P is for Powerhouse, P is for Piercing, P is for Pain

Oh, God, I'm so old. He was the first man I had a crush on. His blue eyes were piercing. HE WAS AGELESS. I named my Ken doll Paul. And she is beauty and strength. And she was the love of his life. I had a cousin that was in New York City in the 70s and saw him in a restaurant. She was with a bunch of girls at the table next to him and these girls kept arguing over whether it was him or not (of course they were all models). He got up and walked over to their table and said, "Yes, it's me." And he took pictures and gave them all his autograph, I guess, so he could have lunch in peace.


He was immortal to me...Hud, Cool Hand Luke, Absence of Malice (my favorite), From the Terrace, Cat on a Hot Tin Roof, Rally Round the Flag Boys (I saw it at the drive-in with my mom and dad and sisters), The Verdict, The Road to Perdition. Oh I thought he would never die, live to 105. And then I found out he was mortal just like the rest of us...and had cancer...I never even knew that.

I told Jim at breakfast Sunday (today) morning that he was one of those movie stars that YOU NEVER KNEW HIS POLITICS or he did not use his celebrity to push his politics on other people. He just lived his life and made and directed great movies.

On a lighter note, how bout them LSU Tigers? Jim went down to Baton Rouge for the game on Saturday. Jim and I are lucky enough to have season tickets although I don't attend for two reasons 1) Jim's seats are eight rows from the top of the east side, right about where the orange arrow is;

And, 2) Jim's seats are eight rows from the top of the east side. YIKES, look how high that is, look at the people in the foreground and it looks like they're standing on each other's heads!


Actually, Jim is THE FAN and he's up at the top for a reason. He screams, he hollers, he cusses them out even when they're stomping an opponent. But make no mistake, he is among other fans that scream and holler and cuss. He and his cousin Bill played high school football, had a torturous coach that taught them to enjoy pain and none of them ever got over losing the state high school football championship by one point in 1967. Jim also played football (defensive tackle) his first year at Northwestern (in Louisiana). He called himself a glorified tackling dummy for the A squad and at the end of the season he could see the writing on the wall and went to the coach at Northwestern to resign. The coach politely accepted his resignation and said, "If I could have just gotten a little more speed out of you Ruffin....." That's when he transferred to LSU and he became THE FAN.

So during last night's game, Jim was screaming and hollering and cussing as usual and animated. Charles Scott made a fantastic LSU touchdown (I do watch the game at home) and Jim jumed up, clapped his hands together hard and his LSU leather watchband popped off, flew up in the air and landed in the lap of the lady sitting in front of him. All his buddies around him fell out laughing and he had to tap the woman on the shoulder and ask her for it back, she hadn't even noticed. So you can imagine how embarrassed he was when lo and behold three or four plays later he jumped up clapping and the button popped off of his shorts and went into this same lady's backpack. Jim will never live that down and guess who's probably finding a stray button in her backpack this morning and wondering where the hell it came from?

Why Can't We Just All Get Along? Look What You've Done to Me

Oh, I'm so optimistic, so PollyAnna, so "glass half full" - the debate tonight between McCain and Obama, well, it was so divisive, it scared me so much, why so confrontational?...I hark back to days when I was innocently "in love" - of course that was before I met my husband of 26 years, the one and true love of my life. But before then I was truly in love for the first time with a young man named "Alex" ...not his true name obviously. We meshed, we fit together like two spoons. And then you find out that you're not as mature as you thought you were, you carry a lot of baggage, he has a pack horse of baggage and you both realize that you're not headed down the same highway into the future. McCain and Obama are much the same way...both informed, both worthy candidates but both headed in opposite directions. However, I believe and hope Mr. McCain is in the White House come January 20, 2009. For Alex:



It was a great song before it was a movie trailer/theme song.

Post-Ike

Ike came and left our world quickly and with minimal damage. We were totally in between bands of thunder storms. We got some bad winds but all in all, just limbs and mega pine cones in the yard. The unfortunate people in Galveston are who I pray for...all that debris on the side of the roads reminds me of the pick-up sticks game I used to play as a child at my grandparents house, that and Tiddly Winks (oh, don't date yourself Susan.)

However, I did have quite a time with my internet company. Along with my apathetic dedication to my blog, I am an obsessed fan of the Weather Channel. So Friday night had me monitoring radar, wind speed, barometer, etc. on us, Galveston, Baton Rouge, where my son lives and East Texas. I got up at 3:00 a.m. Saturday morning to check (see-I am obsessed) and lo and behold the internet was out. I would understand if Mansfield was in the middle of the raging Ike, but it had not even made it up here yet. No wind, no rain.

I called CMA Cable just so I could wake up tech support. The guy that answered was hard pressed to tear himself away from the comic book that I assumed he was reading but told me in his LOW BASE VOICE that there was an outage reported in the area...they would probably get to it on Monday. What?! No way buddy.

Now here is where I stop and tell you about my conspiracy theory. We live a few miles outside of town but we do live in a subdivision, so it's not exactly Mubende, Uganda, but I cannot get DSL. And Hughes satellite is too expensive (although I am saving my pennies). So I'm stuck with cable. And I think at certain times, the cable company steals my broadband. I think they turn a few of us off so they can run the electricity on the East coast or play some game that requires tons of broadband width. I'm not just a little paranoid am I?

Why then, after I told Mr. Deep Voice, comic book reading techie that I NEEDED the internet this weekend because I make my living off my computer (total lie) and that I had a deadline to meet (lie #2) and that I wanted credit on my account for the two days I was going to be down and then hung up, did my modem light up and presto the internet was back?????? Excellent sentence structure Susan. I amaze myself sometimes.

You didn't come this far for nothing did you? Below is Ed Byrne, Irish comedian that I think I found on Parachuting Without a Net, who's blog I found on Baby on Bored, who is one of my favorite blogs. Anyway, Ed Byrne has a hilarious routine about turning the alarm clock off in the morning. Take a few minutes to laugh today.






My version of that conversation includes giving myself permission to go to work in mildly wrinkled clothes, not washing my hair therefore shortening my shower or how about, forget the shower, a wet wash cloth will do...Ewwww, TMI Susan, TMI.

Y-IKE-S

Well, here we are at 9:30 p.m. Friday night, Septermber 12, 2008. Ike is headed up this way. I've been listening to The Weather Channel and all those young metrosexual male meterologists talk about all the "old folks" that went through Hurricane Carla in 1961 (by the way, that was back when they named hurricanes only after females - not that I'm a feminist, just interesting) like it was eons ago. I was young just like the rest of you, thinking I would never get old...and now I'm an "old folk". In 1961 I was ONLY six years old. Enough Susan.

I'm from Houston, Texas. I am very glad I don't live there anymore. The mayor of Galveston told everyone to GET OFF THE ISLAND and if they did not to please write their social security number on their arm so they could be identified. Catastrophic. YOU WILL NOT BE ALIVE IF YOU STAY ON THE ISLAND TONIGHT. Yet of course that does not include Geraldo Rivera, who can do whatever he wants.

Why is God playing with me and my new RV? It's almost like he's saying, "You've worked all your life for this Susan and Jim, now I'm going to torture you with it in your driveway..." Or....perhaps...he has more important things to deal with.

Clif called from LSU - Baton Rouge has dodged the bullet. His frat house is still full of humidifiers and blue tarps from Gustav. The football game is still on for this weekend at Tiger Stadium. Those kids need some fun and excitement to relieve the tension from the past two weeks.

It's 10:00 p.m. now, Jim is still out checking everything (public works director). I'm going to bed with all my tall pine trees around my house and 40 to 75 mph gusts coming our way. Norman (our lab) is with me...I'll check y'all on the flip side.

Palin vs. Obama

Cons
SHE has 70s hair
HE has ears that stick out
SHE has no experience in foreign affairs
HE has no experience in foreign affairs
SHE has fingernails too nice to be a hockey mom or a pit bull
HE has no neck (my husband's definition of a metrosexual)
SHE shoots moose (poor Bulwinkle)
HE shoots hoops

Pros
SHE has 70s hair
HE has ears that stick out
SHE has no experience in foreign affairs
HE has no experience in foreign affairs
SHE has fingernails too nice to be a hockey mom or a pit bull
HE has no neck (my husband's definition of a metrosexual)
SHE shoots moose (poor Bulwinkle)
HE shoots hoops

That is all I feel I need to say. You look up the issues that are important to you. As for me, I have had two weeks of political bullshit and am ready to go back to my mediocre life. Hooray, Big Brother is on tonight. I do love being part of the bourgeois. It's safe, it's comfortable.

Clif, Megan and little Belle headed to Texas and her folks for a few days. LSU classes do not commence again until Monday, September 8. Gustav did the most damage in Baton Rouge this time. Lots of power outages. Clif's fraternity house lost part of its roof and some trees in the front yard. We have cousins down there that had a tree come down on their roof and Mr. G's best friend lost many trees in his yard. I'm thankful that there was no loss of life.

Jim and I are going camping this weekend. In the driveway - I'll be sure and take pictures. Actually, Jones Electric put a 30 amp plug in the storage room next to the garage and we're going to spend the weekend combing all of the RV owners manuals and learn freshwater, graywater, blackwater tanks, hot water heater, tv, surroundsound, holding tanks, dump station procedures, etc. How exciting. May have to embibe in an adult beverage or two. Maybe cousin Jean will come from down the street for a visit. Seriously, I am making reservations sometime this fall for Petit Jean, Arkansas or Devil's Den.

Joye and Mr. G went to Minnesota las week and took many pictures. I wanted a picture of a celebrity, this is the closest I got:

I leave you with my Ruffinism for the day and the Shirelles. Reminds me of my youth.

John McCain Quote: "The good news is that we now have enough money to run the entire campaign in Colorado. The bad news is, some of that money is still in your wallets and purses."

Barack Obama Quote: "Look, when I was a kid, I inhaled frequently. That was the point."

Gustav You

Boy, hurricanes make people crazy. Mansfield is about 160 miles from the Louisiana coast but we are still going to take a hit later this evening. We should get 50-60 mph gusts and tons of rain. We need tons of rain. However, the local Wal-Mart was a madhouse. WE LIVE 160 MILES FROM THE COAST! Get a grip people. You don't need two pallets of water at your house. Nor forty cans of pork and beans. And fighting and pulling hair in the aisles?


I went through Hurricane Carla as a child in 1961. My sisters and I had a blast playing barbie dolls in the den. No electricity. Once an hour Dad would trek us through the house to change out towels on the windows. We'd ring them out in the kitchen and place fresh wet towels on each window sill. I was oblivious to how hard the wind was blowing the rain through the bottom of each window (and we had a fairly new house in 1961.) The street flooded up to our front door. It was a pretty scary time.


And now we have our new RV in the driveway to worry about trees falling on. And the boat is home now. Double worry. We picked up the RV last Thursday in Carencro. I have a couple of pictures. Clif came over from Baton Rouge and we had lunch together. That's Belle, his new beagle that lives with him at the frat house.







I'm going out to take a picture of the RV and the boat, so when Gustav comes through, I'll have something to remember it by.

Below is Megan, Clif's girlfriend and their dog, Belle. They are both precious.

I'm so hoping that Gustav is not as bad on us as Rita was. I must go empty the cans of pork and beans from my truck and also the pallets of water. I have some hair under my fingernails and seem to have lost some myself. Good thing we don't need any sandbags, may have had to bring my shotgun.

Update: It's 10:30 P.M. on Monday night - all 47 pine trees in our yard are still vertical, RV happy, boat happy, Norman dying to run out and wreck havoc.

Ruffinism for the day: “I fear one day I'll meet God, he'll sneeze and I won't know what to say.” Ronnie Shakes