Devil 1, Angel 0

Ok, one last repost to get me through the week...yippee, it's almost over! Mentioning Kim at the Yellow Trash Diaries a week or so ago made me feel nostaligic for this oldie. Catch up to you in a few!

Ever have a moment when you feel like you have a little devil sitting on one shoulder and a little angel on the other arguing about whether or not you should do something?

It happens to me quite frequently.

I blame my adoption.

I clocked a lot of road miles this summer driving the Big Kid back and forth to college classes down in the city. I think I put more mileage on my car in the last two months than I have in the last 2 years.

Obviously I don't get out of our little town a lot.

On one of the interminable drives back home, the Big Kid was sitting in the back seat telling me what he learned that day in Biology class. It had been a really long day, and I was hot, exhausted, and fighting bumper to bumper tourista traffic back into the mountains.

Did you know that hairy knuckles are genetic?

"Really."

Yes, we all compared them in class. Mine are pretty hairy.

I looked at my hands on the steering wheel. "I don't have any hair on mine."

Does my dad have hairy knuckles?

"No." I would have definitely noticed THAT when we were married. Ew.

Well then how did I get them?

This was the moment I was talking about above. Angel on one side Devil on the other. What to do, what to do....

This time the little devil won.

"You can get hairy knuckles from excessive masturbation. Didn't your teacher tell you that?"

Are you SERIOUS????

"Well yeah, everybody knows that. And even worse, it'll make you grow hair on your palms."

NO WAY!!

I glance in the rear-view mirror.

He's scrutinizing the palms of his hands. It's taking everything I have not to bust out laughing.

Mom, are you sure?

"I'm surprised you didn't learn it in your sex-ed class back in high school. You must not have been paying attention that day."

He was pretty quiet the rest of the way home.

Later that night, I mention the conversation to Hubby (who chastised me for letting the little devil win this time), and I solemnly promised to clue the kid in before his next Biology class just in case he felt the need to mention it to his professor.

The next day, the Big Kid was bent over the bathroom sink examining his eyeballs.

Mom?

"What?"

When we went to get my eye exam a couple of months ago, was there a change in my contact prescription?

"No."

Are you sure?

As you can tell, this is a line he uses frequently.

"Yes."

Can I see it?

"What's wrong?"

I dunno. Everything just seems to be a little bit blurrier.

"Maybe it's time to change your 30-day contacts. Let's keep an 'eye' on it, shall we?" I chortled at my own lame humor.

I remarked on the eye thing to Hubby in passing. He turned bright red and looked sheepish.

Rut Row.

"What?" I asked. "What did you do?"

Big Kid had come to him early in the morning to ask him about hairy knuckles.

Did you know you can get hairy knuckles and palms from too much, you know....?

Hubby acknowledged that he was indeed in possession of that little tidbit of information.

"It can also make you go blind", he added.

Oh no.

We're going straight to hell for that one!

Thank goodness the kid has a sense of humor...

Eat My Shorts!

As we're winding up the school year for THD and Little Guy, I've got an incredibly full week ahead. I thought I'd repost one of my favorite oldies. Hope you get as big a giggle out of it as I did. ;-)

What's up with Ohioans in the news lately? Last week it was mummies, now some dingleberry was arrested for making nasty phone calls.

'Hood's phone records show he made 2,623 calls in 20 days, "all basically obscene in nature," Coshocton County deputy Brent McKee said.'

It gets even better. James Hood, from Licking County (ok, I had to get that in there!) made all the calls between 2am and 3am.

That's about 131 nasty calls in an hour.

So...that begs the question.

Given the time allotted, exactly how obscene could these calls have been?

In the spirit of one of my favorite shows, Mythbusters, I decided to test it out myself.

First some calculations.

1). Since Hood allegedly made these calls between 2 and 3am, I tried to figure out what most likely set him off at that particular time. My guess is that it was after closing time at the bar, and he came home three sheets to the wind.

2). 131 calls in 60 minutes equals a little over 2 calls per minute, or about 27 seconds per call.

3). Some people have telephones in their bedrooms. Some don't. So if you calculate the answering time from dead-to-the-world to "hello", it's probably between 2 and 8 rings. Midline is about 5.

Armed with those stats, I set to work.

Obviously, I wasn't going to drink all night and let my fingers do the walking at 2am.

I did, however, have a couple of martoonis and watched the season premiere of The Sopranos. Since hubby wasn't interested in watching the polygamists in Big Love, he departed upstairs to watch some sporty thing on Espn2.

The kid was reading in his room, so I had the place to myself.

When the second hand on the big clock hit 12, I started dialing on my cell phone.

Ring...Ring...Ring...Ring

Hello?

Me (in my best Chester-the-molester voice): "I like to sniff bicycle seats!"

What?

"I like to sniff bicycle seats!"

What the f...?

Click. Buzz. I hung up.

Looked at the clock. Damn. 39 seconds. Too long.

So I dialed again.

Ring...Ring...Ring...

Hello?

"BIG BOOBIES!!" I bellowed.

Wha..? Who is this?

Click. Buzz. The clock read 28 seconds. Right on time.

So I established that I could dial the phone, wait for an answer and get two words out in the time allowed. I had a control.

Now I had to do it again to confirm it, so I made one more phone call.

Ring...Ring...Ring...

Hello?

Rut row. Definitely a hostile voice.

I hissed into the phone, "Sweaty Socks!"

My better half--exasperated--said from the extension upstairs:

Honey, do you want something, or are you trying out that Mythbusters crap again?

Rats! Busted!

Pimpin' with the Dogg

Ok, it's been a long long LONG time since I've blog pimped with the Dogg (seen here in his Huggy Bear Costume).

I've been so very bad. Fer Shizzle.

I've quietly added a number of new blogs to my link list without any fanfare over the last 6 months or so, mostly because I was sick and dealing with family stuff, but really fabulously impressed with their blogs. To be honest, many of them found ME, but I wouldn't link with them if I thought they weren't worthwhile.

I promise.

That said, I've been working my way through my DVRs and finally caught up with Bravo's A-List Awards, and had quite the giggle over them (for the most part I really love Kathy Griffin). I decided to give out my Blings under reality show names. You might not recognize the name of some of the Reality shows, because some of them didn't even last a season, but I did research damnit to make this fit. LOL

If you're not on the list, it doesn't mean I don't heart you just as much---but heck, I've got 100+ links on my sidebar to follow!

Hope you enjoy these Blingalicious blogs as much as I do!

Top Chef

Hands down, ntsc of The Art of the Pig is the Top Chef. The end. Whether he is posting with photos step-by-step on how to make homemade chicken sausage or how to cook the perfect pot-roast, I ALWAYS leave his blog inspired and hungry. Really hungry. Like looking at my Yorkshire terrier and envisioning a Yorkshire pudding superimposed on top of her hungry. Woof!

Currently he's posting on how to bone a turkey (not the xxx-rated kind of boning, mind you). Stop by and get inspired!

Top Design

Both Phlegm Fatale of Fatale Abstraction and Anna from The Alternative Anna design some incredible jewelry. If you're looking for that perfect "one of a kind" creation for someone in your life, I highly recommend them! Plus their blogs are mighty entertaining too!

What Not To Wear

Big Pissy from the Southern Circle of Hell is a fashion icon. She finds the best deals and has the best fashion sense of anybody I know. I love reading the adventures of this true Southern Belle!

The "James Lipton Doesn't Hold a Candle" Bling award goes to RC of Strange Culture. If you're seriously into movies this is the place to go. RC's research and analysis of current and past movies is simply outstanding. He also has timely blog fests where he asks his readers to write about movies or characters who have affected them (like for Father's Day, etc) and links to them. Check him out especially before Oscar Night.

The Bachelor

Just Bob is smart and sensitive. Plus he finds farts funny. Don't let him get away!

Tom is a very warm, hunky single dad with a great sense of humor and better yet, he bakes. Yes, that's not a typo! He is a pie-baker extraordinaire. If I wasn't happily married I'd see if he was into gardening and ask how much his hourly charge would be for trimming my--er--the bushes.

Who am I kidding? I really want the pie. Lots and lots of pie.

Pete lives across the pond in the U.K. and is an avid birder. If you're not really into birds, that's ok. He travels extensively and takes the most incredible photos of historic (some widely advertised, some not) sites. When I look at his pictures, it's almost like being there.

The Real Housewives....

Ok, I'm guilty. Vewy Vewy guilty. I sneered at Reality shows, but when I was sick I got hooked on the Real Housewives reruns (hey, the alternative was watching Bobby Brown pry prehistoric poop nuggets out of Whitney Houston's butt) . Whether it was the botoxed bleached blondes of Orange County, the brittle bitchy broads of New York City or the brassy boobyful beyotches from Atlanta, it was great therapy being able to throw a pillow at the tube and scream "you live in a fantasyland, you delusional b*tch!"

Kind of like Hubby does every time he sees Joe Biden on the small screen.

Anyhoo, I think I've MET many of the genuine REAL-to-life Housewives here in blogland. So they get the bling. I've divided some of them up into subcategories.

These ain't your regular mommy-blogs.

The Real Housewives: Flipping Out

Not only is my buddy Koolio a real housewife, but she is the author of the BEST rants evah! When I'm feeling down in the mouth, I can always count on her to tickle me with her way with words. It's like being served poetry with a dash of battery acid. Her take on people who call incessantly:

"Do I really need to explain why there's voicemail?! Leave a message and the person will get back to you when they can. Grow some patience, f*ck-ryingoutloud! Actually, I think I'm growing some in my garden, I'll be happy to share some with you! Oh wait, those are Impatiens. Nevermind."

The Real Housewives: The Girls Next Door

I would love, love LOVE it if any or all of these bloggers lived on MY block. Every day would be coffee klatch day!

Jennifer, the Redneck Romance Writer has a Monday feature called "Just sayin'" where she takes on everybody from the irony-impaired to Twitter. Gotta check her out!

MrsB at Confessions of a Pagan Soccer Mom finds the best giveaways on the web! Plus she has one of the coolest blog names I've ever come across!

I simply adore Chris at Diet Coke Rocks. She's a hot mama and granny who is gracious enough to invite us into her home and life. I'd like to get a gander at the purple and black thing she hides in her bedside drawer sometime. LOL

The Frau and family moved kit and kaboodle to Germany for a couple of years to accomodate her husband's job. I'm really enjoying their forays in assimilating in West Family Adventures.

Kim at the Yellow Trash Diaries is a scream. You know those characters who have a tiny devil on one shoulder and an angel on the other who argue whenever the protagonist has a moral dilemma?

Kim would be the mini-satan in high heels. And I mean that in the nicest possible way. She puts into words my own reactions to many absurd situations. Compared to her I'm just a cowardly, cowardly custard. Maybe I could shrink her and carry her around in a Louis Vuitton bag like Paris Hilton's chihuaha.

My buddy Beth on the other hand, would be the angel on the other shoulder. She is a calm voice of reason in an otherwise scary and chaotic headspace (which would be my scary and chaotic headspace). Pop by and say hi to her at Books, etc.

Kevin Charnas and his spouse were a couple of (mostly) carefree California guys who've moved to the midwest to be closer to Kevin's aging parents. Reading about their cultural adjustment to the heartland is an adventure in itself!

Joanna's blog The Fifty Factor is absolutely delightful. One of my fave posts to date is one where she shares her discovery that the excellent customer service she was receiving at Restoration Hardware was due to the their mistaken assumption that she was actress Patricia Heaton (Everybody Loves Raymond)! What a hoot!

The Real Housewives: If Women Ruled the World

This is the last section of what's becoming a very long post. If women ruled the world, my picks for the top jobs would go to Ellen at To the Max, Rootie at Because it Really is Personal, the Green Girl from Wisconsin, and Brenda at What's up Down South.

I think if these ladies were in charge, respectively everyone would be treated fairly, have something good to eat, a clean environment, and get a time-out or a warm hug when they need one.

Check them out and find out why.

Cheers all!

Warm Fuzzies and Cold Pricklies

Well, this semester is over for me, and may I say it was a hairy one. Even though I took only one class!

The original idea had been to take a full semester so I can finish up and graduate since Big Kid is no longer living at home demanding my undivided attention 24/7. But then I got sick late last fall and all bets were off. Decided to take just one pre-requisite class---algebra---that won't even count towards my degree or GPA.

When that's out of the way, I can take math-for-people-who-are-crappy-at-math for credit (aka Math for the Liberal Arts). Go figure.

In hindsight, it seems like the decision was providential, because having the opportunity and then going through all the steps of getting THD here probably would have put me on stress overdrive if I was taking a full class-load.

And what the hey...one class. I'd gotten an A in pre-algebra a few semesters before. I also took algebra in high school and did quite well. It wouldn't be easy or enjoyable, but I'd get through.

Famous last words.

When I got my first assignment, which was a review of pre-algebra, I felt a little uneasy. I didn't remember some of the terminology. I had to brush up on a few processes. At my second assignment, the sh*t really hit the fan.

It was like reading Greek. I didn't understand ANY of it.

So I engaged a tutor---a retired middle school teacher. We had a few sessions where she walked me through the basics of Algebra and I limped through the next few assignments and tests.

Then we hit graphing equations. I couldn't make heads or tails of it beyond recognizing quadrants. My textbook, unlike the ones you get in high school, only just brushed on the directions, and there was nothing intensive about it. I showed it to my tutor.

She was perplexed. Mind you, the woman is about 70 years old. She borrowed my book overnight and then called me the next day. "They didn't teach this when I was in college, and I'd really hate to take your money."

Well crud. Three days before my assignment was due, I emailed my instructor (this is an online course), showed him my work (which was all wrong) and told him I was struggling and needed some help. I needed someone to walk me through this verbally---not on paper, because I just wasn't understanding this process at all by reading it.

The day AFTER the assignment was due he emailed me back.

"You only finished 2 of the 7 sections of the assignment and will be graded accordingly."

What? You have got to be sh*tting me! I'm paying twice the rate to take this class online and I can't even get a "what do you seem to be having trouble with" response from this guy?

In desperation I emailed and called and left a message for a friend of mine. She is a high school math instructor (who recently got her Masters, the smartypants). The funny thing is that I've never actually met her in person. We met about 10 years ago in an adoption forum and have been phone and email pals ever since.

Help!

I didn't hear from her for a couple of days, and then it occurred to me that it might be Spring Break in her neck of the woods. Sure enough, she called me the next night.

"I got your message. Is everything ok?"

I didn't recognize the number on my caller ID. Where are you?

"I'm in Paris!! It's 4 o'clock in the morning and I just checked my messages!! I'm having champagne!"

Oh. My. Gosh. But where are you calling from? This isn't your cell number.

"No, my cell is charging. I'm calling from the hotel phone."

Holy crap! Call me when you get back to the states!

What a good friend she is. She got me through the last four weeks of class so I don't have to take the damn thing over again. :-)

On a more serious note, I'm worrying about my brain. Algebra is cumulative, and while I remembered and was able to do some processes, there were some blocks that were completely unintelligible to me. Then I could go on and do the next harder skill set, although I couldn't do the easier one. Very weird.

I can't figure out if I'm suffering from the normal CRS that comes with aging, or if maybe I had some drain bamage from oxygen deprivation when I was sick.

I guess I should just feel lucky as long as I can remember which shoe goes on which foot.

Oh, and I left an appropriate evaluation at the end of the course for my instructor. No warm fuzzies for him. Hmph.

Sometimes You Just Gotta Say...

Today is the 4th Annual Blogging Against Disabilism Day.

For a couple of weeks I've been poking around in what happens to pass for my brain these days, trying to come up with a topic mined from disabilism experiences we've had in the past year.

This experience? No, too personal.

That experience? No, too sad.

What about this one? No, way too mundane.

To be perfectly honest, it's been a pretty boring year on the advocacy front in the Attila household. My killer bunny slippers have been dying a slow death from the lack of butts to kick.

Trust providence to furnish a perfect opportunity at the perfect time.

Now how would I title this? Asshat of the Week? You're a Douchebag? TLPWSFB (The League of People with Sh*t For Brains)?

All too harsh, in my opinion. Your mileage may vary.

So I'm just going to say...

WTF?

WTF were you people thinking?

Ramco Primary School in South Australia had a worthy idea to raise money for a program in Bangladesh that repairs cleft lips and palates in children.

All well and good, and very philanthropic. But as you know, the road to hell is paved with good intentions.

So they sent out a newsletter announcing that May 29 was going to be "Dress Like a Disabled Person Day."

"There will be prizes for the best students dressed as a person with a disability. Get your thinking hats on and see what disability you can represent!"

Here's a great big steaming bowl of WTF? With raisins on top!

When they mention "prizes" does that mean they'll be categories? Like for "most realistic" (where some soccer mom actually catheterizes her kid to win because you know, people are weird that way) or "best accessories"?

Do the accessories have to be something you can carry---like crutches----or do they have to be somewhat attached like a g-tube or a colostomy bag? Will there be extra points for big accessories like a chair or an iron lung?

Snarkiness aside, this obviously begs an answer to the question, "how exactly do people who have disabilities dress?"

So I asked my Little Guy. For those of you who aren't familiar with the characters who share my life, my youngest son is 19, has Autism and some cognitive deficits. I call him Little Guy here, although he really isn't very "little" any more. ;-)

If you were dressing up like for Halloween as a person with a disability, what would you wear?

He thought about it for a minute. "I'd take a shower and brush my teeth first. And comb my hair."

Ok, what else?

"Clean underwear. I'd wear clean underwear. And a belt on my Dickies pants. And my Gap sweater. Oh, and my watch."

Is that it?

"I'd tie my shoes. And clean socks. Smelly feet are nasty."

On second thought, maybe "Dressing As a Disabled Person Day" isn't such a bad idea after all.

For one day of the year all the students will turn up clean and fresh-smelling, well-groomed, stylishly dressed and on-time.

What's not to like?
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Please take a little time to check out all of the wonderful bloggers who are contributing posts today! Click on the link at the top of my post to be taken to the list.

Have a wonderful weekend!
_________________________

P.S. at 11:15pm.

Oh Golly. I know that BADD is winding down for the day, but I went back to the original article (the link is posted above) and simply must say again,

WTF?

While many of the commenters found the whole idea of
Dress Like a Disabled Person Day" repulsive, there were plenty who had the sentiment of:

"Jeez. Just one innocent error in judgement by some normal kids trying to do something good for the school and all the cripples come out of the woodwork crying foul. It's not such a bad idea and if it raises awareness and raises funds for non normal people then let them do it!"

So much so wrong in so many ways.

Peace,

ATM