Let That Settle In...

Harry and I were walking out of the darkened theater on Tuesday night having just seen "Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince" for the second time.

"I liked it - I really did," I said as I tossed my Cherry Icee cup into the trash, "but don't you think it was a bit long at times?"

"Yeah," Harry said absently as he hitched up his britches for the millionth time making me want to find him a belt - and strangle him with it. "So - what should I do? About the car? Do I go ahead and trade it for that SUV? What do you think?"

We'd been over this topic before.

Repeatedly.

A lot.

My patience?

Gone.

My opinion?

Filled with four-letter words and spittle.

"I don't know," I sighed, regaining my composure by staring at a poster with Bradley Cooper's face smiling from its center. "Well, don't settle. That's when you're always really unhappy. When you settle for what you don't really want."

"But I'm happy with you!"

I stopped. My head swung toward him and I smiled a sweet smile. "I'm so sorry, dear, that you had to settle for me. Since I was all you could get. So you settled. For me. So sorry. Call your granny. Tell her your moving back in. Now. And to come pick you up at the theater cuz you so ain't ridin' home with me!" I get country when I get irate.

But then I giggled. So I knew my cover was blown.

"I meant that you made me happy so I never have to settle," he tried and pawed at my arm/sideboob.

"Diggin' a hole."

"You know I love you! And you know that's not what I meant."

I stopped in the middle of the lobby and mimed digging a hole.

"I didn't settle! Wait, stop! Come here!" he dragged me by the arm so that we were hugging under the poster of an upcoming Disney feature. Rubbing his scrufflies on my face he kissed me gently and squeezed me in such a way I feared my Icee would revisit. "I didn't settle." he said.

"Fine," I said and accidently smiled. I tried to cover it with my hand as I was attempting to score a guilt-filled foot massage out of the deal - but he saw it.

We walked hand-in-hand to the elevator and as the doors closed he said, "So really - what do you think I should do about my car?"

And his body was never seen again....

:)

Still there?

I used to love blogging.

Every instance in my life was judged on whether or not it could be blogged and turned to the nets for the enjoyment of others. And I guess I still judge life that way - but the idea of logging in to blogger, fighting with the limited controls and trying to move and crop pictures, well, it's just too much!

When Twitter is instantaneous - and Facebook is so easily accessed on my phone - the idea of blogging, cropping, editing and sticking pics in various places is sooo not appealing anymore!

So - is blogging a dying art?

Was it snatched up by the media and by the publishing and movie biz, glamorized, sensationalized and expelled back out - like gum that's lost its flavor?

Maybe I'm just disenchanted.

Hmm...

Slight of (Wrinkly) Hand

Sliding into the 50's style green pleather seats of "Jim's Steak and Spaghetti House" always brings back memories of my youth. The smell of the meat sauce and the waitresses' crisp white uniforms and dark orange support hose instantly makes me feel at home ---and ravenous.

So when our nice server piled Captain Wafer crackers in a small white bowl on our table, Summer, Aunt Gwen and I lunged for them. My grandmother, a little older and a little slower, stretched one arm slowly across the table and plucked a pack of the buttery crackers. While the three of us ate the bits like rabid dogs, my grandmother examined each side of the package before deliberately and meticulously extracting a single cracker. Her precision was difficult to watch as I worried about her health. She didn't look tired. In fact, her cheeks were rosy, her lips were rouged and her skin glowed.

She looked better than me.

"I took her to Estee Lauder and made them give her a makeover," Gwen said proudly while reaching for another cracker bundle.

"Shelooksgreat!" Summer concurred without pausing and then launched into another topic involving IUD's or breastfeeding or something equally as uncomfortable. I decided to eat another cracker until the topic switched to something else - anything else - but they were gone. The waitress had just left a handful of them on the table as she saw how we attacked any morsel of food - but they were nowhere. Only five wrappers were scattered around the top of the table. But lest I seem like a piggy - I just crossed my arms and chose not to say anything.

I saw Summer reach for the bowl - notice the lone package sitting in it and pull her thin, bony hand back to her lap.

Soon after our spaghettis arrived and we ate heartily.

Afterwards, Gwen insisted on paying and as she reached into her wallet she said, "Well Mom, I swear if you haven't loaded my purse up with crackers!"

My grandmother smiled and pawed at the purse while Summer and I cracked up.

"I didn't even see her do it! None of us did!" I whispered to Sis as my grandmother slowly pushed to a standing position and shuffled down the aisle and we decided that she was the most masterful magician in the world.

She'll distract you and make you think she is old and slow and BAM! She'll have robbed you blind--- of crackers.

And Houdini didnn

Rub a Dub Suds

The washing machine was mocking me.

"21" read the dial. Two glowing green numbers glaring at me from its "advanced" blackened face next to a label touting the wonders of the "Calypso" washing system. An immortal sea nymph you are not, my dear large appliance.

I could hear the basin struggle to fill, then drain, then fill, then drain in a torturous holding pattern of cleanliness. The white cow bayed and mooed as it stared at me with its lowing "2" and "1" seemingly begging me to free it from its burden, to lighten its load.

So I sighed and lifted the lid.

A full load of towels were in the bottom, sopping wet and covered in white sudsy foam.

"Really?" I yelled at the gaping mouth of the machine, "REALLY?"

I reached into the murky depths and removed a single turquoise wash cloth. Holding it under the running water of the sink I rinsed free the layer of suds, wrenched the wetness from it and flung it in the dryer.

Next, a kitchen towel. I continued this foolish game of "Holly the Washing Machine" for another hour while I waited for Harry to return from one of his many weekend errands. He always needs to run somewhere - as if staying home with me for more than three hours at a time would cause his curly head to explode, showering us all with toy stats, chocolate sprinkles and binary code.

The light flickered above me from a dying florescent as I continued to wring the neck of a sand colored Ralph Lauren bath sheet. The light hurt my eyes, the rinsing and wringing was painful and the daunting pile of unwashed clothes at my feet made my brain hurt.

At that moment, all of the frustrations of the past month, weeks, years, minutes and hours were poured into the act of un-sudsing my towels.

With each triumph fling into the waiting dryer I felt my sanity slowly returning - if not my work light.

Finally - I had one towel left.

A large white monstrosity "accidentally" lifted from one of Harry's many hotel visits.

I attacked it like a woman possessed, sloshing suds and water down the front of my not-suitable-for-public-wear Thumper shirt. I kneaded it like a dough ball and watched as the water grew opaque with foam. Blasting it with the spray hose I felt satiated. Done.

I tossed in a Snuggle dryer sheet and hobble-walked over to the couch in the other room feeling pains in my back and legs that my sedentary lifestyle doesn't usually offer.

My phone tinkled with the sounds of "Tainted Love."

"Hello?"

"Hey - did the washer start again?" Harry asked.

"No, it's dead. Let's buy new ones. Red ones."

"We'll see. Hey - don't try to get those towels out yourself - you could get hurt."

"Wouldn't dream of it," I lied.

Later - when he got home with dinner and found me passed out on the couch with a streak of detergent down my front and between my toes, I would explain the need to fix what is broken, but for now, I bask in the glory of an accomplishment.

Until I run out of clean underwear.

Rain of Destruction

As I picked Summer up from work, I glanced to the sky and noticed the darkening sky. The clouds were angry, dark blue and ready to rumble as the spread out over the greater tri-state area. Which was perfect - as it matched my mood. I had been up since 5:30am- wide-awake sitting in my bed, alone, and watching WSAZ-TV as a girl with too much make-up swept her arms across a fake screen of animated cold fronts and stormclouds.

My appointment for (MORE!) bloodwork was a 10am and since Summer was often the stand in for my husband who was, as usual, out of town on work.

She hopped in my white SUV and made a face at the black sky. "Whyisitonlyoverus? Isitmadatus?" she asked in her normal non-pausing ways.

"Yes," I said, as I pulled away from the curb. "Yes it is."

Ten minutes later we're sitting in the parking lot of the doctor's office and watching the rain fall in cloudy parallel sheets. Talking is impossible as the rain pounding on the roof makes any conversation less than shouting a challenge.

I dig two umbrellas out of the back of my car and we run and squeal to the double glass doors.

"Stay to the left!" I shout as I spot a huge puddle. Turning slightly I paw at my key fob and see the lights flash on my car.

"Whew! We made it." The wind continues to howl for twenty minutes as we're ushered from one window to the next. I settle in and pull out my Iphone to check my Facebook and Twitter updates when I hear it:

"Does someone have a White GMC? 'Cause your back is open."

"Aaaagh!" I tossed my phone and purse at Sis and ran, wet pant legs slapping against my ankles all the way. I stood at the doors and punched the hatch button repeatedly until I saw the door slowly close.

"Well, my day couldn't get much worse," I thought as I turned and walked back into the waiting area.

I was wrong. As I was sucking the water out of my car later - I almost sucked up my necklace twice.

What a horrible way to die. :)