Costumes of Yore

1969
Send in the Clowns... there ought to be clowns...

1970
Nancy Sinatra
"These Boots are made for walkin'..."

Woops...
I don't seem to have any more photos of my childhood costumes.
My parents were fine, upstanding citizens of the 70's... and they took slides.
(Want to come over and see my family slide show? Heh.)

1989
Because I was just out of school, gainlessly unemployed and without resources, I made these silly costumes my own self. As lame as they are, you can not begin to imagine how sch-sch-schmashed you can get behind one of those masks without anyone really knowing.
Schuper schmashed!
Oh, yesh.

1990
I am the lame Jester.
Note Raoul Duke and Dr. Gonzo from Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas in the back row surrounded by a harem. How about the New Year's Baby?! Or Akbar!

1991
Hari Krishna!
We had tambourines!
We had ankle bells!
We gave out pamphlets!
(Okay, so the pamphlets were stolen from Winn Dixie and instructed readers about the best methods for cooking ham or picking melons...
...but did I mention we gave out pamphlets?!)
We ended up on a stage at a warehouse party doing a
spontaneous, miraculously syncronized (yeah, right. As if.) dance routine
to Bob Marley's Exodus...
The gal with the yellow tambourine was last seen rolling around on a couch furiously making out with a guy dressed like a Catholic Priest.

1992

My friend Pony Girl made my Pocahontas costume complete with papoose.
(Super dooper politically correct, non?)
See the hick in the straw hat in the back row?
That is my friend Maffy Duck.
He is from England.
He likes loves to dress like a hick when he visits the U.S.A.
Yes. He. Does.
Right Maff?

Oops!
This is a Dead show.
Or the Age of Aquarious.
Or Something.
I appear to be Waiting for the Sun.

1994
Pony Girl really gave it her all in 1994.
As usual, she made hers, mine and everyone's costume.
She was BEING EATEN BY A SHARK (awesome) and I was Shiva the Destroyer.
Sadly, at the lame Halloween party we attended people kept asking me alternately if I was the Mahatma Rice Girl or the M&M Candy Girl.
GAH!
Can't you see that I'm part of the Hindu Trimurti!

(Note to sensitive, PC, new-age types: Hindu friends gave their express consent and approval of this costume in advance of its creation.)

1997
Thrift Store Surprise!
(With recycled mask)
Pony Girl moved to the Bay Area and it shows.

1998
Imperial Fez Person.
Sorta.
Blasted Pony Girl! Return anon!

1999
K and I as The Fonz and Pinky Tuscadero.
(That is a wig, okay?! Seriously.)
I went to a party and none of my friends recognized me.

...and here is how your man will continue to look for eight consecutive days after using pomade to get that Fonzy look.
Talk about being in a "tight spot."


During her visit, Grandma Seattle suggested that this year
my Halloween costume should reflect my life in the here and now.
So I got yellow sweatpants and a yellow shirt
and I'm sewing on two small felt P's.
Because I'm "covered in baby pee pee."

Oh, The Joys.

Happy Halloween!

Showers Likely (Heh)

After The Mayor used the potty I returned the pull up and pants to their upright and locked position.

I must not have done it exactly right because The Mayor furiously worked to adjust the... uh... the wee package.

He gripped and groped like the star of an MTV video, but became increasingly frustrated because he couldn't achieve the desired results.

"Here. Let me help you," I offered.

I reached in and moved the equipment to the Downward Facing Dog position.

"Do you sometimes need to rearrange the position of your penis?" I asked.

"Yeah," he nodded.

"When it rains."

Manly secrets of The Weather Vein unwittingly revealed to the opposite sex!

Ladies, the Outside-Pants Ball Grab Maneuver indicates -- rain coming.

Rain Coming

Shhhhhhhh!

Grandma Seattle's in the house! Woot!

As the parent of wee, tiny children I believe that there is almost nothing wrong with having a grandparent stay for the weekend.

The Richard Scary book called "Cars and Trucks and Things That Go" is new and novel to Grandma Seattle.

To K and I, it is the eleventh circle of hell.

Go Grandma! Read On!

The only problem with Grandma's visit is that the guest bedroom (usually known as the office) shares a wall with the master bedroom.

That would be a wafer thin wall.

Anything that happens in the master bedroom can be heard by a guest.

So if that guest happens to be your own mother, you have to be careful not to make any slappity, slap, slap [bow chicka bow wow] noises.

Shhhhhh.

You also have to bury your head in the sand when your husband comes to bed, stretches out his arm and says, "Pull my finger."

You say, "No way, man. I'm not falling for that!"

Despite the lack of finger pulling, he releases the loudest fart in human history and yells, "Schmoopy! How COULD you?" so that your mother thinks her daughter farts like a man.

[Which, in fact, I do.]

-SIGH-

Arts for Change

[Pssst.... If you haven't visited Kevin Charnas and witnessed the continuing evolution of his Halloween costume, I encourage you to witness his absolute BOLDNESS here and here... and he says there's more coming! You GO Kevin!]

Thou Shalt Not...Oops!

Awhile back, The Mayor's favorite thing to say was, "Oh my GOD!"

We convinced him that the phrase was "Oh my GOSH!" and he has made the shift.

He still says it a lot, but thankfully he uses gosh instead of God saving his father and I from embarrassing encounters here in the Bible belt.

Last night, I was undressing Rooster Girl for her bath and whipped her diaper off (rather too cavalierly) only to realize that she had, um, left an undetected deposit.

Poo poo galore!

[...something about every day being the same...]

I think I might have gasped in surprise and said, "Oh my GOD!" which is a really tame thing to say given my options.

However.

Piqued, The Mayor asked, "What did you said mommy?"

"I said, oh my GOSH! Rooster has a poopy diaper."

[wipe sweat from brow. you have escaped toddler detection of taking THE LORD's name in vain and are super kick-ass mommy.]

After handing Rooster off to K for her bath I called back to The Mayor,

"In just a second it's going to be your turn to take your clothes off and get ready for the bath."

I could HEAR his eyes rolling as he called back,

"Oh JEEE-SUS!"

Saints preserve us.

Better Half

I was recently at a party where I ran into Lecherous Guy, the husband of a random acquaintance.

The way Lecherous Guy looks and talks with women other than his wife always gives me the feeling that he is sniffing out potential extra-marital affairs. He's never said anything overt to me, but my Ick-O-Meter goes nuts when he is around.

Lecherous Guy rico-suave-ed over to me when I was standing alone (ick) and asked, "Where's your worse half?"

I rolled my eyes at him and said, "Lecherous Guy, if you actually knew K and I, even a little bit, you would realize that K is BY FAR the better half of this equation" and I walked away from him because ick.

I wasn't kidding about K being our better half. He is a kind and honest person who does more than his fair share and all while not living in Spain and suffering the Mighty Wind.

I totally won the husband sweepstakes but as his co-parent... I got the SHAFT.

The problem with K being the better half is that my children know it.

My life as a parent has given new meaning to the question, "What am I, chopped liver?"

The Mayor and Rooster Girl fight over who K will carry out to the car and react with violent rage to the mere suggestion that perhaps mommy could do it. Tears, snot, high decibel protesting...

Mommy sucks.

Last night, when The Mayor realized it was my turn to read his bed time stories, he lost it.

"I DON'T WANT YOU TO READ! I WANT DADDY! NO, MOMMY! NOT YOU!"

[high pitched wailing]

[repeat]

I finally had to take away his story privileges. There were no bed time stories last night and that has never happened before.

I never lost my cool with him, but... my feelings got hurt.

I know The Mayor is only two but sometimes I can't help but take it personally and feel all sorry for myself.

[pity party]

The only recourse I can think of is to start crying and wailing for K to carry ME out to the car.

But I won't because I know he would totally do it.

Breathe.

Balance.

Blow Me!

I think it is the anticipation that makes The Mayor squeal.

He knows he's about to be tickled.

He watches his father's finger hover, circling in the air above his tummy, ready to strike at any moment... and squeals before it ever even lands in one of his soft ticklish places.

There is much squealing here at House of Joy.

Lately, K has been blowing gusts of air on him instead of tickling.

Apparently, this is particularly delightful for The Mayor when done to the soles of his feet.

The mere IDEA that Daddy might blow a little air on the naked sole of his toddler foot makes The Mayor go a little mental.

I know he loves it because lately The Mayor has been following K around the house yelling,

"BLOW ME, DADDY!!"

Touch Your Toes

The Mayor, who is not yet even two and a half, is doing really, really well with potty training.

His daycare teachers think he is very close to needing "big boy underpants," but his parents will have to get much better about remembering to sit his tiny behind on the potty on the weekends. Even though changing diapers is a drag, it is hard to re-program yourself to put a child on the toilet at routine intervals.

This weekend we were better about it and The Mayor made many, um... contributions.

Some of our close friends suggested that after a poo, asking your child to touch their toes makes access to the bum region easier for no fuss wiping.

So, after The Mayor pooped, I got him down, asked him to touch his toes and TA DA, it worked perfectly. Or so I believed...

Later, when I was in the bathroom, The Mayor burst in (in full accordance with the 2006 House of Joy Lack of Privacy Act) and asked me if I made a poopy. I told him yes, I did make one.

As he pulled toilet paper off the roll he said,

"OKAY MOMMY, GET OFF THE POTTY, BEND OVER AND TOUCH YOUR TOES!"

That is just wrong.

The Politics of Breakfast

Rooster Girl eats breakfast like a full-grown man. She can and will eat more scrambled eggs than K.

She horks hers down, finishing before the rest of us and then makes the sign for more and points at our plates.

Adamantly.

Give me your eggs, dammit!

I was thinking that if Rooster threw a party, the top names on her guest list would be Bob Evans, The Quaker Oats Man and Aunt Jemima.

Then I started thinking about Aunt Jemima.

How long had it been since I last saw Aunt Jemima? Surely she couldn't still be Mammy as she was when I was a child. Surely we've come farther than that, right?

I did a google image search to find her. Here's what she looked like in the 1970's when I was growing up:

I also found this more radical (and true) illustration and a lot of scholarly writing about african-american exploitation in advertising.

As I looked up images of Aunt Jemima, I found this ad by Haddon Sunblom from 1955.
It speaks for itself.

Then I found this great image from when Aunt Jemima joined
the Black Panther party and fought back.

Make your own damned pancakes.

It turns out that Aunt Jemima is now a beautiful, African-American woman who looks like she has a great recipe for pancakes, but Cracker, you're going to have to make them yourself.

I'm a mother who thinks about race, class and power.

An innocent blog entry about my daughters breakfast led me somewhere political.

Writing this, I paused and called an African-American friend of mine to ask her about Aunt Jemima.

She talked about how hurtful the image was and still is today - even with the update. My friend feels like the new image still suggests Aunt Jemima is a subservient caretaker who doesn't seem to have a life beyond making white people breakfast. She's not called Ms. Jemima Smith, she's still your "Aunt Jemima."

How will I teach my children to understand the issues of race in America and to be allied with all kinds of people that don't look exactly like them?

Dana Gets Busy!

Can I get a drumroll?

This morning The Mayor asked to sit on the potty.

And...

He POOPED!

Oh, exaltation!

In celebration, we perform the dance of our people! (Again!)


Way to go, Dana!

Blood in the Cards

It turns out there's something scarier than taking two babies camping in the deep dark woods...

It's called the pediatric emergency room.

Neither of our children had ever been there before this weekend.

Camping, schmamping.

Pah.

We went out into nature, stayed until dark, put the children in their pajamas, strapped their little butts into their car seats and drove that car straight home.

Some days the little sprogs get the best of you and you have to shout, "RETREAT! RETREAT! RETURN TO HOME BASE! GO! GO! GO!"

Home. Where there is child-related infrastructure...

...like furniture with straps...

...high chairs for example.

Strapped in, is good.

Despite our chicken shit, lazy ass narrow escape from The Blair Witch, Jason and (more realistically) a heavy infestation of fire ants living in the woods, blood was in our cards.

Rooster Girl, our daredevil, in a random and non-daring act, tripped over my foot at the playground, fell on the pavement and split her head open.

She screamed and screamed.

This marks the first time I have watched one of my children really bleed.

Randomly, one of the pediatricians from our practice happened to be at the playground with her son. She looked at the cut and recommended Roo go to the emergency room.

Unfortunately, we were visiting a playground all the way across town and had walked there. We had spent the morning strolling the children downtown to a coffee shop and on further to this far away, but oh-so-very-excellent playground. (Much better than waking up in the middle of the deep, dark woods, no?)

I wasn't very worried at first. Roo was cut, though it didn't seem so deep to me. Then she proceeded to fall immediately to sleep in the stroller prompting Kevin to scare the HOLY BEEJESUS out of me by saying, "You don't think she has a concussion do you?"

GAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAH?!

[FAST, FAST (unnaturally odd looking) WALKING all the way home.]

K took Roo to the emergency room while I stayed with The Mayor.

[Much biting of nails.]

They were gone for four hours.

Rooster, as her nickname would suggest, fought a valient fight against the evil members of the medical profession who glued her back together.

Literally.

(Who knew there was such a thing as "derma-glue?")

She is fine.

Her parents are feeling overly protective and extra tender towards her.

NO! DON'T GO INTO THE WOODS!

Today is Friday the 13th. Hee Hee Hee Haa Haa Haa!

So what is The Family Joy planning?

Why, we're going camping of course! (All good ideas originate here.)

Camping is an especially stupid idea because Rooster Girl has been waking up and SCREAMING every night from 2:00 - 3:30 a.m. for no reason that we've been able to identify. I'll just rely on the universal default explanation... "She must be teething."

The four of us are going to be quite the happy, little family when she starts up in the tent in the middle of the night.

Four people.

One tent.

The deep, dark night.

One girl baby yelling loudly.

We'll be the family in the woods yelling, "Hey Jason, COME AND GET HER!!!!"

Hee Hee Hee Haa Haa Haa!

The Theme Fight

Does every couple have a theme fight?

You know, the fight that you have OVER AND OVER again.

The one that makes you roll your eyes to the heavens and say to yourself, "Have I willingly signed my self up for a L-I-F-E-T-I-M-E of this?"

Our theme fight is about parenting styles.

Though we are very similar in our approach there are subtle differences and so, we commence to fightin'.

The theme fight seems impossible to resolve. He or I feel judged, become defensive, and find some counter accusation to invoke.

"Your ancestors were color-blind, wig-wearing people with chronic halitosis!"

It's really so productive!

Maybe the theme fight changes as the phases of your life change.

When K and I were on our backpacking trip we argued constantly about who got to be in charge of getting us from a bus or train arriving in a new town to the hostel where we would stay. My approach was the best one to find the most direct route on the map and march forward ho. K's approach was to wander willy nilly around the streets of [random town] while wearing a 35 pound pack. That is just wrong.

We also used to fight in backpacker internet cafes. We would often share a computer because we're idiots er, we were too cheap to spend five cents an hour extra for a second computer is just downright wasteful or something. Anyway, in my opinion, K's computer mouse maneuvering style is all wrong. He is to driving a computer mouse what an eleventy million year-old, nearly blind, hat-wearing, retiree in Tampa is to driving a car.

Adventures in slowness, watching paint dry, grass grow...you get me?

Anyway, even though it is important to be on the same page with your partner in order to manage the hellions toddlers, parenting is kind of an absurd theme fight topic in a way because there isn't an absolutely, scientifically proven, best way to parent. All parents seem to feel helpless, hopeless and lost at various points.

At least lately we have been laughing at our inability to resolve some of our differences.

"Parent my way or I'll kick you."

"You want to fight me? I'll fight you. Put 'em up."

[commence to wrassling]

[wrassling can actually lead nice places...like the moon]

Anyway, here at House of Joy, we officially have no idea what we're doing and so we theme fight about that.

Please say you have a theme fight too?!

Sisters are Doing it for Themselves

Today I just want to crow about how excited I am about the woman Rooster acts like she will become.

When she was three weeks old, K said, "I know this is going to sound crazy, but Rooster seems so athletic."

"Exactly!" I said.

How strange that our three week old seemed to be nothing but a little ball of muscle.

As she's grown, she's proven herself to be a fearless daredevil.

We vote her "family member most likely to jump out of airplanes, bungee jump (and break bones)."

She's determined, fearless and independent.

She is woman. (Okay, okay, thirteen month old girl.)

Hear her roar.

Here is a photo essay chronicling her independent mastery of the playground slide (or "SLY!" as she says) this past weekend.

Lacking a bit in the style department, Roo manages to hoist herself onto the stairs.

Climb up.

...and up...

"Ha! Check me out! Am I not a supa-star?"

Seeking thrills without the aid of my parents...

Perfecting the slide botton stop.

Climbing down myself, heading for the stairs to do it again...

Cue music: "Can't Touch This"

I am STRONG,

STRONG

I am INVINCIBLE,

INVINCIBLE

I am WOMAN,

WOMAN!

The Baboon Family Dines

It is completely astounding that our friends Elke and Michael invited us, the doofus gentiles, to join them for Sabbath dinner again.

When they invited us to share in their celebration of Passover we were forced to seek home remedies for self-inflicted stab wounds.

When we recently invited them to share a meal with us K wore a t-shirt covered in baby vomit.

Despite our inability to perform well, we adore this couple and their children.

We are honored every time we are asked to be included in their family traditions.

So when they graciously asked us to come to their Sabbath dinner last Friday, we accepted.

Their Sabbath tradition includes singing a Sabbath song, lighting candles, saying prayers, sharing wine, touching the Challah and breaking bread together.

During the meal, everyone at the table talks about what they want to let go of or "lay down" for the week and what they want to "claim."

So there we were...

The candles were lit, the smoke of the flames curled gently upwards...

Elke, Michael and their children cupped their hands in front of their faces and their voices resonated with the prayer,

"Baruch atah Adonai Elohenu melech ha alom...."

At this exact moment, mid-prayer, The Mayor decided to participate.

HEY!

HEY!

GIT YER HANDS OUTTA YER FACE!!

HEY!

[repeat. many times.]

Sometimes I imagine that when we finally leave their house after a visit, they close the door, look knowingly at each other and roll their eyes.

Want to have us over?

Oh, the *&(*%ing Joys

Both children awoke in the 5:00 a.m. hour.

Again.

The joys.

This morning, they held a contest to see which of them could throw the most heinous of temper tantrums.

Rooster, fearless wee girl that she is, went first.

Milk delivered in a sippy cup rather than a baby bottle is unacceptable.

Rooster threw herself against the dishwasher and gave it a rage-filled, 10 minute pummeling in protest.

When she finished, The Mayor commenced to wailing.

A PURPLE sippy cup is entirely inappropriate. A morning sippy cup should be blue.

This is common knowledge among really good parents.

The Mayor's fit landed him a time-out back in his bed where he repeatedly kicked and slapped his own mother with wild abandon.

His own mother!!!

All of this occurred before coffee had a chance to have any impact on me.

Those little [if you don't have anything nice to say don't say anything at alls] are dressed and at school now.

They have long since bounced back like little elastic bands of energy and are off playing with choo choos and making exotic crafts with paper plates and string.

I am sitting here with my chin in my hand feeling despondent and beaten down.

Again.

Parent: 0 Children: 2

The Great Gender Argument Boiled WAY Down

This morning at breakfast, The Mayor was singing a completely tuneless, high-decibel, resounding combination of High-Ho-The Derry-O and Come By Here My Lord.

When I tried to join in, The Mayor said, "No Mommy. Only the boys can sing. You can't sing. Girls can't sing."

While I know this is going to amuse my own Mother, since as a child I used to routinely say, "Mommy, DON'T SING!" when she was happily singing along with the car radio, and while I don't have to participate in the medley-ification of High-Ho-The-Derry-O with Come By Here, I do have to defend a woman's right to sing and teach my son something of gender equity, right?

So I told The Mayor that girls could sing, and that in fact, girls could do all the same things boys could do.

K piped up at this point and said, "You can't write your name in the snow with pee."

[See my mouth hanging open.]

THIS is my self-proclaimed feminist husband? This is how he helps me teach our son that girls and boys are equals?

Now I have to dig out a hula hoop, practice my moves and book a trip to the snowy north this winter -- all to spell J-E-S-S-I-C-A.

Too bad my name isn't shorter. Like S-U-E.

I'm going to have to load up on fluids.

Fireworks

Last night I put The Mayor to sleep.

We were right at the end of the routine where the light is already off, I give him a kiss and leave the room.

He took my face in his hands and said, "Mommy, you're my favorite...um..."

"I'm your favorite Mommy?"

"Ummm..." He was searching for the right words.

"Your my... your my whole world."

Fireworks, Bambi, smurfs and puppies ain't got NOTHIN' on that.

HFM Pyrotechnics

The Fetish

Last night Rooster Girl pooped in the tub yet again.*

(*Rooster is famous for this, as evidenced here, here and here.)

Her poor spa ettiquette is getting tedious -- particularly for K who has cleaned it up every single time.

This morning while The Mayor was on the changing table he gave a recounting of the poop escapades. His recap ended with a round of him repeatedly yelling,

"ROOSTER IS THE POOPINATOR!"

If I were her, I would prefer "Madam Poopinatrix," but that is just me.

Blue Foot Bear Company

Can

I had something I was going to post today.

Then my friend Melissa sent me the article below in an e-mail. I'm posting it instead because you have to read this story and watch this video.

You have to.

[From Sports Illustrated, By Rick Reilly]

I try to be a good father. Give my kids mulligans. Work nights to pay for their text messaging. Take them to swimsuit shoots. But compared with Dick Hoyt, I suck.

Eighty-five times he's pushed his disabled son, Rick, 26.2 miles in marathons. Eight times he's not only pushed him 26.2 miles in a wheelchair but also towed him 2.4 miles in a dinghy while swimming and
pedaled him 112 miles in a seat on the handlebars--all in the same day. Dick's also pulled him cross-country skiing, taken him on his back mountain climbing and once hauled him across the U.S. on a bike. Makes taking your son bowling look a little lame, right?

And what has Rick done for his father? Not much--except save his life.

This love story began in Winchester, Mass., 43 years ago, when Rick was strangled by the umbilical cord during birth, leaving him brain-damaged and unable to control his limbs. ``He'll be a vegetable the rest of his life;'' Dick says doctors told him and his wife, Judy, when Rick was nine months old. ``Put him in an institution.'' But the Hoyts weren't buying it.

They noticed the way Rick's eyes followed them around the room. When Rick was 11 they took him to the engineering department at Tufts University and asked if there was anything to help the boy communicate. ``No way,'' Dick says he was told. ``There's nothing going on in his brain.''

"Tell him a joke,'' Dick countered. They did. Rick laughed. Turns out a lot was going on in his brain.

Rigged up with a computer that allowed him to control the cursor by touching a switch with the side of his head, Rick was finally able to communicate. First words? ``Go Bruins!'' And after a high school classmate was paralyzed in an accident and the school organized a charity run for him, Rick pecked out, ``Dad, I want to do that.''

Yeah, right. How was Dick, a self-described ``porker'' who never ran more than a mile at a time, going to push his son five miles? Still, he tried. ``Then it was me who was handicapped,'' Dick says. ``I was sore for two weeks.''

That day changed Rick's life. ``Dad,'' he typed, ``when we were running, it felt like I wasn't disabled anymore!'' And that sentence changed Dick's life. He became obsessed with giving Rick that feeling as often as he could. He got into such hard-belly shape that he and Rick were ready to try the 1979 Boston Marathon. ``No way,'' Dick was told by a race official. The Hoyts weren't quite a single runner, and they weren't quite a wheelchair competitor. For a few years Dick and Rick just joined the massive field and ran anyway, then they found a way to get into the race officially: In 1983 they ran another marathon so fast they made the qualifying time for Boston the following year.

Then somebody said, ``Hey, Dick, why not a triathlon?'' How's a guy who never learned to swim an d hadn't ridden a bike since he was six going to haul his 110-pound kid through a triathlon? Still, Dick tried. Now they've done 212 triathlons, including four grueling 15-hour Ironmans in Hawaii. It must be a buzzkill to be a 25-year-old stud getting passed by an old guy towing a grown man in a dinghy, don't you think?

Hey, Dick, why not see how you'd do on your own? ``No way,'' he says. Dick does it purely for ``the awesome feeling'' he gets seeing Rick with a cantaloupe smile as they run, swim and ride together. This year, at ages 65 and 43, Dick and Rick finished their 24th Boston Marathon, in 5,083rd place out of more than 20,000 starters. Their best time? Two hours, 40 minutes in 1992--only 35 minutes off the world record, which, in case you don't keep track of these things, happens to be held by a guy who was not pushing another man in a wheelchair at the time.

``No question about it,'' Rick types. ``My dad is the Father of the Century.'' And Dick got something else out of all this too. Two years ago he had a mild heart attack during a race. Doctors found that one of his arteries was 95% clogged. ``If you hadn't been in such great shape,'' one doctor told him, ``you probably would've died 15 years ago.'' So, in a way, Dick and Rick saved each other's life.

Rick, who has his own apartment (he gets home care) and works in Boston, and Dick, retired from the military and living in Holland, Mass., always find ways to be together. They give speeches around the country and compete in some backbreaking race every weekend, including this Father's Day.

That night, Rick will buy his dad dinner, but the thing he really wants to give him is a gift he can never buy. ``The thing I'd most like,'' Rick types, ``is that my dad sit in the chair and I push him once.''

Here's the video....

WATCH ME NOW

No Real Joeys

He is a liar, a bold-face lyin' liar face.

As we were getting ready to go to the Zoo yesterday morning, (yeah, yeah, so it was Sunday morning Church of the Zoo) The Mayor came to us and said,

"There are no real joeys at the Zoo. Only paint[ed] joeys."

K and I talked to him about the kangaroos at our Zoo and assured him that they are real.

"No. They're not real. They're paint." He was adamant. He was certain.

We disagreed.

The Mayor let the subject alone...for the moment.

There was the faintest of secret smiles behind his insistence. I know he didn't really think the kangaroos were painted. He just wanted to see if he could persuade us on the point.

About an hour later when we pulled into the Zoo parking lot The Mayor said,

"So, there's gonna be a Zoo Keeper in there. He's gonna talk to us. He's gonna say, THERE'S NO REAL JOEYS IN THE ZOO!"

He kept up a very convincing serious face. Even when we were standing in front of the kangaroos and we pointed out their realness, The Mayor said, "No. They're painted."

He lied with such an innocent face. It was so innocent that should he ever accept that he was wrong he would be able to look a camera and 200 million Americans in the eye and say, "I really believed that I spoke the truth when I commented about the joeys. I apologize to the American people. My advisors misinformed me."

He is going to make a great politician someday...depending on what your definition of "is" is.

Don't you miss the big lug?

1995

Just call me Monica.

And I Ran, I Ran So Far Away...

I've been hearing that the fashion and style of the 1980s is coming back and I can't help but yell, "WHY, DEAR GOD, WHY?"

I was there for the leg warmers the first time. Must we go back to that scary time? I advise against it.

The 1980's was the decade I decided a permed mullet was a good idea.

I was on drugs.

Let's review...

Homecoming 1982

Does my date not look completely startled?
It is because my taffeta is so stiff and high.

Bad Girl 1983
I can't tell you what I did the night before this photo was taken because my Granny reads this, but let's just say I was naughty.

(Though naughty, I look remarkably unchanged from this photo taken when I was an innocent flower girl at my Aunt Nancy's wedding way back in the day...)

Like a Virgin 1984
She wasn't a VIRGIN, she was just "LIKE" a virgin.
(I think this whole outfit was purchased at Merry Go Round.)




MTV Hair Night 1985
I am the permed mullet with the red sweater vest and brooch. You read that right, the SWEATER VEST AND BROOCH are mine. I AM THE 1980s.

Working the Mullet 1986
Clearly all my entertainment needs were met and the mullet was still going strong.

With Erin Somebody 1986
Looks like SOMEONE is trying to grow that mullet out!

Summer 1986
I was a camp counselor in Maine and we dressed up on the last night.
Let's discuss the pink, leather tie belt and the rhinestone-y earrings, shall we?

Unable to Get Over Myself 1987
Can someone send a decorator back in time?
The Kountry Kitchen look is burning my eyes.

I'm going up to the attic now to dig out my leggings.

Don't ask me to wear stirrup pants or I will have to slap you.



This post dedicated to Jennifer.