The Boy Has It Easy. Not As Easy As Ricky Stratton, But Still Pretty Easy.

So far this summer, my offspring has spent an unacceptable amount of time complaining, and let me tell you something...that little dude is livin' the high life. Wake up. Lay around and watch cartoons. Mommy makes pancakes or something equally as delicious. Go swimming. Go someplace fun or go out to lunch. Play with friends. Repeat. What the hell is he complaining about? It boggles my mind. For a little perspective, here's how summers went down when I was a kid...

Sometime between 7:00 and 8:00 am:  The woman we called "Mom," but seemed more like a prison warden or internment camp officer entered out bedroom, pulled our covers back, told us to get up, make the bed, and do a few chores that none of our friends had to do. None. Not one.

After bed-making and totally unfair chore doing were completed:  Eat breakfast. Usually it was something totally disgusting like poached eggs, which the warden knew we hated but loved to make us eat anyway, just like she did liver and onions, which I betcha anything the prisoners at Guantanamo would not even be forced to eat. Breakfast took a little longer than one would expect, due to the fact that we had to wait for the warden to leave the room so that we could stuff those nasty, runny, eggs in the way bottom of the trashcan, using our super ninja-like, egg-hiding, moves. Stealthiness was key, because if caught, we would be forced to eat another egg.

After pretending to eat breakfast:  Go outside. "Oh," you might be thinking, "You were an outdoorsy child and couldn't wait to frolick in the morning dew, listen to the delightful sounds of happily singing birds, and generally commune with Mother Nature." Well, if that's what you're thinking you're a delusional d-bag. I was a kid. All I cared about was watching cartoons, eating junk food, and basically just hanging in there with my current family until I was either adopted by Daddy Warbucks or Edward Stratton III from "Silver Spoons." If it were the latter, then the adoption would be informal, wherein I would live with the Stratton's and get all of their money, my own room, my own cotton candy machine, and get to ride around our house on that awesome train, yet could still marry Ricky when I turned 18 (and carry on my illicit affair with Ricky's best friend and token bad boy, Derek Taylor). Anyway, going outside was not something that we volunteered to do, but much like prison yard time, it was required. Although unlike prison yard time, which I have learned from the movie's is usually a short period of time, our yard time lasted until dark.  We would normally be outside for at least 2 hours before other kids, from more laid-back households, would finally appear. They had spent the morning lounging around in their PJ's, eating some Boo Berry cereal, and drinking some store-bought chocolate milk And there we were, the sunburned losers who'd been sitting on the curb staring at ants for 2 hours, and seriously contemplating eating them because our bellies were empty from avoiding the wet eggs.

Lunchtime: Thank God! Sooooo freaking hungry! Soooooo freaking hot out here! Can't wait to go inside and watch some TV and adjust the tuner about a quarter inch to the right so we could get MTV and try to figure out WTF was up with Boy George. Well, dream on kiddos. Once we were thrown out of the house in the morning, we were not welcome to come back in until dark unless we had to use the bathroom, and in that case we were expected to go in the basement door and use the scary one down there which had walls that the previous owner's son had painted with devil's. Probably with blood. There's nothing like trying to release your bladder while staying alert for a satanic attack. At least for lunch we had decent food like regular kids, and usually some Kool-Aid or a Pepsi.  I'm pretty sure the reason our lunch was so good was because we had to eat it outside where the neighbors could see. Otherwise, I'm fairly sure that the warden woulda dug the poached eggs outta the trash, squished them between a couple slices of bread, stuck them on a paper plate, and sent them our way.

After Lunch:  This was usually about the time that we were exhausted and near heat stroke, and in desperate need of some time in the shade to cool down. At least that's what I told the neighbor boy when I draped a blanket over the picnic table and insisted he play house with me. House was the role-playing game where I would make the neighbor boy say things to me like "I love you," "You're the prettiest girl in the world," and "You smell like cotton candy." Then I would make him do some light dusting, sweep the floor, and kiss me on the lips. For 5 straight seconds. Because everyone knows that a kiss that lasts under 5 seconds is not a real love kiss, and is more of a hooker type kiss. Eventually he would get tired of our pretend marriage and try to leave, at which point I would threaten to tell his parents that he sometimes peed in the neighbor's yard, and he would decide to stay.

Pre-Dinner:  Having exhausted ourselves on our bikes, swingset, climbing trees, etc... we would often go door to door with a wagon full of rocks, flowers, and whatever miscellaneous junk we could find and try to sell it, or at least trade it, for candy. This usually went quite well, and we got a big enough sugar high to keep us going until dinner. Once we grew bored of being traveling salesmen, we would ride our bikes back and forth in front of the mean old lady's house. If we were feeling extra bored, we would ride in and out of her driveway and really pissed her off. We would do this until she came outside yelling terrible things at us and threatening to call the cops, then we would move on to something else.

Dinner: All I can say about this is that we got to eat it in the house. Hallelujah.

Post-Dinner: This was the time of day when we would put up lawn chairs and force everyone in the neighborhood to watch us perform some sort of show. Maybe a play. Maybe some stand up comedy. Perhaps a gymnastics routine. Then we would either play some kiss tag, ghost in the graveyard, or swinging statue, or maybe catch some lightning bugs, rip their butts off, and make them into jewelry.

Bath Time: Dear Mom, I hardly ever took a bath. I just stuck my feet in the water then made wet foot prints on the rug. I was a filthy, disgusting child who never even washed the lightning bug butts off of my ear lobes and neck. xoxoxo, Patti

Bed Time: I had to share a room with my sister who snored like a fat old man, and my closet door often popped open for no reason and scared the crap out of me because I convinced myself there was either a psycho murderer or a ghost in there. And my mom would hardly ever turn on the air conditioner and it was hot and sticky and snorey and ghosty and annoying. Not at all like my room at the Stratton's or Daddy Warbucks', where it was quiet and fluffy and smelled like flowers and candy and I got to sleep late and have the maid make my bed and I had a movie theater to watch my cartoons in and if I wanted to see Adam Ant or Boy George, my rich "dad" would just pay him to come over, and the cook would make me whatever I wanted to eat and we had air conditioning and a swimming pool and probably some kind of machine like a car wash -but for people- that I could just ride through and come out clean and all dressed up like the Jetson's or something, and I'd sing and dance with a magic dude named Punjab and maybe make Ricky kiss me on the lips.

The Boy has his own bedroom. His own TV. A swimming pool. He can go outside if he wants too, and back inside if he wants to. I will happily sing and dance with him 24/7, and I wouldn't dream of making him eat liver or runny eggs. That kid has it made. In the air conditioned shade.

Happy Father's Day! (Rerun Alert)

It's Father's Day. If I weren't a lazy a-hole I would have written something special to honor my dad, but that didn't happen so I am going to re-post an oldie but goodie. Summer is the season of re-runs, so think of it like that. Just pretend my blog is one of your favorite shows, but instead of being famous, dating Paul Rudd, making millions of dollars each time I write something and getting free swag all the ding dong day, I'm just sitting on my lazy summer ass drinking beer, lounging by the pool, reading and watching TV. Isn't that what summer is all about? Anyway, this blog contains some good stories about my dad, and really gives you, the readers, a glimpse into what it was like to be raised by such a weirdo. It should explain alot. The apple doesn't fall far, people. Not far at all. Enjoy, and Happy Father's Day!

So, the other day my son drops a bombshell. Not only am I ruining his life, but he is having the worst day of his life as well. My son is seven. If I am already ruining his life at age seven, this kid is gonna be a freakin’ mess by age twenty. We’re talking messed up enough for his own Dr. Phil two-parter. What caused him to react so strongly? Did I deny him food and water for days on end? Did I Make him sleep on a bed of nails? Did I sell him to a band of gypsies? Worse. I had the nerve to talk to him in front of his friends at school.

I laughed about how dramatic he was being, then I realized something: When I was little, I thought my parents were ruining my life too. I was sure of it. I wanted to run away and find my real parents, because surely there had to be some horrible mistake. I couldn’t possibly belong to that freak show.

As our kids get older, we are all going to go through this same scenario over and over again. We will be crappy parents who are repeatedly scarring our little angels for life. But you know what? They’ll get over it. Things that seem like the end of the world when we are little sometimes seem funny when we grow up. They give us our sense of-humor, our personality, and make us stronger. To prove my point, I offer the following “life-ruining” events from my childhood. In spite of these events, I think I turned out okay.

1. Earliest memory of a crappy event: When we came home from church one night and my dad ran over our cat. Since my dad highly disapproved of being dragged to church, I think that subconsciously this was his way out. In the future, if he got anywhere near a church, he would have painful memories of killing his children’s loving pet, therefore making it detrimental to his mental health to attend.

2. In another religion-related incident…when I was 6 and we were coming home from church, I stopped on our front porch to turn and wave to my next-door-neighbor, who happened to be my first true love. It was at this point that my mom thought it would be funny to pull down my skirt, leaving me waving in my Wonder Woman underoos. I could never again watch my favorite tv show without having crippling underwear-related flashbacks.

3. My dad forgot to pick me up at Kindergarten. It was late, and everyone had gone home but my teacher. When she went it for a cup of coffee, I made a break for it. When my dad finally remembered me and found me a few blocks away, I refused to get into his car. Unfortunately, he was not alone. He had a carload of his Drivers Ed. students with him. They drove next to me giggling the whole way home.

4. In 1978 I wanted nothing more than a Snoopy Snow Cone Machine. Since my parents sucked, I never got to taste the fruity deliciousness of an ice-cold Snoopy treat. On hot summer days, I still dream of those cones.

5. My dad though it would be an amazing father-daughter bonding experience if he took me hunting with him. It wasn’t. First of all, he said we were going pheasant hunting, which I thought was hunting for those poor, olden days people from my Disney cartoons. While morbid, this outing intrigued me. It wasn’t what I had thought. He shot a bird, I freaked out, and we left. I held the dying bird in a towel and cried all the way home. Although, I suppose, better than being a Disney character killer, nothing says crappy childhood like finding out your dad is a serial bird murderer.

6. In 6th grade I left my small private school for public, and my mom forced me to get a perm so tight it gave me brain damage. In fact, I am positive that perm is why I suck at Math. My mom assured me that “all the cool kids getting perms”. They weren’t.

7. Dad loved to take my sister and I to the grocery store in his “work-out” clothes. His “work-out” clothes amounted to a pair of polyester shorty-shorts, a headband made from an old tube sock, and one of those shirts made from see-through netting that he cut into a half-shirt. Unfortunately, my dad’s version of a half-shirt meant that it landed above the nipples, which in my opinion, is the main part that the half shirt should cover.

8. For some reason, my dad bought this big, brown, junky car that looked like a piece of crap on wheels.  Unfortunately I had to ride in it, and I spent a lot of time hiding on the floor. He insisted on yelling out the window to any kids we drove past (once including a boy I was crushing on), “Attention kids! Patti Rust is in this car!” He later sold that car for a case of beer. If you ask me, the buyer got screwed.

9. Dad often took us to our favorite pizza parlor, where for reasons known only to him, he put a coin in the jukebox and danced around that music machine like he was the slutty chick in a Whitesnake video. He did this EVERY time, which tells you how much my sister and I loved that pizza.

10.Dad, who had more than enough cash to purchase decent underwear, instead decided to fix his holy ones using duct tape, and then proceed to walk around the house in said underwear. He didn’t care who was visiting. Most of my friends bear this childhood scar as well.

11.Dad – who was a teacher at my high school - told his students that he was on a prison work-release program. This spread like wildfire. The only plus-side I can see with such a rumor, is that you can tell everyone that your dad taught you the fine art of making a shiv out of anything from a tardy slip, to toilet paper, and all the bullies will leave you alone.

12.When I turned 16 my child-labor-loving parents forced me to get a job. Even though my dad knew every business owner within a 300-mile radius, he refused to help me score something good, so I ended up working at a greasy fast food burger joint. I blame him for the acne outbreak of ’88.

13.When I turned 16, my parents also refused to buy me a car, even though all my friends had cars. When I finally got one, I discovered that it had its quirks. For example, when you made a left turn, the wipers came on, and when you went over 40, the headlights came on. The most annoying of these quirks, however, was that every time the temperature dipped below 30 degrees, the doors and windows froze shut. This often made me late for class. One morning I thought I was smart, and I opened the hatchback and crawled in that way. I drove to school, and then realized I couldn’t get out because the hatch only opened from the outside. I decided to drive back home, apparently a little too fast, because a cop pulled me over for speeding. Unfortunately I couldn’t roll down my window or open my door when he walked up to my car. This constitutes disobeying an officer, as far as the fuzz are concerned. I think I was this close to being on the five o’clock news, and I’m sure I was almost taken out by police sniper fire. I definitely could have died, and it’s all my parents’ fault.

This Blog Is So Lame I'm Not Even Gonna Give It A Title

Is summer almost over? What? It's only been one week? One? Are you sure it hasn't at least been eight? It hasn't even been eight days? Really? As in 8 24 hour increments of time? Wow. It definitely feels like it's been alot longer than that. I haven't written anything on this blog since school ended. Partly because I've been so busy. Partly because I've had lots of drama in my life lately. Partly because when it gets this hot I can't think straight. At all. If it's only June 10th then it's really not even hot yet, which means that my brain has alot more melting to do in the days and weeks ahead. This is not good news.

Since I haven't written in over a week, I am sure that you can all guess that I forgot my password again. Yes, I am that stupid. No, I am not ashamed. I am what I am, just like Popeye but without the disproportionate muscle size and sailor suit, although I won't rule out wearing the sailor suit if given the opportunity. Anyway, I think that I have just enough space in my brain for things like 80's trivia, song lyrics, Paul Rudd data, and the names of beers and wines I like as well of those that I don't (the don't list is small). In high school I would always forget my locker combination after a long weekend. Always. So after the nice ladies in the office stopped finding it charming when I would come in to make them look it up, I started carrying all my books with me. In college I would forget room numbers for classes and sometimes not notice until halfway through a lecture that something felt a little...off. But don't feel sorry for me. I memorized every single word of dialogue from "Sixteen Candles" as well as lyrics to hundreds of songs that you probably don't even know exist. I could always find someone to tell me where Botany 101 was, but every single word from Laverne & Shirley's "Duke of Squigman" episode? Never gonna happen. I was totally and completely on my own there, and I have my priorities, people.

That leads me to names. I am nothing if not terrible at remembering them. I have heard the tip about how you're supposed to repeat the persons name after they tell it to you, but I don't ever remember that tip until after they already told me their name and I already forgot it, so it doesn't really work for me. Since I started writing this blog I have started meeting a lot more people which means that there are a lot more names that people expect me to know that I don't. Don't be offended. When you see me just re-introduce yourself like you would to a child. Syllable by syllable. Then tell me something extremely personal and/or embarrassing about yourself and I will never, ever, ever forget you again. My abilities are complex and varied. Basically,  I am like Rain Man but without the mathiness and mad driving skillz. If you drop a box of toothpicks I can't tell you how many their were, but I can tell you who played Leather Tuscadero on Happy Days (Suzi Quatro).

Whether I remember my password for the remainder of the summer or not, it will still be hard for me to write. Usually I sit down at the computer with little to no idea what the heck I'm gonna write about, and I write it with lightning speed. I do this when I am home alone with no interruptions, because if I get even one interruption I am completely thrown off task and my mind goes blank. Like today. I am trying to write this while Ethan is home, shrieking, singing loud and asking me for things like water and food. I mean, we actually had a 5 minute conversation on the disastrous consequences that would ensue if his farts were fire instead of just gas. He's all up in my grill and I can't write anything worth reading when my grill is invaded like that. The only alone time I will get for the next three months will be on the toilet, so I'm back to pretending I have IBS again just so I can get a mommy moment. Unfortunately he has inherited boundary issues from me and the fact that I am sitting on the toilet seems to have no effect whatsoever on his need/ability to chat up a storm. So I will apologize right now for the sporadic crap that you will be reading this summer. Don't get all judgy on me for the junk I will post. I will do my best with the miniscule amounts of free time I will never get.  And if all else fails I will just post the lyrics to a Corey Hart song or some quotes from "Fire with Fire".  Two Lovers. One Chance. No Time.