Tracy Beckerman's Blog, page 2

February 12, 2021

National “I Got Nothing Done Because My Dog Yakked on the Carpet” Day

Today is National “I Got Nothing Done Because My Dog Yakked on the Carpet” Day.

Maybe you’ve never heard of this holiday before. It is a little-known holiday… except by people who own rugs and dogs. These folks know that if you only have one area carpet in your entire home and the WHOLE rest of the place is hardwood floors, the dog will go to yak on the rug because on National “I Got Nothing Done Because My Dog Yakked on the Carpet” Day that is the traditional way the holiday begins.

 

Before the celebration can truly get underway, of course, the dog is whisked off to the vet where he is crowned King of National “I Got Nothing Done Because My Dog Yakked on the Carpet” Day, and then, after a belly massage, and x-ray, he is declared fine and dandy and sent home with his scepter and official National “I Got Nothing Done Because My Dog Yakked on the Carpet” Day bag of Pill Pockets.

 

For those who are not in the know, the thing that makes this holiday special is that the dog always does it at night. He is like some kind of Cat Burglar, or, I guess, a Dog Burglar, except he doesn’t steal anything… he leaves things behind. While my husband and I lay slumbering in our beds, as visions of pristine rugs dance in our heads, the dog quietly yaks all over the place, leaving morning gifts for us to discover.

Doesn’t this sound like an awesome holiday so far?

 

Unfortunately, there are no parades or helium balloons on National “I Got Nothing Done Because My Dog Yakked on the Carpet” Day.  There used to be, but they got banned because the balloons scared the dog which would make him yak more. Some yakking is a holiday. Too much yakking is a visit from FEMA.

 

On National “I Got Nothing Done Because My Dog Yakked on the Carpet” Day, the dog goes into Yak Jail, which is basically the kitchen, blocked off on both ends, so he doesn’t go for a repeat performance on the rug that he missed. Of course, nothing happens in Yak Jail because there is no carpet, but we put him in there anyway because we need him out of the way while we clean up…

The Yak Mess.

 


Some yakking is a holiday.


Too much yakking is a visit from FEMA.


 

Cleaning up The Yak Mess on National “I Got Nothing Done Because My Dog Yakked on the Carpet” Day is a nasty and revolting job, but hey, it’s National “I Got Nothing Done Because My Dog Yakked on the Carpet” Day, so we do it with a bottle of dog yak spray, yards of paper towel, and a smile.

 

This is the highlight of National “I Got Nothing Done Because My Dog Yakked on the Carpet” Day and members of the family will typically fight over who gets the honor of performing this job. Once that person is chosen, he or she gets to wear the honorary National “I Got Nothing Done Because My Dog Yakked on the Carpet” Day Hazmat Suit, and is usually offered a post in the Crime Scene Clean-Up division of their local police force.

What an honor, indeed!

 

Unfortunately, the yak spray often does not do the job and you are forced to call in reinforcements…

The Doggie Yak Cleaners.

The good news is the Doggie Yak Cleaners can come right away!  The bad news is it will be a six-hour window, sometime between eleven and five, as long as it’s on a Tuesday, and Venus aligns with Saturn, and the groundhog saw his shadow, because it is National “I Got Nothing Done Because My Dog Yakked on the Carpet” Day and it’s not like you have anyplace else you need to be.

And then, after all the festivities and honors and celebrations have come to an end,  you get your second National “I Got Nothing Done Because My Dog Yakked on the Carpet” Day gift…

The Yak Bill.

 

©2021, Lost Media Entertainment, LLC. All rights reserved. Follow Tracy on her Facebook Fan page at Facebook.com/LostinSuburbiaFanPage,  join the Lost in Midlife group at facebook.com/groups/lostinmidlife/ and follow on Instagram @TracyinMidlife

 

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Published on February 12, 2021 10:31

February 1, 2021

The Coming of Snowmageddon

“What are you doing?” I asked my husband who was digging into his toolbox.

“I’m looking for my tape measure,” he said.

“Why?”

“So when the snow comes, I can measure it,” he replied matter-of-factly.

Although my husband sometimes comes up with some crazy ideas, this certainly seemed like a reasonable thing to do if we were expecting a lot of snow. Which we were. Because the TV weathermen said we were and everyone knows if they say it on TV,  it has to be true.

The weather men swore up and down that the coming snowstorm was going to be a monster. There was going to be walls of snow! Mountains of it! So, we all ran to the supermarket to stock up on bread, milk and water, because apparently those three things are all you need to survive in the case that your power goes out for a week.

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I happen to think wine, chocolate and double stuff Oreos supersede bread, milk and water… but maybe that’s just me.

The TV meteorologists worked themselves up into a Snowpocalypse-sized frenzy. You could see the sheer glee in their faces as they talked about a foot or more of snow in my area, like it had never happened before and signaled the beginning of a new Ice Age. Woolly Mammoths would be walking the streets! Saber Tooth Tigers in the supermarket aisles!

Meanwhile the people in Minnesota are all like, “Yawn. Whatever.”

Forget the Governor.  The heads of the Departments of Sanitation became the most powerful men in the city, assuring us that all the salt trucks were loaded up and ready to spring into action to save us from what would surely be Snowmageddon.

Confident that my fridge was well-stocked and I would have enough bread to last me for two weeks if necessary, even though I am gluten-free and don’t eat bread, I went to bed with thoughts of sno-cones dancing in my head. I had now where to go. I had bread. I was ready!

When I woke up, I raced to the window and looked outside for the snow. But everything was…. brown. There was no snowmageddon. There wasn’t even a small snowmergency. There was a snow-ma-nothing.

Was I disappointed?  Sure. I’m as up for a good snowpocalypse as the next person. But I decided to make the best of it. And so I give you:

TOP TEN THINGS TO DO WHEN YOU GET LESS SNOW THAN YOU WERE EXPECTING

Make an itsy bitsy, teeny tiny snowmanMake a snow angel in the mudTreat your kids to an empty sno-coneCatch a snowflake on your tongue. Just one. ‘Cause that’s all there is.Go sledding on an ice cubeShovel your driveway… with a spoon.Pucker up and blow the snow off your carMake an ice sculpture of an atomMake an igloo for an antHave a very, very, very short snowball fight

 

©2021, Lost Media Entertainment, LLC. All rights reserved. Follow Tracy on her Facebook Fan page at Facebook.com/LostinSuburbiaFanPage,  join the Lost in Midlife group at facebook.com/groups/lostinmidlife/ and follow on Instagram @TracyinMidlife

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Published on February 01, 2021 13:08

January 18, 2021

Above and Beyond the Call of Nature

Contrary to popular belief, the three words a woman likes to hear most from her husband are not, “I love you.”

They are, “You were right.”

So, you can imagine my utter, sheer, uncontainable joy when I heard the news this week that there was finally proof of something I had been telling my husband for years:

Toilet paper is supposed to be hung with the paper draped over, not under.

I had always assumed this was the right way to hang the paper because it just made good toilet paper sense.  Then a guy on the Internet who clearly had too much time on his hands uncovered a 124 year-old patent filed by someone named Seth Wheeler who invented perforated toilet paper (so you could tear off one square at a time).  Wheeler’s patent application unmistakably showed the toilet paper hanging over, thus ending the critical over/under debate that has raged in society for over a century.

Naturally, this was huge news in the “over” camp, and those of us who have spent a lifetime trying to get the message out there could not wait to share it with the “under” people.

So, after I brought this to my husband’s attention, I waited patiently for him to say those three little words.  But he just shrugged.

“Honestly honey, I really couldn’t care less which way the toilet paper is hung,” he said.

I was aghast.


“Honestly honey, I really couldn’t care less which way


the toilet paper is hung,” he said.


“You say that,” I sputtered. “But isn’t it annoying when you go to the bathroom in the middle of the night expecting the toilet paper to be hung over, and you’re fumbling to try to find the end of the roll, but you CAN’T because it was hung under, and as you spin it, it just unrolls onto the floor?”

He looked at me like I had lost my mind.  I wondered if this was one of those Men are from Mars things, kind of like how I feel it’s polite to drink milk from a cup, not the carton, and he’s all like, “We have cups?”

“No,” he finally said.

“Why?” I insisted.

“’Because I usually don’t need toilet paper in the middle of the night.”

I scowled.  I hadn’t thought of that. There was a basic anatomy difference that kind of made my whole point moot.

Now I was miffed. I was under the erroneous assumption that not only was I due some credit for my correct toilet paper hanging all these years, but also that this news would ensure a future free of underhanging toilet paper from my other family members.

But sadly, when it came to how the toilet paper hangs, frankly my dear, they couldn’t give a darn.

I thought about this for a minute and realized that I probably had to choose my battles and that maybe, maybe, I was over-reaching with the over/under thing.

“Okay,” I sighed.  “Forget about whether the toilet paper should hang over or under.”

“Good,” he said.

I nodded. “Let’s just work on actually changing the roll when it’s empty.”

 

©2020, Lost Media Entertainment, LLC. All rights reserved. Follow Tracy on her Facebook Fan page at Facebook.com/LostinSuburbiaFanPage,  join the Lost in Midlife group at facebook.com/groups/lostinmidlife/ and follow on Instagram @TracyinMidlife

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Published on January 18, 2021 18:11

January 13, 2021

Can You See me Now?

Not long after my fiftieth birthday I noticed a disturbing trend.  Everyone had suddenly started printing things smaller.

As I looked around, I was shocked to see that the type on the food packaging had gotten smaller, the words in the newspaper and magazines I read had gotten smaller, and the names on street signs had gotten smaller. As a result of all this smallness, I was having trouble reading everything.  I squinted at a sugar packet and wondered, “Do I really care what’s in this, or can I just assume it’s sugar and call it a day.

“It’s not them. It’s you,” commented my husband when I pointed out this bizarre anomaly to him.

“What’ya mean, it’s me?  I didn’t change all the sugar packets and street signs,” I complained.

“I mean it’s your eyes.  You need to get your eyes checked.”

I harrumphed.  “My eyes are fine. I’ve never needed glasses,” I argued.“You need glasses,” said the ophthalmologist after examining my eyes.  “You are near-sighted and far-sighted.”

“How does that work?” I asked.

“You can see right here,” he responded holding his hand out about three feet from my face.  “But not here,” he said putting his hand up close to me. “Or here,” he added moving back five feet.

I pouted.  Apparently some time between forty-nine and fifty, my perfect eyesight had gone from 20/20 to 20/sucky. I needed glasses to read and to drive, to watch a movie and to see a stupid sugar packet.

“You have Over-Fifty eyes,” said the doctor. “It’s very common.”

“So are hemorrhoids,” I said  “I don’t want them either.”

Apparently some time between forty-nine and fifty, my perfect eyesight had gone from 20/20 to 20/sucky.

The doctor gave me the bill, which was thoughtfully printed large enough that I had no trouble reading it, and then sent me out into the adjacent eyeglasses shop so I could pick out a pair of frames. I tried on the coolest, funkiest glasses I could find and looked in the mirror.  My grandmother stared back at me. I realized then that I was just one step away from a retirement village in West Palm Beach and membership in AARP.

The glasses were ready in a week. Reluctantly I started wearing them.  All of a sudden I realized I could see everything perfectly.  The words on the pages of books and street signs were crisp and clear. It was like someone had squeegeed my eyes.

While I was thrilled that I could now see better and read everything more easily, I also realized that there were a bunch of things I didn’t see before that I really would have been much happier not knowing about. Once I put on my glasses, I realized I was much grayer, had more wrinkles and was flabbier than I’d previously thought.

“How do I look to you?” I asked my husband after my realization.

“You look great, Honey!” He exclaimed.

“Uh-huh.” I nodded. “I guess you need glasses, too.”

 

©2020, Lost Media Entertainment, LLC. All rights reserved. Follow Tracy on her Facebook Fan page at Facebook.com/LostinSuburbiaFanPage,  join the Lost in Midlife group at facebook.com/groups/lostinmidlife/ and follow on Instagram @TracyinMidlife

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Published on January 13, 2021 08:54

January 8, 2021

A Cronut by Any Other Name

[image error]“Ummm, this is good,” said my husband with a mouthful of food. “What is it?”I looked up from the kitchen sink where I was doing dishes.  “It’s a cronut.”

“A what?”

“A cronut.  It’s part croissant part doughnut.”

He looked at me like I had two heads.

“I was actually going to get some duffins, but the cronuts looked better so I bought those instead.”

“What’s a duffin?” he asked hesitantly.

“It’s part doughnut part muffin.  The cruffins and bruffins looked good too, but I didn’t want to go crazy so I just stuck with the cronuts.”

“What the heck are your talking about?” he said.

 

“A cruffin is part croissant part muffin and a bruffin is part brioche and part muffin,” I replied.

“Are you out of your mind?” he said.

I laughed.  I didn‘t blame him for being confused.  Ever since the cronut made its debut, it seemed like the food industry had been taken over by mad scientists. 

[image error]They were not only combining doughnuts and muffins, but just about any other kind of food you could think of. There were piecakens (a pie baked inside a cake), brookies (brownie and cookie), and cherpumples (cherry, pumpkin and apple pie). There were meatzas (a pizza with a ground beef crust), chocamole (avocado and chocolate guacamole) and turduckens (a chicken stuffed into a duck stuffed into a turkey). It was like Betty Crocker got it on with Dr. Frankenstein and they had Frankenfood babies.

It was like Betty Crocker got it on with Dr. Frankenstein and they had Frankenfood babies.

I actually blame all this on the snooty dog people.  [image error]

When I was a kid, mixed breed dogs were simply called mutts.  But then someone got the idea that they could charge money for a mutt if they came up with a cute name for a dog that came from two different breeds.  Suddenly we were overrun with maltipoos, puggles, schnoodles and schnockers.  I knew we had hit designer dog saturation when I met a woman with a dog that was part bull dog and part shih tzu, which, naturally, she said, was a bullshihtz.

As the proud owner of a pair of jeggings (jeans and leggings), I was already down with the hybrid trend.  But for my husband who couldn’t even bear to hear the word “spork” without cringing, this was all just a little too much for him. Still, I told him it was all really a big nontroversy, and he should just chillax, maybe put on a good romcom, and take a short staycation from all this nonsense.

[image error]

“You know, this is all too much for me,” he finally said. “I’m going to do an online work out.”

“What are you doing?” I asked.

“I have a men’s fitness class.”

“What’s it called?” I wondered.

“Broga.”

 

©2020, Lost Media Entertainment, LLC. All rights reserved. Follow Tracy on her Facebook Fan page at Facebook.com/LostinSuburbiaFanPage,  join the Lost in Midlife group at facebook.com/groups/lostinmidlife/ and follow on Instagram @TracyinMidlife

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Published on January 08, 2021 13:00

Arrested Development

[image error]
“Ummm, this is good,” said my husband with a mouthful of food. “What is it?”
I looked up from the kitchen sink where I was doing dishes.  “It’s a cronut.”

“A what?”


“A cronut.  It’s part croissant part doughnut.”


He looked at me like I had two heads.


“I was actually going to get some duffins, but the cronuts looked better so I bought those instead.”


“What’s a duffin?” he asked hesitantly.


“It’s part doughnut part muffin.  The cruffins and bruffins looked good too, but I didn’t want to go crazy so I just stuck with the cronuts.”


“What the heck are your talking about?” he said.


 


“A cruffin is part croissant part muffin and a bruffin is part brioche and part muffin,” I replied.


“Are you out of your mind?” he said.


I laughed.  I didn‘t blame him for being confused.  Ever since the cronut made its debut, it seemed like the food industry had been taken over by mad scientists. 


[image error]They were not only combining doughnuts and muffins, but just about any other kind of food you could think of. There were piecakens (a pie baked inside a cake), brookies (brownie and cookie), and cherpumples (cherry, pumpkin and apple pie). There were meatzas (a pizza with a ground beef crust), chocamole (avocado and chocolate guacamole) and turduckens (a chicken stuffed into a duck stuffed into a turkey). It was like Betty Crocker got it on with Dr. Frankenstein and they had Frankenfood babies.



It was like Betty Crocker got it on with Dr. Frankenstein and they had Frankenfood babies.



I actually blame all this on the snooty dog people.  [image error]


When I was a kid, mixed breed dogs were simply called mutts.  But then someone got the idea that they could charge money for a mutt if they came up with a cute name for a dog that came from two different breeds.  Suddenly we were overrun with maltipoos, puggles, schnoodles and schnockers.  I knew we had hit designer dog saturation when I met a woman with a dog that was part bull dog and part shih tzu, which, naturally, she said, was a bullshihtz.


As the proud owner of a pair of jeggings (jeans and leggings), I was already down with the hybrid trend.  But for my husband who couldn’t even bear to hear the word “spork” without cringing, this was all just a little too much for him. Still, I told him it was all really a big nontroversy, and he should just chillax, maybe put on a good romcom, and take a short staycation from all this nonsense.


[image error]


“You know, this is all too much for me,” he finally said. “I’m going to do an online work out.”


“What are you doing?” I asked.


“I have a men’s fitness class.”


“What’s it called?” I wondered.


“Broga.”


 


©2020, Lost Media Entertainment, LLC. All rights reserved. Follow Tracy on her Facebook Fan page at Facebook.com/LostinSuburbiaFanPage,  join the Lost in Midlife group at facebook.com/groups/lostinmidlife/ and follow on Instagram @TracyinMidlife


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Published on January 08, 2021 13:00

January 4, 2021

What’s Hiding in Your Junk Drawer?

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I am the queen of organization. But the one place in the house that defies my vast organizational skills is the junk drawer. The junk drawer is that place in everyone’s home that becomes the final resting place for every pen, penny, tchotchke and doohickey that doesn’t belong anywhere else. The problem with the junk drawer, of course, is you can never find anything in it. It is like the black hole of the kitchen universe. Things get sucked in and then they never come out.


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From time to time, the junk drawer becomes so completely overstuffed with junk that I do actually have to clean it out. While I am happy to finally get the drawer organized, I’m not a big fan of the actual cleaning.  Since I am not the only one to dump stuff in the junk drawer, I have discovered such treasures as wadded-up tissues, teeth the tooth fairy forgot to take away, and even a dead mouse, once. Knowing that dead things could be expertly hidden in that drawer for a prolonged period of time, I might have suggested to authorities that they look for Jimmy Hoffa in there.  But since a) the drawer isn’t really big enough to hold a person and b) if they did find him, it would have turned my kitchen into a media circus and then I would never have time to organize my junk drawer again, I didn’t bother.



I have discovered such treasures as wadded-up tissues,


teeth the tooth fairy forgot to take away, and even a


dead mouse, once.



The cause for the most recent excavation of the junk drawer was a pencil.  My daughter needed one and although I swore up and down that there was a box of them in the junk drawer, neither of us could find one in there.  However, since we pulled half the contents of the drawer out while searching for the pencil, I figured I might as well finish the job.


Here is what I found in the drawer:



A dozen dried up Sharpie markers
8 broken pens 
4 nail clippers
A bazillion paper clips, staples, rubber bands, and buttons
Loose change from a foreign country
Loose change from this country 
Loose change with Chuck E. Cheese’s face on it
A mini parasol umbrella from a tropical drink
Two stale Doritos
A Barbie head
A folded up article about how to get rid of stink bugs
A stink bug
Scotch tape, duct tape, masking tape, packaging tape, electrical tape, wood glue, Elmer’s glue, and Gorilla glue.
A tuning fork 
A cassette tape with a lot of the tape hanging out
An open egg of Silly Putty
Packets of soy sauce
A Scooby doo pen light
A sticker that says, “Be nice to me, I gave blood today.”
No pencils.

 


They say you can learn a lot about a person by what they keep in their junk drawer.  According to my junk drawer, I am a Dorito-snacking, blood-donating, soy sauce-loving, Barbie-decapitating, Chuck E. Cheese-visiting, tone-deaf and utterly pencil-less mom, who plays with silly putty and watches Scooby Doo, is tape and glue obsessed, and is desperate to get rid of Stink Bugs.


Sounds about right.


 


©2020, Lost Media Entertainment, LLC. All rights reserved. Follow Tracy on her Facebook Fan page at Facebook.com/LostinSuburbiaFanPage,  join the Lost in Midlife group at facebook.com/groups/lostinmidlife/ and follow on Instagram @TracyinMidlife


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Published on January 04, 2021 10:30

December 21, 2020

I’m Dreaming of a Ruff Christmas

[image error]

As we worked our way through the holiday season, I was prepared for the onslaught of Christmas music, Christmas decorations, and Christmas sales. What I was not prepared for, was the Christmas sweaters…


On dogs.


“Excuse me,” I said to the lady with a unhappy looking pug wearing a Christmas romper with writing on it. “What does it say on your dog’s sweater?”


’I party with Santa,’ she beamed, lovingly petting the pug on the head. I couldn’t be certain, but I was pretty sure he was unhappy because he was dressed in a sweater that said, “I party with Santa.”


I grinned.  “Well, he looks quite dashing in his Christmas sweater.  I’m sure he waits eagerly all year to be able to wear that sweater!”


She scooped up the dog and smothered him with kisses.  “Oh, this isn’t his only Christmas sweater,” she assured me. The pug snarled. “He has lots of them!  He LOVES his Christmas sweaters, don’t you, Rudolph?”


Rudolph?


[image error]


The pug looked up at me to acknowledge that yes, he not only had to wear a silly Christmas sweater, he also had a silly Christmas name.


“Hmmm, you named him for the reindeer, didn’t you?” I asked the pug owner.


“Of course,” she said. “He was born on Christmas!  He’s our special Christmas puppy!”  While she was obviously delighted by this, I was confident Rudolph couldn’t give two kibbles that he was born on Christmas.


“Do you have any other dogs?” I asked her.


“Yes, we have another pug named Shamrock.”


[image error]


I raised my eyebrows. “I bet,” I ventured, “… that Shamrock was born on St. Patrick’s Day.”


She beamed at me.  “He WAS!”


“So where is Shamrock today,” I asked her.


“He won a free grooming from our dog spa. Luck of the Irish, you know?” she grinned.


I smiled. Rudolph sighed.  Even Donner and Blitzen couldn’t get him out of this situation.



I was confident Rudolph couldn’t give two kibbles


that he was born on Christmas.



I actually could really empathize with Rudolph. I was born on Christmas Eve and the nurses all wanted my mother to name me Holly or Merry.  They wrapped me in a green and red swaddling blanket and tied me up with a festive bow before sending me home.  After that I was destined to receive Christmas-themed  birthday presents for the rest of my life.


While we continued to chat, the pug owner put Rudolph down and he sniffed around a nearby tree.  Suddenly, he lifted his leg and did what dog’s do next to trees, soaking his Christmas romper in the process.


“Oh no, Rudolph, you dirtied your Christmas sweater!!” she exclaimed.  “We’re going to have to take it off.”


As she bent down to unsnap the sweater, the pug stopped snarling and barked his approval.


I’m pretty sure he said, “ Merry Christmas sweater to all, and to all a good riddance.”


 


©2020, Lost Media Entertainment, LLC. All rights reserved. Follow Tracy on her Facebook Fan page at Facebook.com/LostinSuburbiaFanPage,  join the Lost in Midlife group at facebook.com/groups/lostinmidlife/ and follow on Instagram @TracyinMidlife


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Published on December 21, 2020 16:35

December 14, 2020

T’was a Week Before Christmas

[image error]


’Twas a week before Christmas and our wallets were bare…

There wasn’t so much as a dollar in there


The gift cards were purchased, the stockings were stuffed


Even the eggnog tureen had been buffed.


 


[image error]


The bonus was gone, the tips had been tipped


The gift to Aunt Martha had finally been shipped.


The lines at the mall were still crazy long


Price surging on ride shares was still going strong


 


The kids were safe studying in their college beds


as visions of Venmo checks danced in their heads.


Some gathered together to watch old Game of Thrones


While others schemed how to get cool new IPhones.


 


[image error]But back at our house as we tried to get cozy


A loud noise suggested that all was not rosy.


Someone was walking on top of the house


And that someone was bigger for sure than a mouse.


 


A burglar? An alien? What could it be?


Something was headed straight for our chimney.


 


And then with an “oomf” and an “ugh” he came down,


Not through the chimney but down to the ground.


With big rosy cheeks and good cheer galore


Our mystery roof-walker appeared at the door.


 


“I’m the guy that you called, I’m a roofer named Kringle


All that snow that just fell?  It ruined your shingles.


“You need a new roof,” said the man dressed in red


“If you don’t do it soon it’ll fall in on your head.”


 


[image error]


 


We looked at the tuition bills tossed on the table


The bills for electricity, water, and cable


Then we gave him a Visa to clean up the mess


Because Kringle won’t take American Express.


 


©2020, Lost Media Entertainment. All rights reserved. Follow Tracy on her Facebook Fan page at Facebook.com/LostinSuburbiaFanPage,  join the Lost in Midlife group at facebook.com/groups/lostinmidlife/ and follow on Instagram @TracyinMidlife


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Published on December 14, 2020 14:00

December 10, 2020

To Ski or Not to Ski, That is the Question

[image error]When my husband and I got married, I promised to love and honor him and learn how to ski. 

I was actually able to put off this last commitment for about ten years. But when he decided it was time for the kids to learn, I was forced to take the plunge, as well.  I quickly discovered that the critical part of skiing is not actually skiing… it’s learning how to fall without killing yourself, and then getting back up again. The falling part is pretty easy.  Getting up again, however, is about as impossible as taking up this sport when you’re 40 in the first place.


Assuming, that you’re bound by a marriage vow as I am, you now face the second element of becoming a skier:  learning the lingo.  For instance, on my first ski outing last year, I didn’t just fall, I was wiped out by a knuckle dragger, had a yard sale and did a face plant In non-skier terms, this means I was knocked down by a snow-boarder, my skis and poles went flying, and I landed face first in the snow.  Of course, if you’re skiing with your squad (ski buddies) and you bail (wipe out), to them, it’s a photo op (when someone else has a yard sale.



Got all that?


Essential to the whole shebang is your ski outfit.  Between goggles, gators, pants and poles, you could send your kid to college for a year on what it costs to put together a whole ski ensemble.  However, if you get the look just right, and the lingo down pat, you don’t even actually have to go on the slopes at all.  Stick a lift ticket on your jacket, rub a little snow on your face, and, voila; everyone will think you’re a skier.


…That is, of course, unless you have a kid to expose your ruse.


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“Hey mom, want to ski the moguls with me?”


“Moguls?”  I questioned.  “You mean like Warren Buffet?”


He rolled his eyes at me.



“Hey mom, want to ski the moguls with me?” said my son.


 “Moguls?”  I questioned.  “You mean like Warren Buffet?”



“No, duh.  Moguls are the bumps on the expert slopes,” he said impatiently.


“Do you go over them?”


“No, around them.”


“I think I’ll go way around them, like, on a totally different slope,” I told him.


“Oh, come on Mom, don’t be a dweeb.”


Even I, ski-illiterate that I am, knew what this meant.


“I may be a dweeb, but at least I’ll be a living dweeb,” I said, and hoisted myself up to go to the bathroom.


Now, if walking on dry land when you are completely ski-ensembled is no easy task, going to the bathroom is darn near impossible.  Twenty minutes later, zipped, buckled and tucked in all the right places, I was finally ready to leave the ladies room. But just as I got to the exit, the door came flying open. As I lurched forward to save myself from being knocked out by the door, my boots slipped on the slushy floor, and I had a yard sale.


I limped back to our table in the lodge and my husband came rushing over to see what had happened.


“What do you call it when you wipe out in the ski lodge bathroom,” I asked him miserably.


He grinned.  “Stupid.”


 


©2020, Lost Media Entertainment. All rights reserved. Follow Tracy on her Facebook Fan page at Facebook.com/LostinSuburbiaFanPage,  join the Lost in Midlife group at facebook.com/groups/lostinmidlife/ and follow on Instagram @TracyinMidlife


 


The post To Ski or Not to Ski, That is the Question appeared first on Tracy Beckerman.

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Published on December 10, 2020 07:19