Thursday, January 26, 2006

Give Me a Boost

I just saw a commercial on television for a booster car seat for kids too old for regular car seats but not quite big enough for adult seat belts. The cut-off height where a child no longer needs a booster seat is, according to this commercial, 4'9".

That's only three inches shorter than I am.

I wonder what happens when you Google "adult booster seat."

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I miss Hershey. Since I cannot have another cat, I want to get a guinea pig next month. I think I will name it either something cute like Gumby or Twinkie, or something totally dull like Jeff or Bob. (For some reason, saying "This is my guinea pig, Jeff," just sounds funny.)

Votes being taken now for both female and male names for guinea pigs.

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This just in from the AP:

"SAN DIEGO (AP) - Hundreds of people were turned away Thursday from an open casting call for NBC's hit weight-loss show, 'The Biggest Loser,' because the venue--a restaurant--couldn't accommodate the immense crowd."

No pun intended, I'm sure.

Thursday, January 19, 2006

Being Sick ... Is Nyquil a Legal Drug?

My several fans have clamored for me to update again, so here I am. You can stop getting your knickers in a twist over it. I'm back.

I had been sick with The World's Worst Head Cold for over two weeks, which truly changed my outlook from one of cheeriness to Let Me Please Just Die Overnight, Okay? Anything But This Incessant Coughing and Wheezing. Really, quite a change in personality for me, usually talkative to a fault. In fact, when my throat hurt its worst, I sat next to Wayne, who was asking me something innocuous (as is usually his habit).

I squeaked out quietly, "Throat hurts too bad. I ... can't ... talk." In his usual droll fashion, he continued to stare at the TV, now playing another old episode of Alias Smith and Jones, and said simply, "Finally."

Smart-aleck.

Just as I was getting better, he started sneaking the thermometer out of the medicine cabinet and getting up in the middle of the night to hit the Chloraseptic bottle. Unlike regular people, Wayne unscrews the spritzy top of the bottle and just chugs the stuff, gargling it loudly right outside the bedroom door (in the kitchen), awakening even the mice in the basement. The sound is probably more effective than the mousey poison-dishes we put down near the fridge last week. (They have this blue crunchy stuff in them and look like little pet food dishes -- almost cruel, really, except when you consider the alternative of mice munching on the Cap'n Crunch and the instant rice in the pantry next to the fridge.)

Where was I? Oh yeah. Head colds. Anyway, Wayne's now fighting off the cold I probably gave him. Probably? Well, considering I was sleeping in his recliner and preparing his dinner and doing his laundry for those two weeks I was sick, yeah, I'd say he got it from me. Anyway, he must know what a turn-on the mixed aroma of Nyquil and hand sanitizer is because he's dousing himself in both things like they're cheap cologne on a gigolo. I swear he uses the hand sanitizer (this gallon-sized pump thing from Sam's Club) like body wash in the shower. Reminds me of when we were first dating and he'd wedge a quart-sized pump-bottle of hand sanitizer between the bucket seats of his Lumina and use it before kissing me at the drive-in.

Ahh, back when we were middle-aged and foolish! Memories . . .

Monday, January 02, 2006

Who Is This Mary Exmas of Whom You Speak?

Happy freakety new year to yinz all!

It's dreary and rainy here, so dark you need to turn the lights on even though it's afternoon. I can't say I particularly love days like this, but if I can stay in and putz around on the computer, well, so much the better.

We had a lovely Christmas with my parents and all the kids (on Christmas Eve, actually, which was fun). The silliest present was what Wayne got my dad. There's been a family "feud" for years where my folks send us noisy, annoying gag gifts. We've got the singing Christmas tree, Bruce the Spruce, and the dancing/singing snowman, a Christmas wall clock that plays an entire Christmas carol every hour, the singing bass fish, a dancing/singing birthday cake -- well, you get the idea.

We've never caught up on this feud. One year we got close when we gave my mom a cute stuffed reindeer that plays "Grandma Got Run Over By A Reindeer" when you squeeze his hoof. But really, we were losing the war desperately.

Until this year.

Until Wayne bought the mother of all gag gifts for my deer-hunting dad. It sings. It dances. It lets you do karaoke. It sings some more. It has a full repertoire of songs, mostly country crap redone by a two-bit singer and piped through its moving, lifelike mouth. Its name is Buck.


As soon as my dad ripped off the paper, he shouted, "That's it! They win!"

'Nuf said.