This Happened

[Elle]

Shanking would have been appropriate in the last case. I was for a moment mortified on behalf of that guy's wife, as she sat right there possibly wondering why her husband had suddenly become superglued to my side, but then she took her suitcase out and threw it into the aisle, blocking the passage of this family who was trying to get through with two toddlers and a stroller, so I figure she sucks almost as badly as her husband.

[DMDarcs]

I went to a track meet today, because two of my students dedicated their performance during the mile run to me. They gave me an apple to eat. Just as I was finishing the apple, my back tooth split in half. Now I've had to make a ton of phone calls to change things for tomorrow. Stupid apple.

[Elle]

[Ronster]

sorry I missed out on the gross people and cracked tooth stories until now...wait no...I could have easily lived without them...now I am forever paranoid of sitting too close to another woman on a plane or anywhere else...Does SHE think I am gross??
Footsie? NEVER...that is for the spouse or significant other...or the intentional date. Nothing is as ugly to me as infidelity...and it starts (IMO) with the thought before the action.

Split tooth...cannot bear the thought of it...sounds like a form of torture...though I did bring some cookies my kids made in to work and my co-worker broke his tooth on them. I found out later that he has terrible teeth and they are apparently held in with silly putty and good intentions.


My story of the week....I was getting ready for bed...exhausted at 8:30...sad story already, right? anyway I get the call "Dad, Mom found a snake and wants you to come to here immediately", so I did. It was dusk and my wife was watering some of our plants we sell that are in 1 gallon plastic containers. She told me she felt this urgent need to spray water toward a hole in the stump. I was able to out-wait the patience of 2, yes TWO, copperheads from their lair and commence my act of one man's war on poisonous reptiles. After administering the killing blows via the graces of a New England Firearms 20 gauge shotgun, I began to worry that these were part of a family...so I did what any God and snake-fearing man would do. I aplied the gas liberally to the stump fully aware of all the ways that this could go horribly wrong...youtube videos replaying in my mind.

The dead snake bodies began to writhe!!!! They were a good 4 feet from the gasoline, but evidently the vapors trigger something in their headless bodies and it creeped the crap out of me. ignition soon followed once I regained my courage. No other instances of reptile aggression were detected. The next step of stump destruction (I forgot to tell you...they were in an old stump of a very large old oak tree). I began chopping with an ax and when its efficacy dwindled I excavated the den with a hoe and shovel. Still unconvinced of copperhead den genocide I plied my tractor skills to little avail...the stump was in some state of petrifaction I think and I went back to square 1....BURN IT WITH FIRE.

We wadded up papers and packed the now-larger opening with them. the obligatory petroleum product was applied and then an ignition source. Due to the lower amount of air access the fire smoldered which was a good thing. Any living thing left in the stump was now asphyxiated. The snake bodies were removed from the scene in a 1 gallon pickle jar and returned to the circle of life the following day after we did a show and tell with my kids to make sure they knew what a copperhead looked like.

I got in bed around 11:00 and paid the price the following morning at my 3;30 wake-up...which I snoozed until 4:00 because I was having dreams about playing slither.io.

TL;DR
I killed 2 poisonous snakes in grand hillbilly fashion and was deprived of sleep.

[Elle]

[Elle]

Aaaaaand this right here is why I do not live that far south and never want to.

Don't worry about sitting too close unless either you are UPON their body, as was the case in this instance - literally ON my limb - or there is a foot of empty space on your other side while your body is pressed into the woman, as was also the case in this instance. Thus the suspicion of actual brain damage. The footsie guy honestly came as a shock. Do they think we are all cougars? But as my husband once told me, if the direct, bold approach works only some of the time but you try it ten times in one night... that was before we married (one hopes).

[Ronster]

My wife says I attract weird women (other than her). I say that people just feel comfortable talking to me. A chubby, bearded, white guy does not push anyone's buttons

[Elle]

I don't know, man, some people have that Santa thing. (And no, nobody post that link.)

Would have thought that my advanced stage in life I was beyond this too. You get out of practice; your guard is down, reaction time slow. Meanwhile I am prepared to slug anyone who addresses my 13 year old as if she is 18, which happens on a constant basis.

[Tahlvin]

So I'm listening to a podcast of mine (Adventures in Imperfect Living) that is hosted by a husband and wife, and they play audio feedback from somebody. When the feedback is finished, the husband asks if the wife heard where the caller was from: Dothan, Alabama! My ears perk up and I think to myself: That's where Mike got the name for his character in the Runelords campaign! The husband then mentions they used to drive through Dothan every once in awhile, and that one of the first persons he hired at an IT company he worked at was from Dothan.

So yep, this is one of those mornings where the planets seem to be lining up and separate parts of my world seem to be intersecting.

[Mike]

[Elle]

Once my husband had a trial in Dothan and had to live there for about a month while I stayed at home and played single working mother. And then Dothan the Bard comes along... I mean, I can't hold a grudge now.

[Ronster]

Synchronicity!

[akiva]

[Elle]

The baby bunny cannot find my newly planted garden, though he smells it, because it is elevated above his head with no obvious way up. Muahahahahaa! Soon he will grow larger, though...

[Tahlvin]

We had a rabbit hole in our front yard, with about 7-8 babies squirming around within. The kids loved watching them, with my 12 year old son taking pictures/videos on his iPad. Unfortunately, we got a really heavy rain over the weekend, and the hole was out in the open without any protection whatsoever. So my Memorial Day in part involved me removing baby bunny corpses from a flooded rabbit hole, filling the hole, and planting grass seed.

[Elle]

That was not a good sort of synchronicity.

Better topic: my child pleases me by spontaneously deciding to play a new instrument, because she can learn it. Yes child, do this.

[Tahlvin]

That's all fine and dandy when the instrument in question costs only a few dollars or so. That way, when they inevitably decide to switch instruments at some future point, you won't lose large sums of money on an instrument that is no longer played.

Speaking of which, I really should see how much the music store would give us for the flute our oldest child decided to stop playing in 8th grade.

[Elle]

We are renting only so far, and I was shocked to discover that a small woodwind instrument is supposedly worth more than I originally paid for my cello. I bought the extra insurance rider at that point.

[Elle]

My kid is awesome - she is basically teaching herself to play. And I made it honk like a really fabulous goose, too. I seriously cackle and squeal every time this goes on. Am going to admit this is the totally snobbish reaction of a string player to the novelty of the lower instrument forms, lol!!!! These tooting instruments are hilarious!!!! But also awesome in their way.

[Elle]

At church: "Friends don't let friends clap on the 1 and 3!" I nearly died of laughter right there on the spot. A whole church was saved!