Dared Germs, "Hi, Puppy!", Licks

I dare a germ to live through 350 degrees!

It wasn't the weather that was hot, it was not.  It was the oven.  Later we'd bake cookies.

We all, complete with baby in stroller, took a walk around the burg, Grandpa, GrwammyPam, Mom, Dad, and 3 year old Miss Lilly.

Miss Lilly's energy and speed ebbed and flowed!  First, we ran like we were given a turbo boost.  Yes, I ran, too!  Slowing, trying to catch my breath before catching up to the crew, I forced myself to walk erect, pretending,  "What?  Me?  Marathon untrained?  Never!"  

This is when I and granddaughter lost horsepower and had to walk a bit, instead of run.    A couple of times when we ran out of gas and had to sit we'd pet a rock or spy the moon, or say "Hi, puppy,", to a neighbor's dainty dog decked in daisies and bows.  All times to sit were Miss Lilly's ideas.  (Surely we didn't do it to just mask a need for sustained and fully infused oxygen.)

Such fun!  

I was glad she was little, a toddler.  Little kids know how to stop and go, rest and run, play exuberantly, and fall asleep half on and half off a chair trying to get to the sink to get a drink!   I know, because Miss Lilly's dad did that.  I could pace myself with a little one in tow, and no one would ever know my need for catch-up breath!

So, Miss Lilly and I next made cookies.  While we were mixing, I asked her mom to pull her hair back.  Why?  Because into the bowl Lilly was putting her WHOLE HEAD!  Yep, she was smelling the dough,  "ummmmmm....", was her exact utterance.

Then when I bent to get the cookie sheets out, I turned around and what did I spy?  Her little pink tongue dipping into the cookie dough, "Lilly!  Stop that!"  

My youngest son was grossed out.  This 20 year old witnessed it.  Said he wasn't eating any.  

"Seriously?  After all the things you did as a child!"  And believe you me, boys do ALL KINDS OF THINGS!  They can be uncaring, dirty little rugrats, and yard apes, their jeans pockets hiding balled-up used bandaids, and dried flat worms.  Of course, I scraped out the small quarter sized area she had licked. 

"Son, it's gonna be 350 degrees in that oven for 8 minutes.  If I left the cookie dough as is, no germs could ever survive!"  

And to tell you the truth, when the first batch came out, I broke one in half and a chocolate chip plopped onto my ring finger, and I was blistered!!!!   Proof!

I dare a germ to come out of a fiery furnace to inflict a disease on him, me, or little Miss Lilly!

It's hot.  And survive in my kitchen?  NOT!

"Go To Sleep, Big Toe!"

Last night it happened again.  Big toe had to go to sleep first.  

You probably need some background.  

En Masse, in uniforms white, we high school girls sat in the courtyard learning questionable songs, other times we marched to dinner through white halls, some times we checked out the fair.   I'd won a scholarship to the Indiana State Fair Girls School, yippee!   It was 300 girls from around the state, housed in a big red brick building, learning what our leaders yearned to teach us.

One thing was a yoga exercise by which to fall asleep.

"Close your eyes, and systematically address every part of your body. Start at your scalp and move toward your toes. Begin by softening your forehead, eyes, face, and jaw. Tensing and then releasing each muscle group to help tight muscles loosen, especially those in the neck and shoulders. Continue giving attention to each area of your body - the arms, the trunk, and the legs - until you reach your toes. Surrender to gravity."

I had forgotten the head to toe.  In my mind, it was toe to head.  

Last night it happened again.

I couldn't sleep.  

Shift positions.

Say prayers.

Smoosh pillow.

Still, no sleep. 

Back to the old tried and true yoga trick.   Addressing my big toe (and here you're supposed to actually send your mind's eye to your toe and "feel" it.  Teacher said address each body part 3 times and relax it.) 

"Go to sleep, big toe.  Big toe, go to sleep.  Go to sleep."

Big toe perked up!  Big toe said "Hi!"  Big toe began greeting me.  He sang "This little piggy went to market" until all the other little piggies joined in and finished the song with a "Wee, wee, wee-ee!"   Oh.  My.  Lands!

That sure didn't work, sheesh.  "Arch, go to sleep.  Go to sleep, Arch.  Go to sleep."  Arch, arched!  First up, then down, like a stretching cat doing the downward dog!

For heaven's sake, "Ankles, go to sleep.  Go to sleep, ankles.  Go to sleep."  Ankles began swaying in unison, left, then right, singing, too, "Wipers on the bus go swish, swish, swish.  Swish, swish, swish.  All through the town."

What is this?  A Musical?

Maybe if I move higher up.  "Navel, go to sleep.  Go to sleep, Navel.  Go to sleep."  You know what Navel did?  Navel held hands with hips and in unison they slid left, they slid right, Navel did the La Cucaracha dance!  And finished with a flamingo castanet accompanied stomp,  "CHA, CHA, CHA!"  Oh no, stop this, no!

"Right Shoulder, go to sleep.  Go to sleep, Right Shoulder.  Go to sleep."  And in the dark of night there rings, "You put your right shoulder in, you put your right shoulder out, you put your right shoulder in, and you shake it all about.  You do the hokey pokey and you turn yourself around, that's what its all about.  Yah!"

That's it.  I'm done. 

When I finally get to my wrists and sleep isn't induced, I give in.  I'm totally done. 

"Wrists, go to sleep.  Go to sleep, Wrists.  Go to sleep."  And what do the wrists do?  The wrists do the Queen's wave.

This Smothers Brothers Comedy Hour is done!

Where's that pillow?  I need to smother something!



 

MARAUDERS! "GRWAMMYPAM! GET HIM!"

It was a quick step to the deck, and a couple of jumps down the steps and a few more paces to the truck to retrieve my sunglasses.  I was back in a hurry 'cause the weather was nippy and I wanted to get inside quickly.  Reaching for the gold door handle on our red front door, it opened before I could make contact.  I recoiled in surprise.  And more to my surprise, this little 3 year old girl in her pink frilly dress had opened MY door!  Holding a favored stuffed animal in her other hand she reached out toward me with her right and swooped it invitingly to the living room, "Come on in!"

ROFL, okaaaaaa, Miss Lilly, I think I will enter my own house, ha, ha, and I laughed, "Thank you!"

Once inside, Jayden comes up to me, "I'm playing with your treasure, and Alayna wants one, too.  Can she have the big box?"  Looking at Jayden's little hands, I see he's holding a little metal treasure chest with which they're welcome to play.  But I wasn't sure about the big box.  So I follow him back to the playroom combo guest bedroom to investigate.  Gotta play.  I just gotta play pirates.  So we sing "Ho, ho, ho" and make up words that has them bouncing on the bed, LOL.

Ho, ho, ho!  And a bottle of rum!
We are pirates on a looting run!

We'll plunder some ships
And steal some gold

Rob all their treasures
From out of the hold!

Amber, emerald, ruby, and jade
Marauding pirates, we love a good raid!

And the large pretend "jewe's" (they leave out one syllable of the word jewels) that were meant to be diving toys become a color identification lesson.  Which one is blue?  Which one is square?  Which one is orange?  And Miss Lilly's upturned face looks at me like "I don't see an orange one, you're a silly GrwammyPam."  So, I pull it up from the orange bedspread, hold it up to the light so the sunbeams can shine through, and sure enough, it's not orange, it's red!

But those "jewe's" have to have a bath when kidlets leave.  They feel rough with dried food, and they smell funny, like peanut butter!

These three dearly would like to maraud and explore the great upstairs.  Many times over the months they've had to be called back after getting a little too high up the staircase.  Lately though, I've had a little help, a saving grace.

These grandkids are not sure they like bugs.  Miss Lilly definitely isn't sure.  Even after I collected some in a ziplock bag so she could safely see them up close, and she could watch them walk about under protection of plastic, she's still not sure.  She's very curious, though, even while thinking they're icky.

My saving grace?  It was a dark spot on the wall of the stairwell.  Miss Lilly is sure, and has convinced Jayden, that its a stink bug.  Miss Lilly says she doesn't like "stink-a bugs that crawl on the wall."
"GrwammyPam!   Get him!"

"Argh," GrwammyPam sheds her granny glasses and dons a tri-corn hat and sword, "Pirate Pam to the rescue!  Get him!"

RECALCITRANT COW AND PRECOCIOUS PIG

Recalcitrant Cow stood in the middle of the corn field that had been hacked and hewed by the farmers for fall harvest.  She had eaten her fill and was ready to come in to slurp water at the trough.  Farmer Furd was calling and calling and going unheard.  Recalcitrant Cow, in rebellion, still had her headphones on and was dancing like a dingo on the open prairie in the corners of her mind.

Precocious Pig, as young as he was, knew trouble was brewing.  He had seen it before from the brother redhead Farmer Fred, his eyes going wide, his nose not so cherry, and his wide little belly, not shaking like jelly, his dimples not so merry!

There'd be mayhem and murder, for sure.  There'd be unguent and entrails; for Precocious Pig -- HAPPINESS -- VICTUALS!  If the great detective were narrating he'd say, "The game is ahoof!"

Finally, Recalcitrant Cow turned her big head and her one moo-cow brown eye ever so slightly and saw a hazy gray shadow of a man waving violently.  Warily, but curiously, she took off her headphones and heard Farmer Fred's upsettedness in sound surround.  You must know, cows are myopic, but they can hear the scream of a bat, and this guy was no bat!

Farmer Furd and Farmer Fred were creating a hurly-burly!  With so many black beeves out and about like pepper on corn, Recalcitrant Cow weens, tho difficult to ascertain, they were beckoning only her with a stag-horn.

So anxious to get to the gulp, she plowed, nay, plunged pell-mell -- right into the fence.  Right into the fence she went, and, was electricized!  "Grunt" she leaped away like a scampering lamb on catnip!  Durn!  Like a calf on a youtube video, she'd forgotten once again about that barrier, Energized by Duke.

Back at the barn, Precocious Pig was squealing with glee, "Another run like that and I won't need a sign around my neck "Eat more beef."

"I won't make another run like that.  I don't wanna be a burger!"  Recalcitrant Cow, kept mooing, "I'll tell Farmer Furd "better thin your herd." "Eat more bacon!"  And she swung her big hairy head high.

With a butt bump, and a tongue swipe, she went end for end, stumping through the barn floor straw.

Precocious Pig did the limbo under udder, oinking on the other side.

And on and on they went.

Until Farmer Fred, having enough of the calamity, said, "Go on get, you beasts!  Unless you want to be part of a hecatomb feast!"

Calmly, with turbulent emotions in reserve, they filed out of the barn into the farm, to return to their  ingestion digestive craves.

Tail curled, snout in the smut was Precocious Pig.
Tail swishing flies, sandy tongue tugging grass was Recalcitrant Cow.

Shaking their heads, Farmer Fred and Farmer Furd, rehashed what they thought they heard, "s'mores of beef?"

"Thin the bacon?"

"Let's be done with this.  Let's take 'em to a barbecue."

That very next Sunday they all came to the family picnic!




**As part of a challenge from son Ian, I read The Iliad.  Here I used terms I learned in the Iliad, as it was translated by Samuel Butler. 

MERCURY'S ODYSSEY

Pamela's Note:  All BOLD words are car names.

An Odyssey

Mercury was rising.
From the turret of his castle, you could tell King Mercury wasn't happy with the hassle of having to deal with these two AGAIN.

Whooping and hollering came Chief Pontiac galloping from the western woods astride his trusty steed, Pinto.  Next came Royal LeBaron, his mail clacking and clanging, riding from the eastern meadow saddled on Mustang, his favored stallion.

As dumb and determined as they were, they were sure to meet, nay collide, in the middle, in the beloved courts of his mansion where there was bound to be some jousting, some Javelin tossing, and some Saab-ing.  Well, maybe not sobbing but at least bitter regret.  They were bound to come to blows and his gardens, with their Leafs, would be trampled!  His precious Lotus!  His stalwart Laurel!  His beautiful Daffodils!

"GUARDS!  GUARDS!  To The Courtyards!" they were Herald-ed.

The guards tried their best, but before they could get there, a Sonic boom resonated throughout the stone castle walls.  Pontiac and LeBaron had boisterously collided in the middle.

The chief had fallen, sprawled, legs and arms akimbo, one foot still hung up in its stirrup.  And the royalist was face down in the dirt, spread-Eagle.

Royal LeBaron dared to open one eye while he kept the other squinted shut in the mud.  To his chagrin there scurrying for cover was a Beetle.  Seemed like he'd been having a Fiesta with some of his friends like their cousins the ants in their own world of trails, burrows, and carrying away of morsels. The Bug gave a final dirt dive and was gone.

Curious about the goings on in the Kings gardens, a Falcon flew closer and dared to light upon Chief Pontiac's helmet, peck, peck, pecking, making his upper visor ping.  "What's in there?  Got any Hornets?  Got any worms?  Got any food?"  Peck, peck, peck.  "Helloooooooo....."

The Pinto was unsettled with his master flat on his back and something hanging from his underbelly staying his movements.  One shoed hoof was stuck in the fishpond.  Swimming by, the Barracuda thought he looked tasty!  The Cobra on the far bank was thinking similar thoughts!  The Pinto wanted free.  He could think of nothing else and began making frenzied circles in the verdant grass; tethered by the chief's foot, round and round and round he went making any onlooker giggle in merriment.  Round, and round, he went, snort and flail, round and round, and snort.

The Mustang had trotted away not realizing at first that his rider was absent.  When the Zephyr wind hit his bare back, it gave him pause.  He stopped, he turned, he looked around.  There like a Mirage lay LeBaron face planted in Mother Earth.  With an equestrian snort of his full-maned head, like any good and Cavalier servant, Mustang went back, bared his horsey teeth, nipped LeBaron with a strong jaw grip, picked him up, and carried him away like a cat with a squirmy kitten, "Wherever I go, Yugo."  Here, too, sightseers could point and chuckle.

Into the eastern meadow Mustang and LeBaron returned, to Tahoe, meaning big waters, to the lake and its waterfall, to spend their remaining days lazing in the sun, and grazing in the grass.   "...  like a couple of Smart asses", thought King Mercury, who was Fit to be tied over his mangled strangled topiaries and climbing vines.

"Where'd the other one go?  Where's that Indian?" he bellowed to the guards.  The guards, with one Accord, though convulsed with laughter, were able to Valiant-ly point to the western woods.  "He's a runner!  On the cobbled road.  There!  We've got a runner!  A Road-runner!"

Mercury grumbled, "Good riddance!",  as he put his Cutlass in its sheath and retired to his Imperial chambers.  Emptying his pockets onto a Charger, he was further Spark-ed,

"We need a wily coyote for that feather-crested cuckoo!"

Darling Hubby About Died

Yep, if you read that title you'll know that Darling Hubby about died yesterday.   Yep.  He about died ... from laughing.

Let's start with a couple-three jokes.  You all know that old joke, "What looks good on a lawyer?  A doberman pincher"?

And then there's "What looks good on hippies? Flames." 

And, "What looks good on a dog?  Sandpaper, it's rough-rough!"

Ha, ha, ha.  Now, for the background story.  We bought a used washer-dryer set from a neighbor man.  The dryer stayed on the truck since we were gonna turn around and re-sell it.  The washer had to be unloaded.  

The ground was snow covered, there was sneaky ice underneath the snow.  No help was to be found...one son at work, 1 son too infirm, 3 sons out of town.  Washer's aren't too heavy so we decided between the two of us we could wrangle it to the tailgate, then lift it with our hands on its bottom edge, and walk it to the landing of the deck, thus avoiding three steps.  So far so good.

I was thinking, "This is doable.  It really isn't too heavy.  I'll stand here on this side of the landing while he gets himself and his side maneuvered up and over."

I shouldn't have thought.  Many times when I was younger I'd start a sentence with, "Dad, I was thinking....."  and he'd say, "Maybe you'd better quit thinking."  ROFL.

So, there I was two hands gripping the edge of a metal white washing machine, the little quarter inch lip cutting into my hands, my mind thinking, my body waiting, and my feet standing  in snow, when it happened.  My right foot slide forward!

Yep.  I'd lost it.  

That washing machine leaned my way.  (Do slow motion film unwinding here.)   A white square block came upon me and was blocking my view of anything.  My back was in the snow.  My bad foot was bracing the base of the washer.  My two hands were up and spread apart on either edge of the washer. 

It seemed to be hanging in midair.  DH was pulling in the opposite direction and extremely upset, "Are you okay?"  And I was.  I was fine.  I was laughing at my stupidity in NOT wearing shoes that would grip in the snow.  

He jumped off the landing and rescued me.  

Like I said, I was fine, and we finished "walking" it into the house.  In case you're wondering, I've not suffered the slightest thing.  No bruises, no soreness, and my foot never hurt.  Wonderful!  Miracle!

Now, that time has passed, it's a funny story.   Like "The Day The Circus Came To Town" this was "The Day The Washer Came Down." LOL!

And the story gets told many times that day and the next.  

To hear DH tell it, it's quite the joke.  Like the one about the neighbor, "What would look good on your neighbor?  A mask."

He's now asking family and friends, with an conspiratal twinkling eye to the men,

"Do you know what looks good on your wife?

A Whirlpool!"

Ba-Da-Boom, Ba-Da-Bing!

3 Quips, Hubby's Quick

3 Quick Quips

Me talking to John:  "I can't find my glasses."

Being silly, I bent to bestow him a kiss, saying,  "You're getting more handsome by the minute."

His wit isn't to be outdone, his response?  "You'll never find them lady!  Away with them!  Gone!"

********

At the local hardware store we were needing help, when a tall, dark, and handsome associate came to assist us, "What can I do for you, Miss?"

I laughed and turned to hubby, "Miss!  He called me Miss!"

John's quick reply?  "Yah, cause you're standing next to an old geezer."

*********

Darling Hubby and son and I were driving along scouring the business numbers on the buildings trying to find a flea market in Anderson that we'd never been to before.  On google maps it was called The Hope Chest.

DH, darling hubby, keeps calling it Toy Box.  "No, John, it's The Hope Chest, not Toy Box" 

He laughs and tells our son. "Keep driving.  We're not going through women's things in a cedar box!"