Author: Big Mama

I have sat here for the last hour and debated just posting one sentence that reads, “I HAVE NOTHING”. But that’s not entirely true. I have a few things I want to tell you but none of them are related to each other and I currently lack the skill and ambition to try to weave them all together like a random patchwork quilt.

Of course, technically, I guess you don’t weave a quilt at all. Which may be part of my problem.

So here are the pieces of the quilt that never will be:

1. For those of you who may have missed the announcement, I chose Half Broke Horses by Jeannette Walls for our first book. You can get all the details from the original post.

2. Don’t forget about the Red Letter Words giveaway. It ends Friday and you can enter by leaving a comment on my giveaway page.

3. I believe I’ve mentioned that I’m a huge fan of Ann Voskamp. Which is why I can’t wait to read her new book One Thousand Gifts: A Dare to Live Fully Where You Are. I have no doubt that it’s amazing.

4. Speaking of books, I’m going to give away a copy of my friend Gregg Matte’s book, Finding God’s Will: Seek Him, Know Him, Take the Next Step, next Tuesday.

I was going to do it today but then I felt like it might be like GIVEAWAYS AHOY and I’d get overwhelmed by all the choosing of the random numbers. So instead I’ll just create a buzz about it happening next week. I read this book in about two days and LOVED every word. It is just so, so good.

5. Is it just me or do I seem to know a lot of people who write books?

6. Yesterday I was driving Caroline to gymnastics. We just watched Princess Diaries last weekend and she asked me why the boy in the movie wasn’t very nice to Anne Hathaway’s character. (I can’t remember any character names. I apologize that I have the short term memory of a gnat, but can remember the words to a T.V. show theme song that I watched thirty years ago.)

Anyway, I explained that the boy wasn’t very nice and he only wanted to be friends with Anne Hathaway after he found out she was a princess.

Caroline said, “Oh. Well why did he do that?”

Recognizing a teachable moment, I replied, “Well there are some people that are like that. They don’t really care about you unless they think you can do something for them or if you have something they want. It would be like if someone was never very nice to you but then heard you had a cool toy and wanted to come over and play with it.”

“Oh.”

I continued, “It’s called using someone for something and you never want to do that. You should be genuinely nice to everyone no matter who they are or what they have. You should always look at what’s inside a person’s heart and not who they are on the outside.”

“Okay. Did you know kids eat free at Pizza Hut on Tuesday nights?”

I had no idea.

Obviously my lecture on human kindness made an enormous impact.

7. I just watched American Idol and was pleasantly surprised to find that I like J. Lo and Steven Tyler as judges. I thought he was funny and she was very pleasant and not at all diva-like. We’ll see how it goes as the season plays it but, as of now, I’m in.

Of course some of my fondness may be due to the fact that I once rode in an elevator with Steven Tyler at the Red Carpet Inn in Omaha, Nebraska and have considered him to be a friend ever since even though we didn’t say a word to each other. I was with Gulley’s stepdad, Big, and I think he totally intimidated Steven Tyler. Probably because he was two feet taller than him.

8. I’ve been meaning to mention this to my San Antonio and surrounding area peeps. Priscilla Shirer is going to be speaking here in town on February 25-26th at Alamo City Church. If you’ve heard Priscilla speak before then you know you don’t want to miss it. If you haven’t ever heard Priscilla, I will tell you DON’T MISS IT.

You can register for the event and find out more information on the LifeWay event page. It’s going to be so good.

9. We finally took down our outdoor Christmas decorations on Tuesday. And by “we”, I mean P. I was very busy pretending I had a lot of errands to run. This did not stop him from sending me the occasional text message that read “Seriously? You had to weave the lights in and out of the porch railing?”

He should know me well enough to know that my OCD is going to come out full-force when it comes to that kind of stuff. Obsessive disorders don’t take a holiday, the holidays only make them worse.

Feel free to put that on your Christmas card next year. It’s a tender sentiment.

Y’all have a great day.

Well, it’s sad times here at our house. P has been stricken by what appears to be the stomach bug that I’d thought we’d managed to dodge. As I sit here on the couch watching The Golden Globes and wondering if Sandra Bullock’s bangs are of the clip-on variety, he has been quarantined to our bedroom. I should probably go check on him but I’d hate to wake him up. Or worse, catch what he has.

However, I think we all know that once the stomach virus enters a home it takes no prisoners. Which is why I’ve been very careful about what I eat tonight since there’s a good chance it might end up on a list of foods that are dead to me.

The irony is that I really thought Caroline was coming down with something. On Thursday night she was completely congested and had that glassy look in her eye that is usually a harbinger that cold season is about to take you down. We were up several times during the night and I even offered to let her stay home from school on Friday, but she insisted she wanted to go because it was the end of the 9 week grading period and she was desperate for perfect attendance.

That trait skipped my generation.

After school on Friday she seemed better but we still laid low most of the weekend. It was rainy and cold here which is the kind of weather that just begs you to stay in your pajamas and be completely unproductive. And who am I to say no?

Late Saturday afternoon, Caroline had another basketball game. It brought me as much joy as the first one except they were playing a team of girls that seemed to have a little more experience. Which is my polite way of saying they were way too aggressive according to the league rules and the refs didn’t call them on it. Not that I’m bitter about it.

When the game was over, P and Caroline packed up and left to go to the ranch for the night. And I was ALL BY MYSELF. I debated all my various options and ultimately chose pajamas, the couch, homemade mac and cheese for dinner and the Miss America pageant.

And let me tell you, I chose well, young Jedi.

(Is that even a real line from Star Wars? It seems right but I am not a fan of the Star Wars movies because they involve space and spaceships and science fiction.)

I grew up watching the Miss America pageant. It always seemed like such a big event. I’d grab my little notebook and keep track of various scores as they scrolled across the screen. It probably speaks to the fact that I grew up in the 70’s that I truly believed that being Miss America was the female equivalent of a boy growing up to become the President of the United States. A boy would have to work hard, make good grades, build a political resume, but all a girl had to do was be able to play a decent rendition of Moon River on the spoons and have hair that defied the laws of gravity for all her dreams to come true.

In recent years I haven’t watched many pageants. I think this is directly related to the fact that most pageants are no longer aired on a major network and I forget to regularly check the T.V. Guide to see what’s on CMT. But on Saturday night, ABC brought the pageant back complete with our favorite host of bad television, Chris Harrison. Well done, ABC. Well done.

And so what could have been an average Saturday night with carbs and pajamas, turned into a veritable extravaganza of sparkly gowns, big hair, smiles that have seen more than their share of Crest Whitestrips, and black two-piece swimsuits that looked like the underwear section of a 1978 J.C. Penney catalog.

My cup was already overflowing when the talent portion began. American viewers were treated to an array of talent that included a rendition of Papa Was A Rolling Stone and an Irish Riverdance complete with a moonwalk.

And then Miss Arkansas showed the world that she was a yodeling ventriloquist. At that point I might as well have just turned off the T.V. because the only thing that could have topped it is if one of the contestants had answered, “Is that NeNe Leakes’ sister?” when asked about the WikiLeaks controversy during the interview portion.

But these girls were way too polished for that. Miss Nebraska even used the word “espionage” in her answer which is probably why she is our new Miss America.

And, bottom line, no one admires how well you can engage in a debate about national healthcare when you look that good in a swimsuit. Although I’m sure I’ve turned heads at the neighborhood pool when people hear me discuss my thoughts on U.S. foreign policy.

After the pageant was over I still wanted to make the most of my free night so I watched P.S. I Love You with Hillary Swank and thought it was pretty good. I also can’t figure out why no one ever mentioned that Harry Connick, Jr. is in it because I would have seen it long before now had I known.

I went to church on Sunday morning and came home with tentative plans to go see The King’s Speech before P and Caroline got home. But then P called and said they were on their way.

They walked in and P announced he wasn’t feeling great. Unfortunately he didn’t mention it until after I’d kissed him hello. And then I went to unpack Caroline’s bag and came across several bones from various dead animals about the same time P’s stomach virus kicked in.

I don’t know which made me feel worse at the time. But I have a feeling which one might make me feel worse in twenty-four hours.