You're Too Nice!

Three little words that have confused me for a very long time: You're too nice.

I would like to know exactly when being nice became a problem of excess.  When did being nice become a no-no?  Where exactly is that line between "just enough nice" and "too nice"?  Someone help me with this please!


There is the 
"you're nice to the point of being a moron
" judgement, as well as the 
"you're nice to the point of being suspicious and you must have alterior motives
" problem.
I may be the first one, but the second one pisses me off and 
I hear it more than anything.  
Personally, 
I dont think 
I'm excessively amicable, and many days my husband would be standing behind me, nodding his head like crazy.

Soooooooo....

Before I continue, I would like to put my meanie-pants on and bitch slap you just so I can be like the cool kids and have the appropriate amount of nasty going on while we talk here.  Cuz I'm not really sure what I'm doing in this "bad girl territory", so I figure that's a good place to start.

I'm a mid-western girl.  My parents moved to the east coast when I was 13.  I was traumatized because the month before we moved, my father had travelled to Aruba to look at a restaurant, so I thought that if we were moving that we would be heading to that "One Happy Island".

Nay, nay.

Instead of working on a tan and gettin' my island groove on, I found myself being analyzed and torn apart by my peers who were kind of harsh.  I dressed wrong, I spoke wrong, I carried myself wrong, and I was "too nice", which was an undesirable trait.  So, yes, I've been confused since I was 13.

But I'm not alone!  My mother, also born and raised as a mid-west girl, has been hearing the same judgement since we got here.  She's just as confused as I am about this one.  However, a few weeks ago,  she uttered those dreadful words to me, and my response was, "When did it become wrong to be nice?  Either I'm nice or I'm stupid.  But there is no "too nice".  Maybe they're just too f*cking bitchy???"

I listen to Howard Stern on satellite and when you hear people talk about his wife, Beth, they always marvel about how nice she is and how she's such "an angel".  Well, I hate to break it to you all, but I grew up in the same place that she did, and I'm the same age that she is, and her behavior seems entirely appropriate and normal to me.  It's no big shocker.  In fact, I have a boatload of cousins who are just like her!  If you got us all together in one room and filmed it, apparently they could promote it as a science fiction series or some other oddity.  An observation of a herd of Too Nicers?   Ooooooo!  Scary stuff.  (oh, puh-leez)

My husband says part of why he married me because of my morality.  When he mentions behavior here that I find mean spirited or selfish, I'm always shocked.  And when I'm shocked, he's surprised.  To him, it's all normal.  It's normal for people close to you take advantage of you, or to turn their backs on you, or abandon you for an extended period of time, or blatantly lie to you, or to say shitty things and expect you to get over it because they "feel better after venting".  I'll stop there.  I'm sure you get it.

Justin is dying to go to where I grew up just so he can see if there actually ARE more people like my mother, my brother and me.  Like we are some kind of Holier Than Thou side show freaks in his world? While I'd love to think we are special, the fact is that people who live further away from big metropolitan areas are different, and there are tons more like us. 

When I have to explain my "level of niceness" in a discussion, it usually starts with, "You know me....the happy idiot!"  I say it with a smile, but I know it's what many people think.  I know because I have good hearing and they talk too loud.

Here's my drama.  I want my daughter to think and live her life more like my family and less like "the local status quo".

Don't get me wrong, I love the extra bit of self confidence and outspoken tendencies of the people from here.  I like that they have a thicker skin and are a little less sensitive.  And I think it's awesome that they will get in your face and tell you that you're an asshole when you really deserve it!  However, I can't seem to figure out how to make "bad ass" and "too nice" merge.  At some point they start to work against each other.

This made me think of some of my prior employers..... especially at one "driven" company 

If I had my druthers, Allie would be kind and loving to people, but speak up when she's being treated in a way she doesn't like.  I want her to stick up for herself and for others who deserve it, but in a way that is respectful and intelligent.  She should be too nice, but only to people who deserve it.  And when people use her pleasant and good natured demeanor against her and criticize her for it, I hope it doesn't deter her from being a good person in the future (insert kick in the shin here).

I must clarify that everyone here isn't a bigfatjerkface.  There are many awesome people sprinkled around this area.  Granted, some of them are from out of town as well, but there are just as many that were born and raised here.  And you know what they tell me?  They say that people always tell them that they are "too nice".

Really, people?  How did something so good become so wrong?

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Morbidity, Mortality and Tattoos

I feel like I've been writing a lot about death lately.  That kind of freaks me out a bit.  It's been a haunting topic the past few weeks.  Most of it kind of funny.  But for some reason, it's been touching my life a bit more seriously.  And I'm speaking beyond the death of Mr. Mouse and my husband traveling with dead people.

About eight  years ago, I had a large spurt of loss going on around me.  Friends died, my neighbor died, my friends' pets were dying and, oddly enough, I was taking a course called Death And Dying at school.  It seemed to be taking over my world.

There was a photo at the start of my class' textbook that I was drawn to.  I had been wanting to get another tattoo for a few years but I wanted to wait until something meaningful came along.  When I realized how often I looked at the photo, that's when I knew it was time.  I found my last tattoo.

These are photos from the day I had it done.  Keep in mind that it's the same tattoo.  If you look at it one way, it says Death and if you turn your head, it says Life.  If you don't believe me, just flip yourself....or your screen, which would probably be easier.  I took all of the hard work out of it for you and just flipped the camera.  I'm nice like that.

I love this tattoo.  It really represents something to me.  Life and death are so interchangeable, inescapable, and you can't have one without the other. 

Little did I know that it's also pretty popular amongst the prison population, but I'm okay with that.  Coincidentally, I was in school with the intention of becoming a prison psychologist.  Sometimes the strangest crap happens to me.

So, this Tuesday I woke up to find a text from one of my customers saying that one of her two dogs had died suddenly during the night.  I have been seeing these two boxers almost every Monday thru Friday for nearly five years and when I tell you that this boxer was the most excitable ball of energy I've ever seen, I'm not kidding.  He was in non-stop play mode.  

Sweet Jameson was only seven when he died.  He had an undetected brain tumor and got very sick over the course of 12 hours and the animal hospital was unable to save him.  His humans don't have human children so the dogs are their babies.  As you can imagine, they are just devastated by the loss.

Allie heard me talking to Jameson's "mom" on the phone that morning and on the way to school, she asked me what happened to him.  I can't even remember the answer I gave her.  I know it was sucky because even I wasn't sure what I was talking about.  

Then we passed a cemetery.  "What are those rocks," Allie asked, referring to the headstones.

What are the chances that after passing that cemetery nearly every day for her entire life, that she would suddenly notice the headstones right as we are discussing death?  Apparently, they are odds are pretty good.

"Those are headstones or grave markers.  They put them over the graves of people after they are buried."

"WHAT????!!"  I looked in my rearview mirror and saw that her eyes were the size of dinner plates.  "Buried??  In the ground??!"

Shit, shit, SHIT!  This was not the best conversation to start during a ten minute ride to preschool first thing in the morning.  And I was entirely unprepared to explain death and burial to a child already.  After all, I hadn't done all of the neurotic necessary research that tends to accompany serious child related issues.  Why wasn't I one of those parents who could come up with just the right thing to say about stuff like this without totally freaking her out?  I could come up with a fake bedtime story with no problem, but a REAL answer about an important topic was a stumper for me.

"When people die..."

"What do you mean die?" she interrupted.

"When people go to sleep for a long time...."  Already I was screwing up.  I remembered that I had read awhile ago that you never compare death to sleeping when explaining death to a child.  They might be afraid to fall asleep after that.

Just then, the car in front of me slammed on the breaks as the light turned red.  What a freakin' blessing THAT was!  

"Mommy, red means stop."  Allie has the attention span of a goldfish sometimes.

I'm no fool.  I was NOT prepared for this parental death test and I saw an out. "That is exactly right!  Red means stop!  And do you know what green and yellow mean?"  I was very enthusiastic about this new conversation regarding traffic signage.  I was grabbing the opportunity to dodge the death discussion and hanging on for dear life.

I don't know if there is a proper age to explain death to a child when it doesn't accompany a personal experience.  I will have to obsessively research this one.  However, if you have any good information to share, I'd love to hear it.  

Have a good weekend, my dear bleeps!  (blog peeps)

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Open Letter to Our Teeny Houseguest

Dear Mister Mouse,

I would like to apologize about how our first meeting wrapped up.  It was not at all how I intended for it to end.  But then again, it was not on my agenda to meet in the first place, so I was really kind of winging it.  You should've had your people call my people to schedule a visit.

Let me applaud you on your elusive methods of getting our attention.   We were thisclose to thinking we were losing our minds.  Every time we heard the strange commotion, we would shut off the television and sit quietly to try to locate where the noise was coming from.  But you were far more experienced at this game than we were and you would clam up the minute we got quiet.  We spent a good portion of the evening playing "freeze and look suspicious" in order to narrow down your location.  I believe I could hear my heartbeat at one point.  And my need to breathe really pissed me off because I was sure that it was inhibiting my ability to hear clearly.

I have no idea when the cat got involved.  To be honest, she's really a chunky, furry, lazy-ass, so I'm surprised she chose to poke her nose in your business at all.   The first question I asked my husband when I forced him to look in that laundry room while I huddled in a ball on the couch was, "Is that cat in there?!" You can't imagine my surprise when I discovered she was with you.  "Yup.  She's here."  She may have intervened, but she kept the action to a minimum, didn't she?  I didn't hear any feline sounds coming from that room.  You could've kicked her ass with no problem.

Even thought I was completely freaked out about you running around our condo, I'm not heartless.  I really just wanted you to vacate the premises.  There's oodles of forrest land around this complex.  You looked like an industrious fella so I bet you would conquer the mouse territories with no problem.  Surely you would have been more comfortable in the wild than in our house.  We're on a diet.  There's slim pickins here.  No good eats.

I am as shocked as you probably were when Justin tried to trap you with that jumbo cat feeder (now you know why she's fat.... key word is "JUMBO")  When I heard the "uh-oh", my fear of a rodent encounter was instantly replaced with a fear for your life.  We don't have much mouse trapping experience so "we" reached for the first thing we could find.  How did we know that you would try to flee as the hollow bottomed feeder came slamming down?

I can best explain my thoughts and feelings by sharing a text conversation I had with my mother during the last moments of your life:

ME: There is something in our laundry room !!! A bat or mouse or something!!!
MOM: OH NO
(pause)
ME: It's a mouse.
ME: We have it cornered.  The cat alerted us but didn't do her job.  Of course.
MOM: I think we have a trap of you need one.
ME: Kill trap??
MOM: I think so.  ____ gave it to us.  You definitely want to get it out of your house before it gets into your kitchen and leaves little droppings.
(pause)
(this is the sad part)
ME: He is no longer with us.
ME: Accidentally murdered.
ME: Deceased
ME: Moment of silence please
ME: No poopers will be left behind now.  The poop maker is gone.
MOM: NOW.....just how did this happen????
ME: Yes, now
ME: Justin killed him by accident trying to trap him under something
(pause)
ME: I think I'm mourning  a little bit
ME: Oh jeez.  Justin just flung him toward ______'s place.  Not even a respectable burial!
(where were the condolences?)
ME: Hello?
MOM:  Oh no.....my poor granddaughter!
ME: Why???
MOM: No reason....just a crazy mother, that's all.
ME: Gee thanks. I can't imagine where I get it from
MOM: Your father, of course!

In conclusion, I'm sorry that you're dead.  I suppose it was better that you were accidentally killed by the cat feeder.  Considering the speed at which Lucky does things, it would have been a slow, torturous death if left up to the cat.  If anyone comes looking for you, I'll let them know that it was quick and painless.  I hope you're in the Great Cheese Factory in the sky, chomping away on a big fat piece of gouda or pecorino romano......or perhaps Brie if you were a fancy mouse.

Fondly,
Vicki

p.s. I'd really appreciate it if we kept it to ourselves that I was hiding behind my three year old during this experience.  She's a brave little soul, isn't she?  Totally badass.


Dear Cat,

Sorry for the slanderous statements.  There was some truth to your inactivity and lack of hunting skills.   And keep in mind that you only started liking me during the past year.  I'm really not obligated to say super nice things about you.   I'm still a little suspicious of your motives, but you're cute so I'm willing to work it out.  Next time maybe you could take care of business though?

Love (With Caution),
The female human

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Taxi of the Deceased

In honor of Halloween, I'm finally going to divulge the story about my husband driving around with dead people in his truck.  I've mentioned it a few times and I keep saying that I'm going to tell you, but I  also keep forgetting.

Now is the moment.

Mind you, when I tell this story, most people have the same reaction at first.  So if you find yourself staring at the screen with the look of utter confusion/shock/whatthefuckness on your face as you read on, it's the common response.   

This blog entry's disclaimer is that I swear that my husband is NOT insane.  However, I DO believe that he should be supervised or checked up on at regular intervals because he's very creative, and intelligent and his thought processes get him into weird predicaments.  Those of us who know him are not concerned that he spends a good portion of his day shaping the mind of a small human, so that should confirm that he's A-OK.  He's a good kind of "wackadoodle".  (And he makes me feel normal.)

A few days before Hurricane Sandy in 2012, I came home from work and Justin looked particularly excited about something.  Usually, he's very chill and laid back.  Instead he looked like a big ole happy yellow lab, bounding over, in my face, excited to greet me at the door.... minus the crotch sniffing, of course.

"You are never going to believe what happened to me today at the storage bin!"

Well, if that doesn't make you tingle with anticipation, I don't know what will.  

Not.

I put my work stuff down and was preparing myself for one of those long winded stories that is usually about nothing too thrilling, because the poor guy doesn't get much excitement in his day.  'Deep breath.  Focus, Vicki.  Focus.  Liven up and look interested now!"

"I can't possibly imagine what you found at Bob's that could elicit this much enthusiasm."  We have a truck stored there.  The truck stores lots of crap that isn't worthy of being part of the practice room for hoarding, a/k/a our garage.

"I found dead people!"

Ok.  I admit my interest was piqued.  He got me on this one.  Interesting shit DOES happen at Bob's!

"Excuse me?"  

"Dead people.  In boxes.  I found them in the dumpster!"  It was as if he found a brontosaurus skeleton or something.  He was seriously pumped!  

"In the dumpster???  What in the hell are you talking about???"

"I went to Bob's to get something from the truck and thought I would throw out some stuff.  I took it to their dumpster and when I looked in, I saw these three cardboard boxes.  The were still sealed, so I was kind of curious what was in there."

I'm staring at him and all I can think of is, 'Oh my God, he's so bored that he's dumpster diving now.  This is very sad.'

"Justin, you took people's garbage out of the dumpster?"

"Vic, I HAD to know.  You know how I am."  

Yes, I do.  If he was a cat, he'd probably be dead by now from his crazy curiosity.

"I opened the boxes and there were dead people in there!  Someone threw out cremated remains.  They had never even opened up the boxes.  And there was information in there too.  Names and dates and photos."

"There were photos in the boxes?"  No one put photos in my father's box when we got his ashes back.  I felt a bit slighted.

"No.  The photos were in the dumpster under the boxes." 

"You went back in the dumpster to get the photos???  Are you kidding?"  The visual of him digging around in a dumpster was so odd.  He's a germaphobe!

"It all was right on top.  It's not like I was purposely looking through the dumpster for shit.  I didn't even have to get in."  

"Thank God.  That's disgusting.  Plus you aren't supposed to do stuff like that."  Handicapped man + dumpster diving = big no-no.  The doctor hadn't included that on the list of stuff he wasn't supposed to do.  It was pretty much a given.

So, I listened the whole story and he went out and got the boxes and the photos.  I admit that I was a little intrigued.  And saddened.  Three people lived on this earth, died, were mourned by their family/friends who had them cremated, and then some uncaring asshole tossed them in the garbage, along with personal photos of precious moments of those lives.  

Every pet that has passed since 2000 has been cremated and they all are in boxes on a shelf in my bedroom.  My father, as some of you may remember from last week, is in my daughter's room, busy waking her up in the middle of the night.  I keep the remains of those that I love close to me.  I can't even imagine spreading the ashes in a lovely place outside, let alone toss them in the dumpster.  Clearly, the person who threw these boxes out didn't really care about them.  They put them in a community dumpster with unwanted things.

"What are you going to do with these people," I asked.  

"I don't know.  I have to find out what you do with them."  I suggested that he call a funeral home and ask them what you could do.  You aren't allowed to bury pets in your yard, so there MUST be some sort of limitations about what you can do with human remains, right?

Days went by.  I forgot about the dead people.  

Then Hurricane Sandy hit and our area became a disaster.  We lost electricity for a few days and everything that was outside was tossed around.  Apparently Sandy was big on renovations and landscaping. 

She also enjoyed dumping everyone's garbage and recycling onto the lawns.  There were photos everywhere.  I came outside the next day to find my neighbors collecting photographs that were strewn all over the complex and joined in to help.

"Who are these people?  I don't recognize anyone.  Do you guys know who they are?"  I didn't see one familiar face.  I'm big on photographs so I was hoping that I could collect them and we could give them back to the person who probably thought that they had lost them forever.

When I got back inside, I told Justin about the photos and he looked a bit guilty.  "Those are the dead people."

"Oh my God!  Justin, are you kidding me??  You still have the dead people??!" I couldn't believe that he still hadn't done anything with them yet.  

"Yeah," he answered sheepishly.  "I kept forgetting to do something with them.  I'm still not sure who to ask and I've been really busy the past few days.  So, I've been driving them around."

I blinked and reiterated, "You're driving them around."  He was that desperate for company that he was hanging out with dead people?

"Yep."  I could hear his brain cranking, trying to think of something good to use as an excuse.  "Just think, if I didn't bring them home and drive them around all week, they probably would've been spread all over Bob's parking lot in the storm.  That's no way to be dead."

More blinking.  I do a lot of blinking at him when he says this kind of stuff.  I think that he's partially serious and partially going for some shock value.  It's all about doing really nutty crap in the most normal fashion possible.

"Get rid of them, Justin.  You're completely freaking me out.  Before you know it, you'll be Googling them, trying to find out more information about who they are.  Your new dead friends."

"I already did that.  I couldn't find anything."

Flash forward a week or so.  

I come home from work and there's the bouncy, happy lab running at me again.  "Guess what I did!"

"Brought home more dead people?"  That was sarcasm, kinda.  If he said yes, I would not have been surprised.

"No.  I got rid of them.  I ran into a cop at the gas station and asked him what I should do with them."  

Again, I"m intrigued.  And shocked.  "You asked a cop?!  And he didn't arrest you or have you carted away?  How did you approach this subject?"

"I just walked up and told him about my situation and how I found them in the dumpster and asked what I should do with them," he said very matter-of-a-factly.

"And?  What did he say?"

"He asked me to repeat myself and then he told me to hold on while he called someone to find out."

Personally, at this point, I would seriously consider driving away for fear that the police officer was going to contact the local psych hospital and they were going to send someone to get me.

"No one really seemed to know, so he suggested I scatter the ashes somewhere out of the way.  I went to the park and scattered them by the woods.  They're at peace now."  He seemed a bit peaceful himself.  I could tell that he felt better now that the people were somewhere proper.  

A few weeks ago I was searching for a box in the garage when I noticed a pile papers on the floor in the corner under a cart.  I stretched under and grabbed the pile and slid it out carefully.  In the midst of some old college papers were some photos.  The photos I had picked up on the lawn about a year ago.  The dead people.  I thought I had thrown them all out after I found out who they were.

I thought about the dumpster and how kind it was for Justin to respect the ashes.  He respected them more than the person who threw them out and was probably connected to them somehow.   As much as I made fun of him for driving dead people around, I think it's sweet.  It was a caring gesture.  

I'm sure I will tell Allison about this one day and she will have her own opinion about how cuckoo/normal she thinks it is.  But it has a good moral to the story.  Respect the dead.  Even when you don't know them.  Because every life is important.  Every life has purpose.  Respect the purpose.

Plus if you make fun of them, apparently they will screw with you.  In the middle of the pile of photos of the dead people was a photo of me and a dog and bird..... who are also now deceased.

I took my photo out and threw out the rest of the photos.  Then I walked back inside and put it back on the side of the refrigerator, where it's been hanging for the past seven years.  I can't remember when it stopped hanging there.  Wasn't it always there?

I have no idea how that photo was removed from the fridge and tucked in with photos of strangers on the floor in the corner of my garage.  I'm too freaked out to think about it.

Spooky.

Happy Halloween Everyone!  xoxo

Me and the Peanut after Pumpkin Picking

"I'M SO EXCITED!  I WANT TO TAKE ALL OF THESE HOME!!"

HEY........How did she get all the way up there?????

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She Sees Dead People....

Since Halloween is right around the corner, I thought that now was as good of a time as any to talk about spooky crap.  Dead people seem to fall into that category.

Before I go on, I have to do a little disclaimer here.  I am not a medium, psychic, clairvoyant, witch, or any other kind of person that connects with the deceased.  I have never actually seen a ghost before, because if I had seen one, I'd be in the local psychiatric hospital, sitting in a corner, terrified while ripping out my eyebrows.

I have, however, seen ghostly activities that scared the bajeezus out of me and left me either screaming or crying.  I'm a big sissy though, so what might be scary to me might be giggle-worthy to you.

So back to my topic.

I think my daughter sees my father.  And he's dead.  I'm not kidding about either of those statements.

When Allie was a baby she would look up at the ceiling or at a blank wall space and suddenly smile and giggle.  You could tell that she was watching something.  And whatever that something was, it was extremely entertaining.

The first time this happened, Justin and I both watched her and asked, "WHAT is she looking at?" We would squint and stick our heads right next hers to see things from her view, and there was nothing.

At least it looked like nothing to us.

After a few more episodes, it hit me like a ton of bricks.

"Well, holy shit.  It's my dad."

"What?!  What do you mean it's your dad??"  Justin looked around nervously, trying to see if there was something around us.

"I know my father. He's all about entertaining kids.  Remember Moheeken, Boheeken and Hobomeeken?  Anything for a laugh.  He's probably making goofy faces at us, or telling her some wackadoodle story about Rindacella and Her Three Sissty Uglers."  It seemed so obvious to me now.

These mysterious gigglefests continued until she was able to speak.  Then the wake up calls began.

Okay.  I'm totally speculating on this one.  Actually, my mother is the speculator.  I just think her speculation may have some merit to it.

Allie does not sleep through the night.  She has slept straight through maybe six times in her three little years.  It's torturous for me to have broken sleep (it hits the Bitch Button in my brain).  Justin can wake up, have a conversation about how to install a torque tube and why a super charger is important (these are car terms, for those of you who were starting to take it to a pervy place), and then roll over and be in Snoresville within two minutes.  AND he's cheerful in the morning.  It's disgusting.

I know.... that's something a jealous person would say....color me green.

After hearing me complain about this nightly interruption for a few weeks, one day my mother comes out with, "Where's your father?"

"Well, that's kinda beyond my realm of knowledge.  I'm assuming he's chatting with Saint Pete at the Pearly Gates.  You know what a gabber he was....." Forever a smart ass.

"Where are his ashes?  Are they still in that room?"  My mom is quite the interrogator and has no tolerance for silliness when she's presenting a point.

I should mention that Allie's room was our office before she was born.  We had two desks and computers and file cabinets and all sorts of stuff in there.  We also had my father's ashes in there.  They were in a bag, in a container, in a box and they used to sit on my desk.

When Justin, my sister, one of our friends and my mom did an Extreme Makeover on the room after Allie was born, Dad was put into a storage box along with a photo printer, some sentimental cards and a pile of jumbo paper clips.  The box has been shuffled around that room a bit.  It currently resides in the closet.

"Yes, the box is in Allie's room.  Dad's in the closet, I believe."  I like to talk about him like he's still a living being, in case you hadn't noticed.  We all seem to do that around here.

"Well, get rid of it.  That's probably what's keeping her awake.  Take your father to a beautiful place and spread his ashes.  It's not good to keep him in that box, especially in her room."  She said all of this very matter-of-a-factly.  Like she has heard of deceased people keeping babies awake quite often.  And like she's an expert on the proper care and the preferences of cremated remains.

Even scarier is that I'm kind of buying into the theory.  Especially after that whole thing with Allie  laughing at the ceiling and stuff during the first year of her life.  I can see my father getting bored and waking her up to play now.  

Unfortunately for Dad, she's at a stage where she's quite fearful of anything or anyone she doesn't understand or know well.  So, I imagine he's freaking her out a little bit.

My dad was awesomely nuts, so if she is seeing him, I hope she starts warming up to him and enjoying the wackiness.  His initials were JPC and he would tell people they stood for Just Partly Crazy, which was quite accurate.

I still haven't done anything with my Dad.  I had wanted to take him to Aruba when I went on my honeymoon, but I was very sick and didn't pack him.  And I forgot to consult with my siblings about it first.  So, he never made it back there.  He really liked Aruba.

I'm convinced that when the moment is right, I'll know exactly what to do.  Then I can ask my sibs and see what they think.  To be honest, I'm kind of just waiting it out to see if he tells Allie what he wants me to do with him.

How cool would that be???

If it happens, you'll be the fifth to know.  Don't be offended.  I've got four other people to contact.  I have two brothers, one sister and Theresa Caputo from the Long Island Medium to call first.  I'm sure you understand.

If you clickity click on the banner below, it will seem like nothing happened, but it did!  You can close the window as soon as it opens if you like.  T'anks peeps!