Things I Don't Understand!

No this isn't going to be a forever blog!  But there are some things that I just do not understand.  I don't know why that we as humans think that we have to understand something to except it at times.  We also think that if we are faced with an obstacle there must be something that can be done to help right?  So hear it goes--things that I don't understand!  #1.  Why they don't make dentures for horses.  I like horses.  I like to talk to them.  I like to pet the flat side of there face etc.  I just don't want to be on the back of one.  I was on a run-a-way horse when I was 10 years old and I made a promise to God that if he got me off that thing I wouldn't ever get on another one.  I have been tempted by others "to fall off the no horseback riding wagon" at times, but I haven't done it.  A veterinary friend of ours from church in Louisiana tried to get us to go horseback riding one Sunday afternoon.  I wasn't convinced of his argument that the horse was safe BEFORE he told me the horses name!  Pardon me, but when someone names their horse TROUBLE I am thinking I need to stay far away from it--maybe even the next county!  However, I once took my children to a farm that had a pumpkin patch in the fall and at this farm you could feed all sorts of baby animals.  The man who was our guide was riding a horse.  I asked how long horses lived out of curiosity.  His reply was "about 25 years or until they lose all of their teeth.  When they lose all of their teeth, they can no longer eat so they die."  He then proceeded to show me "old paint's mouth" and the poor horse had only about 4 teeth left inside.  Now if "old paint" only dies because he can't eat anymore then it seems to me someone should invent some false teeth for horses!  I realize that it may be a problem keeping them in his mouth, but he's a horse for goodness sake, use gorilla glue!  Then you could have one of those commercials for dentures with 2 horses eating out in the meadow and ask "which of these horses is wearing dentures?  I bet you can't tell."  I see those commercials about people all the time and if they would stay in a horses mouth when he can't fix his teeth himself, then if I had dentures I would certainly want to buy the brand that works for horses over the brand that just works for people!  #2.  Why they make packages of buns in lots of 8 and wienies come in packages of 10!  This is just plain stupid!  If I have a big cook-out, I have to actually do some math work in the grocery aisle on how to make the buns and wieners come out right at the end.  I like Math but it has never liked me.  I am telling you that life is too short to be worrying about your buns and wienies coming out right!  How many women have probably laid on their death beds and thought "I wish I had back all the time I wasted on trying to get buns and wienies to be even!  #3  Why my husband can't name one piece of clothing that I own to save his life, yet if I walk out of the room with a new outfit on he pounces on me like the Republicans on the Democrats over the national deficit!  If he doesn't know what I have, then how does he know when something is new!  He can smell a shopping trip better than a bloodhound on the trial of a convict!  #4.  Why if beauty is only skin deep that my wrinkles go clear to the bone!  In fact everything on my body apparently is trying to prove to this world on its very own that GRAVITY is alive and well in our universe.  No wonder old people stay in bed so much.  They are just exhausted from carrying around all that dragging flesh!  Things I don't understand #5 {you can relax, it's almost over!}  Why there are MEAN people in this world.  I'm not talking hormonal, crazy, irritable or just got up on the wrong side of the bed that morning.  I'm talking MEAN! MEAN,MEAN, MEAN!  If Hester had to wear a scarlet letter on her breast for adultery in Puritan times, why can't we make mean people tattoo ORNERY or CANTANKEROUS on their forehead these days so the rest of us don't have to guess when we first meet someone if they are a STINKER or not.  If they are bald and exceptionally bad they should have to tattoo all three phrases just because they have room!  One of the first things a Southern woman teaches her babies is to "treat others as you won't to be treated."  I know that there are folks out there who didn't learn this lesson as a child.  Anyone who does something intentionally to someone else that he wouldn't want done to himself  fits in the mean category.  That is why I am a member of the website "Why test out products on animals when our high security prisons are full!"  Uh oh, since I condone the use of product testing on criminals, and I wouldn't want it done to myself, I guess that makes me mean.  Gotta work on that!

Organization!

Things are not always as they appear.  Take my home for instance.  I can't stand clutter so someone might enter my home thinking that I am a very organized person.  They would be highly mistaken! In fact when the kids were growing up all I had to do was just say I was going to get organized and my entire family would fall out in the floor laughing. It isn't that I haven't tried to be organized.  I have spent a great deal of my adult life checking out organization books from the library, making files, and having datebooks with appointments written down all neat and tidy.  More time has been spent however trying to find the library book on getting organized that I lost, forgetting my file system, and randomly marking info down on scratch pieces of paper instead of my datebook only to later say, "What is this piece of paper for?  I don't know.  I'll just trash it."  The worst problem I have with this is when the phone rings and I need to take a message.  Whatever is close by is what I write the info on.  Sometimes it's my palm and I forget that I have written on it until after I have washed my hands.  Other times it's the back of a magazine or on one of the pieces of mail that came that day.  Have you ever been called by some super efficient local government employee and asked if you needed the phone number marked real important on your part of the return payment stub? "Is there a name with that number ma'am?" There isn't because that would require me being too organized, so I just tell her no politely as I don't remember who the person was that called and left the real important number!  It has then become just useless scratching on a piece of paper like all the other useless scratchings that I have in my drawer under the phone.  I have a file system.  I got some of the prettiest little files that you have ever seen and have them all marked with pretty colored tabs in beautiful script handwriting.  Here's the problem with my filing system.  Ben-"Honey have you seen Benjamin's immunization records?"  Me-"Yeah, there in my file system."  Ben-"What do you think you filed it under?" Me-"B for Benjamin."  Ben-"It's not in the B's.  Where else could it be?"  Me-"Try the I's for Immunization."  Ben-"It's not in the I's." Me-"Try R for Records."  Ben- "It's not in the R's!" Me-"I bet I put it in the S's for shots."  Ben-"It's not in the S's!!!"  Me-"I'll come find it"  After I have torn up the entire file drawer, I find it in the K's---for KEEP {IMPORTANT.} My husband does not approve of my filing system!  He is one of those people that is so organized that he makes lists of lists to make!  I worked for him for awhile at his office.  He fired me once a week.  That wouldn't have been too bad except that I only worked for him once a week!  After this went on for about 3 months I decided that it might be better to let our daughter that is just like her dad work for him.  Apparently I'm not the only one in this world that thinks that my brain is logical although no one else does.  My sister is a nurse in Arkansas.  She was with Hospice and each nurse had their own cases that they handled.  "Renee" one of the other girls had to go on medical leave and the other nurses doled out her patients among each other.  They needed to go see Mr. Whatchamacallit and couldn't find his file.  After they spent 20 minutes all trying to guess what letter Renee could have filed it under they finally called her at home to ask her where the file was.  Renee said for them to check the F's.  My sister said, "Neither his first nor last name starts with an F so why would you file him in the F's? Renee said,"When I look at him I think that his eyes look like fishes so it's F for fish eyes!"  From that point on when they needed something in Renee's files they just called her up and asked her where it was.  There is just no use in trying to figure out someone like me and Renee's file system unless of course you think to look first in the last place on earth that you would look and if you looked there first then it wouldn't be the last place you would look then would it?  I mentioned at church one day that I woke up in a different world everyday.  A friend said, "That must be a lot of fun for you!"  I answered, "Yeah, but it's not so fun for those that live with me!  Just to show you how sweet my little hubby is instead of getting mad at my constant "blond moments" he just laughs and says that being married to me has NEVER been boring!

Dumb Blondes!

I hate to say it but I have always been a dumb blond even before they were called that.  Today I had another blond moment.  My husband sent me to Tire Outfitters to have 4 new tires put on the van before we go on vacation.  We had ordered them at the same time our daughter and son-in-law ordered theirs.  I went into the place and told them that I had talked to them yesterday and they told me to come in this morning.  I gave them my name and they couldn't find it in the computer.  I mentioned ours were ordered with the Lynch's.  They checked the special orders and found nothing.  I mentioned that the Lynch's had theirs put on yesterday because I babysat the grandchildren during the time they were being done.  He checked the computer again and the special order book-nothing.  He called in 3 different sales people and asked if they had heard the name Montgomery.  They all said no.  When checking into the purchase orders they began to complain and scream about some Joe's handwriting and that they were probably  looking right at the order and couldn't read his writing.  A crowd of employees starts to gather and try to decipher Joe's handwriting.  "Could this possibly be it?" " I don't think so.  That doesn't have enough letters  in it to be Montgomery!"  Just as they are calling poor ole Joe and his "chicken scratching self" into the lobby "to let him have it about his handwriting"  I say something like "I'm sure my husband said Tire Outfitters."  "Tire Outfitters?  This isn't Tire Outfitters this is Tire Distributors!"  So then I have to further embarrass myself by asking that they tell me how to get to Tire Outfitter's.  I hope poor Joe didn't get it.  They were pretty hot under the collar when I left. By the way, while I was having my tires put on at TIRE OUTFITTERS, I was reading a women's magazine that was celebrating 125 years.  They had an old article from the 1800's about a special corset designed for "Fleshy Ladies."  So that's what they called plus size women back then.  How times have changed--from "fleshy ladies" to "all that junk in your trunk." Anyway, back to the dumb blond stuff, when I was a teenager my dad was letting me wash the car for money.  There was a new shirt I wanted downtown, and if we wanted extras we had to earn the money.  Daddy agreed to the price of the shirt only if "there wasn't one bug spot on the front of that grill!"  Bless his heart.  He probably could have had the car washed 3 times for the amount I needed for the shirt, but as I blogged before, daddy never said no when you asked something of him.  I go out and wash the car.  I scrub and scrub the whole thing until I am satisfied, but there are still spots on the grill.  "Daddy, I finished the car but there are spots on the grill that won't come off."  "Lisa, you're just going to have to use a little elbow grease."  After searching for 30 minutes in our storage building, I couldn't find one can that said Elbow Grease.  "If you want me to use Elbow Grease you're going to have to find it daddy!"  That's still my dad's favorite story about me.  One of these days when I get to Heaven I plan on asking the Lord what exactly it was that didn't develop properly in my brain when I was being formed.  By the way, I just used spell-check and found that I had misspelled blond {I had it spelled blonde} every single time in this post.  Somethings never change!

Growing up on Chestnut Street

Like many of you I have fond memories of growing up in a small town in the 1960's.  Our street that I lived on as a child was Chestnut St. in Magnolia, AR.  It was the equivalent of living at summer camp the whole year.  My dad once counted 26 kids that lived on the street!  Anytime you have that many kids you have a lot of fun.  Lacy lived down the street {or did she live at our house?}  Anyway, Lacy was always good for a laugh.  She could get anything that she wanted out of her maid named Polly.  It involved a simple plan.  We would all follow her to her house where she would be betting us all the way there that she could make Polly do anything that she wanted.  When we got there, Lacy would ask Polly for something so ridiculous that we would all snicker.  Polly would tell her there was no way she was gonna do that.  Lacy then would say, "If you don't, I'm gonna eat dog food!"  Polly would yell, "I don't care if you do eat dog food, I'm not gonna do that!"  Lacy would proceed to eat dog food and Polly would come running with what ever it was she wanted in the first place.  We would all die laughing and proceed to the yard to plan Polly's next entertainment for the neighborhood.  Little Jack was always doing something crazy!  "Little Jack had to go to the hospital again!"  This bit of info would spread from one house to the next like the flu.  "What happened this time?"  "He drank the gas out of the lawn mower with a straw!"  "Oh, I'm sure he'll be fine, he's done worse than that many times."  Stephanie lived across the street for a couple of years.  She was truly one of the prettiest little girls I ever knew.  She had some sort of medical problem though that always made her  smell like cheese!  I can't tell you how much of my adult life has been wasted trying to figure out how come she always smelled like cheese--cheddar to be exact!  If she had been rolled in pimento cheese  she couldn't have smelled more like it.  She was always clean.  She just smelled like cheese!  Even to this day after I visit my doctor sometimes I think, "Oh shoot, why didn't I ask him why Stephanie always smelled like cheese."  Every street has "the mean Man."  We actually had two.  One lived on the left side of us but we knew his name.  We also knew never to step on his grass!  The other man lived down the street {next to the cheese girl.}  I don't remember ever knowing his name.  He was just "the mean man" to all of us kids.  The Elliots lived at the other end, and they had 3 of the biggest dogs you've ever seen.  Apparently they had trained their dogs not to go to the bathroom in there own yard but to go to the neighbors.  I still to this day cannot possibly describe to you in terms that you will find believable the size of there "waste."  This act would set my mother off like no other!  On several occasions, I was sent down to their house to inform them that they were expected pronto down at our house with a shovel and a wheelbarrow "to get that cow patty"  out of our front yard!  Kids are attracted to things that shouldn't be stepped in.  If you have 3 acres with one cow patty, you can make sure that some kids playing outside are going to find that sucker and have it up to their necks within 5 minutes.  I don't know why my mother didn't just call their house and respectfully ask that they come clean up after their dog.  No, she had to send me down there embarrassed as I could be to inform them that mama wasn't happy and when mama ain't happy ain't nobody happy!  Several of us {I don't remember who all but I think that Lacy was involved} had a race once to see who could eat the most baked beans.  I won and quickly proceeded to the bathroom where I threw up whole beans up out of my nose.  Don't think that I was bulimic as a child or anything.  I was about 8 years old and I just wanted to win the race.  We had a teenager that drove the ice cream truck around the neighborhood almost everyday.  We would hear the music and all run inside to get money.  My search would always involve my father's white recliner.  Every time he sat in it his coins would spill out of his pockets and fall underneath.  My mother always wondered where I always came up with all my change.  By the time we ran back to the truck I was almost always last in line.  I don't remember this guys name but I can still see him to this day.  He had the worst case of acne that I have ever seen in my life!  Some of the kids called him "pizza face." Half the time by the time my turn came I wasn't hungry anymore and just turned around and walked off.  Why hasn't anyone ever come up with the "zit diet."  There has been every other kind of diet out there.  It's supper time right now and I just lost my appetite thinking of it!  Who needs a picture of a pig on the refrigerator--never worked for me.  But give me the ice cream man of my childhood and I could drop weight faster than the Elliot's dogs!

A visit to the Nut House!

Well it wasn't exactly a "nut house."  It WAS a big brick building full of NUTS!  I was one of said nuts.  Let me explain.  Several years ago I started having anxiety attacks out of the blue.  I went to a doctor that wasn't my regular physician and to make a long story short through a mistake on my chart I was put on a medicine for bipolar disorder.  I'm not bi-polar so this fact coupled with the fact that I had a very bad reaction to the medicine caused a severe problem.  My regular doctor said that I needed to go into the hospital for a few days as I came down off this medication.  Sounds like I was on LSD or something!  Anyway I envision myself laying in a hospital room, watching TV, reading magazines etc. while a friendly nurse occasionally stuck her head in the door and asked if I would "like some sweet tea hon."  I later found out that this is not how it is done anymore.  Because of cuts to the health care system and new regulations with insurance, everyone needing to be monitored from "bad med reactions" are all put in the same place--the nut house.  To make it short I was in there with everyone from crack addicts to those like me to bona fide no other word for it "nuts."  Now that it is over I can laugh at it--my family thought that it was freakin hilarious at the time!  Let me tell you about a typical day.  They search your bags to make sure there are no shoe laces or blow dryers {anything with cords} in case someone wants to kill themselves.  By the way I didn't when I went in there but after a couple of hours with those nuts........They came in every 15 minutes all night long and opened your door to see if you were in bed asleep.  I was in bed asleep until I was woken up every 15 minutes all night long being checked on to see if I was asleep!  Now for the cast of characters. This is the honest to goodness truth! There was the guy that thought he was a vampire.  I didn't have to deal with him much because he only came out at night.  There was the "head smeller."  This fine upstanding citizen had the social skills of Hannibal Lecter.  He went around smelling all of the women's heads then announcing, "that's a Prell head if I ever smelt one."  He was usually right!  He finally found a woman that he shouted as he sniffed her hair, "hey you use that shampoo that has the little kangaroo on it!  That's the kind my ex use to use."  I can't imagine why he has an EX!  Every once in awhile one of the nurses would yell out, "Robert, QUIT SMELLING HEADS!"  There was the woman that was faking suicidal thoughts "to teach her husband a lesson!"  Some of us normal women would sit at the round table and color pictures of Porky Pig with the words I WILL TAKE MY MEDS at the bottom of the page.  This beautiful southern woman told us that she had just retired after 25 years at her job and her husband keeps telling her that to continue to enjoy the style of living that she is accustomed to she needs to get out and get another job.  She said every time he brings it up she fakes a "I'm gonna commit suicide episode!"  She was there talking and cutting up with us and the next minute a nurse came over and asked her how she was and instantly she became "suicidal."  When the nurse left she would just laugh and say she'd teach her husband a lesson yet! Every time she got like this her doctor would put her in the hospital and it was costing her husband a fortune!  She figured he would eventually get the message that it was cheaper for her to stay retired. The worst part of this experience was that your family could only visit you for 30 minutes at night and only one at a time.  I found I actually BECOME crazy when I'm told I can't see my family when I want to see them.  Different family members would come into the main room and sit at the table with me as I pointed out my latest colored Porky Pig picture that had been hung on the wall with all the others like it was 1st grade art!  My family was getting a huge kick out of this! Thank goodness I only had to be there a day and a half! One thing I learned through this experience besides how genuinely sad mental illness can be is that there is always a bright side to everything.  I was wearing these adorable little red with white polka dot flats when I was there.  Everyone from the vampire {he probably just like the red} to the mumblers to the ones like me being observed because of a bad reaction to medication appreciates a cute pair of shoes!  Even those women that were really suicidal would come up to me and say, "those are just the cutest shoes I ever saw in my life.  My advise to you if you know someone that is going through a severe depression or having trouble emotionally is first and foremost to say a prayer for them-several prayers.  Just get down on your knees and stay there!  Then go out and buy them a really cute pair of shoes!

Scientists Think Too Much!

Women are nesters.  I really believe that God made us that way.  I've always wondered a little about a woman that doesn't like to fix up her home and have things nice for her family.  That having been said I think that scientists think too much!  In my Art History courses in college we studied cave man drawings as that is considered the first art of mankind.  There are all these theories behind the drawings.  Scientists say that was how they communicated with each other from different tribes as they spoke different languages.  They also think that they were commemorating an important event or history making episodes. Sort of like we would erect a statue at the sight of something we want to honor or remember. I think they have it all wrong.  I guarantee some cave woman was sitting around her "home" one day looking at the same old walls and decided she needed a change.  After she had her husband rearrange the rocks and leaf pallets about a hundred times and then she decided that she liked them better the way they were originally, she saw that big blank space on the wall above the rocks.  "It's just missing something; I'm not sure what."  Maybe if we had a big picture drawn on the wall that is full of life and pretty colors it would look better!"  She and her husband argued awhile over the fact that he thought the wall looked great just like it was.  Then he decided if he didn't put a picture up on the wall that he would never hear the end of it.  Men being the males that they are didn't think of a bowl of flowers or anything like that.  They had just been out hunting for food that day and started drawing the hunt and warriors.  When he was done the wife liked it so much she had him draw on other walls of the cave.  Next thing you knew her friends were coming over for morning "grog" and they were going home and telling their husbands that they just HAD to have a picture above the bed like their neighbor had and that was all there was to it.  Everyone started decorating their homes and the women just kept on finding more ways to beautify things.  "It's a little bare by the opening of the cave.  Couldn't we dig up some plants in the woods and kind of set them out around the front.  It would be so much more welcoming." Yep, scientists definitely think too much.

Bee-Keeping!

As I mentioned in earlier blogs, I have kind of been going through a mid-life crisis.  I am 49 years old-yes this is my true age {although I once remained 33 for 6 years!}  I've raised 3 great kids, had a career for a while and still don't think that I have accomplished anything in my life.  I guess that translates--I HAVEN"T BEEN ON OPRAH!  I have been looking for some sort of new interest.  I have a hobby that I dearly love {shopping}but since I am on a budget and that doesn't include a new pair of shoes every day, I'm searching for some new projects that don't involve as much money.  People don't feel sorry for you if you stand at a busy intersection with a sign that says, "SHOE FUND!" I don't know why, but you get absolutely NO compassion.  Now if I was driving down the street and saw a woman begging for money for new shoes, I would nearly wreck my car pulling over to help the poor thing out.  Even if I had to go without a meal or two myself you just can't turn your back on a poor "need a new shoe fix" girl!  Im looking for new excitement in my life.  I mentioned earlier that  I wanted to have some bees and hives here on our 5 acres.  I recently questioned this decision when I found out what honey is---BEE BARF!  Kind of makes it less exotic doesn't it?  I decided to do some googling to find out what I could about it.  I found lots of websites on beekeeping with some excellent advice.  Some of my favorites were to find a good beekeeper and do everything they do or find a bad beekeeper and do just the opposite of everything they do.  One person asked, "Will I have to worry about my bees swarming and stinging the neighbors?"  I was more inclined to ask if my bees could be trained to swarm and sting the neighbors!  Did I say that?  Seven generations of southern belles just rolled over in their graves!  I've also thought of volunteering at a local antebellum plantation for tours of the home and gardens.  The problem is I want to do it right.  When you go to Natchez, MS for the Spring pilgrimage, all the southern belles are dressed up in their 1800's finery.  That just adds to the atmosphere!  Far be it for me to suggest that these women around here strut around like Scarlett O'Hara when they're showing off the "ole plantation home."  They just seem to think that taking visitors from room to room in a historical house is fine and dandy wearing blue jeans and a tee shirt.  My husband said to just ask them if I could wear authentic looking attire as I strut.  I'm afraid that I might appear to be a tad eccentric.  I worry about that often--appearing to be a tad eccentric that is!  I always tell my husband that I was born at the wrong time.  I should have lived in the 1800's, strolled around the veranda in my gown, carrying a parasol, sipping a mint julep, and smelling the jasmine in the breeze.  My husband always brings me back to reality by saying, "they didn't have air conditioning in the 1800's!"  The Lord knew what he was doing after all, huh?  I thought of volunteering some time at the local animal shelter but my dear, sweet husband has absolutely vetoed this idea. He says that  bringing home a new dog every day that I felt sorry for is even more expensive in the long run than buying shoes!  I like to watch the food network channel and try new recipes but as you found out in an earlier blog {Italian Fish in the Dishwasher} my recipes hardly ever turn out like theirs.  I'm not saying I'm not a good cook.  I can take a mean dish to the church potluck and have others ask for the recipe just like anyone else.  It's just when I try to be a Martha Stewart that there is usually a problem.  Namely I've set my kitchen on fire twice.  Once I was heating grease to fry chicken, and I decided I wanted this wonderful salad with the meal.  I just left the grease on the stove and went to Kroger's.  When I came home I kept hearing this weird noise.  We had a new car and I thought that the warning sound was coming from it.  I sat out in the carport for five minutes pushing every button to try and turn the noise off.  I finally went to the kitchen door and realized that the "weird noise" was the fire alarm and my kitchen wall behind the stove was flaming out 3 feet.  I've told you I was ADD.  The next time I was cooking bones for my dogs in the broiler.  I swear I didn't know that dogs would eat raw bones!  Anyway, another grease fire!  Then there was the time that I saw Martha using parchment paper for baking cookies!  I thought that wax paper was the same thing and set the oven on fire.  Well that didn't really count because it wasn't a true fire.  I mean unless the fire department has responded, your floors have 3" of water on them, your nostrils are black and you have to spend the next 6 weeks at the Holiday Inn, I don't think that it should count.  Do you?