Thursday, December 18, 2008

Merry Chanukkistmas! #2: If I'm Gonna Go Down, I'm Gonna Dehydrate with Style

Every year around mid-November, my Mother sends my brother Lewis and I an over-punctuated email requesting our Holiday Wish Lists ???????? and, consequently, she shares her & My Other Mother's wish lists with us, just in case we've become "people who think ahead" since last Hanukkah. Two years ago, my Moms' lists were ripe fodder for bloggetry comedy gold and included "queen size flannel sheets -- no flowers!", "Mac Word," "No-Batteries Flashlight," "Gas Card," 'Beading How-To/Starter Set," the uncharacteristically specific "Sharper Image Digital Dashboard Compass & Weather Station-CE352" and a Lawn Tractor, Snowblower and a Reciprocating Saw.

Last year, they failed me w/r/t providing comedy gold via wish-lists, possibly on purpose. Suddenly Mom #2 lost her zest for power tools (thusly eliminating a re-run of my favorite dyke-with-power-tools graphic) and wanted jewelery (?!?!), and my Mom shifted her passions from apocalypse survival gear to ... an electric toothbrush and a copy of a mix tape I made her in the 90's.

Not like it really matters what they ask for, it's a charade to me as I'm gonna go ahead and buy them books I think they should read instead, just like I do every year. I know my Mom thinks she wants a remote car starter, but who needs to start one's car remotely when all the adventure you need is right here in a wonderful work of LITERATURE? Right? RIGHT!

Anyhow imagine my delight when my Moms' Chanukkistis wish-lists arrived this year full of potential. Perhaps they think that after last year's "Riese being kicked out of the house and sent to a motel" incident, I wouldn't dare continue to lower my potential esteem in their eyes by making fun of them on my blog. Well I just so happen to like motels, so.

Also, "making fun of you on my blog" is the sincerest form of flattery in my world. Obvs look at my list of weirdos. And my other list of weirdos. Those ppl are all my friends. Even Tegan & Sara. I'm calling Tegan right now. She says what's up guys. I told her you said what's up.

So. The following is the wish list. With commentary.

[OH! BUT FIRST!

Look at the buttons !!!!! We got so many orders, you guys are Obvsing all over the place, keep ordering ... this product does not disappoint! I'll announce a new giveaway soon ... omg!

+++
Wish Lists.
My Mother:

Tickets for the Mandy Patikin & Patti LuPone concert in Detroit, 4/14/09-4/19/09
.
Thanks for the deets on date & location, this'll ensure I don't accidentally pick up tickets for their engagement at the Key West retirement community the following week. Also we took my Mom to see Patti LuPone in Gypsy when she visited me in New York, what am I, a Patti LuPone machine. Patti LuPone doesn't grow on trees. Switch it up! It's not like I go see Uh Huh Her ten times in one year and four times in one week or anything.

Almost any other live theater/performance event (includes DSO and opera.)

Almost? See what she's doing here is expecting me to fill in the blanks. Just 'cause I came out of her womb doesn't mean I can read her mind. Even when I was in there I couldn't read her mind, so how could I possibly do that now, I'm not Magnito. Or maybe I could, 'cause she was a McDonald's manager while preggers with me, and now french fries are my favorite food.

Anyhow obviously I'm getting box seats for "Kwame a River: the Chroincles of Detroit's Hip Hop Mayer," it's at the Second City Detroit, family fun will ensue.

Or movie, or museum.
I can't afford to buy a whole movie so obvs I am going to buy my Mom The Ann Arbor Hands-on Museum (that's where budding lesbian moms take their daughters for early bird training, just look at the logo. Here's the hand, here's the hole, go to town) and request that next year that she give me the Giant Bubble or if possible any kind of human body part I can walk into, ideally a heart and barring that, another tunnel or cave where I can hide.

Actually though, um, I just went to their website and they're for real selling exhibits. I didn't know museums could do that? I could play with Ollie Oxygen, Holly Hydrogen, Wally Water and Mr. Catalyst forevs, I wouldn't even need Hav to vlog with me anymore. Also before I give it to her I'm gonna eat all the Astronaut Ice Cream.

Remote car starter.
Why can't my Mom start her own car? wtf? Where does she want to start it from? A lot of questions about this. I think people should start cars up close and personal, like in the driver's seat.

Cooking/baking dish that can go on stovetop and in oven.
Why would you want to put a baking dish on the stovetop? Isn't that what the oven is for? Personally, I know the oven's where you stick your head if you wanna die a là Lady Lazurus, and also for chocolate chip cookies. Maybe she wants to cover the burners so I won't stick my hands on them like I did when I was a kid. I'll find new ways to re-direct the room's attention onto me, mother, don't worry.

Earrings, (gold, hoops, gemstones)
Who do you think I am, Haviland? Hello remember raising me "gender-netural." I am not Haviland. I am Riese. When I get angry, I like to break things. Speaking of ...

Fiestaware pieces to complete my sets: Purple dinner plate and mug, Tangerine dinner plate and mug, Cobalt Blue mug and 19 oz bowl, Heather dinner plate, 19 oz medium bowl, and mug, Ivory dinner plate, 19 oz medium bowl, and mug. (last time I looked, Linens and Things had a great on-line clearance sale)

This is the internet age, I need to be entertained constantly, and I was tuning out already at "plate." I re-attuned at "Heather," since I know lots of cute lesbos named Heather, but then I dropped out again at 19 oz.

Also I fully appreciate that she's given me permission to snag her front-row seats to "Steve Harvey's After Party" but has specified the size of her required tangerine mugs to the decimal.

What happened to the originals is what I want to know.

-Instruction and guidance, sans ridicule and teasing, on FaceBook, etc. usage. (stop giggling and rolling your eyes!)

1. Absolutely not.
2. Not without giggling and/or rolling my eyes. Actually I can do it without giggling, but I have to roll my eyes. What else are my eyes supposed to do? Look at my Mom's facebook profile? "Maureen has become a fan of Patti LuPone"? "Maureen threw a plate at you?" "Maureen would like to invite you to throw a snowball at her vampire environmental cause?"
3. If I srsly can do this and have it count as a gift, that means I'd save myself the price of a gift, which means I'd save myself the work of earning money to buy a gift, which means I can basically think of this as a job, which I would do.
4. Except I can't. I just can't do that absolutely not.

++
Before introducing you to my other mother's list, let me remind you that I am flying to Michigan from New York. Last year I drove. That turned out to be a bad idea, especially when I cut my finger open with a nail about an hour before departure time and consequently bled all over the steering wheel.

I cannot make fun of my Other Mother in-depth because she didn't give birth to me or adopt me and therefore her love is not unconditional. However, my Mom wrote out this list for her, so really again I am making fun of my Mom.

Food dehydrator (to make her own Beef Jerky)
- though I admire the DIY spirit, I cannot admire beef jerky, and possibly would have considered this request were it not for this unnecessary detail. For example, on my:
My Amazon.com Wish List ,
I include The Cultural Resistance Reader. Innocuous enough, but what if in parens I added (to start a revolution, kill people, a là the SCUM MANIFESTO, which I expect in my stocking or pay the price). You know?

Kayak, (our stretch of AuSable River is too shallow for a conventional canoe.) - Right. Two years ago y'all wanted a canoe ["We're not getting a canoe, because then they're gonna want me to ride in it." -my brother], and now you want a kayak? Next year you'll be asking for a Moped (global warming has melted AuSable River entirely) and I'll wish I hadn't carted that effin' Kayak onto AN AIRPLANE.

Belt Sander - I don't know what this is. One time at band camp in the psych ward, my ex-girlfriend made me a belt in arts & crafts. Is this like that? I'm just trying to relate to you, bisexual-to-lesbian, it's like mano a mano but en engles.

A large/tall cactus plant and/or a Jade plant. -I'll leave "large/tall" alone, but I think cacti are Weapons of Mass Destruction, so praise Allah I will not bring it on an airplane, but you bet the first stop when I get into Michigan will be the Giant Cactus store to get one of these. Actually I'm quite serious, obvs this is what I'm getting, it's not every year you're actually asked to provide someone with a house plant.We can put it in our new Hands-on Museum.

Readers Digest subscription - The one portable item on this list has already been snagged by my Mom (see Mom, now you can't tell my Other Mom to read this, 'cause then you'll spoil it, like when Lewis told you that we got you a bike, which you no longer ride, good thing we didn't get that Canoe or it'd be collecting dust too, along with my ice skates from the 80's and all the books I try to force you to read).

I shared my concerns w/Lewis re: the portability of other mother's list, and he told our Mom about these concerns, and Mom suggested that, pending security clearance of said cactus, we could get Other Mother a "recipe book to use with a food dehydrator." Or: "Socks, she can never have enough of them." Truer words were never spoken. I mean, who says "I have too many socks?" No one, right.

Lewis asked what my plan was and obvs I told him I will be getting a gigantic/significant cactus plant and he responded: "Now that you mention it, a giant Cactus would be pretty awesome to have around ... if you got space, why not fill it with the most dangerous plant known to man? I'm serious. Add that to my list too. I wonder what it would taste like dehydrated ..."

Clearly it's things like "food dehydrator" that get me going on a nonstop internet investigation. We need a word for that. "The act of investigating something on the internet like a crazy person all night long, prompted by something small and innocuous, convinced that JUST ONE MORE SEARCH WILL BRING THE GOLDEN TICKET."

Apparently, one can produce pretty much anything with a food dehydrator. E.g., "cosmetics, mushroom soup, sloppy joes, pesto and moist banana bread." MOIST banana bread! That's like the Cracker Barrel version of the band Limp Bisket.

What if I just got her a lifetime supply of beef jerky and cut out the middle man? This woman Mary Bell is like a Beef Jerky superhero, and her hairdresser called and says he thinks she's a gay. Whatever, she's still no Kwame a River. I bet she never even drinks water. She's just got no need for it you know. Give me that sandwich, let's dehydrate that stucker STAT.

++

My brother's wish lists remain similar in spirit over the years though specifics change. As he grows, he changes. Instead of A MILLION DOLLARS!!!! he asks for An American Express Gold Card.

He's also asked for "something that will make my honda ruckus go faster except for the nitro kit." It's like he speaks another language.

Furthermore he has requested a jetpack. With a link, in case we can't find one at Wal-Mart while Kayak-shopping.

He also asked for "anything from thinkgeek.com except the t-shirts," so I had to go look at thinkgeek.com, and I found this, which was special too, and I would get it for myself as a joke but it's too expensive. I also saw a "LIttle Einstien" bobble-head I wanted to get for A;ex, but then I forgot:

Luckily Lewis has learned to ask for "books Marie thinks I should read," so I can do what I was gonna do anyway without being asked "where's my kayak?"

Oh also, wanna see a dyke with power tools? She can sand my belt all day!


UPDATE: My Mother e-mailed, two days after sending us her wish list, with a mesage entitled "wish list addition" and the following request: "consistent weekly phone contact from each one of you. and at the very least, my phone calls returned w/in 24 hours, as you would expect from me." Obvs I called her back immediately, between that and the Facebook lessons this is shaping up to be a cheap Christmas/Hanukkah, I'll just get a cactus from the wild, done and done. No I can't do the Facebook thing. Gold gemstone hoop-has, here I come.

In two days I will be in Michigan.

Yup.

34 comments:

Vashti said...

My mom never gives me a wish list even though she'll badger me to write one up every year. [This year she texted/emailed/called me everyday starting sometime in November until I sent her my wish list. DO NOT WANT.]
W/r/t Facebook, my mom tried to get me to help her make one. I refused so now she's getting my aunt to help her. Please excuse me while roll my eyes into the back of my head.
Oh and just so you know, when I was packing last week, I definitely said [out loud, to myself, in my empty room], "Why do I have so many socks??" However, while I have a lot of socks, only half of them match and most of them like to slide off and party down by my toesies while I'm walking so I end up buying more. Buying new socks + not getting rid of old socks = "I have too many socks."

asher said...

i actually saw a copy of the SCUM MANIFESTO in a used book store here. i laughed at the sight of it. flipped through it and tried to decide if it was worth the cost ($5?). i decided it was not. but i was really attempted to ask anyone around 'do you KNOW what this IS?'

and my dad's on facebook. we're not friends.

he IS friends with my sister's boyfriend, mo. i think they got in a fight cos she asked mo to de-friend dad, but he was afraid to.

Anonymous said...

Magnito can't read minds?!

BioGal said...

Your family calls you 'Marie' - I love that... I assumed they would use your tinterweb moniker... How wrong can one be?

Anonymous said...

Magneto can't read minds. He manipulates metals. Dr. Charles Xavier could get in your head, but he died in X-Men 3: The Search for More Money.

What kind of nerd are you? Sheesh.

And I seriously can't wait to start poking your mom.

carlytron said...

this is one of the funniest things i've read in a while.

Anonymous said...

i can see your mom reading this, after her dial up has loaded and just sighing. "oh marie". i recently actually felt guilty that i had changed my number without telling your mom and almost sent her a text message letting her know my new digits. then i realized that i didn't do that with about 95% of my phonebook and decided against it. have fun in michigan, i can't wait for the all caps emails.

MoonKiller said...

My mother has also asked for a cooking/baking dish that can go on stovetop and in oven, and she's also called Maureen. Weird.

I remember one christmas I asked for a telescope and my parents thought I was joking, but I wasn't and I was gutted.

Haviland said...

i love that the the annual Bernard wish lists are not affected by the economy. I think the last time I did one of these was circa '96? Would love to find a copy of that one.

elliB said...

My mother got on my case about emailed her a bday/xmas wishlist... then emailed for me to resend it when she lost it... then informed me that she wasn't going to buy me ANY of the cds/dvds/books that I wanted... She wont even buy me the dust buster. She does't believe that I really want one.

Thinkgeek is the bestest nerd website ever. For reals.

Anonymous said...

We're supposed to get a big storm tonight. I hope your fly in is well. I promise you MI is the same old shit hole. And if you're going to be in the Ferndale or Royal Oak area email me and will hang for a smidge!!!

Oo Lynnie oO said...

my mom made a facebook. i won't accept her friend request (tho she did message me "jane wrote on my wall... what do i do ??????") , but my brother did, just another reason he's the favored child.

happy flying!

Lady Thoughts said...

THis post was adorable. I love parents and how weird they are, and how the older we get, the more we see it. Little do some know, they were always weird. It's just we were either kids who were too busy playing in dirt to notice, or angst-ridden teens trying never to come home til the 'rents were asleep cuz we still had red-eye from the shitty pot we smoked under the bleechers.
My mom never gives a list. Id love to see what it says. Except not right now because all it would say is "for you to move home" over and over again.
Odd gifts are always the best. I did Chia pets for everyone, and boy was I hated. No better satisfaction on Christmas than the disappointment and fake "thank yous"
Good luck in flight, I will also battle holiday travel. It does make for a cheap Christmas when just your presence alone is a present...see what i did there?

mimi said...

i'm in the same place with my mom on facebook. it makes you re-evaluate a lot of things when she shows up on your "mutual friends" list with your best friend from high school, you know? our moms should be facebook friends. i'll tell mine during a facebook training session if you will.

also, i totes asked for a cactus like two years ago, still haven't got it

sameera said...

LOL this was great. i kind of choked on the orange juice i was drinking when i read this, though: "Maybe she wants to cover the burners so I won't stick my hands on them like I did when I was a kid."
I TOTALLY DID THAT. not for attention though, mainly because i was an idiot lol. i was 5 years old and my grandma turned on the stove (the one with the coils), told me not to touch it, and went to the garage to get something.. obvs within a millisecond of her leaving, i slammed my right hand onto the now burning hot coil. good times.

autumn m said...

ok so i obvs loved this post for so many reasons. ok so my mom is scared of the internet so i cant sympathize with you there. but she did ask for a percolator. i dont know wtf that is. so i skipped to Wal-Mart and made an employee find me one. after studying the box for about an hour i concluded that it is some kind of old people coffee maker. what’s wrong with the one she has now??? NOTHING!!!
my family had never done holiday wish lists. a) because i really dont care what you ask for, im getting most people gift cards to target. and b) i asked for something i take interest in. like music, or art. last year i asked for a nice set of paint brushes. i got a laundry basket instead. i asked for some charcoal pencils so i can sketch, but instead i got a doll. really. i asked why and my mother said, "you'll always be my baby". i died a little bit when i heard that, because this means i will always get this stuff. its BS.
do you really not know what a belt sander is?? cause that made me laugh. so... i took the time and looked this up so you can be educated. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Belt_sander
wikipedia kicks ass

last year I asked some friends for a chia pet and I got one. I love it!!! and the year before that I asked for a god awful Christmas sweater, and I got it. it looks like Christmas threw up on this sweater, then scooped it up and made it into a soup and threw it back on the sweater. Its so ugly, but It rocks!!! *sigh* good times.

riese said...

Vashti: One time I took all the socks I have that don't match other socks and I photographed them and put up signs all over the house asking if anyone had seen the matches for these one-sock socks. No luck, but now I can look back at ti and wonder how i had that kind of time.


asher: Oh it's crazy, it's so crazy! She's so clearly manic, it actually hurts to read it, I kinda feel bad for her almost, you know?

Anonymous: I fact check almost everything I write to an obsessively nonproductive extent, so when I don't fact check something, it's 'cause I think it would be even funnier if I was wrong, you know?

BioGal: Well, ha, yeah, that is my name. My Mom calls me Ree, but not in print.

DJL: I fact check almost everything I write to an obsessively nonproductive extent, so when I don't fact check something, it's 'cause I think it would be even funnier if I was wrong, you know?

You can poke my Mom for me, she will not be my friend in my network. If she makes me set up her facebook profile then I'll make her friend you first.

carlytron: thank you!! :-)

Anonymous: I'm hoping that's what she'll say instead of writing me to remind me of the "no more talking about Mom on the blog" rule. WE have a lot of feelings in my family, obvs.

Moonkiller: That IS weird. What if it turned out that our

Haviland Stillwell: Oh, the Moms are pulling in the same barely-covering-living-expenses social worker's salaries this year as always and therefore just like last year and the year before, we will be ignoring one another's wish lists and instead getting knicknacks at the garage sale. I bet you wanted a million dollars and a pony.

Elizabeth: Who doesn't need a dustbuster? It's like more socks! Everyone wants more socks, who doesn't want more socks? You should get her the DVDs you want, then wait for them to be re-gifted next year.

Kelly: OOO maybe my flight will be delayed. Unless i'm due to make out with someone on the other end of my route, I'm always pleased by delayed flights 'cause then I have extra reading time. and actually my Mom lives in Royal Oak. I think.

Oo lynnie oO: Man I didn't realize that so many Moms were joining facebook! And apparently punctuation, also, is a special Mom thing.

Leah: When my Moms had their wedding, our step-grandma asked me what me and lewis were gonna get for my moms for the wedding and I was like "um, the 500 plane ticket i had to buy to come to this thing?" and she gave me a look of being totally unimpressed. My Mom has always been a weirdo, I think the big difference is that it used to annoy me, now it amuses me.

Rachel: If my Mom somehow gets me to get her on facebook, I will tic-tac with you re: our Moms becoming friends. We wanted a lemon tree and Autumn got us one, never lose hope.

sameera: I just always touch the stove to see if it's hot yet or to see if it's still hot. my Mom would cover the stovetops with pot lids to stop this from happening, I don't know, I just couldn't think of any other way to test the temperature. I was always real subtle, I'd just go into the other room with blisters on my fingers like, what's up dudes, my fingers hurt a bit.

autumn: I LOL'ed for most of this comment especially the part about asking for paint brushes and gettng a laundry basket. I don't think a laundry basket counts as a present.

I would love a target gift card except that there's no target here, or there is but I would need to get a ride, so I guess what I need is a car, a parking space, and a target gift card.

My grandma always asks for things like that too, stuff where I'm like, wtf, there's newer stuff that works a lot better.

I kind of know what a belt sander is, I think it's a power tool? Sometimes I play dumb like Paris for laughs. I feel like they probs sell it at home depot? I mean I'm getting a cactus so you know.

One year I made everyone sweatshirts with puffy paints. I'll send you one if I ever get back into that.

autumn m said...

you realize i would probs wear a puffy paint shirt all year round like it was the coolest thing ever. i would tell everyone that a retarded hospital patient made it for me. thats how i am.

slicey said...

Thank you for making me laugh. This made my stressful day end on a high note. :)

Hope you enjoy your holiday time with the fam. The good thing about visiting family is that you are always REALLY happy to get back home. :D

sameera said...

lol subtle. i think i showed the coil scar to my kindergarten class for show and tell.

elliB said...

Getting my mom dvds that I want so they would end up as mine would never work. Today, as bday gifts, I got a few dvds from my sibs and before the paper was even off my mom was asking to borrow them...

I'm going to buy myself a dustbuster. Except I feel like I might be tempted to juggle and throw it around like they do with those fancy ones in the new commercials. Then I would have many pretty pieces of plastic that no longer busted dust. Sadness.

Anonymous said...

i'm drunk i ain't gunna lie. heather is hot!

asher said...

so now i'm kinda drunk adn curious as to anon's comen? t about how 'heather' is hot. who the fuck is heater? did i miss soething?

be tee dubs (btw) did you get my email? ... (fuck, now i gotta spell this correctly) http://ashleylinnenbank.com/gift.html ... uh, yeah. i wanted to send you and semi a physical copy but sadly i only had the funds to do that for ppl who might actually lead ot me getting hired one of htese days.

ps- i sorta decided that in honnor of my drunkyface status i hsouldn't eduit the speeling. althought blogger makes this tough. cause with the red squiggly underlines, i could clearly go back and clean it up. but that's just not honest. and i'm all about the troof. word?

oh jesus
word veri = khalatio
it's like they're trying to keep me from posting htis.
maybe they know more than me.

btw why is it easier to drunk type w/ one eye closed?

autumn m said...

so..... ive been at work for 16 hours now. and i have 3 more to go. im soooooooooooo tired. i really feel like people rely on me to much. if they expect me to come back 4 hours after i get off, they can go fuck (i type fucj the 1st time) themselves. that is all.

Anonymous said...

Awesome. Your Mom and I are going to throw ninjas at each other ALL DAY!

And I will forever assume your typos are just well-planned examples of high comedy.

Lew said...

I think its time to let the "I told mom about the Bike" thing go.

Also, not to bring it up again but I'd like to retire the Risk/Ukraine debacle.

See you in a few

dewey said...

As a now poor uni student i was dreading my familys christmas wish lists but luckily my mum had the genius idea of only spending £20 on each other so that meant £80 for the family....i could handle that...but then...

My mum had the even more genius idea of buying all my gifts for me whilst i was still at uni and not wanting payment for them. She gave me the presents i wrapped them up...done :D

As for my mum i just added my name to my sisters gift for her and that just left me with my girlfriend, easy!!

JD said...

My mom is not one for wish lists, but this year she did request an ipod. She's really taking her time easing into technology.

I guess I should be glad that she has yet to ask me to help her learn the interwebs. Considering that just the other day she told me she is worried that someone could stalk me via "Spacebook", I'm thinking it could be a while...both before she embraces current social networking technology, and before my (non-existent) stalker figures out how to penetrate that mysterious place where MySpace and Facebook collide.

El N said...

This post WINS. Seriously.

Anonymous said...

So wheres the autowin party in the "D"??

Jezzica said...

Your mom and other mom's lists were so utterly perfect. Fiestaware ftw! Also I died laughing at the psychward belt sander thing. In 7th grade I was in shop class, using the belt sander to polish my nails / finish a salt and pepper set, and a suicidal boy asked me out on my first date ever. Wow. What great lists. Your book-buying is an inspiration. I'm buying books and subscriptions for all the people who didn't ask for uhhh kayaks or hand lotion this year. Print media is counting on us for its survival...

eric mathew said...

AH! Omg i SO love your mom and we would spend hours together listening to musicals. Weren't you going to tell her that Haviland was Laura in Gypsy?

Anyway...

I'm getting glasses.

OH!

I love the Ann Arbor please touch museum it's just a basket of funnnn.

p.s. the word verification was just fatess kind of like jewess and fatass combined.

eric mathew said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
riese said...

autumn m: that's why you're awesome.

slicey: i live to make other people laugh so thank u for giving me a reason to live.

sameera: i just showed my nail in the leg scar to my mom for show and tell.

elizabeth: i just asked my mom if we still have a dustbuster and she said no. she said they used to be all the rage and now they sell them shaped like cones.

anonymous: yeah she is! whm.

asher: there are many heathers. u didn't miss anything. i don't know who anonymous is. we have a friend named heather who is hot.

we think ur gift is amazing and we have downloaded both. your website is super smokin hot for real.

i know what u mean about one eye closed for sure. everything about this comment fills me with holiday cheer and joy for serious.

autumn m: I imagine you being one of those good workers that people rely on. It's tough to be that person. People tend to take advantage you know. I don't know. But a good work ethic is also quite admirable.

DJL: I can't wait for the ninja throwing adventure. My Mom's never been very athletic but she does like the WNBA.

Lew: Look I don't want to bring up a sore subject, but I am right now sitting at a desk and directly to my left is a squeaky frog. Seriously, probs best gift ever. It doesn't squeak anymore though.

dewey: I'm not sure if I follow exactly the trajectory of your story, but if I haven't said it already but I probably have, it's super cute that you have a girlfriend, also super awesome that your Mom is buying all the gifts, and I still haven't gone xmas shopping myself.

JD: i feel like my Mom would get really overwhelmed by an ipod, she's more a walkman kind of woman. hang on let me ask her.

me: Do you have an ipod?
Mom: No.
me: Why not?
Mom: Can I tell you why without you making fun of me?
me: Yes. (no.)
Mom: I don't like having those little things in my ears.
me: So you don't like any kind of portable music player then, not just ipods.
Mom: No but I have a Sirius radio and you can take it out of the car and plug it into the boombox.
me: Oh-kay.
Mom: I'm serious, I have a Sirius boombox. You can just plug it right in.
me: I have an ipod, I was just asking.
Mom: Well no one's ever offered to buy me one.

El N: aw, no, you win! You win!

JLD: in lozo's pants! I think I missed the party because of Delta, now my trip is almost over before it's begun.

Jezzca: My Mom just told me again why she doesn't have the Fiestaware but I still don't believe her. Obvs there is a serious connection between psychosis and belt sanders. Not where my other mom is concerned but I'm just saying that from your story, I don't know it's a mighty tool.

eric mathew: I know my mom loves musicals. i just had the wizard of oz on the teevee and she said she likes Wicked better.