Monday, November 17, 2008

Holiday Hoopla Getting to You?

In the upcoming weeks I will post some stories from a time in my life when I was dealing with depression during the holidays. Many people get depressed through the holidays and I have found that humor helps drive away the blues.

Do you have a funny holiday story to share?
Do you get depressed during the holidays?

Saturday, November 15, 2008

Do you have a bearded dragon?

Lizard Killer
tells why you should never feed lightning bugs to a lizard.



Wednesday, November 12, 2008

A Blind Dog on a Deck with No Rails

New Deck
is the funny story of a blind dog and her attempt to fly.



Monday, November 10, 2008

Woman Attempts to Repair Toilet

Liquids Plumber
is the account of a woman who tries to simultaneously fix her toilet and help her daughter with a science project.


Friday, November 7, 2008

When did this happen?

Keep in mind that the stories on this blog happened in 1998 through 2003. Yes, they really did happen pretty much like they are told.  All our kids are grown now. Things are sure a lot quieter on the home front. As I look back on these years, I kinda miss the kids being teenagers. I don't miss the hoopla that accompanied the insanity and added to the stress!

What are you going through right now?
Want to share your story about your teenagers?
Do you have reptiles?
Leave a comment at the bottom of this post and I'll make a big deal of it.
Yvonne Perry reads from her book Email Episodes.



Here is the story of a teenage daughter and her new sweater. Some moms should not be allowed to cook!

Soup's On



Wednesday, November 5, 2008

Soup’s on

My daughter asked me to make some tomato soup for her. I boiled it over into the stove burner as I always do. Then, I overfilled the bowl, and put it on a metal tray for her to take to her room. I placed extra napkins on the tray so she wouldn’t drip it on our “used-to-be-white” carpet. She walked carefully out of the kitchen without spilling a drop.

About thirty seconds later I heard a loud “Ka-thump, clank-clang, UGH!” and I knew what had happened--the soup was a goner. As I rounded the corner, my daughter yelled, “Get my sweater out of it, and put it in the washer, quick!”

At least the girl was fine. Her $58 sweater and the carpet will never be the same. The walls and the top four steps were baptized in red-orange Campbell’s and the bowl was empty. Not much spilled on the tray or napkins though. My daughter was trying her best to get up the mess with a towel, but I knew this was a job for Super-mom. I sent her downstairs to boil over some more soup while I went to the basement (a.k.a. reptile farm) for the shop-vac. Of course it was all the way under the snake table, but after rearranging the basement, I got it out.

I took the machine upstairs to the tomato track and plugged it in. "Ahhh! Gag! What is that smell?"

My son and Wayne hadn’t washed out the canister when they used the shop-vac to clean up the mess Salina (Wayne’s dog) had made in the garage! I ran outside to empty it. I tried to rinse it with the hose, but the hose was frozen. I took the shop-vac to the bathroom, filled the tub with hot water and Pinesol, and flipped on the shop-vac. It started sucking up the pine water, and I thought all was going well until I heard an awful sound and saw the machine spewing soapy, stinky, water all over the walls! As I reached for the switch, I received the best facial I’ve ever had. It was better than Oil of Ol’ Lady lotion. Okay, so my idea sucked, literally.

My husband walked in while I was working on the Campbell’s clean up project, and asked what was going on.

“Soup and soap,” I stated matter-of-factly.

All in a day’s work.

Here’s to clean floors!

Sunday, November 2, 2008

Liquids Plumber

FROM: Expressy@coffeehouse.com
DATE: October 14, 1998
TO: Birthababe@nurserynews.com, BusyBee@BayTee.org, Cafemocha@coffeehouse.com, Cappuccino@coffeehouse.com, Kidsrus@Indyfarm.org, Mamadearest@abc.com, fickle@nanabooboo.org, lungeforth@takealeap.net, warrior1@battlefield.com, ballerina@dancerprancer.org MotherMayI@whynot.com, Suzysunflower@kansasgarden.com
SUBJECT: Liquids Plumber

I hope you are blessed to the bulging as we are. From the subject line above, I bet you thought I had stopped up the sink again. Nope, that was last week. My mom was here then, and she reminded me that I needed to replace the flapper thing in the bottom of the flush tank. She discovered that water was leaking out of the tank slowly and the toilet had to refill itself to stay full. So that’s why it was flushing by itself! I thought I had a phantom in the bathroom and was proud of our plumbing ghost, but when I found out that I was wasting water, I went to Ace hardware and got one of those flapper dillies. By the way, did you know that Ace Hardware sells Pepsi? Saved me a trip to the grocery store. My daughter needed three plastic pop lids for a science project. That means we have a lot of drinking to do so my daughter can have the lids.

While I was trying to repair the toilet, I decided that I could conserve even more water if I put a bottle filled with water inside the tank to take up some of the space. I found a 48 oz. bottle of Welch’s grape juice in the fridge. There was only a little left, so I drank it, and then filled the bottle with water, and put it in the tank. It was too light, and it floated. Plan B: Sunny D. I found a 64 oz. partially full bottle of Sunny Delight. All my Rubbermaid gizmos were in the refrigerator developing new life forms, so I had nothing to pour the rest of the Sunny D into. I drank the rest of it, filled the bottle with water and put it in the tank. Still, too light. I went back to the fridge and drank the rest of one of the 2-liters of Pepsi, filled the bottle with water and put it in the tank. It worked! I had to pee by then, but the flapper dilly wasn’t yet installed. That’s when the phone rang.

My friend asked the required phone conversation activation question, “What are you doing?”

“Drinking,” I replied.

I cleaned out the refrigerator today. It’s amazing what you may find when looking into those plastic containers after about a month of incubation. I suggested my daughter use one of them for her science project, but she insisted that we hurry and drink the Pepsi so she can have the lids. At least she’s speaking to me again. In fact, as I type, she is serenading me on her piccolo with the highest and loudest notes she can play. She is supposed to tape record a piece for her band tryouts but she forgot to bring home the music. Good thing too, because she had already figured out who to use my keyboard to synthesize the flute and not get points off for breathing in the wrong places. She has joined a group of people at school who want to form a Peace Corp for Ireland to stop the fighting between the Protestants and Catholics. I imagine Ireland will have peace before the residents of this house do.