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17 Dec 07 - 04:46 PM (#2217512) Subject: BS: Holiday mishaps From: Donuel Christmas time is similar to a wedding, we make our plans and try to be as crafty and inventive as possible and press on. There lies the rub. We try something new. Face it most of us are not Rachel Ray or Martha Stewart so handing us a hot glue gun without a background check is a dangerous thing to do. You know like the time your spouse glued a wreath to her head while bending over with a hot glue gun? Anyway... I write this now with wet buring eyes. More about that later. My saga began with my wife getting an award plaque from work. It was one of those 'We don't want to really condone what you did or reward you for what you did since the truth virtually embarrased some politically appointed honchos, nor can we we punish you so we are giving you this f***ing plaque, kind of awards.' Some of the actual wording was "for exceptional competence in answering challenging questions about the complex array of federal..." So anyway my wife says "Honey can you do anything with this f***ing plaque?" Being of such high brow clever wit I figured I could turn it into bathroom humor. Since the padded seat already had a burn on it I thought I could mount the plaque on the under side of the lid and spray the seat gold. It was gorgeous and ellicited the appropriate amount of laughter from my wife. Later that night I had to go and tested the seat with my hand which felt perfectly dry and not the slightest tacky. Needless to say and excluding any metion of naughty bits, I was stuck. With self reliant pioneer courage I began to pull away with Spartan fortitude. It was like the worst and biggest band aid removal in my life. I washed my face to disguise my trauma as I glanced down at the seat with the new imprint of a kind of fingerprint that might inspire some desperate homeland security private contractor who needs a new biometric identifier project idea. To neaten up further I brushed my hair and closed my eyes and held my breath as I applied the hairspray. Ah-oh, even with my eyes closed and holding my breath the smell of gold paint seeped into my nose. Being blonde it was not immediately so noticable but when I turned my head in front of the mirrors front to back, my head gleamed gold. If I were about to play King Midas in the Christmas play I was perfect, although I'm sure my gold butt would not come into play. Ok maybe it was the fumes but my holiday cheer was undeterred. I was thinking that the McCormack flavoring bottles might make the house smell more festive than gold spray paint, which seemed to follow me everywhere. You know a sort of aroma therapy. I chose the Peppermint for the tree which already had candy canes on it. Drip drip drip...sniff sniff, hmmm nothing. OK a little more down here dribble dribble... oops the bottle is empty. My eyes began to burn as the mint mist hit me full force. Many hours later my eyes still feel hot as the exhaust fan hums merrily away. Most people experiment with tree colors: they have their blue silver tree one year and then maybe a burgandy tree the next. For me this Christmas will be forever known as the mint gold Christmas of 07. |
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17 Dec 07 - 05:04 PM (#2217531) Subject: RE: BS: Holiday mishaps From: Donuel admin delete or stash in the joke thread. oooo maybe the worst part are the stickey gold eyelids |
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17 Dec 07 - 09:13 PM (#2217725) Subject: RE: BS: Holiday mishaps From: Donuel Oderless turpentine doesn't seem to do much with enamel paint removal. Just as I was starting to clean a small strand of hair the doorbell rung. There were two Mormon missionaries who apparently had lost their voice just staring at my half gold head. I said " (admin this is your last chance to delete this monologue.) |
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17 Dec 07 - 09:37 PM (#2217739) Subject: RE: BS: Holiday mishaps From: catspaw49 Well hell Donnie.......Since you're trying so hard, here's a well worn piece of tripe for your thread! I know many of you have read this before but every year as Christmas approaches I can't help but remember the first time I met Cletus, Paw, and Buford...... I had noticed an area on Rt. 664 just outside of our little village being carefully prepared and roped off as I drove by and every now and then there were these three guys working there, building a little shed and driving stakes into the ground about 6 feet apart. It finally dawned on me that they were getting ready to sell Christmas trees. Now I have always gotten ours from the same place for years, but the prices were getting pretty steep so I kept an eye out for new sources. The day they put up the lights, I stopped to see when they'd be bringing the trees in. As I got out of the van I couldn't help but notice that these three, from all appearances, were a bit "down on their luck" and it made me want to help them out a bit. One of them, an angular and lean character came up to me and introduced himself as "Cletus." I asked about the trees and he was glad to tell me all about them in that way which I've since learned to interpret. There is, I now know, a sort of "Cletus-speak" that requires a certain knowledge of him that I didn't have then. At that time however all I could seem to understand was that they were "working on them." These many years later, that kind of phrase would set off alarms, but I didn't know Cletus then so I thought it was just an odd hilljack way of phrasing things. Paw came over and I liked the old guy a lot right away. He said he'd seen me before and I remembered him as well......something about the sewage plant and the day it exploded. I couldn't place what it was that this guy had to do with it but the correlation seemed quite vivid. I shook his hand and he farted in return. I had never met anyone who was quite so casual with flatulence. Paw used it almost as punctuation......."How ya' doin'?" (rriippp) "Purty day ain't she?" (bbraawwmmpp)..........Let's just say it took some getting used to and made it easy to understand why this old coot could probably not find gainful employment. But for all that, he was a friendly cuss who told me they called him Paw because he was from Paw-Paw, West Virginia. He pointed out the other fellow named Buford who was involved in extricating himself from a string of Christmas lights that seemed to have attacked him. Even from a distance, the unmistakable smell of Iron City brew was pretty strong. I figured he spilled about the same amount on himself as he drank and I later found this to be not only true, but the amounts involved were prodigious. All in all, I couldn't help but like them even if they were, well, let's just call them odd and drop it right there. They told me the trees would be in and they'd be open for business on Friday at 6 PM. I left shaking my head at the idea of bringing Karen and the kids here with these guys to "pick out the tree" as was so traditional with our family, but what the hell? We could at least check them out. On Friday afternoon Karen and I were going into Lancaster and as we passed by I pointed out the place, not that it was really necessary to point. I'd never seen anything quite so garish in my life but it was one of those gray Ohio days, very cold and occasionally spitting snow so perhaps it was the contrast......perhaps not. Karen was making comments about the place, but as we drove past we could both see the trees that were now in place. Surprisingly enough, they looked magnificent! All were very full and perfectly shaped and a greener bunch of Christmas trees I'd never seen. Even at 65 mph, Karen saw one on the far end of the first row that she said was absolutely "the one!" Since she and our kids were going to spend the night with Connie and go shopping on Saturday, I promised her I'd stop back and get the tree and forget the tradition for one year. So on my return trip I looked at my watch and saw that I'd arrive about the time Cletus told me they would open and sure enough, I was the first one there. Cletus, Paw, and Buford, greeted me as a long lost friend. They were really in the Christmas Spirit and offered me some of their "spirits." Friends, there is 'Shine and then there is 'Shine and whatever it was they had in the Mason jars was not. I found out later that this was a homebrew of their own and made not from corn, but soybeans instead, and distilled through an old radiator off a Mack. Luckily I only tasted it, but that single gulp went down like a 4-stage rocket, taking my breath away, and immediately starting to bore a hole in my stomach. After the coughing subsided I gave them the common courtesy line you use upon tasting any 'Shine..........."Smooth!" They were all adorned themselves with some of the seediest Santa hats I had ever seen and were ready for business. They said I was the first customer and I nodded appreciatively while glancing about at the trees. Even up at a closer viewing they seemed almost perfectly formed and beautifully green and I thought the light snow must be the reason they glistened so under the glaring bulbs. It was dark now and the temperature had dropped to about 25 with a nasty northwesterly blowing in a chill from Alberta. My eyes were no longer crossed from the 'Shine and I slowly became aware that something was odd about the trees. They weren't moving at all. Not a branch, not a needle, absolutely nothing was moving although the breeze was pretty stiff. Paw commented on the weather and let fly an air biscuit as I walked over to the tree Karen had seen earlier. I reached out to touch it and it was positively stiff! I felt several branches and the whole thing down to the smallest needle was like glass. I put a little extra pressure on a needle and it shattered in my gloved hand. What the hell was this anyway? Cletus came up and asked how I liked them as Paw and Buford tossed scrap wood in a barrel to start a warming fire. I said I thought these were real trees, but they seemed to be artificial. Cletus protested they were real.......and recycled. Once in awhile you hear sommething that is so completely ridiculous that it takes some time before you can absorb the fact that the speaker is also completely serious. Recycled Christmas trees. My mind was slowly opening to the sound of Cletus' voice proudly telling the tale of how they collected them last year and then formed them up, glued in branches with rubber cement, gave them several coats of shellac, painted them with spray cans of "Yew Be Green" epoxy, and topped the job off with several coats of lacquer. I stared at the tree. I stared at Cletus. I stared at the tree. I stared at Cletus. I stared at the tree. I stared at Cletus. Cletus noticed I was a bit pale and pulled me by the arm over to the shed where Paw and Buford had finished filling the barrel with wood and were dumping gasoline onto the contents. Cletus said that I should have another drink and then Paw asked if I was cold. I nodded vacantly, my mind still unable to absorb the insanity which surrounded me. Then I heard Cletus say, "Hey Paw, show him how we light a fire." With that, Paw bent over pointing his butt at the barrel, Buford held a Zippo to his ass, and Paw ripped a monster of a fart, something akin to a Cherry Bomb in it's magnitude. An enormous flame shot out of his ass and ignited the barrel which flared high in the air. But it was a truly huge blaster and the flames not only ignited the barrel, but the nearest recycled Christmas trees. Coated as they were with such a combustible mixture, they didn't catch fire, they friggin' exploded! Bits of flaming plastic-like shards went flying away on the wind to explode the next tree, and the next, and the next. Within 30 seconds every tree was flaming brightly and in less than a minute the flames were gone and 50 smoldering sticks were all that remained. None of us had moved and Paw was still bent over and looking over his shoulder at the charred remains of their business. The next day when I picked Karen up, we stopped at our usual place and picked out a lovely Frazier Fir. I had told her the story and that I figured that here was a case where a single fart may not have saved the world, but at least did save 50 home fires. We stopped at their place and the boys were cleaning up the mess and told us it probably meant a Christmas that would be a little bleak for them. Karen is a kind soul and right then and there invited them to our place for Christmas Day. She said they should come early and maybe Santa will have left something for them and that they would be welcome for Christmas dinner too. As we drove home I tried to explain that this probably wasn't a great idea but Karen felt pretty bad for them and they had cheerfully accepted her invitation. On Christmas morning they arrived at 6 AM and the day went downhill from there. But that's another story. So friends, no matter how bad it is and how you feel, there is always a friend out there for you. Even if you're obnoxious, nasty, and haven't bathed in a month, there is always the chance that if you can light a good fart, miracles will occur. Or how did it go in "It's a Wonderful Life?" "Every time a laquered tree farm burns down, an Angel gets a Zippo?" Well, something like that.......... Spaw |
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17 Dec 07 - 09:47 PM (#2217745) Subject: RE: BS: Holiday mishaps From: Donuel Ahhh Learning from the feet of the master.... a truely humbling experience. When somthin goes wrong I'm the first to admit it. 1st to admit it the last one to know. |