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Mom visits her kids as often as she wants. And she sleeps like a log, according to her. Everywhere she goes, she keeps a nightie and a duster hanging in our closets. Today, her clothes wanted to guest star in Tie o’ the Day #1, which is a black and sea foam-colored tie by designers at little black tie. Duster is from Secret Treasures. Nightie has no label. Mom has probably worn it so often that it rubbed off.

These days Mom spends whole days in nighties and dusters. In winter, she adds her pajama bottoms.The other day, when I was driving the broads for our drinking, Mom was wearing her usual attire, but she was also wearing her earrings. She sports the same outfit, right down to the earrings, whenever the priesthood guys bring the sacrament to her at home when she isn’t able to make it to church. I don’t ask why about the earrings. It is what it is.

Mom wears rings only to church. I don’t think I ever saw her wear her wedding ring. She gave it to Suzanne a while back. And interestingly, Suzanne now wears the wedding rings of both her mothers-in-in law. And she wears them at the same time, all the time. One of Suzanne’s co-workers noticed them on Suzanne’s finger one day, and said they looked like old lady wedding rings. Which they are.

For 9 years, I have kept a pair of Dad’s broken reading glasses. And, a couple of years after his death, Mom gave me the last bar of soap that he used in his shower. I didn’t ask for it. How could I have guessed she had saved something like his soap? She just showed up to The Beach House with it one day. I keep it with his broken glasses. I’m sure I will keep the outfit shown above, as well. As it should be.

Tie o’ the Day #2 (a bloomy pierre cardin design) had a road trip south on I-15 this afternoon. Tie and I and the mutts were at my desk in the loft,  just sitting’ on the dock o’ the bay, watching’ the tide roll away…. anyhoo….and then a text from Suzanne zipped into our cell phone, about how a hutch in her new office crashed to the floor and became pressed-board slivers, and would I like to go to IKEA with her and the district credit card to find some kind of office cabinet that won’t explode into smithereens. Heck Tate, yup. So off the Tie and I went when Suzanne came to fetch us. The mutts stayed home to read Harlequin Romances and chew on fluttering Post-it notes.

To me, IKEA stores are to furniture what Cabela’s is to outdoor play, for mostly grown-ups. They are both huge planets insulated unto themselves. They are as close to infinity as you can get anywhere in creation. It is as if these stores do not have walls, just kinda thick, tall map borders. It is pretty much a necessity to use GPS to navigate the shopping experiences these places provide. Good luck trying to locate your shopping companion if you happen to get separated. It’s not like you can text them and ask where they are, cuz the answer would be the same no matter where you are: “I’m by that white chair in the furniture.”

IKEA has fun stuff, most of which nobody really needs. At the restaurant inside, the swedish meatballs with lingonberries is a nice plate o’ sustenance to nosh on when you need an intermission in your IKEA shopping.

Yes, Suzanne found a non-exploding cabinet and shelves for her office. Suzanne’s district credit card paid for no more and no less than that. Mission accomplished. And a good ride was had by all.

And at home, while Tie and I were gone, Roxy and Skitter had chewed up exactly three tissues from the garbage. Not bad for their day’s work.

Sing with us: Nobody knows the troubles Tie o’ the Day has seen. Nobody knows but Tie.

Tblog-ites, I’m troubleshooting on my site speed bumps. Anyhoo…. All of this figuring out has got me in a baaaaad mood. And thus you can see the CHAPS tie below is acting as a symbol of my frustration. I am a bitch! And here’s a small quote from Anne Lamott, which so accurately expresses my current feelings:

“I thought such awful thoughts that I cannot even say them out loud because they would make Jesus want to drink gin straight out of the cat dish.”

Yup. That about covers it.

Tie o’ the Day #1 is a Penguin piece o’ neckwear for Fish Friday on Saturday. Long story. Shirt is a fishy Bugatchi. I’m glad neither the tie nor the shirt are scratch ‘n’ sniff pieces.

About a trillion years ago, Mom and Dad and I were hanging around the canyon above Oak City, in the ponderosas (but not THE Ponderosa from Bonanza). We saw this humongous fish in the creek, but we had no fishing pole. So Dad just reached into the water and caught the fish with one hand. Typical Dad move. He was like a bear nabbing a salmon from a wild river. Dad was as excited and amazed as a kid. And just then, the game warden showed up on his horse. Dad didn’t try to hide what he had done. He bragged to the game warden, who he didn’t even know. Showed him the fish. The guy was so impressed by Dad’s feat that he didn’t give him a ticket. Patted Dad on the back, in fact. Dad = legend, y’all.

Out at Popo’s farm one day when I was a sprite, I watched Dad take the change from his pants pocket and toss it high into the air. He pointed his .22 pistol into the air, and then I heard a couple of bang-pings. Sure enough, he had hit a couple of the coins before they fell to the dirt. Bullet holes clean through them. I never told my friends about it, cuz I knew no one would ever believe me. I told ya: “legend” doesn’t even begin to cover his larger-than-life abilities. John Wayne cowers in Dad’s shadow.😉

Tie o’ the Day #2 is a sweet, pale blue Stacy Adams.

Sometimes you just need to give up.

 

 

Tie o’ the Day #1 wants to go fishing for trout with Gary. What that means is that Tie o’ the Day and fly-fishy shirt and I want Gary to go fishing for us, returning with trout galore. Tie is from Countess Mara. Shirt is from Field & Stream. It has a much breezier and lighter feel than yesterday’s hefty Field & Stream flannel. It’s colder and rainier outside today, but I was flanneled-out.

I drove down to Daybreak today, to see my Doctor o’ Bipolarity. The name Daybreak made me wonder if when they begin building homes at Point o’ the Mountain–where Utah State Prison’s days are now numbered–will they name the developments/cities Prison Break? No matter what suburby names they call ’em, I will always think: Prison Break.

Below, Tie o’ the Day #2 is my peacenik, beatnik tie. From 14th & Union. Shirt is, of course, the same from earlier today. After my visit with my Doc o’ Bipolarity this afternoon, I felt the need for stability and peace. I felt sticking with the same shirt was a stable thing I could do. And the tie is a calming influence.

Back when I was a munchkin, the peace symbol was considered a radical symbol of the evil, hippie counterculture. Flipping the peace sign to your friends while riding your bike uptown in Delta could get Roy Wood, policeman extraordinaire, to pull you over and give you a talking to. For some reason, after I mentioned my cop talk to Dad, Officer Wood started flipping me the peace sign whenever we passed each other. And I always flipped it right back to him. Dad had a way of helping other people–shall we say– see things from a different perspective. Amazingly, he could show them the limits of their thinking, without making them feel idiotic, and without losing their friendship.

It’s a bit chilly outside, so Tie o’ the Day #2 is a flannel Stacy Adams. Shirt is a heavy flannel from Field & Stream. I do not lie when I say the shirt is heavy: it does weigh almost a pound and a half. It’s fantastically toasty. But I don’t wear it to doctor appointments, cuz when the nurse weighs me, that extra pound or so makes me feel fat. Yes, the cultural propaganda about women and weight works even on me.

I don’t hate the cold and rain. I’m just ready for it to go away for a few months. I love rain in the fall. The scent of rain-drenched leaves mixed with fireplace smoke is a smell of perfection. And it’s fun to crack the windows in a warm house, in order to take a deep whiff of the pleasantly fragrant outdoors–while simultaneously eating a giant bag of Halloween candy an hour or so before (and after) a hot, crock pot dinner. Now that’s the good life.

No matter our various situations, we can all live the good life. Truth, beauty, and goodness abound. We simply have to look at the world with what I call The Grateful Eye. As opposed to The Evil Eye. Or The Teachers Eyes, which really do exist in the back of teachers’ heads.

Tie o’ the Day #1 is participating in a blendy camouflage-type outfit today. It is from 14th & Union, and it really is dark blue. It is also proof that I need to work on taking better pix. Shirt is a Haggar.

Speaking of taking pictures, you may have noticed that I am currently uploading only horizontal pix. We haven’t yet figured out why we can’t control whether or not vertical pix will show up in the tblog pointed in the right direction. The picture will look right on the draft page. But when I publish the page, the tie just lays there on its side. Ties do not like to defy gravity.

The flamingos on this tie are reiterating my desire for summer to get its arse to Utah ASAP. When I got my new phone a couple of years back, the very first text that showed up on it was from Gary. It said exactly this: “Anne needs a box of flamingos”. Huh? I was mystified about what I was supposed to take to Delta, so I replied to Gary, ” What the What?”. Took a minute to figure out that lawn flamingos must come in boxes. Yup. Off to Home Depot I strolled. You learn something every day.

And speaking of this camo look, I must report that according to the speaker at Boston’s baptism ceremony, Bos had declared that his favorite color is camo. Of course.

Tie o’ the Day is a Penguin brand, hanky pattern. Skitter and Roxy both begged to model in the tblog today. How could I say NOPE to those faces? They then bickered with each other over who would get to wear Tie o’ the Day #1, and that got kind of obnoxious, so I did the parent thing and said, “If you’re going to fight over it, you will wear with the same damn tie. I’ll give you something to share about!” And then I tied them together. That’ll learn ’em.

The model mutts are wearing this hanky tie as a tip o’ the hat to Molly Ryther, whose allergies require shots from the vet, and pills, and salve in her eyes. And, of course, Molly’s various ailments and psychoses require Gary to nervously rub holes in the thighs of his pants. That’s Gary’s psychotic move. (He’s my favorite husband.)

FYI I had to pull out Roxy’s snaggle tooth over the weekend. Now her tongue doesn’t hang out of her mouth nearly as much, and her breath is much less deadly. I do not recommend that anybody open her mouth to check it, however.

Tie o’ the Day #2 is a paisley brown and gold Stacy Adams. 2nd Shirt o’ the Day is an Old Navy distressed plaid. Plaid and paisley create a beautiful crash of clash.

At the Pub, the other barflies appreciate Tie o’ the Day’s efforts to add a little bit o’ class to the atmosphere. They sometimes strain to comprehend the finer points o’ the clashing, but they never take the fashion for granted. Or take it for “granite”.

Hey, remember Granite Furniture? I remember going there in 1995 to register to run in some 10K they were sponsoring. Finished that race with bloody shoulders, where my bra straps dug in. Happened in most races I ran. It didn’t matter what fancy new sports bra technology I wore. Same old same old. Thanks, Mom. At some point it ceased to be worth it, no matter how much pleasure I got from running.