I need a nap. Where's my pillow and blanky?

For the last week or so, maybe longer, maybe less because I'm really not sure what day it is and I'm almost certain it is October but I would not be 100% sure of that to call it fact. In fact for the past few days I feel as if I have been watching myself try to function through daily life as a spectator instead of a participant. What I am trying to say is that I have a cold/flu that has come straight from hell.
So forming a thought and trying to string along a few coherent sentences has been difficult. I have thoughts and sentences floating around up there in my brain but they have been bogged down by snot. Random ideas pop into my head and I have no explanation as to why they are up there but they are stuck inside of my skull, rattling around trying to free themselves but to no avail because you see, I can not breath through my nose and I am now hearing impaired. My ears are actually squeaking. How can this be good?
Random thought! I remember an event. Wait I think I'm hungry. I'm going to have soup. I'll finish this post later.

In the delicate mental state that I am in at the moment all my memories happened about a year ago. That being said, about a year ago Boy #3 told me he had an earache. Here is that conversation:
"Mom I think I have an earache."
"Well either your ear hurts or it doesn't."
"I know that. But my ear hurts inside."
"Oh then that's an earache."
After they turn 18 you can relax a little bit because legally they are in charge of their own earaches. But I am a mom, so I asked,
"How bad does it hurt? Going to the doctor bad or aspirin bad?"
"Oh I don't want to go to the doctor."
"Then take a couple......"
"Because I don't have insurance."
This is when the muscles that you have let relax stiffen because now money is involved. I continued the conversation,
"You know that your father and I will help you with medical expenses, you know that."
"Yeah but I still don't think I need to go to the doctor."
"Well get a flashlight and let me look in there at least."

I just remembered I'm out of Nyquil. Shit.

So I have a flashlight and I'm looking into the kids ear. I see nothing. I really couldn't tell you what I expected to see though. Then I had a thought,
"You know I think back in the old days they use to pour a little peroxide in a persons soar ear to help the pain and unblock stuff."
"Really?"
"Yeah, pretty sure. Want me to do it?"
"I ..... don't ......... know."
"Think about it. You get water in your ear when you go swimming sometimes and you always get it out. It would be the same thing, sort of, maybe. Let's see what happens."
"Well ......"
"I'm just going to put a cap full in there, a few drops."
"Okay. Do it."
I tried to contain my excitement, I didn't want him to flee.
With Boy #3's head sideways over the bathroom sink, I guess in case the peroxide came out the other end? We were winging it really. I poured a few drops into his earache ear. He flinched a little and I don't blame him because I had no idea what I was doing, not a clue. Huh. I saw some bubbles in there. And I said,
"I see some bubbles."
No response. He probably can't hear me with peroxide in his ear. So I turned my head sideways over the sink to face him and said,
"I see bubbles."
"Cool. I hear fizzing."
"Cool. I'm going back up there to see what happening."
And I gave him a thumbs up.

In no way do I condone radical peroxide ear treatment. Just wanted to throw that out there. My head hurts.

So I looked back at his bubbling ear. The peroxide seemed to have knocked loose some earwax because I saw some little things floating around. Huh. I went back down sideways over the sink and said,
"How does your ear feel?"
"Okay, I guess."
"Then I think it's time to get that stuff out of there, I see some stuff floating in your ear."
"Huh?"
I put a tissue over his ear and he stood up. He started the process of removing water from your ear after swimming and was successful. He started moving his jaw around because you can't move your ears around. He said to me,
"I think that may have helped."
"I knew it would."
I had no idea what would happen, but I'd say a successful test. Since going partially deaf due to this cold I have been contemplating peroxide in my ear. I'm going to stick to my Neti Pot for now, until I get desperate.

In the late summer of 2014

In the late summer of 2014 I stood in my kitchen making sauce. A cool, yet gentle breeze ruffled my curtains, the husband was watching college football while eating pretzels that were so good he told me to buy them again, Boy #3 planned to cut the grass after playing video games and the dog, she sat regally on the front steps watching over the neighborhood. Not one Jehovah Witness or encyclopedia salesman would get to our front door on her watch, not one. In fact I stopped a moment to watch her watching the cars go by. The leaves had just started to fall from the trees, letting us know that autumn was on it's way. I would have to sweep the steps because the dog seemed to have a little pile of them between her paws. Isn't she cute, I said to myself, she's playing in the leaves.
At that specific time when all was well I squinted at the dog, took a few steps closer to the front door. The birds stopped singing, the wind became still and the blood rushed from my face. This is when pandemonium invaded my almost perfect day.
"Oh no. No. Oh my, holy, Boy #3. Shit, Oh, Oh. Boy #3, Boy #3!"
I waved my hands in the air like a girl. The husband asked with is mouth full of pretzels,
"Is it a spider babe?"
"No. Oh my God. It's a bunny, it's a bunny. Boy #3 do something. It's a bunny. The dog killed a bunny. Oh shit. Boy #3!"
"Seriously?"
"Yes I'm serious. What the hell? It's a dead bunny!"
The husband made no attempt to remove himself from football. But the kind gentle hearted Boy #3 that wants to be a veterinarian sprang into action. That's why in my state of hysteria I called him because I knew who would move and who wouldn't. After 29 years with the husband I knew he would laugh at me and tell me,
"That's what dogs do. They hunt and kill. She probably brought it up the steps for you. Rabbit tastes just like chicken. When I was a kid on my aunt and uncles farm...."
"Jesus, Mary and Joseph, don't start talking about the farm right now because I am so earning this nervous breakdown I'm having right now, I having it, right now. Oh damn the windows are open, the neighbors are hearing my 19th nervous breakdown."
While I freaked out man, I kept looking at the dead bunny and Boy #3 trying to bring the dog in, who wanted to bring her kill with her. I thought to myself, well at least I didn't kill this one. See this post here for an explanation of that thought popping into my head.
With the dog in the house, I calmed down long enough to give her her treat for going outside to pee and kill. And then I went back to, as Boy #3 is now referring to it, my little melt down.
"What? How? Wha....."
"Mom." Boy #3 rested his hands on my shoulders and said,
"I'm going to need some bags."
Blank stare. I just stared at him. He suppressed a smile,
"Plastic bags mom, plastic bags."
"Yes, plastic bags. I will get you plastic bags. Several plastic bags."
And then I looked at the front steps,
"Oh my God, it's still there."
"That's why I need plastic bags."
I ran to the drawer of plastic WalMart bags and started to frantically throw them towards the boy,
"You should double bag, NO, quadruple them. What's after quadruple? Sixtuple them."
The husband interupted,
"Now you're making up words, you're going to hurt yourself."
"Shut up, shut up, shut up."
I flung more bags towards my dear, sweet, youngest child and told him,
"Don't touch it. I have to say that because it's in the being a mom rules, but do what you must to get rid of the poor thing. Here's another bag."
After the removal and disposal, oh eff, garbage day was yesterday. It has to stay in a sixtupled bag for a week. After the removal and disposal I poured Pine-Sol straight from the bottle on to the spot, there was......gah, there was some blood there. I dumped buckets and buckets of hot water on the steps and scrubbed with a broom, more hot buckets.
In the late summer of 2014 I stood in my kitchen making sauce. Instead of driving the neighbors crazy with the delicious smell of my spaghetti sauce, the pungent smell of Pine Sol streamed into my front windows. Not one person would be jealous of my cooking today, not one.

Spider!

Last month on FaceBook I penned a post about a spider web in my car. With that glaring evidence I deduced that a spider was living in my car. I received about 18 'likes' with that post, that translates, to me anyway, that I have a few heartless friends or they felt sorry for me and gave me a thumbs up?
I shook that confusion out of my head. I didn't know if I should burn just the inside of my car or the whole damn thing. My friends comments were an overwhelming decision to burn it to the ground. I had to agree with them. The problem is I'm a procrastinator.
So a month later, living under threat of a spider in my car, the nightmare that I could have avoided had I set my car ablaze in my driveway, came to fruition. In other words, shit got real.

The rest of this post is not for the squeamish. Several of my friends come to mind but I won't name them because they were in the group of the 18 'likes'. I will let them squirm.

In the car with the husband on our way to our daughter-in-laws graduation,
congratulations Karla, I sat in the passengers seat. The husband was navigating his way out of a parking lot. I looked out my window and saw a spider on my shoulder. It had to be at least 1/4" in diameter. The car was moving. I had my seat belt on. I was trapped. My only recourse was to have a spaz attack and make some kind of horrible sound come out of my mouth. A sound that can never, ever be made again, even under hypnosis.
Now I can not remember if I actually touch the spider but after a frantic search I saw it on the floor. I stepped on it until it was ground into the floor mat. Here is the conversation that ensued after my nervous breakdown.
The husband was somewhat alarmed,
"What?!"
"A spider!"
"Jesus."
"It was on my shoulder."
"Christ."
"It was on my shoulder."
"I thought something really bad happened."
"Something really bad did happen. A spider was on my shoulder."
"You scared the shit out of me. I could have gotten us in an accident."
I narrowed my eyes at him and talked through my teeth so he new I was serious,
"Tell me you can look at your shoulder, see a spider and it not startle you, tell me that."
His demeanor waned ever so slightly and with a grin,
"Maybe I would be startled but I wouldn't need a rubber room and a straight jacket."
"I'm burning this car down tomorrow, if you have and CD's in here that you want to keep I'd take them out when we get home if I were you."
"Yes dear."

My September 11th Post. Any Other Day

I post this every year and hope that some day I won't have to any more.

September 12, 2001, I walked down my steps and opened the garage door to take out the garbage. The sun was going down and it would be dark soon I was going to make sure the big garage door was closed too. In our garage I found my 12-year-old middle son. He had on everything Army-ish. Camouflage pants and t-shirt, the only boots he owned, snow boots and an Army helmet from a Halloween costume. He also had his toy rifle and when I stepped into the garage, he appeared to be pretend loading it.

“What are you doing baby?”

This annoyed him, he rolled his eyes at me, I guess in my surprise at running into him down there I made a critical error in calling my little soldier, baby.

“Mom, I’m securing the perimeter of the house.”

Any other day this one little story of mine would have found itself in my humor blog. Any other day I would have sent him off to play soldier. Any other day I would have smiled at him instead of having tears well up in my eyes.

But this day I asked him to go upstairs and told him we need to talk. I had to find out what was going on in that 12-year-old head and try to ease his obvious concerns. And after all I couldn’t have him walking around the house with a toy gun in the dark, everyone was on red alert, someone would have called the police, I know I would have. We were all on edge, uncertain and scared.

I was able to send my baby back into the security of our home and thanked God for that. I had been praying just about non-stop since the day before, September 11, 2001, when Islamic extremist flew our airplanes into the Twin Towers, the Pentagon and the field in Shanksville, Pennsylvania.

This anniversary of terrorism is difficult for me, I have a hard time looking at the pictures, listening to the stories and seeing the videos. Maybe it’s because that day has become just that, an anniversary. To me, September 11, 2001 is unresolved and unfinished. The threat is still there. Mothers are sending their babies to war. Mothers are trying to explain Army isn’t a video game. And with each “anniversary” that goes by I ask myself what has to happen to change the uneasy feeling I get every September 11^th?

That 3:00 am phone call

When your phone rings at 3:00 am the first thing that goes through your mind is,
"Who's dead?"
Then,
"Who's been in an accident?, Who's is having chest pains?' Who's in the Emergency Room?, Who's broke down on the side of the road? Who's in jail?"
But luckily for me, my 3:00 am phone call consisted of,
"Let me talk to Ron."
A whooosh of air expelled from my lungs as I had been holding my breath and didn't realize it. Ron? Did he say Ron? So I asked,
"I'm sorry who?"
"Ron. I need to talk to Ron."
"You have the wrong number." I refrained from calling him a dick and hung up.
Almost have peed myself when the phone rang I got up to go to the bathroom. I got back into bed and the phone rang again. This is what went through my head for the 3:03 am call.
"Jesus, Mary and Joseph does this guy know what he just put me through. I have 3 boys out there, parents pushing 80, a grand baby, daughter-in-laws at concerts, raging pre menopausal hormones and a dog that couldn't get comfortable all night and decided it would be okay to share my pillow. Dude."
I answered the phone again,
"Hello."
"I don't have the wrong number now let me talk to Ron."
"You do have the wrong number there is no Ron here, please don't call me back."
"Don't you hang up, let me talk to Ron. This is Jerry."
And he said 'Jerry' like it was some kind of code word. Jerry, wink, wink. Or Jerry, I really mean business now. I continued,
"I am sorry but you do have the wrong number", sounds of someone else talking in the background, "and I would appreciate it if you didn't call this number again, it's 3:00 in the morning."
"I have the right number."
This is when I handed the phone over to the 'intimidator' aka the husband. He took the phone,
"Sir my wife has asked you nicely not to call again. You have the wrong number."
The husband paused to listen and then said,
"I don't care if you are Jerry Lewis you have the wrong number goodbye."
He handed the phone back to me and said,
"What a dick."
"Yeah. What if he calls back?"
"He ain't gonna call back."
The husband fell right back to sleep and I layed there with my head on only half my pillow, because 3:00 am phone calls don't seem to bother dogs, and worried I would hear from Jerry again. After about a half hour I started to drift off and then the dog decided that she may as well pee too. She whined until I let her out.
I haven't heard from 7 kinds of crazy, Jerry since. Please let him lose my number.

This brake thing isn't over yet.

The wheels are turning quickly in my head almost so that I can't keep up with myself. But who to blame?
Out this afternoon shopping for hell month - May. Birthdays, Mother's Day, Anniversaries, the family has put a ban on any marriages or new babies in the month of May, they just won't be recognized. There's too much going on in May and frankly I don't want my gifts jeopardized because somebody can't afford to get me a present.
My last stop today I parked on a slight inclination. I thought to myself thinking of my 5 speed,
"Should I put my emergency brake on? It's been acting weird and no one has told me if it's okay to use. It's barely a hill, should be fine."
I didn't take a long time in the store but I didn't hurry either. When I got to my car I said to myself,
"Nice parking job Sue, the ass of your car is sticking out at least a foot more than the other cars."
I put my packages in the back seat, slammed the door and felt a dizzy sort of vertigo thing going on like the car's moving but it really couldn't be, could it? No. Don't be silly. I walked around the back of the car, it looked like it was sticking out more than it was before. I got to the drivers side door and I witnessed my car move backward.
"Oh snap! My car is moving backward. I'm not having a stroke."
I jumped in my car and pressed down on the brake and clutch. Took a deep breath and tried to decide who would take the blame for my mishap/mistake.

How are the brakes?

Not so long ago in the recent past I over heard Boy #3 and the husband talking about the brakes on my car and how they needed replaced. Huh. I was not aware of a problem and I spoke up about it.
"New brakes? Why?"
"Don't you hear that noise when you drive it mom?"
"Noise? What noise?"
"The grinding noise."
"I guess I have my radio turned up a little too loud because I don't know what you're talking about."
"Jesus." Said the husband.
"We haven't had that car long enough for it to need new brakes, have we?"
"It's a 2009."
"Really? We've had it that long? That's how many years?"
"Several."
Apparently after several years a car needs a brake job and while they were at it Boy #2 brought his truck over and did his brakes too.

 

They did my car first then sat it in the driveway to go on to Boy #2's truck. I needed to go on my weekly rendezvous with the WalMart people so I hopped in my car and left. They watched me pull out of the driveway with interest.

I was unwittingly taking my car and it's new brake job on a test drive. When I returned I was asked,

"How are the brakes?"

"Uhhh good I guess. You guys fixed them right?"

"We were pretty sure."

Several reason why I love my brain

Most of my 'writing thoughts' pop into my head when I'm in the shower. Lately I have been letting them run amok, they smack into the inside of my skull and remain splattered there, completely useless. But the last few days I let some of them form into complete thoughts. So my brain and I have been on the same page for a couple days. Which is a good thing, I've missed my imagination. So much so that I'm contemplating wearing a fashionable helmet.
Every one has to die at some point and I'm hoping that when I go my brain stays intact. In my will I shall leave instructions to my children to preserve my brain some how. Pickle it in a jar and stick it in the back of their fridge or if I can win the lottery I will have them cryogenic-ally freeze it and donate it to science. I decided this in the shower this morning and made a list as soon as I dried off. At the top of the list: Preserve mommy's brain in the name of science.
There are other reasons why I love my brain. I made Milky Way Cakes for Easter but remembered that the last time I made them they didn't rise very well. Days before the baking I said to myself,
"Put some baking powder in the batter."
My brain retained that golden nugget of information and when I was mixing the batter it over-rided my circuit board, sent me a subliminal message and made me see baking powder instead of baking soda on the recipe card. I think the cakes were better than last years.
This brain of mine also has, not one annoying song that sticks in my head, but an entire playlist. At any given hour of the day one of numerous songs can randomly pop into my thoughts rendering me an idiot. How cool is that?
I also have the ability to retain useless information but I can't remember why I wrote that one on my list.
The characters in my novel have been protesting the fact that I have ignored them. They have been in my head for years, if I don't finish telling their story I fear my head may explode. It is amazing how attached I have become to them, I guess only a writer can understand this. Or I'm completely crazy.
So there you have it, I may not be the sharpest knife in the drawer, just ask the nuns, but I still love my brain.

Happy Easter, don't judge

I feel like I'm finally catching up to the rest of the "Jesus has Risen/Bunny hiding eggs" celebrating people of the holiday that is Easter. I hard boiled some eggs Wednesday.
When Easter Sunday rolled around sooner than I was ready for it, I found myself and family at my parents house for dinner. My sister-in-law made deviled eggs and I didn't. I felt a little bit guilty while I was eating them so I only ate two or maybe three. I think it was four. Usually both of us bring a plate of them which is a sufficient amount for the size of our family. In my mind I ruined Easter dinner and will live with the guilt for about a week. Then next year I will redeem myself and remember to bring a plate of deviled eggs. I will deny the fact that I failed in the egg portion of our meal until somebody brings up this post and waves it in my face.
Thursday I made myself a plate of deviled eggs and ate half of them for dinner. They were delicious.
I'm sure there is some reason why we Christians celebrate Jesus dieing for our sins and rising from the dead simultaneously with a giant bunny that comes to your house in the middle if the night, hides eggs and fills baskets with chocolate, plastic toys and jelly beans on a bed of fresh colorful plastic grass. The plastic grass that finds it's way in every nook and cranny of your house. When you move your couch to find the remote, not because you are cleaning under there but because you are looking for something important, you find some of that grass. It's a little bit faded and you deduce,
"This looks like the Easter basket grass I used in 1996."
Jesus/Easter Bunny, there has to be some correlation. I just don't know what it is and too lazy to look it up. Hell I was too lazy to make deviled eggs. Yes, I was lazy, I didn't forget them. Don't judge me.

Do the cuffs match the collar?

Nope. I color my own hair and have been happily buying the same brand for years. Apparently my go to color and highlight box has been discontinued. Damn it. To have the color and highlight in one box keeps the margin of error down to a minimum. I'm going to write a strongly worded letter to L'oreal as soon as I get a chance.
Now I'm in the hair color aisle yesterday trying to get something close to my comfort zone but think that maybe this is the time to go a little lighter. I picked up what I thought was a light brown and then went to the highlight section. I bought an even lighter color, it's called champagne. These two boxes in my shopping cart should not be applied the same day further expanding the drudgery of coloring my hair from about 90 minutes to 24 hours.
Last night I applied the color and now I'm a red head. Doh!
The first thing the husband said was,
"I don't think the cuffs match the collar."
And then a few other things I'm not willing to repeat.
Being from an artist background I consider myself with an above average sense of color so I'm perplexed. But still plan to go down the uncharted road of highlighting red hair with champagne highlights tonight. I may not emerge from my house after tonight as I am not a hat person.
Wish me luck!

My missing blue gloves

With my big, heavy leather jacket, scarf wrapped around my neck five times, I reached inside my pockets for my blue gloves. Empty pockets? I always put my gloves away. But last night when we got home, the husband and I had our arms full as we trekked into the house.
I had dishes to wash, things on my mind (I never really function well when I'm deep in thought ), wrestling with a time table because I had TV shows to watch and a dog that wanted out every 10 minutes. My blue gloves got shoved in the back of my brain that I have a hard time accessing.
So this afternoon when I was ready to face 7 degrees because I had stuff to do I could not remember where those gloves were. The last time I remembered seeing them they were in my lap in the car that Boy #3 had taken to work. My light jacket had lighter gloves and I put those on and ventured out into the arctic tundra.
Now the lighter gloves are those mitten/gloves. My fingers stick out just below the first knuckle unless I flip over the half mitten. They are cool but impractical when cleaning 3 inches of snow off a car because your pinkie finger always manages to pop out of the makeshift mitten. Frost bite was immanent. I made a mental note to inquire about my blue gloves when Boy #3 got home.
Boy #1 has been staying with us during this cold winter blast because he is closer to work. The husband was also out today. When #3 got home I asked him if my blue gloves were in the car. Here is the conversation that followed:

Boy #3: No, they're not in the car they're on the side of the driveway.
The Husband: Are those the ones you were looking for earlier? I was wondering why they were in the driveway.
Boy #1: Blue gloves? Yeah I saw them this morning in the driveway.
Boy# 3: Do you want me to go get them?

The rest, of the conversation came from me which I shouldn't repeat.
But, WTF?

Daughter of the Year - January 7 and I already blew my chance.

With frigid temperatures blowing into Northeast Ohio I did what the news channels told me to do. I called my parents because it's essential, according to Dick Goddard, to check on the elderly.
Sunday I spoke with my father and told the world's most stubborn man to stay in the house and call us if they needed anything. I snuck this into a short conversation and I thought I heard him agree with me but one can never be sure with my dad when you touch on the subject of his independence.
Monday I called them again, to check on the elderly, and I got their answering machine. I left a message,
"This is your daughter, I told you two to stay put. It's zero outside."
I hung up, looked at the husband and told him my parents are out. We both just shook our heads. The husband then said,
"I wish they would have told us, they could have picked us up some pop."
I went about my day and received a call from my dad around 6:00 pm. I was getting ready to voice my opposition to his blatant disregard to Dick Goddard's and my warnings of the sub-zero temperatures when he told me,
"Your mother's surgery went well and we are home now."
"Huh?"
"Her cataract surgery."
"Oh snap."
"Your forgot, didn't you?"
"I...... no..... well, that was scheduled months ago. Wasn't it?"
"Yeah, but she reminded you about it when we were over New Year's Day."
"Yes, yes she did. I knew it was coming up. The year is going by so fast isn't it?"
He laughed at me and told they would be out again the next day for her follow up check up. He also said he was going to call my brother next and let him know how the surgery went. We hung up. I then made no effort to call my brother to warn him because I wanted him to appear as clueless as me. Is that wrong?