Pretending to Be Homeless...Just for the Fun of It

There are some things that most people are clearly on one side or the other about:

• Chocolate or vanilla
• Shower or bath
• Pro-life or pro-choice
• Underwire or soft cup
• Bikinis or briefs
• Paper book or Kindle
• Angelina or Jennifer

and

Camping.

Not exactly our tent. Our bathtub was on the opposite side.
(photo: http://www.actionafrica.com/fisheagle.html)

Any guesses on which side I'm on for that last thing?  Yeah...so I maintain that I bust my hump to pay a mortgage for that roof that's over my comfy bed, and when the question of camping comes to mind all I can think is "why on EARTH do people find such joy in pretending to be homeless, just for the fun of it??"

But they do, and that's fine...and for some reason those who have seen my face when I'm invited on a camping trip almost always say, "If you don't like camping it's because you've never been camping with US...it's soooooo fun!!"

I know there are some folks reading this who I've had that conversation with, so it's legit.  After this past week/weekend I can tell you with certain authority:  It's really NOT about the s'mores....it's about being a thousand percent thankful that the washer and dryer are fully functional when you get home and have to wash the 800 articles of clothing/blankets/pillowcases that you took with you.  It's about attempting to create a bit of a memory for your kids, who at the end of an exhausted day, though they're slightly too old for it, squabble over who gets to lay in your arms in a lawn chair by the campfire, but not to let them enjoy it too much or be so comfortable that they'll ask to go again next weekend...because you know in your heart it just is NOT happening.

I've been camping exactly twice in the past 8 years.  Both times I've been pregnant.  I've concluded this MAY be the reason I'm not enjoying myself as much as everyone else.  My alcohol intake is in direct opposite proportion to those around me....making my vigilance to ensure no child steps in deer poop higher than normal.

Was it fun?  Yeah, it was.  Were there issues?  Yeah, there were.  I made some important discoveries that I'll take with me going forward.

• I need to put more effort into finding a sunscreen that doesn't make my kids break out in a rash.
• Always use the handicap accessible shower.  It's cleaner since it gets little use, and you can bend over without your butt touching anything.  On the off chance that someone rolls up in a wheelchair and chews you out...well, don't worry, they won't.
• Taking a battery-powered white noise machine and Twilight Turtle really DO keep your kids feeling more like home and less likely to get up every five seconds saying they're scared.  It's worth it.
• Conditioner.
• Camping in a group lessens the impact of forgetting major contents of your cooler back at home in the freezer.  So does an incredibly prepared mother-in-law, who was a Campfire Girl, and thus can roast the shit out of a marshmallow.
• Remember that most state laws do not afford for "differences of opinion when interpreting tent assembly instructions" as legitimate grounds for divorce.
• No tent fits back in the bag it came with.  Just buy a bigger bag.

Having a husband who makes a huge attempt at making things as easy as possible does help.  A lot.  So does being surrounded by family and/or friends who are easy to laugh with, share your sandwich bread with, and who always remember to pack the hammer that you forgot.

Hopefully I will save this list to reference next time we go camping, which will likely be no less than one year from now...when I'll have long forgotten about the not-so-great parts and only remember how....FUN it was.

I still can't fully say I don't feel at least slightly like I'm slapping actual homeless people in the face when I walk away from my perfectly good house to "try on" their life a few days at a whack....and that my failing at it is borne out of the choice to go home.

So.  If you see me at a campground anytime soon please know this:  I have probably been kidnapped and am being held against my will.  My captor is likely armed and dangerous.  Proceed accordingly.

Born In the USA [At the Right Time]

So, I'm a little lippy.  Sometimes.  Usually not at the inappropriate times, but still.  I have been pretty reflective lately about how thankful I am for being where and WHEN I'm at.  This great country of ours affords me the opportunity to be a little mouthy, yet have my message heard and not muffled through my burka.  Not that anyone's listening.  But still.

I feel fortunate to have been born into a generation that gives me what I sure couldn't do without: epidurals, air conditioning, automatic appliances, and disposable diapers.

One of those things is being a real stinker lately and it's not the diapers.  For now.

Last week, when Hubs was doing his laundry (oh, there's another reason I'm happy to live now and not the 50's), he noted, "The washer is leaking."

Interestingly, this did not deter him from completing subsequent loads of his laundry.

I'm used to him making random, generalized statements like this.  The most common is simple: "The toilet's broken."

Nothing more specific than that.  I envision, when someone indicates "toilet's broken" that there are, in fact, two perfect halves of a porcelain throne lying sideways on a bathroom floor.  This is almost never, and certainly in our house has never been the case.  Most often the chain between the flush handle and the flap has become disconnected.  On occasion it will be something other than this, and to be honest I know far too much about it from my far too many encounters repairing toilets.  More than a normal woman my age should, if a psychotherapist were to weigh in on the issue.  On one of my more recent trips to Home Depot for more parts, I was approached in the "toilet repair" aisle by one of their helpful clerks in their smart-looking orange aprons.

"Can I help you find something, ma'am?"

Clayton immediately interjected before I could get a response out.

"Nope.  My mom's fixin' Grandpa's towit.  She's a expert."

Awkward silence, clerk waiting for my response.

"Yeah, he's right.  I kinda already know what you guys have.  This is my 3rd toilet this week.  I'm good.  Thanks anyway."

And off I went to crouch in front of and beside of and around that chilly bowl again, all the while thinking how normal people only hang out around their toilets this way while their best friend is holding their hair back and consoling them about the boyfriend fight they shouldn't have had.

Accurate depiction of me doing plumbing repairs.
Kidding.  I look ridiculous with brown hair.
And I show more crack.
(credit: artisticfootprints/zazzle.com)

So now, the washer - the clearly out-of-commission essential laundry appliance gets the screwdriver put to it.  It took me a little while to find the problem, which I initially assumed to be a hose.  It was not.  It was a leaky gasket seal between the inside and outside baskets.  A quick Google search directed me to what I needed (oh, I guess there's ANOTHER reason why the 50's woulda sucked...no Google!!) and I had how-to repair videos at my fingertips.  One thing was curiously missing from all these instructional mini-movies: WOMEN.  I just find that...interesting.

Anyhoo.  I ordered the part.  It's not here yet.  Our bunghole town isn't home to an appliance parts store, so I'm at the mercy of the FedEx guy, who is scheduled to be at my house tomorrow, according to the tracking status.  Fingers crossed.

Almost out of the woods with the washer and the dishwasher suddenly won't latch tonight.  Nice.  Typical.  It's been an ass for a week, the handle sticking and not powering up when it should.  Tonight, the handle totally broke.  I know this because the dishwasher got the same screwdriver put to it that the washer did.  I removed the faulty handle, then remembered to turn the power off only after I got shocked (I tend to get into an impatient hurry).  Another quick internet search for the replacement and there it was, along with a statistical 97% of other customers reporting this same problem with this same manufacturer as me.

Now this new part is on its way, and I'm trying to stay positive about the fact I'm gonna have to go hand wash that pile of dishes like it IS 1950.  I'm thankful, however, that I am able to handle these repairs myself, and that I don't have to rely on a service guy to do it for me.  I don't tend to have great experience when I DO end up at the mercy of an expert, because they usually give me the "girl" treatment, overcharging and acting like I couldn't possibly understand how my thingamajig is broken, but that they're my knight in shining armor who's gonna save me.

Right.

If any of my lady friends out there need encouragement to dive into a project fearlessly, I'm your biggest cheerleader.  I might even be able to give you a tip or two, since I unfortunately know more about fixing things than I should.  I shouldn't just keep that to myself.

*DISCLAIMER* Hubs may not be mechanically inclined, but he makes up for it with other talents.  The best and most successful couples are those that complement each other, not that are identical to one another.  He can clean a mean toilet....right after I'm done fixing it.

Home Is Where The Heart Is

There is just about nothing I hate more than moving.  When unpleasant tasks present themselves I often say, "I'd rather get a pap smear and a root canal at the same time than do this".

Some people think that's a lie, but it's true.  I'd prefer my dentist keep his hands to my mouth area (or at least do that part FIRST), but other than that I'm up for the slippery salad spoons over lots of other bothersome things in my life.

Actual convo with my OB/GYN:

"You're not due for a pap until November, but we could get it out of the way now.  Or you can wait.  It's up to you."

"Why would I wait?  Just do it.  I already took my pants off."

"Wow, most people will do ANYTHING to get out of or postpone a pap."

"I'm not most people."

Don't get me wrong, it's not like I'm chomping at the bit to get in those stirrups.  It's just that it seems I get handed the biggest piles of manure to deal with on a daily basis that laying back with my feet up seems a nice alternative.

Like moving.  Did I mention I hate moving?  It's not the change part that I have a problem with.  It's just the actual handling/sorting/finding a home for all the SHIT that you pack around and around and around with you.  It's wrestling with decisions about holding onto something out of sentiment or guilt and deciding the ratio of possible future use to storage cost (which is both financial AND emotional).  Extra stuff means extra room, and the direction we're moving there's NO space to spare.

We're cramming our family back into our too-tiny house, and it's going to get smaller by the end of the year as our family gets bigger.  It's a home that we have loved, put actual blood, sweat, and tears into, that we brought our babies home to, that we first fell in love and got to know one another in.  The house that grew us.

My kids LOVE this house.  They love that their room is so close to mine.  They love that I bought them bean bags to watch TV in their room.  They love the shop.  They have been enthusiastic about this move since we announced it to them.  They haven't yet had the pleasure of weeding out their CRAP (luckily we do that behind their backs) in order to address the absence of a playroom.  They inject just the right amount of sunshine attitude into the situation that all it takes is observing them in all their joy to make me push through sifting through another bag of clothes that our closets won't hold and deciding which of the small appliances deserve a spot inside the kitchen and which will make their homes on a shelf in the garage.

We're not staying here forever, though.  Soon we will begin our quest to seek out our (hopefully) forever home.  The one the kids will all grow up at and leave (sniff) one day.  The one our grandkids will visit.  The one that has room for all of us AND all of our stuff.  But even as the prospect of that day shimmers in the distance, so too does the prospect loom for the ACTUAL MOVE...which I do NOT look forward to.  With any luck, we will have sufficiently pared down and weeded out during this go-round that we won't have difficulty with the next transition, and we won't lose any friends or family members over having to help us.  I appreciate all the ones who did help, and those who offered their help too.  It makes a move one step further away from "I'd rather get a pap smear" when you're surrounded by supportive people, and that's huge for me.

Giving Up Grandpa

I will soon have to change the "about me" section of my blog.  The thing that half defined my existence is changing, morphing, moving on.

My mother, who unfortunately seems to be exhibiting more and more of those genetic symptoms of dementia that claimed my grandmother's soul has dropped a proverbial bomb on us.  I knew that having her and my dad under one roof gave us the best chance at fending off their spending any of their last days, however many that may be, in a nursing facility.  Life got to the point where Dad could no longer take care of their yard and Mom could no longer get on her knees to scrub the floors.  When we were at a crossroads where our little family was outgrowing our tiny home we decided, my husband and I, to make the plunge into an even bigger home in order to move these two in with us.

It was an unbelievably moving and unselfish decision for my husband, who is very particular about the order (and cleanliness) of things, to take on this responsibility that was entirely mine and not his.  He could have at any point said, "you can move in with them, by yourself...but count me out."  There were times when I knew his patience was running as thin as mine but we both came together as a team to make it work...in our minds it was the right thing to do.  We struggled sometimes to focus enough to not take our frustrations out on one another....my sleepless nights of getting up with my dad when he buzzed the intercom, the challenge of never really having a private conversation without an eavesdropper who may twist your words before repeating them...our communication with each other suffered.

So when my mother announced very recently that they wanted to move back to their old place, their house which had not yet sold, I was immediately and overwhelmingly concerned for their safety.  All the things I had done and put in place to watch over them were now out of my control.  My dad's prescriptions being bubble-packed after I found out she had dumped out all of one prescription and replaced it with aspirin (he's already ON blood thinners, he really dodged a bullet there), my husband volunteering for the crappiest shift at work so that he could be home during the day while I was working in order to take them on errands if they asked (she didn't want to ask), the fact that neither of them should be driving (though on occasion I would find out that my mom had sneaked behind the wheel)...all these things that I had some semblance of control over are way beyond my control now, and I'm very concerned for them both.

One of the last months they were at their old house my dad called me at 5 in the morning to come scoop my mom up off the kitchen floor where she had blacked out from a (still) yet-to-be-actually-diagnosed seizure disorder, and his frail arms couldn't get a grip on her.  At least if they were in my home, nobody was really more than a holler away from being able to help.  Our new neighborhood is also home to 3 nurses on different sides of us, all of whom I quickly got up to speed on our unique living situation and warned them that my kids were going to be far more likely to come ringing their doorbell for help than calling 911.

Every time he's in the hospital, staff there plans to discharge him to a nursing facility where he's adamant about not going.  I have fought for and advocated and dragged him out when my mom failed to let them know that they don't live alone, that they have younger able-bodied family at home to assist them.

Now, my mom says, she thinks she's the only one who does anything for my dad.  It was the ultimate kick in the balls.  We have walked a fine line between giving them their freedom and independence by letting them do what they can, and helping when they ask (or we find that they need it).  She got to the point where she couldn't recall me telling her I was leaving town for work, so would promptly get on the phone to let other family members know that I "never tell her" where I'm going.

She and I have had a very rocky past - my teenage years were something I'd never go back and repeat.  Our age difference along with a very different genetic makeup put up all kinds of walls between us.  Even still, caring for them in my home, ensuring that some home health visitor wouldn't find that they were in over their heads to take care of their own place and recommend one or both of them should be put in a home....it just was never a question for me.  When I was young and needed parents, they didn't think about it twice.  Now it was my turn to step up.

Old age does funny things to a person's mind.  Unfortunately, she's still maintaining that she's in charge of her own decisions....which to some degree she is, but she's really made some questionable decisions in the past year.  I'm anticipating, however, that it will only take until my dad's next trip to the hospital that he'll be in a nursing home, and I won't have the resources to bail him out again.  I won't have an extra bedroom for him.  We will have to move back into our too-tiny house and sell this roomy home to another family.

She is very private about 'airing our dirty laundry', and for the most part I've kept silent about the trials we've faced.  Knowing this blog entry even exists would put her over the edge.  There was a time, about a year ago, when she initially started "thinking" about moving back, that a series of comments I made on my Facebook page were printed out for her by a family member, and she quickly, albeit erroneously, took the comments to be about her and not the actual unnamed person I was venting frustrations about.  Instead of asking me about it to clarify, she lodged in her head like many many inaccuracies before, that I was talking about her, and she based forthcoming decisions and behaviors on that belief.  It's beyond any feeble attempt at explanation how difficult it can be for the sandwich generation, those caring for children and aging parents.  It's extra difficult because due to our vast age difference my 'peers' for this situation are in their 50's....also not folks who speak my language.

So how are we going to move forward from here?  I don't know.  I know that I must take this time to focus on my husband, who has been on my back burner now for too long, and on my children, with whom my temper runs shorter than it should because I worry about everyone in the house.  My parents will move back to their old house, which they still intend to sell (though I've asked and not gotten an answer as to what their plan is/where they'll GO after that happens), we will move, and hopefully someone will come forward to fill this newly empty home with love.  Though I fully expect those who have never been in my dad's room with me at two in the morning in their undies sleepily loading a nebulizer to be quick to criticize me for "giving up on Grandpa", it's the ones who know me best who know I did the best I could in this situation, and know how it scares the Bajeezus out of me to let these two go back to being on their own.  Only they know how I will struggle to come to terms with this new development.

I will say that I never could imagine a better partner to be stuck in the middle of these two generations with than my husband, who has been amazingly patient and kind and understanding and supportive about my wish to keep my parents healthy, happy, and uninstitutionalized.  It's a passage that most couples our age don't have to go through, and it has the potential to really ruin a marriage.  I believe that in our short time together we've gone through so much that any issues for us in the future will be much easier to handle...and I'm grateful that my children have gotten to witness parents who work together through problems and know that it's not at all unusual to care for an elder in your home...I'm sort of banking on it actually, since I REALLY want to just live with them for the rest of my life.

If anyone is looking for advice in dealing with their own aging parents or grandparents, don't ask me...I'm no expert.  I'm not even a decent amateur.  Nobody is, and if they tell you they are, they're full of shit.  I don't know what "the best way" is.  I just know that I wish things had turned out differently here, because I fear for what actuality lies before us.

Globe Trotting Lee Style

We're back from our Spring Break vacation, and I am exhausted.  Like some years before, we've been fortunate enough to spend that time with friends that we love like (sometimes more than?) family, and as usual the time went by far too quickly.  We, like many families, spent a good portion of our time at the beach.  However, normal families spend Spring Break at beaches that require a swim suit.  We've never claimed to be normal, so obviously chose to go to a Godforsakenly frigid area where we had to bundle up.  There's nothing quite like no sand between your toes, especially when you can't feel your toes from the cold.

Kidding.  The typical unpredictable weather for the Oregon Coast proved in our favor, only raining sideways when we were conveniently inside the warmth of our rental condo having breakfast and planning our next outing.  The sun seemed to know that our combined brood of nine couldn't stay cooped up too long and gave us just enough reprieve to enjoy ourselves.

God, it feels good to be a gangster.

Our busy and curious children explored and climbed and touched and prodded, and I proudly left my hand sanitizer behind.  They were very careful and gentle with some of the specimens they found...

....and others, not so much.  Esten kicked this poor fella all up and down the beach mistaking it for a rock until he asked me what it was:

Gwoth, Mom....thoooooo gwooooth.

We also got lesson after lesson in history and despite our best efforts, we just can't seem to avoid extremes in our lives.  We live in the shadow of North America's deepest river gorge (suck it, Grand Canyon), and already got to ride the world's longest gondola during our mini-winter-weekend getaway recently.  Our list just gets longer with this trip with the addition of crossing over the D River, the shortest river in the world (at 440 feet one must ask why Lincoln City's engineers couldn't figure out a way to NOT have to cross it).

We visited this lighthouse, which doesn't hold any records until you're half way up the steps, then you'll swear it's the tallest freaking building in the world:

Correction: Tallest lighthouse in Oregon.
Son.Of.A.Bitch.
Also....probably haunted.

The only two in our family that are excited about all the steps.

Once safely back outside, Esten insisted that the whale-watching telescope was much more effective for staring into the deepest parts of the universe.  So deep into the universe, in fact, that he felt that was the explanation for total blackness when he put his eye to the lens:

I'm serious, Mom....I can see
the way far away part
of the universe.

We visited the associated "Discovery Center" and were greeted outside the front doors by our guide, who promptly and with an indescribable enthusiasm drew our attention to a peregrine falcon who had made an appearance that day.  The guide, who conjured up recollections of Will Ferrell channelling Janet Reno almost lost her wig, either from the wind or from her head bobbing around and her arms flailing about as she tripped over her own tongue.  She could not emphasize to us enough how rare a peregrine falcon sighting was, and she didn't think we were really absorbing the magnitude of how significantly our lives would be changed from this moment forward.  She returned to the front of the building several times while we were at the center to check on the status of the bird.  She said "Peregrine Falcon" so many times that it became a running joke of sorts after we got back in the car.  Lucky for you, we recently purchased a zoom lens and Hubs was able to snap this pic, though that testy bitchy bird would NOT look at the camera.

Soak it in, people - you'll probably die and never see
one of these in your life.

Yet another record breaker for our roster.  This peach is sometimes referred to as the fastest animal on the planet (you thought it was a cheetah didn't you, stupid?) during its hunting dive where it will hit its prey at speeds up to 200 (TWO FREAKING HUNDRED) miles per hour.  What a bad ass.

The real joke here came after we got home and I realized, and now can't wait to share with our friends, that though it's not our State's bird (the Mountain Bluebird is), this is what the new 2007 Idaho Quarter looked like:

Yep Scot, that's a you-know-what.

We stopped at a waterpark on the way home, and wouldn't you know, they just happen to have the Spruce Goose there....the largest flying boat ever built, having the largest wingspan of any aircraft in history.  Double whammy.  Howard Hughes, thank you for being so bat-shit crazy.  Ironic fun fact...it was actually made out of birch, not spruce.

(photosfan.com)

When we got back my fellow mommy and I got a pedi day and a last minute lunch with ElliePie's Mom, MommaPie.  Ellie's a blogger that I've never met but through whose blog I've gotten to know, and MommaPie is a lovely lady, one of the few I've been lucky enough to have come into my life through that necessary evil sideline called work, but we kindled a special understanding and respect, and her friendship has been timeless and unconditional.  I hope every girl has a MommaPie or two in her life.

Through all the animals we saw, we only got up close and personal with one species....the seagulls.  Hands full of mini bagels, we tromped across the street to lure them in with our treats.  Guided by the advice and courage of a 9 year old boy and his 10 year old sister, I decided to show my children just how big their mommy's balls really were:

Mommy's balls are at least as big as a 10 year old girl's.

Esten decided he wanted to just eat the remainder of his bagel himself.  Once breadless, we wandered down the street and into a candy store for some saltwater taffy and caramel corn and while we were waiting in line, and the sunlight beamed in the tiny shop's window just right, Hubs and I caught one another's eyes and just stood there, time frozen.  I realized how even sometimes crazy flurries of hurriedness in vacation-land can recharge your soul when your children are there, and that here we, in tandem with another couple, were managing to pull off some pretty awesome memories with them.  He's an amazing father and I also realized how much I love him for making this critical time in our family's young life so special.  I knew he was thinking the same thing just by the look in his eye.  He didn't have to say anything to make the moment any more perfect for me but he did.

"Hey, Babe?  You have bird shit all down the side of your face.  You might wanna wipe that off."

Birthday Brain Teaser

Whether you like it or not, you have to share your birthday with other people.  Facebook informs us which of our friends share birthdays.  I often get a chuckle at my opposite-ends-of-the-spectrum friends whose escape from the womb celebration lands on the same day.  Media will remind you which celebrity you share a birthday with if you, like me, have not previously been scarred by the revelation during previous years.  Here are two of the celebs I have to share MY special day with:

(listas.20minutos.es)

(blogue.us)

Now, sorry to get all nerdy on you here, but it's my birthday and we're going to do a little math brain-teaser:  One of these gents is six million times more talented than the other two of us.  Two of us have children, though only one of us has birthed them out of a vagina.  Of all three, only one of us tries to avoid blowing dudes.

Please answer in the form of a question, but please do not make the question:

"Why are you being a hater?"

I'm totally not.  I LOVE GAYS.  Ask anyone.  Read some of my previous posts.

Moving on.

So this year really is the year that I'm feeling a little justice from the Universe for all the "You're too young" statements made in my youth by my parents.  All my classmates who hit this milestone birthday last year have moved on to the downhill slide to 40 and I finally felt a bit of neener-neener-ness when my dial slowly rolled over the midnight mark to 35.

HOWEVER.

It didn't last very long.  While I imagined in my younger and more tormented years that it would feel more worthwhile, I long ago had shed my hard-shell exterior that protected my inner squishy feelings, my sad and vulnerable and quick to be quite embarrassed fleshy soul.  I've already hashed out those thoughts with the people that mattered, so it didn't really matter any more.

So this coming year I'd like to focus on something different.  Did you know that on March 25, 1995, WikiWikiWeb, the World's very first Wiki[pedia] went public?  What a better way to find a new focus, or at least some random March 25th factoids:

• 1924 – On the anniversary of Greek Independence, Alexandros Papanastasiou proclaims the Second Hellenic Republic. (This would be in reference to the Greek Helen...you know, of Troy? My middle name is Helene and I find this very interesting).
• 1965 – Civil rights activists led by Martin Luther King, Jr. successfully complete their 4-day 50-mile march from Selma to the capitol in Montgomery, Alabama.
• 1996 – An 81-day-long standoff between the anti-government group Montana Freemen and law enforcement near Jordan, Montana, begins. (This was a huge deal and I remember like it was yesterday)
• 1996 – The European Union's Veterinarian Committee bans the export of British beef and its by-products as a result of mad cow disease (I don't really remember the mad cow disease issue being that same year, weird.)

Now, some NEW notable births, you know, besides my own:

• 1347 – Catherine of Siena, Italian saint
• 1539 – Christopher Clavius, German mathematician
• 1643 – Louis Moréri, French encyclopedist

These three alone must be the reason I am soooo nice and sooo smart.

• 1911 – Jack Ruby, killer of Lee Harvey Oswald
• 1918 – Howard Cosell, American sports reporter
• 1928 – Jim Lovell, American astronaut
• 1932 – Gene Shalit, American film critic
• 1942 – Aretha Franklin, American singer
• 1965 – Sarah Jessica Parker, American actress
• 1966 – Tom Glavine, American baseball player
• 1982 – Danica Patrick, American race car driver
• 1984 – Katharine McPhee, American singer and actress

And deaths that occurred on my day:

• 1999 – Cal Ripken, Sr., American baseball manager
• 2006 – Buck Owens, American singer and television personality (if you grew up on Hee Haw like me this is pretty devastating.)

Finally, some miscellaneous celebrations, which I would encourage you to double check if you think that you're being punked here:

It's Mother's Day in Slovenia, Struggle For Human Rights Day in Slovakia (which sound like the same thing to me), Maryland Day in Maryland, Waffle Day in Sweden, and what I may just believe is the Holy Mother of all holidays, the proof that I truly WAS born on the right square of the calendar: A holiday in the Roman Empire known as "Hilaria".  I don't know what the Hell it is.  I'm almost afraid to look it up for fear of ruining the laughter that's now stuck in my head.

Never mind....I looked it up....still laughing - they were celebrating the resurrection of a God who had gone mad and cut off his own.....well, not his ear.

So I guess the best gift I have this year is that the list of notable folks may not include me, but certainly I'm sure that between GoDaddy commercials and races, Danica's dying to see what bloggy-loser housewife was born before her, and Katharine McPhee, probably feeling down this year about her slow life around the set of SMASH is like, "I wish someone OLD would inspire me"....and they'll never know what they're missing out on.

Luckily, if my friends...my TRUE friends ever met them they'd tell them straight to their faces:  "Not much."

Keep Your Politics Out Of My Kitty

Let's face it, nobody really likes having to travel for anything other than vacation.  Being away from home sucks to begin with.  The preparation for what should have been relatively straight-forward arrangements seemed to morph into a gargantuan task that involved the help of no less than 6 people in 4 states and Obama's signature for air travel and hotel reservations for a two-night stay.

To make a really long, boring story short....when I checked in to the hotel they had NO record of my reservation, which I was able to email them a confirmation of from my laptop.  This should have been my first indication to leave and check myself into a hotel that had rooms possibly furnished in the last two centuries.  But I did not.  Instead I found myself muttering an actual prayer, hoping that God could hear it over the rumble of the antiquated wall heater:

My traveling Praying Mantis:
Helps me talk to Jesus and eats bedbugs.
More compact to pack than angel wings.
(Photo: Captain Suresh, Flickriver)

"Please God, do not let whomever is in the adjoining room get "curious" as to the integrity of the deadbolt on the door separating us, but if that stranger does, and if that stranger kills me in this shit hole of a hotel, please guide the police to find me quickly, and give them the wisdom to differentiate between me and the dead hooker who probably already exists in this room, either whole or in pieces, probably stuffed in that GOD FORSAKEN HEATER WHY IS IT MAKING THAT NOISE?!?!?!  And please let my alarm go off on time because I'm in a different time zone and I don't understand the alarm clock in this room.  Amen."

And God answered my prayer.  He reminded me that I have an alarm on my cell phone, so I set that instead.  Which was a good thing because the clock alarm never did go off.

My husband gave me a rash of crap for packing a swimsuit for this trip, which I proudly declared to him was "for the hot tub"....and is clearly not necessary at this point.  I really need to do better research on these things in the future.  I don't, however, think it's worth mentioning to them on the "comment card" that said dead hooker's blood spatter is on the tiled ceiling of the shower, I think....I'm pretty sure someone probably already knows that.

Also Screech from Saved By the Bell is working the front desk tonight and it's giving me the creeps....because the last thing I saw him on was Celebrity Fit Club and I'm pretty sure I heard he was doing porn before that.  I'm SO ready to go home.

To even BE in a hotel for me is a stretch in this town.  I typically stay with a friend, but she already had a guest, so this was next best thing.  She was nice enough, though, to pick me up at the airport and have dinner with me when I flew in.  We just had to make one stop in between to take a cat to the humane society to be neutered.  She had a feral cat near her house who had kittens last year, and this was one of said kittens.  She'd caught him in a trap earlier in the day, and while tromping across the parking lot and I was balancing the trap in my stronger arm...she whispered "When we get in there, remember: he's feral."

"No SHIT he's feral.  When you have to CATCH it in a TRAP, that's what it's called.  Just because you have a cute name for it does not make it domesticated."

She MAY be a crazy cat lady in a bit of denial.  No, she is, and I say that to her face, and I love her.  She has a heart that overflows for all things, including my children, and I can't fault her for that.  But holy bananas she gets into some interesting situations trying to do the right thing.  As infrequently as I come to this town, this makes the second cat-wrangling episode I've been involved in.  She got him checked in and all set for neutering, his trap lined up with a plethora of other cats (some people brought in 4 and 5 of those things), paid for his surgery and whatever other fees they had, and we set out the door for dinner.  If we were still hanging out at 8:30, she said, I could come with her to pick him up.

Uhhhh....Meme dude? That's a racoon. It's not even a POLE cat.
(quickmeme.com)

No thanks.  I wanted to be in bed by then.  Had I known I'd be staying in the hotel from The Shining, maybe I'd have felt differently.

So after catching up over some Olive Garden and hashing out my differences with the hotel staff, I'd settled in and resigned myself to my scary residence for the next 48 hours when my phone rang.  It was my dinner date, whose name my phone speaks aloud because her number is programmed in, but mispronounces because somehow I managed to use some German accent characters by accident.  It was weird that she'd be calling at all.

"Hello?"

"You're never gonna believe this.  I picked Smoky up.  First, he was a she.  Second, she was in a family way.  Can you beLIEVE it??!?!?!"

[silence, then uncontrollable laughing.]  "Of COURSE I believe it!  That is the awesomest thing ever.  So....is she....fixed?"

"Oh yeah."

"WHAT?????  OMIGOSH.  Well.  I certainly hope they did a transvaginal ultrasound and made her LOOK at the screen before they went through with her little kitty abortion.  Jesus.  You're SUCH a DEMOCRAT."

[More laughing, together.]

Then she told me she just HAD to tell me that before I went to bed.

And that's why I love her so much, and miss her in between the times that we don't get to see each other.  For the very outwardly differences in us we are kindred spirits in a way, and I've often said I'm so glad whatever planets lined up to bring us together did so, because I'm truly a better person for having her in my life.  As for how she's going to feel about all this?  All I can say is she knows me.  She had to know making that phone call last night and delivering that icing-on-the-cake news was making it into my blog.  That's how I roll.

Incidentally, political protesters were right in my path to get coffee (I was in a big rush to get back to my conference) shouting get-out-of-my-vagina-ish phrases when I also shared the gender-confused feline story with another colleague, who burst into laughter at a very inappropriate point in the crowd.

She was very embarrassed with herself....but continued laughing anyway.

And when I'm done with my business in this town, my dear friend and I will share another meal, and she will deposit me and my bag back at the airport, where it will again be painful to tell her goodbye, and I am thankful for that.  For truly, how many people come into your life that you care about so much that you really do look so forward to seeing, and the time goes too quickly and you long for your next visit?  They're few and precious and I hope mine know how much I love them.