I have not blogged in a fortnight. (Google it.) At first it was because I’d been scared out of “giving away my funny for free.” Then I just got too busy pulling crayons out of preschooler noses and making sure junior high school students (alright, ONE PARTICULAR junior high school student) was keeping up with homework and prepubescent skin care. Then I just got “blogger block.” Every writer gets blocked from time to time. Oh, I’ve got plenty of funny fodder for the social networks. But I feared I had hit a dry patch blog-wise. Until tonight. Tonight I decide to just catch you up on the fortnight that was for:
BEN: My “baby.” The blond-haired, blue-eyed surfer dude among a sea of hazel-eyed brunette landlubbers (no, Mailman Mark is not blond) turned 7 since my last blog, and now looks like an extra from the cast of Deliverance. Corn on the cob is no longer a viable option as a sidedish at KFC. After losing three teeth in one week, the Tooth Fairy learned the hard way that she must always have singles in her purse. Kid woke up to four quarters one morning. I told him the fairy didn’t like his brushing technique. Ben’s kickin’ it in 1st grade, beating the pre-pre-pre-pre-teen girlie set off with a stick and reading at the top level of books offered in his class. And it’s only Oct. 1st. I’m thinking he’s peaked already and it can only go downhill from here.
EVAN: Crossed the hump, and then literally the street, and is now in Middle School. Yay!! Yay?! Feh. Has to be at school an hour earlier than last year. This is not going well. Wakes up like an old man every morning, stumbling blindly down the hall in his boxers like a geezer looking for his soaking teeth. School seems to be going well so far. It could actually be going to hell in a hand basket since I haven’t seen any grades come home yet. But he hasn’t come home bloodied or hickey'd yet, so it’s all good for me! At back-2-school night we met all his teachers. I think I could have babysat or given birth to most of them. Except fo the science teacher. She could have babysat for George Bush...Senior. The biggest thing I’ve noticed as the new mother of a middle schooler is the difference between the girls and the boys now. Boys vary in height, that’s about it. Girls? Ay, Chihuahua! Evan was so nervous the first day of 7th grade that he got sick. Then we pulled up in the morning, and some 9th grade girls (God I hope they were 9th graders!) walked in front of our car. The raised eyebrow I saw on my son said a thousand words that morning. He’s never had a problem going to school since that day. I swear I think I share a bra size with some of these girls. And if you know me at ALL…
CHRIS: Is still Chris. Only change is a recent trip to Chicago. Where he was officially diagnosed with the “meat sweats” after finishing off ¾ of a Gino’s East deep-dish, sausage-patty-as-big-as-the-pie pizza. I felt no pity for him when I heard of his agony, and neither should you. He ordered extra tomatoes on the pie because, as everyone knows, vegetables are healthy.
ME: (Yeah, I’m going to get the biggest passage today. The rest of ‘em know how to write; they can make their own blogs!) I’m still leading my "secret" double life, only I’m now a year older while doing it. Turned 87 on Monday, according to my “dear friend” Mickey, who I hope to see staring down my headlights one night on an desolate road. It was actually a surprisingly lovely birthday. I was treated to a sushi buffet lunch at my favorite once-a-year restaurant. Ben’s photo is now taped to their register under the heading “Do NOT serve!” (that boy is to sushi what termites are to seasoned wood). My parents and siblings went in on a joint gift and got me the scriptwriting software I had longed for, and unsubtly hinted at, for weeks.
The day took a brief detour into hell when I went to Cub Scouts and was serenaded by a room full of scouts and parents against my will. (PAUSE! This is the point in the movie of my life where you notice the birthday girl putting her cell phone on “vibrate” because it would be rude to have it ring during a Cub Scout pack meeting. RESUME PLAY!) After scouts, my folks came over and I was treated to a lovely birthday cake with the number “87” in candles on it thanks to my husband finding “dear friend” Mickey’s message on Facebook. Both men have since been beaten. Chris surprised me with a gift of my very own teeny-tiny-oh-so-adorable netbook laptop, just for me to write my scripts. I named it “Tim.”
After the “party” was over and the kids were put to sleep (not euthanized, just tucked it); Chris set about installing my beloved scriptwriting software onto Tim, while I went to check my email on the now old-hat laptop upstairs. (PAUSE! Flashback to me putting my phone on “vibrate” at scouts. Never took it off that status, so it never rang all night and the voicemail filled up with birthday wishes. RESUME PLAY!) I won’t bore you with the details of emails/texts/obscentities, but my birthday was the night that bad phone etiquette and a secret double life collided and made for one unhappy camper of a secret-life-housewife. Lesson to learn folks: If you leave your phone on vibrate and your mailbox fills up, you may miss the “birthday wishes” phone call of your life. For a would-be comedy writer, this was a dream phone call. It would be like an aspiring physicist getting a phone call from Stephen Hawking’s voice synth. It’s still promised to come “sometime soon.”
So, I now go everywhere with my fully-charged cell phone always in my pocket, with the volume turned up so high it could wake the dead, or at least my father-in-law. I’m an 87-year-old woman waiting to get a phone call. From a talking dog. And I'm happy as a clam. A drunken clam. (yeah, that's a phone call hint.)
BEN: My “baby.” The blond-haired, blue-eyed surfer dude among a sea of hazel-eyed brunette landlubbers (no, Mailman Mark is not blond) turned 7 since my last blog, and now looks like an extra from the cast of Deliverance. Corn on the cob is no longer a viable option as a sidedish at KFC. After losing three teeth in one week, the Tooth Fairy learned the hard way that she must always have singles in her purse. Kid woke up to four quarters one morning. I told him the fairy didn’t like his brushing technique. Ben’s kickin’ it in 1st grade, beating the pre-pre-pre-pre-teen girlie set off with a stick and reading at the top level of books offered in his class. And it’s only Oct. 1st. I’m thinking he’s peaked already and it can only go downhill from here.
EVAN: Crossed the hump, and then literally the street, and is now in Middle School. Yay!! Yay?! Feh. Has to be at school an hour earlier than last year. This is not going well. Wakes up like an old man every morning, stumbling blindly down the hall in his boxers like a geezer looking for his soaking teeth. School seems to be going well so far. It could actually be going to hell in a hand basket since I haven’t seen any grades come home yet. But he hasn’t come home bloodied or hickey'd yet, so it’s all good for me! At back-2-school night we met all his teachers. I think I could have babysat or given birth to most of them. Except fo the science teacher. She could have babysat for George Bush...Senior. The biggest thing I’ve noticed as the new mother of a middle schooler is the difference between the girls and the boys now. Boys vary in height, that’s about it. Girls? Ay, Chihuahua! Evan was so nervous the first day of 7th grade that he got sick. Then we pulled up in the morning, and some 9th grade girls (God I hope they were 9th graders!) walked in front of our car. The raised eyebrow I saw on my son said a thousand words that morning. He’s never had a problem going to school since that day. I swear I think I share a bra size with some of these girls. And if you know me at ALL…
CHRIS: Is still Chris. Only change is a recent trip to Chicago. Where he was officially diagnosed with the “meat sweats” after finishing off ¾ of a Gino’s East deep-dish, sausage-patty-as-big-as-the-pie pizza. I felt no pity for him when I heard of his agony, and neither should you. He ordered extra tomatoes on the pie because, as everyone knows, vegetables are healthy.
ME: (Yeah, I’m going to get the biggest passage today. The rest of ‘em know how to write; they can make their own blogs!) I’m still leading my "secret" double life, only I’m now a year older while doing it. Turned 87 on Monday, according to my “dear friend” Mickey, who I hope to see staring down my headlights one night on an desolate road. It was actually a surprisingly lovely birthday. I was treated to a sushi buffet lunch at my favorite once-a-year restaurant. Ben’s photo is now taped to their register under the heading “Do NOT serve!” (that boy is to sushi what termites are to seasoned wood). My parents and siblings went in on a joint gift and got me the scriptwriting software I had longed for, and unsubtly hinted at, for weeks.
The day took a brief detour into hell when I went to Cub Scouts and was serenaded by a room full of scouts and parents against my will. (PAUSE! This is the point in the movie of my life where you notice the birthday girl putting her cell phone on “vibrate” because it would be rude to have it ring during a Cub Scout pack meeting. RESUME PLAY!) After scouts, my folks came over and I was treated to a lovely birthday cake with the number “87” in candles on it thanks to my husband finding “dear friend” Mickey’s message on Facebook. Both men have since been beaten. Chris surprised me with a gift of my very own teeny-tiny-oh-so-adorable netbook laptop, just for me to write my scripts. I named it “Tim.”
After the “party” was over and the kids were put to sleep (not euthanized, just tucked it); Chris set about installing my beloved scriptwriting software onto Tim, while I went to check my email on the now old-hat laptop upstairs. (PAUSE! Flashback to me putting my phone on “vibrate” at scouts. Never took it off that status, so it never rang all night and the voicemail filled up with birthday wishes. RESUME PLAY!) I won’t bore you with the details of emails/texts/obscentities, but my birthday was the night that bad phone etiquette and a secret double life collided and made for one unhappy camper of a secret-life-housewife. Lesson to learn folks: If you leave your phone on vibrate and your mailbox fills up, you may miss the “birthday wishes” phone call of your life. For a would-be comedy writer, this was a dream phone call. It would be like an aspiring physicist getting a phone call from Stephen Hawking’s voice synth. It’s still promised to come “sometime soon.”
So, I now go everywhere with my fully-charged cell phone always in my pocket, with the volume turned up so high it could wake the dead, or at least my father-in-law. I’m an 87-year-old woman waiting to get a phone call. From a talking dog. And I'm happy as a clam. A drunken clam. (yeah, that's a phone call hint.)
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