The Best Day Ever

The best day of Carly Joe Patterson's life began when a piece of oil rigging fell on her lying cheater of a husband. Carly was in the kitchen nursing her latest black eye with a flank steak when the oil company foreman knocked on the trailer door. Thinking the visitor was her neighbor Elly Jane, who regularly visited for coffee and gossip, she didn't even bother to put on her robe. She just hollered for her visitor to come on in and set. 

Carly, dressed in her black silk unmentionables, turned around with the coffee pot and froze.  The most gorgeous man she had ever seen was standing in her doorway, white cowboy hat in hand.  His brilliant blue eyes held her in place while her mouth caught flies.  The flank steak slid down her cheek to land on her chest.  The cold finally brought her to her senses.  This man obviously wasn't here to sweep her off her feet.

"Y'all a bill collector?" She asked as she put down the coffee and grabbed her robe off the chair.  "Because we ain't got any cash around.  Won't get paid until this well comes in, neither."

"No, ma'am, not a bill collector," Jackson Coltrane coughed discreetly.  "Are you Carly Joe Patterson?"

"I am, but not for long." Carly nodded her head in the direction of the suitcase on the couch. "He said he'd kill me next time he saw me. What can I do for you, Mister?"

"There's been an accident up at the well," Jackson began. "I regret to--

"That pansy-ass bastard is dead?" Carly interrupted. 

"--say that your husband did not survive the accident," Jackson finished.  He waited to see if his news lead to female hysterics.

Carly was struggling to keep her smile to herself.  She was free. An angel of a man had come down from heaven to free her with his words.

Now she could sell the trailer, load up the Mustang, and leave town for good.






The prompt is to use be postpositive and use the third definition of the word ASS.   Really.  I never lie about postpositives.

Words With Husbands

Larry and I were heading home from work one day this week. I was driving; Larry had his phone out and was playing Plants vs. Zombies.

"Hey, what's that game on Facebook that you play?" he asked me. I could hear the unmistakable sound of a zombie chewing, so I was unprepared for a question.

"What game?" I was stumped by his lack of specificity*.

"You know, that one?" Larry said. "The friends?"

"Words with Friends?"

"Yeah. I was looking at that."

(Silence)

My husband has a tendency to mentally wander off in the middle of conversations. I waited a few seconds to see if he would get back on track, then I redirected him with a prompt.

"And?"

"I might like to play it."

"Cool."

It was so nice to have a meaningful conversation. Since I am not really competitive, I knew that it was extremely likely that he would win many of the games we played. I did not want him doing a touchdown dance if he won a game. That would be just plain overkill.

Later that evening, Larry fired up his laptop to start a Words with Friends game with me. Zane was in his Robin the Boy Wonder costume and running around the kitchen chasing one of the cats. I was reading blogs. When I am reading something interesting, I am in 'the Zone'. Everything else is tuned out. This is when my husband often chooses to ask me questions.

"How do you play?"

"What are these letters, DL and TW, already on the board?"

"Hey, it's your turn."

"It's your turn now."

"I've been waiting for twenty minutes for you to take your turn!"

I finally played a word, then I went to bed. My game playing is strictly for fun. I've got about five games going with my various relatives and friends, and it can be days before I think up a word. My husband's need for an instant response may crush my groove, however. He will probably wake me up in the middle of the night, laptop in hand, for me to take my turn.

Maybe I should just let him win every game?








*I'll bet that you can't say 'specificity' five times fast!!

Christmas Game Planning

My husband, who is Mr."We Must Go Overboard On Everything Related to Christmas", spends a lot of time planning the events of Christmas morning so as to achieve maximum impact. In fact, he has been planning the presentation of Christmas for the last month. He's driving me just plain batshit crazy.

"Maybe we should move the couch over there so we can arrange Zane's presents more in a semicircle?"

"Do you think that we should have the presents wrapped and under the tree now, or should we wait until Christmas day?"

"What if we move the tree over to that side, so when Zane comes downstairs the first thing he sees are the presents?"

"We are going to have to go out and buy some more presents. The arrangement is lopsided."

"Where do you think we could find some foam board, so I can make some life-sized pictures?"

"Should we have the presents from Santa wrapped? If so, we are going to need a really big boz."

And so it goes. On Christmas Eve, Larry will stay up late, fussing, arranging the presents just so, posing everything to optimal effect, so that when Zane comes down the stairs on Christmas morning, he will have the 3 year old equivalent of an OMG moment.

And I love him for that. Even though he's driving me nuts. I'm not kidding about that part.