Monkeying Around

Have you noticed that parents get blamed for a lot of traits that their children have that aren’t genetic?

Like when a new mom is lecturing her child about putting his/her eye out, that means the new mom has turned into her mother. Or when a kid gets in trouble for egging a house, and the parent remembers that they did too.

It really doesn’t matter that that isn’t that uncommon of an experience – they’re just like their mother/father.

An example of mine: I’m a dork. I get it from my mom. I was teasing her in the grocery store yesterday for knowing all of the words to ‘Letter B,’ (the Sesame Street remake of ‘Let Her Be’). Then it hit me. I’m worse, because when picking up onions, I am singing in my head the country song ‘Vidalia,’ even though I know less than a dozen words to it. Then comes ‘Bananas in Pajamas,’ even though I’ve never even seen that cartoon. I simply picked it up from other kids when I was little.

And then on the way to work this morning, shivering on my motorcycle (I know, It’s hot, but not on a bike in the mornings), I burst into song at the top of my lungs…. ‘Let it Snow, Let it Snow, Let it Snow.’

I played in the ocean for the first time (other than for just a few minutes as a kid) recently. The first thing that struck me – the wave.

On my chin.

I was still in jeans from the plane ride and was suckered into wading up to my knees, not realizing that in a matter of seconds, water that’s up to your knees can turn to water that’s up to your chin. It’s not only the waves that adapt this advance and then retreat pattern, it seems.

Clams and mussels wash up and down with the waves, and little birds run as fast into the ocean as their little legs can carry them. Then they stop, turn their eyes toward the waves and study them. When they are coming back in, they run as fast as they can the other way, usually making it before the waves catch them. They aren’t the only ones to run and retreat, though.

I  watched my husband chasing a crab through the shallows of the gulf. It went like this – he was stooped over, running and yelling “I’m after a crab! Oh, it’s after me!” at which point he was quickly retreating. I stood back and laughed like crazy at him before I realized that I also saw a crab. It seemed huge to me. I stopped laughing and began my chase. After all, how cool if I could catch it and he couldn’t! The crab I was after also turned toward me… But it had an added advantage – it had a jellyfish in its claws.

Now, I’ve never been stung by a jellyfish, but I’ve heard it’s unpleasant. “Oh – it’s after me!” I retreated as well.

A few months ago I was sitting at a stop light on my lunch break and a total stranger jumped into my car with her two kids and yelled ‘take me to the hospital!’ I did.

It was by far the craziest thing that ever happened to me. When I told people about it, they invariably said, “only you, would that happen to.”

Later, I gave a man on a bus bench a cracker because he said he’d like to feed the seagulls. He popped it in his own mouth. Once again, people said “only you.”

I’ve noticed that people say that to me all the time. When I run into walls – “only you,” when my renter is in the police report for shooting my stove – “only you,” when I think I broke my ear by hitting it on the door -“only you.”

I began to wonder if it WAS only me these things happen to. So I decided to take a poll by asking people what the craziest thing that’s ever happened to them was.

So I decided to start with my mom… But I already know that she got stuck upside-down, elbow deep in a honey barrel when she was pregnant with my sister. So maybe I should leave out the people that I already know will have a crazy answer.

On to my sister, but I already know that she chased and caught some turkeys on the side of the road not too long back – turns out they weren’t as wild as they looked.

My brother – we convinced him to sit on an airbag and set it off (we did at least put a seat under him and a helmet on him – we aren’t completely crazy).

As I continued going down the list I realized – it’s genetic! And then I broadened my list outside my family. My coworker throws out birdseed and gets neighborhood donkeys rather than birds. The list went on and on and I’ve figured it out. You all are every bit as crazy as I am. I’m just crazy enough to admit it.

Linus once broke his leg. He was put in a cast and I was given the following instuctions: 1. Keep the cast dry. 2. Walk him, but make him take it slow - no running. Pretty easy, right? No. For a dog who was often found in the pond, number one by itself was a challenge. Number two was impossible. First experience in leash training. With three good legs and one broken one, the dog could completely drag me if a squirrel crossed his path, although he at least did have the good sense to drop his head and tuck his tail afterwards.

I wash Linus outside with a water hose. The reasoning is simple. He is an outside dog and the last time he came in for a bath was a disaster. The bath went well - the getting out was the problem. As I opened the bathroom door, Linus ran full speed ahead. I grabbed his collar and down the hall we went - my top half riding him like a horse, and my bottom half being dragged beside. He was so happy and exited, he just had to check out everything there was to smell in the house! Great fun for him, overturned furniture and water all over the place for me.

This time, Linus sat through his bath without too much complaint, probably because my husband, whom he actually does listen to, was there. Linus was smart about it. He waited until the night fell and then extracted his revenge.... He went after a skunk.

I am currently in the air looking down over Houston watching a car race and thanking my lucky stars that I'm not in a car trying to figure out the spider web of bridges below. The flight attendant, Ohmar is reminding us of all the dos and don'ts of flying. I love that you must wear a seat belt while sitting, but sitting is, for the most part, optional.

I also love the rest of Ohmar's list. On it is "The use of fingernail polish and fingernail polish remover is not permitted in flight."

The last flight attendant definitely left that off of her list. Ohmar is either very thorough or he's had a bad experience with some bored girls on the plane. Personally, I'm surprised that nailpolish remover is even allowed on board. It is flamable, after all. I know because I tried it as firestarter once, although I wouldn't recomend it - it's accompanied by a very dramatic "woosh."

I wonder, though if this rule is the airlines, or if Ohmar has added his own personal preferences. Saying so may imply a lack of class or charm, but if we can simply add to these rules, I vote that Ohmar adds "No farting in flight," to the playbook. Express airplanes are pretty small, after all. And while we're at it, they should add complimentary gas-ex for those who need reaonable accomidations.

I take a ceramic painting class once a month. I am not what I would consider an arty person. Nor do I typically like ceramics, but I have grown to love this class. The social aspect is great and it has proven much easier than I had imagined. However, I tend to like the odd-ball stuff. I don't particularly want to paint something that I've seen duplicated a million times, which is why I never paint seasonal pieces. Until my last class.

I have now painted Santa. He is ugly. Very ugly. And his reindeer is a dog with antlers. He is ugly also. I love them.

My four year old niece has painted with us before, and she is particularly proud of her hippo. It has about twenty coats of paint, and looks like it sat in pink bubble gum. It's beautiful. She saw my Santa soon after I painted him. She looked straight at him and stopped talking, which I can honestly say I have never seen her do.

"You want him?" I asked.

"No," she quickly assured me she didn't.

"He could go in your room," her mom suggested.

I have to hand it to the kid. I fully expected her to say that he was ugly or scary or simply start bawling, as she looked like she might. She took the high road and put it delicately, which is a skill that's not typically mastered by four (and she hasn't either).

Her voice cracked a little as she cried out in her high pitched little voice "He won't go with my hippo!"

Most people have had song lyrics they’ve misunderstood. I once thought a song said “Let the rabbits and bugs and alligators do the rest (in referring to punishment).” When I asked my husband what a rabbit was going to do to a person, I was informed it was rattler, not rabbit. Not my brightest moment, but better to have a misunderstanding in song lyrics than in everyday conversation.

Yesterday a manager walked up to my desk and asked me a question. He then said “Get your headlight fixed.” I stared at him blankly, blinked a couple of times, and he walked away. I didn’t realize I had a headlight out. After he walked away, one of my co-workers, Clair said “You came in at the same time as me – he couldn’t have seen your headlight.” I agreed. It made no sense. Another co-worker named Chalkey chimed in with “He said you have head lice. You have head lice Leslie?” I assure you, as I assured Chalkey, that I do not have head lice. I made sure not to scratch my head to prove my point. Somehow, that is harder than it should be when someone implies that your head should itch. For me, it’s kind of like realizing you just grazed poison oak. You don’t know how much damage was done, and you know you won’t react for several hours if you do, but you immediately want to scratch (and wash).

This conversation (and teasing) carried on for quite a while with the three of us disagreeing about what had been said: headlights or head lice? Several hours later, the manager walked back through and Chalkey asked him what he had said – wasn’t it about head lice? I chimed in – no, wasn’t it about headlights? The one co-worker, Jason, who had been silent the whole time finally spoke up. “Wasn’t it ‘Do your head like this?’” he said with a nod. Yes. That was it. The manager had simply wanted me to nod yes... And I had stared at him instead. I had probably seemed not too bright. I asked Jason why he didn’t tell us that he knew what had really been said. “The conversation was too good,” was his answer.

In my experience, there are three main reasons that someone takes the walk down the aisle in church. There is the most important reason, that makes you walk down the aisle toward the pastor, and then there are the other two that lead you the wrong way down the aisle, away from the pastor and toward the door: you or your child has to pee, or your child (or you if you’re young enough) needs discipline. The latter is never fun, is always embarrassing, and easy to spot. It is marked by a scowling parent toting or leading a very unhappy child out the back door. I remember taking that walk myself as a child.

Being as this blog is not in the political or parenting section, I will tell you that I stand neutral to the corporal punishment as right or wrong. I will say that it probably stopped me from acting up in church – mostly anyway. I found myself thinking a couple Sundays ago that if I were a couple decades younger I’d be taking that walk again.  

I have a knife keychain. It is old and faded but it used to say “Firestone Safety First.” I always found this ironic, but being as it was dull from the get-go, I’ve always thoughtlessly played with it. I have never been able to cut anything with it. However, as you can probably already see coming, I managed. Right as the pastor said “With all heads bowed and all eyes closed,” I had to open my eyes and head the wrong way down the aisle with a bleeding finger. And as always, it was not fun and pretty embarrassing. I’m just glad my mom or dad didn’t have hold of my shirt collar this time.

I detest text talk with some, but very few exceptions. The worst is when people use text talk while they are speaking face to face with you. If you say “LOL” while you’re talking to someone, well it rings less than genuine if you aren’t actually laughing out loud. And punctuation marks were made to be used other than for emoticons (I know. I’m showing my age. So sorry.)

And while LOL and IDK (I don’t know) are pretty well known, I detest the acronyms because I typically have to text right back and ask what they mean, which does not save time. For example: IDC – I don’t care, HMU – hit me up, IMO – in my opinion…. Who decided this? And will they please stop? I rarely guess right. However, my mother sends me these all the time. I think that she knows it irritates me but takes pleasure in confusing me.

Yesterday she sent me a message, and no joke, it said. “IDK IDC IDWPU.” Now the amazing part is, I actually figured it out. I’m still impressed with myself. Ten points good for nothing if you figured it out too!

“I don’t know, I don’t care, I don’t wear pink underwear.”

And if you’re anything like me, you were sing songing it halfway through too.  :)

There’s an old saying that children should be seen and not heard. I know that came from parents who were trying to teach their kids manners but it occurred to me this week that some things should be heard and not seen.

Two words for you: Mungo Jerry.

If you’ve ever seen him, you know what I’m talking about. If you haven’t, go to UTube and check out the original version of “Summertime.” The person who posted this video indicates it was filmed in the 1970s.

I get it. My mom was a child of the 70s and some of the photos from her teenage years can be summed up in one sentence: “That ain’t right.”

Even considering the era of hippies and doing your own thing and “peace out,” I was amazed. Mungo Jerry has huge mutton chops and he could probably have gotten away with that if he hadn’t also chosen to wear a fishnet shirt. Still, I get it. It was the 70s. He was Mungo Jerry and that song was incredible. With all that, Mungo Jerry could have gotten away with the mutton chops and the fishnet shirt if he hadn’t worn the huge orange scarf tied in a bow. I don’t know what it is, but there was just something creepy about the entire ensemble that I fear will come to mind every time I hear, “Yeah, we’re hap-hap-y.”

Mungo Jerry, in my book, goes down as one of those guys that should be heard and not seen. 

I woke up in the middle of the night sick. I make the decision then that I'm going to the doctor in the morning, but that still leaves the dilemma of what to take for the night. So I began going through the medicine cabinet looking for a bottle that says it's for the correct combination of ailments. Although not a winner, I find a bottle that says this in red bold letters on the front of the bottle:

Controls Coughs

Loosens & Relieves chest congestion

Clears Nasal Stuffiness

Unbreakable Bottle

That's right. Unbreakable bottle. These advertisers saw me coming. I break everything... Well almost. A plastic medicine bottle isn't on the list yet.

This leaves me with a myriad of questions. Does anyone ever really pick this cold medicine over another for fear they'll break the bottle? And has anyone out there ever broken a medicine bottle? Maybe years and years ago when they were made of glass, but these plastic bottles? Really? What would they possible be doing with them? And the biggest question of all – don’t they know that this might be taken as a challenge in some parts of the world – namely the southern US?

Yep. Challenge accepted.

I went to lunch with a few co-workers recnetly. When we got to the drive thru window, I handed the cashier my debit card.

Then the lady says those words you hate to hear. “This card has been declined.”

And I respond as you always do when that happens. “Try it again,” I tell her and hand it back.

And the response. “It’s still declined.” This time she has the beginnings of an attitude.

I began to panic. I knew I had not overdrawn my account, and no one else is on the account. What does this leave? Realization dawned.

My identity must have been stolen!

My coworkers were giving me those looks that say “poor Leslie has fallen on hard times,” and “what kind of accountant can’t balance her own checkbook?” Thankfully, one of them pitied me enough to lend me lunch money, but my mind was still on the substantial debt I could be unwittingly racking up as we ate.

About a mile down the road I realize that my card looked a little odd when I handed it out the window. I pulled it back out of my pocket and realized that the bank name of the bank on the card is not my bank. In fact, I have never actually done business with this bank. This is a card that my paycheck used to come on more than a year ago. And now I know that when the feeling of intense fear and stress is suddenly replaced with intense relief and embarrassment, the result is laughter almost to the point of tears…. And a once pitying coworker demanding my card so that it can be shredded. 

I love snow ice cream. My stepson has educated me that I’m not supposed to eat snow. He learned this in his science classes, but I don't care.

There are two good things about snow: sledding and snow ice cream. Otherwise, give me summer every day – who needs unnecessary cold? Since we haven’t gotten a lot of snow, it’s been a year since I’ve had snow ice cream and longer since sledding. However, I have just made a discovery that puts me one step closer to the ability to live in a warm climate without giving up the only two perks of winter.

I had never had anything from Starbucks. I’m not a coffee fan. However, I was buying a gift card for a friend, so I thought I might as well try something while I was there.

“What tastes the least like coffee?” I asked the lady behind the counter. She informed me that frappuccinos are not coffee based.

And this is how I discovered that vanilla bean frappucinos could really be relabeled snow ice cream, but better because they put whipped cream on top (I’m going to have to add that to my snow ice-cream recipe).

It would probably go against the brand imaging they are looking for, but Starbucks could definitely market this product to country folks like me. “Snow ice cream year round – not scraped off of a car, or left in a bowl overnight trusting no bugs got in it, and safe for kids who actually pay attention to their science teachers!”

Now if only I could come up with a better solution for sledding than a muddy field, a four wheeler and an inner tube….

You know “those days?” The ones where you wake up to the alarm going off, but you have that Saturday morning feeling? So you turn your alarm off, roll back over, and doze off for 30 minutes only to awake to the alarming realization that it is not Saturday, but Friday and you are horribly late.

So you leap out of bed, throwing covers and pillows wildly aside to land wherever they may. Then you hurriedly jerk on your pants while running down the hallway to brush your teeth. But before the first foot gets all the way through tunnel that is your pant leg, you’ve already got the second foot started in a beautiful (or not so much) mid-air ballet style leap, which means that both feet are now tangled in a cloth trap of your own making that you are trying to hold off of the floor, causing a tug of war between your upper and lower body. This leads to a painful slide face first on the carpet.

You grab a hurried breakfast of cereal. No bowl. No milk. Just a box in your hand as you fly out the door. As you dash outside to leave, you hit your head on the car door in getting in and realize that although the new whelp on your forehead may match your shirt, neither matches your pants, and you’ve forgotten to feed the dog.

So you run back to feed the dog who mistakes the sign that you’re running for “Hey, let’s play!” so you now have muddy paw prints on your shirt and pants, but at least something on them now matches, which will have to do as there is no time to change.

At the end of this day, you look back and realize that the morning was by far the best part of the day.

You know. “Those days.” Well, I hate to be a whiner, but I really wish my day had gone this well…

I spend several hours a week with a high school senior. I seem to have forgotten much of the logic of an 18-year-old girl. I find it hilarious.

She has been explaining her theories of love and relationships lately. I have to admit, although the situations never apply to me, and make me laugh, the advice at least tend to have some logic.

I've also forgotten much of the drama. Every experience is new, exciting, life-altering, or perhaps end-of-the-world. Recently, she told me very animatedly, and in a very upset manner that you shouldn't ask to stay friends with someone when you dump them. I happen to share this opinion.

The revelation came with the next statement.

"Asking to stay friends after your break up is like shooting a dog and then saying 'Oh, we can still keep it.'"

However, my favorite came a couple of days later when I expressed my surprise that her ex-boyfriend was bringing her and her friends a pizza to school. I was told, "He broke my heart! The least he can do is bring me a pizza!" And then I realized. She's absolutely right. If a pizza will make things better, I'm game.

If only I'd thought of this earlier in life, as I'm now finding it difficult to calculate whether I owe more pizzas, or more pizzas are owed to me...

My husband Dusty walked up to me and had what I though was a small moth on his shirt. I did what any good wife would do. I reached up and flicked it off.

I completely expected it to fly away. Instead it splattered, leaving a dark streak across his shirt, and dark goo all over my  finger. I then did what the average wife with moth guts on her finger would do - I freaked out. I began yelling and running around the room trying to find something to wipe my finger on before realizing the logical choice of the bathroom sink. While making a beeline for the bathroom, Dusty stopped me, demanding to know what my problem was.

"There was a moth on you and I flicked it and it smooshed and splattered everywhere!"

I managed to slow down enough to show him the "yuck" on my finger though it's still grossing me out completely and I'm in a hurry to get it off.

Instead of the wrinkled nose that commiserated with the fact that I have moth guts on my finger, he gave me that smile that I know so well. The one that says "I've married such a ditz." And that was enough to make me stop and think about it.

He had just been eating a chocolate covered ice cream cone. I had indeed splattered not a moth, but a drop of chocolate. No wonder it didn't fly away.

One to two times a week, a group of coworkers and I take a short lunch in order to take time out and work out. We use the company’s gym which doubles as a storage room, so occasionally there is foot traffic. One of my coworkers is a Pilates instructor. I am new to this. The first time I took this class, I realized very quickly that for a first-timer, Pilates is code for “OW OW OW OW!” It involves a lot of stretching in ways that most of us are not used to. And while most of us can recite the benefits of regular exercise by heart, I have found one that I did not know.

I was told that some of these exercises are good for depression. I was skeptical. We were instructed to lay on our backs with our feet straight up, and using our arms, to lift our backsides off the mat so that now only our upper backs and up were on the ground and the rest was straight up: the candle position. And lying there, with a group of women who otherwise typically only see the professional (okay, semi-professional) side of me, I realized that it was true. Pilates must be good for depression. There is no way not to giggle when you’re in such odd positions and a startled non-Pilates coworker walks in the room. I may not be sold on the science, but I’m definitely sold on the silly.

You should be quick to laugh at your own mistakes and slow to laugh at others. But sometimes you just can't help it. No one that I work with has been able to resist laughing about the "new girl's" blunder this week. Well, with the exception of the owner of the stolen car. 

The "new girl" was asked to pick up cases of paper using the CFO's Explorer. He gave her the code to unlock his door and told her that the keys would be in the cupholder. She walked up to the SUV, typed in the code, got in, took the keys from the cupholder, and took off.

She quickly decided he must have a more sensitive side than she thought, as there was a romance novel between the seats and sappy music playing on the radio. Once reached destination, she opend the hatch and saw, in big bold letters, the word MOUNTANIER. Realization dawned. She had taken a saleswoman's vehicle by mistake. She immediately began calling the owner, but with no answer, was sure it was because the cops were being consulted already. She was not looking forward to trying to convince them it was accidental grand theft auto.

As it turns out, the saleswoman hadn't locked her doors at all which is why the "new girl" was able to open the door after punching in a code. And, you guessed it, the keys just happened to be in the cupholder.

The story has a good ending. New girl was forgiven, and we've all found out that she takes teasing incredibly well, appologizes with grace, and has no idea what different vehicles look like. I've also heard rumors that the saleswoman may start locking her door.

Have you ever heard someone's job title and wondered what exactly that meant? Or misunderstood it completely?

I am an accountant who hates taxes. For many, this is hard to understand. Many of my friends and family call me with taxes questions often, and almost as often, I explain that I'm not sure and go look those answers up.

Recently, when my husband, who is in multi-craft maintenance, gave me a generic answer to "what did you do today?" I probed deeper and ended up with an explanation with at least a dozen words that I needed to look up about machinery that I do not understand in the least.

This led me to wonder - if accounting and maintenance can be so easily misunderstood, what about less mainstream jobs? Case in point - I sit by a breeder manager. That might raise some eyebrows before I mention that I work in the poultry industry. And I just found out that there is such a thing as a Mother Repairer.  Do not get excited. This is another job description that isn't as transparent as it may appear.

And oh, by the way, I love you mom!

Leslie Fite is a blogger for the Siftings Herald and is the daughter of Siftings Editor Wendy Ledbetter.

Someone recently asked me if I'd made a New Year's resolution. I had not but that got me thinking.

So I began a list: Don't miss church unless I'm actually sick, eat healthier, exercise more often and attain a few work goals. I quickly realized that if I kept on, I would soon forget what all of my resolutions were. Best stick to one.

I then asked myself what one thing is that I have had tried to change before and failed: Punctuality. I am always late. And then I realized that this could not possibly work as my New Year's resolution because I'm two weeks late in making my resolution, and two weeks late in turning in this promised blog.

I must find one attainable, memorable goal. I stopped to think about one thing that I did last year that I never wanted to do again. And that is why my Almost New Year's Resolution is to always wear matching shoes in public.