Month: December 2011

New Year’s Revolutions

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That on a triple word score still won't buy you a cup of coffee.

You know, creating a whole list of stuff you’re going to change about yourself in the coming year is kind of pointless. You’re what, middle aged? And you’re still needing to improve yourself? Why are you still even trying?

Instead of making the typical resolutions that don’t last long enough for the ink to dry on the back of the Arby’s receipt I wrote them on, I’ve decided that for 2012 I’m going to make the rest of the world bend to my will. I’m just fine the way I am and in any areas of my life that could actually use a major overhaul, I’m too drunk or lazy to fix it. So it’s far easier to have the rest of you just change around my every whim.

Revolution One: we don’t eat enough fast food. I don’t need to lose weight if the rest of you just get really, really, supremely fat. I plan to look good by comparison. This one is actually my gift to you since you are now expected to eat French fries and drink 600-calorie cups of coffee all day long. You’re welcome.

Revolution Two: I’m gonna park wherever the hell I want to. Handicapped-shmandicapped. I realize they will tow my car for not having a proper tag, but I’m pretty sure my car is untowable. That’s what the guy with the tow truck said when I wanted him to come take it to the shop, and I can totally believe him. Besides, I have documented neck arthritis and it’s hard to turn my head. I haven’t tried to get a legitimate handicapped tag because I’m afraid they’ll realize that I probably shouldn’t be driving. Let’s just call it even.

Revolution Three: I am done with shopping in major retail stores. If they don’t sell it in the gas station near my house, I don’t need it. That little gas station sells eggs, milk, bread, and wine, along with a full complement of lunch meats and M&Ms in every flavor. I can buy cleaning supplies and sweatshirts there. What else is there?

Revolution Four: I really should write more, but you people have suffered enough. I’m going to switch to writing those instruction manuals that come with major appliances and do-it-yourself furniture. I can’t suck worse than the people who already write those things. Since no one is actually going to pay me to do this, it’s more of a calling. I’m just going to start taking things apart at random and then writing a manual about how I put it back together.

That’s really the only things that occur to me at the moment, but I’m sure major changes will be in store down the road. For you, obviously. Because as I said, it’s just too late for me. Save yourselves.

Only a Selfish Pig Wouldn’t Be Fit Enough to Eat

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If the stick figure can fall out of a tree without whining about it, why can't my husband?

My darling husband came home from hunting yesterday (without any meat, I feel compelled to add) limping in the door in a pair of pants so shredded that he looked like he’d been attacked by wild dogs. He dropped his stuff and rolled up both pants legs to reveal really horrible bloody gashes running on the outside of both knees. Apparently, he had started to fall out of his tree stand and instinctively stuck his legs out to hold on but they were cut by—get this—the metal screws that hold this tree stand together.

Those of you from rural Alabama not only know exactly what I’m talking about and can visualize the whole thing playing out in slow motion, you even know three relatives that this has happened to. Those of you not schooled in the ways of killing your own wild game from up in the branches of a tree might need a little help, but I’m too lazy to explain it. Just trust me, he started to fall and ended up cutting his legs. The end.

But that’s not actually the end. He cut himself on metal screws. That were rusty. Let that sink in.

There’s an important story that actually happened just last week and it’s important to today’s tale because you need to understand what actually happens in a tree stand. Not only is there an agreement that any member of the hunting world can use your tree stand—and PEE out of it as the need arises—but nature-type things also happen in tree stands. Last week, my husband climbed up in a tree stand belonging to a friend of his and discovered parts of a furry dead animal. I had to explain to him that a large bird of prey had probably used the tree stand as a perch from which to scarf down its most recent kill, probably a squirrel or a rabbit.

So my husband’s tree stand injury now has happened on metal screws that were rusty and coated in rabbit blood, bird poop, and hunter pee. AND HE WON’T GET A TETANUS SHOT. He refused. I nagged, I begged, I threatened, I Googled stories of people dying from lock jaw, I even called up close-up images of festering yellowy-oozy infectious wounds. And he’s such a baby that he won’t go get one.

As hunting people, we are realists. My husband declared that if he gets tetanus, oh well, he dies, no big deal because his life insurance is paid up. To which I pointed out, you have to be a real jerk to go ahead and die from something infectious because then the rest of us can’t eat you in the apocalypse or in a blizzard or something. Way to think of others, asshat.

Keeping You Badger-Free Since 2011

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Those of you who were reading my blog around this time last year probably remember that we finally had our elderly dog put to sleep because she started to smell like the plague. We got a new one, a really great poodle from a poodle rescue center (yes, they specialize now), and the only thing that made him really great was he knew not to get his leash wrapped around mailboxes when we would go for a walk. This Mensan of a dog could look at an object and decide to go around it without me having to drag him by the neck. It doesn’t take much to make me happy. I got a bathrobe and an office chair for Christmas, I’m kind of low maintenance that way.

I didn’t write about it at the time because I was still on the verge of throat punching people, but our great Mensan poodle was stolen back in the fall. I couldn’t very well go tell the poodle rescue people that I managed to lose a dog WHILE I WAS HOME and I needed them to give me another one, so I went to the local regular dog rescue and had to take whatever they had. Unfortunately, they had no poodles, but they did have a Dachshund.

I really should have paid better attention to the fact that they were way too excited about getting this dog a home. They offered to deliver it. Only now in hindsight is that making alarm bells go off. But it didn’t look like any of those wretched things on the Sarah McLaughlin commercials so I thought it would be a good pet for us. Well, that and the fact that this dog was on clearance. I’m a sucker for anything on sale.

This is possibly the stupidest dog alive. Forget learning any commands in human language, I’m not even sure this dog speaks dog. I’ve pulled this tiny animal out of our toilets and trashcans more times than I care to think about, especially when I see it licking my husband’s face. No, wait, that’s actually kind of funny.

The really sad thing about the dog is the fact that it looks like it was made from parts of other dogs. It’s legs are obviously too short because it’s a Dachshund, but it’s back is also too long, it’s head is so big compared to its body that it has trouble keeping its ears off the ground, and it trips on its own horrifically long tail a lot. This thing looks like someone’s idea of a genetic joke. There’s something so galactically wrong with it that I’m not even sure I should be capitalizing the name of its breed.

I knew there had to be a purpose for this breed besides “court jester,” kind of like how retrievers bring things back and collies keep things in a circle, so my brother Googled it for me. Sit down for this one: Dachshunds were bred for their ability to keep badgers away.

If I am ever in danger from a badger attack, say, while waiting in the carpool lane at my kids’ school, all I have to do is whip this stupid thing out of my purse and those badgers will tuck tail and run. I’m envisioning ruffian Vikings going on midnight pillaging runs with Dachshunds strapped firmly to the front of their armor to ward off the unsuspecting town’s badger defenses.

Since obviously the Dachshund can’t actually take on a badger in combat, I think the purpose for the dog was to make the badgers not want to be anywhere in the vicinity. So far the only defense mechanism my dog has in the ongoing struggle against badger attack is this unholy smell that she emits from a special anti-badger gland right on her ass. The vet keeps having to “express” it but I think he’s actually making a commercial-grade badger defense spray out of the foul-smelling ooze that goops out of her. I can already testify that it is effective in keeping one’s family members away, which is reason enough for owning a stupid wiener dog.

The Imperfect Killing Machine

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It’s wonderful. The four of us are home from school and work, enjoying the calm that settles after a major holiday. There we were, snuggled together in the big bed, watching a nature documentary on our new big TV.

Suddenly, the serenity was shattered by a sort of oversized cat launching itself out of a tree and onto the back of a supremely furry wild boar. Its teeth and claws immediately went to work tearing hunks of meat off the screaming animal. And of course, my husband has to shatter the moment by saying, “So that’s what squealing like a pig sounds like.”

But that actually wasn’t the worst commentary on the program. No, it was from the headless voice-over narrator who said, “Although only slightly larger than the average house cat, the Siberian whatever-cat is the perfect killing machine.” Like we couldn’t tell that from the pig fur strewn across the landscape.

You know what you never hear? You never get a TV show where the narrator calls any kind of toothy animal a completely pointless waste-of-a-killing-machine. It’s always, “perfect” killing machine. Where are the TV shows about the predators that starved themselves into extinction back in the Triassic Period because they were completely incompetent killing machines?

I guess evolution really is a bitch that way. The predators that weren’t 98% tooth-and-claw died out years ago, just like the animals that had a really high center of gravity compared to their prey or the ones that were too pea-brained to find the nearest watering hole. Sadly, stupid seems to be an evolutionary trait that nature selects for. If my dog is any proof, there is no such thing as an animal that is too dumb to live.

Post Party Depression

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Even Charlie Brown put more effort into decorating his tree than I did.

The subject of after holiday letdown certainly isn’t anything new. I’m usually so riled up by all the month-long preparations for holidaypaloozas for a variety of different religions (I don’t like to limit myself to one particular holiday, just in case) that by the time the last piece of tinsel comes down and the last chorus of “Dreidel Dreidel Dreidel” has been sung, I’m an emotional and physical wreck. I decided to avoid the bleak winter depression and resulting heavy drinking by just avoiding the whole mess in the first place.

I don’t mean that I skipped Christmas entirely at my house, although it would be safe to say that Scrooge had a little more festive going on at his place than I do. Sure, the stockings were hung with care…on the back of the couch. There is a tree up in my living room, and it’s fully decorated…with stuff I happened to have lying around the house. Like bottles of expired prescription medications.

The holidays just pretty much snuck up on me this year, so I just never really got around to doing a lot of decorating. Or cooking. Or shopping. I’m hard at work right now on my New Year’s Eve cards since the Christmas cards I bought never even left their box.

But I have a plan. I did a fantastic job today of putting all the decorations on our lovely tree before I shrink wrap the whole thing to put it in the attic.

It’s time to Saran Wrap my Christmas tree.

You read that right. I’m not done with the overspending or commercialism of what used to be a meaningful religious experience, but I am completely through with doing anything that feels too much like cleaning up. So I’ve got every decoration in my arsenal hanging precariously from a nylon and aluminum tree-shaped object and I’m wrapping the entire monument in layers of Saran Wrap until next year. Be forewarned, I have a similar plan in place for the turkey leftovers…

Christmas With Famous People

ME Overly simple thoughts

This is the time of year when all kinds of great nostalgic information comes out about famous people, both living and dead, and their respective holiday traditions. The First Lady’s favorite hot cocoa recipe gets printed in magazines, biographies about noted figures who passed away this year get published, and so on. Not to be outdone by actual famous people because I really hate not being the center of your attention, here is a photo for all of you to enjoy, a mere peek into my childhood. I hope it explains a lot.

A picture is worth a thousand words. This one is only worth about four.

Yes, I am the morose-looking child with my hands over my ears. This would be an excellent time for analysts to speculate on my mental health a la’ Sylvia Plath (“…there were clear signs at an early age, an attempt to shut out the world around her and block the myriad voices that spoke to her in her head, as evidenced in this early photo…”), but sadly, no. My hands are up because my brothers kept trying to put their fingers in my ears. See the brother kneeling next to me, his arm lovingly behind my back? That’s not a hug, dear readers, he’s going for the sneak attack.

The real victim in the photo is actually the baby. That poor thing never stood a chance. We all towered over her and outweighed her by a good bit by the time she was born. The photo has faded somewhat so it’s possible that you can no longer see the fact that she’s covered in a blue glaze. It’s from the fabric softener we had just poured on her, Snuggle, if I recall. Why, you ask. Because we had put her in the washing machine, obviously. Who knew that she could climb out of it without help?

Merry Christmas.

The Frugal Christmas

ME Overly simple thoughts

I used to have a grandmother. Well, technically, I guess like every other mammal on the planet I used to have two of them. But I actually knew this one. Legend has it that this one grandmother was so good at money management that she could…and I quote venerable relatives here…”get three pennies outta one.”

I am here to tell you folks, that’s a lie. One penny back in the olden days still only equaled one penny. And as much as I loved Grandma dearly, part of the reason she was such a good financial planner is she liked to serve her family meals like this one:

Yum...Spam, just like grandma used to make. I wish that was a... on Twitpic

Yup. That’s Spam. Broiled, to be exact, with fancy ham-like cuts in it and a pineapple ring on top. Those are even cloves. Grandma was quite the frugal gourmet, let me tell you. She also had this funky dessert involving bananas with mayonnaise instead of Cool-Whip. Even die-hard cheapskates felt sorry for us around the holidays.

But gosh darnit, we’re in a bad economy right now and there’s a lesson to be learned from her attempts at culinary belt-tightening. If Grandma could still serve elegantish meals like honey-glazed Spam at holiday gatherings, so can I. I can even take it a step further by using generic Spam. When you open the pop-top on the can there’s this layer of Poltergeist-like ooze on the surface. Don’t throw that away. You can save even more money by feeding it to the dog or using it to lubricate the bearings on your car.

But just like Grandma, I can’t just plop some lunchmeat product on the table for my dearest kin to eat. I need to lovingly morph this knock-off Spam product into something festive, something that shows my family that I care enough about them to take the time and effort to go the extra mile. Therefore, my family will be feasting on roast Spam on a spit this year for Christmas, complete with an apple in its mouth.

My own spam recipe. Spam on a Spit, complete with apple in it... on Twitpic

I have nothing better to do than sculpt meat conglomerate made out of pig brains into cute shapes. Enjoy!

And Merry Christmas Back to You…

ME Overly simple thoughts , ,

I don't have anything funny to say because they might eat my eyeballs if I laugh at them.

Here is my Christmas present to all of you. The best part is I’m not singing or talking at all. I lied, the best part is it’s a fantastic song by a horrifically talented person. Enjoy!

http://itunes.apple.com/us/podcast/the-little-drummer-boy/id416896033?i=108558377

If you should feel the need to reciprocate with a gift for me, I really need a new can opener. I don’t have to tell you why.

Merry Christmas to Me

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This could be me if my family were more open to gift ideas.
I am not the easiest person to shop for, as evidenced by the fact that my side of the family just celebrated Christmas and I did not receive a single gift that spouts fire on purpose. Given that I know this about myself, I’ve decided—in a veritable fit of Christmas generosity—to tell all of you what to get me. You’re welcome. I’ve also listed Kidney Points next to each item, basically telling you how big a favor I would owe you if you decided to get me that particular item.

Item #1: I need a better office chair. (25 Kidney Points)
I realize that there are office chairs to be had at all kinds of stores these days, but I want the really awesome ergonomic chair that I saw in a catalog. I can’t remember which catalog, so if it happens to be the right chair, you may add six more Kidney Points for being psychic.

Item #2: Letterhead and envelopes with my name on it. (10 Kidney Points)
But it can’t be plain ordinary personalized stationery. I want it to have my full name and business information but I want it spelled out in ransom note font. How great would that be to know that you mailed a letter to some corporate jerk and when he opens it he thinks it’s a ransom note? Even just for a minute or two??? I’m all giggly now just thinking about it.

I promise to use better spelling with my ransom note stationery.

Item #3: I really do need a gun. (this one’s a toughy…100 Kidney Points)
Here’s the catch with owning a gun. It really needs to be registered to someone who deserves to burn in hell, so that every time I shoot someone with it, it racks up even more charges against that person. The real trick is I also need an unlimited supply of ammo that has already been touched by that bad person, so that when I shoot people that bad person’s fingerprints are all over the shell casings, thus providing even more evidence against him or her. See? I’m thinking of you here.

Item #4: A fluffy bathrobe. (5 Kidney Points)
This one’s kinda boring, but I have this really warm bathrobe already. The problem is I’m really short and it drags the ground when I walk. I’ve tripped a few times on the hem. I’d really like one that does not make me look as old as I am.

Item #5: Wine. (2000 Kidney Points)
You only get the kidney points if I can call you at any time and you deliver it so I don’t have to take off my bathrobe or get out of my ergonomic chair to go to the store. It’s not that I’m selfish, I really am that busy. These ransom notes aren’t going to write themselves…

How Much Did the 12 Days of Christmas Set You Back?

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How Much Did the 12 Days of Christmas Set You Back?

My daughter, Tax Write-Off the First, had a class assignment to estimate the total cost of buying all of the presents listed in the song, The Twelve Days of Christmas. It started out well, but turned into a fire-hazardous parent-fail before we made it to the five golden rings.

CHILD: What’s a partridge-in-a-pear-tree?

ME: Those are two different things. One’s a bird and the other one is, well, a tree.

CHILD: I’m just putting down fifty cents. (determined scribbling sounds) How much do French hens cost?

ME: Were they free range and humanely killed?

CHILD: I guess so.

ME: Then I wouldn’t know. We can only afford chickens that smothered to death on the fumes of their own poop within the confines of the tiny crate they spent their entire lives in.

CHILD: (eye rolling) I’m guessing a dollar each. I don’t think you know what a calling bird is, so I’ll ask my friend’s mom for that one. How much do gold rings cost these days?

ME: We can’t afford real chicken and you think I know about the street value of gold rings? Okay, but first you have to determine if they are stolen or not.

CHILD: Is Dad busy right now?

ME: Very. What comes after the five golden rings again?

CHILD: Well, the six geese-a-laying and the seven swans-a-swimming are still poultry answers, so I’ll come back to those. What about eight maids-a-milking and nine ladies-dancing?

ME: Hmm, those are tough. You’re getting into minimum wage and labor law issues here. Are the dairy girls in a union?

CHILD: I don’t think so.

ME: That makes it easier. But all the rest of the items on this Christmas wish list involve humans. Unless you plan to get involved in actually purchasing the lords-a-leaping on the black market, you’re going to have to pay these people, either hourly or by the day. And this is Alabama, so you’re going to have to factor in the cost of paying off the cops to look the other way on the new immigration law.

CHILD: WHAT?

ME: And are they freelance pipers-piping? Remember, any of these people who happen to be performers of any kind you might have to pay the industry standard charged by the artists’ guild.

CHILD: Can you just write me a note saying I lost my homework like you did when I had to paint that solar system project?

ME: Hey, don’t take that tone with me. You know why the solar system project didn’t work out. It’s not my fault that your teacher doesn’t know about Pluto.