I Think I Just Need A Cigarette…

I am feeling better physically, so it must be time for the nicotine cravings to kick in. Nicotine cravings can do incredible things to your mind, you know?

Tuesday evening I decide to go outside and do some edging. The curb, which is actually a full 6” deep was in danger of totally disappearing. What’s worse, my killer creature lawn was sending out exploratory tendrils into the street. The city officials here frown on that. Bunch of narrow minded individuals who obviously don’t understand the beauty and freedom of spirit expressed by a lawn allowed to go native. So its dusk and I’m edging. And the edger keeps kicking off – won’t stay running. And I’m cussing (softly under my breath because this is SUCH a proper neighborhood that I live in!) and grousing about the edger, attempting to forcibly WILL it to work, when I hear a CRUNCH, as the edger gave up the ghost and quit running for the 452nd time that evening. I looked down and notice a kind of lopsided piece of pvc tubing…UH-OH. That was one of my sprinklers. The one in the handy-dandy spiffy keen built in irrigation system.

Being the handy-woman that I am…I ran inside, grabbed the phone and called Daddy. Honestly, I didn’t expect him to do anything about it until the next day, but I have found it is best to report my miscellaneous little goofs immediately when it involves labor and/or money from Dad. He groused about not having had dinner yet and then headed over. In the meantime, it got dark. And there’s NoDinner Daddy (kinda like CareerGirl Barbie) digging in a hole full of water and broken pipe when some neighbors happen by on their evening walk. They got treated to NoDinner Daddy in FULL grouse! I smiled sweetly. They offered to come over tomorrow and fix it. I thanked them. NoDinner Daddy growled. They left. Daddy made unkind remarks about the old farts (one of who was – I suspect – a good 10 years younger than NoDinner Daddy.)

Never fear – come Wednesday, FullTummy Daddy appeared and fixed everything. Yay!!! Wednesday was eventful in its own right – cause I got to go Dumpster Diving! Heck – I was even issued a personal invitation to the dumpster! Sis and I were outside – cause I was determined to finish edging (and no – it’s STILL not completed for those of you with inquiring minds). I was edging, Sis was watching. A man approached and said he’d bought the house over there (pointed one street down) from the man’s estate and was cleaning it out. There were some items of furniture that weren’t all that great, but might be usable if we were interested. Interested??? Woo-hoo! Sis and I beat a hasty path to the treasure trove. In a mere 20 minutes, we had rounded up a pair of huge ginger jar lamps, a dinette table for the back patio, an end table, a wicker shelf, and a horribly ugly, but wonderfully comfy, chair for my bedroom. (Can you say “slip cover”?) I got to dumpster dive – I got to dumpster dive! Then I did the happy little dumpster-diver dance all the way home! Step-and-lunge-and-step-and-dive…. twirl, twirl, twirl – REPEAT! By that time it was WAY too hot already to finish edging…so I went inside and basked in the glories of treasures n trash. Well, that and the fact that the nice man who invited us to dumpster dive asked me if Sis is my mother. Hehe. He thought she looked old enough to be my MOM!! Oh yeah! (See what I mean about nicotine deprivation? I really shouldn’t be quite so delighted about things that would distress Sis if she knew…. but I am!)

All the excitement must have worn me out, because I fell asleep long before our fearless leader announced to the nation that war had indeed begun. I woke up to that news this morning. Perhaps I was hoping something was wrong with my ears and I had heard wrong…so I toddled off to the store and bought some ear candles. The man at the store said they only had the smaller size. I bought them anyway – cause I only have small ears! Then sis and I did some driving around and local sight-seeing…driving by a lot of the places in town where we used to ‘hang’ to see if they were still there and how they had changed. Sis’s favorite bowling alley is currently a parking lot. My favorite skating rink is a pet grooming palace. It’s hard to reminisce about the good old days when there’s only a parking lot and a puppy beauty parlor to look at for visual aids. We gave up and came home to put the ear candles to use.

Have you ever seen ear candles? Long tapered waxy-papery tubes…you stick them in your ear and light one end. The fire creates a vacuum and then there’s flame and smoke coming out of your ear…and the vacuum sucks all the ear goo out! Pretty nifty, huh? Chickie watched and took notes – as further evidence that her mother is certifiably insane, should anyone ever ask. Hah! At least I’ll have uber-clean ears when they put the straight jacket on! (Really – do you see what I mean about nicotine cravings? If I could have just had a CIGARETTE like I normally do…then I wouldn’t had had to stick lit objects in my flipping ears!)

I’ve already lost count – was that more Rah-Rahs than Boo-Boos? Did you know there’s 20 cigarettes in a pack? And I only smoked ultra-lights…(at the one-time skating rink, current Poochie Puffy Palace). How bad could it be to light one up anyway? Oh shit…after that ear candle experience, I’d probably stick the dang cigarette in my ear. Do you suppose they have “candles” for other body parts?