bad gifts

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

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broken_family-300x141

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?

grizzly-mama-with-cub

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.

emotional

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.

whine

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.

cheeseburger

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.

ugly scarf

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:

slipper socks

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.

doll head kleenex holder

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

Funky Wiring Has Its Advantages, The Un-Birthday, and Please Practice “Safe Text”

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I have to laugh.  As I was reviewing my birthday request list , I noted to my dismay that I didn’t even get the 12-pack of Diet Dr. Pepper.  No cougar cruise, no waterpark fun day, no three pack of Hanes Her Way hi-cut granny panties, no gas card, but it doesn’t surprise me.  My oldest sister, the childhood sadist, sent me a redneck themed card, because she gets such a hoot out of the fact that I married into the Most Redneck Family Ever.   Apparently she doesn’t understand that when you go fishing without appropriate bait you catch whatever bottom feeder the hook manages to snag.  At least she was lucky enough to look good from the neck down and was able to land a decent man.  Ironically, she treats him like shit.  It doesn’t surprise me. Apparently in relationships someone has to be the shitter and someone has to be the shittee.  I know all about #2- literally.

Mom didn’t get me as woefully inappropriate a gift as the cookie cutters.  I still don’t get why anyone would think a diabetic would want cookie cutters.  Why not the whole cake decorating kit and the candy thermometer too while you’re at it?  Mom got me a particularly nice pair of Isotoner driving gloves that actually fit my big meaty man-hands- which is surprising as it is difficult for me to find womens’ gloves that fit.  That is a useful gift.   I did get a phone call from my illustrious offspring, to remind me that February is a short month and he needed his rent money.  Although he and Jerry share no DNA whatsoever, they are both blissfully ignorant of dates.  Unless of course, there is money involved.

Dad finally remembered that he forgot my birthday last night (28th) and asked me (in all seriousness) how I liked being 44.  I reminded him that I’m only 42.  Apparently he is 23 years older than me and more senile than I am.  Now I see what I have to look forward to.  Mom at least knew she would probably forget and gave me the gloves the last time I was up there.

I happened upon a most amusing website today which really cracked me up.  Steve-o and his friends communicate almost exclusively through texting.  Steve-o is a particularly poor speller.  Most technicians are dismal spellers and poor writers- but as a trade-off, they generally have mathematical and spatial skills that far surpass mine.  It was always fun to interview techs, if only to critique the fashion and hair faux pas.  GQ, these guys ain’t.  I should have actually requested them to fill out their resumes using crayons and a Hello Kitty coloring book  just to make reading them more entertaining.  I almost always ignored their resumes, took face to face interviews with a grain of salt, and hired techs off of whatever good recommendations I could find from others in the business, combined with whether or not they could pass a BMV check.  It worked better for me that way.

This being said, I have to laugh at those who use auto-complete or other spell-check features on phones.  Those features for the lazy or inattentive generally suck- but they suck in occasionally hilarious ways.  Damn You Auto Correct is a nice little site where people post all the ridiculous ways that “smart” phones fill in the blanks. 

My funky wiring gives me a few advantages- such as speed-reading and an uncanny ability to spell correctly almost all of the time.  I don’t use auto-complete or spell-checks because I generally don’t need them.  If I really am in doubt over the spelling of a word I will usually verify it on Merriam-Webster’s site, because I truly want to be correct.  I  wouldn’t generally refer to myself as a spelling and grammar Nazi, but I do try to maintain a high personal standard.   The irony of the auto-complete and spell-check programs is that to use them effectively one has to have some sort of idea of the correct spelling or usage, otherwise one may end up with an entirely different meaning to one’s message.  Therein lies the humor.

I think double-entendre to be the most hilarious of the forms of humor.  The more off-color the reference the funnier I find it, even though it may be puerile and sophomoric.  Everyone needs a hobby, and the more things I can find to laugh at, in the depths of my pathetic life, the better. 

I have to wonder, as I troll the Damn You Auto Correct site, what the hell are the people who program the auto-correct and/or spell-check software thinking?  Is English their first language?  Or do they have as dark a sense of humor as I do?  I’d like to think the latter.  We geeks are masters at passive-aggressive revenge, and what better way to exact passive-aggressive revenge on neurotypical society than to humiliate those who struggle with the written word? Why not transform their  attempt to spell “penne” (as in pasta) to “penis?”  Who wouldn’t want to be invited over for “Salad with Vinagrette and Penis?”  I’d make a special trip for that.

Does anyone ever proofread their texts, even a little?  Or do you just hit “send” with wanton glee?

How about a little “safe text?”  Or not.  It’s funny when it gets screwed up!