Apparently Bernie's new girlfriend is a little thick.

Go ahead, have a one sided cell phone conversation within earshot of me and see if I don't blog about, I dare you. You loud talkers crack me up.
Innocently soaking up the sun at the pool today, without a book because I decided to lose myself in my thoughts. In other words, try to nod off. But my ears perked up when Bernie's mom walked into the pool area yammering away on her cell phone.
Names have not been changed to protect the innocent:
"You have a new girlfriend?........... Is she pretty?....... A pretty face, good. How's the body?"
Huh? This is when nodding off became moot.
"Oh, a little heavy? What would you say like fat or just thick."
Oh.....

My.....

God....

The most I've ever asked my boys about girlfriends are their names and where do they live. Because 1. they don't introduce me and 2. my concern for them getting lost is great as they have inherited from me, Boy #2's girlfriend put it best as, the directionally retarded gene.

"Thick, well that's okay they can lose weight, they can always lose weight. They get a nice looking, well built guy like you Bernie and they get incentive to look their best."

The husband has a compass in his big brain. Like one of those black car compasses our parents use to have on their dashboards. It kind of rolls around in his head and the settles on the direction he needs to go. "We have to go North." "Really, how do you know that?"
"Because I feel it."
"You feel North?"
"Well yeah, can't you?"
"I feel like we should stop for a Mocha, but I don't feel North."

"Are you bringing her to Becky's tomorrow, so I can meet her? I know it's Doug's birthday and you have to go there too, but you know how he gets. Come to Becky's first."

One time one of the boys friends got lost and called the husband for directions. She was panicking and the husband was trying to bring her in, finally he told her to pull over, she did. "Now," he said, "Tell me where the sun is, look in the sky and tell me where the sun is."............"You need to turn around, you're going West, you need to be going East."

"Then you can go to Doug's later and not have to stay long. He'll be all over you and you're new girlfriend will feel out of place...... What's her name?..........Dee Dee? Oh."

Hmmm, the thick girl has a name.

"Seriously, come to Becky's then go to Doug's. Remember when I lost all that weight, I was huge and now look at me, she'll lose the weight."

Bernie's mom will have Dee Dee anorexic in no time. Run Dee Dee run!

From the Scary Asian Dry Cleaning Dude Files

I've been quietly observing my scary Asian dry cleaning dude for some time now. In the past here and here and somewhere else I can't seem to find, I've posted about how this little guy looks like he belongs in a Chuck Norris movie staring as a evil prison camp guard. But my during weekly stops to the dry cleaners, I've noticed the woman seems to be taking charge of the place. She has inadvertently fallen into some American customs. Always on the phone when I stop for the husbands shirts and doesn't bother to hang up, she just chatters away in her native tongue and tells me to "have nice day" when I leave.
She has advanced herself to a phone stuck in her ear and now she can continue to work at her sewing machine while chattering, instead of waiting on me she yells something to the scary dude and he hops to attention, bringing the scariness down a few notches. Hmmmmm. The charm and ambiance of the stereo-typical Asian Dry Cleaners has been removed from my weekly routine. They've Americanized, a simulated into our rude culture. What a drag, they were a good source of blogging material.

This is a Perfectly Normal Situation

Who, in the name of Zeus's butt hole, arranges a grocery store with the soup in aisle 8 the ice cream aisle? I'm just asking because that's what held me up today. That's what brought my day to a screeching halt.
I'm thinking of getting myself a fake, in the ear cell phone so I can vocalize travesties such as this out loud. People would look at me and say,
"Did she just...... oh she's on the phone. She's not talking to herself, she's on the phone. It may look and sound like she's talking to herself, but there's someone on the other end of that ear thing just as outraged as she is. This is a perfectly normal situation. The soup is in the ice cream aisle? How many active brain cells do you need to know that's a bad idea?"
See everybody agrees with me.

Did He Just Dis' Me?

Yes, the joys of parenthood came to a crashing halt when I opened the cell phone bill. Events spiraled out of control as I investigated the added charges.
Boy #2 received, from mommy and daddy, a new phone for his birthday last month.
"What's this megabytes charge?" I asked Boy #3, because he's the all knowing, 21st century, techno terminology guru in the house.
"It's memory."
"Oh................ Well, why is his $62.38 and yours is only a $1.99?"
Boy #3's eye's lit up and he grinned, that 'I didn't do it this time' grin.
The birthday phone came with a free month of internet, and that's it, I didn't sign anything.
"I'm calling about this charge."
As the evening progressed the husband barely showed interest, just an occasional glance over the newspaper.
When finally I got a human on the other end of my land-line, I explained, "I'm calling about my bill, it's a little higher than usual."
At the other end, I heard, "Wow, $842.56."
"Whaa..... no. $62.38."
"Ma'am, your bill is currently $842.56. It's from the internet usage."

"But.................$842.56? Could you hold on a sec? Go get your brother, tell him to stop using his cell phone, tell him to turn it off now!"
That's when the husband decided to get involved.

I couldn't get through to the woman on the other end of the phone that this was impossible, the best she could do for me was take off 25%.
"I have to call financial services and see if I can get a payment plan." I told the husband.
"Give me the phone."
By the time he got off the phone he had the entire $842.56 credited to our account.
"How did you do that?" I said in utter disbelief.
"All I did was introduce logic into the conversation."
"Kids, leave the room, mommy's going to hurt daddy."

Gadget Scratch Protection

What do teenage boys do to their cell phones and iPods when mom and dad aren’t looking? We purchase these pieces of sophisticated equipment and then place it in their grimy hands and for the life of me I cannot figure out why. Because the next time we see it, it will be unrecognizable. And the next time we do see it, it’s because something is wrong with it. I don’t even ask “how it happened” any more because amazingly they don’t know. Huh.
“Why is it wet inside honey?” “I don’t know.”
“How did the screen get scratched honey?” “I don’t know mom.”
“Pukey, where is your iPod?” “I don’t know.”
“Was it necessary to scratch you girlfriends name on the back of your cell phone?” “I don’t know how that happened.”

Along with a few extra brain cells they could use an iPod case and also a case for their cell phones. InvisibleSHIELD is a tough film that protects all those gadgets screens from Lord knows what they do to them. I found the site during my morning social networking ritual. It’s funny too, because just last night I said to Boy #2, “Don’t carry your cell phone by the antenna.” The sad fact is, it doesn’t even surprise me that I have to tell him that anymore.