The Furry Pad

This was just too good not to post. We here at the Furry Pad all got a good laugh. Especially over the horse—concussion anyone?

Can’t see the video? Click here and get ready to laugh.

For your upcoming July 4th performance

Dear Mr. Bill Cosby,

Taking advantage of the long Independence Day weekend, Mr. Bill Cosby, sir, we will be joining you in the oldest city in North America. To make the tourist event even more eventful, like the cherry on a sundae, we’ll be up front enjoying your performance in the lovely Quebec City. And, unlike the following story, I intend to be there this time! See, last time—Friday, September 25, 1998 to be exact—my husband and I had tickets in hand and were at the UNH Whittemore Center Arena all dressed up ready to enjoy one of our few nights out as new parents.

As you can see in the image—albeit an iPhone capture—the tickets were never used. But why, if we were outside the Arena, did we not make it inside you might ask? Ah, that has an interesting answer. Principles. Pure and simple.

As we discovered upon our arrival fifteen minutes before show time, we had to park the car two miles down the road and walk back. Now you might be thinking “it’s great exercise!” But to us, we weren’t exactly sporting the latest fashions in speed walking apparel.

My husband, oh my darling and sweet husband, he could have done it in his loafers, but his seating partners might not have appreciated his new au naturel cologne. As for me, I trusted myself enough in heels to walk short distances, but two miles in anything thicker than one quarter of an inch would land me either flat on my face or possibly a broken ankle (mind you, I’m vertically challenged).

So why didn’t my darling and sweet husband just leave his klutzy wife at the door, park the car, and brisk walk it back as was one of the options?

In roll the principles. First off, we would have been seated some twenty minutes into the show interrupting you which is much like walking in on a tennis match. Not cool. Secondly, I’d be standing in a billowing dress at a door while all these people entered, and while he was doing all the walking. Lastly, when we had purchased the tickets, the ticket handler had failed to mention the parking arrangements. Had we known that there was an option to purchase V.I.P. parking tickets to be right next door to the facility, we would have done so. Otherwise, you had to park two miles down.

That just didn’t sit well with us. We were naturally quite unhappy about missing the chance to watch you perform live. Growing up with the Cosby show, later adapting some of the fabulous Huxtable parenting into our lives, co-reading Love and Marriage, adding Little Bill books to the home library for our own Little One—the ways in how one man and his hilarity affected my family of three throughout different periods of our lives is countless and immeasurable.

When we heard that you would be performing in Quebec City—the most romantic and oldest city in North America, I reasoned to my husband why we needed to buy the ticket purchases and make the excursion:

Total reimbursement in 1998 was: $72 USD.

Total purchase price for V.I.P. seating in 2010 is $114.

What with the twelve years of interest, currency exchange rate, and any other possible considerations, we’re reinvesting said moneys right back to you!

I’m not a pack rat, but I still have the tickets from 1998; hubs over here wants to toss them. I’m not one to impose, at least I hope I’m not! Would it be too much to ask if we could get those tickets autographed? That way I can tell my husband “See! I told you there was a reason WHY I never threw them away!”

See you in a few days, Mr. Cosby! Really looking forward to finally seeing you perform.

Thank you …

Gin

P.S. I never miss a chance to say to my not-so-little-one “Over here. Not there. Here. Here.” It reminds me to take life a little less seriously.

P.P.S. My not-so-little-one, loves watching The Cosby Show. Theo’s Holiday is her absolute favorite episode.

Some town names in Canada and beyond can be quite comical…

There’s Dildo, Newfoundland where the lovely people know how to have a good time! Sway on to Hairy Hill, Alberta and cure that bad case of balding. And once you’ve found yourself knee deep in the beauties of Asbestos, Quebec, don’t forget to check out in Paradise, Nova Scotia.

If you’re interested in a secure future, you can look in to Upper Economy, Nova Scotia. But if you’re one of those risk takers and enjoy the wildlife, swing on over to Head-Smashed-In Buffalo Jump, Alberta.

And if you live in Blue Goose, Tennessee, you can fly to Puke, Albania to purge your liver.

It came in the mail. It’s little white envelope sitting there both begging to be ripped open and forbidding to be touched. If I didn’t open it, then there was still that small possibility I might get in. But if I opened it, that thin envelope with a sheet of paper folded into thirds, it might mean the temporary end to a dream I only recently discovered.

“Open it!” he said, sitting beside me at the table.

“I’m not sure,” I said. I wasn’t able to look him in the eye just yet. My heart was flipping to the right and flopping to the left in my chest. “If I wait a just a little longer, there’s still hope, but if I open it and it’s not good news, than I’ll be crushed,” I mumbled.

“Oh just open it!” he pushed.

“But it’s just one thin sheet of paper in there. That probably means it’s a ‘no’,” I said.

“A ‘no’ is just as short as a ‘yes’,” he encouraged. I thought about arguing his point, that if it was a yes, it would be a thicker envelop, that there would probably be more pages describing things in greater detail for what I’d need during my stay, a response form with a response envelope. Something thicker than what was in my hands. I looked at him, pinched my lips and slowly started to tear at a corner. I saw the single sheet and turned it over.

My name, my address, the date it was sent was just underneath the letterhead. Their name beaming brightly at me. He sat beside me, tentatively watching me unfold the paper. I read the first line. No. I read the first two words then read the first line and whispered “I didn’t get it,”  and slid the refolded paper over to my husband who quickly picked it up and opened it. His eyes moved left to right as he read the words.

“I’m so sorry, honey,” he said. He took my right hand and kissed my knuckles. “I love you.”

“Thanks,” I said trying to sound less affected than I really was.

This was my first form of a rejection letter. It wasn’t that I sent out a manuscript or something, but close. I sent out a request for a residency at a beautiful Artist Colony in New Hampshire. I sent my first few chapters plus a short story in hopes that my writing might elicit a ‘yes.’

Instead, I was encouraged to try again in a year’s time.

What happens to be the best thing for a rejection? You gotta work that much harder. I decided I’m going to work my arse off. To not cry about it. To complete my manuscript and get it out that door without the help of a residency. I’m not going to let a “We regret that we are not able to offer you a residency…” letter get me down. I’ll simply borrow these sorrowful feelings and put them to good use.

And maybe once I have something under my belt, maybe then I’ll be offered a “You’ve been offered a residency at The MacDowell Colony!” letter.

“I’ll give you $70 for all of it,” the man said, eyeing the objects before him. His lust for electronic gadgets surpassed any value for integrity.

“$90,” the twelve year old girl said. She knew seventy was too low, but figured that twenty more was a better deal for her, seeing that these were her toys and all. The thought of losing a such a large sale so early in the morning caused angst to swell within her.

* A barely used two year old Nintendo DS player, case, charger and car charger.

* Several games each even more less used than the player.

* A Wii dance mat and game used all of five times; it’s not what I thought it would be when I asked for it for Christmas she had said, justifying her reasons to sell the five month old gift.

* A newly purchased Wii Sims game, paid with her own money.

Together, we had valued this resale at $190. One hundred and ninety dollars.

But it was my fault as a parent. I hadn’t asked her to total the amount, to see it’s total worth, only each individual item’s value and that we’d go maybe five dollars less than the asking price for each. It was my fault that I didn’t tell her to wait for me while I parked the car away from the flea market. I thought because I had ten minutes to finish setting up before people arrived that nothing would be sold.

How wrong I was.

I was heading back to our shared table with a friend and saw our things splayed out, but no child behind it. My heart pounded in my ears from the sudden panic of not seeing Apple where she was supposed to be. I turned to my friend and her daughter and asked for her whereabouts, trying to remain calm.

“Oh, she sold something and will be right back, the man forgot a part. Or something, I’m not sure how those things work!” my friend said giggling. I looked around the tables, trying to find her but there were too many buyers around now. Where did they all come from, I wondered.

Just then, I saw her blond hair flying behind her, her smile enormously bright, laughter bubbling from lips as she yelled, “Mommy! Mommy! I sold it for $85!” she erupted, “all of it! Eighty-five dollars! I forgot to give the man the baggie of games and just brought it to him!!” I had told her that I wanted the games removed from the cases in case someone opted for a five finger discount and swiped the box. I guessed in her excitement during the sale, she had forgotten to give him the baggie in which she’d put them in for safe keeping.

Huh? “What do you mean all of it?” I asked with a smile on my lips, hoping she didn’t catch my concern.

“This older man came over wearing lots of jewelry and asked for all of it,” she said and pointed to the table. I tried to remember what had been there before, but she had been arranging and rearranging when I left her to park the car. “The NDS, the games, the Wii stuff. All of it,” she smiled. Then she saw my eyes and her happiness faded as quickly as my frustration appeared.

“Where is this man?” I asked.

“He went that way. I think he left though,” she mumbled. “I’m sorry, did I do something wrong?”

“You? No, honey. You didn’t do anything wrong.” I sat down on one of our camping chairs and took her hands in mine, pulling her down to my level for some privacy. I took a moment before answering, mentally tallying the asking prices and bit my tongue. I refused to make her feel bad. She hadn’t done anything wrong. It was that man. That bastard, I mentally cursed. “Apple, you didn’t do anything wrong. That man saw you unattended and took advantage of your age. He saw those prices and knew what you were losing. It is not your fault. He knew better.”

She wanted to pack up and leave then. I had to remind her that she still had things to sell, as well as myself. Her bubble, the joy in her eyes disappeared. She was mad. At me? Had I burst her bubble? Did I go about this wrong? Should I not have let her see me so upset over this? No. I didn’t do anything wrong. Except not telling her to not sell anything without me there. It’s my fault she lost a hundred dollars.

I started to wonder what would we have let it go for. Barely used latest kids toys. How much? How much did she really lose? I asked myself. $135. That’s what I would have let it all go for.

She lost $50. I didn’t have the heart to tell her that. I couldn’t. Not after seeing how her joyous bubble had burst. Her excitement of having made so much money already suddenly gone. When the girls walked off to use the facilities some time later, I turned to my friend, vented briefly on the transaction I had missed, and told her I was so angry I wanted to find that man and call the police for stealing from a child.

“She’ll get it back,” she said optimistically. “If she doesn’t get it back today, she’ll get it back another day.” What goes around comes around, I thought. I hope he accidentally drops it and a car rolls on top if it smashing it all to bits. I hope he plugs it in and it short circuits his house, I mentally hexed.

So what did my child do with this money she got from selling off her toys? She bought us a popcorn maker. And her heart continues to burst from the joy of gifting it to us, she glows from pride when she sees us using it.

Last night when I was tucking her into her bed, she asked me when she’ll get it back, what my friend had said at the flea market. I told her my secret curse about the man dropping it. Then I offered hope saying “it may not be today or next week, but it’ll come back to you. Maybe you’ll find a hundred dollar bill on the beach or the sidewalk or something while we’re on vacation this summer. What goes around comes around,” I finished. I left her, but not before throwing in an extra kiss and hug. Her eyes were full, pondering what all I’d said.

But today, even after more than a week has passed, I still feel anger about that man and how he so easily, so callously ripped off my child. As she still must since she brought it up last night. His deceitful behavior towards my child during my absence makes me feel that he sullied my child’s good nature. That I somehow failed as a parent. I know that it was just a flea market. I know that people can argue how one pulls on his side of the carpet at these things to get good deals. But that wasn’t just a good deal, that man stole from my child. I have raised my child to have good, strong values; some people out there could use her an example.

And maybe with those values of her deep desire for honesty, compassion and respect, she’ll get what she deserves. Because she didn’t deserve that.

Image Credit found at following links–> Flea Market, Running Puppy, Sad Puppy, Popcorn Maker, and Sitting Pretty Puppy.

“Love, if I find a residency on a ranch for a month, I’d take it in a heart beat,” I said day dreaming aloud. “Imagine it, waking up before the sun, tending to the horses, grits for breakfast, bareback riding—something I’ve always wanted to do. I can just smell the country air coming off the mountains. Then after all the chores are done and I’m all cleaned up, I spend the rest of the time writing!”

“Uh, honey, I won’t listen to anything you have to say while you’re hormones are raging,” he said.

“Oh. Yeah. That. Good point,” I giggled.

See, earlier this afternoon while we were discussing our dinner plans, I felt this sudden desire to just cry my eyes out. Why? I asked myself. Nothing was wrong. Life was fine. My husband was hugging me, kissing my neck from behind. We were smiling and laughing about nothing in particular. Our darling little child spent her very own money on a theater style popcorn maker and surprised us with this lovely gift.

“Yeah! We don’t have to make mommy’s kind of popcorn anymore!” he’d said, hugging and thanking Little Apple. They both frequently complained about my method of using the good old cooking pot with oil since I refused my family to buy microwave style due to the questionable ingredients.

While we were writing our menu plan down with the gates ready to burst and my husband smiling at me and my daughter basking in the high of her gift to us by dancing about, the sun burst through the windows exposing my issue at hand. “Oh, now I get why I’m ready to start crying,” I’d said.

“You want to cry? But why?” my darling husband looked up from the list before him, pen still in hand. Apple stops moving and looks over at me.

“I’m going to start my period soon!” I sighed grateful to have realized what plagued my tear ducts. So, if in a weeks time, I still want to do a residency on a ranch in the middle of nowhere, maybe then he’ll consider listening to me!!

Home.

Family. People. Things. Places. Smells. Sights. Sounds.

I miss it all. Today, I’m nostalgic for what made me me. I miss my family, my people. It’s been creeping up on me for some time now, but today it really hit home. I can’t say what it was that made it so near unbearable. Was it getting my hands dirty and hearing my mom’s voice tell my 6 year old self to wash my hands? Was it turning down a street and having the flash of a corner from my old neighborhood hit my car? A song on the radio that my sister said makes her think of me? Or was it reading something someone said about his wife and her family? Perhaps the last was the catalyst.

I miss being in someplace familiar, an ingrained familiarity. I miss being somewhere that defines me. And right now, I don’t feel very well defined where I live. I know this will be hard for my husband to read because we are at his home, where he grew up. And I’m in no way wanting to make this difficult for him. But that’s just it. He is able to define his youth to our children, showing them places where he went, identifying them with his roots. Yet me, whenever we visit my childhood home on a long weekend once in awhile, I point out how I went swimming in that lake, or T and I tromped through the woods there and got lost in the marsh, or I road my bike 11 miles to C’s house on a sweltering summer afternoon only to find out that she had biked to my house. Then the complaints come rolling in demanding to know when will we go home.

I miss knowing that family could drop by at any given time without notice. I crave that. I need that. It, in some infinitesimal way, defines me. I miss being able to just get up and go somewhere knowing that I have somewhere to go. That that someplace connects me to who I was once upon a time. But here, I can’t have that.

The other day, I wanted to go out. I needed to go out. The thought that came to mind was driving late into the night down dark country roads. Just driving and getting lost. But always knowing that wherever I was would eventually connect to my road. Then I would hop over to a café or a shop somewhere and know that one of my friends might be there. Other times, I could easily pop over to someone’s house to reconnect myself after that drive. But here, when I needed that winding road topped with a friendly visit time, there was nothing. No place to go and it saddened me. Sometimes, I feel lost here.

And right now in that moment of feeling lost, I miss my family, I miss my roots. It’s a hug from your mom comforting you after a nightmare. Or a push from your dad when you’ve just learned to go without training wheels. Other times, it’s like snuggling with your older sister reading a silly story backwards that’s attached to a teddybear. Or catching frogs in the stream behind the house with your younger brothers.

Right now, I’m missing these things. And it makes me emotional that I can’t readily have them. It’s not about me just going to be with them. It’s about being with my family—my husband and children, and sharing my place with them of what made me me. And it’s not just family or places I’ve been. It’s the all of it. It’s so much more.

I live in one of the most beautiful cities in North America. And I like it here very much. But I think due to nostalgia, I’ve fallen out of love with it.

*text was edited—to the best of my ability that is*

Ovaries. The curse of all women. Not to mention the demise of our loved ones. But without them, where on earth would our lovely little bundles of joy come from? Yet with them, oh dear me oh my. We ovary-bearers become the brunt of all jokes regarding the excruciating swing of our moods.

Let us take today for instance. I happened upon the misfortune of an ovarian cyst rupturing. Now before my cancer five years ago, the very year before my surgery, I wound up having the sudden—seven times over—experience of rupturing ovarian cysts throughout a twelve year month period. Luckily for me, once my surgery was behind us, so were the ovarian cysts. Or so we thought.

After having so many cysts within such a short time, I consider myself a pro. An expert of what happens in the nether region. A seasoned bitch riding that horrible wave. This past Friday when I noticed the discomfort going on around my very lower left side, I could only feel vexation towards the upcoming event.

Saturday comes and so does the peak of searing pain along with a spaciness not unlike a peroxide blonde sixth grader hiding in the school bathroom spritzing layer upon layer onto the already naturally occurring blond head. (and yes, in sixth grade, the lavatory next to Mrs. Paul’s English class is where I could be found.)

Sunday burst into my reality with wide eyes and a nauseated stomach. What was once my left ovary turned into a stabbing sizzle. And what was once my brain turned into the worlds largest, mindless airhead known to man.

Oh. You don’t believe me? Well, let me share with you a simple story of how affected my mind was to the extremely high level of Hormone Shock Syndrome. This story is one of several dozen that happened over the course of 48 hours.

“I was reading Stumbling on Happiness this afternoon and I had to reread this one word. Well, actually, I had to reread most of the words,” I revealed to my husband over dinner. He looked at me, bemused by his luck of having such an easy target for jokes.

(hyphen is only for pronunciation purposes)

“I read re-ap and thought ‘huh, that’s a new word, I guess I should look it up,’ then I thought, ‘wait, that doesn’t make sense, re-ap.‘ I read the sentence again and I just couldn’t figure it out. So I moved on to the next paragraph. When I finished the section, I had to go back.”

“Reap,” he announced, taking my punchline.

“Yeah!” I exclaimed, feeling comforted by his intelligence. At least one of us had it running the household this weekend.

“Love, I think you need to go to bed,” was his order.

Did I go to bed despite being Miss Dolt’s sister, Miss Dunderhead of the Year?

No. Instead, I decided to wait out the ride lest I wake up at two in the morning with an alertly bored mind.

I was extremely busy working towards something very specific for my writing career to which there was a deadline. Waking up early, going to bed late, tirelessly typing away, wracking my brain for possibilities, in addition to volunteering at a writer’s festival for five consecutive days and nights took its toll on me—in a good way! Doing that for several weeks, how can it not! And my busyness has paved the way for mental fatigue. After Monday, the date in which I sent some things on their way that will determine how a part of my life will turn out, I slept. And crashed. And watched t.v.

When you haven’t watched much t.v. in over three weeks—like those favorite shows you look forward to once or twice or even five times a week—getting back into them is … interesting. I couldn’t comfortably sit there watching the tube. I found myself being utterly bored and feeling unbelievably restless. Like I was literally wasting my time. But I couldn’t write. I tried. I even switched to a different project. But nothing worked.

Consider this my first writing since April 12th. And I’m feeling bored. And restless. And like I’m wasting my time. All the time. Only because I’m not writing on my projects!

Here’s to hoping that Monday morning will be fruitful and full of written words.

**the following images are not for the faint of heart; photos made possible from camera on hand – my iPhone**

“Your arm,” he said motioning to my left, “pull up your sleeve.”

I wasn’t sure where he was going with this, I felt hesitant because of what stood on his desk between us. But I also knew he was an authority figure I was to trust. So, reluctantly I rolled up my sleeve, fixing it above my elbow and extended my left arm out towards him. The contrast between the black table and my mayonnaise pale arm was startling. I briefly pondered whether I should tan, or spray.

“Your other arm, too,” he barked. My shirt sleeves kept falling back down, slipping past my elbows, covering up the soft tissue of my inner arms. A warning flashed through my mind, as if it was a sign to flee before he began.

Finally, with both of my limbs exposed flat on the tabletop, he strategically dripped seven tiny drops on my diaphanous flesh. He then pricked my skin with a needle beneath the golden pools, nimbly wiping the tool between each break of the skin.

The bait was laid, my blood goaded by his trickery, taunted by his power. Twenty-eight flaxen little pools tinged with red stared back at me.

“Now go sit out there. And don’t touch. Blow, but don’t touch,” he callously ordered, a simple discharge of me, a dismissal of my grievances, something he considered drivel.

The wait, the agonizing longing to end the torture he induced was burning my arms, ripping my skin. I wanted to scream. Tears brimmed in my eyes threatening to fall. “Maybe I could aim the tears on my arms?” I wondered. Blowing did little to alleviate the heat, the pain, the knives. My heart was racing. Then I remembered putting my mind first, ordering the pain to be second. And somehow control started to set it.

That’s when I saw him—his head leaning out of the door frame, beckoning me back to his lair.

I walked towards him, arms out stretched, hands balled tightly into fists, reaching towards him as I entered his domain.

“GOOD LORD!” He cried aloud at the sight of my arms.

“It really hurts,” I implored, “it itches!”

“I bet! You really do have a lot of allergies!” the doctor admitted taking out his ruler to measure the development instead of letting me submerge my arms in cool water.

*maybe 24 hours later!?*

Copyright 2010 by Ginny at The Furry Pad