Note to Self: Don't Watch This at Night

All right, I did it again. I got to watching the Travel Channel tonight.
I'd already seen Loretta Lynn's Haunted Plantation. But there was
this other show called Most Haunted or something like that. It was
on at 8:00 p.m., so I started watching. #1 son was at his computer,
heard it, and came over to watch with me. We should know better.
We are both big squawking crybaby chickens.

This team from the show went to an old house somewhere in
England.( I have never been good with geography or history, because
I always had a football coach for a teacher, and let's just say I learned
more about grunting Neanderthals picking on sissy boys than I'll ever
need to know.) And by old, I mean this place was built in the 1500's.
For a while it was an orphanage, then it was a home, now it is an inn.

The owners reported that people saw a dark figure in the bedrooms
and a lady on the steps, heard voices, heard children, the maid was
shoved by an entity in the bathroom, their lampshade in their
bedroom shot off the lamp and across the room, and their son
was thrown out of his bed and came crying to them with a
handprint on his neck and won't go upstairs unless an adult
goes with him.

People, this might be a sign that you should not live here. Maybe
you might want to look for a place that is...oh, I don't know,
maybe... not 500 freakin' years old!

So the team had 24 hours to find something. They sat in the rooms
with absolutely no light. They all felt creepy. Their two psychics
told them about some cruel bully spirit that wanted them out. The
woman heard someone whisper in her ear and freaked out in the
basement. Almost all of them, at one time or another, in different
rooms, felt someone touch the back of their head, or got a bad
headache in the back of the head. Interesting. A psychic got
"possessed" by the spirit and threw a lamp. This is the part that
looked fake to me. He growled, "You want confrontation?"
I said that to #1 son as he kept bopping back over to his computer.
It freaked him out, so he came back to the couch and put a blanket
over his head. Ain't I one good mama?

The worst part was when 3 guys sat in a dark bedroom and
taunted the spirit. "If you're here, show yourself. If you're really
what we think you are. Give us some sign." A couple of the guys
saw lights, but they didn't get them on camera. Then this guy said,
"Show yourself to 3 men. Or can you only show children? I am
not afraid of you." At that point, there was a thump, and some
light, and the guys screamed like little girls and grabbed each other
and headed toward the door. The TV had come on by itself. There
was just static. One guy was almost crying. He wanted out of the
room. He mumbled something about how now they were going to
see or hear something through the TV. I guess he saw Poltergeist.
Not me. Too creepy. They showed how the remote was setting
right on top of the TV, not in reach of where the guys had been
sitting. The rest of the team came running. One guy picked up the
remote, turned the TV off, then back on. It had a picture with no
static. The guys spent the rest of the night in the production van.

OK. Now if you are on a show looking for spirits, and you flat
out ask the spirits to show themselves, why do you freak out when
they do? Did you not really believe in the first place? A piece of
advice: if you are afraid to see them, don't ask for them to make
themselves known! And don't get smart with them. Sheesh, people.
This is common sense.

There was another episode right after, but scaredycat didn't want it.
Now I'm sitting here with the lights on while I type. I never leave
the lights on here in my cozy little basement office with no windows.
Lights make a glare on my screen. But now I have spooked myself
and I am afraid of the dark. I will leave on my office lights while I
go out to the main basement and turn on the big light not just the
lamp. Because I don't want a repeat of the time I saw that guy with
no head. And if you didn't hear that story, it is somewhere in my
ghost stories from June 2-7 in the archives.

Chicken little is asleep on the basement couch where he prefers
to sleep every night instead of in his nice upstairs room with the
bunk beds and a big window and a little octagon window right by
the top bunk. "It's too scary, Mom. That window by the bed."
Well, I think a dark basement where your mama saw a headless
man is just a bit scarier, but hey, to each his own.

And the next time he backtalks me, I'm going to growl, "You
want confrontation?"

Hillbilly Mom's Movie Challenge v 5.0

Saturday again, and time for the movie challenge. Good luck to all
who dare to enter. Answers will be posted on Wednesday, June 29.
Winner will win absolutely nothing except their name and link in my
blog. Post answers in the comments. Have at it, folks:

1. "You soaked his underwear in meat?"

2. "Stop that fake Dolly!"

3. "Please, Sir, may I have some more?"

4. "Fellas, we're in a tight spot."

5. "We keep the children right around here...."

6. "Don't ever feed them after midnight."

7. "What's she doing here?"
"I carried a watermelon."

8. "Have you tasted yourself lately?"

9. "That would be harsher punishment for parole violators, Stan
....and world peace."

10. "Fred, these are your pens and your pencils. And Fred, these
are my pens and my pencils."

Mysteries of My Universe Part 1

Sometimes I wonder:

How can Doritos make your breath smell so bad for so long?
(because my kid almost made me faint with Dorito breath)

Why were people sad about the very old very sick Pope's death?
(because if anyone is going to Heaven, wouldn't it surely be the Pope?
and Heaven is the ultimate goal, right?and we all have to die sometime)

If no one is around to see you, do you eat food you drop on the floor?
(because my students act so persnickety about throwing something
away the minute they drop it...except for one kid who ate a box of
Nerds off the floor one by one)

How can men sneeze 37 times in a row?
(because I've never heard women do this serial sneezing thing)

How can teenage boys fart on cue?
(because they do, you know, just ask any middle school teacher)

Why don't more people know that cocktail sauce is just ketchup
mixed with horseradish? (because you can easily make it yourself)

Why would 20 out of 21 teachers and the instructor at a Character
Education workshop that dwells on doing the right thing IGNORE
a high school girl screaming "No...no...get out!" to high school boys
who had chased her into the girls' bathroom? (because it wasn't
even my school district, and I was the only one to go out into the
hall to shoo them away)

How can people confuse the words "recipe" and "receipt" ????
(because someone found my site in a google search for "receipt
amaretto sour")

Why do I have 30 visitors today and 125 page loads?
(because it seems like the boss was away and people at work
must have been bored)

Who told the families who run the Chinese restaurants in my county
to hang Christmas lights for ambience? (because that seems to me
to be kind of an interior-decorating faux pas)

Why can't I come up with something interesting to post on this blog?
(no mystery to this one...because I MUST spend 2 hours each morning
watching ER reruns on TNT)

The first thing we saw upon entering Bass Pro Shop. Great idea, teaching kids to play with snakes. 

Hillbilly Vacation

Redneck Diva has asked to hear about our trip to Branson (imagine
that!), so here it is. No, don't get up...I'm bringing out the slides later.

First of all, it was a 5 hour drive. With 2 kids. And 1 husband. Hubby
has a medical problem that inhibits his driving, which is called
gawking at everything but the road and you are going to kill us
and then I will haunt you for the rest of your life and afterlife!!!
OK, now we have established what kind of rider I am. Now I don't
actually want to drive, myself. I just want to control his driving. Before
you go thinking: what an incredibly egotistical controlling battleaxe,
let me illustrate.

Near Branson, Hwy 65 kind of gets backed up. We know this. We
go every year. But Hubby was eyeballing some barn or tractor or
other such exotic item in a field, and had to slam on the brakes. We
almost rear-ended a line of traffic stopped on the highway. Just after
my heartrate returned to normal, I turned around from threatening the
kids with a trip to spankytown, and saw that we were now driving
down the right shoulder. Completely on the shoulder, no rubber on
the road itself. So of course I shouted to Hubby, "What are you
doing?" and he yanked the giant-SUV-that-should-have-its-own-zip-
code back onto the road. Then he said quite possibly the dumbest
thing I have heard in the last 16 years, which was, "I don't know if
it was me or the road." Duh! I'll be glad to figure it out for you!

We only stayed one night this year, so we didn't make it to Silver
Dollar City. Or as one of my friends used to call it: Steal-Your-
Dollar City. We did go to the Dixie Stampede. Front row seats. In
most places that is a good thing. At Dixie Stampede, it means that
during your dinner, horses throw dirt clods into you food. But I do
really like the show. One of the girl riders threw a carnation to #2
son, and he was very proud of it. Of course we had to find a
way to protect it and bring it home.

We usually stay down the strip by The Track so we are close to
go-carts, but this time we stayed at the Grand Country Inn. They
have everything there, including the World's Largest Fiddle sticking
out the front of the building. (Yes, Redneck Diva, we saw it.)
The kids liked the indoor water park, and we had lunch and
breakfast there too. Or I should say we paid $3.95 for #2 son to
take one bite out of an apple and take one sip of orange juice.

We could see the Dixie Stampede building from our parking lot.
Hubby wanted to walk. "It's only about a quarter-mile," he said.
I did not want to walk, because first of all I am a lazy slob, and
secondly, walking there means you also have to walk back, and
most importantly, I have to tow a 55-pound child like a
battleship anchor wherever I go. He can only hold Mom's
hand, not Dad's. And that was no quarter-mile. So we drove,
which took about 10 minutes, and that is good for Branson
Saturday night traffic. And guess what, the odometer said it
was 8/10 mile. I didn't run the mile for my high school track
team for nothin', baby. I can judge distances. And you know
what they say about men and measuring. Oh, you don't? Sorry,
I can't explain it here. Seems Hubby is backwards, though, under-
estimating instead of overestimating.

We also rode go-carts and bumper boats. #2 son spared me
some embarrassment this year, as he actually drove his bumper
boat to the side when his turn was up. Last year he kept going,
grinning from ear to ear. Of course, Hubby, brother, and I were
screaming at him, "Park it now!" Everyone was staring: the
others who had just parked, the ones waiting in line for their
turn, and all the families lined up around the fence to watch their
normal children who knew how to follow the rules. Somehow,
he just didn't hear us. He grinned even bigger. One of the girls
working the boats had to jump into the waist-deep water, chase
him for a lap around the water-spouting whale, and tow him back.
We made a little trip to the car after that, just me and my boy.
I think he remembered that this year.

We played miniature golf at the Pirate's Cove on Sunday morning,
where I soundly beat Hubby and boys. (Woo hoo! I'm going on
the Old Lady Miniature Golf Tour of Champions!) On the way home
we made a stop at Bass Pro Shop because we hadn't been there
for years, and wanted #2 son to see it. Of course, he just wanted
a Happy Meal from the McDonalds inside. We had to stop at the
Case Knife outlet and Russell Stover candy outlet in Lebanon.
Then it was time to head home to the hillbilly mansion and cement
pond. A good time was had by all.

Here is the logo I will use for my newly created superhero, SNIPE. Beware, evildoers!

"Undies on the Outside" BB Challenge v 11

Hmmm....Rebecca's week wasn't very long this time. Here's my
new Big Blogger challenge: pick a superhero who can save the
world, and choose a sidekick from the former members of the
Cyberhouse. I choose to create my own superhero identity, so
here goes....

I am the incredibly sharp-tongued superhero, "SNIPE." Oh, no,
folks...you don't want to come a-huntin' me. I can wither people
with a single scathing comment from my finely-honed tongue.
Nobody is safe: world leaders, evil-doers (OK, some are one
and the same), candy-from-baby-stealers, prep-insulting-stoner-
students, my-poo-don't-stink snobs, bosses-from-hell, and even
the lowest-of-all-life-forms, the plagiarizer, are not safe in my
world.

I will seek you out and embarrass you to death. Got a skeleton
in the closet? I'll drag him out for Snipe & Tell. Did you pee the
bed? Pick your nose? Forget to flush? Wear raggedy stained
underwear to the ER? Leave toilet paper flapping out of your
pants? Make out with someone (gasp) unpopular? Never make
out at all? Drink from the milk jug? Put an empty Little Debbie
snack cake box back in the pantry? "Borrow" from petty cash?
I will find out, and you will pay!!!!!

My illustrious sidekick is "Mosha." After drinking 7 bottles of
wine, she becomes a kick-a$$ skank-dancer. She also gives
free lessons in kickboxing computers, and chopping potatoes
with an axe, though she will never ever become a prostitute
because that will give her Parkinson's Disease or Multiple Sclerosis.
This distracts the bad guys while I question their so-called best
friends to get the dirt. And believe me, they do tell, as long as
they start out by saying, "Don't tell anybody I told you this, but..."

Once I have their deep dark secrets, it is curtains for the villains.
I mince no words, though my tongue is so sharp it can mince
onions or other odiferous and cruciferous vegetables. I am quite
suited to the job, because as everyone who knows me well is
aware: people piss me off! All day. Every day.

Answers to Hillbilly Mom's Movie Challenge v 4.0

Well, it looks like this week Rebecca barely pulled through with
the win. She had her toughest competition to date from newcomer
Rose, (who left no forwarding address), finishing in 2nd place by
only one movie. Hey, Rebecca, you got your usual eight right.
You might be right about the Scary Movie for #10, but the one
I was thinking of was Rose's answer, and after all, it IS my contest.
Rose had 7 out of 10. We also had Redneck Diva improving on
her previous personal best of one, setting a new mark for herself
with two. Try, try again on Saturday. Here are the results:

1. "You are scaring the freaks."
"I present to you, the New York Giants."
The lemur-in-charge in Madagascar.

2. "Put her in the trunk."
"She won't fit."
"Hack off her legs!"
Christina Applegate, Keith Coogan, and Danielle Harris in
Don't Tell Mom the Babysitter's Dead.

3. "Now I want you to go out there and hit the pace car."
"Why?"
"Because it's the only thing you haven't hit."
Robert Duvall to Tom Cruise in Days of Thunder.

4. "Want me to make you some sandwiches?"
Cloris Leachman, Brett Kelly, Billy Bob Thornton in
Bad Santa.

5. "What would you give me for a basketfull of kisses?"
"I'd give you a basketfull of hugs."
William Hopper, Nancy Kelly to Patty McCormack in
The Bad Seed.

6. "This one time, at Band Camp,....."
Alyson Hannigan in American Pie

7. "Redrum! Redrum!"
Tony-the-talking-finger in The Shining.

8. "Do you know what her high school nickname was? Fingercuffs."
Jason Lee to Ben Affleck in Chasing Amy.

9. "Let's try it again. Only this time, I'm going to stick my tongue in
your mouth. And when I do that, I want you to massage my tongue
with yours. And that's what first base is."
Sarah Michelle Gellar to Selma Blair in Cruel Intentions.

10. Same as #9. Mia Kirshner to Beverly Polcyn in Not Another
Teen Movie.

"I Know What You Did Last Blog" BB Challenge v 10

It's been going on since mid-May, and now there are four of us
left in Rebecca's Big Blogger Contest. This week's assignment is
to stalk another member of the Cyberhouse. Bwah ha ha!

I know what you did last blog. Oh yes, I like to watch. And I've
been watching you for quite a while now. Hiding in the basement
isn't going to get rid of me. I can hear those beer bottles tinkling.
And don't think that buying taawwl cans is going to fool me.

I was there when you made fun of a guy's wife for smothering
him. And while he was trying to sing her a love song, too. You'd
better stick to those little redneck bars where the roaches and
off-duty cops come to drink.

Don't tell me I am doing wrong. I am no worse than you, spying
on those poor welfare people. They are just trying to buy groceries.
They don't need you sniffing their crab legs and steaks. And
remind me never to follow you too closely to a gas station. I don't
want to wait in line behind you while you snark it out with the
employee of the month who is only trying to make her miserable
existence more bearable by tuning in to her TV show of choice
before taking your money. So what if you have to wait a minute
or 30? I just don't want to be waiting behind you for the police
to show up, or for her to remove your severed hand from the
metal money tray and fling it at you.

Did you bring in the eggs yet? Because the last I saw, you were
playing in the corn like Stu Redman in The Stand. I saw you
tormenting the geese by moving their escape hole, and making
them swim in a redneck pool. And what about your poor
little nephew? At least buy the kid name-brand cereal to stick
up his nose.

You'd better get used to someone watching you constanty if
you are planning to be a teacher. Oh yes...what I do is nothing
compared to what students will do. They will find out everything
about you in approximately 2.47 hours. The internet is a wonderful
stalking (I mean educational) tool. You won't be able to do so
much as set Wally's lawnmower on fire before they know all
about it.

Well, it seems as though it's time for me to go now. I was minding
your (er..my own) business when you reached under the couch
and pulled out.....OWW! What was...HEY! You just hit me in
the head with a copy of The Poisonwood Bible! No fair!

Just for that, I'm going to find someone else to stalk.
Or am I??????????

How Could This Happen?

We left around 6:00 a.m. for our trip to Branson. Since we were
traveling with kids, we made pert near 87 rest stops on our 5-hour
trip. And that is where I came across a very strange sight indeed.

At the I-44 rest stop just south of Rolla, a woman came out of the
restroom just as I was walking in. "Sir, could you come in here a
minute?" she called to some guy walking into the men's room.

What? I kept going, because, you know, I had to go. I went into
the first stall. Here came lady and man traipsing right behind me.
Now why would someone do that? Was this some scam they had
going? What self-respecting man would walk right into the ladies'
room, no questions asked? Ooops! I forgot. We're talking about
men. So the answer would be: all of them.

"Man coming in!" the woman hollered, even though he was right
on her heels. I stood in my stall to see how this show was going
to unfold. They walked past me. "She's in the handicapped stall
and can't get out. You might have to crawl under the door and
unlock it."

What? If she couldn't unlock it, how could he? Unless she was
very very handicapped, and if so, then she shouldn't have been
in a bathroom stall alone.

The guy went, "Huh." Then the door popped open. I knew this,
because the two women yelled, "Yeah! Thanks so much!" and the
guy walked out. So then I sat down to do my business, and I heard
them babbling. "He used a key. He stuck it in there and the door
popped right open!" And the other one said "I wondered how
he made it open so easy." And the first one said, "Aren't they so
smart?" Uh...well....apparently so, since you couldn't even get out
of a bathroom stall without the help of a big strong Mensa man.

Now these women were probably in their early sixties, and didn't
look like there was anything wrong with them. Have you ever
been stuck in a bathroom stall at a rest stop? Because let me tell
you, the only problem I have ever had with the door was that it
will not latch, and I had to put my head against it and try to
balance myself. And even when the doors latch, if you bump
the walls, they spring open. I don't know what that guy did with
a key. He must have put it in that crack between the door and
the frame.

I can't figure this one out. Unless these were hillbilly gals going
to town, and they were used to the wooden latch on the outhouse
door.