Ribbon Roping

I bet the thing you are missing most about the Olympics

 are those flexible girls twirling leftover New Year's Eve decorations. 

 I know I am.

As a little girl,

I can remember flinging myself around the living room 

in the flouncy white slip that I usually only wore on Sundays.

I always imagined that I looked as graceful as these

lithe little ribbon skippers.

In fact, I crashed into the furniture with regularity

and never went a day without a scabby patch or giant bruise

on my skinny knobby legs.

I wore them like olympic medals.


 

This poor girl obviously never had anyone to jump rope with.

But she invented her own little game 

and by Jiminy,

it took her all the way to the Olympics! 

I never did use a ball in my childhood routines.

My brothers would have killed me for using their good basketball 

and besides, it was usually a little on the flat side from the bullhead stickers

picked up on the dirt court where they shot baskets 

into the net nailed to the side of the barn.

If I'd only had a leotard
I could have been a contender.

The Gospel According to Liam

This is the handsome five-year-old man in my life.  

He started kindergarten today.

He is an animal lover 

and a great story-teller.

I especially enjoyed his retelling 

of one of Jesus' most moving miracles.  

It is found in the 17th chapter of Luke.

This is how Liam heard in in Sunday School.

One time a long time ago there were ten leopards. 

They wanted to be human. 

They found Jesus and he turned them human. 

 The leopards were really happy to be human. 

Then only one leopard came back to say thank you to Jesus. 

He was a really good leopard.

 

 Amen, Liam.  Amen

Headless Gymnastics: and Other Obscure Olympic Sports

There has been a goodly amount of grousing at my house during ye old Olympic Games. We have found countless hours of swimming and bikini volleyball, but nary a second of pretty plus weightlifting. 

image found here

NBC picks their pets and devotes hour after hour of coverage to them, completely ignoring the thrill of victory and agony of defeat in dozens of worthy sports.

For example. I bet you didn't see the moment that this ping pong ball was hit with such force it imbedded itself into an unfortunate athletic forehead and had to be removed with official olympic tweezers

And then there are the tangle sports.  There is nothing more exciting than watching a big crazy tangle of athletes, whether it is on the mat or in the water.  The tangle sports have been criminally ignored.



Here is a partial list of what else you have been missing.

• Melon Juggling  (Gold medal went to a Portugal farm boy with extraordinarily large hands

• Speed Mall Walking (Gold medal went to blue haired team from Pensacola Florida)

• Wine Tasting (Duh, France wins gold for the zillionth time in a row)

• Blood Letting (In this most ancient of sports, the Transylvanian team narrowly pulls off the gold medal win.  The upstart team from Forks, Washington, USA takes silver)

• Jello Moulding (USA takes home the gold in the well manicured hands of a motherly team from Utah

• Sand Sculpting (A first ever tie for the gold medal between Dubai and Kuwait) 

• Infidel Insults (Iran wins again with a string of invective that singed the beard of the judge from Sweden)

• Headless Gymnastics (China takes gold, silver and bronze)

image found here

Larainy Horrorscope: Guidance from the Galaxy

It's really sad to see the kind of messes you people get into without my guidance.  I've heard some horrifical stories involving wearing socks with sandals, vacationing in Branson, Missouri and eating 3 lbs. of clam dip at one sitting.

Here to save you from yourselves, once again I offer guidance from the galaxy in the form of a

 Larainy Horrorscope

Aries (the wind)

Watching 14 hours of Olympic gymnastics coverage does not imbue your tired old body with elastic capabilities.  Do not try the ottoman vault you have been contemplating or orthopedic treatment will be inevitable.

 

Taurus (the car)

The money you think you will soon inherit is actually sewn up in a trust for Li Li, an obese and temperamental  cat.  Don't buy the boat! 

 

Gemini (the spaceship)

You are misinterpreting your recurring dream about Batman.  You need to quit emailing Christian Bale and consider reroofing.  A surprise awaits you in the attic.

Cancer (the tropic)

 It is high time to drop the "I never shop at Walmart" pretense.  Your neighbors recognize you even with the wig and raincoat.

Leo (Tolstoy)

Two words: new deodorant.

Virgo (the dizzy)

Screaming at the TV during campaign commercials and burning campaign mailers in a gigantic pile on your front lawn does not prove your patriotism.  You need to register to vote.

Scorpio (the venomous)

Now is the time to make your movie musical pitch for that screenplay/score you've been writing; the rollicking but tender "Alice Cooper: My Grandmother Was a Cherokee Princess"

Sagittarius (the droopy)

Sixteen is your number.  Unless you're anemic, then your number is three.  Unless your cholesterol is high, then your number is 451.

Capricorn (the vegetable)

No one is ever going to want the dog hair you have been saving in old pillowcases in the basement, even though it would make a fine sweater.  Your stars signal dire fire hazard issues!

Aquarius (the fishtank)

Romance is in the air!  Unfortunately, you don't have a plane ticket.

Pisces  (the formula)

This is not a good time to make important decisions.  Put off the "paper vs. plastic" conundrum until you have a clear head.

 

Keg Race, Snowflake Style

Most family reunions go something like this

image found here

• 10:00:  meet at park for games
• 10:30: emergency room visit for Skippy who got hit in the eye by a water balloon and is seeing double
• 11:30: Uncle Cooter gets mad and goes home to watch "Turtle Man" 
• 12:00: Potluck lunch featuring Aunt Vita Mae's famous potato salad
• 2:00-eternity: Talent show featuring Mindy and Mandy, the baton twirling twins from the Twin Cities
• 2:30: emergency room visit for Uncle Lester who took an errant baton to the noggin
• 5:00: emergency room visits for everyone who ate Aunt Vita Mae's famous potato salad which is now even more famous because of a a new secret ingredient "salmonella"

My Flake family reunion features a full-on rodeo.  The favorite and final event is the keg race.  Now, if this wasn't a bunch of mostly Mormons, a keg race would probably feature some sort of intoxicating liquid refreshment, but at our rodeo, it's a game of musical chairs on horses.

The cowboys/cowgirls sit on their "kegs" until the announcer says go

Everyone mounts their horse as fast as they can

And race around a barrel at the end of the arena.

Stirrups are optional.

When they come back, one of the kegs is gone 

and everyone jumps off their horse to find a seat.

It's intense and crazy fun.

This year, my brother Jeff entered the keg race.  

He came in third.

We're expecting better results for him in his run for the Senate.

Love,

Your Family

Summer's Slippery Slope

Tsk Tsk Tsk dear readers.  It has come to my attention that many of you have been making absolutely horrifical decisions during the past few months.  I know the summer has been hot, and you have been plagued with drought and unwanted house guests, but seriously.  Get a grip!

For example, Odell Toggie got to feeling so invincible,  he grew his hair into what he thought was a suitable helmet  for when he rides his Moped. His girlfriend Bambi is skeptical; both in the protective power of Odell's coiff, and that he really has any brains under his helmet-hair worth protecting.

Aspiring model and designer, Avonell unwisely combined her love of fashion with her lifelong obsession with the gastrointestinal system and was laughed off the runway.

The Bipperts decided to go out on a limb and eschew their usual matching denim outfits, boldly flaunting both print and pattern in the annual family photo.  Elbert, the youngest, refused and went with his lucky mustard colored shirt because it's the one that can totally camouflage Chik fil-A sauce.  When he donned his lucky green tennis shoes little Elbert knew he had a winner.

image found here

Conrad grew his hair out over the summer but let himself be unwisely influenced by his gargantuan crush on a young Julie Andrews in The Sound of Music   

Even with a unifying denim theme, Sla$h (alias Ronnie) still manages to remain aloof by refusing to unbutton his top button, or sprawl on the floor with the rest of the family.  He sends a message of independence with his firmly folded arms and a hairstyle that can instantly swing into place to hide both eyes, rendering him both mysterious and intimidating.  Neither of his sisters realize that Sla$h has recently hacked into their Facebook accounts and is methodically unfriending every cute guy on their friend lists.

Stay tuned dear reader, 

because very soon, Larainy is going 

to update your Horrorscope.  

You people need all the help you can get.

lovely people found here

A Grand Adventure

36 years ago, my bestest friend and cousin Jill had the nerve to abandon me and our wild post high school plans for college, travel and world domination to get married.

Five years (almost to the day) later, having failed at world domination and seeing how well marriage had turned out for her, I married too and we have been celebrating anniversaries together ever since.

This year we decided on a trip to Jacob's Lake, near the north rim of the Grand Canyon.  The lake is actually a pond but the quaint Jacob's Lake Inn, which is an assortment of little old cabins, and a small hotel nestled in the pines are so cute that you won't gripe about the lack of lake.  Also, there is a dandy bakery, lunch counter and restaurant that made me very happy.

A short car ride away is the north rim of the canyon and a great hike called the Widforss trail.  It has everything I like, not too much elevation change, spectacular scenery and wildlife that doesn't eat you.

 "That thing over there is called a stick-out, 

which is a geological term"

 It took a lot of courage for me to pile these rocks 

as a monument to my loving husband of 31 years, 

but I must say it turned out pretty well.

 Sigh.  

I hope you can smell the rain because 

there is absolutely no smell like Arizona rain

Widforss Point:

which was the point of the hike, 

which is only one of many pointy points in a landscape 

never painted by the pointillist painter Georges Seurat

 Another tender moment when I was reunited with "Brighty", mascot of the Grand Canyon and the favorite burro of my childhood reading days.

Another point of interest never painted by the pointillist Georges Seurat, is the million-dollar-most expensive-non-flushing toilet in Arizona. It can be found at the Navajo Bridge Visitor's Center.  A good stiff breeze mysteriously blows up through the commode when the lid is opened, providing a unique and refreshing experience for the weary traveler.

I quite like this guy and look forward to many travels to come.

And I wouldn't mind if these two were along for the ride.

Give em' Hell Harry

So furious that tiny sparks were shooting out of his crackling silver hair, Harry Reid blasted the Ralph Lauren designed USA olympic uniforms that were made in (gasp) China.

“Put 'em in a pile and burn 'em,” Reid said of the uniforms,

“If they have to wear nothing but a singlet that says ‘USA,’ that’s what they should do.”

(Now, in case you are confused, a "singlet" is a skin tight wrestling type uniform, as opposed to a "doublet" which is a tight fitting Sumo wrestling type uniform)

You have to hand it to ol' Harry.  He went right home and took the spandex into his own hands, cutting, measuring and sewing all night long, humming away at his grandmother's treadle sewing machine and creating the uniform that he modeled the next day on the Senate floor, to the delight of no one.

 Apparently, Harry has not heard back from the USA olympic clothing committee, but his wife has requested that Harry wear it when he does yard work.

Ten Good Reasons To Quit Trying to Fit Into Your Bathing Suit

Do you know that there is a class in every creative writing department in every university and junior college across the fruited plain called

How to Write a List of Ten Ways to Fit Into Your Bathing Suit:101?   

Okay, maybe I made that up, but there has to be some serious scholarship on the subject because every magazine, newspaper and online column runs an article like this every day of the year from May through August.

Well I happen to think that there are some seriously compelling reasons not to fit into your bathing suit.

1.  You can't eat a whole pan of these

2.   Bathing suit crotches are notorious breeding grounds for bacteria

3.  Since your old bathing suit doesn't fit, you have an excellent reason to go to the mall and look for a new one, not find one and buy some shoes instead...also a pretzel.

4.  Your bathing suit was probably made in China and wearing it would be unpatriotic, unless you are part of the U.S. Olympic team wearing Ralph Lauren.

5. You can't drink a quart of this




6.  Losing weight, getting fit and looking good in that old bathing suit will alienate 69% of your friends and have been short on friends ever since you starting selling Cutco knives and bugging people to host parties.

7.  Forward thinkers like Al Gore are all recommending the acquisition

of a healthy fat layer to compensate for impending crop failures due to global warming.

 8.  You can't make this and eat it like that kid in the Matilda movie because you have always wanted to see if you could do it.

9.  Watching the Olympic swimming events in your jammies is much more fun.

10.  Who wants to swim anyway?  You'll just have to blow dry your hair all over again.

Happy Birthday Dear Spam

Time to get your party hat on!

Spam just turned 75!*

In their wildest nightmares, 

who could have ever predicted that a

"ham-like nodule amalgam 

encased in a quivering gelatinous coating"

would last longer than the marriage 

of Tom Cruise and Katie Holmes?

Did anyone ever jump on Oprah's couch and proclaim their love for a hunk of Spam on Wonder bread?

The answer to that my friends is a big fat no.

Spam has survived scorn and a bevy of failed taste tests 

to celebrate 7 decades plus a fiver

despite a profound and well earned lack of respect.

(The army liked to call it

"ham that didn't pass it's physical".)

So get on out there and celebrate

with a tender morsel of Spam wusubi.

Or,

you can just eat a Vienna sausage,

which is neither from Vienna, or a proper sausage,

but a Spam cousin, once removed 

molded into a flesh-toned cylinder of horror.

 

Bon appetit!

*I really hope I look this good when I'm 75. 

I really hope I don't look like this when I'm 75.