Life fantastic and Christmas on hold

Every year some string of outdoor lights doesn’t work. I’m not sure why…they literally sit in the garage all year without moving. Our weather is not extreme usually so what the heck? But every year it happens. This year it was the lights to the little pine tree next to the garage. We put up the rest and I figured I’d run to the store and get a short string. Sadly, neither CVS nor Dollar General had any lights. I decided to order some online. I ordered a 70 light set of bright pink lights. Why not? When they came, this is the box.

Yes, I did not simply get bright pink lights. I got lights that illuminate my life fantastic! They are LED fairy string lights too! On the back of the box, it says “ These lights will last a long time and you no need to keep on buying new ones year after year. These lights will not overheat and you can leave them on for days.” Wait, days? Despite the dubious reassurance that they won’t burn the house down, and the grammatical error suggesting a job opportunity for a proofreader or interpreter, I am intrigued by the promise that I shall not need to keep buying new ones. That would indeed be a Christmas miracle! They do look beautiful on the little tree!

Unfortunately, here east of Cleveland, Mother Nature decided to give us a white Christmas.

It was just overkill on the white. Our kids were going to drive back from NYC Friday, but since the weather forecast was for the storm of the century and we weren’t feeling well anyway, they decided not to. For once the usually way-too-dramatic weather anchors were spot on. The Ohio turnpike closed for crying out loud and that never happens. We got a fair amount of snow but it was more the blowing and cold that caused whiteout conditions. With being sick and snowed in, we watched Christmas movies and specials.

One of the specials was an “Old Time Radio Christmas.” Oh my gosh it was so bad. How bad was it? Well let me tell you…there was a bad guy named Uncle Barnaby. Alan and Jane were trying to figure out something and Jane sang a song about “I can’t do the sums” where she couldn’t do math. She was quite cheery about it. Ummm…STEM anyone??? No wonder. There was also a girl named Contrary Mary who sang about being contrary. Alan asked her if she would be contrary if he married her. She said yes. You go girl! Might as well lay it out there. They went on some adventure that I honestly couldn’t describe if you paid me. Uncle Barnaby attempted to drown them. There was a commercial about puffed wheat shot from guns. They sang “Toyland.” I think this was actually “Babes in Toyland” because they met Bo Peep along the way. Then we turned it off. I am still confused. I’m not sure what happened to Alan and Jane or Mary, they could be wandering the forest still. Uncle Barnaby went on to greater villain things I’m sure.

The snow also buried two out of three of my solar powered Christmas chickens. But one is blazing away! Chester did not go for walks for a couple days, but he had a great Christmas. He has eaten so many treats I had to loosen his harness.

Zeus and Milo got a pretty plaid blanket to curl up in, and Zeus took it over. They got treats too though and Milo is treat motivated. He is motivated to get more treats.

We haven’t’ had our Christmas yet with the kids and aren’t sure when it will happen. Truth is there are two ways of looking at Christmas. If Christmas for you is about Jesus’ birth, there is one meaningful Christmas Day. This is reassuring because no matter what happens with our family customs or weather (things we can’t control) like they say in The Grinch, couldn’t stop Christmas from coming, it came all the same. No matter where we are or what we are doing, like Mary and Joseph, Jesus’ birth gives pause. (I realize that the actual historical day may not really be on December 25, but that’s when we celebrate it so…)  But, if Christmas to you is about family and friends and goodwill, then Christmas can happen any time, and should probably not have an expiration date. Christmas day may be consistent but the Christmas spirit can roll on as long as you want it to. If Christmas is not something you celebrate, then disregard this last paragraph, it’s just what I am thinking about. I need to get out with Chester more to have deep and random thoughts while attempting not to wipe out in front of the neighbors.

We did get out today since it hit 51 degrees here! A lot of the snow is melting which sends Chester into mega sniff mode. We joked that he is receiving all sorts of messages from his girlfriends. They were buried under the snow, just like my sheet music is buried at the post office. It was a nice walk and the ice on Lake Erie was cool literally. It will likely melt a bit as we are supposed to reach 60 next week! Go figure.

Whatever your holiday traditions I hope you are doing well what with the craziness and weather and illness around. Let’s ring in a new year with hope. Happy New Year!! Be safe!

Snow adventures and a bad movie

Chester and I have continued to walk even after the snowpacalypse of the last week. It has been cold and snowy here. Chester likes the snow except for one thing: he can’t find a place to poop. Before the snow he pooped on the grass. Now, this is all he sees.

Not all grass is created equal either. There are some spots that are waiting for him, but he doesn’t go there. After walking farther than usual, he leaves a deposit on the mushy part of the snow. Not ideal but easy to pick up.

I thought maybe he was getting bored with the same old route and decided to take him to the other side of the tracks, that is across Bacon Road. I made a critical error in thinking. We crossed Bacon to be met with a two-foot snow wall. Obviously the snowplows had been by.

OK, it wasn’t quite this bad…

Cars were coming so I pulled Chester over the wall. Unfortunately, the snow on the other side of the wall was deeper. It had not been touched and was up to my knees and Chester’s chest. He tried to turn around toward the road, but we had to walk at least to the next street because I couldn’t brave the Bacon wall again with the traffic. I wasn’t sure we would emerge intact. So we slogged on to the next road. It was rough going. It was like walking through a ball crawl if the balls weighed several pounds each. I either had to lift my leg above the snow, or scoot through with a wiggle-wiggle squish-squish movement.  Poor Chester would take about three leaps in a beautiful deer imitation, then peer longingly over the snow at Bacon Road. I almost called my husband to pick us up but I never would have lived it down. We plodded on. Finally, we reached the little road that opened to Bacon.

We crossed Bacon, but there are no sidewalks on Bacon Road. Luckily there are driveways. It was wall, driveway, wall, driveway. We stood in the driveway of a house, then in between traffic, we hustled to the next driveway. We would wait there for a break in cars, then do it again. I’m glad I played so much Frogger. Finally we made it back to the development and walked down the middle of the street with pleasure.

I can’t complain since Lake and Cuyahoga Counties do a pretty good job of snow removal. I grew up in Toledo where they just toss some salt on it and call it a day. We are technically in the “snow belt” and lake effect snow is a real thing, so our crews are ready. You may have missed this news gem: Ohio Turnpike decided to name their snowplows. The Turnpike commission asked the public for ideas in a naming contest. The winners were announced. They include Darth Blader, Snow Force One, OH snow you didn’t, Snowbe Wan Kenobi, and Plowy McPlowface. I’m telling you, in Ohio we love our plows! Now kiddies can say “Oh look mommy, there’s Plowy McPlowface!” and “way to go Sir Plows-a-lot!” (Yes, that was another winner.)

One of Ohio’s finest, Snow More Mr. Ice Guy

With all the snow, there are limited opportunities for entertainment. Our kids went sledding with the grandkids but 1) it’s cold and 2) we’re old. That sounds like our mantra: it’s cold and we’re old. We could ski, but..(repeat mantra.) We could go to a bar or something but we’d have to go outside and..(repeat mantra). So, we watched movies.

There are bad movies, there are baaaad movies, and there are movies so awful that they would have to work to rise to six feet below bad. Such was “Snow White and the Three Stooges.” This movie was not one like “Plan 9 From Outer Space” which many believe is the worst movie ever. Not even close. This made Plan 9 look like an Oscar winner. This was also not bad in the vein of the Three Stooges being bad anyway. Like, what do you expect, it sounds bad from the get go. That doesn’t do this one justice.

A side note, I have yet to find a female who enjoys the Three Stooges. Guys laugh at it like it’s uproariously funny. I don’t get it. Even our daughter, who my husband tried to indoctrinate, thought it was ridiculous and turned away. And she was only four years old.

No, this 1961 movie was literally the worst I have ever seen. It was like a train wreck. We couldn’t look away because we wanted to see the next horror they could pull out. And pull out they did.

The one with the remote won’t change the channel.

The Three Stooges were hardly in the movie. Although this should make me like it more, by the end I was praying that the Stooges would reappear.  Please, please, I’ll never ask again, bring on the Stooges! The movie starred an ice skater, Carol Heiss, who was coming off an Olympic gold medal performance. They tossed in a couple songs thinking a musical number or two would show the sincerity of the plot. If only there was a plot. Neither Ms. Heiss nor Prince Charming could sing. They were dubbed by a singer from the Lawrence Welk Show and some other poor soul.  It was like a lip sync festival.  

A world of beauty and rollicking fun for everyone! Why is this in black and white? And yes, there was a witch on a broomstick in the movie.

Not being a singer, Ms. Heiss was cast to try to meld her ice-skating fame with that of the Stooges in their final years of dubious popularity. Sure, ice skating/stooges/musical. Skoogical! Sounds like a winner! To capitalize on her skating, they put a dream sequence in the middle of the movie. It was in oranges and yellows with an exceptionally long (or maybe it just felt like that) skating number involving some children sliding around. When the dream was over, it was back to the Stooges plonking each other on the head with assorted cabin items. While Snow White was busy happily cleaning the house (ugh) the Queen’s accomplice turned the Queen into a witch at the Queen’s request with his magic sword that went woo-woo-woo and radiated green and white light. Snow White must have eaten the apple because the next thing we knew the Stooges were mourning over her dead but remarkably lifelike body. Luckily Curly Joe (Stooge fans are groaning) got hold of the sword and saved the day (whew! I was worried!)

Needless to say we watched it to the end. I’m not proud of that. But honestly, I laughed harder than I do at bad karaoke. Granted, some of it was bad karaoke. I highly recommend it to those of you (and you know who you are) who have a warped sense of humor and a couple hours. Well worth it!

I have been posting on Wednesdays, which sort of works for me, but I decided to change it up. I’m going to go back to posting on Fridays. I greatly appreciate you and thought you might have more time to read on the weekend. Meanwhile, here’s a picture of Chester after “The Snow Wall of Bacon” walk. Have a good week!