Sarah Grismore – I find you everywhere

My mother passed away last October shortly after her 83rd birthday. It still seems impossible that she is gone. Still, I find her everywhere from books with newspaper clippings in them to uniquely rigged repairs. I came across her yesterday in the trunk of the 1981 diesel.  It’s from 1981 –  a Delta 88 Oldsmobile – and the trunk lid is extremely heavy and does not stay up on its own. I recall knowing this, although it was not something at the front of my mind. But yesterday afternoon I took it to Wal-Mart and when I opened the trunk to carry out the transfer of stuff from the cart, I saw an old walking stick.

Yes! Aunt Sara’s walking stick. Aunt Sara was actually my grandmother’s aunt; she was the youngest sister of the oldest Wisler boy who was grandma’s father. I think the difference in their ages was about four years. Aunt Sara was the one who married the Encyclopedia Britannica traveling salesman in the first decade of the last century. She continued to travel until she was quite old and then retired to a room in New Orleans. Not my choice, but I’m not in Aunt Sara’s league.

So, here is this antique walking stick and Mother used it to prop up the diesel trunk lid. I never thought that strange. But now that she’s gone, I guess I’ll bring it in and find an old fireplace poker or something of that ilk to do the job.

The Pioneer Woman – Ree Drummond Update

Over two years ago when I started this blog on WordPress, I wrote about things that crossed my mind and  that’s what I do now. When I was fooling around with the layout and wondering if any of my family was actually stopping by, I learned about Google Statistics and would check in to see a count of the five or six random people who stumbled in. You had to go to a special site then to find out – Google Webmaster Tools or Stats or something – and soon I just stopped doing so.

However, in the beginning when The Pioneer Woman, Ree Drummond, was hitting the news following the award of Best Kept Secret Blog or something to that effect, I wrote a short bit about her and because I was checking stats at that time, I saw people were stumbling by looking for her.

Just recently I scrolled all the way down the WordPress Site Admin page and discovered it now included statistics on visits in graph form. I noticed that folks were still typing in keywords about her and finding themselves here at the site of very little information. I also saw a big spike on Friday, March 19, and wondered what was going on. Well, that was the day the PW talked about Reese Witherspoon playing her in a movie based on the romance story she had included in her blog that was an account of her meeting and marrying Ladd Drummond.

So people are winding up at a two year old post that mentions her and has pretty much zippo information.  I added an update to that post sort of saying sorry for the wild goose chase, but on the other hand, with the internet and blogging, you pays your time and takes your chances.

Well,  The Pioneer Woman has gone way beyond the best secret blog thingie.  She has a giant following, having started by writing about ranch life and sharing pictures of an Oklahoma Shangri-La. And she diversified with recipes, home-schooling, photography lessons and big time giveaways . . . into the Big Time of success. She has won the ‘big” blog awards and has a huge following. A dissenting opinion about her wonderfulness by a blogger who has actually spent time at her ranch can be found at My Sister’s Farmhouse.

As for me, I liked seeing pictures of the ranch and learning a little about the cattle-working process, but since I don’t cook, home school or do more than point and shoot my camera, it’s the same course and I’ve already taken it. It’s a Goldilocks place where everything is “just right”.

Sydney’s opinion

Just before they were gone . . . but Sydney knew something was afoot.

And now they are gone – Der Bingle to the Ohio Redoubt and Quentin back to Texas. But while he was here, Quentin and I scanned in some old photos he had with him.

Grandson, Grandpa . . . Quentin Vance, Robert P. Grismore

Grandma Sarah at the West Chester house.

Quentin and hamburger birthday cake.

Quentin, Shadow and Der Bingle.

We started out to get the diesel, but went to the mall

Okay, we had an hour to pass while we waited for Quentin’s glasses to be made, so we went to Red Robin and here is Der Bingle sitting across from me. Great smile, eh?

And directly across from moi is Quentin. Great smile, eh?

Quentin and Der Bingle = two great smiles.

I remarked that at least we weren’t sitting across from the kitchen door which happened to us at Mimi’s and Der Bingle pointed to my right.

YES, A TIGER BUTT.

However looking in front of me I saw Woody the Woodpecker, er, could it be a Red Robin?

We all were seduced by the horseradish advertised on the ChopHouse burger, but actually it was bland. Next time I’ll stick to the Whiskey River BBQ burger.

This is me outside waiting for Q and Der Bingle. It seems my mouth is down-turned.

And here is the Q after he and Der Bingle came out and saw me sitting on a bench and said, “Come along, homeless person.”

Finally, I show you the license plate bear representing the Ohio Redoubt of the West Facing Cave.

Tomorrow . . . the diesel.

Quentin is home

Yesterday I stared at the escalator in the Fort Wayne Airport – actually, I think “International” is there in the name – and waited to see the familiar silhouette appear from feet on up. He is never in the first group and my eyes darted around during an escalator drought – and, then, there he was walking toward me. He looked taller, but I think I am shorter. Oh, and I wore my Ray-Ban sunglasses because I think they make me look better than my regular ones. Then, when we went outside and I took them off. Go figure.

I have no pictures because when I went to get the camera to click, it didn’t and I realized the battery was sitting back in its little charger. Now, today, I want to remedy that.

I vacuumed my head

I was sitting on the floor up in the sitting room working on getting a clog out of the vacuum hose, when I started thinking about how warm it was and, gee, was my head kind of sweating? All of a sudden, I pushed on the hose in just the right place and the clog dramatically sucked into the bag, and at that moment, it occurred to me to wonder what would happen if I vacuumed my head.

I figured it was pretty dusty up there on my locks and I was going to shower after I finished with the sitting room, so why not. I stuck the end of the hose – no metal wand – on the side to top of my head. It felt good; I wondered if my roots were being stimulated. I vacuumed another place on my head and thought, “No one must ever know about this.” And then I thought, “I just have to tell them.”

I really wasn’t surprised when the folks in the Foo Bar looked at me as if I were crazy. Foo paused and then asked, “Remember the time you took that online IQ test and scored 76? Had  you vacuumed your head then also?” All at once, no one thought to make a remark about me and the vacuum; they murmured a little to themselves and then Frank called out to those in the PBC & Roadhouse proper, “Hey, did you guys know AJ has an IQ of 76?”

That thrilled me; I knew it would be all over town in a flash. All the snide little remarks like remembering the winter of ’76 (snicker, snicker, snicker) and reference to The Music Man and the parade with 76 trombones (snicker, snicker) and suggestions I try out for the Philadelphia NBA team. And then I started wondering what it would be like if I used TWO vacuums on my head. I can’t experiment today, however, because the other powerful canister sucker is at Mother’s.

Gee, this takes me back to the days when I used to suck up little Fisher-Price people (accidentally) and they screamed all the way up.

Sometimes I am fairly certain my train of thought often jumps the rails . . .

Auggghhhh

I was all ready to be sitting RIGHT NOW in the car on my way to the fairgrounds with Sydney after the school drop-off, but a few minutes ago as I was standing at the door, Summer reminded me it was 30-Minute Delay Wednesday. Of course it it. So another Wednesday with my psyche feeling like a cymbal that has been dropped on the floor. Thank you very much, East Noble; I find these Wednesday rants so cathartic. I can spell cathartic because I did not have four years of screwed-up Wednesday mornings and English classes. I’m probably exaggerating; of course I am.  But these stupid Wednesday 30 Minute Delays bring me to it, and every darn week I let them catch me off-guard.

It has grown all out of proportion for me, I know. I think it has become the scapegoat for lots of frustrations in my life. I want to incite riots over this; I want to march on the school corporation office and demand the head of the person who came up with this Wednesday farce. I want to be a partisan fighting against The Thousand Year Wednesday Delay. Oh yeah, next year it’s on Mondays. Okay, let’s call it the 30 Minute Delay Regime.

We need codes and safe houses and  . . . blood pressure pills.

Now, now, just relax

Hi there, Pottermom. It’s me, Rose, waving at ya. I know you must be so almost done in with this wedding business. My job here at the PBC & Roadhouse is pretty much the one who comforts.  I am also the Den Mother for the Ohio Redoubt of the West Facing Cave. I don’t know what it is, but Der Bingle always says, “You just don’t want to let Rose down.”

I have experience with this: Everything from two blood clots and hospital stays and AJ’s mother passing away to Summer having the right shirt for her chorus recital. It’s going to be all right.

Really, I know you will all have a wonderful day with dancing and laughing and visiting and Hannah will be a beautiful bride . . . a beautiful, happy bride.

See, look how calm and happy I am. You can trust me. You will save me some cake, won’t you?

Now, just put your hand on the computer screen and we will share good vibes.

Oh, AJ says “Hey.”