mepps

Recently I was reminded of a little goodie from my childhood. I was searching for some form of entertainment via 'onDemand' on the television when in the top, right corner a blurb about an old movie called The Coneheads was being referenced. Do any of you remember that movie??

The Coneheads was a sketch on the Saturday Night Live television show of the late '70s about aliens with cone shaped craniums that come to Earth to observe everyday life. My mother thought the comedy sketch was hilarious and when I was nine years old, she dressed me up as, you guessed it, a conehead for Halloween. [go ahead...laugh]

She worked painstakingly on my costume. She made a cone for my head that allowed all my hair to be tucked inside. Spray painted it just the perfect flesh color. And, even included a senso-ring. Ha! Oh gawd, how I wish I had a circa 1980ish picture to share with you right now.

So while all my peer counterparts were dressed as princesses and ballerinas, I walked into my third grade class dressed like an alien with a cone-shaped head. I! Know! Now you might understand where my sense of humor comes from a little better.

Those were the years kids wore their Halloween costumes to school for the whole day. And, Halloween parties were called Halloween parties not Harvest Festivals. Truth be told, I sort of loved the originality of my costume. I wasn't like all the other kids walking around in drugstore purchased, plastic costumes that were itchy and falling apart that day. I was a homemade freakin' Conehead! I wore my cone proudly.

After being hopped up on classroom party candy, It seemed like forever waiting for dusk so Mom and I could venture out for trick or treating. At the time we lived in a mobile home park. Mostly filled with young families and older, retired folks. Not the best area for prime candy collection, but the trailer houses were close together and the drives were filled with street lights.

With every knock on the door I was asked the same question: "what are you supposed to be?" And, with every question my excitement and love of my cone dwindled. Nobody in my neighborhood thought my costume was as cool or as funny as my mother and I did. Nobody knew what the heck I was supposed to be.

Jump forward to present day: I was on the phone with Mom. I mentioned to her how I remembered that costume and how nobody in the neighborhood appreciated the fantastic-ness of the Conehead. At nine, I was expecting laughs and instead, I only received puzzled looks. Which in a nutshell is pretty much how my humor is received to this day.

But, in reminiscing about that night almost thirty years ago, we decided the problem wasn't with my costume. Because lets be honest, a nine year old alien with a conical skull is pretty damn funny. The problem was the trailer park filled with older retirees that go to bed at eight o'clock. That was our big mistake!! If I had gone trick or treating in the near-by hippie community that shared in the hilarity of the Saturday Night Live sketch, I would have had success aplenty.

Moral:  Know your target audience!

the story of my life

...is simply baseball, baseball, baseball. I feel like I do nothing else but shuffle children around from practice to game to game to practice and do laundry.

 

White pants + PNW rainy weather + muddy fields = mama does a lot of laundry.
 

 

All three kidlets are playing baseball. Did I mention that already? Meaning the girls play BASEball, not SOFTball. Big difference around these parts. And, everyone we talk to always respond the very same way, "I didn't know girls could play baseball?!" Yup, they can!

 

We tried softball and I do worry my girls aren't making connections with the other girls, but after a couple years of really going nowhere skill wise and schedules being bounced around who had dance and gymnastic and horse riding lessons. Not to mention all the singing and dancing in the dugout. We decided to put the girls into baseball.

 

The kids are on the same schedule. Bonus! Plus, the boys don't dance or sing or even once mention an American Girl doll.

 

It builds some major confidence in our middle child, especially, being nine and all. Lessons she learns is that she can do the same things boys can do, and in most cases kick their butts at it. Not to mention the lessons it holds for the boys having a rocking girl play on their team. So I would like to take a minute and say "you are welcome" to their mothers.

play ball

It's that time of year again. Rain and all!

 

 

 

how much

I was in the pharmacy this afternoon to pick up a prescription I had refilled and I was gobsmacked when the clerk said "your total will be three hundred and thirty dollars."

I almost pooped in my bluejeans.

Three hundred and thirty effing dollars?!?!

The sad part is I really wanted my prescription and I just couldn't let myself pay that much for a teeny, tiny tube of cream for chronic cold sores. Which is currently my throbbing issue. A big fat cold sores on my top lip. I get them all the time. Anytime the weather changes dramatically, or if I let my lips get too dry or if I'm stressed or sick. Wham-O! Cold sore. It's uber annoying!

I thought I would just have to make due with the over-the-counter, supposedly miracle creams until one day I happened to be in the doctor's office and she commented on the hideous thing on my lip last year. With a sigh I told her all my about my embarrassing, painful problem and how I hate it. She wrote me up a prescription lickely-split and unlike what I can purchase in the grocery store, this stuff is a miracle cream.

How did I not pay three hundred and thirty dollars for my magic medicine last year you ask. Well, last year our insurance coverage was different and this potion came into my life free of charge. So when I called the drugstore and dialed in my prescription refill number I didn't think anything would be different.

But before all you Obama-hating-finger-waving Republicans start in how awful, terrible that black guy in the big office is making everything go south, let me say this. I do understand that because of ObamaCare, the company my husband works for had to (or more like wanted to methinks) change their policies. And, it's true our coverage is different and I'm not a fan. Not a fan at all. Mostly because the pay cut my husband endured to work for this company however many years ago was balanced out because of the fantastic benefits we would be provided. Except now, those benefits are no longer. I won't lie, it urks me. And, I also understand the reasoning behind ObamaCare and it's purpose. In theory.

That said, I think if you rally rumblers want something/someone to blame I think you should (we all should) start pointing our fingers at the pharmaceutical companies. I don't know much but I do happen to know there is a farmer in Costa Rica that earns himself about eight cents per plant on crops for a company that makes medicine for the U. S. of A. So how, I wonder, does my magic cold sore medicine go from eight cents to three hundred and thirty dollars?  Obama isn't making my magic medicine....in fact, I have a very strong feeling he could care less about my cold sore.