Make Your Own Day

Women's Day? No thanks. Take your Women's Day and shove it in your manhole. Women, don't buy into this crap. Hold your head up and live your life every day. Celebrate being female every day. Be a wonder woman every day. Don't buy into the idea that we need a special day to make sure people appreciate us. We are half of humankind. Take the respect you are due, every day. Respect women every day. Respect men every day.

And we don't need a Women's Month, either. We have every dang day.

Well, Whaddya Know

I recently got my first pair of sweatpants (spirit wear!) and pulled out some t-shirts from back in the day to complete the slummocky look. I was excited to pull out my Death Cigarettes shirt. I got it one time when I got home for the summer from college and there was a surf shop on A-1-A in Deerfield Beach having a Midnight Sale! Dorothy and I went and I got this shirt. It's all black, with a skull and crossbones on one side, next to the words Death Cigarettes. I didn't know at the time what it meant, but the irony amused me. Plus I like the cool stuff...

So I pulled out the shirt this morning and my first thought was, Watch, I'm going to look online and find out it was an actual brand of cigarettes...  I went online to look it up and Sure Enough. Marketed to the Underground Punk Scene in England.

Now, I don't smoke. I have never smoked anything and I will never smoke anything. I think it's super-nasty. BUT I once got a Joe Camel shirt from a giveaway at work and wore it around all the time. And now I also have this shirt for another brand of cigarettes. Smoking isn't cool, but they sure make some cool-looking shirts. Is that how they get the weak-minded to smoke? It must be.

Now that I think about it, I also had a shirt that I loved to wear in high school that featured a picture of a drunk mexican surfer and the saying "Everybody Needs Tequila." What is wrong with me??!! I don't drink either, but I would wear that shirt around in a heartbeat!

One More Dream

I was at some kind of big huge glitzy event, possibly located at a horseracing track. It just so happened that I found a table with my two friends Rich Eisen and Stuart Scott sitting there, and I sat with them and we just chatted it up and yucked it up and had a fine time together for most of the party. Then after a long time, I realized they were celebrity type guys, and I jumped up and suggested we take our picture together! Well, the rest of the whole dream was the frustrating type, me trying to get the right program open on my device to take the picture, trying to get the correct-facing camera open on the device, trying to get the device to sit on the table just right to get the picture, trying to get people to stop walking in front of us while we were trying to take the picture. And then Stuart got distracted.

Whoo! I'm glad I got to hang out with my cool friends in this dream, but I should really stop trying to get photos with my friends if they're celebrity types!

I Had a Dream

There was some kind of outdoor college or high school gathering or event. I was there, going up the stairs, bleachers or hill, and I was talking smack about something because I was thinking for sure I was the Cool Adult, because all teens are constantly trying to find a Cool Adult, am I right? Anyway, someone was warning me to stop smack talking.

Then I came across a senior missionary couple and they were so sweet, but they were warned that they might get in big trouble because they had brought their large turtle, and such-and-such other couple had recently gotten in trouble for bringing a wacky pet like that, which was specifically prohibited. So I really felt for that couple.

Scene Change: the high school/college gathering was indoors, in a semi-rustic room, like you might see in a fancy-type lodge or wilderness meeting facility. There might have been a pot-belly stove in the middle of the room, or it might have been a lectern, and instead of mostly older teens, the room was filled with regular people and lots of my Provo Clayton cousins. And in fact, the room was somehow in The Arapahoe House. Someone came to the door and indicated to the group of us, not everyone in the room, but specifically us Clayton people, that there was an issue, perhaps a serious issue. I thought,"I hope everyone is ok!" and we all stealthily got up and left en masse. We were not disruptive at all. As we were leaving, my Uncle Keith said to me,"There's an atomic reactor under this place." And I was trying to puzzle out what that could mean when he clarified,"We supply all the power for Amazon." And then I knew that he really meant there was a nuclear reactor below the building. So the group of us, which specifically included my cousins David and Julie, headed down the outside stairs. As we were going, there was a little girl walking right in front of my Uncle Keith, who was right in front of me, and she passed by a glass tube that was obviously a heat vent for the reactor. It was kind of sticking up and then bent sideways so that it was in the path of  people walking down the stairs, which seems like a really bad design choice for a nuclear reactor. And as the girl passed by it, her arm brushed against it and it bent, because it was blazing hot from venting a nuclear reactor. Anyway, I was really worried the girl would have a circle-shaped burn on her arm, but she seemed unaffected and Uncle Keith just sort of bent the tube out of the way and kept going. Isn't it crazy that the glass could be so hot it would bend, but not burn people!?

Scene Change: inside The Arapahoe House (but not really; you know how dreams are) We are obviously right below the room we were in before. It is not an emergency at all for which we have been called out of the other meeting. We are all just sitting around, and someone is trying to conduct some business. I am a single college student. I learn that my cousin Julie is offering me $10.50 an hour to be a nanny for her kids. I'm trying to do the math and it's only coming out to like $160 bucks a month, so I am considering asking for $12 an hour. People are chatting and conducting business of some kind, like negotiating. My sister Dorothy is there, possibly telling me it's not worth it to be a nanny. Then people come to a consensus, while I am doing the math on the nanny job, and my cousin David starts singing. It's Ave Maria. He is unabashed, just singing it up, which is impressive to me.

That's when my alarm goes off, but it's on my device, so it's not just a beeping, but some kind of peppy sound effect, and I was thinking, what is that crap? I'm trying to listen to Ave Maria before I start my nanny job! And it was such a bummer to wake up.

Catchy Theme Song

There is a kids' show on Amazon Prime called Tiny Planet and it has a super-catchy theme song. It is a show about two fluffy alien guys that go around doing stuff without talking and their names are Bing and Bong. According to the theme song, they are the Heroes of the Universe. The catchy part is that the song says their names in a way that sounds like bells, so it's really easy to sing. Again and AGAIN.

Check it out and listen to the theme song. As soon as you hear it, you will start singing it and I won't be the only one stuck here in catchy kids-show theme song purgatory.

Who Thought That was a Good Idea?

So I'm on a blog and she has a recipe for "Easy Barbecue Pork {crockpot} Here's the link.

Then half-way through the post, here's a helpful little link-bar, and it says:

"See a peppered-pork biscuit recipe"

There is something hilarious about this to me.  Because, was I searching for the perfect "Peppered-pork Biscuit recipe?"  Is that even a thing?  Is peppered-pork really even a thing?  Pork biscuits?  Could there be anything less healthy?

It just sounded hilarious and out-of-place.  Because it IS hilarious and out-of-place.

Favorite Transformer Names

My three little brothers wished they had Transformers back in the day.  We accidentally acquired the one that turns into a cassette tape from somewhere, and another one that wasn't as cool.  I was a teen when they were That Cool, so it wasn't my scene.  I thought GoBots was a better name, but Transformers were obviously the better product.  Not that I cared at the time.

Then I got married and gave birth to four sons.  I have had Transformers in my house for more than a decade.  My boys are insane for these.  The Classic, the Energon, Whatever the New Thing Is -- we've had them all in here.  I am thankful for my nearly 14-year-old, because when I claim transforming-incompetence, he is more than glad to step in and help his brothers transform Whoever-it-is.

I seem more flippant than I am.  I am actually pretty good at remembering their names.  I know there are a couple-a girls in the bunch.  I have transformed both the car and motorcycle ones.  So yeah, I'm that good.  I have a few favorite Transformer names, since I am involuntarily immersed in Transformer Culture.  That's the reason for this post.  And here they are:

Devastator : my big boy used to pronounce this "Demastator"
Iron Hide : that's a good name, no matter what.  If I had a little fluffy pet kitty, I might name him Iron Hide
Ultra Magnus : What?!  That name is awesome! It's ultra!
Optimus Prime : A little more contrived, but so what?  Optimus Prime! My big boy used to pronounce this "Octimus Prime"  so I always picture him having eight of something.  Mini-cons? Past lives?  Who knows.
Brimstone : super bad
Cyclonus : feels a little bit Greek.  Definitely menacing.
Megatron : a doofus evil robot guy, but great name.
Unicron : as awesome a name as it is to be a robot that's also a planet.
Ravage : name says it all
Cybertron Primus : I'm sorry, but that is the best mash-up of tech-sounding power syllables ever!


I also feel compelled to share my list of Lamest Transformer Names:

Star Scream : and the guy is just as annoying as his name
Astro Train : little boys love trains, but this one is just not cool.
Rat Trap : from Beast Wars.  Eww.
Jazz : really?  Not even going to try?
Kup : allegedly he transforms into a pickup truck

I'm sure there are more.