Cicada Karaoke

UPDATE: We are back in the heat again--forcast for this coming Tuesday says 98°F with calm winds and dead birds dropping out of the trees. *grimace* It just takes me so long to do a posting that I overlap myself!


From Last Week:

The heatwave has finally broken, with daytime temps and humidity lower at last. It's been a gradual shift over the past week, but cold air hit my face when I opened the glass door to let the cat out this morning. COLD!

I had become accustomed to wincing miserably as the hot, wet, Eau 'd Sewage Treatment Plant air slapped my face each morning. The little dials inside the electric meter out back of the house had gone "SPROING!" and scattered miniscule metal parts all over the inside of the protective glass dome. (Not to worry; the electric company will be able to figure out what to charge.) Everyone I bitched to commiserated with described the same set of heat-related physical symptoms: lethargy, listlessness, digestive problems, depressed mood. It seemed we had slid off New Jersey and plopped down into Hell without even the opportunity of a fair trial.

But then we had a few thunderstorms and things began to cool off, the daytime/nighttime temperatures going down a few degrees each day over the past seven days. Early morning today must have been in the 60's--a little promise of autumn to come.

After a busy day, and when I finally got a chance, I took Daisy the Terrier out to the back yard to chase after the frisbee. Daisy only weighs about 25 pounds, but she leaves deep ruts in the yard with her hind paws as she charges off after a thrown toy. She's solid muscle and lightening-quick, using all her senses to catch or track her toys. It's wonderful to see a little terrier at work; their speed, agility and comic determination always amaze me.

Daisy likes to "hide" her toys rather than return them straight to me. We had a rash of huge spiders out in the yard a couple of summers ago (webs a good three feet in diameter), so I'm careful when walking under trees to get Daisy's hidden whiffle ball or frisbee. I got rather traumatized by a particularly large spider while searching for puppy's whiffle ball one evening. She had spun her web out of a pine tree and across to my clothesline and I almost ran into her web headfirst. I looked up just in time to see her perched on her intricate construction, two feet from my face. Talk about a potential screaming, hysterical back yard ballet!

Now, Mr. Pseudonym and I are gentle, ex-hippie type people, and we don't like to go around randomly stomping on other living things just because they don't look like Bambi. But Mizz Spider was the type of woman who could make the blood drain out of a very large, muscular dockworker's face. She was at least and inch and a half long, with a full, ponderous body and long striped legs.

We tolerated her presence with trembling good humor until several of her sisters decided to set up shop at crucial points on the front and back of the house. They liked to move their webs a couple of feet over from the previous night's web each time they spun, so we never knew what we might be running into when leaving the house. We had taken to peering fearfully out of our doors before attempting exit to see who was merrily spinning her way into our nightmares that evening. Reluctantly, but before they could lay their eggs for next year, we wiped out the whole community one evening with a can of Raid and a broom.

We had seen this same type of spider adorning several stories of a hotel we stayed at on one of our vacations, two dozen or so of their giant webs spread across the outside of the hotel building like patches of angel's hair on a Christmas tree. We were not anxious to host our own "Jump Out In Front of the Humans & Scare Them Into Shrieking Temporary Insanity" workshop at our home the following summer. Even after the slaughter, I still wouldn't go out by myself in the evening to exercise the dog for the rest of the summer; Mr. Pseudonym had to tolerate my whimpering and hanging onto his arm while he inspected the trees with a flashlight before Daisy and I began to play.

Cicadas, however, are another story. For some reason, they don't scare me. They are big insects, with a no-nonsense exoskeleton and disturbing noisemaking capabilities, but they just don't seem that threatening to me. They don't bite or sting (good thing for us!), content to suck on plant juice and sing their shrill, grating, intrusive arias up in the trees each evening. During daylight hours, they will occasionally fly into us by accident, with a loud "THWAP" as they hit the space between our eyes and fall to the ground insensate. Since cicadas are, as I said, BIG and prehistoric looking, the thwapped individual will usually look down at the stunned insect on the ground and immediately begin screaming, running around and waving his/her arms wildly above the head. "EEEEEEEEK! EEEEEEEEK! EEEEEEEEK!" we will exclaim. But there really is no reason to do this.

Cicadas are actually quite beautiful, with the many species varying in color and size. Their characteristic ear-piercing "song" results from the male cidada rubbing his special abdominal "tymbals" together to attract a mate. Most cicadas have multiple-year life cycles. There are "annual" and "periodical" cicadas, with life cycles, respectively, of two to eight years and 13 to 17 years. So, while there are usually some species of cicadas around each year, some of these lil' sap suckers arrive in great numbers every 13 to 17 years. (See Periodical Cicadas, http://hydrodictyon.eeb.uconn.edu/projects/cicada/NA/Magicicada/index.html

It is amazing to me that these insects spend all these years underground, sucking on tree roots and going through several stages of development, only to emerge as adults so infrequently. Junket once found a molted exoskeleton from a cicada and ran around after her sisters, scaring them with it for a few days. She was so proud of herself: "I named him STING ASS," she explained. Junket is indeed mischievous.

107 In The Shade

I had to reschedule Sprinkles' and Pokey's vet appointments today. The SHared unInspected Taxi has no air-conditioning, and I just couldn't see packing ice around the rats and taking them out in this weather for just a routine check-up. They can go next Monday evening, when Mr. Pseudonym's well-chilled little silver Civic will be available.

The shaded thermometer outside the back door now reads 100◦F, which feels like 105◦F to 107◦F when we factor in the New Jersey humidity, or roughly meaning "you're FRIED, Pineys!" Under these conditions, the New Jersey State Bird has been known to swarm out in choking clouds, even at mid-morning, from the low-lying foliage. The cloud then heads straight for the average NJ housewife at her clothesline. Within five minutes, there is left only a heap of collapsed skin and bone in a housedress, a couple of clothespins and a cigarette poking out from between its clenched teeth.

Junket and I are gratefully hunkered down in the cool darkness of Pseudonym Manor, two wall-unit G.E. air-conditioners straining under the load, confused animals gathered at our feet. Daisy the Terrier doesn't understand why we can't go play frisbee; the cats are staring listlessly at the sliding glass door which lets out to the back yard, wondering who will stalk the birds in their absence. Solid food doesn't go down easily, but lies at the bottom of my stomach, complaining bitterly.

An old friend once told me she watches certain films on very hot days. Her favorite cool-down film is Waterworld, which I have never seen in its entirety. (If I'm going to watch a hosed-down leading man, it ain't gonna be Kevin Costner; I'm more of a Mel-Gibson-in-his-tight-leather-pants, c. Mad Max, kind of girl.) When the temperature exceeds 95◦F, I like to watch Fargo, It's A Wonderful Life, The Day After Tomorrow or Smilla's Sense of Snow. Well, that last one sort of irritates me with its implausibility; Mr. Pseudonym just bought it so he could look at Julia Ormond. Mr. Pseudonym also likes to look at Audrey Tautou. Both of these ladies look somewhat like I did in my youth, which is of some small comfort. Well into having completed my sixth decade in this body, my skin is a bit rumpled and careworn these days.

It's OK, though--I've given up makeup, for the most part, and J.Q. seems to find the crosshatched wrinkles on my face to be of considerable interest. I still hold him when he's sucking down his milk or juice, even though he's been capable of holding his own bottle for quite some time. He stares into my eyes, pats my face, tries to stick his fingers up my nose or rips off my glasses and giggles while driddling milk out of the corner of his mouth and down his neck. We only have these few precious minutes before he flings the empty aside and chases off on all fours after the cat or the nearest available electric outlet. He's tall, solid and wiry at 15 months, and he doesn't believe in holding still for much these days. My babies didn't either, and they've run all the way into a time in which I cannot comfort or protect them.

Oh, never mind me. It's just the heat. I need to brave the baking sun just long enough to get to an icy-cold Target and buy myself some toys.

Or maybe not. It's just not worth the stress. I'll pop in my Oceanscapes DVD (fishies, foamy waves, coral reefs, blue-green coolness, tranquil tinkly music), make some iced tea and let the day wind down.

Pet Cemetery

Mr. Pseudonym and I moved to Inalienable Heights in 1983, when our oldest child was not quite two years old. We bought a small rancher on a big lot, thinking the baby would enjoy tearing around the large yard and that our family would remain small.

Wrong! Two more kiddies arrived within three years of the first, the endocrinologist having found out what was wrong with me. So we found ourselves a family of five, stuffed in a family-of-four house, with several of us having a deep longing for pets. (Not Mr. Pseudonym; the only thing he has a deep longing for is the remote control.)

The first pet was a kitten for #1 Daughter. Despite a few moments of hysteria when daughter was informed that Mom had mistaken the gender of kitty and that he would have to be named Jessie instead of Jessica, Jess turned out to be a much-beloved pet. He met his untimely end on a busy cross street a mere year or so after we got him. I had to go claim his body, shovel it into a garbage bag and store it in the neighbor's garage until Mr. Pseudonym came home and hacked out a grave under the giant oak tree at the northeast corner of the Pseudonym Manor estate.

I'd had previous experience with hacking out kitty graves when my neighbor's Snowball crawled under a shrub the year before and gave up her ninth. Kathy and I had to get the job done before her two boys came home from school and saw Snowball's deflated remains, so we set to work with vigor. Problem was, our back yards were mostly crabgrass, clay and tree roots. We tried digging a grave on her southwest corner, but the roots were just too thick. We both worked feverishly at her northeast corner, and we managed a shallow depression just big enough to hold the black plastic Hefty bag. We flung Snowball's bagged remains into the poor hole, shoveled dirt over the top and tried to tamp the dirt hill down with our feet. But every footstep set the grave to undulating since neither of us had thought to let the excess air out of the Hefty bag. We stood there, panting, in 90 degree heat, staring at each other. Kathy leaned on her shovel, gagged once and lowered her head. "Well, look, Kath," I said, "unless it rains real hard or Spot decides to investigate the interesting aroma, it will probably be OK." Kathy gagged again, and we piled a few fallen tree limbs and assorted sticks and rocks on top of the rippling grave.

Jessie went under a bit easier, thanks to Mr. Pseudonym's exemplary digging skills. And he even made a little tombstone for Jess out of pressure-treated wood engraved with puss' name and dates. We got our Onyx from the local shelter the same day because I do things like that for no apparent reason. She was six months old then and is still alive today, some fifteen years later. She just doesn't look too good these days.

A long string of pets and random animal corpses have been interred under the oak tree since those early days. We had to expand our pet cemetery out from the oak and into the surrounding yard over the years for lack of space. There was a snake found flattened on the road; a few heat-exhausted birds; two or three cicada exoskeletons; Beaureguard the guinea pig; Caramel and Lucifer, the hamsters; Uncle Blackie the fish (after a lovely, candlelit, public viewing of his cadaver on a cardboard coffin/catafalque made by #3 Daughter), Creamsickle and Alex (also fish); Rumply the Brave Stray Cat (we only had her for a year--she was old but very determined and personable); our first dog Roxy, who lived for fourteen years; and, most recently, #2 Daughter's pet rat Nutmeg and #3 Daughter's pet rats Snowflake, Sniffy and Hambone.

To be truthful, when the kids were little, a few "bad" fish went down the toilet to "live with the other bad fish in the sewers" after chewing the fins off their sisters. Recently, Floppy, sister of Flippy and Flappy, was found in a mummified state where we keep the fish food, so she went down the toilet too; it was just more expedient. In addition to the two less-adventuresome fish and Onyx the cat, we currently have cats Jean, Peanut and Buju, Daisy the Terrier and pet rats Pokey and Sprinkles. (Pokey is my thumbnail picture; she's fat and sleek from her daily milk and cookies snack at exercise time.)

The old oak tree was here when we moved in; as a matter of fact, the old oak tree was probably here 100 years before we moved in. And there was an old maple on the other side of our lot. But Mr. Pseudonym and I had planted everything else in the yard ourselves--the burning bushes, viburnums, Norway maples, tulip tree, two lines of white pines along the east and west fences, two Japanese maples, the bridal wreath and, most recently, a little hydrangea bush which serves as a memorial for our Roxy. All of our plantings were little when they first went in, and now several of the trees tower above us and shelter the yard and house. They will all come down, eventually, but we probably won't be here to see them change. They will all go back to the Earth to begin again, just as our little furry (and scaly) friends have gone back to the Earth.

Mr. Pseudonym and I are getting older and older by the day - our children are all grown, and we sometimes think about retiring to another state when the time comes. We no longer need to worry about uprooting the kids from their neighborhood, there are more peaceful places to live and our current hometown is too loud and smells funny. I daydream a lot about Virginia, or the New England states, or even the ancestral home in Ohio. But then I step off my back landing and feel the life vibrating there: life we planted, life our kids climbed and carved their initials into, life in the air and flitting around above the grass, life we helped send on to its transformation, life we are only dimly aware exists. It's all out there, rollicking around in a small square of the Garden State, lifeforms too numerous to be counted.

And it's life that gives us a sense of experience and emotion. The scent of an early summer morning, the echo of my children's laughter, the memory of butterflies flitting around their wading pool, red tomatoes hanging from tall plants, squirrels swinging back and forth at the top of Mr. Pseudonym's little experimental cornfield, tiny blue robin-egg shells, thunderstorms that failed to wake the little children, the smell of digging in the earth, the soft brush ends of white pine branches, birdsong, dew on spider webs, ants forming a line into the house to get at spilled juice. I wonder if I can really leave this place and these memories some day.

Some of our pets could have had better lives, and I think of this often. No excuses offered, but I didn't always fully understand my moral obligation to treat all living things as I would wish to be treated. I didn't always see them as my little brothers and sisters. I didn't always see that all life nourishes all life, that we are all of the same substance and that we will all swirl through the life cycles of Earth continuously for as long as She exists. It takes living through times of "birth" and times of "death" to understand our part in the big picture. No animal in my care now ever wants for food, a comfortable house and a respectful, loving relationship with his/her human companions.

We will meet again, all of us. There's so much work to be done.

--Revised 7-01-06--

PANIC (or other things just as amusing)

Waking up from a dream of my parents; they were walking like mobile wax figures, expressionless yet somehow disapproving. A new house with many rooms--each room with one or two washers/dryers and piles of dirty clothing. I'm telling Mom I'll make lunch for Dad. He's ill and old. She goes off with one of my brothers. But it's Christmas, and there's very little time before company descends like locusts with a yen for candied sweet potatoes. I have to run out and get presents for everyone, but the house isn't cleaned, and the turkey is lying on the kitchen counter, naked and pale...

Start down the corridor... something's wrong. I'm awake, but not walking a straight line, and I keep scraping my arms on the bookshelves. Thirsty...terribly thirsty. Can't breathe through my nose... and the dream pops back in for a few seconds: didn't set the long tables, white tablecloths, who's supposed to cook the turkey? I'm falling forward...

Wait. I'm facing the wall. Again. Fell back asleep while walking. Well, at least this time I'm not waking up facing a wall and then turning around to see Mr. Pseudonym facing me. I just can't bear that strange, Christ-Kicked-Over-A-Hurdle look on his face. Maybe Junket will make coffee. Pain's running up and down my spine in cruel waves. Go back...get medicine. Junket's asking what's wrong. Don't want to talk. Thirsty, so thirsty. Can't breathe. Air's too heavy - too stale. Junket's ready to talk agenda: what time is mammogram appt?, is Dad still going for his foot x-ray tonight?, do I still need the car?, if I need the car, can I be ready to take her to work in fifteen minutes? Just sit down for a minute and take deep breaths...

Voices - first of the herd of company - and I'm not dressed yet...not even showered. What presents was I supposed to buy? Why does house look so torn apart? Who's going to do all of this wash? Why is the turkey lying on counter like a sodomized backwoods trail hiker? Falling again...

Something's wrong. Just breathe. What do I need? Junket's asking what's wrong again. Phone's ringing. Find remote control - maybe t.v. will divert from pain. Click remote control...click, click, click... . Junket's saying Mr. Pseudonym wants to know if his foot x-ray is still on for tonight. Wave of guilt (was supposed to have arranged for referral to be sent to radiologist on Wednesday - forgot - oh, SHIT! SHIT!)

Waving away phone at Junket's exasperated, "It's DAD!" pronouncement. I really don't care if it's Jesus inviting me out to the diner for steak and eggs and an x-ray of hubby's foot with his eyes when we get back to the house. I gotta go stand on the back steps and look at the sky for awhile. Just BREATHE!!!

This is a bad day, as so many of them have been recently. Trouble sleeping, trouble waking, physical torment, nightmares, guilt, telephones ringing, lost hours... ah, GOD! Junket has to call Kathy, our friend and next-door neighbor, a middle-aged lady who is also at a stuck-point in life. Neither of us can get away from our increasingly-distressing family situations. My girls are breaking free of their "this is all I deserve" relationships, and I feel pain when my kids feel pain. My neighbor cares for an end-stage Alzheimer's mother without much help or understanding from her all-male family.

Kathy flies over in record time, having loaded her mother onto the daycare bus just minutes before. I've stood by her for the past sixteen months or so, since she's been providing care for her mother entirely by herself. She's done the best she can with the situation, Alzheimer's being almost as cruel as money-hungry relatives. Her sister - who had shared caregiving responsibilities with Kathy ever since their father's death three years prior - waited until she could legally get her sticky hands on her share of their father's estate and then, on the magic, legal date, bailed out on caring for their mother. The sister screeched up to the Heritage Dairy store where they traded off Mom every other night, yanked their mother out of her car and shoved her into the back of Kathy's car, yelling, "I hate the f***ing bitch! I don't care WHAT you do with her!"

So, I became Kathy's sister, because if your own family bails on you, then you have to make a new family. Kathy needed a sister, I never had a sister - VOILA! I got a spare Mom out of the deal, my own mother having died in 1995. The spare Mom smiles at me, holds my hand, and speaks in long, rambling, rhyming sentences about dogs and her father and little kids being cute and helpless. Even in end-stage, curse-word shouting, nose-picking, crayon-munching, milk-spilling, cell-phone hiding, talk-to-mirrors, bead-playing, trashcan-browsing, rawhide dog-bone licking, crap in your giant diaper Alzheimer's, Marie is kinder, gentler and more thoughtful than many "normal" adults I know. And Kathy and I have grown much closer in the past sixteen months. We raised our kids together, but now we share things we never touched on in over 20 years of friendship. And when one of us is in trouble, the other is right at her side.

Kathy makes me stand on the back steps and breathe the cool morning air. She pats me on the shoulder and tells me it's just Panic (which I already figured out), makes me a cup of tea and takes over the world for me when I can't think one more thought. I'm so grateful to have her.

Day 2 With J.Q.

I don't know why I agreed to spend two days with little J.Q. in the first place. I know how my body feels after spending one day with the lil' devil: wide band of gnawing pain across lower back; hot poker twinge in left, right or both knees; weakened, worn-down muscles from lugging a dense, highly-compressed hominid around for 10 or so hours; T5, my constant vertebra companion (pictured above), sending an intense, two-inch wide tingling sensation from himself to my right underarm and then on around to my right breast nipple; a defeated, demoralized mental state caused by flecks of dried feces on exposed skin, chewed shoelaces, several small bite marks on my face and chest, Gerber Stage 2 Sweet Potatoes & Apples smeared on my eyeglasses and a long, jiggling strand of booger hanging from the hair at the nape of my neck... .

I could go on, but in truth it's all worth it. It's wonderful to see that crooked little grin when J.Q. first sees his Grandma Priscilla and to see those little arms shoot out for me to pick him up. Those cool, solid little legs. His rose-petal-soft skin. The smell of his silky, soft hair as he nestles under my chin. His muttering, "NaNa," in this case meaning Grandma, but also meaning hungry ("na-na-NA-NA-NA-NA!") or banana ("NA-NA! NA-NA!"). His recognition and delight in our special baby games - rolling the ball, patty-cake, little piggies, so-big, peek-a-boo. His craftiness, his silliness, his determination. His doll-like physical appearance. He's just the sweetest little thing, and it's so, so easy to forget my own physical limitations when asked to put in a some extra time with the little guy.

So, when #1 Daughter, Mrs. Thumbscre.ws, asked me for an extra day this past Wednesday, I agreed. After all, it was just a one-time thing as she switched over to a 5-day work schedule; next week J.Q.'s usual daycare could take him for the extra day. I was with J.Q. every Thursday anyway, and #1 Daughter's new schedule would put her at home sixty to ninety minutes earlier than usual, so WHAT THE SMOKIN' HELL? More time with baby, RIGHT?

Wrong. While J.Q. was the most adorable, pleasant little guy on Wednesday, he had a different agenda in mind for Thursday. I didn't sleep well on Wednesday night and was grateful on Thursday morning for the little coffeemaker #1 Daughter had installed up in my room at her house. Even the Brown Marmorated Surprise East-Coast Visitors clinging to my bedroom windows seemed to be moving a little sluggishly Thursday morning. I had two cups of coffee down before the first of them lumbered over to ask for a sip.

I thudded down the steps slowly on swollen legs and took the handoff from Mr. Thumbscre.ws on his way out the door. J.Q. seemed a little sluggish, too. His "Hi, Grandma!" grin was a little shorter and less enthusiastic than on Wednesday, and he objected strongly to being put down on the floor while I made his bot-bot. Matter of fact, he objected strongly to my doing anything but holding him for most of the morning. I kept J.Q. up until after lunch before attempting to put him down for his nap. We played upstairs for a long time before we went outside in the stroller to be rolled back and forth and back and forth, staring at the big tree until he conked out.

J.Q. went out just in time. T5 had been at me for some time, bitching steadily through the morning hours and then ramping up to bullying nastiness by 1:00pm. "Look, Priscilla, you idiot! I can just hunker down and squeeze that disc all the way out to your f***ing liver if you want!" (Priscilla has stopped using the F word - T5 has not.) "Now, I want some morphine, an ice cream sandwich and to sit down and watch Court TV, so put that brat in the crib and let's get some TUBE TIME IN!"

Baby was in a better mood after his nap, and he decided to stage some races with his stuffed dachshund and get Grandma hoppin' as well! I'll let J.Q. explain his favorite Activities for a Thursday Afternoon (When You A Baby!)

Hi, babies! Me J.Q. Me CUTE! Gwamma say so!
Dis how me keep Gwamma busy so she not get bored and take nap.
You twy dis wiff YOUR Gwamma, too!
But not twy wiff MaMa/DaDa - dey get MEAN!

• Chase Cat. It hard not go HEE-HEE-HEE when we get Kitty in corner, but if we waff too much, Gwamma will hear and get Kitty tail out of our mouf before we can BITE IT. Ha-ha-HAHAHAHAHA!
  


• Take Diapey Away from Gwamma. Dis work well wiff a pee-pee diapey, too, but Gwamma not get scared wike wiff poo-poo diapey. Just when Gwamma is open second tab on diapey, stick wittle hand under our butt, gwab first tab, yank diapey stwait up and pwetend we COWBOY and diapey is LASSO! If we fast cowboy, Gwamma get face full of pee or poo, and she skweam and skweam and skweam! HA-HA-HA-HAAAAA-HAAAAAAAAAAAAA! Dis one never get old!
  


• Pee in Gwamma Face. Always good for waff! Gotta give old bat kwedit, dough, she getting faster wiff cover up Mr. Winkles before she get compweetwee soak. HEE! Pee-pee FUN! Poo-poo FUNNER!
  


• Stuff Peas Up Nose. Why dey get so mad? It not dere nose... It OUR nose! Maybe we need get a few peas out for snack in case we get hungwy beefore supper! WOTTEN GWOWN-UPS!
  


• Spit Cottage Cheese All Over Gwamma. P'tui, p'tui, p'tui! Me spit food on you-ee! HA-HAAA-HAH! Wait...Gwamma! NO! NO! No washkwoff! Me not done! REAWY! ME HUNGWY!!!
  
  
• GWAB! Gwab EVWYFING! Gwab weemote contwols, magazeems, Gwamma gwasses, toity papoo, icky buggies, folded waundwy, cords, dirt on fwoor, dvd's, table-kwoff, cups, pwates, ovver people food, cabinet handoos, baby powdoo, shoewaces, kitty food, toity bwush, newspapoo, banana, gwandfovver kwokk, Gwampop muff-tash, pen, kitty, doggie, bwanches on twees, wight switches, noses, EVWYFING! Gwamma go, "NO, J.Q.!!! NO! J.Q., NO! FTOP, J.Q.! FTOP!" Ha-ha-ha-HAA-HAAAA-HA-HA-HAAAA-HA! Oh, and stuff EVWYFING in mouf! Or up nose!
  
  
• Me Add More Soon. Me haffa put Gwamma down for nap now. She fussy.

Oh, CRAAAAAAAAP!

Not AGAIN! I just knocked over a bottle of Diet Coke, and it's run all over my desk, meaning 4-7" of paperwork that should have been taken care of long since but never was. This is two days after I dropped two separate bottles of Diet Coke on the kitchen table, which was also gaily festooned with Stuff That Any Normal Person Would Have Put Away Three Days Ago. I must hang my head in wretched misery.

No...wait...I can't hang my head, either. There's been various slimes dripping out of my nose for a few weeks now, and I don't want any of it glueing up my keyboard. I've sprayed lots of stuff up my nostrils and then flung my head back proudly to acquaint my sinister sinuses with the deliverer of their retribution ("Take THIS, you plugged-up little bastard chambers!): NeoSynephrine (didn't work), 4-Way (didn't work), Sinex (didn't work), Saline Spray (didn't work), Flonase (didn't work), SinuKick (didn't work), Muco-Rooter (didn't work), SneezeRite (didn't work), Flapper-Zapper (didn't work), Catarrgh-Not (not worked), Son-of-a-Sinus (didn't work), Kill-Goo (didn't work), and Booger-B-Gone (didn't work).

The only thing that gives me even sporadic relief is crying. So I pop in a real sad movie a couple of times a day. Suggested titles for nasal disgorgement (temporary):

Jersey Girl (hokey, yes, but effective at times)
Million Dollar Baby (Mr. Pseudonym almost had to take me to the ER over this one)
Mystic River (it is beyond my comprehension how as fine an actor as Sean Penn could have at one time married that shallow, self-possessed, pointy-titted, bleached-out, first-generation trailer trash removed, licentious, vulgar, rattle-voiced, fabricated, hyped-up, ugly, rotten piece of fly-blown dead cow meat.) (but that's just my opinion.)
Dead Man Walking (shall I repeat myself? or do you get my drift?)
The Deer Hunter (it ain't about Bambi's momma!)
Bambi (they shot Bambi's MOMMA, for God's sake!)
Philadelphia (watch this while folding laundry; you're gonna need more material to blow your nose on than a lil ol' box of Kleenex!)

I could go on, but I don't even watch these movies in reality! Cause I don't like to cry unless I absolutely have to, and life hands us too many absolutely-have-to occasions for tears, if you ask me. Laughing hysterically will also temporarily clean out the nasal passages (and put a scare into the more tenacious rubber cement sinusial encampment), and for this there is only one penultimate movie scene: Apopka the Snake Man from Ernest Saves Christmas. Do the research; you'll thank me next time your nose is ambushed.

It Was The Best of Mother's Days, It Was The Worst of Mother's Days...

Holidays have never been my favorite days--too many sad memories going back too many years. But any Sunday when all the kids are here--and now J.Q. too--turns out well in the end. Sunday dinner was way too much work for my special day, so we ordered out from a new bbq place we recently found. Their ribs are almost as good as Mr. Pseudonym's, and the New Jersey Pulled Turkey Buzzard, I predict, will revolutionize smokehouse cuisine in the United States.

It was wonderful watching J.Q. gnawing his first rib bone. He didn't know it was something to eat at first, but he was sitting on Aunt Sar's lap and observed her voracious rib attack, so he figured things out and couldn't be separated from his own greasy wand for quite some time after that.

Daisy the Terrier was circling the table with moist, longing eyes during dinner, as usual. She was given handouts, also as usual, and was happily running back and forth between the yard (prime rib bone burying ground) and the dining table for half an hour or so.

J.Q. was finally washed up and crawling around on the kitchen floor. Dinner was finished, and leftovers were being put away. No one was eating, and Daisy wasn't begging, but she took exception, for some reason, to the baby crawling near the table and knocked him over with a sudden burst of growling and snapping. J.Q. was frightened and crying; we were all upset, even though Daisy is a small dog. There wasn't a mark on J.Q., and I don't think the dog actually attempted biting, but it was still awful. Daisy was banished to the back yard for a while and seemed suitably ashamed when she came in, but we will be doubly vigilant over the baby-dog interaction around here from now on.

On a happier note, Priscilla made out like a BANDIT this year! Lots of flowers (roses and impatiens) from the younger daughters, a Tea For One pot and Belgian chocolates from the oldest and a Flip-It floor cleaner from Mr. Pseudonym. PLUS, my birthday is just three days away, so I may rake in more plunder later in the week. I get one week of greed per year and enjoy it thoroughly!

I asked Himself to get me the floor cleaner because I'm convinced that the proper array of housecleaning gizmos will eventually yield me a clean house. I have a traditional vacuum, a Clorox Ready-Mop, a Shark cordless 9.6v hand vac, a RoboMaid Robotic Sweeping Machine from Europe, every possible cleaning powder/solution available and now my dry/wet hard floor cleaning machine. Just one problem, though--my kitchen floor always looks as if a lunch wagon has crashed into a cage full of cats.

I've never gotten the hang of keeping a clean house (or even a reasonably neat house) (or even a slightly cluttered house) (or even a house that will look better when the Mrs. thereof is released from the institution for the criminally insane). I feel terrible about this, but about the best cleaning method I've thus far come up with, after 35 years of marriage, is to keep the vacuum cleaner, a bottle of Windex, a can of furniture polish and some cleaning rags prominently displayed about my living room so that, if anyone comes over, it will look like I've just started to clean. I might actually get away with this if it weren't for that heavy layer of greasy dust covering the vacuum cleaner.

At least I used to have the kids to blame for the condition of my house. But now they're all off on their own. Maybe it's all the pets (Daisy The Disreputable Terrier, cats: Onyx, Jean, Peanut & Buju, rats: Pokey & Sprinkles, fish: Flippy, Floppy & Flapjack), maybe it's my ADD, maybe it's a time warp of some sort - I just don't know. But I am sorely ashamed of this hovel. *sigh*

Gotta run and read my Flip-It manual. Happy Mother's Day to all, and to all a Good Night!

I'm IN! I'm IN!!

I'm IN!! I'm Bleedin' IN!

Months have gone by, as they usually do when one approaches old age faster than a fart, without my posting anything. I tend to get wrapped up in troubles--mostly my childrens' troubles--and I forget promises I've made to myself. Promises to do something just for Priscilla: promises to accept reality, promises to simplify my environment, promises to clarify my mental process, promises to BE HERE NOW, as we used to say when we were hippies and read all that eastern philosophy written by fat, bearded westerners with the stench of quarter-pounders wafting out from their beards.

I continued to read my three daughters' posts with delight. Despite their interminable thrashings through young adulthood, no one can say that these little women are not bright, and funny beyond belief, and beautiful as Arabian thoroughbreds. Well, realistically, gentle readers of these musings would have no way of knowing my girls are beautiful; I mean, they could be as ugly as viperfish. So we will have to take my word for it: they have trails of drooling, tumescent males following behind them on most excursions. Mr. Pseudonym and I, just to witness the amusing spectacle of the male reaction to something of beauty, stay quite a few steps behind them when we are out as a family. And then we whimper a lot and wring our hands and sigh pitifully.

My girls have repeatedly urged me to balance out their blogflections with those of the previous generation. I would be able to offer buckets of sage wisdom on varying subjects of interest to those of the vaginaed persuasion who regularly visit the girls' blogs, having personally (myself) experienced dysfunction in my family of origin, depression, the Seven Year Itch, addiction, the Therapeutic Process of Continuous Co-Pay, infertility, becoming an older parent, multiple female offspring parenting, turning 40, multiple teenaged female offspring parenting (and accompanying gentleman callers) (!!!SCREAM!!!), caregiving parents who have slipped on the banana peel (metaphorically speaking), loss and grief, turning 50, young adult parenting, the wedding of the first child, the birth of the first grandchild (there is no adequate description for how this feels), the acquisition of pet rats and the inevitable onset of sliding on one's ass* toward the senior years.

I didn't blog, however. I sat with my children, argued, hugged, listened, fed, cried, yelled, gave money, comforted, annoyed, made tea, lectured, cried a lot more, reinforced, changed direction, celebrated, meddled, backed off, let go and grabbed back for more hugs. It just didn't occur to me to write about the events of the past few months or the past five+ decades. There was just too much to do, too much to worry about and too many conversations to have with Mr. Pseudonym and the kids.

Then, yesterday, I went to the doctor. I was feeling decidedly snotty and out of sorts, but just going in for a routine check of my meds and sausage ankles. My doctor, a kind man who likes to help his patients, was delighted to see mucous and a red throat in a patient whose spine has been turning to poorly-glued broken china for the past ten or so years. "Yep, Priscilla," he intoned while emerging from the samples closet, "you've got a BAD, BAD infection! You have to take this medicine right away and go to bed!" So I limped out of his office with a brown paper sack full of antibiotics, the name "Mucinex" written on a prescription form and feeling much sicker than when I had bounced in thirty minutes earlier.

Too ill to stop at the drugstore to find out what "Mucinex" was, I sent SarLiveSound (AndSweetie) out to the store, muttering "it had better not be guaifenesin" under my breath while sliding into my bed of gasping anguish. It did indeed turn out to be guaifenesin, but in a pretty, bi-colored tablet form, one color for instant release and one color for extended release! I could have bought a gallon jug of guaifenesin on my way home and taken a big slug every four hours, but the $12.00 charge for Mucinex somehow lent creedence to the severity of my illness. The antibiotic tablet actually did make me quite ill, as would ingesting any tablet that would choke Seabiscuit. Wait...maybe I was supposed to poke it up my... . (no...that's just not logical!)

Upshot? I'm sick and not doing laundry, gardening, cooking, visiting or any sort of errand today. After much username/password anguish, necessitating a frantic bout of whining to my oldest, Mrs. Thumbscre.ws a.k.a. The 24/7 CompuHelpDesk & Mother's Milk Machine, I'm signed in and blathering prodigiously about nothing! Mr. Pseudonym's workshirts remain wrinkled, the terrier's unexercised, J.Q. will not be pulling Grandma's hair with one hand and yanking her glasses off with the other tomorrow, the mail's unopened (bills getting colder and colder), Junket has gone over to the neighbor friend to help with the Alzheimer's grandmom by herself, the stove is cold, the garden bleak and dusty, with one lonely dried clump of manure sticking up from last year, and I'm sitting here going on and on and on! About SQUAT! Ha-HAA-HAA-HAAAAAAAA! *cough*

Y'know what? It feels good to write. It's something to do for myself...just for myself.
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*this misused word being the only vulgarism to be employed in this blog, my daughters having used up all the the f-words and variations available.

"Little" Christmas

When my kids were very young, they used to wake up on the morning of December 26 and immediately begin crying because Christmas was over. Desperate-witted as I was, I used to tell them, "Oh, no! Christmas isn't over! Do you know what today is? It's LITTLE CHRISTMAS--the day you spend doing nothing at all but having fun and eating Christmas candy and cookies! Now, let's play one of our new games!"

My kids are no longer gullible and easy to handle. They're all young adults, with adult-sized problems. I'm looking forward to sharing the easy part of my grandson's life with him--the time when he can still believe in Santa and still be pacified with a quick explanation of how much fun there is to be had each day. He was only about eight months old this Christmas, which meant he was more interested in knocking balls off the tree and chewing wrapping paper than in playing with his new toys, but next year should be really wonderful for all of us.

And next year, I really am going to simplify Christmas!!! I'm going to get my shopping and wrapping done early so the holiday doesn't turn into a forced march during the last few days. On December 23rd, 2005, I had just finished my shopping and was busy screaming at everyone around me to get busy wrapping, baking and cleaning.

What had I been thinking all throughout November and December? Was a morbidly obese elderly man in a red suit with white fur accoutrements supposed to have arrived at my front door with gifts for everyone on my list plus wrapping paper and scotch tape? Were the nice man's elves supposed to have wrapped and tagged all of my gifts while I made coffee and a grilled cheese sandwich for my perpetually-hungry visitor?

We had to work into the wee hours of the morning on the 24th and 25th, and it all seemed so senseless. Toward the end, I was piling five and six gifts on top of each other, throwing a big piece of wrap around them and mumbling under my breath, "Go ahead, you miserable shits--complain about your gifts being wrapped together and I'll jump up and snatch your pointy heads bald!"

My own procrastination had whupped my heiny once again and ruined what could have been a very enjoyable holiday celebration. I had, once again, turned Christmas into Angry Resentmas.

Hmmmm...I feel a New Year's Resolution coming on.

Who's That Up on the Rooftop???

Who's that up on the rooftop?
Must be Mastercard,
Must be Mastercard Swat Team!

Well, here it is, December 20, and I'm in my usual shape for this time of the year:
--House torn apart...
--Six bags of flour, four bags of sugar, five pounds of butter sitting in the kitchen, waiting...
--Giant shopping bags full of presents making it difficult for us to enter our bedroom...
--No Christmas tree up, even though two little artificial ones are stored away in the closet...
--Mastercard smoking and changing shape...
--UPDATE--four and three-quarters pounds of butter waiting, one-quarter pound of butter (having fallen from the refrigerator) eaten by terrier. One greasy, burping terrier stretched out in the sun, eyes closed, reflecting on the beauty of life.

I try to keep Christmas simple and enjoyable. This philosophy doesn't work, of course--never has, never will. I'll explain more later, after I get back from the post office, the mall, Sears, Walmart, K-Mart, the pharmacy and the supermarket.

Primary Pinelands Pondering

My oldest daughter has been blogging her guts out here for some time now, and I've enjoyed reading her posts. She deals with a full-time job (with attendant grinding commute), an under-one-year-old baby and a full homemaking schedule to round out her day, and she still finds time to blog.

My daughter also periodically reminds me that I haven't written anything in some time and that the Blogger venue would be simple to use even for the uninitiated. So, I guess I can yank my ample buttocks up off the couch now and again to jot down a little confusion from from the deepest folds of my brain for the amusement of my family and for the shock and awe of those complete strangers who straggle by.

My apologies to my family for embarrassing them to tears and my plea to the complete strangers: please don't track me down and break into my house and smother me and steal Aunt Rose's diamond ring while my husband and the terrier lie snoring and farting not five feet away.