If I were a cow . . .

I'd be a mad cow.

Get it? MAD cow?


That's the line I gave my 15-year old son last night when he was trying to get descriptive about anger in a short story he was writing for English class. He laughed when I said it. Out loud. He laughed and laughed. And laughed


Oh, man! It was the best laugh I EVER got!


So my son's guardians are out of town right now so guess who gets to babysit. That's right, me who! Woowhoo! (BTW, no, my hub and I didn't split up, it's a school boundaries guardianship.) But you know what? You gotta be careful who you let raise your kids cause he's kinda spoiled now. He's been asking me to read scriptures and make him a home lunch.



The last time he asked for a home lunch I just stuck a jar of Nutella in his back pack. That's how I roll.



And the last time he asked me to read him scriptures I opened up to Mosiah and read one verse.


"Is that it?" He said. "Read more."



So I read it again.



"Wait! That was the same verse!"he protested.



Can you believe he actually noticed??? I pull that prank on my twins all the time and they don't even bat an eyeball.



In other news, my daughter got asked to Homecoming!!! By Justin Beiber!


At least that's what she calls him.



Did you know Justin Beiber was the prom king at American Fork high? And the fastest runner on the cross country team?



Me neither! But he is. At least that's what my daughter tells me. Anyways, my daughter and I stayed up late listening to JB songs trying to change lyrics and come up with a cute reply. But you know what happens when you stay up late listening to JB songs? You catch the fever. The Beiber fever. (What a cutie patootie, right?)


Does anyone have some extra-strength Tylenol I can borrow? Anyone? Anyone?

Other than feeding my fever I haven't been doing much besides throwing parties and going out to lunch with visiting relatives from out of town. Oh, and last Friday I got to help with a funeral at the church because I'm on the compassionate service committee now.

So. Much. Fun. Fer reals. I love working with the old women as much as I loved working with the young women. Plus I have a soft spot for funerals. Not just because you get free funeral potatoes and Jello, but because people at funerals are so humble and thankful.

Loss can be flattering if you wear it well.

Capiche?

One of the fun things about working with the old women is that it's a lot like going to charm school. Setting a table for a funeral is not at all like setting a table for four teenagers who slurp their spaghetti. You gotsta be proper about it. You gotsta think about napkins pointing in or out, and silverware left or right.

I'm kind of an expert now, after getting my hands slapped a few times. Alls you have to remember is that the knife always runs away with the spoon because knives and spoons are republicans. They sit to the right of the plate. To the left sit all the forks, because they ain't afeared of same sex marriage. In other words, a fork always runs away with a fork.

Capiche?

(Notice I'm saying capiche now since I finally saw Pirates?)

Anyways, I don't have time to give anymore charm school lessons because it's my twins birthday today.


Gotsta go!

P.S. JB photos to come!

Thinking things through logically

My hub is on this crazy kick right now of thinking things through logically (except when it comes to raising chickens).

He keeps saying, "You know, if you really think things through logically, nothing makes any sense!"

This all started last weekend while spending time in St. George with his parents.

Not to be rude, but my MIL, bless her heart, is not a particularly logical person. I mean, she's fun, she's entertaining, she's a sweetheart, but sometimes she doesn't make a lot of sense.

Just sayin'.

Like, for example, when she does things like knock on our bedroom door at 8:30 a.m. to tell us not to worry about getting up yet because they are still sleeping.

"That doesn't make any sense, if you think about it logically?" My hub's eyeballs said to me.

During breakfast she tried to teach us how to stand so that our insides don't fall out. What you do is you cross one leg in front of the other--like you do when you have to go shi shi--and squeeze real hard.

"They say this keeps your innards from slipping out," she told us, while simultaneously demonstrating.

I won't repeat the specific innards they say will not slip out if you squeeze your legs together, but I will say that my hub looked his mom right in the eyeballs, like Eminem recommends, and said, "That doesn't make any sense! And you're grossing me out!!!!"

See my MIL believes everything they say. That's her problem. Especially if they have witnesses.

"It's the truth!" She declares. "There were witnesses."

There were always witnesses. Like the time one of her ventriloquist relatives was being attacked by an Indian. He threw his voice into the plants so it sounded like the plant was speaking, and by darn if that Indian didn't high tail it outta there.

"What did the plant say that frightened the Indian off so quickly?" I always ask sincerely, because honestly, I'm sincerely curious. I want to put myself in that Indian's moccasins and walk a mile with him. Back to his tribe. I want to see the whites of his eyes when he tells his buddies in the teepee, "You would not believe what this plant said to me today!!!"

But the witnesses didn't write that part down because it wasn't important to the story. The important part was that one man's mad skillz saved his scalp.

"That doesn't make any sense if you think about it logically!" said my hub at The Olive Garden in St. George, after his mom told that story.

But my hub has heard that story a million times. He even told that story in one of his primary talks. Why all of a sudden he's thinking things through logically about a talking plant is beyond me. If his mom says there were witnesses, there were witnesses. Even if they didn't write down the direct quotes.

There were witnesses in other stories we've heard before too. Like the one about little Sarah, who walked 5,000 miles across the plains, singing all the way. All of a sudden this does not make any sense to my hub logically, just because there are only 3, 492 miles from coast to coast, and no one in his family likes to sing.

(Except you, Miss Shelby!)

There were witnesses in the story about the ship that hit an iceberg too.

"Was it called The Titanic?" I always ask. But nope, this ship didn't sink, even though they found a hole the size of Vermont below deck. This ship was carrying two Mormon missionaries and the captain had never lost a ship that was carrying Mormon missionaries.

"Well how many ships did he lose that weren't carrying Mormon missionaries?" Asked my hub.

A seemingly logical question, but apparently there were no witnesses to that.

Power to the Peeps!

I can see why my daughter loves her tennis coach so much. He's a 70-year-old, male version of herself! (If she was the senior citizen national tennis champion and the top law student in her class.) He's got sass! And class!

Guess what he did yesterday?

So she wasn't allowed to play her match because the Utah High School Athletics Association is still deliberating over our paperwork to waive the transfer ineligibility--it's not an issue of parents complaining this year--this school is not a tennis threat in the region--it's an issue of we turned in the proper paperwork and now it's going through the proper red tape. So anyways, her tennis coach is like, "This is ridiculous! If she can sit in class and take tests, she can participate in sports! I'M PLAYING HER!"

But he's a lawyer so he did it legally. He forfeited her match and then let her play her opponent "just for fun."

What a stud muffin!

That's why I like playing for losing schools. When you lose, you have nothing to lose. You get me? It's big L's on the forehead all the way around. Here here!

I'm not worried anymore. Whatever happens happens, let the chips fall where they may. We turned in the proper paperwork to the proper authorities and put in a petition to the Universe. And the coach has my daughter's back.

Thank you for all of your cheers for her as well. You're always so supportive.

And thank you for voting for the Nutty Hamster Chick's Turkey Bone photo. She won!!! She actually won! It looked like she was going to lose by a landslide, but the top three contestants were cheating so she crossed the finish line first and now she gets 10th row seats to the Utah vs. BYU game!

If any of you know Nutty, like I know Nutty, you know that she's coo-coo for Cocoa Puffs over BYU football. I swear her blood is bluer than blue and her loyalty is truer than true--I've seen her football player stalking scrapbooks first hand. And I've seen her Facebook profile:

Nutty, did you know LaVell was my hub's home teacher when he was a teenager?

Just sayin.' I'm important. By association to association.

So I have one more favor to ask. I have this really cool neighbor named Katie Terry who was in a car accident when she was a young mom. When she woke up the doctors said, "We have some good news and some bad news. You're pregnant . . . and . . . you're paralyzed."

She went through the whole pregnancy paralyzed and now she's going through her whole life paralyzed. But she's a total trip. Not only is she a mom, she skiis and bowls and (ahem . . . goes to pole dancing class) and she won the Boston marathon, and, and, and . . . the list goes on. Fer realz! She does more without legs than I've ever done with legs.


And she even looks better in a swimsuit than I do. And I have this exact same swimsuit so I would know.

Katie is running for win Ms. Wheelchair Utah 2012 because she wants to be a public speaker, and part of the gig is winning the essay contest.

You only have to vote once (thank ye lard), so alls you have to do is:

1. click on this link

2. cast a vote for essay #1

That's it! You don't even have to read the essay, I'll tell you what it says. It says my life is great and being in a wheelchair ROCKS! yada yada yada!

She would be a spectacular representative for the disabled in Utah! Think of all the downtrodden and disabled people out there in Utah who need a voice--someone to look to and say "I can do that!"

And we've got the power! Nutty's votes went up by over 200 points in a few hours--GRACIOUS! Let's catapult Katie into the public speaking circuit.

(Plus, I'm her visiting teacher and I can count this as my visit.)

(J/K proper authorities, J/K!)

Conversations with God

Oopsidaisi. I accidentally published this post before I finished it. EEEEK. My WORSE nightmare. Thank goodness Barbaloot commented or I wouldn't have noticed.

Bout gave me a heart attack Barb! But here is the finished post:

Last May I went to the LDS Storymakers conference in Salt Lake City. I roomed with DeNae from My Real Life Was Backordered, and we went out to dinner with Motherboard from Crazyland and stayed up into the wee hours of the morning talking about serious matters and giggling like school girls.

One of the serious matters we giggled about was the scriptures. They are in love with the scriptures, those two. They can recite them front to back. They can also tell you the entire history of the church as they drive you through the Avenues in Salt Lake City. While we were talking DeNae said something really profound. She said that she thinks God knows every language, including every love language, and communicates to us in in our own particular language.

In other words, he speaks to us in ways he knows we'll understand.

DeNae and Motherboard both speak scripture. When they read the scriptures they feel like God is telling them stuff.

Me? God tells me stuff through music. He tells me to say what I need to say and that this is my temporary home and that tonight's gonna be a good night and that my eyeballs are stuck on my plate.

No lie, once he told me that he loved me during Mozart's Requiem.

If I'm not listening to music he tells me stuff through fortune cookies. Fer reals! Like this morning. I woke up at 5:00 a.m. because I heard my daughter leave to go to the temple. So I got up and started vacuuming. It's what I do when I'm distressed. Or when there is dog hair everywhere.

I've been distressed for the past few days. Plus there is dog hair everywhere.

What I've been distressed about is my daughter. She feels like she made a wrong choice.

No, she didn't get a tattoo. It's something worse. She transferred schools. Last year. And then she transferred back.

See there is a law irrevocably degreed in Utah that if you transfer schools after the 9th grade you have to sit out a year of sports. You don't have to sit out a year of band or of drama or dance team, but you have to give up a year of athletic eligibility. Even when you think you've filled out the proper paperwork.

Remember how last year she transferred to the best tennis school and I sang Waka Waka and pumped my fist until she won 2nd in the region, but then she got anonymously turned in to the proper authorities and disqualified from states and I got addicted to gangsta rap, so she immediately repented and transferred back to the proper school and is now playing for the proper team?

And remember how I've been so happy lately and how my life has been so perfect (besides the fact that the bishop dumped me for a blond YW Prez)? And how my daughter has been so happy lately because she loves her proper teammates and her proper coach (even though he told her she's going to get slaughtered)?

Well history is repeating itself and at this very moment there are committees trying to decide if she is eligible to play tennis at all. Even for the proper school. It seems she's just plain ineligible that girl. And she blames herself. And I blame myself, because what is that old saying? Disqualified once, shame on you. Disqualified twice, shame on ME!

Or something like that.

So yesterday I went to the temple and I squeezed my eyes shut hard during the entire session and I petitioned the universe. Just like in Eat, Pray, Love.

First I asked for forgiveness and mercy for being such a dummy. Then I literally wrote a petition in my head that said "LET HER PLAY (please, please, pretty please)" and I imagined all the people who would sign it. (All of you were there signing it, thank you.) (And my Papa was signing it and Jackie Robinson and John Adams and Jack Johnson were signing it, and Jean Val Jean and Martha and Hamlet were signing it.)

And then I imagined stadiums of people doing the wave and shouting:

LET! HER! PLAY! (please, please, pretty please!)

And then, just like in the movies, I panned out until I could see the entire planet shouting LET HER PLAY over and over and over.

And then I took a quick cat nap.

It's exhausting to ask the whole wide world to join in my crusade. Especially when I know she's going to get slaughtered anyway.

But I digress. I was telling you about how God talks to me through fortune cookies.

So this morning. I was vacuuming at 5 a.m. And I came across a little wadded up piece of paper. Normally I would just pick it up and toss it, but today I picked it up and smoothed it out. It was a fortune from a fortune cookie, and it was torn in half. I had never seen it before and I have no idea where it came from or how it got on my floor, but as soon as I read it, I taped it back together, and then pressed it to my heart like a band aid from God.

And then I handed the band aid to my daughter when she walked in from the temple.

She smiled. And then she told me about a random woman who walked up to her in the temple and told her that something good was going to happen to her today.

Maybe that's how God talks to my daughter, through random women.

I wonder what good thing is going to happen to her today. Who knows, maybe she'll become eligible. Or maybe she'll get asked to homecoming. Or maybe she'll just be able to breathe.

Breathing is one of the best things that can happen to us if you really think about it.

Someone should put that on a fortune cookie.