Monday, June 14, 2010

God’s Will

One of the more . . . interesting . . . things to come out of the BP disaster is the right wing insistence that this is somehow the liberals’ fault, or my favorite, “an act of God.”

Mmm, hmm! ‘Cause God is in the oil business you know. I'm pretty sure that if God wanted oil all over the fucking place, he would have drilled those holes himself.

But then I started thinking. You know there are an awful lot of “acts of God” that seem to especially victimize the South. Hurricanes, tornadoes, floods, humidity, televangelists. I could go on, but you get the picture. God obviously hates the South.

But wait a minute? Isn’t the South all red states? Isn’t the South the bastion of conservatism, especially religious and way too busy minding other people’s business?

Holy Shit! God hates religious conservatives and red staters! How could I have missed this? It’s so obvious.

Maybe all that “God’s will” you keep talking about is actually taking his name in vain. And that’s a pretty big sin according to that book you like to thump around.

Glory, indeed.

Wednesday, June 2, 2010

Throw Mama From the Plane!

So we’re on the way back from our brief respite, flying out of Wide Stance International Airport (also known as Minneapolis/St. Paul). I am, of course, like a kid in a candy store. I love airports. I love watching people in airports (can’t imagine why?!?!).

Our gate was near the end of a moving sidewalk. The origin of said sidewalk was out of sight, but I can only imagine the origins of this particular cluster. As I watched, an entire family came into view. Three generations, led by Grandma, closely followed by the married couple and grandkids. Actually, I should say they were led by Grandma’s WALKER. That’s right, they put grandma on a moving sidewalk . . . WITH HER WALKER!!

Cue disaster! Cue hilarity! Cuz, bitches, pretty soon that sidewalk ends. And ya gots to get off. Grandma and her walker had NO CHANCE. Apparently, they were an especially close-knit family, since they were giving each other essentially zero personal space. I’m all for family ties, but in this instance it was a bad, bad idea.

As Grandma struggled mightily to put her history of ambulation to use and stay upgright while exiting, the rest of the family plowed into her (guess they never thought to walk backward). Literally they all wound up in a giant pile at the end of the moving sidewalk, Grandma on bottom.

Fortunately, no one was hurt. Except for me. I slightly pulled a muscle turning away so they wouldn’t see me laughing.

And yes, once again, I’m aware that I’m doomed to the fiery pits of hell. We’re on the same flight.

Tuesday, June 1, 2010

The Mosquito Cost

Sometimes I am a diva. This will come as a complete shock to . . .absolutely no one. While I apply my Southern Belle upbringing in wide swaths, I have moments where my actions and intentions don’t exactly go together.

Take this holiday weekend. My proscritos del norte invited us to join the family at their cabin in the woods of northern Wisconsin, on the shores of Lake Superior. Beautiful. Bucolic. Relaxing. Inviting. All the things you’d want from a brief respite. Except for the SWARMS of mosquitoes. Billions by my quick mathematical calculations (#of actual mosquitoes minus futile fanning divided by degree of exasperation time degree of exaggeration). It was ridiculous.

I don’t know, maybe it was the margaritas or maybe it was being so close to Canada that I got to thinking I was Celine Dion carrying prefab twins or something, but I fished out my metaphorical Marie Antoinette wig and boldy took action: I decided to pay the offspring to kill the mosquitos.

A dollar.

Per mosquito.

Uh-huh, I know.

Who knew that a 12 year old could be a killing machine. Two hundred mosquitoes later and daddy is thinking “that coulda been a bar tab instead of a mass hit on the Cheeshead mosquito population.” Hell, I may have to go give blood a few times to scrape that together. Should have just given it to the mosquitoes and cut out the middlemen.