Know your Labs

Looking for trouble

Politics is the art of looking for trouble, finding it whether it exists or not, diagnosing it incorrectly, and applying the wrong remedy.
- Ernest Benn

Fruit bats orphaned by the floods in Australia. Can I have one?

Superglue is not my friend. It is imbued with fiendish properties best left to horror novels.

For example:

Last night we decorated our Christmas Tree. One of my daughter's favorite ornaments was broken and she asked me to fix it. Well, technically she didn't. But I wanted to fix it because a miniature plastic Barbie in a ballgown just doesn't look quite right with one hand broken off at the wrist. She looks like the latest victim from the movie "Saw IV" and who wants to think of that on a Christmas tree.

So, I attempted to glue her poor little appendage back on and instead I cemented a permanent relationship between two of my fingers and her gracious little plastic hand.

"Oh, look! I'm shaking hands with Barbie", I joked until I realized I would not be able to get the hand out from between my fingers without losing a significant amount of flesh way past the surface tissue.

So here I am. Plastic Barbie hand glued to fingers. Fingers glued to each other. It was one of my brilliant signature moves.

I called in reinforcements and my husband obligingly, and eventually, found the bottle of acetone and Barbie and I parted ways after much amusement to my family and my own personal humiliation.

I had started to gather my shredded dignity about me when the owner of aforementioned Barbie ornament inspected my fingers for damage and stated, "Well at least you didn't glue your nose shut, like last year!"

Superglue is not my friend.

The bear facts, part I

I fed a bear when I was a kid. Really. A wild, Alaskan Black bear. At the time this did not seem unusual to me. Given the ensuing decades and a small amount of reflection I realize things could have ended very badly for me back then. But they didn't.

I did scare my Uncle Dick half to death though. When I have properly framed this episode in my life, I will update my blog. But for now, picture me at about 8 years old with a fish in one hand and a bear two feet away, on a lovely summer afternoon along the river.

I love this gal Allie at Hyperbole and a half....

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Like my new look?

The juices are flowing...

Well, the turkey is done two hours early and we don't know what to do. We haven't put the side dishes in the oven yet, the table is still covered in God-Knows-What projects and alluvial deposits, and the kids refuse to go outside even though it is finally snowing!

My husband-the-chef is muttering something about "Goddamn brine", whatever THAT means and berating himself for his imprecise calculations on brine versus shorter cooking times.

This is why I will go to great lengths and multiple pizzas to stay out of the kitchen. I leave it to my loving husband to conduct kitchen chemistry (ooh, you like that alliteration?) and keep us all fed and healthy.

I offered to help with Thanksgiving dinner and he smirked, saying "I bet you don't even know where the cranberry sauce is." I fired back an irritated, smug retort and found out that, no, the canned cranberry sauce is NOT in the back pantry. In fact, he wouldn't tell me where it was. I am not sure why. Something about the kitchen, home accidents, and the children are too young to go without a mother. It was a confusing conversation.

So, here I sit, at the computer. While the muttering in the kitchen continues. There seems to be a whirl of activity as the troops of sweet potatoes, stuffing, rolls, and other side dishes are regrouped and the battle plan modified.

They say no plan survives after five minutes of contact with the enemy. Enemy thy name is turkey! But we shall prevail. I say skip the meat and head right for desert. The turkey is better on the second day anyway. Vive la pumpkin pie!

Have a great day and thanks for stopping by. Both of you.

OK. So I am bad. Very, very bad. I haven't called. I don't write. I'm bad. I do think of you often, if that helps. But I am still bad.

But here is something good. I don't want you to leave my blog and never come back, but this gal's work is just TOO GOOD NOT TO SHARE!!! I really like her site ALOT. Go to her site to get THAT joke.

http://hyperboleandahalf.blogspot.com/2010/04/alot-is-better-than-you-at-everything.html

The rising tide

Dipping an oar in the water on the rising tide can be a challenge. You just need to learn how to ride the waves and not fight the current.

Okay, enough metaphor for today. Larry the mouse is dead, again. So is the cat. I think they went out together in a blaze of glory. Happy catnip journeys, Sam I Am. May you chase Larry in a cheerful game among the stars.

Egad! Where did July go? Hello? Did it get stuck in the laundry chute? Did it get tossed out with the pizza boxes? Who skipped July and set us on a collision course for August?

I know I slept late, but give me a break!

School starts August 19th. And although it cheers the heart of many a parent to have the new year get underway, I still remember what it was like as a kid to face the dreaded end of summer. I feel for my kids, I really do. This summer has gone by way too fast.

What to do, what to do

What do you do when you can't do anything
What do you do when you can't go on
What do you do when it all seems hopeless

You keep marching and marching and marching along.

Cheery thought. I need a martini.

Larry Lives!!

Fans will recall an earlier post about Larry, the Zombie Mouse, Leader of the Ravaging Hoard of four-legged fur butts that call my house their own.

Well, I successfully waged war on the furry hoard and they have retreated from the field. But Larry lives. He has taken to darting from the living room, across the kitchen floor, and into the wall space behind the stove. Always at 6:00 a.m. when I am at my most vulnerable.

At least I think that's where he goes. I see him start from the living room. I know he makes it to the roll-away dishwasher in the middle of the kitchen. But he always seems to disappear after that.

Unless he is taking a ride in the old pizza box that I keep forgetting is stuck under the dishwasher, he is disappearing into an unknown black hole. An alternative verminous dimension where he is the king.

He taunts me. His furry little sprint is just to show me he has no fear. (Although he does move dang quick when he catches my eye.)

He has thrown down the gauntlet of startlement. He messes with me before I have had coffee.

This means war.

The Rain Came Down, Chapter 1

Here is the intro to my new story: "And the Rain Came Down"

She remembered how her heart stopped beating. Her breath caught in her throat and never left her body.

Time just stopped flowing and all that was left was the image in front of her, burned into her brain. The sight of her husband, looking physically crushed by the weight of the burden he had to pass on to her.

It was difficult when all things stopped. He was frozen in time, the words choked out, the deed done. No going back. Sean was gone, he said. An accident, he said. Something about the boy’s bike, no helmet, a car.

Her husband couldn’t get all the words out before time stopped. She felt sad for him. It was obviously important, what he had to say. It wasn’t fair time stopped him in midsentence. He was forced to hold it all in.

She looked around the room. Everyone there was frozen, her mother, the policewoman, all of them.

She turned and walked to the kitchen and realized it was silent. No humming refrigerator, no fan, no clinking ice maker. She realized the water wouldn’t flow from the tap in the sink. So she put down the glass she had taken from the cupboard. No use trying to get a drink.

Her favorite window over the sink showed a frozen moment of a perfect summer day; a bird on approach to the bird feeder, a bumblebee laboring toward a potted rose in the planter under the window. They were motionless, suspended. She smiled. She wanted to go outside and look at things. To walk in this lost time. She wrapped the stillness around her like an old fuzzy robe, warm from the dryer.

But then she heard the thunder. Zeus clapped his hands right over her head. The sound split her in two and she felt the rain, a deluge, pouring over her, so cold. She couldn’t see through it and her outstretched hands groped for the counter. But it was too much rain. The thunder exploded again and she fell to her knees. The rain fell and time flowed. She heard the thunder screaming, screaming her son’s name and she melted into nothing. And the rain came falling down.

Sins and fears

There was an interesting homily on Sunday about the sin of shame. Father Odo (no, he is not from Deep Space Nine)spoke about using your fear and sense of shame to keep you from acknowledging a wrong you had done, a wrong to yourself or others, and it really got me thinking.

The things we do to ourselves, the choices we make, are the most pain-full and often we don't even realize how bad we hurt. It is easy to focus on the injustice from another and to nurture a resentment or a lifetime of resentments based on one incident.

But I started to look at myself and all the injustices, the fears, the guilt, the negative talk, that I heap on myself each day like business-as-usual. And I realized how much pain I feel because I am afraid to talk about these things. Not only am I afraid to talk about them, I am afraid to change. I will keeping stabbing myself with sad choices rather than feel the pain of postive change. Changing hurts. It means really looking at yourself and acknowledging that something in you is broken. It hurts to mend, to repair, to slip-up and have to start all over.

But the sermon really got me thinking about how my fear and shame of bad choices are the real demon in my life. I isolate myself from those who care most because I am too embarrassed to admit I am not strong in some things. I am afraid I will lose their friendship if I share my fears. So I step back first and lose them for sure. Brilliant.

I believe a sin is anything you put up between yourself and God. A sin is something that keeps you from having a connection with the divine. And you can best experience that connection when you love yourself. So if I trust that I am worth loving. If I believe in my faith and accept that nothing is so bad it can't be forgiven by a greater love than there is nothing I need to be ashamed of. There are only things I need to mend, I need to change, I need to let go.

One of the best quotes I ever read said, "Resentment is like drinking poison and expecting the other person to die." I am tired of resenting my "enemies", tired of resenting myself for all my faults. Tired of resenting life for being so painfull.

I am going to call my friends and tell them what is going on. Let them know that it isn't about them, it is something I have done to myself. And I am going to believe that I can survive my choices, good or bad, that I am worth divine love.

I think it's time for a cup of coffee. Here's to happier times.