That Awkward Age

Next time, I shop 'til she drops.

I offered to arm wrestle a woman for a chicken Friday.

Oh, how the self-righteous have fallen.

I’ve never been one of those kind of women who stand in line all night on Black Friday to get $10 off a curling iron at Walmart or one of three iPods marked half off at Best Buy. In fact, I’ve been rather smug about the silliness of it all.

You’d never catch me at the Running of the Brides at Filene’s Basement, even if I needed a bridal gown. All of those Bridezillas stripping down to their underwear in public for a marked-down Vera Wang? No thanks.

We ladies of the Southern persuasion are much more genteel when we shop. Or, at least I used to be.

Picture this. It’s just before the holidays, and I’m perusing the aisles at one of my favorite designer stores, MarShalls. I spot some really nice tall ceramic coffee mugs for $3.99, the kind sold in coffee shops for $15 a pop. So I grab two and am shifting them in my hands to reach for the third and final matching one when a woman nearby picks it up. She examines it and compares it with a short, squatty mug in her other hand. I see a couple other mismatched mugs in her cart.

“Which one of these do you think holds the most?” she asks, holding up the two mugs. “My husband likes mugs that hold a lot. I can’t decide …”

“Um, yes. So do I,” I mumble. She appears oblivious that I have the two matching ones in my hands. Can’t she see me suffering here?

“I can’t tell which is bigger. I want a mug that holds 20 ounces. Which one of these do you think holds 20 ounces?” She indicates the others in the cart.

(Guys -- Chick Secret revealed here: Women always need other women to verify their shopping choices. If we don’t take a friend with us to shop, we seek the opinion of the nearest woman around to make sure we aren’t making a mistake. Even a $3.99 one. This is especially the case around holidays, when we make special dishes. Just go into any grocery store around Thanksgiving and watch. Before long, you’ll see one woman asking another – “How many fresh apples does it take to make a real apple pie? I usually buy Sarah Lee.” or “How do you know the turkey is done if it doesn’t have one of those little pop-up thingies?” I’m telling you, it’s a virtual call-in cooking show.)

A better woman would have told that woman that the tall mug was the 20-ouncer, but you see, I really wanted that mug. But being a nice Southern lady, I couldn’t just tell her that I wanted it, and that she snatched it out from under me.

“Oh, I dunno,” I say, in my best honey voice. “It could be the short fat one. Sometimes size is an optical illusion. Kind of like those little quizzes that you get in email?”

She looks up, eyebrows knit.

“You know the one … where the lines are really the same length, but because the way the lines are drawn on the ends, one actually looks bigger than the other?”

I’m hoping she’s buying it, because I’m making this up as I go along. Suddenly her eyes uncross and a smile cracks.

“Oh, r-i-i-i-g-h-t!,” she says. “I know what you mean!”

Encouraged that she’s picked up on my logic, I get the courage to ride that wave all the way to the shore.

“And this other one here,” I point to another mug in her cart. “The way it’s fat at the bottom and then narrows at the top – that’s definitely the case. I bet it holds 20 ounces, maybe more.”

“You think?”

“I’d bet on it,” I say. “You can’t go wrong with short and fat.”

Man, I’m good. I can feel that sleek tall mug in my hand. Now I won’t have to wash out my mug every day between dishwasher runs. With three perfect mugs, I can have one in the dishwasher, one in my hand and a spare in the cabinet at all times. That baby is mine!

“Thanks, Honey!” she says with a wave. “I think I’ll just get them all! After all, they’re just $3.99.”
And with that, she rolls off with my perfect mornings and my perfect coffee mug. That’s when I realize that three mugs in the cart are worth two in the hand. And if I’m going to win at this hunter-gathering thing, I’m going to have to up the ante. No more Ms. Nice Gal.

Fast forward to Friday, when I stop at Harris-Teeter along with everyone else in Newport News who had gotten off work early because of the impending snow storm. It looks like a swarm of locust has cleaned out the shelves.

I rush to the deli and spy one last rotisserie chicken under the heat lamp and another woman eyeballing it. I go in for the pass, but there’s interference from another shopping cart. By the time my hand is on the chicken, the other woman has snatched it from the jaws of victory.

That’s when I make the ugly proposition.

“I’ll arm wrestle you for that chicken,” I say, deadly serious. She flings the bird in her cart, barely glancing my way. Flipping her hair back and head held high, she glides to the checkout counter leaving me in her wake to nurse my defeat with nothing but an overheated and dried out rack of ribs.

Southern lady or not, next time I’m going in for the tackle. And she's going down.

Photo: http://www.flickr.com/photos/soggydan/ / CC BY 2.0

 

And now a message from the people who bring you Christmas . . .

That would be women. Especially mothers. Both yours and the women you are married to, if you are among the male persuasion.

Now in my thirty-third year of responsibility for making Christmas magical for children, grandchildren and spouses (two, subsequently), I can attest that it never gets any easier or less hectic. It matters not how old the children are, because a mother is a mother, and once the second generation procreating begins, there are the grandchildren for which all stops must be pulled to create the miracle which is Christmas.

It is up to us, those of us with the ability to accessorize and who can tell the difference between pink and mauve, to clean and decorate the house, string lights on the bushes, buy and wrap the gifts, make the fudge, construct the gingerbread house, cook the Christmas goose, negotiate the peace between feuding relatives, schedule holiday social events, take the kids to sit on Santa’s lap, squelch any early rumors about Santa’s true nature, and get everyone ready and out the door for Christmas Eve service, all while working full time. Is it any wonder we are cranky?

When my kids were young, I put up at least five Christmas trees, the “big” tree in the living room where the nice decorations went, a tall, skinny tree in the den that the kids decorated with popcorn strings and construction paper ornaments, then tabletop trees in each of their rooms. My husband’s contribution was to advise me that I was putting the lights on wrong.

There was fresh greenery on the mantle among the 100-plus Santas that I had collected, and my Christmas village was carefully extracted from the bubble wrap and displayed on top of the bookcase. The ceramic nativity scene was unpacked and positioned on the window seat near the tree. Every picture in the house was taken down and replaced with either a Christmas scene or wreath. Outside, I entwined greenery around the porch posts, hung a handmade wreath to welcome visitors and blanketed every shrub with white lights (after untangling the strings and changing out any bad bulbs).

There were piles of presents under the tree, with each pair of socks or pack of underwear boxed and wrapped so that each child had more things to open. I not only bought all the gifts for the kids, my family, and my husband, but also for my mother-in-law, something I said I would never do, but which became words to eat. Meanwhile, I would need to either circle items in a sale flier that came in the Sunday paper or pick out my own gift at the mall and ask that it be put on hold so that Bob could pick them it later, because he would otherwise have “no idea” what kind of gift I might like, even though I advised him that anything in gold would always suffice.

Cookie baking began in early December, and by Christmas we were so overrun and tired of them that we would commence to export them to office, neighbors and family to get rid of them. We both sang in the choir at church, practicing for weeks on the Christmas cantata, which included numerous additional practices in addition to the regular Thursday night practice. We went to two or three different schools -- depending on which grades the kids were in – for holiday programs to see our darling boys perform as singing reindeer or snow flakes.

At Thanksgiving, I began planning the annual family Christmas picture in which everyone wore matching clothes -- to the chagrin and complaints of the family. One year there were handmade red vests; another year I made green velvet dresses for my daughter-in-law and me. Then I sent 200 Christmas cards stuffed with Christmas letters and photos.

There was church on Christmas Eve, not just the midnight service, but also the one at 8 p.m., since we were in the choir, then home to pay the sitter and play Santa, and grab a few hours of sleep before the early wakeup the next morning. Then on the day of Christmas, there was the 30 minutes of excitement, followed by hours of cooking the holiday meal and cleaning up the gift wrapping, then packing everyone’s suitcases to get ready to go to visit the Grandmas in southwest Virginia and western North Carolina. And after Christmas, there would be the mother-in-law’s gift to return because she didn’t like the color.
And now?

There’s no tree. Nada. No wreath. Not a light to be seen. I didn’t make it to Christmas Eve service, again. Just too much left to do to get ready for Christmas. The few gifts I’ve purchased – to supplement the gift cards – are in decorative bags, not wrappings. I intended to vacuum tonight, but didn’t have time and was too tired anyway.

I don’t know that woman who did all that stuff 20 years ago. It’s hard enough to do what gets done now. But if you are a mom, you know her. She’s busy whisking flour and butter together to make a perfect white sauce, or hiding behind a locked bedroom door wrapping one last present in the funny papers because she’s out of Christmas paper, or grinning and bearing an insensitive remark from a mother-in-law because she doesn’t want to ruin her children’s perfect day.

To that woman – you, if you are her – this Christmas is dedicated. For without you, this day would not gleam as brightly or taste as sweet. And even if all the trappings were taken away, as some would have it, insisting we have lost the true meaning of Christmas, let’s not forgot that without Mary, and her willingness to be used by God, there would be no Christmas at all.

If you are a husband or adult child, I hope you will appreciate this woman who is bringing you Christmas, and realize that the least you can do is help with the dishes. That, and give her a gift certificate for a massage and a pedicure.

Photo: http://www.flickr.com/photos/eridius/ / CC BY 2.0

The funny days of Christmas

From the homeowner:

"Good news is that I truly out did myself this year with my Christmas decorations. The bad news is that I had to take him down after two days. I had more people come screaming up to my house than ever. Great stories.
But two things made me take it down.

First, the cops advised me that it would cause traffic accidents as they almost wrecked when they drove by.

Second, a 55-year-old lady grabbed the 75-pound ladder almost killed herself putting it against my house and didn't realize it was fake until she climbed to the top (she was not happy). By the way, she was one of many people who attempted to do that. My yard couldn't take it either. I have more than a few tire tracks where people literally drove up my yard."

****************************************************************************************

*****************************************************************************************

**************************************************************************************

******************************************************************************* <

Exclusive! Read it Here First! Another Woman Confesses in Tiger Woods Scandal!

In view of the other women who have come forward and claimed having rolled in the hay with a certain famous golfer, I feel that I must also come forward and make my own confession.

I have not had sexual relations with that man, Mr. Woods.

I’m sure that comes as a great shock to you, but I ask that you respect my privacy so that my husband and I can concentrate on our laundry. 

That and the latest crises in the lives of our three adult sons. And the twice-a-day pilling routine with Scottie, in which I cram the capsules down his throat, and he spits them back out until they are so sticky with dog slobber that I have to throw them away and start over. Oh, and then there’s my business, where I spend 80 hours, give or take 20 or so, every week.

So, unfortunately, I haven’t had the time to have a fling with Tiger Woods. Or with anyone else, as far as that goes.

How does anyone have the time to have even ONE affair, much less NINE? Do these people ever take out the garbage or pick up the dry cleaning? Maybe in Tiger’s case, he can pay somebody to do those mundane chores, but even so, how would he keep all of their names straight? Keep one from finding out about the other? The logistics are mind blowing.

And what kind of excuse for being late or unavailable could he use –- “Sorry, Honey, I’m working late at the sand trap?” Fat chance.

Tiger may be the number one golfer in the world, but that’s a distant second on the list of his talents.

First is juggling.

If Tiger Woods ever decides to branch out and do a time management program, I’m there. Meanwhile, he needs to get a dog. With allergies.

Photo:

http://www.flickr.com/photos/keithallison/ / CC BY-SA 2.0

 

Lunch? Dinner? What’s in a name? That which we call lunch by any other name would smell like Hamburger Helper.

If the meal that falls between breakfast and lunch is called “brunch,” what does one call the meal between lunch and dinner? Lupper? Linner? Dunch?

Europeans call it “tea,” but it seems odd to call it that without a pot of hot tea and crumpets.
It’s the quandary of our star-crossed marriage.

I’ve heard that it takes a lifetime to really get to know someone. That appears to be the case with my husband, who always asks, “What are we going to do about lunch?”

Translation: “Are you going to stop what you’re doing (even though you’re on a client deadline or in the middle of recaulking the tub or fighting incoming with rocket launches) to make lunch for me, or should I plan to eat out?”

For nearly 27 years, the answer to that question has either been an eye-roll or “I don’t know what WE are doing for lunch. I only know that I’m not cooking.”

Then Bob takes himself out to lunch.
 It’s a ritual that, until Oct. 1 when he retired, was restricted to weekends.

Now it’s daily.

Bob can make a mean pan of bacon and eggs, but other than that, he’s not the cooking kind of guy. A couple of months after we started dating, he invited me to his house for dinner. I was impressed. When I got to his house and noted that nothing was in preparation, I asked if he had decided that we’d go out instead.

“Oh, no,” he said, reaching into the freezer and pulling out two frozen lumps of Banquet Boiling Bags. “Would you rather have the beef stroganoff or the meatloaf?” 

I was doomed.

This is a guy who expects a meat, a vegetable and a starch at every meal and thinks chicken and fish are vegetables. If there’s not a steak the size of a commode lid, it’s not a meal.

So early on, I laid down my rules. I’ll cook one meal a day. You pick.

When I was commuting to work in Virginia Beach for two years, it wasn’t uncommon to get home two hours later than Bob. I’d walk in -– hoping against hope –- that he had started something for dinner to find him and the three boys on the sofa lined up on like bowling pins, the stove cold and the table bare.

“I thought you’d never get home,” he’d say. “We’re starving.”

“Why didn’t you warm something up –- can’t you start something?”

“I didn’t know what you wanted to do.”

While the kids were young, I implored him to remarry quickly if I should die. Otherwise my kids would starve. I even picked out a few potentials for him based on culinary skills.

How is it possible that I married not one -– but two -– men (sequentially) that not only couldn’t -– but wouldn’t -– learn to operate a microwave? Bob can rebuild a computer, troubleshoot a transmission or rewire the house. But take leftovers out of the frig and warm them in a microwave? Clueless.

Now that he’s retired, mealtime has become a roulette. Because he sleeps later and is painfully slow, especially in the morning, because of his Parkinson’s, he’s usually not ready for breakfast until 11:30 or 12. He’s pouring cereal when I’m foraging for lunch.

Around 4 or 4:30, he’s ready for lunch while I’m just beginning to consider what I might nuke for dinner.
“What are you planning today?” He’ll ask. This is a food-based question, not one about my work schedule.

“I cook one meal a day. You pick.”

“I’m hungry now.”

“Is this going to be lunch or dinner?”

“It can be whatever you want to call it.”

And so methinks the question remains, as hunger hangs in the balance for yet another day. Ah, the sorrow.

Photo: Romeo and Juliet

http://www.flickr.com/photos/frted/ / CC BY-SA 2.0

77 Random Things I'm Thankful for This Year

1. Turtlenecks for the turkey neck, Wonderbra for the boobs, Spanx for the butt.
2. Bob’s new hearing aids and the end of “huh?”
3. A dog to pill twice a day instead of a cat.
4. Chico’s weird sizing that lets me wear size 2 for the first time in my life.
5. Weighing what we weighed on our wedding day. (I weigh what Bob weighed; he weighs what I weighed. Sigh.)
6. Spandex-enhanced jeans.
7. Freecycle.com.
8. Opportunities to give and receive tough love and grace.
9. John McCain’s choice of Sarah Palin as his running mate.
10. My superior humility. ☺
11. Knowing how to navigate my refrigerator rather than having to ask where the leftover pizza from last night is.
12. Maraschino cherries and Red Dye No. 40.
13. Disposable turkey roaster pans and rechargeable batteries.
14. “5” gum, especially the “Lush” flavor.
15. Winning a $100-bet with our handyman on Election Day.
16. The ability to read.
17. Tina Fey.
18. 39 college friends that lived and studied together for one line-changing year in Haus Steineck in Bonn, Germany 37 years ago.
19. Biannual reunions with my Haus Steineck friends and the never-ending storytelling.The right to vote.
20. Midweek Saturday Night Live.
21. To be the mother of three grown sons. Grown being the operative word.
22. To be married to my BFF.
23. Food, friends, family, fun and freedom.
24. Shoes that don’t hurt.
25. Email.
26. Answered prayers.
27. The ceiling windows in our church sanctuary that allow worshippers to experience God in the clouds, treetops and high-flying birds.
28. Vancomycin.
29. Health insurance that pays $7,280 of the $7,300 cost of a Vancomycin prescription.
30. Retweets.
31. Susan Boyle and the hope she inspires in anyone who has ever dreamed a dream.
32. Newspapers.
33. Bees.
34. Wikipedia.
35. Seeing Leonard Cohen in concert in Durham with friends from #18.
36. NPR.
37. Popcorn.
38. Surviving three car accidents, shingles, surgery and C-diff in one year.
39. Our OCD dog Scottie that licks every square inch of the kitchen floor every day, reducing the need to mop.
40. The insanely generous Presbyterians and Facebookers who outfitted our sons’ apartment after they lost everything in an Ida-related flood.
41. Clients, partners and vendors.
42. Watching Gilles Marini dance on Dancing With the Stars.
43. Diet Coke.
44. Watching Gilles Marini do anything.
45. Polar bears.
46. The life and legacy of Suzanne Williams, who died way too young in May.
47. Attending Suzanne’s wedding in January.
48. Suzanne’s best friend and sister, Jennifer.
49. Spam filters.
50. Bob’s retirement in September.
51. My new Mac.
52. My new I-phone.
53. Prilosec.
54. The Amazon Wish List.
55. Scottie’s decision to throw up on the hardwood floor rather than the rug.
56. For things seen.
57. And unseen.
58. The reduction in hot flashes.
59. An overnight visit this week from Debby Jennings, one of my friends from #18, and my maid of honor. Twice.
60. Sully Sullenberger.
61. House plants that don’t need much water. (The only way they’ll survive in my house.)
62. My Mom.
63. My granddaughter Cheyenne.
64. The opportunity to work with Erica.
65. My very sharp Wüstoff cook’s knives.
66. Traditions.
67. Change.
68. Self employment.
69. Splenda.
70. So much food that there’s not enough room for it in the refrigerator.
71. Wishes denied.
72. Ambien.
73. Being a Baby Boomer.
74. Faith.
75. Doubt.
76. Rock and Roll.
77. The cracks in everything that let the light in.

Photo: http://www.flickr.com/photos/90155419@N00/ / CC BY-SA 2.0

Things You Learn About Yourself When the Power Goes Out

 

1. You’d never make a good pioneer woman. No matter how many episodes of “Dr. Quinn, Medicine Woman” and “Little House on the Prairie” you watched, when the power goes out, you realize that you just aren’t the kind of woman who can wash clothes by beating them with rocks in the creek like your grandmother did.
2. You still can’t remember all the neighbors’ names when everyone congregates in the cul-de-sac to ruminate about the fallen tree that took down the power, cable and phone lines.
3. You don’t mind that turning the stove on will overload the generator while the refrigerator is running and therefore will sacrifice turning it on. You have no problem eating dry cereal for lunch and picking up takeout for dinner every night. And as for the food in the frig? No way. It could give you salmonella.
4. Your sense of smell improves in the dark, and your tolerance of kitchen garbage decreases.
5. You are great at rationalizing the eating of high caloric food that might go bad if you don’t consume it quickly. Even food in boxes sitting on shelves.
6. Wireless has become much too important in your life. Your fingers ache for the familiarity of “f-d-s-a-j-k-l-;”. You wake up in a cold sweat, realizing that you have been typing in your dreams and posting to Facebook and Twitter.
7. You’d rather have a hot shower than hot sex. (From what you can recall.)
8. You resent having to use math skills to keep from tripping the breaker while using the generator. You’re not a math major or an electrical engineer, after all, and you’re just too tired, hungry and cold to calculate which arrangement of appliances the generator can power without shutting down.
9. You feel a little guilty reading by flashlight in bed, like a sneaky kid waiting for Mom to come in and make you turn the light out and go to sleep.
10. You, the wife, must always know where the candles and matches are and must be able to light them within 60 seconds of blackout, just as he, the husband, must find the flashlights and extra batteries.

Photo by nateOne

Who says nice ghouls don’t pose for the press?

Ladies, the adage goes, should only have their names in the newspaper three times: when they are born, when they marry and when they die.

I guess getting your picture on the front page as a vampire disqualifies me. I never really liked being called a lady, anyway. It’s very limiting. White gloves, hats and pinching girdles come to mind.

When Nicole Paitsel of The Daily Press sent out a request for adults to wear Halloween costumes for a photo spread in our local paper, I was the first to respond.

I love playing dress-up. Just a few weeks ago I wore a pumpkin costume at church to promote our fall festival, and I used to spend as much time designing my Halloween costume as my boys did theirs. Once I made my husband dress up as a Big Mac while I was a Whopper.

Putting on a mask or cheesy makeup allows you to get a new face when you’re tired of the old one. Without the expense of plastic surgery. And costumes allow a basically shy person to assume an alter ego, giving you permission to act goofy.

Bob would argue that my ego doesn’t need any altering and I don’t need an excuse to act goofy. But there’s something about pretending to be someone – or something – else that inspires you to let down your inhibitions. Put on a cape and fangs, and you can pretend that you’re a danger to society, not a 57-year-old post-menopausal grandmother. Put on a wig with a reverse-mullet haircut, and suddenly you’re Kate Gosselin.

“Who’s Kate Gosselin?” Bob asked, when I told him last week about the second costume I modeled with my friend Chip Booth.

“She’s the witchy half of the Kate-and-John reality TV couple with eight kids who’s very mean to her husband,” I tell Bob, who is TV-illiterate. “I was totally out-of-character, of course.”

“Right,” he says, with eye-roll.

“Congratulations,” said Bruce, my business partner, when I tell him I was on the front page of the DP today. “From the front page of the Daily Press as a reporter to the front page of the Daily Press as a vampire. You’ve come a long way in 30 years.”

As a PR consultant, I’m usually trying to get my clients in the media. This is one publicity stunt that could come back to haunt me.

 

Fashion doesn’t catch my husband with his pants down

One day last week –- my husband Bob’s first full week of retirement –- he came downstairs for breakfast wearing boxer shorts over his pajamas.

“Nice look,” I said, peering up from my computer.

“It keeps my pants from falling off,” he said, heading for the front door.

“Did you get the paper yet?”

“No. But if I had known you were dressing for the occasion, I would have thrown it out in the yard.”

He cracked the door and snatched the paper from the porch.

“Very funny.”

“The yard man comes today,” I reminded him. “I hope you have that on when he comes to the door for his check.”

He mumbled and shuffled off to the kitchen for coffee.

Bob could easily make the Worst Dressed List with Mikey Rourke and Madonna. There is the thing about not being famous, but still.

Once when we were dating in the early ‘80s, he showed up at a party wearing a slinky, polyester shirt with a near life-size fox hunt scene on it. It must have been in style in the early ‘70s. If ever. I was mortified. He later said he wore it as a joke, but I was never convinced.

After we got married, I discovered a whole closet full of slick shirts with long collars and weird prints, plaid sports coats, funky ties and bell-bottom jeans, all bought by his first wife. And they had been divorced for seven years before we married.

If Bob hadn’t  married me –- or somebody –- he would still be wearing them. Or going naked.

“These go,” I told him, prying the shirts from his hands.

“But look. They still have all the buttons  … no holes. They’re perfectly fine.”

I convinced him to put them in our yard sale, where we sold them to another clueless single guy who thought they were a bargain.

“You’re selling all these great shirts for just $2 each?” he said, dumbfounded. He couldn’t believe his good fortune. Neither could I.

Over the years I’ve bought virtually everything in Bob’s closet and struggled to get him to toss outdated clothes. Even holey underwear and stained t-shirts produce a tug- of-war. I have to sneak them into the rag bag or he’ll wear them as long as they’re hanging together by a thread.

Now that he’s into wearing his underwear on the outside, I suppose I need to go shopping to get him some snazzy ones. You never know when he and Madonna might want to go on tour together.

Do you smell what I smell? Hampton Roads homeowner has a whale of a time with dead mammal

When you hear about a beached whale in the back yard, there are only two possibilities -- you’re in for a mother-in-law joke or you live in Hampton Roads, Virginia.

Back when I was growing up in western North Carolina, periodically there would be pictures in the paper of smiling men holding dead, 10- or 12-foot rattlesnakes that had half-dozen rattles on their tales. But rattlesnakes are boring compared to the dead animal stories we have here.

Can you imagine looking out your back window to see a 30-foot long, 10-ton humpback whale bobbing along belly-up? Can’t you hear the home owner? “Hey Marge – how much room do we have left in the freezer?”

Last weekend a female whale carcass got stuck in the marsh of Perrin Creek in Gloucester, a rural community on the Middle Peninsula. And get this -– this was a small whale. (Somehow, that seems like an oxymoron.) If it had been full grown instead of a juvenile, it could have been as long as 60 feet and weighed upwards of 40 tons.

So you know when you wish your neighbors would keep their yard up better? Oh, wait – that’s what OUR neighbors wish. But can you imagine being the lucky neighbors of these folks, with a dead, stinking mound of rotting whale flesh next door?

And to top it off, state law says if a whale washes up in your back yard, it’s up to you to dispose of it. It’s not as though you can dig a grave in your yard to bury it, as if it were a dead puppy or road kill. Nor can you compost it. What, exactly, do you do with a 10-ton whale?

What they should have done –- and would have done in western North Carolina -- was set up a stand, charge admission and call it a tourist attraction. Apparently people came from miles around to have a look -– and a sniff –- at the decomposing mammal. People from every state agency that had water-related words in its name showed up to poke, prod and slice off a hunk. Yep, they decided. It was a whale. And it was dead. Didn’t know what killed it or why it was in the man’s back yard, but there it was.

After scratching their heads for a few days and waiting until the whole neighborhood smelled like a fish market, the Virginia Game and Inland Fisheries decided they’d pick up the $5,000 tab to get rid of it. While they were searching for a flat-bed truck to haul it away to the landfill, a marine towing company donated its services to tow the whale out into the river Wednesday morning. They tied a rope to the whale’s tale, dragged it into deep water and anchored it to the bottom of the river.

That never would have happened in North Carolina. There it would have been taken to the taxidermist.

I Spent Eight Years and $25K for an MFA and All I Got Was This Stupid Blog

It’s been a year since I graduated with my master’s degree in writing. To get this degree, I spent a lot of money I didn’t have, gave up every spare moment I wasn’t working at my job, drove through the Hampton Roads Bridge Tunnel at peak traffic hour, and sat through weekly workshops where would-be writers ripped out their hearts and served them up to each other to be stomped on.

In the nicest possible way, of course. And all for the sake of the art.

I’m still on the department email list, and periodically I get updates about the accomplishments of students and alumni. This one’s got a new novel coming out. That one’s just won a big award.

I’m very happy for them.

Except I want to rip out their hearts and stomp on them. I mean that in the nicest possible way, of course.

I’m feeling a bit John McCain-ish. I’m much older than most of them, and I’ve wanted to be a published writer all my life, and here these young whipper-snappers are, making it to the White House – I mean Random House – before it’s their turn.

They’re annoying in the same way that those drivers behind me in the merge lane pull out and go around me rather than waiting their turn. If there’s not a law, there should be.

Now that I’ve got the degree, I’m spending most of my time trying to figure out how to pay off the credit card on which I charged my tuition and books, rather than writing the Great American Novel. By the time that is paid off, I should be well into dementia.

So here I am with my blog, giving it away for free. But there are intangible rewards.

Just the other day, my husband was getting testy, and all I had to do was warn him: “Don’t make me blog about you.”

That’s power worth a National Book Award. Almost.

Photo: dbdbrobot