I overheard this brief exchange the other day and it made me laugh.
My Father: I got those Cadillacs in my eyes. I’m going to get the operation this week.
Neighbor Lady: Oh…you’ll love it. You’ll just love it. That operation is wonderful.
I’m not big into playing sports. I’m actually one of the lest sporty people on the planet. I can’t get a basketball into a hoop. I can’t catch a football. I can’t hit a baseball with a bat.
When I was a kid sports meant gym class and gym class meant humiliation. I was the kid who always dropped the ball or more accurately ran away from the ball. I was the kid picked last for the kickball team. I never understood why they let kids pick teams in gym class. It’s so embarrassing for the people that no one wants to pick. The only time I excelled in an athletic activity in school was during a game of capture the flag. I managed to run unnoticed into the other teams territory. Unfortunately, I was being chased by a bee so I ran right past the flag and into the school.
I’m older and wiser now, but I’m not any more coordinated than I used to be as a child. I still suck at sports. Because I’m not good at it I don’t like it. The other day I encountered a sport that I enjoyed. It’s called disc golf. Have you ever played it? It’s like golf but there are no holes, clubs, tees, sand traps, or balls. Doesn’t that sound just like golf?
Instead of holes, there are baskets, and instead of balls, there are Frisbees. I’m not sure if anything that involves a Frisbee can really be classified as a sport, but I’m sure it can be called fun. Here’s a picture of someone playing disc golf:
He doesn’t look like he’s having fun, but that’s because even though he’s supposed to be a professional he’s obviously doing it wrong. He should get a few lessons from me. While I do approved of the raised leg technique, I definitely don’t approve of the frown.
When I get back to the UK I’m going to make my own disc golf course. I think I can make the baskets out of twigs and yarn. I’m also pretty sure I can use a dinner plate as Frisbee. That should work just fine. Right?
Photo by USACE-Sacramento
My parents are into having big blowout parties. This has happened all through my childhood. Back then the parties where outdoor summer events in our backyard. They were the kind of parties that held up traffic as cars passing on the street slowed down to see what was going on. There was a lot going on too. My father is a musician and his parties always include a jam session. Live music makes every non-musician party attendee think the party was the best thing ever.
Last night’s party was usual in that regard–live music and way more food than anyone could eat. The party was supposed to start at 6. In true Stan and Pam (my parents) fashion, they weren’t even there when the guests started to arrive. My sister and I were there alone to greet confused guests who all wanted to know where Stan and Pam where. That was a good question because while we knew where Pam was we had no idea what was going on with Stan. When I called him I was told that he was getting ready. From what my husband described though getting ready seems to mean walking in a completely different direction than the party for no apparent reason. They finally did make their appearances though and the party started.
My father invites so many people to his parties that there is no place for them all to sit. There are also usually plenty of people there that no one in our family including my parents even know. Most of these people turn out to be perfectly nice, but sometimes you get a rude entitled one. We had one of those at the party last night. My sister and I didn’t know who he was so we just referred to him as Big Nose. He talked to us like we were his personal servants. Of course, my parents didn’t know anything about this because they were busy being party hosts, but my sister and I experienced his rudeness first hand. We dealt with it by walking away from him every time he tried to demand something of us. We also made sure he didn’t get a piece of birthday cake. If you can’t be nice at the party you don’t deserve cake.
Since my father turns 80 this week my mother thought it would be fun for us all to run a 5K race together. Here the term run loosely means walk at a slow to moderate pace. The race started at 8 in the morning which was a struggle for us because my husband and I don’t get up until 9:30.
When my sister called the day before the race to find out what time it started she was shocked by the early hour and asked to speak to me on the phone. “When I agreed to this no one told me that I’d have to get up that early on a Saturday,” she said.
She was ready bright and early the next day though. We put on our matching race t-shirts, pinned paper numbers to our stomachs and headed for the start line. The runners all got to the front of the group and the walkers were to the back. When the starter’s pistol fired everyone took off running. “Why is everyone running? You told me we could walk,” my sister said. We almost got trampled by a herd of middle-aged people in running shorts and Nikes.
Once the stampede cleared we were free to have a peaceful walk at the back of the pack. Luckily, my sister’s iPhone was not cooperating with her so she had to talk to us instead of listening to music. My sister is a public defender so she has a lot of scary stories about the adventures of her clients. Outrageous tales of robbery, drug dealing and assault can be so entertaining that the first mile just flew by.
At the half-way point people cheered us on and gave us cups of water. “Why isn’t this coffee? At this hour they should be handing out coffee,” my sister said.
Despite stopping to pick up flyers from houses that were for sale along the route and taking pictures of cats in trees we weren’t the last people to finish the race. There was actually a group of people behind us. My mother was hoping my father would win for his age group just because he would be the only person in the 80 and over group. Unfortunately, a group of buff 80 year-olds showed up in short shorts and sweat bands and they ran the whole race.
My husband who is incredibly competitive would probably want me to tell you that he ran the race. Then he came back to cross the finish line with us even though he’d already finished the race. Anyway, here’s the photo of me completing my first leisurely 5K.
When we started running toward the finish line, my sister said, “What’s with this running? You told me I wouldn’t have to run.”
“We always run over the finish line,” my mother said. So we ran and we finished. Than we ate a not very good breakfast at a restaurant near the finish line.
I put my glasses back on last night. I decided that even though everything tends to look better in soft focus–here soft focus really means blurry–being able to see is a bit more practical than not being able to see. I think my insistance on not wearing my glasses was getting on my family’s nerves anyway.
They were getting tired of my need to stand directly in front of the television in order to see anything that was happening on screen. My husband was also getting tired of hearing me say, “I can’t drive because I’m not wearing my glasses.”
Lifetime movies are much easier to figure out if you can actually see the various characters and make out what they are doing. Apparently, being able to see the screen is an important aspect of movie watching…surprise, surprise.
Even though my grandmother has had success using eye exercises to have good vision in her nineties, my vision is already shot. It’s probably too late for me. I’ve decided to put my sights on more obtainable goals like building a robotic housekeeper that cooks delicious ethnic food and cleans the bathroom–not at the same time of course. My robotic housekeeper would clean the other rooms in the house too of course, but the bathroom is the room I hate cleaning the most.
When I was in fourth grade I got my first pair of glasses. I still remember the first day I wore them to school. I was so shocked by how clear everything looked. All that time I’d thought that everyone else saw the world in blurry shapes just like I did. I remember saying to my mother, “Wow! Trees aren’t just blobs of green. They have individual leaves.”
I wasn’t the kid who desperately wanted to get rid of my glasses so I could be one of the cool girls. I though glasses were cool. I thought I looked great in them. That is until my husband got lasik eye surgery.
I would never get an eye operation. Just mentioning eye operations now is making my eyes tear up, but I don’t want to wear my glasses any more. I’ve decided to deal with this problem by trying Bates Exercises.
The Bates Method is a series of exercises that are supposed to improve your eyesight. The theory is that the muscles around your eyes can change the shape of your eyes to improve your ability to focus. Bates developed a series of eye exercise you could do to train the muscles around your eyes improving your vision.
I decided to start doing these exercises. Well, that’s not exactly the truth. I’ve decided to make up my own exercises because I’m too lazy to look up what the Bates Exercises actually are. I also really like making things up, like stories, dances and dessert recipes. My made-up cookies are pretty darn good, I think I could accomplish equally good results with made up eye exercises.
When I’m in the car with my husband at night I take off my glasses and concentrate really hard on seeing. I’m not driving when I do this my husband is. It’s a good thing too because as soon as I take off my glasses all I can see is a bunch of streaky lights that look like snow flakes. I’ve put myself on a strict eye exercise routine. My husband says that the exercises just look like I’m making a really serious face, but that’s because he can’t see the tiny movements that are actually going on in my eye muscles. I do this for about 1 minute twice a week.
Is it working? Of course it is. Now when I walk around without glasses, I can see slightly more detailed blobs of color in the distance. Okay, that’s not true either, but I figure that if I pretend it’s working it will work…eventually.
I love blog comments. This blog doesn’t get many and that’s fine. I’m not complaining about my lack of comments, I’m just saying that I love comments. Don’t feel guilty or like you’re being pushed into leaving a comment. Seriously, don’t.
Sometimes I get really funny comments from people who are spamming my blog. That means they’re just trying to get a link for their website, but they haven’t actually read the blog post they are commenting on. Just the other day I got this funny comment on my Santa Mouse post from someone named Destiny.
I don’t know where you get your informatio-n but the Grand Hotel in Jerome, Arizona was NOT a former insane asylum — it was a hospital. I should know because I was BORN there (1939). Like most hospitals it did have a pyschiatri-c ward but it was primarily a hospital not an Insane asylum!!
Thanks for clearing that up, Destiny. I really appreciate it. Next time I travel back in time to 1939 to have a nervous breakdown in Jerome, Arizona, I’ll know not to go to the Grand Hotel.
I just looked up a picture of the Grand Hotel and I have to say that it does look like it might have been an insane asylum. Something about the red roof is screaming padded rooms and straight jackets to me.
I partied like a rock star this New Year’s Eve–a rock star who does yoga and watches made-for-TV movies. Someone once told me that how you spend New Year’s Eve determines what you’ll be doing during the upcoming year. If that’s the case, I’ll be very flexible and I’ll know a lot about serial killers.
This year is bitter sweet for me. You see I love the number 12 because it is one less than 13 and because 1 plus 2 equals 3 which of course is the magic number. That’s the sweet part, in case you couldn’t figure that out. The bitter part is this whole end of the world thing. I’m not sure why people are putting so much trust in the Mayan calender, I mean what have the ancient Mayans done recently? I don’t even think they managed to mark my birthday down on that thing.
If the world is really going to end this year, there are a bunch of things I need to get done before 12-21-12 (that’s 21-12-12 for my UK friends). I should go through my important papers file and get rid of the papers that aren’t really that important. I’m sure there is something else I needed to get done too. What was it? Oh yeah, I really should back up my computer. Other than that I think I’m all set for the end of the world.
We went tot he beach the other day because it was beautiful out and we thought the beach at sunset would be nice. It was nice to look at. I took a lot of pictures, but it wasn’t really the best experience. Why? I’ll tell you.
A swarm of devil flying ants landed on us and bit us with their evil little ant jaws. I didn’t know anything was wrong until I suddenly I felt like something was stabbing me in the back. My husband looked down the back of my t-shirt and saw that I was covered in flying ants. Those horrid creatures were trying to build a nest on my back.
I’m still suffering from the ant bites that itch like you wouldn’t believe. I didn’t even realize I was so attractive to ants. The next time you have an ant problem in your house invite me over. I’ll lay on the floor and they’ll all run to me. I’m the perfect environmentally friendly, living ant trap. I wonder how much I can charge for that service.
Anyway, here are the pictures I took at the beach. No ants appear in the pictures.
Christmas in our house isn’t very eventful, but this year something tragic almost occurred. My mother decided to retire Santa Mouse. When my sister found out she was not very happy.
“I don’t care if you have to take something out of the trash and put a yellow ribbon around it, we have to have hear the Santa Mouse story,” my sister said and she was serious.
With that my mother disappeared into the bedroom for a few minutes. When she came out she had Christmas tree ornaments wrapped in yellow napkins that she handed out to all of us. She told the story. Santa Mouse isn’t going into retirement yet, not if we can help it.
