Things I Remember, But Don't Need to Know

Have you ever wondered how big of a percentage of your memory contains completely useless information?  I know so much stuff that's a complete waste of brain matter that I thought maybe if I purged some of it here, I could free up some prime real estate.

Things I remember for no good reason:

• Kim Kardashian was married for 72 days before filing for divorce.  Whoopity-doo!  All forms of media are pushing this fact on me and now it's stuck in the place where all the other celebrities short-lived unions are stored.  J-Lo and Cris Judd.  Kid Rock and Pam Anderson.  Lisa Marie Presley and Nic Cage.  Renee Zelleweger and Kenny Chesney (still trying to wrap my head around that one!)  Britney Spears and that guy from her high school.  Drew Barrymore and that bar owner.  Drew Barrymore and Tom Green.  Julia Roberts and Lyle Lovett.  Actually, I'd like to keep the Roberts-Lovett marriage in there if I can.  It was one of the most unexpected, quirkiest, barefooted (and soon forgotten) short-lived unions between two celebrities that I actually like.  But, the rest of you all, be gone!
• All of the words to Jabberwocky.  I memorized this with great fervor in the seventh grade and have never forgotten it.
• All the words to "Pink Elephants On Parade" from Disney's Dumbo.  You know, the song the hallucinated elephants sang to Dumbo right before he woke up, hung over, in a tree full of jive-talking crows?
• My high school gym locker combination.  Don't believe me?  4-24-2.  Right, left twice and right again.
• The fact that all of my elementary school teachers wore polyester elastic-wasted pants (that made their butts look big) and shoes with wooden soles that clip-clopped down the halls, so you could hear them coming from a mile away.
• That my childhood neighbor from across the street once had a dead squirrel stuck in his tree.  Its head was inside a hollow about 15 feet up and it died somehow with its butt and tail hanging out.  We couldn't look away and peeked in on it for several days in a row.  One afternoon we were surprised to find it suddenly tailless!  The mystery still remains unsolved.
• That same neighbor's daughter was showing me a family photo album in which her dad had cut their dog's head out of the picture frame when taking it.  She chuckled and said, "Oh, Dad cut off the dog's head."  And, for the longest time I thought that her dad had cut off their dog's head!
• Every Adam Sandler, Chris Farley, David Spade, Mike Meyers, Phil Hartman, Julia Sweeney, Melanie Hutsell and Jay Mohr SNL sketch ever made.  Most of them, verbatim.  This goes for all the corny Sandler song lyrics and the farewell they all sang, in character, to Phil Hartman on his last night on the show.  (Favorite line: Michael McKean, "I don't have a character yet, but I was on Laverne and Shirley... ♫")
• My class room number for my first day of fourth grade.  The elementary school I'd attended grades K-3 had closed down and I was very nervous to be starting at a new school.  Class room 6 is burned in my memory because I did not want to get lost that first day.
• That my gym teacher was missing half a finger.
• E=MC squared.  Don't know what to do with this information, but I remember it!
• HONIFClBr.  My tenth grade chemistry teacher promised us we'd always remember the diatomic elements if we turned them into a nonsense word that was pronounced "Honey-Feklurbur".  Did it work?  Seeing that it's twenty-two years after the fact, I guess so!  What is a diatomic element?  Ummm...  It looks like your work here is only half done, Mr. Shalla.
• Janet Jackson has her cha-cha pierced.  I didn't want to know that either, but she had to go and mention it in an article I read in the 90's.  After her Super Bowl appearance, I guess we all know she's pierced elsewhere as well.
• Lots of mean things that were once said to me, but don't bear repeating.
• That the corners of the hallways that were painted orangey-red in high school had the girls' bathrooms.  If you headed to the wrong corners of the school, you would find a boys' bathrooms instead and you would be late for class.
• Daniel Day-Lewis won an Oscar for a movie called My Left Foot.  I had heard of the movie about a man with cerebral palsy that learned to paint with his left foot.  But, every time a presenter that night would name the movie title, I still thought it sounded like a phrase you use when you're trying not to swear.
• A friend in second grade made me sing her phone number over and over again, so I wouldn't forget it.  I still remember it along with the melody that she created for it.  I have no use for this information anymore seeing that I have no idea who would pick up if I dialed the number thirty years after the fact.
• The chorus to the first song I ever wrote, when I was about 8 or 9ish.  "Jack and Jill went up the hill, Humpty Dumpty fell off of the wall, Old King Cole was a merry old soul, but my love ain't no fairy tale at all."  I didn't know much about love at the time.  Just that singing about it could land you on the radio.

Well, I don't know if I've manage to purge anything tonight, but I've certainly made myself good and tired.  Now, my main concern in going to bed and dreaming about headless dogs and tailless squirrels.  Night all!

Girls Who Wear Glasses

You know what they say about girls who wear glasses? That we don't see very well.

There's a dreaded block of weeks that come out of every year.  It hits once in the Spring and once in the Fall when the weather changes and the new mold, pollen and ragweed is grown.  Allergy season.  The first few weeks of allergy season hit me hard and contacts are just not doable during these times.

There's always the people who will avoid me these weeks, because either: a.) My eyes are all red, swollen and dripping and they think I have pink eye; b.) I'm sneezing like it's a contest and there's money involved, so they think I'm contagious with something; c.)  My sinuses are swollen, I'm grumpy and I'm not wearing makeup, so they think that my paleness equals the flu and their flu shot hasn't kicked in yet; or d.) I'm wearing my glasses and they don't want to be seen with a four-eyes.

As an adult, I've come to terms with Allergy Weeks.  I was very vain in the past and was a glasses refuser for many a year.  If you don't remember my Back to School post, this was my first pair of glasses:

I wasn't diagnosed as near-blind until middle school.  Even though the schools gave us eye exams every few years, I had the worst time trying to see the blackboard and would have to pull the side of my eyelids out toward my ears to be able to see what that night's homework assignment was and I was known to accidentally try to open my neighbor's locker from time to time.  No teacher caught on until I was thirteen.  (Thanks public school system!)

Getting glasses opened a whole new world of near-20/20 vision to me.  My mom was amazed on our ride home from the eye doctors that first day of vision.  I marveled at the ability to read traffic signs (I had always wondered why they didn't make them much larger) and the fact that I could see the outline of every individual leaf on each tree. (I had always thought that, until you climbed up in one, trees were supposed to look the way every grade-schooler drew them. Brown stick with green cotton candy blob on top.)  The world was finally mine, because I COULD SEE IT!!!!

Then came high school. 

I don't believe a picture exists of me donning my high schools frames.  In fact, I made sure of it at the time!  But, rooting through some boxes in the basement produced the brown plastic glasses that made my life a living burning hell.  They looked a little something like this:

Now imagine that look on a younger, paler, less made up and greater eyebrowed fourteen-year-old whose-face-hadn't-filled-out-yet version of me and you can imagine my pain. 

I never felt ashamed of wearing glasses until high school. I was just ecstatic to finally be able to see up until that point.  Perhaps it all started when the female bully in my math class would torture me by having her friends call me "Goggle glasses" for almost every day of my geometry life.  When I'd turn around and glare to half stand up for myself (a move my older sister often used effectively on me) she'd howl, "Ooooh!  The look of death!  If looks could kill!"  If only I had the courage to ask, If  I'm in 9th grade and you're in 11th grade, why are we even in the same math class?"  But I didn't. 

One of her friends eventually did stand up to her one day (since my teacher never did) and said, "Why don't we just leave her alone?"  A few years later, after high school, that same friend delivered a pizza to my house.  I was wearing contacts and eyeliner and had come into my own by that age, but I noticed a vague flicker of recognition in her eyes.  She had a small look of fear that I was going to now chew her out for going along with the "Goggle glasses" chant her bully friend had wrangled her into.  But, I always chose to remember her as the girl who made it stop.  I never mentioned recognizing her but gave her a good tip, it was the least I could do.

From that year on I was Jan Brady.  Glasses were donned only to see the chalkboard, came back off as quickly as possible and then placed back on once a parent would emerge.  Finally, at age sixteen, I was granted a pair of contact lenses.  The heavens sang!

Contacts changed my life.  They somehow gave me confidence.  Then there was the boy, who supposedly liked me, and showed such affection by asking me, "Where's your glasses? I thought you wore glasses.  You have a 'glasses' kind of nose."  Yes, thank you.  I'm flattered.  You too can achieve such a nose by standing yours in front of every basketball and volleyball in gym class that comes your way.  Using this technique over the course of several years, your nose will eventually develop a shelf of a bump perfect for resting a pair of Coke bottle lenses. 

Then came the insecurity about the nose.

These days we have wonderful inventions like glare-proof coating and feather-weight lenses (my "glasses kind of nose" until then would throb under the weight of my thick prescription.)  Frames became smaller and trendier, and some people even wear them, despite their natural 20/20 vision, with clear glass in them for---get this--fashion! 

I don't mind wearing my glasses anymore.  But, only on a from-time-to-time basis.  There's still a small part of me that shrinks a little once the frames hit the bridge of my nose.  I find it harder to sit tall and make eye contact with them on.  I'm a little less witty and not a fan of the loss of peripheral vision that goes with wearing them.  But, I've learned over time that the glasses/nose/tanness of skin/clothes/looks don't make the (wo)man.  People eventually start being impressed by your personality and talents and all the rest of that stuff becomes backdrop.

I don't know how or when this switch is turned on, but I'm glad that it does.  If only we could teach the teenagers this trick.  If I only knew then what I know now, I could have steam-rolled that bully with sarcasm and had the whole class turn on her. 

But, I'm glad that I didn't.  I'm a better person this way.  Four eyes and all!

Back to School

First day of school, 1983. The note pinned to my sister says "Handle with care. She's the favorite." (I'm not sure of that, of course. Just guessing!)

Everyone's kiddos are finally back to school. The kindergarteners, the high schoolers, the public schoolers and the homeschooled.  If there's one thing I don't miss... I DO NOT miss the first day of school.

When I was in school, my main goal was getting out of school.  The first day of the year was just one day closer to the last.  The only incentive to showing up was a few new outfits and a fresh lunchbox. 

Once the bus deposited me, though, and I found my new class and seat... I'd get back into the groove.  It was always good to see who was in your class that year and play with your friends that you hadn't seen all summer.  The first day of school, rough. But, eventually curable.

The next worst day of school? Picture day:

Kids get their school pictures taken every season these days. Good land, the pressure! In my day, once a year was bad enough. You'd pick out your outfit, your mom would stick a check in your book bag and before long you'd be handed a black plastic comb and be told to say "cheese" four seconds after the shutter had already snapped. (Those combs were totally useless after the arrival of the 80's perm, by the way.)

I remember I would never smile with my teeth in school pictures until high school. I had crooked chompers until the braces were installed in 9th grade. After that, strangely enough, I would smile humongously with my silvery shine reflecting every ounce of light in the room. For some reason I thought braces were cool.

Good thing teachers weren't so quick to call social services back in my day. One look at any school picture grades K-8 would convince the observer that I was clinically depressed. I'd be laughing and joking ten minutes later, but that side of me would never dare be captured in front of a sky blue backdrop.

I remember my sixth grade picture (top right, red sweater) was so bad, my mom wouldn't even give my own grandmother a copy! Ironically, I thought I was set that year. Not being allowed to perm before high school, I had carefully wrapped my hair in sponge rollers the night before. That was my the-world-will-think-it's-a-perm trick (until the crimping iron was discovered a couple years later, at least.) "Didn't they give you a plastic comb?" she pried. You can't plastic comb sponge-rolled hair! That ruins the whole effect!

I spent several nights of my middle school life in self-applied rollers (Sponge, plastic, even tried the sock trick for awhile.) And, spent many a-morning with a cricked neck. Looking at the picture now, I probably wouldn't have handed it out either. My hair is a rat's nest (can't completely blame the rollers, this was probably also after gym class) and for some reason I also look as if I'd been sedated that morning by a large animal vet. Would a simple toothy smile had distracted keenly from the hair? (Like in 10th grade's example, bottom middle.) The world will never know.

In my eighth grade shot (bottom right) I had forgotten to put on my training bra that morning and was horrified that the world would be able to tell! I thought I was all set walking to my locker that day. I was wearing my ultra-cool Coca-Cola shirt, you see, so this would be the best picture day ever! Then I felt a strange draft beneath my shoulders that I hadn't felt for about a year now. I forgot my bra! How does one forget one's bra, you say? Well, when you're thirteen and the boy in your algebra class calls you "Carpenter's Dream" (flat as a board), it's a mistake that can be easily made.

Grades 8-10 pictures have a bonus Easter egg feature. If you could see my lap in them, you could also see a thick pair of plastic-framed glasses resting in it. I was such a Jan Brady and refused to be photographed in my glasses. I never rode my bike into the fence, but I was (am) definitely near blind without them. After being on the wrong end of some bully teasing in high school I would only don my glasses to see the blackboard until I finally was granted contact lenses at age 16. There are only a handful of pictures out there from the eighties of me in my plastic frames. Hold on to your hats readers, because you're in for a special treat.

Wait for it.

Wait for it.

Now!

See! I reward those dedicated enough to make it to the end of a post. Considered yourselves honored. I even remembered my training bra that day (as if you can tell.) And, I'm actually smiling with teeth! That might be because a friend took this picture and not some sweaty school photographer. It might be because I think I'm rockin' because my sister actually let me borrow her favorite shirt that day. But, it's most probably because this was taken on the last day of eighth grade. School's out for summer!

Well, fortunately, my siblings' kiddos all produce adorable school pics. I don't know why genetics shined so brightly on this batch of offspring, but at least they won't be humiliated when their yearbook photos show up online one day.

From all of the reports I received last night, all kids had wonderful first days at school... for the most part. (There was one kicking incident that one of my nephews was on the receiving end of.) They all actually like going to school and have been looking forward to it for weeks now.

The child version of me could never fathom a world where I would be anticipating the school year and looking adorable while doing so. The adult me just wonders, "How on earth will these beautiful kids ever build character?"

Back to Headache Shopping: Part Deux

Back-to-school shopping continued yesterday afternoon.  Things went a little more smoothly this time around  (especially since I was wise enough to do an undies-check before we left the house.)  There's nothing like waiting until Labor Day weekend to finish the back-to-school shopping.  People are running around rabid for no. 2 pencils, driving like toddlers and the parking lots were worse than at Christmas time!

I was also presented with a school supply list that seemed to accommodate the teacher more than the student. (What is a nine-year-old going to do with two packs of Post-it notes and a ream of printer paper?!  I'm surprised his teacher showed the restraint to stop herself before also adding coffee creamer and feminine hygiene products to the list.)  Pickings were slim and he almost ended up with three purple folders and pink post-it notes, until I was clever enough to leave the school supply section and take a trip down the stationary aisle.  Red replaced purple, yellow replaced pink (although we had to settle for star-shaped) and a little boy (who's starting school in a new district this year)'s reputation was saved.  For now, at least.

Picking out shirts proved to be no easy task either.  All the boys wanted to buy were novelty tees.  I had to force one polo and one button down apiece on them!  What's with the snotty t-shirts these days?  I can't believe the sass of some of them.  "My mom THINKS she's in charge!" was being sold in the little boys section. (The girls section was ten-times worse!)  Amazingly it's still the moms shopping for the kids and buying these shirts at this age.  I guess maybe that's proof that she really isn't in charge.  I had to talk older brother out of this purchase (see right) after a middle-of-the-aisle lecture about respecting his siblings.

 

 

The shoe store employees seemed to be the most parasitic in the mall.  Big sis was the only one in need of shoes, but shoe-commission lady kept insisting on wanting to measure the boys feet and sell them socks.  After prying three pairs of heels off of little brother (of the pair pictured on the left, he exclaimed, "Ooh! Are these alligator?!") I decided that maybe sis could shop on her own for a few and the boys could use a bathroom break.  Asking Ms. Shoe-Commission where the nearest facility was, she responded by offering to measure the boys' feet once more. "No really, we just need a bathroom," looking at big bro who's now doing a potty dance, "Close by!"  She gives us overly-elaborate directions that we had already figured out by her first statement, "It's directly beneath this store." She's goes on and on about how to arrive directly beneath the store we were standing in (my correct guess was to take the "down" escalator positioned right outside the door) as big brother's potty-dance had stepped up a notch into a potty-Mambo No. 5.  I hear her mention the word "alcove" and have had enough. Grabbing brothers by the hands I toss off a half-hearted "thank you" and make a break for the escalator before she has to mop up her shoe-sizer.

The restroom, of course, ends up just being a one-seater.  As a dad finally drags his two boys out of the sole commode, my boys rush in taking cuts in front of the two college-aged guys who have already been waiting in line ahead of us.  Fearing a public bowel explosion, I don't even bother to apologize on their behalf.  I do, however, knock on the door repeatedly as one of the young men begins a potty-dance of his own.  I overheard him say to his buddy, "Standing still this long is just killing me!"  I knock-knock-knock again. "Are you almost done boys?"  Big bro, "These things take awhile!" 

Fortunately, my nephews reemerged before I had to direct the dancing twenty-year-old to the nearest potted plant.  Sister found a good deal and surfaced with two pairs of school shoes and I figured this earned us a window-shopping trip to the pet store.

All-in-all, we had some laughs, some close-calls and some budget crunches... but it was a successful day.  Although, I still came home with a mild headache and am in no hurry for Christmas shopping to begin.

Back to Headache Shopping

I took my brother's kids back to school shopping for jeans today.  We go through the same thing every year.  I'll drop my teenage niece off in the juniors department to try on clothes by herself while I accompany the two younger boys to their section and begin my uphill battle of the day.

The older of the two will always immediately grab the first pair that are closest his reach. (Which will always be at least two sizes too big.  His size on the jean wall is always more at eyebrow level.)  He'll hold them up against his chest (I'm not sure why he thinks that's where they go) and announce, "Yep, I like these!" as if his work here is already done.  "No, you're going to try them on," mean auntie counters.  I grab six pairs each, find a fitting room and the same thing happens every year:

1. They'll both act confused about what they're supposed to do in a fitting room. "What do we do with these?"  You put them on.  "Do I have to take my pants off first?"  It usually works best that way. 
2. The youngest at this point will always realize that he's forgotten to put underpants on that day.  (Every year!)  I'm still confused about how this happens.  I see the waistband of his Fruit of the Looms sticking out of his pants every other day of the year.  Not sure why it's always on shopping day or how it even happens at all.  Do I forget to put my watch on ever?  Yes.  Jewelry?  So, many times!  But, if I'm not in the shower, underwear are pretty much a permanent fixture here.  I guess not with five-year-old boys.
3. Per stage #2, comes the repeated reminders to the youngest to be very cautious while zipping up and to please stop dancing in front of the mirror (He must not get to see himself pantsless enough in the privacy of his own home.)  Are you asking yourself, "She's really letting him try on pants commando?"  Yes. I'm an aunt, not a mom.  That's how I get away with these things.  I'm not going to gather up three kids, run all the way back home to grab  a pair of underoos and load them all back up to return and refind the pile of pants we'd already accumulated. We're just careful not to try on anything we're not seriously considering purchasing.
4. Older brother will always act confused about snaps, buttons and zippers.  Even though he's been wearing pants for nine years now and putting them on himself the majority of that time, he suddenly forgets in a fitting room how these strange fasteners work.  He'll continuously whip pants up and down those skinny hips of his without a thought of undoing them. I'm sure it's a comedy show to the neighboring rooms (or, possibly even a drinking game, if they're carrying a flask) to hear me say repeatedly, "If you put those on without unzipping them, they're much too big!" Him, "They fit!" [while modeling jeans with the crotch brushing against his knees]  Next pair, "Remember to unzip them before putting them on!" Next pair, "Remember the zipper!"  Next pair, "ZIPPER!!"  Next pair, "UNZIP the pants FIRST!!!"
5. Once the pants are finally on and zipped, I can never get either of them to stand up straight so I can check the fit.  They always have some fly modeling/ninja move they feel more appropriately tests the quality of the pants instead.  Today's move for the youngest was dipping down into the splits.  "Okay, I can't see if they're long enough while you doing the splits. Please stand up straight." He returns to his feet for a whole 3 seconds before slooowwwly sliding back down again with a sinister grin on his face.  The oldest's move today alternated between a Chuck Norris side-kick and an exaggerated hand-to-hip, hip-thrust-out stance. Aye mi!
6. It will take only five pairs tried on for the youngest to pick out two (This boy knows what he wants! No cargos jeans, dark wash preferable and usually one pair of non-denims. He eliminates about 2/3 of the store just in the pre-dressing room walkby. Works for me!)  It will take the oldest about dozen or more tried on just to weed out two.

After gathering up big sis (who's smart and checks the clearance rack, thereby earning herself an extra pair) I'm relieved that back-to-school shopping day is almost complete.  I'm trying to ignore oldest boy while he's doing some sort of wild arm-flapping bird dance in the checkout line until he almost whaps the elderly lady in line behind us and I have to intervene. 

Balance paid, bags in hand, relief in the sight of the parking lot ahead and then I remember I promised them tops next payday.  Stay tuned.