So, here it was a quiet Sunday afternoon, and “ding-dong.” I decided I would ignore whatever visitor was at the door, cuz I was enjoying my quiet Sabbath afternoon. I figured if it was important, whoever was out there would keep ding-donging. But there was nary another ding-dong, nor was there a knock-knock from outside.
A bit later, Suzanne happened to go outside. Sitting on the front step was a package for Skitter from prime. Apparently, the little mutt had found my amazon account and my debit card. She’s a crafty beast. As I opened up her package, I discovered she’s also a chip off the old tie block. She had ordered all 40 of these tiny ties. Skitter presents 40 Ties o’ the Day. She wins.
Skitter’s nose sticks out from under her blanket, which shields her from the cruel world.
I was working away upstairs in my Psycho Bunny-brand Tie o’ the Day this afternoon, just peacefully minding my own business. Okay, I admit I was singing too, which some will say is not a peaceful sound. Anyhoo… I made the bed. I folded clothes and put them in drawers. I got lost in my chores. Somebody’s dog kept barking up a storm outside, with that high-pitched yappy bark of smaller dogs which I cannot abide to listen to. But on I slaved. I made a stop at the computer in the loft to check my email, and then I got lost in doing that for way too long. That dang dog kept going. But the yapping reminded me that a couple of doors in the house had been squeaking, so off I went to the garage to find the WD-40 to solve that problem, which I did.
After returning the WD-40 to its spot in the garage, I decided it was time to crack open a frosty can of sparkling water and spend some time sitting with Skitter on the couch. But the dog I could still hear barking outside was getting on my top nerve, so I decided I had to go find it and its person before I could finally sit down and relax with Skitter. I wanted to give both the owner and dog a lecture about how to be a good neighbor in the neighborhood by not letting your dog bark outside for two hours, driving the rest of us neighbors crazy.
As I approached the patio door to go outside, there it was! That infernal barky, yappy mutt was in my back yard, right out on the patio—on its hind legs, knocking its front paws against the sliding door to get in as it barked!
Ahoy! It was none other than my very own personal dog, Skitter, herself. I had completely forgotten I had put her outside to potty before I started my round of chores. I have never, ever done anything remotely like that to our little rescue darling before. I make it my business to always know exactly where The Skit has parked herself, and that she feels safe in her environs. It’s my job. Golly, I oughta fire myself.
The poor, tortured thing! O’ the trauma I unintentionally put her through! The horror! The horror! Gee, I feel about a centimeter tall right now. Skitter wasn’t shaking too bigly when she came back in the house, although she was a little hoarse when we howled together as we were reunited. Other than that, she seems to be recovering from her temporary terror just fine. I, however, am still quaking in my cougar-print Sloggers at my enormous mistake.
Excuse TIE O’ THE DAY’s absence yesterday. We had a playdate with the plumber for most of the day at our house. (You’ll get that story at a later time.) Peace Bow Tie o’ the Day and I will begin this post with an update on Skitter’s ear problems. The vet discovered Skitter’s left ear has BLACK MOLD! Well, not exactly. She has a fungal infection deep in her ear, for which I’m giving her ear drops daily. But it’s much funnier to say she has black mold. Suzanne even believed me when I told her that’s what it was. Her eyebrows got really high! And I could see her having visions of spending bigly bucks to tear up the house and rid it of whatever black mold might be lurking in its walls, which had surely—somehow—given Skitter an ear infection. I had to say, “Whoa!” to Suzanne. I had to explain I was making a joke by labeling Skitter’s fungal infection “black mold.” I NEVER have to explain my hokey-jokey names for things to Suzanne. She always gets my humor. But it was her birthday, so I understood she had her mind on the festivities. Skitter will be fine in a couple of weeks.
For Suzanne’s birthday, we stayed home this year. It’s a bit pandemic-y out there right now, so I designed her birthday celebration with that in mind. Suzanne is good about no longer eating certain favorite “foods,” so her blood pressure is happy. But I decided to give her the gift of freely eating junk food for one evening. One by one, at various time intervals, I paraded out many courses of sweet, salty, and non-nutritional eats. The menu was as follows: Hostess Birthday Cake-flavor Cupcakes; Starburst jelly beans; a Birthday Cake-flavor Kit-Kat; popcorn; peanut M&M’s; Chocolate Peanut Butter Pie OREO’s; Fat Boy Birthday Cake Ice Cream; and—drum roll—my famous Potato Chip Birthday Cake. Suzanne was so full of bad-for-everybody food that she had to wait until the next day to eat my specialty, which is microwaved (no more than 10 seconds) Skittles.
BTW I purposely wore my salad tie to the grocery store when I bought all the junk food. I forgot to take a selfie at the store. Sorry.
Another BTW The party hats are mermaid tails. They were supposed to be for Gracie’s first birthday, but they weren’t delivered to me in time for that. Skitter’s mermaid tail is a little under the weather here, surely reflecting the discomfort of her black mold situation. Mermaid tails sure look dandy on us though, eh?
I’ve got a wood-lookin’ fabric, nuts-and-bolts-and-screws Bow Tie o’ the Day to offer y’all. Purple butterfly Face Mask o’ the Day had me covered when I erranded at the bank and the grocery store. Beyond that, I’ve been unable to concoct a story or sermon for you. Even as I type this post, Skitter has her muzzle on my laptop, which makes typing tough. She has a very bad infection or something going on in her left ear, and she thinks she has to have my complete attention. You know how kids are when they don’t feel good. They neeeeeeeed you to be right there suffering along with them. Skitter’s been like a clingy dryer sheet to me all day. Thank the heavens her vet is squeezing us in, first thing in the morning.
The Bow Ties of the 4th of July happened, but the air parade we were supposed to see above us as we sat on the deck did not come to pass. The city said it was canceled at the last minute because of problems with insurance. Most of our development didn’t get that memo, so we were all outside looking to the skies. We each did our social distancing by staying on our own property, but socializing with each other very loudly. Gradually, the news of the air parade’s cancellation got texted, tweeted, screamed, and facebooked up and down the street. Oh, well. We got to see the regular air traffic in the blue sky anyway. Hey, we’re free! No complaints here.
As you can see from her pix, Skitter had dressed in her patriotic tie to watch the parade. She’s still a little unclear of the concept of how to watch any kind of parade. On the deck, her skittishness kept her staring into the house the entire time, instead of out at the neighborhood or up at the skies.
Magnetic LEGO Bow Tie o’ the Day heralds my most recent return from the city of Bipolarville, in the great state of Extreme Depression. Told ya I’d be back. This is a recent photo of me in my Face Mask o’ the Day, hanging out in the flag section of the Parrish Lane Walmart—prepping for the upcoming Fourth of July celebration.
I woke up yesterday morning wishing someone would write me an utterly frivolous TIE O’ THE DAY post to make me laugh, then I realized it’s my job to write said posts. So there I was… staring at Skitter’s hairy hip mole, eating a soda cracker, and casually letting some possible tblog ideas percolate in my crazy brain. I was getting nowhere fast—when suddenly my phone honked at me and announced the caller was Mercedes.
I call her Mercedes, but most of y’all know her as my oldest sibling, Betty or BT. She has been a faithful reader of my neckwear posts since TIE O’ THE DAY was nothing more than a bigly group text. Mercedes called to check in on how her bipolarly-benched little sister is doing, AND—most importantly 😜—to check on when the heck TIE O’ THE DAY posts would be returning to social media.
I can affirm that at the very beginning of our conversation, I could hardly form sentences without great physical, cognitive, and emotional effort. The inability to think and speak easily is one of the main symptoms of my extreme bipolar depression. But by the end of the phone call, we were both heartily cackle-laughing about a smorgasbord of current events, human foibles, and what I will refer to as “Mom stories”—as in, stories starring Mom. Pick an event, pick a topic. If Mom was part of it—or even has an opinion about it—there’s sure to be a full-blown, repeatable, mostly family-friendly story to tell for generations to come. Mom and her escapades are the gift that keeps on giving. I felt demonstrably better during and after my phone call from my bigliest sister.
Don’t misunderstand me. I’m not saying Mercedes cured my depressive swing. Nor am I saying that stories about Mom conquered my bipolar speed bump. Oh, that it were so! If BT and Mom were the cure for bipolarity, I’d take our Two-Helen’s-and-a-Mercedes act on tour from town to town, and the three of us would make a bigly bucket o’ bucks rescuing folks from their own brain chemistry. Although it was not a fix-it, yesterday morning’s phone conversation with my biggest sister clearly lit an oomph-spark under my TIE O’ THE DAY muscle. If you’re sad to see I’m back, feel free to blame my Mercedes. Or Mom. Mom has given me permission to blame her for everything. I’m sure she’ll happily let you blame her for everything too.
BTW I’m so madly in love with the “Raised in a BARN” cap I got in Arkansas last summer. Out of all my hats, I find it is my go-to hat during these bipolar-y, pandemic-y, protest-y days. I just keep putting it atop my noggin, day after day. Its attitude fits me perfectly right now. Perhaps it’s a rapid-cycling bipolar thing. Perhaps it’s a redneck thing. I don’t know why, but it’s currently my thing.
I thought I was lookin’ pretty hip in my geometric-pattern Face Mask o’ the Day and my wood Bow Tie o’ the Day. But after I examined the selfies I took, I realized no one can see the bow tie cuz it’s camo-patterned. On top of that, my total look apparently scared Skitter into a brow scowl rivaling my own when I’m not happy. She looks like she’s ready to jump ship and hie to Kolob in the twinkling of an eye. (Excuse the Mormon hymn reference)
Skitter is as patient with me and my clothing whims as Suzanne is, but Suzanne never gets scared of how I look—because her brain is bigly-er than a walnut and she understands I’m just weird. But I promise—here and now—that from now on, when I get dressed for the day, I will try harder to be more sensitive to Skitter’s easily-afeared canine feelings.
For decades, Mom and her best friend, Peggy, made a daily Pepsi run. Peggy would drive one day, Mom would drive the next. They’d pull up to the drive-up window at any one of a number of Delta’s finest establishments. It was the Cardwell gas station for the last few years of their Pepsi-running. There was always a brief tiff over whose turn it was to pay. Drink in hand, they would cruise the roads of Millard County. Even the Stake President once acknowledged their presence in a Relief Society meeting by referring to them as the ladies who drink and drive. His wife made him apologize to them later, but they thought it was funny. And all the church ladies of the Delta West Stake understood and thought it was funny too.
There came a time when Mom could no longer drive, so I drove them when it was her turn. When Mom got rid of her car, I began to drive them in Peggy’s car when it was Mom’s turn. Eventually, I became the official chauffeur of their daily forays to and fro across the county, always in Peggy’s car. If you ever experienced the comedy routine that was Mom’s and Peggy’s friendship, I don’t have to explain how exhausting and enlightening and uplifting it could be to be around them. If you never had the chance to see them be friends live and in-person, all I can say is that you missed something wonderful. Now Mom lives in a care center and Peggy is gone.
It was because of Mom and Peggy that one day I truly regretted not having bigly bucks in my bank account to waste on one humongous good laugh. It’s the only time in my life I have been ticked off that I wasn’t awash in wealth. We had just picked up our daily drinks and we were driving out of Delta on Lone Tree Road, when I got this vision. I wanted to buy a motorcycle, with two side-cars attached for Mom and Peggy. I wanted to jump on the bike and drive Mom and Peggy—and their drinks—up over the overpass, and up and down Main Street, then all across every paved and dirt road in the county. And the old broads would have gone along with it—once, just to make everyone who saw them laugh.
Well, of course, I told Mom and Peggy my plan-which-wouldn’t-happen. We all got a kick out of envisioning it. I said, “You know you would do it.” The minute I said that, they both replied in unison as if they’d practiced the line for years, “Yes, but not on hair day.”
I couldn’t find a side-car for my bicycle, but I did manage to find a bike trailer for Skitter to accompany me on my bike outings. I’m letting the skittish mutt get used to her trailer for a few days before we head out on an actual trek. Here, she wears her Tie o’ the Day, looking forward to our meandering daily journeys. We wish Mom and Peggy could come with us.
Well, I have an in-office pain specialist appointment in SLC in a few days, but before I’m allowed to actually enter the office, I am required to take a COVID-19 test. So this morning, I threw on a mustache wood Bow Tie o’ the Day, and I managed to wrangle Skitter into the car with me for a drive to the Farmington Station U of U Hospital, where they have drive-thru COVID-19 testing. Skitter and I sang Lumineers songs together in the car while waiting in line, and she was very brave. She even held my hand through the entire drive-thru testing process.
The testing itself was a shock to my system—only because I didn’t know it was going to be done quite that far up my nose. Ever had a really long toothpick shoved all the way up your nose for exactly 5 seconds? The stick may have been only about the circumference of a toothpick, but when it’s poked up your nose for 5 seconds it feels like an angry ponderosa pine.
I get the results in 24-48 hours. Kudos to the U of U Hospital folks performing the tests. The process was streamlined and professional. The testers also liked my mask.
It’s time for one of Skitter’s booster shots and her Centerville city license expires on May 5th, so she needs a new one. She also needs what they call an “older dog” physical. Plus, I decided that since we live in the bigly city, she really ought to be chipped.
I called Dr. Doolittle’s office yesterday to make Skitter’s appointment for this morning. When I made the appointment, I was told to not enter the building when I arrived, but to stay in the car, then give ’em a call to say “My mutt and I are here,” and then someone would come out to fetch the patient.Bow Tie o’ the Day and I drove The Skit to her appointment, and a masked vet tech came out before I could even call to announce our arrival. She told me one animal was ahead of Skitter, then she grabbed a dog patient from the car across the parking lot from us. So Skitter and I sat for a few minutes in the waiting room which is also known as my car. About ten minutes later, the vet tech came for Skitter the Skittish.
Before she picked up Skitter from the passenger seat, the masked vet tech and I discussed the exact purposes of our being there. I’m glad we did that because it seems their ID chip shelves were as bare as toilet paper shelves were at COSTCO two weeks ago. The vet clinic’s scheduled chip shipment hadn’t arrived. The vet tech said she would take Skitter in to take care of the other stuff today, then I could make a future appointment to get Skitter’s chip. I said “Oh no, we will not!” We’ll schedule one appointment for some time in the next few days.
I refuse to make Skitter go through the fear and anxiety of even one more vet visit than she absolutely has to. Skitter will see the vet for these needs once, when they can all be taken care of at one time. She can barely handle a vet appointment without shaking her bones into dislocation.
In her photo here, notice The Skit’s praying paws and the forlorn look in her eyes as she waited with me in the car/waiting room for her turn. She and I are glad she escaped the vet visit for at least another day. As we pulled out of the vet’s parking lot, I swear I could hear Skitter actually say, “WHEW! That was a close one.”
