Tarry Christmas!

Supposedly the Strange Science book that The Pony didn't get for Christmas is on its way. I finally got a return email about it on Thursday. I think that was about 3-4 business days late for their response. But then again, the book itself is WAY later than that.

 

Farmer H also has a missing gift. Two, I think. Wouldn't you know it! One is touted to be delivered TODAY. Except today, we are at the casino. It's been three weeks since we last went. So the very day we chose is when this late gift is supposed to get here.

 

This is coming by USPS. So maybe it will be put in the lockboxes down by Mailbox Row. I think it will fit. It's a metal key-holder thingy that is shaped like an old gas pump. Just the kind of thing Farmer H will enjoy. He might even build a special themed shed for it! As I recall, it's 12-18 inches tall. That size box should fit. Even it somehow it gets delivered to the Mansion, I doubt the dogs could damage it. The box, yeah, it's chewable. But I don't think they'd eat the metal.

 

Well. That's assuming it would be delivered to OUR OWN MANSION!

 

Anyhoo... right now it's 1:15 a.m., and I'm trying to check the latest tracking information. But there's a slight problem. The USPS tracking website has a message in big red letters:

 

SORRY, WE'RE CURRENTLY EXPERIENCING TECHNICAL DIFFICULTIES WITH OUR TRACKING APPLICATION. WE THANK YOU FOR YOUR PATIENCE WHILE WE WORK TO RESOLVE THE ISSUE. PLEASE CHECK BACK.

 

I'm not so sure they should be thanking me for my patience...

Robbery Attempt At The Liquor Store: Ample-Rumpused Woman Makes Off With $105

Friday I stopped by the Gas Station Chicken Store for my 44 oz Diet Coke. I cashed in a $60 scratcher winner, and got some $3 scratchers for myself, a Bingo, Crossword, and Gold Mine. The Pony wanted one of the new $30 scratchers that came out on Monday, and five MegaMillions draw tickets. The jackpot was $480 million.

 

Since I'd bought my own new scratcher $60 winner there the day before, I did not get The Pony's ticket. I figure a loser would be ready if I bought again so soon. I had plans to go across the street to the Liquor Store for it, and to get myself more tickets, especially a PacMan that I can't find anywhere else these days. 

 

I stuffed my winning change into my shirt pocket, and headed over there. Let the record show that The Pony had given me $40 to cover the cost of his tickets. I had the two twenties right there in my shirt pocket, having used my winnings to pay for his draw tickets. I knew I would get it back when buying at the Liquor Store. I was going to spend exactly $40 there, after cashing in a couple more winners.

Lest you think this is a math problem, I will plainly list my ticket purchases after I handed the gal (the little FRIENDLY one, not the hateful hag) my two $5 winners.

$30 new ticket

$5 Crossword

$5 PacMan

$9 Bingo, Crossword, Gold Rush

$1 new ticket

See? That adds up to $50, but I was cashing in two winning $5 tickets. I owed $40 as planned.

While standing there, I was momentarily discombobulated by a PENNY under the counter. So I took a picture and fished it out. As the gal was tearing off my tickets, which I'd asked for by their numbers in the ticket case, I remembered that I forgot the $1 ticket. I don't usually buy them, but those $3 tickets make me come out uneven.

"Oh, and add on a number 24, since I have a dollar left. Might as well spend it all!"

The gal scanned the tickets, and pushed them across the counter to me.

"Yes, that's right. It's $40 even now."

"Okay! Thank you!"

I turned to leave. Had hobbled a couple steps, actually, when Little Gal said, not unkindly,

"I mean you OWE me $40."

SWEET GUMMI MARY! I was SO embarrassed! What am I, some kind of lottery novice? Of COURSE  I owed her! Scratchers aren't free!

"Oh! I'm sorry! Here!" I pulled the two folded twenties out of the front of my shirt pocket. I'd intended to do that all along. I had them ready! "I just cashed in a $60 winner over at the Gas Station Chicken Store--"

 

"Congratulations!"

 

"Thanks. I guess I was thinking, since I handed you those two winners, that I had covered it with my winners! Good thing you caught me before I made my getaway! Sorry about that."

"Oh, that's all right. You have a good day. Good luck!"

"Thanks!"

Well. I DID have good luck, despite trying to steal those tickets! The Pony won $50 on his new ticket, and I won $40 on my PacMan, and $15 on the three-dollar Crossword. We raked in $105 after spending $50 ($40 after deducting the winners I cashed in).

Yes. It was a good day for winning, but a black mark on the permanent record of Mrs. Hillbilly Mom, who really does not have a long rap sheet, despite being Public Enemy #1.

Heh, heh! I doubt I could have made a clean getaway, since I travel slower than a Galapagos Tortoise riding on a snail's back. Little Gal or the customer behind me could have nabbed my ample rumpus before I got to the door. You'd have to be in a coma inside an iron lung to be outrun by Mrs. HM.

My Head Is Tied In A Knot

I have a stalker. His name is G. Mail. Every week, he sends me an email, saying that I am bloated. Full to bursting. That for my own good, he is going to stop feeding me messages. Until I regurgitate, he may just starve me. Ain't THAT a fine kettle of fish? How do you like THEM apples? Me? Not very much.

I'm pretty sure that back when G. Mail was just a gleam in grade-school Genius's cornflower-blue eyes, ol' greedy G. Mail professed that he had NO LIMITS. That anybody was welcome to join him to email to their heart's content, without ever having to worry about storage space. That was one of the luring points. Just have somebody invite you to join G. Mail, and you were set for life.

I'm pretty sure G. Mail shares a branch on the family tree with those rental car companies who know how to TAKE a reservation, but don't know how to KEEP a reservation. And on his momma's side, he goes out on a limb with those mail-order companies who know how to TAKE and order, but not how to DELIVER an order. He's an Ind-- um... one of those givers who GIVES an item, but then TAKES IT BACK!

G. Mail says I have used 98 percent of my storage! Can you believe that? Why, all I use it for is sending an email every now and then, and receiving some from my ONE friend, or myself. Like maybe four or six pictures of pennies a week, for the past five years, and pictures of casino foods and slot machines, and let's not forget winning scratchers, and of course my special Jack and Sweet, Sweet Juno. How else could I get them off my phone and onto my blogs? I don't know HOW it's possible that my space is full!!!

Tonight I went through some old emails. Cut out about a thousand, give or take a couple hundred. I went from over 9000 to the low 8000s. And do you know what? That only reduced my hoggage from 98 percent to 96 percent! Of course, I didn't get to the penny years yet...

My brain is kind of fried. The Pony says getting rid of pictures should help. Help G. Mail to leave me alone, not help my fried brain. But that he doesn't think just deleting regular emails is that important, since he has over 20,000 unread emails on his account, and has never gotten such a notice. I think about 15,000 of them are probably from Farmer H, who says The Pony never responds to him...

Sometimes, Farmer H Treats Me Like A Mushroom

He feeds me bull and keeps me in the dark!

 

You know I have an affinity for country music. Mostly the older stuff, like 60s/70s/80s. Of course I had a lyric handy for my title for this topic. Travis Tritt's "Lord Have Mercy On the Working Man." Yeah, I changed a couple words. But it means the same thing.

Anyhoo... when I have to do certain chores for myself, I take shortcuts. Like if I need a box of Puffs With Lotion down in my dark basement lair, or another roll of toilet paper in the NASCAR bathroom, I drop it over the stair railing. The goal is to land it on Genius's old desk, which sits at the side of the stairs. 

 

It doesn't help that my old computer and keyboard are on top of that desk. Sometimes I get lucky, and the Puffs box will hit the keyboard, which absorbs much of the momentum as the keys compress and spring back. Ain't physics wonderful? Then the Puffs sit there and wait for me to come down and move them to my lair. If they miss the keyboard, they'll still wait for me. But with a caved-in corner, and perhaps on the floor.

The toilet paper is a bit trickier. If it doesn't land on its side, flattening out a bit as it absorbs its own momentum (again, ain't physics wonderful?), it will bounce off and ROLL across the dusty press-down tile, and wait for me to find it.

Last week, I dropped a roll of toilet paper. It did not land on its side. It also did not land on the keyboard or desk surface, but hit something else laying on the end of the desk. I was not sure what it was. I have The Pony carry things down for me. I knew I had a ream of paper sitting there, but I could still see it, and that's not where the TP landed. Something had been there, and now was gone. As best as I could remember, there had been a box of Roasted Garlic Triscuits sitting there in a Devil's Playground bag. I kept meaning to take them into my office, but since I still had an open box there, I hadn't.

The Pony trotted down the steps with my lunch tray.

"Oh, look out. Somewhere you'll find a roll of toilet paper that I dropped down there earlier. I didn't see where it went. And I think it knocked off that box of Triscuits."

The Pony returned.

"Um. I found the toilet paper and put it in the bathroom. That was NOT a box of Triscuits that it knocked off. It was a box of LIGHT BULBS!"

"Did they break?"

"I didn't check. I just set them back up there. I'm guessing maybe their packaging is made so they don't break?"

I remembered several months ago, when there was a light out, and I told Farmer H. He muttered something about fixing it. Then didn't. Then I asked again, and he admitted that he didn't have any light bulbs.

"There are BOXES of them on the shelf in your workshop by the furnace!"

"Them's just boxes. Empty."

Huh. Imagine that. But within a week, Farmer H had replaced my burned out light. So I guess he'd laid the box of light bulbs there on the desk, where he'd gotten one out to put in the light fixture. So I informed him of the toilet paper incident.

"Oh, I knocked your box of light bulbs off the desk when I dropped my toilet paper down the steps. I hope it didn't break them."

"I didn't put no light bulbs on the desk."

"Yes you did, when you finally put in a new one. You said you didn't have any, but then you somehow DID, because you put one it. I figured you must have bought some at Lowe's or Family Center."

"I didn't put no light bulbs on the desk. Maybe The Pony did."

"Um. No, Dad. You know I don't buy light bulbs."

EXACTLY! It's not as if The Pony would be putting in a light, which would first require figuring out what kind, driving to town, finding it in a store, buying it, and bringing it back home to where it was needed. Not without a legal decree, some cajoling, a bribe, and an ultimatum.

Farmer H has progressed from gaslighting to mushroom-farming. I refuse to be his mushroom!

Scraping The Bottom Of The Big Triangle Tub

I'm running out of things to complain about! So I'll have to gripe about the lack of inspiration for two daily blog posts. I even reached out to The Pony. You KNOW how he purely loves to help people! He was on the way to run his bath in the big triangle tub when I sent him a text.

 

"Can't you do something paranormal or humorous that I can write about? I'm out of stories. The lack of a town trip today hurt me."

 

"K. I'll summon a demon in your bedroom."

 

"NO THANK YOU! I have Genius's Madonnas and childs to protect me."

 

"I saw someone at the Devil's Playground with like twelve bottles of rum in their cart, if that's good enough."

 

"Heh, heh! They must have gotten their stimulus money."

 

Good enough for me.  

The Pony Shall Rue The Day He Turned Up His Muzzle At The New Year's Day Black-Eyed Peas

If I was a more nimble women, I'd be doing my TOLD YOU SO dance right now. You know, the one made famous by Grace, on Will&Grace. Not a week has gone by yet, but Even Steven is letting The Pony know that he made a BIG mistake!

Tuesday, I brought home my scratchers and some Hardee's Chicken Tenders for The Pony. I always give him a charity ticket. Because I'm a GIVER like that. And UNLIKE The Pony.

Anyhoo... he took his chicken and honey mustard sauce to the living room before I even sorted out the tickets.

"OOPS! Good thing about honey mustard sauce: it wipes off easily. Off the table, and off my PowerBall ticket that's waiting for Wednesday. I don't know what happened! That packet just EXLPLODED! It's all cleaned up now, though. You can hardly tell."

"Well. At least it's not on the carpet like the CANDLE WAX you spilled. I've got a ticket for you, but you don't have much of a choice today. I got some for me for tomorrow, because I'm not going to town. And I got some for Genius's letter. So all you have is a Crossword. But you have a choice of the Gas Station Chicken Store, or the liquor store, or Country Mart's machine."

"Oh! I want the liquor store."

"Darn it! That's number 18. I had my eye on that one. It's the one I really wanted. But that's okay. There's a number 5 from the Gas Station Chicken Store. I guess that one's good, too."

The Pony scratched his Crossword. Double-checked it with the scanner app. Loser.

"Oh, well. I saved you from getting a loser, Mom."

"That's kind of you."

When I got to my lair, I set the tickets aside. I had some $3 tickets as well. I sorted them. Some for me on Wednesday. Some for me now. And a Crossword and two $3 tickets for Genius. I picked out Genius's first, so his could all come from a different store. By the time I got to the Crossword, I had to give him the one from the Gas Station Chicken Store. Oh, well. I put them in an envelope to await the letter.

I scratched my $3 tickets first. Won $10 on a Bingo ticket. Then I did my Crossword. Wow! I was excited to have four words! THEN I saw that I had FIVE words! In the top puzzle. And one of them had the moneybag symbol in it, which DOUBLES the win!

 

 

I won $50 on my $5 Crossword ticket!

When I looked at the number, it was 18. Maybe it was the 18 I'd had my eye on! Maybe not. All I know is that I really wanted that number 18 Crossword puzzle ticket, and The Pony and I BOTH ended up with a number 18 Crossword. Upon being informed of my win, he said, 

"I hope you didn't give me the WRONG TICKET!"

"Um. You ASKED for the liquor store ticket, and that's exactly what I gave you!"

 

 

Heh, heh. I always put initials on the back of the tickets, so I know where I got them. In case I have a good winner, I don't want to buy that kind of ticket there again for a while. That little action might have just saved me from a lawsuit from The Pony! Though for a win of only $50, I think he'll let it slide without contesting it.

I refrained from mentioning my Black-Eyed Pea Luck...

If You Go Down To The Creek Today...

... what you'll see is no surprise

If you go down to the creek today

You'll surely recognize

That ne'er-do-wells will never do well, this much is for certain

After the day the ne'er-do-wells have their picnic

 

 

Maybe it was just one ne'er-do-well, and a gang of teetotalers. But they were also ne'er-do-wells, because Do-Wells don't let their buddy Do-Wells get away with never doing well.

Maybe that's not even a beer bottle. Maybe it's one of those freaky root beer bottles made to look like a beer bottle. Because that's cool, right, to let kids look like they're drinking beer? Like the candy cigarettes from my childhood, with the tips colored red like a burning ember? Ah, good times, before we became such a crybaby wimp society!

Anyhoo... I can't imagine somebody sitting in their car parked beside our creek drinking a root beer and then throwing out the bottle. But I CAN imagine them imbibing an alcoholic beverage, and casting the empty out the window, for less evidence if they were stopped for a DUI.