Unleash da Beast

I’ve always known I was different, a little quirky, and even an oddball perhaps.  I kinda like that about myself.  I never fit in with any cliques, didn’t want to, but I got along with just about everybody.  Besides, I don’t want to be like everyone else.  I like myself just the way I am; how many people can truly say that?

I took a Facebook Smackdown last night at the fingertips of a young lady whose daddy asked me out on a date.  I’ve never met the girl, but that’s just a mere technicality cuz according to her, she knows all about me.  She says I am “batshit crazy” and that she must approve who her daddy sees cuz her daddy deserves a good woman (or something to that effect).  I can’t argue with her first and last point.  But she said “batshit crazy” like it’s a BAD thing?!  Ouchie.

Truthfully, I am human (with a li’l bit of bat blood in me of course), and it hurt me at first that someone who has never even met me would call me such a thang, but then I remembered it doesn’t really matter what she or anyone else thinks of me.  My self-worth is based solely on what I think of myself, and I, quite frankly, think I’m pretty awesome – for realz!.

I get such a kick out of people calling me crazy and miserable and all the other not-so-nice terms, so much so that when it happens, I proceed to take on their description of me to the millionth-fold … just to make them think they are right.  Why bother trying to change their closed minds?  Not a one has ever come to me and asked my side of anything cuz they all know everything already … or so they think.  So screw it, I go for the shock factor and say really off-the-wall and sometimes nasty things.  Why not?  I might as well have some fun with the lashings I get, right?!  It ain’t like we’re gonna be friends … ever … just Facebook friends, which cracks me up cuz they call me names but keep me as a FB friend.  Kinda twisted, don’t ya think?  Amusing anyway.  I made up a saying once that got quite a few laughs.  It was, “Hey, come on, we’re all Facebook friends,” which we all know means nothing more than we peek into each other’s lives on a daily basis through a computer screen and many make judgments solely on what we see.  Whoops, got off track.

Ya so, fo’ shizzle, what is “batshit crazy” anyway?  I needz some street cred, bitches.  I reckon I’ve heard the term before but not as it applies to me.  So I looked it up … not in my Webster’s Dictionary.  Thankfully, I found the Urban Dictionary online, cuz there just ain’t enough words in the world, we gotta make up our own.  Here’s the rather long definition of “batshit crazy,” with my sidenotes in black:

A person who is batshit crazy is certifiably nuts.  Hmmm, I wonder how that chick is qualified to determine that I am certifiably nuts, especially without ever having met me.  Sounds like she’s got a great future as a shrink if she can diagnose someone without leaving the ‘puter.  She should be quite proud.  The phrase has origins in the old-fashioned term “bats in the belfry.”  Not gonna try to mislead anyone … I dunno what a belfry is, but if it’s anything like a French fry, bring on the ketchup baby … yum. 

Old churches had a structure at the top called a belfry, which housed the bells.  Oh dang, hold da Heinz.  I get it now – a belfry is what is known to me as a steeple.  Bats are extremely sensitive to sound and would never inhabit a belfry of an active church where the bell was rung frequently.  I’m not sensitive to sound, just sensitive to some of the idiotic things some people say, but I get over it quickly and turn it into a humorous blog post.  Occasionally, when a church was abandoned and many years passed without the bell being rung, bats would eventually come and inhabit the belfry.  I wonder if we pay for that BAT (bells are tollin’) study through taxes, wouldn’t surprise me.  So, when somebody said that an individual had “bats in the belfry” it meant that there was “nothing going on upstairs” (as in that person’s brain).  Yes, I’m sure y’all can tell there’s nothing going on in my brain.  In fact, I am pretty sure my brain was surgically removed years ago.  It’s a wonder I am able to type through all the drool on my keyboard.  To be BATSHIT CRAZY is to take this even a step further.  Oh gosh, this doesn’t sound good at all.  A person who is batshit crazy is so nuts that not only is their belfry full of bats, but so many bats have been there for so long that the belfry is coated in batshit. Hence, the craziest of crazy people are BATSHIT CRAZY.  Well no darn wonder my Degree deodorant has failed me, it ain’t BODY odor, it’s frickin’ BATSHIT.  And I’ve had the nerve to get upset with Sammie Sad Eyes for rolling in horse poo.

Dudes and Dudettes, I think y’all would understand … I gotta go take a shower.  I hope you enjoyed this tongue-in-cheek post.  The bottom line is not matter what ANYONE thinks of me or any of you for that matter, repeat after me:

So while I sometimes participate in the drama cuz it’s kinda fun to mess with peeps, the above stands.  I am gonna shine!  And haters gonna hate.  Have a great weekend, y’all!

Ok … couple things I need to point out here.  This is not a recent image of me, but it is me.  Obviously, I was exhausted.  Looks like I was sitting next the da Captain’s seat on a boat … I figure Daddy was at the helm and most likely took this pic.  That’s fine … but does it not beg the question, “Who lets their child sleep in this position?!”  What if I got stuck like that?  For my own peace of mind, I am convinced that the pic was taken as soon as my wore out li’l body fell into this awkward, slumbered state, and then I was, very gently, picked up and put in the V-berth or at least onto a stretched out seat, to finish out this much-needed siesta.  Then again, I do suffer from lower back pain to this day … hmmm.  Maybe the folks giggled the whole way back to the marina, while mixing cocktails and eating cheese and crackers, and then stuffed me in the trunk of Dad’s old Mustang for the trip home.  I will never know.

This is how I have felt of late, just over the last week or so.  Remember I said I couldn’t even make it through a workout the other day.  Well, today I got through the iron-pumping session, thoroughly dug it, and then proceeded to … not sleep yet, felt like I needed to earn it.  I trimmed this goofy shrubs:

When we first bought da house, they were here to the right, but the late hubby moved them so he could plant some:

Weeds?!  Well, no, Azaleas, but all I’ve got now is weeds.  The Azaleas croaked.  So I trimmed, and this is very much a “Well, they look better than they did” effort:

I dunno how many times the trimmer blade got caught up in the railing.  And this is really gross, but if you look close enough, you will see a totally rusted out part of the railing (no worries, I’ve given up on selling this house, so no shame, baby – full disclosure).  SSE and the late hubby would go out every night and sit on the porch.  I asked Don why the dang railing rusted out right in front of where he sits.  He said, “Cuz that’s where I spit!”  Wait … what?!  He doesn’t even CHEW but he SPITS?  Don’t get me wrong, he was a very good man, but he loved to sit in that spot and tell me how to trim the shrubs, wash the vehicles, sweep the driveway, blah-de-blah.  Meanwhile, he was spittin’ all over the place?!  Ew.  I guess he wanted to instruct me on sanding the railing down and painting it.  Out of respect for my sweet Sammie … bless Don’s heart!

I did take a nap after that.  Here’s what I was doin’ yesterday:

Um, no, that’s not my yard.  BUT, my yard did get mowed.  It doesn’t have the smiley face cuz it’s all brown and yucky … I guess we are in a drought.  I was gonna buy a push mower and do it myself, but some mysterious mower man took pity on this damsel in distress.  Of course, had he known what he was in for, he might never woulda showed up (I live in the South, where proper English is frowned upon):

This is my burn pile that’s been empty since I made a blog post about burnin’ it up!  MMM (mysterious mower man) came to the door and asked if I had anything that could cut branches.  Luckily, I did.  He had to sharpen same and bitched about their ineffectiveness most of the time, but that’s not my problem cuz all I wanted was my grass shortened, right?  I felt I needed to help in some way; he was a bit resistant to that but did relent.  I said, “Holy cow, I never thought you would cut THIS many branches down … and BIG branches at that … we’ve got enough to make a whole new forest.”  Know what he said?  “You don’t know how many times these branches almost took me out while I was mowing.”  What a baby!  Has he never played duck, duck, goose?!

Oh … hmmm … well geez.   I never thought of THAT (just come in for some lemonade!).  I said, “Ya, there’s some trees in da yard … they used to make me giggle.”  “GIGGLE?” he asked, as I “chuckled” my way through the explanation.  Giggle is such a sweet, innocent word … obviously it was one he could not comprehend.  I said, “Yeah, my hat would get caught on a branch and I’d lose it, but it never, ever dawned on me to clip the branches.”  I’d just stop daBeastMower, climb off, grab the hat, put it back on, and salute to my neighbor’s porch just in case they were watching?!  Isn’t that what everyone does?  Apparently not, as now I’ve gotta get a burn permit and pray that I don’t set my whole neighborhood on fire.  I had a burn pile once and even invited a firefighter over to help me with it, but all he wanted to do was show me his hose.  Pig.  Hehe!

So the whole point of my post … why do I feel so fatigued?  I wanted to blame perimenopause or hypothyroid or anything I could take a pill for.  I’m already hypothyroid, so just increase the dose.  But I fear it is the above photo … my creation … Heaven in a Bowl … that has wore my ass out.  Two freshly baked chocolate chip cookies, 4 scoops of vanilla ice cream, and several tablespoons of Hershey’s hot fudge.  Not a regular on the menu for a low-carber.  But oh so good.

Yes I am a self-diagnoser.  I Googled “fatigue in women.”  What came up was too much caffeine and sugar.  I guarantee y’all that it ain’t gonna be sumpn as simple as taking more thyroid hormone, taking less brain tumor medicine, or taking a new vitamin.  Although, I hope it is.  If my doc, whom I have only seen one time in several years, says I need to drop “Heaven in a Bowl,” I will feed him same and ask him why.

Dat’s da fact, Jack!

I remember when me and da family moved from Massachusetts to New Hampshire when I was just 6 years old.  I remember peeing in the foundation of my future neighbor’s home (sorry Mr. Deacy, hehe).  I dunno why I even remember that … I just know we used to drive up to visit the “lot,” known once as 21 Blueberry Circle.  I recall, shortly after we moved in, watching the Deacy’s move in from the big city of Lawrence (where they actually had CABLE TV) … the boy had a freakin’ BIG WHEEL and a Huffy bicycle … I couldn’t wait to make friends with him.  I remember huge sunflowers, taller than me, in the yard.  What’s really neat is I still have the original home plan that my dad got from Better Homes and Gardens magazine:

I also have the actual blueprint.  Why?  I dunno.  Here is da house shortly after it was built … not quite as much glass as BH&G showed:

Heck, no grass either.  But there was grass eventually … complete with homeplate by the lobster trap on the lower left side and three other bases for our neighborhood whiffleball tournaments.  And check out my first 5-speed Schwinn bicycle … good times … Schwinn was a special brand in my family.  My bedroom was in the cellar, lower right corner.  There was a “well” thingy by the window that one morning held a skunk.  Ew.  We put a 2 x 6 down as a ramp, and the li’l stinker found its way out.  Amen.

I will never forget the lake … Big Island Pond … the meeting every year to “open” it up … freakin’ awesome.  Swimming in the cold, cold water.

I remember Mrs.Deacy, a school teacher suffering with cancer … shoot I didn’t understand it then.  She was a beautiful woman.  I remember her looking out her front door as the neighbor’s Beagle, Snoopy, that lived on the other side of her, was attached to our li’l husky, Lassie, and Dad pouring hot water over them to try and separate them.  LOL.  They made cute puppies.  Lassie, after two litters, “ran away” or so my parents told us.

I really had it made as a kid … times were a lot simpler then … right?!  This is me in my yard in 1980 on Bramwell, my neighbor Davida’s horse.  Flannel shirt and Levi’s jeans … yea buddy.  I’d get up in the morning and put my jeans on the woodstove to warm them up while I took a shower.  Life was good.  My dad loved the woodstove so much that he burned a damn line right across his lower back from leaning up on it … burned it right through his down vest.  What a goober … the Born Loser … that’s what he always said.  Remember that cartoon?

This must’ve been after Daddy built the mancave A-frame that attached to the house via the back porch.  It was awesome, complete with a garage and back driveway.  It was his Sunday escape and a great place for family parties.  We even held Christmas out there and one year had to shovel our way out to the gifts.  I don’t care who you are … kid memories are the best.  Look at me … I sucked at baseball (was good at softball), but I loved being in uniform.  I thought I looked like Nicholas from Eight is Enough, hehe.  The ball field was just a hop, skip, and jump down a dirt trail from our house.  I never let my parents come to my games … I was afraid I would disappoint them.

A lotta history in my ‘hood.

This will probably sound really bizarre, but when I wake up each morning and hear the sounds coming in my bedroom window … I imagine myself in my bed on Blueberry Circle … hearing the noise from the ball field and thinking about riding my bike up to Don’s Market to buy milk and cigarettes for my parents.  Yup … kids used to be able to do that.  Crazy, huh?  Life was so damn simple then.

Now I’m dealing with a shit-rolling mutt.  See it on her collar?  Love her to death, but why the infatuation with horse poo?  I took her collar off and tried to catch her to give her a bath.  She ran away.  Meantime, sitting on my front porch, I see fireflies and a white-tail deer running through the yard across the street.  Beautiful.

Dunno where da dawg went … I reckon she will come back.  I probably better go to bed.  What do you remember about being a child?  Cuz I am not the only one who thinks about this stuff … am I?  I miss those days.

JOY:

Rode to the grocery store this morning … was dangerously low on toilet paper.  Ya notice a lot more when riding a bike.  I dunno why but I think tractors sitting in fields look cool.

OY:

I could only buy a 12-pack of TP rather than the usual 24-pack.  I really thought it would fit in the bag, duh!  Luckily, it tucked in nicely under the seat.  I must’ve looked like a gooberfrig biking it up the road!  Gone are the days of really stocking up, though.  I always feel better when I have an overabundance of paper goods in da house, just one of my many quirks:

JOY:

I call this the Stone Church … it’s very pretty.  Of all the times I’ve driven by it and even run radar from the parking lot, I never noticed the water fountain to the left.  Doesn’t matter … it doesn’t work … I tried it this morning, lol.

OY:

I’m starting to look my age!

JOY:

Beautiful horses next to the church and Talley Farm off in the distance … can’t beat some of the views around these parts.

OY:

These pics don’t do it justice, but this hill is a MONSTA to try to climb on two wheels.  It was even too much for the TP, which went flopping off when I almost dropped the bike while trying to walk … yes walk … it up part of the incline:

The bags were full of some rather heavy groceries, which threw me all outta wack when trying to push the bike by hand … I was a dang mess!

JOY:

That right there is a horseradish deviled egg.  I wolfed down four of ‘em when I got home … sooooo yummy.

Quick story (well, maybe not so quick) … then I gotta do some house cleaning.  One of the weirdest nights on the job as a deputy … a couple of things happened on this road where I took most of these pics.  Early in the evening, there were two separate calls of cows in the road, one by where that tractor above is and one near where those horses are (these locations are a couple miles apart).  I was busy on something else so other officers responded.  Unfortunately, the good folks in dispatch were unable to locate the owner of the cows that were hanging out by where that John Deere is now.

Some time around 11 p.m. or so, we got a call way north … dude said there was a black guy on a motorcycle driving up and down his street shooting a rifle.  Well holy crap.  First of all, the call struck me as odd in that there are very few black people in Franklin.  And how do you shoot a rifle while driving a motorcycle?  Not to mention that the road this cool rider was supposedly wreaking havoc on is pretty well populated, so why would only one person on the street be calling to report such a dangerous thing?  Nonetheless, those types of calls are scary.

Anyway, it turned out to be nothing.  The man who called it in believed it happened, but we could find no evidence of same.  Can you say “hallucination?”  While walking around looking for rifle casings, another officer on my shift told me he had to use his Taser on a cow earlier … it had him backed up to a fence!  That had to be quite a sight.

Around 1 a.m. that same night/morning … I was driving down the straightaway by John Deere when I noticed something in the road.  There was a vehicle coming towards me as well, but it was too late.  I thought, “OH NO, A COW,” and then heard kerplunkaplunkaplunkplunkplunk plunkety plunk plunk (or something like that).  I stopped and looked in my rearview mirror.  The other vehicle was on the wrong side of the road, so I knew it must’ve hit the mostly black beast, who was very difficult to see in the dark.  I jumped outta my squad and ran up to the the driver’s window to make sure he was ok.  He was shaken up but not injured and already on the phone telling his wife what had happened.

The cow was nowhere to be seen.  I asked the guy if it went flying into the field, having visions of those cows soaring through the air in the movie Twister, but he pointed down … it was underneath his SUV!  Thank God the poor moo-moo died instantly.  It was literally cooking from the heat of the truck.  Y’all should’ve seen the look on the tow truck driver’s face when he arrived!