Pulling Weed = Needing Pot

Don’t tell my mom but…

How many times have I started a blog with that line? I should go back and look.

Okay, so let me start again. Don’t tell my mom but, I’m using pot. Neti Pot, that is. For those of you who’ve never heard of a neti pot, it’s a cheap, at-home, saline irrigation system that cleans out all of the crap in your nasal passages. Just heat up 6 ounces of water, dissolve in 1 ½ teaspoons of salt (preferably sea salt or kosher salt harvested directly from Lake Wobegon or Lake Michigan if you can get it) and let it cool down to lukewarm - but NOT matthew, mark or johnwarm. Then pour it into your neti pot. This is where the fun begins. Stick the open end of the neti pot into one of your nostrils, tilt your head and pour half of the solution into one nostril and watch in shock and awe as it comes out the other nostril. Then repeat on the other side with the remaining half of the mixture. Seriously. I’m not kidding. It’s sort of like laughing and having milk come out of your nose but this is on purpose.

April is pollen season in the south and this year, it came early and is overstaying its welcome. I love being in the yard when the temps are good, like right now, but this is getting a bit ridiculous. The neti pot is getting a work out that almost warrants a gym membership. I’m also washing way too many bandanas, and not because they contain “working in the yard” sweat. I’ll leave the “what I’m washing off of them” to your imagination and your own personal nostrils.

I’m off work today. As is always the case when I’m home alone without anyone to talk to but the cat, my mind wanders (or as they say in disability applications when they are trying to get approved for cognitive issues, my mind “wonders.”). Today I was home from work for a specific reason that caused my mind to “wonder” about words that weren’t in my vocabulary until my adult life. Take for example, “Sub-Zero”. This new word is the reason I’m home today; I’m waiting on Seth, the refrigerator diagnostician. You know what that means? It means that I’m going to pay for a service call today and I’m only going to find out what’s wrong with the fridge. Then I’ll have to take another day off work, and pay more money, so that the repair technician can come out and fix it. So here we go in Jeopardy speak: “a large stainless steel chilling apparatus that looks really cool for ten years but ultimately repair costs are the same as a brand new Kenmore. What is Sub-Zero?

In the meantime, at least the beer is a bit colder than lukewarm (who would have thought one could use the word lukewarm twice in just a few short paragraphs?). And since the freezer section is working just fine, there’s plenty of ice for frozen drinks. So while I wait for Seth, I might as well get outside on this blue-sky Atlanta day and pull weeds – even if it means filling my nose with pollen, such that I once again need pot…neti pot…yet another new adult word.

So back we are, full circle, to the net pot. Well, almost. Just one more thing.

Mom hated it when we kids came in from the sandbox and washed our dirty hands in the kitchen sink. In fact she wouldn’t allow it. I’m guessing it’s because it would interfere with the plastic sandwich baggies she had washed and was drying so that they could be used again? Or maybe it was just that she was a home economics major and this was part of her training? Either way we had to go to the bathroom to scrub our grimy mitts. Or if we were at Grandma and Grandpa O’s, we could use the sink in the entry room, where there was always some really cool abrasive soap – the kind that could scrub off tractor engine, chainsaw, cherry picker and snowmobile grease AND I bet could even be added to the laundry to freshen up a well-worn Carhartt jacket.

So if mom hated those dirty paws in the kitchen sink, imagine what she might say if she saw me employing the services of a neti pot over the kitchen sink? There’s no handed down from generation to generation protocol for where to use a neti pot. Maybe next time she’s in town, I’ll give her a demonstration and let her determine the guidelines. Or maybe I’ll just keep pulling weed and using (neti) pot in the kitchen sink.

When are you coming to visit again mom?

For those of you in the Atlanta area – see you at the Inman Park Festival this weekend?

black bag

What do you think of when you hear the words black bag?  I think of Marcus Welby, M.D. or other famous doctors who carried around cure-all potions and instruments in a leather black bag.  Or other times I might think of a really expensive purse that a co-worker or friend purchased that was pretty but not worth sacrificing that utility bill I really need to pay or that dental appointment I really ought to keep.

But now, after living in the hood for a time, I realized that there's a true market for black bags - black plastic bags that is.  Every beer and liquor store in town delivers one's purchases in these little black bags, usually from behind a bullet proof window.  Cheap wine, beer, Jose' Cuervo, Wild Irish Rose and probably even the occasional bottle of Manischewitz (shameless nod to Passover) have no doubt seen the inside of one of these ubiquitous black plastic bags.

I've often wondered why alcohol is passed across the check-out counter in this way?  Is it because we are supposed to be ashamed of what's in them? Like no one else on God's organic, chicken composted, grain fed, free range, green earth ever drank directly from a bottle of Boone's Farm Strawberry Hill tucked away in a recycled brown paper bag?  Call me a snob, but a black plactic bag is just not the same.

And if we're to be ashamed of these purchases, why doesn't Publix offer us little black bags for wart removal cream, jock itch powder, dandruff shampoo, Harlequin romance novels, pork skins and Ben and Jerry's Chunky Monkey?  These questions are beyond me. 

Also beyond me are the two men on the MARTA train this morning who decided to re-purpose their black plastic bags as "lunch containers".  I kid you not, one man got on at my station and the other got on two stations later and sat his sweatpant-covered butt in the seat right next to us.

Wait, maybe this wasn't their "lunch"?

Cheers to you no matter what you drink out of....

Black Bag "lunch" number one

Black bag "lunch" number two

Speaking of alcohol - check out my friend who has just relocated to Las Vegas from ATL - two VERY funny blogs she writes that I read religiously - or perhaps I should say spiritually?

www.mybigfatvegas.blogspot.com/

http://www.sevenbellsandthreesheets.blogspot.com/

Vacation Signs

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JHSgAGeh8gw

April 10, 2011 marked the 30th anniversary of my parents buying a two week share of time at the Sea Crest Surf and Racquet Club on Hilton Head Island. I’m sitting in the Dock Master, sleeps 8 Unit, as I type. It’s a two bedroom, two bathroom, pull out couch and bunk beds, 1980’s era (still) condo just a block from the beach.  Several of my dedicated readers have visited here over the years so you get the visual.

I was a junior in High School when my family purchased weeks 14 and 15 of this time share "deal". Their realtor, Bobby Sandell, was honest with them and made sure they knew this was NOT an investment but rather a vacation location for years to come. Bobby is still a realtor with Re/Max on Hilton Head.  When his name is spoken, we all smile; such a cutie then and a handsome man now.  I feel certain I can feel his presence or at least the presence of his BMW convertible, every time I drive onto the Island.

Shortly after conferring with my maternal grandparents (for financing I’m sure) and holding a Brady Bunch family meeting at the Ice Cream Cone across the street (est. 1971), the deal was sealed. So what if mom and dad spent $17,000 30 years ago for what can now be STOLEN for $7,000? We love it and it’s been so worth it!

So here I sit on my last evening before returning to Atlanta – typing out the top 10 signs I’m on vacation (well, I didn't quite make it to ten).

I've only been here a week, but there are 32 Piggly Wiggly plastic bags tucked under the kitchen sink.  It, along with the Red Dot liquor store, are within walking distance of the unit.

The remote control on the living room t.v. doesn’t work and I don’t care.  I can just pull a chair right up to the t.v. and operate the channel changer by hand.  Or, I can be lazy to the max and go lay down in front of the television in the master suite where the remote control DOES work.

On my way to Hilton Head, I stopped in for an appointment at {Intimacy} for a bra fitting.  I spent over $300.00 despite a potential government shut down and after days of hand wringing and beating myself up, I'm finally over it.  And my girls are happy.

Every meal has fresh seafood and alcohol involved.  Prime example here at Chef David's "Roastfish and Cornbread"...

I begin to ignore the irony in life but am subtly brought back to reality at "The Salty Dog" at Sea Pines' South Beach where, you guessed it, there are no dogs allowed...

I've finished three books including "Quiet Guilt: The State of Michigan v. Starr" by my second cousin once removed, Clare Adkin.  Also in the top three for this vacation were "Sophie and the Rising Sun" by Augusta Trobaugh and "Dewey: The Small-Town Library Cat who Touched the World" by Vicki Myron (Thanks Christal and Katie!).  I only cried once during that last book - during the death scene - and I didn't even care that I was out on the beach deck when that happened.

And for the 14+ times during this trip that I visited the Piggly Wiggly, I always chuckled at the "Butt Wipes" aisle - thanks to WPPJ (Witness Protection Program John) for pointing this out to me.  I wonder how many years it's been there?  Gotta love that Piggly Wiggly, that's been there for 50 years, for leaving it up there.  I dig the pig....

Hope they sign the budget tonight so that I have a job to go back to on Monday to pay for this week of decadence!