Happy Halloween!

So yeah, it’s Halloween and I’ve been trying to decide which story I should tell today. I thought about this time I was babysitting, and some guy kept prank calling, and the police told me he was calling from inside the house. Or maybe that other time I was babysitting, and this dude in a white mask showed up. Or that other time, at camp, when I was making out with some guy while there was a slasher on the loose.

But those stories aren’t so exciting, so I’ll just tell you about last year’s Halloween. Actually, it’s about the week after Halloween, but whatever.

When the kid moved out to Virginia to live with me last year, the first thing he did was test his boundaries. How far was Mom going to allow him to go? He started with his hair. The kid’s a blonde, but he decided he wanted to change that. He wanted to dye his hair blue-black, he said. I think he assumed I would say no because he seemed a bit shocked when I showed up with a box of hair coloring. A week later, he decided he wanted pink highlights. Again, I picked up the stuff. Again, he seemed shocked. Next, it was a Mohawk. He backed out when I took him to get it done.

Score one for mom.

Shortly before Halloween, he asked for black fingernail polish. And black lipstick. But instead of wearing them to school on Halloween, when all the amateurs were dressing up, my son decided to do it a week later. I helped him paint his nails (so he wouldn’t get black nail polish all over the carpet) and showed him how to put on the lipstick and I even helped him with some black eyeliner. It was one of those milestone moments that makes a mother proud, I tell you. The day you show your teenaged son the proper use of cosmetics.

Anyway, I sent the pink-haired, black-lipped, eyeliner-ed kid off to school and drove myself to work. I was pretty sure there would be a message waiting for me when I got there – an angry principal telling me I needed to come get my demon child and never send him to school looking like that again. We lived in the country then, and the school the kid attended . . . well, it was filled with country folk. The children of church-going, gun-toting, flag-waiving, we-don’t-take-to-your-kind-around-here country folk. And my child was doing everything he could not to fit in. So I was certain there would be a phone call. And I was prepared.

I spent my entire forty-five minute commute composing my response. My son is just trying to express himself, I would say. Nothing in the dress code prohibits black nail polish or lipstick, I would tell them. And if you’re going to let the girls wear make up, then you have to let my son. To tell him he can’t just because he’s a boy is sexist.

I was ready for the fight.

And, as expected, there was a message waiting for me when I got to my office.

But . . .

It wasn’t the conversation I expected to be having. Yes, my son was in trouble. Yes, he had been to the counselor’s office. Yes, he was being suspended. But not for looking like the spawn of Marilyn Manson and Pink.

There had apparently been a drill the previous day. They were practicing what to do in the case of a gunman in the building. This included closing the blinds of the classroom and hiding under their desks.

My stupid son, being one to find and acknowledge humor in the most inappropriate times and places, joked that closing the blinds didn’t seem all that smart. After all, if someone with a gun was outside, he could very easily deduce which rooms were in fact occupied.

Then, to make matters worse, after about fifteen minutes hunched under the desk, the oxygen apparently stopped flowing freely to his brain and he started to giggle. Before I tell you what happened next, I have to preface it by saying that my son is a fan of irony. And dark humor. And again, he finds humor in the most inappropriate of circumstances.

So when he said to the kid next to him, “Wouldn’t it be funny if a gunman came in while we were having this drill?” He did not mean, “I would like for someone to come into this room with a gun and start shooting.” He meant something more along the lines of, “That would make a great Quentin Tarentino/Wes Anderson flick.”

(I did punish him. There was grounding. There were lost tv privileges. There was even a researched report on Columbine, where I made him read the memorial sites of each victim. And there was a lot of talking about this. Just so you know.)

So the guidance counselor who called me didn’t seem too upset. She said she had talked to him, and he seemed to understand how what he’d said was worrisome to others and that he seemed like a good kid with an unfortunate sense of humor, but that they took these things seriously and he would have to be suspended. I assured her that we had no weapons in the house and he absolutely had no access to any weapons and that he really was, as she said, a good kid.

Then I had to talk to the principal. And to try to convince her that my son was not a menace and not depressed and not violent or anything other than a normal teenage boy.

Despite the fact that one day after making a “threat” to his classmates, the kid showed up wearing black nail polish and black lipstick and a black t-shirt with a bleeding skull on it.

Irony.

I'm apparently addicted to HGTV

Over the weekend, my son and I were watching some show on HGTV where they come in and organize a messy room in some family’s house and turn it into a functional living/sleeping/dining place that will no doubt be trashed again in a few short months. This particular family had three kids between the ages of six and ten, and the kids had toys and games all over the house. So the parents wanted to reclaim their house by renovating a room in their basement – an unused, cluttered family room with fake wood paneling and poor lighting.

Then they showed the designers’ plans for the space – paint the walls white, add some primary color accents to brighten it up, etc. Then for organization, they added some shelves with brightly colored bins and a coffee table contraption to which they added plexiglass sides for the display of artwork they commissioned from the kids.

While they were working on the room, the people from the show interviewed the little tykes on why they didn’t use the basement, despite the fact that it (like the rest of the house) was full of toys. The girls said it was dark and spooky. The oldest kid, a little boy around ten years old, said, “It creeps me out.”

At this point, my son looked at me and said, “Fast forward to five years from now, they’ll just have to come back and do it again. This kid will be sitting in the basement, wearing eyeliner and black nail polish, looking around at the pictures of Barney on the wall and saying, ‘It creeps me out.’”

You may not find him charming, but my kid cracks me up. Sometimes enough that I choke on my apple juice and cough it all over the new slipcover on our chair.

How Sub-Zero changed my life

As I polished off the last bits of my lunch – a bag of Chex Mix and a non sugar-free soda – I thought about how I perhaps should have had something a tad more nutritious. However, as this would have required either going outside of the building and purchasing something or bringing a meal from home, I decided not to be too hard on myself about it.

The first option isn’t really an option because, well, for one thing, it is raining outside. But more than that I am limited by both time and money and food on or near campus can be found but it is either cheap or nutritious. Or smokable.

The second option – bringing something from home – sounds plausible. I could get up early and make something to bring with me each day. But then I remembered that in order to get up earlier I would have to stop sleeping sooner, and this option no longer appealed to me.

All of this pondering made me tired, so I put my head down on my desk for a few moments, and when I woke up I was hungry again.

Last night I was watching HGTV and for some reason they were touring Kelly Osbourne’s house, and she was very proudly showing off her $12,000 Sub-Zero refrigerator. While I was watching, I thought about how much different my life would be if I had such a refrigerator. And by different, I mean better. And by better, I mean more like that of a celebutante and less like that of a single mom.

Of course, the appliance itself was larger than my current kitchen, but I figure if I could afford a twelve-thousand dollar refrigerator, I could probably afford a larger kitchen as well. And if I could afford a kitchen big enough to house a twelve-thousand dollar refrigerator, I could probably afford some sort of help, you know, to take care of the kitchen and the refrigerator.

I’m pretty sure this is what I was dreaming about when I lay my head down on my desk.

The reality is that I have an apartment-sized galley kitchen with an apartment-sized stove and an apartment-sized refrigerator. My freezer will hold one quart of ice cream, two bags of frozen vegetables (pizza rolls), and three frozen Healthy Choice (Hungry Man) dinners. The refrigerator itself has two shelves and one drawer.

If I had a Sub-Zero instead of the Westinghouse compact, I just know my entire life would be healthier and happier. Whenever I wanted a snack, I could just reach into one of the many refrigerated drawers and grab an apple or a handful of grapes. Admittedly, I could do this now, but with only one drawer, all my grapes end up smashed under the thirty pounds of deli meat required to keep my son in sandwiches throughout the week.

Plus, if I had a twelve-thousand dollar refrigerator, I could find things when I look for them. So instead of grabbing a pudding cup because pudding cups are at the front of the shelf and I’m too busy and important (lazy) to move things, I could have yogurt or one of the fruit cups obscured by the pudding and leftover chocolate cake and day old donuts in the way*. And because I would have someone to clean my Sub-Zero refrigerator (remember paragraph three?), I would never reach for an orange only to discover fuzz had already grown on them in the three short months since I decided to turn my life around and eat only fruit (but had quickly given up on because, hey wait! There are pudding cups!).

And, you know, since I had someone to clean my refrigerator, I could probably afford a few more people as well – one to cook healthy, nutritious meals for me and for my son (who would probably refuse to eat them, and would eat out every night because I’d probably spoil him with a new sports car and an allowance larger than my current annual salary plus whatever money he stole from my purse because, yes, with that much money, I’d also have a wine cellar and a bar and would likely be intoxicated most of the time), and a couple more to clean the rest of my house and keep things organized. Because I really crave organization, but I also really crave sleep and time in front of the television, so . . .

Anyway, with all the time this would free up for me, I would probably be okay with getting up a little earlier to make a lunch for work (of course I would still have to work. Where do you think I would get all this money?). Then again, I would probably just have one of the servants take care of that for me and with the extra time I could probably engage in some other healthy activity, like joining a gym (pub crawl) or hiring a personal trainer (at-home bartender).

I would be so fit.
___

*Of course I’m kidding. I don’t have yogurt or fruit cups in my kitchen

New at eleven: Signs that your parents may not love you after all

Newscasters convinced my son that he was suffering from a staph infection. Oh, and that he was going to die. Immediately. Unless he was seen and treated by a qualified physician. Perhaps even an unqualified one. And the fact that I would not take him to see any physician whatsoever for said staph infection was evidence that I did not love him.

So really, newscasters had convinced my son that I am a horrible excuse for a parent.

This part is nothing new.

The kid complained Monday night that he had a mildly sore throat and he had a bit of a sniffle. I suspected this was a ruse to get out of going to school, but I told him he probably had a cold and that he should drink plenty of water and go to bed early, probably take a nap when he got home from school the next day. Tuesday night when I got home from work, he had discovered (invented) a new set of symptoms to support his theory that he would need to be hospitalized at any moment. These symptoms included but were not limited to the following:

-A tender spot on his head, suspiciously near the base of the hairs he twists into knots when nervous and/or bored.

-A protrusion beneath the backside of one of his toes. He claims to have stepped on a piece of glass when he was nine and is certain the glass is still in his toe. I felt the toe and informed him that said “protrusion” was in fact a bone. He was unconvinced.

-A burning fever. This proved to be just plain false. When confronted with his actual body temperature, he rebutted that a lack of fever did not mean he wasn’t sick.

-A red spot behind his ear. I asked what had prompted him to look there, since in the nearly fifteen years he has been a conscious being, he has failed to notice this birthmark previously.

But yesterday, knowing that I should never take my child's health too lightly, I took him to Patient’s First (love these guys, by the way) where, for a measly twenty-five dollar co-pay, my son was diagnosed with an upper respiratory virus. In other words, he basically has a cold. He was sent home to drink plenty of fluids and get some rest. And to stop rubbing that bone in his toe.

I won't post about serving tomorrow, I promise

Uhhm, so, I almost got myself fired last night.

Okay, so the story’s not all that exciting, but here it is anyway.

I had a four table section in the second dining room and, because we were short staffed, an eight table section in smoking. Being Monday night, it wasn’t exceptionally busy, but we got a decent crowd in for dinner. I already had a couple tables down when the hostess seated a seven top in the smoking section. Mostly kids.

Yes, some people think it’s cool to sit with their kids in the smoking section. But that's not today’s rant.

Since there were five small children at the table, I asked the hostess not to seat me again for a few minutes because the presence of small children at the table generally adds two minutes per child to the ordering time:

Mom: (to kid) What would you like to drink?
Kid: I want Coke.
Mom: No Coke. How about chocolate milk?
Kid: I hate chocolate milk.
Mom: Please sit back down in your chair.
Kid: I want Coke!
Mom: I’m not ordering you soda. It’s almost bed time.
Kid: Coke!
Mom: You can have chocolate milk.
Kid: Co. Ca. Cola!
Mom: Let go of your sister’s hair. Chocolate milk or nothing.
Kid: Fine!
Mom: (to me, standing patiently beside the table) He’ll have chocolate milk.

Repeat scenario once per child.

(Here's where it gets boring. But it's called a set-up. Like the long, boring parts in sci-fi shows, where you're just picking up clues and backstory and waiting for the action.)

After I finally got the drink order for the seven top, I swung back by my other section to check on my guests and discovered that the hostess had sat me anyway. And not once, but twice. I picked up the drink orders for the new tables, being informed by one that someone else would be joining them, and headed into the kitchen for the drinks. I asked another server to drop off coffees and sweet teas in the second dining room while I went back to the seven top with bread and their drinks and got their order.

Before I put the order in, I stopped back in the second dining room, dropped off a couple checks, and checked on the two tables just sat. One wasn’t ready to order. The other was still waiting for their guest.

I put the seven top's order in and came back to the dining room where the third guest had finally joined her party. I greeted her, got her drink order, and since they weren’t ready to order food yet, I told them I’d be back. I took the order from my other table (who was ready) and put it in before coming back with the drink and finally getting the order from the three top. I came back out to the dining room with pitchers and coffee pots, refilled all my guests (including the three top) in the second, brought boxes for people who were getting ready to leave, and then went to my tables in smoking, where I had been sat again.

They gave me a drink order, asked about the soup and specials and for bread, but weren’t ready to order. They were ready when I came back, so I took their order and left to put it in. As soon as I was finished, the seven top’s food was ready in the window. I gathered all their requested condiments, asked for a couple followers, and took the food to their table. They needed more napkins and some extra dressings, which I brought right away.

When I came back into the kitchen, someone else was walking out the door with one of my trays – for the two top – but the three top wasn’t up yet, and since this was the first moment since refilling drinks I’d had, I started setting up a plate of bread to take to the three top. Just then my manager came back and said that the three top “requested your presence.”

(So here's the "action." No flying or bolts of lightning flying out of anyone's hand. No bending time - though that would have been helpful)

At this point, it had been at most, at the very, very most, fifteen minutes since I had taken that table’s order (and I refilled their drinks once after the order went in). Here is the conversation:

Woman who came in last: Where have you been?
Me: (setting down bread and plates on the table) Uhm, I’m sorry, ma’am, I have a large part-
Woman: (interrupting) You’ve left us sitting here for thirty minutes.
Me: I’m sorry, ma’am. But it hasn’t been thirty-
Woman: We had to get someone else to refill our drinks.
Me: I do apologize, ma’am. I have several other tables and a large par-
Woman: (interrupting, again, and gesturing toward the manager who is standing at the next table over) He told us you were at a large party.
Me: Yes, ma’am. Their food came up and I was-
Woman: Well, you just walked away and left us.
Me: Ma’am, I had food to bring out and another –
Woman: You didn’t even come back to refill our drinks for over thirty minutes.
Me: I do apologize, but I just took your order fifteen –
Woman: Are you telling me it hasn’t been over thirty minutes?
Woman’s father: I think she is.
Me: (trying to change the subject) Ma’am your food should be up any –
Woman: Are you going to tell me it hasn’t been thirty minutes?
Woman's father: Of course she is.
Me: Ma'am, I have five other tables, including a party of sev-
Woman: I don't know what you were doing, but it shouldn't take you thirty minutes.
Me: Ma’am, I apologize if it seemed like I was gone -
Woman: It was thirty minutes.
Me: I apologize. Can I bring you -
Woman: Are you going to continue telling me it hasn’t been thirty minutes?
Me: Are you going to continue to be rude to me?

Yep.

There it was.

She said, “Excuse me?!” And I walked away before I said something really stupid. Or threw lightning at her. She turned around and grabbed the manager who was still at the table beside them.

In the kitchen, I checked their ticket time. It had been seventeen minutes since I put it in.

When the manager came back, I apologized to him and asked told him I understood he was probably going to send me home.

“Hell no,” he said. “I heard everything. She was being a bitch.”

I calmed myself down, checked on my smoking tables, and came back to the window, where the three top’s food had just come up. I got it ready and ran it out to them.

And I apologized. I didn’t say I was sorry (because I wasn’t), but that I apologized. I asked them if they needed anything else. Perhaps some refills (because for the third time in twenty minutes they had sucked down twenty ounces of liquid). Then I dropped off their check. Showing the time they ordered.

I brought back refills, asked them how everything was, and apologized again. The woman said thank you and for the rest of their meal, they were all extremely polite.

At the end of their meal, I brought them to go boxes and welcomed them to join us again.

The manager said he would back me up if they decided to complain, but they tipped me eighteen percent. So I don't think they will.

Still, I felt bad about it all night. I mean, she was wrong, but I never lose my cool with a guest. And I have had some awful guests. I didn’t understand why I reacted that way. The rest of my tables were doing fine. I wasn’t in the weeds. I was having a pretty good night. I wasn’t anywhere near the end of my rope or the last straw or whatever.

I just suddenly couldn’t take this woman being so incredibly demeaning.

I don't have a single Barbie doll in my bedroom, so knock it off

One of the new servers at the restaurant where I work has called me "girl" several times. At least once a day since he started working there. The first day I worked with him, I asked him to use my name and reminded him that I am well over eighteen years old (and by the way, he's new here), but he just smiled and fluffed his spiked-up crew cut, being sure to flex his bicep as he did so, and said, "Sure thing."

Apparently, what he meant by this was, "You're obviously attracted to me but overwhelmed by my charm and good looks and unable to come up with any witty banter because you're just so darned nervous around me, little girl." So he still refers to me and to the other women I work with as girls. He usually does it in the dining room, in front of guests, where he'll say something like, "Oh, I see the girls brought your food out. Did they get everything you needed?" to his table. Or "I'll see if this nice girl can get that for me," when his guests ask for refills or cocktail sauce.

Since we are in the dining room, in front of guests, usually near tables full of my guests who I expect to pay me, I have refrained from taking him down.

However, yesterday, after he failed to remember my name three times in fifteen minutes, I called him "boy."

In the diningroom. In front of his table. And I did not refer to him as a boy - no, I called him "boy" as if it was his name.

He didn't notice. Well, no. He did notice. I could tell by the confused look on his face, but I think he just thought he didn't hear me correctly or that maybe I thought his name was Roy or something because I couldn't possibly have been such an insolent child, now could I?

But I'm going to keep it up. Until he stops. I'll keep you posted.

In a one-room bar on the Missouri-Iowa border

This is part of a larger piece about my mother and dancing. I've been working on it for some time now (ie avoiding submission and rejection), and since I just realized it's the middle of October and spent yesterday researching airline tickets for the Christmas break, I've been thinking a lot about home and my crazy relatives and especially my mom. Anyway, enjoy. Or don't.

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My sister selects “Baby Got Back.” Her favorite. Embarrassingly bad for anyone to dance to, but even more so for those with extra wide posteriors. Fortunate for them, no one in my family believes that they have extra wide posteriors, so they take over the dance floor and get the gala going. Besides the bartender and a couple of regulars, we are the only ones there, my sisters, our friend, my aunts and a few cousins. They are all out on the linoleum-tiled dance floor at the other end of the room.

I watch from the table, alone, ignoring multiple requests for me to join them. I call to the bartender for another beer and he sends it over with one of the regulars, a scrawny guy with two days’ worth of stubble and a John Deere ballcap, probably fixes cars for a living because his hands are stained with motor oil.

“Not much of a dancer, honey?” he asks, shoving the mug into my hand, leaving smudges on the handle.

“Oh, I’m a hell of a dancer,” I laugh, sip some beer. “But I prefer the Meringue.” I laugh again and he follows suit, completely out of politeness.

“Ain’t even gonna try it?” he picks up his baseball cap and slicks his greying hair back, then puts the cap on.

I shake my head from side to side, take another drink from the mug. “I don’t belong out there.”

“Hell,” he says, “that’s just dancin’. Ever’body belongs out there.”

“Not ever’body. Definitely not me.” I sigh and John Deere leaves after a quick wink at me and a smile. I watch for a while longer before getting up to play pool.

I don’t make it to the table. Two pairs of arms grab me from behind and a third pair helps them drag me onto the floor. I struggle to free myself from my sisters’ grasp and growl at my aunt. I make a complete fool of myself, even in front of John Deere and his friends. I stay on the floor rather than run away, but there still is no dancing. Maybe if I stand here for this one song, I can go finish my beer.

My mother, six weeks into her first of a long series of psychiatric treatments, will have none of that.

“Dance, girl,” she takes hold of both my hands, squeezing them tight as she swings her arms in and out in an overly wide motion. Her feet move in time with everyone else’s. “Come on. You never dance anymore.”

“And with good reason,” I look back over my shoulder, at the table, at my chair.

“Come on. It’s just us here.” She is still dancing. So are my arms. “Dance. No one’s even paying attention.”

I am certain everyone is looking at me now. I try to lead my mother back toward my chair.

“I don’t even know how.”

“It’s easy,” she tells me, letting go of one hand. “A line dance. Just step like I do.”

“I can’t,” I try to pull my arm free.

“Young lady, get your butt on this floor and dance to some music!”

In my mind, I hear the song stop as the record is ripped from under the needle and everyone stands staring at me. Back in reality, the music keeps playing.

“Okay. Show me.”

She lets go of my hands completely and I realize that I can make my escape, but I know I cannot leave. This foot forward, she says, then over, then over, then back. I watch her feet as she speaks, trying to make mine do the same thing. Or at least a similar thing. And back and over and turn. I go over and back and back. We try again. Forward and over, over.

I begin to figure it out and at some point, I move in the same direction as the rest of my family. And over, and over, and back, and clap. I do just that. And soon she stops speaking and I am getting the rhythm of it and I forget that I cannot dance. I look around the floor, at my mother and my aunts, at my two sisters and my cousins, all moving in the same direction, all whooping as they clap, contributing to the ruckus in this normally quiet pub. I want to whoop with them. I need to yell and laugh and be a fool. But I never do. I just keep moving my feet, hoping no one will notice me.

Why, yes, Mr. Bundy, I would love to get into your van

After our dinner rush, I stood in the break room talking to a couple of other servers, when one of them stood on a chair and very excitedly started telling me about how her latest crush is going. Because there were other people around, and her crush is one of our co-workers, she was speaking in code. And this was on top of her already shortened and overly enthusiastic speech. When she left the break room, another server shook his head and commented that she was crazy.

She must have heard him as she walked away because later, as we were cleaning up the restaurant, she asked me if I thought she was indeed crazy.

“Yes,” I told her. “But I find that your insanity is one of your most endearing traits.”

And I meant it. I admit, when she first started working, I found her a little off-putting. She is loud. She has an odd laugh. And she laughs a lot. At her own jokes. Which aren’t funny. And aren’t jokes. She’s also nice. Like really nice. Like insanely, over-the-top, unnecessarily polite.

But we’ve worked together a few months now and after many smoke breaks together and a couple of drinks after work, I’ve discovered that I really like her.

She isn’t afraid to say what she thinks or feels. She has a really unique laugh. She laughs at her own unfunny jokes and I find this very charming (probably because I do this too). And she’s nice – would do anything for anybody (except watch your tables while we’re in the middle of a dinner rush).

And several times over the past few weeks, we’ve hung out in her car and smoked and talked before I headed home to the kid. I think I have a new friend.

Anyway, this got me thinking about first impressions. Mostly, how mine turn out never to be right. And by this, I mean I thought Mike Vick was a real sweetheart, right up until he asked if I wanted to meet his dogs.

Some examples of my (wrong) first impressions:

When I was thirteen, a new family moved into the house across the street from us. I was playing football with a group of neighborhood boys (tackle football – I kicked ass) in the church yard across the street, and the new kid emerged from his house and asked if he could join in. He said his name was “Daniel.” He was gangly and awkward and sucked at football. I didn’t like him at all. After his father called him in for dinner, I joined the other boys in making fun of him.

Reality – He turned out to be really, really funny. Also very smart (I think these go hand-in-hand). He liked the same corny movies I did and read the same books. He turned out to be my best friend all through school. He was my date for senior prom. And even though we never dated (and he is madly in love with another friend of mine), my mother still refers to him as the one that got away. Oh, and his name isn’t Daniel, though it’s close.


When I was very young, I thought my father was the greatest person on the planet. He was really smart and really funny and took me to football games. It didn’t bother him that I liked to play with GI Joe (back when he was a full-sized doll and not that puny piece of plastic) rather than Barbie. In fact, he thought it was kind of cool. I thought my mother was kind of boring. She was just, you know, a mom. Like June Cleaver. Except she complained a lot while doing the housework, which I found totally unnecessary (“How in the Hell did you get spaghetti sauce on the ceiling? I told you girls not to eat in your room!”).

Reality – My father is smart and he is funny, but he’s a violent shit-hole. And irresponsible. And did I mention, a shit-hole? My mother could kick June Cleaver’s ass. And probably Ward’s (and not just because he’s dead now), but she would never kick anyone's ass because she's just too cool. I found out after my parents’ divorce that she was just quiet most of the time because my dad was too busy doing all the talking. And telling her to shut up. And I realized that my mom was really smart and really, really funny. Especially when manic. Oh, and she used to wear combat boots. What of it?


My first semester in grad school, I adopted two cats. I planned to adopt one, but when I met Mickey and Annie, they were just too sweet to pass up. Annie was kind and gentle, and her brother, Mickey, came right to the front of the cage and rubbed against my finger, then rolled over on his stomach, and though I couldn’t reach it, I knew he wanted a belly rub. He stole my heart.

Reality – Annie was sick. Her full lethargy surfaced within a year, and she had to be put to sleep. Mickey turned out to be aggressive and standoffish and the first time I rolled Mickey’s upturned belly, I pulled back a shredded hand. When I took him to the vet to be neutered, the vet laughed at me and told me the cat had already been fixed. And that, oh yeah, he was a female*. I changed her name to Mickie.


I worked the closing shift at a convenience store during my first semester of college. I had to restock the coolers and clean out the back room before I could go home each night (early morning), but I could only do this when there were no customers in the store since unattended customers tend to shoplift and/or masturbate in the bathrooms (yes, really). Every night, about an hour before close, this guy would come in and play pinball for about forty-five minutes before finally getting the hint that I had work to do and he needed to move on. I assumed he was just some lonely, creepy dude who loved pinball.

Reality – He was just some lonely, creepy stalker dude who loved pinball. Apparently, I had said something funny to him one time when he stopped in for coffee. He took this as flirting and came back the next night, and the next, and so on, hoping to continue with said flirting. Oblivious, I gritted my teeth each night when he came in because his presence in the store meant I couldn’t get my work done and get the hell out of there. One night, I took my frustration out on a cardboard display stand of Reese’s Peanut Butter Cups, and as I tried to move the stand (by kicking it across the floor), the cardboard collapsed and candy bars spewed forth. The creepy dude helped me clean it up and a conversation ensued. His son now lives in my spare bedroom. And eats all my food.


*The Richmond SPCA sucks. That is all. Dismissed.

Congratulations Nobel Laureate Gore!

News this morning is that Al Gore has won a Nobel prize. How very sad. Sad because this man could have been the leader of our country and of the free world and instead we have – well, you know. Anyway, I decided in light of this to do a little side-by-side of Gore and the man who instead became president.


Former President-Elect Al Gore - During his tenure as Vice President, the US economy expanded and government spending slowed.

G.W. - During his tenure as “President,” US spending exploded and many government programs were cut, mostly due to a little war in the Middle East.

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Gore – Despite low grades in his beginning years, graduated with honors from Harvard, where he studied government. Pursued a law degree at Vanderbilt, but left to enter politics.

G.W. – Received a bachelor’s degree in history from Yale, where he was an average student. Apparently missed all classes discussing the Revolutionary War, Hegel, and the Geneva Convention.

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Gore – Vehemently opposed the Vietnam War. Rejected a spot in the National Guard and enlisted in the US Army where he served as a journalist before being sent to Vietnam because he saw it as his civic duty.

G.W. – Served in the Texas Air National Guard (Champagne Unit) because “I was not prepared to shoot my eardrum out with a shotgun in order to get a deferment. Nor was I willing to go to Canada. So I chose to better myself by learning how to fly airplanes." His flight status was suspended and he requested a transfer to the Alabama National Guard where he may or may not have actually attended drill.

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Gore - Elected by the people as President of the United States in 2000.

G.W. - Assumed Office of the Presidency in 2001.

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Gore – With President Clinton, leaves the White House and the country with a budget surplus of $284 billion dollars in 2001.

G.W. – Inherits said surplus in 2001 and predicts $516 billion dollar surplus by 2006. Creates budget deficit of $296 billion dollars by end of FY06.

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Gore - During the aftermath of Katrina, chartered two private aircraft to help evacuate New Orleans’ citizens.

G.W. - “Brownie, you’re doing a heck of a job!”

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Gore – Appears on Saturday Night Live in a (if-only) mock State of the Union Address.

G.W. – Is mocked by Saturday Night Live and called out by rapper Kanye West for not liking black people. West forgets to mention the other groups of people the President dislikes such as Muslims, immigrants, and women.

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Gore - Authors The Assault on Reason, arguing that there is a trend in politics toward ignoring facts and analysis in policy-making.

G.W. - Is an assault on reason.

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Gore – Receives an Academy Award, an Emmy, and the Nobel Peace Prize for his work with the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change in his efforts to combat global warming and protect our environment for future generations.

G.W. The National Academy of Sciences releases a report on global warming, requested by Bush, in which they agree “with the assessment of human-caused climate change presented in the IPCC” report that “Human-induced warming and associated sea level rises are expected to continue through the 21st century." Claims G.W. in response, "We do not know how much our climate could, or will change in the future. We do not know how fast change will occur, or even how some of our actions could impact it." Continues to blow the hell out of the desert.

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Gore - Wins the Nobel freakin' Peace Prize!

G.W. - Is viewed as the second most dangerous leader in the world, behind only Bin Laden. Responds, “Aww, shucks!”

Let's just eat and get the hell out of here

The past few weeks at the restaurant have been pretty slow. Well, the work hasn’t been slow – the pace is still quick and the tables are filling up – it’s just the money that’s been coming in slowly. Monday night, for example, it seemed I couldn’t get more than a three dollar tip from a single table. It didn’t matter if the bill was $15 or $38.50 – the most anyone paid me for my excellent service the entire night was five bucks. And that was on a $45 tab.

And, no, I didn’t forget anyone’s entrée, nobody’s ice clinked in the bottom of an empty glass, and as far as I can recall, I didn’t, say, drop a tray of drinks in anyone's lap. Not that I didn't want to. I started to think maybe I had something hanging out of my nostrils all night or perhaps I was exuding a peculiar odor. But it’s been like this for some time now and I think I know why.

People are unhappy. I don’t know if it’s because summer is over, or because the country is at war, or if it’s because Kevin Federline was deemed a responsible parent. I’m not really sure. But the majority of the people I’ve encountered lately, at least at the restaurant, are a sad, sorry lot.

With very few exceptions, these are the two types of parties I’ve been getting:

Party one: Two or more guests sitting at the table when I arrive. I smile. I introduce myself and tell them I’ll be taking care of them today (yes, ‘taking care of’ like they’re my children or I’m a hitman). I ask if I can start them out with drinks. Sometimes they look up from their menus and grumble a hello. Mostly they mumble ‘sweet tea’ or ‘decaf’ and continue reading the menu. When I return with their drinks, they are still looking at the menus. I assume this means they still need a few minutes to look it over, but I ask anyway. They give their orders, one by one, then hand over their menus without making eye contact. Eye contact is apparently bad, which is why they were all still enraptured by the description of our country fried steak. No one at the table speaks to anyone else at the table. When I bring back bread and salads, the men at the table sit with their arms folded and are angled toward the aisle or wall, away from the other guests. They accept their bread plates in silence. Conversation is also bad. Each time I pass the table or stop to refill their drinks, I notice the absence of sound. I assume they are all deaf and mute because I can’t understand why any group of people would pay to go out to dinner if they found each other so intolerable and boring that they couldn’t at least participate in a conversation about the weather. Or football. Or Flavor of Love. Then I remember that they communicated with me. Maybe they are just conserving energy.

Party two: Before I can even open my mouth to begin my spiel, I hear one of the following: “It’s cold in here. Tell your manager to turn down the air conditioner.” “We’re starving. Bring us bread!” “Coffee. Black. And I don’t want any of that crap that’s been sitting. Brew a fresh pot.” It doesn’t get any better from here. They spend the rest of the meal barking orders at me. They speak to one another, but while I refill their sweet tea, I hear them arguing or complaining or nagging another member of the party. By the time the food comes, a full-on war has commenced and they are either whisper-yelling or just outright shouting at their children to stop talking and just eat. Twice this week alone, I have been asked for to go boxes within moments of delivering the food because having to endure one more moment with their friends and family would really send them over the edge. By the end of the meal, they resemble party number one. I wish them a good evening as they leave and am either ignored or met with a glare. I retrieve my three dollars from under their sweating water glass. They go home and kick a puppy.

So you had a bad day

My son believes himself to be the luckiest person on the face of the Earth. As far as contests go, that is. It’s not that he’s ever won a contest of any sort or that he’s received any encouragement, but he’s certain that at some point, he’s going to hit it big. When he was seven, he signed up for some drawing for a new truck while at the mall with his grandmother, so the next week, when our own car broke down and I was stressing over how to pay for the repairs, he told me not to worry. He was going to win a new truck, and he would let me drive it until he was old enough.

The fact that I am still driving a third-hand car has not deterred him. Last night, for instance, he tore the house apart looking for missing McDonald’s Monopoly game pieces. I’m not sure what prompted the sudden search. It was almost ten o’clock, and we had eaten fast food the night before. But I arrived home from work and found him with a game piece in his hand as he shuffled papers and dug through the trash.

He was frantic.

“I have the last railroad piece,” he said, almost whined. “I had three other pieces. They were on the table. What did you do with them?”

I hung my apron near the door and reminded him that he had been the one to clean the table off and that he must have put them somewhere. He snapped back that he would have left them where they were and I must have lost them somehow.

I wasn’t interested in arguing over useless squares of paper, so I left him to his quest and changed out of my work clothes before planting myself in front of the television. But for the next hour – yes, an hour – the kid stormed up and down the apartment, in and out of the diningroom, and sulked around the livingroom, trying to figure out what had happened to his precious game pieces. He growled. He grunted. He slammed things down. He threw stacks of papers on the floor as he looked through them. He kicked boxes and grumbled because I hadn’t unpacked them yet.

He was, in short, behaving ridiculously.

I paid no mind to his growling and grunting. I reminded him that beating my table top would not make anything appear. It is not a magic table. Just a wooden one. With benches. I stared at him – the puzzled, I-know-you-didn’t-just-do-that, mom-stare – when he threw things on the floor. And after a moment of glaring back with a yeah-I-did-it-now-what-are-you-going-to-do-about-it stare, he recovered his senses and stacked things back where they belonged.

At one point during his apartment-ravaging-tantrum, I asked him if he hadn’t put them somewhere in order to keep track of them and then forgotten where that somewhere was. I do this sometimes. Okay, all the time. I suggested places he might have hidden them. I even joined his search for a few minutes, before telling him that it was (by now) almost eleven and he needed to go to bed and that wherever the pieces were in the apartment, they would still be there tomorrow when he got home from school and he could find them then.

This sent him into another mini-tantrum in which he again accused me of moving his things and of having too many of my own things lying about.

I suggested he go to his room. He did, but not without shouting on the way there.

At this point, I was pretty angry and frustrated myself. I had about an hour between the time I got home and the time I should be going to sleep to relax, and every bit of it was spent dealing with an unreasonably upset teenager. I wanted to shout too.

But I didn’t. I let him cool down. And eventually, he emerged from his room and apologized and acknowledged that perhaps, just maybe, he had behaved slightly irrationally. And I listened as he told me that he was almost certain he had all four of the game pieces needed to win a hundred bucks and how he knew if we had that hundred bucks it would really help out and he was just so mad because it was like he lost money.

I told him that it was likely the fourth game piece he found was probably a duplicate of one of the others, but I assured him he would find them so he wouldn’t have to wonder. And I told him I understood his frustration, and that I too was tired of living out of a half-unpacked apartment, but there wasn’t much I could do about it right then and that we would work on the weekend to get everything in order.

We sat and talked about the rest of his day. He had a crummy day at school, he said. There’s a field trip next week for the kids with the best grades and he was expecting to go, since he’s gotten hundreds on all his work, but his English teacher claimed he had missed a quiz (which was given the first week when I couldn’t get him enrolled yet) and hadn’t turned in homework, which he says he did. And his technology teacher misplaced a project he and another student did in class and turned in, so in both classes he has lower grades, and he won’t be going on the field trip. And then he came home and one of the kittens had peed on his new magazine, which he hadn’t read yet. And then he tried to play a game on his new XBox, and it kept freezing up on him. Then he tried to take a nap, but workmen are tearing up the parking lot at our complex, and every time he almost nodded off, the sound of machinery or shouting workmen woke him up.

The source of his frustration became clear.

The thing is, I could have yelled. The moment I came home from my second job only wanting to relax and was met with an irate teenager, I could have joined him in his anger. We could have shouted, escalating with each back and forth exchange until one or both of us was in tears. Or behind a slammed door. Or in a squad car.

But what good would that have done?

My kid, the hero

My son and I adopted two kittens on Saturday!

And that was basically the highlight of my weekend. There are few highlights in my work-filled life, as you can no doubt tell by reading this blog. My week pretty much starts Sunday afternoon at the restaurant and ends Friday night, again at the restaurant, interrupted only by time at the office and an hour or two of television and conversation with the kid when I get home. Save for the occasional dinner or drinks with friends and that little bank-robbing gig I have on the side, the only real highlights, the two things I look forward to with any sort of fervor are Thursday nights when The Office and 30 Rock are on, and Monday night, when I come home after my fourteen hour day and watch Heroes.


It's an exciting life, I know.


In order to catch Heroes though, I have to depend on my son to tape it. Yes, tape. We are one of the last families to still own and actually use a vcr. And because I have still not unpacked all the boxes from our move, I haven't yet found the remote control for said vcr. I did the responsible thing and packed all remotes in one box before the move. I even marked the box to avoid all of this hunting, but when I unpacked the box I found controls for the tv, my son's tv, the stereo, an air conditioner I no longer own, another stereo, an old dvd player that no longer works, my son's PS2, another remote for the tv, and an orb-shaped remote control with two buttons. I have no idea what it operates. But no vcr remote, which means I can't use the timer function on the vcr.


Thus, I am dependent on my son to turn on the machine and hit the record button at 9pm each Monday evening. This sounds like a simple enough task . . .


Last night the restaurant was dead so I was cut from the floor early, early enough to make it home by nine. But the kid was running low on deoderant (again, my life is exciting) and he'd used up all the ketchup and so had refused to eat anything in the house for two days, so I stopped at the grocery store on my way home. And I'd had to pick him up early from school yesterday because his "stomach was about to explode" which I think was code for "I want to go home and play with the kittens," but I bought it, and since he'd been "sick" all day, I ran through the drivethru because he'd said something about wanting french fries the night before. And I stopped to fill up with gas and picked him up a soda. Because he's my son. And I love him. And I do things for him. Because I care.


And when I made it home a few minutes before ten, I handed off all his goodies and settled into my chair, ready to stare at my favorite flashing lights. And he stared at me in horror when I asked him to put the tape in for me.


I just sighed.


He moped around the house for a few minutes, pretending to feel guilty for depriving me of my few moments of weekly joy. He even went so far as to pretend he wasn't interested in the fast food I brought home for him. I assured him that I wasn't mad (I wasn't) and finally convinced him to eat. After several minutes of silence, he offered the following excuse:


"It wasn't my fault," he said. "I was tired. And I fell asleep because the cats wouldn't get up from my lap."


I didn't buy it, but I told him it was fine and to stop obsessing. I really didn't want him to feel bad about it. I was annoyed, and I may joke around, but I don't want him to carry around a bunch of guilt. And it was, after all, just a tv show. I told him I'd watch it Saturday when they play it again. I would just have to avoid any spoilers online this week (I did not. I promptly logged in to tvguide.com to read a recap when I got to work. I suck).


So we went about our night, talked about his (half)day at school, about my night at the restaurant, about the newest video game he has to get for his sometimes-working XBox. But mostly, we sat around and watched the kittens play with a new toy I picked up at the grocery store. And there's something about watching ten-week-old kittens chase a feather on a stick and pounce on each other and roll around on the carpet that just makes everything all right. We sat in our chairs and stared at them, both of us grinning, mesmerized by these tiny, ferocious beasts, and the kid finally let go of his guilt.


Then he turned to me and said, "We could just watch them all day. We don't even need a tv."


And I must have had some stupid look on my face that reminded him about my forgotten recording because he blushed and looked down at the ground and said, "Well . . . "

dhf and the newbies

Turnover in a restaurant such as the one in which I work is high. Anyone who works in any sort of retail or service position will probably echo this statement. This is true for many reasons – the main being low pay and having to put up with unreasonable customers. These are two reasons I don’t want to wait tables, but unlike the college students still living at home and the suburban moms who are just working to get a few hours away from the kids, I have no choice. I wait tables because I need the money. I wait tables because my son expects to eat dinner every night. Spoiled brat.

Anyway, turnover is high. Of the original sixty or so servers I trained with before the store opened last February, I am one of maybe ten left. There are probably only four of us left working the night shifts. Servers don’t last at my restaurant. What this means is that every few weeks I show up on a Monday evening to work with a new batch of co-workers, of which only two, maybe three, will still be working with me in another three weeks. Some won’t last that long. Some won’t be back on Tuesday. One might even walk out mid-shift. You just never know.

Working with so many new employees, some who have never before waited tables, makes the job difficult. Although I’ve never been asked to directly train anyone (partly because of the hours I’m available), those of us who’ve been there a while are constantly placed in the position of coaching the newbies. They need to know how to ring in a salad with no tomatoes. They need help substituting hash browns for fried apples. They need to be reminded to put ‘out’ on their bread and soups so we don’t run it out again with their food. They need to be reminded to spot seat, spot seat, and spot seat. And all of this would be fine, it would be no big deal at all really, if it didn’t mean taking time away from my tables to help out.

This Monday was the same as most – one other server who started with me and one who’s been there a couple months but who’s waited before and is awesome, and five or six who have been there no more than two weeks. Mondays are usually a bit slower than the rest of the week and a nice break from Sundays, which are crazy busy with the pre- and post-church crowd.

But we got in a party of twelve and a party of twenty at the same time, right in the middle of our dinner rush. The manager gave the twelve top to two of the new servers and split the twenty into two ten tops, giving one to me and the other to the other more experienced server. I had three other tables including one in the smoking section at the time, so it was a little hectic, but things were going smoothly. Then another party came in.

Since I’m one of this particular manager’s go-to people (his words), he sat them at three tables – two of which were in my section and one in another newbies’. We only had two grill cooks in that night and they were slammed with the three big tables we had just put in, plus all the other tables in the restaurant, so I greeted the new table, introduced myself, and in order to stall a little and give the grill some time, told them I had a large order to put in and that I’d be back to get their drink orders in a just a few minutes. They seemed agreeable and went about chatting, and I headed to the kitchen to get salads and bread for my first ten top.

When I came back out to the diningroom, there was one of the newbies at my table, taking their drink order. Already. Then I checked the board, thinking maybe that the third table was in her section. When a party is sat across tables like that, and the tables are in different servers’ sections we can either split the party (and the tip) or trade the party for the next table we get sat in our section. It’s not even an unwritten rule – it’s in our handbook. Tables are like real estate. We own them. We keep them up. And once the hostess has rented them out for us, we take care of the tenants and collect the rent.

But the third table wasn’t even in this newbies’ section. It belonged to someone else. So when she came back to the kitchen with the drink order, I walked over to her and said, “That party is in my section, so I’ll help you with it. I already greeted them and we were trying to stall them to let the grill catch up.”

I thought this was reasonable. I thought I said this politely, as opposed to something like bitch, that’s my table, what the hell are you doing?

Apparently, I was wrong.

The newbie snapped. “Well, just take it then!”

“Uhm, no,” I said. “We can split it. [The manager] sat them in my section for a reason (because you’re new and can’t handle your four-tops, let alone a twelve), so I’ll just help you.”

“Just take it,” she said again.

I reiterated that I wasn’t trying to be a bitch, but two-thirds of the party was in my section and we could split it.

She rolled her eyes and agreed.

Then the manager asked why we were splitting the table when it wasn’t even in her section. I told him I didn’t know and he moved another newbie over to help me (the one who actually had that table), so the original newbie walked off in a huff.

The second newbie and I took the drinks out and started getting orders from the twelve-top. I took my two tables and she took hers. Then she handed me the order slip and as I stepped up to the micros to put it in, the first newbie and another told me my ten-tops’ food was ready and they started out the door with the trays. I grabbed the third tray, assuming they had checked to make sure everything was there and walked out to the table. I started passing out the food only to discover that I was missing grits for two orders and one sandwich had mayo when there wasn’t supposed to be mayo and two entire meals were not even on the tray.

I was, to say the least, a little irritated by this point. Not only had another server tried to steal my table and been an ass to me about doing so, but now they had sent me out to a table, a big table, potentially worth big tip money, with trays that hadn’t even been checked, making me look like a fool. I rushed back into the kitchen and called for the food I was missing. And I complained. Not at anyone directly. But I was frustrated, and I said, so all the new people could hear, “If you’re going to set up a tray, make sure everything is on it. Otherwise, don’t bother.”

And of course, we’re all expected to run trays, so not running isn’t an option, so what I really meant was, “Get your shit together!”

While I was rushing around getting the missing meals and a new bun for the messed up sandwich and grits and a manager to visit the table and pretty much anything else I could do to salvage my tip, a couple of the newbies said to each other, “I don’t see what the big deal is.” I was pretty frustrated but didn’t have time to argue, so I ran what I could out to my table then came back and had to enter the order for the second party.

I put in all the orders for the part of the party that I took, then picked up the sheet from the other newbies’ order pad to put in the rest. Only she hadn’t done any spot seating. And I couldn’t find her anywhere. But it had been a good five minutes since we’d taken their order, so I just put the plates in and figured we’d auction off their food at the table. Annoying, but better than going out to the table to ask and letting them know we hadn't put the order in yet.

Then I discovered that she’d written catfish for one guest, but hadn’t specified grilled or fried. This was slightly more important. I finally found her and asked her about it, but she hadn’t even bothered to ask the guest. So I had to go back out to the table and ask the guest his preference.

Back at the micros, I mentioned to the newbie that she hadn’t spot seated, to which she responded that she wrote down the meals in the order in which the guests gave them to her. I stared blankly back at her for a moment.

I told her why it is we spot seat. Guest one is always the first person to our right. Always. If I know what meal goes to the guest in each seat and I have to run another servers’ tray, I can just drop the food off ask if they need anything else and go back to serving my own guests.

Why is this important? Because in the fifteen minutes between ordering and receiving food, many guests have already forgotten what they had their hearts so set on earlier. Having it all written down on a ticket, in a format all servers recognize, saves a lot of time. Time which I can spend at my own tables, earning my own money, instead of helping other servers earn theirs and neglecting my own guests.

The newbies response?

“It’s no big deal. They’ll get their food. Who cares if it takes longer?”

My response: “That’s fine. But I won’t split anymore parties with you then.”

This apparently angered her enough that she followed me halfway to my table, asking me to repeat what I said. I ignored her, refilled my guests’ drinks, and walked her back to the vestibule where I reiterated, “If it’s no big deal for you to do your job right, then I won’t split a table with you anymore because it is a big deal to me to get it right.”

Of course, I said this in front of several other new employees as well.

And then I rushed back out to my tables to see if anyone needed anything, since you know, they were going to be paying me and all.

During my absence, all the newbies formed a dhf hate-club. They decided they wouldn’t run any of my trays, wouldn’t refill my guests’ drinks if they had a pitcher already in the diningroom, and I think they even ordered t-shirts for their new club. Then they all went in the back to smoke and plot my demise.

Okay, so I could have been much more pleasant. And I could have not let the frustration of so many screwups in a fifteen minute timespan get to me. I won’t argue with that. I understand that they are new. I understand that some of them are not accustomed to the quick pace. I understand that mistakes are going to be made. What I don’t understand, and what ultimately pissed me off, was their complete lack of concern for having made mistakes or any acknowledgement that maybe they should do their job the way they’ve been asked. Because, you know, we might do things for a reason.

Also pissing me off:

The ten-top with the missing meals left me a twelve percent tip and complained about me forgetting their food.

The second newbie never came back to the twelve-top after we took their order. I refilled drinks three times, got them more bread, brought them dessert and to-go boxes, pre-bussed the tables, and reset them after they left and I still had to split the tip with the newbie.

The other four tables I was working, who didn’t get spectacular service from me while I was trying to recover the ten top, and didn’t get refills as quickly as they wanted (since the other servers weren’t helping out) left me lighter tips. One completely stiffed me.

Making me feel better:

I work my ass off at the restaurant and will help anybody with anything (despite my apparent grouchiness). The newbies will come crawling back once they figure out they sparred with the wrong server.

You can't bring that sheep in here!

So the ACLU has become involved in the case of a 14 year old boy expelled from a Detroit school because of the length of his hair. The boy, Claudius Benson, and his mother argue that the cutting of hair is forbidden in the Bible. According to the article:

Benson’s mother said she strictly abides by various Old Testament provisions, including a passage in the book of Leviticus that forbids the cutting of hair: “Ye shall not round the corners of your heads, neither shalt thou mar the corners of your beard,” Leviticus 19:27

The ACLU has filed a lawsuit under the claim of religious liberty and says that the school is violating both the religious freedom and freedom of expression of this young man. And I agree.

But that’s not really the point of my post today.

The mother’s argument got me thinking (this is always dangerous).

You probably think she’s either a) crazy or b)some religious zealot taking the Bible waaay too seriously. But what if she’s not? What if there really is a god and he’s not too happy about all these close-cropped people wandering around claiming to be his followers? What if everyone else has it wrong and this woman and her kid (and a few people stranded on deserted islands where they don’t have scissors) are the only ones he’s going to let pass through those gates?

So I did a little research (also a dangerous thing), and I picked up a Holy Bible (and no, neither I nor the book burst into flames) and found some really interesting stuff. If the literalists are right, pretty much everybody is an abomination unto the LORD and there are going to be a whole bunch of dudes with crew cuts standing around at the end of the world, shrugging their shoulders and saying, “What the hell?”

To which some fiery deposed-angel dude’s gonna respond, “Exactly!”

Now I haven’t had a haircut in nearly two years (mostly because of poverty), so I might escape the wrath there. But all those small town barbers, despite their weekly sermon attendance, they’re definitely goners. As are all the women under hair dryers in those big New York salons. Get used to the heat, ladies. And don't even get me started on skinheads (of course, they may have a few other issues to worry about).

And here’s (potentially) why a few others won’t make it to the promised land:

Leviticus 11:10 And all that have not fins and scales in the seas, and in the rivers, of all that move in the waters, and of any living thing which is in the waters, they shall be an abomination unto you:

According to the next couple verses, the Big Guy doesn’t even want you touching the abominable shellfish. All those folks at working Red Lobster? Better trade those aprons in for fire-retardant suits. Live in the bayous and have a taste for the crawfish? Prepare for a pain worse than a thousand of those suckers getting hold of a finger. Like the way those pearls look dangling around your neck? Learn to hold your breath because I’m almost certain inhaling fire and particles of brimstone tends to be a tad suffocating.

Again, I’m pretty safe on this one. I don’t like sea food much, and aside from a plate of steamed octopus I tried while in Japan, I don’t think the stuff has ever passed my lips. And I was really drunk when I had the octopus, which I’m pretty sure is a valid excuse. Plus, I found it to be an abomination too, and think I even implored Jesus to help me find a napkin in which to spit it out.

Then there are a few verses in chapter twelve discussing childbirth. Apparently, when a woman gives birth, a priest needs to be present. I have no problem with this – there were already five or seven people in the room while I had my legs in the air. What’s one more? So a woman needs to get a lamb of not more than one year and a pigeon or dove and give it to the priest:

Leviticus 12:7 Who shall offer it before the LORD, and make an atonement for her; and she shall be cleansed from the issue of her blood. This is the law for her that hath born a male or a female.

If you can’t afford a lamb the Bible says you can bring two turtles or two young pigeons for the offering as well.

Now here’s where I’m in a little trouble. See, I don’t remember a priest being there, and those damned nurses wouldn’t let me bring any wildlife to the hospital. Something about health codes.

I also came across a few passages about not oppressing an alien who resides with you in your land and not withholding the wages of laborers. Oh, and something about leaving the excess of your harvest for the poor because they need it and because “I am the Lord, your God” and he said to. And there might have been something about newlyweds not being sent to war for the first year of marriage, but I’m not sure any of those are really relevant.

The Kid in the city

My son has spent most of his life in the suburbs, the only exception being when he was nine and the two of us lived with friends in a row house in Oregon Hill, one of the older neighborhoods in Richmond, and not necessarily one of the safest (though it's been getting better). That year was his only experience living in the city - a year during which we were dirt poor and I was in the midst of my own depressive episode - and it is the only experience on which he has to base his opinions of city life. So for the past several years, whenever we discussed his inevitable move back to Richmond, and even last year, when the two of us lived in a house in the Virginia countryside, I heard nothing but complaints about how horrible it was going to be living in the city.

In response, I've taken it upon myself to teach him the joys of the urban lifestyle. He has, for instance, completely warmed up to the convenience of being able to call for food to be delivered to our door. Not just pizza or sweet and sour chicken, no, he can order burgers and spaghetti and black and bleu salads. Okay, not so much the salad, but he's excited about the options, nonetheless. He's even developed a platonic crush on the dirty, tattooed, Fu-Manchu sporting Birkenstock boy who delivers his favorite burgers. And he's starting to warm up to his new status as a city boy.

So yesterday I thought it was a good time for his initiation to another urban lifestyle institution - the laundromat. Now I know what you're thinking. Laundromats are everywhere, you say. What's so urban about a hot, stuffy, strip-mall occupying washeteria?

Well, I offer you this, in the kid's own words:

"I love the laundromat [ed. note: WTF?!]. You've got homeless guys sleeping on the plastic chairs inside. Snooty white people and hippies going to the health food place next door. Strange men asking to bum cigarettes. A crazy woman talking to her towels while she folds them. And some dude breaking up with his girlfriend on the payphone." And I think he would have added a bit about the college girls in their laundry day shorts too, but he never talks to his mother about such things.

Anyway, I think he's starting to warm up to the place.