Not That I'm Bitter About It or Anything...

You haven't slept until you've laid yourself down on an pillowy mattress, covered in heavy blankets on a cool night, in a duplex, sharing a wall with a couple of reformed crack addicts, a few yards away from the railroad tracks. Here, I'll show you:



Every night, the 1:00AM Express barreled through, shaking the windows and furniture.

I got used to it. Eventually.

The reformed crack addicts, let's call them Bubba and Charmagne, were a very nice couple who had met and fallen in love at Narcotics Anonymous. Isn't that a romantic story?

They had a little girl, let's call her Gwendolyn. When they first moved in, Charmagne and Gwendolyn came over to formally introduce themselves. I have this overwhelming empathy for bored children, so I scoured my childless (and therefore toyless) house for Gwendolyn and all I could find was my semi-prized Cabbage Patch Doll. This was around 1990 or so and as some of you well know, the Cabbage Patch doll was the Wii of the 80s.

My doll was named Magdelena Something with blonde hair and hazel eyes. She looked a lot like this:








She wasn't "mint in box", but she wasn't dog-eared either. My hands hovered over the doll on my guest room bed, as I hesitated to allow this child to play with it. I was sure she wouldn't rip it to shreds, but I hadn't meant for it to be played with, really.

It's only a doll, I told myself. It's not like she'll pee on it or anything. Will she? I forced myself out to the living room where they still stood there politely not touching anything. See? Everything's fine.

I held up Magdalena and little Gwendolyn's eyes widened. Her cute, pouty lips spread into a smile.  

Score! She likes it. That'll keep her busy while the mom and I chat.

"Here you go," I said, handing Magdalena and her hazel eyes, to little Gwendolyn.

"Wow." said Charmagne. "Oh, she loves Cabbage Patch dolls. She's never had one. What do you say?"

I stood there with a smile frozen on my face.

Oh no! It's not a gift! You're just supposed to play with it while you visited here. But how do I say that with out sounding like a jerk? 

"THANK YOU!" said the little girl.


Say something! Maybe, "Well actually...", or "Oh, I just meant..." No, that won't work. Hurry! You're going to lose if you take too long!  

I looked at little Gwendolyn's arms tighten around the doll as she buried her sweet little face in Magdalena's blonde yarn of hair. Gently, through semi-gritted teeth, I said:

"You're welcome."

Goat Thing of The Day

Midlife Slices gave Nanny Goats a Christmas gift the other day.  It's a Gift card!

That's FIFTY-SEVEN pairs of panties, ladies. Also? She sent me a catalog for me to peruse from the privacy and comfort of my own home:

And the best part? Now Nanny Goats can lounge around the house all day for FIFTY-SEVEN days in a row. Without doing laundry. Woo-Hoo! Thank you, Midlife Slices. You rock!