what we're all thinking

blogger FAIL!

P.S.  I want my stuff back.

tea anyone?

I wish I could write with dripping satire like this article from Rolling Stone.

Gawd, I love that article.  I think this sentence might be one of the best I've ever read: "Meanwhile, a slick grownup yuppie politician with a GI Joe beard and a breeder wife and eight kids, leeching off the state at every turn and gunning for a U.S. Senate salary and pension on an anti-welfare platform, he’s just a hardworking citizen who simply needed a lift during a “transitional” period."

It's hits EXACTLY how I feel about this whole tea-bag-thing.  Not to mention my in-laws who kinda, sort love themselves some farm subsidies ... all the while trash-talking Democrats and welfare.  Um...dear sweet pot?  I'd like to introduce you to the kettle.

Can I share with you my very favoritest thing about the Tea Bag Party?  Can I?  Can I?  Yeah, well, I don't care if I have your permission or not.  Do you know what "teabagging" is? Tee hee.  (DO NOT Google it at work, folks.)

P.S.  Yeah.  Yeah.  I know they do not call themselve the tea-bag party; but I'm immature like that.

P.P.S.  Just put this up as my Facebook status and it fits here too:  Dear MRS. Palin, To you he is PRESIDENT Obama, not mister.  Show some freaking respect.

i do not understand this

I was bored and so Facebook stalking.  I clicked on the link to one of my cousin's kid's pages and was literally floored by the picture of him.

He is 17.  S E V E N T E E N.  Barely 17.

What the hell?  In what universe is that picture appropriate for a CHILD?

I am not close with my cousin.  Perhaps you can understand why.  (Yes, she is his Facebook friend so presumably knows this is his profile picture.)

Oh, and for a little juxtaposition, here is his favorite quote...also supplied by Facebook:  "Come along, follow me.  I'm going to change the world.  - Jesus"

I'm pretty darn sure Jesus had no intention of changing the world with an automatic weapon.

In case you cannot tell, this is NOT an NRA-house.

breaking news

This just in...

Floral stores nationwide are being invaded by walking zombie Easter eggs.

The Easter Bunny has call in his friend the Passover Parrot to fight off these zombies.

Pictures of the ensuing battle to follow . . .

oh hell

Remember this post? About how Car-man's high-school-girlfriend has stalked kept-up with him for most of 21+ years we have been together?

Well, yesterday, April Fool's day, she announced on Facebook that her husband left her. Car-man said the phrase she used was "dumped her".

And it wasn't an April Fool's joke.

I feel sorry for her. But? Ugh. I'm not looking forward to a return of stalker-girl.

It appears that Younger was correct when she flippantly opined to her father that, "Wow. She must have been a real keeper." The kid is prescient.

I'm really mean, aren't I?

It's a stalker house.

more wrongness

I really will blog about our ski trip when I catch up at work. It's a little crazy here right now.

In the meantime, I couldn't resist snapping this picture on my way into the office this morning. Remember how the Window of Wrongness was displaying a rabbit in their dusty fake ficus tree? Well, the recession has apparently hit the Window of Wrongness. I'm sad to announce that the Easter Bunny has been laid off. But never fear, your children will still get something come Easter morn. Just be forewarned. Apparently the Easter Bunny been replaced with Satan.

Or maybe it's just because it's Lent and Jesus is out there being tempted by the serpent in the desert.

I find snakes a refreshing Easter theme. Don't you?

wrongness.3

Can you guess from whence this photo came?

*shaking head*

It's just so very, very wrong.

window of wrongness.2

In my effort to keep you updated on the tacky flower shop on the first-floor of the building I work in, I bring you the second edition of "The Window of Wrongness." It's the kind of place you walk by and think, "Hmm. That's just w.r.o.n.g.!"

The shop has another new great marketing idea to follow-up on the Valentine Christmas tree. Let's say you want to sell fresh cut flowers in the time of spring . . . in the time where the world is looking forward to the fresh faces of daffodils popping up or the cheery mix of tulips swaying in an almost warm breeze?

Well then, to sell your flowers, that's what you want to remind potential customers of, right? You want to tap into that springy feeling to induce people to buy your beautiful flowers.

So here's how you do it . . .

Take your old, dusty, fake ficus tree, add a string of colored eggs and then stuff a rabbit in the tree holding a beautiful bouquet of . . . stuffed fabric flowers.

Don't you feel like buying some fresh flowers now?

real tales of dunces in real estate

So if your adult son introduces you to his boss who turns out to be a really nice guy--we'll call him Eric--and he's friendly and cordial and keeps you entertained with interesting banter and he's a mortgage broker and real estate agent and tells you he's got some investment property for sale in a small town in the bootheel of Missouri, you should pause from that there run-on sentence and think.

First, you should think real hard about why you would invest in the bootheel of Missouri. Have you been to the bootheel? It's hillbilly land. It's not exactly prime real estate investment territory.

Second, you should not rely on Eric's associate, an enormously fat, Jaba-the-Hut-Man, to drive you around the lil-boot-heel-town and tell you he is an unlicensed appraiser and believe it when he tells you there are great deals in this here town but he's not zactly sure which properties Eric has in mind for you but you can buy lots of rent ready property and sell them for a profit in a year.

You should not turn over your credit information to Eric, via your adult son, and let him apply willy-nilly for loans on your credit.

You should not say "SURE!" When Eric slides a yellow piece of paper across the table at you and says he got you a $60,000 property for $54,000, with a loan at no-cost to you.

You should not close on that no-cost loan with no signed sale agreement, no independent inspection and no review of the tax records to see the tax valuation. Plus, you SHOULD actually see the property before you buy it. Really.

You should not sign your wife's names to the legal documents (even if she knows about it), because then you just have to wonder about the business ethics of the notary.

You should definitely not do these things 10 times, borrowing between $500-600,000 to make these great investments. (Read the word "great" with a somewhat loose interpretation.)

If you do this, you should not be surprised to discover the 10 parcels Eric got such great deals for you on are collectively worth less than $150,000 and that Eric ran off with the rest of the money. You should not be surprised when the floors of the properties are rotting, the plumbing is missing and the "city" (village?) is in the process of condemning some of the property as blighted.

And most of all, when you figure out that you've been had...that you were as stupid as a dark, lonely night is long...that your two brain cells passed by each other in the empty space in your skull like two passing ships on the vast ocean...you should not sue the people who didn't even loan you the ridiculous sums of money, who in fact bought your loans on the secondary market...you should not claim that somehow those banks--who perhaps are not bastions of our current society, but who are also not at fault for YOUR stupidity--should have known that you are an idiot. Cuz, quite frankly, you are the only person responsible for your own mistakes.

Ugh. People make me mad.

It's a dumpy house.

the evil thought that made my day

So an evil thought made my day.

And here it is . . .

Facebook is also suggesting to LeeAnn that I be HER friend.

Hee hee (with malevolent hand-wringing).

snarky friday

To paraphrase BJH, sometimes life is so full of blog-fodder, it's like manna from heaven.

This manna is risky. Yet . . . I must. The magnetic draw of blogging this is too great for me to resist. I am weak.

I have an acquaintance who had a baby this week. The baby's name is listed below; first, middle then last. I am putting dots and dashes in here so they can't find it if they Google search his name:

G.U.I.N.N.E.S.S

K-I-N-G

G.E.O.R.G.E

I like these people. They are well-educated. But I do not get this name at all.

I am mean.

I am going to blogger hell.

I bet BJH will be there too.

By the by, this is King George's house:

snarky saturday

Oh. My. Hell.*

Let me share a few choice moments from the weekend.

Hello Crazy!

I invited my brother's family to join us at our city's Fourth of July Parade. His imminently-ex-wife ("Iew") decided that she wanted to do the parade with the kids and not have him around. (Mind you, they are still living together and their kids don't know they are separating yet.) So my brother bowed out and said he'd do something else. I decided to play nice, even if Iew was banning him. I e-mailed her and asked her if she wanted to meet. I also told her that if she didn't want to sit with us, it would be fine. Iew responded via e-mail asking me the route and said something like, "The kids and I are going to attend." I e-mailed her the route, told where we usually sit and asked her to text me in the morning so we could connect, if she wanted. I never heard back from her. So I figured she'd decided not to join us and go sit somewhere OTHER than where I said we'd be. Right? Ok assumption?

Nope. We eventually saw her, when she walked right past us and sat 1/2 block away in the blazing sun. (There was space by us.) I knew she'd seen us but Car-man couldn't believe it so he walked down to tell her where we were. She barely mumbled hello at him and then resolutely ignored him. Later, I tried to stop and say, "Hi" on my way to the restrooms. She wouldn't look at me or even really acknowledge me. I can see this divorce is going to be wonderful on everyone.

My girls were pretty shocked and couldn't understand her behavior (mind you, THEY don't know about the divorce yet because Bro didn't want me to tell them until after all the family get-togethers this weekend). I couldn't really understand her either. If she didn't want to sit with us, fine. But why traipse right by us and ignore us and our KIDS, with HER KIDS? It's a big damn parade. There was no need for this. Younger said, "I don't know what's going on with them because no one will tell us. But Iew's STILL our Aunt!! Why did she do that?" I responded with something about how Iew was hurting and upset and she didn't know how to act. But the truth? She's an adult. She can do better than this around the kids. I'm pretty irritated.

Hello Joy!

I can't wait for my niece's birthday party tomorrow. It should be wonderful. My brother, Iew , her divorced parents, my parents (including my vehemently anti-divorce mother) . . . and a gazillion giggling six year old hula girls. Give me the six-year-olds and some tequila (the tequila is just for me). We'll be the mature ones.

Hello Yummy!

Before the weekend, I told my mom that we'd do burgers on the grill Friday night before we went to watch fireworks. She offered to bring fresh corn, which was a great idea. When she showed up she also had homemade pineapple salsa. It sounded "interesting" and potentially yummy, but knowing my mom, probably horrendous.

The first issue? What were we supposed to eat it with? I didn't have chips or anything like that in the house. She said we were just to eat it like a side-dish. Ok then.

I put some on my plate and ate a bite or two. I didn't really like it. I do like adventurous food. But this was made with canned pineapple and an anemic looking green bell pepper. (I'm betting the recipe called for fresh pineapple and an Anaheim chile.) It wasn't yummy. So I left most of it on my plate. She was sitting across from me and could see it was left on my plate. Yet she asked, "Did you like the salsa? Isn't it great?" I kind of looked at her thinking, "Do you really want my opinion? Can't you see it sitting, uneaten on my plate?" I mumbled something like, "It was pretty good." But NOOO she had to push the fact it was uneaten. So I looked her straight in the eyes and said, "It's really not my favorite thing."

She then pouted for 45 minutes.

Hello Nosey!

During fireworks, Mom was popping off with little tid-bits on my brother's divorce:

"Iew seems really, really angry at Bro and I'm not sure she's got any reason to be."

"So Iew filed first. Didn't you say it would be better if he filed first? I bet she got advice from her Mom to do that."

Um, what the hell am I supposed to do with that? I sat there mute. This is not MY stuff to tell. God Bless Car-man. He overheard her and stepped in. He told her that she had to remember that I was caught in the middle and she needed to not ask me for information about the divorce. (I cannot tell you how UNLIKE Car-man this is. He is very non-confrontational with my family. I'll give him a big thank you later. :o>)

Unbelievably, she then said, "Oh, I wasn't trying to get information at all. I don't want to make Laggin feel bad."

If this was high school? She'd get an "F" in not making Laggin feel bad.

Hello Guilt!

So this morning, I was taking Mom out for a delayed Mother's Day celebration. (We had to cancel it when it was originally planned in June because Iew kicked my brother out for a few days. She also endeared herself to me by asking me to call my parents and tell them not to come that weekend when they were supposed to stay at her place. Nice. It was really fun. Especially when I couldn't tell my Mom WHY Bro was getting kicked out.)

Anyhoo, I knew Mom would spend our time together this morning trying to talk over the divorce situation. I had myself braced and ready. I do understand that she needs to talk. I just really can't deal with listening to her because it's all so full of her snobbery and judgmentalism. Eventually I ended up telling her that I disagreed with her views and I really couldn't take listening to her. There were tears. Ugh.

Oh, and in case you care, she's an adult and I don't have to hide things from her. She can handle bad news. (Now remember, she's not TRYING to get information from me. Right?)

But NOOOO, we weren't done yet. She needed to make sure that I would tell Car-man that she wasn't "trying" to make me feel bad or get information about the divorce the evening before. She was just making statements. I needed to assure him that she wasn't "asking" anything. She told me she had carefully crafted what she was saying as statements.

OMG. I'm the spawn of friggin' female Bill Clinton. And anyone who doesn't believe that she was digging for information? You don't know my mom.

When we got to our destination, we had a nice time and I was able to avoid all further discussion of the travails of Bro.

Hello Reprieve!

Now I'm at the office, in hiding. She's taking all the granddaughters to see the Kit: An American Girl movie. Even my teens secretly want to see this movie. They were huge American Girl groupies. Eldest still has the dolls in her room! But much to Eldest's horror, Nana is making her bring the Kit doll out to lunch. (Tee hee. When Mom tortures the girls, I laugh a little.)

I'll reconnect with them when we all meet for dinner tonight.

I'll give you a patriotic house today.

*Thanks, Tonkelu. I love that phrase.

a party game for snarky friday

A party game, via a post over at Unfogged.

Your instructions are as follows:
1. Take out your iPod (or whatever you own).
2. Press shuffle songs.
3. Answer the following: a) How many songs before you come to one that would absolutely disqualify you from being President? b) What is that song?
4. Leave your answers.

I'll do this in the comments later. I left my iPod in the car!

snarky friday

"How much weight HAVE you lost? Your butt almost looks sexy."

I know he was trying to be sweet, but something about the last part of that phrase, just didn't do it for me.

dear peoples attending the stupid truck race

• Dear Lady sitting in front of me,




• I know we were outside. However, there is no smoking at the races. Really. You are rude to light up about a whole pack worth of ciggies during the race. It was bad enough that Younger and I hate the races but then our asthmatic lungs had to suck in your stink all night. Thanks bunches.




• I was also wondering about your blanket. The fuzzy one with the blue-grey pandas on it? I mean, sure, it was precious and all but shouldn't it have been red and black or black and orange--representative of some racing team? But I suppose the fuzzy pandas did go better with the flowery bed pillow you brought to sit on. Those aluminum benches are pretty hard. I can totally understanding hauling your "pretty" bedroom pillow to the race track to sit on.




• One last thing . . . your reading material. I have never had the opportunity to read the Harlequin Romance called "Night of the Condor". I bet that it's REALLY good. Can I borrow it?




• Very truly yours,




• Laggin

• Dear Fat Man Sitting Three Rows Down and Across the Aisle,




• I really, really admire your appreciation and dedication to Dale Earnhardt. I mean he's been dead for what, six or seven years? And that was clearly a NEW black t-shirt. I mean it looked like it had never even been washed. Brand, spankin' new, I bet. You are a truly dedicated fan.




• But here's the thing . . . I understand that when you are in public sometimes you've just got to move the . . . uh, member. I get it. It's just not in a comfortable position. But . . . um, I have a few suggestions. First, I suggest that you consider not doing this out in public. They DO have restrooms at the races! Did you know that? I mean, it is surprising at all. I just can't believe how some people think that the races are a sophisticated sport and that we spectators just pee in our beer cans or something. Anyhow, I know walking to the restroom means you might miss a good wreck. But still, think about it.
• Second, I recommend that you do NOT untuck that beautiful new shirt and physically LIFT up your beer belly. I accidentally got an eyeful of your hairy belly. And . . . well . . . it's not the prettiest thing I've ever seen.
• But from there, it was kinda like one of those car wrecks. I just couldn't help but stare as you jostled your belly out of the way and stuck your arm down your pants (by the way, they are a bit tight around the middle; you might consider moving up a size) and re-arranged your package. It just seemed like a personal moment. You didn't really need to share it with me.


• Really, it made me erp in my mouth just a little bit.
• Very truly yours,
• Laggin

• Dear Mystery Air Bubbler,




• The races are really, really loud aren't they? I swear, you cannot hear yourself scream at the top of your lungs, can you?




• But I'm just wondering a little something. While all that noise means that you certainly can cut the cheese with all the impunity in the world, does that make it a good idea? Because, man, whoever you were, you stank! Again and again and again.
• Very truly yours,
• Laggin

This, blogosphere, is why I hate the races. Today, you get a racing house (yes, the drivers LIVE in these things).

snarky friday

• Another rule for success in life (or maybe this is for success in working with me):






• Do not drive your boss nuts with 478,000,001 stupid conversations on each project. I do not need the details of everything you are doing. I do not care if you called someone and they were not in the office. I DO NOT WANT to know how you are making the sausage. Just make the damn sausage and bring me an end product.






• Of course, if you have a question, I'd love to talk to you.






• I just don't need you in here every 14.3 seconds updating me on the stupid, little meaningless project I gave you. And, um, if you insist on coming in here like this, I'm never giving you another project again. Big or little.






• Because . . . I'm mean like that.






• So now, it's a bitchy house.

snarky friday formula

We shall see whether this will be a regular posting event but today I bring to you a formula for success in life. If you follow these rules, it will bode well for you:

• If you are a woman who is, let's say, 63 (give or take), you should not have long stringy hair that hangs down to your butt.



• If you are a woman who is 63 (give or take), you should not self-dye your butt-long, stringy hair with cheap products creating the orangosity of "Sun-In" from the 1980's.



• If you are a woman who is 63 (give or take), you should not tie your orange, butt-long, stringy hair in a side pony-tail approximately three inches above your left ear.



• If you are a woman who is 63 (give or take), you should not decorate your orange, butt-long, stringy, side pony-tail with a multi-colored scrunchie.



• If you are a woman who is 63 (give or take), you should not wrap your multi-colored scrunchie around your orange, butt-long, stringy, side pony-tail three or four times causing said pony-tail to stick out of the side of your head like a sad, broken tree branch.

Because I'm feeling a little crazy--it is ALMOST the weekend, after all--today you get a crazy house.

Have a great weekend all!