I've devoted several posts to Craig and the funny things he says and does because Craig says and does funny things, especially on accident. Recently we were talking about a conversation we had a few years ago and he reminded me of my hypocrisy on this subject. The truth is this--for all of the funny things that I've called him out on, namely butchering song lyrics and just generally being the youngest crotchety old man around, I'm definitely a pot calling the kettle black. I know that I often speak (type?) in superlatives, so I'll try and tone it down. Let's just say that I am one of the more literal people that I know. I'm no Forrest Gump, obviously, but I can get a little lost in hyperbole and unfamiliar phrases. I'll never forget this book that I read in third or fourth grade that was written from the perspective of a similar little girl who overhears her parents talking and misunderstands everything. When they talk about navel oranges, she imagined a fleet of oranges with sailors and the whole bit. I imagined a kindred spirit.
With that background, this might seem less stupid. It might not. Meh. Anyway, several years ago Craig made a remark about "not looking a gift horse in the mouth," and I casually agreed saying, "Yeah, 'cause he'll take your presents back."
I know, huh? It's all so clear to me now, but let me paint a picture for you. I've heard that expression other times in my life and what I visualized was a horse bringing you presents in his mouth, kind of a hand-less Santa. It made sense to me that you weren't supposed to look him in the mouth, because that would be very rude to check out all your gifts before they've been given to you. Don't look a gift horse in the mouth, lest he turn tail and take your presents to someone else. How was I to know that it means something about how if someone gives you a horse, you shouldn't go checking out his specs, since he was a gift? Who gives horses? What are they looking for in there, the Carfax?
The fortunate things is, we got married and all is well. I have not always been so lucky. At twelve I asked my science teacher the genuine question of how big the tubes were for full term test tube babies and I lost points for being a smart alec. She lost points for being a bummer, and became the scapegoat for why I have an English degree.
Sunday, July 24, 2011
Friday, June 3, 2011
Captive's Log
Day 4,3452 in Captivity (unemployment)...give or take
I'm adapting well in my new surroundings. I've started to understand the natives. Admittedly, little brown dogs are only mediocre conversationalists. If you try and discuss anything more than the superficial, they zone out and start licking phantom boy parts long removed. Yesterday, he broke rank and we had a slight disagreement. He thought that he would help me clean by getting on the dining room table and licking my lunch plate. I disagreed. Other than these set backs, all seems to be well between myself and the other prisoner. As I don't have the occasional accident on the floor, I don't have to be put in solitary like he does when everyone leaves, but the threat is always there.
I seem to have some form of Stockholm syndrome, which I attribute to the attractiveness of my captor. He's very good to me and occasionally takes me out for yogurt. He seems to appreciate having a captive, as he no longer does any housework to speak of. Just yesterday, I baked a pie with a homemade crust and sweet tea. I knew the pie was good, but I was concerned that the tea was tad on the weak side. My kind captor said that, no, "It isn't bad. It just tastes like one of the those restaurants that has sweet tea, but they don't know how to make it." Apparently, a return to my previous formula would be appreciated. Noted.
It's true that I am enjoying my captivity, but I can't even convince myself that I'm benefiting at all from my college or law degree, but I will at some point. I think I'll wait until then to update the alumni information with these respective institutions, lest they report, Laura Locke, nee Britt, has become an amalgamation of her grandmothers. She recently received a prestigious library card, and has gone through an entire bottle of Fantastik.
I'm adapting well in my new surroundings. I've started to understand the natives. Admittedly, little brown dogs are only mediocre conversationalists. If you try and discuss anything more than the superficial, they zone out and start licking phantom boy parts long removed. Yesterday, he broke rank and we had a slight disagreement. He thought that he would help me clean by getting on the dining room table and licking my lunch plate. I disagreed. Other than these set backs, all seems to be well between myself and the other prisoner. As I don't have the occasional accident on the floor, I don't have to be put in solitary like he does when everyone leaves, but the threat is always there.
I seem to have some form of Stockholm syndrome, which I attribute to the attractiveness of my captor. He's very good to me and occasionally takes me out for yogurt. He seems to appreciate having a captive, as he no longer does any housework to speak of. Just yesterday, I baked a pie with a homemade crust and sweet tea. I knew the pie was good, but I was concerned that the tea was tad on the weak side. My kind captor said that, no, "It isn't bad. It just tastes like one of the those restaurants that has sweet tea, but they don't know how to make it." Apparently, a return to my previous formula would be appreciated. Noted.
It's true that I am enjoying my captivity, but I can't even convince myself that I'm benefiting at all from my college or law degree, but I will at some point. I think I'll wait until then to update the alumni information with these respective institutions, lest they report, Laura Locke, nee Britt, has become an amalgamation of her grandmothers. She recently received a prestigious library card, and has gone through an entire bottle of Fantastik.
Wednesday, June 1, 2011
Keeping it Real (Boring)
Every time I think about this blog, the sound of crickets drowns it out. I have nothing to write about. Whatever wit I may have feeds on stress and anxiety, which is why I posted so much while I was studying for the bar. I love being home (except for the impending doom of loans/needing a job) and I pretty much do the same things every day, so there's just not that much to say.
I have been spending a lot of time, though, with the always charming, never dull, shoe-ruining, canine alarm system Max. You wil be shocked to learn that this bit of cinema was completely unscripted. Ol' one-take Beanpotts knocked it out of the park. I'm kind of embarassed by the unexplained nasal tone of my voice, so try to just focus on the little brown face. I especially like when he first hears his name.
I have been spending a lot of time, though, with the always charming, never dull, shoe-ruining, canine alarm system Max. You wil be shocked to learn that this bit of cinema was completely unscripted. Ol' one-take Beanpotts knocked it out of the park. I'm kind of embarassed by the unexplained nasal tone of my voice, so try to just focus on the little brown face. I especially like when he first hears his name.
Thursday, May 5, 2011
Happy Mother's Day!
I only had a fraction of a fraction of a fraction of the experience of motherhood, but I got a glimpse of the instant priority shift, the me into you. It's amazing to think that I was and am on the receiving end of that everyday. I love my Mom so very much, and it's hard to imagine that she's loved me as much since before I can remember. Before I was born. It's one of those things that's been so large and constant in my life that I have the privilege of being able to take it for granted sometimes. I shouldn't, and I definitely try not to. I know that so many people never had or have lost that love. But what a love that is to be so constant and steady that I forget that it isn't just a given.
As if I haven't been lucky enough, I've also got a wonderful mother in law that I love, too, and feel so grateful to for making such a great man out of Craig. I never imagined that I would feel so comfortable in someone else's family, but going to her house always feels like going home. For reasons I've mentioned before, that fact just shows me that God has really taken care of me.
I'm so lucky to have been my mother's child and equally lucky to have Craig's mom. Lucky and grateful. Thanks to the best moms I know and happy mother's day!
Wednesday, May 4, 2011
Clean Sweep
Stress is like amphetamines for housewives, or at least for this accidental housewife. I've been on a DSM-IV worthy cleaning tear. I've moved past organizing the closets and cabinets and started scrubbing the walls and bleaching all the trashcans. Yesterday I took the top off the stove and drug it into the shower and scrubbed it until it said uncle. I don't know where the stress is coming from. Probably nothing. That's kinda where I live, so no need to worry. Before I do any self-examination, I'm gonna ride this wave until the floors beg for mercy.
On a related note, Max is beside himself. I cleaned out his treasure trove under the bed. He went all Little Mermaid on me and started talking about his "whosits and whatsits galore."
P.S. In response to my last post, my Mom said she needed to tell me the rest of the story. Maybe that will fill in some gaps : )
On a related note, Max is beside himself. I cleaned out his treasure trove under the bed. He went all Little Mermaid on me and started talking about his "whosits and whatsits galore."
P.S. In response to my last post, my Mom said she needed to tell me the rest of the story. Maybe that will fill in some gaps : )
Friday, April 29, 2011
The Birds and the Bees
Some of the funniest stories I have ever been told are of how some of my friends first learned about the birds and the bees. A lot of people (myself included) have little to no recollection of the very first time we were told the awful truth. It seems that if you have a pretty clear memory of the "talk," your parents put it off so long that you probably already knew. My understanding of the real deal was kind of an evolution.
1. The Early Years---
I have this very, very faint memory of watching tv in our living room in Mobile. My brain being what it is, the part that I remember most about this whole experience is that the woman on the screen was wearing a bandana on her head. She had no hair, which I guess my Mom must have explained meant that she was very sick. I decided then and there that I would never wear a bandana.
During this formative moment about future head pieces, I believe that I asked where babies come from. This is where the memory ends. That's it. I have no idea what my Mom may or may not have said. Knowing her, it was pretty straightforward and a bit on the clinical side. Obviously I thought it was pretty dull because a bandana beat out that conversation for space in my permanent memory bank.
2. The Revelation--
Around fourth or fifth grade my Mom developed this horrible, life-shattering habit. No, it wasn't heroin, and she didn't develop a taste for the drink.
So much worse.
She would ensnare me on long road trips and talk about how I was going to start my period one day. I would get hysterical, all but clawing my way out the car on I-65 and try to make her take it all back. Occasionally she would relent with, "Ok, Laura, maybe you won't" so that I would raise my seat back up and stop humming. Needless to say, I wasn't hearing any talk about my own or anyone else's body.
Flash forward a year or so. I had completely bypassed training bras and gone straight to the top of everyone's pool party invite list. I was a most embarassed and begrudging VIP. To all of you girls who dreamed of developing in middle school, count yourself lucky. Boys in my class would call me the B-52 bomber. No, that is not a human size, but it stung nonetheless.
I found this attention weird and confusing. My friend at the time would've killed for it. She was definitely more cosmopolitan than me. She shaved her legs and knew about sex, which at that age, is basically the same as having your own apartment. She asked me if I knew about the big IT and I was like, "Yeah, I know. Fallopian tubes, sperm, tampax, clean your room, nine months, yada yada yada." She realized that I was pretty much in the dark and proceeded to explain the deed. I told her she was a liar and not funny and that that was impossible anyway. Turns out, I was missing a lot of anatomical information. Being a good friend and a prodigous artist, she shed some light on the situation by drawing the whole thing in sidewalk chalk on her parents' driveway. I was truly horrified. That night I bargained with God that I would never do that if he would take away periods and math class.
3. Teenage Years--
So let's add this up. I was a young girl who had found out only a few years earlier that God has a strange sense of humor and that belly buttons are not, in fact, the magical portal to pregnancy. By this point, every health and science class had pretty well convinced me that even thinking about sex will get you knocked up quicker than you can say unwed mother. Our school allowed a program called You Are Unique to come and talk to us about saving ourselves for marriage. This woman with the perkiest South Alabama Junior League accent told us a story about a young lady whose father...excuse me, let me do her justice...
whose Daddeh had given her a beautiful strand of pulllls (pearls for those who don't speak Bama-nese) to wear on her weddin' day. This young lady, though, wore them out one night in high school and spilled punch on them. She put them away after that, but then she took them out anotha night in college where they were broken. She put them back in the box. Years later at her weddin', she was standing with her Daddeh at the church and he went to put her pullllls on, but they were too spoiled too wear.
TRAU-MA-TI-ZING
4. Adulthood--
Well, I'm still snickering my way through life. I have learned that you cannot get pregnant by merely being horizontal. I get the reason for scaring teenage girls stupid by telling them that pregnancy will come and find them if they so much as speak its name. I think, though, that when you get married and may want to have a baby, someone at the end of the aisle should say, "Nah, we were just playing." I get a little nervous when I think about having to give the talk myself. I'm scared it'll come out all wrong. I just don't want them the think that if you don't wear a bandana while you're on your period, you might ruin your pearls and get pregnant.
Picture from here.
1. The Early Years---
I have this very, very faint memory of watching tv in our living room in Mobile. My brain being what it is, the part that I remember most about this whole experience is that the woman on the screen was wearing a bandana on her head. She had no hair, which I guess my Mom must have explained meant that she was very sick. I decided then and there that I would never wear a bandana.
During this formative moment about future head pieces, I believe that I asked where babies come from. This is where the memory ends. That's it. I have no idea what my Mom may or may not have said. Knowing her, it was pretty straightforward and a bit on the clinical side. Obviously I thought it was pretty dull because a bandana beat out that conversation for space in my permanent memory bank.
2. The Revelation--
Around fourth or fifth grade my Mom developed this horrible, life-shattering habit. No, it wasn't heroin, and she didn't develop a taste for the drink.
So much worse.
She would ensnare me on long road trips and talk about how I was going to start my period one day. I would get hysterical, all but clawing my way out the car on I-65 and try to make her take it all back. Occasionally she would relent with, "Ok, Laura, maybe you won't" so that I would raise my seat back up and stop humming. Needless to say, I wasn't hearing any talk about my own or anyone else's body.
Flash forward a year or so. I had completely bypassed training bras and gone straight to the top of everyone's pool party invite list. I was a most embarassed and begrudging VIP. To all of you girls who dreamed of developing in middle school, count yourself lucky. Boys in my class would call me the B-52 bomber. No, that is not a human size, but it stung nonetheless.
I found this attention weird and confusing. My friend at the time would've killed for it. She was definitely more cosmopolitan than me. She shaved her legs and knew about sex, which at that age, is basically the same as having your own apartment. She asked me if I knew about the big IT and I was like, "Yeah, I know. Fallopian tubes, sperm, tampax, clean your room, nine months, yada yada yada." She realized that I was pretty much in the dark and proceeded to explain the deed. I told her she was a liar and not funny and that that was impossible anyway. Turns out, I was missing a lot of anatomical information. Being a good friend and a prodigous artist, she shed some light on the situation by drawing the whole thing in sidewalk chalk on her parents' driveway. I was truly horrified. That night I bargained with God that I would never do that if he would take away periods and math class.
3. Teenage Years--
So let's add this up. I was a young girl who had found out only a few years earlier that God has a strange sense of humor and that belly buttons are not, in fact, the magical portal to pregnancy. By this point, every health and science class had pretty well convinced me that even thinking about sex will get you knocked up quicker than you can say unwed mother. Our school allowed a program called You Are Unique to come and talk to us about saving ourselves for marriage. This woman with the perkiest South Alabama Junior League accent told us a story about a young lady whose father...excuse me, let me do her justice...
whose Daddeh had given her a beautiful strand of pulllls (pearls for those who don't speak Bama-nese) to wear on her weddin' day. This young lady, though, wore them out one night in high school and spilled punch on them. She put them away after that, but then she took them out anotha night in college where they were broken. She put them back in the box. Years later at her weddin', she was standing with her Daddeh at the church and he went to put her pullllls on, but they were too spoiled too wear.
TRAU-MA-TI-ZING
4. Adulthood--
Well, I'm still snickering my way through life. I have learned that you cannot get pregnant by merely being horizontal. I get the reason for scaring teenage girls stupid by telling them that pregnancy will come and find them if they so much as speak its name. I think, though, that when you get married and may want to have a baby, someone at the end of the aisle should say, "Nah, we were just playing." I get a little nervous when I think about having to give the talk myself. I'm scared it'll come out all wrong. I just don't want them the think that if you don't wear a bandana while you're on your period, you might ruin your pearls and get pregnant.
Picture from here.
Monday, April 18, 2011
That's Bull
I'd like to share a story. I have a sneaking suspicion that it's one that you really had to be there for, but I'm gonna try to do it justice. So, to start, Craig and I are in this prayer group that meets once a month or so. Everyone in the group is a little bit older than us. Ok, most of them are our parents' age or older. We really enjoy it and were pretty honored to be invited to be a part of it. Stop that, that's not the joke. Now, among this group of people that are our parents' age and older, there are also two nuns and a lady that I'm pretty sure is the sweetest living person in the universe. Like I said, we've really enjoyed it, but I will definitely admit that we make an effort to be on our best behavior and not highlight the maturity age difference.
That's the backstory.
We had our meeting a week ago and we were discussing something as a group and a man starting sharing a story. Now, let me say for the record, I really, really like this guy and what he was saying wasn't something to make fun of. What he did next, though, leaves him wide open. You see, this quiet, somewhat serious, man was trying to say that in this situation he was describing, he needed to grab the bull by the horns. To emphasize his point, he even held his hands up in fists, you know, like grabbing bull horns. I'm really hammering this home, because the part that follows is so much better when you realize how much of a mistake it was. Anway, while he's making this bull/horn gesture, he has a completely unintentional mental mashup of phrases and says, "You've got to grab it by the bulls."
???
??
?
Now, not that big of a deal, right? Right, except it sounded like a Jersey Shore "grab it by the balls" if there ever was one. I can %100 guarantee that not only was it not intentional, but it went unnoticed both by the man and the rest of the group. The husband and I, however, not so much. We both IMMEDIATELY shifted way too much in our chairs and started looking down to not get caught cracking up. I went into full blowfish cheek mode trying not to start laughing out loud.
I don't know, maybe you did have to be there, but there isn't much that's funnier than a straight laced guy saying balls in a Jersey accent in front of a prayer group with nuns in the mix, accident or not. Happy Monday. I hope you really grab Holy Week by the bulls!
That's the backstory.
We had our meeting a week ago and we were discussing something as a group and a man starting sharing a story. Now, let me say for the record, I really, really like this guy and what he was saying wasn't something to make fun of. What he did next, though, leaves him wide open. You see, this quiet, somewhat serious, man was trying to say that in this situation he was describing, he needed to grab the bull by the horns. To emphasize his point, he even held his hands up in fists, you know, like grabbing bull horns. I'm really hammering this home, because the part that follows is so much better when you realize how much of a mistake it was. Anway, while he's making this bull/horn gesture, he has a completely unintentional mental mashup of phrases and says, "You've got to grab it by the bulls."
???
??
?
Now, not that big of a deal, right? Right, except it sounded like a Jersey Shore "grab it by the balls" if there ever was one. I can %100 guarantee that not only was it not intentional, but it went unnoticed both by the man and the rest of the group. The husband and I, however, not so much. We both IMMEDIATELY shifted way too much in our chairs and started looking down to not get caught cracking up. I went into full blowfish cheek mode trying not to start laughing out loud.
I don't know, maybe you did have to be there, but there isn't much that's funnier than a straight laced guy saying balls in a Jersey accent in front of a prayer group with nuns in the mix, accident or not. Happy Monday. I hope you really grab Holy Week by the bulls!
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