If I Could Have Just One Superpower...

My life's dream has been to don a pair of spandex pants and take crimefighting to a whole new level.  When I was a child, I used to tie a towel around my neck for a cape (my parents never thought to buy me an actual cape) and I would pretend to "fly" through the front yard saving everyone I could.  Looking back, our neighbors must have thought I was a real nut job.

Sometimes, I would swoop down and save the Professor from "Gilligan's Island," but leave the rest. 

I think we all know that he was the only one that mattered.   But, if I were granted just one super power and had the option of that one choice, I think it would be mind control.

Why would I need X-Ray vision? I don't feel the need to see that criminals have developed a crippling case of arthritis.  Telekinesis?  Oh, maybe for some superheroes, but not for me.  I just don't think I could make my car or shovel go on a murderous rampage, even against a thug.  And for the record, I am not picking on thugs...some of my best friends are thugs.  Yep...

No, mind control is the super power I want.  If the villain tries to rob a bank, I would just make him very sleepy. Go home and take a nap, bad guy.    Oh, yes, they would have to go home and sleep instead of robbing the bank.  BAM! I'm a superhero crime fighter maverick.  That is me.  A maverick.  I do not need anyone or anything, except for mind control.  I need that.

Actually, I already have mastered the art of mind control. I even control you and you don't even know it.  Are you ready? You will stop reading this post right now.  BAM!

Where Was I Going With This?

The sky burst open with all of it's width this morning.  And across that same sky flew billions of beautiful white doves and  I believe an angel or two.  Today, life specifically tasted like teddy bears...no make that chocolate teddy bears.  And on this day the South could once again poke it's chest out and be proud to call itself...ummm...the South.

My son, Teen Boy, got his driver's license today, December 27, 2011.

Hark! Do I hear no more midnight runs to the Hungry Store for food? Can he not pick up his own keys and make his own runs now?  As a matter of fact, I never, EVER again for the rest of my life have to get out of my PJs ever again.  Did I say ever?

Except, I do have a ten year old...OHHH...I totally forget about her! UGHHHH!!! Suddenly, I feel this driving need to pack bricks into a sack and bludgeon myself  in the face with it over and over and over again! Let me grab the back of my shirt and fling myself onto a massive fire ant mound while I am at it.  

I love to write and blog.  My job is in my home.  I really don't have to get dressed at all.  But, those rotten kids always wanting something to eat or drink make me have to get up and moving and do for them.  

Then, they try to embed themselves into my skin and suck the last little bit of lifeblood out of me.  Sometimes, I think I am present on this Earth just for them.  It's true.  Kids are very demanding.  They only think of themselves.  They both made Christmas lists for themselves this year (as usual).  Neither of them made a Christmas list for me! So selfish! I went ahead and used most of the Christmas money to buy myself an IPad so that they could feel better about themselves and feel charitable.  Life is too short not to give your kids life lessons.  

And just as I get old enough and lonely enough to need them, they will take their power of youth and hostility somewhere else and leave me rotting like an alligator corpse on the side of a swamp-infested back road.  Only in my case, I do pick up the alligator if it is still warm.  You would too if you knew how expensive alligator meat is.  And that is what I will be.  Expensive.  Rotting.  Alligator.  Meat. 

Ok, so where was I going with this? Oh, yes, Teen Boy got his driver's license today! Teen Boy, if you are reading this, and you probably aren't,  you may be a brat sometimes (OK, a lot of the times) but I am still proud of you!  Now, I am hungry, can you go to the Hungry Store for me...please?

I WAS Good!

Like a creature of the night, Santa snuck into my little abode I call home and slipped some great things under the tree.  Teen Boy got what he wanted also, but he definitely wasn't good.    And  on the way home today, an unbelievable thing happened...I hit an alligator with my car.  It was a Christmas miracle!  Alligator tacos this week...yummm!

Hang On Santa...

I just bet you have heard this one. "Santa is watching you.  He knows whether you are being naughty or nice."  I staunchly believe that it is totally fabricated and I will tell you why I believe that.

One pitifully prosaic December day, as I went about my usual, habitual duties of being a child, playing "beat my brother with a wooden chair" (it was my own personal game I created as I had the imagination of a true visionary) and my mom screamed at me with all of the trembling fury that she possessed that, "Santa was watching and had decided I was naughty and not going to get ANY presents for Christmas!"

Oh, really? So, let me get this straight.  There is this unshaven, morbidly obese 500+ year old man sitting in his ice fortress in the Northern Hemisphere of the Earth, lounging around in who knows what the 364 days of the year he is not actually working watching me through his magic crystal ball at all hours of the day and night passing judgement on my playing skills.  For the record, my goal was to make my brother stronger as a person so I was doing a good thing, but even if that plan didn't pan out I still resent the fact that Santa was on a power trip dangling toys over my head like I was a puppet in his creepy little ice world.

Hang on Santa. I'm coming.

Obviously, the old man didn't really know who he was dealing with.  I just happened to have first hand information (my mom) that Santa was going to be at the local mall that Saturday.  I had only days to put a massive offensive campaign together.

Oh, I'll show you naughty, big guy.  Drink your milk.  You gonna need it.

I spent night and day plotting against Santa.  There could be no tactical errors on my part.  

The day arrived.  I loaded up my gear into my backpack and headed to the mall on my bike.

"Are you going to see Santa, Dear?"  I heard my mom yell as I hopped on my bike.

Oh, yeah, I'm going...

I waited in that line for what seemed like hours to see him until at last my turn came.  The first part of my plan was to get close to him and lure him into my trap so I crossed step one off of my list of sitting in his lap.  I lay my backpack out of sight close to an elf.  I thought about bringing the elf down, too.

As I got close to him, I was shaking with excitement.  I was going to bring him down, down, down!.  I was going to be the kid to bring down Clause.

And then something happened after I sat on his lap that totally caught me off guard and completely threw me for a loop.  He asked me what I wanted for Christmas.

Was he kidding me?  Was this some type of joke?  There was still a chance? My heart beat fast and my mind raced faster.  I had to think with the skill of lightning.  Was this a trick or a defensive move on his part?

It got worse.  He put his arm around me and smiled.  "Ohhh...he is good," I thought to myself.  I looked over at my backpack full of weapons, including a small rocket launcher I had devised.  I looked back up at him and smiled.  I knew exactly what I wanted.  

In the excitement of the event, with great hope of getting toys, I ran out of the mall without my backpack.  I didn't remember it until the next day I saw on the news that a backpack filled with weapons of mass destruction had been found at the mall near Santa's post.  They had evacuated the mall and temporarily closed it down.  Almost, 1500 kids didn't get to see Santa that week and the mall lost tens of thousands of dollars in revenue.  

I secretly smiled to myself while watching the news, so thankful that they had found someone else's green backpack with the initials TF and not mine. Santa might not have thought I was nice, after all.

The Professor and Me...A True Unpublished Confession of Why I Really Watched Gilligan's Island

I have a confession to make.  I never wanted him rescued.  The day he washed ashore on that island was my dream come true. I was all of eight years old and he was my castle in the air and with great certainty, I knew that one day we would be together. I wanted him stuck on the island forever, just for me to watch him inventing and fixing things.  Every time a boat sailed along, I secretly prayed a rescue wouldn't happen.  It wasn't that I was selfish, but I actually was.

I hated Mary Ann.  HATED.  She was my competition.  At times, when she would be standing underneath a coconut tree with her scantily dressed glamour girl body, I would find myself up against the TV screen with my fists doubled up hoping for the day a coconut would fall on her and cause her some extent of blunt trauma.  I didn't want her to die, give me some credit, just permanently disabled.

Now the love of my life looks like my Grandad...ugghh

Water For Elephants

When I was eight, I was going through a perpetual state of world-weariness.

My Grandad decided it would be a good time to bring me to the circus.

Though his dementia hadn't quite set in at the time, he felt certain that since the animals were locked up or heavily guarded by trainers that they would be safe.

When we got to the circus Grandad held my hand tightly.

There were bears and elephants and tigers!  After we arrived, Grandad ran into one of his friends and they talked and talked and talked.  Then, I realized that I needed to get some water to drink or I would die!  I begged Grandad to let me go and get something to drink.  He glanced around to make sure all of the animals were safe in captivity before he let me go. He handed me a dollar to buy a drink.

On the way back from the concession stand, I saw some elephants behind a tent.  I decided that they must be thirsty so I looked for water to bring to the elephants.  I searched and searched but there was no water for elephants.  I saw a bear in a cage.  Then I saw of set of keys near a circus man who was sleeping.  I decided to borrow his keys to get into the bear cage to get some water.  I would be like a superhero saving the thirsty elephants.

I unlocked the cage with one of the keys.  I stood back while the bear stepped out for some fresh air.  Then, two other bears came out of a little house and decided they needed some fresh air, too. I like bears.  I went in and picked up a bucket of water.

But, while I was walking back, I passed by the tiger's cage and thought I saw food in the cage so then I figured that the elephants would probably be hungry,too.  I still had the keys, so I opened the cage to the tigers and they decided they needed fresh air, just like the bears.  Once I was in the cage I realized that there was no food and they must be hungry.  Maybe they went to look for food.

Then, suddenly I heard screaming.  I looked up and the tigers were chasing the elephants and the bears were chasing everybody.  The elephants ran into the tent and then the tent collapsed.

A man with a tall hat was angry and screaming at me in the cage.  I figured the elephants didn't need the water anymore since they were playing with the tigers so I went to look for Grandad.  The man with the tall hat screamed at Grandad and told him to leave and for us not to come back.

I thought that was very mean of him since I tried to water his elephants for him.  I then asked Grandad if we could go to the zoo, instead.

Brain Scan

This is what I do at 2:00 in the morning when I can't sleep.

Adventures in Finding Mr. Right--part 1

I have made a short list of some of the qualifications I am looking for in a man. I think it goes without saying that he should never wear plaid, but if he has all of the characteristics below, then why would he?

The Hungry Store

Have you ever been bathed and ready for bed or not bathed and ready for bed, however you float your boat and one of your rotten kids screams, "Mom, we want a hamburger from----"  and then you scream back  "No, I'm not going, go feed the alligator!" and they both  keep screaming and screaming and you want to just RIP your own head off so then you get dressed again and make a trip to the hungry store at 10:00 at night so you don't have to hit them with anything sharp or blunt.

So you are dressed and in your BMW convertible (everyone has one of those, right?) and then you get behind someone who is at least 3 times your age (no matter how old you are) and it takes 3 hours to go one block before they finally turn and get out of your way.  At this point, a car full of swamp people turns directly in front of you and you don't know if they are mutant or just have live alligators hanging out of their windows like dogs so they have to drive slow or the alligators will fly out and land on your windshield.  Then when you finally arrive at the hungry store to get the hamburgers, their little blinky light goes off and you jump out of your car and beg and plead through the locked glass to speak to the manager that it is an emergency and you quickly come up with a crazy story about how Aunt Sue is on her deathbed and wants her last meal to be 2 hamburgers from the hungry store.

Then the  hungry store charges you an extra 15 dollars for the overtime they have to pay the burger people to make your two burgers, but it is worth it to keep from hearing your kids scream at the TOP of their lungs all night and then it starts pouring down rain and you fall in a mud puddle and when you finally make it home with the food, they are sound asleep.

Yeah, it's happened once or twice...

My Mentally Challenged Alligator--True Story

He was mentally challenged from the get go.  Something just wasn't right.

His name was T'Jacques.  He stayed in my house.  I live in South Louisiana.  Alligators and swamp people are everywhere.  I will take in man-eating birds and alligators into my home, but never swamp  people.  There are some things you draw the line at. 

He stayed in a bathtub in my house.  One day, I was minding my own business and peeped into the bathroom where he stayed to check on him.  He was definitely up to something.  I  walked in there and stared at him.  He hissed at me while I was just minding my own business.  I hated it when he did that, but his mouth was still slightly open.  

"Wow, "I said to self, "my finger would would fit right in there and I wonder if he would bite me and I wonder if it would hurt..." 

 He was only a foot or so long, so I figured that it was worth a shot.

Normally,  when I stick my finger in something's mouth, it doesn't bite me, but this alligator was really dumb. He clamped down so hard it felt like a small car with teeth slamming down onto my finger.  I think he liked the taste of me because he wouldn't let go!   Doesn't he know not to bite the finger that feeds him! 

Do you know how hard it is to unslam a small car with teeth off of your finger that refuses to budge, while you are doing a new dance choreography to pain and your bloodcurdling screams are heard around the world?

That's what I get for minding my own business.  Alligators are so dumb.

Man-eating Birds

Have you ever been walking down the sidewalk not poking one of your kids with a sharp object when you glance to the side and in the bushes you notice a small, possibly man-eating bird laying helplessly on the ground hoping a superhero would come along to save it.  I have.  In those precious moments I had to think quickly and so I pushed my child into the street for his safety while I tried to subdue the creature in order to save it's life.

In those moments every second counts, so I tried feverishly to perform mouth to mouth, but being a man-eating bird it tried to bite me on the lip so instead I wrapped it in my child's jacket.  It was too cold to use mine.  Children are resilient to cold temperatures, they bounce back if they get sick and I had to be well enough to take care of the bird.  Anyways, with the bird safely wrapped up I had to pull my child to safety from the street as a car almost hit him. I then brought the bird home to nourish and take care  of him so that he could live a fruitful  and joyous life thanks to me.

As days went by he became better and I knew that it was time to  let it go.  He would chirp these beautiful songs in the morning, like an angel.  If you love something, set it free and I loved it so I went to reach in it's little ward of a cage and as I did he tried to bite me over and over so I grabbed a blunt object and started beating him with it so he would stop biting me and as his squeals became less and less I realized that this was my purpose...to save the world from this man-eating bird.

The world is safe now.  It feels nice to be a superhero.

Hurricanes and Steroids

If a hurricane and a tornado got married, had a baby and put that baby on a massive amount of steroids the byproduct would be my 10 year old.

This morning I watched as she walked to her bus stop for school. I always wait until the bus is in sight before I sneak back in. The bus driver is onto me. He always tries to get my attention by honking his horn and sometimes I think he speeds up just so he can screech his brakes at me.

I pretend not to notice. Good luck Mr. Bus Driver! He must hate me.

Yesterday, I told her to go study her flash cards. She told me she didn't want to and that it didn't matter because the teacher always helped her. Go do your cards!

Here is the conversation that came along 5 minutes later.

"Mom, I can't do my flashcards anymore."
"Ok," I say exasperated, "why not?"
"I ate them"
"You ate all of them?" I asked cooly.
"There are three left."
"Then go study the three that are left."
"Can I have a snack? Studying makes me hungry..."
"You just ate 25 cards. That was your snack."

At least hurricanes come with warnings before they come.

Flying Monkeys

Flying monkeys. Sometimes, I would like to punch them. What happened to the days of monkeys just throwing poo at you. They liked it. We liked it. It worked. Since when should monkeys be so intelligent? Who benefits from that? The Wizard of Oz is the most frightening show ever made, since the beginning of time. My kids put the show on just to see me make a mad dash over or through furniture for the tv or remote to change the channel.

Same scenario every time. I slip. Fall. Hurt myself. They laugh. They throw poo at me.

I could just punch them...the flying monkeys, not the kids.