Wisteria Lane

I live in a neighborhood in the foothills West of Denver. To protect the innocent, I will not name it. If you live here, you know where you are. At least I hope you do. Sometimes I'm not completely sure but that's another issue altogether. If you don't, use your imaginations. According to my mother, however, there are no innocents in the immediate vicinity. Mom: "Goobie!!!!! I wish you would move!!!!  Your neighborhood is like Peyton Place!!!!!" First of all Mom, even if I wanted to up and leave, I've got uh.....TWO houses here???? One of which I have rented out for two more years??? AND then there's the whole selling at the bottom of the market thing. Shit there are people trying to GIVE things away and there aren't any takers. Not to mention that I've got just about every penny I have wrapped up in these places. Second is the fact that I LIKE LIVING HERE. I HAVE LIVED HERE FOR TEN YEARS. MY SON DOESN'T REMEMBER LIVING ANYWHERE ELSE. He has friends he's had since he was less than two years old. They hang out at the pool together. They come over and knock on the door and ask him to play. People know who he is and look out for him. Just like we all look out for one another's kids. It's an awesome neighborhood. Red rock formations, a golf course, people I like. Sure, there are people I don't like and some that don't like me. It's essentially a small town. With all of the accompanying drama. And yes, some of it involves me. Which may be part of the equation. That being said, there are little dramas and "Peyton Places" in every neighborhood you can imagine. It's called "human nature". There is no economic barrier to drama and rascally antics. Inner city? Drama. Multi-million dollar country club neighborhood? Drama. Particularly if you are not standing on the sidelines. I am not a sideline kinda chick. I'm out there and in the mix. Alternately being helpful and causing trouble. I'm all about the balance. Throw a match on an incendiary situation and run? Balanced by my collection of good works. In fact, I think such things as "Peyton Place" are so ingrained in us as human beings that it keeps coming up in our popular culture, which is usually an aggrandized or exaggerated snapshot of reality. "Wisteria Lane" ring a bell with anybody? Thought so. Maybe we don't have a Nicolette Sheridan sort running around seducing all of the menfolk.......oh wait......maybe we do. But you know what I'm getting at. You can't escape this stuff. You put it out there and some shit is going to hit the fan. I'd rather live life to the fullest and take my lumps as they come. I'm a work in progress and I don't think where I live has any bearing on the things that happen to me 'cause they'd probably happen no matter where I was. I could probably attract trouble in a refrigerator box. So, God willin' and the creek don't rise. I'm staying put. On Peyton Place. Or Wisteria Lane. Now I'm going to find Susan and Bree and drink some wine and kibbitz about our neighbors.  

Prognosticator of Doom

While rooting around in my utensil drawer for the pizza cutter (I am rather OCD and will eat only Subway or a Lean Cuisine pizza for lunch) I came across a set of measuring spoons and was reminded of a story I meant to share but it got lost somewhere in the madness that is my life. Some of you may recall that I went to a wedding in Arizona last month. Great time, my boob popped out of my shirt, blah, blah, blah. A typical Friday night, right? So, the next day, the family of the bride hosted a brunch for the families. They had a girl there singing that was one of those, "dude, how are you not famous" types. Amazing but completely beside the point. The point is, we're sitting on the patio with the quite literally glowing bride and my mother-in-law (Mother Bradford to those of you in the know) says, "Oh, you look so happy.......you're in for a big let-down". We all about choked. And the poor bride got these huge eyes and had a look of general shock about her person. It's like, MB......WE all know that life becomes a living hell in the long-run of married life but part of being in the Secret Society is that YOU DON'T LET THE NEWBIES IN ON IT. Otherwise, we'd be a dying breed!!!!! It's the same reason I didn't watch the childbirth videos. I would have never had sex! There are certain things ya just don't talk about. So anyway, back to the utensils in question. The newlyweds gave us all these really cute little silver, heart-shaped measuring spoons as a favor. They say things like "a pinch of happiness" and "heaping spoonful of love". My brother-in-law Skippy and I took one look at them and almost fell out of the car as we were driving away.......they should say "a pinch of doom", "a heaping spoonful of resentment", "a dash of I hate you" and "a sprinkle of YOU RUINED MY LIFE". But that's okay. We'll let them be hopeful. Sssshhhhhhh.

I BE BACK!!!!!!

Yikes.....I haven't posted since June 21st, huh? And don't think I haven't been yelled at. My dad, my best friend, my husband are all pissed because I lose readership when I don't post. Imagine that. And friends I haven't seen in 20 years have written to say that surely Jack or Grady have done something entertaining in recent days. Well of course they have. I've been on vacation and while I haven't been writing, I've been thinking. Deep Thoughts is pretty frustrating because it gets pretty crazy readership (not that you guys are crazy.....although I'm sure some of you are slightly off balance) but crazy from a numbers standpoint. My issue is how to take it to the next level. So I've spent the last couple o' weeks pondering that very fact. There will be some changes made in the coming weeks and months that I hope will take my ramblings to a wider audience. But you guys can say you were first. Yay, you. And I promise I will start posting once a day again, you will get WTF for dinner on Thursday (I may actually start working on a cook book for the boozy.....I mean busy.....mom about town) and you may see some added features if I am too addled to come up with 'em. So thanks for your patience, peeps! I genuinely appreciate you visiting. Keep it up and tell your friends. Okay, now some snippets from my vacation Up North with Jack at my parents cottage:

Dad, when discussing the blog: "You know, I think you're making a BIG mistake by having that God Damn bag on your head. You're a decent looking person". Me: "Gee thanks, Dad......what a compliment!!!!" Dad: "What am I going to say? You're my daughter." Ummmm, I'm still not sure how to take that one other than that I should probably call the chick from Napoleon Dynamite that does the glamour shots. 

Rainy Day Incident: Mom and I grow weary of the inclement weather "I'm bored! I'm bored" (wait.......that might have been me......maybe it was mom that had grown weary) and dispatched ourselves to the local bowling alley with Jack. The "Northern Lights Recreation Center" is over in Harbor Springs. It's not really your conventional bowling alley but it works. The problem is that there aren't that many lanes and apparently the whining was rampant throughout Northwestern Michigan and everybody had the same idea. We were told that it would be about 45-minutes for a lane. Alrighty then. Fortunately there's an arcade. My mom gave Jack ten bucks, nine of which he immediately dumped into the bane of my arcade existence, the freakin' CLAW MACHINE. I hate those things. For $9 he came up with a lead-laden 3-inch penguin with scary eyes and a bow tie. Joy. So having exhausted that minor amusement inside of ten minutes, we ventured outside of the arcade. Fortunately in the interim, Grandma had produced two vodka and tonics from the adjoining "Sassy Loon Saloon". Yay, Grandma. Oh, and some popcorn. We set ourselves up at a little table and pondered our next move. Oh look! There's a punching bag game! Grandma produces another couple of bucks and Jack and I saunter over. Jack inserts the money. We cannot, rocket surgeons that we are, figure out to start the fucker. I'm looking at the directions and it says, "Press Start". Okay, fine dumbass but WHERE IS START?????? Wait.....wait......this might be it........and I press a button. The punching back, which was on an arm and remains in a raised position until engaged (by pushing start, natch) comes downs AND.......hits Jack squarely in the face. I was laughing so hard that I couldn't even determine if he was okay for the first few seconds. As it turned out, he too was laughing. My mom was practically on the ground as were many other passersby. God. 

Michigan Militia: Those of you who are my facebook friends likely saw the pictures of my mother with the gun. We're sitting out on the patio having cocktails and playing Mexican Train when my mom, freshly home from golf at the club and attired as such says, "BILL!!!!! Where's your gun??????" Inexplicably he tells her (it's just a pellet gun......my family is smart enough to know that we shouldn't be trusted with the real deal.....the pellet gun probably poses danger enough) and she starts shooting into a tree. Seems some birds were causing her consternation and she wanted to scare them off. There's just something strangely disturbing about a sixty-something woman in golf clothes looking down the cross-hairs of a gun and letting her rip. Go, mommy......go. 

Adventure at Sea: My very oldest friend came up with her kids for an evening over one weekend. The kids, being kids, wanted to go tubing. It was pretty cute......her 13-year old son and 11-year old daughter and Jack, all on one big tube. My dad was giving 'em a pretty good ride......Jack was bounced off a couple of times and I think Alex went flying once. Well, they didn't seem to be showing much fatigue and wanted to keep going. So la, la, la.......tube, tube, tube, CLUNK. My dad and I look at each other kinda wide-eyed. WTF? NO, we did not run out of gas. Something is seriously wrong with the boat. Shit. Get the kids in. Double shit. We're almost out of beer. Swimming for shore was ruled out as there was a great deal of boat traffic that day and the chance of being chopped into chum by a boat engine was looking good. Okay, so that's out. Dad suggested that eventually we would be blown home. Looked in the cooler. "Eventually" was not an option given our "supplies". Jack starts bellowing, "EVERYBODY PANIC!!!!! WE'RE ALL GONNA DIE". Yeah......probably Jack. I can see both the house and the country club from where we floated. It's not like we were in the vast Bearing Sea. But then I started bellowing, "EVERBODY PANIC!!!!!!!! WE'RE OUT OF BOOZE!!!!". As things were starting to look pretty serious, we started waving down other boaters. "NO, dumbass.......we are NOT saying 'hi'. We need help!!!!!" At a certain point I offered to take off my shirt (as long as my dad turned around) but was informed that we didn't want to scare people away. Waaaaahhhhh. FINALLY, a little fishing boat with an outboard motor, a shirtless fisherman and his wife came to our rescue. I somehow made it from our boat onto theirs without losing my dignity and they delivered me over to our dock wherein I was yelled at by mom for not having brought my phone as that would have saved us alot of trouble. Well, duh. So, mom comes down and maneuvers the little Whaler skillfully to the big boat and we somehow get it tied up a tow it in. Grandma saves the day!!!!!! Having been sufficiently rattled by our brush with death, I believe we all retreated to the safety of the porch and enjoyed some bracing cocktails. That was a squeaker.

Well, readers, lots more happened that I'll share with ya but that's about enough for today. Shit, things have happened even since I've been back in the hood. I'll start putting 'em out there as they happen. At least the things I'm allowed to talk about. Stupid people and their bizarre need for discretion! Whassup with THAT? 

The Most Fun You'll Ever Have With Your Clothes On

So, Jack had to run errands with me today. As an astute parent always on the lookout for "teachable moments" (I think I just threw up in my mouth), I saw this as an opportunity. You see, dear readers, Jack like many of his peers often laments the fact that nine months out of the year, he has to go to school while I "get" to "stay home and do what I want". Hop in the car, Bucko. First stop? Goodwill. Had a carload of junk that at one time I once wanted but now have no earthly idea WHY. Gigantic key from Pottery Barn???? Who hasn't had their eye on one of those???? Pull up to the drive-up donation center. Am not really so much assisted as grunted at. The guy that is usually on duty (dirty-ish guy with one leg.....you know the one) was nowhere to be seen. I think I was asked by the guy that WAS taking donations if I wanted a receipt but I'm not really sure. Pull out of the drive-thru. Exit is completely blocked by shitty, random crap that nobody wants on both sides and by a pick-up truck in front of me. There's dirty-ish one legged guy!!!!! He's helping some old guy unload a couch so gross that it made the stuff I used to see on porches during the college years look appealing. Oh, and they are in no hurry. "HELLO????? Is my car not here???? Do I not LOOK like I would really like to get out of here???? Perhaps if I start LAYING ON THE HORN you might be inspired to step-lively???? Or hop, as the case may be? Yes, I know one of you is down to one leg but THEN DON'T WORK SOMEWHERE REQUIRING HEAVY LIFTING!!!!!" Eventually the truck was moved and we were onto our NEXT scintillating stop. The dry cleaners!!!!! Had to pick up a suit and shirt for daddy!!!!! Yaaaaaayyyyyy!!!!!! Wheeeeeeeee!!!!!!! Somebody stop me from "getting" to have so much FUNNNNNN!!!!!!! We then merrily drive over to the UPS store where I was informed I had to pay the guy behind the counter 25 cents to drop a pre-paid package off at his establishment. Seriously? How 'bout I just give ya a gumball? Shit. Next stop was the mall because the two of us are going on vacation. The aforementioned "up north". I needed shorts because I realized that my wardrobe consists of workout clothes, pool clothes and things to wear to parties. Nothing really in between. We go to the Gap. I find a couple of pairs of shorts. NO, thank you but the bored-looking eleven year old boy should indicate that I do NOT want to try anything on. Bored eleven-year old goes over to the kids side of the Gap. I figure since I've got him here and all of the sale stuff is an additional 25% off, I may as well get him situated too. I have long established that shopping with your child costs you roughly 40% more than it would if you were out on your own. This applies not only to clothing but to grocery shopping as well. "MOM!!!!! I NEED THIS GIANORMOUS PACKAGE OF CHEESE STICKS. MOM!!!!!! WE'RE OUT OF ICE CREAM. I NEED TWO KINDS!!!!!! MOM!!!!!!! MOM!!!!!!!! MOM!!!!!!!!". AAAAAAHHHHHHHH. So anyway, Jack found a LOT of stuff he liked. He said, "Now I won't look like a dork". God forbid. All of that Ralph Lauren you've been sporting since kindergarten thanks to your Uncle Skippy surely established you as King of the Outcasts. We step up to pay for our pile of treasures. I am asked if I have a Gap card. Yes, I do but I would prefer to use the card that earns me airline miles. Yes, I know that I could save blah, blah, blah. Correct. I STILL DO NOT WANT TO USE MY GAP CARD. This makes me crazy. Last I checked, "NO" means "NO". That does not just apply to horny teenage boys. It applies to overzealous sales clerks as well. NO!!!!! We walk our two big bags out of the Gap. Security beeper thing goes off. Back in we go. Both bags are gone through. No tags are found. Out we go again. Beeper thing goes off again. We are waved off. OKAY! Back to the car. Jack: "Can we go home?" Me: "What???? You're not having fun?????" Jack: "This is the most fun I've ever had. Not. Can we go home????" Me: "Huh. I thought this was a blast. And no, we cannot go home. Mommy needs to stop at Tipsy's Liquor World as she is out of both Malibu (which I have just learned is yummy with Diet Coke.....word up, Amy L.) AND vodka. This simply will not stand. Because you see, dear offspring, when you "get" to have all of this spine-tingling fun All. Day. Long. a drink sounds mighty fine come cocktail hour. I think my teachable moment worked. Lesson? Drinking solves ALL of your problems. Yep. I'm that good. 

Vaja-WHAT??????

Okay, so I'm at the pool yesterday hanging with the girls. Somehow the topic of Brazilian waxing came up. I've talked about this topic ad nauseum in this space. Bringing it up again under normal circumstances would be like beating a dead horse. Or a dead beaver as the case may be. A new twist has been added however!!!!! Yaaaaaayyyyy!!!!!! This friend of mine tells me that after you have had your lady bits stripped of what nature put there for some reason unknown to me, you can have it "vajazzled". That's right. Like a Bedazzler for your no longer bearded clam. This blows my mind. I almost fell off of my lounger. I had tears streaming down my face I was laughing so hard. Being in possession of an inquiring mind as well as an iPhone, I googled "vajazzling". Oh, there's video, people. I could have lived without seeing some chick having crystals hot-glued to her nether regions. *Boys......I know what you're doing.......you have left Deep Thoughts and are googling 'vajazzling'......you can't fool me......"* The larger question is WHY????? If I don't "get" the Brazilian thing, I sure as shit do not understand this form of embellishment. Call me crazy but don't guys pretty much like it down there WITHOUT FUCKING CRYSTALS ON IT?????? I've never had any official complaints lodged. Imagine that. From what I can see, I am in posession of a perfectly lovely vajayjay. It's done alright by me so far. But anyway, let's say one of these crystals becomes dislodged during carnal activity? Or is ingested? Or worse yet, what if one fell off in the middle of a cocktail party? I don't imagine that girls who get vajazzled wear underwear. I can see it now. Vajazzled female: "Oh my God!!!!! I just lost a crystal!!!!! Everybody look for it!!!!" You know, kinda like she lost a contact. And I really, really can't imagine the reaction of the "lucky" dude who is on the receiving end of this "surprise". I can hear it now......Woman: "Honey, wait 'til you see what I did!!!!" Man: "Neither can I, baby....." Woman (revealing her bad self): "Surprise!!!!!" Man: "It's so.....so.....sparkly????". 'Cause you know, nothing says "I love you" like a sparkly crotch. "Hello, waxing place? Do you vajazzle? I'm on my way". 

A Real Bite in The Pants

After Dave read my last entry, he reminded me that Coalers actually did one bad thing that I didn't mention. One very, very bad thing. First off though, his name was actually Coal. I just tend to add an "ers" to the end of the names of people and dogs I like. Please note that Grady is not referred to as "Graders". At least not yet. Grady in fact JUMPED IN THE HOT TUB LAST NIGHT. A HOT TUB FILLED WITH 10-YEAR OLD BOYS WHO LIKE TO SCREAM LIKE LITTLE GIRLS. But this tale is not about him. This is about the Honorable Mayor Coalman A. Young. A concession to Dave. I refused to spell it correctly on the AKC papers as a concession to not not naming my dog after a complete boob. If you ever want to make yourself laugh, find yourself a copy of quotes from the good mayor. Come to think of it, is it too late to change Grady's name? Probably. Snap. But anyway, back to Coalers the Great. We were Up North as was our habit in the summer. And as has been established, Coal was an epically good dog. He'd hop on the wicker porch furniture on occasion, which drove my mom to drink but since we let him on the couches and beds at home, it wasn't really his fault. And he did develop the aforementioned crazy stink that no amount of outdoor showers or trips to the groomers could remove or mask. But other than that, he was da bomb. Even my dad, who is not really an animal guy would admit that he was good. Until "The Power Washer Incident". My dad had dragged the power washer out to clean the docks. I'm sure there were many things he would have rather done on a beautiful summer day but I'm also sure my mom was behind this somehow. Rose likes to coerce Bill into doing things and then when you try to tell her to give the poor guy a break she'll say, "But Daddy LOVES to power wash the docks!" or "Daddy LOVES to pick people up from the airport at midnight!" or "Daddy LOVES to be the designated driver". The latest one was more general: "Daddy LOVES to help". Newsflash: Daddy does not love any of these things. He does love not being bitched at though. Thus the power washing on the day in question. Dad, having rolled the power-washer out from the garage and onto the dock bends over to start her up. Coal is standing nearby. As he lets it rip, I think Dave and I both had the same horrible realization: Coal is driven nuts by two-stroke engines. Power washer starts up. Coal immediately goes completely berserk and BITES MY DAD IN THE ASS. Exact quote (that will live in infamy)? "THAT GOD DAMN DOG JUST BIT ME IN THE ASS". Um, of all of the asses in the world you could bite, my dad's is pretty close to the bottom of the list. He's just not the kind of guy you screw with. Or bite. I seriously think his eyes almost popped out of his head. All I could think to say was, "Errrr......did he break the skin? No? Sorry???". I don't believe my dad acknowledged Coal for the rest of that summer. We're big on shunning people in my family. And animals. The one good thing that came of it is that my dad was the first and the last person Coalers ever bit. Probably 'cause we had his teeth removed like the Bumble. Not really. We didn't. Alrighty then! I am taking my bad self and three children to the pool. Will report back with any antics of note. If nobody is doing anything crazy I'll take one for the team and figure something out. It's too early to involve alcohol but nudity really doesn't have a time frame. 

The Little Cottage That Couldn't

While in my last post I indicated that the original Birch Point cottage is no longer, I didn't really touch upon how that came to be. Again with the Dave telling me I'm not writing a novel thing. As indicated, we really learned to love the little cottage. My parents knew that somewhere down the line they would be demolishing the place and so in the interest of not polishing a turd, they didn't want to put a ton of money into it. Fortunately, I get my design skilz from my mom and she did wonders with the place. I should have her be a guest columnist for my upcoming "Formerly Fabulous" blog as girlfriend was embellishing curtains with freaking POTATO STAMPS. That is correct. My mother made stamps OUT OF POTATOES. Bottom line, tubers notwithstanding, is that the place looked pretty damn cute. Cute, however, does not go a tremendously long way with a rapidly expanding family. In the five or so years since my dad bought the place, my brother and I had both married (to other people, not each other) and the grandchildren were starting to arrive. While my mom had LONG been keen on getting going on a new place (something about carrying wet laundry out to the garage, perhaps?) my dad is not exactly Quickdraw McGraw in the cash disbursement department. He was dragging his heels. Scratch that. He was kind of an immovable wall of "NO" when we all increasingly ratcheted up the begging and crying and screaming for a place that would accommodate our expanding clan. He was like a really good goalie, skillfully deflecting any incoming attack, no matter how talented the shooter. No logical argument could dissuade him from his position that the cottage was perfectly fine at that point in time. Well, as the story goes, one hot, steamy afternoon, those currently in residence at the cottage included my parents, myself and Dave, baby Jack and Coalers, who was Grady's sainted predecessor. He was as big and black and Grady is bad. But sweet as sugar. The only bad things Coalers ever did was work up a lake stink and die, which broke my heart. The dying part, not the lake stink. Although the lake stink was pretty heartbreaking too.  As was the usual practice, everybody was scrambling to get ready for dinner after a day filled with golf, going to the beach, shopping.......the usual summertime leisure pursuits. Like I said, this day was particularly muggy. Off the charts, sticky humidity and heat. Anyone that has spent any time in the upper midwest knows that it is virutally impossible to get ready for anything in these conditions, let alone something requiring decent clothes and makeup. Your clothes instantly stick to your body and your make-up rolls of of your face seconds after it's applied. That is unless you have air conditioning. Most of the cottage did not have a/c. My parents bedroom, which had been added on at some point in distant time and had an air conditioning unit. Soooooo, according to my dad, he had one person in HIS shower, another one on HIS toilet, a toddler bouncing on the bed, me standing in front of my mother's dresser and a wet dog running around and shaking his bad-self around. This inexplicably caused my dad to snap. I'm not sure why. Sounds like a day in the life to me. Regardless, the architect and builder were on the phone the next day. And that was the end of the little cottage that could. It went out in a blaze of glory having MY family as it's final residents. It was probably relieved. Kinda like an old dog that's sad to go but grateful to be put out of it's misery. It was time. Oh there's more peeps. Much, much more. I'll be sharing that with you in the coming days and weeks as well as the very, very interesting daily drama that occurs at the local country club swimming pool.  I'm just reporting it as it happens. And as we know, shit DOES happen. Happy freakin' Friday, everybody!!!!!!