an open letter

dear inventor of fleece sheets:

where have you been all my life? i love you.

thanks

get in line

the other day at wal-marts i was grocery shopping. and needed some laundry detergent. i can only get certain kinds of detergent. usually the one with no odor. or fragrance as they like to market it. i beg to differ. most give me an instant headache. kind of like that unscented dryer sheet i used the other day. i am half way through the box of these unscented dryer sheets. and i pull out a load from the dryer last week and instant headache. now, unscented dryer sheets don't have a smell. or so i thought. and especially when you are already half way done with the box. whatever. i had to wash the load again. anyway, so i decide to buy tide. not because it is three times as expensive as the other brands but because i know the regular scent does not affect my head. and it seems that the stink free versions just aren't getting our clothes the cleanest. and i need to find something that does. well good luck finding it. i counted twenty-six different kinds of tide. twenty-six. there is regular. mountain scent. lavender. and so on. then there is the kind with fabric softener. and it's not just one fabric softener. there are about three different scents of fabric softeners to chose from. and then you can get one for your high efficiency model washers. and all of those come in the above mentioned choices. who runs tide? general motors? i see another bail out coming.

needle in a haystack

so, i get this bright idea that the kids both need strings to attach to their mittens so they don't keep dropping them in the snow. we were still at my parent's house for the holiday and i thought my mom could just whip me some up. or i could go buy some. and then we read on the internet that those strings are no longer in use. because they can cause a hazard. like if they get caught in an escalator. and they don't break free. okay. good point. but it's funny how the internet can put the fear of god in you. every kid had them back in the day. it's like you can't have a string in your hood nowadays either. or lead paint. anyway, we think of another idea. we can use suspender clips. off to the fabric store we go. they don't sell the clips in pairs. they sell them individually. for four dollars a pop. we refuse to pay that much. and we are off across the parking lot. to goodwill. in search of old suspenders. zilch. the next day we are off to salvation army. we find some suspenders. and a bunch of other stuff we don't need. but neither one of us can pass up a good deal. the suspenders we found only had three clips per pair. and we need eight total. and one of the clips didn't hold well on one of the pairs. about two hours later i am looking in the woman's accessory section and what do i find but a pair of suspenders. black with pink polka dots. and black clips. three black clips. we still need two more. and you had better bet we are using that polka dot elastic for something too. we figured we had all that the store had and we would look again another day. but wait. on our way to the register we stop and look through the shirts. and my mom starts to laugh. which doesn't surprise me. we are always picking out the best shirts for each other. but this one was the show stopper. it was a white long sleeve shirt. with a pink patterned piece in the shape of the top of some overalls that was stitched on the front of the long sleeve part and the faux straps held on at the top with no other than suspender clips. one on each side. i. kid. you. not. if ever you need something you can call my mom. i swear she will find it. and i have no doubt that if we had not bought that shirt it would have remained on the rack until the year 3018. when it fell off the hanger. all by itself.

an open letter

dear ninety-nine point nine percent of all pottery barn outlet customers:

your shit stinks. just like everyone else's shit stinks. so do us all a favor. and get over yourselves. and furthermore, ninety-nine point nine percent of the merchandise appears to have fallen out of the delivery truck at one point, or five, before it reached the outlet store. and it's still outrageously expensive. but go ahead and knock yourselves out.

thanks

why ask why

but i am going to anyway. you know i am home for the holidays when on christmas day we rang in baby jesus' birthday with no other than a lifetime movie. thanks bill. anyway, today closed captioning is on. scrolling along the bottom of the screen. blocking all of the football scores. and yet the volume is so loud verna can hear it. and we are no longer even neighbors, as you all know, for what is going on to be well over twenty years. it leaves me to wonder why the deaf guy has control of the volume. yet again. or still.

last call

the other day my friend shel and i were trying to get in touch. except we couldn't. her phone doesn't actually ring any longer when someone calls it. and i always seem to leave my cell in my car. with no charge. we call ourselves organized chaos. we were trying to get our schedules together because both of us were spending christmas with our parents. in our hometown. shel finally got a new cell. but she couldn't activate it because once she did she would lose all of her contacts on her old phone. the phone was so old they couldn't even transfer the information from the old phone to the new phone. so she had to do it manually. i told her i didn't have that many friends. it wouldn't take me that long. she said it wasn't really all of her friends. it was more of all the takeout places. massage spas. and pedicure joints. that a girl, shel. that a girl.

merry christmas

man, santa. you're one. lucky. bastard. sorry i forgot the beer. ho. friggin. ho.

an open letter

dear children [my children]:

there is no such thing as santa claus. and i so kept all of the receipts. i hope you like your coal.

thanks

follow the leader

you may remember rudy the reindeer from our trip to hensler's nursery in the fall. we went back this weekend to see santa. there isn't a photo with santa. or even of santa. because neither kid would go within ear shot of his house. i will remind you that hensler's is over an hour drive from our house. at least they wanted to see rudy. and it's okay. i figured they weren't going to do it anyway. plus, they have killer sales in the barn at this time of year. i swear rudy remembered the kids. as soon as we walked up to the fence he came right over. both kids ran the fence line. 1,284 times. and rudy was right after them. 1,284 times. will yelled, 'come on, rudy! come on! you can do it!' 1,284 times. funny. my mom took me to san diego back when i was in college. my dad's annual convention was out there so we took advantage of the warmth. and god awful salty rotting beach air. must be an acquired smell. one i never want to smell. again. anyway, we of course took in the world famous san deigo zoo while we were there. my parents lived in california for a brief time when they first got married. they visited the san diego zoo. it had been over thirty years earlier at that point. while we were at the zoo we stopped to visit the camels. they were all toward the back of the enclosure. way back when my mom had a love affair with one leon the camel. at the sand diego zoo. i don't think he had a name. that she knew of. she just called him that. so, while we were standing there she calls out. to a leon. and i'll be damned if one of the camels made a beeline over to where we were standing. a long lost reunion. i wonder if rudy will live that long.

if the shoe fits

while we are on the subject of laundry. and getting divorced. this is a real gem. now this is when we were very first married. like in the first month. because we were still in my old apartment. my husband had moved to where i lived and took a job for the sake of having a job and it was about an hour and half to drive one way. but it was a job. so it made for some early mornings. most of those mornings he had already been showered and gone before i even got out of bed. as it was time for me to get dressed i reached for a pair of underwear. the said underwear was not only inside out but it was also not folded. why is my underwear clean, inside out and not folded in my underwear drawer i wondered. because my wonderful husband of about two minutes had done the laundry. i was furious. i was so furious i could not wait for him to get home. already. the day dragged on until i received a phone call in the afternoon. it was my husband. on his way home from work. i immediately asked him why my underwear was not only inside out but not folded. without one second of hesitation he replied that he didn't know something that small needed to be folded. and that, my friends, was the end of the conversation.

for best results

when my husband and i first got married we almost got divorced. over one. navy. blue. sweater. a wool navy blue sweater to be exact. it is very difficult for me to find things that i like to wear. let alone an actual sweater. that's navy. and wool. and fits. it's like trying to find obama's birth certificate. anyway, one morning i awoke before work and planned to wear my coveted wool navy blue sweater. i couldn't find it anywhere. i rifled through every closet in the house. i even looked in the dirty laundry. and then it hit me. i remembered that my husband had just done the laundry. you know, that stuff happens when you first get married. i went downstairs to the line that we had put up to dry our clothes on instead of having to use the dryer. and. there. it. was. on the line. and about a size 0 -3 months. now, it was one of those things where i couldn't be upset with him because he did actually do the laundry. but everyone knows you don't put wool in the wash. it goes to the drycleaner. after i explained this to him he said i could go and get another sweater. oh, whatever. i was reminded of this incident this afternoon. as i was doing laundry. there in the dirty clothes was a pair of his suit pants. wool suit pants. hello. bueller. anyone.

an open letter

dear dress shirt packaging guy:

i bought my husband several dress shirts the other day. there were eight straight pins in each shirt. eight. there was a cardboard sleeve tucked into the body of the shirt. complete with tissue paper. there was a plastic guard behind the top button. there was a cardboard sleeve underneath the collar. there was a fabric tab on one of the buttons redundantly stating that the shirt was care-free and wrinkle-resistant. the price tag already indicated that information. i was just wondering how much cheaper the shirts would have been if all of that crap wasn't a part of the packaging. one word. hanger.

thanks

thanks for nothing

i know you are all aware as you go for groceries that the packages are shrinking but the cost remains the same. or sometimes it has even increased. yadda. yadda. yadda. however, i noticed the other day that reynold's wrap is now offering five more additional feet of alumimum foil per roll for the same amount of money. oh, well thank god for that. since we all buy a roll of that every week. seems our prayers have been answered.

they don't make 'em like the used to

and i am thankful. i had forgotten about this one. until yesterday. when my trusted kitchen aid hand can opener reminded me that it can't seem to open a can any longer. for whatever reason. and no amount of cussing seems to help. you see, back when my mom and dad got married over forty years ago they received a can opener for a wedding gift. they still have it. you may have one of these gems in your family. it is pictured above. i hate this effing thing. i can't seem to use it. not once in my thirty-seven years. and swearing at it doesn't seem to help it either. my dad definitely can't use it. my sister can't use it. my mom is the only one in our immediate family, maybe on the face of the planet, that seems to know how to operate it. i would have thrown the thing out decades ago. it's a delicate balance of holding the can just right. pushing the handle down and releasing just at the right moment. all i get is a can that won't stay clamped and that annoying whirring sound. as if i need a reminder that the effing can i want to open is not in fact opening. the sound of failure. once again. and this can opener may be the very reason campbell's soup decided to put pull tab on their cans. any time anyone of us needs to have a can opened we don't even try. we call my mom away from whatever she is doing at the moment. so she can do it. i kind of hope every time it happens it will weaken her a little more to breakdown and buy a new opener. but it hasn't worked yet. the top photo is what happens when my mom and i are at garage sales and my husband has to open a can of fruit for the kids. with a screwdriver. and a hammer. i probably would have tried to open it with a little more pressure. like under my car tire. i have no doubt in my mind that my mother will live to be one hundred and forty-seven years old. and she will still have this effing can opener. and if i do happen to out live her i know for certain she will leave this effing can opener to me. and she will have the last laugh.

deck the walls

this was the tree as of 9:37 am yesterday morning. we had just gotten done decorating it. it had all of it's ornaments.

this is the tree as it stands. as of approximately 11:49 am yesterday morning. as you can see i had to move it. to a different wall. and a different height. about four feet off of the ground. because while i was changing will's diaper at approximately 11:44 am yesterday mister structo [miss destructo to anyone other than will] took it upon herself to take off an ornament. or two. and mash them up in her hand. while i was changing will. at least she showed them to me. i then got smart. and placed the tree four feet off the ground. the second time. so santa would have enough room to put all of sophie's coal under it. maybe i should move it up a little bit more.

an open letter

dear sophie:

the point of reusable stickers is to pull them off and put them back on. and repeat. not pull them off and crumple each and every single one of them up in your hands. and place them on the table.

thanks

you light up my life

last night was round 5,201 of the light tour. if we stay in our neighborhood there are lots of lights to take in. at least for a three year old. that begs to go every. single. night. each night he picks out something different that he wants to drive by again. and again. and again. on one of the courts there is a house with icicle lights. blinking icicle lights. not only do they turn on. and off. they turn from white to blue. and back again. and here is the conversation. from the backseat:

will (gasping): oooooh, blinky lights! they go from white to blue to white to blue. on and off. on and off.

me: which is your favorite color, will?

will (matter of factly): on and off.

then it was off to granger. to find santa in the window. from last week's tour. again. and again.

here's your sign

seriously. yummy pizza. they must have gotten this name from the chinese place. in elkhart. once again luring potential customers in with their name. funny. i would immediately pass on this too. but wait. there's a sign in the window. they do sell miller lite. pull tab for certain.

never fails

why is it when you pull into a parking spot or the garage and have to turn your car off the best song comes on the radio?

on the twelfth day of christmas

a few years back my mom started this thing she read in a magazine. called the twelve days of christmas. she does this now instead of stockings. you know, since her kids are now 37. and 41. the deal is that she buys twelve little gifts and wraps them individually. and on the 13th of december you start by opening one gift. and then open one gift per day until christmas. she does this for me. my sister. and my husband. it's not my sister's husband's kind of thing. so he doesn't get any. she also does this for my two nieces. but she calls it the twelve days of summer. because she does it for them when they visit her for a few weeks on their summer break. last year i started to do it for my mom. it's kind of fun to find the items. and of course, they are most always from a garage sale [aftermarket as we like to say], estate sales and even a few csd [curbside discounts for those who don't remember]. however, none of mine that i gift are csd. because i have not gone there in my lifetime. yet. one time my mom hurt her knee on a csd. trying to get it into the car. i'm glad she did though. it's one of my most favorite trunks. and i needed another one my husband will be quick to point out. anyway, we always leave the price tag on the stuff. just to show each other who got the best screaming deal. love it. today will be our first day to open a gift this year. since we are leaving town on the 24th we get to start a day early. no yunk. no yunk. all good snuff.

an open letter

dear dvd packaging guy:

please, for the love of god, have you ever tried opening one of your own packages?! first of all, one can never find a loose corner on your outer cellophane wrap. it takes at least seventeen minutes just to pry one loose. and 3,320,931 cuss words. and what seems to be an impossibility of overcoming the urge to gently toss the mother effing dvd across the room. unopened. and if you still have it in your hands when you finally do get a loose corner only two millimeters of cellophane come along with it. the next chunk comes off with ease only to find that it narrows the more you pull it until it breaks off when it hits an edge of the dvd. the last portion of cellophane is easy. it just pulls off of the one end. and after all that you go to open the box. but you can't. because there is a theft deterrent sticker on the top of the box. if you cannot catch me trying to steal the dvd out of the box in the store during the seventeen minutes it takes me to even start to get the cellophane wrapping off you should be fired. furthermore, the tab that is printed pull here should read dig here. and that makes me angry to now have a blemish on my nice, new dvd sleeve because you have to dig at it to start the removal of the theft deterrent tape. and after going through all of that your kid doesn't even like the dvd you bought.

thanks

and on the twenty-seventh day...

...the bandage finally was off. a few weeks ago will became a casualty of our log bed. he's not the first. and won't be the last. he slipped on one of the logs trying to get on it at the end of the bed. had he been wearing clothes this never would have happened. but he was going through a spell of diaper only. much to my disliking. but it did save me time on laundry. anyway, he scraped it up bad and it was bleeding pretty good. enter screaming fit. just when i thought it couldn't get worse i pulled out the bandages. 'no! no! no!' he cried. check that. screamed. directly into my right ear. i was trying to explain to him that he was bleeding. and he needed a bandage. but he couldn't hear me. because he was screaming. directly into my right ear. i think he thought he was getting a shot. because that was the only other time he ever needed a bandage. i couldn't even get anti-bacterial spray on it. the bandage was all i was going to get. i finally got the bandage on because i reminded will that frances has a bandage. on her bug bite. catastrophy diverted. until it was time to take it off. seriously. as much trouble as it was getting it on now he wouldn't let us take it off. if we even went near it he would scream bloody murder. it stayed on for twenty-seven days. and twenty-seven nights. through temper tantrums. through baths. through couch cushion forts. and it would have stayed on longer if my husband wouldn't have ripped it off last night. he tricked him. as he was getting his jammies on he grabbed it with his pants on the way off. will protested. just a little. but then couldn't wait to come and show me where his bandage had been. and you know if we would have wanted the bandage to stay on that long it would have lasted a day. if that.

another fine specimen

surely our neighbor again [thanks for sharing, brown].

on dasher

this was sent to me in an email [thank you, zmagic]. this has got to be one of my neighbors. no doubt.

i'm just saying

if we aren't supposed to insert q-tips directly into our ears than why do they make them small enough to fit?

thumpety, thump, thump

last night we went for a light tour. there have been some new additions all week. we should know. because it was our fifth light tour. this week. one house added a twelve foot inflated frosty the snowman to their collection. and will noticed it right away.

will: frosty!

me: yep, sure is. good spotting.

will: he has a corn dog pipe!

this little piggy

i went wal-marts today. the fifth of december. at 4 pm. i will never do this again. i had to get some christmas lights. we went to add some lighted garland around our front door. and discovered that the lights didn't work. after i plugged them in to check them once. they worked. i checked them yet again just to make sure. they worked. as i was half way through wrapping the garland one half of the string went out. i wasn't very happy. fake needles were falling out by the thousands every time i touched it. i was totally irritated. and then i realized the string of lights was about thirteen years old. i bought them to put on my patio in my condo when i first graduated college. so, they really didn't owe me anything. my husband then went to the hardware store to get some lights. i get them out of the package and they are some kind of garland light three wide that i had never seen before. off to lowe's i go. they had nothing. i find it difficult to believe that i couldn't seem to find plain. white. lights. and that brought me to wal-marts. at the height of the mad dash. it was awful. people everywhere. but i found what i needed. without a problem. a christmas miracle. but i thought too soon. the checkouts were a mess. i was in the self-checkout lane. for about three seconds. line not moving. people can't scan items. then i went to the fast lane. twenty items or less. right. i sure wish people knew how to count. lady, here's a clue. when your items in your cart or more than each of your fingers and each of your toes you have too many items to checkout in the fast lane. or not so fast lane. in your case.

score

last night i scored. big time. i went to marshall's to get a christmas tablecloth. because when i was at wal-marts earlier in the evening they had some but they were $15.00. now, the wednesday before thanksgiving i scored a fall tablecloth for $3.00 on clearance at marshall's. i knew the christmas ones weren't going to be on clearance but i thought they would have a better selection. and they would be cheaper. so, i drove over ten miles to get to marshall's. found a tablecloth i liked. and it was $24.99. good thing i passed up that one for $15.00. anyway, while i was there i found a product that i was familiar with but hadn't known they made this particular item. awhile ago, i bought the kids these vinyl reusable wall art scenes for each of their bedrooms. ingenious invention. i have already had to move some of will's. worked like a charm. so when i saw a vinyl reusable christmas tree last night a marshall's i thought i had died and gone to heaven. it came complete with the tree. a tree skirt. garland. and ornaments. last year we were only able to put up a small tree. on top of a table. so the destruction diva couldn't get at it. this year i put my rusty barbed wire tree up on the same table. you know, to discourage them from touching. well, that isn't exactly working. barbed wire won't even keep them away. i think i have it licked with this find. that'll teach them.

http://www.wallies.com/item/W13500.htm

full circle

ever since i can remember my dad has, at times, impersonated nestor chylak. a professional baseball umpire. with a hairlip. to this day i don't know why he does it. he just does. one summer as i was helping him at his office, an umpire came into his office. it was a good thing my desk was facing the wall. the guy had a hairlip. and the minute he started to ask my dad's assistant about something i started to shake in silent laughter. not at him. just because ever since i was little my dad did this impersonation. i looked out of the corner of my eye and there was my dad. also shaking in silent laughter. which made me shake in silent laughter even harder. all i could think of was debbie, my dad's assistant, and how she was able to keep a straight face. because i know in all the years she worked with my dad she had heard the nestor chylak impersonation. at least once. year's before my mom and her friend were at an auction. the guy kept saying no yunk, no yunk, all good snuff. they couldn't figure out what the guy was talking about. finally, it dawned on them. the auctioneer had a hairlip. he was saying no junk, no junk, all good stuff. so, it didn't really surprise me when sophie started to talk. like she has a hairlip. but she really doesn't. now when she asks for a rink with her nack i know exactly what she is saying.

shop 'til you drop

yesterday morning i was doing laundry. the kids were playing. and pretending. will was forcing sophie, or gloria, to go shopping. gloria is frances' little sister on frances. as in bread and jam for frances, frances. they wanted me to play with them so i told them i would play the store clerk stocking the shelves as i needed to put the laundry away in our closet. and this was the conversation:

will (dragging sophie by the arm): we're pretending to play store. come on, gloria.

me: ok. i'll stock the shelves. who are you shopping for today young man?

will: a turtle.

me: a turtle? what size does he wear?

will: a back.

'tis the season

i'm not going to sugar coat this one. i hate christmas music. can't stand it. it's bad enough to have to go out at this time of year. it's cold. people are in a hurry. and bitchy. because they can't find something to buy that special someone. if they are that special maybe they should have thought about it a few months ago. like me. i do all my shopping in september. online. and don't get me started on that damn bell ringing. so by the time i get to the store i am already on edge knowing that i have to go out in the cold, hold the door open and smile for the bitchy people hoping that makes them even more bitchy, dodge that damn bell ringer and when i finally get into the store that christmas music just grinds on my. last. nerve. i should clarify that i have nothing against the damn bell ringers themselves. it's the organization they represent. don't get me wrong. i donate. just not to them. i used to. until i discovered by shopping there they staple the price tags to their donated clothes. staple. not to the tag. anywhere but the tag. as in put holes in perfectly good donated clothes. i'm not exactly sure who thought up that one. but they should be fired. it was probably that girl that answered the phone at fisher price. and i do dig that crazy christmas by the brian setzer orchestra. but that's it.