Make me over. PLEASE!

Do you ever watch Lifetime? You know, the cable TV channel? I don't usually spend much time watching TV unless it is something I've recorded so I don't have to sit through commercials. The other day I was watching a movie I'd DVR'd and had to pause my fast-forward to answer the phone. When I was ready to get back to my movie, I was intrigued by the commercial it had stopped on. Seems that if you go to Lifetime's website you can make yourself over with their Total Beauty Makeover tool. You can either play with their models or, fun of all funs, upload your own photo and futz around with yourself! It is so much fun to play with that I got sucked in for almost 3 hours. New hair, new makeup, new me! Well, old me with new do.



For quite a while now I've been toying with the idea of coloring my hair. FOR THE FIRST TIME IN MY LIFE! Believe it or not, the most I've ever done is add some highlights from time to time. Right now, it is totally natural -- gray and all. My naturally blond hair was a very solid YES answer to a prayer I sent up when I was a teenager. After watching so many of my blond friends' hair turn brown mousy or dishwater dirty I asked God to please let me have my Auntie's hair.

Like me, Auntie had blond hair all her life. As she got older, instead of going all dark, it stayed that beautiful childhood blond only changing with the growth of lovely silver highlights, slowly morphing into a beautiful, classic silver-white. My hair is doing the same thing. How do I know that it's a gift from God and not just genetics? I'm adopted, remember? So there's no blood connection to carry the trait. There's only a God connection to prove that even the smallest things are possible if we just ask. (Sorry, didn't mean to get all preachy, but this is one of those things that I feel pretty sure about and love for people to know so they can try it in their own lives. It is soooo cool when you realize that you just got blessed in a very tangible way. OK, back to the hair thing.)



So now you may be wondering why, if I have loved my hair all my life, am I thinking about changing the color. The simple answer is... I don't know. I just think it'd be fun to look a little different for a while. Not to mention that within the last two weeks I've had two people on different ends of the age spectrum comment on my lovely gray hair. IT'S NOT GRAY! IT'S BLOND WITH BEAUTIFUL SILVER HIGHLIGHTS. Of course, in my mind I'm still a 130 lb. hot model with smooth skin and an upper lip. Obviously my self image needs a makeover, too!



So here's the deal. I'm dropping in four photos. The first one is of me in October of this year, so it really is what I look like (dang it). I am so fair complected that I think I look all washed out and even older than my 52 years. The other three are the makeover shots. I want you to vote on which hair color you like best. With your help, at the end of the month I will decide how I want to start the new year. Leave me a comment and I'll tally them up in a post during the first week in January.



OK - Here goes ... (Note - the hideous eyeliner and fake lashes thing is NOT me! It was added by the program. I couldn't figure out how to get rid of it without screwing up the rest of the stuff!)

1. Just plain old me.

2. Strawberry Blond

3. Auburn Brown

4. Dark Brown

OK - now go vote. And send your friends over to vote, too. Believe me, I need all the input I can get.

(Edited to fix the size of those pictures! Much better! In the process, though, I noticed that the program removed my double chin! YAY! Why can't ALL photo editing programs do that. They have a button for red eye, why not add one for peach pudge?)

Peace, Blessings, and Lady Clairol calling!

Port-O-Potty Fishing

Heather's Great Port-a-Potty Adventure reminded me of something I hadn't thought of in years.

Twig was about 3 when Bug was playing T-ball. The local field had a plumbing problem that year and brought in P-O-Ps to... ummm.. relieve the problem. Half way through Bug's game, Twig HAAAAAAD to go NOOOOWWWW!!!! The smell hit us before we ever opened the door. I tried to talk him into just going behind the bushes, but NOOO.

Once inside I realized that the quarters were way too tight for me to be able to help him get his pants off and back on. The only easy way was to leave the door open. Twig, however, even at the tender age of 3, was a modest little guy and would have no part of pulling his pants down in front of the whole world. After a couple minutes of him screaming, "Noooo Mooommyyy!! Cwose it! Cwose it!" I gave up and squeezed in beside him.

We had just managed to get his britches off when he realized that this was no ordinary potty. When he saw the bottomless pit over which he was expected to dangle his exposed derriere he began grabbing at me like some wild baboon trying to keep from falling out of a tree. He was sure he was about to fall in and never get out again. It was about then that I heard the keys hit the hard plastic surface. All I had time for was a quick shriek before they slid over the edge and vanished into the murky depths of port-o-potty hell, taking my stomach with them. Hubby was out of town and that keyring held the only set of keys I had to both the house and the truck.
I immediately grabbed Twig, forgetting that his pants were still down around his ankles, and hightailed it, with a screaming child tucked under my arm, for the concession stand. The whole way there I kept praying that there was something I could use to fish out the keys. All they had was a wire coat hanger that, as it turned out, wasn't long enough to reach the bottom of the muck. One of the dads came up with a ball of twine out of his tool box. And thus was invented a new Saturday-evening-at-the-ball park event: Port-o-Potty fishing.

For the next 2 or so hours every man within a 1/2 mile radius had to try his hand at port-o-potty fishing. Each just knew that if you hooked your wrist this way, or held your mouth that way, or dragged the string the other way, that he could land his prey. We never did get the keys back, and you do NOT want to know what all else was hooked!

I'd love to be around a thousand years from now when some archaeologist happens on that particular ... er... dump sight and finds a set of keys to a 1985 Ford F150 embedded in the remains. I wonder what weird conclusions they'll draw about the eating habits of the human inhabitants of that region. If you don't think that's ever gonna happen, go check out this article. It may just make you take a little bit closer look at the funny looking rock you pull out of the ground the next time you are out gardening.

And, not to worry you or anything, but beware the next time you enter a portable public facility. You may get this surprise on the way out:




Love, Blessings and Port-o-Peace to you all.

THE OLD LADY WEARING MY CLOTHES

I hate shopping. So much so that when my mother died in 1984, my aunt was actually worried about my boys having proper clothes to wear. She would even to call me and remind me to make sure their stuff still fit right and wasn’t wearing out. (Thank God she did because without her badgering me there’s no telling what they’d have gone to school wearing.) I still dislike shopping in general, but shopping for myself? Pure misery. Especially if it requires entering a mall.

This aversion to all things Mall has made me the window shopping queen of Texas. The only way I typically buy anything for myself is if I see it in the window and they have my size on a rack close enough to the door that I don’t have go on a scavenger hunt to find it. My penchant for buying the displayed outfits has led me to the very unscientific conclusion that I’m not alone in my totally non-traditional-female-person world because occasionally I run into someone else wearing the same outfit. It doesn’t happen often, but it does occur frequently enough for me to be comforted by the recognition of kindred spirits. Ever since I realized this, whenever I see a woman sporting the same outfit I’m wearing (or any part thereof), I endeavor to make a point of trying to catch the woman’s attention and grin like an idiot when she realizes that we have on the same clothes. It’s a fun game for me because I think most women act ridiculously stupid when faced with another woman wearing the same thing. So the ornery little sadist in me takes great pleasure in seeing if she’s going to grin or grimace. Yes, I know that I am WAY too easily amused!

Shortly before The Dream came to a crashing end, I was lucky enough to happen on an outfit that I really liked. Since it was in a strip center, thus requiring no mall anxiety, I took the opportunity, to actually go in and try on the outfit before purchasing it. (My other shopping-related aversion is to clothing store dressing rooms. I have nightmares about having one porcine appendage stuck in a pair of pants when a fire alarm goes off requiring me to either waddle out nearly naked or risk dying a slow, burning death while I try in vain to either get the one leg out of, or the other leg into, pants that are almost inevitably the wrong size. This has led to me having donated a massive number of brand new, price-tag still attached, clothing items because they hung in my closet or languished in the trunk of the car in the shopping bag awaiting my next trip to the mall for so long that the act of returning the item became, in and of itself, simply too humiliating. Sorry – that wasn’t where this story was supposed to go. So anyway...) I was pleasantly surprised to find that the first permutation of size combinations fit. (Remember, I haven’t easily seen my feet since I was about 13 so I always have to buy coordinated outfits. Suits with the same size tops and bottoms will NOT work.) I loved the way it camouflaged some of the more unsavory aspects of my physique so, of course, I bought it. In 2 different colors. YAY!

Until our blissfully normal shopping spree last week, I haven’t had much occasion to dress up to leave the house. I was thrilled to get to wear my new duds on our outing. We’d had a lunch and were laughing as we headed into the store. The last thing I expected to see as I was walking up to the doors was a woman wearing the same outfit already inside. “What fun!” giggled my inner sadist.

Once inside My Girl headed one direction and I took off in the direction it looked like the lady was going. She must have been in a real hurry because the next time I caught sight of her was at the dressing rooms. As we were walking in for MG to try on some shorts, I caught quick glimpse of her heading into another stall. I didn’t want to bother her while she was trying on clothes (I know I always hate having strangers try to talk to me while I’m half naked!) so I just stood there outside of MG’s stall waiting for either one of them to emerge. MG took forever because she had several things to try on, but none of it worked. She had pretty much scoured the racks the first time, so we decided to leave that store because there was nothing else that MG was interested in looking at. I was sad that I hadn’t been able to talk to the lady with my clothes on, though. When I saw her that second time I noticed that she was really too “shapely” to be wearing that type of outfit. It really wasn’t very flattering on her at all. I was hoping to be able to do my mothering thing and gently suggest that maybe she should think about finding clothing more befitting her age. But that lady must have had a load of stuff to try on because she never did show back up before we headed on to the next store.

We all know that great minds think alike, right? Well, that lady and I were seriously on the same wavelength because a little while after entering the second store I spotted her again. This time she was across the aisle looking at the jewelry. I only needed to see the side of her head and part of one shoulder out of the corner of my eye to instantly know it was definitely her because I recognized that hair. I made a mental note to also mention that she might like to try my wonderful $14 stylist if I ever caught up with her. Sadly, MG called me to come look at something, and by the time I looked back up she’d disappeared.

A little later, while MG was looking at shoes, I spotted the poor old dear again. She was over by the hats and handbags looking right at me. Seeing her pale, wrinkled face confirmed what I’d originally thought about her being much too old and out of shape to be wearing the layered tank top look. Now I also knew that I should recommend my wonderful Merle Norman dealer’s makeup makeovers. However, by the time I got across the aisle and around the mirror she was standing behind she was GONE AGAIN!

For the rest of the day I caught sporadic glimpses of her. Once I saw her reflection in a plate glass window as she stood behind me staring at my back. Another time, I caught her peeking around a corner through the glass door of the shop I was entering. The last time I saw her was in a furniture store looking at bedroom suits. I caught a peek of her reflection in the mirror on the dresser. By then, though, we were leaving and I had given up hope of having any kind of meaningful conversation with her. I’d concluded that she was, after all, a grown-up, and if she could remain in denial about her looks after spending so much of the day seeing herself in mirrors, nothing I could say would have helped.

So, the next time you bow your head in prayer, please send one up for that, out of shape, wrinkled and pasty faced, new-hairdo-needin’ old fat woman wearing my clothes. I KNOW she will appreciate all the help I she can get.

Wishing you Peace, Blessings and appropriate purchases for all the days you live to shop.

These tools are NOT for sharing!

My bloggy friend, Angela, posted a really good reason to password-protect your phone. After I quit laughing at the fact that she's now looking for a good therapist for one of her kids, I knew I had to tell about one particularly... mmmm... interesting Damama's World experience.

Over the years, Hubby and I have been open to monkeying around with (within limits) some different "things" in the intimacy department. I use the word "things" because the exploration has been definitely limited to the employment of a few different... mmmm... tools of a very shaky nature, and some very ... uummmm... interesting videos. Now, why it embarrasses me to tell you guys this, especially after what happened years ago, is baffling to me. Nonetheless, I find myself blushing over here! OK, moving on...

When Bug was a teenager he was looking for something in our nightstand and -- you guessed it -- found one of our toys. We'd been.. mmm.. playing a couple of nights before and had gone to sleep without putting it up in its proper, safe place. Hubby had been awake enough, though, to think about the possibility of one of the boys coming in before we woke up, and so had stuck it in a drawer. You know that old saying - Out of sight, out of mind. And so it was forgotten. Until Bug needed something that he thought he remembered seeing. In the nightstand. (Note; If you are wondering how I know when he saw it, it had to be this time because this was the only time we EVER failed to put it back! When we remembered it was there we laughed and congratulated each other on getting away with it! HA!)

Now I must tell you that Bug is an EXTREMELY intelligent guy. He was talking in full sentences by the time he was 18 months old. He was reading by the time he was 3. He started kindergarten at a 6th grade reading level. Being so intelligent, he knew enough to know right away he'd seen something he shouldn't have. So, unbeknownst to me, he just closed the drawer and moved on, storing the information in his cunning little brain for potential later use.

Fast-forward to 1999.

While working on a huge project for a large client, I found myself in need of someone who could not only think outside the box, but also worked cheap. 20-year-old Bug had done some work for me at clients' offices before, so as an employer I knew he was good at problem solving. As his mother I knew he needed a job. And as his chief financial aid officer I figured hiring him would actually end up saving me money in the long run. I was so proud of myself for coming up with such a win-win-win scenario that I forgot to remember that wicked, off-the-wall sense of humor that makes him so loveable.

Our team consisted of me, my wonderful right arm assistant DeeAnn, my quality control guru Bug, and 10 other very dedicated employees of the facility whose departments had volunteered them to become part of the group. The work was tedious, repetitive, and challenging all at the same time. We spent hours reviewing accounts for errors trying to tie mistakes that were being encountered together so the IT department could come up with solutions. With 13 people housed in a 12 x 16 room, tempers flared fairly regularly. But by and large you could not have asked for a better group of individuals to work with.

On one particularly difficult day in which people were complaining about their lack of personal space (primarily due to the fact that somebody had eaten Mexican food for lunch and you know the end result of bean consumpation!), a discussion broke out about most embarrassing moments. We all laughed as people talked about having ripped their pants, or spilled something on someone else, or having made a fool of themselves at various times. Then somebody mentioned how horrified she was to have walked in on her parents in the act. She said she never told anybody about it until just then. And that, my friends, is when Bug decided it was time to share his own little secret.

There, in a room, in front of 11 people who were supposed to look up to me as their project leader, my son grinned and said, "That's almost as good at the time I found the dildo in Mom's nightstand when I was a teenager." The room dropped into dead silence as everyone stopped, stared, and waited for me to react, and then errupted in loud raucous laughter when I said, "Well, you shouldn't have been snooping around in my drawers." And since I was not about to let him have the last word, I couldn't resist adding, "And which one did you find, anyway?"

At least I was nice enough not to tell them about his delight at having discovered his penis when he was only 2 years old. After all, a mom has to save some ammo for emergencies, right?!?

The moral of the story is:

If you are going to monkey around,

be sure to re-hide your bananas when you are done!

BUGGY CHEESECAKE

I was tired. It had been a long week that involved leaving home at 5:00 each morning to drive 65 miles from our rural home to my client’s training facility where I was being paid to shove the all new and all powerful Microsoft Office Suite into the brains of people who didn’t want to learn this particular new thing. The company was migrating from WordPerfect and Lotus. The employees, however, did not understand why it was necessary to fix what wasn’t broke. They knew and were proficient in WP and Lotus, and had no desire to change. This final day of beating my head against the brick walls that doubled as their brains had started off worse than usual.

I mentioned the rural home thing. Well, this rural home had a rural driveway consisting of crushed shale and limestone that shifted under foot. I had ruined so many pairs of high heels trying to get from the car to the house and vise-a-versa that I’d given up and started wearing my fuzzy slippers to and from. This morning I’d gotten a late start and didn’t notice until I saw my reflection in the mirrored entry doors on my client’s building that -- you guessed it – I was still wearing said fuzzy slippers!

I went back to the car and discovered that I’D FORGOTTEN MY SHOES ENTIRELY! Thank God there was a brand new, 24-hour Wal-Mart store about a mile away. I sped over, ran in, grabbed the first pair of cheap black, passably professional shoes I could find and dashed back to the facility just in time to greet the first students at the door. THOSE WERE ABSOLUTELY THE MOST UNCOMFORTABLE SHOES I’VE EVER BEEN FORCED TO WEAR IN MY LIFE! Around 3:00 p.m. I gave up and told the ladies that I really didn’t care if it was unprofessional or not, I was going barefoot. However, I’d waited too long and already had blisters the size of the polar ice caps sprouting all over my feet.

So there I was, in pain literally from top to bottom. Because of having to endure the daily 130 mile round trip drives, plus the stress of pushing and prodding the unyielding masses, plus the facility’s rigid break scheduling rules that prohibited untimely recesses, in addition to the blisters, I was also nursing a mammoth migraine and a Colorado River sized log-jam of constipation. (I know – that’s a visual you could have done without, right!) The only saving grace of the whole week was the eager anticipation of having dinner that night with one of my best friends – none other than my very own wonderful Bug.

He got to Carrabba’s early and had a table waiting. I’d stopped at the drugstore for some stuff, as my granny would have said, to fix all what ailed me, so I was about 20 minutes behind him. He knew something was wrong when he saw me weave toward him and then just sort of slither down into the booth, but I assured him that I’d be fine if I could just get something to drink and down some pain pills to dull the headache. I dug around in the bag and pulled out a box from which I extracted the much needed analgesic. When I glanced up at Bug, he had the strangest look on his face. I didn’t care, though. I was too focused on getting the wrapper off to give a rip what he was thinking at that moment. I just kept wrangling with the blasted thing thinking when did they start putting foil wrappers on Tylenol and why were the capsules so large?? I looked Bug again and could tell he was obviously dying to tell me something, but I had more pressing business at hand, so he’d just have to wait a minute. I finally got one unwrapped and only when I felt the greasy, slick, bullet in my hand did I realize it was a suppository!!! I’d almost downed a cotton pickin’ suppository!!

GOD HELP BUG! I thought he was going to fall off his chair laughing. And apparently I wasn’t the only one who was worried about him falling over, because the ladies at the table next to us were openly gawking at his antics. So he felt the overwhelming need to explain to them why he was laughing so hard. Then I had to worry that THEY were going to fall out of THEIR chairs laughing! Before it was over with they’d told everybody within a 4 table radius plus the waiter who proceeded to have to go tell the manager who knew me because we ate there so often! After regaining his composure, the waiter decided that it’d be a good idea to rush our order a little so I could get home to bed. That, alone, got him a huge tip that night!

I think I remember reading somewhere that is very unhealthy to consume rich, heavy, Italian food without including dessert. (Something about balanced nutrition???) So any time Bug and I go out to dinner we share some sinfully rich and decadent delight to complete our meal. And with the week I’d just had there was NO WAY I was leaving there without my sweet treat. We quickly decided on cheesecake. With both strawberry and chocolate sauce on the side. We’d almost finished the whole thing when Bug sweetly offered me the last bite. I thanked him kindly as I reached my fork over to get it. But I was so tired that I actually missed the food and drew back an empty fork.

Bug looked very concerned and asked, “Mom, are you sure you’ll be OK to drive home?”

“I’m sure,” I lied and motioned to the waiter to come refill my coffee thinking that if I could just get enough caffeine in on top of the Tylenol I’d be quite OK. Then I once again reached for the piece of cheesecake taunting me from the plate – AND MISSED AGAIN! I thought, DANG! Maybe I shouldn’t try to drive that last 30 miles home.

I shook my head to clear my vision, and when I missed a third time I actually picked up the fork and looked at the end of it to make sure that it wasn’t bent or something. I was beginning to feel like I’d stepped into the Twilight Zone! Thank goodness Bug had kept up an endless stream of chatter during the whole ordeal, so I was pretty sure that he had been engrossed enough in conversation that he hadn’t noticed my last two failed attempts.

Being one to never refuse a challenge, I was determined that I was going to have that last blasted bite of cheesecake if it took all night long! As I made the fourth stab at it I caught just the tiniest glimpse of a hand as Bug rotated the plate ever so slightly just before my fork made contact. And even then, it didn’t really register why I couldn’t get that dang cheesecake onto my fork! As I sat there looking puzzled, suddenly he could no longer contain himself and burst out laughing again so that our whole half of the room was craning their necks to see what the ruckus was. Only THEN did it finally dawn on me that he’d gotten me but good.

Now, every time he wants to remind me that he can get me whenever he wants to, he simply acts like he's turning a plate and grins like a cocky billy goat.

And the moral of the story? No matter how cute he is, never ever share your cheesecake with a Bug!!

Peace, Blessings, and un-wrapped analgesics all 'round!

Booze, Beans and Boys - NOT a good combo!

While I was eating a PB&J for lunch today I flipped on Maury Povich . He’s always good for two things: 1. Comic relief; 2. Affirmation that my life is not NEARLY as bad as it sometimes seems. Today, though, he came in handy for a third thing – jogging my memory about the events of my first wedding.

R. and I met while we were both working at a steel fabrication company. We first became good friends, and then started dating. The crowd that he ran with had been together for years and so they were a very tight bunch. When we decided to get married it was only natural that we would ask the father of his best friend to perform the ceremony.

Reverend W was an ordained Methodist minister. We were getting married in a Baptist church. Why then, you might wonder, were we not being married by the pastor of that church? Well, I’m glad you asked. R. really did want Reverend W to marry us from the get-go, but I wanted to get married at my church home. However, after the pastor of the church I’d attended for most of my life told me that he wouldn’t bless the union unless I put my whole life on hold, found my biological mother (yes, I’m adopted – REALLY cool story for another time), and PERSONALLY told her that I forgave her for abandoning me, I was so ticked off that I decided to get a little payback by having a Methodist minister, robes and all, perform the ceremony in his very staunch Southern Baptist church. Minister Holier-Than-All was horribly offended, as I’d hoped he would be (this wasn't the first disagreement he and I'd had), and insisted on being present anyway, so we had two ministers at our wedding. But even two ordained ministers cannot trump Murphy when he decides to impose his law on any given situation.

Now, as I said, R and his buds were a tight bunch. They had a long standing tradition of taking the groom out the night before the wedding and getting him plastered. Knowing this, and knowing that R could handle his liquor quite well, but failed miserably at dealing with the ensuing hangover the next day, I threatened them with their very lives – or worse – if they got him drunk. I should have stipulated that NONE of them were to get snockered, but in my youth I was not nearly as detail oriented and controlling as I became later on. Come to think of it, the events that unfolded here may well have been the birthing ground for my later tendency toward extreme control freakishness. Anyway – moving on…

Having managed to get all the way down the aisle on my dad’s arm without having him 1) stagger so bad that he knocked me down, or 2) escalate our argument into a full-blown fist fight (yes, another long story for another time), I stood relieved and anxious, holding R’s hand. Reverend W, being not only R’s second dad, but also a very verbose orator, felt the need to give us some really great marital guidelines during the ceremony. During the rehearsal the night before he’d warned us that what he had to say was long, but important. We both loved and respected him and were honored by his concern that our union begin on solid biblical grounds, so we were willing to endure… tolerate… accept… wait patiently for him to conclude his pronouncements. Five-year-old ring bearing boys, however, are more easily distracted.

I stated earlier that I should have broadened my booze ban, and that fact became clearer by the minute as the best man, R’s very best friend in the world, began to sway noticeably during his father’s speech. He had apparently taken it upon himself to consume R’s portion of the liquid refreshments the night before. At a Mexican food restaurant. So, now, not only was he seriously hung over, he had a case of gas that would have made a whole family of skunks envious! The smell was almost palpable. I was afraid to glance sideways at him for fear that there might actually be a green cloud hanging around his back side! Of course, the ring bearer had to keep making faces and gagging noises – that’s what 5-year-old boys do at times like that! We were all trying to ignore both him and the malodorous emanations. It was difficult, but we were managing.

When the time came for the blessing of the rings, Reverend W extended the bible toward the Green Gasser. As he reached to place the rings on the bible, leaning forward ever so slightly, concentrating solely on delivering the rings without dropping them, he apparently forgot to control his rear muscles… AND HE RIPPED ONE! In the middle of my wedding, he let go a long, loud, almost juicy sounding gas explosion that I figure could be heard roughly 10 rows back. Someone in the first row – probably my mother— started giggling. R and I tried almost successfully to stifle ourselves. And poor Reverend W, for the first time in his career, almost dropped the rings off the bible when the ring bearer, having maxed out his ability to contain himself, turned and shouted to his mother who was sitting several rows back, “MAMA, HE FARTED AND DIDN’T SAY EXCUSE ME!”

The moral of this story, as the title states: Booze, beans, and boys are not a good combo – no matter how old the boys may be!