Stuck.

"Wastin' away again in margaritaville. Lookin' for my lost shaker of salt." That tune has been playing over and over and over and over in my head for two days. Forget analyzing sleep. Now I want to be a part of a think tank that analyzes that incredibly annoying phenomenon. I haven't had a single margarita in, well, forever. Maybe it's because I heard "Kokomo" on the radio this weekend and it talks about the Florida Keys and that's where Mr. Buffet hangs out. "Kokomo" was also a question on the pop culture quiz; you had to name all eighty-five places sung in that song. It was really only about six. Here's a random insight into my mind . . . whenever I exaggerate numerically, it always involves an eight of some sort. Don't know why, but my kids will confirm it. All eight hundred and sixty-three of them.


Tonight, as Tyler was leaving, he said something about the boom being really loud today. I whirled around in my chair and yelled, "What? What are you talking about?" For the last week, precisely at 4:00 (or anywhere from 4:00-4:15) our whole house shakes for what I've been assuming is no good reason. It lasts for several seconds. Then Tyler explained that they blow something up every day around that time at the construction site behind the pool. I was SO relieved. My mind was running wild with possible scenarios. That's a total lie. I probably had one-eighth of an idea and at this moment I can't even make anything up. But I'll try. Aliens pulsating our home to extract the humor cells from my brain (because, really, have you ever seen a hilariously funny alien?)? Or some underground gas line that's preparing to blow us to kingdom come? I asked Ron today if he felt it. He was out walking Zooey and he didn't notice anything. Sometimes I wonder if he's really connected to this planet. Anyway, I can sleep well tonight knowing that my funniness is not in jeopardy of being stolen. I know, I know. You're relieved, too.

A Little Bit of This, A Little Bit of That

Well, I've finally figured out how I got so smart. It's in my genes. Ok, not really. Not even remotely. Mainly because I'm adopted. I'm not saying that my birth parents weren't smart. They may have been stud geniuses. I'm getting completely sidetracked. On Saturday, Ron, Tyler and I went to my mom and dad's in Raymore to a family reunion. It really wasn't even our family. It was, kind of, in that fourth-cousin-twice-removed sort of way. It was my dad's father's sister's family. I sat here and thought about that last sentence for a full 30 seconds and I'm still not sure I'm right. Anyway, it was the Jennings side. The only reason my folks were invited (and consequently, the Martins) is that Foxwood Springs (where my mom and dad live) had the proper facility. Which was a big room with tables and chairs. And food. Now, back to the smart part. One of dad's cousins (I'm not really sure what the relationship it, but let's just keep it simple) was one of four women who programmed the ENIAC computer back in the 40's. Basically the first computer ever made. And she was a woman. In the 40's. There was a huge argument about whether or not she was the first woman on the cover of TIME magazine AND the Wall Street Journal. She says no to both, but everyone else in the room swore she was. Anyway. She hung out with John Nash (aka The Beautiful Mind guy) and is strictly brilliant. Her son is now part of a think tank somewhere. I want to be a part of a think tank that figures out why sleeping is necessary. Think (!) about it. You just lie there, inert, for six-eight hours a night. Weird. Anyway, that side of the family is impossibly intelligent and my side is impossibly funny. I'm glad I'm on my side.

Today at the local Village Inn, where there's no better breakfast in the world, Ron was looking at the estate sale section of the paper. He asked me I wanted him to go by himself. I drew back in horror and said that him going by himself to an estate sale would be like cheating on me. To which he replied, "No. It'd be cheating if I said I was going to Home Depot and I went to an estate sale instead." Hmmm. Guess he's got a point. So we BOTH went to two estate sales; one was really a glorified (and I use the term loosely) garage sale and the other was pretty uninspired. Except for the Harry Truman letter and photograph. The letter was about some Liberty Memorial re-dedication and was on sale for $295. The picture had a pricetag of $450. Pretty outrageous. BUT, in addition to having HST in the shot, there was also Pat Boone. I passed on both.

Last night, Ron and I watched "Been Rich All My Life." Absolutely priceless. It's about these five former Harlem showgirls who are still dancing. And they're all in their mid to late EIGHTIES! Simply amazing. All totally beautiful teenagers when they started and still feisty, with lovely legs. They're called the Silver Belles and in their prime they danced at the Cotton Club and the Apollo (and lots of other places). The oldest, Bertye, was 96 when the documentary was made, but had only stopped dancing the year before. She was a spitfire and cute as a button. On the marquee at one of the clubs they were referred to as "copper colored girls." Totally worth renting. Has some mild language, but it just kind of loses its punch when it comes out of a octogenarian's mouth.

Tomorrow's Monday . . . just another manic Monday.

No Shame

Is anyone old enough to remember that they used to show cartoons before the feature films? Well, they did. Looney Toons, mostly, I think. Porky Pig, Daffy Duck, Elmer Fudd. The classics. Ron and I went to the movies the other afternoon. He'd gotten free passes for tickets, popcorn and drinks. We figured we saved $30, at least. I remember going to the show for less than three bucks. Nowadays three bucks may get you a box of Milk Duds. Anyway, instead of cartoons, we're now bedeviled with "Behind the Scenes" featurettes of upcoming movies. And repeated requests to silence our cell phones. I'll bet half the teens in any given audience are still texting like mad during the whole movie. Oh, and we're also a captive audience for commercials. Is nothing sacred? We go to the theater (pronounced thee ah ta) for an out-of-the-ordinary film experience. We all can rent movies and sit at home in Barcalounger or LazeeBoy in our underwear or pjs and watch movies. When we go to the theater (pronounced thee ah ta) we don't want to see ads for Viagra or be told to have a happy period (I seriously want to draw and quarter whoever dreamed up that tagline - a happy period? The only happy period is the one at the end of a sentence that ends with the word 'chocolate.' See? That period's delirious!)

So, tonight, Ron's running into Hen House to get a pound of ground round to top our CostCo giant pizza (half of which ended up in Zooey's stomach - she's been banished to the basement) and I'm sitting in the car, taking in the lovely Merriam scenery when I happen to notice that the parking lot stripes are quite a bright white. Wait! There's writing on those lines. What is it? "Life comes at you fast?" Well, now I've seen everything. Advertising on the parking lot stripes. I'm not even kidding you. Nationwide is not only on your side, it's on every side. As Ron got back into the car we had a "Can you believe this?" conversation with the guy parked next to us. All three of us were shaking our heads in disbelief. Ron almost backed the Prius into an old lady . . . who was looking at the parking lot lines.

So, what's next? Billboards on the highway pavement? Don't tell anyone I said that. Because, if you do, it will happen.

An Iota of Redemption

After suffering the recent and oh-so-painful humiliation of discovering that my pop culture prowess has lost its prow (ouch) you can imagine my joy when I tuned into Jeopardy this afternoon to see that it was Teen Week. I actually said to Ron, "Oh, goody. We'll know most of the answers." Alas. More agony of defeat was imminent, I just didn't know it yet. Yes, we knew a majority of the answers. I got all of the Presidential Library questions right. I did not know that Grover Cleveland had a secret operation to remove part of his jaw because of cancer. Seriously, show of hands - how many people knew that? Well, the freshman from St. Louis Park, Minnesota knew it. And a whole bunch more. But the girl in the middle that we didn't like knew it all. That's why we didn't like her. She, however, did not know that another word for a throng of people that's also a type of infatuation was "crush." I did know that answer. She lost $4,000 on that one (a daily double). And she blew the Final Jeopardy question. The answer was "What is a panda" and she answered, "What is a black panda." Too much information, Meryl. It cost her some money, but she still won.

I'll watch again tomorrow, of course, hoping to boost my ego and beat Ron to the punch. The thing about Jeopardy is that a lot of the times they give huge clues to the answer. Like last week there was a question about the philosopher whose theories included the idea that all diseases were not divine (or something like that; don't quote me). "Who is Hippocrates." The big clue: diseases. If you look at the key words (and dates) a lot of times you'll be able to figure it out.

Our sweet friends, Tom and Leah, came over tonight. They brought their beautiful babies, Wyatt and Cassidy, with them. We spent the evening on the porch, laughing, solving the worlds problems and giving Tyler advice about his upcoming departure to college. It was one of those evenings that ended up with Ron and I doing the dishes and reflecting, again, that life doesn't get any better than this. Word.

Running into Tammy Faye

So sad to hear about Tammy Faye Bakker's death. I heard someone today say she walked a fine line between being an icon and a caricature. Yep, that's how I'd have to describe her. Her larger-than-life personality made it almost impossible not to be drawn to her.

First there was the make-up. Estee Lauder, Maybelline and the folks who make clown make-up were all able to retire early thanks to her liberal use of the stuff. Seriously, one of the funniest t-shirts ever had two black smears on it, a slash of red and two spots of peach. It said "I ran into Tammy Faye at the mall." I'm sure old Tammy Faye even had a chuckle over that one.

Second, her unwavering passion for Jesus. She was one tough lady. She endured the PTL scandal and her husband's infidelity. Two husbands in jail. Tough times with her kids. Cancer. But she never missed an opportunity to keep sharing the gospel message and how much her faith had sustained her. I saw a clip of her from Larry King Live (taped the day before she died) and she was still praising God. And she looked really, really bad. Kate says she weighed 65 pounds. Really tragic.

Third, her phoenix-like ability to keep rising from the ashes. And her gutsiness for appearing on "The Surreal Life." And making friends with legendary porn star, Ron Jeremy. I never watched that show (yes, I'm surprised, too), but she probably encouraged a lot of people to re-examine their opinion of Christianity by moving more towards center and being transparent about the challenges she's faced.

Now I'll never get a chance to see her in person. I had heard (from my mom) that she was building a home in Loch Lloyd and the folks at my parent's retirement community were all excited because they wanted to have her be a guest on their little closed circuit tv station. Turns out she had already moved to KC and I missed I don't know how many opportunities to have a chat with her. But, there's always heaven. I'm putting her on my list of people I'm going to go visit. Who else is on my list? The Holy Trinity (I hope I don't have to make three separate appointments), the Apostle Paul, Moses, Harry Truman, my grandmother Spainhower. With my luck, they'll be part of those five people I WON'T meet in heaven. But if they're not there, chances are pretty good that I won't be there either.

Shamed Into Action

That's right, no song title. Ever again. I have been mercilessly shamed into admitting that I'm a dolt when it comes to music. I just finished watching VH1's World Pop Culture matches and I think I was able to identify one song in the whole series. It was "Hips Don't Lie" by Shakira and that's only because we saw it 836 thousand times while we were in Italy (don't you know I love working that phrase "while we were in Italy" into conversation. It's so, you know, European). If that funny host guy had sung the songs maybe I'd have fared better. No, probably not. I'm painfully underexposed to rap and hip hop music, which doesn't upset me all that much. I'd rather be underexposed to that sort of thing than something really important, like oxygen. Or chocolate.

This is why I think I'm so woefully behind the curve when it comes to "modern" music: Most Saturday nights Ron and I listen to NPR's "Retro Cocktail Hour," which is really a misnomer since it's on for two hours. It serves up music "that's shaken, not stirred." It's wicked stuff. Lots of horns, bongo drums and xylophones. And once in a while some swanky organ music. Total swanky and a little slinky, too. I picture a brunette with a sleeveless black hip hugging dress, lots of black eyeliner and blue eyeshadow and ratted, teased and backcombed hair. Black hose and stilettos. Oh, and frosted pink lipstick. Sucking on a Winston and knocking back vodka gimlets like there's no tomorrow. Ah, those were the days . . . I could sure hold my liquor back then. Oh, wait. That was Kool-Aid I was holding. Silly me.

Tonight they played the theme song from Charlie's Angels by Henry Mancini and his orchestra, and I was instantly back in high school watching Farrah Fawcett toss that tawny mane of hers and flashing that neon white smile. You know she was only on that show for one season. Sure got a lot of mileage out of it. The fact that this song was on the Retro show . . . doesn't do much for my ego. Anyway, another one of the songs they played was "Lady In a Car with Glasses and a Gun." Not even kidding. It's Lawrence Welk music served with a martini instead of a glass of warm milk. You should check it out. Saturday nights, NPR from 7-9. After that they have an hour of songs from Broadway musicals, which sends me over the moon. I sing like I'm good at it and Ron wisely keeps his thoughts to himself. I think tonight it's music from West Side Story. We had "One Hand, One Heart" sung at our wedding. But without the voice double's thick Puerto Rican accent.

If you'd told me twenty-six years ago that Ron and I would be listening to cocktail music on public radio on Saturday nights I would have said you had me confused with my parents. I would have predicted that we'd be doing something much more romantic, you know, something that makes your heart race. Hmmmm. Gotta run. What? Oh, you thought . . . no, I think I hear "Maria." Hee hee. Fooled you! For real.

Little Lies

(Fleetwood Mac, 1987)

If I'm lyin', I'm dyin'. Occasionally (really, only occasionally) I get a won't-be-denied jones for Krispy Kreme chocolate iced cream filled donuts. Tonight was such a night. So, I hopped in the roadster and sped on up the street to the local KK joint. Not another car in line, not another car in the lot, but I'm still told "I weel be right weeth you." So, I'm perusing the menu and I just had to laugh. In keeping with the ever increasing health agenda we Americans like to talk about (but, seriously, is anyone really doing anything constructive about it?) . . . Krispy Kreme has a new multi-grain cake donut. Cross my heart, hope to die of a sugar induced coma. But wait. There's more. In what I would almost deem a form of cholesterol heresy, they also have a whole wheat glazed donut. I'm sure both Mr. Krispy and Mr. Kreme are doing 360's in their graves, or urns or whatever.

Come on. If you're going to Krispy Kreme, you're not really concerned about if it's whole grain or multigrain or unigrain. You want the sugar high and you want it NOW. And thanks, but no thanks - I don't need the guilt trip. When I want to take a ride on the food sin wagon I don't want some health donut trying to climb on board. Noooooo. I want my siiiiiiinnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnn.

It's like Kentucky Fried Chicken becoming KFC. Like taking "Fried" out of the name suddenly makes it healthy for you. Or all those sickly sweet cereals that have replaced "Sugar" with "Honey." These clever ad people (sorry, Morghan) think they can pull one over on us by changing the packaging and doctoring a name. To be honest, I think it could say "Full of harmful chemicals that will make your brain rot and your butt as big as Wyoming" and we'd still buy it.

So Krispy Kreme can tell me little lies that make me think that if I eat a whole grain glazed donut I can whoop it up on the sin wagon AND be good to my heart. What's fun about that?