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We were sitting at dinner earlier this week, Troy, Grandma Jane, Daughter Gwendolyn, Son Garrick, and I, listening to Garrick regale us with a story that happened at school in Mrs. Brown’s third grade classroom.  He finished the story with the sentence, “Well, at least it wasn’t puke!”.  (Mind you, this is when we are all eating chicken Pot pie and vegetables in a creamy, puke like sauce.  Normally my homemade pot pies’ gravy looks creamy white, but I had run out of white wine for my sauce and so used red.  This resulted in a pinkish gravy for the chicken and vegetable lumps to lay in.  It did, indeed, resemble puke.  Thank the lord for camouflaging Pie Crust.)

ANYWAY…”Well, at least it wasn’t puke!” was the attention getter for all of us.  There was a moment or two of silence, and then we all burst out laughing.  Yes, I know, I know, this is no way to instill table manners into a rambunctious 8 year old boy.  But, he is so dang funny with his inflections and his facial expressions, and the stuff that comes out of his mouth is classic.  Troy, being the quick thinker that he is, verbalized how that phrase would end just about any sentence well.  Then hot on the heels of verbalizing that thought, he realized his mistake.  Because the rest of that night, and still on through this latter part of the week, my adorable critter is finishing people’s sentences with “At least it wasn’t puke!”

Me: (as I’m shaking the rain off of my bathrobe and the mud off of my shoes) “I forgot to take the trash to the street last night and just had to do it in the rain!”
Garrick:  “Well, at least it wasn’t puke!”

Gwen: “I don’t want to scoop the catbox today!  Its got too much in it!”
Garrick: “Well, at least it wasn’t puke!”

Troy: “There is a cat hair in my coffee”
Garrick: “Well, at least it wasn’t puke!”

Grandma: “I bought you all some fantastic eggs from Hedgeapple Farms!”
Garrick: “Well, at least it wasn’t puke!”

Do you have the idea yet, or shall I continue?

And here is the thing…. I don’t want to squash his sense of humor.  Inappropriate?  Maybe.  Obnoxious? Most certainly.  Funny?  Absolutely!  And if you DON’T think so, your funny bone is in SERIOUS need of a tune-up.

Now then, THAT all started at the beginning of the week. Today, I received a kind thank you note from my friend Peggy Miller, which had a picture of a ridiculous MOOSE on the front of it, chewing on some grass.  It read “Moose Chews Grassias.”  I made the mistake of trying to explain the pun to Garrick (Gwen got it the first go-round, being the MUCH older – by 18 months- and wiser sibling if you listen to her tell it).   It took a bit to explain why the spanish phrase “Muchas gracias”, and the MOOSE eating the grass was a pun; and he was perplexed about the ‘ass’ part of it.   It spiralled downhill into an explanation about how ‘grassy – ass’  was not the intention of the note’s pun.  That explanation then caused him to roll around in a peel of laughter envisioning a Moose chewing grass out of someone’s butt.  It’s all very convoluted, but the point of it is, we now have two new constant additions to anything we say around Garrick this week.  Either it’s, “Well, at least it wasn’t puke!” or it’s “Moose chew grassy butts!”

My apologies extend to the following:
Mrs. Brown.
Peggy Miller.
The parents of all the 3rd grade boys at Monocacy Elementary School.
All my Spanish-speaking friends.

And to this apology I would add a huge thank you to the heavens that gave me such a spirited and funny little guy.  He makes me smile. I don’t care if that DOES mean my own sense of humor is stunted to that of an 8 year old boy’s.  I love that kid!  I think I’ll keep him.

So there you have it my friends.  More tools to make you smile.   Duck Butts, puke, and moose eating grassy butts.

Yesterday I had a woman tell me I was fat.  Today I had a doctor tell me if I cut back on the McDonald’s Sausage Burritos, it “wouldn’t be a bad thing, if you know what I mean”.

Seriously?

Seriously, folks?

Do I look like this is something I don’t already know?  Do you think if you point out that my girth is impressive, I might look down and have some epiphany that “Oh GOOD LORD, when did THAT happen?”.  Come on.

Why do people feel the need to point out other people’s weaknesses and say they are “just trying to help”?  Wouldn’t it be better served to point out someone’s strengths instead?

Of course, if we are going to try to spin the positive on this, maybe my girth IS my strength. I mean, just as ADD isn’t necessarily an evil, maybe fat isn’t either.  I won’t blow away in a gale-force wind.  I am harder to kidnap than your average soccer-mom.  You can take one look at me and know I can cook like nobody’s business.  Obviously my hugs are nice and soft and squishier than my bonier counterparts.   You can bet my longevity will be cut short, and therefore I’ll use up less of this world’s resources.  My husband can rest peacefully in the knowledge that the dogs aren’t going to come sniffing around his mate. If someone is hungry, you can bet there will be a munchie somewhere in my purse on any given day. And my car.  And my coat pocket. (I don’t like to take chances.)

Fat is Fat.  So what?  So because my thighs rub together when I run, or jog, or walk, or even just cross my legs when sitting, they create enough friction heat to start a fire, does this make me a lesser person?  So what if on the rollercoaster my side of the seat tilts precariously on the turns?  Aren’t we confident in the abilities of our amusemant park engineers?  So what if anytime I get into bed, everyone who is already in it…from Troy, to the kids, to the cats, roll towards me?  Isn’t togetherness a good thing?  Who doesn’t love a good cuddle with a fat woman?

“I want you to be healthy” says my loving husband.  He wants me to live longer, and be by his side longer.  I say I don’t want to live longer if I can’t have my Lindt Truffles, or my Rum Balls, or my McDonald’s sausage burritos!  They give me joy!  So what if I run out of breath coming up the stairs?  Maybe I just need to pace myself!

So to the opinionated lady yesterday, and the doctor today, I say, I’m happy just the way I am, thanks.  I’m not out to hurt anyone (unless they come between me and the food listed above).  I’m just living my life.  There is no need to be concerned if you see me coming.  I won’t eat your lunch, or your children, or your pets.  I can almost promise you that.  You walk your road, I’ll walk mine, and we’ll get along just fine.  And my road resembles a Candyland Board Game, which, in my opinion, ROCKS.

There is nothing in the world cuter than, or more likely to make you smile, than a wiggly Duck Butt.

Most people don’t really think about it, but I do.

Have you ever been watching ducks in the water, and then they plunk their adorable little heads under the water to feed, and FLOOP! up comes their wee little butts, tails a wiggle-waggling?  OH LORD are they hilarious!  I can’t stop smiling when I think about it. My kids and Troy are well versed in catching the sweetness and humor of a Duck Butt, whether they want to be or not.  I share, you see.  Vociferously.

But(t), upon further thought, just about any butt would make you smile.  Certainly high up on that list would be Moose Butts.  Followed closely by Baby Butts.  Elephant Butts. Hippo Butts.

Cat Butts are not really the kind of butt that would make you smile.   Usually they are presented to you in an aloof, “Screw You, you are beneath me, Talk to the Tail” kind of attitude.

Human Butts CAN be funny, but, they can also be very very sad.  Tragic, really.  Why, just tonight, I caught a glimpse of mine in the mirror after my shower, and I was ready to cry.  Fortunately, I have a short attention span, and up until I typed this, had forgotten all about it.  Now I want to cry again…..

Wait, what was I talking about?

Oh yeah, Duck Butts.  You gotta love them.

And now that you have wasted several minutes of your life on this subject, minutes that you can never ever have back, I will further inject the topic into your psyche by ordering you to pay attention to the next Duck Butt (or any other butt) that is presented to you.  See if it doesn’t make you giggle, or at the very least, smile wryly.  It will.  I’ve just inserted it into your subconsciousness.

My work here is done.

You’re welcome.

This past New Years holiday weekend, Troy, Gwen, Garrick, and I slept in a log cabin in the “mountains” of Western Maryland. (You have to put the words “Mountains” in parentheses when referring to anything in the mid-atlantic after visiting Montana.  It’s a western snob kind of thing).

I forgot to pack half of the necessary kitchen requirements because I had a teeny weensie insignificant little “melt-down” the morning we left (the kind where you are yelling in the shower at anyone who will hear about every perceived wrong that was unfairly done to you in the past week.  The kind that uses a half a dozen inappropriate words, many of which you know your kids will actually google later when you aren’t looking…)  This resulted in us using Grapefruit scented bath and body gel as dish soap, and Clorox Bleach Wipes as sponges in the tiny cabin kitchenette.  It worked fine, except that our coffee, soup, beans and rice, and yogurt had a rather antisceptic, citrusy tang to it.  Nobody complained…a positive side effect to the melt down mentioned above.

I also forgot to bring flip-flops for shower shoes for us, and THAT resulted in everyone (except Troy, who simply manned up and risked the germs) showered in mommy’s crocs.  I don’t believe my crocs were ever cleaner, even when they were brand spankin new.  I also forgot to pack socks to match my pink sweatpants, so I had my olive and black and purple argyle socks with my baby pink sweatpants and my ridiculously shiny clean black crocs.  I rocked it.  Troy never felt prouder to have such a gem on his arm.

Despite all the packing blunders, we plowed on, determined to make 2012 begin with a BANG! So, we braved a State Park “First Day” Hike in Swallow Falls that was breath-taking.  Breath-taking for Troy and the kids for the amazing beauty of the wilderness surrounding us.  Breath-taking for me because, well, flubber takes a lot of O2 to get moving. (If anyone reading this happens to hike the main trail at Swallow Falls and finds a 44 year old lung somewhere in the underbrush, it’s mine.  Please return it ASAP.)  It got to the point where my beautiful 10 year old daughter, the sweet little peanut I carried around lovingly and nurturingly for years and years, told me that she refused to wait for me anymore because she didn’t want the Ranger to forget about and/or lose us.  And true to her word, she left me in the woods to fend and hobble along for myself.   I got the last laugh though, because THIS fatty McGee knows her priorities, and I had THE SNACKS AND DRINKS in my bag!  Guess I’m not so expendable NOW, AM I?? (insert maniacal laugh)

Back at the cabin, we built a cozy fire in the wood stove, and then almost immediately had to open ALL of the windows because it was molten-lava hot within 20 minutes in our tiny little cabin.  Lemme tell you what a crazy fun idea it is to be shut up in a little tiny cabin with three people who know all of your little buttons (see eensy weensie melt down above) and then turn the ambient temperature stiflingly HOT.  We should have added a couple of hand to hand combat weapons in the mix, just to make it more interesting.  Oh, it was genius.  Brilliant.  We took ‘Togetherness’ to a new level.

We had a few not-so-friendly conversations.  A little more sass than I would have liked.  A few unkind Gripes.  Quite a bit of all-out bitching.  The weekend was quickly sprialling downwards.  The term “Butt-Head” was used way too many times, in all earnestness.  (But I apologized to Troy when I calmed down.)

Then it snowed.

And since the windows were all open, we had snow IN the crazy hot little cabin.  Look up ‘Sturm und Drang’.  You’ll see a picture of us in that moment.

At some point in all of this, I sent my son Garrick outside to play with his new metal detector.  I needed him out of the cabin to save his life, you see.  Classic Family De-Escalation move.  But, blissfully unaware of the fact that his life was in imminent danger, he came running back in, breathlessly excited, eyes dancing, yelling ‘Mom! Mom! You’ve got to see this!!!’, tracking snow and water and mud all over as he did.  49% of me wanted to hightail it to the shower to have another eesy weensy meltdown (see above).  But the other 51% of me over-ruled and I followed him out to the van, where, snow falling all around us, he insisted I look at A PARTICULAR SNOWFLAKE on the window of the van.

I was thinking “DOH!  I’m out here, freezing, getting wet, pissed off from being shut up in a tiny volcano of a cabin and you want to show me a freaking snowflake!!?” But what I DID was bend down and look at what he was so ferverently pointing to.

There, on the window of the rusty old Dodge Caravan was a picture perfect snowflake.  Absolutely perfect.  Circular, even, symetrical.  Beautiful.  And my son, who was in all of this same vacation stress bullcrud I was in, showed me what was important again.

So I kissed him on the top of his head.  Agreed that it was all that was wonderful.  And went back in to clean soupbowls with bath and body gel.

Life is so freaking weird.

So, I’ve been asked to explain the moose.

WHY do I have a 9 foot moose in my front yard?

It’s simple really.

I don’t like to wear klunky jewelry.

Clears it right up, don’t it? … I didn’t want an engagement ring.  So, Troy bought me an engagement Moose.  I like mooses. They are Big, bulky, klutzy, goofy, and have comically shaped behinds.  They are also fiercely protective of their loved ones.  When angered or scared: LOOK THE HELL OUT!  When they are looking for a mate: LOOK THE HELL OUT! And they can accessorize like nobody’s business.  Have you ever really noticed those antlers?  Good lord!  It’s like a throwback to ’80’s hair.

Everyone snickers and laughs at a moose’s ridiculous form…. up and until they are actually within a stone’s throw of a moose and then they are in utter respect and awe of the big bodaciousness of that moose. Few people mess with a Moose and live to tell about it.  And yet, left to themselves, they really are gentle giants.

So you see, I totally get a moose.  I GET them.  I relate.  If I were an animal, I would SO be a moose.  And not just any moose.  I’d be a momma moose.  Cause they are as bad-ass as honeybadgers, only hundreds and hundreds of “mo” pounds bigger.

And as to the moose in my front yard….it was given to me with love by my Husband.  (All women reading this please sigh a collective “AWww!” here.) Plus, it made it safer for him if we got in a tiff…its not like I could whip off my engagement ring and throw it at him if he pissed me off royally.  What could I do?  That moose is secured in over a THOUSAND pounds of concrete, in addition to being several hundred pounds of hardwood himself.  So if I got pissed to the point that I wanted to throw something at him, it couldn’t be the moose!  I had to find other ways to show my discontent if he did something stupid and manly like fail to tell me how wonderful and perfect for him I was (am) every 10 minutes.  Which meant I had to perfect my Stink Eye.  Oh, and it’s a doozy.  My stink eye could flatten a Navy Seal.  It’s kind of a cross between the face you make when you are trying to vacuate your bowels after a night of binge eating cheese fondue (and DON’T try and deny you’ve been there…who hasn’t?) and the face you make when you suck on a lemon.

So, that, you see, is the simple and logical reason for my pre-occupation with Mooses, and the fact that I have a 9 foot moose in my front yard.  Elementary, really.  So simple you all are probably insulted that I felt the need to explain it. But, some of you DID ask.