Taking a Stand

Written in response to The Daily Post’s Daily Prompt: Not Lemonade. When life hands you lemons…make something else. Tell us about a time you used an object or resolved an issue in an unorthodox way.

Weekly travel was once the norm for me as a consultant for a non-profit educational foundation. One week I’d be in Devil’s Lake, North Dakota, and the next week I’d be in Detroit, Michigan, or Albuquerque, New Mexico, or some point in between. As a result of all this travel, I’ve stayed in more than my share of hotels. Some have been luxurious. Others have been dumps.

  
 

Detroit
 
One thing they all have in common, besides the requisite bed, is a notable lack of a plunger for the toilet. On more than one occasion I’ve managed to clog a hotel bathroom toilet. Blame it on faulty plumbing setups or questionable Mexican food, but a clogged hotel john is a lemon of the worst kind. 

Typically the clog occurs in the middle of the night, and even if one could face the embarrassment of calling the front desk for assistance, seldom would anyone answer the call. I don’t know what the main desk clerks do at night, but fixing toilets apparently isn’t a priority.

I quickly learned that I had to be my own best plumber. (If you’re squeamish, just stop reading now and imagine fuzzy bunnies and pink flowers.) the first time I was faced with the clogged toilet predicament my initial instinct was to use a pair of my own underwear to cover my hand for a foray into the bowl. But that was an indescribably icky thought, and I don’t buy cheap undies.

Casting around for anything to keep my hand dry I spotted the small trash bin with the ubiquitous clear plastic liner. Channeling my inner Archimedes, I shouted, “Eureka!” while inserting my right hand into the liner and then quickly into the bowels of the bowl. 

My idea went swimmingly! The clog came free. A flush took all of the waste away, and no one but yours truly knew there’d ever been an issue. Well, I did have to swish the liner around in the clean toilet to remove any evidence of my activity, but that was a minor task in the scheme of things. After one’s arm has been in poop up to one’s elbow, everything else is, well, lemonade.

  
Peace, people!

Accessories Make the Outfit

I’m not gonna lie. I looked really cute Saturday afternoon. I was dressed in black leggings and a gorgeous red tunic my daughter sent me. I paired them with my tall black Frye boots and a black and white scarf. I was turning heads, baby. Strutting my stuff.

To celebrate my beauty, Studly Doright took me to see a matinee showing of The Revenant. I settled into my reclining seat with a 24 oz. Sam Adams Cold Snap and a smuggled-in box of Jelly Belly jelly beans. Life was good.

About fifteen minutes into the movie, after the deadly surprise attack on Leonardo DiCaprio’s camp, but before a protective mama bear basically makes him her afternoon snack, I reached up to adjust my stylish scarf. Something was poking me.

This is what my fingers came away with:

  
Little pieces of brown paper excelsior. 

I admit I was puzzled. I couldn’t recall having played in a pile of excelsior that morning. My pre-movie meal hadn’t had any paper in it. Faced with a mystery I put the evidence in my purse and pondered on it throughout the entire grisly movie. 

DiCaprio sliced open and climbed inside of a horse to keep from freezing to death; I thought about excelsior. He chopped off a guy’s fingers, I thought about excelsior. It really made the movie palatable, that brown, scratchy paper I’d pulled from within the voluminous folds of my scarf.

As soon as the film was over I showed the pieces of paper to Studly.

“What do you make of this?” I demanded. 

“Hell, I just thought you were moulting,” he said.

No wonder I was turning heads. With any luck I started a new fashion trend. 

Peace, people.

  

Bucket List

In response to the Daily Post’s Daily Prompt

Kick it: What’s the 11th Item on your bucket list?

There’s a hole in my bucket,
Or so I believe,
The older I get
The bigger the peeve.
I cross one item off,
And up crops another,
You’d think by my age
I’d not even bother.
Yet if I were counting
From top to the bottom,
Item eleven would be
Seeing Paris in Autumn.

Peace, people

Fees Waived Today!

If you live in the Tallahassee area come find your new best friend! Purrs and wagging tails are also free.

  
Remember: Don’t shop. ADOPT! 

Peace, people!

Mr. Tarentino, I’m Ready for my Closeup.

 I was blaming the holidays and a weekend visit with friends from Indiana for my sudden and startling gain of ten pounds. Long gone, it seems, are the days when I could inhale an entire pepperoni pizza and not gain a tenth of a pound. Nowadays if I even look too longingly at a Cinnabon sign I find myself in need of a new pant size.

Then I saw this meme on Facebook:

  
And I knew what a much better story it would make.

(Ring, ring!)

Quentin Tarentino: Talk to me.

Me: Mr. Tarantino?

QT: Yes? 

Me: Hey! This is Leslie. Leslie Noyes? You know the kind of hefty, middle aged female lead for your next film, The Overweight Eight?

QT: I’m sorry. There must be some misunderstanding. We just released a film with a similar title, but….

Me: I was really counting on this role, and I’ve already gained the weight. Are you sure…? I can be at the studio tomorrow. Samuel L. Jackson is going to love me!

QT: Look lady. I’m sure you’re a real groovy chick, but I don’t know you. Never call me again, or I’ll have you arrested. (Click!)

I guess I wasted all that money on my SAG card, too.

Peace, people!

Without You

Daily Prompt: What’s the most time you’ve ever spent apart from your favorite person? Tell us about it.

Studly Doright and I have been married for 39 years, and he’s one of my favorite people. Thanks to eight job transfers, all for his career, we’ve spent quite a bit of time apart. 

Physically the longest period of separation was during our last move. He headed to Tallahassee in July of 2012 while I stayed in Mahomet, Illinois, to sell our home. It was Thanksgiving before we were reunited. He did fly me down for a long weekend, though, to house hunt. As separations go, it wasn’t too awful.

The toughest time we had to deal with was our move from New Salem, North Dakota, to Great Bend, Kansas. Studly left us in November to begin his new job while the kids finished the school semester at New Salem (Home of the Fighting Holsteins), and I readied the house for sale. It sold quickly, and we made arrangements to move, but then both kids and I came down with the flu. 

We finally recovered only to have one raging blizzard after another paralyze our part of the country preventing the moving truck from getting to our home. The crew got through to pack up our belongings, but couldn’t get the big truck up to the house. 

Finally fed up with delays, I packed overnight bags, stuffed the kids and the cat in the car and headed due south, leaving detailed instructions for the movers. I could barely see the road for the snow, and every now and then I’d have to skirt around abandoned vehicles stuck in drifts. I prayed a lot. 

As soon as we crossed into South Dakota the skies cleared and the temperatures warmed. I felt like we’d escaped from a Stephen King novel, The Shining 2.0.

With all my heart I hope we are through with moving and the separation it brings.  I’ve told my family I’ll consider going to an assisted living community some day, as long as Studly comes along.

Peace, people!

A little Harry Nillson for your listening pleasure. Damn, I love this song.

http://youtu.be/_bQGRRolrg0

The Mid-Winter Panic

Really feeling this one today! Read more at eurobrat.wordpress.com.

eurobrat's avatareurobrat

Well, the winter season is here, and it feels like I’m snowed in at a horror movie ski cabin full of lunatics, idiots and psychopaths.  The door is blocked.  There is no way out.

Listen–it’s Trump’s Freedom Kids, singing their patriotic little hymn again.  Over here, USA!  Over there, USA!

Hillary is at the party too.  She is cackling at everyone’s jokes, wondering why nobody finds her likable.

Bernie and Trump are playing a game of I’ll do you one better.  “I’ll make America great again!”  “I’ll make America even better than America!  I’ll make it Sweden!”  “I’m gonna win!” Trump yells.  “I’m gonna win!” Bernie mumbles.

“Neither one of you is going to win!” I want to say, but there’s too much clatter just outside the living room door.  Out there, religious fanatics are beheading and shooting people, and blowing things up.  Great.  We’re going to have to…

View original post 113 more words

Crushed

left alone with
thoughts unwieldy
too intense for
this bright day
crushed beneath
thoughts of envy
will they always
hold this sway?

gathered close for
future’s telling
slowly ticking in
mad men’s hands
stop the clock and
start the living
mark the place
then heave the sand.

prayed, oh please
don’t let this nature,
keep me wrapped in
jealousies
sifting through grayed
grainy photos
begging for my
soul’s surcease.

I Believe in Flint

We should all be angry!

Jan Wilberg's avatarRed's Wrap

Flint

There are plenty of reasons to be angry about Flint. The racism, the arrogance, the incredible damage to people, pick one or all. We look at the trajectory of disregard, how State officials brushed off complaints month after month, and it seems incredible. But it confirms what we all really know – all lives matter but some lives don’t matter all that much.

Flint is a Black town. The U.S. Census Bureau tells us that 57% of the population is African American compared to just 14% of the State of Michigan as a whole.

Flint is a poor town. It wasn’t always a poor town. It used to be a heavy duty working class town where the term living wage meant a pretty decent life. Now. the median household income of $24,834 is almost exactly half of the State’s median income of $48,411. (A median income is that point where half of…

View original post 401 more words

BoRing!

Daily Prompt: What Bores You?

Believe it or not, I’m never bored. Maybe it’s a result of having been chastised as a teenager for ever uttering the “B” word. 

Instead I decided to make a case on how to avoid boredom. I give you–

Exhibit A: Writing blog posts. 

Yes, any time I feel a tinge of ennui sneaking up on me I plop myself down in my favorite writing spot and just begin typing. Usually these posts end up perpetually stuck in my draft folder, but occasionally they see it to publication. 

Exhibit B: Utilize the full potential of my pets. 

Surely they were placed on earth to serve and amuse us. 

 

No actual felines were harmed in the writing of this post.

Exhibit C: Make snarky comments on Facebook. 

It really is too bad that snarkiness doesn’t pay better. Or anything.

   
Exhibit D: Explore Pinterest. 

Honestly, if one can’t find something to pique his/her interest on Pinterest then he/she might not have a pulse, and should be administered CPR ASAP.

  
Exhibit E: Drive! 

Drive to a new shopping center or explore a local tourist spot that you’ve never been to because you’re, well, a local. I still kick myself because the entire time I lived within 100 miles of Springfield, Illinois, I never visited the capitol building.

I believe I’ve made my point. Now, if you’ll excuse me, I’m going to take a nap. 

Peace, people!