Manly men

SG was going into a bank the other day and stopped to hold the door for a mom and her three children (that's the kind of guy he is. He opens my door for me too.) The mom walked through with the kids following behind (there's something about being a mom that often makes me think of ducks) and as her little boy - about 3 years old or so - walked through, he stopped right in front of my husband and looked up at him.

"You look like ... "

Now let me stop there. As I was hearing this story, my thoughts jumped ahead to a lot of things that could finish this sentence. SG, as I've mentioned, is TD&H with dark hair, and a goatee that is starting to show some silver (so sweet of him to keep up with the grey taking charge on my head). He also wears dark wrap-around sunglasses that work very well for cycling but completely block his eyes and the immediate area around them. He's just over the six foot mark (he says it's the shoes) and with the sunglasses hiding the laugh lines and the goatee camouflaging the smile, he can look a trifle stern. Now that I think about it, put him in black leather chaps and a vest and he could convincingly be a biker. Although his road bike might lack the conviction of a Harley.

So, anyways, I was filling in the blank of what this little boy might have said while staring up at my husband. I didn't even come close though.

"You look like a real jonkleman."

(Not sure? He meant "gentleman.")

________________

On an unrelated note (and day, and event) - we were watching a Tae Kwon Do class that was taking place in a local park a couple weeks ago. The class was a group of teens and adults and they were doing some sparring without the benefit of boundaries for the matches. One young man had a very impressive display of spinning kicks that he kept trying to use on his opponent. The problem was he wasn't anywhere near his opponent.

The coach kept trying to urge him in closer but still he spun around and away from his sparring partner.

Finally, his dad on the sidelines couldn't take it any more.

"Hit somebody, you ballerina!"


Yep, manly men.

Privvy to my thoughts

It's late so maybe that will explain the turn my mind took tonight (or failed to take, whichever you decide). For some reason, I found myself mentally reviewing the staff bathrooms (washrooms, restrooms or WCs depending where you reside) I've seen lately.

I have to say, they are always pretty interesting. Maybe just because they reveal so clearly the humanness of teachers. I suppose like most kids, if I had thought about it at all, I would have said teachers just sprang to life at their desks each morning, and deflated into the same chair at the end of the day. But seeing a collection of hand lotions, makeup bags and toothbrushes (obviously I go to the ladies version) proves beyond a doubt that simply isn't the case.

Some of the funniest posters and some of the worst poetry I've seen have been in a staff washroom. ("Using that spray/Makes the stinky smell go away.") I learned about the "courtesy flush" thanks to a handwritten note in one. And I've been baffled by an older-school's fountain-style washing station where you had to step in just the right spot to get the water to shoot at your soapy hands (and the dodge required to keep it from spraying all over the front of my shirt and/or jacket will be a valuable skill should I ever take up paintballing. )

From there, my thoughts wandered on to a trip that's coming up. One of my offspring is terrified of automatic flushing toilets and I've been trying to think of ways to get around that. Most airports do not trust their patrons to have to stoop to such measures on their own so I know it will be an issue once or twice. I was even in one airport where the little seat cover automatically rolled around the rim as soon as you stepped into the stall. I must confess I stared at that one awhile thinking, "Now there's something that could really go wrong."

Which raises another problem.

Have you every tried to trick an automatic toilet into flushing? Maybe its timing was off. Or maybe it scared the living daylights out of you by flushing too soon. Or maybe that ___! paper cover didn't completely disappear. I'm sure there are several scenarios you can imagine that might mean you want to try again so the next person doesn't think you're a uncouth slob just in from the hills. And there you are - waving fingers, looking for the self-help button and generally aware that the toes of your shoes are pointed in the wrong direction for the ladies room.

I guess you have two choices. One is to laugh.

The other is to just go with the flow.

I'm a people person, aren't I?

There are a billion ways (well, maybe only thousands) to classify someone's personality. Some of them are funny, some are classic and some are ridiculous. Horoscopes say people's personalities are determined by their birthday in relation to the stars. There's the introvert/extrovert distinction. Type A and Type B. Beavers, golden retrievers, lions and otters. Melancholics and phlegmatics (which doesn't sound nearly as cute as the otter.)

A friend of mine has to wear a fish label at her job (all the employees do, not just her. I mean, it's not like she's being punished or anything) so that people will (in theory) understand better how to communicate with her.

I haven't done many of the lists and personality tests but I know this - In theory, I'm an extroverted introvert. A Type B functioning in a Type A world (and with a type A spouse). Touch of the melancholic with hints of the golden retriever. What it boils down to is: I like people, work well with people, but they still wear me out.

Maybe that's why I find this so extremely funny...



Want to try a personality test? Here's one based on Jung's personality types. Or here's another one that's similar but with more questions and more character types. This one uses color choices to tell you about yourself. And this one tells you which superhero you most resemble. And if you have an alter ego, you can also figure out which SuperVillian you are...

Only a dork...

We haven't had a lot of video game systems at our house. We had the computers where Tetris and Solitaire take up way too much of our time (although I will say I RULE our Tetris scoreboard), and we had an old Atari knock-off with games like Centipede and Breakout and that sort of thing. Fun enough that there's even a geek version available with some of the original games all packed into one joystick. ( Jakks Atari Classics 10 In 1 TV Games if you really want to check it out. But be warned the controls are less responsive that the original system. Don't ask me how I know.)

But I digress.

So someone in the family (won't say who but he's over 5' 10") got the bright idea to get a Wii. "There's sports games and exercise programs and don't forget Wii Fit. It'll be great to keep us active when it's raining all winter and we can't ride."

What do I know about Wii?

There's a website for people that have hurt themselves playing Wii. There are categories of injuries you can inflict with a Wii. There are doctors around the globe worried about Wii-related injuries. And they have a cute commercial. No one sporting bruises at all.

So being the informed consumer that I am, what do I say?

"Okay."

After all, what kind of maroon do you have to be to hurt yourself playing a video game?

Apparently my kind. (Is it spelled "dorque" in Canada?)

Turns out I'm not a very good cow racer (just about leaned off the chair) and my golf game's not good either (bent a fingernail. Don't laugh - that hurts!) And as if the Wii-tennis-strained elbow and the obscure-but-somehow-related-to-Wii-bowling muscle at the back of my right arm weren't enough, for Christmas we added Dance Dance Revolution to the mix.

So now I'm limping (but only slightly) after that last jump on "I Want Candy" proved to be my undoing.

But, hey, I burned 100 calories.

Great idea, hon.

Not quite what I expected

So today I was teaching again in an art residency and it was a painting day (as opposed to a writing day or a sketching day or a "dummy" day). The students are usually pretty excited about it. We've done all sorts of water color techniques including the highly popular spattering.

But today, one child wasn't quite ready to enter in to the process. Instead he threw up.

Fortunately, it was only a few minutes to recess time, so the teacher rounded the class up and took them to the playground while a parent volunteer shepherded the poor child to the office and the custodian came in to clean up.

And there I sat, torn between a parental sympathy for the student and thinking "Wow - that wasn't the reaction I expected at all!"

A Fishy Story Indeed

This is something I wrote a while ago for a writing challenge. The theme was "What is character?"
__________

Character is what you are when no one is looking. It’s also what you are when it’s late and you just want to go to bed.

Several days ago, we picked up a 10-gallon fish tank. It was free and the ad read,

“Includes fish! Plus: tank, gravel, filters, heater, even a cute little thermometer. Fish are a catfish, a hiding shark-like thing, an eel-type thing (a loach?), and several orange striped fish...”

To transport the tank, we unloaded the tank water into various buckets while netting the fish into self-closing bags. But we couldn’t find the hiding shark-like thing. We drained some more water and re-searched the tank. Nothing. So we loaded up and brought the whole kit home.

It was late when I started reassembling the tank, but by eleven o’clock, I had almost finished. As my last task for the night I was standing at the sink, scrubbing a seashell when – PLOP - something slimy drops into my hand! I yelp, it slips through my fingers and my brain registers "shark-like thing?” just as it slides into the garbage disposal! Now what do I do? Do I look for it or do I run the disposal so it doesn't suffer?

But I’ve been told some amazing stories about fish survival so I leap into action. I can’t see into the disposal properly, so I start running around the house – I CAN’T FIND THE FLASHLIGHT!! Instead, I grab a decorative lamp shaped like Noah's Ark and pull the shade off of the 7w bulb.

Now how to reach the fish? After several faulty attempts, I grab a pair of aluminum tongs (the kind you see in salad bars) and start hunting. My progress is slow and every time I spot the fish and gingerly try to pick it up, it promptly panics and thrashes out of sight among the remains of a nice Alfredo casserole. At this point, I'm talking to the fish, sounding like a bad ER movie ("Stay with me now, we're gonna make it buddy"). And still at the back of my mind is the execution switch - just run the disposal and it will all be over and you won't even have to tell the kids.

But I can't do that. Where there's life, there's hope, right? I have to remove the fish’s hiding places. I grab some peas, some pasta, a piece of tomato, spinach, some more peas...and there’s the fish lying in the sink among the peas! Before he can slip away again, I scoop him into a spoon and whisk him over to the fish tank. Heart hammering, I hesitate a moment - Do I float him first? What about the temperature shock? Duh - he can't breath! - and in he goes.

The fish was in the drain for at least twenty minutes. But he is doing fine...except for a tendency to hide under a shell every time I come near the tank. Apparently he thinks I’m a suspicious character.


______________

Incidentally, it won the challenge. But the fish didn't seem impressed...

Don't forget to REset your clocks...

I have a new-fangled bell-and-whistles sort of clock.

Actually my husband has a new-fangled bells-and-whistles sort of clock. It has dual alarm settings, a static-prone radio and/or a beep guaranteed to skewer your cerebellum as it slumbers in REM sleep, big buttons and little buttons so you can randomly flail at it when your cerebellum convulses in primal self-preservation, huge numbers that are bright enough to guide in aircraft and even on the "dimmer" setting give the entire room an NVG-sort of hue, AND (here's where I think my husband got suckered by the marketing language on the box) it automatically adjusts in the spring and the fall for Daylight Savings Time. So no more sleeping in or wandering the house with an hour to spare when you forget to set the clock.

EXCEPT that the clock is above such things as governmental whims like changing the weekend that DST begins. Pshaw - says our clock - Fall is here, "Fall back" time it is. Kind of like the automatic house in the short story that keeps vacuuming and serving meals even after the nuclear bomb goes off, our clock disdains the changes ordained from above and sticks to its schedule.

Which means, of course, that we can't stick to ours.

Yesterday morning, I got up thinking it was 7 o'clock and thinking I had an hour to spare. I was just getting ready to hop into the shower when my husband came flying in. "It's 8:02!" he cries. "The clock got us again!"

Now my cousin has a clock. And she brags about her clock. It's reliable, she says. It hasn't let us down for over 20 years, she says. And as I frantically dressed and threw my hair into a braid, I planned the covert operation that would avoid her crazy cat, defeat the hazards of her sometimes party-littered floors and claim her clock as my DST loot.

Anyways, by 8:12 we were at our Sunday morning posts (DH, admittedly, looked much fresher than I did). It was another hour before I got to have that shower and actually start my day.

And we get to do it all again next weekend...

Lock the doors, cuz. I may be coming.

Starting the day off right...or not

Last night, I went to bed on time - a feat for me - and didn't set the alarm clock. I was sure I'd wake up in time to get ready for church OR I'd hear the young 'uns moving around the house in time OR - if none of those happened - I'd have had a REALLY great sleep.

But at some still-dark point, a ringing phone snapped me off my pillow. I peered at the clock by the bed.

6:00 am

As I reach for the phone, the usual range of thoughts ran through my mind:

a) It's bad news - Grandma did take a fall a few days ago and I haven't had an update lately.
b) There are other people I know that might be calling with bad news.
c) DH forgot about the time zone thing and is calling me to tell me some bad news before the first seminar starts. (He's a couple time zones away right now at a conference with a goofy name.)
d) Nope, he'd never make a mistake like that. It must be bad news and how will I let him know?

"Hello?" Well, at least I sound fairly conscious. I think.

"Hi, this is Jason. Who's this?"

Check the clock again. Still 6:00 am. I'm not telling anyone my name at 6 am.

"Um." (Perhaps not as conscious as I thought.) "Um, Jason who?"

"Is this joyful living?"

Great. Now he's not even talking English.

"I beg your pardon?" (Slightly better than "Huh?")

"Isn't this Joyful Living?"

Not at this time of day its not.

"No, I'm sorry it's not."

"Oh. Sorry to have woken you up then."

He doesn't sound sorry to me. But it's too late now anyways.

"Okay."

"Bye." Click.

6:01 am.

I guess my day just started...

Irony is a funny thing

While we were traveling this summer, I saw this in a public restroom on a paper towel dispenser. (No, I don't usually take my camera into a restroom. But this time I had to.) Does anyone but me find this hilarious?