Okay, I admit it. My husband and I eat our heart-healthy dinners in the kitchen in front of Katie Couric or Brian Williams. This puts us in the demographic of old farts who still get their news on TV instead of Twitter. The advertisers know us. That's why the ads are for medications to make bladders behave, control cholesterol, relax restless legs, and my favorite: decide to have sex while sitting in those footed bathtubs looking out over a field. It is obvious that the people writing these ads are not our age. Otherwise they would realize that even if you did manage to get into those bathtubs, you'd never be able to get out.
We try to hit MUTE when the ads come on, but sometimes we can't find the remote in time. So we get stuck listening not only to the advertisement, but to the possible side effect warnings. They are hilarious! This is all part of what my husband calls the "Lawyers' Full Employment Act."
But of all the ludicrous caveats, the one that really gets me is the one that says you should "use caution when performing unsafe acts."
Is it me--or isn't this some kind of oxymoron (moron being the key word here...)? Doesn't performing an unsafe act preclude caution from the get-go?
What do they mean? Don't try to get out of those bathtubs without a paramedic present? Don't swing from chandeliers without a safety net below? Don't go grocery shopping without wiping the cart with one of those hand sanitizer wipes?
I guess which unsafe acts you should use caution performing is a personal thing.
For Larry King, it could be: don't drop your suspenders for your wife's sister without a prenup. For BP, it's: don't drill for oil unless you have a better plan for stopping a leak than stuffing the hole with golf balls. You get the idea. I guess for me and Erik it's: don't eat broccoli without taking Beano first. When you fart instead of Twitter, I guess you know you are in the correct network news demographic.
I am too busy to blog a new, brilliantly funny post right now, but I can always depend on the hysterical Jessica Bern. In my lists of blogs I love to follow on the right, I call it The Funniest Mom Blog Ever. How can you resist a blog whose subtitle is: "Read this blog and I promise you'll never have to meet my family?"
If you haven't yet signed up for her blog, Bernthis (as in Jessica Bern), you should. I am so glad I stopped working long enough to watch Jessica on this gray May afternoon. Here goes:
Thank you, Jessica for giving us another reason to laugh! If you are a single mom, mom, stepmom, grandmom, a woman...if you are alive--sign up as a follower on http://www.bernthis.com/!
It is the day after Mother's Day, 2010. I have just finished walking the dog with my extra thick sunglasses and tears behind them. My mother Jeannette, who was about as perfect as a mother could be, died in 1990 at 75 of cancer. I was 40 at the time, busy with my young twins and husband, but I flew the red eye to be there. There was never a day when I didn't talk to her on the phone for about a hour. But that day my sister and I left Johns Hopkins bereft of the woman who was the center of our lives. I clutched my mother's purse on my lap. I looked inside and found her prescription sunglasses. I put them on and winced. How bad could her eyes have been? The prescription was so strong I could see nothing but blur. I gently put them back in their case and took them home with me, shoving them in a drawer.
Years later I found the glasses and put them on. Yep. By then I could see through them perfectly. They are big and round ("Jackie O" style). I wear them when I drive and walk around persistently sunny California. I wear them because not only can I see well with them; when I wear them, I play a kind of spiritual game. I pretend that when I put on my mother's glasses, somehow she can see all the amazing things she missed: her twin grandsons grown into bright, capable young men. Her daughter winning writing awards. Her son-in-law winning teaching awards. Her other daughter receiving kudos as a food writer and cooking teacher and living a beautiful life on a horse farm with five talented grandchildren, Jeannette's great grandchildren. A grandson becoming a doctor...on and on stretch the list of the missed wonders. I put on those thick dark glasses and hope she can see it all.
My mother loved baseball. On summer nights she listened to games on the radio. To me, the sounds of night baseball were soothing lullabies. The melodies began in Brooklyn with her beloved Dodgers. Then when my father died so young, and we moved to Baltimore, I fell asleep to the Orioles' night music. Yesterday I heard about a young pitcher who pitched a perfect game on Mother's Day. You don't have to love baseball to love the story. His mother died when he was a senior in high school, so Dallas Braden was raised by his grandmother, who was there yesterday when he pitched his perfect game.
For those unfamiliar with the sport, this is a rare feat. Only 19 other major league pitchers have ever pitched a perfect game. 27 batters up; 27 down. He wore his mother's wedding ring around his neck and kissed it before he embraced his grandmother and then faced his overjoyed teammates.
This is my perfect pitch for Mother's Day, 2010, the day after. I want to thank that young pitcher. I hope my mother saw the game, too. She would have loved it. Today I raise my/her glasses to all the mothers who nurture human seeds, the most delicate of all growing things, but do not live long enough to see the results of their loving care. I suppose that's the idea behind sending flowers, but next year, maybe just send a baseball...
Here it comes again, courtesy of Hallmark: Mother's Day. So this is an open letter to my sons. I don't want a bouquet of flowers. They wilt, and I love growing my own. I don't want an expensive musical card because it's a waste of money. I don't want a cheap card either, because that's just tacky. I'm not into jewelry. I'm on Weight Watchers so dinner is out.
Here's what I want. It's called "The Hora Chair." Somebody invented it for Jewish weddings and Bar/Bat Mitzvahs when they hoist the brides, grooms, etc. up in the air. This way no one gets a hernia or falls off. Easy to lift and has a seat belt. It's only $479 plus $80 to ship. Some assembly required. It even comes in pink.
You could both come home to the empty nest and carry me around all day in style. Okay you might need to bring a few friends because I'm not as slim as I used to be, but I'm still way under the 300-pound weight limit.
Well, guys, what do you think? Am I "chair worthy?" Consider it an investment. When you finally do choose your brides and get married, we can haul it out again. I'm sure Dad won't mind storing it in the garage. They even have a "protective cover" accessory. And I bet we'd be the first on the block to have one.
Don't you think all moms deserve this "Diva Chair" for Mother's Day?
