I know that my Faithful Five have been sitting on pins and needles ALL DAY waiting for me to post about my near-air disastrous experience this past December in which the ever-so-polite Sky Goddess asked my mortified husband and hysterical self to deplane. It all started with my husband’s new job. He’s now gainfully employed in the Oil & Gas business. This type of business requires frequent trips out to west Texas and other places in the country where large quantities of land and railroad intersect. THAT, in itself could be another post. The long and short of it is this: through his new business connections we found ourselves on the receiving end of a super-double-fabulous end of a swanky cross-country train trip. Yes, I said train trip, as in rail road…like in the old time black & white movies of a time long gone.

Neither one of us had ever been on a train before. Subways and airport shuttles DO NOT count as real trains. THIS was a train! We were supposed to fly from Houston up to Chicago, board the train, ride the train down to New Orleans, Louisiana, have dinner and see the city, and then ride the train back up to Chicago and fly home. The trip was to take about four days. All I could think about was the itinerary the train company sent over. There was a dress code! No jeans. It was a dress-for-dinner type of event. There was a Club Car! Jeff and I were included on this trip with three other couples. Granted, as the trip started, we didn’t know these couples, but being trapped in a train for a few days changes things!

The trip was fantastic. I’ve never experienced anything like it. What I haven’t mentioned, is this: I don’t always travel well. Oh, I usually have a great time once I get to where I’m going…it’s just getting me there that tends to be the issue. Jeff and I have discovered that it is better for everyone in my general vicinity if I am heavily medicated, or at the very least, have a made a trip or two to the closest bar before take-off. Now, on the trip UP to Chicago, I discovered that I had forgotten my medication that keeps me relatively calm. But, I think that my excitement about my impending train trip was great enough to keep my mind occupied for the trip North. The trip home was a completely different story.

Jeff and I arrived at the airport a bit early and wanted to catch an earlier flight home. We were slightly surprised that United was able to get us on the flight that was slated to take off about an hour and a half before our original flight. The only kicker with flying stand-by is that we would not be able to sit together. My blood pressure began to rise. He was talking to me very soothingly, with words that one might attempt to use on a small child, “Honey, it’s going to be okay. you’re going to fine…” I was not reassured, nor was I impressed. We boarded the plane. He sat me in my seat, three rows from the door, and he proceeded to his exit row seat (some ten rows behind me). The main cabin door was shut, and we began to taxi away from the gate. I hazarded a glance out the window, and noticed the gently falling snow. My blood pressure was definitely on the rise at this point. Just breathe, I kept telling myself. It’s Chicago–in December–it snows here.

We continued to taxi a little further down the runway. The Sky Goddess mumbled something over the loud speaker…something about seat belts…safety cushions…drinks for five dollars. Going to probably have to get one of those. Then I heard the Captain’s voice:

“Folks, we’re going to have to head back to the gate for a minute. One of our engines is having a little trouble starting back up. Just going to need to have that looked at.”

And that’s when I lost my mind.

Settle in, and please allow me to share with y’all the text messages that transpired between my mother and myself as I sat stranded on the tarmac in my busted bird. (For a point of reference, these texts happened after an epic and award winning melt-down, just about 20 minutes before I was asked to board another flight “for my own comfort”)

Me: I’m sitting on a busted bird in Chicago. The stinking engine died.

Mother: You’ll b fine. Don’t u believe n heaven?

Me: Shut up Mother

Mother: Want 2 play scrabble?

Me: No. The plane just witnessed an epic meltdown. I’m the coolest passenger on board

Mother: I knew u would b, but it doesn’t say much about ur fellow travelers…lol

Me: I hurdled over the person sitting beside me to get to the door when they opened it

Mother: LOL

Me: Jeff caught me before I got off the plane. The flight attendant talked to me

Mother: That’s a good visual

Me: I’m n a skirt

Mother: Even better! Do u get a new plane?

Me: Jeff is 10 rows back. Wonder how people he jumped to get to me. No new plane. Jumper cables and duct tape.

Mother: Just keeps getting better

Me: We r n a recession. Apparently I’m the on-board entertainment. I told the flight attendant I wasn’t interested in flying a bird that was going to go down as a fireball over Kansas.

Mother: u didn’t!

Me: I did. First class wasn’t amused. Coach was…they don’t have their own tv’s.

Mother: Tight skirt or loose?

Me: Loose

Mother: Heels or boots?

Me: Boots

Mother: Maybe they’ll let u and Jeff sit together?

Me: He’s n an EXIT row. I’m not exactly stable enough for an emergency. I am an EMERGENCY.

Mother: Maybe they should take drink orders…

And that’s where our conversation ended. They did NOT put me in the exit row with Jeff, as no one thought I would be of any great assistance in an emergency. I cannot imagine why. I would’ve been the first one with that door OPEN and off that plane! As it turns out, “for my own comfort” as I was hyperventilating and sweating and shaking all over, our friend, the Sky Goddess, combined with efforts of my husband, thought it wise to get me off the plane and try again later. We walked off of the plane and straight to the United Club, where Jeff parked me on a bar stool. I sat there until he could get me “ready” to fly home. I slept all the way home, and everyone on THAT flight missed a really good show. I was quite dull. Six months later, I cannot re-tell that story without my hands shaking. Jeff continues to tell me that it was an APU, auxiliary power unit that wouldn’t start. That unit runs the air conditioner. I still don’t care. I heard engine, and my panic button was tripped. As I said, going somewhere with me, is very rarely boring.

Here’s hoping your day is emergency-FREE!

-Dallas

So, I have this friend who is a professional blogger. In fact, she is so amazing that she blogs on TWO sites. She has three kids, a husband, a house, she speaks at conferences all over the country and has about a million other things to do, and yet she manages to keep up with BOTH blog sites. She also has perfect hair. I hate her. That’s not true. I don’t hate her. I actually love her…I’m just really envious of her, and of her incredibly sensational time management skills.

Here I sit, with my ONE site and I cannot muddle through putting up a couple of posts a week. Cry. Oh, but wait! I have brilliant excuses! For the faithful five people that read this blog, y’all know that last Fall I went back to school. That, in itself is a brilliant excuse NOT to be able to keep up with my blog. I forgot that I am no longer in my twenties, regardless of how much I protest each and every new birthday that creeps up on me. University life was created for the young in body, not the young at heart. There is a substantial difference in those two. I have found through the course of the last two semesters that I am a terrific perfectionist. This was sssooo NOT the case during my last attempt at college. Striving for the Dean’s List, leaves little room for anything else during my waking hours.

While that may seem like a good excuse to me for abandoning my posts, I realize that for my readers, those are fairly empty letters merely falling into random orders on the page. So, I’ll give my brilliant excuse another shot: Two more broken bones. Although this time, it was NOT my Glow Worm. It happened to be my daughter. A broken wrist and a broken ankle…within weeks of each other. I now have my own parking parking spot at the orthopedic’s office and social service worker following me around. We are looking into buying a cow, evidently my kids are little low on calcium. However, in my defense, the ankle-thing happened at school, and I wasn’t even around for the wrist. That was a result of a cartwheel gone bad.

Infestation. This one tends to take up a great deal of my time as I am in constant turmoil over the fact that I am neither Farm Folk nor whole-hog white trash. I’ve staked my claim on being a Redneck, and I’m proud of that of that part of me. I am not dirty nor do I live in the country which are the only two reasons (in my mind) for which vermin come to visit your backyard. Apparently I was wrong. You see, I have palm trees in my backyard (vermin LOVE palm trees). AND, my house backs up to an easement…AND there’s undeveloped land around my house AND I live in TEXAS. Bottom line: we have critters down here. Every now and again, you will end up with one or two that want to come and say ‘hello’. I am NOT a friendly neighbor. I’ve been saying ‘hello’ to these little critters with a pellet gun. I’m the welcoming committee. POW!

How’s this one, for a Brilliant Excuse? I have a cavity. How pathetic is that? I had a dentist appointment in SEPTEMBER. September, Y’all, it’s May. Can you believe that? But, I had a Western Civilization exam that day, and evidently a dentist appointment was NOT a great reason to miss a test, so I canceled my appointment. Well, I never rescheduled. Now, I’ve got this tooth that is bugging me. It’s been bugging me since February. Most people would go in, and get it checked out. I am not ‘most people’. I am a 2-Xanax-kind-of-gal-for-a-cleaning type of patient. For a cavity, they will probably need to call the Houston Zoo and borrow something from the elephant trainers in order to keep me calm and relaxed and make sure that the dentist keeps all of her fingers. I have the first of two appointments this Wednesday…stay tuned to see how that shakes out.

Life takes over and things get busy. It is hard to keep up, but I am no different than any of y’all out there. But, as Summertime approaches, I will write more, with the hopes that my Faithful Five will read what I post. I have some trips planned for the Summer…and seriously, who doesn’t want to read about “What I Did On My Summer Vacation”? Just as a little teaser…come back tomorrow, and I’ll share with you about the trip Jeff and I took this past December when I was asked to deplane. Going places with me is very seldom boring.

Here’s hoping your excuses are JUST as brilliant!

-Dallas

Round Two shall commence soon.

Here’s the skinny: I got a phone call the other night from my sister-in-law, informing me that we, as in my husband, myself, our three kids, my brother-in-law, his wife and his daughter were ALL going to the upcoming Monster Jam truck pull here in Houston. Now, to give my SIL credit, she was laughing as she called me, knowing full well, this was NOT going to fly with me. For starters, I’m not a big fan of being told that I’m going to do something. Secondly, my sweet husband is away on business…again. However, this particular trip did not take him to West Texas or North Dakota; no, this trip took him to INDIA…as in across the stinking world India. Which means, he is slightly unavailable for a scheduling consultation about the epitome of a redneck recreational event. I informed my SIL that there was NO WAY I was going to Monster Jam 2013.

Apparently, I was wrong.

Fourteen hours later when my husband surfaced via Skype, I mentioned my little conversation with my SIL, and then my idea about turning the truck pull from a Family Fiasco into a Daddy Dilemma. I had no intention of going. I can, right now think of twenty-five other things I’d rather do besides watch a group of morons jump monster trucks over thirty-six 1970-model police-chase reject cars. I happened to mention that to Jeff, who then proceeded NOT to hear me. Evidently, the curry in the food over there has adversely affected his hearing. He said, “Babe, you’re a “proper redneck”. How can you NOT want to go?”

Let’s pause right there, for a moment to examine that claim, shall we?

I am not offended by being called a Redneck. If the boot fits…buy two pair! I hunt with two different guns…while wearing pink camo pants, and a bling-ed out shirt depicting a buck with earrings. No lie. For two full weeks after Jeff bought his truck, I wouldn’t let him drive it…because I was behind the wheel (of a 4×4, extended cab, long bed F-250, diesel). Don’t sneak up on me because more often than not, I’m packing a .380 in a spot you’d NEVER believe! Always call me before showing up at my house, especially when Jeff is out of town…that same .380 is under my pillow. I love a good boat and RV show, and don’t even get me started on the gun show or the rodeo! Now with that being said, even I have limits as to what I will attend and where I will go.

And I have NO DESIRE to go to Monster Jam.

Perhaps my aversion is so strong because of the way I was informed of my participation in this event. You know, you do catch more flies with honey than with vinegar. So, I’m planning my second attack very carefully. Jeff will be home tomorrow, which gives me five days to prove my case against NASCAR gone wild. Granted, Round One didn’t go as I had planned. I don’t often have to do things that I don’t want to do. For Round Two, well let’s just say, the challenge has been issued.

Here’s hoping YOUR Round One falls in your favor!

-Dallas

Here we are, a mere three weeks passed Christmas, and already I am picking up the pieces…literally-picking-up-the-pieces from Christmas presents that have seen better days. You may be wondering, “I thought her kids were old enough not to destroy toys anymore.” You would be correct. You may remember though, that it isn’t only my children’s items that I have the happy pleasure of stumbling across and therefore finding their proper homes. I also have two dogs, who quite honestly, don’t clean up after themselves any better than my two-legged kids. Grace, our Golden retriever, and Faith, the long-haired miniature dachshund.

Now, anyone who has ever been to our house has tried to sneak Gracie into their purse, pocket, coat or vehicle at the close of the evening…which is a neat trick when you’re trying to hide a seventy pound dog. She is extremely laid back, super loving, and definitely in the running for “The Best Dog EVER” award. Once you meet her, you love her immediately, and you are even willing to overlook her doggie breath.

Then there’s Faith. She’s a cute as the day is long, but she’s a handful. In fact, she’s two handfuls, and that’s really saying something as you stare down at an eight and half pound Swiffer mop with eyes. Faith doesn’t know she’s a runt. She thinks she’s as big as Grace, and twice as ferocious. I can’t really complain too much about her; she protects me from the dangerous creatures that often terrorize the streets of suburbia…LIZARDS!!! She can track them and kill them in an instant. But, perhaps her most impressive feat was when she discovered she could run down the doves that like to roost in my neighbor’s bushes. I must say, I was ill-prepared for that little gift she brought to the front door one day. I’ve never seen a dog actually smile, until she dropped a dead dove at my feet, her tail wagging so hard that she knocked herself sideways.

Why am I telling you all of this?

You see, I really enjoy cooking. I like to cook all sorts of things: I bake, I try new sides, new main dishes (although my daughter still thinks all I know how to cook is chicken), but as my time has not been my own, neither have our meals. We’ve eaten a lot of spaghetti, roasts, and quick fix ideas from the crock pot.

Then December 7th happened.

MY Christmas break. Apparently, I was a little rusty because I didn’t hit a true home run until Christmas Eve with my very first brined turkey. It was super YUM! The kids were impressed, my poor daughter was ever-more confused because seriously, what is a turkey but an overgrown chicken? My sweet husband, knowing how much I’ve missed my kitchen bought me new pans for Christmas. Big, heavy cast iron pans…I’ll work out my arms just lifting them. Well, yesterday it finally started to feel like winter. It’s cold and raining and the perfect day for vegetable beef stew. I just so happen to have the perfect pot to cook it in. Fresh carrots, Italian green beans, potatoes, top sirloin…the works! It bubbled and simmered and happily cooked all afternoon.

The thought of my actually cooking something other than chicken was too much for my sweet little girl to wrap her mind around because she kept calling it “meat stew”. I had visions of some backwoods mystery meat dish with every mouthful. It was my Glow Worm that summed up the evening meal for us: “Mom, you are the best chefess in the world!”

Chef-ess?

My oldest son burst out laughing, informing my Glow Worm that “chefess” was SO not a word, to which the Glow Worm (who didn’t miss a beat) replied, “Ya huh, it is so a word. A chef is a BOY. A chef-ESS is a GIRL chef!”

And that says it all. Through the eyes of my nine-year-old Glow Worm, he calls things as he sees them. I want to be like that. I want to see the world around me for its potential. I want to be the chefess…even if it’s not a real word–it sounds good to me!

Here’s hoping your day is CHEF-tastic!

-Dallas

So I suffer from migraine headaches. I have for most of my life…they are sort of like my constant companion, always with me, they never go away. And every now and then, they throw me a supreme curve ball. I’ve run the gamut on tests for these pesky little occurrences…MRI’s and CAT scans. The good news is that I do have a brain, just in case anyone out there in BlogLand was wondering. The bad news is there aren’t any physical indicators as to why I get these (often times) debilitating headaches.

Since they’ve been with me for almost a solid thirty years now, I do know how some of them get started. Alcohol…bummer on that one, is a HUGE trigger, so I stay away from the sauce. Stress is another trigger, if anyone knows how to completely eliminate stress from their life–please do let me know. Lack of sleep is another one. So there are things that I know of that irritate the headache monster in my brain, and I try not to poke that monster because the consequences are simply too dreadful to deal with.

Now, having said that, there are those rare occasions that I get woken up from a dead sleep with a crawl-to-the-bathroom-and-think-you’re-having-the-WORST-hangover-EVER type of headache. That’s where I was Friday morning around 2:00 am. These are the Mother of all Monsters. They come with no warning. They give you no time for a rescue medication before the onslaught of waves of nausea and room-spinning pain. Going off of the typical hospital grade pain scale of 1-10 (1 being the least, 10 being a breath away from death) these headaches are a 9.7. I’ve had maybe four of them in my entire life. They last for DAYS. However, the one on Friday morning was a behemoth. I called my neurologist–crying. He insisted that I go straight to the emergency room for immediate relief.

It’s no secret that I come from a Redneck background. I say that with pride, but having said that, we never went to the hospital unless we were bleeding (profusely) or maybe had a bone we were positive was broken. It never entered my mind to be seen for a headache. Granted, this was not your typical take-two-asprin-and-call-me-in-the-morning type of headache…but still. Considering that I had lost the ability to think without the most sickening pain I’ve ever experienced (and that INCLUDES delivering a baby sans drugs) I called my hubby to come and take me in.

I’m here to tell you, the hospital is where they keep the really GOOD meds. Within thirty minutes of arrival, they had my hooked up to an IV and were administering what they call a “Migraine Cocktail”. First they gave me something for the nausea–score! Next, they gave me something to decrease the swelling of the blood vessels in my brain. Then, they just continued down a really long list of different medications. Through my haze, I could hear my husband ask, “Are you sure she can handle ALL of that? She’s not very big.” Bless his heart. The only two medications I’d heard of was Benadryl (odd, I thought…until…) my nurse administered the final vial—MORPHINE.

Say goodnight, Gracie.

Apparently the key to dealing with a monster migraine is to completely relax the brain and the body. They did that with their little “cocktail” that consisted of no less than SEVEN different medications. I slept for two days. Now, I’m awake and I have just the slightest twinge of the remnant of my headache. I should be able to knock that out fairly quickly. I can tell you one thing: I will NEVER wait through 10 hours of mind-numbing and debilitating pain before seeking medical intervention again! Migraine headaches are a torture tool of the devil. Anyone who suffers from them, has my deepest sympathies. Those of you who are blessed enough NOT to have these types of headaches, imagine cramming your head through a trash compactor while someone hammers your brain from the inside…then you’ll have a starting point at where we are.

Here’s hoping your day is PAIN free!

-Dallas

There’s an old saying that circles around a particular time of day in any given household when Mom stands back and can actually wait and watch the heads of her precious angels spin right off of their cherub-like bodies. This is known as the “Witching Hour”, and it usually happens just before dinner. Sometimes, as in my case today, a series of events can lead up to the Main Event. Considering that we are merely days from Halloween, I figured tonight I would pay homage to this supernatural phenomenon.

This event happened in my house every-stinking-single-day when my children were babies. Granted, I did have three babies under the age of two in my house, so that might have had a little something to do with the chaos level reaching into the stratosphere. I hoped and prayed that as the kids got a little older, the frequency, both in number and in sound waves would eventually taper off. Fortunately for the shred of sanity that was left clinging to my sorely depleted brain cells–the Witching Hours backed off as my kids got older.

However, the most interesting little side nugget of information that the other mothers who had blazed this trail before me failed to mention was that although the Hours were fewer and further between…the volume and intensity with which they hit were often times more catastrophic in nature.

Bonus.

Enter today. You see, my sweet husband has been in China (yep, China…as in Asia) for the past nine days. He was in Los Angelos, CA yesterday and today. And he will be in Lubbock, Texas tomorrow and the next day. While he is moving closer to us (remember we live in Houston), close only counts in horseshoes and hand grenades. Right now I don’t have either. Naturally, today would be the prime day for all three of my kids to dust off their brooms, don their pointy black hats, and see just tightly wound their mother really is… Phase One: My oldest starts coughing up large brown and yellow chunks of East Texas’ finest results of a ragweed and pollen air concoction. No school for him. However, I still have school–WITH A TEST. He stays home alone–he’s in sixth grade–just wanted to throw that out there before the 5 people that read this blog flip out. He stays here, WITH a high tech house alarm, and two dogs. Phase Two: Arrive home from my school to pick up super snotty kid, so we can go get the other two kids from school, so they can all three go get haircuts. Snotty kid number I engages me in an award-winning throw down at the house. It appears that he likes the shaggy dog look. I don’t, therefore I win. He finds himself in the car. Phase Three: The salon. Shaggy kid really REALLY doesn’t want his hair cut. Claims he feels too bad to sit in the chair. I mumbled something to the effect of “Can you imagine what you’ll feel later?”

He got in the chair.

Phase Four: My Glow Worm found his Church-only belt in the back seat, swung it over his head like a lasso, and hit his sister in the head. I almost drove off the road. We iced her with frozen peas when we got home.

Phase Five: I walked around the block A-L-O-N-E twelve times trying to catch my breath after the lasso-thing.

Phase Six: My mother called. Pass on that one. There are times when you know picking up the phone just isn’t going to end well–this was one of them.

And the final straw that did me in for the day…drum roll, please: I got a text from my man. Bless his heart. You see, while he was in China (cringe) I know he was working..to an extent. I’m sure there were meetings to go to. But, Life here at home didn’t change, nor did it stop because he was standing on The Great Wall. I still had kids to take to basketball…to art lessons…to the orthodontist…I still got to go to the GROCERY STORE WITH ALL THREE OF MY KIDS. For the past ten days, my life hasn’t slowed down, let alone stopped. So, tonight when I got his text that told me he was “tired and wearing down” I swear I actually spit fire.

Tired and wearing down…my day starts at 4:00 am, so that I have enough time to get dressed, finish up my homework while it is somewhat quiet in my house. Then I get to make lunches, make breakfast, start something for dinner and wake up protesting kids. After taking them to school, I have the happy fortune of sitting in Houston traffic with about 2 million of my closest friends while I try to make it to one of my FIVE classes on time–all the while maintaining my 3.8 GPA.

The Witching Hour? Yeah, I’m thinking it’s making a comeback…I might just have to dust off my old broom.

Here’s hoping YOU still remember how to fly!
-Dallas

I was thinking about my grandmother today. I think about her a lot. She’s been gone for almost nine years…that seems so weird to actually type out. But, at any rate, she had this saying for when something smelled especially rank, rather than just coming right out and saying, “That smells like roadkill.” She would, instead say, “Ya know, that smells just like roses and honeysuckle.” Then she would wrinkle her nose and walk away.

Through the years, this phrase was applied to various different aromas: Papa cleaning catfish, dirty diapers, day-old trash…pick your poison. In fact, I think I was around eleven or twelve years old before I realized that roses and honeysuckle actually smell quite nice. Hey! If you ever doubted that my blonde hair was real–the proof is in the pudding.

So, I told you that story to tell you this one: My kids are getting older. I know this because they remind me that their birthdays are coming. I know this because my oldest kiddo now has bigger feet than I do. I know they are getting older because when I pick them up from school, I am greeted by the unmistakeable odor (not to be confused with aroma) of hot-sweaty-stinky-gritty-kid-smell.

Gross. Roses and Honeysuckle.

Anyone one of them, after school, by themselves is enough to initiate the gag reflex. Combine all three of them in the extreme close quarters of a Kia Soul, you can all but see the poisonous green gasses emitting from them and fogging the windows. Cough. Gasp. Choke.

Granted, it isn’t their fault that we live in HOUSTON. And that today, as we are welcoming the lovely season of Fall into our midst, that we, down here, hit 95 degrees…again. Come on! That’s HOT! We promptly got home from school, and I ushered all of them into various showers, so that by dinnertime, each of them really would smell like ROSES & HONEYSUCKLE.

This one was for my Mimi–

Here’s hoping your day smells like a ROSE.

-Dallas