The way Christmas should be; used to be

Let's trip down memory lane for a minute.

Back in the day before Big Box stores took over Christmas. Before crowds camped out in the cold parking lot so they could stampede the place at the crack of dawn and run each other over in search of the latest techno-toy.

Back in the day when people wished each other a Merry Christmas and meant it. Before political correctness made people began couching their greetings with "If you celebrate Christmas, may I wish you a merry one?"

Was it all that long ago that we looked forward to Christmas Eve and Christmas Day, when there was no Black Friday, Black Monday, or day after Christmas sales -- even stores that were closed Christmas Eve and Christmas Day?

When did The Retailer edge out the baby in the manger and Santa Claus? How do we get them back?

Something is missing in the Christmas season. Maybe it's a day or several spent baking special cookies, making divinity, the smell of good things from the oven. Or could it be the scent of a cedar tree that was dragged in from outside, its trunk chopped a bit more so the top didn't brush the ceiling? When did trees become designer accessories with a color scheme — a theme for Pete's sake? What happened to the colorful lights and strands of tinsel and ornaments festooned with glitter?

I miss the Christmases when I would count up my babysitting money and head to Woolworths. Woolworths was there year round, but at Christmas it became magical. A trip to Woolworths meant lunch at the counter — a burger and fries, their light and airy cheesecake, exquisite egg salad sandwiches. Then a trip through the store to buy Evening in Paris or Desert Flower gift sets, the latest trend in costume jewelry, a record or two after you asked the clerk to play it first to make sure it didn't skip. There were Old Spice gift sets, a wonderland of toys, necklaces and earrings to match, coffee mugs, chip and dip servers — you could buy something for everyone on your gift list and have some left over to get yourself the latest Cutex nail polish color. With a matching lipstick sometimes.

No one pushed, no one shoved. You savored the bright lights, smells from the lunch counter, music in the air, and when you were ready to check out you stopped by the candy counter for a bag of bridge mix to take home.

Forget crowded parking lots, overheated big mart stores, space aliens and big mean transformers, pink plastic trees, and keeping the receipts in case you need to take something back, or dolls so far beyond puberty they would disdain the little girls who treasure them if those little girls didn't look like they can't wait for their boobs to develop.

Bring back department store Santas, who could easily pass for the real guy. Bring back the cold nights with dress up clothes to wear to the school Christmas plays. Bring back getting warm PJs for Christmas, and snuggly slippers. Hot chocolate and sugar cookies. Hard candy and nuts you have to crack. Oranges and tangerines dropped in stockings along with candy canes.

Heck, bring back Woolworths! Christmas hasn't been right since it closed!

Things I can do without

Ladies magazines lately have been printing lists of things various people, mostly celebrities, can't live without. Some of these pampered people would just expire if they didn't have a certain kind of mascara, or some herbal tea that tastes awful, or some such thing.

There's really nothing other than oxygen, chocolate and cats that I can't live without, but there are some things I wouldn't miss if I didn't have to be aware of them. Here's a few:

> Knowing anything at all about the Lohans, pere et fille.
> Food-flavored bath products. I'd rather smell like flowers than food. And there's something very distasteful about the latest product I noticed: chocolate cherry foot cream.
> Blue and green nail polish. One looks like a bruise; the other a fungus.
> What passes for Saturday morning cartoons on TV. Where oh where are Bugs Bunny, Mighty Mouse, Sylvester and Tweety Bird? And what in the world are Transformers doing to the minds of innocent little children?
> Vegetable pizza. If a pizza doesn't have greasy, spicy meat offset by anchovies, then don't even bother wasting dough.
> Kim Kardashian's back to back wedding and divorce, Paris Hilton's anything, and Jessica Simpson's pregnancy.
> Non-stop political debates among a dozen so-called candidate wanna-bees that turn into bitch-fests. Very little solid information ever escapes from them.
> Presidential prime-time speeches peppered with surly innuendo. Leak it to the press like everyone else and quit interrupting NCIS!
> Christmas store promotions in September.
> Sports games on TV that leak over into subsequent programing time. Whose brilliant idea was it to stop the clock so players can wander around, scratch their backsides, and split hairs over nothing of any importance in the greater scheme of things?
> Daylight Savings Time. Sanity returns this weekend!
> Laws that prevent normal people from delivering a pie in the face to anyone seen driving and talking on a cell phone.
> By the same token, laws that prevent anyone from kneecapping anyone who blows a red light because they were distracted while driving. It should be open season on anyone seen behind the wheel with a bent elbow and a hand against the ear.
> Green bean casserole.
> Brussels sprouts.
> Sphynx cats. I love cats, but fur-less felines are a cruel trick on nature.
> Inappropriate apostrophe's.
> Unnecessary "quote" marks.

Watch out world! Women in their M&M years (between menopause and Medicare) are going to take over the world. We're getting our lists in order!

Fear and loathing in the supermarket

A trip to the supermarket is not for the faint of heart, and lately it has gotten worse.

Shoppers push those metal carts up and down aisles like they're trying to win NASCAR points. When you reach the end of an aisle, you need a traffic signal light to proceed into the crossing aisle to go around the end displays and into the next aisle. Those not so lucky may need a paramedic. It's like a demolition derby in there sometimes.

If that weren't bad enough, some yahoo invented the miniature shopping carts for children to push along while Mom ignores them in favor of checking labels on cans of dog food. Get two or more of those cart-pushing brats in one aisle and the next thing you know they're having a contest to see who can bruise the most ankles of other shoppers who had sense enough to leave their kids at home.

And then there are the shoppers who have to march two abreast down the aisles in unison, chatting all the while, oblivious to anyone who wants to get around them. And we all know about the people who slip in 26 items in the 20-items-or-less aisle claiming that six cans of cat food should count as one item because it's all the same product.

Now we have the extreme couponers. These people are lethal! At the checkout counter, they're worse than people who buy in bulk through WIC. Look for determined-looking women (men wouldn't bother with extreme couponing) with loose-leaf note books full of coupons separated by category.

In the aisles, you can see them balancing their binders on the shopping cart handles while they clear the shelves of every jar of peanut butter, every box of cornflakes, leaving none for anyone else.

They lie in wait at newspaper vending racks, put in enough money for a paper, then clear out the rack of papers to get the coupons. They rifle through stacks of papers on a store counter to get the pages of coupons.

A leisurely stroll among the rutabagas and bottles of ginger ale is a thing of the past. You take your life in your hands just running in for a quick loaf of bread, assuming there's any left after the couponers get there.

Parade was wrong

Last week's Parade magazine published an article comparing cats to dogs as perfect pets. Dogs won.

Well, of course the research was flawed! Obviously the research panel was stacked in favor of dogs. The criteria that determined which pet is better favored the canine bunch.

No one judged either animal on sarcasm. Cats would win paws down. When I give my cat Arthur food he doesn't like, he draws his paw over it like it's something nasty in his litter box. Show me a dog with an opinion!

Generosity. Dogs will bring you anything you throw away, and call it a game of fetch. A cat will bring you something she actually went out and chose: a not-quite-dead mouse.

Parade gave dogs points for herding. Said it was part of the canine work ethic. Cats can herd just as well as dogs can, but they don't limit themselves to sheep or cattle. Cats herd humans -- from the living room to the kitchen to where the cat food and kitty treats are kept. Talk about leadership skills!

Dogs may be loyal and all that, but what dog will risk his life to make sure the food you're eating won't poison you. Both my cats are right there on the spot at every meal, making sure that my meat isn't tainted. If that isn't love I don't know know what is.

Cat people are a different breed of ... well ... cat. We can see the hidden talents of our feline-Americans and should have been better represented on Parade's panel of judges.

Besides, there's nothing more comforting than snuggling up with a sleepy cat and listening to it purr. Show me a dog that can do that!

Random thoughts from a wandering mind

Much talk has been going around lately about how we're living in the last few gasps of civilization's breath. Some quote Nostradamus; others Revelations. All I know is that the weather has been goofy lately, it snowed in Hawaii in June, and last week my doctor was early for my appointment with him. Early! A doctor! Three exam rooms, no waiting! That's scary.

Ladies, a tip that will save your sanity as well as your appearance. Ever get in the car and realize you're not wearing lipstick? Dive into your purse, fish out your lipstick — before you start the car, of course — and use the rear view mirror to apply it. Whatever you do, don't use the mirror on the back of the sun visor, Trust me on this one; you don't want to see that closely. Besides if you use the rear view mirror you have to tilt your head back a little, and that's good exercise for the sagging neck.

It's amazing how your attitude changes about some things. Ten years ago when I was earlier into my M&M years (between menopause and Medicare) but not quite senior status, I was checking out groceries and a snarky little child just barely out of Pampers who was working the cash register asked me if I wanted the senior discount. I informed her that I did not qualify, and she said "I'll give it to you anyway." Little twit!

Now fast forward 10 years. I'm shopping with a friend in an apparel store I'd been to the day before; she wanted to go after I told her about what I'd bought. The saleswoman offered my friend (only two years older than I) a senior discount. I was really ticked! Not for my friend, she can be ticked for her own reasons, but she wasn't. No one offered me a discount the day before! Never mind that I should be flattered that the saleslady didn't think I was a senior -- I WANTED that discount!

One last thought. It's summer and baseball is being played at all levels. There's something traditional about baseball reports on the news, hearing the play by play on radio, the warmth of the sun at the ball field, the taste of hotdogs — the crack of the bat on the ball. There's just something wrong about the clink of the ball on an aluminum bat. Whose idea was that anyway?

Just thinking....

Confessions of a word nerd

There are few things that annoy me more than bad grammar.

Now that I've said that, picky people in Blogland will be looking for mistakes in this post, but that's OK. Leave your name and contact. I want to connect with kindred spirits. I just want to know you're really out there.

I grit my teeth whenever I hear "between you and I." My eyes roll involuntarily when I hear something like, "Mother left a bundle to my sister and I." If your grammar is that bad, you can't be trusted with an inheritance.

And I really lose it when I read about someone who wants to loose a bad habit.

Unneeded "quote" marks drive me batty; and if you want to make me suffer, tell me about someone who has went on to become an English teacher. And if you use the word "irregardless" I swear I'll think long and hard about kneecapping you.

I nearly freeze with anger when I hear someone say he took a chicken out of the freezer to unthaw. If you want to unthaw the damn bird, leave it in the freezer!

Whenever I hear news broadcasters make grammar errors, I wonder what the world is coming to. These are supposedly educated people. They speak for a living. They should know their verb tenses and how to make pronouns agree with nouns. And by now everyone should know the difference between to, two, and too, their, they're and there, its and it's and your and you're. It ain't rocket surgery!

Life as a word nerd is challenging. My tongue is constantly sore from my biting it to keep from making an ass of myself correcting someone's grammar. I may be anal retentive, but I do try to be polite. Besides, I can imagine that constant correction would be very annoying. I have other ways to be annoying that are much more fun.

So if anyone is reading this and thinking "Yeah! I agree!" or "Right on!," then do let me know you're out there so I'll know I am not alone in this world.

And if all of this has whizzed right over your head, and you're wondering what all the fuss is about — Yeah! I'm talking about you!

The bird is on the wing -- thump!

Maybe it has something to do with spring.

A couple of weeks ago, when I got to work one morning I kept hearing a thumping sound coming from the back room. It wasn't the Fax machine malfunctioning, nor was it someone trying to break in (or out; I got there before my staff did).

It was a bird hitting the window. I saw the wings flutter and saw the impact and heard the thump. The stupid bird kept flying into the window. It was almost as if he believed that if he kept hitting the glass often enough, he'd move the building out of his way and fly across the street.

Then I remembered, a year ago about this time, a bird — maybe the same one — repeatedly flew into the window. Thump!

For the last couple of weeks, that bird-brained bird keeps hitting the window. What's up with that?

Could it be that it's last year's bird, and it just keeps trying to move the building hoping this year he'll be successful?

Could it be he's the offspring of last year's bird and flying into windows is genetic?

Maybe he's suicidal. And determined. Albeit extremely unsuccessful which ought to make him even more suicidal.

It certainly isn't because the window glass is so clear that the bird can't tell it's a window.

That's it! Maybe he thinks the window is a big flat tree and he wants to land on it.

Is there such a thing as a neurotic, self-destructive bird?

Or do I have too much time on my hands?

Why people don't read instruction manuals

In every large purchase, there's always a pamphlet telling you how to put it together and how to fix it when it breaks.

These manuals are basically worthless.

If you've bought something not made in this country (which is practically everything), you get a manual written in a foreigner's version of English. It has entertainment value, but not much information.

After I assembled the last vacuum cleaner I bought, I looked at the instruction manual — yes in that order — for some of the finer points of using the sweeper. It turn out that the manual drawings don't look anything like the vacuum I bought. This is the case in most items -- the drawing always has a few extra knobs and buttons than the product you bought.

Or you might read something like "this feature not available on Model Number 823B" and you have Model Number 823B. Where are the instructions for 823B — in the box with Model 823A?

So you just put the thing together, hook it up the best way you can. In the case of computer equipment or a DVD player, you call in a 12-year-old who will get it up and running in 30 seconds flat.

But I have the owner's manual problem that beats them all. Recently I bought a new car. The salesman went over all the features of the vehicle with me, but really, how different are cars anyway? I could figure out the lights, wipers, cruise control and all that stuff, but one button on the CD player left me baffled. It left the salesman baffled too.

My car has a cat folder. It's a button that has arrows on it indicating forward and backward.

Chances are that I'll need one are pretty slim. My cats are more than capable of folding themselves. Actually they'd rather stretch. But they're seldom in the car. When they have to go to the vet, they're in carriers and they're crouched and complaining anyway, so why fold them. They're already ticked off.

I pushed the button and nothing happened. And when I went to look for the cats, I found them unfolded.

So I checked the owner's manual. It was predictable. The drawing of the dashboard doesn't look a thing like my dashboard. Actually, there were three drawings, one for however many CDs your player is capable of holding. None of them looked like mine.

But one did have a button marked "folder." It's for storing songs from an iPod. But there was nothing about cats.

So if anyone needs a cat folded, I have a cat folder. I just don't know how to use it.

Reality weather

A winter storm is brewing, again, and we all know what that means. Weather forecasters will prove that they don't have enough sense to come in out of it.

That probably isn't fair. They may very well know, but they probably have bosses who think it lends a touch of reality to send their weather reporters out in freezing rain, knee-deep snow, torrential rain, and blowing winds to tell TV viewers to stay inside because it's really bad out there.

We've all seen them, on the cable Weather Channel and on local news. Before dawn even cracks, they're out there in an empty parking lot scruffing their feet around chortling, "Look at how deep this ice is! It's really slippery."

Or they're leaning into the wind, holding on for dear life, describing how Hurricane Gidget is really tearing roofs off houses, and for Pete's sake, get out of town!

My personal favorite is the film crew that drives around while snow and ice are building up and the road crews aren't even out yet, the camera guy is filming the windshield wipers going back and forth and the reporter narrating "It's gosh-awful out here; better stay off the roads."


Some weather forecast events I'd like to see —

An 80-degree day, blue skies, balmy breezes, weather guy slugging down a glass of iced tea, saying, "It's a gorgeous day out here. Too bad you're stuck at work and my job is to be out here rubbing it in your face."

Early spring. Weather crew is standing in a freshly-mowed field; pollen flying; bees buzzing. Weather guy swatting at bees with one hand, holding the mic and an injection pen with the other, wiping his nose on his sleeve and sneezing. "It's allergy season, folks," he croaks. "Crank up the air conditioners."

Wintry mix falling, accumulating. Weather guy on a parking lot. "It's really coming down, freezing rain mixed with sleet. Let me show you what the parking lot looks like here.' Takes a step, and THUD! Followed by "(Expletive), let me inside, dammit! It's not fit out here for man, beast or studio executive."

Now that would be reality TV at its best.

Winter fantasies

Snow is piled up almost to the top of my foot, and it's colder than a well-digger's back pocket. On days like this, rather than slip my way to work I'd rather stay home and — focus on food.

I imagine hot pots of homemade soup simmering on the stove. I fantasize about warm cornbread out of the oven. I dream of chili, hot and spicy. Warm cookies. Steaming pans of brownies. ....Ooooh!

Ahem. Excuse me. Got a little carried a way there.

The actual work that goes into preparing all those things doesn't occur to me. Cleanup gets pushed out of my mind. Slogging my way through snow and cold to take bags of trash to the Dumpster doesn't even enter the picture.

I dream of snuggling down with warm comfort food, and all my cares melt like the accumulated frozen sludge on the bottom of my car.

Maybe if one day I actually did make hot soup, and warm cornbread, and brownies on a cold snowy day I would either 1) be satisfied to have carried out a longing desire or 2) realized that my cold-day fantasy is a lot like Christmas memories -- all the reality and disappointment are edited out.

My money's on number 2. I've experienced too many times of finding out Prince Charming is really a toad.

Maybe it's the fantasy that keeps me warm on cold days, because in my dream world, I don't see myself chopping vegetable and scrubbing dirty utensils. Just inhaling the aroma and enjoying the flavors and warmth. In my fantasy I scarf down the entire pan of brownies and don't gain weight. And my cornbread never crumbles either.

Maybe the snow will melt soon and it'll warm up and I can go back to fantasizing about Harrison Ford ditching that scrawny Callista Flockhart and coming over to revel in making me some hot soup and cornbread.

My magic wand

If I had a magic wand, I'd wave it and turn myself into a lawyer.

Don't want to sue anyone. Don't want to lower myself. I want to be a lawyer because lawyers become judges, and that's what I really want.

I want to be the judge that hears Ohio Congressman Dennis Kucinich's suit against the lunchroom where he bit down on an olive pit. In 2008.

This is so stupid on so many levels. The guy is a congressman. He has better health insurance than anyone else, and it includes dental coverage. So it's not like the dental bills set him back financially. He waited nearly three years to sue. Did that tooth just now start throbbing, or was this just too far down on his to-do list?

Kucinich is seeking damages of $150,000 — because of a broken tooth. No, he says it was because the sandwich was inedible and contained a pit in an olive that was supposed to be pitted.

News flash for you, Kucinich: Pit happens. It says so on the jars they're packed in.

Yes, if I were a judge, I'd throw the book at him for wasting the court's time. If he'd taken daintier bites of his sandwich, he might have noticed the pit before chomping on it. Regular fluoride treatments and flossing might have made for strong healthy teeth that can withstand the occasional olive pit.

I'd find him guilty of gross stupidity, and bar him from eating popcorn that might have unpopped kernels in it, salt-water taffy, peanut brittle, and caramels. The guy has to be stopped!

As a judge I'd also sentence him to weeks of public service — stuffing pimientos into olives.

Then I'd impose an additional fine for gross stupidity, arrogance, and for making me waste a good wave of my magic wand, making me turn into a lawyer instead of making me rich and thin.

The solution for all that's wrong

I think I know the answer to most of the world's problems.

Bubble wrap.

Has anyone ever popped bubble wrap without a smile? Or a giggle? Or a devious grin that precedes more, maniacal, popping of bubble wrap?

Can't you just see a courtroom situation with one lawyer cross-examining a witness, the other lawyer plotting his response, the judge listening ominously on the bench, when POP! POPPOPPOP!

They'd probably dive under their chairs thinking someone opened fire on them, but imagine how the atmosphere in the room would lighten once the court reporter holds up a flattened sheet of bubble wrap and says, "Hey! No worries! It's just bubble wrap!"

Then they'd all share a good chuckle and the wheels of justice would spin a little faster.

Or imagine what a round of bubble wrap would do at a filibuster in the somber halls of the Senate. Both sides of the aisle would find reason to grin, elbow each other, and look around for a little wrap to roll between bipartisan fingers. It's what this country needs more than half a dozen bridges leading to the side of a cliff to keep the pork flowing back home.

Who knew bubble wrap started out as someone's idea of home decor? In the 1950s someone invented it as a new kind of wallpaper, when texture was a key word in wall covering and not in food preparation. For some reason, the notion just didn't take off. Flocked wallpaper did, but not puffy, popping wallpaper. Who'da thunk it?

It would certainly be a way of making sure you didn't get fingerprints on the walls. One touch in a dark room as you're trying to feel your way in after a late night and POP! Well, maybe that's why it didn't take off.....

If everyone had a shot at bubble wrap on a daily basis, the entire society's sense of humor would improve. At a UPS store not long ago, I saw a huge roll of it, about 5 feet high and several feet across. I asked the clerk if she ever felt, as I did at that moment, the temptation to spread some of on the floor and roll on it.

She definitely needed a sense of humor.

National Bubble Wrap Appreciation Day is coming, Jan. 31. I'm saving up!

Just say it!

OK. It's a new year and some people make resolutions. I find resolutions to be a huge waste of time, but there is one thing I want to do now that a fresh new year awaits us like pizza dough awaiting pepperoni.

I'm officially declaring war on political correctness. What has PC gotten us except for a way to dance around subjects and pussyfoot around the truth?

The last straw was when it was suggested that 'illegal aliens' was hurtful and instead should be called 'undocumented foreigners.' Male bovine byproduct! They weren't born here; they're aliens. They sneaked in across the border and are dodging INS agents; they're illegal. Hurtful? Unless you say it in Spanish, it's doubtful they know the difference.

But I digress.....

One of the things I looked forward to when I was young was that when I grew old (see how easy it is?) I could say what was on my mind and people would think it's cute because I'm an old lady. I will not be denied that!

No more will I bite my tongue when some punk calls me "young lady." I know some women of a certain age (oops! Missed one - old ladies) find it flattering, but I find it patronizing and insulting. So next time I hear "How are you young lady," the response will be "Just fine, little man, how are you?"

A few weeks ago I watched with a great deal of pride as a woman older than I responded to a waiter who asked "Can I get you guys anything else?" She replied, "Do we look like guys?"

I dipped my foot in the water recently at a doctor's office. When the nurse asked, "Did we have lab work today," I responded "I had lab work; I don't know about you."

Damn that felt good! Earlier when I stepped on the scale I asked "Now you do allow 20 pounds for clothes, don't you?" She looked at me in all seriousness and said, "Not 20."

The world also needs to develop a sense of humor, but I can tackle only one resolution at a time. After all, I'm old and I can't tackle stuff like I used to."