A Helpful Hint from Amy - The Cool Paper Towel

School started last week and although I'm not a teacher, most of my friends are teachers. Did I ever mention that my best friend Amy teaches the 2nd grade? Yes she does. Did I ever mention that my best friend Amy is brilliant? Yes she is.

One of my favorite works of her genius is this:

She keeps a little mini fridge in her class room filled with diet cokes and a life time supply of water-soaked paper towels tidily folded up and individually sealed in snack-size zip lock baggies.

Do you know how many snot dripping, red faced, sniffling, crying jags occur in the daily lives of 2nd graders? Well, I'll tell you, it's a lot. Bumps, bruises, scrapes, headaches, loose teeth, name calling, hair pulling, pants peeing, booger eating - no matter what your problem may be it can all be taken care of by the soothing relief of a cool, wet paper towel.

Amy always says it really fast too - Go get a coolpapertowel and sit down. The smeary red-faced child person goes to the mini-fridge and gets his or her own cool paper towel. Sometimes they even tell her when they might need one.

Mrs. Amy I'm very upset. I think I need a coolpapertowel.

I would like to state for the record that the cool paper towel works on children older than the 2nd grade also. Like 41 year old ladies who have had a bad day at work only to come home and find the kitchen sink full of dirty dishes so that she has to work all goddamn day and then clean up the damn kitchen before she can fix dinner, and clean up the kitchen yet again before bed. I think I need a cool paper towel.

Yesterday there were lots of cool paper towels getting tossed around at my house after my husband, who had started off the day sticking to the original plan of renting one of those Rug Doctors from the grocery store, ended up ripping out all of the carpet in our living room, dining room and hallways.

This is something that I have wanted to do from the minute we first walked in the door of this house, but MDH has always held back because hardwood floor restoration is in our home ownership fear zone, along with pretty much any home improvement project that goes beyond spackling or painting.

Needless to say there was some drama, but as you can see, it's a bit too late to turn back.

I'm not sure we have the skills to refinish this floor properly because it has some pretty bad stains in the wood, and I'm fairly certain that we do not have the money to pay someone else to do it.

Even scarier, MDH, in a similar fit of reckless impulse to the one that caused him to go from cleaning the carpet to tearing at it like a wild animal, decided to call in his brother Miami to see if he could come up and do the floor for us.

Bad. Idea.

Yes. Miami is by trade a concrete foreman and tends to work on high rise buildings, but started off as a carpenter and general contractor, so he knows how to refinish a floor.

He is also a roaring drunk.

Several years ago he nearly ruined the office of our old house when MDH asked him to make us some built in book shelves. Miami was all disciplined and lovely the first 2 days, but after that I'm not sure what happened, but I do know that he discovered the bar down the street kept Valpolicella in stock, and after that the job was rather untidily abandoned. He claimed it was complete, but I ended up hiring someone to come in to fix nearly everything he had done.

The thought of him coming here and attempting to take on our floors makes me need a coolpapertowl. Maybe five.

Even Turtle needs a cool paper towel after this...

The Boysh Are Back In Town or... Fuzzy Memories

MDH has kicked it into high gear this week as he plots a pilgrimage with 3 of his 4 brothers to Las Vegas for the Superbowl.

"But Lady", you might ask, "isn't the Superbowl in Tempe, AZ this year?" And to you I would reply, "Why, yes. Yes it is."

Here is the plan as I understand it so far:

MDH will fly to Las Vegas next Thursday, along with his brothers Miami and Syracuse to meet with their other brother LV, who I normally refer to in this blog as Las Vegas, because I have named his brothers by location (which wasn't so smart in hindsight because what if one or more of them moves?) with the exception of his brother Knucklehead (because he is a knucklehead wherever he goes and Cambridge sounds way too educated and important sounding of a handle to give him). For the purposes clearing up any confusion in today's post brother Las Vegas will be referred to as LV.
Are you with me so far?

Moving on then...

Where was I? Oh, yes, MDH and his slightly less knuckleheaded brothers are meeting in the city of Las Vegas next Thursday with the hopes that between the 4 of them someone will have been able to score Superbowl tickets. How this is supposed to happen, I haven't a clue. I assume it won't be above board, based on the thuggish character of his brothers, so I don't ask.

If the tickets are scored the group will (hopefully) sober up and rent a car with which to drive from Las Vegas to Tempe, AZ and attend the game.

If the tickets are not scored the group will remain hammered and watch the game together in one of their hotel suites or in the Caesar's Palace Sports Betting Lounge.

I have a feeling they will not make it to the game.

The last time they were all in Las Vegas MDH was having such a good time that he called me from what sounded like a combination of a Girl's Gone Wild video and a scene from Animal House and slurringly and lovingly asked if I minded if he stayed an extra day. He's a grown man, we have no children. What do I care? Go ahead my darling, stay an extra day. Party responsibly.

MDH: Hunna Bunna (Honey Bunny) me n' LV wanna shtay till tommmmma, tommma...

Me: Tomorrow?

MDH: yhu

Me: Why? What's up?

MDH: Otish Day n' the nights are playin and there'sh a toga party an Jenny McCarthy ish here n' Otish saysh for me to tell you "hi". (I had met some of the members of the band on a flight a few months prior and I'm sure they had no recollection of it.)

Me: OK.

MDH: yer smost wunnerful baby I wishyu were here right now I'd take yer mine armsn givya a big...

I could smell his scotchy breath through the phone from 2000 miles away.

Me: We can talk about it when you get home baby. Have a good time. I'm going to hang up now. Come home safe, OK?

MDH: Hunna Bunna, hunna bunna I jush wanna tell yoo shanks I love yoo soo mush...

He went on, but I hung up.

Half an hour later I received a call from the American Express Fraud Department about an attempted suspicious cash withdrawal of $4000 on the card from an ATM machine at Caesar's Palace.

Half an hour after that I received a call from Visa's Fraud folks on the same topic for the same amount.

I told them both to deny the transactions because MDH is really happy and generous when polluted and probably trying to buy a round of drinks for the entire audience at Cirque Du Soleil, but there was also the possibility that he had had his pocket picked by Miami's "date" or been robbed at gunpoint.

Anyhoo... I think it's pretty obvious that I'm not a jealous type, but don't fuck with our bank account. So next weekend I'll be manning the phone here at home, ready to nix the crazy credit card cash withdrawals hoping like hell Otis Day & The Nights have a gig elsewhere.

Here is a sampling of the amazing photos MDH took at the toga party:

Not sure.
No idea.
Kind of like when you point to something for a dog and it looks at your finger.

With regard to the photo at the top: Betcha can't tell which one is Knucklehead.