The exhumation.....

Ohhh this Saturday Centus was a brutal one...the subject and the 50 word limit.

Visit Jenny Matlock at ...off on my tangent to see what I'm talking about and to read what the other bloggers have written...

This week's prompt is in BOLD.


Using strong chains they lifted the wooden box that held the body.

Later, at the museum spectators gathered close.

The top creaked loudly as it opened.

It felt sacred seeing an unearthed body.

After 145 years, nothing more than bone and teeth.

"Abraham Lincoln was a lot shorter than I thought he would be..." an onlooker remarked, forgetting about the top hat.

A love that's divine....

Today is my wedding anniversary, Daddio and I have been officially official for 28 years.

Even though we were a true official couple for eight years before we tied the knot October 29, 1982.

He fills my heart with laughter...

He asked me the other day to buy him a new shirt.

Any color was fine, as long as it was black.

Like usual he tells me he doesn't want it too big or too small, as usual he wants me to find the perfect black shirt.

"What size would you like" I ask.

"A smedium, I'd like the shirt in smedium" he answers.

(Seriously...he wants me to find him a smedium shirt.)

He's unbelievably supportive...

When I ask him if I'm certifiably crazy...

or a rip roarin bitch,

he answers "you have a lot of stress in your life".

There have been times when I've gained all kinds of poundage and my pants were being held together with a large rubber band under a long shirt and I'd inquire "do I look chubby..?"

"Nah" he says "you look healthy."

He's protective too...

When it's brought to his attention that kid A or B or C has been disrespectful, hurtful,  or a general pain in the ass....

he's been known to respond..

"You want me to rip their face off?

I've been wanting to take that kid out for years".

Ease my troubles, that's what he does.

There's a love that’s divine
And its his and its mine,
Like the sun.
And at the end of the day,
We give thanks and pray,
To The One, to The One.

Have I told you there's no one else above him?

He fills my heart with gladness, take away all my sadness,

Ease my troubles, that's what he does.

Have I told you lately that I love him?

Cause I really, really do...

"Not too high" I tell him as he tries to get to my garter...

I almost (but not quite)...

broke my ankle last night.

For two nights in a row in the middle of a deep hazy dream filled sleep I am summoned, ordered really, by my Drill Sargent caper sized bladder to get my...

 assouttabedquicklikebeforeIpeeallovertheplace

 in your face, " uh-oh" gotta go gotta go gotta go right now...

ohhh shit..I really (seriously!!) gotta pee feeling.

I'm always surprised by the urgency, even though I seem to have a vague memory of bickering with that ol bladder of mine for the past hour or two...

"psst...I gotta go" it says politely.

"In a sec" I reply and go back to conversing with my lunch dates.

We are dining ocean side.

The water, blue and inviting.

"Ummm...I really need to go now" my bladder calls to me again.

It figures that just as Liam Neeson is passing me a caramel macchiato it interrupts, again.

"Wait" I hiss "just a few more minutes.

Please, let me enjoy this moment just a bit longer"

Steadman chuckles as Oprah leaned forward to allow me a quick sniff of her neck.

She's just about to disclose the name of the heavenly scent she's wearing...

the perfume, a gift from Donna Karan who blushes a bit when Oprah and I start babbling about her other delicious fragrances.

I want to hear all about the two of them dating, Liam and Donna...an unlikely pair in my celebrity watching eyes.

"I can't (and won't) wait any longer" my rude bladder informs.

Finally, the nagging is too much and I know I have to comply.

I fight to get out from under my pile of blankets.

I karate chop style beat Daddio's leg off me.

All the while trying to pamper my stiff back which is threatening to seize up, rendering me temporarily paralyzed.

That would be awful because I'm positive I'm near wetting the bed.

And if the soaked sheets didn't wake up poor Daddio, my howls of pain surely would.

Daddio has no sympathy gene, this is especially apparent in the middle of the night.

I was trying so hard to be careful, yet hurry at the same time.

Finally the shackles of my bed release me and I am free to dash to the pot.

Except...

my blanket has one last bit of fight left in it

and it has a hold of my foot,

and I nearly fall head first out of bed,

but my twisted ankle saves me.

I heard it crack, but it was still functioning when I finally righted myself and headed in the direction of the bathroom.

On my feet now, my eyes refused to open.

I forced one open with my fingers and it was blurry and not focusing.

This, of course, triggered my inner hypochondriac, causing me to quickly surf my mind files for possible causes.

None of which were my new old lady eye cream.

I curse my old age and the fact that I can't ever go back to sleep or rejoin a neat dream in progress...damn it all to hell anyway.

Bird song...

I've always had a love/hate relationship with birds. Stay in the air and let me look at you we're good. Land on something in my sight, but not too near we're good. Soar above my head and let me envision riding on your wing...we're good. As much as I like birds, it is totally on my terms. As in I wouldn't consider (ever) having a bird share my indoor living space. (Ever see Alfred Hitchcock's The Birds?) I like to call myself a bird watcher, though I'm not the kind of birdwatcher my sister Susan is...I don't have a book and I can't distingusih sounds...but I delight in watching birds. And I especially like to watch birds on wires.. Here in Michigan I get lots of bird on a wire entertainment. So while I'm pretty sure I'm not the only one spending countless minutes trying to figure out how it is that the birds usually line up on the wire with even spaces between them, or how it is decided who exactly sits solo on the top wire, the guard bird??? Hmmm, and I wonder too, are there "mean birds"? Uppity birds that don't socialize with their neighbors? Ohh, the many mysteries of our universe for those who take the time to see and to listen. I wanted to put some neat bird on a wire pictures on this blog today so I Googled "Birds on a wire"... A confirmation that there are many, many bird on a wire fans out there. One guy looked deeper...and below is what he saw, or rather heard. (Turn up your sound... :-) Jarbas Agnelli viewed a picture of birds on a wire, he noted their positions and put them to music. Tell me...will birds on a wire ever look the same to you again...???

Bloody details...

This post is a themed writing project challenge taken from Jenny Matlock over at off on my tangent.

Jenny says we can use UP to 100 words to tell our story. It can be fact or fiction. Jenny posts a few words, a prompt that we work from. This weeks prompt is in bold itallics.


They’d waited weeks to hear the story of a survivor, first hand.

They listened, huddled at the lunch table, so close their heads almost touching as Barbara Osborn shared details of her accident.

“Blood EVERYWHERE” Barbara whispered, looking from girl to girl.

“More blood than anyone should ever have to see”

At seventeen, they knew better than to follow Barbara’s example.

She’d been warned too, but liked to do things her own way.

They all knew the accident was bound to happen sooner or later.

"This is the scariest story I've ever heard..."  

Dee Dee Flynn responded to Barbara’s finishing detail...

“Giving birth was like shitting a watermelon”.

Service with a smile....

Today my baby boy begins his official first job...or his first official job.

Hey...don't judge, the kid has an entrepreneurial spirit and has made lots and lots of money in unconventional ways (all of which are legal).

He had a paper route (and sure, Goog and I did most of the work, but hey...what are the girls in your life for anyway? right??)

He's made lucrative deals on Ebay and Craig's List.

He worked with a man building porches and another cleaning out repossessed homes.

He sells wise buys at the Gibraltar Trade Center.

And he also has a winning way with conning his mother out of a few bucks here and there.

So the kid has managed to make ends meet for a while and now he (and dad have) decided its time for a real job.

He's been looking for a long time, applying everywhere.

He's gone on an interview or two.

Initially he had no interest in working "fast food".

Everyone who works there has too many pimples, he explains.

They are in the midst of the grease all day long and look what happens, he says.

I have to work hard at keeping this gorgeous mug looking good, pimple free...don't want to back slide, he teases.

So he finally concedes and takes the fast food job.

He's happy to report that the training consists of playing a video game.

A video game that teaches one how to properly build a burger (oooohhhh holy brother, how this world has changed).

He had to drop I had to drop nearly 40 smackaroos on some ugly black non-slip dressy work shoes.

My suggestion of painting his old gym shoes black and slappin a bit of duct tape on the souls fell on deaf ears.

So since yesterday I'm feeling a bit sniff-ley at the thought of him beginning to make his way in the world by becoming a bona fide working member of society.

And I'm hoping that the public treats him with kindness.

And this morning I feel the need to offer him some last minute words of advice....

1. Don't give your friends free food
and
2. So help me God, if you should decide that the pimple factory isn't for you and those damn freakin ass non-slip black work shoes have been bought for naught and are not returnable and you haven't yet made enough flow to pay me back for them...

I SWEAR TO YOU.... I'll have dad sit on your chest and I solemnly promise that I will pull each and every one of your nose hairs out... one by one with my sharp tweezers...we straight??

Go conquer the world sweet Bear, one burger at a time.

Faith for dummies....

Hating to be labeled procrastinator I've decided to get a head start on my winter blues.

Careening toward what I'm sure to be a long dark winter has me feeling mighty blah.

And since I have an intense desire (and horribly irritating habit) of dissecting every good, bad, indifferent feeling I have into "what the holy hell does it all mean?" I'm driving myself mad.

Control what you can...hmmm, that would be, not much.

Yesterday I needed to get to church.

In a perfect world I'd make it every week. I'd sing at the top of my lungs and know every word to every song by heart.

I'd exit the church doors with a cloak of faith draped around my (skeptical, stooped) shoulders.

A force field of Godly goodness to protect me from the cold, cold cruel world.

Instead, in my imperfect world I tend to get irritated the second I walk in the door and am forced to shake hands with a greeter who should be passing out hand sanitizer and tranquilizers.

Tranquilizers that could possibly help when in my imperfect world I am irritated in church by crying children and their waxy eared parents...

"Buy some freakin Q-tips.

And a muzzle (or two)....."

I want to shout from my seat in the back.

In a perfect world I'd take every word of Pastor's sermon and make it fit my life.

Instead of daydreaming statistics about male pattern baldness.

And messy uncombed bed heads.

I'd not pick lint, nor stray hairs using only my eyes.

I'd avoid getting sidetracked by a nice knee lenght coat, a pretty dress or a sparkly bangle bracelet.

I'd stay focused on the sun beaming through the beautiful stained glass windows.

And the strong voices reciting the Lord's Prayer.

Yesterday at church God knew what I needed (and when doesn't He, really?)

I didn't notice any pint sized expressions of dire unhappiness (woo-hoo)

I kept my mind focused.

AND... I sang for all I was worth (but not out loud ;-)

I walked out the doors feeling refreshed and content.

Some days I have TOTAL faith I'll make it through the dark cold winters of my life.

A couple of my favorite quotes....

Turn your face to the sun and the shadows fall behind you.  ~Maori Proverb

Better to light a candle than to curse the darkness.  ~Chinese Proverb

It's "Moan"day...enjoy the sunshine (in whatever form it may appear).

Some like it hot....

This post is a themed writing project challenge taken from Jenny Matlock over at off on my tangent.

Jenny says we can use UP to 100 words to tell our story. It can be fact or fiction. Jenny posts a few words, a prompt that we work from. This weeks prompt is in bold itallics.

The gigantic fake breasts made it up the porch steps before the chest they sat on did.

A crimson painted rosebud shaped mouth didn’t do more than pout as its owner’s hand held out a pillow case balanced on huge, made by mother, cleavage.

The blonde wig hugged the head it was placed on like it was God issued, and thick liner developed, and defined, doe like eyes.

The black mole made it O-fficial.

"Trick or treat!" they shouted as the door opened..."

"Hey...it's Marilyn Monroe!!!" chuckled the man giving the candy.

8 year old Ronald Richard J wasn’t the least bit impressed he’d been recognized.

Nuthin's worryin me....

Never a mid October passes that I don't get a dreadful feeling of missing my brother, terribly.

Doesn't matter how much time has passed.

It's always too much time..

I miss him everyday...

Does that mean I'm still in mourning?

Does it ever go away?

Most times it's not the knife stuck in your heart kind of mourning...it's a sweet reminder.

Like when I look at my nephew, his namesake.

He has the same big ol pumpkin head.

A big head covered in a tremendous mop of floppy blond hair.

Just exactly like my brother's.

I sometimes have the urge to thump him in the head.

Or grab him in a headlock and give him a rough back and forth with my knuckles..

A Dutch rub is what my Grandpa used to call it...

I want to do that to the kid.

Just like I used to do to John.

And that makes me laugh.

Every October I replay the day he died and the couple of days before his accident.

The days are as clear to me as the day my children were born.

I replay everything.

Like when Susan and I talked right after he died and I told her I wanted the unicorn music box, the one we'd gotten him for Christmas one year.

Pathetically cheap and cheesy, the music box that plays Rain Drops Keep Fallin on My Head, one of my brother's favorite songs.

His love of that song earned him a lot of ribbing as we grew up.

Susan was into John Denver and John liked the raindrops song.

Me? I listened to the hard stuff, I liked to think I was turning cool when I appreciated bands like Black Sabbath and Grand Funk.

(I also listened to the Osmonds and David Cassedy...but that wasn't cool to admit).

The embarrassment, the horrible, horrible humiliation when my friends would come to visit and my odd freaky little BJ Thomas lovin brother would belt out in squeaky (unintentional) falsetto...

 "Rain drops keep fallin on my head, just like the guy who's feet are too big for his bed...dadadadaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa"....

Owning the record was bad enough, but the singing, sealed the deal.

He was freak flag flier for sure.

As we grew, the Raindrops song became a weapon in Susan and my arsenal of "ways in which we can prove, beyond a shadow of a doubt, that you were one messed up freaky ass kid" when torturing our brother with stories of our past.

Susan and I had discovered the unicorn music box in an aisle of Christmas junk at KMart one year.

We'd been looking for some cheap decorations and stumbled upon it.

Sitting on a shelf, cockeyed and looking broken the unicorn music box caught my attention.

In addition to their shared love of gawd awful music Susan and John also had a longtime thing for unicorns ...(don't laugh..it's true).

She'd given him a unicorn pin to wear on his coat... and she had a matching one on her coat.

Bookends, those two.

So at the store, the day the unicorn music box caught my eye, and I learned what music was stored within it's tin walls we had no choice but to buy it.

And give it to John for Christmas as a symbolic reminder of our silly childhood.

I hadn't thought about that music box for years, until the day that he died.

I was on my way over to tell my grandparents that his accident had been too bad, his injuries too severe.

That he was gone.

On the way over I remember wondering how it was that the world hadn't been placed on pause, on hold..everyone was going about their business as usual.

How could that be?

How could the world just simply continue when my brother was gone?

I was too young to have experienced many deaths. So the concept that my brother was here one minute and gone the next was something I was having a hard time grasping.

Where had he gone?

Did he go right to Heaven?

Was he in a waiting room, somewhere?

Was in floating in the sky above my head?

A beam of sunlight? A soaring bird?

Where was he?

"Where are you?" I said aloud, wanting him to answer.

When he didn't... I banged on the steering wheel and screamed it.

"JOHNNY!!!!!!WHERE THE HELL ARE YOU...?"

When I stopped crying a second to listen for an answer...this is what I heard....

'I'm never gonna stop the rain by complainin'
Because I'm free
Nothin's worryin' me.....

"Susan" I said later on the phone to my sister as she was preparing to go through John's things "find me that unicorn music box...that's all I want".

The music box sits in the top of my closet and every now and then when I bump into it or it gets tapped in just the right way it will spout a few notes of that crazy song.

It always makes me smile.

John...I miss you always, but especially today.

xoxo

John's unicorn music box and "free" jumping in the Arizona mountains...

The Freshman....

In my dream I was a college freshman living in a dorm on campus.

I was the age I am right now...(I'm not going to say exactly how old I am, suffice it to say that I'm just a tad bit over 39 44 49).

The age I am right now, living in a college dorm.

Googie was also living there too, but not with me.

She visited and we talked in hushed tones about my awful roommate.

The roommate, a snobby slob who appeared to spend lots of time in her boyfriend's lap.

She carried on with him as if they were alone.

Incredibly embarrassing, for Googie and me.

In my dream, we were living in almost pure filth.

I had to walk through knee deep crap that littered the floor.

And step over her faceless boyfriend, whose legs were always stretched out so far that everywhere I stepped, it was over them.

My roommate, her boyfriend and his legs...

everywhere.

In my dream the school semester was in full swing...but I hadn't done a lick of homework.

I knew this because Googie was chewing me out about it.

Without warning my dream location shifted and...

suddenly, in my dream I was at a bank.

With a very long line, which I was standing in.

Waiting..

Trying to be patient.

There were lots of people in the bank, working behind the counter, standing in line with me, and a few were walking in and out of the doors.

All this activity was going on but you could have heard a pin drop in there.

I could hear the freak in line behind me breathing.

Taking liberty with my personal space.

But other than his breathing there were no sounds.

When the breathing got beyond annoying I turned around and gave him the stink eye.

He responded by grabbing me in a big bear hug.

I started squirming,  trying to get away, all without a sound.

The bank was quiet.

Except for the sound I made when I was finally let go.

He smiled and I got a look at his teeth.

They looked like the teeth you carve into a pumpkin.

Except they were brown and yellow.

I forgot all about the ugly chompers when when a woman in the bank had the nerve to cut in front of me in line.

She stuck something wrapped in butcher paper on the counter to be rung up.

The bank teller stepped forward to take care of her and that's when I saw the outline of the mouse run up the back of the customer's thin coat.

I could see the outline of it's body and it's long tail.

I woke up with my belly still hurting and my heart beating too fast.

And I tried to figure it all out.

Even in my dreams, quirkiness.

(Note to self...no more, NO MORE!!! of that cheap crappy ass Walmart brand Trail Mix before bed.)

I've fallen and I can't get up...(or maybe I can??)

Is today really Monday?

Did we seriously just have a weekend?

Daddio played on Saturday (in the afternoon, which is very hard on him since he really hates to be seen in the daylight, he's not a vampire or anything odd like that....it's just that since he's a bit on the shy side he'd rather have a dark corner of a bar stage to perform on. A dark corner where he can dip and tuck when he needs to)....

Since Daddio played on Saturday afternoon we were all discombooberated (yeah, I know that isn't a real word...but this is my freakin blog and I can write whatever the frick I want to on here)

Yep, discombooberated...

discombobulated?

whatever...(you get my drift)

Also on Saturday was a visit to this guy...

That crazy planful daughter of mine made us an appointment 6 months ago to go see this sadistic maniac...

I lost enough blood to need a transfusion...but I was cavity free.

So I guess there is something to be said about those semi-annual checkups.

No matter, even still...Saturday was a bust.

On Sunday I woke up in the worst mood.

Then it got even worse.

If that was possible.

There was no real reason for my visit and lengthy stay over at Funkytown...no full moon, no moon blood, nothin, nadda, zilch.

So I wallowed in my (self inflicted) misery for a couple of hours.

Daddio tried to get me out of my pissiness..

He offered to let me rub his feet.

Or cook him something to eat.

He offered to let me come back to bed with him to vent or cry or talk or laugh....

I think he may have (Googie, skip the rest of this sentence) had other ideas.

Nothing like being in bed with a wet stinky diaper...?

Or a pound (or 136.5 pounds) of rotten hamburger.

I stunk.

Not in the sniffy sense.

What to do? What to do?

I wanted to wiggle from the heavy weight of my bad mood.

Unzip my bitchy suit and step out into a new attitude.

Maybe a walk would help.

I decided to take the dogs with me...they would be my cover..my disheveled self could rant and rave and pound my fist at the sky and no one would be the wiser that I wasn't just making small pet talk with the girls.

The walk started out pretty shitty crappy...

They obviously had their own agendas.

The one that resembles a brick waddled walked like one...

She'd get tired after about 6 steps (Yes, I do realize that she's a bit on the chunky side..your point is??).

I'd pick her up, and 6 six of my steps later she'd start wiggling like a fish out of water, almost slipping from my grip.

Up,down,up,down, up....down.

The other one (with the attention problem) was busy sniffin air and chasing sounds and running around my legs tangling me in her leash.

Picturing myself, I got a chuckle.

The first one of the day.

It seemed that once I decided to pick up my head I began seeing some wonderful things....

suddenly this.....

Turned into this....

and this.....

I laughed out loud when I saw this....

(plucked from my butt....??? tee hee)

I realized then that my day was one of these....

simply a work in progress.

The way it would go would be totally my choosing.

Have a stupendous Monday....

by choosing to let it be a good day!!!

xoxoxo

Convo-interruptus....

Googie gave me a ride into work yesterday.

On the way I chattered and made observations and was, in general, my usual annoying self.

I don't think myself annoying (do we ever?)....

But I must be.

There is a little joke about people with ADD...describing how in the middle of a serious conversation they will suddenly become distracted and yell goofy stuff like "Ohhhh look there goes a chicken"...(bringing notice to some exciting visual treat)

anyway....

I understand I do this... something or someone grabs my attention and my mind is off and running, chasing this new and interesting thing...could be a bird, a plane, even Superman.

At this time of year it's usually a tree,

or a bunch of trees,

that grab my attention.

Just as I was about to proclaim a roadside vision as theeee most beautiful I'd ever seen my kid started talking.

"Mother, I told one of my co-workers all about you and trees" Googie said, pulling me back from the brink of my tree-gasm.

"I told her that you probably shouldn't be driving this time of year".

"I told her you're so busy looking at pretty colored trees that you can't pay good attention to the road.".

As we drove and to get her off the subject of my tree lust I began telling a story about the author of a blog I visit.

The author has quite a mouth on her and in order to tell the story with total authenticity I had to swear.

So a string of filthy words came tumbling out.

Totally obnoxious in their filthiness.

One by one the bad words slipped from my mouth.

Streaming from my lips, pouring out with reckless abandon and just as I was building to the climax of the story Googie (suddenly and without warning) POPPED!!!!

"MOTHERRRRRRRR!!! she yelled " Eeeeeeee-NOUGH!!!

ALL RIGHT!!!!

I GET IT"!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!......

"GEEEEEEZE, YOU GOTTA STOP, I--- get--- IT"

HOLY CRAP!!!  I thought... "This kid is one freakin sassy m-effin smart ass" and I started to tell her so

...but then I saw some really pretty trees.

Oh my goodness you should soooo see Michigan in Autumn.

Stunning, I tell you....

simply stunning.

Just Google "Michigan in Autumn" (the above copyrighted photos were stolen right from there) and you'll see what I mean.

Happy Wednesday

xoxo

Lickity spit....

Googie, Trouble and I made a trip to the bank on Friday.

She's bonafide now (working 37.5 hrs per week,  her first "grown up" job) and needed an account where her checks could be auto-deposited.

We waited in a small vestibule for a bank employee to wait on us.

While we were waiting a young boy ran up and jumped into a chair next to me.

He began an excited chatter... sadly not a one of us could understand a thing he was saying.

I assumed he was foreign.

He talked so fast and was so full of life it was impossible not to laugh at his antics.

In the middle of one of his long animated monologues I thought I caught a word I recognized...

"Winjafurtil" the little boy said.

"Ninja Turtle" ? I asked.

His little head bobbed up and down.

Once he got that I got him there was no shutting him up.

We heard about "Fwedir" (Shredder, a Ninja Turtles worst enemy).

and "Fwinter" (Splinter, the Ninjas' Sensi).

They carry "fords" and "fwite" baaaaaaaaaaad guys." the small boy explained.

Soon the adorable chatter box got called away by his very distracted mother and Googie and I were called into the little cube office of the bank's Assistant Manager.

Right off the bat Googie let this guy know that she is deep down a pioneer woman who has a fear-filled and severe dislike of financial institutions of any kind (a little misunderstanding between Googie and her debit card some time back..and that's all I'm gonna dish about that particular matter, I don't want to get hit up side the head with her washboard)...

Anyway...

She told the man that she wants a no frills account. And to reiterate her point she said "They put my money in and I want to take my money out" said Goog "Simple as that. I don't want an ATM card, I don't care about a penny or two of interest, I don't want a credit card, I don't need a passbook, or a ledger, or anything that I have to read and be confused about.... To tell you the truth Sir, I really wish to just put my money under my mattress...but the company I work for has insisted that I have direct deposit"....

"Well then" the man said "I'll be right back, I've got to grab some papers that will get you started".

Googie pulled out her hand sanitizer, gave me a squirt and then in true germaphobe fashion gave herself another dollop.

(One can never be too safe you know).

Soon Mr Assistant Bank Manager was back and shuffling a nice sized pile of papers...

Googie had some papers to sign.

I almost told her she could sign with an X, since pioneer women usually weren't too educated and didn't ever sign anything..(but I (wisely) thought it best to keep my corny jokes to myself).

Googie and I watched as the man prepared the papers.

He appeared to be having some trouble separating them.

As we watched he put his hand toward his face, tipped his thumb sideways and drug it across his waiting tongue.

Ohhhh sweet Jesus...No he did not just slather his thumb with spit.

Ummm yeah, he did.

He licked his thumb and soaked it with spit and then he touched it to the papers.

Then he attempted to hand the wet paper to Googie.

The look on her face was priceless.

I dug my nails into the palm of my hand to keep from exploding into hysterical laughter.

He did this over and over and over,  until each and every paper had been filled with his DNA and everything in his pile had been X'd.

I didn't dare look at Goog, but I could feel her shaking.

At one point we both started laughing...

I said something dumb like "oh, we're really excited that she's getting an account"..which made us laugh even harder

Just as I was feeling really sorry for poor germ infested Googie the Bank's Assistant Manager turned his attention toward me and said "I'm going to give you a business card too, if I can help either of you, don't hesitate to call".

He beat me to his card holder...

and like a slow motion shoot out in the movies

I wanted to scream NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO

instead I sat powerless and watched as he slurped up his thumb one last time and soaked the business card he was about to give me.

I let him lay it on the desk.

Hoping it would dry a bit before I had to touch it.

When I thought neither of them was looking I reached for the card.

Using the edge of my fingernail I inched the card toward me.

I felt Googie watching.

That was all it took...

The laughter damn burst.

I gave another stupid excuse for our giggles as we made our way out of his office.

(I looked around for the bald guy from Candid Camera... or MTV's Boiling Point staff)

That really really didn't just happen...?

Googie and I tumbled out the door and made it to her car before she lost some tears and I lost some pee.

I sat on her bank papers...a little moisture never hurt anything..right?

Pssssst...Pass the Purell

ThE pUnK-iN pAtCh....

This post is a themed writing project challenge taken from Jenny Matlock over at off on my tangent.

Jenny says we can use UP to 100 words to tell our story. It can be fact or fiction. Unusally Jenny posts a few words, a prompt that we work from....this week she decided to shake things up and bit and she posted a picture that we will use as our prompt....

Here is the image,

They waited in staggered lines.

Their numbers too great to count.

Every size, many shapes.

The majority of them knew what their futures could hold…carvings, mashing, small fires lit and burning from within.

Morton, Illinois the self proclaimed “Pumpkin Capitol of the World” had certainly seen its share of punk-kins, but never anything like this.

A bumper crop year.

A quiet solidarity smoldering in the night.

Waiting patiently until the time was right.

The noisy crowd grew as one evening wore on.

They’d seen a sign that said “see SMASHING PUMPKINS here tonight”

Assuming it meant the rock band….

The company I keep....

Yesterday I was forced to take a day off from work.

It wasn't a punishment of any sort.

It felt like one though.

The company twisted my arm said (via the company handbook) that if you don't take your personal days by a certain September 30th, they will.

Use it or lose it.

What kind of freak saves their personal days until the very last day?

To have that day force fed into realization?

I was saving the day. Saving it for something special. A big sale at Macys, an invitation to doooo, oh I don't know what?..something...anything worthy of taking an entire day off for.

I waited a year for that special reason to take a personal day.

An entire year.

And nothing ever came up.

So yesterday I had a day off.

It was punishment for being a procrastinator.

When the last of my family was waved off toward their day I realized I was alone.

Allllll alone, with a whoooooole day to kill.

The possibilities were endless....

So endless they were actually overwhelming.

The house was a mess, and as I looked around remembering all the stuff I wanted to get done when I had a day off, somehow the inspiration I needed to get started just never came.

After an hour or two of spinning my wheels I finally made a decision to walk around in circles.

I was bored.

And lonely.

Bear had my car so there was no leisurely trip to Kohls the grocery store.

I also couldn't take the pile of clearance impulse buys gently used clothes to the Salvation Army Store where I planned to snoop around and try to discover that special overlooked treasure that would make me an Antique Roadshow celebrity.

Neither were within walking or bike riding distance.

So here it was my personal day and I was stuck home all by myself with nothing, yet everything, to do.

The day seemed to drag.

Me, myself and I were not having a great day off.

Not wanting to miss a chance to speak with the outside world (should the phone ring) I carried around all three of my phones.

The were neatly stored in a fanny pack I dug out of the donation pile.

When the phones didn't ring, I decided to call an old friend.

It'd been so long since we'd chatted in the middle of the day that the work number I had for her was disconnected.

And everyone else I knew was busy.

Susan was at school.

Googie and Micky were at work.

Joyce didn't answer.

Vicky, out of town.

I had no one to talk to but myself.

And I really had nothing much to say.

I flipped on the radio to hear some voices.

And I tried (like hell) to be the 25th caller to win some contest they were having.

I almost called their request line to ask them to play Bob Seger's Good Time Rock & Roll.

I had a sudden urge to dance in my underwear.

And sing at the top of my lungs.

When I tired of that, I searched for something new to do.

I didn't dare turn on the tube...where I knew some episode of Saved By the Bell would suck me in.

So I wandered.

And I pondered.

And finally, finally I started to see some progress.

Slowly but surely I got some things done.

And by the time Daddio and the young adults walked into the door the house was actually quite clean.

It smelled of Spic & Span and Yankee Candle's Autumn Harvest.

And also like beef pot pie.

Which was on the table at 6pm sharp.

I miss being a "stay at home."

But not much.