Jennifer was Right About the Pot Smoking Mr. Rogers Goodwill

Geez, I hate it when she's right; it just makes her bossier next time. I gave the Edmonds Goodwill a thorough going over, and it definitely did not make my list of favorites. I would go there if I lived nearby but even Captain Kangaroo on LSD wouldn't make it worth the long trip. See the pants? I rest my case. Also, it was pretty small. One thing I did like was that the dressing room doors are unlocked so you don't have to get someone to let you in. I despise that about most Goodwills and have never understood why they are so concerned about shoplifting. It's not like they're going to go broke and have to report a loss to the shareholders if someone steals a $6.99 sweater. Or maybe they're concerned about Mr. Rogers toking up in there? I dunno, but it annoys the hell out of me.

They had a good selection of reading glasses, so I snapped up a couple of pairs. I go through those things pretty quickly and recently lost my last pair. They must be somewhere in my office, but I cleaned it up last week and didn't see them. I don't actually NEED reading glasses, you know, but I think they make me look smart. Well, okay, that's a lie. But I do find them to be multi-purpose, and pretty handy for meetings when I am trying to pretend I'm paying attention but am instead exchanging snarky messages with my equally inattentive friends.

And as if that's not enough excitement for one weekend, check out what my dad gave me in the most recent batch of junk he's cleaning out of his house:

I regret to report that my graduating class was quite large, and that the vote was nearly unanimous. My parents were as pleased and proud as you might imagine, though I note they DID save the thing.

That's the Sunday report, friends, I hope you all have a wonderful President's Day and a good week!

Independence Day

Happy Fourth of July! I don’t know about you guys, but for me, this year is DEFINITELY going to be better than last year. Independence Day 2010 started out fine. For the most part. Sure, we were living out of duffel bags in a tiny garage apartment that was far away from a thrift store, we had no jobs, and we were having Air Force withdrawal trauma. On that last one, by ‘we’, I mean Lloyd. OBVIOUSLY. I WAS having thrift store withdrawal trauma, though. Which is WAY worse.

But the early light of the glorious fourth last year dawned bright and clear; we probably could have seen the broad stripes and bright stars flying over Fort McHenry from our ramshackle abode if we’d squinted just a little. We had relatives in town and a cookout on tap. My dad had picked up a discarded self-propelled airplane from the park where he goes to walk the dog. At least, he SAYS it was discarded. I hope some poor little kid isn’t waking up this Independence Day all sad about the airplane some mean guy with a big dog stole from him last year. Either way, the kids were having a blast flying that thing around the yard when destiny guided it to a gentle landing on the roof. Lloyd bounded upstairs to go out onto the roof through a second story window to retrieve it, and all hell broke loose, along with skin, muscle, multiple blood vessels and most importantly, a tendon. You can read what I wrote about it then, and look at the gory picture.

Thus began the worst six months of my entire life, including the six months between April and October of 2007 when I was enormously pregnant and Lloyd had to go to the sandbox and I had to travel around the country with a toddler and then be on bedrest for my high blood pressure and then have a baby by myself in a Louisiana hospital and then move to Korea. No, that was a walk in the park compared to the descent into the ninth circle of hell of 2010. Hmmmm, now I can’t decide if I should bore you with all the dreary specifics or not. There’s something very satisfying about describing all my travails in painful detail, right up until everyone starts to call me Crybaby McWhinypants and throw rotten tomatoes at me. Now, THAT would suck, because only spoiled potatoes and dead rats are worse that rotten tomatoes.

Maybe just the tiniest little smidge of a description, for a speck of holiday self-indulgence: Starting July 4, 2010, Lloyd was unable to move his left hand and had to have reconstructive surgery followed by intensive physical therapy multiple times a week. We were living in a garage apartment with one car. He could not drive, carry groceries or children, cook, clean or write blog entries about how miserable was. He could, however, verbalize his dismay at his sudden predicament. Which he did. Also at this time, my mother was having chemo and requiring daily trips to the cancer center, followed by five weeks in the hospital. During this period, I had a job interview. Then she came home on hospice. I got a job offer, and we had to find a new house near my new job, and take delivery of our household goods. This consisted of two semi-truckloads and houses full, one from storage in Louisiana and one from Korea. These things, all 17,000 pounds of them, had to be placed into our small house or otherwise disposed of. Remember Lloyd’s hand? ME, TOO. We had promised Weston as soon as we had a house, he could have a cat, so we got Henry. Perhaps you recall him. Then my mother died. This was followed by a giant steaming pile of necessary planning, and none of it the fun kind. As soon as Lloyd could drive, he had to fly to the east coast to bring his truck, boat, bee hives, pine beams and other assorted items back. These things, too, had to be somehow incorporated into our tiny new home. On the way back, the truck and boat both required expensive repairs and an extended stay in some podunk town in Montana. THEN, I started my new job. You can read about the very first day here, when I had my pants come undone and spilled tea all over my brand new cube. After a while, miracle of miracles, things started looking up. Lloyd could move his hand, the boxes started to disappear, and I was settling into my job. My mother was still dead, but maybe I was getting a little more used to it. And then Henry died.

Wow, that sounds really bad, now that I look at it in black and white. See what I mean? There’s no place to go but up from there, right? Happy Fourth of July and God Bless America. Pass the beer and the roman candles, and make it snappy! I have a lot of life improvements to make and if there's something that can’t be made better with alcohol and fireworks, I don't know what it is. At least that's how it works in Auburn, where I come from.

Bloody Hell

I don't even know how to start this story, so I'll just hop right in. I get myself in the worst fixes that way. If you ever hear me say, "There's only one way to find out!" or "How bad can it be?" just do yourself a favor and RUN. But I'm sure my story will come out fine, right?! Here goes:

I had a dentist appointment this morning, so I left work early. Luckily, my dentist is near a Goodwill, and it is also near a blood donation center. I have been wanting to give blood for a while. I used to do it, but it always made me queasy and lightheaded, and so I stopped. But blood donations kept my mother alive for a while, and I've been wanting to donate. Just a note for my Korea/Europe friends: living in Songtan will not disqualify you to donate blood products when you are back in the U.S., but some European locations may. I think it has something to do with those anemic Brits, but I don't know for sure. Also, there are some new creepy diseases to watch out for, like Chagras and Babesiosis (which I bet is not NEARLY as fun as it sounds).

After fortifying myself with a 7-11 Coke Slurpee and my beloved sea salt and pepper Kettle Chips (no FTC disclosure needed, this post is not sponsored by 7-11, Coke, or Kettle, though I would dearly love it to be!) I went into the blood center. I hadn't been for quite some time, so it took them a while to dig me up in the computer. When they found me, my birthday was off by a year, on the old side. This made the volunteer at the desk nervous that she had the wrong person, and while she was performing another records search, I recalled why the date was wrong.

See, I was a year younger than the rest of my high school class, and was thus not quite old enough to donate when the bloodmobile came around, so I just moved my birthday back one year. When I was regularly donating, I could remember that I had lied and so would just tell them the fake date that matched their data, so it wasn't an issue. I decided the time had come to 'fess up, so I told her the truth. Well, she thought that was so funny that she told the whole staff and they all thought it was so cute that I had wanted to donate so badly that I had lied about my birthday. I didn't have the heart to tell her that I did it for the extra credit, which I desperately needed. This will probably not shock you, but I was not the most industrious student in high school, though I was enormously talented at bootlegging animal beer. This post is also not sponsored by Schmidt, though I would dearly love it to be (CALL ME; I accept beer in lieu of cash!)

Then, they asked where I had gone to school, and when I admitted that I had gone to Auburn High, they told me that to this day, good old AHS has the best turnout for high school blood donors in the entire Puget Sound. I know they must think it's because Auburn's teenage citizens are the most civic-minded, generous, plump-veined kids in all of South King County. Sadly, though, unless things have changed significantly in the ever-so-brief period since I left, I'm pretty sure it's just because AHS is the home of the kids that need the most extra credit. And cheap beer.

I did get several compliments on my nice plump Auburn veins. I often do, they are quite appealing to a certain segment of the population. Funny, no one ever mentions my stunning looks, my brilliant conversation or my charming personality. Oh, well, I'll take what I can get, I guess. And guess what? The whole time they were sucking my blood, I felt perfectly fine.