It flooded and stormed in my small western Tennessee town on Saturday. Families were evacuated by boat. I have no reason to complain.
People who had little to begin with have been left with absolutely nothing. Two trailer parks and one Section 8 housing area flooded. I have no reason to complain.
Big Creek breached its levee and in a matter of minutes the water in housing at Naval Support Activity Mid-South went from ankle to waist-deep. I have no reason to complain.
After a sleepless Friday night filled with tornado sirens blasting, thunder rolling and lightning flashing, I awoke, placed my feet on the floor and felt water seeping between my toes. Yikes! I put my hands on the floor and felt from my bedside to the window and to the door of the bathroom. Yep. Wet. Lovely.
My husband sits up after I bellow at him for a few seconds. “We’ve got a leak! The floor is wet! Get out of bed!”
He looks at me as if I’ve lost my mind and then his work phone begins buzzing and continues buzzing, unless he’s talking on it, for the next hour.
My son and I throw all my husband’s shoes into the tub to get them off the floor of his closet.
Water in the closet, water in the bedroom, water all against the building on the outside …
Before he left my dear husband dug a quick, short trench to move the standing water from the house. My friend’s husband came over with their shop-vac and he dug a better trench (bless his heart). My friend and I moved the king-sized bed and all the furniture away from the wall.
I’ve been re-digging trenches and running the shop-vac since then.
We couldn’t get out of our neighborhood on Saturday. I called and texted and Facebooked offering our two upstairs rooms but got no takers until I reached my son’s friend. His family had been evacuated from their home in one of the water-logged trailer parks. His mom, a city police officer, said they were fine and had somewhere to stay. The phone rang immediately after I placed it on the cradle. Her son said he’d much rather come to our house than stay where he was and could his mom bring him?
He spent the night. The boys had a great time. He kept my son occupied.
I dug trenches. I shop-vac’d. I cooked and cleaned. I cleaned out the pool. I have no reason to complain.
Groceries! Kroger had been open on Saturday but I couldn’t get there. Yes, the police officer got to my house fine, but she’s the one who told me to stay put. I obey the law. While I needed some of the basics I knew we could survive without them.
I grocery shopped on Sunday and let me tell you, it was nice to walk in a clean store and shop at my leisure. It was nothing like the aftermath of Hugo where we had to stand in a line, on a broken-glass strewn sidewalk and give our orders to the clerks who then ran around the dark store collecting our items and then tallying our cost on a legal pad.
My husband worked from 0900 to 2100 hours on Saturday and 0600 to 1900 hours on Sunday. He helped organized feeding, transporting and housing 800+ dislocated Navy family members and 200 Navy reservists. He contacted his 120 employees to see if they needed assistance.
I dug trenches. I shop-vac’d. I cooked and cleaned. I have no reason to complain.
I finally broke down this morning in a fit of tears.
Before my husband hurried out the door at 0630, I asked him to help me stand our mattress on one end so I can get in our room with the steam cleaner as it now smells like mildew. He acted like he didn't have the two minutes to spare. He has a thousand people to worry about and I should be able to handle this …
Like an idiot I started crying. He assisted me but it was like asking him to donate a kidney for some reason. All I wanted was a bit of help - this is a king-sized mattress, I cannot lift it by myself.
I think the pouring rain, muddy floor, soggy carpet, dirty pool, slippery shovel, ringing siren and hermit living gave me a Hugo flashback!
A friend calls this “throwing a Scarlet.” After birthing a baby, fighting off horse thieves, driving through fiery Atlanta Scarlet throws a fit and cries because Rhett wanted to go fight for the cause.
I did, I felt like Scarlet.
My son went to school today but the base is open only to essential personnel. (I'm not essential! Yay!) I have to steam clean the carpet and then spend about $200 at Lowe's to get the material for a twenty-foot French drain, two catch basins and a percolating area. After that I must fix the fence where the mud has seeped to the neighbor and the dogs have dug a hole.
On the bright side, I found muscles I forgot I had, and I have a house, a car, a job, furniture, a child, a husband and four dogs!
After all tomorrow is another day.
Tuesday, May 11, 2010
Silly Bands Taking Over the World One Wrist at a Time
The Game
My child’s elementary school has been infiltrated with colored-shaped silicone-bands. Known as silly bands or crazy bands, the children collect the numerous shapes, trade them, wear multiples as bracelets and compare what they own with their friends.
In case you don’t have someone twelve or younger in your house, these are thin silicone bands that can be stretched and snapped but revert back to their original shape time and time again. They can be used for any purpose you’d use a regular dull-tan rubber band. However, let me tell you, they don’t work well to make ponytails.
But wait, the bands have slipped into the teen and college-aged vernacular and lifestyle. No one is safe, the lure of these colorful fashion accessories is strong.
And … okay … I’m wearing two as I type this Blog entry!
The Education
One local church uses the bands as a teaching method. The instructor supplies bands and talks about the designs. Since the shapes come in many varieties the program must be structured to a format the facilitator can handle. My son is itching to attend the program next Sunday and we don’t even attend that church! He’s finagled an invitation from a schoolmate.
The SillyBandz Web site style list includes: baseball, rock-n-roll, princess, fantasy, holiday, dinosaurs, western, basic, alphabet, zoo, pets, sea and rainforest. It boggles the mind!
Who’s on First?
According to Toy Directory Monthly the original Eastern Accent animal bands design won awards in 2003. Supposedly, the new hip bands are different from these original bands as these can now be worn on the wrist by children and the new college-aged fans. They are distributed by SillyBandz by BCP Imports, LLC, Toysmith and Top Trenz just to name a few.
My son and I picked some up at Walgreens for $2.99 per pack of twelve. They were called Shaped Rubber Bands and, of course, are made in China. The SillyBandz sell for $4.95 for a pack of twenty-four.
Now I’m off to order the baseball bands for my son to trade with his coach-pitch team!
Warning this fad toy is rated for ages five and older.
My child’s elementary school has been infiltrated with colored-shaped silicone-bands. Known as silly bands or crazy bands, the children collect the numerous shapes, trade them, wear multiples as bracelets and compare what they own with their friends.
In case you don’t have someone twelve or younger in your house, these are thin silicone bands that can be stretched and snapped but revert back to their original shape time and time again. They can be used for any purpose you’d use a regular dull-tan rubber band. However, let me tell you, they don’t work well to make ponytails.
But wait, the bands have slipped into the teen and college-aged vernacular and lifestyle. No one is safe, the lure of these colorful fashion accessories is strong.
And … okay … I’m wearing two as I type this Blog entry!
The Education
One local church uses the bands as a teaching method. The instructor supplies bands and talks about the designs. Since the shapes come in many varieties the program must be structured to a format the facilitator can handle. My son is itching to attend the program next Sunday and we don’t even attend that church! He’s finagled an invitation from a schoolmate.
The SillyBandz Web site style list includes: baseball, rock-n-roll, princess, fantasy, holiday, dinosaurs, western, basic, alphabet, zoo, pets, sea and rainforest. It boggles the mind!
Who’s on First?
According to Toy Directory Monthly the original Eastern Accent animal bands design won awards in 2003. Supposedly, the new hip bands are different from these original bands as these can now be worn on the wrist by children and the new college-aged fans. They are distributed by SillyBandz by BCP Imports, LLC, Toysmith and Top Trenz just to name a few.
My son and I picked some up at Walgreens for $2.99 per pack of twelve. They were called Shaped Rubber Bands and, of course, are made in China. The SillyBandz sell for $4.95 for a pack of twenty-four.
Now I’m off to order the baseball bands for my son to trade with his coach-pitch team!
Warning this fad toy is rated for ages five and older.
I'm Obsessed
I’m obsessed.
With Scrabble
On my iPod Touch playing Words with Friends
Last week the audio-visual team at work took our Wi-Fi apparatus with them on a trip. It was a long, long week because, see, I have to have Internet access in order to play!
I drove home for lunch every day in order to use our Wi-Fi.
I never return home for lunch. My husband thought I had errands to run.
Thank goodness it takes only six minutes to drive from work to home giving me more time to place tiles and figure out how to score 56 points with a three-letter word.
Words with Friends is a free app for the iPod. You play Scrabble with friends (hence the name, I suppose). Friends or random opponents play and score just as you would if you had a board on a table between you.
You can pay a small fee to purchase the app and be relieved of clicking through ads. (Guess who coughed up the fee?!)
They also have tournaments. In April 2,048 people participated. I got eliminated in the round two. Which is understandable, as it has been years since I’ve played.
I carry a lot of personal Scrabble baggage.
Which segues to a story …
I am the only person in the history of the world to be placed on Scrabble restriction. Yes, you read correctly, Scrabble restriction!
My two-and-a-half-years younger brother could not play the game worth a darn. He took f-o-r-e-v-e-r (13 pts) to figure out a word. The excruciating wait for him to finally make a move drove my best friend and me to hide that we had a game in session.
In my twelfth year (making him either nine or 10), my mother told me I had to let him play with us or not play at all.
One day, my older sister, my best friend and I snuck the game into my sister’s room. In the middle of the game came a tap, tap, tapping at the door.
We scrambled to our feet, heat burning our faces, thunderous hearts in our chests, shaking hands covering the board with a sheet from my sister’s bed.
The knock repeated louder, she used her ring this time and the hollow tap changed to an insistent rap. The normal knock at our house was “shave and a haircut” without the two bits. This drumming on the door had no rhythm.
My friend opened the locked door, side-stepping until she had the security of the door separating her from my mom.
Mom, arms akimbo, glasses sliding down her nose, frosted hair sprayed into a helmet, said, “Hey, your brother and I wanted to play Scrabble but we can’t find the board. Do you happen to know where it could be?”
My brother’s head peeked around her waist, his mouth quirky with glee, a bit of leftover mustard from his mustard and mayonnaise sandwich coating the jut of his chin.
I flipped a page of Forever Amber that I’d hastily retrieved from the floor, looked my mother right in the eye and said I had no idea where the game could be …
Mom brushed past my friend who had inched out of sanctuary, lifted the sheet, turned to me and pointed a finger. “You will put the game back in the box immediately and bring it to the den so your brother and I can play and you will not be allowed to play Scrabble in this house for one month!”
I argued that the educational game would help me learn SAT words, increase my vocabulary, ensure I received a college scholarship, she couldn’t possible restrict me from playing it. Could she? Oh, yes, she could!
I spent a lot of time at my friend’s house that month. She owned the fancy game with the indents for the tiles so the loss of playing at my house did not hurt as much as my mother wished.
And my friend’s little brother didn’t like the game.
I’m still a bit bitter about the entire incident.
Gotta go, I have eight concurrent Scrabble games to catch up on!
Find out more at the app store or www.wordswithfriends.net
With Scrabble
On my iPod Touch playing Words with Friends
Last week the audio-visual team at work took our Wi-Fi apparatus with them on a trip. It was a long, long week because, see, I have to have Internet access in order to play!
I drove home for lunch every day in order to use our Wi-Fi.
I never return home for lunch. My husband thought I had errands to run.
Thank goodness it takes only six minutes to drive from work to home giving me more time to place tiles and figure out how to score 56 points with a three-letter word.
Words with Friends is a free app for the iPod. You play Scrabble with friends (hence the name, I suppose). Friends or random opponents play and score just as you would if you had a board on a table between you.
You can pay a small fee to purchase the app and be relieved of clicking through ads. (Guess who coughed up the fee?!)
They also have tournaments. In April 2,048 people participated. I got eliminated in the round two. Which is understandable, as it has been years since I’ve played.
I carry a lot of personal Scrabble baggage.
Which segues to a story …
I am the only person in the history of the world to be placed on Scrabble restriction. Yes, you read correctly, Scrabble restriction!
My two-and-a-half-years younger brother could not play the game worth a darn. He took f-o-r-e-v-e-r (13 pts) to figure out a word. The excruciating wait for him to finally make a move drove my best friend and me to hide that we had a game in session.
In my twelfth year (making him either nine or 10), my mother told me I had to let him play with us or not play at all.
One day, my older sister, my best friend and I snuck the game into my sister’s room. In the middle of the game came a tap, tap, tapping at the door.
We scrambled to our feet, heat burning our faces, thunderous hearts in our chests, shaking hands covering the board with a sheet from my sister’s bed.
The knock repeated louder, she used her ring this time and the hollow tap changed to an insistent rap. The normal knock at our house was “shave and a haircut” without the two bits. This drumming on the door had no rhythm.
My friend opened the locked door, side-stepping until she had the security of the door separating her from my mom.
Mom, arms akimbo, glasses sliding down her nose, frosted hair sprayed into a helmet, said, “Hey, your brother and I wanted to play Scrabble but we can’t find the board. Do you happen to know where it could be?”
My brother’s head peeked around her waist, his mouth quirky with glee, a bit of leftover mustard from his mustard and mayonnaise sandwich coating the jut of his chin.
I flipped a page of Forever Amber that I’d hastily retrieved from the floor, looked my mother right in the eye and said I had no idea where the game could be …
Mom brushed past my friend who had inched out of sanctuary, lifted the sheet, turned to me and pointed a finger. “You will put the game back in the box immediately and bring it to the den so your brother and I can play and you will not be allowed to play Scrabble in this house for one month!”
I argued that the educational game would help me learn SAT words, increase my vocabulary, ensure I received a college scholarship, she couldn’t possible restrict me from playing it. Could she? Oh, yes, she could!
I spent a lot of time at my friend’s house that month. She owned the fancy game with the indents for the tiles so the loss of playing at my house did not hurt as much as my mother wished.
And my friend’s little brother didn’t like the game.
I’m still a bit bitter about the entire incident.
Gotta go, I have eight concurrent Scrabble games to catch up on!
Find out more at the app store or www.wordswithfriends.net
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