Just for fun

Note to the Express News: Thank you for stating the obvious since 1861.

Note to the rain: Go Away.

Note to the neighborhood swimming pool: It is my sincerest wish that one day I will find myself reunited with you, your energy burning powers, and your lovely snack bar with the cookies-n-cream ice cream sandwiches.

Last night I was suffering from a touch of the writer’s block and my plan was to wake up this morning and write the best post of all time. However, Caroline didn’t know about this plan and proceeded to keep me up over 3/4 of the night for no good reason whatsoever. Unless trying to drive your mama insane is a reason.

So, the greatest post will have to wait for another day. Although I did think about writing something around 3:30 a.m., but it would have just said, “Help. I’m having a nervous breakdown and would like to run away from home.”

Good stuff.

Instead of that heartwrenching plea for help, this is what y’all get instead.

LOOK!

Red, white and blue M&M’s. God bless America, I found them at HEB on Monday and they make me happy. So happy. There is nothing better than combining my love for this country with my love for the chocolate candy coated goodness.

I will most likely finish this entire bowl by noon in a futile attempt to make myself feel better after all the sleeplessness last night.

Speaking of the sleeplessness, here’s a picture of the perpetrator that caused all the no sleeping with all the non-sleepiness.

Notice she looks fresh as a daisy. She woke up (as if she ever went to sleep) at 6:15 a.m. and has been dressed and accessorized since 6:25.

There will be no picture of me because, trust me, there are some things the human eye is not meant to see.

And lastly, while I’m sharing pictures. Here are some pictures I took last week when Janet from Life with the Wisners came to visit with her kids, Big H and Goo.

That’s Caroline and Big H. Caroline is practicing her stellar hostessing skills. Hopefully also thinking that maybe her wardrobe selection of green jogging pants with bright turquoise shirt wasn’t really the best choice.

Let’s just say the microwave caused quite the uproar. All the injustices of the world could be solved if only there were two Pottery Barn microwaves in every household.

Also, in my defense, I do wash Caroline’s hair every day. It just looks particularly greasy because I’ve been putting baby oil in her bath to fight the drying of her skin from all the chlorine in the pool. The process makes her hair so greasy that I could style it like Danny Zuko’s.

That’s the Goo. She is so much cuter than my limited photography skills indicate. I wish I could have caught a smile because, seriously, she smiled the entire time she was here except for the two seconds when I took this photo. She would make babies everywhere weep with envy at the joy she gets out of life.

And that’s about it for now.

Oh, except for seriously? Bo Brady is 60 or 52 or whatever. Hats off to Botox and hair dye, because while he doesn’t look like he did back when he and Hope ran away from the church on his motorcycle (a scene which was the epitome of romance in my 5th grade mind), he doesn’t look 5 years away from Social Security either.

Y’all have a lovely day. And please say a prayer that I get a nap because otherwise, a breakdown is in my near future.

Well, we attended another wedding this weekend and it does not please me one bit to tell y’all that apparently, brides everywhere are keeping their guests waiting for cake. Seriously, what is up? I suspect it’s a sophisticated ploy that allows the bride to save money by ordering a small cake, knowing that if she waits until midnight to cut it, all her guests will have gone home.

And made a stop at Baskin Robbins on the way home because they are in desperate need of something for dessert, and have spent the last 5 hours staring at a huge display of chocolate groom’s cake goodness they didn’t get to eat.

Get off the wallet, brides of America. Cut the cake already. Wedding guests need their cake.

It’s not like the day is all about you.

So, about the actual wedding.

The minister began the service by telling the bride and groom to look around and savor the moment, to realize that they were in the middle of one of the high, holy days of their lives, which I liked a lot. But then, his whole message focused on the most important aspect of marriage is forgiveness and while I agree that forgiveness is necessary, I think there are so many other great things that can be said of marriage. Love, companionship, blah blah blah.

He even said that this day would be a good day for anyone in the audience holding a grudge to let it go. And as he said it, the groom’s father who was serving as best man, left the altar and walked back to his seat like he was on a mission. I thought we were about to witness a real live airing of the grievances, but apparently he’d spent the day with the stomach flu and started feeling a little woozy, so he sat down.

Needless to say, I was a little disappointed that there wasn’t any drama.

We got to the reception and were thrilled to see they were serving sushi. P and I had been on a big sushi kick right before I quit my job. Now, it just doesn’t seem to make good sense to have raw fish delivered to our door 3 nights a week at $65 a pop, which I’ve figured out because I am a financial genius.

So, we enjoyed our sushi and, as a bonus, they had a whole display of assorted cheeses and crackers. I am a fool for a quality assortment of cheese and crackers. In fact, whenever I stay in hotels, one of my favorite things to do is to order up a big tray of cheese and crackers with a glass of wine. Not because I am sophisticated wine and cheese type person, but because I love all fatty dairy products, and I need the wine to help me sleep on a bed that doesn’t have a fitted bottom sheet.

Non-fitted bottom sheets are worse than attending a wedding and not getting to eat cake.

Maybe.

Anyway, we had to leave the reception to go pick up Caroline from P’s sister’s house. And we left without cake. There was much sobbing and crying in the elevator, and I finally had to tell P to just get over it. There will be other weddings, other cakes. Plus, we had a bag of Hostess Powdered Donettes at home, which is almost the same thing…but not.

Our recent experiences with wedding cake deprivation made me remember a story my Nanny told me about my Big Bob. Towards the end of Big Bob’s life, he struggled with dementia. It started slowly and since he’d always been a bit quirky, no one really noticed at first.

Nanny and Big Bob were guests at a wedding for a good friend’s granddaughter. Nanny was standing around, visiting with some of her friends, when Big Bob strolled up eating a piece of cake.

She asked, “Bob, where did you get that cake?”

He nodded in the direction of the cake table, pointing with his fork, “Over there”.

Nanny couldn’t believe she hadn’t noticed the bride and groom cutting the cake. And then realized, she hadn’t missed the bride and groom cutting the cake. She had missed Big Bob heading over to the cake table and using the silver, engraved cake knife to cut himself the first piece of bride’s cake.

She blamed it on his dementia, but I say he knew exactly what he was doing. There is just so much willpower a person can have when being taunted by an uncut cake.

I’m not saying I would do it myself, but if I could find an elderly wedding guest to do it for me, I’d totally consider putting the knife in their hand.

I’m kidding.

Maybe.

Y’all are not kidding around about your bed making or unmaking preferences. I mean, seriously? 106 comments on making the bed? I have written posts that are my personal favorites that have received all of 10 comments, and then I throw myself under the bus by admitting I don’t make my bed, and y’all come out of the woodwork.

Stay tuned for Monday’s post where I’ll discuss whether or not I rinse my dishes before I put them in the dishwasher.

It will be riveting!

So, I’m sad to say it appears the bed makers have the advantage over the non-bed makers. It was a close race, but the final results came in like this:

53 people make their beds almost daily, with a few of them being sneaky enough that they’ve figured out how to get their husbands to do it. Nice, ladies. Very nice.

Also, out of this 53, several make their beds at night as opposed to in the morning, which frankly, blows my mind. But if it makes you happy for those 3 minutes, then more power to you. It’s our differences that make this country great.

43 people let me know they are like me and do not make their beds on a daily basis. The reasons ranged from not caring, to knowing that no one sees their room anyway, to rebelling from a childhood of forced bed-making. Too bad these people didn’t know P, because he could have shared his sleeping bag trick and saved them much trauma.

5 people came in as what I’ll call “other”. These are folks that may not normally make the bed, but due to the fact that they currently have homes on the market, they are forced into deviant behavior. Most of them assured me that once their homes sell, they will once again be fellow slackers. Be proud, fellow slackers. And here’s hoping those houses sell sooner rather than later.

I will say that as I tallied the results it appeared, at first, that the non-bed makers were going to win. Y’all started off strong in the early comments, but as the day wore on, more bed makers showed up. I’m sure they were late because they had been straightening sheets and plumping pillows all morning. It’s all about priorities, and hats off to those of you who put reading blogs first. I salute you.

And lastly, I want to answer a few questions and concerns that came up. First of all, in defense of my raising, let me say that I always had to make my bed while growing up. I continued to make my bed throughout most of college and even during married life. Then, 4 years ago, two things happened. We added on a master bedroom to the back of our house, where no one can tell if the bed is made or not even when the bedroom door is open, and we had a child. I’m not sure which of these things holds more weight as to why I no longer make the bed, so I’ll say they both play a role. Back when our bedroom was highly visible, I did, in fact, make my bed every day because otherwise, the whole house seemed messy.

Plus, anyone who came to visit had to walk past our bedroom to use the bathroom and there was really no way to tell people they weren’t allowed to go to the bathroom for fear that they’d see my unmade bed. That would just be cruel.

I change my sheets at least once a week and sometimes more often because I have a child who likes to sneak snacks into my bed when I’m not paying attention. A bed covered in Oreo crumbs is the equivalent of sleeping in the third level of hell. And as far as pajamas, I usually wear the same pair two nights in a row and then move on.

Someone was concerned about my off-white coverlet, so let me assure you that it was purchased pre-child and a huge advantage of not making the bed is that it has stayed clean. Having a made up bed everyday would be asking for it to have a huge grape juice stain on it, so really, by not making the bed I am saving us tons of money on drycleaning and new bedding, not to mention the therapy I’d need if my beautiful coverlet was ruined.

Thank you all for your comments. It has been more than enlightening and most importantly, extremely entertaining. Y’all are the best.

Since it’s Friday, I figure it’s as good a day as any to bring up what could be a heated, controversial topic. Just remember that a comment is forever (unless I decide to delete it), so don’t be too quick to judge me or anyone else who may conduct their life with the same beliefs as me.

It all started Wednesday night. I was talking to Boomama on the phone and, as usual, we were solving a myriad of complicated life issues, in between sharing what we had recently read in People magazine and our thoughts on Sarah Jessica Parker’s new fashion line. We are always striving for enlightenment and exploring the deeper issues. Anyway, she was getting packed and ready for her big trip and as a sidenote said, “Alex is sleeping in our bed tonight so that I don’t have to make up his bed before we leave for the airport tomorrow morning.”

What did she just say? I think I just heard some crazy talk.

Suddenly, nothing else mattered. Some of y’all may think my shock was due to Alex sleeping in her bed, but you would be wrong. I completely get that part. I find myself sharing my bed at least 3 nights of the week with my own 3 foot tall, 32 pound person, who somehow defies physics and takes up more bed space than a full grown adult. Having a toddler in bed with you isn’t a hot topic, it’s practically a way of life.

I asked Boomama the question that was echoing off the walls of my brain, “Would you really make up his bed before you left for the airport if he slept in it?” And without skipping a beat, she answered, “Absolutely. I never leave my house without making all the beds because I’m convinced something bad would happen to me and my mama would come to my house and find all my beds unmade. It would be a huge embarrassment.”

I’m just going to come clean right now before God, the internet, and my mother-in-law. I do not make my bed in the morning, which is kind of interesting considering that I cross the border on obsessive about the rest of the house. In fact, the only time my bed really ever gets made is if someone is coming to visit who has never been here before and I’m concerned they may ask for a tour. I completely justify this lack of bed making by telling myself that because my bedroom is at the very back of our house, no one ever sees it.

And it’s not like P cares if the bed is made or not. He slept in a sleeping bag on top of his made up bed every night of his life growing up so that he could just roll up the sleeping bag and toss it under the bed in the morning. It’s really a brilliant plan in its simplicity. Here’s hoping that Caroline has inherited that propensity for coming up with creative solutions to avoiding chores.

Lest any of you think that maybe my bed doesn’t look so bad in its unmade state, I’ll show you this.

Oh yes, it’s very attractive and sadly, it takes a lot of effort to get it to look like that. In fact, it takes me longer to unmake the bed than it does to make the bed. P and I discovered about 3 days into our marriage that if we continued to try to share the same covers, we would be on the fast track to divorce court. So he pulled out that attractive, yellow comforter, which was actually my bedspread throughout college and has a lovely, floral print on the other side, and has been using it every night for the last 10 years. During the winter months, he adds a lovely flannel sheet with penguins printed all over it.

The whole look is really right out of Southern Living.

I sleep under the down comforter with the blue checked duvet cover, which actually used to belong to Gulley. We are obviously all about the fine linens here at our house. And those lumps that y’all may see under all those attractive bedcovers aren’t us, they are the collection of 182 pillows that we sleep with every night.

And when we travel, we bring them with us. Doesn’t that make you want us as houseguests? We’re very low maintenance.

This morning I actually got up and made our bed. Honestly, I had forgotten how pretty it looks when it’s all made up. If something terrible were to ever happen to me, I’d definitely prefer that my bedroom be found in this state as opposed to the other. Boomama might have the right idea.

So, here’s the big question. Do you make your bed every day? Is it a crucial part of your daily routine? Or are you like me and feel like you’re just going to sleep in it again in about 12 hours, no one sees it anyway, so why bother? Also, someone please tell me that you’re as high maintenance regarding the unmaking of the bed as I am.

I’m hoping I’m not alone, because if I am, I may have to delete this post to preserve my reputation.