Posts Tagged With: silly

~ If You Can’t Beat ‘Em….~

Posted on November 24, 2013 by mamaboe

Every year we decorate the Carved Wooden Moose outside the Little Cottage for various holidays.  On Christmas, he sports Ol’ Saint Nick’s red hat. He really is as festive as any 9-foot moose can be.

Last year, his red hat had a little bit of a mishap, and had to be thrown away.  (By mishap, I mean that I got so frustrated when I couldn’t remove the hat post-New Years, I ended ripping the ding-dang thing clean off of his head.   Apparently I have anger management issues….)

So this year I had the task of sewing the Moose a NEW Santa Claus hat.  My Captain promised he would help design it.  I loved this idea because whenever My (big, strong hunk of a) Captain does something as sweet and sensitive as pick up a sewing needle, I get all gushy and warm inside.  Last year, it happened when Critter’s backpack needed mending….Talk about CHICK magnet.  Good NIGHT!)

Where was I?  Right, My captain started to help designing The Moose’s new holiday hat. I was envisioning just making a ginormous cone hat out of red felt, and then cutting an “X” wherever an antler or ear might be.

This is NOT how My Captain’s Left-Brain personality works.

Before I knew it, he had blue-prints, schematics, and back-up logistic plans in effect.  He was prepared.  Newsprint for pattern making?  Check.  Tape Measure?  Check.  Sharpie?  Check.  Red Felt?  Check.

But My Captain did NOT plan on one eensie weensie, but ultimately IMPORTANT aspect of this process.

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Sir Monty of Stinky Butt.

Oh, sure, he LOOKS benign enough,

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He LOOKS like he is only being attentive….

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He LOOKS like he hasn’t an evil-mastermind within that wee fuzzikins head of his.

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And then…..The Butt Wiggle.

The Butt Wiggle means attack is imminent.

The Butt Wiggle means you’d better hurry up and finish what you’re trying to accomplish.

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Especially if you are working with Sharpie Pens.  On Cream Carpeting.  New Cream Carpeting that would be reason enough for your wife to beat you like a piñata if you got ink on it.

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My Captain tried in vain to ignore Sir Monty.  He endeavored to work around him.

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All that did was induce Monty to call in the reinforcements.  Silly Captain.  You thought this would be straight-forward.  It’s just a Santa Hat, after all.

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My Captain is a smart man.  Wise enough to know when he’s made a fatal miscalculation.  Humble enough to admit defeat.

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He picked up his tape measure, and joined the party.

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Of course, Sir Monty knew all along that this would be how it ended.

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Sir Monty: 1, My Captain: 0.

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~ Earning A Man Card ~

Posted on July 20, 2013 by mamaboe

It has been hotter than a World War II Pin-up Girl here in Dickerson this week.  Though the thermometer reads 95 degrees, with the humidity that comes with the swamp that is the greater Washington DC area, the Humiture is usually around 105 degrees.  Basically, you walk out of any air-conditioned building, and the hot, wet air hits you like a concrete and steel-reinforced, brick wall.  The air is so stifling;  every breath feels used already…. like someone is breathing directly into your face.   It’s nasty.  And gross.  I don’t do well with pre-breathed air.

My Captain, when he wasn’t working this week, has had the unlucky task of digging up the wooden border around Critter and Varmint’s old playground.

The one outside in the back yard.

The one in the sun and pre-breathed air.

The one with all the bugs and yucky mud.

Poor Captain!

Critter watched him from the coolness of the kitchen, and wondered aloud about how long it would take to finish the job.  I eyed him speculatively and answered, “I dunno, but I reckon it would go a lot faster if he had some help.”

“I can’t do anything to help him,” he shrugged.

“How would you know if you don’t ask?”

Man I’m good.  Smoother than 30-year-old Whiskey, and twice as effective.  I lobbed that guilt-grenade right over his head…he never saw it coming.  Dead Bulls-eye.  I’m like a guilt-sniper.  Ka-POW.

He grumbled and went out.  And by ‘grumbled,’ I mean bitched.  Audibly.  Copiously.  He was, as they say, unwilling.

Five minutes later, however, I watched him through the window wielding a hammer, and some other strange device that, while probably originally designed for a different task entirely, looked to me like a Medieval bludgeoning device.

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Apparently My Captain entrusted him with the task of removing screws from 25-year-old pressure treated 6X6s.  This is NOT an easy task…..And certainly not if you are 60lbs, working in the sun when it is over a hundred degrees, and the bugs are eating you alive.

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I was sure there would be more, er, unwillingness being communicated.

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But Mama learned a lesson in Male-ness that day.  Instead of focusing on being too hot, or too bug-bitten, or too frustrated when screws would be difficult, Critter dug in.  He took it as a challenge, not as an undesireble chore.  And I could see that a little bit of discomfort and adversity actually sat well with him.

I’m not saying he would sign up to do it every day, but he wasn’t a tool about it.

I could see My Captain was just as surprised as I was that Critter wasn’t quitting in disgust.  It was obvious he was enjoying being ‘one of the men,’ and doing manly tasks.  You might even go as far as to say he took PRIDE in working with My Captain.

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He didn’t have time to whine.

He was too busying earning his man-card.

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~ Picnic In A Hurricane ~

Posted on July 7, 2013 by mamaboe

It all started with the small idea that we go to Lowes and buy a simple $90.00 picnic table for Pop-Pop’s cottage at the beach.  A table where the kids can eat without getting yelled at for doing so in wet, sandy-butted bathing suits.

My Captain got that familiar look in his beautiful eyes and said in his deep, quiet voice, “We could build one way stronger than anything on the market.”

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The next thing we knew, he and Varmint and Critter were doing math computations, and trying to say “3 and 3/16ths” three times fast.

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There is something you should know about My Captain:  He has more structural engineering background than one OCD man should have… and when he has a structural challenge before him, he takes it seriously.

Perhaps a little too seriously.

This anal-retentive trait served him well when he was the Task Force Leader for Maryland Task Force One during the rescue mission at the Pentagon on 9/11.  This served him well when he was working the rubble pile at the OK City Bombing.  This came in handy when he was at Hurricane Katrina’s Search and Rescue efforts.  But when he takes on a small task like a picnic table….it becomes a little overkill.

He was putting struts and braces on his struts and braces.  He was using a heavier wood than would normally be required…and more of it. He had impact drivers and hammer drills out.  He used pulleys and mechanical advantage systems.  There was rebar littering the deck, and he wasn’t even using concrete.

He was building a picnic table so structurally sound, it could withstand a Class V hurricane….complete with Tsunami….during a tornado.

But we love him and his good intent, and cheered him on the whole time.

After day one, we thought he was finished.  Silly, silly us!

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Apparently, he had just begun.

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On day two, he added cross braces and more diagonal struts.

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On day three he added double reinforced cross supports for the umbrella stake.

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This table, I kid you not, weighs at least 2 tons.

And after day three, he turned to me and said, “Ok, you take it from here.”

I blinked innocently, and he handed me the Dewalt Sander.

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And I’ve been sanding ever since.

You see, all of those cross braces and struts and double reinforced thingy-ma-bobs have hard, splintery edges that are kid unfriendly.  My job is to make it kid friendly.

And in the shower, while I’m picking saw dust out of crevices on my body that would prefer NOT to have saw dust, I can’t help but wish a hurricane would come to test the table.

We’re THAT proud of it.

Obviously we need to get out more……

 

Bethany Beach, DE, USA

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~ Parental Chaperone From Hell ~

Posted on September 12, 2012 by mamaboe

Through a process entirely unknown to me, I find myself signed up for a three day/two night John Poole Middle School outdoor education camp…and I’m going as….get this….a parent chaperone.

BAaahahahaahAHAAHAahaahahahaAHAAHAHAAaa!

I don’t honestly know how it happened.  It was a blur.  My friend….or at least, I thought she was my friend, Wendy, cajoled and flattered and finagled me into it somehow.

I’m not speaking to her ever again.

Or at least until I see her again. And even then, only if she is bearing coffee and chocolate for me.

I think she said something along the lines of, “You’ll be so good for the kids!  Your daughter needs you there!  It will be good for you to make new friends!  There will be s’mores!”

I heard this: “Yada, yada, yada, blah, blah, blah, S’mores.”

And the next thing I knew I was signed up.  Committed.

My Captain, the love of my life, said he would come too, without hesitation.  Not because he isn’t already SERIOUSLY over-committed.  Not because he relishes the idea of a complete and total lack of privacy for three days.  And not because he is crazy, though the thought crossed my mind.

He is doing it because he loves my kids. He’s doing it because he loves other kids…all kids.  He is doing it because he is driven to teach and model and encourage.  He is entirely selfless.   He is doing it because he is truly, honestly, sincerely a hero in every way.  Yes, he is a hero as a firefighter and paramedic.  Yes, he’s a hero as a rescue technician for the Urban Search and Rescue Maryland Task Force One’s Collapse Rescue Team.  But for an infinitely more important reason, he’s a hero because he has an enormous heart.   No one had to cajole him into this venture.

Me?

I’m in it for the S’mores.

Categories: Family | Tags: , , , , , , , , , | 8 Comments

~ Critter Vs The Rooster ~

Posted on July 24, 2012 by mamaboe

We are taking care of chickens this week.  For a friend. A friend who thinks we are responsible and trustworthy.  A friend who thinks enough of my children to invite us into this wonderfully fowl world of hers.

So we gather eggs.  We change water.  We spread calcium pellets.  We scatter feed.

We watch out for the resident black snakes who are known to show up from time to time.

And we avoid the rooster.

The Rooster.

THE Rooster.

Let me tell you something, my critter is not a calm child.  He is a bundle of energy, full of impulse and joy.

Roosters, apparently, do not appreciate these qualities in a human caretaker.

We had finished up the work and egg gathering portion of our visit this morning, and were embarking on our talking-to-the-hens portion, when Critter, in his usual exuberant fashion, bounded from the door of the barn to the coop.  The Rooster, who was coming in the exact opposite direction, took umbrage to this and attacked Critter’s calf.

There was horrible squawking.  There was gut-wrenching crying.  There was blood.

Fortunately, My Captain had come with us this morning, and hightailed Critter to our car and it’s very-oft used first-aid kit.  Critter’s wound had to be well cleaned because Rooster claws are full of, well, CRAP.  Nasty, bacteria-ridden chicken crap.

Varmint and I stayed at the coop and calmed all the occupants down, with a watchful eye on The Rooster From Hell, otherwise known as RFH.   Frankly, it was already business as usual to them.  Even the RFH, who simply strutted and cocked around like “That’s right!  And there’s more where THAT came from!”

Critter eventually stopped crying and asked me in the most pitiful voice I’ve ever heard him use if we could boil the eggs we gathered this morning so he could eat them for lunch.

“That would make me feel a lot better, Mom.  It would serve him right, too.”

I guess the lesson here is that revenge isn’t best served cold.  It’s best served Hard Boiled.

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