you believe delayed twins?. Anyway today has been full of great surprises and one of them was a giant German chocolate cake at work. I nearly died from the sugar coma, but YUM.
I started out the day at my mini meca Wally World. They put out the Christmas ornaments just for me I'm sure.
I found one of those hoodies that go up over the head and become a costume for $3.00 (this is not a typo) for one of my Grandson's for Christmas. Woo woo.
I am boycotting work for the most part and typing this blog.
My doggies woke me up early to slobber all over me and bite my nightshirt.
Tobi already called me, and BD hugged me. Talk about a lucky day!
And ... I am giving all of you the day off of school, work, the bank, and mail.
Have a great my birthday!!

Please let it stop snowing for an hour or 2

There is 2 feet of snow outside. The weather person says it will be 4 to 6 more inches by 6 pm. I lost a whole black Labrador dog today in it. Luckily she is strong enough to dig her way out. The puppy, not as good since it is over her head. I have not gone to work in 2 days since I can't navigate a car which sits 7 inches off the road in 2 feet of snow. Maybe the plow will break all laws of probability and come near our street this year.
In case you were wondering, it's October the 28th (for crying out loud).
There are trick or treat activities in 2 days. Maybe we will create snow shoes and go. I see a Werewolf with tennis rackets on his fuzzy toes in my future. Seriously, the snow is up to Kale's waist.
"Trick or treat, see my cool feet, give me something warm to eat".

e harm any technological device.com

I went to my blog today and realized I have once again substituted my picture of myself for some random photo (a Jedi storm trooper from the clone wars)
without realizing what I had done. Who knows how long this has been going on. I kept looking at my daughters blogs and wondering "What whacko uses the Clone Picture?"
That would be me.
I am the antitechnology queen. I repel technology. The wonderful cell phone my daughter provides me with works really well for her, for me not so much.
The phone I bought for my house is really shiny and nice. I have no clue how to work it. There are literally hundreds of messages on it, and I am sure
some day I will figure out how to listen to and /or delete them.
The rice cooker Tobi got me like 3 birthdays ago has only been operated by me once. We still can't get the rice off the sides. BD does the rice.
I have a lovely computer which I can turn on and off beyond that I am helpless.
I had an MP3 player or whatever it is called. I could not get it to work ever.
The 7 year old has it now.
Yesterday I got a picture of my daughter Sarah's new shower. WOW. It looks like she paid someone a lot of money to do it
No no, she did it. I did a shower once. It was terrible. Actually the shower in my mother's 50 year old single wide trailer was better.
The microwave in our house does everything but wipe it self out. I just use it to heat up green beans and hot dogs. The DVR I got from Comcast sure does have a lot of
interesting buttons and selections. I like the heart shaped one. It lets me know I like this show. How it works…. Not a clue.
The car has more broken buttons than working ones, I can't figure out my 99cent calculator and my bank account is bouncing to the seventh power.
Hey I can not cook either.
Maybe I'll join eharmanytechnologicaldevice.com and get it over with.

Nothing in life is free, or working right

My car and my son
Where oh where to begin? The car came for free, but it had problems. First of all, if your car's heater is powered by a
wall light switch duct taped to 2 red wires hooked directly to your battery and laying on the passenger floor…. Well, you get the idea.
However, the only problem with the heater / air conditioner was the fan switch.
Notice I said WAS.
Then Josh tried to fix it so it did not look so "ghetto".
Notice I said tried.
Now not only does the heater not work at all, the air conditioner is on at all times. This is a problem when there is ice on the windshield. Not only that, now the rear defroster doesn't work, the fan still doesn't work even with the wall switch, and we can't change the heater to air conditioning because all the controls are frozen in place.
Needless to say I am less than happy with the current situation. The car blows cold air in the morning when it is cold and hot air in the afternoon when it's hot.
You can NOT see out the rear window unless a tropical suedo-tsunami sprays over it in the morning.
You can not be warm in the car without a fire… which I am ready to try. You have to ride around in the afternoons with a red face from the heat and all the windows down.
Maybe it is time to consult a specialist you say? If I could afford that I would not have needed a free car or a free repair.

Halloween

Halloween!!!
So the month of Halloween has begun with a bang. It is toasty warm here in Colorado… NOT.
If you call frost on the ground and a negative # for a temperature at night warm that is.
The pumpkins we grew had to be removed from the garden this year in September as the vines were freezing.
We have colds and flu and ghouls in the yard. Ah ha ha. Vampires and ghosts beware this house.
Personally the holidays begin for me when the weather changes and that seems to be this week.
The puppy thinks she has died and gone to hell and it froze over. She looks at me like "Hey where is the outside hotness?"
She is 13 weeks old now and has roughly doubled her size. She eats like a pig and hasn't turned down food yet.
I was buying uber expensive puppy food, but the big dog and the cats eat it too. Back to the normal cost food.
The kids think she is public animal enemy # 1 because she is cutting her canines now and chews on them.
The boys had to get boots today cuz wow it is crappy weather outside. Tennis shoe weather is over.
Coats and boots and long sleeves, here we go.
Brittany dyed a stripe down both the boys heads. I think they look like chia pets! I'll have to ask her to take pix.

jacob o licious

Jacob Black is HOT

Flu round 2

This week is flu round 2.
Phoenix had it last week Thursday and Friday.
Saturday we took him into the ER and became part of the statistics. "He has the flu"
Kale now has it, worse than Phoenix did.
The boy could keep a laundry mat in business today.
He is soooo sick. BD came to work to pick me up and in that amount of time he got the car, the couch in my area, the toilet, the rug in front of the toilet, my sink, both trashcans in my bathroom, and my trashcan in my office.
Did I mention he is sick? We just threw out his second outfit of the trip to pick up Amoo.
Luckily, the flu seems to have missed me and BD with the vomitus majorus and just hit us with the earthquake cramps and shooting volcano diarrhea.
Gruesome huh?
Glad you're not here?
Back to the washing machine for me.

Freddy Krueger Scary

OK I am calmed down enough now after 2 weeks to blog about the attack on Kale.
For several weeks now he has not wanted to go with his other Grandmother & Grandfather to their home. We did not know why.
We asked several times a day, Why don't you want to go to Grandma's house? Is someone mean there?
Are there scary things there? Is there someone hurting you? Etc… Always he said "No" or "I don't know"
This is a child who danced at the door waiting for her to pick him up prior to this. He would go there for days on end, spend the nights, and always wanted to go back.
I'm not saying we suck, I'm just saying he really liked it there. More than he liked it at home.
One day about 4 months ago he started refusing to go. Then as that continued he went over once under protest and after that he refused to go again.
No explanation, no reason, he just would not even discuss it. As we continued to press him to go (the other Grandmother was calling almost daily) he started throwing the most
incredible fits you have ever seen. Like a kid in the same room with Freddy Krueger fits. If she or her husband came to the door he would run through the house
screaming and hide so he did not have to see them. They own the house we live in so they come once a week to collect rent or do maintenance or mow the yard.
After the 3rd or fourth fit like this Britt forced him to go with her and his brother for a party trying to show him Grandma's house was still OK. He was fine unless she looked like she was going to move, then he freaked out.
2 Fridays ago she just had enough and made him go. When he came back I thought I was going to jail for sure.
He was covered in bloody scratches and bruises. Someone obviously slapped his face hard enough to leave a mark.
When questioned he said his grandma did it trying to keep him from jumping out of her moving car.
I called her and had a very aggressive talk with her. She told me we (BD and I ) have brainwashed Kale that she is evil and that we are to blame for his beat up state.
She challenged me to call the cops (several times) and called me basically an enemy of hers.
She told me that BD and I have gotten "What we wanted" and that she will "Never bother that child again". Wow what a great person.
By the way, we never discouraged his going to Grandma & Grandpa's house. Quite the opposite. We Loved the breaks and took advantage of the time
without the 4 year old to do some things we can Not do when he is here. Go to a movie, clean, go buy him secret birthday presents, groom the dog.
If you have ever tried to do any of these things with Kale, you understand.
No, we did not turn them in for child abuse. We did not have to. The minute he walked into school his teacher freaked out and called the cops.
Needless to say we really are enemies now. I still think she could have restrained him without the injuries, I still think she is crazy, I am still mad my grandson was hurt so badly while in her care.
Do you wonder why he won't go??? Neither do I.

I must be old

Today I am wearing a green plaid shirt, black jean shorts, purple shoes, and brown striped sox.
I was not trying to make a statement or anything, I have just gotten to the age that being to work alive means more than being there cute.
Those extra 5 or 10 minutes sleep in the morning have become so much more fun than being color coordinated.
I close my eyes and dream I live in a world where I do not have to get up yet. For just a few moments Kale will NOT be screaming when I wake his butt up
and Phoenix will not be throwing a kicky fit. There will be no chocate milt and pop tarts and nobody will be breathing on anybody else in the car.
The most strenuous thing I will do this day is stretch and play with my puppy. I won't have to chase the 4 year old out of the garden and into the car.
My boss will not give me 1,000 impossible tasks he wants done 5 minutes ago…. Etc…
After this 10 minutes of self delusion I get up, wake up BD and the boys, and begin the day. Unfortunately for everyone who looks at me I do not have time to match and I'm not "stylin" either.
Sorry world, you get it this way, or just turn your head and laugh.

I am a concession mogul

OK it started with the candy/chip machine. Vern gave it to me because he did not want to be bothered with it any more. So we have been filling it up and using the money for gas.
Then Ryan got fired and he gave me his pop machine. Then he took it back. So my boss went over to the new building where there was sitting an unused pop machine and gave me that one. The new one happened to be full of pop! Then Ryan decided his was too big to move and gave me that one too.
Now I own 2 pop machines full of pop and a candy/ chip machine full of healthy NOT snacks.
The treats are great for the kids because we virtually NEVER run out. On the down side anytime anything goes wrong with these machines I have to take out the key and fix it.
Since taking over this empire I have made some startling discoveries:
Vending machines are mouse proof (believe me if they could get in they would)
My 4 year old grandson can make a Sprite come out with a penny
There are plain old lights in the door and you have to change a bulb.
The keys are a pain in the butt but you always have change
You CAN start a fire with a bag of Frito's. Just crumple the bag up, light it, and put it under the wood. True story. I have seen it done.

Early Childhood Education will never be the same.

Today Kale led his second attempt at takeover and escape from ECE
Luckily his brother saw him running at the head of the pack of 4 year olds and body tackled him on the playground
Needless to say, Britt is on a first name basis with the principal now
Kale has only been in preschool for 5 days now and has led 2 rebellions and been to the principals office 3 times
Time out in the principals office should have a "reserved for Kale" sign on it.
We hope he gets over this soon, but it doesn't look promising. The thing is he never has been a "social" kind of kid.
He would rather keep all his stuff to himself and not have anyone else touch it. He would also rather play alone.
Sarah was like this. She once kicked all the beer cans out of Afton's car floor into the school parking lot and screamed at the principal that she was going to kill her because she did not want to go to Kindergarten that day.
All I can say is he will get over it because you can not leave the kids at home unless you want to home school them and

THAT AIN'T HAPPENING!!

It is only 33!!

Today I found a pair of crocks in my bathroom cupboard at work!
It is 6 months now that we have had the doggie. In that time she has eaten 33 pair of shoes.
Here is the list:
3 pair of the boys sandals (1 was Thomas the Train Light Up) 3
5 pair of the boys flip flops (2 were from those 3 piece outfits with flip flops on them) 8
2 pair of my church shoes 10
3 pair of Brittany's tennis shoes 13
1 pair of my tennis shoes 14
1 of my pink crocks 15
1 of my green crocks 16
Kale's sponge bob crocks 17
Kale's spider man crocks 18
Phoenix's spider man crocks 19
Phoenix's blue crocks 20
4 pair of Phoenix's tennis shoes 24
Brittany's purple and blue flip flops 26
Brit's boots, both pair 28
My leather slippers
29
Britt's Van's
30
3 pair of Dakota's tennis shoes 33

While I am a pretty patient mammallama, I have started to be just a little testy over the price of shoes. She also eats plastic, wood, stuffed toys, small metal toys, and all manner of paper. She ate an entire bag of maxi pads last weekend. We gotta find a solution soon.
She also dug a chuck hole to China in the back yard. The boys took it over and now it is a G.I. Joe bunker. They even cut tree branches to camouflage it.

The C Word

Monday night a bug crawled into my house. I nearly died when I realized what it was.
The day had been a particularly crappy one and it lacked but that to make it total Schnit.
Tonja had placed a box of potato flakes on the bottom shelf of the microwave cart, and it ended up in the box.
EEEEEWWWWWW what a terrible feeling.
To make matters worse.. Dakota heard us say the "C" word
and went around telling the boys all about it. Then the 3 of them had a C….. Party. They spent the next
3 or 4 hours repeating the "C" word to each other and yelling from various parts of the house that they had seen a bug with this name. Later at the grocery store they took turns telling anyone who would listen that we had this kind of bug and they saw it! All over the house!, in every room!.
The next morning I spent $100.00 to procure the means for BD to spray, gel, trap, clean, and eliminate any and all traces of "C" 's.
We are stinking poor and have no grocery money, but there will be NO "C" 's in my house.
If I have to move, I will move.
If I have to spend 50% of my time with bleach and spray,
I will do it.
But I will NOT live in a house with a "C".
Call me neurotic if you will, but my childhood was too horribly filled with this "C" bug and I can NOT stand them now. Every 4 or 5 years I would take my kids to see my mother so they would know her a little. They were equally grossed-out by the "C" 's. If I could eliminate one thing from earth. It would be all the "C" 's.

A Friend

Today should have been an average Monday. It should have been very busy with payroll and hunting down the workers who did not report their time correctly. That should have been my day.
It was NOT that average Monday day.
Today my friend died. This past spring, he gave me a car. We have inhabited the same workplace for 3 1/2 years. I have a hole in my heart for Shaun today. He is a really nice man.
Be good to your friends and family. Be nice to everyone you can. You might blink and they will be gone. Taken away before you had a chance to heal that hurt or end the fued.
I love you Sarah. From the day you barreled your way into the world screaming like a little white haired angel with a bad attitude. Till the day you left my house with your 2 wonderful boys a few days ago.. I have never stopped loving you.
I love you Tobi. From the moment you took your first breath till the day you drove away (looking left with a stiff neck)... I have never stopped loving you.
If the world keeps me on it for a hundred years I will never stop loving you.
I love you Xandra. From the moment you were born till this moment and every moment in between.. I have loved you as only a grandmother could.
If I have done anything bad or stupid and it has offended any of you. I am sorry. Please forgive me. I love you.
Life is short and my friend was only 49 years old. He planned to go to Vegas when he turned 50 this year a few days after my birthday. He wanted to be just like you and me and live on and on. He had 2 cats which will be coming to live with me soon.
Don't turn your back on love, everyone needs to be loved and to love.

The garlic is missing!

Tonight we are having pork tenderloin. It is supposed to be Garlic Pork Tenderloin but ...The garlic is missing. OK I know I bought this jar of minced garlic on the 9th of this month. I know it came home with me because I have been moving it every 3 or 4 days so I can get to my Cheese slices and then putting it back in front of them in the door of the fridge. Now the whole jar is gone.
"Where do vanished items go? Into non-being which is to say everything".
No way, did I just quote Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows? Yes, I did. Anyway the world just got a little smellier because the garlic is gone. But I have to wonder, where does the stuff hide while we rip our houses apart room by room looking for it? Is there a room of requirement in my house with all the chuckling sox and keys in it? Are there piles and piles of my mail sitting in some secret chamber waiting for a chance to fall on me?
The sock thing is out of control. I have a giant basket full of un-mated sox. I think I am going to buy 300 pairs of the same sox from now on so I can loose 1/2 of them and not care.
I saw the Harry Potter movie last Saturday and it was soooooo good. I already knew the plot from the books but the whole thing was so much better than I had guessed it would be. Ron is very funny in this movie. The whole book is there except my favorite chapter ever written by JK "Will and Won't". Ah... to see the Dursleys with glasses bouncing on their heads. A small let down. Other than that it is wonderful.

The beatings will continue until morale improves.

Today did not start out well.
I had a huge hole in my tire and pulled over into Prairie Dog city to change it.
So I thought I would call work and see if one of the manly men there would come rescue me from the Plague riddled area and fix my tire.
NO They were all busy doing "manly" work things.
I changed my first flat tire today. HA I did it with nothing but a book and a little tiny jack kit thingy. HA
I kept wondering if one of the Prairie Dogs was gonna bite me in the butt for sitting so near them and give me Bubonic Plague.
They seemed to think it was the better part to ignore me (since I was sitting in all the Plague germs they left on the ground?)
It may be that I am contaminated with Plague germs on my shorts and shoes, but I triumphed over the tire!!
Meanwhile, several of these manly men have stopped by my desk to check up on their paycheck's progress.. What gall. I have a can of fix a flat on my desk and a sour look on my face.
There will BE NO PAYROLL QUESTIONS TODAY.

Clumsy??

Clumsy don't mean stupid.
Just because I tripped over the contents of the bad bag from WalMart which gave out and dumped in front of my feet as I was walking to put it away
doesn't mean I'm clumsy
The arm in the sling and the several bandages on my body
do not mean I rolled like a 1960's space capsule on re-entry or that I landed like one either... Ker Splash
The crooked glasses and corresponding hole in the door
does not really prove the theory of a graceless face-plant
The fact that I limped into work today
proves I am not totally wiped out, doesn't it?
Or is this just another sign of stupidity showing back up at the scene of the wipeout??
Maybe tomorrow I won't wake up wondering if anyone got the number of the truck that hit me. Meanwhile, I stumble on.
Wounded but still kicking

Fun Fun Fun

There has been a giant upheaval in the household for the last week. Summer is here and with it we get Dakota. I love each and every one of my Grandchildren, but put 3 hyper boys in a house together and whoa nelly is there a lot of stuff going on. We now have 2 military bases (made of turned over furniture and blankets) A haunted house made of toy boxes and a turned over couch and beds. And the bathroom door is history. Evidently, nobody, not-me, and I don't know broke it. There are no dry towels in this house and all the shorts are wet too. Hoses are for soaking. The trampoline is dead and we need to get a new one. I believe one of the Jedi used the force on it and broke the springs during the epic battle last week. During the boxing match Kale got a great bruise on his face. Phoenix has stripes on his limbs from the Kung Fu battle with Ninja sticks. Dakota has no shoes left in the place because while he was pretending to be a pitt Bull and biting the dog she evidently took it to heart and ate his shoes later in revenge. There is also no food in the house because 13 year olds can EAT. Nothing is sacred. He will eat it unless it runs out the door first. 4 gallons of milk last 2 days! Ice cream is bought in the giant bucket size and we just keep the koolaid faucet running. He can also (assisted by Phoenix) eat one of those HUGE bags of cereal in a day. I love the caos!! Tonight we taught them to table dance for dollars!!
No what really happened was I bought them each shirts and flip flops and Dakota pointed out that they all match, at which point I had a mutiny on my hands and had to give them each a dollar to pose.
Gotta go.. Smoke alarm usually means trouble...

Drip Drip Drip

I am at home today doing the watch the boys thing. This is the 23rd episode of Sponge Bob whatever pants I have (listened) to while doing the laundry, cleaning, feeding the dog, and generally trying to stay the heck away from the TV. (Somebody get me a gun)
Of course, since we all had to be here for whatever this holiday is, the weather is Hurricane force rain outside. I'm not kidding it is pouring. And has been pouring for 3 days. The kids are bored, the trampoline is falling apart, the ground looks like Bikini Bottom, and the dog smells bad. Usually when I am watching the boys I can kick back with the (little green music holder) and rock out. However, since it is colder than an ice cube and Kale keeps stripping down and going outside to see if that rain is still cold... I have no Muzak to sooth me except what I can drum up in my soggy brain. I mentally can not bring any songs to mind except the theme song to Sponge Bob so here goes with my version:
Who lives in a barnacle under my butt?
Who screams every minute and acts like a putz?
Who's shows most annoying in all of TV?
If screaming insanity is something you need,
Turn on Nickelodeon and finally go nuts.
OK so it is not the best poem I ever wrote, but I am working with one brain cell activated and a huge psychological deficit here.

The BLA (guh) of it

I have a small confession:

What I do not understand about this blog spot would fill a very large bucket
I am not very technologically proficient
Can't do pictures (attaching, editing, removing)
Can't do backgrounds (colors, moving objects, links)
Sometimes can post a blog or edit one.
Very proficient at deleting the one I meant to save and having to re type it.
Exemplary at miss-spelling and skipping a word.

My daughter Sarah is using her webcam as a normal camera and sending out pictures of her son's latest haircut.
Not to be jealous or anything (I really appreciate the pix) but darn it I can barely aim and click the camera.

Tobi (also a daughter) has her self portrait on the web. Which she took herself. I would be lucky to have 1/2 my thumb and a blur on the photo.

Britt (also a daughter are you seeing a trend here?) puts all these cool pictures and backgrounds on her blog.

My antitechnologyism is really getting to me. Last week I texted an Egyptian hieroglyph to Brit's phone.
She forwards my texts to Tobi and Sarah for interpretation, then gets her sisters consensus on what I meant to text, then texts me back.
All this is done faster than I can do the first screw-up.

So call me the reigning queen of terrible at technology then please Tobi, get me a new background and some cute pix.

Thanks

Mammallamma

Ode de toydee

O Charmin you are so soft & sweet
I never use you without a little sigh
and even though you are for my butt and tweet (er)
I love you more than that gas station brand BD buys

Thank you Sarah for the ton-o-fun you sent to me for mothers day
I love the softness and sweetness of it and after all the chocolate BD made for me, it was most useful.
We shall be well-prepared for the visitation of the members of Stark Industries.
My hemorrhoids salute you.
(Now there's a visual for ya)

Boom Boom

This was a picture of a gun
Tomorrow is Armed Forces Day. Yee Haw.
In consideration of what day it is I wanted to dedicate this blog to my son in law Joel who is my Army man.
Sorry for the missing picture of old guns Joel, but this is the best gun picture I could find in my age group.
Thank you for serving our country and beating down the enemy of our great nation: (Guitar Hero)
Thank you for the millions of hours spent in ultra boredom and for the communal sleep in a giant sand-infested flea pit.
Thank you for the armpits of death you endured for months on end. Thanks for the crappy food consumption and the holidays spent away from all you love.
Thank you for dressing in 90+ pounds of uniform and armor to go out in 100+ degrees.
And last but not least, thank you for always having my fake son-in-law grin ready for my lovely daughter when you get home.

The dreaded 8

8 Things I look forward to:
When my mind and body finally agree what age we are
Every call from any of my kids
The day I conquer the cell phone or the computer
4:30pm Monday through Friday
The day I own my own house (not that renting has stopped me from improving it mind you)
Packages, gifts, treatsies, surprises!!!
Trying any new kind of chocolate
Visiting the grand kids

8 Things I did yesterday
Talked to Tobi (she sounds like she is Minni Me Mouse)
Built Mothers day cards with the kids
Taught a Primary lesson
Went to Church
Taught Phoenix and Kale to play marbles
All the laundry
Carried a 4 year old with 2 casts on her legs around sharing time
Cleaned Kale's room to find his Superman Costume

8 Things I wish I could do
See all 10 of my Grand kids together at once
Keep the dog from eating shoes
Exercise without cardiac repercussions
Take a long Hawaiian vacation
Swim every day
Help all my kids with money
Shop for new furniture
Move to a better neighborhood


8 Shows I watch
Survivor
Escape to Chimp Eden
Iron Chef
House
Star Trek (whenever it is on)
uh… That's it

Some reasons I will not tag anyone
Don't know 8 bloggers
Do not want to anger anyone
I do eat chocolate at least 3 times a day so I am mellow
It took me 3 days to complete this

Happy Mothers Day

What makes a mother? It is definitely not the ability to cook, or clean, or sew, or even give birth. It is the ability to nurture. To love someone more than yourself. Motherhood is about support and character building. About Constant Vigilance, teaching, and protection. To care for and about that being even when they are at their most un-lovable. Through all the illnesses, sleepless nights, corny school plays, a B+ on homework (you mostly did for them), sports events they lost, ice cream headaches, tooth fairy night maneuver's, and other less challenging moments; you watch them with a sparkle in your eye (and some times a twitch in that eye too) and love in your heart that can not be described in words. It is knowing that this person is yours and you are theirs... forever. If the world stopped tomorrow and all the universe ceased to exist, being a mother was the one thing I did which I am proud of. Look at these people, I did that!!

A Bone to pick

There are 206 bones in the human body. I actually have had one removed so I have less. In the 70/80's I could have named them all. Now all I want is for the ones I have to stop aching.

How the heck did I get old? I don't feel this old mentally. I still want to play (the soul is willing, the flesh is weak). I still crave the things I craved in my 20's. How did this happen?

It seems like yesterday I was in college and my kids were babies. Now I have 10 grandkids! How the heck did I get 10 grandkids? (One or more of my children had sex, I just know it).

There are many changes associated with getting older which I must say have been less than fun. Who changed my hair to grey? I can barely hear anymore if there is background noise. My patience is better, but who wants me to wait for anything now? If I want something, I just work for it or go get it. I have faulty eyesight and someone moved my waist down south somewhere out of the country.
The point of the geriatric biology rant is that I protest! Everything seems to be on a downward slide when I should be free to be me. When I was younger I put everything I wanted on hold and raised the kids. I couldn't just sling the kids aside and go do what I wanted, I had responsibilities. After they all leave and I am a single entity again, the body falls apart. That is SO not fair. Where is the justice in this system? Maybe I am finally having a fleshy breakdown to go with the mental breakdown I had a hundred catastrophe's ago?.

Sit up and beg

OK so now I can text with a degree of suckitude that is acceptable. It is nowhere near as fast or perfect as the younger generation, but it is not unintelligible gibberish any more either. I get about every 4th or 5th word wrong, misspelled, or changed in translation. On the whole I have mixed emotions about text ing.
On the plus side:
My boss can't spy on me and hear what I am saying to whoever I text.
There is no "Ding Dong the Witch is Dead" tune associated with it.
It saves time.

On the minus side:
It is less personal.
The keys are small.
There is no Hands Free text ing.
Actually the whole text ing thing can be whacked because if you have no bars you are screwed either way.
So I guess the shiny new is off this one.

However, I must print a retraction. You can teach an old dog new tricks.

Roll over and play dead

They say you can't teach an old dog new tricks. Such is the case really. My daughter called me yesterday and told me we have a new service on our cell phones; text messaging! I was over-joyed. Taking phone in hand I leaped into the new Milena and text ed the following: "z,mnfa;iepru39gig nanc274-1n,zmnf'sdfja'kfj"
The darn phone tries to anticipate what I am spelling and leaps to the wrong word every time. If I try to back up or keep going it just keeps guessing.... WRONG. I can spell the words to and the. End of understanding between me and the text messaging machine.
Thus, my little minions if you do not get a text from mom at all, or get one which is incoherent babbling..
Yes it really is from me and you can't teach an old dog new tricks.

Buttocksicants

My boss, wonderful man that he is offered me a gym membership. If I will go, he will pay.

The offer is a double edged sword. If he pays I MUST go because it would seem ungrateful of me to not go.
However... If I go I may just die. Seriously, I have a heart problem.
There is also the matter of my buttocksicants. I am used to a certain amount of cushioning in the rear. In fact I am used to a certain level of creature comforts which do NOT include sweat rolling off my body, fast movement of the vertical mass, or leaving my home.
A good book, a good movie, a good steak, chocolate sin cake, and a diet coke. Arranging these things takes time, effort, and $. These are the things I like around me. My dog and grandchildren are also invited as long as they don't try any poaching on my cake.
Buttocksicants are the hormones and fat levels in my body telling me to "just say no" to exercise. For 53 years they have ruled my body.
On the other hand, it is free. On the other hand me in yellow and blue spandex? On the other hand everything is headed south. Did I mention the spandex?
Dilemma in deed.

De-hurt-full retraction

So, having been duly chastised by my wonderful daughter who selflessly took her children to the Easter Egg Hunt... I Mammallama now print my de-hurt-full retraction.
You are not the worst monee on the earth for not coloring eggs with your children. You are all that is wonderful and wise and fed them healthy wabbit food after the hunt. I am bad and posted an internet-wide blogger alert to the world that you did not color eggs: which you and only you will ever read. (My other 2 followers will never be aware how bad I am).
Obviously you were indulged too much by their awful mother and pampered far too much with the dye and egg routine. Only constant vigilance will prevent me from making such an announcement again however as I am old and forgetfull.
And anyways, I can't take out an add in the Rocky Mountain News as the paper went belly-up a month ago and closed forever.

Global Warming?

Wow.
It is 40 below outside and there is a blizzard. It is April 5th!! OK so hell has frozen over, why isn't Joel blogging?
He has writers block? A broken arm? (possible)
A prior commitment to type?
HA!
My daughters all type. Maybe it is a man thing? Oh well, we did not want to know what was going on in your life anyway. Take that slobber mouth!
Meanwhile on the home front . . .
Joshua has put in another change of address to the post office. That means that we are once again NOT getting our mail. Neither is he of course. Every few months he or his wife go to the Montghetto post office and try to control the bureaucracy. Other than probable entertainment value for the pissed off postal workers, the effect of this is that we get NO mail for a few weeks afterward. I swear my son and his wife both have ESP because they always do this when we are expecting something important in the mail. We ordered a series of books. Now the only thing I got today was my son's bank statement.
Luckily, he called me to tell me this time so I am not left just wondering where my books are. They are being held hostage at the mail center, or just being used to warm some disgruntled postal workers house as there is a blizzard outside right now. We never see this mail when he does this. It has disappeared into the postal void forever. This is the 3rd time he has done this.
Welcome to reality son.
There is a USPS and they really do not care.
A lot. All the time.

To my dumb (see picture) daughter.
Explaining to me why you did not just spread out the mats I bought for the car so your evile children could not spill any more
candy, chips, french fries, soda, chochate nilk, water, gatorade, flarf in a can, cookies, pancake on a stix, chickken
nunnets, more candy, and all the wrappers, bags, receipts, packaging, boxes, and or covers associated with those things
does NOT make it OK that the mats are still not on the floor of the car. Tossing them into the back seat in a heap
does NOT cover up the carpet stain the size and color of a grapefruit back there. The fact that the mats are in the car means you did see them.
What did you think I bought them for? The 7 times I have had you clean out the car since I bought them it did not occur to you I meant them to be placed
in the back seat floor? (See Above) Move your tushie out to the driveway immediately and put them in place!!

Snow snow go away, come again some other day. That could be our theme song for March/ April here in Colorado. Every other couple of days we get a snow pounding. From 2" to 15". Then the weather goes back to 60 or 70 degrees and it all melts. Then it snows again. Yesterday evening it snowed a couple of inches, now it is all gone. Saturday is supposed to be snowy again (6 inches). I am not sure what the weather is doing, but we did not have any real winter weather so I guess it is good. I have lost all faith in the Weatherman but mostly he has been within a few days of each change. On last nights weather forecast he said it was "partly cloudy with a 65% chance of snow". I looked out and it was snowing. Hey buddy, get a window installed in the TV station broadcasting area.

What a weird spring

Today I am at home. Spring is here. Along with Spring we got 15" of snow. This is the first snow storm we have had this whole Winter/Spring that left any real accumulation of snow. The interesting thing about this is that we had all the kids home for spring break. I have sent them outside with our newly purchased snow shovels (they were on clearance on Wednesday when I went to the store) and a mandate to move the snow off the sidewalk. I can hear them moving the snow on the patio around in the back yard. Yesterday they buried the dog twice in snow up to her nose. Luckily, this is a very fun-loving dog and she just shook it off, climbed out of the mound and play bit the shovel for a while. Today, armed with shovels and a brightly shining sun to melt it a bit, they should be able to make some huge fortress of defense or some such thing in the yard. Meanwhile, having a free KIA for a car I have not been to work for 2 days as the blizzard and accumulated snow make the probability of my wrecking almost 100%. I will go tomorrow and spend 1/2 a day piddling around. Nobody at my work can work in snow this deep. We do construction.. outdoor only. I did call this morning and they said "Don't come in". Hopefully the mailman will get here today. He did not make it yesterday. The kids are quiet now so I better go see what terrible thing they are up to.
Anywho happy Friday!!

Grandmother Hood

Ah Grandmotherhood what a great state of being.
All the fun and none of the responsibility. It doesn't bother me if they eat donuts for breakfast because tomorrow they will be back with Mom & Dad toeing that healthy eating line. The fits and crying is going to end soon because their parental units will be coming back to take over. So I bought them a toy and let them play with play dough on your living room carpet, so what? I'll be gone and you get to clean it up. Cupcakes before dinner? Who told you that? We played hide and seek in your bedroom? Who said we couldn't? Make them clean up their mess, wash themselves, eat dinner first, behave? Don't ever say it. That is anti-amoo-istic.
Grand motherhood is ideal for those of us unfulfilled moms. The more irritated and agitated the parents of your grand kids get, the happier you become.
It is a carma thing. "Let your children do unto you as you did to me".
And man does it work.

Tobi was the princess and her father and his parents made NO bones about it. I was a wart on the end of her prince Charming's nose. Daddy was the greatest thing ever invented, and I was second to everyone else in her lineup. I was incapable of doing it right, and let me tell you when a 5 year old pops off regularly about how "You're doing it wrong!", that hurts.
AH the sweetest little dumpling on the earth is Cora. She has figured out which buttons to push on Monie and she does it really well.
My Grandmother Carma alarm goes into peals of delight whenever I see that girl.
Joshua was the martyr. Every time Dakota hangs his head and acts like he is dying from the request his parents just made, I nearly fall over with glee. What? He is failing Art? No kidding, let me see, what grades did you get in Jr. High? He only wants to play games and has 3 girlfriends at 11? No! Dalton is throwing a fit for a giant radio control Hummer and you said NO? Let Amoo get that for you Darling.

Sarah was self contained. All she needed was a kinky and a thumb. Nothing I provided or did mattered to her. She had the world figured out and wanted to be left the hell ALONE. She even did not like the name I gave her and made us all call her Michelle for years and years. She moved under the stairs once to get away from all of us.
Ian is a jewel. He thinks he knows everything and wants to do it ALONE. It is almost more than I can bear because she also got the "Girly Girl" Xandra. It is like if I went out and picked a kid to torture Sarah the most, it would be a girly girl. TEE HEE Not to mention the shoe thing, (rapturous waves here) that your daughter would be in love with the one thing you are most possessive over is very Carmic and she is officially her mother's size now!!

When ever Phoenix throws a screaming tantrum and Kale announces that he has "stones and a man stick in my pants", besides being a little emarrassed, I come close to a brain embolism of happy retribution. Brittany looks like the Secretary of State when the whole world has gone to DEFCON 3 and the President calls on the Red Phone for an accounting. Her eyes shoot fire at the kids but all she can do is make these horrible faces and watch as the whole (store, doctor's office, mall, dentist's office, whatever) turns to see who's really BAD children these are and watch the drama. I just gratefully slip into the other aisle to shake with laughter. You were SO BAD as a child Brittany.
Yes, being a Grandmother is like a giant Carma fest. You took it like a trooper lady, now come get some back!!

The whole thing was a plot. You and the prince were in league the whole time.

Ok so I talked to dumbellina and he married her in September. Supposedly, it was by force. Who held the rifle? He was tired of her parents complaining about the fact that they were "living in sin" and she was whining about this all the time.
This is why I am single. No body (male or female) over the age of 10 should be allowed to whine. This should be an offense punishable by removal of voice-box forever.
I guess you could say he got whined into it?
I can tell you how it really went, he gave in so the rich in-laws would find him more acceptable. I am the poor relation and I admit not caring that I am the poor relation, so I don't count.
Lets take a poll here.
1. Do you have a responsibility to let the woman who squoze you forth from her loins know that you have added a member to your family? Even if she is the poor relation?
2. If you drop your progeny off to be baby-sat by your relative more than 1/2 their summers and time off school, does that constitute "keeping in touch with Mom"?
3. If you have more fast food take out places on your speed dial than the yellow pages, but can't remember your Mother's phone # or when Mother's Day is, is that a Freudian slip?
4. If the phrase "We didn't tell anyone" means you only told your Parents in law, your kids, everyone at work, your POS father, all your new wife's co-workers, all the people you "hang" with, and just not your relatives on your mother's side of the family, is this prejudicial?

My dummy of a son strikes again

What is wrong with men in general? What is wrong with my son? He got married 2 days after my birthday and did not tell me. HELLO it is 4 months later and I found out from my daughters on the phone last night. Married!! Yes, actually I can believe this. He diss'es me every Mother's day and says he "forgot". He totally blanks out my birthday every year and says he "forgot". (It is a freeking HOLIDAY). He ignores me every Christmas and stops at the grocery store on the way over to pick up the loot for his kids and claims that he is broke again this year, then gives me a random something he bought 3 minutes before he got there.
So what about the girl. She has been in my house several times since the event, why did she not say something??? Hello, I married your son yesterday? Oh look, the ring I've had for 3 years is really a wedding band now? I changed my name to your last name the other day?? By the way your son did the cutest thing the other day... he married me?
Maybe I am old fashioned but isn't this supposed to be an event?
Maybe I am stuck in the past, but isn't this supposed to be something you celebrate?
Maybe I should have asked "Hey, what did you guys do for my birthday this year?"
Help me Obi Wan, you're my only hope.

I have found them

Girl Scout Cookies. We have searched the greater Denver area for them and finally found the mother load! Britt spent every penny we have on them. I would have gone into debt personally for the crunchy goodness of thin mints and Samoas. They only come once a year so we will be fighting over the last box. The boys are not as enthused as BD and I are. They would really rather have a toy.
I would like to line my small freezer in the boxes and keep this delicious treat all year long. Alas, Samoas, I knew thee well.

FRIDAY BOOYAH
It just does not get any better than this. You can see the weekend clearly from here.
The work week is nearly done and 1/2 the people take today off as part of their weekend anyway.
I personally love Fridays because the phones are generally slow, the boss leaves early, we may get to leave early, and best of all… when I get off I am not coming right back after some sleep!
The recreational part of my life begins tonight!!
WOO HOO
Bring out the scrabble and orange soda.
The party animal in me is flexing her claws. I might even wash the dog.

Thursday is the day you wait. I am currently waiting for Friday.
Thursday happens very close to the week-end and if you are careful and quiet you can see Saturday coming.
Usually things pick up at the grindage because everyone wants to get it all done by Friday afternoon.
You begin to see signs of life and the future doesn't seem so far down the road now.
Today in my little section of the work area I am wearing my readers because I forgot my real glasses.
The boss had me book a room in Cortez Colorado for some delivery or other and the light at the end of the tunnel
is actually visible. Yes, it is true, this week has an end and it's almost here!!

Wednesday
Wednesday is the day which marks the beginning of the better part of the grindage.
The first 2 days are terrible and much groaning and grimacing accompany them.
This day has a little lift at the end of it because the grind is 1/2 over when Wednesday ends. Here at my work it is also pay day, so everyone attends the grind today. Payday and being able to see the of the end of this week are great reasons to be here on Wednesday.
By Wednesday you actually have remembered what you were doing on Friday and with any luck, you have finished most of it by now.
The grindage seems to have a lighter grey color on Wednesday afternoon
All extracurricular activities occur on Wednesday nights. (Baseball practice, Karate practice, Whiffle Ball practice) Some sports director somewhere decided we are awake enough by Wednesday evening to deliver kids to the practices. I babysit while BD works.
This is a test of my patience and the kids' ability to work a nerve. So far, they are winning big time.
So here is a cheer for Wed Nes Day. The middle of the week is here!

Terrible Tuesday

Terrible Tuesday
Tuesday is the second day of the grind. It is not as much of a shock as Monday was to your system, yet it isn't far enough into the week to be a good day either.
Tuesday begins a little earlier than Monday as you haven't got the "I got used to sleeping in" excuse to use on this day.
Most serious work begins on Tuesday since everyone wandered around on Monday talking about the weekend all day.
Also most serious work dodging begins on Tuesday. My boss doesn't show up until Tuesdays because the previous day is a recovery day for him.
When the boss shows up it is like a hurricane goes through the office. Suddenly paper starts flying, chairs throw their occupants out into the isles,
or people in the isles run for their chairs, laughter and talk stop, writing implements fly, the calculators clickety click, file drawers open and close,
the computers flash as all the internet connections go down, and a hundred mouses click at once.
This day should be taken out of the week just for being so boring. In fact, the only good thing about Tuesday is that Monday is over.
Let the monotony continue.

Not me Mondays.... ew!

MONDAYS
MONDAY UCK.
Monday is the first day of the grind.
You go to work and pretend you remember what you were doing Friday, then pretend to continue doing it.
Every other earth dweller at your work complains that the weekend days are shorter and go faster than the workdays.
This will generallly be the topic of discussion most of the morning on Grind Day.
Smile and nod. Phrases like "you're not kidding" and "It went so fast" will help with this affirmation of a time warp.
Do not become alarmed, there is no break in the space time continum.
The weekend days seem to go faster because we do not stare at a clock all day wishing it would move faster.
Time at work on Monday is called "the grind". This reference has absolutely nothing to do with the speckled black and
brown remains in a filter.
"Grind" when used in reference to Monday means the heel of your respective boss' shoe which is placed on your neck when you walk through the door of your workplace and is usually removed only on Friday afternoon when he goes golfing. Without you.
It is called "the" grind because each one is taylor made just for your mind's torture.
Sometime when we are all sleeping as children, someone measured us and created work to slowly turn us all into homicidal maniacs. This is best known as going Postal, because it works best on the mailman.
Thus every Monday we trudge in to our prison and start out a 5 day course of work and take up the monotony call.

One week later....

The lump on the noggin was the worst of the bruise damage.

What is really funny about this post is that like the quoter that I am I always say "and then I'll turn green, and grow a second head". This is from Fraggle Rock and is usually in reference to something I believe will never happen.

So due to circumstances beyond my control, I grew the second head (a goose egg) and then turned green. Evidently, I can turn green. The lovely lump from the lava lamp turned into a lovely green bruise and is sliding off my head onto my forehead.

The second funny thing I want you to know is that I had decided to wear yellow spandex and be Wolverine for the family reunion which all of us had decided would be Super Hero themed.

The 3 wounds on the back of my hands actually hurt the worst of any of the injuries on my body and I have officially decided the look might not be worth the effort.

There is no cute way of presenting these pictures. The road rash starts here and goes on down to the knees. 9 days old, it looks like someone beat me with a hammer. For the sake of semi-modesty I draped and covered and shot the pix from weird angles. Hope you (especially my son in laws) are not gouging your own eyes out right about now. I left out the chin, stomach and thighs, hoping to keep that illusion of beauty and boobs!

Anyway I wanted to blog something funny and the state of the body right now is funny. All I need is to be in a car wreck with someone I am mad at. I could get anyone arrested. "Look, he beats me all the time!"

At work they think I have formed some old ladies Fight Club and am bare knuckle brawling at night. The rational is that I could not get this many cuts, bruises and lumps on my own without being in a serious fight. They keep asking me if I am OK at home with BD. Like she is boozing it up and clobbering me at night. As IF.

I would kick her trash.

The best week - and the worst week

OK This is getting crazy around my life.
Today a man at work gave me a vending machine.
That's right, a vending machine.
We were all complaining that he never fills the thing up and it has been empty for several weeks and he turned to me and said he would give it to me if I wanted it. So I filled it up and here we are with a vending machine.
Crazy huh? I watched him clean all the quarters out of it and he said he makes about $1,200 a year on the machine if he keeps it filled.
I am not sure what to do except go with it.......
AND RAISE THE PRICES!!
Hey, the guy who owned it before was not filling it up because the price of things has gotten so high he was only making 3 cents an item.
So I changed the prices and filled it up. We will see if it works!
I can not imagine it will sell less than it already does and if it does then I'll stop putting stuff in it.

Meanwhile, I expect to be in the hospital or worse tomorrow anyway. I have had 2 really bad accidents this week and tomorrow is Friday the 13th! I fell down the driveway on Monday and bumped my chin on the curb. I have several large bruises up and down my front. My right hand looks like Wolverine after he pulls back in the claws, only it's road rash.
Last night I pulled a Lava lamp down onto my forehead in BD's bed while I was asleep "*&^%$*". It really hurt and now I have a goose egg and a bruise on my head also.
Maybe tomorrow I'll let BD drive me to work since I seem to be on some sort of mission for injury this week.
Anyway it has been a crazy crazy crazy life so far and this week seems to be destined to make a memorable one out of itself.

The dog is NOT a puppy!

The dog is not a puppy. So why does she chew virtually everything except what she is supposed to? I am a giant chew toy. The old beds are chew toys. The pencils and pens and crayons in the house, chew toys. The blankets and sheets, chew toys. The children's toys, chew toys. Every shoe known to have graced any ones foot in the house, chew toys. Plastic cups, paper plates, Kleenex, t.p., paper towels, sponges, paint brushes, and oven mitts, you guessed it, chew toys!
The friggin chew toys we buy by the dozen?, ignored chew toys. She spits the rawhide bonz and chaser ballz back at me like they are poison.
This is not a stupid dog. The other night Phoenix did not finish his hostess cupcake and left it on my bedside table. The dog snatched it up and ran. I screamed "NO BAD DOG" and then sensing that I was too late I lectured her on the possible death she faced from Chocolate and how bad it was for her, etc.... She had not gone 3 feet away and she just stood there cowering and looking at me. When I was done she spit the whole darn cupcake back up on the floor. She had not even chewed it. It still had some t.p. around it from when I took it from Phoenix and wrapped it up. As I said this is not a stupid dog. Since then she has NEVER touched anything on my bedside table. I write this as I have taken from her mouth in the last 5 minutes, a pen, 1/2 of a sponge paintbrush, a peg from the bookcase, and a wad of t.p.
The other thing I have a problem with for Cheyenne is that she will NOT wear any kind of leash, halter, or collar. She chews them off. She actually growled at me when I tried to put one on. I think someone tied her up and beat her or something. Anyway, she is upstairs now terrorizing something so I better go find her.

My thing is broke

It's official, my blog spot is broken. I must sincerely apologize to all of the blog visitors here for this. My "I tag" thing dropped some of my responses, perhaps in boredom, and my muzak is stuck on the Grinch song.
Since I have NO clue how to change these things we are all stuck with it.
I would send an SOS to Tobi (the blogmaster) but she is out making her debit card smoke at the Mecca by now as her taxes finally came.
Deal with the lame outdated muzak and 1/2 dead profile people we are in a recession here.

Yes, this is a pitiful attempt to shame my blogmaster to fix the blog.

What wandering I do

What is the deal?
About a year ago I started taking Ambien to sleep
You take the pill and blammo, 15 minutes later you are out. Or so I thought.
Then one day I discovered that I was missing time. I started the movie "Hellboy" and I vaguely remember turning it off. When I turned the DVD player on the next day, it was at the end of the movie. I remember about 10 minutes of the movie. I actually was up and playing with my grandson and watching the movie for a couple of hours after my memory ends.
Since that incident I have been having these sleep "walking" episodes a lot. From what my kids say I guess I am coherent, agile, and able to do complicated tasks like cooking.. all while technically asleep. I don't know if I really am "asleep" but I have only vague memories, if any the next day of what I did. Last night I painted my grandson Kale's room blue.
I remember the beginning of the process like taping up the doors and the floors, but I woke up without a spot of blue on me… so either I bathed or I am a better painter when I am asleep than when I am awake.
I have painted 4 rooms in my home, sewed up a bunch of pant hems for my grandson, cooked, cleaned, done laundry, had several dozen conversations with various people, even put the trash out on the curb.
The one activity I find most bizarre is that I cook when I am unaware I am doing it. One day I woke up to a wonderful smell and discovered I had cooked a whole turkey dinner the night before. I have since made corned beef in the crock pot and a couple different roasts (all of which I do not remember doing).
I seem to have no ill effects from all this night time adventuring and I stay in the house, so who can say why I am doing it and if it is bad or good?
I only know I wish I had this when my kids were growing up. My house is easier to clean when I don't know I'm doing it.

Yes Virginia there still is a Santa Clause

Wow what a day. A man at work gave me a car today! A car. Not just a POS either. A real working running car. What a wonderful gift. Here I was just feeling sorry for me with no car and POW there it is ... instant car!

Thing one and thing two thing two and thing one
they are the most fun under the son(s)
The doggies are fun, most of the time. Yesterday Kale had a medical problem and BD took him to the ER. When we got home the basement floor was gone. This was what I had to remove to find it then clean up pee and poop too!!
They had chewed up and scattered the following stuff:
a stuffed dog toy of Xandras about the size of a small cat
a nail file talk about your roughage
several mcdonalds wrappers and empty cups straws are apparently un- shreadable
a set of pantyhose yes they were pink, and now they are gone
a couple of towels one white, one Ironman
3 crocks in assorted colors and sizes One red white and blue, one spiderman, one black fleece
my tennis shoes Beyond recall
a trash can (plastic) only a dollar, but truly spectacularly torn up
3 plastic bags from WalMart free, fun, and gone
SEVERAL TOYS I have no idea what they were prior to detonation
2 toilet paper rolls these make great noises prior to death
1 paper towel roll ditto
a king size blanket More fun than the towels I think
a standard pillow and case disappeared
several balls all missing chunks
3 Plastic cups also smashed, thrashed, broken, bye bye
a giant bag of candy from Kale's Birthday party
nothing but tiny bits of wrapper for miles and miles
(Kale is very picky and won't eat most candy)
I caught them with my nail scrubbing brush this morning and took it away.
Maybe I will have a house tonight, I'll let you know
They also chewed up the tissues in the bathroom trash, but that is toooooo gross to mention

Thing 1 and Thing 2

We are in the midst of naming them. For now Thing 1 and Thing 2 are fine.
The smallest dog is very fiesty. You can tell they are scared of people and have not been fed for a few days. There is a list of what they have eaten which is growing. The littler female has a lot of color in her legs and she whines a lot, I am not sure what she wants. By bedtime tonight there should be 2 dog tired little boys!

All I wanted for Christmas

Every year for Christmas I receive many wonderful gifts. Some are as unexpected as they are wonderful. Some are expected and as bad as I had feared.
These are things I've always wanted and never gotten.
This is a crazy list, and yes it is truly what I have wanted
Some of these are very expensive and can't be bought until one of my family win the lottery
# 10 I have wanted all the Harry Potter wands for a long time - I have Harry's wand
# 9 I have always wanted a jingle cats and dogs CD (prior to that a cassette)
# 8 I have always wanted to decorate my basement like Diagon Alley (MONEY)
# 7 I want a home theatre room (MORE MONEY)
# 6 I have always wanted to go to Hawaii (get those lottery tickets out)
# 5 I want a new mattress for my bed (buying it myself probably)
# 4 I want a puppy dog (Samoyed or Black Lab)
# 3 I have wanted a nice computer chair starting 3 years ago
# 2 I want a set of speakers for my computer that don't suck
# 1 I have been asking for a cam-corder for 9 years.
If you have hundreds and hundreds of dollars sitting around… get on this right now!! If you are like the rest of us sigh with me now.

Coughing on the outside

Today I stayed home from work to cough. I know what you're thinking, I could have gone to work and coughed. I am tired of sharing my illness and have decided to stay home and keep it for myself. A controversial decision to be sure since I am pretty sure the staff at work gave me the germs which produced the cough. However, here I am selfishly keeping it to myself. It is sort of like the immunity necklace on Survivor. I really should give it back to Len since he shared his germs with me, but I have it now and it seems to have awakened in me a selfish sense of ownership. I temporarily possess the illness, therefore I own the illness?
With this anti-immunity necklace came the usual crabbiness due to symptoms. Fever, Chills, Aches, Hacking Cough that keeps you up all night, and lest we forget the $$ cha-ching at the druggist for all those flu and cold remedies which never work. This latest symptom, selfishness is the result of literally days and days of talking in Mini Mouse's voice, coughing like a 3 pack-a-day smoker, and several dozen landfills of tissue use (I am a mucus machine).
Call all the eligible men you know, I am available! Charming! And already dressed for bed. Taking off the fuzzy slippers is optional.

Happy Birdy 2 Ewe

Happy Birthday BD
Hippo Birdy Ewe Ewe
Hippo Birdy Ewe Ewe
Hippo Birdy Dear BD
Hippo Birdy Ewe Ewe
and many more

Peace Out

The Tobinator is coming! For those of you who don't know, Tobi is my darling daughter who was my very first female child. She is wonderful and spiffs up this blog for me since I am technically challenged.
In the days of her teenagehood, I would have sold her to passing gypsies for a plug nickel. But she has turned into a great person so I am glad no gypsies were in the area while I was raising her. She has decided to come to Colorado for a very short visit without my grandkids. (a controversial decision for which I will probably forgive her eventually) However the time is short for us so maybe the visit will be better without kids.
Anyway,,,,,,, Horay Horay she is on her way!!