The Buick and Jail Time...by Diane Ogden

I have always driven a car I was proud of. Well almost always. Once my second husband decided to buy me a car. How nice huh? Well the hubs brought home an old used Police Car! Yup he did. Was I happy? Nope I wasn't. Was I embarrassed? Yup I was for a long time. Kate and John plus 8 had nothin on me! I'm fine.....it was a long time ago and I am over it, can't you tell? Back to my point. I hit some hard times in 2003 - 2007. My 2000 Dodge Intrepid was getting embarrassing. (not like the old police car!) So my parents bought a new Buick from my brother who owns a dealership in upper Wisconsin and they gave me the old Buick. Mudflaps, whitewalls and all! I then gave my 18 year old Grand-daughter my Intrepid so she could find a job. What's my point? I have made so many jokes about this Buick. Like how I can go to any local restaurant and line up with the rest of the Buick's, eat eggs, and fit right in! All old people own a Buick and I was not ready for a Buick. But I got one, free, paid for. So I made myself be thankful. (i.e.Oprah) No one gets in trouble for one drink duh....but my life has been run by the guilt button......so I forgot. Friday night I drove 25 miles to my home town to have fish with a facebook friend I hadn't seen in years. We had fish! I had one scotch and soda. I left the "bar" around 10:30 and took the back roads home. I was going thru a small town when I noticed a police car sitting bored. I knew that I knew he was going to stop me. I didn't know why, I just knew. I started digging in my purse for the ONE Halls Menthol Liptus STRONG smelling cough drop. Do you know any woman with an organized purse? Nope. I dug and I dug and I found IT just as the red and blue and white lights started circling my bladder!! Oh for sure! I thought to myself, "Why is he stopping me?" I am not speeding. Sheit, its the plates. Whose going to take my dog out to podie? omg! He comes to my Buick window. I have my drivers license ready. I cant even tell you what I said. Blah blah blah. I had practiced this a hundred times. Why? Because my mind goes fast and I imagine allot. That is why I write novels see? OK so he says I have no plates. And I am searching for the title I know I put in the car. Then I go into my best form of master salesmanship. I have been told I was a born salesperson. It worked. I told him with Halls Menthol breath that my Mother GAVE me this car....and I gave my Grand-daughter my car. That my brother owns the dealership listed on those plates... ALL AMERICAN APPLE PIE FAMILY uh huh!! He never asked me if I had been drinking. Why would he ask an old lady in a Buick with white walls and mud flaps.

S H U T U P! Am I now thankful for the Buick. Oh yes I am! He let me go...no warning nothing.

He was just bored is all. I was not bored! And I informed him that he scared me near to death. Another sales pitch is all. The older I get the better I get. He apologized! LOL

What a Week! by Diane Ogden

I finished my taxes, and yes I applied for an extension. And I had to pay!! I hate paying the government right now. So we wont go there today. Then I spent more days trying to figure out the FAFSA (Federal Aid to Students) online website while filling out their papers, losing my pin with only a day left before the appointment at the School to fill out more papers. This is the only good thing I can think of or remember about my Daughter's father. He was a passing person in the night....no, no, not just a one nighter! A three monther....with birth control that obviously failed. He never paid his part... sucker died, too bad, so sad....and now its payback time! The daughter will get social security while she attends school full time. Yes!! What a Dad huh? Onto the next day of the week.... My Step Grand-daughter was in a very bad car accident. She always wears her seat belt but did not that said day. The driver over corrected after hitting the side gravel which sent them air born into a field and somehow she flew from the front seat through the back window, landed on her tailbone, broke it, broke her pelvis, her collarbone, ribs, fractured her shoulder and punctured her spleen. The police officer said it was a miracle she is alive from all he has seen in his travels on the job. She has to use a walker which her cat is scared of. She got out of ICU and then out of the hospital in four days. Doctors said, "When we see you can walk and you have "pooped" you may leave." So she did both and left. Kids!! Next, I got this new washing machine at my apartment and used it. I put some bleach in the dispenser, washed the towels, then washed my five cute little outfits (in a new load) I wear to work each day of the week. Sort of like those underwear we used to have with embroidered Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, Saturday, and Sunday, each a different color... yup just like those. When all is "washed and done" my five little outfits have large and small white spots all over them, AND THEY ARE NOT WHITE! So who do I sue for new work clothes? Surely if I write a letter to Whirlpool they will respond promptly, not! If I demand the apartment complex reimburse me for my ruined goods, will they? Not! So what do I do, wear nasty clothes to work huh? huh? I'm pissed now. Just telling you all has made it worse. So its been the IRS, FAFSA, VITI, ICU, and then to top it off, dead clothes......Now do you see why that lousy three month-er looks so good to me this week. He is the only payoff and he's dead which means no trouble, peace ya know, and that's a good thing. Take that however you'd like. Me, I need some peace without dying to get it. See why you shouldn't ever say your dying for anything, ha! Love my puns...

p.s. of course that is me in the photo, duh!! (Another dead one gone, body that is)

The First Date in MANY Years + Rain by Diane Ogden

And I thought I was going on a simple double date to a baseball game! NOT! I had the best threesome ever. No not that way....I got all three of these wonderful men to myself for eight hours of laughing, more laughing, getting rained on most of the night, taking turns holding umbrella's. Steve, (the man in blue) his boss gave me a slicker rain coat, Don (in gray) bought me a DuckPond Mallards baseball cap, and Tim (in green) besides making me laugh for hours, brought me a sweet little turtle sundae in a mini baseball cap. We ate hamburgers and french fries in the pouring rain with wet napkins that reminded one of wet toilet tissue....obviously that doesn't cut it and sticks to your fingers and face. We watched a man shot out of a canon...We weren't going to. We were going to make Tim call a cab if he decided to stay any longer in that miserable weather, but he persisted like a bad child! He pushed us all to stay and we turned out very glad we did! It was a pretty good deal after all. At this time it was a tad past midnight so we stopped at a local pub for a couple toddie's. Steve was driving so he did not drink. I had two Scotch and soda's and continued laughing ridiculously. They say laughing cures all illness's. I am certainly cured of any and all past present and future illness that may try to befall me. Wont happen!

The Parties Over...by Diane Ogden

That's Grandpa Joe uptop with Mr. L.E. Phant wearing PaPa's special straw hat! L.E. Phant is going to college with Briana soon. We hope that L.E. is going along, and that Briana chooses to go on to college vs go on to boyfriend. I thought we got rid of that crap in this family! You know "going onto boyfriend instead of college??" I really thought we as a family had evolved more. But then hormones are hormones at any stage of evolution right? Or Wrong! The brain is certainly affected by hormones ,but intellect, if on a scale other than zero should by all accounts count. And be heard by said hormonally charged teenager who has viewed those surrounding her/him of the consequences. It is what it is and Nana's can only throw parties and give hugs and love and cars. Maybe sneak in some sound advice very carefully. Who knows maybe we Nana's should be loud and obnoxious and we would be heard more?? Not sa sure about that one. Back to the Party. It was a nice little party with enough food to pay my daughters rent. You say what? Well its better to have too much then not enough which we certainly did have. So as they say, "We killed two birds with one stone!" (I would never kill one bird with any stone and I hate that saying yet it fits the moments analogy.) I sent a huge Tupperware container of Potato Salad, Barbecues, buns, 13 x 9 pan of home made mac n cheese, tuna noodle salad, brownies, cookies, mega pop, and a mess of fresh veges with vege dip, all home with Lindsay to give to her landlord roomie for the rent. LOL for real. (She lost her job recently and could not pay her portion of the rent which is very small.) Her roomie has two precious little girls who will think they died and went to heaven with all this home spun food. Actually I hope they enjoy it as much as I enjoyed standing all day making it. Take that phrase or leave it. Sooo the giving got gave in all directions and there is money left over yippee do... We had a nice little party, the dog came and enjoyed all the attention.....Briana felt loved......she got cash flow......and I got CAKE!! At least two pieces and three roses. I know I know, eeewww. Well I like Cake and frosting but too much sugar wakes me up at 3:30 a.m. So here we are getting on with the a new day before the old one is finished. It's alright...there is a peaceful rain going on outside and dim lights going inside along with my little heater running in JUNE under my desk here. I am happy. I have one piece of cake left!

The Graduation Party by Diane Ogden

This is the Graduate! When she was two and now at eighteen... Isn't she a beauty? God that sounds like she's horse.. isn't she a beaut...guys in the Fonzie days used to call their cars beauts... Briana Maria Hull, better known as Bree, or Bri, or Breezy, or Bones.... is a beautiful young woman with such grand things ahead for her. I suspect that means boys, boys, boys, and then hopefully work, school, and a job making allot of cash. So her and I can hop the AMTRAK Train to Tucson to see her Daddy and then onto Los Angeles to see Cody and Chris Ogden and more. If we could sit in a seat for 42 hours we could get there for less than flying...$250.00 But to have a room, bathroom, shower, bed...it is $1200 for each of us. Now that means we need to start practicing sleeping upright for three days so we can go without flying. Nana D wont fly. Just the way it is folks. Just like I wont do boats! Not going to change it, don't want to, no need. Just practice sitting up sleeping. Back to Graduation....the party is in two days. A pool party and I just heard there is a good chance of a thunderstorm. Sweet! I am making barbecues and I don't know how. Ha. I don't eat barbecues so why would I know how to make them. They are too sweet for me. So my X gave me a zillion pounds of meat....I like free meat! I bought a half gallon of Uncle Herbie's Gourmet Bar-B-Q sauce...no clue what it tastes like. Ordered a cake with the above photos on it. Making potato salad, home made mac n cheese, blah blah blah.... pulled a groin muscle trying to move furniture and clean in case anyone and I mean even one wished to see my abode... So I am hobbling around like a 90 year old hoping the hair cut I get tomorrow will be some sort of miracle. And will not match my hobble. We always hope that. Yet we walk out after the cut and color, a bunch of money less and looking still 60! But where's the mini lift and the miracle I was expecting? No diff than going to Macy's and hitting the makeup wall only to have some youthful little girl paint my face with a pound of makeup thinking she has to hide all the imperfections vs working with them...jeez these kids! I should have a makeup stand (on some street corner) for the old ladies...I 'd make a fortune for sure. Back to Graduation. I sure cant stay on track today. I gave Bree my car in great hopes it will run for two more years... humm. So my Mum gave me her car, "The Buick," which I still have to blog...all I will say is its got mud flaps and white walls and I have to brake constantly to keep it from heading to the restaurant for eggs because it wants to get in line with all the other Buick's and all the old white haired drivers but I don't...so we battle. I am winning so its alright. Hey, its free and paid for. More than I can say for this Graduation Party. Now I know why people give the kid money and forget the party and I haven't even started cooking yet, and don't forget they just forecasted rain for our pool party. That might mean a bunch of little ones in a small clubhouse. O'Well, they can eat and I will sneak a shot of something into my Soda. They say its not the problem, its the solution and this time I agree. Don't worry.

Buttons...by Diane Ogden

There are Drama Buttons, Defense Buttons, Jealousy Buttons, and "Bad Mommie Buttons!" ( and more) Buttons are what get pushed when someone, anyone pushes them emotionally by verbal expertise or emotional inconsideration. I say that because most of us react to how we are spoken to and treated. Me, I experience the Bad Mommie Button for various reasons. One because I have been a Bad Mommie five times....That makes the button really try to glow in later years! One of those times I had a daughter... Daughters push Mommie's buttons from the time they are old enough to have their own little personality. Of course other factors come into bloom also. Such as inherited Buttons from the generations past to button pusher and the button holder.
What's my point? Don't let anyone push your buttons. Just ignore them and be who you know you are. Bad Mommie buttons suck. Some people have huge over sized buttons right on their left shoulders and sometimes you cant even find any buttons on some folks . That's a smart evolved person there! A person that probably read and lived every self help book on the market as well as had counseling for several years. Or have a very calm as they say, "Laid Back" personality. Bad Mommie Buttons do best on people with the biggest Guilt Button Syndrome.... I think I have one of those on each shoulder. My mentor says we all have syndromes/issues and just have to learn to live with them. I say, if you have done the best you can, even if it was wrong, and you corrected it, or even tried to, then don't let anyone push your Bad Mommie Button. Just carry on past them and don't look back at their words or they will surely find their way and hit your button... which will just make it grow bigger and brighter. Only Mommie's with grown children will understand this Post the best!

Peace.....by Diane Ogden

I bought and paid for this video in hopes I could post it on my friends blog and it would be beautiful. NOT and they wont refund my money. In fact I bought two of these buggers.

So here we are a dollar short and a day off on this one. O well...I am learning as I go. I wanted the CODE for this. Cant figure out how to get Code on these videos...

Happy Birthday Christopher Dimitri Ogden by Diane Ogden

Wow look at you my grown into a man boy! The one on my five that was always smiling and kind to most everyone. You have traveled the world, learned more than most on your journeys, taught people what is real and good about life and more. You have mastered your body, and mastered your mind, as well as working with your spirit. You help others to open theirs and heal themselves. You have taught me allot also, but I still like cheese and Frito's..sorry. I'll get over it and come to your side. Your teaching the masses has only begun and be assured you have my prayers and all goodness sent your way. I love you forever, you are a very special human being, besides a special true Ninja Warrior son. Mom xxoo

Shabby Chic...by Diane Ogden

So this is me! I have to have it along with everything else in the latest Romantic Country Magazine which costs more then most medications. I bit the green paper bullet and bought it. My passion is Creme and White Victorian Wares, Whares?? Either way you get it. Frilly, Lacy, roses, wicker, chandeliers with the more glass hanging for them the better, birdhouses, mirrors, and on and on....although the round table in the living room photo might be over the top for me.

One chair cover is $150.00 in the porch photo. Maybe I best get out the sewing machine. But who has time.. I am "the bookmaking lady" remember. So far I have about seven published, one in the puter waiting, then upgrade my program and five left to go. I cant die or move or do anything diff until the books are completed. Then we shall see what calls my name. Maybe I will take single orders for Shabby love seat and chair covers. Or maybe I will sell everything I own and hop in the car my Mother is handing down to me next week. Yup, a freebie. I dislike car payments, even tho I like new shiny cars. Too bad, so sad, I am not turning down "The Buick." You'll have to tune in tomorow or next day for the hilarious "Buick Blog Post." I'll give you a hint......it has white walls! Stop laughing!

susiessavystyle@comcast.net

Choking the Chicken? by Diane Ogden

Check this out. And it is not cruelty to animals. I don't think anyway. I think this chicken likes it. Chickens make great pets by the way. Remember the blog post about Emma, the first pet chicken at the "funny farm," my parents own...and have since 1960. Emma was bullied by the other chickens because the "funny farm" family gave her the most attention. I am not kidding people. Emma went to school for show and tell...and Emma got to come into the house. Yup for sure...so she was shunned by the others. Just like women isn't it? One day the parents went to town and forgot to put her inside. There had been a fox around and Emma got "foxed!" Of course that's a pun. And she wasn't the only one the fox got.... So this hen in the photo is one of the new batch at the "funny farm." My little Granddaughters think the chickens are dolls. I swear its because they didn't have dolls when they were little. My son was in charge of the toy buying so the girls got boy toys and no dolls. O well...he did his best. Now they play with salamanders and frogs and CHICKENS! It ain't normal, or is it? The chicken seems to like the attention. Mother/Grandma allows this because she had a Chicken for a pet when she was a young child. So this is the norm for her. Allowable?? Me...I don't know really. I have a client who lives in the center of our 250,000 population city, right next to the big zoo, and her neighbors have chickens. It is legal to have chickens in the city limits. Really! Whenever I am there I can hear the cluck cluck, balk, balk, blakbalk.... I kind of like it you know? Reminds me of my youth. Maybe I will get me some chickens and put them out on my porch. NOT! By the way we get fresh brown free range organic eggs! Cant beat that. But then did you read my blog called "The Umbilical Cord?" Maybe you shouldn't or you may never eat an egg again. da da da da da da da da...Twilight Zone da da's....

Kopke's Fruit of the Bloom by Diane Ogden

Actually I have always heard very good things about Gordy Kopke, owner of said Greenhouse. And as for my own experience with Gordy, it has been very good. I purchased two large Geranium hanging plants less than two weeks ago. At $27.99 which is the most I ever paid. Beautiful they were. Then came the big Bumble bees who seemed to love the little white flowers descending around the Red Geraniums. So much love no one could enjoy my porch life. Not me, not the Grand Children, not the manfriend I don't have. So I called Gordy, and asked if I could do something most people including I never do. Take them back. He agreed I could. So today was the day I took the two plants back. Gordy wasn't there, but wonderful, friendly, cordial, kind, uplifting "I don't know who," was. (NOT) I had not watered the two plants for two days because I couldn't carry them if I had. Sooo.... not so nice lady told me to browse around, after I explained to her the situation, and then she, talked about me to all the "checker outers." I felt like it was Jr.High School all over again. I could hear and see this. I actually apologized and tried to, I am not sure what. Like I have never returned flowers before, but these people acted like it was some criminal act or cardinal sin. I will tell you I felt two inches tall. I felt like a kid who had been reprimanded in front of the class. I tried to shake it, but I also knew the returned plants didn't look as good as they should have. I had watered them well but not fertilized them. I felt partially to blame here but Jeez Louise, I thought and have always thought flowers were to be fertilized once every two weeks so not to burn them! And that is what I have always done. With good results.
I got two new plants and got the appropriate fertilizer. The not so nice woman came over and in front of everyone told me in a not so nice or quiet voice that my other plants were unsellable, in terrible shape, no buds, and would go nowhere but the trash can. (I think that wasn't the real truth and I almost asked to have them back if that be the case ha.) I apologized but then I stopped because, what for, she was on a mission. She overcharged me $8.00 which at that point who gives a "shiet"....then as she continued her rant...I FINALLY spoke up louder then her and said, "OK that's enough, I got it! I- I -I -I (dragged out the I) got it!!" I have never returned plants in my life and had permission to do so and do not deserve this treatment. (OK so I didn't say that!) .... after I said OK that's enough I LEFT with my two HUGE plants...petunia's.
Yes now I know I have to fertilize them twice a week. (Forgot to tell you she also reprimanded me on why they put tags on the pots. "They are to be read and the directions followed," Ratchet Lady said. Excuse me for not being up on flower tags that I thought were price tags. I am used to buying plants out in front of the grocery store tent and there are no tags with instructions. Well sort of. That was quickie blog excuse. Actually I plant every year and I never have any problems. That is BRL....before Ratchet Lady.... I was treated very poorly and with great disrespect and I will never go there again. So there ya go Rose! The end......I hope.....they cant sue me can they? Course not. The truth used to set you free. But we know that is old hat harry. Oh Dear. I'm fine ALSWELL as my license plate reads.