An Ode

Yesterday I saw you in the store
You were bright red and shiny
I knew I had to buy you
I did and I brought you home

Today I remembered that you were here
You were in my house, in my kitchen
First I put the bread in the toaster
Then I got out the Miracle Whip and a knife

I got out a plate and then I got you
As I sliced you I saw the juice and seeds trickle out
I knew that you were perfect
The toast popped up

First I smeared on the Whip
Then I delicately laid you on the toast
I sprinkled you with salt
the secret ingredient

I put on the second piece of toast
and smashed you just right
I cut the sandwich in half
I then got ready to partake

I knew when I saw you in the store
I had to have you
I was right
You were delicious

Sweatpants and Tuxedos

When I was a sophomore I used to run around the neighborhood to stay in shape. One Saturday evening I had just returned from a run when there was a knock at the door. I answered to see Brian Ridenour dressed in a tuxedo. To say the least, I was mortified. I was in sweatpants, I was sweaty, my hair was a disaster and I'm sure I stunk. He came in and told mom and I that he was taking Martina to the prom that night but he didn't know where she lived and he needed directions. Mom said that I could just go with him and show him where the house was. I almost fainted. How embarrassing. So I went with him. We actually did talk thank goodness. To sit there in silence would have been a slow painful death. Then as we pull up I start to get out. He tells me that they can drop me off. I explained that I'm already in my running outfit so I may as well run home. In all reality I just wanted to get out of there as quickly as possible.
Soon after, Brian left on his mission. When he returned the first thing he did was ask me out. He told me he always wished that he could have taken me to prom that night. Soon after our first date we were married. Now we go running together sweatpants and all, but we also like to get dressed up sometimes too. This time we are either both in sweatpants or both in our fancies.

I saw a leprechaun today. He brought me a pot of gold. I took my pot of gold to the bank and exchanged it for some American dollars. Not too wise, I know. So now I'm a millionaire. I am currently flying in my own private jet to my new condo in Salt Lake city and after that I will make a stop to my new ranch in Carson City. I bought both of those online as soon as I got back from the bank. Now, don't worry, I promise all of you a new car. Hey, I've got an idea. If nobody else is doing anything today, let's all go to Ireland right now. That would be fun. Well, leave a comment if you want to go too. Don't forget to wear green.

The other day I was getting my boys ready for school. We couldn't find a pair of shoes for one of the boys. Normally, I would have already been standing by the window watching for the bus. But this day I was looking in the trunk and under the coach. I heard something outside so I opened the door to see the bus was already there. It was about two minutes early. I called Dougan over but the bus was slowly driving away. I figured it was okay because the other boys were running so behind that I knew I would have to drop them off anyway and it wouldn't be that big a deal to drop Dougan off too. So we all got back to looking for the shoes. Then we had to look for the backpack and the jacket. While I was looking for those I thought I heard something outside again. The bus was back, so I called Dougan over again and we went out to the bus. The bus driver started yelling at me that she had been out there for two minutes waiting for me. I told her I had already seen her leave and was just planning on taking him to school myself at that point. She didn't listen and just kept going on about how she's going to be late now because of me. I told her, that I didn't ask her to come back.
I was so upset by the way she was acting that I called the transportation depot. I told them what happened and he agreed that there was no reason for her to be snippy with me. I explained that I didn't ask her to come back and that it was her choice. He told me that normally they don't come back but if they have time they will. Now I was really mad. She acted like I had ruined her whole morning, but really I didn't. She chose to come back because she had time. Okay, so I was fuming and I debated picking Dougan up from school that day so I wouldn't have to see her. Then I decided to let him ride the bus home.
When the bus came she wouldn't look at me. I just stared at her smiling. The next day was the same thing. She stared out her window and I was just smiling at her. This went on for over a week. Then last week I saw her breaking her route and she came up a different street and totally bypassed my house. I waited ten minutes after the time she should have been at my house and then I called the transportation depot. He radioed her and told me she'd be there in five minutes. When they came she apologized for being late and said it was because another parent wasn't there the first time so she had to go back. Hmmmmm. So at least she was speaking to me again. Then on Friday I went to watch Koen's 2nd grade class swim at the YMCA. She was there. She has a son in the same class. I talked to her as if none of the other stuff had happened and she seemed to let out a sigh of relief and talked to me throughout the duration of the swim class. So, it looks like things are resolved and the bus driver is no longer angry with me.

I love you mom

Today my kids were angels. They obeyed every word that I spoke. They played nicely together. I didn't hear a single cry. We spent our afternoon singing hymns. They cleaned the whole house for me. The diapers were dry and unsoiled all day. The only thing I had to do was prop up my feet and watch some Jane Austin movies. When it was time for bed the kids all gave me a hug and kiss goodnight and each told me that they loved me and then they all quietly went upstairs and got ready for bed and fell asleep.

One Year Older

One day when I was a little girl it was my birthday. I was turning 4 years old. I remember that nobody said happy birthday and I didn't get any cake or presents. I was sad but too proud or too shy more likely to tell Mom and Dad that they had forgotten my big day. On my "fourth" birthday I thought it was funny that I had a little secret. Nobody knew that I was really five. They all thought I was four. When it came time for school to start I asked if I could go. Mom said that I wasn't old enough and that I had to wait one more year. I wondered if I should let the cat out of the bag yet or keep my secret. I decided to remain silent.
Over the next years I just pretended I was the age they thought I was. Nobody had a clue that I was one year older. I went through kindergarten and first grade. When I was seven I knew that I was supposed to be baptized because I was really eight. By this time I didn't want to tell anybody because they might be mad that I kept such a big secret from them. So I didn't tell anyone. When I was in second grade we were learning about birthdays. My teacher said that everyone was either born in 1977 or 1978. I knew that must mean I was born in 1976. When I went home I asked my mom what year I was born. She told me I was born in 1977. I did not believe her.
I decided to look in my baby book. I snuck into my mom's bedroom and opened the drawer with all our books in it. As I looked in mine I was shocked to see that my birthday really was in 1977. How could this be possible? For years after I tried to figure out what the heck I was thinking. The only thing I can come up with is that maybe I heard somebody say that it was August 3rd and I thought they said October 3rd. I don't have a clue.

Big Big

In a big big town there was a big big street. At the end of the street there was a big big house. Inside the house there was a big big staircase. At the top of the staircase there was a big big hallway. At the end of the hallway there was a big big door. Behind the door there was a big big room. Inside the room there was a big big closet. Inside the closet there was a big big box. Inside the box............there was.........a big...........big.........booger. AAAAHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

CSM

I was waiting at checkout one day. There was only two people ahead of me. There were not many lanes open so my lane really started to fill up. There were about 4 people behind me. The cashier obviously had some physical problems. She was shaking the whole time she was working but she was actually pretty quick. I had seen her before and she's worked there for a long time. Anyway, I know people were getting really impatient because of the line but I knew it wasn't the cashier's fault. She was going as fast as she could. There was a csm however who was just sort of walking around. Then out of the blue she comes up to our cashier and starts bawling her out that she's not going fast enough. The cashier just took the abuse and went on ringing everybody up. I was mortified. I could not believe that this csm would come up and embarrass this cashier who was one of the only employees working as far as I could see.
When I got up to the cashier who looked like she was having an awful day and that she was about to cry at any moment. I told her that it was not right what that csm did. I knew that she was working as hard as she could. I also said it loud enough that the others behind me could hear me. I figured that if they heard what I thought it might change their thinking in case they were taking the side of the csm and I did not want any of them to be snotty to this poor cashier. After I got done with check-out I went right up to customer service.
I had to wait about 15 min. before I even got to speak with anyone. They had two people working there but they were going very slowly. They also were talking to each other so we all just had to wait for them to work at their convenience. By the time I got up there I was steamed. I asked to speak to a manager. They asked about what and if they could help me. I explained that I would end up speaking to a manager anyway and I figured their time could be used more wisely to just page the manager and help the next customer.
I waited another 15 min. Finally a manager appeared. She asked if I had a problem. I explained that it wasn't really my problem but the store's problem. I told the story of the cashier and the csm. I described my disgust. I talked about my less than positive view of the customer service workers. I then talked about how it was amazing how long it took for a manager to come up to the service desk. I said that whatever they pay the cashiers they deserve more. I said that whatever they pay the customer service desk worker or the managers was way too much. I said they shouldn't be paying the one csm anything at all. I've seen her before too and she's always just standing around.
I felt like my voice was heard and I left. I've been back to the store and guess what, nothing has changed. The lazy csm is still there. The slow customer service workers are still there and that poor cashier is still there getting no respect. Sad ending I know.

Fortune Cookie

I was sitting in a Chinese restaurant with my friend and roommate. We had a lovely dinner. Afterward the fortune cookies were brought out. Her's said something about love or something. Mine said that there was a suspicious character watching me. I felt the hairs on the back of my neck begin to rise. What kind of a fortune was that? I told my friend and we scanned the restaurant. There seemed to be only one suspicious character. There was a man eating alone about three tables behind me. He was facing our table. My friend said he had been watching us during the dinner.
I admit, I was a little freaked out and since we were done we decided to get out of there. We paid and left. After about two blocks I dared her to look behind us just to check. She did and said with a quiver in her voice that he was following us. We knew we were only one block from our bus stop and we hoped that we wouldn't have to wait long. Luckily the bus was there and we hopped on. So did our friend. We got some seats in the back of the bus where we could watch him. We knew we had seven stops until ours and then we had to walk five blocks to our apartment, unlock the door to the building, walk a long hall, go up one floor by elevator, walk down another long hall and then finally unlock our apartment until we would be safe. Needless to say, we were not feeling confident.
We were trying to decide if we should try to go home or if we should try to go somewhere else more public first to try to lose him. But we also didn't know if it was just our imaginations getting the best of us. At the time we were both sort of fit so we decided we would just go home and hopefully we could out run him if needed. We sat in our seats and jumped out the door the last second before the doors shut and just started running. Neither one of us wanted to turn around to look so we just kept running. She had her key out for the building and I had my key out for our door.
We made it too our building and while she was getting the key in I saw him coming. He was definitely after us. Luckily we were faster. We got in, ran down the hall, up the elevator, into our room and slammed the door. Then we called two friends of ours and related the whole story. They came over immediately and checked things out. They even went around our building and neighborhood to look for the guy as we described him. We never saw that guy again.

Born in A Barn

This is one of my favorite stories to tell.
My mother was pregnant with her seventh child. It was a fairly calm day and we were all home except for Dad who was on a trip. Us kids were all just lounging around in the living room watching cartoons when mom walked into the room and announced she was going to have the baby. Mom usually had plenty of time to get to the hospital so she was in no rush. She told us to all go get some pjs and a change of clothes because we were going to stay at Gramma's for a little bit. We all went up and gathered our stuff and then got loaded up in the van. While driving my mom seemed to be in pain. We got to Gramma's and Mom said, "Something is not right." Gramma had some experience with midwifing and Mom had gone through this six times before. Gramma told Mom, "You are having this baby here."
The older girls were put in charge of watching the little ones and the boys were put in charge of cleaning a space in the barn. Gramma brought out a bunch of quilts to the barn. We could see Gramma and the older female cousins going in and out from the barn to the house getting things like towels, blankets, and water. Finally they all came out with a little baby wrapped in a yellow blanket. Then Gramma made the bed for Mom and she and the baby rested the rest of the day.
Whenever my youngest sister would behave a little badly it was always fun to say, "What, where you born in a barn or something?"

Chalk the Walk

My second year of college is when I feel I really came out of my shell. I had the best roommates and they brought out the best in me. We often did crazy things for fun. One of my favorites was getting dressed up in wild outfits and walking on to campus to get frozen yogurt. We each had to act however we were dressed. Once I went as a Charlie's angel. That was fun. Anyway, out of all the fun stuff we did, there was one that really stuck out. I decided we needed to complete a covert operation. I made some self-destructing notes for each of my roommates. It layed out the mission complete with all new handles and any code words they needed to know. We would find any opportunity to discuss our mission in front of others to build up the excitement. We talked about the "chicken" being in the "kitchen", and the "hens" might stop the "chop". It was fun to see peoples reactions to our secret code.
So the night of the mission finally arrived. Our mothers were at college that week with us and of course my adventurous mom was right there with us. With our black get-ups, secret maps, and chalk in hand we arrived at the predesignated spot to chalk the walk better than it's ever been chalked before. We mostly wrote things like, "Welcome Moms" and "Ricks Rules!!!". Of course every time someone was coming we had to jump into the bushes. I had to army crawl a couple times and of course do the ninja roll.
Then all of a sudden we were surrounded by campus police. There was about 6 of them. My mom yelled "RRRRRUUUUUUUUUUUNNNNNN!" We tried to spread out to get away but the guards caught all of us. They gave the moms each a little shake of the head and told them to go get some sleep. The rest of us got taken to the security office. We had to show our IDs and then the interrogation began. My friends all sang like canaries. I wasn't going to lie anyway. I knew I would take the heat. So they finally let us all go home but I had to meet with the dean the next day. I went to meet with him and he told me how disappointed he was. I believe he called me ridiculous even.
Okay, so my punishment was to "wash the walk". I had to show them my class schedule and they found an opening that was during prime campus traffic. Unfortunately it was during my lunch so I had to go hungry. I sort of wished we hadn't used so much chalk because there was a lot to clean up. I started cleaning up. I got several reactions as people went by. Professors looked at me very angry like. Some students looked at me like they thought I was a dork and others congratulated me. Moms looked at me like they felt sorry for me. I had only been cleaning for about 10 min. when from around the corner I saw a small mass of people coming toward me with buckets and brushes in hand. It was my roommates and good friends, a couple strangers and some moms. They were there to help.
We cleaned it up quickly from that point. And what do you think I learned from that experience? That if you have friends to back you up, it's always a "GREAT IDEA".

Kool-Aid

The local grocery store was having a sale on Kool-aid. Me and the kids love it so I went to buy some. I got to the check-out with about 20 packets of Kool-aid and a bag of sugar. The cashier says to me, "I haven't had Kool-aid for a long time." I say, "Well, I have a bunch of kids at home." She says, "I can't believe people give it to their kids. It's practically all sugar and it's disgusting." I was in shock. I mean how rude. I then say, "Well, cashiers normally do not tell customers that their purchases are disgusting and bad for children." She says, I didn't mean to offend you but it's true." I say, "Well, how old are you, 20??, well when you grow up and have kids, which is hopefully not in the near future, then you can give them whatever you want, but for now could you please just keep your mouth shut and ring up my Kool-aid." Then she just gets a little smirk and finishes ringing up my stuff. As she hands me the receipt she says, "You should give your kids milk or water to drink." I say, "Excuse me, do you think that I don't? Are you that naive to think that because a person buys a lot of one item than that is all that they have in their house? I do give my kids milk and water and juice. Occasionally I will give them a treat and instead of giving them pop I would rather give them Kool-aid, which is on sale right now and that's why I bought so much. We do not drink Kool-aid everyday for every meal. We have it only about once every two weeks. Now I know a person of your size and maturity level does not know how to take things in moderation, but I do. Now, may I please speak to your manager."