DUST OR NO DUST?

I love decorating for all occasions, but I especially love decorating for Christmas. Gramps has always said that I get my taste in colors from south of the border. He's right. I love bright colors in all hues and in many combinations.
When Christmas comes I decorate anything and everything that doesn't walk, talk, and move around on two legs or four legs. Actually when I'm in the middle of decorating, Gramps tells our family and visitors that they should always keep moving because if they sit or stand still long enouth I'll decorate them. It's very tempting, really.
Today I found a perk to overdoing the decorating and being as garish as I want to be. I decided that it would be a waste of precious time to dust anything that I'm going to decorate because the dust will be hidden by the abundance of decorations. Fortunately, dust is not one of our personal antigens, so it's no health hazard to Gramps and me. With the blinking lights which I put on everything and the garish colors in the plethora of decorations that adorn the inside of our house, no one will know that there is a layer of dust under all of it. What you don't know won't hurt you. If guests start to sneeze, I'll just offer them a Benadryl without any explanation except that it must be the Oklahoma winds blowing something in.
The bonus of my new discovery is that I won't have to dust again until close to the middle of January because we observe Twelfth Night and leave the Christmas decorations up until then. Yea! That means I can delay my least favorite chore of dusting for at least thirty more days. That makes sixty days total, since the last time I dusted was before Thanksgiving. No one will know the difference unless you or I tell them, and I never reveal my secrets to anyone except my most trusted friends.
By the middle of January I'll put the decorations up in storage boxes and get the Pledge out and clean and shine everything that doesn't walk or talk or move around, so the timing will be perfect.
You just have to figure these things out as you get older.

MISTAKES

"Neil is a successful businessman now"

Our grandson Neil has always had great wisdom, even when he was a little boy. He spoke deep, convicting wisdom to me one time and I think maybe it came from heaven because of its importance.
Gramps, Neil and I had gone to eat at a fast food place, Neil's favorite one. Gramps had inadvertently locked the keys in the car and we were miles from home. After calling several neighbors and family members who weren't home at the time, the only thing left to do was walk home.
I began joking with Neil, trying to lighten the mood of everyone involved in the experience, and I said, "Well, Neil, what are we going to have to do to Gramps for locking the keys in the car? Can you think of anything we could do to him?" My objective was not to really punish Gramps, just get Neil's mind off of the long walk."
The following words came out of the mouth of Neil, seven years old at the time, "Grandma, everybody makes mistakes and next time it might be you."
Wow, did that stop me in my tracks! Such great wisdom from a child. I congratulated Neil on his mature insight and asked him to forgive me for my curt comment. Of course he did.
The good news is that we stopped at a store on the long walk home and the owner let us borrow his car to drive home to get our keys.
I think that Neil's wise comment set up the solution to the problem because it took all guilt off of Gramps and all sarcasm off of me. That cleared the atmosphere for the solution to appear. I learned a lifelong lesson from Neil, not to hold anyone to their mistakes because I might be the next one to make a mistake.
Thanks to Neil for his wise words and the courage to say them.

Parking Space Angels

"Jesse"

Gramp's and I have always instructed our grandchildren to look for our special parking space right up front at malls, stores and athletic events so we won't have to walk too far to the front door. We always have a space right in front and it's still astounds the grandchildren that we always have one every time we go someplace.
Gramps and I just take it for granted that we will have a parking space close to the front door. We've never doubted it and we've always trusted our parking space angel to provide it for us. We've never wondered how he does it, we just accept it by faith and go on expecting it.
One day when our grandson Jesse was six years old he commented out of the blue that he finally figured out how the parking space angel does what he does for us. I was curious as to what he had figured out, but I was amazed that he had been stewing about it for years.
His assessment of the working of the parking space angel was this. He said, "Meme, when you decide that you want to go to Wal-Mart or some store, your parking space angel leaves you and goes to the store and whispers in the ear of a person who has a close parking space, 'It's time to go home. It's time to go home.' Then that person pays for the purchases and goes to his car and pulls out of the parking space just as you get to the special space. Then you pull in. That's how it works."
I was amazed that he had come up with that wonderful description of the interaction of heavenly angels with earthly beings. I told him, "Jesse, you are exactly right. That's exactly how it works."
I'll always appreciate Jesse's spiritual insight into the matter of the parking space angels. Now that I know how it all works, I really have faith for my special parking space when I go shopping.
"A little child shall lead them," the Bible says, but I experienced that a little child can also teach us.

GROUCHINEOSIS

"Lindsey"

Our grandchildren are all so smart and creative!
When our granddaughter Lindsey was eight years old she decided to write a short story about crabby parents. She dictated the words to me and I typed it for her. She dictated the following:
DEADLY DISEASE
by Lindsey Allen
WARNING: This disease is contagious.
NEW DISEASE: Grouchineosis.
CURE: Stay home and go to sleep.
HOW TO AVOID: Do not get near the people with this disease.
IF CAUGHT YOU MUST CALL THE MANNERS POLICE AT 555-MANNERS. That is 555-626-6377.
APPROACH AT YOUR OWN RISK.

Unfortunately, Gramps and I also have Grouchineosis on occasion. Lindsey is right, it's catching.
I determined at the time when she wrote that brilliant essay that I would always take her advice, taking the cure by staying home and going to bed because I don't want to spread Grouchineosis around to other people when I have it.. It's toxic!
Maybe the medical community can make an inoculation for it and we won't have crabby parents and emotionally wounded kids anymore. And maybe we really should have manners policemen to watch for parents with Grouchineosis. They could give tickets and assess fines. Then our towns wouldn't have financial difficulties because grouchy parents would fill the coffers with their fines.
Grouchy parents, count to ten and then go to bed and sleep it off.

15th Birthday Rap Song for Grandsons

Keep your privates in your pants,
You don't want to take a change
On being a daddy as a teen,
So keep your privates in your jeans.

Sex too young can cripple you,
Can give you some diseases, too.
Ruin your future and your life,
Put your family into strife.

Respect yourself enough to see
That sex is not just he and she.
It changes everyone you know,
To sex so young, just say NO.

Travel first and go to school,
That's the best way to be cool,
Then sex can be with your mate,
Not with some teenage date.

So keep your privates in your pants,
You don't want to take a change
On being a daddy as a teen,
It can make you sad and mean.

SUNDAY DOLLAR MOVIE LAUGHS

Gramps and I never know what we are going to encounter when we go on our every Sunday dollar movie theater adventure. We almost always see a good movie, and the price continues to satisfy us. If you haven’t read about our many experiences on those adventurous Sundays, you might want to read the other posts on this web site. We look forward to the Sunday experiences as much as we look forward to seeing a second run movie for a dollar. The one we saw this Sunday was a first run movie last week which cost eight bucks at the expensive movie theater instead of the one buck we spent at the dollar movie theater one week later.
We didn’t have to wait long to have our Sunday laughs before the actual movie began. The laughs came during the coming attractions portion of the movie. The first four series of coming attractions of upcoming movies were shown without incident. The fifth coming attraction was about a movie currently showing on one of the other screens. It was about the popular movie Evan Almighty, a contemporary parody on Noah building the ark, per God’s instructions.
Somehow the film of the coming attractions on Evan Almighty was put in the projector upside down and also backwards. It’s a mystery to us how the projectionist did that. Oh, yeah, I just remembered, the snack bar attendant is also the projectionist for the movies at the dollar movie theater. I think maybe they need to make their HELP WANTED signs a little bigger in order to attract more employees. We have so much fun just going to the dollar movie theater, it must be a constant series of laughs to work there. Maybe they should pay people to work there since it’s such good therapy to laugh.
Imagine this in your mind, the film being upside down made all of the people and the animals standing on their heads. The film being put in backwards made every scene run in reverse, people running and walking backwards, walking backwards into door opening with doors shutting ahead of them instead of behind them, people and animals spitting their food out instead of swallowing, cars and trucks running in reverse all the time. All of that happened as the people spoke what sounded like a combination of Chinese, Japanese, Mongolian and East Indian languages. The lions’ loud roars were backwards, sounding like SSSSSRAOR. The sounds from the elephants’ trunks were weird, like maybe elephants with speech impediments who were beating their trunks on the ground instead of raising them in the air.
It was hilarious, upside down people, animals, cars and trucks walking and running backwards on their heads, with the people speaking weird languages and the animals uttering strange sounds, like animals with speech impediments. And, poor Evan, who was supposed to be the modern day Noah, disassembled the ark in the upside down, backwards coming attractions instead of building it. God surely didn’t give him those plans.
Those two minutes of the movie trailers, commonly called coming attractions in our day, set the mood for the great movie that we viewed. Gramps was concerned that the movie would be upside down and backwards also, but it wasn’t. It was right side up and from beginning to end, just like it should be.
I’ll have to admit, we feel a little cheated on the rare occasions that all incidents at the dollar movie theater go as planned. Even when the movie we view is a good movie, it seems kind of boring when things go right. We’re too used to having unusual experiences that cause us to erupt in great laughs. The healthy laughter is a bonus to our paying only a dollar to view an entertaining movie.
The only problem is that we were the only ones laughing at the upside down and backwards coming attractions. Not one of the other six people in that theater could see the humor in the situation. Maybe they’re expecting too much perfection for the dollar they paid. Gramps and I find humor in everything. That’s why we have so much fun together.
You haven’t lived until you’ve seen people and animals standing on their heads walking and running backwards, cars and trucks on their roofs running backwards, along with the people speaking a Chinese/Japanese/East Indian/Mongolian language, and the animals making reverse sounds like they have speech impediments. It’s a sight to see and hear. We all need to find mistakes humorous instead of aggravating. Anger clogs the arteries and laughter clears the arteries. We would all live longer and have happier lives if we found humor in stressful situations.
I’m already looking forward to next Sunday for the next experience on another of MeMe and Gramps great adventures at the dollar movie theater, as long as Gramps doesn’t fall on the floor again and I don’t lose my hundred and twenty-five dollar sunglasses down the stool in the bathroom again, as I related in the earlier posts on the web site. Just remembering those experiences starts me laughing all over again.
The more I think about it, maybe the funny incidents are saved for Sunday when Gramps and I are going to be there just to keep us laughing.

Halloween Loving Gramps

HALLOWEEN LOVING GRAMPS Gramps hasn't always been as funny as he currently is. At one time he was very, very scary. He continues to be scary once a year on one of his favorite holidays.You see, Gramps never outgrew his love for Halloween, not at ten years old, not at twenty years old, not at thirty years old and not at forty years old. Having been influence by him, our oldest son and his friends observed the holiday all year long in our basement with a continuing, all year long spook house. Regrettably they used our youngest son as their first victim in testing their ingenious work. Still to this day our youngest son hates scary movies.Even today in his early seventies, Gramps still dresses up for one of his favorite days of the year. Now he's a mummy and he stands in the front yard in the middle of elaborate holiday decorations with a blazing fire in a fire pit behind him.As a matter of fact, currently I have to dress up like a cute black kitty cat so I can soothe the fears of the frantic children when they get a glimpse of the scary mummy. I have to encourage them on toward the chocolate candy bars that the mummy passes out while they resist their urges to run the other way in fear.Last year I got insulted by a snippy smart mouthed preteen girl who said to me, after I had spent hours putting on my cute black kitty cat makeup, black cat ears anchored to a head band, black shirt and pants, "Are you a black cat again? When are you going to change your costume?" I could have tucked my long fake black cat tail between my legs and cowardly walked into the house, but I wasn't going to let an insult ruin my holiday. She didn't say one nasty word to the mummy about his costume being outdated, and he's been a mummy for 15 years.For years Gramps has had a reputation in town for being very scary with several generations of people. In the late 1960s, 1970s and early 1980s he used to dress in my full length black evening cape, my shoulder length flowing dark brown wig and a tall witch's hat. Being the artist that he is, he always created huge fake warts out of clay, painted them dark brown and temporarily glued them to his nose. He even put long straight black hairs growing out of the warts. He was ug-ug-ugly in that costume.On every Halloween evening during those early years he took up residence on the front porch of our previous house, stirring a concoction in a huge vat that was boiling from dry ice. It looked like witches brew. As long as our black cat (creatively named Blackie) cooperated, Gramps cradled the cat in his left arm. He was very, very frightening. We always had scary organ music accompanied by screams playing on the outside loud speakers, the sounds originating from the hi-fi in the house. This was a typical Halloween at our Boston Street house.Three of our regular trick or treating customers in those years were children of friends of ours. They always warily approached our porch, urged on by their big protective daddy, to collect their candy. Year after year they came for their frightening experience.The father of the children told us that the children always refused to walk on or ride their bikes down, "The street where the witch lives."Years later, one of those children became a pediatrician, one an attorney and one an educator. It continues to be embarrassing to be at a fancy party and hear our friend remark to his adult professional children, "Do you remember who this man is?" They still say, "Yes. He's the witch who lived on Boston Street." Then they go on and tell how Gramps in his witch's costume cost them lots of hours of sleep and added to their childhood fears.Gramps, I'm thinking about using that as part of your obituary when the time comes, "He will always be remembered as the witch who lived on Boston Street."Do you double dare me?

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