BlabberMouse

Thinking Is Believing

Once upon a time, I dated a young man we'll call Mr. Nice.

Mr. Nice--as his name would imply--was very nice. Nice to me, nice to his friends, nice to his family. Just nice.

And I mean just nice.

Beyond the fact that he was nice and I like nice people, we had very little in common. If you were to make a Venn diagram out of our hobbies and interests it would like two headlights flashing WHAT IN THE FUCK ARE THESE TWO PEOPLE DOING TOGETHER in Morse code. 

Eventually, the relationship fizzled to an inaudible (yet amicable) pop, and I thought very little about it until a year or two had passed and my mother showed me a picture.

It was a picture of me and an extremely rotund gentleman smiling by my side.

"Who is that?" I asked.

"That's you and Mr. Nice."

WHAT?

WHAT? WHAT? WHAT?

"But Mr. Nice wasn't fat!"

"He wasn't at first," my mom said.

SWEET JESUS!

I mean this person was borderline obese. Not the cute, athletic Mr. Nice I remembered at all. And I'd had no idea. I just didn't see it.

I suppose the weight gain had been gradual, but the difference was PHENOMENAL. How I didn't notice it is just ... I don't know ... a testament to my incredibly poor observational skills? Or maybe I just thought he was really nice, and I was seeing him with my incredibly pure and loving heart? Or probably I was drunk. I DON'T KNOW.

But it's happened again!

I got an email from one of my readers last night. The email linked to a picture of me and Gus that she had found posted on one of her favorite blogs. A picture you might remember.
A picture I thought was a damn near perfect likeness of my adorable boy until I saw it in the context of a web site called PHOTOSHOP DISASTERS.

Go! Visit! You'll see ...

He has no hands!

I don't even think those are his real arms!

I ran to grab the actual box out of the closet, grumbling and huffing about that can't be right ... Hoax ... Please ... grumble give me a break, he does NOT look like a Squid Boy on the actual box--OH MY GOD! HE DOES! HE DOES LOOK LIKE A SQUID BOY ON THE ACTUAL BOX! And everyone's talking about it!

Up until I read the comments on PhotoShop Disasters, I had never noticed the PhotoShopping. Not AT ALL. And I've been giving these boxes as gifts!

Hello and Happy Birthday! Here is me and my son who has neither hands nor muscle tone! And we are swimming! Good thing he has the ring, eh?

Thank you Jennifer, for bringing this matter to my attention.

I'll be looking at my loved ones a little more closely from now on.

(Editor's Note: Where the comments left off last night, no one had said anything particularly ugly about me or Gus personally, but I caution readers who might have been involved in giving me or Gus life not to read too far down, as it's very possible they'll be attacking my stupid haircut (justified!) and God knows what else in the future. People can be mean. But this site is pretty hilarious.)

Hooray 4 Hllywd.

Really. So irritated. Have little time/patience for cmplt sentences.

Rented Wiggles Live: Hot Potato, Hot Potato

(Old. From "Greg" Era.)

"Maaaahmitskips! Maaahmitskiiips!"

Of course skips! DVDs always skip! Otherwise how would recognize thm? If didn't skip, would be coasters!

Try to wipe.

Try to buff.

Try to WISH HARD. Contemplate church, God, prayer. Not worth hassle. Potlucks.

Dice, none.

FCK IT! DVDs = SHITE.

Watch vintage Mr. Rogers on VHS instead. "Friendship" episode. Fred goes to restaurant, buys cheese and tomato sandwich from restaurant friends. Cheese Swiss. Slice abnormally thick. Very delicious looking, but really! Who puts cheese that thick on sandwich?

Returns Wiggles DVD/Worthless piece shite coaster to Hollywood Video after work.

Me to cshier: DVD does not play. Is scratched.

Cshier: (Takes, smiles) Ok, thks.

(Cshier rings up new DVD. Coraline. "That will be $4.99" or whtvr.)

Me: Don't I get credit for scratched wiggles?

Cshier: Oh, well, what usually do is give other version of SAME.

Me: Do you have other version of Hot Potato Hot Potato Greg-era?"

Cshier: No. Is old DVD. Only one copy.

Me: Right then, so ...

Cshier: Next option is we buff scratched Wiggles! You try. If still no work, THEN come back, talk to mgr to arrange refund.

Me: ($%^%^#@!!!! !!!!!!!!!)

Cshier: Otherwise, everyone would return videos and say "no work", see?

Me: ($%^%^#@!!!! !!!!!!!!!)

Cshier: You want we buff?

Me: Sure. Buff.

Cshier: It will be few minutes. Buffing machine in "gaming area"

20 FCKING MINUTES LATER CSHIER RETRIEVES BUFFED DISK FROM GAMING AREA:

Cshier: Here is! Must ring up now! Will give you FULL week rental with buffed Wiggles so you have time to enjoy!

(Looking around for video cshier prince's steed! So generous! ONE FULL WEEK OF BUFFED RENTAL that did not work first time! Can not believe good fortune!)

Go home. Watch Coraline. Dakota Fanning really growing up! Button eyes too scary. Try buffed Wiggles.

Lights, Camera, Action! (Stilted hand gestures!)

Wiggles drive up in big red car (car not very big actually. Actually quite small. Silly.)

Tick tock, six minutes pass ...

"Mahhhhmitskipped!"

"To where?"

"Back to the beginning."

Of Mice and Man Purses (Except, Not Really About Mice)

Today I posted a piece for Her Nashville about Larry's man purse.

The purse--or as some call it, The Murse--is yet another ray of light in our already sunny relationship.

He carries it with such confidence, and our boys are so proud! "That's our dad!" they say (to every stranger we pass). "He has a man purse!"

The other day I asked Patrick where his BB* was, and he said, so matter-of-factly, "It's in Daddy's man purse." That is how seamlessly the man purse has become one with our family.

*BB (n.) 1. Pacifier. 2. Lifeline 3. Personal savior 4.The only way anyone gets any sleep around here.

While I am very pro-Man Purse, I'm not a purist. I fully recognize that there are other ways for a man to transport his important gear.

(To quote Miss South Carolina) Like, for example, the such as ...

Whatever works.

Eye Have No Idea What's Up With My Eye

Do you see this?

This is ridiculous. The photo doesn't do it justice at all. My whole eyelid and the right side of my nose is inflated. First I thought it was a bug bite. Then I suspected poison ivy, because I broke out in these weird itchy bubbly things on my right wrist yesterday after tending to Larry's garden all week. But I went to the doctor in my mind, and she looked at my eye and was all, "Huh. I don't know what that is. It could be poison ivy. Or it could be a bacterial infection. Or it could be viral, in which case there's nothing I can do. I could give you a prescription to see if it works? And if it doesn't improve, come back and see me, so we can keep stabbing wildly in the dark, yes?"

So I did the math:

(Advice I could have gotten from Google)+

($25 co-pay)+

($30 prescription that may or may not work)+

(Waiting for 35 minutes at ghetto Kroger's pharmacy window while they tell me my name isn't in the system even though I've had elevenbajillionkerfuckedy prescriptions filled there)+

(Explaining to the pharmacy tech that there's an APOSTROPHE in O'Brien and that's why they can't find me in the computer)+

(Hoping they know what an apostrophe is, but doing the little apostrophe finger gesture just in case)+

(I have no vacation or sick time [or patience] left between now and Christmas)=

FUCK IT, I'LL JUST BE THE ELEPHANT WOMAN FOR A FEW DAYS

Which, even in the last 24 hours, has taught me a valuable lesson.

I would be the most annoying insecure handicapped person ever!

I can't just have elephantitis of the eye and go about my business. I have to keep bringing it up. I have to always call attention to the elephantitis in the room.

--Hey, Amanda. Here's the first round of ad comps.

--YOU'RE LOOKING AT MY EYE, RIGHT? ISN'T IT GROSS? AREN'T I GROSS? I'M SORRY YOU  HAVE TO LOOK AT ME! I HAVE NO RIGHT TO EXIST LOOKING LIKE THIS, I KNOW. I'M DISGUSTING.

--Well, I hadn't noticed until you brought it--

--It's okay. Don't feel bad. My eye is sinful and unclean and I am unworthy of love and affection.

I'm always amazed at the confidence of people who have serious physical deformities. They don't seem compelled to tell everyone around them what happened. And of course they shouldn't. It's none of our business. But I know if it were me, I'd be walking around pointing at my head like "Cooking accident. Grease fire. Hideous, right?" And I'd wear a laminated "before" photo on a lanyard around my neck.

Anyway, this is getting long.

If you know something I don't know about swollen eyelids, and you think there is a legitimate reason to see a doctor, please (without scaring the crap out of me) let me know.

Otherwise, I'm going to just wait and see (out of my good eye).

Dog Tired & Other Pictures from the Blabbermouse Charitable Trust

I finally had a chance to go through some pictures I've taken this summer. I meant to post this weeks ago. 

 

As Larry used to say to his junior high French teacher, Monsieur Le Nev, every time the poor man asked him a question, "Je suis tres, tres, tres fatigue, Monsieur Le Nev."

Let's see, neighbors ... what other gems do I have to share with you today? Hmmm ... first let me slip into my cardigan ... and then let's feed the fish (hello, fish!) and head over to the Land of Make Believe, where ...

--What's that, Trolley?
--Ding, ding!
--You say you wish what?
--Ding, ding!
--You wish the YMCA wouldn't just leave their Patrick-sized dummies lying willy-nilly by the side of the pool where any unsuspecting mother could see one passed out behind a deck chair and HAVE HERSELF A MOTHERFUCKING HEART ATTACK?
--DING! DING!
--I'm with you, Trolley.

Seriously. Ten years of my life. Gone.

And then I took a walk with the boys one evening. A "nature walk" around our neighborhood. And when we were passing by our neighbor's garage, we noticed the doors were open, and there was music coming from inside.

And CHERYL was sitting in the recliner, listening to the music and enjoying having no hands or legs.


Heart attack.

My camera is my pacemaker.

A close up of Cheryl:

A little blurry, but alarmingly lifelike nonetheless.

What with the sun hat and the lei and the missing pelvis and all.