No, I'm not doing an Orbitz commercial. We have a hovercraft here at the Mansion. Don't look for this model at your local hovercraft dealer, however. Ours is the 2010 Hovercraft H.
The Hovercraft H hovers nearby when you're in the middle of something. It is not there to assist, but to observe in a critical manner. Washing the dishes by hand in your dishwasherless kitchen? The Hovercraft H will hover at the kitchen table, watching silently except for intermittent snorts when all the suds are not quite rinsed away from an occasional fork.
Removing clothes from the washer to put in the dryer? The Hovercraft H will drift through the laundry room and need access to the laundry sink between those two appliances at that very moment.
Folding laundry in the living room? Make room for the Hovercraft H, which seems to have an aversion to cable news programming, marked by bursts of explosive exhaust until the channel is changed to reruns of Ax Men.
Sitting in your dark basement lair, typing on your desktop? Beware the sudden, sneaky arrival of the Hovercraft H. This machine not only idles, it sidles. Yep. The Hovercraft H sidles like a champ, sidles to beat the band, sidles to the envy of that Elaine Benes co-worker who received an unsolicited gift of TicTacs in her misguided effort to predict his whereabouts.
Won't you order your Hovercraft H today? Better hurry...there's only one left in stock.
Saturday, May 8, 2010
Friday, May 7, 2010
Dishing Up The Dinner
We were out late last night, chowing down at the academic banquet at Newmentia. The food was really good this year, perhaps due to the use of a different caterer. The beverages left a little to be desired. The kids were used to the cooler of canned soda from years past. Not this year. They had a choice of tea or watery pink lemonade. I'm not so sure it wasn't pink water. Given a blind taste test, I'm betting that 50% of tasters would say it was water. I let my kids go to my room and get a soda from the minifridge. My mom and I drank the weak pink lemonade. The meal was salad, pork loin, wild rice, some kind of beef rolled around some dressing, corn, green beans, mashed potatoes, hot rolls, and chocolate cake or a strawberry/jello/whipped cream concoction. Our cooks made the cakes, and that strawberry thingy is a Newmentia favorite.
Awards were doled out to the top 10% of each grade, from 6th through 12th. The salutatorian and valedictorian were officially announced. Academic teams were recognized. All in all, it ran like a well-oiled 90-minute machine. Now let's dish...
We left the building at 4:00, planning to return at 5:30 for the 6:00 dinner. Before leaving, The Pony and I went to look at the set-up. I saw a table for six in the corner that I figured would seat The Pony, #1, my mom, and me. That would leave only two seats for interlopers, and most kids bring two parents. I folded a piece of copy paper in half, and set it down on the program, along with my blue pen. I figured that people might think, "Oh, that table is taken," and walk on by. At worst, I would only be out a piece of paper and a pen I had found on the floor of my classroom.
When we got back, I sent The Pony to grab the table while I went in my classroom to change shoes. After we were seated, The Pony said, "Your paper was gone, but I got the table. I saw your paper and pen over there. Somebody wrote RESERVED on it." WTF? Who steals a piece of paper and pen? I kept my eye on that table. And I was not a bit surprised to see who sat there. I shan't name names, but it was two Newmentia employees and their daughters. One has been referred to by an insider as 'the witch who looks like she dresses out of the rag bag', and the other has been known to stir the pot in both buildings--Newmentia and Basementia. If my buddy Mabel is reading, she will no doubt peg them for their sunny dispositions, even though she is not the one who described them as above. I knew that no laymen would dare pick up my paper and pen. These two should have marked their own territory, not taken my materials. I was incensed. It doesn't take much. I was OH SO TEMPTED to walk by and say, "Oh, I marked MY table, but somebody picked up my placeholder. Can you believe it? The nerve of some people!" But I resisted.
Basementia Buddy was at the table next to us. She invited us to her long, medieval great hall table, but I declined, as I did not want my back to the proceedings. Basementia Buddy brought over a program and pointed to one specific class, and snarled with all the composure she could muster, "How the H*LL did that one make the top 10 percent?" I rolled my eyes in acquiescence. And I might or might not have stage-whispered, "Well, look at that whole group. It's just rock, paper, scissors." Which might have meant, if I had let it leave my lips, that shed is not filled with the sharpest of tools. Because I am a teacher. I give tests. I know the difference in the acquisition of knowledge, and the wheedling and cajoling and downright cloak-and-dagger procurement of homework answers with which to pad one's point total. There is more to learning than numbers on paper, you see. Numbers which may or may not be an accurate reflection of the ability of a student to eventually maintain gainful employment in the real world.
Oh, and while the majority of the evening was a pleasant interlude, a lack of manners reared its ugly head in the buffet line when a crony of #1 dared to cut into line right in front of me. I am sorry. I can not tolerate rudeness in the younger generation. Or any generation. I said quite loudly, no doubt to the dismay of the crony's mama who was right behind me with her other two ducklings, "Where are YOU going, Crony? What's that? You don't know? How about to the end of the line?" To which other of #1's cronies a bit further back shouted, "YEAH! You're only here because of Academic Team!" Kids can be so cruel, those top tens vs. the lowly academics. But I'll not be silenced in my Johnny-Appleseed-like spreading of etiquette. Because fair is fair. While I might overlook it at the school cafeteria student lunch line if I'm not on duty and nobody complains, I'll be darned if I'll not speak out when a kid blatantly thumbs his nose at any sense of propriety and shows a lack of respect to the elderly such as myself and my mom by cutting line right under my nose. #1 and a legally-in-line crony moved behind me with The Original Crony. But it still didn't satisfy the lesser cronies further back. I feel their outrage.
I'm a downright cranky b*tch, ain't I?
Awards were doled out to the top 10% of each grade, from 6th through 12th. The salutatorian and valedictorian were officially announced. Academic teams were recognized. All in all, it ran like a well-oiled 90-minute machine. Now let's dish...
We left the building at 4:00, planning to return at 5:30 for the 6:00 dinner. Before leaving, The Pony and I went to look at the set-up. I saw a table for six in the corner that I figured would seat The Pony, #1, my mom, and me. That would leave only two seats for interlopers, and most kids bring two parents. I folded a piece of copy paper in half, and set it down on the program, along with my blue pen. I figured that people might think, "Oh, that table is taken," and walk on by. At worst, I would only be out a piece of paper and a pen I had found on the floor of my classroom.
When we got back, I sent The Pony to grab the table while I went in my classroom to change shoes. After we were seated, The Pony said, "Your paper was gone, but I got the table. I saw your paper and pen over there. Somebody wrote RESERVED on it." WTF? Who steals a piece of paper and pen? I kept my eye on that table. And I was not a bit surprised to see who sat there. I shan't name names, but it was two Newmentia employees and their daughters. One has been referred to by an insider as 'the witch who looks like she dresses out of the rag bag', and the other has been known to stir the pot in both buildings--Newmentia and Basementia. If my buddy Mabel is reading, she will no doubt peg them for their sunny dispositions, even though she is not the one who described them as above. I knew that no laymen would dare pick up my paper and pen. These two should have marked their own territory, not taken my materials. I was incensed. It doesn't take much. I was OH SO TEMPTED to walk by and say, "Oh, I marked MY table, but somebody picked up my placeholder. Can you believe it? The nerve of some people!" But I resisted.
Basementia Buddy was at the table next to us. She invited us to her long, medieval great hall table, but I declined, as I did not want my back to the proceedings. Basementia Buddy brought over a program and pointed to one specific class, and snarled with all the composure she could muster, "How the H*LL did that one make the top 10 percent?" I rolled my eyes in acquiescence. And I might or might not have stage-whispered, "Well, look at that whole group. It's just rock, paper, scissors." Which might have meant, if I had let it leave my lips, that shed is not filled with the sharpest of tools. Because I am a teacher. I give tests. I know the difference in the acquisition of knowledge, and the wheedling and cajoling and downright cloak-and-dagger procurement of homework answers with which to pad one's point total. There is more to learning than numbers on paper, you see. Numbers which may or may not be an accurate reflection of the ability of a student to eventually maintain gainful employment in the real world.
Oh, and while the majority of the evening was a pleasant interlude, a lack of manners reared its ugly head in the buffet line when a crony of #1 dared to cut into line right in front of me. I am sorry. I can not tolerate rudeness in the younger generation. Or any generation. I said quite loudly, no doubt to the dismay of the crony's mama who was right behind me with her other two ducklings, "Where are YOU going, Crony? What's that? You don't know? How about to the end of the line?" To which other of #1's cronies a bit further back shouted, "YEAH! You're only here because of Academic Team!" Kids can be so cruel, those top tens vs. the lowly academics. But I'll not be silenced in my Johnny-Appleseed-like spreading of etiquette. Because fair is fair. While I might overlook it at the school cafeteria student lunch line if I'm not on duty and nobody complains, I'll be darned if I'll not speak out when a kid blatantly thumbs his nose at any sense of propriety and shows a lack of respect to the elderly such as myself and my mom by cutting line right under my nose. #1 and a legally-in-line crony moved behind me with The Original Crony. But it still didn't satisfy the lesser cronies further back. I feel their outrage.
I'm a downright cranky b*tch, ain't I?
Wednesday, May 5, 2010
No Badge For HM
Mrs. Hillbilly Mom is not a happy camper this week, my friends. She had a splitting headache from 2:00 p.m. until midnight on Monday, broke off half a molar eating dried apricots on Tuesday, muddled through Wednesday and got her paycheck, but has a dinner date with the Top Ten Percent of the student body from Basementia and Newmentia on Thursday. The good news, though, for Mrs. Even Steven, is that both of her young 'uns are in the Top Ten percent of their class and get a free $10 meal, Convention Booth Vendor H is gone for three days, and the end of the school year is just a hop, skip, and a jump away.
In fact, Mrs. Hillbilly Mom is not a camper at all, though if she was of the camping ilk, she would hitch up her 5th-wheel and high-tail it to Kathy's Kampground, where no doubt she would soon be happy enough. Don't worry, Kathy. Mrs. Hillbilly Mom would not back over your frost-free hydrant, or ask for you to pay her money to camp there. Frontiersman H might even whittle you some gewgaws to barter at your kampground store. He had a most scathingly brilliant idea one time, about making those wooden ducky kid toys that you push with a stick handle and it rolls around flopping its feet made of old tires or some such recyclable, and then taking them when he went camping, and wheeling them around to make kids cry for them, and then he would sell them to the parents. Alas, much like his plan to mine the backyard of the Mansion for copper, this little venture never reached fruition.
My sister and her husband the ex-mayor are a camping bunch. They have a little gang that goes camping together. One time, we drove my mom down to visit them, since she used to camp, but doesn't want to since my dad died. When I saw how this band camped, I knew it wasn't for me. Oh, they all had nice campers, with air conditioning, and TVs and gaming systems, and toilets and showers and kitchens. Wherein lies the problem.
They invited us to stay for dinner. And while the men and kids went off to fish and ride bikes and swim and play whiffleball...the women went to their separate campers and cooked for their potluck supper. I kid you not. My sister's dish was a pot of smoked sausage, cabbage, and potatoes, with a side of cornbread. WTF? Why pack up your kit 'n' caboodle and haul it over hill and dale just to do the same chores you do at home? It's beyooooond me! Stab some weenies with a green stick and torture them over some hot coals. Rip open a bag of chips for the vegetable. Lick that green stick clean and impale some marshmallows, then hold them over the fire until they bloat up and get a charcoal crust. Voila! That's dessert.
Back before I was Ladies Man H's woman, I went camping with some of my Cuba compatriots. Cuba, Missouri. The teachers went out to George and Jane's farm and had a good ol' Woodstocky kind of time, but without the herb. We played volleyball and cards and Trivial Pursuit and BBQed hamburgers and hot dogs and popped many an aluminum top, then retired to tents to sleep it off. No showers, no air conditioning, no 20-course meals, no TV. Three days and two nights with just a port-a-potty, tractor rides, a creek to wash your feet before bed, and some good gossip about the people who weren't there.
Now THAT'S camping!
Note-to-self if you ever do this kind of camping: It's not a good idea to lay in your two-woman tent and make play-by-play small talk about your friend Jim as he staggers around the fire pit poking branches into the coals, because right after your buddy says, "He's so drunk, he's going to fall into the fire and burn up," Jim will sit down on a log, light up a cigarette, and say, "You know, I can hear you b*tches."
In fact, Mrs. Hillbilly Mom is not a camper at all, though if she was of the camping ilk, she would hitch up her 5th-wheel and high-tail it to Kathy's Kampground, where no doubt she would soon be happy enough. Don't worry, Kathy. Mrs. Hillbilly Mom would not back over your frost-free hydrant, or ask for you to pay her money to camp there. Frontiersman H might even whittle you some gewgaws to barter at your kampground store. He had a most scathingly brilliant idea one time, about making those wooden ducky kid toys that you push with a stick handle and it rolls around flopping its feet made of old tires or some such recyclable, and then taking them when he went camping, and wheeling them around to make kids cry for them, and then he would sell them to the parents. Alas, much like his plan to mine the backyard of the Mansion for copper, this little venture never reached fruition.
My sister and her husband the ex-mayor are a camping bunch. They have a little gang that goes camping together. One time, we drove my mom down to visit them, since she used to camp, but doesn't want to since my dad died. When I saw how this band camped, I knew it wasn't for me. Oh, they all had nice campers, with air conditioning, and TVs and gaming systems, and toilets and showers and kitchens. Wherein lies the problem.
They invited us to stay for dinner. And while the men and kids went off to fish and ride bikes and swim and play whiffleball...the women went to their separate campers and cooked for their potluck supper. I kid you not. My sister's dish was a pot of smoked sausage, cabbage, and potatoes, with a side of cornbread. WTF? Why pack up your kit 'n' caboodle and haul it over hill and dale just to do the same chores you do at home? It's beyooooond me! Stab some weenies with a green stick and torture them over some hot coals. Rip open a bag of chips for the vegetable. Lick that green stick clean and impale some marshmallows, then hold them over the fire until they bloat up and get a charcoal crust. Voila! That's dessert.
Back before I was Ladies Man H's woman, I went camping with some of my Cuba compatriots. Cuba, Missouri. The teachers went out to George and Jane's farm and had a good ol' Woodstocky kind of time, but without the herb. We played volleyball and cards and Trivial Pursuit and BBQed hamburgers and hot dogs and popped many an aluminum top, then retired to tents to sleep it off. No showers, no air conditioning, no 20-course meals, no TV. Three days and two nights with just a port-a-potty, tractor rides, a creek to wash your feet before bed, and some good gossip about the people who weren't there.
Now THAT'S camping!
Note-to-self if you ever do this kind of camping: It's not a good idea to lay in your two-woman tent and make play-by-play small talk about your friend Jim as he staggers around the fire pit poking branches into the coals, because right after your buddy says, "He's so drunk, he's going to fall into the fire and burn up," Jim will sit down on a log, light up a cigarette, and say, "You know, I can hear you b*tches."
Tuesday, May 4, 2010
The Halls Have Ears
Overheard this morning in the hallowed halls of Hillmomba's Newmentia...
Teacher, hustling down the hall, waving a stack of newly-copied diagrams:
"We're learning about the reproductive system today."
Custodian, putting broom back in the closet:
"Call me if you need help."
Except for being a tad risque for the blue-haired elementary teacher set, that would make an excellent cartoon for School & Community, the magazine of the Missouri State Teachers Association. Too bad I can't cartoon worth a whit. It's way better than Elaine's New Yorker cartoon of a pig at the complaint department saying, "I wish I was taller."
Teacher, hustling down the hall, waving a stack of newly-copied diagrams:
"We're learning about the reproductive system today."
Custodian, putting broom back in the closet:
"Call me if you need help."
Except for being a tad risque for the blue-haired elementary teacher set, that would make an excellent cartoon for School & Community, the magazine of the Missouri State Teachers Association. Too bad I can't cartoon worth a whit. It's way better than Elaine's New Yorker cartoon of a pig at the complaint department saying, "I wish I was taller."
Monday, May 3, 2010
Isn't It Funny
Isn't it funny that...
The kid who wears his jeans with the waistband at his thighs, showing the entire school his underwear, is the same kid who would slap the school with a lawsuit if they told him to drop his jeans for a contraband search?
A certain teacher calls a couple of kids on their cell phones regarding school functions, then wonders how all the kids got his cell phone number?
The girl who has been broadcasting for weeks that she is going to turn 16 and get her driver's license is flabbergasted that she didn't pass after the second time, just because she drove down the middle of the road and made a turn too wide after a stop sign, crossing the center line, and forgot to apply the emergency brake when parking on a hill?
A group who steals two paper bridge designs from a neighboring group becomes outraged when a member of that other group dares to look at their design?
Sonic lets people with short-term memory loss work the drive-thru?
A lunchmate mentions that over the weekend, he took his dog and his wife for a walk at the state park, in that order?
Mrs. Hillbilly Mom asks that rhetorical question using the word funny when what she really means is odd?
The kid who wears his jeans with the waistband at his thighs, showing the entire school his underwear, is the same kid who would slap the school with a lawsuit if they told him to drop his jeans for a contraband search?
A certain teacher calls a couple of kids on their cell phones regarding school functions, then wonders how all the kids got his cell phone number?
The girl who has been broadcasting for weeks that she is going to turn 16 and get her driver's license is flabbergasted that she didn't pass after the second time, just because she drove down the middle of the road and made a turn too wide after a stop sign, crossing the center line, and forgot to apply the emergency brake when parking on a hill?
A group who steals two paper bridge designs from a neighboring group becomes outraged when a member of that other group dares to look at their design?
Sonic lets people with short-term memory loss work the drive-thru?
A lunchmate mentions that over the weekend, he took his dog and his wife for a walk at the state park, in that order?
Mrs. Hillbilly Mom asks that rhetorical question using the word funny when what she really means is odd?
Sunday, May 2, 2010
If You Give A Girl A Casino Comp
If you give your daughter your free room comp from Harrah's in St. Charles, she will invite her friends to join her in celebrating her 21st birthday at the casino.
Since her friends are, after all, just 21-year-old dudes themselves, they will not discern a difference between Harrah's St. Charles, and a Harrah's in Illinois.
Due to their 21ness, the friends are stoked that even though the check-in desk at Harrah's St. Charles has no reservation for them, and no rooms available for that Friday night, a dude named 'Bill' just back from Iraq has a room to himself and offers to let them stay with him.
Your daughter and her girlfriends, on the highway from Hillmomba to St. Charles, will desperately beg the boys not to stay with Bill. "No. It's my birthday. I'm not going to be responsible for you getting raped or killed in a Harrah's hotel room! We'll squeeze you into our room. Six isn't much more than four."
Upon arrival, your daughter will find that the dudes have invited Bill to the birthday dinner. That's OK, because with 12 other people, Bill should be minding his Ps and Qs and not pulling any shenanigans. One of the dudes keeps trying to talk to Bill across the table at dinner by yelling, "Bill. Bill!" He gets no response, which is surely a sign that 'Bill' is not who he says he is, and is, perhaps, a lonely perv who hangs out at casinos every Friday night trolling for fresh hayseeds from Hillmomba.
Your daughter will find a way to ditch Bill after dinner, proceed to win and lose a couple of hundred dollars but not remember it, return home with the $50 she took to gamble with, and declare that next time she goes, she will listen to her friend's advice and not drink while gambling, and not feed all of her winnings back to the one-armed bandit.
But then again...that friend is the one who was planning to spend the night with Bill.
**********************************************************
Happy Birthday to my niece, the seasoned gambler! And congratulations to my sister, who won $200 on her free Harrah's $10 voucher.
Since her friends are, after all, just 21-year-old dudes themselves, they will not discern a difference between Harrah's St. Charles, and a Harrah's in Illinois.
Due to their 21ness, the friends are stoked that even though the check-in desk at Harrah's St. Charles has no reservation for them, and no rooms available for that Friday night, a dude named 'Bill' just back from Iraq has a room to himself and offers to let them stay with him.
Your daughter and her girlfriends, on the highway from Hillmomba to St. Charles, will desperately beg the boys not to stay with Bill. "No. It's my birthday. I'm not going to be responsible for you getting raped or killed in a Harrah's hotel room! We'll squeeze you into our room. Six isn't much more than four."
Upon arrival, your daughter will find that the dudes have invited Bill to the birthday dinner. That's OK, because with 12 other people, Bill should be minding his Ps and Qs and not pulling any shenanigans. One of the dudes keeps trying to talk to Bill across the table at dinner by yelling, "Bill. Bill!" He gets no response, which is surely a sign that 'Bill' is not who he says he is, and is, perhaps, a lonely perv who hangs out at casinos every Friday night trolling for fresh hayseeds from Hillmomba.
Your daughter will find a way to ditch Bill after dinner, proceed to win and lose a couple of hundred dollars but not remember it, return home with the $50 she took to gamble with, and declare that next time she goes, she will listen to her friend's advice and not drink while gambling, and not feed all of her winnings back to the one-armed bandit.
But then again...that friend is the one who was planning to spend the night with Bill.
**********************************************************
Happy Birthday to my niece, the seasoned gambler! And congratulations to my sister, who won $200 on her free Harrah's $10 voucher.
Saturday, May 1, 2010
Toupee Deadbeat Brooding
I don't know about you, but if I was placing a bet at the Kentucky Derby next year, I'd bet on Calvin Borel's mount. A Churchill Downs contest winner did just that with his free $100,000 betting money, and turned it into $900,000. Good for him. Now he can get hair plugs instead of that ratty toupee.
Flipping channels this morning, I happened upon a show called My First Place. Twins Mandy and Sandy were trying to buy two houses within walking distance of each other, with a budget of $174,000 apiece. I pity the two husbands. When the realtor, a regular Methuselah's great-grandma, found two houses for $209,000 apiece, they offered $169,000. Well, that deal fell through because those twins couldn't swing the final asking price of $178,000. What's $4000 when you're mortgaging to the tune of $174,000? Anyhoo, the contractor finagled the interest rate after a week or so, and Mandy and Sandy and hubbies 1 and 2 sat down to close the deal. But wait! There was still five minutes of show left! Darn the bad luck, Mandy or Sandy had defaulted on a student loan, and could not get a home loan. Funny how that works. The deadbeat gal went home and called around and after making a payment of $50 on her student loan to make it current, she got the house loan. Sweet Gummi Mary! I would not like to be holding that mortgage. Or waiting on her to pay back that student loan. Why do people think they can get something for nothing? I guess she though that the government could not repossess her education.
Speaking of old biddies...we have a hen who is killing herself sitting on a nest. She's a real-life Miss Prissy. Farmer H gave her four eggs at the end of March, and put her in a separate pen so she could be left alone. She's the hen that hatched our only chick to date, even though it wasn't her own egg. Miss Prissy was a very good mother, chasing that little white chick all over their pen to shove it under her wing, scolding it when it escaped through the wire fence just to taunt her. This batch was due to hatch around April 15, but there was nary a chick. Farmer H left that poor hen setting for another week. Finally, he gave her four new eggs. She wouldn't let him take out the bad ones, though. This batch is due around May 20. You'd think that with our plethora of roosters, we could make some chicks. The hens must be all worn out from the constant lovin'.
Flipping channels this morning, I happened upon a show called My First Place. Twins Mandy and Sandy were trying to buy two houses within walking distance of each other, with a budget of $174,000 apiece. I pity the two husbands. When the realtor, a regular Methuselah's great-grandma, found two houses for $209,000 apiece, they offered $169,000. Well, that deal fell through because those twins couldn't swing the final asking price of $178,000. What's $4000 when you're mortgaging to the tune of $174,000? Anyhoo, the contractor finagled the interest rate after a week or so, and Mandy and Sandy and hubbies 1 and 2 sat down to close the deal. But wait! There was still five minutes of show left! Darn the bad luck, Mandy or Sandy had defaulted on a student loan, and could not get a home loan. Funny how that works. The deadbeat gal went home and called around and after making a payment of $50 on her student loan to make it current, she got the house loan. Sweet Gummi Mary! I would not like to be holding that mortgage. Or waiting on her to pay back that student loan. Why do people think they can get something for nothing? I guess she though that the government could not repossess her education.
Speaking of old biddies...we have a hen who is killing herself sitting on a nest. She's a real-life Miss Prissy. Farmer H gave her four eggs at the end of March, and put her in a separate pen so she could be left alone. She's the hen that hatched our only chick to date, even though it wasn't her own egg. Miss Prissy was a very good mother, chasing that little white chick all over their pen to shove it under her wing, scolding it when it escaped through the wire fence just to taunt her. This batch was due to hatch around April 15, but there was nary a chick. Farmer H left that poor hen setting for another week. Finally, he gave her four new eggs. She wouldn't let him take out the bad ones, though. This batch is due around May 20. You'd think that with our plethora of roosters, we could make some chicks. The hens must be all worn out from the constant lovin'.
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