Animal House

These are not easy times. 

Here's a fun game.  See if you can match up the correct noun with the adjectives that most accurately describes it:

1. The U.S. government                          a) lost and confused
2. The Catholic church                            b) leaderless and confused
3. Cleveland, Ohio                                  c) depressed and confused
4. My brain                                              d) just really, really confused
5. My house                                             e) overrun by knuckleheads

It's Monday, and I'm not in the mood to deal with a lot of confusion...so, let's focus our attention on number 5 ... my house ... which is, in fact, overrun by knuckleheads.  I include myself in that group, because ever since Mom died in January, I have come to realize that I've gone completely out of my mind and now I'm really, really confused.  I wake up confused.  I go to bed confused. I'm really thrilled when I get to go to work because it's the one thing in my life that seems to make sense.*
But then I get to come home to a house that used to have my Mom in it and now it doesn't, and the confusion starts all over again. 

And somewhere  ... in the middle of all this confusion ... two cougars moved into my house. 

It began shortly after my Mom passed.  My nephew decided to move to another house, and asked me to temporarily take care of his two kittens.  They were little gray tabbies, very sweet-natured, and I was assured they wouldn't be much trouble.  Billy told me their names - which I promptly forgot ten minutes after he left - so I decided to name them Sheldon and Leonard (given that the networks re-run episodes of "The Big Bang Theory" almost constantly, I thought it would be helpful if the boys heard their names every five minutes.) 

S and L have been living with me for several weeks now, and I don't know when they're leaving.  Frankly, I will be sorry when they do leave, because they're wonderful boys and I love them dearly (although my cat, Miss Kitty, wishes they would run outside and get hit by cars).  But, you know what happens with kittens?  They grow into cats ... and, in this case, these two are BIG cats.  Huge.  Mountain lions. When these brothers chase each other up and down the stairs, it sounds like the buffalo have returned to the Great Plains.  Even now, as I type this blog entry, I can hear them knocking each other senseless upstairs and it sounds like we're having a thunderstorm. As long as I don't hear glass breaking, I figure everybody's okay and hopefully today my house insurance premiums won't go up. 

You have to understand ... I grew up as a DOG person.  My folks always had dogs, I loved dogs, I still love dogs.  I have never EVER chosen to have a cat.  Years ago, when I lived in Chicago, I thought it would be nice to volunteer at my local animal shelter, and I wasn't there more than 48 hours before some nice lady with a very sad face asked me to "foster" an abandoned calico cat and her kittens.  I didn't know what I was doing.  I bought a litter box, some litter, some food, crossed my fingers and hoped for the best.  I never gave any of them real names because I didn't want to get too attached to some cats I knew I wouldn't keep. So, I sort of got into the habit of calling the momma cat "Miss Kitty" and each of her three babies, "Stop That You Idiot." The kittens were all eventually put up for adoption, and were - happily - adopted the same day, but the momma cat had litter box issues...mainly, she occasionally forgot to poop in it, and I'd find her tootsie rolls outside the box. When I mentioned her toilet lapses to the Person In Charge at the Shelter, I was told she would not be put up for adoption and would likely be put down.  This was not about to happen in Brenda's Universe, so Miss Kitty (it was too late to give her a better name) came to live with me permanently.  That was 16 years ago.

She is, of course, the darling of my life.  She's sweet and petite (two qualities I highly admire, being neither) and she's turned out to be an excellent companion.  Never weighing more than six pounds, she's often invisible and never a disruption.  She's very affectionate and loves kisses.

"Miss Kitty"  aka:  Cat.  Very Cute.

Once "the boys" moved in, however, Miss Kitty Congeniality turned into The Saber-Toothed Vampire Cat From Hell.  Not only am I now living with three cats, it also sounds like I'm living with a psychotic python, because whenever "the boys" invade her territory,** her incessant hissing starts.  The boys don't hiss.  They're huge, they're happy, and they believe that everyone in the world must love them unconditionally because they're just so darned cute and all.  They do not understand that Miss Kitty does not want to play... today or any other day.  They do not understand she is old and f***ed up. And they do not understand that when she hisses at them from the couch, it means they should leave her alone and drop dead.  These knuckleheads are also not extremely bright.  Leonard has absolutely no grace, and can't figure out how to jump up on furniture without promptly skidding off the other end... and I've seen him eat at least three things off my carpet, none of which I've been able to identify and none of which, so far, has sent us to the emergency room. Sheldon, on the other hand, has a passion for water.  His favorite recreational activity is to shove his heavy ceramic water bowl across the bedroom floor until all the water splashes out.  I have patiently tried to explain to him that he's not going to have anything to drink if he keep it up, but he has a tiny kitty brain that has the attention span of dirt.  I know I'm not getting through ... but, being the biggest knucklehead living here, I keep trying. 

"The Boys"  aka: "Pumas."

(Note:  See the rocking chair?  You should never ever have one of these if you have cats.)

And they never - EVER - stop pooping.  I clean litter boxes constantly.  At the rate these boys are eating, they will soon be the size of Great Danes. 

So, here we are.  It's Monday and I have to go to work.  My brain is insane, my house is insane, our government is insane, my future seems hopeless and my church is Popeless.  The animals have completely taken over.  I am looking out my bedroom window and see a herd of deer stealing birdseed out of my bird feeder.   There is a flock of sparrows sitting on the bush outside my window screaming at me about all this.  I am very, very confused about it all.

But ... I think ... maybe, just maybe ... it's okay, because I think this means Somebody Up There is still in charge.  And whoever He is, He's making sure that although I might be very confused, I'm never truly alone. 


*And then I remember that I work for the U.S. government. 

**Uh, that would be the ENTIRE house.  All of it.  Every last inch, it's hers, all hers, get out.

***These don't indicate a footnote.  These take the place of actual letters so I'm not guilty of writing a bad word. 

My Sequestration Requestration

I have a requestration:  that the word "sequestration" be banned from everyday life... starting, of course, immediately after I finish writing today's rant. 

Now, I realize that "requestration" isn't a real word.  I just made it up.  But as I obviously live in a world where reality has no meaning, it's a word that works for me.  Anybody out there know what "sequestration" -- as it applies to all this doomsday stuff you're hearing on your TVs -- really means?

Here's the definition from www.m-w.com :

Definition of SEQUESTRATION

1

: the act of sequestering : the state of being sequestered <a jury in sequestration> *

2

a : a legal writ authorizing a sheriff or commissioner to take into custody the property of a defendant who is in contempt until the orders of a court are complied with

b : a deposit whereby a neutral depositary agrees to hold property in litigation and to restore it to the party to whom it is adjudged to belong 

Examples of SEQUESTRATION

1. the sequestration of a jury
2. During their sequestration, jurors were not allowed to speak to reporters.

First Known Use of SEQUESTRATION

15th century**

 

Okay...it would seem none of this has anything whatsoever to do with all the penis-waving*** and chest-pounding that's apparently eating up every elected official's valuable time in Washington, correct?  So, out of frustration, I clicked on the link for the Kid's Dictionary, and here's what it said:

 

se·ques·tra·tion
Pronunciation: sk-ws-tr-shn, sek-
Function: noun
: the act of sequestering : the state of being sequestered****

 

Consequently, the bottom line here is that "sequestration" was the first college word a flunky found in a dictionary, who then said, "Hey, Mr. President, let's use this one, none of these voters will know what it means anyway."

 

I always enjoy it when our federal government redefines our reality...and, as this happens all the time, my consciousness is the happiest place on earth.  Too bad for you, Disney World.

 

But if The Powers That We Elected are going to do that, why not go all the way?

 

They could have called it flooperization, or frustrationquation or The End of The World.*****  My philosophy is, pretty much, if you're going to risk looking ridiculous, go all out and KNOW you're going to look ridiculous.  Risking anything suggests uncertainty and fear, but if you go for the Big Loss, you'll be much more comfortable and will probably live a lot longer. 

 

Okay, so no ... the word doesn't begin to describe what's happening in Washington.  Of course, to choose a word that aptly describes a situation, one must be able to comprehend what the situation IS ... right?  So, what exactly is going on, you ask?  What IS happening in Washington (I mean, other than Congress and The President going on vacation while The World is Ending?).  Let's see a show of hands ... anybody out there know? I sure don't.  But I do have a few theories:

 

1) The woods are on fire, and two firemen aren't putting it out because they can't stop arguing over which hose to use.

 

2) A plane is crashing into the side of the mountain because the pilot's hands are around the co-pilot's throat and not on the controls.

 

3)  A lot of millionaires (aka: "elected officials") are only pretending to work, because we the American People had an election to decide who would be the most useless in a crisis, and these are the idiots who won.

 

4) A lot of millionaires are confused over which Lobbyist of the Month is holding which puppet string.  (There's just SO many to keep track of, you know?)

 

5) A series of severe, mindless budget cuts will automatically trigger at the end of the week because nobody ever got around to putting out an actual budget (even though I think ... I THINK ... that's part of the "Elected Official" Job Description).

 

6) Each side is secretly building a Death Star to destroy the other side.******

 

So, maybe I'm being a tad unrealistic.  Maybe "sequestration" works as a word to describe this mess because no real word with any real meaning can describe the meaningless insanity that is torching the trees and flying our planes into mountains. 

 

For the sake of this argument, I'm not a Republican or a Democrat.  I'm not anything.  I think everybody's the problem because I also think everybody's the solution.  I personally believe that the reason nobody can come up with a reasonable solution to our budget crisis is because all that's on the table are tax hikes and spending cuts, and NEITHER WILL ENTIRELY SOLVE THE PROBLEM.  Even a combination of both won't solve the problem.  Our real problem is we aren't collecting the taxes that are already owed us. The Tax Gap******* in this country is the real problem.  We don't need MORE taxes.  We need to collect the TAXES THAT ARE OWED US.  Of course, with the Dept. of the Treasury facing budget cuts like everybody else, fat chance we're going to collect more of THAT money.  This country is full of liars and cheats when it comes filling out tax returns, and guess what?  Even if there were no liars or cheats, we have a growing population vs. a shrinking number of jobs that produce ... uh ... income .... that would then generate the ... uh ... income TAX.  (And because we like to give people child credits as a reward for having more children, our population isn't going down anytime soon). 

 

So, the "income tax" has become a joke, and needs to be replaced.  Some intelligent people have suggested a flat tax for everybody ... but I don't believe that would fix the problem either, because it's still based on income nobody seems to have anymore, and, well, there still would be cheats and liars filling out tax returns. 

 

The only obvious solution is a federal SALES tax, which would replace the income tax.  Maybe everybody doesn't have income they're willing to declare that the government can tax, but EVERYBODY buys stuff.  I'd like to know that my brother ... poor as he is, collecting Social Security, would still have to cough up his fair share by paying tax on all that booze and all those ciggies he's buying over at the food mart.  And I'd like to know the drug dealers are paying their fair share when they purchase all those cars, boats and vacations their lucrative, formerly tax-free gains have enabled them to buy. 

 

This is common sense ... and therefore has no place in Washington, I do realize. 

 

So, forget that.  Instead, let's all sit on our hands and watch the Big, Meaningless Washington Reality Show play out on TV.  As a federal worker, I don't even care anymore if sequestration happens.  Let whatever's gonna happen, happen, so we can move on with our lives.  Frankly, I'll bet this is going to be a replay of the whole Y2K doomsday scenario where everybody expected the world's computers to crash on Jan. 1, 2000, and then NOTHING happened.   

 

 

*Yeah, okay, that cleared it all up nicely.  Thank you for playing.

** And the last known use of the word "SEQUESTRATION" will be, God willing, the 21st century.  Isn't it dead YET? At the very least it's in a coma, and somebody somewhere must have the authority to pull this plug.

***Yes, I do realize there are women working in DC ... but I also believe that they are issued penises when they take the oath of office so they won't feel left out.

****And we wonder why our kids are so screwed up.

*****The Media would have you believe it's the End of the World, so it must be true.

******Everybody thinks they're Luke Skywalker ... but the trouble is everybody is really Darth Vader, and that's before he turned back into Anakin the Good Guy. 

*******The "tax gap" is basically the ridiculously huge chasm between what people already owe in taxes and what they've actually paid. Here's a newsflash ... you might be paying your taxes, but your neighbor probably isn't. Your neighbor is probably earning money under the table and not declaring it as income.  Your neighbor is probably on a payment plan during which he will continue to claim 8 exemptions on his W-4 and then cry to the government about how he can't afford to pay what he owes.  Your neighbor might even be a drug dealer who has never paid a dime for the privilege of living in the greatest country on earth ... and his sister is probably collecting thousands in Earned Income Credits and Child Tax credits as our government's reward for working a little and breeding too much. 

Groundhogs and Puppies

Happy Big Ugly Rodent Day!

As I have always been a fan of the irrational and ridiculous, Groundhog's Day has always been one of my favorite pointless holidays.  Asking a primitive-brained mammal to forecast weather is like asking my brother (another primitive-brained mammal) to analyze my stock portfolio.*  Of course, if I were going to offer a full comparison, I'd invite Fox News over to the house with TV cameras to tape the excitement... during which, of course, my neighbors would be dancing around on my front lawn and passing out in the snow.

(Given that 90% of my neighbors are over the age of 75, there could be 9-1-1 calls and upsetting lawsuits to follow.)

Also, asking Punxsutawney Phil or Buckeye Chuck or Sockittome Sam** to assure me Spring is only a couple weeks away is laughable.  With the exception of last year (the never-to-be-forgotten "Year Without Winter"), spring NEVER comes early to Northeast Ohio.  When that over-bloated groundhog (beaver, squirrel, sea otter - would we really notice the difference?) predicts "six more weeks of winter," most Clevelanders will pray he honestly means it.  "Really? Only six weeks? It'll all be over in March?  Do we dare to dream the dream?"

Speaking of delusional dreaming ...

The Super Bowl is tomorrow.  For folks in Baltimore and San Francisco... and New Orleans ... Green Bay ... Indianapolis ... Pittsburgh ...  Boston ... Denver ... and at least 10 other cities ... it's the pinnacle of reality television.  For sports fans in Cleveland, it's like watching science fiction.  I would expect to see Darth Vader herding Ewoks down Ronald Drive before ever watching the Browns scoring touchdowns in February. 

My sister, Barbara, lives in San Francisco, and hasn't stopped bitching about her team since Christmas. Every time they'd win a game, she'd call me up and begin every conversation with, "Well, the fucking 49ers won again."  She obviously hates football.  And when she says stuff like this, I tell her I'd hate her if I didn't love her so much.  I try to explain to her that saying this to me would be like me telling a starving, homeless guy how much I hate lobster.*** But, I do get her point ... San Francisco is glutted with crazy people**** on a good day, so a major sporting event in their tiny little town resembles the day the power failed in Jurassic Park and all the dinosaurs got out.  For somebody just trying to go to work or shop at the grocery, it's a commuter's worst nightmare.  So, I kinda get why she's annoyed.   But here in Cleveland, we'd weep with joy over the prospect of being thusly inconvenienced because, dammit, we never win ANYTHING.  All of our sports teams universally suck.  If a nationwide competition would be held to see which town's sport franchises suck most consistently, that's one championship we'd have a shot at actually winning.  Cleveland's really a wonderful little city with a lot going for it, but decades of losing have polluted Lake Erie and the Cuyahoga River with rolling fumes of inadequacy and inferiority.  Seriously ... if you stand next to either one and close your eyes, you can hear the voices floating in off the water ... particularly Stillwell Angel's from "A League of Their Own" chanting, "You're gonna lose!  You're gonna lose!"

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1FUB8SrlQAE

Consequently, I won't be watching the Super Bowl. To me it's like being a chubby, pimple-faced high school girl being invited to watch the quarterback nail the head cheerleader (right after he spits on me and makes canine references).  Fun?  Not so much.  And I don't care about missing the commercials because ... well ... I won't.  If they're any good, they'll be on YouTube five seconds after they air.  And nobody misses pizza, wings and beer in Cleveland because, c'mon, you can't miss something that's always around.  What's special about any of that in this town?  You and I both know I just described a typical Friday night.  Or Saturday night.  Or Sunday night.  (But never during the week, because that's when we exist on donuts and french fries).  Just like San Francisco now has to deal with Green Police who lurk around at night checking everybody's trash bins for recycling violations, I predict Cleveland will someday have Grease Police who knock on our doors to make sure we're all eating something green.

So ... what will I be watching? Why, Animal Planet's "Puppy Bowl", of course!  Every year I watch stupid young animals romping around on a green surface playing tug of war with a toy while smacking each other in the butt... and then I change the channel to watch the puppies instead.  I'm especially a big fan of the annual "Kitty Halftime Show."  It's good, wholesome entertainment without all the bad lip-synching, wardrobe malfunctions and goofy explosions that make the usual halftime shows so worth missing.

You say I'm wasting my time?  Watching a bunch of puppies peeing in the red zone? (While some lucky guy in a referee uniform throws a yellow flag, holds up a little dog and announces there's been a personal foul on the field?  Ha ha ha ... I chortle every time!) 

Yeah, maybe it's a huge waste.

But c'mon ... my TV is on this morning, and I just saw a bunch of old guys in top hats holding up an obese marmot and telling us all spring is coming early this year.  If I'm going to waste my time, at least let it be on something that is cute, warm, fuzzy and loveable in a universe that is almost never any of those things.  




*"(Grunt) ... Hey ... this is your Brother Bill ... You need to buy more beer."


**I made that one up.  I think.  Practically every state has their own, so I can't possibly keep track of them all.  I don't think they have groundhogs in Hawaii ... maybe somebody in a grass skirt just holds up a pineapple?  I'll bet a pineapple would be a lot smarter than a groundhog.  Or my brother.


***Actually, I don't hate lobster. I love lobster. In fact, one of the many reasons I'm single is because I never met a man I loved more than a dead lobster, or who treated me better than a dead lobster.


**** Go ahead ... visit this link and tell me all their silly green technology hasn't rotted their brains:
http://blogs.sfweekly.com/thesnitch/2013/01/5_reasons_your_should_move_to.php

Merry Stressmas!

I guess the Mayans* were wrong...the world didn't end on Dec. 21st.**

Now normally I gotta tell you ... I never buy into this end-of-world stuff.  I tend to believe the end of me is going to come long, long before the end of the world.  Unless a surprise meteor appears out of nowhere and obliterates Earth, I'm thinking this planet will continue to exist in spite of mankind's ceaseless efforts to crap it up.  Earth...well, she's a pretty smart cookie, and I'm betting she will probably hang around long enough to see us all turn to dust.  Heck, the other day I was at work re-arranging file cabinets, and at one point I was down on my hands and knees, moving one set of files from one drawer to another.  One of my co-workers walked in and, sounding very worried, asked if I was okay.  I was in the process of climbing to my feet ... which, if you've ever seen Animal Planet, kinda resembles the way a baby elephant gets up after it's awakened from a tranquilizer dart, but (trust me) is not nearly as cute.

So no, the world didn't end on the 21st, and probably isn't calling it quits for a good while. However, I would just like to point out that the emails I've been getting all week (from at least a million different retailers) suggested that the end was, in fact, near.

I think it had to do with messages like these:

"TIME IS RUNNING OUT!"
"RUSH!"
"LAST DAY!"
"LAST CHANCE!"
"IT'S NOT TOO LATE!"
"HURRY UP!"
"FINAL HOURS! GUARANTEED!"
"WHAT ARE YOU WAITING FOR, YOU BIG LOSER?"***
"WE'RE NOT KIDDING!" ****

I know I'm especially vulnerable to these not-so-subliminal messages because the "It's Christmas Eve and My Shopping Isn't Done" nightmare is one of my worst stress dreams.  Most of us seem to have recurring dreams our brains regurgitate when we're stressed.  I have three:  1) I'm in an airport terminal trying to find my gate where my plane is leaving in five minutes and, uh oh, I have to go to the bathroom, 2) I have to take a final exam in Intermediate Spanish in half an hour and I haven't been to class all year and don't even have the faintest clue where the classroom is, and 3) it's Christmas Eve and I haven't done any shopping.  At all. 

It's strange that I would have all this Christmas Eve anxiety preying on my brain when I have always been one of those annoyingly early people.  My loved ones are always giving me grief because my Christmas cards are usually among the first to go out. I typically start my Christmas shopping on Dec. 26th of the previous year, and am in full panic mode by the time the catalogs start flooding my mailbox every October. Nevertheless, I see, "YOU'RE LAZY, YOU'RE LATE AND YOU'RE DOOMED" screaming at me from my inbox and know my blood pressure's on the rise.

Because the reality ... even for poor slobs like me who try to get everything done early ... is that we're never really done.  Some things can't be handled until the last minute, and knowing that drives me insane.  So, during this not-so-joyous "Stressmas" season, here a few of my favorite things:

1) The stray Christmas card from the person I didn't send one to.  This shouldn't be a big deal, I know, but it is, because of course I'm imagining this person counting up his or her cards and thinking, 'Hey!  What about Brenda?  Why didn't that uncaring, insensitive person send me a card?  Does she not want to be my friend? Is she poor and can't afford stamps? What's wrong with her? What's wrong with me?" You see, in my brain, I've just contributed to someone else's Stressmas, which then contributes to mine because stress is the real gift that keeps on giving. There's only one of two things I can do. I can dig out an unused card, address it, stamp it and mail it on the 24th, or I can go buy a New Year's card and pretend like I planned to do that all along. Either way, I know I'm not fooling anybody.

2) The inevitable (and much hated, at least by me) Christmas electronic greeting card.  I tell friends I never open them because they might have a virus, but that's not the real reason. I don't open them because they irritate me.  When I see one of these in my mailbox from someone who didn't send me a real card, I think, "Why didn't this uncaring, insensitive person send me a REAL card?  Does she not want to be my friend?  Is she poor and can't afford stamps?"  It's this way ... if Hallmark means someone cares enough to send the very best, an e-card means somebody didn't want to bother, so she sent the very worst.******  The next time somebody sends me an e-card with a lovely picture of a snowman and some trees, I'm going to send that person a picture of a Coach bag and write, "Here's your present, Merry Christmas, because you know a photo is just like having the real thing."

3) Cleaning the house  I hate it, and I'm too cheap to hire a maid. So, during the holidays, I wait until the last minute because, let's face it, if I clean it too soon it will just get dirty again.... and I'll have to clean it again...dirty ... clean .... dirty .... clean ... it goes on and on and who has that kind of time?  Keeping rooms in a perpetual state of spotlessness requires that one cleans as one goes along, and I just don't feel that's a very efficient way to live.  Procrastinating until the last possible minute and then frantically scrubbing my floors at midnight tonight ensures that the job will be done correctly. Brenda a-scrubbing with sweat a-dripping and tears a-streaming adds a special sheen to a clean kitchen floor that you just can't buy in a box in a store.*******

4) Christmas lights.  Okay ... here's the deal.  I'm a huge Snoopy fan, and this year I decided I wanted to put a lit Charlie Brown display in front of my house.  It's small, but cute ... and the last time there were Christmas lights in front of our house, my Dad was alive and it was 1978.  So my nephew helped me put the display together, and proudly we stuck it in front of our picture window... only to realize that my Dad ... for some bizarre reason he took to his grave ... had capped off the electrical outlet that used to be by the front door.  There was no electrical source. 

Yes, I'm sure I looked like an idiot.  Fortunately I don't think my nephew did, because he was pretending he wasn't with me and had no clue why he was even standing there.

So, the choices were this ... we could run extension cords around the side of the house, under the gate, and into the patio where there was another outlet (I think it's still there ... but I really should check, maybe Dad killed that one too)... or, I could call Mr. Electric******** and have them put one in for $300.  So, three hundred bucks later, there stands Charlie Brown, Linus, Lucy and the whole Peanuts gang, singing around the Christmas tree.  As long as there's no wind, it looks pretty good.  But the day before yesterday, we had wind ... and the whole Peanuts gang nearly took flight over Ronald Drive. I was able to re-anchor it before Snoopy became airborne, but the display still flaps in a strong breeze.  Christmas would be perfect if it weren't for that "winter" element that always mucks up the outdoor decorating. 

And, finally, there's one more stressful thing ... a job I need to do in exactly one hour from now...

5) Going to Costco for the food.  Yes, I could go to Giant Eagle, but it's an unwritten rule that if you're having a party, you go to Sam's Club or BJ's or Costco.  Warehouse clubs should all have the same motto:  "Obscene excess for a lot, lot less."  I know that in Costco I can buy enough shrimp to feed 50 people, so that might be enough to feed the seven coming over on Monday.  I also know that in Costco I can buy a pie or a cheesecake that's the size of a wagon wheel for, I don't know, fifty cents. So this is where I have to go today, and I know that if I don't get there when it opens at 10 a.m., I will probably die of old age standing in line while everybody is coughing on me.  Unfortunately, I'm sure every other food shopper has the same brilliant idea, but I can enjoy my getting-in-getting-done-getting-out fantasy right up until the time I pull into the parking lot and the swearing starts.

So ... that's my Stressmas.

I know that everybody's Stressmas is unique.  Some of you have the flu.  Some of you are dealing with financial strain. Some of you have loved ones in the hospital or - worse - are saying goodbye to your loved ones.  The irritants I've mentioned are nothing next to some of the challenges you're facing.  But I hope mine made you laugh a little.  You know ... as a Christian ... I think there's nothing more important at this time of year than finding a way to keep Christmas holy.  And the way I see it,  the only way to do that is to take the "stress" out and put "Christ" back in.  I like to think a little laughter can really help.

So, I say no "Merry Stressmas."
And yes to "Merry Christmas."
God bless you and your loved ones this Christmas and throughout the coming year. 
 
And, while I'm at it, I really want to thank you for your readership.  It has been one of my greatest blessings in 2012.  Stay tuned for 2013!



*Well, one good thing came out of all this silliness ... at least now a lot more people know who or what the "Mayans" were.  Or maybe not.

**Actually, the Mayans didn't predict Dec. 21st would be the end of the world (their calendar just ran out).  A bunch of ignorant people***** thought that the calendar running out meant the world would end.  Which reminds me ... I'd better get to the Office Max for a calendar refill before my world grinds to a halt Dec. 31st.

***Okay, I made that one up.  But if I owned a store, that's what mine would say.

****I didn't make this one up.  It was actually in a Walmart ad.

*****A bunch of ignorant people were WRONG?  Oh my, what a shocker.

******Of course I'm saying "she" because - with a few exceptions - guys suck at sending cards of any kind.

******* I should never work on my blog after watching that Grinch cartoon.

******** No, I didn't make it up, this is the name of a real company, and they're very good, by the way.

(Cata) Log-Jammed

Okay, so I watch the news.  And it's my understanding that the U.S. Post Office is teetering on the edge of some kind of cliff.  I don't think it's a rocky cliff or a fiscal cliff* or a heath cliff or any other type of cliff ... including that weird kid named Cliff** who used to sit at my lunch table at Willowick Junior High -- he won a classroom Ho-Ho eating contest and ended up vomiting in the nurse's office.  No, I'm talking about the standard metaphorical cliff, the kind used to signify when something or someone is ready to crash and burn in a huge fireball of failure. 

Now, I'd hate to see this happen for several reasons...first, it's impractical to not have a Post Office.  While UPS and FedEx are more than happy to ship my packages, where am I going to take my greeting cards?*** Second, I don't like the idea of more people being out of work.  Third, life will become dull and meaningless for far too many neighborhood dogs.  Fourth, all the postal employees I know are really nice, except for that weird guy behind the counter in Middleburg Heights who's mean to me and makes me feel like a moron. Fifth - and probably most important - I like putting stamps on things.  When I was a little girl, I loved stickers only slightly less than I loved Colorforms, and I would see my Mom filling up her little book with green stamps and I'd think, oh goody, I'll get to play with stickers until I die.  Green stamps didn't even make it until the dawn of the Internet (which, let's face it, is to blame for every other fun thing we've lost in the last 20 years).

Not to say I don't get really frustrated with the Post Office.  The other day, at work, the postman handed me a pile of mail that included a plastic bag.  Inside this baglet was one-third of an envelope I had mailed out a week earlier ... the part of the envelope that contained the send-to address was entirely missing, so all that remained was the return address (the envelope looked like it had been chewed in half and spat out by the Postmaster General's mastiff, Fluffdog****). Not wanting me to be confused about why my mail wasn't delivered, the Post Office kindly rubber- stamped "insufficient address" underneath my return address before putting the remains into a protective ziplock bag (you know, so nothing bad would happen to it on its way back to me).

Who knows where the actual letter ended up ... I like to think it stayed with the part of the envelope that had the send-to address, thereby increasing the chance they both made it to their final destination. I imagine the two of them telling reporters, "We don't know what happened to Return Address ... after the giant dog attacked us and destroyed our ship, he went down a different chute and we never saw him again, poor little guy."

So, no.  The Post Office definitely has its problems.  It occasionally shreds our mail and is, by all news reports, going broke ... even though they keep raising the price of stamps to some number none of us can remember.  Really ... it intensely bothers me when they hold a press conference to announce the price of stamps is going up to some weird amount like 43 cents or 44 cents or 47 cents or some other number that isn't divisible by 5 or, preferably, 10.  If a book of stamps has 20 stamps and stamps are 44 cents each (I'm just guessing that's what they are; I really don't know and I'm too lazy to look it up), how much money do I hand the mean guy behind the counter? Yeah, I can figure out the answer ... or wait for him to bark it at me ... but if the postal gods would simply make the stamps 50 cents each, I'd know I'd need 10 dollars for a book, life would be simple, and the Post Office wouldn't be crying so much about how broke they are all the time. 

Which reminds me of what I wanted to talk about when I started this entry ... there's something I don't understand.  If the Post Office is delivering fewer pieces of mail and is bringing in less revenue ... and we all have this thing called the Internet that is apparently replacing everything, including face-to-face relationships with other people ... why am I getting more catalogs? 

Now, I'm not complaining about the catalogs.  I love them.  They're Golden Books for grown-ups.  I don't have to read the actual words in them and, consequently, stress out my brain; I just look at all the pretty pictures.  Yes, I know I get gorgeous, high-definition ads on my iPad from mostly the same vendors, but it's not the same as having the glossy remains of a dead tree gathering dust on my coffee table, loaded with stuff I might be able to buy if I hit Powerball. Because I have too much attention deficit disorder to sit and watch TV without doing something with my hands, the catalogs keep them constantly occupied.*****  When "Big Bang Theory" has a commercial, I can pick up the latest installment from Hammacher Schlemmer or Cheryl's Cookies and fantasize about new toys and frosted buttercreams. So no, I do love catalogs.  But this time of year they multiply at an alarming rate...I fear that, by Dec. 15th, the catalog tower I have piling up next to my sofa will topple over and kill my cat.  I really don't want Miss Kitty's final, muffled meows to creep out from beneath the Fingerhut Big Book. (But I sure like that one; it has a very shiny, sparkly cover and makes me feel all Christmasy inside. Having a dying cat would kinda ruin that for me.) 

The obvious answer, of course, is to suck up some personal responsibility and throw them out. But ... I don't wanna throw them out. I have a horrible time doing this, and it doesn't make sense.  I spend the rest of my waking hours on a futile quest to continuously de-clutter my house.  I give bags and bags of clothes to Purple Heart and Easter Seals and I am forever throwing out crap that has been lurking in closets that never seem to get emptier.  There is even more stuff in the basement that needs to go away, but I'm afraid of the basement, so my master plan is to just leave it all there until I die and then I won't have to worry about it.  (That was my Dad's plan, and it worked for him, so who am I to alter tradition?)  I want a clean, orderly life ,.. but since I can't have that, I try to settle for a clean, orderly house.  The house just laughs at me, but I still try.

I think, though, the catalogs are different because they have become as much a part of my Christmas experience as the greeting cards and gift-wrapping.  When the inevitable flood begins right after Labor Day, I relish each new book, knowing some perfect gift is just waiting to jump out at me and announce itself.  Gift-giving is a competitive sport for me, but not one where I compete against other people. I compete against myself; if I dazzled friends and family last year, THIS year has to be better. To that end, I'm always open to whatever new inventions my catalogs tell me to buy. The Internet really sucks at this; you mostly have to know what you're looking for, and then you can find anything. But the catalogs aren't so passive; they tell me what I want before I even know I wanted it, and I rather enjoy that.  I have to control everything else in my life, so it's refreshing when somebody else takes over, even if it is my good friends Harriet Carter or Carol Wright.  Thanks to them, I completed all my Christmas shopping without stepping foot into a mall this year.  By the time Cyber Monday rolled around, I knew exactly what I wanted and who I wanted it for.  I didn't have to burn out my retinas searching through online catalogs; I merely found what I wanted in the mailed books, marked the pages accordingly and ordered my selections off the websites.  Thanks to free shipping, I've been able to take my laziness to an entirely new level of sloth.

But, for me, when I throw out the catalogs, it means that Christmas is somehow already winding down, and even though my shopping's finished, I'm not ready to face that.  I want the first week of December to last forever; I love Christmas when it's still fresh and new and the stores haven't yet slashed their cards and decorations to 50 percent off.  I love gift-wrap, and I love to see neat, pretty rows of wrapping paper lining the aisles before they've been picked over. I don't want Christmas to get tired, or old, or over; if I lived alone, I'd probably keep my tree up until February. 

But ... I really love my cat.  
So...I guess it's time I shovel out the catalogs. 

But I'll take a deep breath, tell myself it's okay, and remind myself that they'll all come back next year ... that is, if the Post Office does.



*Hey, all you Fox-watching, CNN-slumming news addicts out there ... this is our new drinking game... raise your glasses whenever you read or hear these words and you'll stop caring that one even exists, which it really doesn't anyway but that's an entirely different post in somebody else's blog.

**If, by some bizarre occurrence, Cliff is out there reading this blog ... well, I'm sure you know who you are, Clifford, and I'm sure sorry you do.

***And yes, I'm talking about a physical card somebody cared enough to buy at a store, stick in an envelope, stamp and mail.  E-cards are not cards, they're somebody's way of saying, "I'm too lazy to turn off the computer and get up from this chair," and that's something I'm always saying to myself so I certainly don't need to hear it from you.

****Really, that's his name ... what, you think I make this stuff up?

*****Usually I just play with my iPad, but I can't hold that thing forever - it gets heavy, so yeah, I still need the catalogs.  I really think I need to buy that nifty floor stand that would hold the iPad for me ... which is, of course, in the Hammacher Schlemmer catalog.

Something To Chew On

I find it ironic that the most valuable asset I have is my mouth.

Before I drove Mom to the dentist's office yesterday, I paused to consider how much money I had, over the years, invested in my own dental work. On one side alone I had dropped more than ten grand on fillings, root canals, crowns, a bridge, and -- when that bridge finally broke -- a longer bridge (too bad I couldn't use stimulus money for all this roadwork). Over on the other side, I was looking at three fillings (one of them gold) and an overlay that probably amounted to another couple of thousand ... and this was all in my lower jaw. I'm not even counting the medical bills spawned by the extraction of two wisdom teeth and a painful "dry socket" episode following one of the surgeries.

This wouldn't be so terrible if there were a finish line I could cross, knowing I was finally done with all this maintenance. But, as I'm sure you know, a set of teeth in an adult over 35 becomes a ticking time bomb. Just like old car parts, teeth have a tendency to decay, rust, crack, fall off and suck the money right out of your past, present and future.

Furthermore, my upper jaw -- mostly untouched -- taunts my dentist with delightful possibilities every time I have my X-rays retaken. 

"See these?," he says, trying not to smile, as he points to two railroad spikes lying sideways in my jaw, embedded up above my two baby canines. "The only way these will ever come in is if I pull the baby teeth and put braces on the rest ... even then, there's only a fifty-fifty shot at success because YOU'RE SO OLD to be having this done. The only other thing you can do is have me pull the baby teeth, extract the impacted teeth and put in implants, but then you'll still need braces to help the other teeth reposition themselves properly."

These are the words he is saying, but what I'm hearing in my head is a series of loud "cha-chings" followed by unearthly screams coming from my credit cards. I hear the word "braces" and wonder if so little added beauty in my middle age is worth mortgaging the house.  I glare at these X-rays, resenting the two baby teeth that have caused all this chaos. How can it be that I have adult teeth blowing gaskets all over the place... yet these two white nubbins, hold-overs from babyhood, stubbornly sit there, ruining countless photographs my friends and family have taken of me over the years? Yet... strangely ...I can't help admiring their sheer willingness to survive. They're like two ugly little pimple-faced, nose-picking friends who refuse to stop hanging out with me. I'm embarrassed to be seen with them, yet can't cast them off.  With all their faults, at least they're loyal and they apparently enjoy my company.  

So, I politely smile my crooked smile at Dr. Wantsanewbmw and try to soothe his disappointment by offering to replace yet another sad little filling in the back of my mouth. He sighs, takes the crumbs I'm throwing him and revs up the drill. 

Of course, much of my dental angst could have been avoided if my parents had believed that teeth were important enough to bother with. Too busy paying for my brother's countless medical bills (Bill routinely sprained, broke or shattered some body part at least once every six months), my folks considered trips to the dentist a luxury. I can remember exactly ONE visit to the dentist up until the time I was 18, and that likely involved Dad finally dragging me there because he couldn't stand my wimpy sobbing any longer (plus, I'm sure my swollen jaw wasn't a pleasure to look at either). I brushed my teeth, but had no clue what dental floss was until I was in my twenties. But, let me assure you, this didn't mean I had bad parents. Both of them grew up during the Depression, which meant they had learned to be frugal with money. Why, my Dad reasoned, would anyone invest hundreds of dollars into their teeth when they would all be pulled and replaced with dentures by the age of 40?

My sister Barbara vividly recalls a time when my mother - still in her thirties - was bent over a bowl of soup when one of her teeth fell out.  Barb sat there in fixated horror while Mom casually explained, "Well, that's just what happens when you get old." 

So, when Mom and Dad made it into their fourth decades of life, they both went to the dentist and had ALL their teeth pulled and replaced with dentures they then decided not to wear. But, given that Dad expected to die by the time he was 55 (he lived to 86), he figured toothlessness was only a temporary inconvenience.

Well, okay...maybe they weren't entirely toothless.  They both wore their uppers ... but whoever built their lower dentures must have accidentally mixed up their orders with Mr. Ed's. Their bottom dentures were HUGE and, frankly, frightened people. Dad, of course, thought this was great ... he'd put in his full set on national holidays and, using his tongue, would thrust them out past his lips while we were at the dinner table.

"Oh, yuck, Dad, STOP THAT." 

He'd just laugh at me.  What can I say ... there was a 13-year-old punk inside my Dad that thrived until the day he died.  He was definitely cut from that mold of old men who was forever trying to get me to pull his finger. His belches were almost musical and he thought public farts were hilarious.

Mom, on the other hand, was unaware that a defective product could be taken back and exchanged  for one not so defective. Her bottom dentures never fit her properly, so she simply stopped wearing them and, over time, forgot about them. Most people were unaware that she didn't wear them because she quickly learned to mask their absence with her lower lip. However, the omission of half her teeth became painfully evident in old age. The list of foods Mom could and couldn't successfully gum began to look something like this:

Okay to eat:

Applesauce
Oatmeal
Eggs
Vegetables, But Only If Really Mushy
Citrus Fruit, But Only If Packed In Syrup
Greasy Chicken*
Grapes
Bananas
Cake
Soft Candy
Middling Candy
Hard Candy**

Not Okay To Eat:

Most Protein Sources (Steak, Pork, Fish)
Vegetables That Still Had Vitamins Not Boiled Out Of Them
Fruits With Peels
Nuts
Grains
And Anything Else Even Remotely Healthy

When she was younger, Mom would instinctively avoid foods she couldn't be bothered chewing with only half her mouth, but as she got older she sort of forgot what worked and what didn't and would re-visit this list through trial-and-error.  I would sit across from her at lunch and try to eat my hamburger without looking at her, knowing she was wadding up napkins with half-chewed broccoli or a carrot that required more chew action than it could possibly be worth.

When I moved in with Mom, I started a crusade to get her bottom dentures replaced, knowing the quality of life for both of us would improve substantially. It took me a long time to convince her that a woman in her eighties was worth the investment; after all, my Dad had taught her to believe she wasn't worth it at 40. But yesterday, after a series of visits, Mom came home with a full set of teeth. She's still not used to talking or eating with them, but it's a joy to see her smile. 

Now ... if I could just persuade my idiot brother to have his few remaining (and thoroughly rotten) molars pulled and replaced with dentures, my happiness would be complete.  Bill used to brag he could open beer bottles with his teeth. Now in his fifties, he sits in windows and frightens children on Halloween. Sadly, Bill could have had all of his needed dental work paid for with public aid, but he obstinately refuses to go to the dentist because it cuts into valuable drinking time. 

So, this Thanksgiving, I still won't be looking at him much while I eat, but at least I can look at my mother. And... this Thanksgiving, when most of you are giving thanks for your health, family, friends, and that huge $5.99 pumpkin pie from Costco... I hope you'll stop and say an extra thank-you for your choppers.  Sink your teeth into the knowledge of how much richer your life has been because you can eat well, speak well, and light up a stranger's day just by beaming a great big glorious (and even imperfect) smile his way. 


*There is a direct correlation between the fat content in a morsel of food and the effort needed to successfully inhale it.

**Maybe Mom couldn't chew a string bean, but she could somehow gum down a piece of granite if it was covered in chocolate.

Election Rejection

With so many pundits voicing so many opinions about why Obama beat Romney in the election last week, I had every intention of keeping my mouth shut.  For one thing, I can't analyze demographics and numbers and lots of dry, meaningful data without getting bored halfway through and going out for ice cream. For another, I was pretty certain that nothing I could say would have much value. I'm really not much good at arguing politics; I mostly try to avoid it because once I'm in the middle of a discussion (usually with my sister), I tend to lose.  I think it's because our discussions usually go something like this:

Barbara:  Okay, here's why you need to hang onto your money: The world is going into the shitter because, according to Dr. Blahson from the University of Blah, that poser in the White House is advocating for blah blah blah while blahtity-blah percent of the current population is on food stamps, which our economy can't sustain. Furthermore, factity fact arguments suggest that fact number of people are blah blah fact fact and, of course, totally wrong.  So ... even though I don't like Romney, I'm still voting for him.

Me:  I don't like Romney because I think he's a big poo-poo head.  (This point in the discussion is when I usually start thinking about strawberry or mint chocolate chip, and whether I seriously need the nuts and whipped cream.)

Frankly, I think the analysts need to talk to more people like me if they want to know why Romney lost. Sure, what I just said sounds simplistic, shallow and just plain stupid. But when it comes to politics, I think most of those "s" words do apply to most of our ignorant, uninformed population. It's not because all of us are idiots ... it's because the topic of politics makes us all idiots. Why?  It's just plain boring. If I write the words, "coalition," "lobbyists," "sequestration" and "fiscal cliff," I'm betting at least half of you out there will start glazing over.  It's really not your fault; political science can be dull, dry and depressing.  So, desperate to not appear to be as stupid as we are, we turn to mass media and cling to whatever talking points people like Rush Limbaugh and Rachel Maddow hammer into our heads. What other course of action is there? Must we do actual research on the Internet?  I'm sorry, but I only have so much Internet time at my disposal, and "Words With Friends" eats up a large chunk of it.

But politically speaking, most of us don't have a clue what we're really talking about.  And we're the ones who were out there voting last Tuesday.  So, when some brilliant person like George Will wants to analyze election results, he needs to stop thinking that we all make predictable, semi-rational decisions based on hard facts. Human beings are, as a group, pretty irrational and messed up much of the time. My friends and I tend to make our decisions based on hormone levels, the Magic 8 Ball and whether the Planet Mercury's in retrograde.  I have no clue why members of my family make the decisions they do...the other day I watched my mother put strawberry jelly on a burrito. So, when someone like Karl Rove or Peggy Noonan suggests that Obama won because he appealed to more Hispanics, or won more young adults, or ran a better ground game, they're dead wrong.  Why?  Because those conclusions sorta make sense, and we, as a species, never do.

So, here's my not-so-brilliant analysis, based on all the shallowness, simplicity and stupidity I can muster: Romney lost because he didn't have the "X factor", and most of us couldn't stand the thought of watching him on TV for the next four years.  That's it.  And, let's face it, that Great Glowing Screen in the living room pretty much dictates everything we think and do. It tells us we're too fat, what to wear, where to stare and whether or not we have good hair.*  With Obama, we either liked him and welcomed his almost-constant presence in our faces or, if we couldn't stand the guy, we quickly learned to tune him out. But Romney wasn't really all that lovable, even to his own party. I would have considered voting for a charismatic, good-looking Republican who would interrupt my prime-time television viewing without my wanting to blow an artery, but it definitely was not Mitt. I was too aware of his money; too annoyed by his gleaming family (all of whom looked like they were birthed from a loaf of Wonder Bread); and, seriously, I didn't like his smug little mouth and his beady little eyes. I wouldn't have wanted to buy a car from him, much less entrust the future of the free world to a guy whose own cars get to ride in elevators.

And, before all you Romney-lovers get on my case, let me just say that Obama often annoys the stuffing out of me too, especially when he's campaigning. His voice gets all churchy and he delivers every line with the grandeur of MLK's "I have a dream" speech. And, frankly, I was disappointed with his first four years.  I was one of those people who expected him to magically fix everything wrong with the country; I was willfully oblivious to the reality that no president has that kind of magic. And this whole Benghazi/Petraeus mess has me more than a little wondering if some folks in his administration may not have been entirely honest with us. Worst of all, though, I sure wish modern science could do something about his Alfred E. Neuman ears. When he's on TV, I can't stop staring at them. The entire time he talks, I'm sitting on my couch thinking, "My, what big ears you have, Obama." They're very distracting. Maybe he could tape 'em against his head or something, I don't know.

So...now that everybody's mad at me, I'll continue with my original point.

People make friends with people they like; they hire people they like; they buy crap from people they like, and date and marry people they like. That's just how we're wired.  We bond with other human beings because of gut feelings and brain chemistry and then later invent reasons for feeling the way we do. Furthermore, the Great Glowing Screen That Rules Us All lets us participate in popularity contests such as "X Factor" and "American Idol," where we get to vote every week! Do we always choose the most talented contestants?  Nope. We vote for the ones we love. We vote for singers like Scotty McCreery because yeah, he's a good singer, but awww, isn't he just the sweetest boy, playing baseball and workin' in the grocery store after school? You can bet he loves his mother and goes to church. Even with those big ears, isn't he just so cute you wanna squeeze his widdle face? Much of America fell in love with him and that's why he won.  With American Idol winner Phillip Phillips, it was a little different.  The guy was talented, but he made people like him because he was able to project irresistible self-confidence even while his clothes looked like they just tumbled out of the dryer. Gruffy, scruffy people-you-can-share-a-beer-with are often perceived as charming and quite easy to love.

So, if the Republicans want to take back the White House in 2016, it's really easy: Pick out several guys or gals who exhibit more personality than an ear of corn, parade 'em in front of Simon Cowell and let him pick out the star. The winner will be someone who can turn on the ol' razzle dazzle, put on a good show and leave the audience begging for more.  Look at the last two popular Republican presidents ... one was an adorable old geezer who used to be an actor ... the other a make-believe rootin' tootin' cowboy who liked to invent words like "stratergize."** Yeah, maybe some of us made fun of George because he sounded kind of stupid when he said that, but secretly we loved it.  And in the voting booth, the love is all that matters.



*Speaking of not having good hair ... can somebody out there please beg Hillary to cut hers if she wants to run in 2016?  Flippy hair only looks good on 20-something, Marlo Thomas "that girls" from 1970.

**At first I loved going around saying "stratergize" just to mock George Bush, but the last laugh's on me because now the word pops out of my mouth when I least expect it and makes me look like an idiot... as if I needed any help. Thank you, Mr. President.