Confessions of a Flower Stealer

I have a confession I need to make. It's been weighing heavily on me for many years. They say confession is good for the soul so here goes: I stole something one time. Gasp! I know! So terrible! I'm a thief! There! I said it. But I couldn't help myself! I HAD to have it. You probably would have done the same thing. Allow me to explain...

I was blessed enough to get to go to France one time and I was BEYOND happy about it. I am a true Francophile. I love everything French. I was in absolute bliss from the moment we landed until the moment we left. To make my delirious happiness even bigger, we went to see Monet's house. My entire life, his paintings have been my all-time favorite. To stand on the bridge over the water lillies, a scene from his paintings and to stand IN his house where he painted, was, for me, beyond belief.  I actually cried. Sheesh.

While strolling joyfully through Monet's luxurious garden, I noticed a bunch of pretty yellow-flowered plants, some of which had dead flowers on them. And those of us who garden know exactly what that means! SEEDS!!

 Well now.

I casually looked around and whistling, bent down slowly and deadheaded that little plant. I surreptitiously stuck it in my pocket and then waited for alarms to go off or for French-looking gendarmes to rush me in a tackle. 

Huh. Didn't happen! Did I truly just steal something? I didn't. I did!  Did I get away with it? I did! Phew! Bad girl! But I HAVE SEEDS FROM MONET'S GARDEN IN MY POCKET!! OMGOSH!!! The children's book I read to my boys when they were little, called "What If Everybody Did?" popped into my mind and I swatted it away.

While going home through the airport I was SURE I was going to get stopped and thrown in prison for breaking how many agricultural laws? 

 Attempting to look innocent with a blushing red, sweating face, I was horrified to see the drug-sniffing dog walk by and STOP right by me! He then shoved his head all the way down into my bag and I almost fainted. I couldn't breathe. 

The police guy unloaded my bag and pulled out the bunch of lavender I had in there and seemed to be satisfied that was what his dog was sniffing. Phewwwww. I was so relieved and I tried to smile at him but it just looked like I had a bad case of diarrhea. You see, I've never stolen anything before. I've never broken the law! I honestly don't know how they do it. That was utterly exhausting. Gee whiz. That was definitely the end of my criminal career. 

I carried that beautiful little bunch of seeds home, planted them in my garden and voila! A yellow flower popped up after a while. I had an actual plant that came from Monet's garden in MY garden! Amazing! Made me SO happy! 

Even though I could never handle being a Career Criminal, that one time was so worth it. I'd totally do it again. ;)

Awkward Conversation #13,847

 Awkward Conversation of the week: 🙄🙄🙄🙄🙄🙄

Missoula-based Delta employee (who is around my age and also big and handsome to boot) - "I think I've found your bag! Is it brown?"

Me - "Sigh. No, it's black."

Delta person - "Really? Does it have a white ribbon and a piece of gray tape on the side?"

Me - "Yes but it's not brown. It's black. Sigh!"

Delta guy rolls suitcase out of back room with hopeful yet confused look on his face. Yep, that's my bag. And um yeah, it's brown. It's brown?? I thought it was black! 

Me - "Uh. Ha ha!! That IS my bag! Duh! I guess it IS brown! Ha ha HA!"  (Dear Lord.  🙄 How did I not know the color of my own suitcase???) (In my defense, it is a very, very DARK brown, almost black. To me anyway.) 

Me, sheepish from having senior moment in front of this man and trying to make pleasant conversation showing him I'm not in fact nuts - "I'm really glad to get my suitcase back! It doesn't have anything expensive in it but it does have something I can't live without, a little battery-operated doohickey I NEED (because for some reason I didn't want to say the obviously embarrassing words 'Water Pic' out loud, dental implements being as shush shush as they are).

Handsome Delta employee - *blank stare*, then chuckles like, "Wow. Okay. Thanks for the info."

Me (face turning beet red, horrified at the implications of what I just said because most people, NOT me, have their minds in the gutter, sputters out) - "OMG!! WATER PIC! It's my water pic for my teeth!!" baring my pearly whites and pointing to them in a frantic manner. 

Delta Guy - looks at me like, "Uh huh." then walks away, still chuckling. 

Me on floor, unzipping suitcase  - "No! Come back! I'll show you! Look!" waving just found Water Pic in the air. 

Me to myself - "Alisha, STOP. TALKING. Put AWAY your Water Pic.. people are staring. Turn and leave NOW."

Talk about a walk of shame. 

I'm beginning to think I should never leave the house unsupervised ever again. 😂😂😂😂

High School Turkeys

Backstory to help explain my PTSD - Post Turkey Stress Disorder:

  When I was a senior, my high school was all the way across Houston from where I lived. The morning drive in rush hour traffic was lonnng. It was also dangerous, considering that everyone drove at least 80 mph and if you didn't keep up, you were roadkill. Two of my friends and I carpooled, taking our turns pretending our best to be young, female Mario Andretti's. 

One of my friends, Lisa, often drove her dad's BMW, proving that this was one brave man indeed ... or that he had really good insurance. 

The time of year was Thanksgiving and our crazy friend Lisa decided she wanted to give her on-again, off-again boyfriend a live turkey (where she obtained a real live turkey I have no idea.)  She decided to present this feathered gift to him at our school where, being filled with high schoolers, it would gain the greatest amount of hilarity and/or embarrassment possible.

There were two of us going in that morning with Lisa (besides the turkey). After laughing our 17 year old heads off at Lisa's excellent prank, Lisa put the, and I cannot stress this enough, HUGE turkey in the backseat of the gorgeous BMW. (Who knew that turkeys were so BIG??) 

Lisa climbed behind the wheel and our other friend hopped into the front seat leaving, you guessed it, Moi to keep the big turkey company in the back seat. I wasn't too thrilled about this arrangement. I mean, didn't turkeys peck or something? (Certified city girl here.) 

Please, envision this with me if you will ... you are in Houston traffic trying not to get killed and here is a black BMW flying down the highway going by you with three young girls and ... is that a TURKEY? I sat up straight and proud, not looking around, pretending there was not an actual turkey sitting right next to me. 

At first I was really afraid of this bird and I sat as far away from him as I could, smushed up against the window you might say. I was just waiting for him to peck me, at which point I planned to scramble over the seat into my friend's lap. But after we had been driving for a while, going around turn after turn, the turkey had slowly slidden over the nice leather seats and was leaning on me for support, which I thought was sweet, in a scary sort of way. It was as if he knew instinctively I was an animal lover and could be trusted. We were friends. 

But then, it was as if he suddenly felt comfortable enough to look around and since he was leaning against me and his head was the same heighth as mine, he slowly turned his ugly little head and inches from my face, looked me straight in the eye with an accusing look as if to blame ME for his humiliating vehicular predicament! I quickly pointed at Lisa identifying the real culprit but he apparently decided we were all culpable and he was going to start with the closest perp and he PECKED my shoulder! (No it didn't hurt, but still....)

As I was about to hurdle over the front seat, it occurred to me I'd be presenting a very big (and tender) target on my person for him to peck so I decided to stay put and defend myself from where I was. I screamed of course, and then bravely put my folder up between our two faces, at which he pecked (each peck accompanied by a scream)(from me not the bird) the rest of the way to school. Seriously, you'd have thought I was being attacked by a Tyrannosaurus Rex the way I was carrying on.  All the while my two 'friends' in the front seat were laughing their fool heads off. 

I can only imagine what this looked like to passing motorists. I find it hard to believe we didn't cause a pileup. I'm sure there were quite a few laughs at my expense. Tsk.

We made it to school without incident, where I leaped from the car, shaken but not hurt, where the turkey was gifted in front of a very appreciative audience, high schoolers being what they are. 

I later asked Lisa why she didn't tell me BEFOREHAND that we were escorting a live turkey to school. She shrugged and said, "You didn't ask." 

Turkey. 

;)

It's Not Cheating If You Win

This story has nothing whatsoever to do with our life on the Montana mountaintop but I thought it might give a little insight as to why I turned out the way I did... past crazy adventures (and trauma) and all that..

Scene set up: Me in my late twenties, already have two kids. Going with a group of people from Sugarcreek Baptist Church (near Houston) on a 'mission trip' (read: totally fun vacation) to a small church in Edmonton, Canada. We were showing them how to 'do' Awanas and some other kid's programs that we had at our church.

While we were showing them all about Awanas, we also entertained these wonderful people and had so much fun I can't even tell you.

 One day, for reasons that have been completely lost to me, we decided to put on a race for the enjoyment of our new Canadian friends. Also, for some reason, we decided to run this race in costumes - horse, camel, giraffe and zebra. I cannot remember for the life of me what this had to do with Awanas or Christianity in general but anyway, it was over 30 years ago so...

I was part of the camel duo, and as luck would have it, the back end. Meaning, I had to run bent over at the waist, with my hands on the hips of my girl partner who got to be the camel's front end. It is worth mentioning here that these costumes were OLD and ratty and smelly so this could be considered a sacrifice of sorts earning me points in heaven.

 We four animals (8 humans) lined up at the starting point, and then we were off! Well, the other three were off and running. Me and my dromedary partner got our legs intertwined and collapsed in a heap. Getting back up without taking off our costume was difficult to say the least but we wanted to maintain the illusion of being a camel so we made the beast of it. Our falling down and trying to stand back up was apparently, HILARIOUS to the people watching. Hump! I mean humph!

Once we were up, we looked ahead at the other three running fake animals (I could see out through some side panels in the costume), and they were so far ahead of us that we might as well quit. But no! We valiantly started running, tried to anyway, and then my partner, MUCH to my shock and surprise, takes a detour, veering smoothly off the track, cutting right through the middle of that field, straight towards the finish line. What could I do but follow? 

I looked out my little side panel and could see when the other floppy-headed beasts realized what we were doing. You could almost see the surprise and anger on their fuzzy faces! They all did a double take, and then doubled down and started running faster, because we were definitely going to win.

The roar of the crowd erupting into laughter when our camel self veered off the track to cut across was deafening. Please imagine if you will, this tattered, be-humped camel with the head flailing around, deciding to take care of matters by..... cheating! How this inspired confidence in our Christian brothers and sisters who invited us to come help them, I'll never know.

But it did make them laugh.

     And we won.

Which is all that really matters, right?  ;)

Parts Per Million!

 "Parts Per Million!" I swear, if I have to hear that one more time. Gah. 

This is Butch's pat answer whenever I complain about certain common things that happen up here on the ole mountaintop like a dead mole or two floating in our spring where we get our drinking water. "Eh, it won't hurt you. Parts per million!" 

Or when he cleans out our plastic water tank with bleach then doesn't rinse it out before filling it with more water, which we drink. "Meh, you won't taste it. Parts per million!" 

Or when there was a bloated fly floating in my tea ... 

Or dog pee in the snow we were melting for household use .... 

Or dog slobber on my huckleberries... 

Or weevils in the flour ... 

Or when he tracks in mud on my floor... 

Or leaves black fingerprints everywhere ... 

Or leaves a mess on my table .... 

Or ... heyyyy, wait a minute. Wait just one cotton-picking minute. He's using that excuse for everything!  What the heck?! How did I miss that? 

Well two can play that game! Yessiree Bob. The next time he finds a dog hair in his food and freaks out or I accidentally break the tractor, or the house is a mess I'm going to gleefully yell, "Parts per million!" and see what he does. What's good for the goose is good for the gander, right? 

I felt the need to test his little motto a bit further by putting a couple of scared, odiferous stink bugs in his milk to see how "parts per million!" worked in that situation. I wanted to see where his particular line was drawn. He picked the bugs out and drank the milk down, no problem. Huh.

Next, purely out of intellectual curiosity mind you, I decided to go for the extreme, to a place I was SURE "parts per million" wouldn't fly, so I asked him about the famous chocolate poo pie from the movie "The Help", if "parts per million!" worked there. He grimaced and said, "Hmmm... I don't think so." 

(He doesn't think so?) 

"Those Southern women could COOK! May have been worth a try."

"Sooo, you'd have easily survived the Biblical plagues then." 

"Oh yeahhh. Frogs, grasshoppers, flies, locusts, lice, dead fish. That's good eatin' right there. Pure protein!" 

Okay, so now it's clear - we have found THE man, 

Mr. Parts Per Million, who will survive a nuclear winter, hands down, no question. 

Good to know! ;)

Writer's Hearts

 I've written before, "You know you have a Writer's heart when you're going through something awful/terrible/terrifying and all you can think is, 'If I live through this, it's gonna be a great story.'" But you also know you have a Writer's heart when your own husband is going through something awful/terrible/terrifying and all he can think is, "This is gonna make a great story. I wonder how she'll write about it?" 

Case in point: 

Butch threw his back out Monday night. He was feeling better enough on Wednesday that I was able to go to town to run errands. I was concerned about him being by himself all day but he said he was fine and that I should go on. When I got back home, hours later, he was chuckling and regaled me with his "I-had-a-back-spasm-and-got-stuck-on-the-potty-for-30 minutes!" story (no, he didn't say "potty"). Plus there was no toilet paper so there were unfortunate wiping challenges, more painful back spasms, a mess of sorts and wondering how in the hecky darn he was going to actually get off the potty and out of the bathroom! Haw haw, it was sooo funny!  It was a horrible fight and a half! Chuckle, chuckle! 

And through all of that, he said all he could think about was how funny this was and wondering how I'd write about it. 

Butch -"So you're gonna write about it, right?" 

Me -"Oh gosh no. I wouldn't want to embarrass you." (Liar!) 

Butch - "No, it's okay. Go ahead. It's funny!" 

Me - "Um welll, it's a little TMI." 

Butch - "Huh?" 

Me - "Too much information. It's kinda gross." 

Butch - "But it's funny!" 

Me -"I agree but it may be a bit too much for our audience." 

Butch - "Hmph. What about your Poo Debacle story? That was, what you call it, TSP." 

Me - "TMI. That was different. That wasn't gross." 

Butch (full on pout with crossed arms) - "You really should write about it. IT'S. FUNNY." 

I hated to disappoint him because CLEARLY the thought of my writing this HILARIOUS poo story got him through that painful episode but ... as juvenile as my humor sometimes is ... even *I* have standards (as low as they are.) I encouraged him to write it himself and we could post it on HIS Facebook page because everyone already knows he has a 'potty' mouth. ;) 

(P. S. Okay,  I may actually write this funny story and save it somewhere for future poo-sterity. Posterity? Get it? And on a day when my inner child is in control, I may even share it. Stay tuned! ☺)

Hushpuppy Dilemma

 I made hushpuppies a while ago and proceeded to happily enjoy them with ketchup like always, just like I would do with French Fries. I caught Butch looking at me, his mouth agape, looking seriously confused, annoyed even.

 I asked, "What??" 

He said, "Whut are yew DEWING?? Why are you eating catchup on those?? You're supposed to eat them with butter!"

I stopped chewing and looked down at my ketchup-covered puppies and thought, "Butter? Really? Nah." I asked him, "Why butter? They're like fries."

He yelled with passion (who knew this was so VERY important??) "NO! They are fried CORNBREAD. You eat butter on cornbread right? You don't eat it with CATCHUP! Sheesh!" 

I answered, "Huh. Never thought about it like that." And continued to dip the puppies in ketchup and munch away, defiantly, while Butch looked on in utter horror. 

Later, after his complete meltdown over the whole ketchup-on-hushpuppies fiasco, I decided to reach out to my family for vindication. I wrote several of them and asked, "Hey! What do you eat on hushpuppies?" The answers I got from this simple question had me snort laughing.  Allow me to share:

One son answered, "I don't know, what?" (He thought I was telling him a joke. 😅)

The other son, who is obviously a Foodie like me, answered, "Oh, aioli or a japanese spicy mayo or chipotle, or a nice dip." 😋

One sister answered, "I feel like I'm walking into a trap." (😂) and then said, "Great. Now I'm hungry for hushpuppies!" 

And my mom answered, "Etoufe." (🤔  What???) 

I swear, they crack me up. 😂

They did all agree though that ketchup was perfectly normal to have with your puppies so I did indeed feel vindicated. It was all worth Butch's head exploding just for the laughs. Happy sigh.... I love my family, buncha characters. 😍