Yum

Seriously, I'm not a serious person and I think many times folks just need to relax. Have a cookie. Run tell that.

Six months in the making

It is done.

The "horror" happened the last day of May and it took until the last day of November to get it all fixed.

Here it is in all of its glory.

Now no more people in my house! I'm going to rest.

So over at the Real Housewives of Oklahoma
they wanna know what are you looking forward to the MOST on Thursday or what are you MOST thankful for?  
 It's a blog hop too so you can go back and read what everyone has written and maybe discover a new blog to read.




I'm thankful for the following:


My two girls who fight and scream and the next moment hug each other and whisper secrets only they can know.


My son, who calls me faithfully from college--when he runs out of money.


My husband, who says he'll be home by a certain time and it's guaranteed he'll be at least 30 minutes later.


My dog, Ozzie, who vomits at least once a week on the floor for me to clean it up.


The rest of my family, who during the holidays, provide me with more entertainment than the Jersey Shore ever could. GTL--Good Times Love.

Thanksgiving Week...gobble gobble?

It's Thanksgiving week. Most of us have made lists and are in the process of getting everything we need for Thursday. There are advertisements everywhere you look for food. On television, there's a constant dedication to food commercials. Morning shows have been spotlighting dishes for weeks that we can cook for the family. Desserts flash before our eyes. Just watching TV can make you hungry. Heck, I'm almost inspired to cook a few things myself.



You be careful though. This is just the beginning. Sure, they encourage you to eat now. Images of happy people with family and friends enjoying food and drink dance before our eyes. Beautiful music plays in the background while the unknowing stuff their jolly faces. 


This trickery will continue through the month of December and then advertisers will hit you with a brick full of guilty.  Just you wait til January.


On the first day of January we're all overweight slobs who've indulged way too much and shame on us--Jenny Craig is calling.  How dare we eat everything we're encouraged to buy. Now, they're selling guilt in a package on the morning shows. They're telling us how to get rid of the tire around our waists. Diet soda commercials replace the chocolate candy ones and a tear of disbelief rolls down our chubby little cheeks.


So, keep all this in mind as this week kicks it all off in royal fashion. Gobble, gobble they tell us now, but just you wait. They'll be singing a new tune. But really--do we have to dance to it?

Wow...this semester.

This semester has been kicking my butt.

I work at a local community college and I teach developmental writing. I don't know what it is about this semester, but it's going to do me in.

I've had some issues with not feeling well. My doc prescribed me a medicine that sent me to the hospital and it seems I've been working from behind since then.

Really...I could say that.

I'm just not feeling teaching there anymore, so at the end of this semester I'm going to take a break from it and see what else develops.

I know it sounds juvenile--I'm just not feeling it. In grown up lingo this is what it sounds like: I've decided at this point in my life that this may not be the path I want to pursue and I'm going to take a some time to investigate other avenues or opportunities.  Yeah...not feeling it.

Wish me luck.

Blogging Pumpkins

We're gonna do it anyway, so why not showcase some of our talent, uh er our hard earned efforts in the pumpkin carving/decorating category.

How about it ladies?

Wordless Wednesday: Begone Braces!

Which one to pick?

Mrs. McGillicutty over at the RHOK is asking:


What is your favorite John Hughes movie and why?

Pick a favorite John Hughes film...you might as well ask me to pick my favorite pair of shoes! There are too many!

OK...less drama. I'd have to say Miracle on 34th St. I know there's no teenage angst here. One of the best Christmas movies ever. And when you get tired of "I triple dog dare you!," there's always this great classic.

But then there's also Pretty in Pink, and Some Kind of Wonderful, and Ferris Bueller's Day Off too.

Is four enough because really, one was too many

Four young teenagers dead.
One high school.
Mentor, OH.
Mentor High School.

Four teenagers bullied to death at one high school? Incredulous that no one could keep them safe. Horrible that they couldn't feel accepted.

All four of these students were good looking kids. One had a learning disability. One was even hated enough that she was taunted and laughed at in her casket at her wake. Despicable.

Mentor, OH is not a rough town. This school received an Excellent rating from the state. What is going on not just in OH, but everywhere?

School administrators and teachers are not standing up against or in the way of bullying. In fact, they're leading the way.

I attended the orientation meeting at the local high school where one of my children attend. The administrators addressed the usual parent orientation topics: dress code, attendance, grade reporting etc.

The part about the dress code was interesting. The administrator put up a picture of Benjl Madden (I doubt he even knows who Benji is) to show what a student shouldn't look like at school. Benji is tattooed and pierced. The face piercing is what the administrator was highlighting and said to the crowd jokingly, "How'd you like your daughters to bring this home?" First of all, Mr. Madden is NOT a high school student and is a grown man and may very well be a nice person. Who knows? Are we supposed to pass judgement on him because of he way he looks? Yep. We should publicly ridicule and make fun of him too. That's what every student in that audience was just shown an example of--if you're different than the accepted norm, you have to pay for it.

At another recent school assembly the administrator again brought up an ongoing issue at the school--hair color. It's against the rules for students to dye their hair any color that isn't natural. That's fine. Don't have a problem with this. The administrator then went on to call out publicly a student who'd already been disciplined for having hair color, in the student assembly, by first and last name, "Isn't that right ____________ _____________?" Every student in the assembly then turned to this student to gawk. The turn of bodies and then the dead silence that followed broke my heart. The student's hair was mostly dark brown with a three to four inch bleached part of bangs on one side of the head. No color involved. What gave this administrator the right to call this student out publicly? The fact this student was different. Different is persecuted publicly. This was the second example the students saw of this at this particular school.

So now, when they go and carry out this persecution themselves, we know why. It's what they're taught.
How many more kids need to die before we stop this behavior. Is four enough, because really, one was too many.

What to wear: Halloween Dilemma

Think back to the simple days. It's Halloween and you want to go trick-or-treating and your costume is what was on your bed earlier that day--a sheet for a ghost costume and a pillow case for your candy. Ok. Maybe it wasn't always that simple, but my Halloween wear did come from something around the house.

These days we have Halloween superstores. Costumes are $30 or more. These costumes look a little "porny" especially for women and young girls. You want to dress as a referee---well you could referee the skank games in this outfit. You thought about being a fairy? This fairy has more that just her wings showing in this costume.

I have two young teen girls and most of these costumes are showing too much! The skirt barely covers the butt and the top doesn't have enough coverage either. The themes are totally inappropriate. Want to be Alice in Wonderland? Well this is pin-up Alice in Wonderland. And I'm being nice when I call it that.

Halloween is quickly becoming "Skankoween." Both my husband and I like dressing up too. In fact, we have a wedding to go to this Halloween. Notice the invitation said "Come Dressed to Kill," and not "Come Dressed to Shoot a Porno."

Somebody get me a sheet!

Cyberbullying...uh parents!!!!

You know I'm getting tired of hearing  about cyberbullying. I'm heart broken when I hear of another young person who's taken their life because of some crap that's been said or video that's been posted on a social networking site. What do we do? Not all kids are impervious to the harsh and mean words of others. Parents! Hellooooo...talking to you now.

The first thing we need to do as parents is be real. Our children are NOT perfect little angels. Even though we'd like them to be perfect--it's not happening. I never say my child would NEVER do something because as soon as I do he/she would do that very thing. If someone tells you your child is bullying you have a duty as a parent to find out if it's true and do something about it if your child is indeed being mean to others. I'm sick to death of hearing parents say, "Oh my kid would never do that." Get over yourself. I had to do it, and so can you. Plus, no one wants to hear how perfect you think your child is. GAG.

Second as parents we need to be aware. If your child (as long as they're under your roof or you're paying for their college) has a page on a social networking site be aware of what's on it. I have the ability to log on to all three of my children's pages. I see what they write and have set limits. If they post something I deem unacceptable, it has to be deleted. If they keep posting unacceptable things, then they know the whole page will be deleted. Recently my middle child, who's in high school, deleted her page because she said she was "tired of reading about all the fighting." She saw it has a negative in her life and got rid of it. Sometimes we have children who are not wise enough to do this for themselves and as parent we have to step in and do it for them. Also, there are programs out there that you can install on your kids' phones that send you any text or pics they send or receive. Your child can't cyberbully someone if you know what they're doing. Nor can they be cyberbullied without your knowledge if you see what's going on.

And most importantly sticks and stones hurt, AND words are a bitch too. They stick with us. They bruise our souls. They hurt us deeper than a physical pain. Acknowledge this fact and address it with your children. Help them to learn to process negative behaviors directed at them during school, through text message, or the Internet. When my kids come home and say this person said this about me I always question them as to how the situation developed. Sometimes my kids have provoked a negative response from a student. You can't just say rude things to someone and not expect to be treated rudely in return.

This is a complicated, social atmosphere we're raising children in today. It's our responsibility as parents to show our children how to survive in it.  Or you can just continue to ignore what you child is doing and hope for the best. It's up to you.

Today is the day

At first, the days pass slowly. Each one is harder to get through than the day before. Then those days become weeks and months. The sixth month is marked and I say, " I can't believe it's been this long." Finally, this day arrives. Today is the day. Today is one year since my mom died. I miss her everyday. I miss her 365 days worth of telephone conversations and outlandish things she would have said. I miss her 12 months worth of birthday cards signed in her fancy handwriting for myself and my children. I miss minute by minute the countless things neither I or my sister was aware she made happen and now those things go undone and unsaid.

My mother was an individual to say the least. She dressed to the nines whenever she could. She wore big hair until the day it fell out from the chemotherapy. She wore the reddest red lipstick she could find. She thought lipstick was as good as Prozac. "Put some lipstick on honey. You'll feel better." She spoke her mind no matter what the cost. She never backed down from a challenge and was more often than not labeled a "bitch" for it. She loved all her grandchildren as best she could. She even danced a couple of times a year when the opportunity presented itself. She made the best potato salad.

Yep. That was Ransy. She even had a unique name to top it all off. Today...this day...I honor her for who she was.

Ransy Marie Robicheaux Waguespack

Wordless Wednesday with Wine

Kung Fu Girl Riesling...yum

Mom's birthday

Today is my Mom's birthday. She would have been 63 today, but she died last year in late September. It's almost been a year without her now. On her birthday she loved to eat birthday cake. She'd take a little piece and eat it and then say, "I just had a little piece, so I'll just get another." I think the cake was the thing she wanted the most and she wouldn't mind eating out or having something grilled, but you better not forget the cake.

Last year she didn't eat much cake and my Dad got her some food from one of her favorite restaurants because by then she was too sick to go out and eat. The last couple of months of her life she had been eating as much red velvet cake as she could hold down. She always loved sweet things. The chemo and radiation made it hard at times, but it was one of the last things she could still enjoy. One of her last good meals was probably her birthday meal. She ate a bit for their anniversary, which is September 18, and after that she didn't eat much at all.

I remember on her 40th birthday she accidentally locked herself out of the house. She had to wait until I got home for me to let her in. This of course was before everyone had cell phones. She said it was one of her worst birthdays. She carried a key with her at all times after that. She pinned it to her bra and she made sure she was never locked out again.

I would have definitely called her today. We spent hours and hours on the phone because for about decade now I've lived at least 10 hours or more from Louisiana. Too bad there are no telephones in Heaven.

Happy Birthday Mama.

The Plout

        I love fruit and the other day at Sam's I came across a plout. Sounds yummy right? In fact, it is quite delicious. The package also called them dinosaur eggs because they are speckled like and egg, but larger than a chicken egg. The plout is a plum and an apricot mixed together. It's the size of a large plum, juicy, and doesn't have that fur skin the apricot has. Get you some!

Wednesday without Words

Morning sky

Tuesday Tirade

Buses! Ugh school buses to more specific! In order to save money this year Jenks/Tulsa decided to re-organize its bus routes. This re-organization has forced me to drive my kids to school now.

My son, who's in his second year of college, complains how unfair it is that he had to ride the bus until he could drive. I believe riding the bus builds character. I did it and it was a good socializing activity. I was in disbelief when my high schooler told me she has friends who've NEVER rode the bus. Inconceivable!

I've got a 5th grader and a 9th grader who would ride two different buses. One would pick up my daughter about a quarter of a mile from our house off the main road and the other would get picked up two blocks behind our house. They both get picked up a the same time. Here is where the problem is. How can I keep an eye on both them? And the aspect of all this that irritates me the most is one of the buses passes in front of the house. This is where it picked up my other kids the past three years!

So now I drive them because you have to keep your kids safe and having my girls at bus stops in two different places doesn't allow me to help keep them safe. A year ago a man attempted to abduct a young girl from a bus stop a mile away from our home and that has stayed in my mind.

So what's a mother to do?

It happened so fast

You know you always hear someone say "it happened so fast." I know the last thing someone saw this morning was another car moments before it changed everything for them. And it was lightening fast. I know this is supposed to be the Tuesday Tirade. (I'm going to get to that on my next post.) I witnessed someone die this morning and it's made quite the impression on me.

I was driving to work on Hwy 11 just past the airport exit in Tulsa when I noticed an SUV coming across the highway from the other direction. It slammed into a BMW in the lane next to  me. Pieces of this accident flew past my windshield and bounced off the top of my car.

I pulled off the side of the highway and so did quite a few other cars. A TSA agent, with his blue uniform on, took over telling people what to do. After flipping over three times the SUV had come to rest on the side of the road upside down. A bloody arm hung out of the smashed window.

I thought the BMW driver had gotten out of his car and was standing next to it with a cellphone talking to 911. The man was visibly shaken and his eyes were locked on to the car. He wasn't the driver. The driver of the car sat behind the wheel still--dead from the impact of the crash.

I couldn't look at any of it. I had to get into my car and leave. Several men were running around trying to be useful in a situation where nothing was left to do. It took emergency service workers 45 minutes to get the driver of the SUV out of his vehicle and he's in the hospital in critical condition. When I left work these cars were still on the road and both lanes were still shut down.

Hug everyone you love today.

From the Sea of Cortez: Looking through a keyhole to the Pacific Ocean

Tuesday's Tirade

Last Tuesday I had the rant and I'm still in the same boat so maybe Tuesday needs to become Tuesday's Tirade.

The same boat I'm in is the "my house ain't fixed yet and I still ain't got no kitchen yet" boat! I called my contractor last Thursday and he said he'd call be back later that day. No call. I called Friday and left a message because I hadn't heard from him. Still haven't heard from him. It is Tuesday right?

No work has been done yet this week. I'm going to have to put on my other hat now. I hate that hat. It's tight on my head and makes me act irrationally. But it has to be done.

Swamp People

I'm from Louisiana and last night the History Channel debuted it's new show "Swamp People." Of course this show is about the part of Louisiana that I'm from--the southern part. The part filled with good food and "coonasses." The accent that flows from their mouths is home to me. Last night the show focused on alligator season. I got to see water I'd skied and hydroslided (hydroslid? kneeboarding to everyone else) in right along with those gators. My right leg bears a scar from an alligator. This is my home. These are my people.

The whole show made me miss home. I've lived in many states and even though I don't want to go back and live in Louisiana, it's still my home. I miss the kind people, the food, the music, the attitude about life that exists there. If you're not from Louisiana you might see these folk as uneducated idiots out tempting fate to catch a few gators so they can live in their trailers and house boats and not have to work too much. You'd be wrong. These are hard working people who see the land as a provider and they're its caretaker. The take only what they need and they can get what they need from that land---and that's enough for them. These are the good people that would "give you the shirts off their backs" and offer you some boiled crab too.

And I miss em.

The Situation: Survey Says

This particular situation was so shocking when I heard it presented that I thought it was a joke at first. Yesterday I was listening to the Lex and Terry show (not something I'd listened to before). The show topic caught my attention in the car as I drove because they said it was Wednesday Women's Day on their show. The show is hosted by a couple of guys and they sounded like they weren't really prepared to handle women's issues, but I thought it might be worth of couple of laughs. I reasoned it was better than listening to Ke$ha sing Tik Tok one more time.

So this little gal calls in and lays out this unfathomable story. Her sister had come to visit her for a few weeks before she heads to Germany to live and had been staying with them for about a week when this little gal's husband approached both her and her sister and told them he had something important he wanted to discuss with them. He said he had made a "survey." Now this survey consisted of a list he created to compare his wife and her sister. He said he believed he'd fallen in love with the sister. The "survey" listed such items as face, eyes, hands, breasts, stomach, back, vagina (yes--the hooo ha) legs, feet, ass, mysteriousness, personality, and attitude. He rated these items on his survey from one to ten for both of them. He then started to inform them how they rated. Both of the women became upset within a few minutes. Her sister wanted to leave immediately because she didn't want to break up their 5 year marriage, which was also the result of two children.

The husband also figured out quickly that he'd probably bit off more than his playboy mouth could chew at this point. The wife was angry and took the list from him and her sister and her went to another room.
At this point the show hosts ask how she compared to the sister. So she goes through the list with them.
She beats her sister out on most of the items except for attitude and her ass. Of course, the hosts being men kept track of the points and added them up. This was something neither of the women had done. For goodness sakes their sisters! The ONLY redeemable quality of the survey (if you can call it that) was the fact that he gave the sister a 0 on the vagina because he hadn't seen it. Wow.

This gal now wanted to know what she should do because even though they had two kids, she believed he had crossed a line, and as a couple, they'd never be able to recover or get back on the right side of that line. The hosts then proceeded to tell this woman she was stupid, a doormat, it was her fault this had happened, and that she should leave the loser as soon a possible and stick him with the kids--all terrible advice.

The husband is a disgusting idiot. I don't know what he thought he'd accomplish with that survey, but the one sure thing he did was to break up the home of his children.  I was encouraged by the fact the women had stuck together and didn't try to lay any blame. The gal said her sister hadn't done anything to encourage her husband in this direction. Maybe she can get on a plane with her two kids and join her sister in Germany. Hasta la vista dirtbag.

Good hair day

Feel the ocean breeze

Tuesday rant

Most of you know I had a plumbing mishap back in May and it ruined quit a bit. Here it is a month later and I still don't have a kitchen. My son went back to college a week early because he was done with the house being a wreck and not having food to eat whenever he wanted. I was told last week by my contractor my granite countertops, plumbing, electrical, and appliances would be installed and completed TODAY. Well it's 1 p.m. and nothing has been done. I even called him this morning and he assured me everything would go in as planned.

You want to know why I called him? Not to make sure everything was still on...that was my secondary reason for calling him.  Here it goes. I hope you're sitting down. It's been sweltering hot in OK. So on Sunday morning I went out into my garage and it smelled suspiciously like rotting garbage. I checked for garbage bags my lazy kids might have tossed out there. Nope. That wasn't the reason for the smell. I then noticed a gathering of  blow flies (you know the big ones) around my deep freezer. My eyes then darted to the wall where the freezer is plugged in. The plug-in was on the floor of the garage!! The carpenter had been here Friday and he unplugged my freezer to plug in his saw and he never plugged it back in! The rotten smell was coming from rotting food. I didn't even dare to open it. And that big bubba is filled to the top let me tell you.

So I called my contractor to tell him I wasn't about to clean that out myself! Not to mention the loss of ground buffalo meat my husband was so proud of...that's a whole other story. I think I'm going to need an intervention soon before I end up on an episode of "Snapped" or whatever that TV show is called that tells the stories of women who go into fits of rage and murder!

What do I write about?

Almost 15 years ago I wanted to get an email address. Everybody today HAS an email address--back in the day it was optional. Yes. For real. I wanted something that represented me, but wasn't my name. So I chose Ladeemelie@aol.com . I still use this emal address. Now I have a work email, but work is work and my time is my time and never shall the two meet. I went with this for the name of my blog because it was what I want to blog about--being a lady. Even though this isn't the 1800s in London, society still has expectations for us gals. We are expected to "present" a certain image and I certainly learned this the hard way so there's hope for the Snookies out there. I write about my life and how women should be positive forces for one another, instead of dragging each other down. I believe women are the only ones who can provide other women with what we need. Sure our husbands and men love us, but they just don't get it all. He's only going to listen so long to me about paint color choices for the hall bathroom and how those strappy sandals cut off the circulation in my left foot. So women, ladies, positivity...yeah that's Ladeemelie.

Books Books Books Ahhhhhhhh!

In about 20 days I've read 26 books (I'm reading 27 now). Before we go on vacation my husband and I get all of our books ready. I mentioned before he has and iPad now, so I got his old Kindle. I was reluctant at first to use it. I'm a "real-book-needa-turn-the pages" kinda of gal. After the first book I never thought of that again. In fact, I love the Kindle. I don't have to remember what page I'm on and I always had to remember because my kids can't keep their hands off my books and out slips the book marker. OH I am NOT a page bender. Nope no way. Kindle keeps track of what page I'm on and as soon as I turn it on, like magic, it's right on the page I stopped reading. I downloaded 8 books for our Cabo trip which was 8 days and on the plane back I finished the last book. Another nifty feature is all my books are in one place. I want to go back and re-read something from a book in a series all I need do is click a few times and there it is. I do sometimes miss the pages...but not that much. So 27 books! The summer is always a read-a-thon for me. Recently with all the demolition in the house I needed an escape. Walking on black tarred concrete and seeing my beautiful black granite countertops on my back patio has been quite disturbing. I haven't had a kitchen for over a month. The best place to go...into a book. I've been reading Lisa Kleypas. I haven't really been a romance novel fan, but she includes so much history into her plots. And turn your nose up if you want, but they're good books and they've saved my sanity. I teach literature and I refuse to be a book snob. So thank you Lisa Kleypas. I'm going to finish reading all the books she's written. I do go back to work Monday. My reading pace will slow down. Hopefully I'll remember this as the summer I discovered reading her instead of the summer that was ruined by a plumber.

Back to school

My girls went back to school today. One is in 5th grade and the other is a freshman in high school. I have a son who is moving back to college tomorrow also. I didn't even take pictures of my girls this morning. That is a first. I don't know what came over me. Maybe I'll do it this afternoon...won't be the same though. Maybe I'll take a picture of my son's car as he leaves tomorrow. Either way I'm sad for summer to evaporate away in this hot August heat and I'm looking forward to the routine and cooler weather of fall. I've never cried when my kids went to school. I'm not gonna start now.

This work is still going on!

No it's not done yet. And NO I don't have any pictures of it. I still don't have a kitchen to cook in and I'm darn tired of eating out. The wood floors are done. Everything is painted. The carpet still has to be done and the granite and appliances have to be put back in. Almost there. I just wish it could have happened before I went back to work on Monday. Yes. College is starting. My classes are full and I look forward to bending their little minds to my grammatical ways!

And the mess goes on and on...

So we are a week away from our 20th anniversary trip to Mexico and the work is still going on in our house. Contractors around here just don't want to work everyday. If they'd work everyday they'd be done! ARGH!

Here's what it looks like now. (Yes. That black cement is my floor for now.)

The first picture is the hallway to my laundry room. There's a bathroom in this hall too without a floor now.

The second picture is the kitchen. As you can see the lovely island with granite counter top is gone. All my counter tops are gone. Appliances gone. Three hungry kids home for the summer all day and no pantry!

The last picture is the hallway leading to the study. The wood floor survived in the middle, but not after. The carpet in the study and the our bedroom was also ruined. And the mess goes on and on.

I wish they were finished. When I leave to go somewhere I love to have the house all in order and clean so when I come back I can continue that relaxed feeling for a few more hours. I don't think that's gonna happen.

Hey I'm gonna celebrate 20 years together with my wonderful husband no matter what. So when it gets done, it will be done. Until then I'm dreaming of beautiful beaches and cool drinks.

4th and demolition

On Tuesday work is going to start on my house. I'm not quite sure of the timeline, but the contractor tells me his goal is to get all the work done before we leave for our 20 anniversary trip to Mexico. I'm looking forward to the trip--not the rest of this s#17. I'm also excited about our 20 years together!

Father's Day

Well here are my two boys. One's my hubs of course and the other is my son. It's Father's Day which means we grill steak and give the remote to my husband. We watch as many blow-em up action movies and we can in one day. Let's see it's been Iron Man, GI Joe, and now the latest Star Trek movie. My girls stay scarce as these are NOT their type of movies and after lunch my son found other things like his best friend and his girlfriend to occupy his time. Which leaves me. Typing here on this page. 

The Mess

So the plumbing mess is at a standstill right now. Workers took out the parts of the floor that were wet and now we're waiting for the estimates and exactly what work will be done to restore everything to it's original state. It's awkward being in the house with part of the floors tore up. No matter how much I sweep or clean it always seems to be spreading. There's this sawdust that's every where. It's making me nuts. All the wood floors will have to be replaced and most of the carpeting downstairs too. All of my kitchen cabinets will have to come out as well. They tell me it will take about a month to get it all done.

Friendships and the Real Housewives

You know there's a whole series of shows built around the "Real Housewives" of whatever city. If you turn on a TV or computer you know this. It's usually around this time I will catch a few episodes of one of these shows. I think whether you work or not you're a housewife. I don't know about you but I don't have nannies to pick up my kids from school, bring convicts as party guests to my friends' homes, or borrow my friend's yacht for a little afternoon jaunt. These shows should be named the "Unreal Housewives" because the things they do are so unreal. One of these housewives just filed bankruptcy claiming they make less than $100,000 a year when on one of the episodes her husband gave her that much cash to go buy furniture. Then the arguing these women do and the back biting is unreal. I've never had the drama these women have nor do I want it. I would guess if I did have that drama I'd do whatever I'd have to do to get OUT of that drama. I know it's a TV show and drama equals big ratings, but honestly after a few shows I have a headache and need to turn it off. Real housewives have real issues to deal with like laundry, meals, kids, and life for goodness sakes. Friendship is an alien concept to these gals. It's what they can get out of it and when there's nothing else they move on and run the used up friend into the ground. Sad.

Charlaine Harris' new book and the Kindle

It's summer and the read-a-thon is on! Thank you Charlaine Harris for releasing a book just in time for my summer enjoyment. I've been a fan of Harris for a long time. Sorry not a fan of True Blood though. These books are the best. They always have a strong plot and how can you not love Sookie Stackhouse. If you're unfamiliar with this author start with her first book, Dead Until Dark. If you're already a Harris reader, then you've probably already read this one since it came out in May. I read mine on my Kindle. It's the first book I've read on the Kindle since I inherited my husband's because he's moved on to the iPad. I have to admit it felt funny not to turn pages or be able to see the cover. I know that sounds weird, but I love books. It's a great book though and now I'm reading J.R. Ward's newest, Lover Mine.

We saw the movie Killers

This is not a Mr. and Mrs. Smith killers for hire movie and I'm sorry but Ashton Kutcher isn't very convincing as trained killer or the husband of Katherine Heigl. There's none of that bad ass chemistry going on between these two. Tom Selleck and Catherine O'Hara steal most of the scenes. This would have been a cute made for TV movie, but not one where you pay $8 to see it. I'd say skip it and wait for the DVD rental from Red Box.

What a mess!

Yep a mess. That's what I have here. The city ran a sewer line last summer. Thump, thump, thud all summer long as they dug along the backyards of my whole neighborhood so that we all could be hooked up to city sewage. I was fine with my septic tank thank you.  The next step was hire a plumber and hook into the city line. Simple enough. But my plumber left a 6 inch piece of pvc in my clean out and the sewage backed up into the house. Now the inside of my home is being gutted. Hard wood floors, cabinets, carpets, tranquility and summer peace all ruined. Help...

Baby smokes 40 cigarettes a day

Here's the link.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Hpuye64qoqY

What's going to become of the gulf and it's beaches?

Here's a picture of Grand Isle, LA. This is a beach off the Gulf of Mexico. I'm from LA and I went to this beach as a child. It's a really a nice secluded beach and although it's not Florida, it's close. This beach is now closed because big swatches of oil have begun washing up on shore. People from home tell me the whole smell coming in from the gulf has changed from the usual smell into something"chemically smelling." How much of the nations coastline will have to be damaged before something is done? That oil flow has to be cutoff. Now.

Who needs a passport?

Bruce Redmon, the man who is a suspect in his wife's untimely and suspicious death in Cancun Mexico, somehow crossed the border back into the U.S. without a passport. Now he hasn't been charged with his wife's death, but the Mexican government did take his passport and tell him not to go anywhere. Who cares? He showed back up in L.A. yesterday. No passport needed. His wife's family is furious and distraught. I can understand why. I can just imagine what would happen if an everyday American citizen tried to get back across the border without a passport!

Sunday mornings and cell phones

It seems it doesn't matter where people are or what they're doing, they have to do it WITH a cell phone. I hate the text-n-drivers. That's a whole other subject. We're in Sunday school this morning and we're in there for almost an hour. That's it. We have 40 or so folks in our SS class and I watched as several people texted during class and nonchalantly checked email. As you can see I noticed this and was distracted by it. Has everyone lost their manners? Lost their self control? Can't all this wait anymore? Isn't it disrespectful? I'm sure people text and check mail during church also. I must just be missing it. This concerns me because it shows how we put OUR needs before anything else. Wow. I'm just so disheartened by this. Any thoughts?

Olive Kitteridge

This is one of those Pulitzer prize books and when I consider reading one it's almost the same as when I decide to watch a movie that's been given an Oscar. Prize winners are sometimes just a load of horse pucky. This borders on horse pucky. Each chapter of the book tells a different story about someone and how Olive fits into their story. Some chapters are from Olive's perspective and other chapters are about other people where Olive is just a character in their story. It's a book without an end. Suicide is also one of its major themes and I would like a heads up about this thank you very much, but the book description mentions nothing. It's an OK read. There are some parts where I thought, "This is great writing." I understand why it was given the Pulitzer. When you're done reading it you've been moved to another place--to a different understanding.

The Reliable Wife

I just got through reading this book and it was quite a surprise. I bought it weeks ago and have been moving it to the bottom of the reading pile until there was no more pile and this was all I had left to read. This is a great book. The author had written a story of his life before and in the process of doing so came up with the plot for this story. It all begins with an ad put in the paper for a reliable wife. The story is set in the early 1900s and has quite a few plot twists. The summary of the book on back doesn't even begin to do it justice. I think it's vague because it's hard to talk about this book and not give something away. It's sorta like Sarah Plain and Tall, but with a little more fuel to it.

Rest in Peace Ruby Ester Rock Robicheaux

My little 95 year old grandmother was laid to rest this Tuesday. She's finally with the people she loved the most--the Lord, her husband, my mother who was her only child, and her two brothers. My mom died eight months ago and she just wasn't the same after that.


Her funeral wasn't attended by many because let's face it, most of the people she knew were already dead. The guy who use to cut her grass came with his wife. This man is a saint. He would stay at her house for hours after cutting her grass because he knew my grandma was lonely. He knew her life story and he didn't mind listening. His family even took her with them when she had to evacuate during hurricane Katrina. He told us stories about her and how he met her in WalMart one day. It made me smile.


Good memories. She will be missed. 

Movie to see: Waiting for Superman

Just saw this trailer for an upcoming movie. It's probably more of a documentary, but it addresses some problems with our education system. It looks really good. Here's the link so you can take a look.

http://trailers.apple.com/trailers/paramount_vantage/waitingforsuperman

Fin as in End

I've mentioned before that my mom died in September of last year of lung cancer. This is my first Mother's Day without her. She wasn't the "bestest" mom, but she was my mom. Even though it's been eight months since she died, I've still thought at least five times that I need to go and buy her a card and wondered if I should pick her up something else for Mother's Day. I'm still getting use to the fact I can't pick up the phone to call her and tell her the things that no one else in this world is interested in hearing but a mom. I just keep those ideas to myself now. Also I'm hoping one day soon tears will stop welling up in my eyes each time someone brings her up in conversation.

 Ruby, my 96 year-old grandmother is still alive. She is my mom's mom. My mom was her only child and my grandmother helped raise me through the years when my mother wasn't sure she wanted to be a mom. Ruby is laying in a hospital bed right now, ten hours away from me, and these are probably some of her last few days, possibly hours. She has been sad since her daughter has stopped visiting her and she can't really understand why. She just knows she misses her. Ruby also knows she has outlived almost everyone she's ever known. Her husband has been dead for 35 years, her brothers even longer than that. She's went to the funerals of all her friends, visiting some in the the nursing home as they took their last breaths.

The hardest part about living is the ending. There are many endings. Our childhood eventually ends. Our free young adult lives end when we have children. AND then moms this is the cruelest part, those same children that needed us for so long will grow up and leave us and not need us anymore. Try not worrying about them after 18 years of it being your sole duty to keep them safe and warm and you'll find it's not so easy. Everything has an end. Some ends lead to new beginnings here on this earth and other ends are more final.

This all leaves me to wonder what end is next and I'm anxious about it. Then with my next thought I realize I can't live my life anticipating the end because I'll miss what comes in between the beginning and the end. I'll miss the living. "Don't miss the now," I hear whispered to me.

                                                                           FIN 

Moon Over UHAUL

Tulsa has some weird architectural spots. This UHAUL truck on top of a building is one and the moon just happened to be out on a beautiful afternoon to add to the "weirdity' of it all.

Sweatpants: The New Birth Control

Recently I heard about an author who wrote how the ONE pair of sweatpants she bought led to the downfall of her sex life.  After being married for a couple of years she went out and bought a pair of sweatpants because she felt like now that she was married she could relax. Her butt needed a hug. First of all, I can't believe she didn't own a pair of sweatpants before. Didn't she exercise or ever go for a brisk walk in the cool morning air? Oh, I know. Sweats have a bad reputation. Who says you have to wear them all the time? The preferred Stepford Wife outfit in my neck of the woods is the sweet, but short tennis skirt. It's a far cry from the ugly grey sweat pants. I still wouldn't be caught dead in that skirt! What are these gals running around hoping to catch a pick up game of tennis somewhere? Anyhoo, I digress...back to the sweats. So this gal buys the sweats for comfort and before you know it her and the hubs aren't having sex anymore. Now was it really the sweatpants' fault? I think not. If it were that easy to discourage your man from the goods, well let's just say we'd all own at least 5 or 6 pairs. AND forget about taking birth control. We could just slip on a pair of sweats and call it a done deal. Our teenage daughters wouldn't own anything else. We'd fix their wagons! Whoa! Hold on here...it's not that simple. The sweats are getting a bad rap from a woman who was apparently tired or bored. We are each responsible for keeping our intimate lives exciting and inviting. Somebody in that relationship dropped the ball. Maybe they both did. But seriously, you can't blame the sweatpants.

Reading new author Gail Carriger

The newest author I'm reading is Gail Carriger. I don't just stick to one particular genre of novel. I love to read. Why else would I be a professor of English unless I enjoyed reading? This novel, Soulless, is self described as a novel of "vampires, werewolves, and parasols." It follows the doings and undoings of character Alexia Tarabotti. Carriger describes Alexia with a snappy Brit wit and builds a strong plot. The story begins with Alexia being attacked by a vampire. Now this Victorian spinster is not without her soulless ways and parasol for protection. The vampire quickly finds himself dead and Alexia finds herself in the midst of sinister plan--not to mention a romance that may also be in the works for her as well. I like humor with my writing and Carriger delivers. So if you enjoy tales about vampires, werewolves, and a quick witted gals this may be a novel for you. I'm currently reading her second novel Changeless. I'll let you know more about it once I'm done.

Spring has sprung

I know it's like the old saying goes Spring has sprung because I've a planted a few flowers and they are looking nice. When we lived in Iowa we didn't plant anything until after Mother's Day because there was always a chance of freeze until around that time and being from the deeeeep way down south this was torture for me. So here I get to plant a little earlier. Just wait until it's frying outside and these petunias won't be looking too great then!

Mommy Hysteria

I'm always paranoid about my children playing in the front yard. For years we lived in the country and knew for 10 minutes before someone got to the house because you could see their dust trail on the horizon, but now we're city folk. When I see something like this it just fortifies my belief that children aren't safe playing in the front yard anymore.

Also, there's been a ton of break ins and a couple of attempted child abductions in the area near my home--neither of which I've heard about on the news. My neighbor's home was broken into and the police told her there are so many break ins right now that they're having trouble getting to the homes quickly and sometimes it's hours before they can respond. Some of these home even had alarms going off during the robberies.

This morning on the Today Show there was a segment on "Mom Hair." It caught my attention and I decided to listen to it. I imagined there would be pictures of women with hair straggles hanging, hair thrown up into a clip or pony tail, or moms pulling their hair out, but what TS was really getting at was how women make themselves ugly after childbirth. I had to think about this. Did I do this? What do they mean short hair is making myself ugly? The more I listened to this segment, the more irritated I became. Yes, mothers do sacrifice their looks some days to make sure all the kids are dressed so they can all get out the door on time. I'm sorry all of us can't and have never looked like super models. We have hair and some of us are creative with it and try new styles while other women are content to wear the same hairstyle year after year. This past Christmas I saw an old college friend who I hadn't seen in years, but she was rocking the same helmet hair she had back in our college days. Oh and surprise! She managed to get a husband and a career with that hair mind you! I think it's crazy how "they" tell us we shouldn't let "Mom Hair" take us over and we should try to keep our lovely long locks flowing for our men. These are the same men who we love and adore, but bless their hearts they wouldn't take fashion advice or hairstyle advice from us. My husband has had the same hairstyle since kindergarten. He's not changing it because he has "Dad Hair." Why do you think it is women have to be held to a higher standard?

Corollas and Pintos

The topic of cars and whether or not you name your car was brought up to me a couple of weeks ago by a friend who's a journalist. She asked if we'd ever named our car and what kind of car it was. She later wrote an article about it. We've had a couple of cars we've named. There was one in particular I remember. We owned this car back in the day when we were poor...I mean really poor. In fact, my in-laws gave us this car because we needed a second car and couldn't afford to buy one. It was a blue Toyota Corolla. It was a stick shift and what really made it unique is that it was missing most of the floorboard. Driving down the highway, seeing the road zipping by under my feet was not something I found comforting. We named this car "The Mullet." This was after the fish, not the hairdo, but now that I think about it either reference would probably be appropriate.

Now all this got me to thinking about a car my mom owned in the 70s. This car is infamous today because of it's exploding gas tank. Yep. The Ford Pinto. My mom was a single mother raising me and she bought this car because it was a good buy and because it was a gorgeous shade of yellow. I have a life's worth of memories from that little car. We lived in Louisiana and the fire ants loved that car almost as much as my mom did. Every morning she'd had to sweep out the mound they had built in it overnight. No matter how diligent she was in sweeping them out, a few still managed to stay behind and bite us. This car also took me through my first tornado. Now mind you, the funnel of the tornado never actually passed over the car, but it came close enough for the car to be rocked and pushed around as it roared by. Last but not least, the Pinto took it's last breath on the street corner next to a Texaco gas station. I was probably 6 years-old and we were stopped at the light at the corner. I was fascinated by the goings on out of my passenger window, where I sat without a seatbelt because those hadn't been invented yet. A huge crane was erecting a giant new Texaco sign on a towering poll above the gas station. The crane swung around to get in position to lift the sign up to where two men tethered to the poll waited to help guide the sign to it's final resting place. The crane operator gunned the engine and began backing up into the street--straight toward where we were waiting for the light to turn green. After a few choice words of indignation, my mother laid on the horn of the little yellow Pinto. The sound was lost over the engine sound of the big crane. My mother luckily realized that we had to get out and get out fast. She grabbed me by my left shoulder and pulled me as she exited the car. Loud popping and cracking noises filled my ears as we made our way across the street to safety. We turned around to see to crane now stopped on top of the Pinto and a flurry of people making their way to us. The Pinto, well let's just say it was a flat as a pancake under the weight of the crane. My mom's legs were scrapped and bleeding, but I was without a scratch. Who knows? Maybe that was a blessing in disguise. At least the gas tank never had the chance to explode.

Cigarettes don't cause cancer

I had an interesting conversation with one of my students the other day. This student is in his/her late teens to early twenties and we were discussing bad habits and another student threw in smoking as a bad habit. Eventually the conversation wound itself around to the fact smoking is a really bad habit because it causes cancer. This student became very passionate about the fact that he/she believes that there's no data or facts to prove smoking causes cancer. Even on a pack of cigarettes it's noted that smoking can cause cancer. There's a definite correlation and it's almost unbelievable that a person would ignore all the information out there on smoking like it were a conspiracy theory. We can put walking on the moon and getting lung cancer from cigarettes in the same category--doesn't happen. It's all made up. The truth is we'll tell ourselves (myself included) whatever personal story we have to so we can believe that and keep on keeping on. We lie to ourselves basically. If not about cigarette smoking, then we lie to ourselves about something else. Winston Churchill once said, "A lie gets halfway around the world before the truth has a chance to get its pants on." This is so true. In fact, yesterday a friend put this quote up on Facebook and it got a lot of comments. I think if Winston were still kicking around he would have appreciated what I added to the quote. And when the truth does get its pants on it suddenly realizes it left its fly open.

It's a Mad Mad World

In honor of my daughter's birthday (she's a teen) we've transformed the house into Wonderland and will be hosting a Mad Tea Party this evening. They've dressed up and arrived, so let the madness begin!

American Idol Fan

Yep. I'm an American Idol fan. I'm almost ashamed of it this season. I only dare whisper I watched the show last night and whisper even lower when I ask someone if they watch also. I've watched the show since the first season and I'm excited as each new season begins in January and scratch my head and wonder what to watch when the season ends in May.

Uhn Uhn. Nope. Not this year. I'm having a hard time even liking the singers this year. Oh sure Crystal Bowersox (CBX) is a good singer, but do I like her? Big Mike has really surprised me with his big voice, yet I'm not sure about him. You can forget the guy who took his shirt off for Kara. I'm gonna hate on him all season just because he did that. Siobahn Magnus is a little spark of hope, but she thinks she has to screech out the ending of every song since she learned how to in the shower ever so long ago to a Kelly Clarkson song. Each week Didi Benami gets the shaft from the judges even though she gives a good performance. Not that I'm on Team Didi either though.

I'm not even going to bother going through all of them. I'm going to wait and see if any of them can step it up. Go hard or go home. Maybe this will be the year when no one will be worthy of the title of American Idol.

Return to the blog

I took a break from the blog because my mother was diagnosed in January of 2009 with small cell lung cancer. She lost her fight with that disease in September of 2009. If you've ever lost someone you know what I was doing. RIP Mother, grandmother, friend Ransy Waguespack