• Mother-In-Law’s Extended Hospital Stay Nudges Batmobile Odometer On Beyond Zebra

• Lay Sister-In-Law Blows In From Virginia To Correct Diagnoses Of Four Experienced Docs

• Third Great Grandchild Makes First Appearance At 12:45 A.M. on May Day

• Fifi Finishes Cutting Grass Between Raindrops & Hospital Visits.  Twice!

• 2007 Dandelions Take A Mowing And Keep On Growing

• Giant Bumble Bee Finds New Home In Bedroom Closet

• Toad Hall Seeking Second Refrigerator For Unwieldy Asparagus Crop

• Obsessive Olga  Declared Public Nuisance For Reading Three-Page Magazine Article To Fifi O’Toole Over The Telephone

• Carpal Tunnel Syndrome Makes First Appearance of Year.  Ouch Times Two!

• Mr. & Mrs. Clyde Bodinski  Bring “Genevieve The Charmer”  For Unextended Visit

• Not So  "No-Good Rotten Stepdaughter"  Serves Fifi's Birthday Dinner Al Fresco.  In The Weeds.

• Support Post On Carport Attacks Left Front Fender Of Batmobile -- Mangles Budget Beyond Repair

• Antibiotics Wreak Havoc (Again) With Stomach

• “THE KID” & Family Move To Larger Home Just In Time For Derby Day!

• Amazon.com Sends Birthday Gift to  HighOnPrine  Four Days Prematurely

• Toad Hall Dogs Threaten To Leave Home Due To Mom’s Inattentiveness

• Hot Tub Wintered Poorly -- Needs New Frame, New Paint, New Home.

• Fifi O’Toole Selects  "William Tell Overture”  As This Month's Theme Song

And last but not least............

    In summary, it has been one helluva hectic couple of weeks around here.

    Over and Out.  

    (For who knows how long this time....)

    •I gave up and called my accountant, Super Guy,  Thus, enough about taxes.  Except to say that yes, I’m a quitter and proud OF it.  Besides, being rescued by a CPA wearing a cape kinda’ gives me that “feminine” feeling, you know?

    •Monday was my 103rd birthday.  I got, in no particular order of importance:

    (1) Dinner with Princess Prissy & Company and “THE KID” & Company,  At a restaurant.  With 3 very small grands at the table, and 1 grand running around and around the table. (For some reason, I kept thinking about Gwennig’s youngsters, Chaos & Mayhem, the entire time....)

    (2) A Peace Lily from “My-Brother-the-Cowboy” & Company, which I shall do my best not to kill before next year, when they'll send something else I don't need.  (Does anyone want a $200 Queen-Sized Blanket that has to be dry-cleaned?  It's yours for the asking!)  But before I attempt not to kill Lily I've gotta find a place to put her.

    (3) A sinus headache to beat 40, and a query from a friend who wanted to know if it would have been better or worse if it had only beaten 38.  Silly man.  HowshouldIknow?  My sinus headaches always  beat 40.  They have never beaten anything else.

    (4) A physical ailment that requires antibiotics.  Which will make my stomach threaten to leave home by week’s end.....

    (5) Half of Toad Hall Farm mowed, with the other half still screaming for attention.

    (6) Stuck for an hour out on Highway 42 in a long line of irate commuters waiting for a wreck to be cleared.  The bad news is that one cannot reach Toad Hall by any other route and I didn't have a jar in which to pee.  The good news is that no one was hurt in the wreck.

    (7) Dreadful news of a massacre at Virginia Tech.  For 48 hours nonstop so far.  (I hate it when the media beats bad news into the ground, yet I, like everyone else, keep listening for some sort of answer to all the "whys?")

    (8) Fresh asparagus for dinner.

    (9) An invitation for next Sunday to the “No-Good-Rotten-Stepdaughter’s” house for dinner.  She's gonna make that bread I love so much.  Sigh.  I guess I’m gonna have to find another name for her.  Suggestions?  Anyone?

    • Of possible interest to those who’ve spent any time in Kentucky, this coming Saturday is “Thundah Ovah LOO-uh-vulle.”  (That’s “Thunder Over Louisville” for those who don’t speak Southern.)  It is, supposedly, the largest display of fireworks in the continental U.S. and kicks off Derby Season  every year.  Approximately 100 thousand, 237.5 people jump in their vehicles and drive downtown so they can spend 4 hours searching for a parking place.  Then they walk, en masse, toward the Ohio River where the display is held.  (It’s rather like a parade of Lemmings.)  Afterward, they spend 16 hours and 20 minutes driving home.  How do I know this?  Because I went.  Once.

    • And yes.  It is just plumb wonnerful to live near a place that is known ONLY for a 3-minute horse race that takes place once a year.

    • I’m off for a date with John Deere.  And then to dinner with my friend, "Elizabeth-the-Best."  If she’s lucky, I’ll have time for a shower first.  If not, perhaps we can sit outside....

....taxes.

(Not to mention an extremely annoying letter from the IRS complaining that I didn't send them enough money LAST year.)

Whut fresh (red) hell is THIS?

Dammit all.

And a tip of the O'Toole hat to Willie Nelson.

 • Fifi Fights Jungle Behind Garage...And WINS.  Sees Back of Garage for First Time in Years!

 • Toad Hall Farm Loses Two Trees To Wind - Chain Saw Massacre Imminent

 • 2007 Burn Pile Tops 2006 by 5 Feet 3 Inches So Far

 • First Asparagus of the Year Pops Up Weeks Early!

 • Sick Maple Can Be Saved With Buckets of Money Says Tree Doc

 • 70-Year-Old Sewing Machine Repaired Just In Time For Amazing Grace’s Sun dress

 • Asbestos Suit Proves Handy for Fighting Poison Ivy

 • Richard and Lula Hollytree Get Fed and Treated for Black Spot

 • Fence Row In Danger of Being Covered by Polk

 • Goddammed Mower Clogs Every Three Feet In Thick Grass On Banks

 • Giant Black Dog Digs Unnecessary Foundation for Equally Unnecessary Second Home

 • Wanted:  Clean Dirt

 • Fifi O’Toole 0 -- Weeds 2,137

 • Unexpected Rain Causes Grass to Grow Three Feet.  Overnight!

 • 2006 Tax Forms Missing -- Psychic To Be Called In

 • Birds Invite Relatives Over -- Crowd Consumes 40 Pounds of Sunflower Seed In One Week!

 • Woman Plans Heist On Vet Pharmacy

 • 60-Year-Old Leak In Back Room Still Leaking

 • Bodinski Home Brew Arrives Via US Mail -- Enclosed Note Warns Against Drinking

 • "THE KID" & Family In Danger of Being Evicted by Toys -- Seek Larger Living Quarters

 • Princess Prissy Changes Name to "Young Mother Hubbard" During Weekdays

 • Easter Bunny Assists Fifi In Keeping The Ends From Meeting

                                                                                - 30 -

Correction Notice: 

    Due to an error by our proofreader, Fifi O’Toole, one of yesterday’s headlines was printed incorrectly.  Princess Prissy has NOT changed her name to “Young Mother Hubbard” during weekdays.  She has, however, changed her name to “The Young Woman Who Lived In A Shoe.”  During weekdays.  Or weak days, as the case may be,

    Fifi O’Toole has been suffering lately from entirely too much fresh air and sunshine.  We apologize for any inconvience that her error may have caused.

A friend sent me to this cool place. But whut's even MORE exciting is
that I actually figured out how to move it all from there to here!

(kindly insert applause here)

Oh yeah -- and Happy St. Paddy's Day, y'all!

Ignorance and Bliss

    The year is 1950-something. The scene is a first grade classroom in a Chicago elementary school that was formerly a high school.  There are six rows of pint-sized wooden desks containing six desks in each row.  Some of the desks are empty, because there are only about 25 kids in this class.  

    It’s early -- we’d hung our coats in our lockers only minutes ago -- and our teacher, Miss O’Connell, has just begun to talk about shapes and colors when the door to the classrom is opened by the school principal who is escorting a little girl wearing braids and a plaid dress.  The girl is carrying her coat over her arm.  She looks very shy and very nervous.

    The rest of us are nervous too, for Betty is a “colored” girl and we are all as white as white can be.  

    After a brief discussion between our teacher and the principal, it is explained that Betty has moved to our neighborhood from another city and will be our new classmate now.  This statement is greeted by curious glances at each other and by the most total silence I can ever remember.  Betty hangs her head.

    Miss O’Connell, never one to let any child feel left out, puts on her happiest face and says something to the effect that Betty is most welcome and we are all glad to have her with us.  More silence.

    Continuing as if nothing were amiss, our teacher  announces that Betty will need a place to hang her coat, and asks for raised hands from those of us wo do not already have a locker mate.  There were a lot of us who didn’t have a locker mate, but not one hand went up.

    I remember to this day how deafening the silence grew and how I squirmed in my seat, embarrassed for Betty who looked so miserable up there at the front of the room all by herself -- being stared at by a sea of expressionless, cold, white faces.

    When I couldn’t stand it another second, I raised my hand high, smiled and said bravely, “ *I* will share my locker with Betty!”   (Bravely because I knew that my mother  -- an outspoken southern woman who was positive that all “coloreds” were no-accounts -- would not like this turn of events one bit.)

    My courage was bolstered to the rafters though when Betty looked up and smiled at me.  It was worth any trouble that might come later just to see that smile!  And off we skipped, Betty and I, to hang her coat in our newly shared locker. Gawd!  I felt so good that day!  I didn’t really understand why at the time, but looking back I still see it as one of the highest highs of my entire life.  Somebody else was happy because of me.  Way cool!

    The Ignorance:  That night at the dinner table, still feeling happy about my new friend, I told my parents and my older brother all about Betty and how no one else would share a locker with her.  My mother literally gagged on her mashed potatoes and screeched at me, “Oh NO!  She’ll STEAL your COAT!”   I was crushed of course, but puzzled as well.

    The Bliss:  “But, Mother,” I asked, wide-eyed with sincerity:  “Why would she steal my coat?  She already has a coat.  That’s how come she needed a locker!”

    And now a brief note to whatever cosmic karma made me raise my hand that day:  “Thanks.  I owe you.”

    A friend sent me to YouTube the other day to catch a cool video and I got to lay eyes on Dave Edmunds for the first time.  I dunno too much about this guy, except that he once sang a duet with Carlene Carter.  I dunno much about Carlene Carter either, except that I think she’s June’s daughter, she’s definitely a looker, and she once sang a duet with Dave Edmunds.

    (And just as an aside, now that I’ve seen Dave, I’m even more in love than I was back when I first heard the duet.)  

    But more to the point, there’s a line in the duet that goes like this:  “....if your lovin’ is good and your cookin’ ain’t greasy, then chuck the Chuck Wagon and we’ll ride away.”

    Gawd!  I would trade my Smokey Mountain Backscratcher for the CD that contains that song!  Because hey!  Anybody who can squeeze a line into a love song about greasy food is my kind of people!

    No, I don’t especially like greasy food.  But the idea of singing about it amuses me.  (Admittedly, my sense of humor is a tad off-center, but it's a congenital disorder and I’m proud of it.  Or proud OF it, as we say down here south of the Mason-Dixon Line.)

    Now, if someone would just sing a love song and squeeze in a line about mold and mildew, I believe I could die happy.

    On another subject -- all grands being equally perfect and because Wissh likes to look at them -- here’s a pic of THE KID’s kids: Aidan-The-Pensive and Always-Agreeable-Mackenzie, (or Little Mac, for short).

    As far as I know, my complete adoration is the only link between these two topics.

    - I adore the Snow Buddies because they are two of my grands -- genetically perfect, of course, and quite photogenic, to boot!

Washington, D.C.
 
    The House Subcommittee on Energy and Air Quality hearing entitled "Climate Change: "Are Greenhouse Gas Emissions from Human Activities Contributing To A Warming Of The Planet" scheduled for 10 AM Wednesday has been canceled due to an ICE STORM and rescheduled to a date and time to be announced later.

 
St. Louis, MO
 
     Maryville University has canceled a screening of Al Gore's movie on global warming, "An Inconvenient Truth,"  because of a 6-inch SNOW STORM.  More snow is expected Friday.