Friday, April 22, 2005

Warm Fuzzies

It scares me that I saw this headline on AOL’s home page today.

“Chili Finger Finder Arrested.”

Say it 3 times fast. It also scares me that I knew immediately what the story was about. Ick.
http://aolsvc.news.aol.com/news/article.adp?id=20050422025809990006&ncid=NWS00010000000001

From
http://www.merriam-webster.com****************************************************************The Word of the Day for April 22 is:callithump \KAL-uh-thump\ noun : a noisy boisterous band or parade Example sentence: The town is trying to enlist one of Hollywood's most famous leading men to serve as grand marshal for this year's Memorial Day callithump.
Did you know?
The callithumpian bands and parades of today are more organized than those of the past, but they retain an association with noise and boisterous fun.


Last night was Scott’s birthday dinner extravaganza and callithump. It was noisy and boisterous fun. His gf, “T” decided to get out all the nice china his mom passed along to him and set a table that would make Martha Stewart swoon.

I brought my friend M (who is now the former “GF” and good for her for cutting that one loose…and no, I will not be picking up any of those pieces from him (Rebound Boy) thankyouverymuch. ) See February 23rd in my archives if you have any questions about that. http://kallipalooza.blogspot.com/2005_02_01_kallipalooza_archive.htm

Anyway, M and I put on our Thursday best and traveled out to the west side to cook stuffed mushrooms, crawfish etouffee, and drink up the host’s wine. We were noisy and boisterous.

At the last minute, I made contact with an old friend who Scott and I used to pal around with back in the early 90’s, and happens to be living closer than we realized… I felt somewhat foolish that we hadn’t had more contact since he’s been living 30 min. away for 2 years, and hasn’t had the easiest past few years, either. I resolve not to let another 8 or so years pass with such little contact. He joined our dinner soiree last night and I assume by the smile on his face that he figures we’re all still a little weird and crazy, as usual.

Our party included S and Puppy, who are Scott’s other bff’s besides his T and myself. Snippets of the dinner conversation included stories that were absolutely inappropriate for the dinner table, but I will happily share here.

One person revealed that once as a child s/he had been fascinated by their dirty bathwater enough to put it in a jar and take it to school for show and tell. I’d love to hear what the teacher said to that one.

Another person revealed that as a result of a young spring break sunburn, s/he had peeled a very large piece of skin from their back and had thought it prudent to save it in a baggie in their bathroom drawer until Mom found it and intervened. I’d love to see the look on that Mom’s face, and wonder if this resulted in any extra deposits in the child’s “Therapy/Psychoanalysis Fund”.

I think this is a fund that every parent should invest in, by the way, as it seems that we all go to therapy at one time or another to get an accurate reading on how screwed up we are and find out who made us that way. This should simply be another parental responsibility, as it was them that messed us up of course.

In the interest of full disclosure, I’ll just tell ya’ll what my weird story was. Or maybe I’ll save it for next week’s post.

Kidding. Anyhoo, in the 3rd grade Mrs. Whiteman requested that we all purchase or make “warm fuzzies” to keep in our desks for some sort of “warm fuzzy time” that would occur randomly throughout the year. I don’t know why.


My family was in a pretty rough financial time, and I’d overheard enough parental conversations about money that I chose not to ask for this “warm fuzzy”. You know, they were the little pom-pom creatures you could by at card stores and stuff, that you’d typically stick somewhere by the little feet. They had googly eyes and came in a multitude of colors. Mrs. Whiteman had assured us that a homemade warm fuzzy was just as acceptable, but I didn’t understand her directions for how to make them.

As a crafty kinda girl, I went my own way and came up with my own solution. Unfortunately it involved scotch tape and dog hair, lovingly donated to me by our sheep-dog mix named Daisy.

I was proud of my warm fuzzy, and Mrs. Whiteman seemed cool with it. My mother returned from a parent-teacher conference a few weeks later mysteriously unimpressed and mortally embarrassed by Mrs. Whiteman’s story of my homemade warm fuzzy. It turns out these little things cost like 89 cents or something, and if I would have asked Ginger would gladly have purchased one rather than have me going to school with my scotch tape/dog hair concoction. Oh well, I think you get your warm fuzzies anyway you can, and a little creativity never hurt anyone. On that note, have a fabulous Friday, go have yourself a “callithump” and drink one for me.



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"I get up every morning determined to both change the world and have one hell of a good time . Sometimes this makes planning my day difficult." --E.B. White