Things Mitch won't do for me:

1.  Expel my dog's anal glands.

That's all I can think of right now.  I saw my poor dog dragging her ass on the grass yesterday and I asked Google why dogs do that.  They do it because their anal glands are blocked up and also because it makes children laugh and laugh. 

I took a look, which was gross and unpleasant for me and for the dog, and sure enough, she's swollen back there.  She needs some help.  I thought about doing it myself but it sounds disgusting so I told Mitch he had to do it.  He laughed like I wasn't serious.  I'm still working on him to do it.  In the meantime I have been researching how to do this so I can tell him when he finally gives in.  I read about it and it sounds really gross, but it can't be any worse than popping a big zit, right?

So I looked it up on Youtube (this is a link to the video I watched.  Don't watch it.  You will throw up and DIE.) so I could watch a video of it.  Oh my god, you guys, it is so much grosser than you could ever imagine! So. Much. Grosser.  I was just sitting here while it loaded between commercials on SNL.  Mitch is sleeping on the couch and when I played it and got to when the magic happens with a cat I was so amazingly grossed out that all I could do was say, "OH HO HO HO HO!  OH MY GOD!  OH DEAR GOD!  NO!  NO!"  I was too grossed out to even push the pause button and I couldn't take my eyes off the horror that is animal-anal-gland-expulsion. Mitch woke up for a few seconds and said, "What's going on?"  I didn't tell him what I was watching because I was kind of thinking of learning to do this myself for my poor dog, but now there is no way I can do it, and I'm too cheap to pay someone to squeeze my dogs anus, so it is all up to Mitch, and he doesn't need to know the horror of it before he does it. 

The Summer of Self-Improvement: Day 1

I decided to start eating healthy, exercise a LOT, and expand my mind this summer.  It's getting off to a slow start.  Here's what happened. 

1. The power went out for about an hour, so in the interest of keeping the cold in the fridge, had pudding cup(s) for lunch instead of salad. 

2.  Went out to run errands.  Got some gin and some tonic.  Justified it by getting diet tonic and then walking next door to the liquor store instead of driving across the parking lot.

3.  Saw many skinny, wiry marathon runners running all over downtown, getting in a last practice before Grandma's Marathon tomorrow.  Was reminded to carb-up for dinner tonight. 

4.  Saw a morbidly obese woman in the library and told myself that compared to her, I'm in fantastic shape, so there's no rush to start this self-improvement business.

5.  Had to pee super bad, but didn't want to go at the library, so instead of standing around trying to decide what language I would try to learn this summer with my legs crossed wishing I was wearing Depends, walked away from language-tape display and went to "beach reading" display. 

5.  Went to the bathroom anyway because of close call while trying to decide if I've already read that John Grisham book, saw self in the mirror.  Discovered why people say horizontal stripes are unflattering.  One stripe going over one boob and under the other.  Looks like I'm deformed.  Have been walking around like this all day.  

6.  Came home and thought about going on a walk, decided it's too hot and windy and my time would be better spent drinking a gin and tonic and reading a trashy library book on the deck.

LOST!!

Questions I still have about LOST:

1.  Who the hell is Jason? Who was the first Jason?  How did Lock turn into Jason if he was Lock?  Why did Jack become Jason?  Why did Hurley become Jason?  What happened to Hurley and Ben?  (Whoa whoa, that's 6 questions in one.  Not exactly following the rules.  But all Jason-related, so I'll let it go.)

2.  Why was Desmond pressing the button? 

5.  What about the polar bears?....WHAT ABOUT THE POLAR BEARS?

6.  Why is the time/space continuum controlled by a donkey wheel in a basement freezer?

7.  If they are all dead anyway, what was that stupid thing Desmond uncorked and Jack recorked, and why bother?

8.  Was Lock right the whole time?  Or was Jack right the whole time?

9.  Where the hell was that dog for three years?

10.  What about Michael and Walt?

11.  Why does the after-life suck so bad?

12.  Why didn't the smoke monster just float off the island if he wanted off so bad?  He's SMOKE.

13.  Mr. Echo was my favorite.  What happened to him?  Why wasn't he in the shitty afterlife?

14.  Why were those cages that Kate and Sawyer got locked in on the island anyway?

15.  If I kept watching Lost instead of giving it up for Glee in the middle of the last season, would it make any more sense?

15.  If I knew how lame it ended, (THEY'RE ALL DEAD) would I have started watching in the first place?  I think I learned as a college freshman that it is a cop out to kill off all your characters, or to say, "And it was all a dream...!"  Lame - o.

I almost died from...

I read a post today at Sara's Organized Chaos about how she's sure she will die of a brain tumor, or breast cancer or an aneurysm.  She has good reason for believing these are the things she will die from (Sorry for validating your fears, Sara) because she has family history and crazy headaches.  She made me think about my crippling case of hypochondria and be thankful that I don't have any actual symptoms of dying of the things I'm so sure I'm dying of.  The following is a list of things I am sure I've almost died from.

1.  Cancer - When I was little I couldn't sleep because I was pretty sure I would die of a fast-acting cancer before the morning. 

2.  Teen pregnancy - I thought I was pregnant pretty much every month since I've first gotten my period when I was 11.  Sure, I wasn't sexually active at all, but I thought since I physically had the ability to get pregnant, I probably would in some obscure way and then I'd die of embarrassment and humiliation.  There's nothing sadder than a pregnant 13 year old who has never had sex. 

3.  AIDS - When I first heard about this in the 80's I immediately thought I had it.  Again, without being sexually active, or an intravenous drug user (except for that one time I tried heroin behind Mr. Movies)(Just kidding, Mom and Dad!), or a promiscuous gay man.  It was a crippling fear even though I knew it wasn't that contagious unless you swapped body fluids with someone.  I bought the book The Coming Plague and read it religiously and marked passages and basically scared myself almost to death with AIDS and all the scary diseases around the world.

4.  Ebola - I read about that in The Coming Plague too.  Yikes.

5.  Hanta Virus - Again, thank you The Coming Plague.

6.  MRSA - Every time I get a cut I get MRSA (in my mind).  I'm really good at fighting it off.  (so far)

7.  Trench foot - I think I broke my foot once because it hurt for a long time and I thought it was trench foot. It wasn't. 

8.  Rickets - I might have rickets right now.  

9. Ovarian cancer - Because there is no reliable screening to catch this disease early, I'm pretty sure I have it.

10.  E.coli - Got a stomach ache?  OMG it's got to be E.coli! 

11. Milk leg - My friend Pete told me about this disease.  It's when a pregnant woman gets deep vein thrombosis in her legs.  I didn't know about it when I was pregnant, or else I would have diagnosed myself with it.  I think I had it when I was on the pill too. 

12.  The bends - In high school I once had a contest with a friend to see who could stay at the bottom of the ten-foot-deep pool the longest, just holding our breath.  I won.  But then I got the bends.  I fought hard and beat it. 

13.  SARS - Our friend Tom bought a stuffed animal for our kids from Hong Kong.  He said kiddingly, "Watch out, it has SARS on it!"  It really did.  I got a very mild-to-no case of it. 

14.  Ankle sprain - I fell down the last two steps at our house because I was concentrating very hard because I was holding a scissors and a needle and I didn't want to fall and hurt myself.  So I fell and hurt myself.  It was the worst ankle sprain in the history of ankle sprains. 

15.  Childbirth - Watching my stomach grow until it was the size of a beachball, knowing the whole time this huge thing had to somehow come out of my body.  I was sure I would die.  The babies were huge too, but I lived THANKS ONLY TO MODERN MEDICINE!

16.  Wisdom tooth pain that really turned out to be abscessed tooth pain/suicide - The tooth wouldn't kill me but the infection probably would have.  If I had to live with the pain for one more day I would have killed myself.

17.  Bear attack...

This is getting tedious.  Let's just sum up by saying I've dodged a LOT of bullets.  The list would be shorter if I wrote about what I'm pretty sure I won't die of: 

1.  prostate cancer,
2.  brain tumor. 

I don't know why, I'm just not that afraid of brain tumors.  I'll have to think about it some more and work myself up into a tizzy.  What are you irrationally afraid you will die from?

Last Will and Testament

Tomorrow I am having the most difficult and traumatic root canal anyone in the history of the world ever had, and I feel I should be prepared, so I am writing my will here for all to see, in the likely event that I die of dental-phobia.

1. To Mom and Dad - you can have my bird. Be nice to her. (Mom, that means DON'T let her free in the woods behind your house.) You can also have my dog. She's very sweet. She also gets worms a lot. Watch out for that.

2. To my sister Amy - You can have my Dr. Quinn memorabilia which includes my autographed picture of Dr. Quinn, Sully and John Schneider, and my DVD collection of every single Dr. Quinn episode and movie, and all the Dr. Quinn paperback books.

3. To my sister Beth - You can have my floppy straw sun hat and Kiwi scented sunscreen dauber. Both are good for the prevention of the dreaded "freckle 'stache. You can also have everything I've ever crocheted and all my yarn. Rent a U-haul.

4. To Grandma Zetta - You can have the teacup that you stole from Worcester College for me. I will no longer have to blackmail you for stealing it, because I'll be dead.

5. To Kira, you can have my iPod which I know you love so much that it will do much to ease the distress of losing your mother. Please, make sure I'm dead before you get too excited though, because if I pull through somehow, you do not get it.

6. To Sam, you can have my computer. Again, don't get too excited until you're sure I'm dead.

7. To my friend and fellow blogger, Anne - You can have my blog if you will agree to write a comprehensive and glowing obituary for me when you get over the initial shock of my passing. The username and password are in an email draft that Mitch will send you when he is able to pull himself together enough to crawl out of bed and continue with the business of living (probably several months). Feel free to use the outline of the obituary I wrote for myself (included in the email). Of course it's up to you, since I'll be dead and won't know the difference, but you could make it into a dental-phobia-awareness blog.

8. And finally, to my loving husband, Mitch - you can have all the candy I've hidden throughout the house. I'm not going to write down where it all is because in case I pull through, I don't want to have to find all new hiding spots. You'll just have to find it. Good luck, and look diligently because some of it is perishable. You can also have everything else of mine not on this list to give away or keep at your discretion. Oh, and you are to NEVER remarry, or I will haunt you ("till death do you part" means your death.) And make the west wall of the living room into a shrine for me, complete with altar and candles. Also, make sure that "Ballroom Blitz" is played at my funeral.

Goodbye all, and thanks for the memories!

Mitch's Animal Knowledge

 1.  Border collies can run 27 miles per hour.  Tops.

2.  Raccoons tie sloppy knots.

3.  A pigeon can fly into the window of a car going 60 miles per hour.

4.  If a squirrel has a choice between living in nature and living in a lunch box, it will choose the lunch box.

5.  If a bird has a choice between flying and walking, it will walk. 

6.  Good raccoon names:  Smokey and Bandit.

7.  Dogs can climb plum trees.

8.  Dogs love plums.

9.  The best way to catch a bat in your house is with two paper plates.

10.  If one of your kids leaves a coonskin hat under your bed, and you see it and and think it might be an animal, don't touch it.  Make your wife do it.

11.  The best weapon against bears in the long grass:  canoe paddle.

Negative Nelly

Did you know that was a saying, Negative Nelly? I just looked it up because I'm feeling so very negative today. Mitch pointed out that many of my recent sentences start with "I hate..." So I think I'll just make a list of all the things I hate lately, and then I'll concentrate on being more of a Positive Polly starting tomorrow.

I hate winter
I hate snow
I hate cold
I hate wisdom teeth that don't fit in your mouth but come in anyway and squish all your other teeth together
I hate the snow plow, (but I also love the snow plow)
I hate subbing for kindergarteners (but I love kindergarteners, just not being in charge of them for more than 5 minutes at a time)(because they're crazy)
I hate being torn
I hate jaw pain that radiates into your sinuses and gives you headaches that no amount of Advil can relieve
I hate the guy on the radio today that said that when he hears people call music "funk" he re-educates them and tells them that it's really soul music.
I hate Mario Lopez
I hate how dirty my car is
I hate shoveling
I hate getting up before dawn
I hate being beaten at Mario Kart
I hate Michael Buble
I hate that I'm going to have to schedule an appointment with someone (ideally a doctor of some kind) to dig around in my skull and fish out my impacted wisdom teeth
I hate running out of milk
I hate when my glasses get dirty
I hate the phrase "a lick and a promise" yuck
I hate when I tell someone that I hate something trivial and they say, "It could be worse! You could live in Haiti!" Well, no shit.
I hate hockey
I hate that the laundry is never JUST DONE ALREADY
I hate nostril scabs
I hate when I forget to make the kid's lunches until 11:30 at night, every single night
I hate wet socks (no duh, who doesn't)
I hate dry skin
I hate that I can't wear my robe in public
I hate the word lavatory (there's no lava in there)
I hate all these snowmen mocking me constantly
I hate that all my pants have shrunk ( shut up)
I hate turtle-heading
I hate neck zits
I hate running out of Diet Coke
I hate that song (you know the one)
I hate being a grown-up
I hate when I say that I hate being a grown-up and someone says, "Well, what's the alternative?" Being a kid, you idiot.
I hate squash
I hate caraway seeds
I hate the lady judge on So You Think You Can Dance
I hate the male judges on So You Think You Can Dance
I hate that show So You Think You Can Dance
I hate knowing that there is a chewed up Hot Tamale somewhere on the floor of my car because it fell out of Kira's mouth
I hate Ted Bundy
I hate John Wayne Gacy
I hate the word crux
I hate the word cusp
I hate when guys try to dictate where their jaw line is by shaving beard jaw-lines halfway up their face
I hate when people yank my chain
I hate even thinking about litter boxes
I hate even thinking about hemorrhoids
I hate how hard hemorrhoids is to spell
I hate how negative I am
I hate this list

Okay, from now on nothing but sunshine from me.

Resolutions?

I usually don't make resolutions because why start the year disappointing yourself, am I right? I'm not going to start exercising and eating right on January 1 because I've still got bags of chips and tubs of dip to take care of and it would be abusive to let my kids eat all that crap by themselves. But I suppose resolutions are something I could try out.

1. I will study another language. (I originally wrote "I will learn another language" but that's setting the bar a bit high.) It might be Spanish, it might be Na'vi. Probably Na'vi, although I did take 6 years of Spanish and it is an actual language used by millions of humans, so it might be more practical and more useful.

2. I will stop being so practical.

3. I will continue teaching myself to play the guitar. I got a guitar a few years ago and I taught myself quite a bit, and this year I will practice and learn more stuff. Watch out B7 chord, this year you're mine.

4. I will be more social...... JUST KIDDING! Ha ha.. I really make myself laugh sometimes!

5. I'll get a real job. Plan A: NASA. If that doesn't work out, Plan B: Hollywood. If not at NASA or Hollywood then nowhere. Sorry, Mitch.

6. I'll wash that gray right out of my hair.

7. I'll make a goal during the mother/daughter hockey game in March, and I'll do it wearing figure skates. (real resolution: I will not get permanently injured during the mother/daughter game.)(Note to self: start being nicer to Kira.)

8. I will make ten different edible dishes in a bundt pan. I'm counting last week's meatloaf as one even thought it was technically last year, and I'm also counting cake as one. Eight more to go. Next week: Jello mold.

9. I will get the crumb of food out from under the F key on my keyboard, and I won't eat over my computer anymore.

10. I will not be disappointed with myself when I don't do any of the previous nine things on this list.

Do you have any resolutions this year?

Things I'm learning from Dr. Quinn, Medicine Woman

I got the box set of every single second of Dr. Quinn Medicine Woman for my birthday. This is what I've learned so far.

1. Every medicine cabinet should be stocked with plenty of laudanum, quinine, and willow-bark tea.

2. Frontier people were hot-heads.

3. Dr. Quinn's mother is actually the person she thinks is her sister who is 15 years older than her. (This has not been substantiated by the show, it's just my own personal theory.)

4. Don't ever let a barber pull out your tooth.

5. Haho means "thank you" in Cheyenne. And also "hello" and also "goodbye."  Kind of like Aloha!

6. Being a whore in a frontier saloon in the 1870s wasn't that great a job after all.

7. Hawks listen to what you say, and if you say something profound, they caw. Every time.

8. If you want to dress up as Dr. Quinn and her children for Halloween, your 12 year old son will ruin it by refusing to have anything to do with your plan.

9. When you eat a bowl of candy corn, what's left after you eat the big parts is just a mess of white tips, and they look like baby teeth, and it's really fun to pretend you are eating baby teeth. (I actually learned this from eating candy corn WHILE watching Dr. Quinn, not from Dr. Quinn herself.)

10. General Custer was very vain, and a real bastard.

11. Dr. Quinn is a naturally talented trapeze artist. Who knew?

12. Wolves make great pets until they get rabies, which they will.

13. Mine cave-ins = no joke

14. You know how you thought that 1870s frontier doctors couldn't perform plastic surgery? Well, you were wrong.

Travel Much?

I'm sitting at home today being totally lazy. The most productive thing I've done (so far) aside from reading blogs, is clean out between the keys on my computer with a corn holder. There was a shocking amount of hair stuffed down there. And food.

One of the blogs I read is Kady Hexum's. She is on a trip to Norway right now and I am so jealous!

She has been all over the world. I fancy myself a traveler, although I haven't been anywhere abroad in 12 years. (stupid kids)(just kidding kids! Love you to pieces!) That was a trip to Oxford, England to take a Shakespeare class at Worcestershire College. Fancy huh! I also lived in Australia for a year when I was 12. I told my parents, "I'm out! Gotta see the world!" Just kidding. They came with me.

The thing about traveling is that actual traveling is so much different than the idea of traveling. I watch travel shows and the people are trying new food, and they are bragging about their accommodations, whether it is a hostel or a fancy hotel. The travel shows never talk much about jet lag or how traveling totally screws up your poop schedule, or how the foreign food that at the beginning of your trip was novel and interesting, makes you want to cry at the end of your trip. And they never tell you about the things that most Americans would think are totally fun. Like taking your picture in front of a sign like this:

I'd be willing to bet all the money in my wallet that Rudy Maxa and Rick Steves both have pictures of themselves in front of signs like this. This is Kady on her trip in Norway.

When I went to England I stayed in a beautiful room on the college campus in what they called the "new" building, which was built in the 1700s. The "old" building was built in the 1000s. I always feel like such an ungrateful baby when I travel because I tend to focus on the problems and get homesick for stupid stuff. For instance, although my room at Oxford was beautiful, the bathroom was down one floor. I have to pee during the night every night, so I would have to get up, put on a robe, march down a flight of stairs, pee and then march back up. By the time I got back I was wide awake. That made me very tired and cranky so to solve my problem, I found an empty peanut butter jar (don't ask) and when I'd have to pee in the middle of the night I'd pee in that, and then in the morning I would have to scout out the hallway to make sure nobody was around so I could bring my full-to-the-brim pee-jar down to the bathroom to empty it. Not very glamorous, and at the time, highly stressful. Thankfully, I never got caught.

We took our meals at Oxford in a dining hall that looked just like the dining hall in the Harry Potter movies. So nice, right? But about half way through the second week I was so sick of lamb that every time I saw lamb with gagorific mint sauce I wanted to stab someone's eyeballs out. How many lambs can the English eat? Judging from those three weeks you'd think there should be an international lamb shortage.

See, I'm a total crybaby. I shouldn't be allowed to travel. Now, when I think about that trip, I wish I would have quit being such a baby and just relaxed and enjoyed it more.

But, thanks to Kady, I have the travel bug and I think now, with 12 more years of life experience and 12 years of eating truly disgusting things off my children's plates, or that I've cooked myself, I would be a much more appreciative and mature traveler. I'll just plan ahead and bring a laxative and an empty peanut butter jar, and a bag of candy bars and then I'll be happy, and comfortable. Right?

These are the top five places I want to go:

1. Italy - because I would love to see the Vatican, and the Colosseum, and Venice.

2. Jerusalem - I want to see The Old City: The Dome of the Rock, the Temple Mount; all that jazz.

3. Istanbul - because it's half in Europe and half in Asia! Super cool! I want to see Hagia Sofia, the Hippodrome and take a boat tour of the Bosporus.

4. Oman - I'd like to see huge sand dunes and travel on camels and stay in a real Arabian tent. Think I'd find something to complain about? Oh yeah! But I'd still like to do it. Unless there are scorpions. Then tent-living is OUT.

5. Australia - I'd like to see it now that I'm an adult and I'd like to have a couple of months and tons of money to do it. I want to go to Darwin, Ayers Rock and Sydney.

So, my friends, are you a traveler? Where are the top five places you'd like to go?

Irrational Fears

I think I may have a touch of OCD and it manifests itself in irrational fears that I worry about and fret over. I have lots of rational fears too, but they aren't very fun to talk about so this is just a list of the most ridiculous things I'm afraid of. Maybe if I shed some light on them, they will stop bothering me.

1. Dropping my iPod into the toilet. I don't even bring it in the bathroom, but I'm pretty sure someday, somehow, it will meet its fate in a toilet.

2. Going bald

3. Becoming a quadriplegic. This would be a rational fear if I ever did anything dangerous, but I don't so it's irrational. And it's also a fear because Mitch asked me one day if I'd ever wear a shirt that said "Jam Out with your Clam Out" on it. I said no, obviously, gross. And he said, "If you're ever a quadriplegic you'll wear that shirt every day."

4. Bears. I watched a documentary about Yellowstone the other day and it re-awakened my irrational fear of bears. They are so fast and bloodthirsty!

yikes!

5. Spiders crawling in my mouth when I sleep.

6. Flesh eating bacteria.

7. Nuclear winter.

8. Sharks.

9. This crab:

So, what are your irrational fears? Public speaking? Dying alone? Peeing your pants at work? (been there, done that; not that scary) Tell me in the comments!

The top five inventions I couldn't live without

I had lunch with a friend the other day (Hi Dana!) and we got to talking about cool inventions we couldn't live without and how we feel so dumb and lazy for not inventing anything. (yet) I thought about it (for about five minutes) and these are my top five favorite inventions (other than, you know, polio vaccines and really important stuff like that.)

1. Caller ID - I had this back when you had to buy a special box and have the phone company hook it up. It has saved me from hundreds of phone ambushes. Hundreds!

2. Technologically advanced thin prescription eyeglass lenses. If it wasn't for this I would look like an even bigger nerd than I already do. My glasses would be so thick that it would look like I was wearing goggles that were full of water. Like this kid:

3. Diet Coke. Sweet calorie-free nectar of the gods.

4. Deodorant maxi pads. Because they keep a person from smelling like the bastard child of a butcher at the end of a double shift, and a hunk of liverwurst left out in the sun. (Hey Always, you can use that for your commercials if you want.)

5. The Google and my laptop. Because they have made me seem (and feel) so much smarter than I actually am.

There's a lot more, of course, but I limited it to five because now, internet friends, I want to know what YOUR five favorite inventions are and why. Write them in the comments! I can't wait to read them!

Read the Label!

I woke up with a headache this morning so I went to take some painkillers and guess what I almost took? My dog's worm pills. The bottles are the same size and shape and were right next to each other in the cupboard. I'm so glad I figured it out in time, for the following reasons:

1. I don't think worm pills get rid of headaches.

2. They were expensive and then I'd have to go all the way to Wisconsin and buy more worm pills.

3. I might actually have a tapeworm who has been living a quiet existence, in perfect balance with me, and those pills might have dealt it the death blow and then I'd see that a person can't really eat as many calories as I eat (without a tapeworm) and not gain unbelievable amounts of weight.

4. I'd have to worry about how a dead, morbidly obese tapeworm gets expelled from its host.

Thankfully, I took the tylenol, so Tapey and I are healthy, happy and soon to be headache free!

What to write about today.....

Kira and I are sitting here on the couch, while it is going the 5th consecutive hour of rain and cold, and we are trying to think of today's topic for the blog. Here are her suggestions:

1. How annoying Sam is

2. How mean Sam is

3. How we made blueberry muffins

4. How selfish Sam is

5. How Sam steals people's wool socks and hides them in his drawer when other people have really cold feet and could use a pair of wool socks.

So, are you seeing a theme here? What a fun day we have been having!

Things I destroyed or debauched in my week of kid-free destruction and debauchery

1. Getting up early

2. Doing anything in moderation

3. The self esteem of all of my facebook friends who play Typing Maniac.

4. Hygiene

5. TWO huge bags of Stacy's Pita Chips (Stacy, whoever you are, you are a fricking genius)

6. Sensible portions

7. The idea that only "doctors" can successfully cut things off your body. (My new motto - "Dermatologist Shmermatologist")

8. Whatever was left of Mitch's innocence

9. My hair

Come home, kids! I miss you!

5 things I learned today

We have a new channel called Retro Television and it has all kinds of shows from the 70s and 80s. Mitch's new favorite is Ironside. Here are five things I have learned after watching a few minutes of it and talking it over with Mitch, and then double checking using Google:

1. Ironside is the character's actual name. As in Jeff Ironside. I always thought it was the nickname, Ironsides, referring to the metal sides of his wheelchair. I thought it was weird that everyone called him Chief Ironside. That would be like my sister calling that guy she knows at work whose nickname is Pignuts, "Mr. Pignuts" or "Chief Pignuts." Not very professional if you ask me. And also confusing. What are we supposed to think when the writers name him an obscure name like Ironside and then put him in a wheelchair?

2. Ironside is played by Raymond Burr and not Orson Wells like I always thought. I said something about it being Orson Wells and Mitch said, "It's not Orson Wells! It's the same guy who played Perry Mason!" I said, "Yeah... I know... Orson Wells."

Raymond Burr
(Ironside and Perry Mason)

3. Orson Wells does not play Perry Mason, Raymond Burr did that too.

4. After looking on Google, I also learned that Orson wells was not Mr. French on Family Affair either!

Sebastian Cabot
(Mr. French)

5. Orson Wells wasn't nearly the prolific an actor I thought he was.

Orson Wells
(NOT Perry Mason, NOT Ironsides, NOT Mr. French)

More Horrible Facts

More horrible facts from 1001 Horrible Facts:

1. It would take 20 minutes to pour all the human urine produced in a single day over Niagara Falls. (COOL!)

Think about it, that's A LOT.

2. King Louis IV of France had a stomach twice the size of a normal human stomach. (How the heck would anyone know that?)

3. The longest tapeworm ever found in a human was 108 feet. (I wonder how much it weighed?)

4. Over a ton of pubic hair has to be filtered out of London's sewage each year and be removed to landfill sites. (I couldn't find a picture. Sorry!)

5. There is enough sulfur in the human body to kill all the fleas on a dog. (Question: How many fleas are on a dog? Are we talking about a chihuahua or a Great Pyrenees? I think I could casually "expel" enough sulfur to kill all the fleas on a chihuahua, if the chihuahua was strategically placed; but I'd be hard pressed to kill a mature colony on a Great Pyrenees without some sort of medical intervention.)

Oh CUTE! They play guitar!

6. The pearl fish swims into a sea cucumber's anus and lives inside it during the day, coming out at night. The sea cucumber breathes through it's anus, so it can't keep the fish out. (I have several questions about this one:
1. Why does the pearl fish only stay in the sea cucumber's anus during the day?
2. What is it doing at night?
3. Why do people assume it's the sea cucumber's anus and not it's mouth, if that's where it breathes?
4. Why not just call it it's mouth?
5. Was some crazy know-it-all marine biologist asked which end was the mouth and which end was the anus, and not knowing, he just guessed, and then later was he busted when the sea cucumber was caught eating and breathing with it's anus and crapping with it's mouth?
6. Did he then say, "Oh, it's a mysterious animal, this sea cucumber. Now don't bother me, I'm an important marine biologist and I'm off to find the elusive SeaCheez-it that has an amazing ability to hear things with it's ear-shaped rectum!"?
7. Why is it that because the sea cucumber breathes out of it's anus, it can't keep the fish out?
8. Hasn't the sea cucumber ever heard of spitting?)

Mouth? Or anus?
(aren't you glad people don't ask that when they look at pictures of you?
See, there's something to be thankful for every day.)

iPod fun

I was driving from Northfield home to Duluth today and I decided to listen to at least five seconds of every single thing I have on my iPod. There is sooooooo much on there! I found some stuff I didn't realize was so good, some stuff I didn't realize was so bad, and some stuff that made me say WTF is this doing on my iPod? Here's the WTF list:

1. Don't Cry For Me, Argentina by Abba
2. Wake Me Up Before You Go Go by Wham
3. You're First, Last, Everything by Barry White
4. I Ran by Flock of Seagulls (I HATE that song!)
5. Beat It by Michael Jackson
6. Beat It, Moby vs. Michael Jackson by Moby
7. The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn (In my opinion as an English major, this book sucks ass. Sorry Mark Twain.)
8. These Boots Are Made for Walking by Nancy Sinatra
9. Unforgettable by Nat King Cole and Natalie Cole (super creepy duet)
10. Is That All There Is? by Brenda Lee
11. 867-5309 (HATE that song!)
12. Mr. Roboto by Styx. (Guess what? Styx Stinks, that's what.)

How did these things get on my iPod? I usually listen to a few playlists and never hear all the stuff I have on there. Oh, by the way, what was I thinking when I downloaded a Supertramp Greatest Hits album? I don't know what.

I also made some happy discoveries:

1. The band Muse is really good.
2. Ballroom Blitz is a great song.
3. Queen is an awesome band.
4. I should have listened to the second album by Maroon 5 a year ago when I bought it. It's pretty good.
5. Enya can put you into a coma. (not exactly a happy discovery when you're driving)
6. Cheap Trick is better than you think.
7. I like These Boots Are Made For Walking by Nancy Sinatra and I choreographed a little dance in my head while I was listening to it.
8. Dexy's Midnight Runners = good stuff.
9. Little tip - Don't count out Rick Springfield!

Thanks again, Amy, for getting me the iPod so long ago. I still love it.

Still not arrested

I have been without kids for two days now, and still have not been arrested.
Not. Even. Close.
This is what I've been doing with my time:

loads and loads of laundry (what did the kids pack to wear? It seems like everything was in the wash)

Cleaned half the house

Went out for dinner with Mitch at McDonalds. (Seriously, what is wrong with us?)

Got a haircut

Got my oil changed

Got tax stuff ready for the accountant

Started crocheting a new blanket

Is this sad or what? I told Jared I would consider his list of ideas my "to do" list. Here is what they are:

1. Stalk and kill a hobo a la "The Most Dangerous Game".
2. Found a religion.
3. Initiate a frivolous lawsuit.
4. Impersonate a police officer (with the aim of doing a better job).
5. Learn how to make black powder (if you don't already know how).
6. Shave your head.
7. Shave someone else's head.
8. Make ice cream with liquid nitrogen.
9. Study witchcraft.
10. Spend an entire afternoon grabbing and smashing the mobile phones of all the people you see using them in a checkout line. If you're confronted, make low burbling chainsaw noises with your mouth and throat while doing a sort of spastic dance to and fro in front of the irate ex-owner of the phone (remember, the arms really *sell* any such dance). Repeat as necessary.

#1, I can't do it. I just haven't met a deserving hobo yet. From what I've seen they aren't all that hard to hunt anyway, they're not the fastest runners.

#2 I sort of already did that. Well, not me, but Sam. When he was five we went out to lunch with a religious frienemy of mine and before we ate she made everyone join hands and she prayed for what seemed like hours thanking God for the bland taco salad she made. We aren't religious, so Sam never saw anything quite like that before. He stared at her the whole time she was praying, and when she was (finally) finished, he said, "... WHO are you TALKING to?" and she did her best to give him a primer on Christianity. He listened and then said, "Oh! You mean the Owner!" Later when I talked to him about it he said that the Owner was the one who made the whole world and everything in it. Being the religious skeptic that I am, I said, "Oh yeah, well who made the Owner?" and he said, "Mother Nature." I said, "Who made Mother Nature?" thinking I had him now! He looked at me like I was an idiot and said, "Mom... she made herself." Of course. So although the Owner religion isn't all that organized, it is sort of a religion. Thank you Sam!

#3 Too much paperwork.

#4 That's on the list for tonite. (Well, I have the cuffs anyway; hubba hubba, Mitch!)

#5 I'm not sure what black powder is unless it is the stuff with saltpeter, sulfur and charcoal. If so, no thanks, too stinky.

#6 I got a haircut! Does that count? It's kind of cute in a pre-menopausal hausfrau sort of way. I can't shave it. I would look more like Telly Savalas than Sinead O'Connor.

#7 The only other person's head I have access to is Mitch's, and I can't do that because his head is really pointy and I think his scalp would probably be blindingly white. He'd look like a thumb.

#8 That sounds interesting. Maybe later in the week...

#9 Done it. And palm reading.

#10 This is my favorite idea. I like the idea of the dance. In fact I have the dance all choreographed, I just have to work up the guts to do the rest.

So... not starting off very reckless, but maybe after I get the house totally cleaned and get a few more rows done on my new blanket, then the wild side of me will kick in. I'll keep you posted, unless I go to jail and there is no internet access.

1001 (well, 15) Horrible Facts

I taught in a second grade classroom today and the teacher had a book on her desk called 1001 Horrible Facts. I love it! Lots of little nuggets of wisdom in there. Here are a few of my favorites:

1. A pregnant scorpion sometimes reabsorbs its babies instead of giving birth.

2. An octopus tentacle will keep wriggling for some time after being cut off. but I still wonder how long "some time" is. Three seconds?(so what) Two hours? (THAT I would like to see.)

3. Land leeches in Asia can drop from trees onto people and suck out so much blood, the person DIES. Weren't those the leeches in Rambo 3 (or was it 4)? He was covered with them. Just some more evidence to show how incredibly tough John Rambo really is. Sly Stallone, you rock.

Hey, that's not Rambo!

4. A full grown python can swallow a pig whole. when I read that to Mitch he said, "A pig hole? I saw that on Fear Factor once."
I thought stuffing 33 cheeseballs in my mouth was impressive (and chokey. Don't take on this challenge when you're alone. Have someone with Heimlich Maneuver practice as your witness. Just take my word for it.)

5. A ribbon worm can eat 95% of its own body and still survive.

6. Turkey vultures poop on their legs to keep themselves cool. What a charming bird!

7. The female praying mantis begins to eat the male during mating. He keeps going, but she eventually eats all of him.

8. The Japanese beetle, found in Canada and the U.S., can eat through a human ear drum. What?

9. A flea can jump 30,000 times in a row. Come on, who counted that.

10. Occasionally, human babies are born with a full set of teeth. That is a horrible fact. One of the creepiest thing about children is that they lose their teeth, and the whole tooth fairy thing is crazy if you think about it. What is she doing with all those teeth? Her house must look like the ultimate serial-killer-treasure-hoard. Millions and millions of children's teeth. Beat that Jeffrey Dahmer!

11. Head lice can change color to match the hair they are hiding in.

12. You will produce 8700 gallons of urine in your lifetime. I'm way ahead of schedule on that one.

13. A rat can fall from a 5 story building and walk away unharmed. How did they find that out? Did the rat finally break his leg and require crutches when they dropped him from the sixth floor? I wonder.

14. Early colonists in America used to clean their windows with rags dipped in urine. Mitch just got me some Sham WOW! s. I have an idea....

15. If you are ever trapped in an avalanche and can't tell which way is up, pee and see which way the stain goes. Gravity will pull it down. Handy little tip. Mitch thinks it would be easier and less disgusting just to see which way the spit in your mouth goes.

I recommend this book. I gave the kids a lot of "free reading" time so I could have some peace and quiet in order to read it. I sub in there next week too. I can't wait!