Luke

I am sure you all know about dog farts. Or at least most of you do. But my dog Luke has the most disgusting, offensive farts of any dog or beast that walks the Earth. You are sitting there and suddenly you are ambushed, a FOG of stench so repulsive has surrounded you. And you cannot get rid of it, it clings to you, to the air, to everything. You cannot walk away, it will follow you and repulse you for at least half an hour.

Luke's farts are more like a plague. Kind of like swine flu. Eveyone is fine and happy, and suddenly people are dropping dead all over the place. I remember swine flu when I was a kid, and it was killing tons of people, and the lines for the swine flu shot were miles long even though the shot could kill you. My parents took it seriously after it didn't disappear after a few weeks, and one day we all got in the car and drove over to city hall where they were giving swine flu shots. We drove by and my dad asked if we should get on line (he hated lines so we went to six flags on weekdays that it rained and left at 6am for the beach and joined a private ski resort so we did not have to wait on lines). My dad reminded us we could die. I was insanely afriad of needles of any kind back then, so I immediately suggested we wait another week to see what happened. My father immediately agreed and we went home.

I will never know if he was worried about his children dying or if he just didn't want to wait on line for it. I like to think he didn't want anything bad to happen to us due to a panic over a disease, but I can't be sure, ever. Either way, it doesn't really matter much. I didn't have to suffer the painful, death causing shot. And I am still thankful!

Saturday Night Live

Tonight I am watching Saturday Night Live for the first time in maybe 15 years. A long time, maybe longer. I saw a really sad thing tonight on SNL. They are desperately trying to cling to the political mania created by the presidential election. And it's really sad and pathetic. The people at SNL should be the first to recognize the loss of a popular topic and move on. It is much more humorous to me when they are imitating a candidate over an actual president.

I did see The Rock (he has a real name but I do not know what it is) do the BEST hot dance with women and chairs that I have ever seen. I loved it. Now I realize that I must be getting on in age since that entertains me very much.

Cookie sales time right now, love it and hate it simultaneously. But I so love the leaders and the girls. They are worth it most of the time.

wretched

sometimes i am really wretched. sometimes i am really really nice. i wonder some days if people think the really nice days are just a show, and the really mean days are the only me. those are the ones who have no clue. i enjoy being really nice much more than anything. it gives me a pure, positive feeling that I so enjoy. I'm no movie star, but i can make a difference in anyone's life by making an effort to be nice and helpful.

I also admit that the high of verbally slamming someone is a great appreciation in my life. But the difference is that I don't do it unless I feel the other person is being really mean and unfair. They always seem so shocked, to be counted among the heartless, the mean, the self centered. I laugh at that. They never have a clue. I have to admit that I despise people like that. I also have to admit that I thoroughly enjoy helping my friends, family and neighborhood.

I do wish people would leave their "health clubs" and country clubs and put their energy and physical efforts into the neighborhood. They might find they like the people they ignore.

what's really important

Today Newsweek magazine proclaimed that we are all socialists and will basically be France one day soon. I was horrified. Not because of what Newsweek said, but because when I woke up this morning and opened the fridge to make my Puerto Rican coffee, there was NO milk. Not a drop. How can something so devastating happen to me? WHY ME? My God, I would so rather have Tanya Harding bash my knee than not have my 60 minutes of Puerto Rican coffee savoring every morning. I had to brace myself and get the kids ready for school, knowing I was not going to get my special moring treat to myself for being a lazy mother of school children who basically does nothing but cannot function without her cafe con leche.

It took me a while to realize that my dear sweet hubby had poured milk into a thermos and discovered it was bad (he drinks 1%, I drink skim, which people out here eloquently call "non fat") and left it out on the counter to stink up the house. So, I went and got myself milk today just to make sure I can have my coffee in the morning. If it's gone, I will go insane. I cannot be expected to last 2 days without my coffee without my Girl Scout buddies around to keep me laughing so coffee seems insignificant.

Oh yeah, France. As Jane and Joanna would say, Gimme the Gun!

Yertle the Turtle

My daughter is Yertle the Turtle. This information was broken to me today, just a few minutes ago, actually. She is in a school play, Seussical the Musical, and she is a Who. Today, they told her she was also Yertle the Turtle, due to her stick-to-it-idness. She is very excited. I am trying to remember what the heck Yertle did in the book and just have this vague image of a turtle in a tree. So now I have to go find the book and read it. Although my daughter tells me the show has nothing to do with the books. Go figure. At least it's rated G.

I love her crazy ass attitude and hair. She's so wild, yet so innocent, just like I was. People don't get how you can be both, but she really is, and so was I.

Now I have to wait weeks until the darn show. Then I'll probably go to all 6 performances. Maybe I can stand in for Horton or something by the end.

Help me

I am terrified of my daughter. She is normally the sweetest most loving child on the planet, but today she mutated into a strange scary creature. Right before my eyes.

Chloe is 11, almost 12. A few weeks ago she told me that she would like to try out for the school musical, and wanted to know if that was okay with me. Of course it was! So she signed up, got a piece to read for audition, and I didn't hear of it again. So the night before the first audition, I asked her if she had practiced. She had. She recited this long piece with enthusiasm and I was very impressed. She got a callback. Then she was given a small part. (After all, she explained to John, this is her FIRST Broadway Play, she doesn't want to get in over her head.)

So, practice most of this week, and today is Saturday. No school. So she is dancing her heart out, and singing too. She told Guy she could not play with him as she had to practice. She seemed upset that she could not remember every single dance move yet. I pointed out to her that the play was not until March, and she had plenty of time to learn it all and not to worry about it.

That was the precise moment my child morphed into a psychopathic lunatic. I was advised that 6 weeks is NOT enough time to truly prepare for a play and it takes one full hour to memorize one minute of dance. She pointed out that she would have to suffer the WRATH of someone named Stephanie if she didn't remember the dance steps. (Chloe just looked over my shoulder and told me I had BETTER not be emailing Stephanie about her not remembering a step, I assured her I was just emailing grandma about it - Yikes).

She's taking this all very seriously. And I am scared. Very, very scared. 6 weeks to go. I must keep my mouth shut at all times.

Help me.

flushed away

Last night I flushed the toilet and decided to scoop up the dirty laundry that my husband and I leave on the floor in front of the shower door. Much to my horror, a sock popped up and went directly into the spinning tornado of water. I attempted to grab it before it was sucked into oblivion, but alas, it was not my day to save the sock. So I scream like a banshee who sees a really big bug and my husband assumes the cat brought a mouse inside. When he comes in (no rush there, I could have been dead by the time he arrived), that sock was gone gone gone. So, I left him to figure out what to do, he's the man, he gets to deal with pipe issues. I think I poured myself a glass of wine immediately upon dumping what was left of the traumatized laundry down the shute.