Crazy Antics and Dreams

Swing Set Smiles

My Grandmother gave my brother and I a swing set when we were kids. So it’s no surprise that numerous photos were taken of us on the swing set since it made a perfect setting for photographs. In addition, we did play on the swing set quite a bit too.

Fashion "No-Nos" at Theme Parks

As a confessed "people watcher," it's always been fun to spend a day at an amusement park. Better yet, spend your annual vacation at a theme park in Florida. Let's consider Florida in the summertime where it's so hot that everyone is wearing shorts and sleeveless shirts. You get to see far too much of too many people. In addition, it's the people who should NEVER be seen in skimpy summer clothes who comprise ninety-percent of the attendees to the park the week that you're visiting the park.

After one such vacation, I returned to work and told my stories of people in shorts who should be wearing either a larger size or have refrained from the short-shorts that they wore to the park that day. One of my coworkers told of his days as a "fashion policeman" at a Florida theme park and said he would bring his favorite picture to share with me the next day. As promised, he showed up at work with the photo in hand. The woman in the photo had been in line in front of him as they waited to get aboard the next ride. She was in tight black shorts that were approximately 4X to 5X in size and the rear seam of her shorts were ripped from the waist all the way to the unseen parts of the shorts! The unfortunate woman's white panties stood out like white on rice!

What I still wonder is that if she knew that her shorts were completely blown-out, why hadn't she gone back to her hotel room to change? OR if she didn't know that she'd ripped her shorts, how did that happen without her knowing it? Don't really want to think about that one!

Visit to the Doctor's Office

Once upon a time in a doctor's office far away, the annual visit to gynecologist's office was always a truly humiliating experience. In order to get through the ordeal, I would try to make jokes in order to forget the real reason why I was flat on my back in a paper-thin gown.

As the gynecologist dutifully performed the breast exam, he would invariably ask my favorite question, "Do you check your breasts for lumps every month?" This was my moment! My response was always the same, "Of course I do. I lay flat on my back and if there's a lump, I have a lump!" At this point, the good doctor would get flustered and tell me that it was not a joking matter.

Even skinny women with not-so-big breasts can make a gynecologist just as uncomfortable as the doctor's patients!

Falling Down

Have I ever fallen in front of a person? Or, how many times have I fallen in front of other people? When I fall, it's always in front of someone or a group of people! I've had so many "closed head" injuries that I seem to have developed the ability to see ghosts! But I digress.

My most famous tumble was several years ago while I was on an eighteen-day tour of Europe. Ah yes, it was at the Astor Hotel in Coimbra, Portugal. What a place to fall on my face in front of several of my fellow tourists and numerous hotel employees and patrons! As I walked from the lobby to the sitting room where my tour group was meeting, I missed a step-down and stumbled as gravity had its way with me. Fortunately, I didn't knock myself unconscious and I did miss the glass topped table in the room, but I broke my nose and bruised my right side of my face. My reaction was total shock, or perhaps stunned to silence. I do remember the people in the sitting room gasping in unison. The hotel manager helped me to a sitting position and had an employee bring me a bag of ice for my face. My reaction was total shock, or perhaps stunned to silence. I do remember the people in the sitting room gasping in unison. The hotel manager helped me to a sitting position and had an employee bring me a bag of ice for my face. A physician in my tour group checked me to see if I broke my wrists, knees, ankles, and face before he allowed me to stand.

You'd think I'd have embarrassed gratitude down to an art form with all of my falls! Two days later, my daughter's remark when she picked my up at the airport was "What the hell happened to you?" The heck of it is that seventeen days later while on a camping trip with my sister's family; I tripped in the shelter and broke my nose again! Guess that explains why my friends used to call me Grace! Honestly, I have all the grace of a train wreck!

Fishing with Grandpa

As the old adage goes: "the worse day fishing is better than the best day working" is as true today as it was years ago. I’ve always loved to go fishing. While catching fish is always a great experience, just having the opportunity to go fishing is enough to make my day.

My grandparents, parents, and siblings all enjoy fishing, so my love of fishing must be genetic. When I was a kid, my grandpa took my brother and I on a couple of fishing trips with him. One of the trips was a day trip to a local lake and another was an overnight camping trip on a river in the Texas hill country.

Grandpa’s friend owned a floating pier and cabin on the lake and he let grandpa use for the day. Grandpa had my brother and I fish for perch to use as bait for the larger bass that filled the lake. We caught lots of perch and spent the day trying to catch bass. I don’t remember whether or not we brought home any keepers, but I do remember it was nice to be fishing.

There used to be a commercial about the unpleasant perm results that sometimes occurred with the old-style home-perms. I remember the opening being something like: "remember when you were a kid and your mother would give you a home-perm and afterward you cried for six months?" I remember home-perms and I hated home-perms because of results. The perfect example of this is the perm I had in the photo on the lake cabin.

The second trip was a combination camping and fishing trip. As we set up camp, grandpa had us prop a couple of baited rods on the riverbank to see if we could catch anything. I remember seeing my brother standing behind one the trees and peeking around at the river. After a moment, he picked up his rod and reeled in the largest bass that was caught during our excursion. It was interesting to see my brother sneaking up on the fish!

The best part of this fishing trip was that we were camping on the property of a dude ranch. The morning after camping out, I was able to go horseback riding! Please remember as you look at the picture of my straw hat and peddle-pushers that it was 1963 and that was one of the styles.

A Moll and Her Gang

For many years, my parents owned only one car. After "making due" for so long with a single vehicle, one of my mother’s cousins had a used car that she offered to sell my mom. Since the price of $5.00 (1960 U.S. dollars) was about as cheap as any car could be purchased for, my mother happily bought the Studebaker which was about a 1936 model,or so. Believe it, or not, the old car with dull gray paint, suicide doors, AND its original wool upholstery was still running and had a lot of life in it! I still remember the smell of the interior of that car and I hated sitting on the wool upholstery when I was wearing shorts, or a skirt.

On numerous school days mom would haul not only her four kids but a couple of extra neighborhood kids who also attended our parish school. The joke was that the car looked like a gangster's getaway car and mom often looked the part of a moll and her gang as she took us to and from school.

There was an afternoon when mom had picked us up from school that I remember well. As we went around a corner, one of the car’s tires blew out. The exploding tire sounded like a pistol being fired. The poor school crossing guards on that corner jumped back in terror. What a sight we made that day!

The old Studebaker was a favorite of the carryout boys at the grocery stores. Most of the teenaged boys wanted to buy the old car from mom so they could "soup it up" and show it off. After several years of faithful service, the old car was sold to a teenager for $25.00 (1960 U.S. dollars); he planned to restore the Studebaker. You sure can’t find deals like that anymore!

Runaway Steers and Burnt Biscuits

While my brother and sisters were all attending our parish grade school, mornings were often hectic to say the least. My brother and I were probably in the seventh or eighth grade at the time of this comic event. Our mom had put some biscuits in the oven and was fixing brown-bag lunches next to the kitchen sink. The kitchen window was above the sink and mom happened to notice a steer galloping down our residential street. Mom dropped everything and ran out the front door. Needless to say, all four of her "gang of kids" soon  followed in her steps. Dutifully, my mom hustled all of us back into the house and called the police. She told the dispatcher which street the steer had turned onto after running down our street. The dispatcher told mom that the police and workers from the city’s stockyards had been chasing the steer for hours.

Please note that our home wasn’t anywhere near the stockyards. Mom’s main concern was the steer would hurt the numerous children in our neighborhood who would soon be walking to school, or waiting for the bus. What I can remember about the steer was that it was reddish-brown in color and had horns that weren’t curled under. Guess mom thought that the steer would gore someone if it were to be corned.

After all of the morning’s excitement, we returned to the kitchen for breakfast. The pan of biscuits was now a charred black and smoke filled the kitchen the aroma of burned bread. I can’t remember what we ate for breakfast after that, but knowing my mom we weren’t late for school!

Cardboard Boxes and The Lone Ranger

On June 26, 2002, I had what seemed to be a short dream. I don’t remember the beginning and it was cut short when I awoke at about 1:35 a.m. For whatever reason, I found myself in a large room with cardboard boxes filled with old movie costumes and props. As I sorted through the costumes, there were a few other people who I didn’t recognize. These people were explaining which actors wore the costumes or used the  props.

One of the boxes contained bright-colored cowboy shirts that had been worn by Lee Marvin. There was also a rifle that a man removed from a box; the rifle had been used in "The Lone Ranger" television series. I heard  someone say, " Hi-ho Silver, away!" I awoke after I heard that statement.

Funerals and Parakeets

On the night of June 24, 2002, I dreamed that was back in my parents’ home and there was a funeral going on at the next door neighbor’s house. I never see the neighbors or their children during the dream.  There were approximately forty people attending the funeral. The funny thing was that I never learned who the funeral was for, but a black couple buried an urn of ashes in the front yard.

I then remember being in the driveway of my parents’ home. As I looked at the den windows, I noticed that a green Parakeet had built a nest similar to the ones that swallows build on the bricks next to the window. There were three or four fledgling Parakeets in the nest. A Red-tailed Hawk made a brief appearance as it swooped down on the nest and grabbed one of the fledglings with its talons.

At short time later, I seemed to be back inside the neighbors’ house speaking with the bereaved family members attending the funeral. I clumsily bumped a lamp with my hand and the bulb shattered and cut the palm of my hand. Just as with my dream the previous night, I seemed to bleed profusely.

I’m not certain when the dream ended, but I can’t remember any more of the details. I think it’s strange that I dreamt of being injured too nights in a row . . .?

Stabbed in the Neck!

The night of June 23, 2002, I had a strange dream. Unfortunately, all that I remember is that a strange man stabbed me in the neck. While this was scary, I didn’t die in spite of the fact that I bled badly.