Happy Lupercalia! Which is So Appropriate Because…

February 14, 2014Tonya Lanthron Leave a comment

Roadkill: It’s What’s for Dinner!

Valentine’s Day as a holiday has always sort of given me the creeps. It’s named after a Christian martyr who according to legend was killed by having his heart cut out. So we make nice little chocolates and cookies with hearts on them to commemorate this why? As far as celebrating holidays that have bizarre origins, it would be more fun to commemorate Bastille Day with scale model guillotines and flying Dennis Rodman ~~doll~~ action figure heads, but I’m weird that way.

The ~~doll~~ action figure came with two heads.

Valentine’s Day wasn’t always Valentine’s day. It actually began as a co-opting of a popular pagan holiday that was celebrated around the middle of February- Lupercalia. Basically it was “The Wolf Festival.” Along with a lot of drinking and fertility rites, that is. What makes this different from The-Game-We-Cannot-Name Sunday or any other redneck beer drinking holiday, except that even rednecks frown upon animal sacrifice? Perhaps the main distinction is that in redneck fornication, procreation generally is not the primary goal. Hence the importance of the Trojan Man.

Because this is all that stands between you and 18+ years of child support.

I don’t believe in romantic love. Not one bit. If Jerry buys me something it’s usually because it’s something he wants. The last thing he bought me was a Stoeger Condor Competition 20 gauge over/under shotgun. It is a sweet shotgun, but I think he enjoys shooting it (and bragging to the guys at the club what a great deal he got on it) more than I do. Don’t get me wrong, I appreciate a good shotgun, but it’s not exactly the gift that screams “hot teenage lust.” Not that “hot teenage lust” was ever on my agenda to begin with.

A holiday for dogs, on the other hand, isn’t a bad idea. The interesting thing about a “wolf festival” is that dogs are wolves. Literally.

Grey wolf taxonomic classification: Canis lupus lupus

Domestic dog (all breeds): Canis lupus familiaris

All the same species as the grey wolf. Even the ankle biters.

I’ve also said it before that since dogs are a subspecies of wolf, it’s imperative to respect that. If dogs are improperly treated and/or we humans don’t pay attention to their signals and body language, they can be deadly. Correctly handled and respected, they can become amazing companions, protectors and friends. I trust my dogs more than people, and with good reason.

Not to mention AIDS, chlamydia, genital warts and herpes!

The only thing that disturbs me about those old-time VD warnings is that they always showed women as being carriers of VD. Dudes spread it too. How do you think the women got it?

I always thought Valentine’s Day, with all the insinuation of love being in the air, as a perfect opportunity to warn against Venereal Disease. Here’s a little song from 1969, just in case anyone needs some VD awareness. It’s called “VD is for Everybody” and has a cute little video that goes with it. Just doing my duty to further public health.

Speaking of public health, as I was trolling along, I found another holiday worth celebrating:

I have some questions about Rabies Day.

1. Is this about getting rabies? If so, this could be a very painful and drawn out form of population control. I can think of much easier ways to “cull the herd,” such as leaving the stupid to their own devices, to earn their Darwin Awards without any interference from others.

2. Is this about getting rabies shots and/or preventing rabies? I can stand behind that. I definitely don’t want to get the rabies.

I don’t want to get the cholera either:

“Beware of Drunkenness- nothing is so likely to bring on Disease.” Amazing. Public health authorities knew this back in the 1830’s, that being drunk and dirty could bring on disease. I would like to know where you find hot lime, though.

I think there should be more public campaigns to advocate personal hygiene and cleanliness. It seems that being clean and well groomed is more of an exception than a rule, and then you wonder why you’re surrounded with the hacking, coughing, chronically ill masses.

Of course, as more and more of the people in this country are growing up raised by wolves, what can one expect?

More Central Ohio White Death, More Funky Victorian Pics, and Other Odds and Ends

February 7, 2014Tonya Lanthron Leave a comment

I’m still trying to figure out this Rube Goldberg device.

This contraption, which I think is some kind of spinal correction device (?) could also have afforded some tactical advantage when other kids are chasing you down to kick your ass. I can see where it could be a sort of almost skateboard without the board. I love Victorian ingenuity. Strange thing is that even in the early 1980’s (and I’m not sure whether or not this is still being done in schools) all the girls had to get checked for scoliosis in 7th and 8th grade.

The scoliosis check was not what I’d call a good time. All the 7th and 8th grade girls were herded into the gym, (wearing those hideous gym suits, or in my case, since I had a Doctor’s Note permanently freeing me from gym class, a t-shirt and shorts) lined up in alphabetical order, then we either had to unzip the gym suit or pull up our t-shirt and let (supposedly) a nurse trace our spines with her finger and verify that our spines were straight.

If you were found to have scoliosis (a couple of girls did have it) then you were sent to an orthopedist who would fit you with a full torso brace with metal stays and tie up straps that you had to wear 24/7 for two or three years unless you wanted to become a hideously deformed hunchback.

Imagine having to wear this continuously – all through high summer. Oh, the stink!

I’m glad my spine stayed straight.

This is one of the snow piles outside of Target. It’s 5°.

But, as always, they set up the swimsuit racks the week after New Year’s!

The City of Columbus, I must say has been doing an abysmal job in clearing the snow. ODOT got the freeways cleared right away, but the major through roads that are the city’s responsibility, by and large haven’t been touched. I have to wonder what the hell they’re doing with all that income tax money, since the state and the surrounding localities are seeming to cope pretty well with snow removal. I know that corruption and graft and union thuggery run amok in Mayor Coleman’s hizzy. I’m surprised he didn’t ask for emergency money from his homeboy Obama to clear out Downtown.

It didn’t used to be that way, and it’s sad. The illustrious Mayor-for-Life Coleman has ran the police department into the ground, presided over (and approved of) the corruption and vice and absolute lack of accountability in the schools, and now the city can’t seem to get the crews out to clear the freaking snow. Coleman will keep on getting re-elected though, because a.) there’s no term limit, and b.) he kisses up to the gimme crowd. While everyone (me included) who can moves to the freaking suburbs because of the uncontrolled druggies and rampant crime-but if you work in the city limits (I do) you still have to pay income tax so this gimme-appeaser and cronies can keep on subsidizing the gimme crowd. The worst thing about living in the suburbs is that I can’t vote against this shyster when he runs for (and gets elected) mayor again.

So much for the Things-I-Can’t-Change.

I have been somewhat remiss as of late in not posting more of those postmortems that people just can’t help gawking at. It’s bad that I am so bored that I’m trolling postmortems again, but it is February. What else am I supposed to do? February always makes me think about death. Maybe it’s because I have to go to the BMV to get my car registration, and that’s always depressing.

The only way I’d ever been that close to either of my sisters, voluntarily, is if I’d been dead– which I think these two are.

Generally, if either of my sisters had been that close to me when I was a little kid, it was because they had me in a headlock, pounding me with whatever sort of pointy or heavy object that was handy.

I am surprised that I actually survived childhood with only minor scarring and disfigurement. The psychological damage- well, the Prozac does help.

Gam-Gam died in 1890, but those eyes are still watching you!

I know it’s morbid, but I think the postmortem pics are a forerunner of the Open Casket Funeral, which I find most distasteful in almost every instance. I can’t get the images of my grandmothers in their coffins with badly done makeup, in those awful pink nighties out of my head, let alone the image of Aunt Ellen (the non-makeup wearing Pentecostal) slathered down with day-glo orange lipstick and all dolled up as if she were headed for the Oompa-Loompa Prom.

I told Steve-o to cremate me when I die, but knowing him (and I’ve said this before) he will have me taxidermied and made into a coffee table.

“Looking beyond the embers of bridges glowing behind us
To a glimpse of how green it was on the other side
Steps taken forwards but sleepwalking back again
Dragged by the force of some inner tide”- Pink Floyd, “High Hopes”

Perhaps it is true that one can never really go back home again, but in another sense it’s also true that one can never really leave. It’s amazing how our society forgets the past so quickly, and repeats its mistakes so readily. Memory, if anything, should serve as both a harbinger and a teacher.

I think we do ourselves a disservice when we neglect the study of history. It may not be a good idea to continually live in the past, and I have to guard against this, but to deliberately seek a sort of live-in-the-now amnesia isn’t very healthy either.

I’ve learned to be careful which bridges to burn and which ones to leave standing, although I can’t say I’ve mastered the art of moving forward, or of knowing which pieces of the past are worth holding on to, and which pieces are things I need to let go.

I’ll have to remember to check the empty seats in my car for Hitler before I go.

I think I’d be hella nervous if I were approached by a giant talking frog. But I’m paranoid like that.

Bodily Effluvia, Bizarre Dreams, and Silence

February 4, 2014Tonya Lanthron Leave a comment

I hate snot. Green snot, clear snot, yellow snot, brown snot, bloody snot. Snot out the nose. Snot out the mouth. Snot down the back of my throat. I’ve had it forever with snot.

Yet for the past four days, excessive snot, in all its disgusting, messy, and inconvenient forms, has been my sad reality.

Sunday I was tempted to grab a big piece of cardboard and a Sharpie and just write on it : CAN’T TALK / GO AWAY. When I’m feeling crappy I want to be left alone. Let me snot and sneeze and choke and spray snot chunks in relative peace. If I need something That Bad, I’ll go get it. Leave me alone to my vast stash of Nyquil and related patent remedies, so I can drift off to restless and strange dreams of swallowing aluminum cans, climbing mountains, and hanging out with the dude from Survivorman. That is not a good show to fall asleep to. Especially considering the dude eats bugs. That is not normal.

I know, lean protein, but ewwwwwwwwww!

I know that someone like me who is highly prone to a surplus of bodily effluvia of the mucoid kind should probably sell everything and move to the desert. The only problems with that are: 1.) Even if I sold everything I own, it wouldn’t get me much further than about Illinois, which is even worse than Ohio- worse climate, worse economically, etc. and so on. 2.) The desert, while dry, is HOT. I don’t do heat worth a tinker’s damn, especially since the Menopause Fairy has come to stay. I still get the wayward hot flash, even in below-freezing Central Ohio winter.

I’m stuck here, although I don’t refer to Central Ohio as the Armpit of North America any more. Not since I’ve been to Detroit. I’m not Catholic and I don’t believe in Purgatory, but if there were such a thing as Beezelbub’s Waiting Room, it would be located somewhere on 8 Mile Road. The greater Columbus area is paradise when compared to Detroit, or even Cleveland.

Clark Griswold wants to know: “Hey, kids, you see all this urban blight?”

Hint: It’s what happens when the gimme crowd takes over.

Not being able to talk has its advantages- once people get it that your voice has taken a hiatus they tend to leave you alone- but it has disadvantages as well.

It wasn’t very fun trying to communicate in the Sprint store on Saturday. My phone (admittedly it had gone long beyond its intended lifespan) bricked (bricked (v.) – to stop functioning, i.e. to effectively become a “brick.”) so I was more or less compelled to go to the Sprint store to get another phone so that communication with my son and other family members would still be possible. Even if I can’t talk, I can still text. If I have a working phone!!!

Even though the poor girl in the Sprint store probably had a hell of a time understanding me, she understood me well enough to retrieve my SD card from the old phone and transfer as much of my data as possible between the card and what I’d saved on Google. My old phone was old, but it was still an Android phone. It had some of the new amenities. Even so, now I know to save ALL my contacts to Google and not just here and there.

Thankfully (and with a much lighter wallet) I left with a working phone that I can text on and play my MP3s with. Well, a bit more than that. OK, so I let the tech geek in me have a bit of fun and I got the Note 3 that Steve-o was raving on and on about. I can draw pictures on it, and the camera’s better than my actual camera. I like it a lot, so far.

At least I can text…and then some.

I’ve been so choked up with snot that I’ve been without a voice pretty much since Saturday morning until this morning, and what little bit I have, is a little bit. I was able to drag my carcass in to work today which is a plus. I don’t like to call off on Mondays, but there’s no sense in coming in if I can’t talk to anyone and I’m blowing snot chunks all over them to boot. There’s also no sense in spreading whatever freaking germs are lurking in all that superfluous snot, although this time of year is a veritable germ smorgasbord no matter where you go or what you do. At least I wasn’t on the SS Montezuma’s Revenge like all those poor suckers who paid out the wazoo for cruises. I got good and infected right here at home, for free!

Which is worse? Shits or snots?

Even though I generally don’t get to pick, I think I can live with the shits better than the snots. Although neither are to be envied.

A Day Without Scatological References is a Day Without Sunshine, and Selected Sophomoric Observations

January 29, 2014Tonya Lanthron 1 Comment

As long as we have this clear.

There is a classic scene from one of my favorite, and timeless movies, The Jerk, where Navin Johnson’s Dad explains to him the difference between shit and Shinola. For those who may not be aware, Shinola was a waxy shoe polish that was popular in the beginning of the 20th century. I know that sometimes I have a sophomoric obsession with things scatological, but it seems that many people in this world are having a hard time telling the difference.

I can go on and on about entropy and devolution- especially after perusing the illegitimate president’s mostly plagiarized speech (lots of tidbits lifted from the State of the Union address given by President G.W. Bush, 2007) and realizing that this despot is hell-bent on ruling by executive fiat, but there isn’t much I can do about that. Obama is pretty much beyond rationality, and the only course for rational people is to do what they can to mitigate his nonsense and attempt to block his unconstitutional actions for the next three years. Nothing productive or positive will get done in government as long as the Imperial BO is still squatting in the Oval Office, but hopefully by the grace of God (and a gridlocked Congress) some of the potential damage can be thwarted.

Let’s just say I wasn’t surprised by the last blast of hot air to come from Washington. Obama makes me want to puke.

Sometimes I think that if there is such a thing as parallel universes and/or if there is a universe for every possible combination of actions and decisions, that I got dropped in one of the more insane sets of possibilities. There are physicists who say that everything boils down to one big long complex equation. It probably does. Just don’t ask me to explain it.

I was doing good to pass high school algebra.

The really scary thing that I’ve come to realize is that the “powers that be” who have all sorts of high faluting expensive pieces of paper from supposedly prestigious institutions of learning, are proving themselves to be rank imbeciles. Maybe I’m just cynical, (and largely self-educated,) but I think these supposedly prestigious institutions care about two things: the money, and where the money’s coming from.

Maybe I’m being negative and fatalistic, but I am beginning to believe that higher education has been hijacked, and that the “powers that be” are presiding over a continual dumbing down of the populace. Sadly, such a theory makes sense. If you want to remain in power, and acquire more power, it might be in your best interests to keep your subjects stupid. That was the mindset behind the Romans’ free bread and circuses. Keep the people fat and sassy and uninformed, and they won’t care if you strip them of their rights.

Americans don’t even need the Olympics to be distracted. The Kardashians and Honey Boo Boo are enough.

See what I mean?

There isn’t much that I can do. I can try to find the humor in popular culture, but even that is a sort of bittersweet adventure. Some things are funny and some things are just plain sad. Why do the media care about people who dress up little girls to look like street walkers- and why do they follow around adult women who already look like street walkers who have nothing better to do than spend money on stupid things and cavort around with gangsta rappers? Are we obsessed with such bizarre families and weird behavior because the circus freak shows of days gone by have become politically incorrect? Instead of “Let’s go to the carnival to see the bearded lady, ” it’s “Let’s watch Mama June?”

Plus ςa change, plus c’est la même chose.

I enjoy perusing ads for Victorian patent medicines and other nostrums that were popular in the mid-to late 19th century. You just want to believe they would work even though most of the “medicines” were comprised of heroin, alcohol or a healthy combination of both.

You might not be “cured,” but you’ll be too stoned to care.

I also find humor in some of the 19th century euphemisms for ED (which is itself, a euphemism, but it’s just not nice to say “he has a limp dick.”)

Certain parts of the body enlarged…hmm? And exactly what is a tansy?

Now if I could get my hands on this and if it actually worked, I would be a most delighted old bitty.

I thought that was what that “Anabuse” pill was for – to make you puke every time you take a drink.

It Came From Planet Zit, Victorian Quack Cures, and It’s Frozen

January 23, 2014Tonya Lanthron 2 Comments

It has taken on a life of its own…

Thankfully this face crater is not on my face. I have enough problems. Unfortunately it’s on the POMC’s face, which really sucks for him. Nasty. The worst part of it is that if the antibiotics don’t kill it off he might have to go to a plastic surgeon and have it cut out. Joy and rapture- and this for a guy who almost lost it over a simple blood draw. I had my quarterly required blood draw yesterday. Big deal. I really don’t even notice it, but then the phlebotomists at the lab draw blood all day long. It’s simply what they do, and they’re good at it. The POMC, on the other hand, I hate to see what kind of anguish he might experience over a minor surgery that will (while still being minor) have a bit more to it than a simple blood draw.

I had to have a funky growth taken off the side of my head about 15 years ago. I was worried about losing hair over it, but they didn’t even shave that section of my head. The actual surgery was about five minutes, and it wasn’t that bad except for the surgeon was a little rough with the Lidocaine. Getting to surgery was the problem. I was scheduled for 7:30 AM, but didn’t get taken in until almost 2:30 PM. The guy who was scheduled for surgery right before me picked a really inconvenient time to Bite the Big One- as in, he commenced to take the Dirt Nap while he was on the operating table getting an ingrown toenail or something cut out.

Eventually, the Morgue Cart comes for us all.

So I had to wait around while they brought the code team in to try to get him jumpstarted. That was an effort in futility. Once they were satisfied that the guy was completely dead, and there was no revival going to happen, then I had to wait for the medical examiner’s team to come in and take notes and clean up and do the paperwork necessary to send the poor dude down to the morgue. Then the cleaning crew had to come in and hose everything down so it would smell nice and disinfectant-y, presumably in the hope that maybe I wouldn’t get too freaked that some guy just died in there while getting a minor surgical procedure on somewhat of the same scale of what I was having.

Yeah, the scent of shit-and-piss hosed down with disinfectant spray and Clorox doesn’t remind me of my own mortality and impending death. Not at all. ‘Kay… What made the whole experience even more fun is that the surgeon was a big burly guy with a very German name and a rather morbid sense of humor.

I was rather pissed by the time they were finally getting me rolled in to surgery. I had spent most of the day starving, sifting through stacks of distressed, inane and aged periodicals, and enduring such drivel on TV as Montel and other various daytime “Who Be My Baby Daddy” sorts of shows. Even so, in spite of my angst, curiosity got the best of me, and I asked some of the nurses and orderlies what sort of disaster went down, and why it was cause for my very minor surgery to be so delayed. They were more than happy to give me the low down on why my surgery was delayed for seven hours.

I also had to find it funny when the surgeon comes loping in the operating room, syringe full of Lidocaine, saying, “Hey don’t die on me here- that’s what happened to the last guy. It’s bad for business.” At least the surgery was quick, and he didn’t do any damage to the facial nerve the growth was right on top of. I can still eat without drooling and can enunciate when I speak, (these are good things.) Also a good thing, according to the path lab, the growth was benign. It never came back.

Getting a new driver’s license and a registration renewal at the BMV is faster than processing a dead dude to go to the morgue, apparently. Shit happens. Sometimes the timing just sucks.

The BMV: Abandon Hope All Ye Who Enter Here!

Of course the weather here in beautiful Central Ohio is absolutely frozen- right now it’s 9º. Of course when it is that cold here, that cold is always accompanied by gale force winds that make it feel like it’s 20° below. Just walking out to the car is being outside too much in this weather.

I wish there actually were something like this device, and that it actually worked.

There is something a bit creepy about wearing batteries on your head. There is also something a bit creepy about having a constant, splitting headache that feels like someone is trying to break out my hard palate from the inside with a crowbar, and to take the same crowbar and poke my right eye clean out of the socket from the inside too.

I’d duct tape some nine-volts to my noggin if that would make this shit go away, damn tootin’.

Unfortunately I think it’s just another reaction to stress and the stupidity that surrounds me.

I don’t think this would do much of anything.

I wish this one would work, but we all know better than that.

Misdirected Feline Aggression, Red Sky in the Morning, and Snot Apocalypse!

January 13, 2014Tonya Lanthron Leave a comment

There’s an old nautical saying (and why would I know anything about anything nautical when the nearest ocean is 500+ miles away, and I’ve never actually seen the ocean for myself, I will never know) that goes, “Red sky at night, sailor’s delight / Red sky in the morning, sailors, take warning.”

Usually sunrises (which are seldom seen in Central Ohio during the winter, because the dismal grey clouds usually obscure them) in Ohio are not this blazingly red, but this morning’s was so out of the ordinary I had to stop and click a pic. Whether it bodes good or ill, I don’t know, but I really don’t buy into funky superstitions. Murphy’s Law does not need a reason for anything to go wrong. If it can go wrong, it generally will, even if the sky is green with brown splotches.

Fanny- sort of the “fat kid” at school.

Cats have an interesting defense mechanism when they are bullied or threatened by a larger or more powerful entity. They lash back at a perfectly innocent and non-involved party rather than to retaliate on the aggressor, hence the phrase, misdirected feline aggression. Fanny displays the best example of this of all of my cats. The irony is that she’s by far the largest of the cats, but the most pathetic at defending herself. Jezebel (all of 5#) takes Fanny (15# the last time I tried to weigh her) down in headlocks frequently, at what point Fanny retaliates (?) by lashing back at one or more of the dogs, who simply give her a dismissive look and carry on whatever business they had been engaged in. The dogs really don’t care how pissed Fanny is or whether or not she hisses at them and swats at them. Fanny is declawed, and my smallest dog, and most frequent recipient of Fanny’s angst, (Lucy) is 40#. Lucy could care less. Clara and Lilo usually just step over her and keep right on going. Apparently the dogs are a good target for Fanny’s rage, because she knows they aren’t going to bother with her.

I never made fun of the fat kids in school, (there were only three of them, because when and where I grew up, nobody could afford to be fat) simply because my fighting skills were just as bad if not worse than theirs, and if worse came to worse, the fat kids could always sit on me. I was tiny and scrawny, which usually motivated me to keep my mouth shut around anyone with any incentive to kick my ass. My oldest sister would kick my ass just for sucking up valuable oxygen, so I never needed an invitation to an ass-kicking. Breathing was more than enough just cause for her to give me a good pounding. She did not like me breathing. Not one bit.

I wish I could score Jerry something stronger than Nyquil.

I don’t understand why, but for him the most minor of head colds or sniffles is a Major Ordeal. The world is coming to an end if he has the snots for a day or two. Perhaps I don’t have much sympathy because I am pretty much always either drowning in snot or very close to it, but the incessant and constant moaning inspired me to come home prepared Friday night: two bottles of the really nasty green Nyquil he likes, an extra bottle of snot pills, and some of those disposable ear plugs so that after I medicated him I could get some bloody sleep without hearing him moan and snot and bitch.

Just as a contrast I remember a time when I had an extremely wicked sinus infection as well as a rip-roaring case of bronchitis. I was a green snot fountain that was reminiscent of the that slime game show that was popular on Nickelodeon in the late 80’s- Super Sloppy Double Dare, if I remember correctly. Only I was emanating more green slime than even that show could- out the nose and, big thick green loogies out the mouth too.

I was working for a particularly psycho cokehead boss at that time, and didn’t dare miss work for something so trivial as showering fountains of snot both uncontrollably and copiously. So I drove the 40 miles to work, only to let fly the world’s most horrendous goopy sneeze that completely coated the entire inside of my ’94 Toyota truck’s windshield.

I knew it was going to be a really shitty day when I was trying to scrape off the snot from the inside of my windshield with an ice scraper so most of it wouldn’t dry on there. As I am trying to scrape and wipe the snot off before it dried, my boss (thankfully not high that morning for a change) saw what I was doing and was horrified. He sent me home and told me not to come back without a script and a doctor’s note.

When I did go to my doctor that afternoon (lucky me) he gave me nine kinds of hell for not coming in sooner- and four or five different scripts for various sprays, pills and rinses. It took a long time to go away, but I only missed one day of work, and that’s because I was sent home.

Women can endure bodily discomfort. Jerry would beg for Vicodin for a butt zit.

I Can Explain the Velveeta Shortage!

January 10, 2014Tonya Lanthron 5 Comments

I can explain the Velveeta Shortage!

Apparently it’s not just Marion County that has a run on Velveeta cheese (I’m not so sure on the Marlboros, maybe it’s just that there are a lot of smokers in Marion County) when there are rumors of impending White Death.

It must be a universal redneck thing.

Impending White Death Apocalypse=Must Have Velveeta Cheese!

Who would have thought?

The good news is that I do have most of a (loaf? brick? box?) of Velveeta cheese left over from holiday scalloped potato adventures. If you wrap it up so it doesn’t dry out, and keep it in the fridge, it has a 3 bazillion year shelf life. It should outlive the cockroaches should there be a real apocalypse- unless the cockroaches get to it and eat it first.

I also have plenty of Wolf Brand Chili, sausage, and green peppers to go with the Velveeta cheese for nacho dip should I choose to make it. I don’t really give a rat’s ass about the Super Bowl, so I will have nachos when I feel like having nachos.

SSDD, and If You Have to Ask, I Don’t Have Time to Explain

January 6, 2014Tonya Lanthron 2 Comments

Depression sucks.

Same shit, different day.

I could of course, attribute my unshakable malaise by chalking it up to the horrible weather or the interminable dark that pervades this time of year. Usually my mood improves when the holidays are over, at least a little bit, and then goes back in the toilet around mid-February until about May.

Maybe it’s because my life is pretty much lived stuffing ten pounds of shit into a five pound bag. The worst part of that is that it’s usually ten pounds of other people’s shit that I allow to be unloaded on me.

The sucky part of that is that one of my closest friends (who I really need to have a nice, long conversation with again, and sometime soon) once told me that life boils down to what you cause and what you allow. I allow other people’s dumb shit to go on and on without telling them to piss off, and that’s my own damned fault. I hear a lot of bitching through the course of a day, and a lot of it is in regard to things that either I can’t control or can’t change. Hearing all that day in and day out tends to make me feel pretty discouraged and hopeless.

Then I go home and get to hear Jerry bitch about things that he should just deal with himself if they bother him that much. This is the same guy who has no problem spotting shit or puke or some unfortunate object that Lucy has reduced to smithereens- but who does have nine kinds of excuses for why he can’t clean it up.

Really? I so need this amazing shit-shoveling gnome in my house!

That, and my left arm is killing me right around the place where I broke it. I think that might be because of the cold (it’s a balmy 1°F out there today) and low barometer, but it hurts something fierce today. I dug out the big black brace I had to use for awhile after they took my cast off, and put it on, which seems to help. Then there’s always the gift that keeps on giving- all my joints are rather creaky and stiff today- thanks to the lingering repercussions of rheumatic fever. The good news is that I was one of about three people in the pool this morning. I’d be much worse off today, at least as far as mobility goes, had I not gone to the pool. The pool, opposed to the outside world, is usually somewhere around 80°, which is quite nice.

If money were no object, this would be my personal indoor pool.

And here would be a suitable personal pool boy.

Maybe not so blond, but the bod is right on. Nice pecs.

It would be a total blast to lounge about in a lovely pool surrounded by buff young dudes, if I had the means, but as the old saying goes, “Wish in one hand, shit in the other, and see which one fills up first.”

Of course the fantasy would only be complete if I could have a big screen TV in my pool room showing Journey’s Greatest Hits Live 1981:

Play ALL. All night long.

Believe it or not, I’ve actually done a fairly decent job of cheering myself up. For now.

Please, Lord, don’t let me come home to a massive debris field left in the wake of the “Mouth of the South” (aka Lucy) because Jerry was too lazy to put the dogs back in their crates after lunch…

Or to a to-do list of Jerry’s errands to be ran (outside of course,) in sub-zero temperatures…

Give a poor white woman a break for a change, eh? A quiet night with maybe a few military documentaries, or even a showing of Hot Fuzz or Super Troopers? It doesn’t even have to be a cop-themed movie- Borat would do just fine… something funny, something light?

Norman Rockwell, We Ain’t, and a Most Pragmatic Christmas

December 26, 2013Tonya Lanthron Leave a comment

I actually thought that when the POMC’s male DNA contributor signed off his rights that I would be done with the snarky, vindictive antics that always seem to go down with “broken” families when children and holidays are involved. Yeah, right. I had no idea just how vindictive and snarky my granddaughter’s baby mama can get. Far be it from her that her child’s dad just might want to spend time with his daughter on Christmas too, eh?

Of course she can’t know his plans, or work with him for a compromise acceptable to both sides- if she turns off her phone and ignores all his calls and texts, right?

I’m trying really hard to avoid the very natural Mother of the POMC tendency to unsheathe the claws and protect the Precious Cub at all costs. After all, the POMC’s male DNA contributor was only good for his small contribution of biological material, and that’s the nicest thing I can say about the male DNA contributor. I don’t want to think that my granddaughter’s mother is being spiteful and vindictive without cause…but…Steve-o actually does care about his little girl and actually is involved in her life (unlike his male DNA contributor) so I figure, what the hell’s her problem? Lack of maturity, desire to get her own way, and the Opportunity to Make a Scene, are all things one does at age twelve to get attention, but when a 20 year old woman’s doing it, it just looks stupid and sad.

It’s a shame when they carry over into adulthood.

I can understand that mother’s desire to have one’s child all to herself. I can understand the instinct to protect one’s child from psychos (my ex in-laws, for example) or even from the indifference of the other parent -should the other parent be apathetic and simply consign the offspring to the caprice of said psycho in-laws, but Steve-o is anything but indifferent, and I might be wired a bit differently than most, but I’m not a psycho. Yet.

I think what was truly at work here was a vindictive, spoiled brat trying to inflict pain on someone who didn’t go along with her fantasy.

Guess what happens when you let your kid have everything he/she wants!

Now if I had known I would have spent most of Christmas Day between trying to calm down my son, traipsing in and out of Walgreen’s, Speedway and McDonald’s, and had I known Christmas dinner would have been a cheeseburger and McNuggets (thankfully they did not forget the hot mustard sauce or I probably would have lost what little bit of sanity I thought I had left,) I’d have stayed home with Tipsy McNumbnuts and saved the gasoline.

I normally don’t eat this kind of stuff but when it’s all there is other than Flamin’ Hot Cheetos and beef jerky, I guess- any port in a storm.

We were supposed to leave for my sister’s house at 12 noon. It was 3 PM before we were able to pick up the Precious One’s offspring and get going. Other than the insanely (stupid) late start, the day was lovely for the kids. Lots and lots of presents and toys and candy and food.

It was a more dismal picture for the adults. Mom somehow got it in her head that I and my illustrious siblings would just love, love, love these fugly scarves that some lady who lives next to the retirement home makes in her spare time. So we had to pretend that we were going to just adore the fugly scarf that (to me) looks like something Lucy mutilated, shredded, and then crapped out. But Mom doesn’t know any better. One year she got Jerry these:

With nice, slick vinyl soles!

Mom’s intentions are always good. She doesn’t see anything malicious or funny or even dimly inappropriate in stuff like this. So it’s best to just play along. Why hurt her feelings by telling her Jerry’s going to break his neck wandering around shitfaced wearing extra-slick soled slippers, or that if I wore that scarf in public people might think I started believing it fashionable to run around wearing trash bags and roadkill?

At least Mom doesn’t have any friends who know how to make those creepy doll-head faux fur Kleenex box holders. Grandma eventually got tired of making them and moved on to more sensible kitsch, such as crocheted afghans and toaster cozies.

She’d twerk- if she had a butt, that is.

Dark and Pensive, Infomercial Madness, and Outside of the Sphere

December 18, 2013Tonya Lanthron Leave a comment

Winter can be beautiful as well as dark and lonely.

I can’t say that I’m sad or even melancholy. I’m more in a sort of dark and pensive mode, which for me is a familiar, almost comfortable place to be. My deep preference for solitude and quiet might be hard to explain to those with an extraverted personality, but for me it’s the mental equivalent of a warm fire and a relaxing easy chair. The gardens of memory, like real gardens this time of year, are subdued and don’t appear to be as active on the surface. Dormant, maybe, but not dead.

Of course it’s not as easy to turn off the world as it probably should be. I am better at it than most, but I still have to deal with the practicalities of living and communicating with other people. It would be nice to be able to tell a few people to go hang (or to just plain get bent) but I can’t shut down completely. I’m afraid if I do that I won’t be able (nor will I want) to turn back on.

For me, every day is an act of the will to choose to interact with the world beyond my very restrictive sphere. I don’t want to most of the time. Today I would much rather prefer to take a trip to the Main Library in downtown Columbus and peruse and read and think in the quiet. Unfortunately I don’t see a day coming where I can do that, unless I stop off there for a bit on my way to the Paper Nightie Appointment tomorrow. I scheduled tomorrow and Friday off (I will pay for that one, but I need a little time away and I have the vacation time) so tomorrow I don’t have to scramble about and then have to endure the Paper Nightie Appointment. I dread it enough as it is. Friday I hope to finish getting Steve-o whatever Christmas gifts I want to get him- or better yet, meet him somewhere so he can pick out what he wants.

Dad’s getting Angry Birds jammies.

Most of my relatives have way too much crap to begin with, so I have to be creative. Dad is quite enamored of the Angry Birds game, and he likes those men’s lounge pants that geezers wear around the house. It should work. What else can you buy for the man with the taxidermied squirrel on a skateboard?

Yes, Dad really does have a taxidermied squirrel on a skateboard.

I learned a new word from the infomercials that pollute the airwaves from 2-4 AM. Insomnia must have some advantages, if only to enlighten me to the wonderful world of such invaluable products such as the Pos-T-Vac, the Nu Wave, and the No-No.

I always thought that area that’s not your neck, not your tits and not your shoulders was simply the not-neck-not-tits-not-shoulders area. Then I discovered the French actually have a word for the not-neck-not-tits-not-shoulders area. It’s always good for me to expand my vocabulary. They call it the décolletage or décolleté- meaning “sort of around the neck area,” and you’re supposed to slather expensive cream on it so it doesn’t end up looking all wrinkled and birdy. One infomercial suggests you should blast this area with a radio frequency device you can also use on your face to ward away the birdy wrinkles. ‘Kay….

All I could think of when I came upon this device was Oh. Holy. Shit.

If I feel the need to hook my face up to this, I have deeper issues than a few birdy wrinkles.

I can just imagine if I’d found this when I was five years old and had to use the bathroom in the middle of the night at Grandma’s. Seeing Grandma’s and Grandpa’s dentures sitting next to the sink, glaring out at me from their soaking cups of Polident as I was taking a midnight whiz was enough to give me nightmares for a month. It was bad enough that Grandma could remove her teeth at night. I could just imagine the insane terror my five year old mind would have gone through if I thought Grandma took her face off at night.

At first glance I thought the above alien face mask was some kind of device intended to turn someone into Lieutenant Commander Data from Star Trek:

You never know.

Of course women have been doing bizarre things to themselves to attempt to stem the inevitable tide of aging since the beginning of time. The truth is that entropy is always going to win. Live long enough and your tits will bounce off your knees.

At least most women don’t still wear these awful things:

I bet they itched, too.

I have discovered many interesting things online that I can’t imagine anyone would have any sort of real practical use for, but people will buy anything on Amazon. Even this: It’s a model to practice doing prostate exams. And you can have it in time for Christmas if you order it by December 23!

I have an idea for a new party game based on this: “Pin the Prostate on Bob”?

ELYSIANHUNTER, ALWAYS INCITEFUL:

Because comedy is the flipside of tragedy

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Author: Tonya Lanthron