Coffee and Cake

Headed next door for coffee and cake... well, rather cocoa and GF muffins. We're substituting it for walking today. Butts bigger instead of cardio? General consensus is that it's worth it.

No photo--butt too big to fit.

Update

Have I not surfaced since the 11th? Where have I been and what have I been doing? YIKES!Kids, outdoors and primitive dying methods. Smash the leaf and make colors.
CaDee and her purses, anything with a handle, buckets, etc.
Is this leaf big enough for you Grandma?
We love Silver Dollar City. Driving through Arkansas made everyone wish to barf, and the bouncing frogs finished the job.
CaDee, my soul niece loves my green smoothie!

Here are the sister picts. from her visit. Would that I had family here every day, and since there are enough of them to accomplish that, where are you when I need you????

Makin' Bacon

If you love bacon, you will love this. Hee, hee.

thanks to Melisa,

http://www.flickr.com/photos/fncll/2129889439/sizes/o/

Cut Off II

Cut Off II

(no picture available-obvious reasons... but I'll try to sneak up on him...)

Tonight I trimmed the husband’s hair. He’s presenting a project tomorrow, to the bigwigs at the business meeting and he wants to look tiptop, hair to heel.

I shave his neck after he grooms his own cut, usually a ¾ inch over the whole head using a razor fitted with a handy-dandy little gadget that measures the length of the hair from tip to the scalp. It’s quick and easy and maintains his hair in contemporary business style. (Compare this to the time and expense of hair cuts required of his female counterparts, but that is another tirade entirely.)

Anyway, he hands me the razor and I step toward him. I spy a little wayward swath running up the rear that has escaped his diligent cropping and I reach forward and run the razor up the back just as he dodges forward and yelps!

Oops.

A bare spot, about an inch square appears right in the center of the back of his head and I realize the handy-dandy little measuring gadget is missing off the end. Shock sets in, but not before my mind races with total realization. I see all, a total and complete view of the ramifications. I’m picturing his PowerPoint presentation, made with his body flat against the opposite wall, him making no natural head movement. I envision his desk at work turned around facing the door, him sidling along the wall to reach the boys room, and then, that’s it. Shock and total shutdown.

It thrusts me into a state of paroxysm, which then advances to a total state of hysteria. At one point I am laughing so hard, the knees are knocking, the bladder is bellowing, and I can no longer stand, I’m sitting on the floor convulsing.

When this happens, it can easily be misinterpreted as a serious lack of compassion and disregard for one’s actions. I’m going to be weeks making up for this one--probably about as long as it takes for the hair to grow back in.

Meanwhile, how am I going to explain the snicker that escapes, whenever I walk behind him? Whee, T

Excerpt from Book One: A Bite of Reality

...the cut-off

from book two: Arms and Legs In and Have a Nice Ride

To: astutiecutie@win.out

The latest psycho-survey says that adults laugh as a response to fear… fear that a situation may happen to them. This book should be hilarious! And so it begins, T.

As a child, I remember Mom’s warnings. “It’s half-past,” she trilled as she flew past me like a busy quail, on her morning quest to roust the brood. I could tell from her tone that this fact was critical, but it never really dawned on me how any hour could be half-past, so I dallied on and wondered what was so frantic.

But, now I know! If I have my math right, this is the year when the half life begins on my own personal toxic waist! I’ve peaked; I’m over the hill, and sliding down the slag pile. Suddenly, Mom’s vision of urgency is starkly clear! It’s half-passed!

To: thatsritch@take.out

So, does this new haircut make my rear look big? I could attach my photo and email it to you, my best friends who would tell me honestly, but the whole photo thing takes too much time and it probably wouldn’t work anyway. Just take my word for it, my bottom is bigger in the hour since I got this new flippy haircut and it’s out of control!

Gotta go, Me, T.

It was to be expected—this ever-looming crisis. (That’s why women never tell their age, for fear their bodies will overhear.) The first indication was when I started walking two miles a day and gained five pounds. How does that happen? Muscle may weigh more than fat, but the bottom line is dresses don't lie and the bottom doesn't fit in the dress.

To: thatsritch@take.out

I'm off sugar, watching the fat, avoiding pop and increasing my fiber by eating more popcorn. I'm awake at five-thirty with every muscle and joint aching, but this time I can blame it on exercise— stretching and dashing around the block in a frantic attempt to stave off the inevitable decline of everything. It's getting harder and harder to feel good about myself, and this dang haircut didn't help. Again soon, T.

Until now, birthdays that end in nine have never been a problem for me, in part because I skip them entirely and move on to the next decade. No one ever really believes you’re twenty-nine, thirty-nine or forty-nine anyway, so my age is the next round number for the next two years and it has worked out well.

To: thatsritch@take.out

It has to be the hair. More on the ‘do,’ it's a short cut that all the actresses named Jennifer have, you know, flippy at the bottom. The rest of the real world has it too. I know ‘cause I just drove home with thirty other Jennifers.

On me it’s more a 1950's apron, circle-skirt, high-heeled father–knows-best look! I’m waiting for someone to tell me I look like June Cleaver. Back then, women looked like they had such tiny waists because of their big hair! Whew, T.

But I’ve never been this old before! It’s more than just the body, or the hair. I’m more than halfway through and I’m not halfway through—finished I mean! The mid-life trauma of being little behind is much more than no longer having a little behind—it’s much bigger!

The life list is long and I must get started. I’m finding myself adding line items to the list just so that I can mark them off, to appear to me that I have completed something in my back-forty!

What am I thinking? I need to get a firmer grasp on what is really important. I don’t have time for this now! It’s early; I still have half my life. I’ll deal with this next decade.

Reality Bite: So, then…it's not my butt! It is the hair. Or it could be the distortion of my reflection on the foil liner of the popcorn bag.

Surgery Success

Surgically, Ian went under beautifully--well manfully at least. He was a lovely patient and entertaining when he came out of recovery. He talked and talked, but the nurse said she was disappointed that he didn't sing. Many of her patients sing.

The bone is pinned in two places and he's recast for a month--then maybe rehab. Yes, it is his left and he is left handed... but I'm sure he will write as well with his right as he can with his left.