Curiosity Killed the cat (and possibly the dog ) . . .

This last week has been a exercise in " Just how friggin' dedicated are you to being a parent to fur children?"

After the now infamous "Coon-Cinara" incident, where both dogs decided to nap on the rug , just inside the door where the EIGHT  friggin' racoons were feasting on our garbage , it all went downhill from there.

He ain't heavy, he's my brother :-)

If you can imagine a moment where a unicorn that shit rainbows fell out of the sky and after agreeing to be your personal pet unicorn forever and ever shit a huge rainbow that little leprechaun's ran down in herds showering you with a million dollars in gold doubloon 's  while you got a full body message serenaded by Barry Manilow and Cher in person on your lawn , take all that happiness and multiply it by about a million , and you would have my day today ! It started out pretty good, I mean I got to see my mom, take a road trip with my husband, we are still childless until tomorrow. Made it to my trunk show , made some new friends , did a little shopping and then, after more time than I even care to think about had elapsed , I got to see Tom.

Just in case you were wondering . . .

Here are just some random updates , in case you had been wondering about anything :-)

( and also because right now I feel too lazy to write and actual blog , lol ! )

There are pictures etc in the works for the blog , and we hope that feature will be up and running hilariously by mid August .

We are seriously considering making " Turnpike to Hell" and " Happy Coon-Cinara " T-Shirts.

Maybe Miss Quiser bumper stickers that say " Towanda" on them ?

All of my animals are still alive , as of the writing of this blog.

Wednesday is still barred from goldfish for the rest of eternity.

She is begging for a hamster, so I'm thinking of getting a stuffed one and putting it in her empty goldfish aquarium. ( that's the best she's gonna get until she gets a bit more responsible)

Bill is doing fine, and still cursing on command .

I have lost 7 pounds since writing " Roller-coaster of lard".

I plan to lose more.

There is a dude coming in two weeks to put a picket fence and a deck on our cottage, we are also expecting a visit from my ex husband around the same time. Expect LOTS of blog postings around then.

Yesterday was lawn mowing day and this weekend Wednesday is at her Nannies . We are some happy mother fuckers over here right about now :-) ( please interpret that as a big ole shit-eating grin )

Rest assured, I am sniffing out blog fodder everywhere I go and will fire at random as soon as something strikes my fancy , worry not, I will continue to be here for your amusement :-)

Since Bill's Coon-Cinara we have also been visited by an Opossum. Apparently the word has gotten out that the eats are pretty good over at our place . Sadly , this has contributed to my insomnia because I now can't seem to stop getting up and looking out the door to see if there are any critters eating  lol ! ( I need to stop that ) but who needs the nature channel when they come to you ? ( except snakes, the damn nature channel can keep them )

And I think that's about enough random shit for now .

:-)

Babies R' Us is the devil, and other revelations . . .

Everyone has that "friend" (some of you may be unfortunate enough to have more than one) or family member. The one who always seems to get what you want , and 'Unwittingly' rubs your nose in it while your stuck there empty-handed. Sometimes its a new car, or a new job/promotion, or a new relationship.  You love them, and you want to be nice , you want to support them, you want to cheer them on , but all the while , the little green monster is just gnawing away at your insides. . .This is even more difficult when the thing you covet isn't something you can just save up for and go buy at JC Penney's.

I will confess something  now. Something I am sure I am not the only woman in America who feels. This one is for the others like me, that they may know they are not alone.

Roller-coaster, of lard . . .

A long time ago , I had a waist . Technically i suppose I still have one, I just haven't seen it in a VERY long time ( about six years or so, to be exact). Back in the day (Jr High) i was about a size 7 in Jeans. By Freshman year, I was a 10. By Sophmore year I was in a 13, and i stayed between a 10 and a 13 for the rest of  school (i.e , until I dropped out Senior year for reasons I will go into another time.) Several failed and abusive relationships later, I was 22, depressed , and in a size 28. I weighed 285 pounds. I hadn't seen my feet in months . It was at this time that I found myself Homeless. B.S was nice enough to send me an airplane ticket to go live with her in the Seattle suburbs. She had just had a baby, I had just lost a baby ( though at the time I spoke of him to no one ) , and we BOTH had some serious weight to lose. Before long , we had established a workout routine and we made excellent workout buddies ! I hit the treadmill every day for 30-45 minutes at the house, sometimes with Duddits on my back in the baby carrier ( for that little bit of extra resistance) . We went totally vegan,and enjoyed long walks taking turns pushing the loaded down stroller up the hilly terrain. In around 10 months of Yoga, Pilates, and the aforementioned veganism and activities , I was down to 135 pounds , and back in a size 10 for the first time in almost a decade. It was great.

Sadly, I had relied very heavily on the drug Zantrex to achieve this goal. I took the maximum allowed dosage EVERY day . And I ignored all the warnings on the label about drinking or taking any caffeine while using it. One day , because of this , I found myself in an ambulance headed to Whidby General. They thought I was having a heart attack. After a few scary hours full of EKG's and unanswered questions, it turned out that all those diuretics had dropped my potassium level so low , my heart was having trouble functioning properly. Eventually we got this under control, but doing so , and getting off the Zantrex gave me back about 40 pounds, but I was still in a 13, so I was ok with that. Then BS got a divorce and we had to hope a greyhound with Duddits and head on back to sweet home Oklahoma, and Hectors. Hector lived directly within smelling distance of my favorite diner in the world ,and pretty soon the heavenly burger smell had worn me down , and my self-control caved. Soon I was driving all the way across Le Ghetto to get a fried onion burger with everything , every day . Soon , I had gained back another 40 pounds. Then i did the stupidest thing of all . I got into another dead-end relationship, with another dead-beat , who turned out to be a coke-head , as well as an alcoholic. Needless to say this did NOTHING positive for my self esteem .Soon I was back to my old habit of self soothing , with loads of wine and take-out. This time, by the time I had called it quits , I was back up to 290 pounds.

This time, hoping to not have another Zantrex incident, as soon as I had made up my mind , I went to my doctor and ask er what I needed to do to lose this weight and get my life back ? She proscribed a drug called Phenteramine , and the South Beach Diet. I did every little thing she told me to , with near surgical precision, and soon I was back down to a healthy size 14. When she discontinued the phenteramine , i gained back a little weight, but i was still a size 16, so I was Okay about it. Then I met Num-nuts. Num-nuts was my first experiment with a " friends with benefits" type arraingement .To facilitate the arangement  , I got on birth control for the first time in my life. I tried Yaz, ortho-evra, and Neuva-ring. The first two made me sick , we had to discontinue the neuva-ring because it turned out , I was pregnant. Nearly 12 weeks. Having had four previous losses by this time , I was scared to death to lose another baby, and therefore determined to do everything I could not to . So I ate. I ate , and I ate, and I ate. Whenever and whatever I was craving . for 10 months. On the day she finally delivered I weighed 250 pounds. At first , it seemed to just peel off, but its true what they say , C-Section fat is some of the hardest fat on the planet to lose.

By this time Num-nuts and I's relationship was circling the bowl. By the end of the next year it had gone down the hole , despite my best efforts. We separated April 1st of 2011, just after her 3rd birthday. By this time , my depression had helped me escalate to 350 pounds, beating out my all time heaviest by 55 pounds.  I was miserable. My husband had cheated on me , in full veiw of Wednesday , while I was working to support him, and going to school full time to better my income. By this time I had been l;iving with the full effects of Polycystic-ovarian syndrome (PCOS) for three years, ever since she had been born. The doctor said I had probably always had it , but the pregnancy had caused it to escalate to one of the worst cases she had personally seen. For those of you who don't know PCOS is a hormone problem that is accompanied by a sort of insulin resistance , as well as horribly heavy periods that last far longer than they are supposed to . ( my worst ever lasted for just under 4 months straight , and was bad enough I had to wear depends to work and was so anemic I passed out on several occasions. ) Coping with this through an eight hour work day was grueling enough , it was all I could do to get through it , but I was supporting our family alone, and a mom's gotta do what a mom's gotta do. The good doctor also informed me (as by this time we had also had two more losses) that the only reason I had managed to carry Wednesday to term was probably because I HAD started birth-control, just my hormones alone wouldn't have been enough to sustain her. I had started out wanting 6-10 kids, now I was being told to be grateful for the one I had because she was a damn miracle and " lightening never strikes twice ".

It goes without saying that this only magnified the depression, and the health problems made it almost impossible to just perform daily tasks like bathing Wednesday , work, or cooking dinner , let alone my "Marital Duties ". It still floors me that he rationalizes his infidelity based on my "un-willingness" to have sex at this point , and in this shape( physically, mentally, and emotionally ). I dare you to find a sane woman that would, but I digress.    After the divorce , I got a second wind. I thanks to treatment I had my PCOS under control and the renewed vigor from my new situation helped me drop back down to 300,then back down to 295, then 280, and there I stayed .Things are better now in SO many ways. I really have very little these days that my depression can rear its ugly head about ( there is one thing, but that for a whole different blog). But the last 2+ years have also found me in the most inactive lifestyle I have EVER in my life been in.

Last Thursday , we took the kids to the Amusement park. The same one I spent every summer at growing up. My ass would barely fit in seats that used to swallow me . On the roller-coasters I dearly love , I very nearly couldn't ride, due to an inability to fasten my seat belt.Getting the seat belt fastened took long enough that the other riders became impatient  , and the sight of me squirming into my seat and wrestling with the belt had drawn a group of onlookers. Some laughing, some cracking jokes, and others staring and turning their heads down in embarasment for me when I looked their way. I felt humiliated . At one point in the day , it became too much for me and I thought I was having a stroke. This was the moment . Something had to give. If I was going to live long enough to get Wednesday through to adulthood , there were going to have to be some MAJOR changes.

About a year ago , a good friend of mine lost 50 pounds on a new , all natural product called " Zeal for Life ". I started using it , and I loved it , and i did see some results. I even signed up to be a consultant for the stuff. But I never really worked it. I allowed every little thing that could to get in the way. I gave into temptation at every turn. To this day , I have never successfully completed the Zeal 90 day challenge, even though I have seen so many others do it with such wonderful results . Sunday , I agreed to start a new 90 day challenge and my goal this time is to see it through the whole 90 days and make it a lifestyle change, a permenant one.So far I am on track with only one minor fall from grace. Today I went to Voldemart and bought a bathroom scale to monitor my progress with . When I stepped on the wheel spun all the way around , back to the zero, so as best as I can tell , I weigh either right at or somewhere over 300 pounds now (thats the highest the scale goes). For now , my goal is modest. I want to put that hateful assed little red needle back where it belongs, on a readable number somewhere under the 300 mark. I am going to get there. No matter how much blood sweat and tears it may take to get there, I am going to get there. Yesterday I bought a Y membership. It is about a mile from our house. Someday , I am going to have the stamina to walk that mile, do my workout and then go home. Then one day , I will be able to ride my bike there . Someday I will be able to play on the floor with Wednesday without feeling like a beached whale, and someday I will be able to take her to the water park and not exceed the weight limit for all the rides by 50+ pounds.

My Lard is like a roller-coaster, and I am tired of riding it. This is the point of no return.this is the point where I get off.

To hold myself accountable, I will be posting pictures of my current physique , I will also be blogging about it at regular intervals, but I have no desire to turn this into a strictly weight-loss oriented blog. I do a hell of a lot of other really interesting shit, and I wouldn't want you to miss out on that ! lol ! besides , that would be boring !

P.S. Thanks to Zeal Wellness, I have been off anti-depressants for almost a year and I feel great and have more energy ! Its time to put that energy and Zeal weight-loss to work and see what it can do for my waistline and the rest of my health ! I am looking forward to giving all these 4x's   and size 28's to good will ! Bring it on ! :-)

Pop quiz hot shots !

Just a few things, now that I have been at this for roughly a month I would appreciate a little feedback. I am almost daily offered " blog-fodder" that is funny , as well as blog-fodder that is more on the serious side . Generally speaking, when a decision has to be made between the two, my first inclination is to go with funny, unless the serious thing is REALLY bothering me . I would just like to know a few little things to help me improve.

1. Of the 25 or so postings made at this point , which was your favorite, and why ?

2. I would love to see more ____________ on your blog.

3. The thing I don't like about your blog is _____________.

4. The thing I would change is ________________.

5. The reason I read your blog is _______________.

6. I wish you would blog about _________________.


All feedback will be read and taken into consideration with regard to future postings. I am just trying to hone my writing skills and find my " groove" so to speak. I appreciate your help, and the fact you even read my crappy little blog means more to me than I could ever adequately express. Please leave feedback in the comments . I must remind those of you who know me IRL to please refrain from using actual names and places in your comments. I keep my blog anonymous for several reasons, not the least of which is the privacy of those whose stories are tangled up with mine, as well as for my own privacy and in order to shield myself from libel suits should someone decide that they don't care for what I wrote. Please respect that .

In sincere appreciation,

Quiser

And this is why my husband deserves a frigging medal and possibly a national holiday for putting up with me . . .

So Sunday night, we came home from a trip to Wilbur to find a skunk on our porch happily chowing down on the new bag of cat-food I forgot to bring in with the rest of the groceries. We ended up sitting there in the driveway for about 5 minutes before it realized we were there , got full , and left of its own cute little accord. Bill was astonished. I got about a 1 minute video of the little bugger stuffing its gobb and was amused as hell. To say that Bill and I have different backgrounds is putting it lightly . He's a WASP , and I'm a heinz 57 redneck. ITs like if the city mouse, and the country mouse got married, on crack. I digress.

I may have mentioned at some point in an earlier blog , that we share our domicile with two dogs ( among other creatures) and that Mister Dog is neurotic as hell ( Miss Dog is more of a 'who gives a shit' type personality). We have an alarm system, though I'm not sure why since thanks to Mister dogs neuroses we know the second ANYONE so much as sets a foot on our property. In fact , we are frequently awakened in the middle of the night by Mr. Dog because someone has had the audacity to use our sidewalk !

Last night was no exception , but with the previous nights skunk incident fresh in my mind , when he began his noisy tirade i decided to check it out. Sure enough , there was a stray cat out there helping himself to some grub , and Mr. Dog was furious ! The insomnia was still in full force so i decided to play on my ipad for a bit in the hopes of getting sleepy. Eventually I did begin to feel like I could fall asleep , so i got up to take the ipad to the kitchen and plug it in to charge. " I wonder. . ." I thought , " if that cat is still out there?" Mr. Dog was being very quiet. I walked over to the door , and looked through the glass, and what to my wondering eyes should appear ? But a whole bloody tribe of raccoons enjoying a buffet on my porch !  I counted four raccoons  ! Then I looked and realized there were another two hiding under the chair . " Good lord thats six raccoons ! " I had never seen that many in one place before .

Part of the problem was that I had got the trash out of the house yesterday, but it hadn't made it from the porch to the dumpster yet . This and the cat food had rolled out the welcome mat for the raccoons. I began to lightly tap my fingers on the glass to let them know they had an audience, and they began to dissapate, including two more raccoons that had been eating under the other furniture on the porch . Thats EIGHT raccoons ! Suddenly my porch had been turned into a friggin raccoon clown-car ! I knew I needed to get that trash to the can before I could go to sleep , or else spend the day tomorrow cleaning up loose trash all over my yard and driveway . The whole time all of this is going on BOTH dogs are asleep on the kitchen rug. I acquaint Bill with whats going on, and he goes straight to fearing that I am going to be devoured alive by rabid raccoons. I turn off the alarm and prepare to get er done. The only knowledge or experience i have pertinent to this coming from Forrest Gump " Raccons try to get on our back porch, Momma just sweep them off with a broom ", so armed with a broom , I went to work.

When I got back inside ( at around 3 am) the conversation went something like this ;

Bill: Are you OK ?

Me: Yeah, I'm fine, but the dogs are So fricking fired !

Bill: Why?

Me; The little sum-bitches when ape-shit over a damn stray cat , but when there is a damn racoon clown-car on our porch the little bastards slept through it like it ain't no thing !

Bill : Oh yeah . Fire them on the spot . Can't be tolerated . Define " Raccoon Clown-car ?"

Me; Oh, there was EIGHT blasted racoons on our damn porch .

Bill : EIGHT ? Holy shit .

Me: Well their gone now honey, its ok. Besided they were cute . all stuffing their gobbs with catfood and garbage :-)

Bill: Holy shit.

Me: Are you gonna be alright ?

Bill: Yeah, I think so. It's just , nothing like this has ever happened to me before .

Me: Really ? ( the idea that anyone can get to 65 without having had a run-in of this sort at some point amazes me )
Bill: Really.

Me: Are you gonna wig out ?

Bill: no i'm not going to wig out. I am only slightly wigged. I have just never experienced this before.

Me: Awwww, poor Bill ! You had your skunk cherry busted last night , and now tonight the grand racoon initiation. You've had a hard week haven't you ? Poor Bill ! There needs to be a celebration that you have reached this milestone , like a Bill's wild animal cherry-busting party.

Bill : you gonna put all that on the invitation are you ?

Me: Yeah, your right. It needs to be catchier and cuter .

Bill: Just a little.

Me: I've got it ! " Happy Coon-cinara Bill ! "

Bill : Lord help us .

Me: It's your Coon-cinara ! I'm so proud of you !

Bill : I'm going to be fodder for tomorrows blog-posting aren't I ?

Me: You better believe it .

Bill : Wonderful.

Me: I'm gonna see about getting some Coon-Cinara t-shirts made for your party ! Some little raccoons in tiaras in tu-tu's maybe ?

Bill : Oh dear.

Me: You would wear that , right ? It'd be cute wouldn't it ?

Bill : Uh, sure.

Me: I'm so excited !

Bill : Um, me too . But  how about we do some actual sleeping before the sun comes up today hon.

Me: Yeah, that would be good , I'm gonna Dream about your Coon-cinara !

Bill: Great.

Me: Happy Coon-Cinara honey !

( i know it was dark, but i'm pretty sure he rolled his eyes at me then )
Bill : Goodnight honey , I love you .

Me: Goodnight my Coon-cey ! I love you too !

Bill : This is going to be a thing now isn't it ?

Me: Yep.


 

there's no substitute for age and experience . . .

Tonight , as I was preparing for bed , I came across a post on Facebook that left my jaw on the floor.  As usual , it had been made by a teenager. A million things went flooding through my head at once , and I wanted to say them all to this kid. Feeling a "delete-button-inducing rant " coming on, I decided it was probably best I just back away from the ipad , and chill for a minute. So I went and made myself a peanut-butter sandwich , and as I commenced the chilling , I had an epiphany ! My lowly little peanut butter sandwich was a wonderful metaphor for life !  Let me explain ;

When I was a kid ,I liked my Peanut butter by itself  on crackers or bread , period. Bread must be white, period.  And woe be unto him who tried to serve me PB with Jelly on wheat bread ! they would face the wrath of Mini Quiser ! And hell hath no fury like a Mini Quiser who has been presented with an in-correct sandwich ! Now , while the crust is still my favorite ( I used to love to steal the heels out of the bread bag )I have traded the white bread in for whole-grain white ( a small compromise for my health), and I can't stand solo PB. PB no J tastes like foriegn cardboard to me . I have acquired enough patience to wait for the heel at the back of the bread bag , rather than dig it out. And I am actually thinking of trying peanut butter and honey, a practice I Once considered abhorrent ! Whats worse, I know look back on the peanut-butter and banana on a toasted bagel phase of my early twenties in about the same way I do those pictures of my spiral perm in the eighties.  EW !

It is amazing to me the ways the years and experiences I have racked up have changed the way I eat this ONE thing !  Thanks to some irresponsible use of diet pills when I was 22, i ended up in an ambulance . They thought i was having a heart attack. Turns out , my potassium level was so low my heart couldn't function normally. It also turned out that I couldn't keep any of the potassium supplements they perscribed down. So I had to radically alter my diet , to include as much banannas and potatoes as possible. one day , out of pure desperation ,i tried the banannas with peanut butter on a bagel. It was a welcome change, and became my breakfast of choice for the next 6 months. If you waved one under my nose now, I would probably hurl on your shoes. The mid-twenties brought on a surge of proverty that likes of which I had never known , which eventually put me in the position of stealing PBJ's at work because I couldn't afford to eat otherwise. It's funny how the addition of Jelly to your PB dosen't matter when that PBJ is the only thing standing between you and starvation. Just like as I have gotten older , my needs have changed, and my knowledge has expanded. Hence the whole grain white, i have grown an appreciation for my health and well-being that was somewhat lacking in my youth. I have learned of the benefits of regularly consuming LOCAL honey on your allergies. Being plagued by allergies, suddenly a little honey on my PB dosen't sound like blasphemy after all.

The point is , age and experience have made all the diffrence. As I have grown older , and acquired more knowledge , and more experience , my views on Peanut-Butter and all its varying acoutrements have changed. I have grown as a person. This is why we are told (though few ever listen) to listen to the words and advice of our elders. They have more experience and knowledge under their belts than our little pea-brains can fathom. And whether or not we want to admit it, more often than not , they know whats best for us better than we do .

So to the kid who inspired this ramble ( if you even read my drivel) , don't go swearing off the peanut-butter forever. Try it with Jelly , try it with banannas, put it on toast , it could be fun . But for gods-sake quit wasting good peanut butter on that useless, flavorless lump of celery your dragging around with you . It has mold all over it and no real nutritional value.   There is plenty of lovely bread and crackers for your peanut butter far better than a shitty stalk of celery ! Listen to Quiser ! ( at least until you have accumulated a little more age and experience of your own ) Don't leave your warm and lovely bakery full of peanut butter to live in a moldy celery patch. Trust me when i say , God and all those bakers have bigger better plans for you than a sorry old celery patch , even if you don't.  Much love to you my dear, this too shall pass .

Love , it really does move mountains :-)

Today , my family actually managed an outing to an amusement park.  For a quote unquote " normal" family, this is no big deal. For us , it was bordering on unattainable. As I have mentioned before , my family consists of 3 people, myself, my five year old daughter with the ADD and Creepy tendencies , and my wonderful husband  Bill, who is 65 , with crippling arthritis and vertigo among other things.  Did I mention that I am ( at least for the time being ) morbidly obese ?  I also just quit smoking , have asthma , and also have a nasty case of arthritis and am officially in the worst shape I have EVER been in in my life !  So for the two of us , amusement park = hell on Earth , but for Wednesday , it would be more fun than she could ever imagine . Some things were going to have to happen if we were going to do this thing ;

Wednesday was going to need some clear expectations and rules.

Bill was going to have to acquiesce to using a wheelchair.

I was going to need an extra set of hands.

As luck would have it , a friend of mine had a convention to go to and needed us to keep her 12 year old at our place for the week . I seized the opportunity . 12 year olds are wonderful things indeed ! Quite helpful, or at least this one is ! Ellen is a dear ! And Wednesday Adores her !
Your probably wondering why all this fuss over a simple day at the park ? Well, let me elaborate. I cannot hold Wednesdays hand AND push Bills wheelchair at the same time . It just doesn't work . Hence the extra pair of hands , they hold Wednesday's . The alternative would have been to take Wednesday by myself , but that would require leaving Bill home alone 45 minutes away from where we were , which is neither kind or safe. Hhis feelings would have been hurt dreadfully, and when you love someone, the last thing you want to do is hurt their feelings.
When we got to the park, I headed us towards the kiddie area where they have a mini version of their big wooden roller coaster . Ellen took Wednesday on it first , and we quickly discovered that  even though she's evil kinevel at home, she does not really care for thrill rides big or small , which surprised us . There went my dreams of us riding the big woodie together :-(  Ellen came in handy again by taking W. on the spinny rides that make me puke , which apparently she loves ? This gave me and Bill a time out . The other side of this trip was that for it to work, and us to be able to do it as a family , I was going to have to push my 170lbs husband up and down every hill in the July heat while hollering at two children . This is not an easy task for a morbidly obese arthritic asthmatic , but the love I have for my family stoked my willpower and that and my determination to make it a great day , made it a great day !
We're there things I wanted to do but didn't get to ? Yes. But everyone else experienced that at least once too.
Did Bill get to ride anything ? Yes he did , not a whole lot. But enough to make him giddy happy :-)
Did Wednesday have a good time ? By her standards, I think she did .

As for me , we ended up staying two hours longer than we planned . After 6 hours of pushing the wheelchair and managing my tribe in extreme circumstances I am exhausted , but its the good kind of exhausted . The happy kind . I know we managed , ( with some degree of difficulty) to make some great family memories today . And the pictures will last a lifetime ! As will the memories.  That said, I am waiting at least another five years before I try that again ! This time wouldn't have been possible  without Ellen, and love . My love for my family . It enables me to do stupid things , crazy stupid things, but with great love . Things like pushing a grown person all over an amusement park for six hours because you love him too much to leave him behind . I will admit , there was one point when his Lasix kicked in and we had to find a bathroom quick so I kicked it into high gear and by the time we got there I was afraid I was going to have a stroke for a minute !  But I got over it and it looks like the good lord is going to let me live after all ! When it was all said and done everybody got to do enough to make them happy, myself included . And we made a memory , and that's what counts. Not the fact that I sweated through my clothes and felt like I was going to die for a minute .
I truly believe that love , when harnessed can be a kind of superpower. It is my superpower. It's what enables me to get up everyday and work my ass off for my family without complaining, what enables me to read five bedtime stories a night  when I'm beyond exhausted . It allows me to get through days like today, and to the sweet reward that lays on the other side , family time and precious memories !

Tattoo's and parenting don't mix , and other bullshit you may have heard. . .

When I was a little girl , I remember the first time I saw someone with tattoo's.  I was fascinated . Her was this dude with a picture of a pretty lady IN his skin ! I wanted to know how in the world you do that ! Before I could ask him My mother whisked me away and told me that getting tattooed was something trashy people did , and that she wasn't raising trash, she was raising a lady. I tried hard to be a lady , but I was mesmerized . Whenever we were out in public and I saw someone with ink, I couldn't help but stare. To me they were beautiful. I just couldn't understand what made them " trashy" .  Before I knew it drawing " tattoo's " on B.S. , and on myself with a bic pen became one of my favorite hobbies . Scrubbing it all off with rubbing alcohol before church became a weekly ritual , as well. My newfound secret dream, though I didn't know what they were called yet , was to be a tattoo artist when I grew up . I dared not tell anyone .
I spent an extraordinary amount of time dreaming up all the tattoos I was going to get once I was old enough . I was in my twenties before tattooing became legal in the state of Oklahoma ( traveling to Texas like so many others did was not an option for me) which is probably good because it saved me from making a LOT of permenant mistakes. For instance, I used to swear I was going to get a care bear with a pot leaf on its belly tattooed on one ass cheek , and ' Xavier Roberts' autograph tattooed on the other like a cabbage patch doll because I thought it would be funny.  Words cannot express how grateful I am for the fact I do not have to explain either one of the aforementioned tattoos to my hubby , lol !
That said, despite tattoo parlors being illegal at the time , my desire to be inked was so strong that I went out while I was still very under aged , and got my first tattoo . It was done in a friends basement up in Enoch , Ok , with a homemade gun that prominently featured an e-string that had been borrowed from an obliging guitar . It was supposed to be a sacred heart , but it ended up looking like more of a sad and wilted turnip. Eventually, when tattooing became legalized in the state , and I had the time and money , I was able to go get it fixed and now it is beautiful. Once that was squared away , I began to add to my collection. The first thing I did was get a couple of wrist tats. I am a survivor of 13 failed suicide attempts , and very glad they failed, but as someone who deals with depression from time to time , I would find myself  staring at the scars and thinking things I knew weren't good for me . So I chose two verses from the Bible, that I knew would help me climb out of that pit of depression if I should find myself at the bottom of it again. Philippians 4:13 and James 4:10 , I became very attached to them during my step study at celebrate recovery , they are respectfully , " I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me" and " humble yourself before The Lord, and he will lift you up ".  They have already helped me through a few tough times.
The funny thing about tattoos though , they are very much like lays potato chips , you can't get just one ! So before long , I found myself back at the tattoo parlor, in the chair getting work done by Sam , the badass lady tattoo artist whom I LOVE . I had struggled with what it should be for months ! Ultimately , I chose a circular " Sheheyanu" in Hebrew . A subtle nod to my dads side of things , but mostly a way to unite my hubby and Wednesday in one tat. I said that blessing over her the day she was born, and over him the day we married , and every time I see it I well back up with gratitude that they are both in my life and I in theirs .
Sadly, this doesn't mean that everyone else in the world doesn't feel the need to chime in on them. The Hebrew seems to be the ne that garners the most attention. I have been accused of  being a terrorist with " Muslim language" on my arm ( the people who accused me of this apparently weren't intelligent enough to understand that Muslim isn't a language , so I let it slide n account of their pure and un adulterated idiocy ) , others have assumed that it is Sanskrit . My personal favorite though is still the voldemart associate that thought it was the elvish inscription from The Lord of the rings .  I aspire to such incredible nerd-hood, but I haven't quite reached it yet .
One thing I wasn't ready for though , was the judgement I get in public when I am out with my daughter . The looks that say " geez, they'll let anyone have kids these days won't they ?" Or " what n earth is SHE doing raising a child ?" Tattoos are my jewelry , and they have about as much to do with my ability to raise my child as that K-Mart necklace does with yours , K ? My daughter is a little creepy at times, I will give you that. But generally , she is a well rounded, open minded loving and intelligent little creature , and she is that way because I have poured blood sweat and tears into her every day of her life . I have worked 18 hour shifts to put food on the table and still gone hungry myself so that she could eat . I have gone without work shoes or a winter coat for myself , so that I would have the money to get her boots and a coat instead . When you love someone and you are responsible for them, those are just the sacrifices you make. I have dne the all night throw up marathons and still managed to keep my compassion, I have had more date nights with my hubby canceled due to lack of babysitting and an ill child than I can shake a stick at . But that's what I signed on for when I had her , it's in the mom contract , and she is totally worth it .  And that little girl doesn't give a damn that Mommas got a litte ink . But she does give a damn that I am at  every soccer game, recital, program, graduation, and there for every Obie, every nightmare etc. and most intranet of all, she knows that as long as there is breath in my body , I always will be. Not please tell me where the ink on my skin has any effect on that ?

It doesn't. Will I get more tattoos ? Hell yes.  Will they effect my ability to be a good mom and a good person ? Not in the slightest.

Not that it matters, but I still wish I was a tattoo artist :-)

A retrospective look at life before children , and all the ramifications thereof . . .

Years ago, before I became a parent , I was FULL of sage-like wisdom and advice for everyone, ESPECIALLY , people with children.  When my nephew Duddits came along , and I started helping B.S raise him , I started getting way too big for my britches. Suddenly I felt qualified to dispense opinions and suggestions without having been asked to everyone I met pushing a stroller, especially B.S. in short, I became a sanctimonious know-it-all BITCH. When I was carrying Wednesday , I spent most of my time making lists in my head of all the things I had seen other Mothers do that of course I was NOT EVER  going to do with MY child ! I was going to be better than that ! I was going to be the best and most perfect Mother ever ! And naturally , I was not going to repeat any of the "mistakes" my mother made either . ( God I was a judgemental cow ! ) so throughout my pregnancy I was very much " holier than thou " about everything . My nose was so high in the air I'd have drown in an April shower !
Then, after 56 hours of labor and an emergency C-section ( the midwife attended home water birth without mess I had planned was ruined by pre-eclampsia) that everything possible went wrong with , there was little Wednesday . Due to an adverse reaction to the epidural she was almost 5 hours old before I even got to hold her, so, while I was going through three bags of blood transfusions , I had lots of time to think. Coming out of my birth experience having done it almost entirely alone, and not at all the way I planned was a real eye opener . Sometimes , a LOT of the time , your best intentions Nd best laid plans just don't work out.
As I lay there staring at her in her little plastic bassinet , still unable to hold her , it hit me. This is really it. This is real parenting, there is no going back now. It's no longer " just play with the kid for the weekend and then send him back to mom, it is a real 24/7 commitment for the rest of your life. You are officially 100% responsible for another human life. You will supply every need , kiss every boo-boo , cook every meal, change every diaper, and somehow pay for all of it for the rest of your life. Despite all my previous theories , I was beginning to realize there was a big difference between being and Auntie, and being Mom. When I was able to hold her at last , I lost it. The tears just came like a flood. And I put my hand on her head and said the "Sheheyanu", ( i used the original Hebrew, but here's the English translation) " blessed are you , O lord our God, King of the universe . Who has sustained us in life, and enabled us to reach this season." My heart was full of gratitude , thanksgiving, love, and fear.
Up to that moment , I had sworn a number of things to myself , but here's a short 'sampling ' ;
" I would never drop my child off wearing my PJ's , that's just tacky ! "
" how could she feed them that ? It's no un-nutritious ! "
" there is no way my child would ever leave the house like that ! "
" lord her house is a wreck ! She's a stay at home mom, that thing should be spotless ! "
"Well obviously THAT woman doesn't discipline that child at all ! He's a monster ! "
" Clairice is always asking me to watch her kids , doesn't she spend any time with them ? "
" look at that mom over there playing on her phone . She's not watching her kids at all ! "
" if that were my kid I'd put him over my knee and beat some manners into him ! "

Now let me tell you this, five years into this journey called parenting , a whole lot of shit has changed. For one , I have left the rafters and returned to earth with a thud ! And for two, I have learned to view the parenting styles and choices of others in a far more understanding way, ( real experience does that ) . I have also not only dropped her off in my PJ's , I have gone robe, slippers and all into her classroom to sign papers etc , on more than one occasion ! Rather than the June Cleaver breakfasts I had pictured there have been more days than I care to try and count when she has had pop tarts , a cereal bar , or a package of snack crackers for breakfast .  She has gone all over Gods green acre in mis-matched clothes and a bright red kool-aide mustache . My house is far from spotless, and I am indeed a stay at home mom. Despite loads of discipline at home, I refrain from publicly disciplining her for two reasons, 1 fear of some know it all cow calling DHS, and two, I prefer to dole out the discipline when I m NOT pissed off. It's safer for both of us this way.  A cooling period is very beneficial. And now I totally see whY Clairice wanted a sitter all the time, wanting ain't getting, and sometimes it takes months of trying to actually find ONE for ONE night so you and your partner can take a chill for a few hours. As for the phone , I LITERALLY. Run our whole darned household with mine, it's ' work' about half the time, and fun the other half. You know what though ? Wednesday is a very happy ( if slightly creepy ) kid , and I am a very happy ( if more than slightly off kilter mom) and we have a great relationship and both love each other very much .  If I have learned nothing else the last five years , it's to worry a LOT less Bout what everyone else is doing with their kid, and a lot more about what I do with mine. I no longer feel the need to feel superior to someone . I am ok being the kind of mom I am, and I have learned to appreciate the different parenting styles of others.  The old saying is very true , there is no one way to be a perfect mother , but a thousand ways to be a good one. I am not a percent mother by any stretch of the imagination, but I am a good one. And I now realize that that mother on the cell phone probably is too , indeed we all are in our own way , the best we know how to be .  My new parenting strategy, just do your best and it will all work itself out . So far , it's working :-)

I was a grade-school serial killer . . .

The events of today ( cleaning out Wednesday's fish tank etc ) got me thinking ( always a bad sign) and after a lot of thought and careful introspection , I have come to the conclusion that she may in fact come by her ' tendencies ' naturally. ( at least somewhat )  explanation of this theory requires a little trip back in time , to Wilbur Oklahoma , in the early 80's . . . Fasten your seat belts , it's gonna be a creepy trip.

I was quite the tomboy growing up. Most of my classmates from back then have vivid recollections of  me bringing frog eggs and tadpoles from our pond as well as lizards I had caught and snakes to class for show and tell.  For some reason I seemed to have a knack for those " critters" , my room looked like a small wild animal hospital and my Mother used to tease me and call me " Ellie Mae" .  Then one day , she took me and B.S to the pet store and I became enamoured with small furry creatures. Each of us left that day with our very first gerbil . Mine was named Tempelton , B.S named hers Pepe . Pepe was meaner than a damn snake and bit everything that touched her , so she rarely ever left her cage (until the day an enterprising house cat figured out how to open the cage and made a tasty snack of Pepe ) . Tempelton did well , he was gentle and sweet , and I enjoyed reading about gerbils and their natural habitats. I learned that most gerbils lived in burrows, so I went to the back of our acreage and ate to work digging a lovely tunnel and burrow system for my baby. Sadly , 6-7 year olds make very poor architect 's , and about a minute after I put him down in the burrow, it caved in on him. Bye bye Tempelton.

Since B.S and I had both lost our gerbils by then , our kind-hearted ( or possibly crazy ?) Mother took us back to the pet store and gave us another chance. This time we got matching Gerbils , we named them Chip and dale . Chip and dale did well until the day we decided to take them swimming in the swimming pool with us . We had the best time making them dive into the water and swim to the bottom of the pool and then up again, until eventually they just sort of floated to the surface . That was the day we learned that gerbils need oxygen too , and by the way , really aren't the best swimmers . . .

Next trip to the pet store yielded a hamster named Ernie-bob ( so named because Mother had refused to pay for two animals again so we had to share him and each had our own ideas about his name, ever the diplomat , Mom suggested a hyphenated name, and it worked ) we loved playing with Ernie-Bob , as it turns out , so did the cat. We accidentally left him in our my little pony castle when we went to the city to see the Flintstone's movie, when we came back , there were tufts of hamster hair EVERYWHERE, but alas, no hamster.

After this there was an unfortunate pair of birds named tweety and Sylvester . We just couldn't seem to keep our little fingers out of the cage , and surprise , surprise , they too became cat fodder.

It must have been about this time that Mother realized she had bred a couple of small animal serial killers, because I don't remember any more pets of the small caged variety until we were significantly older
Perhaps this bad luck killer instinct is genetic ? Maybe Wednesday isn't really a fish-killer ? Maybe she's just from our  polluted gene pool ? Or perhaps some voodoo witch doctor put a curse on my great grandpa that if we touch a small animal it will die ? That sounds ludicrous , but just to be safe , if you have a gerbil and you love it , whatever you do, don't let anyone from my gene pool pet it , or play with it in any way .

There should be a warning poster about our family in every petsmart .

Honestly , I'm a little surprised that PETA isn't camping on my lawn as I doodle this out .


By the time I was out of grAde school and we sold the house , there was a pet cemetery like you wouldn't believe in Moms flower bed .

I wonder what the new owers thought ? Did they find it ? Inquiring minds want to know . . .

Alas, poor Arnie , I knew him well . . .

" Arnie" committed suicide. I feel like an ass ( but only a little bit)

Buffy gave him a burial at sea . ( otherwise known as a flush down the toilet)

Rest in peace Arnie. You put up a good fight.


Any suggestions on what to do with an empty aquarium when you have no intention at all of EVER putting another animal in it again ?

The little plastic castle . . . Of TERROR !

                                        " They say goldfish, have no memory. I guess their lives 

                                         Are much like mine. And the little ,plastic castle , is a 

                                         Surprise every time . And it's hard to say if their happy.

                                          But they don't seem much to mind." - Ani DiFranco

Last month, when we first moved to Mayberry , munchkin started just throwing a fit to get a pet ( apparently two dogs and two cats just isn't enough for the poor girl ). At first , she wanted a guinea pig, but we talked her out of that . Then she wanted a rat, again we talked her out of it. Then it was a hamster , and eventually a gerbil. When we made it clear that we were not going for the gerbil , she said she would be willing to accept a mouse , I said no deal. You see we already went through several gerbils and rats with her a few years ago, most of them became cat or dog fodder , some of their demises remain an unsolved mystery ( cue creepy 80's music now) . I distinctly remember her introducing  her 4th or 5th rodent to a family member as , " this is Cinderella. She's not dead . YET" ( I told you , little Wednesday can be creepy sometimes) none the less , we were not about to trust here with anything warm and furry, nor were we going to make a special trip into the city to purchase a rodent knowing said purchase would put them immediately on the " endangered species list ".  What we were willing to do was head on down to the Mayberry Voldemart and get some goldfish.

By the time we left Voldemart we had a 10 gallon tank, glow in the dark rocks and plants , 4 koi , and a pink and yellow little plastic castle.  After getting everything together and installed ( which was an undeserved pain in the ass, if I do say so myself ) we went over feeding etc , and agreed that we would feed them at lunch and bedtime. 

It was less than 72 hours before I found the tank full of what could only be described as " pond scum "  with 2 dead fish floating on the top of it . I checked the food supply . Sure enough, over half gone. 

When confronted Wednesday says " no mommy, I didn't feed them without you ." 

" really ? So the fish pellets just unscrewed their own lid Nd jumped in there by themselves did they ? " 

" Must have " ( here's where she gave me the puppy eyes from hell ) 

It took me and Buffy three hours to get that damn tank back to normal , and save the remaining two fish. If she had been there at the time, the urge to smear her with stinky fish water Nd pelt her with glow in th e dark gravel would have been hard to control. 

Eventually however, we did get it clean and back to normal , and enjoyed watching two very happy and relieved fish , back in their home.  Wednesday and I had a little heart to heart after that , that can best be summarized as " if you kill all these fish, they are the last poor critters that will EVER live in your room ! I mean it ! " 

This morning , I discovered the tank full of dingy -ass nasty water again, with surprise surprise , a dead fish floating on top. I am pissed. But magically ( and unfortunately ) their is still one lone 'tough as nails' fish swimming around that cess pool she calls a fish tank , and since she apparently couldn't manage another double homicide, mommy and Buffy will have to clean the damn tank again. Yea. 

I hate to admit it , but I'm almost hoping Arnold Schwartza-fish commits suicide PDQ so I don't have to mess with the tank . ( I know , I'm going to hell, start throwing your tomatoes and stones now dears ! ) 

At any rate. When Arnie croaks , I am friggin done man ! No more fish for Wednesday! No more ! 

Maybe she can handle a lizard or a hermit crab ? 

Only if its made out of play dough.

The corniest post you'll ever read. Otherwise known as " ears:II"

So, as I was saying in my previous blog ( before this wretched iPad cut me off) , out of ALL the crap I have planted in that blasted vegetable garden , a small handful of things have actually started to take off. The cucumber is actually flowering ! ( score ! ) the peas are actually about six inched high now ( not bad for a first time gardener)  AND I HAVE CORN !

Yes , way back in the corner, all by its lonesome , there is a big beautiful stalk of corn about 2 feet high ! There is no shux on it yet , but hell ! I grew corn dammit ! It's beautiful ! Who'd a thought you could feel so ridiculously proud of a freaking corn plant ?  I go to the back windows and look out at the damn thing about 100 times a day , and it never gets friggin old ! I grew corn ! I made corn ! Ha ha ! ( picture me doing some kind of strange ritual dance around the garden screaming and babbling nonesense  about corn , because that's what I'm doing most of the time now . Just look in' at my corn. . . Singin' to my corn. . . Waterin' my corn . . . You get the picture . I have formed an unhealthy obsession with this corn . Mostly because I harbor the probable delusion that someday it will yield actual corn , and then I can take it in the house and put it on the table before my family and say " eat this magnificent and beautiful healthy corn that I have grown for you most beloved family " or some shit like that . ( I don't know why , but for some reason that whole sentence came out in my head in the voice of  tiger Lillie's father from Disney's 'Peter Pan ', and I'm probably going to hell for that , but anyway , moving right along .. . .)

If my hypothesis proves true , and this corn is indeed the only thing in my occursed vegetable garden that actually produces food, then next year I am changing my strategy. I shall plant only corn . Loads and loads of beautiful corn . I will film a documentary called " only child of the corn " in which my munchkin wil dance through the corn in order to please her ( surprisingly sober) mother . Then I will call Stephen King and see if he would be interested in helping me develop the script for " only child of the corn " ( something tells me I can expect a big hell no on that one, but a girl can dream , right ? )

Please , Sweet baby Jesus , let something else besides corn do diddly in my garden . I mean , I know there are lots of people with problems bigger than mine , but it sure would be nice if you could spare a minute to save me from a lifetime of growing only corn ! For one that fact that corn has no real nutritional value ( the irony would kill me , daily ) , plus , the corn jokes are limited . Let me branch out , just a little ? Think of poor Stephen king , and all those harassing phone calls, he don sent deserve that! And most of all , think of poor munchkin , sentenced to a life of running through her mamas mini-cornfield spouting cheesy one-liners from " children of the corn " for her mothers amusement , I'm sure that must constitute some kind of abuse , right ?


Lord, I am just one never-ending spiral of crazy aren't I ?

All over some friggin corn.

God help us all if anything else actually grows . . .

Lord keep my spark of insanity well lit , so I can find the humor in everything. Amen.

I'm all " ears"

Some of you may remember that some weeks ago , Bubba and I made a backyard vegetable garden only to discover there was no spigot with which to water the darn thing ! Well , I'm pleased to report that after careful deliberation over wether to install a spigot in the back yard , or just buy a longer hose , we elected to buy a MUCH longer hose. ( damn plumber wouldn't call me back )

It was hotter than the blue blazes of you-know-where when we got that darn thing home , and Bubba's "babies" were just about to give up the fight !

I waited until dusk to water for two reasons. The obvious , so the sun wouldn't evaporate the water or further scorch the plants. And because I was hoping against hope , that munchkin would fall asleep in time for me to water alone .

GUESS WHAT DIDN'T HAPPEN ?

You guessed it . Someone wasn't feeling a damn bit sleepy , even after their melatonin . As I looked out the window and saw daylight passing me by I realized Elvis was right, it's now or never. So I suited up in my garden gear and hauled my buns outside to install the new hose.  A 150 ft whopper !  With the cutest AND most aggravating ( but well intentioned ) little helper on the planet. Once I had freed it from its plastic torture chamber , I attached the hose securely to the spigot by the front porch and turned it on and just began walking towards the backyard. Munchkin was enthralled ( she had been promised first turn with the spray nozzle) and skipping along beside me , I was feeling confident and in control and then . KINK ! Suddenly the hose stopped, WAY short of the gate . I looked behind me and saw a tangled mass of hose less than 3ft from the front yard spigot. Dammit ! I began walking back towards the spigot ( marching back , more like ) determined to sort his whole thing out . Did you know that it is damn near impossible to untangle a 150ft Waterhose while it is still turned on ? (Well I didn't so stop laughing dammit ! ) ( if you are one of 'God's special people' like myself and would have dne this too, bless your heart ! And learn from my example cause I had to learn it the hard way ! )  All in all it took us over an HOUR AND A HALF ! To water a damn 8x10 vegetable garden and a few friggin rosebushes ! ( and the herb garden , and oh ! Those damn canna's we brought from the old house . Oh and the morning glories. Oh shit . . .) anyway, the addition of munchkin plus a 150ft hose that was determined not to work with me made for more than an hour of God-awful horrid gardening ! We may have argued the whole damn time about who got to hold the darn sprayer , but eventually we did manage to get everything watered and fertilized and get inside .

Once we got inside we had a few minutes to revel in our job well done before we both realized we were covered from head to toe in bug bites !  They were EVERYWHERE ! You see in our frenzy to water the garden we forgot to put on bug spray , even though I. Have cans of the crap deposited at strategic locations throughout the house AND garden hoping to prevent this , we are covered in freaking bites , and the damn " deep woods off " remains unused .

Here's where munchkin and I both clean up and get Jammied and spend the next half hour or ore slathering each other with Benadryl cream. ( insert Dean Martin's , " Memories are made of this " here) . Seeing as how munchkin is a wiz with a whopper , I can only imagine the stories that were told the next day at daycare as she showed off her  " battle scars " . The next days were punctuated by repeats of the same events , only with the " deep woods " ON  for once , and thankfully though the child was no less agitating , the sun at least made the sun more pliable so I didn't have to feel like I had just escaped the ring with Mahommad Ali after watering . Watering is finally starting to feel like watering . At last .

You may wonder what I have to show for all of this laborious effort . Well let me tell you ;
2 bell pepper plants in dire need of life support.
3 eggplants that are sitting in the corner of the garden with a mug in their fronds begging for sustinence.
1 strawberry that has done exactly squat since I got it.
4 okra plants that have apparently gone into the witness protection program .
33 tomatoes rifled little tomato plants.

But you know what ?  I have corn !

Good gravy !

As most of you know, I consider myself to be a fairly decent cook. In general , my meals are tasty and relatively nutritious , but there are just some things that I can't seem to get right for love nor money , and gravy is one of them.

For those of you not from around here, in these parts, gravy is sort of an art form . It requires skill , and dexterity, and perfect timing ( unless of course your one of those cheating bastards who uses a store bought mix packet, in which case you probably have no trouble at all, do ya ? ) . For years , I used pre-made canned gravy or mix-pack gravy , with my head hung down in shame , praying that no one knew my secret ( of course, as soon as they tasted it they knew I had cheated , so what was the point ? )  but I digress, about 6 months ago , I decided to hell with store bought gravy ! I was gonna learn how to do this shit myself ! How friggin' hard can gravy be I ask you  ?  Well, as it turns out , pretty damn hard . ( at least for my clumsy ass)

So for the last six months or so , my family has been subjected to " the great gravy trials of 2013" , as of yet , there have been mo casualties , but plenty of bellyaching and complaining.  Once I had made up my mind I was gonna do this, I started Making gravy every chance I got !  ( which wouldn't normally be a problem , since hubby loves gravy and would eat it on just about everything if he could ) sadly , the first batch of gravy I made tasted a lot like the paste I used to eat in kindergarten , with just a subtle hint of chicken flavor .  I tried again the following night with similar results, much to the chagrin of my family .  At one point I abandoned my great gravy quest at the urging of my family who were tired of having " gravy paste " at every meal .

Then one night sister Buffy was over , and I decided to try and make gravy for her . Again , I produced ( despite my best efforts otherwise) that horrid , atrocious "gravy paste " . Unknown to me at the time , dear Buffy is something of a gravy connoisseur , and she was able to tell me what I was doing wrong ! ( bless her ! ) She told me to put the flour in the grease and stir it in before adding the milk, well as it turns out, that helped a LOT. Sadly , I went from producing "gravy paste" to making lumpy, bumpy " gravy soup " but Buffy assured me , " it just takes practice " so in spite of my family's complaints , and their relentless begging me not to , I just kept trying !

Last night it finally paid off ! Last night I produced what my Husband heralded as " the most edible gravy you have ever managed !" ( high praise from someone coming off six months worth of gravy paste) not quite gravy mastery , but the closest I have ever came ! Woo hoo ! ( it's the little things :-)  Tonight we shall celebrate by making sloppy joes , and taking it easy on Miss Quiser , lol !  My quest for the perfect gravy is ended , close enough is good enough for me !  Besides, I'm sure I can find some more trouble to get into somewhere , or another new means of driving my family insane .

It's amazing what you can do when you apply yourself !

The great cat baptizing of 1986' or 7 ?

So tonight , as on so many nights , I got to Indulge in a multitude of randome housewife tasks, though tonight things did get shaken up a bit. You see, in addition to the munchkin , we also have four little fur babies, there Is Miss Dog ( of the small and yippie variety , more than a little overweight but pretty darned easy going ) , then there is mister dog , ( extremely yappy and incredibly neurotic , probably somewhere right now neurotically licking the remaining fur off his poor balls ) , then there is miss cat , who is just shy of the most anti-social vile creature god ever blew breath into ( she is probably lurking suspiciously under some furniture about now.) and last but not least , there is mister cat , who spends most of his time in the masters lap , soaking up all the affection, and has no doubts at all that he indeed rules the roost . I may have mentioned before that we just moved here a month ago, well , at the old house we had the yard treated for fleas etc , so I got very spoiled to not having to really worry about that. Here, not so much , and not long after starting to let the critters outside again,  we noticed they had started to scratch , and lo indeed they had acquired some fleas. So tonight was flea bath and flea collar night ! Yea ! Woo-hoo ! It stayed pretty uneventful while I did the dogs, and mister cat took it like a champ , but when I got miss cat in the tub all hell broke loose . By the time I hurriedly finished her up  and carried my kitty-cat burrito into the living room, I was pretty beat.  Once she was Dried off and acting semi-nice I stopped to review my battle wounds.  Only 16 scratches and punctures. Not too bad . I can remember another time when I didn't get off so lightly. . .

It was the summer of 1986' or 1987 ( since I discovered pot in 1996 it had been a little harder to remember exact dates , even after quitting in 2004) , at any rate I was approximately 6 or so ( just a hair older than munchkin is now ) and my little sister bat-shit was around 17 months younger ( to save time and make things easier , we will just call her B.S. for the rest of the story ) . Back then we lived in the small town of Wilbur , Oklahoma , population, about 1,000 on a good day. Despite its small population , Wilbur, inexplicably , had about 10 churches. And the only thing to do in Wilbur during the summer , was go to vacation bible school " VBS" . All the churches worked together to make sure they had theirs on different weeks , and if an enterprising parent played their cards right , they could be rid of their children free of charge for 10 weeks out of the summer !  Since mom worked , B.S and I spent all of our summers being shuttled from one VBS to another , along with all the other kids who had driven their parents crazy . We got to make a lot of coasters and wind chimes , and learn a LOT about the Bible. The week we were with the Methodists , B.S and I learned about baptism , and how if you don't get baptized you go to hell. Well we didn't want to go to hell, but lucky for us at our home congregation ( which was at that time Pentecostal ) they were having a big ole baptizing that Sunday in one of the congregants swimming pools ! Well sign us up ! We were rooting , tooting, and ready to go ! We were first in line ! We were both so proud when we got dunked ! Not going to hell feels good ! ( bear in mind this is from the prospective of a child who thought communion was just snack time in the middle of services )  so , on the long ride back to the boonies from the baptizing, still soaking wet, B.S and I had a revelation.  Sure we weren't going to hell now, but what about our animals ? We couldn't let them go to hell ! Something had to be done about this ! They had to be saved !

Well, we had a big ole pond at the back of our property , so the sight was obvious , the rest was a little more difficult . You see . Our Mama had a heart the size of Texas , and she didn't know how to say no , or how to turn away any creature in need . The people of greater Landon county figured this out and the next thing you know everybody in a 50 mile radius started bringing every stray they found  over to her . Now , there is some dispute over exactly how many there were. Hector swears it was 49, Mama says 29 , and I remember somewhere near 34 . At any rate , we had a HELL of a lot of cats ! There was also a lot of dogs, and chickens and such as well. Mama made us change our clothes before we headed to the pond ( church dresses are alright for chlorine pool water, but not allowed in Oklahoma red mud ! Remember that ! ) the dogs were easy. We took turns dunking them under the water and saying " I baptize you in the name of the father, the son and the Holy Spirit !" , dogs down , we decided we would just throw buckets if pond water on the chickens , so they were over rather quickly . Then it was time for the cats . We were determined that every last one of them was going to get dunked if it killed us ! We did not want to go to heaven without our cats !  One by one we caught all 30-something cats , and trotted them down the hill to the pond walked out into the water , and pronounced them baptized ! It was grueling work, it took hours , but as I said , we were determined to succeed . By the end of the day , we were COVERED in cat scratches ! We had them everywhere ! More than enough that we had to eventually quit counting ! But we had the satisfaction of a job well done , and were we're very proud of ourselves . I can only imagine what went through Mama's head that night when we came in for d inner ! Saving souls is hard work !

That's why tonight , when my hubby asked me if I made it out of the bathroom in one piece , I said " it couldn't hold a candle to the great cat baptism of 86 ! " and he just giggled , because he knows he married a nut job, so nothing I say EVER surprises him . I love that man :-)

A new Job for Miss Quiser ?

Well, if everything I have been reading in the checkout line is true , it would appear that food network has got a pretty big job opening .

Never one to look opportunity or a gift horse in the mouth , I have decided that the best person I know to fill this spot , is me !

Ok and here's why .

Ok, we'll start with the obvious , I'm not racist . I mean , let's face it , my hienz 57 family tree is such that I have no business throwin' stones at anybody. I like everybody till they give me a reason not to.
You piss on my lawn or steal my paper , I'm probably gonna not like you , but as long as your nice to me, we cool .

Secondly, just once I wanna see somebody on that channel take one of them $25 pot and pan sets from the voldemart , and a handful of voldemart 's cheap kitchen tools and make a meal . I mean, who the hell do I  know who owns a julienne slicer and a lemon zester ? Or any of them other fancy-ass tools they are always us in' on there ? If It couldn't be got at voldemart , and cheaply, I wouldn't use it .

Thirdly, I would use things you find in a normal persons kitchen. You know like  spam, and ramen noodles, and Kraft Mac-n-cheese and Vienna sausages , crunched up tater chips. Y'all get the picture. I don't know anybody who keeps kale, and Swiss chard and bok Choy just in their frige for shits and giggles.

Fourth, I would have my viewers send me a list of what was in their cabinet and fridge , and create a workable meal with only those ingredients . You know, just go to the pantry and the fridge and make a list , e-mail it to old Quiser , and I will show you how to make it edible :-) we could call it Kamikaze cooking with Quiser.

Fifth. Recipe lotto:-) all my southern peeps, my Okies, my cajun's my rednecks , y'all send me your favorite recipes and I would make 'me on the show. Don't matter if its for gator, or frog legs , or what , you have my word I will try ANYTHING ONCE !

Sixth. I would keep it real . I would do the whole damn thing from the privacy of my own house . A nice normal residence, not some palatial goody two shoes place in California . And if it was less than clean on filming day , I would leave it that way. And I would not curtail my language because lord knows those guys who work the buzzers at the network need a job too!

I would have awesome guests like Ruby-Anne Boxcar , who could show us how to make deep fried twinkies and chocolate covered bacon !  And Sister Unity could teach us how to make a nice Hindu friendly vegan pâté or something , just to keep it well rounded. Aunt Jaunita could send us recipes from prison too ! Those would be fun ! And ya know, I could do for food network what Larry the cable guy did for comedy if they would just give me a chance !  Ya know ? If nothing else the impressive number of kitchen fires I have under my belt would make it worth watching, I don't care if people are watching to see if I light myself on fire , or watching to see how to make squirrel pie, their watchin dammit , and that's what matters ! Besides, it might give the " here comes honey-boo-boo" crowd another channel to be interested in . I might even have mama June on sometime, I bet she's got some awesome casserole recipes ! Oh it would be so much fun !

I have no idea how to start an Internet petition , but as soon as I figure it out I'm gonna start one to get " Kamikaze cookin with Miss Quiser " on food network ( or at least the local public access cable station )  I sure hope y'all will sign it !

My spidey-sense is tingling . . .

Something happens, when you become a Mother. Something incredible. Even before you somehow manage to shoot that little sucker out of your birth canal, you change. Not just you, but your world and the way you see it , the way you react and respond to it . Thanks to evolution it's in your DNA. The moment those pregnancy hormones start surging , you get the beginnings of your " Spidey-sense" .

It is this " Spidey-sense " that allows you to smell a tiny crust of burnt toast that fell behind the stove 4 days ago as vividly as if it were freshly burnt and under your nose .  It convinces you that pickles and ice cream with a side of watermelon and a chicken leg for dessert is the best smelling meal EVER and should be eaten by all. As your fetus continues to develop , so does your Spidey-sense. Eventually , you are able to spot dust , and grease, and grime that your partner will swear is invisible to the naked eye . You will smell hour old dirty dishes and their repugnant stench will force you to wash them immediately , all the while your partner will be in the living room reading informational brochures for the local nuthouse.  By the end of your pregnancy you have evolved into an organizational guru and cleaning and safety pioneer ! Your nest is safe and sparklin' clean ! It smells like a clean breeze , and the local librarian is in awe of your organizational abilities .

Now many people will try and tell you that this Spidey-sense will leave by the time the baby is a few months old , but this is crap. As the child grows and develops , your Spidey sense does too ! This is why someday your offspring will swear you have eyes in the back of your head and your partner will swear your psychic. You will be able to smell an open container of anything three rooms away !  You will know that silence = trouble and respond appropriately.  B the time your children are , say about 5 , you will have garnered a rather unique ability in addition to your Spidey -sense. You will be able to see things that are invisible to others !  Things like full trash cans , and dirty laundry, and empty dog bowls , and dirty toilets . Everyone else in your house will breeze right by them without noticing , but you ? You will tackle them like the awesome mom-beast you are ! You will clean them up and make them beg for mercy ! You will put them away , and later on , when you ask your child and your partner " hey, did you see that overflowing trash can ? " they will say " no hon, sure didn't " , it 's magic I tell you ! Pure magic !

The legend and lore of , "The Grandma Blanket "

When I was a little girl, We had what seemed like a TON of quilts ! Most of the ones I remember from back then were made by my Maternal Grandmother . My Mother , amazingly , could still remember where most of the fabric for the patches came from and would lay them out on the floor , or on the bed , and tell us the stories behind each patch . Some she wore to the amusement park, or kindergarten graduation, some on dates with handsome suitors, and while my little sister was usually bored senseless,I was completely enthralled !  I loved hearing the stories and fingering the historical fabric , it made me feel connected. Part of something bigger than myself .

As time went on , and I grew some more , I discovered that I seemed to have my best night's sleep and best dreams , when I was sleeping under a " Grandma Blanket " . As Time went on , I eventually became old enough that I was given some of these magical blankets for my own , even some that my great grandmothers on my fathers side had made 100 years ago . When my hubby and I married , I acquired some made by his Grandmothers and Great Grandmothers MORE than 100 years ago .

Each one is unique , and beautiful and each one is a story I haven't managed to unravel yet . And i have slept under each and every single one of them ,at least once , and no matter which one I use , from which Grandma , I still sleep like an angel and have the best dreams ever.

I have tried like the dickens to figure out why this is,and the best I can come up with , Is because they were made with love for you , by someone who hadn't even MET you yet , but believed that one day you would exist , and just in case she wasn't there to see it , she wanted to leave you something to remember her by , and to make sure you still felt her love she poured it out in every stitch . And then everyone who came after this wonderful woman added some of their spirit too .

Newlyweds spent their honeymoon under them. Families spent cold winters snuggled together by the fire under them .  Children and babies were cuddled in them by loving mothers. Sick and aged loved ones were warmed and cared for beneath them . Weary travelers and friends were warmed by them. They were used to offer hospitality to those in need of it . When it all comes down to it , quilting is really and act of love , and sharing . It is the gift that keeps on giving, and only improves with age and use , the more love you pour into it , the more love you get out of it , and that is where it gets it's magic.

I told my daughter this one night when she awoke during a thunderstorm with a nightmare and i needed a quick story . She liked it so much she ask me if she , could sleep with a " Grandma Blanket " too ? I snuggled her up in one , and she dozed off quickly . After that she requested one after every nightmare for a while. Now she refuses to sleep without one .

Sometimes , we like to run our fingers over the quilts together and imagine how their makers came by the pieces that we don't know the stories of . And sometimes , we just talk about the ones we DO know. Always I remind her that this is her heritage , and someday it will be hers. I hope she will share it with her children . I hope she will remember that a quilt, is the fastest way for a hug to travel through generations .

Because i'm an old Southern woman and i'm supposed to wear stupid hats, and ugly clothes , and grow vegetables in the dirt. . .

Long ago, when we first eye-balled this house, I decided that the old foundation in the back yard was perfect for growing my vegetable garden, and boy I was hell bent for leather on growin' one ! I had decided that we were going to go 'green'  and grow as much of our own food and such as possible, and just be more environmentally conscious in general. Having only just taken up flower gardening last year , growing my own food was a bigger leap than I realized .

I may have told you before that we don't set out to make things complicated, but in this family we sure do have a gift for them ending up that way . As usual, this vegetable garden was destined to be a journey all it's own. . .

It was about three months between the time we selected the house, and the time we moved in. Ironically , we selected it in early spring, prime planting season ( sure I know that NOW ) . When we moved in June 7th , Bubba the horticulturist assured me , "it is NEVER too late to plant." Well , by the time I " got around to it " one early morning the last week or so of June , I pulled into the local greenhouse only to be told that they were closed for the season. I drove to another and was told the same thing . "Fine" I told myself,"then I'll just go to voldemart , they should still have some."

As luck would have it , Voldemart DID still have some , and I spent the next hour combing through the leftovers of greater Mayberry. By the end of that hour I had selected the sorriest crop of seedlings you ever did see. Just a handful of this and that , and a few packets of seeds . As I awaited my turn at the checkout , it seemed every redneck in spitting distance had to come eyeball my cart. Eventually , a fella with a mouth full of chewin' tabaccy made the brilliant observation " well you must be one of them there folks that likes a challenge , he-yuck , he-yuck ".  Not particulairly, but at that moment I had dreams of producing mountians of corn and tomatoes with my measely and pitiful little plants, if for no other reason than to bring them back and pelt him with them.

The poor bastards sat on my porch for two days before anything managed to get done with them.


When all was said and done poor Bubba had to plant them because Munchkin was on a bender and I had to wrangle her , and he assured me that if we didn't plant them soon , they were gonna croak.


So , Bubba planted my pitiful plants , and at the end of the day , I had a beautiful veggie garden , and could feel like I had fullfilled my duty as a stereotypical old southern woman. All I had to do was water the poor things ! This should be easy, right ? I mean hell, how hard can waterin' be ? My roses look great ! I can SO do this !


I forgot . For the first 2 days, I forgot.

Then one day , I looked out the laundry room window and saw all the poor little buggers all wilting in the sun , and I said " Sweet baby Jesus ! I better get them poor things some water ! "  So I ran out into the yard and got the hose from the front of the house ( since I hadn't hooked up the one in back yet ) turned that sucker on and ran like the wind into the back yard . I was stopped abruptly at the southwest corner of the garden when I ran out of hose .

Now I know what yer thinkin'. Well just put your thumb over it stupid and shoot the water into the garden, right ? Well I will have you know I DID , and the water pressure on that stupid fancy curly-cue hose sucks ! The damn thing would just barely dribble on the corner tomato plant and go no further .

That was when I decided to hook up the damn back yard hose . Only problem there was that When I started looking, there was no where in the damn back yard for me to hook the stupid hose to. You see , in all my excited veggie garden planning , I neglected to check out one key element . " How in the hell am I going to water these things once I have planted them ? " Ladies and gentelmen, ALWAYS ask yourselves that question BEFORE you plant a dang garden !  It was at this point that I threw my hands up in exasperation and went back into the house .

The next day , Bubba came to visit . He took one look at our garden and went screamin' into the back yard  yellin' " my babies ! My babies ! " ( and let me tell you , when you see a 6'9 tough guy do this , it is a sight to see ! ) He glared at me accusingly and said , in the most pitiful voice I have ever heard come out of his mouth  , " they need water ! " He very quickly discovered what I had found out the day before .

The next couple of hours were spent dumping buckets of miracle grow water over the plants by hand .

They have perked up a bit , but i'm not holding my breath .

Time shall tell if anything edible ever comes out of that thing .

In the meantime I'm tryin' to nail down a damn plumber to see about putting in a stupid spigot.

Who the hell builds a house without a backyard spigot ?

I guess that's what we get for falling in love with an almost 100 year old house .

Goodness, the things we do for love .

Parenthood : A reality check for prospective parents .

If At all possible , read this BEFORE knocking someone up OR getting knocked up.
This is all the crap I know now, that I wish I had known when I was pregnant .
(not saying I wouldn't have had kids if I had known this, just saying I like to go into things with my eyes wide open , that's all. And I love my munchkin very much )

1. June Cleaver is full of S*#T !  Having two boys doesn't just give you and the Hub's a little something to chitter about at the end of the day while your having your highball. It will drive you insane ! Or at the very least , it will turn you into a wino ( you basically have no other choice)   but take heart, from what I hear from mothers with two boys , eventually they do grow up, and usually they turn out alright, and sometimes you still have a shred of sanity and a slice of functioning liver to show for it ! So no worries :-)

2. Laura and Mary Ingalls are a figment of your imagination ! Sisters who get along do not happen . Like EVER. Right now , your probably sitting there rubbing your belly having daydreams about the three of you braiding each others hair , and playing barbies , and everyone is all just getting along hunky-dory and crap.
WRONG ! In reality, sisters be fierceley competetive and tearing each others hair out ! I speak from experience ! I had a sister , and we threw each other down the stairs , out of trees, tried to curb check each other . . . I could go on and on . Unless you plan to spend every minute you are with your family playing wound care nurse, or referee , two girls isn't for you ! On the bright side though, if you survive the hormonal teenage years and synchronized " Shark Week " , from what I hear , once they reach college they are somewhat tolerable, and sometimes by their 30's have buried the hatchet ( sometimes in each others backs )

3. I only have one friend with twins , and her kids are ridiculoulsy smart and good natured, not at all like the average run of the mill children I used for this "study " . Therefore I have no comparison and analysis on Twins :-(

4. Having a Multitude of children will not transform your family into the effing Brady Bunch. In reality, it's a lot more like Village of the Damned . There's a LOT  more of them than there are of you , and those little buggers are out to get you ! Look out Mama ! If they figure out they out number you, your days could be numbered !

5.Only Children. Only children are creepy. They just are, or at least mine is . When I was pregnant, I imagined my precious little girl all angelic and sweet. NOT . She is incredibly morbid . Some days it seems she is obsessed with death , and she can ask some of the most unsettling questions you ever heard of .  In short , I gave birth to Wednesday Addams .Then there are days when she is as sweet and adorable as Cindy Brady , and you just want to snuggle her. And about the time you do , she Morphs into Carol-Anne and gives you the willies with a " They're here ". You just can't win for losing .

When I started Parenting , we were all far from functional. I was over-informed and worried about everything . He was under-informed and non-chalant about everything . We needed a happy medium but we never found it . That's one of many reasons why we have been divorced for what feels like forever. The relationship between me and my daughter post-divorce , was a LOT like Tom Hanks and his son in " Sleepless in Seattle " , she was just as precocious as Jonah, and i was just as frustrated but devoted as Sam, trying to figure out my new role in this and what to do in this brave new world. It bears mentioning however , that while most of Sam and Jonah's exchanges could easily have been ours , the "Jed's got cable " conversation or anything like it never took place. When I remarried (my current Hubby) we morphed into a sort of fun-house Mirror version of Ellen Paige's parents in "Juno", mixed with Emma Stones parents in "Easy A" , Picture a sort of happy medium there. They aren't the best parents, but they aren't the worst either . At the very least, they handle life with a sense of humor and they love their kids . We love our Munchkin. She isn't perfect, neither are we. And that's the way we like it . We celebrate and embrace our weirdness. it's us, it's what makes us unique . It bears mentioning that if you put those two aforementioned characters (Olive, Juno) in a blender and made them 5 ish , you would have our munchkin . Spirited , mouthy and oppinionated , but super smart and willing to go to great lengths for a friend , all while marching to the beat of her own drummer . . . that's our girl !  Gotta love her .

The moral of this winding , rambling piece of crap story is don't go into parenting with the" My child won't do that " attitude. I can garuentee you everything you have ever said that about , they will do . AND then some . Probably more than once . When you can make peace with this , then you are ready to be a parent . When you can see yourself holding your little bundle and thinking , " sure little Johnny might grow up to be a window licker, but would I love him any less ? " your probably ready.

and I should probably quit while i'm sort of ahead. . .

or at least before I ramble any further.

My apologies for the spelling. My hubby is asleep and he usually does the spell checking for my sorry ass.

I promise this is a subject I will try to steer away from in the future .

at least within reason :-)

Bring him home ?

Alright y'all. Now I don't know about you, but we Southern Okies , well we pretty much all of us have that " one " relative. You know , the ner'do'well who just try as they might couldn't keep from interacting with the state penal system.  In my family growin' up we had two. On Mama's side we had sweet little  Aunt Juanita  who just couldn't seem to keep her hands out of other peoples checking accounts. Then, on Daddy's side , there was dear ole cousin Jim Bob, who discovered the wonders of drugs in the late 70's, the end result of which was him robbing and shooting a man who owned a liquor store . He got back out a few times, but much like Aunt Juanita just kept going right back. And you love 'em cause they're family, but you also know their nature , so you don't doubt their guilt. Instead you just grow acustomed to visitors days at the women's correctional facilities , or in Jim-Bob's case , you write lots and lots of letters. Truth be told, I only ever met Aunt Juanita about 3 times in my life, as for Jim-Bob , I have never met him in person, but we have written for over 10 years. Because of this , courts , and prisons and sentances only became "real" for me , a little over three years ago. Prior to that , although i had incarcerated loved ones, in my mind , it was something you watched on " Law and Order" , not something that happened in real life .

Now I'm gonna give you a little back-story , before I go on . You see, after my parents got divorced , during my teenage years , for a number of reasons, most of which could not be helped, it was not always possible for me to live with my family of Origin. Because of this I gained several other wonderful families who took me in , and also participated in my raising . I got a whole mess of awesome siblings this way ( which was great since my bio Brother lived in another state and was 11 years older than me , and my bio sister went bat-shit crazy ) last time I counted around 15 or so . Thanks to this I now had big brothers and sisters, and little brothers and sisters , it was and remains great ! We are all still in contact ! I would like to take a minute to introduce you to one of my brothers . I  will call him Tom Robinson , and in a few minutes , so will you .

Tom started his life as a scrawny , sweet, lovable little flute-playing closeted kid in a VERY rural school district , where he was bullied near constantly . His dream was to one day create a place where kids like him could go and be safe , and be themselves without fear. It would take him years to accomplish his goal, and a lot of hard work . But he did it . He created the place he had dreamed , and was doing the work  he was meant to do . Then one night everything changed .  One night Tom found himself  cornered by an unwelcome advance , which turned into attempted rape. The other guy was easily a foot taller and 100 pounds heavier than Tom and Tom was terrified . He managed to get away by the skin of his teeth, and like so many other victims , did not report it for fear of not being taken seriously . You see, here in America,we have a nasty tendancy to blame the victim in male on female rape, her clothes provoked him, she was drunk etc. But most people, and especially law-makers and law enforcement don't even recognize the fact that rape can take place between a man and a man , or a woman and a woman just as easily.  In the particulair jurisdiction where this took place, Tom knew he had a snowball's chance in hell of having ANYONE listen to him, let alone do anything about it. So he did what most victims do , he went home, cried, tried to put the pieces back together and go on with his life.   Then the next day , before he knew what hit him , the police were breaking down his door and dragging him away from his family in handcuffs.

Eventually we were able to put the pieces together. It turns out his attempted rapist was 15 , and having not gotten his way , had decided to go down to the police department and tell a VERY different story about the events that took place. What followed after that was Tom , in jail . My precious Tom, behind bars , the victim being punished for a crime he didn't commit. Bail was set ridiculously high , and while he had a competent attorney , there was little she could do against a crooked small town judicial system. In the months that followed , as he made it through appeal after appeal and docket after docket , more and more came to light about 'Burris" his accuser , including multiple stints in the local mental hospital, sociopathic tendancies, and a history of having done something similar at least three other times previously to his interaction with Tom.  Now in a perfect world , this new information would vindicate Tom, and send Burris to a state Juvenile offenders home . Instead, Burris was never reprimanded at all, and while the 'authorities' did drop some of the charges ,they were sure not to drop so many that they couldn't still 'stick it to 'em" .


Not long after that , Tom was offered a 'deal' , a 'plea bargain' , if he would plead guilty to the lesser charge , they would commute his sentence to where it would be mostly house arrest and probation , with only 6 months or so spent in a minimum security facility . His lawyer counseled him that this was the best he could hope for , and to take it. So he did. And within that polluted and predjudiced system , it probably was " the best he could hope for " , But that didn't make it right. It didn't help matters at all that during this ordeal , a significant portion of the gay community , both local and abroad , had turned their backs on him. In order to distance themselves from him they threw him to the wolves. By the time he was released to house arrest , there were few indeed who would still call him friend . Then the time came and he was taken to the minimum security prison. True to form, Tom kept his spirits up and did his best not to allow the circumstances to dampen his spirit , or put out the beautiful light within him, and I am sure there were days when that was very hard indeed. For me these months were fraught with prayer and worry that the others would pick on him , or hurt him. Fervent prayers for his safety and safe return punctuated my days and letter writing filled my nights. Those were some of the slowest months of my life, and i'm sure they were even slower for him.

"God on high, hear my prayer. In my need , you have always been there. . . "

After months of family prayer , worrying with every spare minute I had, and breaking into tears whenever I heard " Bring him home " from Les Miserables . The day finally arrived when it was indeed time to bring him home . I wept for joy when I heard ! After all this time ! Finally ! It was like Seeing a real - life Jean valjean walking away from the quarry . He is coming home ! Bring him home ! My heart was in my throat , and it was all I could do to make myself wait a bit to go run up there and hold him . I had to tell myself , " It's a long trip from there to there, they will be tired. Give them time ", "Give him space, and time to get used to being on the outside again " Then , as I was in the midst of all this pining here in Mayberry , I had my socks knocked right off unexpectedly.

Less than 24 hours after my precious Tom was liberated, I saw his name and face plastered on facebook, by none other than a member of the gay community there . Along with the rest of the bad news, that he was now a registered sex offender and would have to find a new place to live asap , because he is no longer allowed to share a residence with his elementary school aged niece whom he has helped raise since infancy. The fact that this thing listed his name , address EVERYTHING scared the shit out of me .  Now all the people who didn't know he was innocent , all the ignorant and hateful people , would know where he lived. They could find him , they might hurt him. For the first time ever , I became worried about what kind of world and home we were bringing him home to. What kind of peace would he have ? How would he earn a living ? Most importantly , what kind of a world do we live in where the victim can be incarcerated for a crime he didn't commit , while the attempted rapist roams free ? And he will try again, and eventually he will succeed . Will Tom be exonerated then ? Or will the damage have already been done ? Is the damage already done ?

I know what your thinking . Your thinking I am delusional and I have just " bought his story " hook, line and sinker , aren't you ?  Well let me tell you something , I KNOW THIS MAN .  I have known him for 20 years. I know his character , and i believe him. Because I know beyond the shadow of a doubt that he is inncocent . Because i have seen inside this man, and greed and evil are not there. He is my mockingbird, my Jiminy Cricket. and I love him. Our judicial system is not perfect, nor is it without prejudice. If you don't believe me , go check out the Southern Proverty Law Centers website , they have exonerated countless people from death row who were convicted by predjudiced jury's , with falsafied evidence . This crap does happen in real life , and now I have seen it .

For now , I ask that you keep he and his family in your prayers . Pray for their peace and their safety . Pray that somehow the rest of the world will be able to see what i know already, Pray that someday, my mockingbird will be truly free again, and that the time he has lost will be given back to him in abundance !

As for Burris. God will deal with him in a way that's perfectly fitting in his own good time , of that I have no doubt !

Thank you for bearing with me . I promise the next one will be funnier :-) or at least less serious .