Will Hartzell-Baird's Blog, page 4

The Chronicles of Oreo and Jake

Oreo...

I keep my ass where you keep your face. Remember that.

Oreo found her way to my wife while she was still in college, after bouncing around between homes that had cast her out because she wasn't litterbox-trained. The truth, as it turned out, was that she was perfectly litterbox-trained, it was just sometimes hard to tell, owing to her chronic, explosive diarrhea.

Best. Cat. Ever.

We're not sure exactly how this started. At one point, we determined that one of her teeth had rotted away, and we wondered if she had developed diarrhea because she wasn't chewing her food due to the pain. We developed this theory when my wife noticed that Oreo was throwing up whole, unchewed food, and I noticed that my wife was the sort of person who closely examines cat barf. And, sure enough, when we got the tooth removed, her diarrhea -- which, in honor of the show Haven, we began to refer to as "The Troubles" -- went away.

But, much like a slasher-flick villain of the 80's, The Troubles came back a year or two later with no discernible logic. And we certainly tried to determine what caused The Troubles, or why they came back. Oh, did we try. Naturally, Una worried about the discomfort that Oreo might be experienced, but there was also the fact that she was capable of producing the most vile smells that any human has ever encountered.

And, of course, there was the mess. To put this in perspective, we're discussing a cat that once shit on the ceiling. I'll leave it as an exercise to the reader to determine exactly how this happened.

But even though we never figured out where The Troubles came from or why they came back, we found that we could mitigate them practically to the point of non-existence by feeding her very carefully. We determined that the only thing she could eat safely was a specific type of frozen meat medallion. The wrinkle, of course, was that Oreo had other ideas. She decided early on that nothing would stop her from eating anything and everything. Oh, you gave normal food to the other two cats? Yoink. You hid food on the counter? Jumping up there was certainly no problem. Put yogurt in the trash? Psh. That was just a matter of prying the door open with her paw, opening the trash can's lid with her nose, and digging it out with her face.

Fun fact: they sell cans of compressed air hooked up to a motion sensor to act as a deterrent to cats getting into stuff they shouldn't. We came to refer to these as "turrets," and I'll say that I highly recommend them if you ever feel the need to scare the crap out of your wife.

With enough effort, we did eventually manage to reach a sort of equilibrium. For a while. But one day, the Troubles came back with a vengeance. We struggled to figure out what to do now...was she getting into something new? Had her teeth rotted again?

We never quite figured it out, because shortly thereafter, Oreo stopped eating.

Since she ordinarily snatched up any food you put in front of her, we rushed her to the vet, who determined that Oreo was suffering from end stage kidney failure.

This struck me as...wrong. I had always thought of the cats as silly little creatures, with silly little problems. A fear of the vacuum. An inability to figure out that scratching an ear with a front paw just doesn't work. A fight over who gets the squishiest spot on the back of the couch. But at seven years old, she wound up facing the same serious problem that we all do eventually.

The vet pumped her full of fluids, which seemed to give her a new lease on life -- she started eating again, and she suddenly had more energy -- but it was still just a lease. We found a vet that made housecalls for euthanasia, and we made an appointment.

We spent the next week in a sort of limbo, that weird space between life and death. There is a strangeness to grieving someone whose emotional reaction is basically, "Hey, guys, what's going on?"

Because what other reaction would she have? She didn't know she was dying. She knew she didn't feel like she used to (even after the fluids, she wasn't grooming properly, and she had gotten clumsy), but not that this was what the rest of her short life would be like. But even if she didn't know the end was near, she did notice that we had changed. Before, we had spent years pulling her off of counters or fighting with her about whether she should eat our food (her opinion: yes)... but all of the sudden, we gave her anything she cared to eat.

The other cats' food? Bits of egg? Yogurt? Why not?

Okay, she shit a few places she wasn't supposed to, but still.

Make this into bacon. Now.

Her last morning before the vet came to put her down, we gave her bacon. Bacon isn't terribly good for cats, for much the same reasons that it's not great for people, but since her health was no longer a concern, we let her have a little fun. It was far from the only treat we gave her, but for some reason it stuck with me. Perhaps it's because that was her last treat.

And then the vet came, and where there had been a cat, there now was... not.

...and Jake

See? Someone liked the book.

After Oreo, I made it a point to spoil the other dipshits (Boy Cat and Jake) regularly. Their lives are short, and their pleasures are simple. The treats were plentiful, and the catnip flowed like water. And -- Jake's favorite -- the laser.

As an aside, it's difficult to adequately express Jake's love for the laser. When I first showed it to him eight or nine years ago, he would chase it until he started to pant, and was willing to run in circles so fast that he got dizzy. Dizzy cats are hilarious. I highly recommend them.

But the perceptive among you may realize that getting paired up with Oreo in a blog entry does not bode well for Jake.

You see, about a month ago, we noticed that Jake wasn't eating like he used to.

Kidney failure, it turns out. Not as far along as Oreo's was, but just as fatal. Apparently kidney failure is pretty common among domestic cats. I may have used the "slasher-flick villain" analogy too soon.

We started giving Jake fluids twice a week, but it didn't prove as helpful for him as it was for Oreo. He continued to lose weight, and is now at about five pounds -- half his former weight.

In the meantime, I've started referring to him as "Make-A-Wish Cat," because in the last month, we've tried to do whatever we thought would make him happy in his final days. Results have been mixed. He's enjoyed the opportunity to sit on our laps for hours on end, no matter how uncomfortable we are, and he's loved the extra time with the laser (even if his energy isn't what it was), but he's lost his appettite for the human food that he once tried to steal while we weren't looking. I'd kind of always imagined that he'd get the chance to eat bacon like Oreo did, but it seems the time for that has passed.

This leaves the awkward decision of when to kill the cat. You can't ask him how he feels about it, so you're left to decide on your own when you cross the line -- how do you know if there is still enough joy left in life to justify the pain? He still goes for certain treats, and curling up in our laps, or playing...but his grooming has suffered, and the same clumsiness we saw with Oreo now affects Jake.

And here we are.

Jake's final appointment with the vet is scheduled for Monday morning.

I was hoping we'd have a little time before the end, like with Oreo, where he'd be almost like normal. Time for bacon, or cheese, or whatever else we never let him have throughout his life. But death isn't the sort of thing that goes according to plan. So I guess the lesson behind Jake's story is this: Give your loved ones bacon while you still can.

The Chronicles of Oreo and Jake

My Pet Baby

So my son has recently turned three months old (and, coincidentally, this is my third post about parenthood, which I think officially makes this a mommy blog).

At the moment, we're still in the middle of what I refer to as the "My Pet Baby" phase. I call it that because at first, when you get down to it, having a baby is not that different from having another, unusually stupid pet. Our cats -- who are idiots at best -- have been known to have the occasional moment of brilliance, such as by prying open the laundry room door and breaking into the trash in search of food, or scaling the shelves to find the catnip. In contrast, it took at least a month before the light came on in Liam's eyes, and he was able to do anything other than declare his anger with the world at large.

This situation has improved somewhat -- he seems to increasingly have some understanding of his environment; specifically, that when I'm around, it's really fun to scream like the world is on fire, unless I'm willing to appease him via interpretive dance. Said dance must include some combination of bouncing, spinning, and lifting him up over my head; furthermore, if there is any discernible pattern to these movements, the Baby Gods will strike me down for my hubris. I should add that, based on his size and weight, I'd say that Liam has the density of a neutron star.

I probably shouldn't be surprised by this, since he is clearly all muscle, based on how freakishly strong he is. I know that all parents go on about how awesome their children are, but I'd just like to say that, no, seriously, Liam is clearly some sort of mutant. He could lift his own head from the minute he was born; as soon as we took him home, he kicked strongly enough that we were worried he would leap right out of our arms (and die, since...you know...babies are idiots); and he could roll onto his back at one week, tummy time be damned.

I suppose the possibility exists that the whole dancing/crying routine is really Liam's attempt to get me in better shape, so that I won't wind up embarrassing him in front of his future friends (obviously assuming he hasn't inherited my social skills). Then again, since they specifically sell swings and vibrating seats to soothe babies, I'm guessing that Liam's love of bouncing is fairly common... which kind of makes me wonder how the phrase "dad bod" refers to anything other than bulging biceps and six pack abs, because dear God, I'm sore all over. And he's only getting heavier.

Nevertheless, it seems that the "My Pet Baby" phase might be ending soon, to be replaced with that dreadful time when he starts having his own "feelings" and "opinions" about stuff (*shudder*). I say this because last week, Liam laughed for the first time. If you've never heard a baby laugh for the first time, I have to tell you, it's a truly magical experience, because when it happens, you know -- you absolutely know -- that it will probably be at least five minutes before the little shit starts crying again.

Incidentally, I've noticed that when people find out about a baby laughing for the first time, they tend to ask what made him laugh, as if he might have been pondering a particularly witty passage from Joseph Heller's Catch 22. So to forestall any further questioning on the matter, this is how it happened: after I spent about 20 back-breaking minutes dancing Liam around the living room while he cried the entire time, his mother came out of the shower and changed his diaper, at which point he promptly started smiling and cooing. I then walked into the room and said, "Well, you certainly look happy, you little asshole." At which point he broke into laughter for several minutes. In conclusion: He may have inherited his mother's brown eyes, brown hair, and...well, every other visible trait, but he definitely has my sense of humor.

My Pet Baby

Fa. La. La.

In order to help you get into the holiday spirit, I thought I'd ruin all your favorite holiday songs by telling you what they're about. And, of course, by "favorite holiday songs," I mean the songs that are forcibly thrust upon you as part of the media's bizarre Solstice ritual of replaying decades-old music ad nauseam.

Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer - The story of a mutant who was ridiculed by his peers, despite living with a supposedly all-seeing, benevolent being tasked with enforcing a sense of morality in children throughout the world. Then one day, the benevolent being decides that this mutant might be useful to him, and he makes Rudolph work all through the night during inclement weather, presumably without pay, thereby earning Rudolph the right not to be treated like the glowing, talking abomination that he is. The moral of the story: if you work really hard, or at least patiently suffer through ostracism for your entire life, people may one day forget that you were created as a cynical, cost-cutting marketing ploy by a now-defunct department store chain.

Frosty the Snowman - After an unknown number of children inadvertently perform a magic ritual, they create some kind of clumsy snow golem that, keenly aware of its own impending death as winter gave way to spring, decided to have one last hurrah and induct the children into a life of crime by ignoring the police shouting at them. Note that this interpretation is probably preferable to the potentially darker implications of the fact that the song ends with Frosty running around with children, ignoring a traffic cop, and then running off alone while something went "thumpety thump thump," which we can only hope was intended to be some merry Christmas nonsense from a lazy songwriter.

Baby It's Cold Outside - Surprisingly, not sexual assault. Mind you, since the song was written in the 1940's, that still means that listening to this song is basically the equivalent of overhearing your grandparents debating the wisdom of taking a trip to Pound Town.

The Twelve Days of Christmas - A hoarder attempts to woo his true love with gifts, primarily in the form of birds and human trafficking. Failing that, he clearly intends to bore her into submission, since that is the only reason I can think of that anyone would opt to perform a cumulative song.

White Christmas - Loneliness and longing.

I Saw Mommy Kissing Santa Claus - Infidelity, as seen through the eyes of a child who will one day grow up and question the old cover story that "Santa" had simply been his father in costume when he realizes that his parents hadn't known he was there, and therefore would have no reason to rent a Santa costume. Alternatively, this was the child's first introduction to the world of cosplay and daddy issues.

Jingle Bells - I don't know, probably drugs or something. Who cares? I'm going to go write about zombies now. Maybe.

Postpartum is Such Sweet Sorrow

My wife recently decided she was tired of being pregnant, and subsequently insisted upon giving birth. Unfortunately, as our son's supposed "due date" came and went, she became increasingly eager to get the child out of her.

She tried all of the standard tricks: getting trapped in an elevator, having car trouble while driving alone through the woods, and getting caught in a hostage situation while at the bank, but, to her chagrin, her water failed to dramatically break shortly after meeting a scrappy young teenager or a neurotic, middle-aged man whose perspective on fatherhood would be changed after being forced to deliver the child for her.

Finally, she resorted to the most desperate ploy of all...scheduling an induction. And it worked like a charm: the day before her appointment, our son Liam came into the world.

The experience so far has been enlightening.

First of all, to people who refer to childbirth as "beautiful": stop that. I know, I know, you want it to be beautiful, because you like sex, and you like babies, so the stuff that happens in between should be beautiful, too, right?

Well, it's not. There's more blood than a Tarantino movie, there's a strong chance that the mother will crap the bed, and the whole process ends with the woman getting stitches. On her junk.

Oh, and let's not forget the placenta. What's that? You forgot the placenta, because they always leave that out on TV? Then allow me to remind you. Remember that time you accidentally walked in on a plate of marinara-soaked angel hair pasta having sex with a jellyfish? It's like that. Except that for the past nine months it's been tethered to your child by a shriveled purple tentacle that will haunt your nightmares for the next several months.

Just kidding. You won't sleep for the next several months.

Second of all: drugs. I don't know if you've ever had an epidural, but I highly recommend them. I know, they say that it can make the baby a little groggy, but as it turns out, they don't make the baby drive home afterward. And, at least according to my wife's doctor, mothers who say "yes" to drugs are better at following the doctor's directions since, you know...they're not in terrible pain.

And, finally, there's the whole baby thing. Previously, I had thought that babies were terribly boring. Now, it turns out, it's just that everyone else's babies are boring. My baby, on the other hand, is awesome. When I see billboards or commercials with babies in them now, I'm like, "Nice try, other baby. You're not nearly as awesome as Liam."

Mind you, I can't claim that my son is inherently interesting for anyone else. His primary activities at this point are 1) sucking my wife dry, and 2) waiting until we've given him a clean diaper, then shitting loudly in my arms. Incidentally, if you, the reader, happen to actually be my son looking back to see what sort of things I posted on the Internet about you when you were a child: you're welcome.

And, on the off chance that you, the reader, are not my son ten years from now, and you're wondering why I decided that what the Internet really needed was another obnoxious parent blogging about their stupid kid: you're welcome.

The Dark Side of the Womb

It has recently come to my attention that my wife is eight months pregnant.  The astute reader will no doubt discern that, yes, this means that my wife and I used to have sex.  At any rate, I have decided that our current circumstances present the perfect opportunity to do what any responsible adult and citizen of the world would do: conduct experiments on my pregnant wife.  After all, we've all heard that pregnancy has certain effects on the human body, but how do we really know?

So let's address these pregnancy myths one-by-one, and sort the facts from the fiction.

Myth #1: Pregnancy Makes Women More Emotional

Throughout the course of the pregnancy, which I was definitely aware of all along and didn't just find out about, I've been taking careful notes of my wife's behavior, and a few incidents stand out above the rest:

About a month into the pregnancy, she woke up at three in the morning, declared she had a dream about Calvin and Hobbes, and burst into tears.
Upon learning that Finding Nemo came out 13 years ago, she burst into tears.
She has literally cried within the past 15 minutes.

Findings: Inconclusive. Even when she's not pregnant, she cries at Hallmark commercials and when cat pictures show up in her Facebook feed, so differentiating her emotional state under the influence of pregnancy hormones from her baseline is...problematic.

Myth #2: Pregnancy Causes Food Cravings

A few incidents come to mind from the second trimester:

She briefly became obsessed with waffles. I would ordinarily dismiss this of being the result of the fact that waffles are awesome, but since she was actually willing to purchase and eat Eggo waffles -- and somehow managed to keep these godawful crap-sponges down -- this seems unusual.
She ate an entire pot of mac and cheese in a single sitting. Twice.
She decided she wanted frickles after we had already eaten dinner. She then spent the entire evening searching Instagram for pictures of frickles.
She dropped a pineapple chunk on the cat, then ate it anyway.  She does not like pineapples.

Findings: Inconclusive. To be honest, I'm struggling to believe that she ate Eggo waffles on purpose, so I can only conclude that this was some sort of practical joke that never reached fruition because, upon realizing what she had done, she decided it would be best to never speak of it again and hope that I'd forgotten.

Myth #3: Pregnancy Induces Nausea

During the first trimester, she became so unable to tolerate rich food that she spent a week eating nothing but toast. At the end of the week, she binged on cinnamon rolls.

Findings: Inconclusive. My wife loves toast. She was probably faking it.

Myth #4: My Wife is Eight Months Pregnant

My wife insists that she is, in fact, nine months pregnant.  She seems annoyed when I question this assertion, primarily on the basis that the idea of her being nine months pregnant is too terrifying to contemplate.  To support my position, I have pointed to a calendar where the subject's due date -- November 14 -- is circled on the calendar. In response, she keeps pointing back to some random date -- October 14 -- even though its circle is crossed out and labeled "Definitely not the due date."  She has been unreceptive to arguments pertaining to the fact that we clearly need more time.

Findings: Inconclusive. I'm pretty confident that this one is false, but I'll humor her.

Myth #5: Pregnancy Results in Babies

This is the most widespread myth of all. Certainly, Big Health would have you believe that the probable outcome of pregnancy is a baby, but my wife has been pregnant for almost a year now, and I have to tell you, we haven't seen even a single baby yet. Honestly, I think that this one is a lie, but for good measure, I'll wait until the twelve month mark to debunk this particular myth.

Findings: Inconclusive.

To recap: science is hard. In any event, hopefully my findings will prove useful to any of the countless men and women who are, or might soon become, pregnant. Good luck!

On Dinosaurs, Carnivorous Plants, and Fighting Nerds

I was recently invited to attend the Celebrate the Life Ahead gala, a fundraiser for refugee resettlement that included a silent auction component. Naturally, I opted to participate in the same manner that I do all of my socialization: at home, from behind my computer. While my wife was off gallivanting, hobnobbing, and giving some sort of speech that brought the audience to tears, I was crushing the competition.

The auction had actually opened a couple days earlier, but only the suckers bid early. Apart from a dummy bid to make sure the system works acceptably well, the real pros know that the only bid that counts is the one that wins. As an aside, I suppose I should mention that this isn't information that I've gleaned by virtue of being some sort of auction addict; I did a stint selling vintage dolls on eBay, which was an experience that taught me a variety of interesting but generally useless things. In any event, the key take away here is that all the action happens in the last minute or two. And, at the end of those two minutes, we claimed our prize: John Green.

Well, I mean it's not like we got to keep him. But we did win a "Coffee Date" with John and his best friend, Chris. Naturally, when John found out about this while speaking with my wife at the gala, his reaction was -- and I'm paraphrasing -- "What the hell is wrong with you?" At least, I assume this was his reaction, since he is well aware that my wife sees Chris literally every day, seeing as how he is her boss, and he could have set this up for free at any point. You will note that, while many of my bios list me as an "Author, programmer, and lawyer by technicality," none of them have ever described me as a "financial planner" or "all-around smart guy."

Anyway, somewhere behind the scenes, Chris presumably vouched for us as not being obsessive fans who would, for instance, covertly break into John's house under cover of darkness, night after night, so that we could shave his head and gradually collect enough of his hair to construct a life-sized John Green doll that would sit on our couch with us as we snuggled up as a family together and watched movies, and so John opted to instead invite us into his home for dinner (a decision he would almost certainly regret if he ever read this, partially because of the whole "hair doll" thing, but mostly because, as a writer, he should rightly resent the length and poor quality of this trainwreck of a sentence).

Now, what could convince the Greens to put up with us for the night? The answer is this. Go ahead and watch – this story isn’t going anywhere (seriously, it’s not).

And so it was that my wife (Una) and I were invited to dinner with John, his wife/yeti Sarah (I was too embarrassed to ask which was the more accurate title), Chris, and his wife, Marina. (Incidentally, I should briefly note that I recognize the unfortunate implications of the fact that the previous sentence has defined all of the women in this story in terms of their relationships with their respective men; unfortunately, the structure of this story has made any alternative constructions unwieldy). (I should further note that, at the current rate that the story is progressing, this blog entry will be complete in late 2017).

In advance of our arrival, Una and I decided to get the Greens a host/hostess gift, and stopped to pick up flowers along the way. Fun fact: the Dionaea muscipula, commonly known as the "Venus flytrap," develops white flowers in the spring. If you're thinking that giving someone a live plant that isn't particularly aesthetically pleasing and needs to eat live insects is about as thoughtful as giving someone a puppy and should therefore not be done by any decent human being, then you're right. And if, after hearing that they actually sell Venus flytraps in stores, you are wondering what kind of person would actually own a Venus flytrap, the answer is "John Green."

You're welcome, John.

A quick note: as we move into the anticlimax of this increasingly long-winded story, I'll be obscuring some of the details in order to avoid violating the privacy of a very nice couple that graciously invited us into their home, and also because Una gets angry when we're forced to share our hair dolls. Okay, yes, John and Sarah are both public figures with Wikipedia articles that I could easily use as a reference to determine what information is already publicly available, but let's be honest: I'm not known for backing up my writing with thorough research, and this blog is no exception.

Okay, back to the "story." When we arrived at the Greens' house/apartment/hidden jungle base somewhere in the American midwest, John, Sarah, and Chris met us at the door. Shortly thereafter, a small dog ran out and greeted us with the unrelenting enthusiasm that only a dog can muster. In light of the fact that many websites stupidly offer pet names as security questions, we'll call him and/or her "Holy Shit, That Dog Has a Dinosaur Costume!"

Shortly thereafter, we began the night with a meat and cheese plate. We sat outside, where the local variety of airborne, bloodsucking insects sniffed vaguely around me, then swarmed Una. In the background, an unspecified number of children--some of whom may or may not have been somehow related to the Greens--adamantly refused to eat their food, and probably killed the Venus flytrap. Meanwhile, Holy Shit, That Dog Has a Dinosaur Costume! discretely ate the meat casings that Chris (probably) thought he was safely discarding. The discussion covered a variety of topics, such as [censored], or [redacted], or how to dispose of a dead body. Once the insects finished feasting on Una, we moved the party inside. Dinner consisted of an undisclosed number of undisclosed dishes, one of which may or may not have been a bird that I can neither confirm nor deny as being chicken. Thankfully, the Greens weren't looking when I mangled the "chicken" as I somehow managed to extract its thigh bones without pulling any meat off, and then crushed several additional joints like I was some sort of enraged ogre. As another aside, this is not dissimilar to my approach to jigsaw puzzles, debugging software, and having sex; that is to say, there's a lot of swearing, I typically break something, and I'm usually glad that I’m alone.

During the meal proper, we covered topics that we could only discuss with John Green, such as how only an idiot would reread his own writing after he's done with it, John's involvement in certain unnamed movie adaptations of certain unnamed books about faulty stars, and how Una and I are decorating our nursery. The children, sensing weakness, exploited our presence to postpone bedtime. We realized that Una was wearing Sarah's old maternity pants, in a way that we could plausibly play off as being the result of a hand-me-down chain rather than another callback to the "hair doll." In short, a good time was had by all, except for possibly John and Sarah Green, and probably the Venus flytrap, and almost certainly that dog.

Eventually, the night ended, and we stepped out into the infinite blackness beyond the Greens' doorstep. While this might appear to be a somewhat melodramatic statement, it bears mention that I don't think there is any place on earth as dark as the Greens' front yard at night; fortunately, one of the advantages of the digital age is that, at any given moment, whatever happens to be in your hand can double as a flashlight.

As we left, Holy Shit, That Dog Has a Dinosaur Costume! followed us to our car and, as we backed out of the driveway, exhibited an intense curiosity about our front tire, or, possibly, the sweet release of death.

Una and I hesitated as the thought struck us both: How I killed John Green's Dog would make an excellent blog title. But then it occurred to us that it could be like with the Grim Reaper -- if you kill John Green's dog you become John Green's dog -- and I'm sure as hell not wearing a dinosaur costume. In the hopes of avoiding a fate worse than death, I got out of the car to move Holy Shit, That Dog Has a Dinosaur Costume! out of the way, only to find out that it was a trap: as soon as I was back out in the abyss of the Greens' front yard, the dog hopped into the car and excitedly barked for my wife to hit the gas while there was still time...the two of them could just put it all in the rear view, leave the Greens and the children and the dinosaur costumes behind...just drive until they ran out of gas...

I can only assume that my wife thought long and hard about this, but in the end, she'll always be a cat person.

P.S., Apologies to Marina, who has been edited out for length.

P.P.S, Apologies to my readers, for adding a "P.S." to a blog.

Win a Signed Copy of The Taste of Cashews

For a limited time only, you can enter to win a signed copy of the Taste of Cashews, by Will Hartzell-Baird!

...just to clarify, I'm Will Hartzell-Baird. You can enter to win a copy of the book, signed by me. Will Hartzell-Baird.

.goodreadsGiveawayWidget { color: #555; font-family: georgia, serif; font-weight: normal; text-align: left; font-size: 14px;
font-style: normal; background: white; }
.goodreadsGiveawayWidget p { margin: 0 0 .5em !important; padding: 0; }
.goodreadsGiveawayWidgetEnterLink {
display: inline-block;
color: #181818;
background-color: #F6F6EE;
border: 1px solid #9D8A78;
border-radius: 3px;
font-family: "Helvetica Neue", Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif;
font-weight: bold;
text-decoration: none;
outline: none;
font-size: 13px;
padding: 8px 12px;
}
.goodreadsGiveawayWidgetEnterLink:hover {
color: #181818;
background-color: #F7F2ED;
border: 1px solid #AFAFAF;
text-decoration: none;
}

Goodreads Book Giveaway







The Taste of Cashews



by Will Hartzell-Baird

Giveaway ends January 25, 2016.

See the giveaway details

at Goodreads.

Enter Giveaway

A Christmas Tree for Christmas

For the entire month of December, my wife has left the Hallmark channel on in the background, playing a never-ending stream of movies with names like "A Prince for Christmas," or "A Wedding for Christmas," roughly half of which star a woman who finds love while simultaneously struggling to further her career and raise her set of one-or-more orphans or orphan-like children from an unpreventably absent sibling.

However, after watching these movies for weeks straight, I started noticing something odd: reruns. Clearly, the Hallmark channel is having difficulty filling the 600 hours of Christmas-themed programming that they are morally obligated to provide throughout December, so as a fantastically unsuccessful writer, I figured I was qualified to lend a hand. Twenty minutes later, the script was ready. And, in the meantime, I thought I'd post a broad outline here, to delight my adoring fan:

A Christmas Tree for Christmas

Open on our heroine, Blondie (so called because she is probably blonde for some reason, and you missed the first ten minutes so you're not sure what her actual name is). Anyway, Blondie is at the food court, talking to her sensible brunette friend, Stacy. Blondie is lamenting that the bank is threatening to foreclose on her mall kiosk, where she sells Christmas trees, unless she can pay her balance in full by December 24th. And to make matters worse, she only has three days left until Christmas and she hasn't had time to buy presents yet for her brother's orphaned children, which she's looking after while he's out of town on a business trip.

At this point, it's about time to introduce some sort of non-denominational supernatural entity, like a mall Santa who might be the real Santa, or some kindly old lady who might be an angel (the Christmas kind, not the smiting kind), but you're not really sure because, again, you missed the first ten minutes, and they probably played coy about it anyway. We'll go with a Christmas platypus, because seriously, those things are awesome. So after Blondie and Stacy finish their coffee, or sandwich, or whatever they're pretending to eat for the camera, Blondie trips over this magical platypus and spills her coffee on this handsome guy who is talking on his cell phone. He's a little startled at first because it's hot coffee, but he's really cool about it, and instead of swearing and suffering third degree burns and going to the hospital, he just kind of laughs it off, then stares at her in a way that's romantic and not at all creepy, then makes a joke about how they should do coffee, but this time they'll keep it inside the cups. Also, his name is Brad or something.

A few minutes later, Blondie is back to work at her kiosk, where there's this old man looking at the Christmas trees, and Blondie asks if she can help. The old man declines, saying that he's just browsing, because they remind him of childhood with his family, and in any event, he can't afford a Christmas tree. Blondie is touched, and gives the old man a free tree, even though she can't even pay rent, or her mortgage, or whatever it was she had to pay in order to save her kiosk. As it happens, Brad Or Something is passing by and overhears this interaction, then helps the old man carry the tree to his car. Meanwhile, Stacy stops by the kiosk, and they chat about Blondie's upcoming date with Brad, and how she should cancel, since she should really focus on saving her kiosk. Stacy says something like "Don't you dare," and insists that she follow through with the date. They probably argue some more, but there's a commercial break, so you go to use the restroom, and by the time you get back, Blondie is talking to that platypus for some reason.

Anyway, then Blondie and Brad O'Something have their coffee date, where she talks about how her kiosk is going out of business because she sells Christmas trees, which no one buys eleven months out of the year. Then he suggests that maybe he could give her some business advice, since he's a successful C.E.O. at some sort of social media company, but that sets her off, and she says that she'll run The Christmas Tree Kiosk the same way her father ran it when he was in charge. She then breaks things off with Brad, saying that they're too different, and besides, she just doesn't get along with his mother, the queen of England. At this point you start to wonder how much you missed while you were in the restroom, and whether you should start eating more bran.

Blondie runs out of the coffee shop, and then the camera pans over to see the platypus watching her go, and his eyes sparkle as some mischievous Christmas bells jingle in the background. The screen fades to black, about thirty minutes of commercials play, and then we find Blondie moping at the house with her orphan(s), who sympathize with her plight, and, in an adorable lisp, they express that she doesn't have to worry about buying them gifts, since she's having financial trouble. Blondie tells them that's sweet, but they don't have to worry about her finances.

The next day, Blondie opens the door to her kiosk (which has a door in a way that totally makes sense), and sees that people are lined up all throughout the mall, waiting for the kiosk to open. The crowd cheers when they see her, and while her employees sell Christmas trees like mad, Stacy calls and asks if Blondie has seen "it," then explains that her kiosk is all over the social media - coincidentally, the same social network that Brad happens to own. Next, the old man from earlier comes up to her and says that in order to thank her for her generosity, he's gotten her a thank you gift - a pair of toy platypuses that will be perfect for her orphan children. After some profuse thanks, the man leaves. After that, some grouchy bald man from the bank stops by to repossess the kiosk, but Blondie has sold so many trees that she writes him a check right then and there. The bald man is baffled, and while he's gaping at the check, one of the customers accidentally hits him in the face with a Christmas tree branch.

Finally, Brad shows up to apologize for trying to tell her how to run her business (neither of them noticing that he had just single-handedly saved her business by doing things his way), and that his mother (the queen) had changed her ways, and wouldn't try to sabotage their relationship anymore. They kiss as some Christmas music plays in the background, and as the camera pans up, the focus lands on the mall Christmas tree, but instead of having a star or an angel, the tree topper is a platypus.

THE END

And there you have it: definitive proof that no matter what I write, it'll probably be kind of weird.