Huked on Fonix Wurkz Fur Me!

I commute to work every day with an absolutely hilarious friend. When you spend a great deal of time in the car with someone, you get to know them fairly well and also have some interesting conversations. Today, this song came on the radio:



I began making the bull whip sound earnestly, as it is my favorite part of the song. Somehow or another, my friend and I got into a deep conversation about how you would describe this whip sound. Specifically, how would you spell it?

Before you know it, my friend and I are making the whip sound over, and over, and over. We are really analyzing the sound and trying to put letters to go with it. Of course, every time we make the sound, we have to make the whipping motion with our hands! I'm sure we looked VERY odd, sitting in traffic, whipping the air repeatedly in the car.  We were also dying of laughter.

To better clarify the sound, I turned the volume WAY up so we could study the sound in detail. Here we are, sitting in my old lady car, music BLASTING, whipping the air with a frenzy.

My friend suggested that you spell the whipping sound like this:

Witchchchch-chhch

My argument was that sounded like a whip that had a stutter, or a whip that is cold. Besides, you'd need the hyphen earlier in the word! But hey, try spelling her suggestion outloud to yourself and listen to how silly it sounds!

I don't know if it's

whi-tch
whtch
witch

Or, as Chandler Bing says it...



Don't you wish you carpooled with us to hear our stimulating conversations?!

Why I Should Move to Minnesota

For the Thanksgiving holidays, I was invited by some very kind people to their home.  Their home happens to be in another state that I'm not very fond of, but I went anyway.  The last time I went to this state, it was hotter than the surface of the sun.

Just so you know, there are three things critically important that you need to know about me:

1)  I am a weenie.  A big, big weenie.  I don't like to sweat. 

2)  I am white.  Really, really, really white.  I sunburn just thinking about the "s" word.  The rumor seriously went around that I was half-albino when I was in college.  HALF-ALBINO?! 

3)  I am not an outdoorsy girl.  I'm just not.   I don't like getting hot, I sunburn like bacon in a frying pan, I am an insect magnet, and I am petrified of ticks.

For these reasons, I love snow.  Love, love, love it.  It's beautiful!  It's refreshing!  It requires me to be bundled up!  It is virtually impossible to get sunburned when you're wearing a hat, scarf, coat, gloves, and pants.  I like feeling cozy and warm in the house when it's cold outside.  Heck, I don't even like being outside, so winter is perfect!

So imagine the sadness in my heart when I left my state for Thanksgiving and, in my absence, it snowed.  There is still snow on my roof.  I missed it all.  I am the snow repellent!  I always want snow.  Wherever I go, the snow goes the other way.  I'm so sad.  I wish I could have sung "I'm dreaming of a white Thanksgiving..."

Maybe next year.

In the meantime, I'm ready to move to Minnesota.  I'll blend in beautifully, I'll have plenty of opportunities to stay indoors, and I'll get snow.  Lots of snow.  And, I can say "baeg" instead of "bag."

Praying for snow days,
Non-Mommy

(PS - Wait, I need more info.  For schools in colder climates, what is the temperature cut off for playing outside at recess?  Do they ever get snow days?  I DO love snow days...)

Grandma Got Run Over by her Neighbor

 My grandma is hilarious.  She's really an interesting bird.  I could write an entire blog about her life alone.  However, it is the story of her being run over by one of her neighbors that I am sharing today.

My grandmother lives in a housing development filled with old people.  She spends a lot of time with a group of widowed women.  They go out to eat and see shows together.  You'd think, since this group is pretty much in their 80's, that they would be boring and drama free.  NO, SIR!  They fight as if they were in high school.

Two of the characters in the group have been battling one another.  The first Fighting Geezer is Sally.  Sally is old.  Really, really old.  She's tottery, forgetful, and looks as if a strong wind would blow her over.  Sally has been good friends with Dorothy, Fighting Geezer number two.  Dorothy had a stroke recently, so Sally has been helping her by driving her around.  Sally and Dorothy regularly go out to eat, and Sally always cuts Dorothy's food for her because Dorothy's hand strength is weak since her stroke.

Recently, Sally and Dorothy got into a fight.  As a payback, Sally declared that she would no longer cut Dorothy's food for her.  THAT SHOWED HER!  So Dorothy called up my grandmother and asked her if she would cut her food from now on, because Sally wasn't going to anymore.  When I heard this story, I laughed so hard.  The silly drama!  The best part is, they still go out with one another, even though they are mad.

Fast forward to a few weeks ago.  Sally, Dorothy and my grandmother went out to eat at their country club.  Sally, who is very frail and probably doesn't even remember her own name, drove.  Don't ask me why!  Every time I see Sally, I think that she's on Death's door and can't see.  Doesn't fill me with confidence to think that my grandmother is riding around with her.  So Sally drove the ladies to and from the country club.  My grandmother was helping Dorothy into the backseat and buckles her in.  She walked around, put one foot into the car, and was about to bring the other one into the car, when suddenly, Sally floored it.  This caused her to run over my grandmother's foot that was still on the pavement.

My grandmother found her shoe on the other side of the parking lot, and her foot was badly bruised, but nothing more. 

The next day, Sally showed up at my grandmother's house, apologizing profusely and handed her cash to get new shoes or to put toward a doctor's visit.  My grandmother was insulted, but I told her not to be.  Sally was just feeling guilty.  Then Sally called my grandmother four times in a row, prompting my grandmother to stop answering the phone.  Then Sally showed up AGAIN, acting as if she hadn't been there before, and handed my grandmother more money.  I'm just glad that a) Sally isn't my grandmother and b) my grandma was okay.

I'm going to choose to ignore the fact that there are people like Sally, all over the world, driving around when they shouldn't be, and instead focus on the fact that my grandmother got run over by a senile woman because the senile woman was fighting with her friend and wouldn't buckle her up.  In honor of this story, I composed the following song:

Grandma Got Run Over by her Neighbor

(Sung to the tune of "Grandma Got Run Over by a Reindeer)

Grandma got run over by her neighbor

buckling a friend into her seat

you can say that old folks are pretty boring

but I say they're an entertaining treat!

She'd been riding with Senile Sally

and we'd begged her not to go.

But she's a stubborn little old lady

and chose to be a friend, not a foe.

When they found her in the parking lot

at the scene of the attack

there were tire marks on her foot and

her missing shoe in the lot, way in the back.

Grandma got run over by her neighbor

buckling a friend into her seat

you can say that old folks are pretty boring

but I say they're an entertaining treat!

Now we're all so proud of Grandma

she's been taking this so well

See her there sipping her cocktails

encouraging Sally her car to sell.

It's hard to walk without a shoe

and a foot swollen and black

But we just can't help but wonder

if she'll go back?

Grandma got run over by her neighbor

buckling a friend into her seat

you can say that old folks are pretty boring

but I say they're an entertaining treat!

Now the shoe has been repaired 

and the foot is almost healed

I think my grandma needs a helmet

and a full length body shield.

I've warned all my friends and neighbors

better watch out for yourselves

they should never give a license

to an old lady who hears bells.

Grandma got run over by her neighbor

buckling a friend into her seat

you can say that old folks are pretty boring

but I say they're an entertaining treat!

Thanks!

This was such a crazy  Thanksgiving holiday.  I won't bore you with the details, just know the story involves starvation on a certain picky blonde's part, sleeping in my brand new ski jacket, hat and gloves, and coming home smelling strongly of bacon. 

Instead, I want to talk about being thankful.  Seriously, the last year of my life was almost the worst it could possibly get and I came about 10 seconds away from having to go into the looney bin, but I made it through.  Victory!  If I talked about all the things that have happened in my life, all the blessings through the rotten pain, I would cry.

You don't want to make me cry.  Trust me.

So, instead, I am going to talk about the silly things that I am thankful for.  I mean, I am genuinely thankful for these items, but not as much as the important people in my life and the way God has taken care of me.  My coping mechanism is humor, so humor you get!

1.  I am thankful for friends who will send me or pick me up food from Trader Joe's.  Trader Joe's, despite my deepest love and support, and many letters written to them, has refused to put a store within a reasonable driving distance from me.  I love you, Trader Joe's!  Stop snubbing us!  We need your unique and organic goodness just as much as everyone else!  So, until they finally decide that I am a genius and build a store closer to me, I am instead grateful to people who will buy me things like chocolate covered edamame or Meyer lemon thins.

2.  I am thankful for flat iron spray.  Without the stuff, my attempts at flat iron curls would, well, fall flat, for lack of a better term.

3.  I am thankful for the electric blanket.  Whoever created that baby was a genius.  I salute the inventor of the electric blanket from September to May.  Bravo, inventor!

4.  I am thankful for my missing appendix.  Because of its absence, I will never have to have another appendectomy.  This saves me a great amount of pain, time out of commission, and money.

5.  I am thankful that I get to work with a man.  In the education world, men are rare.  Without any testosterone present, the women work themselves into a frenzy and rip one another to shreds.  Even though I am female, sometimes I just need to hang out with the guys.  In my case, guy.  He's hilarious and he lets me use his restroom, which is much cleaner than the overly used ladies' room.

6.  I am thankful for bell peppers.  Without bell peppers, this certified veggie hater would be in big trouble.

7.  I am thankful that I have the ability to play the piano.  I don't play it well, and certainly don't want anyone to hear me play it, but it's a pretty cool feeling to be able to do it.  I enjoy it.

8.  I am thankful for Google Reader.  Thanks to Google Reader, I am able to keep up with lots and lots of blogs - and it even recommends new ones for me!

9.  I am thankful for the tankini swim suit with a skirt bottom.  Who knew that just a few more inches of fabric would make me strut around the pool belting out "Boom, chica wah wah!"  OK, not really.  But hey, the fact that I'm even walking around the pool at all is progress.

10.  I'm thankful that I have a job in which I can require my students to put on flower leis and dance to Elvis Presley's "Blue Christmas" every day during the Christmas season.  Is it educational?  Welllllll......

What random things are you thankful for?

I Needed Some Ruby Red Slippers

Tonight I just happened to be in the wrong place at the wrong time.  You see, I was determined to get my mother's extremely late birthday gift.  I had ordered her DVDs of the Canadian show Corner Gas (hilarious, trust me!) but apparently it is hard to find.  It never came, even after I ordered it.  I recently located a copy and was finally able to give her her gift, five months late. 

On my way to pick up the DVDs, I decided to try and take a rural route to the store to see if it was any shorter than the way I usually went.  I happened to be in an area that was literally flattened by a tornado a few years ago.  I knew it was rainy and very dark looking, but didn't worry until I noticed a really low cloud.  I thought I knew what a wall cloud looked like, until I saw a real one several years ago.  I had no idea that they were so low.  So this afternoon, when I noticed a very oddly shaped dark cloud that was very low to the ground, I noticed.  I called my mother and asked her if we were in any storm warnings.  She looked, said that it was just a small storm that was about to blow over, and that I'd be fine. 

RUN FOR YOUR LIFE!  This is not a good sign!

Approximately two and a half minutes later, I found myself in an area with no buildings around.  In hindsight, I did notice branches and leaves swirling around in the air, but I ignored this.  I drove onto this large bridge when suddenly my car was slammed by this freak "pop up" storm.  I couldn't see anything at all.  It was hailing incredibly hard.  My car was swaying side to side.  And where was I? 

On a freaking bridge. 

There was no where I could go, and I didn't know what to do.  I was in major trouble. 

Being calm is just not my forte.  I called my mother, bawling, and yelled into the phone "Are you sure that I'm safe out here?"  Which, by the way, never call your mother crying and asking things like this.  I contemplated what to do.  I mean, in a real tornado you should get as low as possible.  But I was on a very tall, large bridge.  I was seriously concerned that my windshield was going to be broken, and my car was literally swaying from side to side.

Turns out that little freak pop up storm caused quite a stir.  It turned out that I was in a tornado warning.  I was in exactly the wrong place at the wrong time.  The winds were 70 mph and it was quarter to golf ball sized hail.  Just as quickly as it had come, it blew over and I was on the side of the road, teary eyed and petrified.  And THEN, suddenly on the radio, they were telling me to take cover, that I was in grave danger!  Gee, thanks!  A little too late, don't you think?!

I don't know why I can't remain calm at times like this.  If I am at school and something goes wrong, I remain calm.  But on my own?  Not at all.

Last year the stupid tornado sirens went off right before 6 a.m.  I'm a very light sleeper, so I woke up immediately.  I'm also not one to wake up suddenly in the morning.  It makes me rather frantic.  I looked outside and saw a sky that looked exactly like this:

This is also very, very bad.

 So when I turned on the TV and they said "People living in Non-Mommyville need to take cover IMMEDIATELY, you have MAYBE 10 minutes before the storm will hit" I immediately ran around like a chicken with my head cut off.


"Bra, bra, you need a bra, where is your bra? You have to get your purse out of the car.  Hurry Non-Mommy, you have like 9 minutes.  You need shoes!  Shoes!  HURRY!  Should I pack my laptop? Seriously, it's solid black outside and you're worrying about your laptop? Get out of here!   8 minutes!"


They really need to stop giving specific times until you die.


So off to the snooty neighbors house I went.  She's seriously one of those people who smiles at you and says sweetly "Oh, those are an interesting choice of shoes. Hmm."  So here I come, with my hair literally standing straight up, in mismatching clothing (because I just grabbed something to wear), carrying my purse (because, after all, if you are going to lose everything, you'll want a credit card to buy yourself a toothbrush.  Not that my $200 credit limit on my Target credit card was going to help me much). And then I had to sit in her basement and make small talk.  At 6 a.m.  Talk about torture.  I'd rather go through a tornado.   Annnnnnd we sat there.  Listening to it outside.  It was scary. 

I hate storms.  Does anyone know where I can find a remote island that has no scary storms, no UV rays to sunburn me, and is fabulous enough for me to live with my rich, rich husband where we can have lots of babies?  Anyone?