Freakily Funny Family

Last weekend found us racing from the DFW area to Austin for my nephew’s graduation from the University Of Texas at Austin. Of course, ThatManILove and I were very, very proud of him, so we did what all aunties and uncles do...we lavished the ultimate present upon him.

En route home, we got a call from his mom, who happens to be married to my brother Scott E. This woman is hilarious, and has the dryest sense of humor.

Me: It was great seeing y’all this weekend!
Sisinlove: We had fun. And by the way, you didn’t have to give No.1 Son that much money. We’re going to make him return some of it.
Me: Yeah?
Sisinlove: Yeah.
Me: Why?
Sisinlove: We just think it’s too much. We’re going to make him return $82.35 of it.
Me: (laughing) Hey, girl – that’s okay. ThatManILove said the only reason we did it was to make y’all look bad.
She cracks me up.

This week, I found an e-mail from brother Scott in my inbox.

Thanks for coming to No. 1 Son’s graduation ceremony. It was a lot more fun with y’all there. And you do not have to make up for Lucy-Gran not being there by giving that much money to my kids. Oh by the way, No. 2 Son is graduating this week, & MyBride and I are now enrolling in College . We should graduate first summer semester-you can go ahead and send money now. Thanks again, Scott

Their No.2 son graduated Friday. I’ll post their comments next week, though I don’t know how they can beat these.

Blessings Come In Bottomless Pits

Zanna the Wonderpup was due for her second segment of hunter puppy training at Decatur, so we decided to take Little Brother along and make a weekend of it. His eyes gleaming with the promise of swimming at the hotel, he buckled up and settled down in the back seat, new Ipod jamming, earphones in, sometimes singing along. You've been there - you're trucking along, and all of a sudden, a song you know is being sung, sans music, from the back seat, and wonder of wonders, you know the song, too? Well, there we were. He's got a great voice, and always cracks us up with his song choices - he loves the 80's bands!

As I drove and ThatManILove settled down to do some computer work, we counted back. LB1 was my “Little” first, and he was 8 years old when I first met him at his school. I would go in for an hour, once a week, and the principal would take him out of class and we would just hang out on the school premises. (This is what Big Brothers Big Sisters call “a school-based match” –since I was on the Big Brothers Big Sisters board, I wasn’t allowed to have a community based match. This policy has since changed. ) Around Christmas, when we were making his mom a surprise Christmas tile, I visited with his grandma to arrange surprise delivery of the present.

At that point, Grandma politely told me that though LB loved my school visits, that their desire was that he be matched with a man who could take him to activities outside of the school. I told her that they had him signed up for the wrong program – that I would call (as my heart was breaking!) and ask their coordinator to call them and get LB signed up for the community program. Not too long afterwards, ThatManILove got a call…they had a match for him in the community based program. To our surprise, that match was my former Little! And Little Brother’s been a huge part of our lives ever since.

We arrive at the Anderson Ranch, let Zack and Zanna out of the truck, and LB starts exploring the grounds. It had recently rained, so everything was wet and muddy. LB goes and checks out all the different dog breeds, the Labs, the German Shorthairs, and the Walker Coon dogs. LB goes to all the barns, and checks out the contents. There, he finds the baby goats, and falls in love. The Andersons let the babies out so LB can play with them. Meanwhile, the family cat is all over him, and later follows him up on the trampoline, where they jump together. (Sorry, LB’s Mom – hopefully Shout will get all that dirt out of that white t-shirt, and we bought him replacement tennis shoes!) Then, he climbs all over the new Ranger Polaris, and asks to drive it. No way, Jose!

We make it to the hotel, where we’ve arranged for connecting rooms. We arranged for his room to have two doubles in case he doesn't want to stay there by himself. He’s a little nervous about staying in a room by himself, but gets over it quickly after moving freely between the two rooms and realizing we’re right there. ThatManILove goes into LB’s room, and they order the Simpsons movie. They laugh throughout the movie.

LB wakes up with the chickens, and has to go downstairs to grab breakfast. He's starving, he says, and can't wait for us to get ready. (We call him the bottomless pit.) He finishes breakfast, comes back up to the rooms; by then, ThatManILove wants to go to the Waffle House. I'm eating fruit, and LB is now into a movie, so ThatManILove goes by himself. Before he can even get back to the hotel, LB is hungry again - but the breakfast area at the hotel has been closed. I call ThatManILove, and ask him to order an omelette to go for LB. ThatManILove laughingly says, "The Bottomless Pit strikes again?" Soon after, it’s swimming time, and they finally come back up to the room at 2pm, exhausted. We pack up, and head out to eat lunch (LB ate a huge Mexican plate) and drive home. It was a great weekend!

People try to recruit Big Brothers and Big Sisters because it's a way to bless a child. They've got it all wrong...I promise you, we're the ones that are blessed.

Spanglish Flu Concerns

I received this on e-mail today. Cracked me up!

BUENOS DIAS !!

JU HAB YUST RECEIB A MEHICAN BIRUS!!!!!

SEENCE WE NOHSO TECHNOLOGICALLY ADBANCE EEN MEHICO, DEES IZA MANUEL BIRUS. PLEEZ DELETE ALL DE FILES ON JOR HARD DRIVE JURSEF AND SENDA DEES E-MAIL TO EBRY WONE JU KNOWS. TENK JOUS POR YHELPING ME. MI ESPOSA, HE BE BERRY HAPPE WIT JU POR DEES.

JULIO MANUEL JOSE RODRIGUEZ GARCIA DE LA CRUZ INFANTE SALGADO FERNANDEZ, -- MEHICAN YHACKER

Surely I'm Old Enough To Retire!

I just don't have it in me.

I tried to post all week.  I couldn't.  I was too tired.  I think I read about 20 blog posts all week.  That's not good!

Three early (6:15 a.m.) breakfasts in a row, then go about my normal sales day (calling on customers, dealing with problems, finding solutions), which never ends before 7 p.m., and that's only if I'm not entertaining customers. I think we had two customer entertainment nights this week...and that's light for us!

A good measure of a busy week is when we have to call our friend Bud over to take the dogs to the dog park for us.  Now that is crazy, isn't it?  Such is mi vida loca!

But, yeah!  It's Friday, I'm so glad.  Now, I'm off to my 4th customer breakfast and then to the office to catch up on paperwork.  

I feel like I've caught my second wind.

Maybe, just....maybe!!

Have a great weekend!!

Who? What? Where? When?

Mamarrazi Strikes Again!!

Meet Lady E, the precious young lady who graces our lives (and that of Elder Son!).  Lady E graduated yesterday from Texas Tech University.  Congrats to you, Lady E!  We're proud of you!

Elder Son acts like he gets tired of Mamarrazi (his name for me)...but he really likes it. Anyway, don't they make a beautiful couple? 

I took a ton of pictures yesterday.  This morning, I called Elder Son.

Me:  Hey, dude.  Wake up!  

Elder Son:   Okay.

Me:  Hey, the pictures are great.  I sent them to you via Snapfish.

Elder Son:  I'll look at them when I get up.

Me:  Okay.

Me:  One more thing.

Elder Son:  Yeah, Mom?

Me:  I hate to inform you of this, but Lady E's prettier than you.

Elder Son:  Whaaaattt?

Me:  Lady E's prettier than you.

Elder Son:  Just this time.

He's such a smartass.  And I don't have a clue where that comes from.

Mattress Sandwich

Elder Son was in the area, roping with friends, and jumped truck at Lubbock.  So, Thursday night found us picking him up there, and bringing him home for the weekend.  We tarried too long, and got home to Midland around midnight.  Then we picked up a bit for the housecleaners, and went to bed.

Unbeknownst to me, ThatManILove had gone on a cleaning of the bedroom spree earlier that day.  Our bed - a Big Huge California King Sleigh Bed - was pulled out from the wall. I commented on such, and TMIL confessed to tackling the dust demons under and behind the bed.  (Such things are obviously beyond our house cleaners, but I digress.)

We pushed the bed back up against the wall, and got in bed.  Immediately, Zack the Wonderdog jumps in the bed, and demands to be “under his blankie.”  (Which is, by the way, a blanket on top of our comforter.)  This action places him right around where my knees go in the bed.  

And, voila!  Zack snuggles down in the bed, deep mooooaaaannnns of delight, and immediately starts snoring.

ThatManILove looks at me, and says, “Need me to move Zack?”  I tell him no, that I’ll move over closer to him.  I snuggle up to him for a second, then tell him, “Wait.  This isn’t going to work.  I have to be able to stick my foot out of the bed if it gets warm.”

(I know.  Don’t even say it.  That’s what hormones do to you when you’re my age.)

So, I skooch back over to my side of the bed, and we move Zack to the middle.  He never wakes up.  We lay back down.

And immediately hear this weird deep moaning sound.  Loud.  Louder. And then the moan escalates, both in volume and up an octave or two.  We’re looking at Zack, then realizing it’s not him, at each other.  I’ve got chill bumps on my arms.  Do we have a freakin’ ghost? Is Zanna having a bad dream?  Oh, Lord!  Is the air conditioner kicking the bucket?   (You’d be amazed at the thoughts that shoot through your brain in a second or two)

And then...

HIGH PITCHED SCREAMING SQUEAL!  followed by a 

BAMMMMMMM!  

CRASHHHH!

BOOM!

The.

Bed.

Cratered.

Oh, yes it did.

And all three of us - ThatManILove, Zack, and myself - all roll into a Deep V that now suffices for what was our top mattress.

I immediately start giggling.  ThatManILove - cussing.  

And Zack?  Still snuffling and snoring away.  He doesn’t even wake up.

Thank God Elder Son was around.  We have one of those Denver Mattresses, and baby, a California King top mattress ain’t light.  Especially when two of you...the mother and son two of you...are laughing so hard you can't stand up.

We moved the upper mattress to determine the extent of the damage.  Guess what supports a California King Denver Mattress, under the twin box springs?

Three 2X2 slats.  Screwed into the frame.  And attached to each of them, one 3X3 leg. Two of which had bent when ThatManILove went into his cleaning frenzy,  causing the bed to lose support and the slats to break in half.

We wedged them back up, supported them (with all those books I’ve promised you I’d give away on this blog), put the mattress back on and ThatManILove went back to sleep.

That was a miracle in itself - but I finally quit laughing long enough to go to sleep myself.