ENOUGH SAID

Nurse Giggleswich and Lord Bumhampton are here. Tomorrow they are going on the U.L.C.E.R (Utah Lake Century Epic Ride) bike ride. It's one hundred and eleven miles. Oh my.

Our living room is full of bikes, bike equipment and dogs.

L.B. said, "Oh, you know what we forgot? Under the saddle bike bags."

N.G. said, "No we didn't. I brought them." And then she paused and in a quiet voice she said, "Because I'm a woman."

That just about says it all.

SHOPPING AT COSTCO or A CART FULL OF WOE

The kids were here Monday evening through early Wednesday evening. Barely 48 hours. They went to Costco with Phil. Twice. I did not go. I am the lone voice of reason. This shopping trip is typical. It was in May.

Actually, there is one other voice or reason. She was outnumbered. She wanted soy milk. That was all. Just some soy milk.

"We can go now. Mission accomplished."

"But lookit! Peanut butter."
"And, lookit. Chips!"
"We do not need chips," said the voice of reason.

"But, they are Kettle Chips. I'm pretty sure that means they are special."
Look at the cart. Does it look like the voice of reason is winning?
"Oh, no. What has he found now?"

She speeds ahead. She must stop disaster.
It was too late. Disaster was piled high. Do you see one fruit or vegetable there? Me neither.

And that is how ALL trips to Costco end. You would be better off just walking by the door and throwing twenty dollar bills at them. At least you wouldn't have a bunch of junk...do you see the Oreos? And the chips? Chips of all kinds? Some chips are even masquerading as veggies. Veggie chips. Right.

The score: Costco one hundred and fifty-five. The voice of reason zero.

PS I hate to admit this but I am not actually the voice of reason. The Sun Chips were my purchase and probably other junk food too.

AND THEN THERE WERE NONE

They came to retrieve their dogs. The vacation was fun, they said, but they missed the puppies.

Are we ready to go yet, huh? Huh? Huh?Good-bye dogs. Be good boys.

I'm going to take a little nap on the way home.

This is the hard part, seeing them drive away. And not because of the dogs, either. Well, maybe a little bit because of the dogs, but mostly because of the kids.

And they forgot to take their pineapple. I think they should drive back down and get it.

And go to J-Dawg again.

And Costco--after all twice in two days is hardly enough.

And then they should move here.

I SHOULDN'T BE BLOGGING

I shouldn't be blogging. I'm dead on my feet. I still have manuscripts to read before my Writer's for Young Reader's class tomorrow. Claudia Mills is my teacher and she's fabulous. If you ever "do" Writer's for Young Readers and Claudia is teaching you should be in her class. She is also nice. How can anyone be so nice? Nice and talent sometimes don't go together but she makes it work. And she's a philosophy professor at University of Colorado. So she's smart, talented, nice and funny. She got several people's talent and they are left with only their bodily functions, functioning. Probably.

I follow 42 blogs plus there are several more I check daily that don't have the "follower" feature, but I only read three tonight. I read my daughter's , because she's my daughter and she blogged about me, my daughter-in-laws, because I love her like a daughter and then there is Shan, who's title pulled me right in: The Three Pound Poop. I had to read that one. I looked at all the others with longing but had to save them for tomorrow.

Lord Bumhampton had a friend once who had a similar problem as Shan's little friend. He left an offering in the downstairs toilet. It wouldn't flush. That is the honest truth. It was impressive! It wouldn't flush for many times. He was a good sport about it and later told me, "All my family have the same problem but we solved it. We now take fiber!"

So, if you have a poopage problem, take a little fiber. And if you don't you should probably write something. Or blog. Or be a philosophy professor. Or at least be nice.

And when this week is over I have another Mrs. Bird story to tell you. Stay tuned.

PS I probably shouldn't say the word, "poop" on a blog should I? When I typed it into the "labels" I see I've talked about it before. I really should repent. Probably.

I'M THEIR HERO 'CAUSE I'M THE FINDER OF THE KEYS

A couple of weeks ago Lord Bumhampton and his charming wife, Nurse Giggleswitch were down for the week-end. We had a glorious time--photos of the fire pit to come sometime soon. We went to dinner at Heaps and then, after the fire had burned to coals, AND the neighbor's sprinklers came on and reached twenty feet and sprinkled us, right on the lawn swings--remind me not to sleep out there anytime soon--we came in and they watched TV and I computer'd. Phil had already gone to bed.

Lord B. started to look for his keys. Nowhere. They were nowhere. He needed to look outside but the flashlight was dim. I found new batteries for him, I'm helpful like that. He looked through the car windows--the car was locked. The keys were not inside. He looked on the lawn. Nothing. He looked everywhere and finally said, "Mom, I may need to borrow one of your cars and drive home--2 1/2 hours away--and get the extra keys and drive back."

"That would be fine," I said and since he wouldn't leave until morning I didn't worry about it much. Lord B. and Nurse G. continued to look.

I finally took pity on them and went upstairs to help. "I've come to find your keys," I said.

He didn't say it out loud but I could read his eyes. "Fat chance!" Since the word "fat" is a forbidden word, kind of like the Forbidden Palace in China--that's how obnoxious that "fat" word is--I didn't look at him anymore.

"Have you looked in Nurse Giggleswitches' purse?" I said, looking at the ceiling.

"Yes, many times."

"Have you looked in my purse?"

"Why would we do that?"

I walked over to my purse and pulled out his keys.

"Are these yours?" I asked.

I know he wanted to kill me or at least shake me until all the "forbidden word" body parts jiggled mightily, but he restrained because he's a good boy. I raised him that way.

"Why," he said through clenched teeth, "would MY keys be in YOUR purse?"

"Well, because," I said, widening my eyes in a most innocent way, "I guess I saw them on the clerk and thought, what if Phil locks the keys in the car? I better take mine, just in case. So I picked up your keys, thinking they were mine, but, ha ha, it's funny isn't it, they were really yours."

"Mom," he said, "my keys have a total of two keys on them. What do your keys look like?"

I fished them out of my purse. "They look exactly the same, don't they? Well, except for the extra three keys and the automatic car door opener and the Eiffel Tower. I saved the day for you, didn't I? Now you don't have to drive all the way home and all the way back. Aren't you lucky?" I paused so he could contemplate how lucky he was. "And you're welcome," I said.

He didn't even smile. That boy need to cultivate his sense of humor.

And I don't think he said "thank you," either.

THANK YOU FOR SAVING MY EVER LOVIN' FREEZY LEGS

Nurse Giggleswitch is an amazing woman. She works a full time job and goes to school. Next year she will finish her nurses training--right now she an LPN and is finishing her Bachelor's degree. She taught herself to crochet. Her mom was a crocheter (is that a word?) but she didn't learn from her mom, she learned from words on paper. Who does that? Not me, I'm still downloading the photos of my new camera by pulling out the card, putting it in my old camera and downloading it from there. (I change the subject a lot, don't I?)

Anyway, several weeks ago we went North to the land of the c-c-cold--although it SNOWED here today so maybe we are the land of the cold too. Or maybe it's the last days when you can't tell the seasons by the weather. Let's not talk about that. (Changing the subject again.)

So, we went to see Nurse Giggleswitch and Lord Bumhampton. We had a great time. She gave me this!

A beautiful afghan in my favorite color--red! I love it. It hangs on the rocker and as I go out the door I snatch it, just in case. When driving with Phil you always need more warmth. He rolls down the window or turns on the air conditioner. Has he seen it outside today? Photo's tomorrow, maybe. It snowed. A lot.

Anyway, here it is, keeping my legglets warm as hot buttered toast. I LOVE it. On the trip north that day I covered my legs with pillows! Honestly, I did. "Little Red" worked 95% better all the way home. I even had a nap. (And then I threw up in the middle of the night and was sick a week. Little Red kept me warm during my puny time, too.)

Yesterday, Phil received a present in the mail. Who doesn't like that? When he opened it up this is what he saw: His own personal afghan in BYU colors, yet. And the note that went with it.
Here it is, in it's infancy.And here are her talented hands. And last of all, this is our fine boy, eating breakfast. This has nothing to do with this post but since I changed the subject so often I might as well do it with photos, too. And here is one of the watch doggies, waiting for our arrival.

Thank you, my darling daughter-in-law. I love Little Red.

But most of all I love you.

OUR KIDS WERE HERE FOR A WHOLE TWELVE HOURS

It's Lord Bumhampton's birthday this month. He and Nurse Giggleswich really like the comic, Brian Regan. When ever they are here they sit side by side and watch "You Tube" clips of Regan and laugh at things like his his Dora-the-explorah, routine or the Greeting Cards one. Their laughter makes me laugh and pretty soon we are all scrunched together on the couch, watching and laughing.

I love those times. They are the stuff that makes all the dreary winter days or the hot, sweltering summer days worth the wait until they come again. So when Phil and I saw that Brian Regan was coming to Thanksgiving Point we bought tickets for them as his birthday gift.

Our tickets were for last night.

The weather was perfect. The 65 foot waterfall was turned off. How about that, being able to turn off a 65 foot waterfall?

There were a few interesting characters there. One, a grown man in an orange, crushed velvet cape--I kid you not--full length. One woman wore white short, shorts that were--ahem--kind of see through. She wore nothing underneath. That's more information than you wanted to know, I know. Sorry. It was more than I wanted to see, too. But most of the people were normal, there were a lot of them. We sat behind the sidewalk so we could see the whole parade of interesting people before the show started. I sat in Lord Bumhanpton's chair so Nurse Giggleswitch could coach me on Sudoku.
She does the puzzles in pen. I have to erase because I kept saying, "Oh, no. I have two three's." I said that a lot. I also said, "Oh, no. I have two fours."

She is the champion. She is focused.

I am not. I have unfocusness syndrome. I'm pretty sure of it. Maybe you too have a problem but couldn't quite put your finger on what it is. Now you can give it a name: Unfocusness. I'm happy to help you out with this diagnosis for absolutely no charge.
While Nurse Giggleswich taught me the finer points of Sudoku Lord Bumhampton and Phil discussed world events. Actually I don't know what they discussed. It could have been snacks for all I know.

Here are our kids, being focused on the pre-show.

Which seems a million miles away but the sound was fantastic and we didn't mind. Being on the fringes also gave us the opportunity to make a quick getaway after the show was over. But we got off track, following a bunch of people who also made a quick getaway and we had to walk through a hedge, but don't tell anyone, okay? We might be arrested for hedge violation.

Here I am suffering from bad hair and Phil is suffering from short-chair syndrome.

The show was very funny and sitting outdoors was wonderful. Brian Regan will have a one hour special on Comedy Central this fall and is making his 20th appearance on David Letterman. One good part, well, apart from his insane funniness, is that his jokes are clean.

After the show we played Sudoku in the car, waiting our turn to get out of the parking lot--that was a 45 minute walk away form the venue. Not really, it just seemed like it.

While we were waiting we were behind a car with two people in love. How could we tell? They used the time wisely, kissing. The show was almost as good as Brian Regan's. We all remembered those days and then we sighed and went back to our Sudoku puzzles. I said, "Oh, no. I have two fives."

We got home late and everyone ended up in the kitchen looking for snacks and then off to bed but not for very long, for the kids. They had to get up at 3:00 so Nurse Giggleswich could drop Lord Bumhampton at the airport for an early flight. They were here almost exactly twelve hours. I wanted to wake up when they left so I could yell goodbye and throw kisses from the window but, alas, I slept through their departure. I'm blaming it on my unfocusness--sleeping when I should have been letting the kids know I already missed them.

CAFE RIO SALAD-TYPE-TACOS THAT YOU SHOULDN'T EAT THIS LATE!

It's 11:40 and we finished dinner about a half hour ago. Lord Bumhampton and Nurse Giggleswich were in Salt Lake City all day, planning the funeral for her father, and didn't get home until late.

Such a sad time, she is handling it well. Thank you to all who sent your sympathies to her in my comments section and in emails to me. She appreciates it so much.

I made chicken for Cafe Rio salads--the chicken recipe I kept finding on the Internet. But, Her Excellency of Mousehole got involved in the tasting and decided it needed her expert spice-shaking-touch and by the time she was finished it was outrageously delicious. Her cooking skills have passed my own--as you might guess, she is hanging over my shoulder, telling me what to type. Now she sighed and called me an idiot and then said, "Bless your heart." We understand each other, my last-born-favorite-child. Her words again, but I guess she is my favorite last born child.

I fried some raw tortillas--from Costco--put a bit of chicken on top--so much for a vegan meal today--I wonder if it would work with tofu?--added some S&W Caribbean Beans, rice, chopped romaine, Cafe Rio Salad dressing, and Red Hot pepper sauce on it, rolled it into a taco shape and ate it. Three times. It was fantastic! Now I am one and a half tacos too full. I must figure out what our combined efforts for the chicken were so I can post it on my cookbook blog. I forgot to take a picture to post with it. So much for late dinners and starving participants, gobbling everything down with no chance for a photo.

Don't eat this late. You'll be miserable, like me who is too full by one and a half tacos. But if you do eat this late be sure it is something worth the misery.