Nacho Dog

The other day I overheard my daughter yelling at our dog,

"Nacho dog! Nacho dog!"

I asked her why she was calling him Nacho Dog, picturing the dog on a bed of chips with guac and salsa. Her reply,

"You always say Bindi is Nacho, that he's a Nacho little dog!"

"That's Macho sweetie, he's a Macho little dog."

"Oh, what's Macho?"

Now we're in the 'South'

And we thought we were in the South.

Ney gentle reader, we were but in the Southern South. We had not yet experienced the languid and lugubrious south of the Carolinas yet. This is the South of small children who do no say "pig", but "swwwwiiiiiiiiinnne". This is miles upon miles of mobile homes along the highways, seemingly placed just so in case someone should want to expand the highway; the homes could be moved in a moments time. This is the south where, as one young lady explained,

"We've nevah beeen outsahd North Carahlina to Virginia befoah."

as we sat consuming Meat and Three* in a cozy Bar-b-cue joint named Little Richard decorated with all sorts of animal parts. The main theme inside was pig decor (as though Little Richard was somehow an apt symbol.) In fact, we had a lively debate over whether the coat hooks were supposed to be pigs feet or deer hooves. The proprietor just said,

"Well, they's supposed to be deer feet Ah think."

I should've snapped a photo for yah'll to judge for yaselves.

The pace of life here is beyond slow. If a police car spots someone speeding, they don't give chase, they just wait until the culprits come around again, which they must surely will.

Varmints crossing the road don't even hurry, since they know they've got more than a fighting chance against the sidling traffic. And, of course, as in everywhere else in the South, we can never rush into a store or restaurant, get what we want and go. It is the height of rudeness not to 'pass the time' for a bit before getting down to business.

Me: "Help!, where's the fire extinguisher, my hairs on fire!"

Store Keeper: "Well well, young lady, are yah'll from these parts? You sound like Yankees, now not meanin' to be rude or anything. Have you ever been to New York? Those folks really move. What's that you need?"

Me: "Ahhhhggha!"

The upside of the pace of life is that you DO get to know a lot of people, their dogs, children, grandchildren, dentist and proctologist. Folks will stand there and question you about everyone you know, not to be rude, but to find some sort of connection. Eventually one always turns up. Their third cousin's wife's lawyer is actually one of your patients, or the girl who trims their dog was living in Seattle at the exact same time and was your next door neighbor. People care about these connections, they make you family and that means warmth and kindness all around. Here is a true story:

A friend in Boulder, Colorado gave me a knitting book called Mason Dixon Knitting. The writers of the book write a blog. I checked the blog and saw that a group of women from somewhere around Chattanooga went up to Nashville for a knit-along. I hadn't found a group to knit with yet and so I wrote to the author of the blog in Nashville asking if she could forward my e-mail to those knitters in Chattanooga. 2 days later I received and e-mail from one of the knitters and called her up. Turns out the group of knitters is not just from around Chattanooga, they are in my neighborhood of Signal Mountain and one of the main places they meet is just down the street. (Hi Beth and Karen!)

Also, it turns out that this group is a talented group of artists who are members of a number of art associations which my DH and I have been looking for. It also turns out that the people taking over the book keeping for my DH's office is the family of a couple of the knitters in the group. (and when I say family I mean 'Family' with an Italian last name, I think they're just book-keepers rather than book-makers...(just kidding Karen...))

So, connections, it's all about connections, one way or another. And luckily, because my DH is a Dermatologist, there will be no swimming with the fishes for us!



*The 'Three' in Meat and Three stands for vegetables, in most cases potato, corn, and canned green beans.

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Well that's Weird...

Did you know that most Southerners don't say 'weird'? Nor do they say 'you guys'. Also, and don't ask why I noticed this one, they don't say 'boogers'.

The exception to all of this is Florida, which is really an exception to everything anyway.

In the South they* say:

"Well that's mighty strange..."
and
"All ya'all come over here ya hear?"
and
"Wipe off that snot, would ya' please?

In the South they* also don't say, "What's that?" (as in "I didn't quite hear that".)

They* say, "Do what?" To which I usually say, "Huh?"

And finally there's the "Oh Bless Her Heart.." (All starting with caps)

This saying is more complex and can mean several things:

1. "Oh that poor wreck of a person, she is completely hopeless and will always be so."
2. "I can say anything nasty or mean that I want as long as I say 'Bless his heart' so he knows I'm really not SO mean and I am blessing him after all."

I'm assuming these are the things said instead of:
"You moron for God's sake, pull yourself together!"

*I can't honestly say 'we' here, since I still yell, "Come home you guys!" to call my kids inside and I regularly use weird and booger around my house since my kids are still in elementary school.

Well, thank ya'll for visiting my blog and I'll see all ya'all as soon as I get a tissue for this strange bit'a snot there on that child....bless her heart.

Little Book of Magic

Angels are singing, birds are chirping and I am so excited I could spit. At least, I think that's what we here in the South do.

Why this explosion of ecstasy usually reserved for a new ice-cream? Because I am now the proud owner of a new passport. Yep. Me. I am official and I have a little book with my picture in it to prove it. And even almost as good, it took less than a week to get. I did pay the extra money to get it expedited, which I thought meant it would come in perhaps 5 weeks rather than the usual 6. This is the Government people...nothing takes 5 days.

Those of you who are passport pros are probably wondering why all this babble, especially about a little book that represents the tragic state of the world in that we cannot blithely and innocently go and visit whom ever we want any time we want. (glad to get that off my chest) However, this little book also means big things. It means adventure is waiting just around the corner and it reminds me of the wonders I experienced when last I used this little book, nearly 20 years ago. (Which is why I needed a new one)

Now that I have my little book, and I have seen that it is not so very aggravating to obtain, I must fly and get little books for the rest of the family so that we can all go on adventures together. That way, if we all want to rent bikes in Holland, we just whip out our little passports and say, "Tak, I vonten ein reddish bicicle danks."

And, BTW, my last travel companion on big adventures has been my life companion for nearly 20 years, so the little book is a reminder of that small accomplishment.

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End of 2006

Now that the holiday season has taken a hiatus, until the Groundhog Day sales begin again and the newspaper takes on that large and bloated look due to ad indigestion, I think it’s time to look back at the end of 2006 in our family and post a few pictures that I didn’t have a chance to post earlier. Here in the South the ‘Holidays’ are huge. It’s the time when everything is happening at once. Every event happens in a two-week time period before school break. One of those events is the annual school concert parade of proud parents and durgy music designed to make you swell with pride and then burp loudly during the second act.



The tickets for these two torturous hours of the slowest version of Jingle Bells I’ve ever heard, set us back $14 dollars apiece. They were supposed to be $7 but I left the first set at home and we had to buy 4 more. The event was set in the city theater, the Tivoli, a very nice venue to be sure. However, even huge chandeliers and beautiful drapes were not enough to keep our 6 year old entertained, and so I joined many other pairs of rotating parents in the lobby, all of us feeding our children M&Ms one at a time to keep them quiet and happy. The other reason for our stay in the lobby was the two giant (like, 25 ft. high) and frightening Nutcracker banners hanging in the back of the stage. These were the ugliest meanest Nutcrackers we had ever seen and most of the younger kids were afraid to look at them.



Because the schools in our area decided to have all their concerts here rolled into one we only actually saw our daughter from afar. In fact, it may or may not have even been our daughter. Luckily we took the correct one home with us.

It Seemed Like a Good Idea...

I’m not sure what possessed me to try this, it just looked…interesting, or like something someone needed to test. Anyway, there they were, little bits of false eyelashes that were supposed to be glued individually to the eye area to make a realistic set of lashes.

Mind you, I have never, in my life, worn false eyelashes, but hey, we’re in the South, home of some of the biggest false eyelashes and hair in the world, so how do they do it? Theatrical displays run in the family so I had to check it out.

So I brought these home (very inexpensive from CVS) with the proper glue substance and guffawed at the fact that salons charge some $40 to apply these suckers. Surely I could do it with my eyes closed.

It turns out you have to do it with your eyes closed, since applying them means closing one eye and then blocking the other eye with the hand applying the lashes. My first attempt (eye number 1, lash number1) went pretty well. Beginners luck. Subsequent attempts resulted in lashes on my eyelid, eyebrow, cheek, hand and finally the floor, which started to take on a creepy look like a little spider gathering.

I proceeded doggedly on, glue was beginning to form stalagmites on my fingers and my original lashes were becoming one with each other. I finally called my Dear Husband to have a go. He is gainfully employed as a Dermatological surgeon, (“…the cancer, I forgot about the cancer…”*) so I figured if anyone could do it he could. Apparently it takes more skill to apply these lashes than a surgeon, used to tiny maneuvers, could manage. Even weirder, he made no comment about my trying out these little beasts as though I do this sort of thing all the time. I’m figuring that either:
1. He secretly liked the looked of random lashes on my eyelid,
2. He was also curious about this process, since he might one day have to perform this operation in his office,
3. He knows me a little too well.

Finally I had to give up. Resistance was futile and I had wasted enough time in my stubborn insistence that I could conquer these little beasts.

I made one last attempt. I tried a different approach, and it worked!




So if any of you women or men out there get the urge for big false eyelashes, pay the $40 bucks, it might be worth your sanity.

NOT that I'm condoning this kind of behavior.

Except for Johnny Depp.

The big hair is next.



*Seinfeld, for those of you too young to remember.

Trying out a New Format for a New Season

 I thought I'd try out a new format for a little while, unfortunately I lost all my links so I'll have to rebuild those.  Remember, 'Patience is being able to wait peacefully' or at least that's what I tell my kids.