Where's my barn?

My best friend bought the farm today. She stammered for help… I, I, Farm - don’t know where - please help me.
She skyped my sister for help, but got no answer. My sister, who lives clear across the ocean phoned me at 10:30 in the evening quite concerned. “Is everything OK?”
“Have you (pause) spoken to Trixie?”
Me - in a half a bottle of Spanish Rioja fog… “Ahhh, no I haven’t, um why?”
“Well she skyped me (pause)… and wrote stammering sentences about large sums of money, and a lost farm, or barn or (another pause)… Was she involved in one of those phone scams that happen to old people?”
Me - “Now why would Trixie buy a barn over the phone from a total stranger. Franz maybe, but not Trixie.”
My 12 year old daughter was listening.
“Mom, Trixie can’t find her 40,000 gold coin barn she bought on Farmville.”
Farmville, well that explains everything.
Margaret said it would be a good idea for Trixie to add some Amish neighbors to her Farmville and have a barn raising. Good idea, but Trixie is from South Africa, I don’t know if she knows what Amish people are. And besides that, Amish don’t have computers, thus no Farmville.
I phoned her this afternoon, and apparently she still hasn’t found her barn. I went to her farm to try and straighten the whole thing out. I saw the beginnings of a horse stable. Just the framework. Why would anyone buy just the framework?. Or perhaps they’re making Farmville more realistic. Little Farmville builders come and start a half-ass job, and then stop midway. Leaving you’re farm looking like a white trash, plot of land. Soon they’ll offer that oh-so-appealing TYVEK siding people in America are so fond of.
Or is that the Yo-ville game… I figured Yo-Ville is more city stuff. You find virtual subsidized housing, and shop with virtual food stamps the beginning of every month at a virtual K-Mart.
What we need is a Trailerville. You could upgrade to a double-wide depending on how many XP you earn by making babies. And the more “Babies Daddies” you have, the more gold coins you earn. Gifts for your Trailerville friends and neighbors could include RID kits, Cut & Curl coupons for a mullet trim, or muscle shirts AKA “wife-beaters”.
Well, I seem to have gotten off the subject here. Where was I? What was I writing about? Ah yes, Trixie’s lost barn. I believe it is stuck on a virtual island somewhere.
It is filled with pink cows, and possibly a polar bear. If Trixie can make it to the temple where the Frank Zappa dude translates for the Asian guy, I believe she will find her barn.
Good Luck Trixie.

Old McGaiser had a farm E-I-E-I-O

My pig is 99% ready. I don’t know what happens when he is a full 100%. Will he be sent off to market Jiggedy-Jig? When my rabbit was 100% I shaved it for it’s angora. But pigs don’t have fur - pigs have bacon. It’s all quite exciting. OH! My pig just oinked - I’ll be right back…False alarm, he’s still at 99%.
Two of my horses are at 58%, and one is at 20%. I haven’t had them long, so I don’t think they will have to go to the Elmer’s Spa when they are 100%.
After spending 10,000 on a dairy farm I realized I didn’t have any cows. An embarrassing oversight I must admit. But my son Patrick helps out around the farm, and was able to get me not one, but TWO cows. This in turn gave me more fertilizer for my crops. Let’s be honest - Soybeans can never have enough fertilizer.
I know, I know, soybeans. It sounds so… well, nerdy. But after spending a full fifteen minutes in the seed department of the market I concluded soybeans would give me the highest yield, and two XP’s per field planted.
I am going to get a little crazy today and plant Super Pumpkins. I can only sell them for 3.6% of what I paid for the seeds verses 4.2% that I am getting for the soybeans, and I am only getting one XP per field but I just LOVE GIANT PUMPKINS. Reckless, I know, but all work and no play makes Liz a dull girl.
Excuse me while I check on my pig. Pig (as I so fondly call him) now has a pink candy-corn thingy above his head. TRUFFELS! Pig has collected truffles, and I have collected coins! I didn’t know pig would be so talented. Now I feel absolutely awful letting Patrick pen up all my animals. Not only did he pen them up, he told them to STAY. Are the not all god’s creatures? Do they not have the right to roam about the farm as they please?
FREE RANGE FOR FARMVILLE ANIMALS! (and while I’m at it, range free - lest Pig ends up on the breakfast table…)
I am starting a Facebook Cause. You can’t force the animals to stand in one spot day after grueling day. Rotate them for cryin’ out loud!
I am off to take down my whitewash fence. A waist of three hundred gold coins per fence, but maybe I can use them to decorate.
OH! Mystery gifts! Now I really have to go. Remember, Free your Farmville Animals!

Backing Out

Margaret and Sharon - Friends, neighbours, and Garden Artists.

Two driveways side by side separated by a beautiful three-foot-wide flowerbed.

I walked out the back door and to my horror saw my mother trying to back her car out of my sister's driveway. She had Adam (my 21 year old nephew) in the back seat and was going to give him a ride home. When I "arrived on the scene" her car was kitty-corner in the driveway and about to hit the front porch. She straighted it out, and now all she had to do was back straight up. That's it. But she kept backing into the flowers - actually, she kept backing down the row of flowers between the two driveways.
...Mom, get out of the car! Mom, you're in the flowers!
...No I'm not! (Pulls forward, backs up again EVEN FURTHER into, and down the flowerbed)
...MOM! (I bang on car window) PULL FORWARD AND GET OUT OF THE CAR!
meanwhile... Adam is sitting in the back seat. Just sitting there, kind of staring at me like maybe it's Aunt Liz that is crazy. And my mother has a manical look in her eye. It's frightening. Pam (who resides in the house from aforementioned flowerbed has arrived from walking the dog and is standing on the sidewalk. She KNOWS not to try and walk behind my mother's car because if she does, Sally WILL floor the gas and run her over. So she stands, leash in hand, and wonders if maybe she is having a bizarre dream. Meanwhile, Ray (my sister's boyfriend) has pulled up in his (stupid-ass-butt-ugly) Hummer. He stops in the middle of pulling in, and cuts the engine. I am still yelling...
...PULL FORWARD! GET OUT OF THE FUCKEN CAR!...
When (enter holy music) Margaret (my sister, owner of house and driveway. Co-owner of driver, and mother of passanger in car) comes walking up the sidewalk.
Thank God! It's Margaret! Margaret will make everything better! Margaret will fix everything.
I don't think Margaret noticed me, or Pam with dog in tow, or Ray, or Ray's (stupid-ass-butt-ugly) Hummer. Or the small crowd that had begun to gather. No, what Margaret saw was her first-born sitting (clueless) in the back seat of a crazy old woman‘s car. He mind flashed through twenty-one years of memories starting with pushing out a 12-pound baby boy and ending with the last time they hugged.
She calmly walked over to the car...
...Hi Adam. Would mind getting out of Gramma's car? That‘s right. Just get out please....
Adam got out (still clueless) and Margaret looks at my mom and says...
... Okay Mom, your fine, just keep backing up, I'll see you tomorrow...
Sally backs down the through the flowers, which are literally crunching and snapping, pulls into the street, and proceeds to drive (in the wrong direction) home. Black-eyed Susans' hanging out of her muffler.

So we had our German Thanksgiving. It was nice, albeit having to explain each dish I had prepared. Cranberry… yes, I know they look big. No, they are not from an actual forest in Sweden. Yes, there is a lot of sugar in them. Yes, a lot. And that? That is stuffing. It’s a bit like a Knödel, just all broken up, and with celery - not the celery root, the actual stalks. (Telling people about the celery makes a lot of them put the serving spoon down before taking any.) One year I didn’t tell anyone, and one person (Oh all right, it was my mother-in-hell, I mean law) Grabbed, and I mean literally GRABBED her glass of water and gulped it down. What was that, what did I just bit on, WHAT WAS IT?? (Did she think it was a cockroach?) And then there are the bright orange sweet potatoes. I like to call them the polite bite dish. Who, on the face of God’s green earth takes a teaspoon of yams? Germans, that’s who. And the Gravy goes on EVERYTHING people! I don’t even bother serving pumpkin pie. The Pumpkin Pie -yes, I even capitalize it - is Holy to me. And I will not have it sacrileged by a bunch of “isn’t she serving spätzle??” Germans.
All in all, I did get a lot of compliments. However, the after-dinner Thanksgiving tradition of undoing your pants and flopping on the couch doesn’t go over well here. I had to stay buttoned.
The day after with my German husband is always a treat. It is time to put the furniture Back In Order. I need to back up a bit and tell you about the 24 hour argument/anxiety attack on Uwe’s part each and every time I invite a lot of people over. It requires setting up another table, and moving the coffee table out of the way. This, my friends, is drama. Drama, drama, drama. It will CHANGE the order of life as we know it. Or at the very least, my living room. And furniture DOES NOT get pushed around. If we’re not allowed to shove the furniture around, then why, pray tell, did he put little round felt things on the bottom of everything we own, including the coffee maker.
WHY I ask you, why? And yes, I do wait for him to leave the house and PUSH it around. And yes, I do lie and tell him Alexander helped me CARRY the furniture.
But the next day, bright-and-early-first-thing-no-time-for-coffee, Rainman and I put the house back in order. Jawohl.
But wait, there’s more… more food that is. Leftovers. Now I ask you, are they, or are they not the best part of Thanksgiving? Honestly.
But Uwe has this thing about leftovers. They’re, well, left over. I put them outside on the picnic table. No room in out tiny German Fridge for a roasting pan full of leftovers.
So the kids and I were digging in about noon, and sin of all sins, the last person left the top askew on the pan. And the Saran Wrap from the cranberry had flown across the backyard. Now, not only do we have leftovers, we have exposed leftovers.
That was all he could take. It was, so to speak, the feather that broke the turkey’s back. I got him calmed down, and suggested he go to the sauna. There is nothing like sitting naked with your cousin Ralf and twenty other sweaty people to ease your nerves. It seemed to do the trick. And today, (day two) I shall dispose of all leftovers on the premises. In three weeks we’ll be having a Christmas Party. This will not only require more furniture relocation, but the hanging of colored lights. The more anal he gets, the more lights I hang.

Christmas lights for the house - $150.00
Timer for outdoor lights - $15.00
The look on Uwe’s face when he sees an inflatable Sponge Bob Square Pants on the roof atop 2,456 blinking lights? Priceless.
There are some things money can’t buy. For everything else, there’s Mastercard.

To lazy to lather

Is it my imagination, or do Americans get lazier every year. Liquid soap comes out pre-foamed. My God, have we become so lazy that sudsing our own squirt of soap has become too tedious? What's next? Pre-chewed gum? "ABC Spearmint gum. We do the chewing, so you don't have to."
Do I sound old? ... "Back in my day we had to work up a darn good lather all on our own. You kids don't know how good you have it!"
Next thing you know I'll be buying sensible beige colored shoes with Velcro straps, and underwear with a waistband that goes all the way up to my bra.

The Story of Sally and Mrs. Mally

Three things you need to know to "get" the story I have written.
1.)When my mother - Sally - cooks something it is always enough for twenty people. We call them "Sally Batches".
2.)As long as I've been alive, my mother hasn't had many friends. But, the ones that have come and gone over the years have always been, well, peculier.
3.)This story stems from an e-mail I got from her. She was very upset about having hit a kitten on the way home. She stopped at the only house around, and asked if it was their's. The old man told her that people just dump litters of kittens out in the country, and not to be too upset, and that he would bury the kitten, like he has for the past twenty years.

Out of those three things, and a very warped sense of humor, I have written,

The story of Sally and Mrs. Mally.



The old man appeared out of nowhere carrying a weather-beaten shovel. His green faded overalls hung low and saggy in the back, and one of the metal clasps in front was missing. His wife, a hunch-backed old woman, walked as if her left leg was shorter than her right. Her hair was pure white and pulled into a loose bun held together with bobby pins. She hobbled towards a simmering black kettel in the side yard and stirred it with the most enormous wooden spoon Sally had ever seen.
„I‘m Mr. Mally," he said in a consoling voice. „Don't worry none about that kitten. Happens all the time. People just think those poor little things can take care of themselves, and they leave whole litters of ‘em out here in the country. And, well, they wind up getting hit by a car.„ Sally listened to old Mr. Mally, still in shock from hitting the kitten. She didn‘t know what had happened. It was as if the kitten had actually flown through the air and landed in front of her car. „Can I interest you in one of the missuses fine crocheted couch throws?“ Mr. Mally asked, startling Sally back to reality. „She spins the yarn herself. Ain't nothin' softer than kitty yarn." He spit a stream of brown chewing tobacco out of the right side of his mouth and pointed towards a green roadside stand.
"Got free samples of jerkitty today. Smoked-n-dried right down yonder in what used to be the old outhouse. Just the right size for a smoke house." He hooked both thumbs into the sides of his overalls, gave a Skoll stained grin and continued with his sales pitch.
"And everything here is Or-ganic." That's just how he pronounced it, with a pause between the Or and the Ganic.
His wife gave a friendly wave as she stirred the kettle. "Won't you stay fer stew? Got plenty. With your hit, that makes five today. I'll have to freeze it if you don't stay."
Sally's eyes darted from the makeshift roadside stand, to the old woman, and finally stopped on the still warm road kill.
"Name's Nellie Mally," the woman said hobbling towards her. "I always make too much. My young-ens call it a Mally Batch when I cook."
Sally couldn't believe what she was hearing. It was like the good Lord himself had brought these two woman together. Destined to be best friends.
"Well?" Nellie asked her. "You gonna stay? Can't you speak woman?"
Sally gave a sly grin. "Oh I beg your pardon." She said sarcastically. "Guess the cats got my tongue."
This made both women laugh so hard they wet themselves right there, together, by the side of the road.
And so began the friendship between Sally and Mrs. Mally. Sally sold her trailer and moved into the old farmhouse. Old Mr. Mally spent his time raising kittens and putting them by the side of the road when he heard cars approaching. Sometimes giving them a friendly nudge, or toss into the oncoming car. Most folks bought a little Jerkitty, or handmade scarf. Sally and Nellie sat on the porch sipping lemonade and spinning "karn" as they so called it. (and giggled like schoolgirls every time they said it. Sometimes they would say it for no reason at all but to have a little laugh. Karn. Tee-Hee, Karn.) If they weren‘t spinning and giggling they were busy cooking up Sally-Mally-Batches of soup or stew.
And they all lived happily ever after.

The End

Capweats

Sharon and I became friends the day she came over, handed me a cup of coffee and said, “What the hell is up with your husband’s sweat pants. Is he waiting for a flood?”
“Haven’t you heard? They’re all the rage. I call them Capweats.” - And when I said it, I sounded like Barbara Walters or Elmer Fudd.
The famous sweat pants were an indiscernible shade of green, and the length of a pair of capris. He wore them with black dress socks and sneakers. (Why would I make that up.)
The thing with my husband is, he cannot part with his old clothes. They are “perfectly fine”. And hell hath no fury like Uwe’s anger if he finds I have pillaged his sock and underwear drawer and thrown out the pairs that crunch when you stretch them. Elastic shouldn’t crunch. And that, my friends, is a fact. If we have an argument and I want to really piss him off, I head for his underwear drawer. He follows. “Liz, don’t you dare. I’m warning you!”
I take out a pair of his mommy -wear (Underwear his mother bought for him back in the 90’s) and rip them. Childish? Yes. Effective? You betcha.
My friend Trixie’s husband has the same 100% polyamide white Adidas shorts as my husband. I can hear some of you reading this squealing “Oh, Oh! The one’s with three black stripes on the sides and a draw-string waist!” The very same. Bikini cut and lined with a 100% cotton banana hammock. (Thank God.) I dare say they are pre-1980's. The label says Made in West Germany. And I am willing to bet money his mother bought those too.
What prompted me to write this? Well, the green sweatpants are long gone. (A tragic accident involving gasoline and matches.) However… He went out, and bought the same sweatpants. (Adidas, by the way, with three black stripes down the leg. Just like the shorts.) And while I’m at it, how do men manage to replace their old clothes with exactly the same thing? Anyway, as I was saying - he replaced the sweatpants ten years ago, and now, they too are the length of capris. It made me think of Sharon, handing me that cup of coffee. And all the cups of coffee we had together thereafter. Her’s black, mine with vanilla-toffee flavored creamer.
Just a little trip down memory lane.
Well folks, Uwe has just changed out of his sweats, and left the house. Time for me to wrap this up. The gasoline and matches are ready. Oh don’t worry, there’s an Adidas store downtown. Unless his mother has already bought him a pair…