Monday Mimisms ~ Ala Recuperation Bloggingham

Now I ask you.

Do you see anything remotely resembling a nurse here? But it's my fault. I forgot to unlock the dungeon door before I went to the hospital-from-hell and had my blue/green thingy out. That's medical lingo for gallbladder. Consequently, Homer is stuck down there with no way to get up here to help me and I can't descend the stairs (doctor's orders). What am I gonna do??!

I am so sick of his howling!

It's just as well he's there. He's heard this story a thousand times already. Yeah, Homer, I know it's you listening in on my phone conversations. Join the crowd. It went something like this...

"Put this on."

You've got to be kidding.

They weren't kidding.

Look at my socks.
They don't even know how to dress me. I'm trusting them to remove a vital organ??

It was 5:30 in the morning. My hair was a mess. I was not amused.But I am nothing if not brave.

Look. I know there are nurses that God sends down from Heaven on a regular basis, but the day I landed in the OR was not one of those days. How would you like to hear this when you wake up from surgery?

Nurse #1 "I don't think she's breathing right."
Nurse #2 I don't think she's breathing at all."

My son was not amused.

Back I go to the Recovery Room. Shouldn't they have been able to tell if I'm breathing before they let me out the first time??! Big Baby Boy (seen here being a smart alack wearing a mask) said they argued for five minutes about the state of my respiration and all I could say was something about calling the blogger bees.

I am nothing if not resourceful.

During one of the most unQueenly moments of my life a nurse actually told me, "I have other patients to deal with." "But my arm HURTS. You have to use small needles in my veins, Nurse Ninny, I'm trying to save us all a lot of trouble here." Several sticks later and a search for veins that would have put Columbus to shame she added, "Be still. It's all in your head."

I kid you not.

My son was on the phone with my blog buddies at the time and reading text messages, trying to figure out how people from all over the country I'd never met knew more about my anatomy than he did. He was so confused! And even in my drug induced state of nonsense I remember him laughing hysterically. "Mom, one of your internet friends said not to worry about the nurse. Something about goat voodoo?" ....Finally! Some people with some sense! I thought. I hope Ann made a big ole' batch for Nurse Ninny.

"What is Reiki? Somebody in a grass skirt just sent you some from Hawaii...maybe England. Is Kat really a cat? And Mom, who are Bruno and Guido? Bees? Bees?! You have strange friends, Mom......Anyway....they want to know if there is padding on the walls. "

Very funny, my friends, very funny. I lose my ning and you're making jokes. How many of you actually still have your nings? I'll bet not many. Hell hath no fury like a ning-less Queen ya know!

Just before I slipped into that nice fog of unknowing, they asked if I had a religious preference. That was comforting. Their timing really stinks. I looked at her as seriously as one can wearing nothing but blue paper and a rubber-banded ponytail and said, "Preference? Yes. Somebody better be praying to Baby Jeebus!" (hat tip Starr)

She laughed and warned the psychiatric ward of my impending arrival.

I am now on week 3 of Ala-Recuperation-Bloggingham. I no longer need drugs that make me see waterfalls on the wall and spiders in the bed (yes. really) but I'm beginning to think they extracted my fun bone. I know I used to have one. Friday I got to see a picture of my very own liver. It was beautiful! The other-thinga-ma-bob ...not so much. But it could be worse. Without this little adventure I might never have discovered that goat voodoo really does work and my body CAN function without wearing earrings for twenty-four hours. I'm working on my new diet of bland this week and hiding bags of Cheetos and boxes of chocolate covered cherries for later. Somebody needs to get over here and rescue Homer from the dungeon. He's running up the phone bill down there. I don't know why he's been doing internet searches on voodoo and....and....

Why am I craving goat cheese?

Looking Forward To A Snuggly Snowy Weekend

What jewels I found today in the blogosphere. I hope your weekend is restful and full of snugglies (is that a word?) with the one you love. We might get snow tomorrow!!! I'm ready. The pantry is stocked and the fire is going.
Let these peaceful messages give you a smile and warm your liver....er.....heart...soul. A few examples from last month's BlogBlast For Peace for your viewing pleasure.
Are you snuggling yet?
Grab some Cheetos and wine.
Carry on.

Author Kathleen Maher Diary of A Heretic ~ New York

Sans Pantaloons

Made by Tammy in Canada

Don't forget to snuggle. I shall return!

Window Pains and Rain

I had an eerie feeling. A presence around the corner feeling. Faint ghostly flashes of light that seemed to follow me around...what?....what was that..?
Time for bed. There are storms brewing in the south tonight. Time to hide under the covers and wait for the rain.



I first saw it standing at the east kitchen window looking out and down the hill towards the pond.

The body.

Sticking out from a log covered with leaves blown by rain and wind and promising winter changes. Legs I recognized. Arms I loved. I immediately knew who the grotesque indignity belonged to. Somebody, please help me get him out of that mess. I flew in the next room to call for help. We'd found him. Right under our noses all along. I called the hospital. The morgue. The police. The ambulance. The preacher. Any and all who could help me pick him up before my mother saw him in that condition. I couldn't look and yet I had to make sure nothing else happened to him. It was raining! I didn't want her to see and I needed to cover him up.

This is a dream you want to awake from. I did not wake up.
Boom! Crash! It's raining in Bloggingham. Wind at the window. Branches flying. Howls outside. Voices. Did I hear voices? Window panes rattled.


My brother, standing guard at the other window, watched for those who would come and shield us forever from this sight. Deterioration. Sickness. Decay. A body with no vibrancy or similarity or remembrance. To us, a painful vision. To him, a painful existence. It would soon be over though and he managed to guide my mother out of the house just they drove into the back door of Bloggingham and took him away. Such are jumbled up dreams.




Hospice rooms become your front yard. Legs become branches and beds hollow logs, wiry lines of agony-relieving-drugs morph slowly into twigs and trunks tangled with wet puddles of grace on the ground. Clean white sheets of white white death are covers of protection. Rotting leaves hide what daughters must not see. Nurses replace morgue workers and body bags carry your cradled up daddy to his spot in the old churchyard to a faraway grave of flowery rest beside his mother you know is waiting somewhere at an altar of years gone by.

It was over. He was gone.

I didn't have to see him like that ever again.

**maybe I should get the candles ready. The power could go any minute.**

Boom! Another crash! Rain beat down on my bedroom window. Half awake. Half asleep. Immersed in a dream of rain.

And suddenly there he was.
I turned around to stand face to face with my dad. Inches from him. He was wearing a bright yellow banlon golf shirt. The kind he wore on his way out to work each morning when I was a little girl. Neatly tucked in his pressed pants. Shiny shoes. A full head of dark brown hair curled thickly on top and shining piercing dark eyes that matched mine - staring directly at me - Daddy!! Daddy!! You're here! Daddy!

He looked wonderfully tanned and handsome. Virile. Strong. Sternly himself. Young. Alive. As I remembered him and yet had forgotten too. He was perfect. Whole. Healthy. My daddy.

I felt his hard shoulders underneath the shirt of banlon and smothered him with hugs and he placed his hand on the back of my hair, pulling me to him and kissing my hair. I couldn't let go. I could see my sister directly behind us over his shoulder barely able to contain her joy and impatiently waiting her turn. She grabbed him too and we cried with happiness. Daddy! It is you! The joy on my sister's face was almost more than I could take in and the three of us stood squarely in a bond of unabashed love and power.

And then I sensed an urgency that he needed to leave. We were standing at the door. We had to let him go. But this time, there was no grief. Let me say that again because I still see it and feel it this morning. There was no goodbye.

There was no grief. There was no grief. There was no grief.

She was standing just outside Bloggingham's front door. My mother. We watched as he stepped through in a sure and purposeful stride towards her. He knew where he was and why he was there. Her face lit up with delight and they embraced. We watched with excitement. They were young and in love. Strong and together. Eternity, somehow, met the strands of regret and sorrow and sickness and we stood outside a world that was privy only to them...watching as they held to that which was good and alive. In the span of a few moments he spoke not a word to either of us - yet said everything we needed to hear.
And then he walked away.

I awoke.

Just as powerfully as it began, it was over.

For awhile I lay awake in my grandmother's spindled bed staring into the darkness.

The storm was over. The rain softer. My bed warm and safe. The tears were gone and I felt a strange and sure sensation that I must remember and record every detail. I replayed it over and over....framing the sight of my father's curious yellow shirt - the smell of him - and the strength of his youthful presence just moments before.


I was shaken to the core.

How did he find his way through the long journey of flight to make it back to me? How did he know that I'd been haunted with flashbacks of graves and leaves and ugly storms? Macabre sights that tainted and distorted my memories of him.... How did he manage to find me in a pain of remembrance through all the twisted twigs and branches? How did he know what I needed..... How did he know that sometimes all I see are 3am nightmares of delirium on the third floor?

How did he know that what I'd witnessed had changed me so?

Why did he choose this rain soaked night? How did he come back from that place of rest and exuberance to ease my nightmare, turn on the light, and speak to the daughter he knows sees stories in every bit of thunder cloud she hears.
I don't know how.

But I do know that I will never.... Ever. Ever. Ever......forget the youth on his face, the restoration of his body or the strength of his arms. I don't know exactly where he is. I don't know what his new sphere looks like. But I do know that my daddy's favorite color was not yellow - you all know it was Carolina blue. Just for me, last night, he wore a symbol of strength and power and light.

And I know he's just fine.

The Queen's Meme ~ Naked Mannequins?

1. What is your favorite item to shop for and why?






My favorite item to shop for is ME. Oh. You said item not person. The list is tooooo long. Let's start with shoes. No, purses. I know! Antiques! Glorious antiques....no no no no ...earrings are my favorite. And then there are the bracelets. Skirts. Jewelled crowns. Hats. Somebody stop me.

2. Quality vs. Price. Will you buy off-brand replicas at a discount store or must you have the real thing? Why or why not?

Need I say more?

3. Have you ever asked a sales clerk to remove something from display if it is the last one in the store? Tell us what special something would make you strip the clothes off a mannequin.
(which begs the question...Are all mannequins born naked?)

See this mannequin? She was born naked. I asked my mother.

Except unless you're in the Fuji store they usually don't hold cameras.

They asked me to leave. I complied by hiding in the hat closet.

You should try it sometime.
However, I forgot I was allergic to straw.

4. I really don't care if a guy goes shopping with me. I'm in my own zone and always have a plan. Are you an alone-shopper or would you like to have company?

My shopping experiences are legendary. Infamous. And on this blog. I only live to do it again. I've been a bookstore criminal, Jackie-O-Wannabe in the antique store
Don't ask me about the arrest on Christmas Eve. But since you (I) asked...

I wasn't trying to steal the pink fan or Barbie's tiara. Really. That's hard to explain once you've picked up the Customer Service phone and pretended to help someone. You see, my bloggy people, THAT is why you hide behind fans and pink boas. Have I taught you nothing?

5. Have you ever done anything other than actually try on clothes in a dressing room? (I have no idea why this question followed the previous one. Ahem.) You (I) had to ask.
Frivolous unzipping of epic proportions occurred right here on this blog. I blogged where no man has ever gone before. That dressing room is now being excavated and moved to the The Royal Museum of Queen Nonsense in London. Oh. The Fame!


6. Do you like or do you get annoyed when salesclerks and store management follows you around asking "May I help you?" a million times? (I have no idea why this question followed the previous one.)
The Hardware Store caper daftly illustrates my propensity to get lost in ToolWorld - and find a maze of mirrors instead. I plead guilty. No man should try to "sweetheart" me while I'm buying a dishwasher. It was disgraceful.

The short answer is: LEAVE ME ALONE. I'm busy.

7. Create your very own store-brand name. (ie; Toys 'R Us, WalMart) What would YOUR establishment's name be?

WHAT ELSE?

And please, for the of all things plastic, stay out of the dungeon. It's almost Christmas. I hear there's a sale this weekend. I have new stories to tell.

I'm so there.

Monday Mimisms ~ YUK 101

There are times in your life when external forces beyond your control seek to destroy and steal the peace within. And even though you try, they seem impossible to ignore. People you love get sick, your world goes topsy turvy, and just when you think you can't take anymore, something else happens. When nothing makes sense and in a second everything makes sense and you are left with a truth so startling and irretrievably sad that it makes you physically sick. Have you ever had those moments of absolute clarity about a situation, a person, an unanswered prayer for a loved one or a lingering question in your mind.....and wish the answer had been anything than the one you got?

I do know this. There will be people there to hold you up. Sometimes others swoop in at your most vulnerable point to tear you down but I've learned it's best to hold on to the first group and toss a passing sympathetic glance to the second.

What do you do when the world makes no sense and unsettling things happen despite your every effort to ignore the changing temperature inside your personal peace barometer? Here's what I do.




1. I take a walk



2. I rant to trusted friends who know how to talk some sense into my pencil head. Then I take another walk.

3. I internally DELETE all the junky vibes and move on. Some literally go down in the trash bin of life. If only I had a magic button that would delete all the "yuk" from my life (ie: dirty dishes, flat tires, silly annoyances). Oh wait. I do! I went to college to learn that word ya know. YUK 101. It's a scientific fact that Yuk clogs up the joy.

Who needs that? Click.

4. I put on my shades...

And talk to my best friend Barbara or my sister and others. Their perspective always makes me see things in a new light. They see through my lens. I look through theirs. I usually find another shade to ponder.

Wanna borrow them?

5. I hide in an antique store.

6. And if all else fails....

I go for a drive.

Look what I ran smack dab into.

Sometimes the signs are just so obvious.

*Photography credit: Mimi Lenox*

We've Got Cake In The Castle!

And what have we here? Birthday cake? Sent all the way from Canada to my blog made by my lovely friend, Anndi. But....but.....whose birthday is it?


Sqqquueeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee!! It IS my birthday. That's what the calendar said this morning. And now we have adorable Bumble Bee Cake in honor of the magnificent Peace Globe worker bees Beehive. Travis, there's cake! Did you see?

Hush Homer....I'm trying to tell people about my birthday. Hush. Ann didn't send the cake to you, she sent it to me. And it's my day so just hush. What's that? Oh, Homer...you are not starving. Now hush, I say.. You're such a baby.

Thank you my sweet friend.
I will share my beautiful cake with all of you.

Please have a slice and save one for Homer. Maybe he'll stop talking so much if he's eating. And did you notice there are no candles on the cake? That must mean I didn't age at all this year. I must be timeless!! No candles is a good thing, right Homer? Right?

We've got cake!

Smooch!
Don't you touch that bumble bee in the corner! Homer!

That dog.

Oh For the Love Of All That Is Blog Holy, Please Remove My Ning

So I get this email during my recent and ongoing recuperation from the bed of pain known as gallbladder surgery (so lovely).

I was shocked! It read,

"Dear Network Creator,

As we've mentioned on the Ning Blog (http://blog.ning.com), we're committed to improving the performance and capacity of the Ning Platform so that Network Creators can add all of the things that make their Ning Networks the exact right social network for their interests or passions, and achieve fast performance. One way we can do this is by removing Ning Networks that have never had any activity or that have been dormant.

MimiLenoxsnetwork, a Ning Network you created, has been inactive for an extended period of time. We took this network offline recently and are planning to remove it in 4 weeks (December 18th, 2009). To prevent this from happening, simply take your Ning Network online and click the link at the bottom of the page.

We hope you will take advantage of this opportunity to build and grow your Ning Network. If you would like to learn best practices or tips and tricks from successful Network Creators, please join Ning Creators. If you have any other questions, please visit our Help Center.

Thanks,
The Ning Team"

Who knew??! My response:

I do not remember, Dear Planet of The Ning, ever creating such a thing as my Ning. I would think that if I actually had a ning I would know it. That doesn't sound like the sort of thing one forgets. I can't create a decent grilled cheese toast sandwich these days, much less an entire network. Really? That was me? I CREATED a NING Network? On purpose? Really?

Looking through my files. Nope. Sorry. I can't find a single folder that says, "On the 3rd day Mimi looked and saw that it was good." I would have remembered a historical event such as online Creationism. Is that a word? But my readers have at least another week and a half of listening to me moan and groan in the Castle's Recovery Room while I'm out of work - anything is bound to happen. Creating worlds could be an option while I'm bored out of my gourd.

And really. Do you honestly think that anything with my name on it could become inACTIVE?

I own 51 blogs already. Some publish daily, others publish hourly.... with permission, without permission, cloned, confiscated, in litigation and on the verge of litigation, there's not a lazy blog among 'em. Doozies maybe, but certainly not dormant.

And still here I sit on the very prissy precipice...uh...precipice of priss....I tried so hard to misuse that alliteration... of losing my Ning.

This concerns me.

Where did I put those pills......
I asked my surgeon if he saw my NING during the gallbladder-surgery-that -was but he said "NOPE, never saw no ning, Miss Pencil Skirt. I saw a lot of other mess, but no NING."

And yet you say I did it, so I must have. I have more important things to worry about ya know than finding something you're threatening to remove on the 18th of December that I didn't know I had or needed or created in the first place. What FOR? I'm doing perfectly fine without that little green organ they just took out last week and my skin is a lovely shade less than the green it was becoming - this is NO time to mess with my complexion. I find it oddly surreal that I've spent at least the last 10 minutes of my new gallbladder-less life searching for my ning. Maybe I'm missing out. Maybe I will miss my Ning. Maybe it holds the key to the universe (maybe she's had too many pain meds today), the Holy Grail of Nings, the light at the end of the Tunnel of Ning could be the 9th wonder of the Universe for all I know. Google being the 8th you see....Maybe it's Ning to my Nang! And all God's chillin' know that Mimi needs a Nang.

Or something like that.

Alas, I'm Ningless.

I hope it wasn't tax deductible.

Signed,

Mimi Queen of The World

Mama's Jail ~ A Thanksgiving Story

When my son was fifteen, he did something stupid. His dad, my ex-husband, gave him the usual “Atta boy don't do that again” talk, the school got their three days without his smart mouth, and I was left with the what am I gonna do with this child? nightmare invading my dreams. In those days there was no dungeon, no chains, no rack – not that I would have used it ( I didn't even believe in spanking) – but you catch my drift.

What am I going to do with this child?

The conversation went something like this: “You know I love you so I'm not even going to preface this punishment with I love you because you've already gotten a slap on the wrist but OK OK I love you.”

“Yeah, I know Mom.”
He started to walk away.

“Well, I hope you'll still love me when I tell you what your punishment is going to be.”

Although I vowed never to give the think of all the starving children speech to my child (I broke that rule many times), this time I went for the jugular. Mine was bulging. “What were you THINKING?! Do you think you can just go through life handling things this way? Do you know how privileged you are? (yeah Mom) Do you understand that there are kids in this world who would love to have your life? (yeah Mom) Why are you choosing to mess things up for yourself? Do you know that you can't play sports now? (yeah Mom) Are you listening to me?! If you don't get your act together young man you're going to end up somewhere you don't want to be and I'm not bailing you out. Do you hear me? (yeah Mom) You have no idea how close you came to getting in serious trouble today, do you? Do you? Well, DO you?? (a surly yeah Mom....See, I told you, listen to the smart mouth.) What you do right now in school will determine your future. And now you have a bad mark on your academic record and a three-day suspension before high school. You are out of control!”

“So ground me,” said the smart mouth.

“No. I will not ground you.”

He halted.

“What are you going to do?” he asked.

“Just think of it as Mama's jail.”

The smart-aleck ceased for a moment and then....."Whatever, Mom.”

I was furious with him and at my wit's end. He needed to see how the real world works. I made arrangements. It took some doing but they finally saw it my way. "You want your son to do WHAT? But he's not a criminal (not YET I thought) and we're not a juvenile detention center." (well......) "Will you please allow us to do this? I asked the nun-like administrator of this facility. “I'm not trying to teach him a lesson here, that is not the point, but he needs to see and understand with his own eyes how lucky he is and how his actions now can affect the rest of his life.”

So for the next two months that summer, we got up at five am, drove to another town and worked in a homeless shelter's soup kitchen. It was the worst of the worst neighborhoods. I had cleanup detail (you didn't think they'd let me near the food now, did you?) and he served the line.

“What are we doing here?” he asked.

I never told him why. He didn't need another lecture.
Think of all the starving children just got real.


After one week of losing his summer sleep to ride an hour in my car at the crack of dawn - with music blasting all the way - and mingle with very old people volunteers and stir canned creamed corn in a pot for an hour he said, “Why didn't you just send me to REAL jail?! I hate this!”




Uh huh, I thought. Just stir, buster.

In the middle of the second week he started to actually get up before I did. “Hurry up, Mom. We have to get going.” (Oh great, I thought. He's met a pretty girl at the homeless shelter. That's the only reason he would get up at five am. My plan has backfired. Drats!) And what was this grand revelation I expected him to learn? Heck if I knew. I was just a parent with an unruly fifteen- year -old with no respect for himself or his elders or his life. I didn't even know if it would make a difference.
All I knew was that somehow the corn and pintos and no-dessert-for-you rule would magically translate into a light-bulb moment for him. Osmosis maybe? I just knew this was the right thing to do but I didn't know how or why.

One early afternoon as I started to clean the lunch tables with a large wet rag and a bucket of soapy water, rearranging the napkins and utensils for the next meal, I looked up to see my sleepy-headed son talking with a man through the narrow serving window.

My boy had just served lunch. There was pie for dessert that day.
Pumpkin pie.The man had returned to the window for another slice.
He was dirty. Shaky.
No teeth. Scraggly. Scary. Smelly. And hungry.

The rules were clear. One serving per person. No seconds. Period.

No one was looking. And I'm thinking....We're going to get thrown out of the soup kitchen for not following the rules. Oh great! Suspended again. And this time I'm going down with him. Oh the shame. Until.....

The man who wanted more pie.

Up until this point he rarely made eye contact with anyone in the line. Especially not the kids. He plopped the food on the plate and reached for the next empty Styrofoam sadness shuffling through. People with their entire families in tow. Hungry folks down on their luck and needing not even a hot meal. Just a meal. Families living in cars through no fault of their own. On the street. Raggedy clothes crossing elbows with his Tommy Hilfiger jeans and watch.
Pork 'n beans, wax beans, any beans. Didn't matter. Please feed my child. My little girl is hungry. I saw it in their eyes. The sadness. And the shame.

I was so moved that summer. Apparently, I needed a reality check too. But that was not the point. Was it?

The man would not stop asking and he was forced to look him squarely in the eyes. I could see the wheels turning in baby boy's brown-eyed head..... “Will you shut up? I'm going to get in trouble if you don't go away.”

Silence.

And a hungry stare full of embarrassment that a life-giving gesture lay in the hands of this kid he did not know and would never know - someone young enough to be his grandchild - who held something he wanted.. something he had to beg for. And then I saw my son slip a plump piece of pumpkin delight (with whipped cream) onto the scraped clean empty plate. The man nodded appreciatively, lowered his head, and walked away.

By this time my wet rag had dropped to the table and the cleaning had stopped. My hair in a net, pretending to fold silverware sets, I watched what happened. He saw me sit down. I waited for someone to say something. I waited for him to get in trouble. No one saw his discretion that day but I'll tell you this - If I could have jumped through the tiny little window and wrapped my arms around that boy I would have done so.

He was shuffling his hundred dollar Nike-shod feet standing with a spatula and an empty pan, trying not to look at me. When our eyes finally met, the blur of tears between us said what no lecture ever could. We never talked again about the man, the pie, or his punishment.
But I was proud.

We finished our tour of shelter duty as promised and school started again in the fall.
That was fifteen years ago.

Did that summer stop him from forever being a knuckle-head? No.
Did he straighten-up-and-fly-right from that moment on? No.
Were there more nightmare dreams for me through the teenage years? Yes.

But I have to believe that it shaped his understanding of the world a bit and through all his troubles that most certainly came later, I did see – and continue to see – a great compassion develop in him for people in need.

And to this day, every time I'm offered a a slice of pumpkin pie.... I see a homeless man, a prized piece of dessert and brown-eyed humility.

Mine.

mimi writes Mimi Lenox Mimi Pencil Skirt Mimi Queen of Memes

copyright Mimi Lenox

Much To Be Thankful For

May your table be full

and your blessings many

Happy Thanksgiving

From my castle to yours

See you after the Holidays

Mimi's Anatomy

They say I don't need this.

They say I will feel better without it. So tomorrow morning, I will lose part of my pride anatomy. But let's look on the bright side (that was for you, Trav) It's really not my color anyway. I'm sure the organs above and below it could use the room. They must feel cramped from time to time. It's been a slow year for the economy. The nurses and hospital staff might appreciate my business And for heaven's sakes, it looks like a car part.


How fortuitous that I have only one. I'd hate to feel lopsided for the rest of eternity.
And I thought I could deal with losing the lovely balloon-shaped food masher until.....

"You want me to do what?"

"Okay, Miss Pencil Skirt, it's time to talk to the man who is going to put you to sleep."

"I am not a dog."

"Of course, you're not a dog, Miss Skirt...I just mean that....well...he's the anesthesiologist."

"You've been reading my blog, haven't you?"

"Your blog?"

"Everybody on the internet knows that baby boy can spell dog. Are you trying to say he can't spell anesthesiologist? Cause he can ya know.....he can!

"I can spell a.n.e.s.t.h.e.s.i.o.l.o.g.i.s.t. too. See?

"Now, let's go over your instructions for tomorrow's surgery.
#1 NO food or water after midnight, no alcohol beverages, no smoking, no fun.
#2 DO NOT wear make-up, nail polish, jewelry, or anything metal in your hair..
**Mimi raises hand**
"Excuse me, but I don't think I can do that."
Ever been ignored? I so hate that.

#3 If you have long hair put it up with a plain rubber band.

Do you realize, Bloggy People, that I had to go purchase one plain rubber band?
That brought the grand total of this little vacation to $2,000,000,000,000 and one cent.

#4 Remove all metal from your body.

And then the earrings had to go. This is too much trauma for me.

I'd better go to sleep now.


I will see you when I wake up.If not before.