At her request, we met for a family brunch to celebrate my sister‘s birthday.  Brunch is her favorite meal in the whole wide world, and why wouldn’t it be?  It pretty much gives you the leeway to make whatever you damn well please.  We went with overnight french toast, tons of sausage and bacon, which of course led to bacon-wrapped-sausage, and jalapeno poppers.  Plus grits.  Because we’re southern.

Anyway, I had offered to make the poppers because Mom had stopped at a local farmer’s market and found the IDEAL jalapenos for poppers.  Most of our imported crap at the grocery is too fat and big for adequate poppage.  I like ‘em a little smaller, cause then you can literally POP them in.  No biting or chewing required.  Just swallow those suckers whole.

I am clearly hungry, as none of this story has anything to do with food, in reality.

So we’re rushing to get ready .. okay, I was rushing because per usual, I spent the entire morning making sure everyone else was ready and then was like, Crap, I’m still in a towel about the time we were supposed to be on the road.  As I was rushing to get my hair somewhat tame, Tony came over and stood in front of me, speaking.  I couldn’t hear him over the hair diffuser, so I shut it off.  What did you say, buddy?

“I said, you’re pwurfhect.”  His little lips twisted around his teeth and tongue as he struggled to get the words out.

What?  I can’t understand you, baby.  Can you try again?

“I said, you’re PWURFEKCT.”

Did you.. did you just say I’m perfect?

“I did, Momma.  You are pwurfekct.”

And then I melted and put the rest of the makeup away.

****

Those of you who follow me on Twitter got a glimpse of a very weird happenstance about a month ago.  I ran to get lunch late in the day and noticed .. about a dozen pills in the floorboard of my car. 

Now, because it’s hotter than southern hell here, I keep my windows cracked during the day.  But my car is locked.  So .. this was a little disconcerting.  They were not my pills, nor did I recognize them, but I was damn sure intrigued.  I took those babies in and Googled the code that was engraved in each pill.  PRESCRIPTION-GRADE HYDROCODONE. 

LIKE, BIG PRESCRIPTION GRADE.

I just thought that was weird.  I threw them all away, after I made my alibi on Twitter known, and then promptly rolled up my windows.  I’m moving buildings soon anyway, I thought.

****

About two days ago, I heard a weird rattling in my driver-side door.  My passenger-side door has a little wind noise due to .. well, listen to me diagnose it like I know anything about cars .. but I think it’s due to a misalignment of the seal along the door.  Anyway, I assumed that maybe I had ruined the driver-side door as well, but couldn’t locate where the seal might be bad.  I drove home, wondering what that noise was, but forgetting it entirely when I got home.

Yesterday, I was running between job sites and that weird buzzing came up again.  Now the pseudo-engineer in me was intrigued.  I noticed there was no pattern to the buzzing; rate of speed had no impact on it.  Neither did my seated position (I wondered if it was seatbelt related).  I was just about to tear the door off the hinges when I noticed ABOUT A DOZEN HORNED BEATLES CRAWLING AROUND IN MY DRIVER-SIDE DOOR POCKET THINGIE. 

I don’t mind bugs.  I rather like them.  But I don’t like a swarm of ANYTHING, including bugs.  So I calmly drove to my job site, flung open the door and proceeded to arm-flail and beg a man to please come help me with this horned beatle infestation.

Cicadas?  I could understand as we had the biggest cicade outbreak this year in recent memory.  But HORNED BEATLES?  WHAT THE HELL, NATURE?

****

Tony is obsessed with “noodles”.  That’s all he wants for dinner, ever.  “Um, I’ll take some nyoodles for dinner, Momma.”  Every night.  He is so obsessed that now, if a wayward punch of blow makes contact, he’ll exclaim, “RIGHT IN THE NOODLES, OH NO.”  Which is kind of funny.

Well, “noodles” is not an easy feed-yourself meal for a three year old, especially since he’s convinced that egg noodles are just like spaghetti noodles and can be “twirled” on your fork. (Newsflash: they can’t.) So while he struggles to feed himself, the Italian Mother in me wants to do it for him.  He is three (read: INDEPENDENT DON’T NEED NO HELP MOMMA), so we have this struggle nightly.  Exasperated, I stopped reaching for his plate and kind of growled to myself.

“Momma,” he said.  Big ole blue puppy dog eyes that I hope always stay that ice blue.  “Momma, calm down.”

Yes, buddy.  Sorry, I will.

“Momma?  You’re bwootiful, you know.”