He Put My Ring In His Pocket!!!

Daily Prompt: Tainted Love..

Ever been dumped by a boyfriend or girlfriend? Was it a total surprise, or something you saw coming? Tell us your best worst breakup story. Never been the dumpee, always the dumper? Relate the story of a friend who got unceremoniously kicked to the curb. Change the names to protect the innocent if you must.

I swear, I laughed out loud when I read this prompt.  Loud guffaws.  Tell about a break-up?!?  Hell, this blog was STARTED as a way for me to work through the rambling musings bouncing around in my brain post-break-up with my former love!  I have written mmmaaaannnnyyyy posts about the very subject.  Well, more about the aftermath than of the actual event, but still.  I’ve also written about the end of my marriage.  May haps I should just link my whole damn blog!?

But, I shan’t.  As while those are interesting stories, they are not one of those epic “Oh. My. God.  Are you kidding me?!?” break-up stories.  But, honey, have I got one for you.  Buckle up!

I have mentioned before that I was engaged TWICE in my early twenties, neither of which “took.”  I am not three times divorced.  Just once, thank you very much.

So, here is the story of my break-up with fiancé #1 – AKA Fratboy.

Fratboy and I met my first year of college.  Became engaged my second year, and were planning a wedding the summer I graduated.  Right on schedule.

Fast forward to the summer before my final year.  We were in the homestretch!  10 months before we were to be married!  Life was perfect…or so I thought.

I show back up to school for my senior year, my head full of plans for the future, and a U-Haul trailer full of my stuff.  Fratboy meets me at my dorm to help me unload and to help carry all my things up three flights of stairs.  WHAT A SWEET BOYFRIEND!!!  Was I lucky OR WHAT?!?!?

*snort*

Back and forth we go for 45 minutes.  Everything seemed fine.  We had  spoken the night before and he told me how happy he was I was going to be back the next day and how happy he was that I was going to be back in the same town with him and how much he missed me and loved me.  Blah blah blah.  While I had chattered on about how I had just gotten my ring professionally cleaned and how sparkly it was and how I couldn’t wait for him to see it.  Ah…bliss.

So, here we are on the final trip down the stairs to get a few more things, when about half way down Fratboy says to me, “Hey, let me see the ring.”

I grin and hold my hand out for him to see the sparkle.  “Isn’t it beautiful?!?”

“No, let me SEE it,” he replied.

Being the trusting young thing I was, I slid the ring off my finger and held it out to him to look at.  Makes sense, right?  I mean, we were GETTING MARRIED!!!!!  Weren’t we?

He takes the ring from me, and then…

(ready for it?)

PUTS IT IN HIS POCKET!!!!!

My ring.  It was no longer on my finger.  It was no longer in his hands.  IT WAS IN HIS DAMNED POCKET!!!  What the hell?!?

My two-thirds of a carat heart-shaped diamond on a gold band FREAKIN’ CUSTOM-MADE FOR ME engagement ring WAS IN HIS POCKET!

Ok.  In retrospect, the ring was incredibly cheesy, and I want to go back and slap the shit out of my 20-year-old self for ever loving it in the first place.  But, HE PUT MY RING IN HIS POCKET AND I WANTED IT BACK!

I remember I kinda laughed and said, “Hey!  Give it back!”

“No,” he said.  “I’m going to keep it.  I don’t think I want to do this any more.”

(BTW, gentlemen, “I THINK” is a passive statement.  If you are in the process of breaking up with someone, passive terms do not sugar coat the situation.  Use plain language.  A helpful little hint from me to you.  You are welcome.)

All this happened as we were walking down the three flights of stairs to go back out to the parking lot of my dorm.

At this point I am somewhat hysterical.  Standing, by now, in the parking lot next to my 1974 orange Volvo SOBBING.  He asked if I needed him to bring my things up to my room.

I just answered, “NO!  I WANT MY RING BACK!”

“I’m sorry, but I just can’t do that right now,” and he got in his car and drove away.

Somehow I made it back upstairs and into the arms of my best friends who started calling him every name in the book, and how they never liked him, and how I was better off, etc., etc.

And how right they were.

If I had married him, I know for a fact that I would have either divorced him, or killed him.  Either way, I would not be with him now.

Ironically, he ended up marrying another girl from my college.  She is Facebook friends with several of my Facebook friends.  I can not tell you how badly I want to stalk her pictures and see if she has a cheesy two-thirds of a carat heart-shaped diamond in a yellow gold band engagement ring sitting on her finger.  Just so I can laugh, and know how she was given the ring that was custom-made for ME!

Oh, and to be ever so grateful for the day that Fratboy took it back.

In Search of a Land of Happy Monkeys…

As I am sure many of my fellow bloggers can attest, I am addicted to the stats page for Happy Monkey Land.  You know.  The one that tells you how many views you’ve had in a day, which countries they hail from, and how – exactly – they managed to stumble upon your ramblings.

I am particularly fascinated by the search terms that are typed in to various search engines that somehow manage to lure a reader to my musings.   Not because I want to “tailor” my writing so as to draw in more folks – but, because some of them are down right funny.  Hysterical, even.

Here is a sampling of my favorites –

Dysfunction monkey.  Sounds kinda like Conjunction Junction.  “Dysfunction monkey, what’s your function?”

4 letter word for “without change.”  Me thinks someone was trying to cheat on a crossword…

Monkey writing good words peam.  Nope.  Not a typo on my part.  What in the hell is a peam?

What are the swirly vortexes in candy crush saga?  I kid you not.  Maybe that reader could tell me how to beat the level on which I am currently stuck.

My kids love happy monkey.  Well, yes.  Yes they do.  Particularly a happy Mommy Monkey.

Guess the word bungee cord 4 letters.  Again…CHEATERS!  Figure it out for yourself, why don’t ya!?!

Could picking off shingles scab cause a rehash of shingles.  I do hope that reader figured out my blog is not a place to go to look for medical advice.  I’m not a doctor, nor do I play one on TV.

But perhaps my all time favorite is one that popped up today.  This phrase, unbeknownst to the searcher, pretty much sums up life here in Happy Monkey Land…

Monkey that gets distracted by shiny objects.  Well, in our house it is actually FOUR monkeys that get distracted by shiny objects (that don’t even really have to be all that shiny to serve as a distraction… SQUIRREL!).  The Three Monkeys thought it to be tres funny.

I did my own search to see which post would come up.  Turns out it was The Cleaning Bug, written about The Girl Child and the cleaning jag she has been on.  When I informed her thusly, she proclaimed, “YES!  The post about ME came up!  I’m FAMOUS!” (Drama queen, anyone?)

Poor little thing.  I didn’t have the heart to tell her that one of the posts about her brothers, My Little Bronies:  Brotherhood is Magic, had by far the most search terms linked to it.  Who knew so many people were searching for all things My Little Pony?  Not I.

Hey!  Know what this has put me in the mood for?

Popping on to my favorite search engine (that would be Bing, my friends) and just start typing in random strings of words.  Just to see what pops up.

But, no matter what I find, I am sure it will not be any where NEARLY as awesome as life here in Happy Monkey Land.

Happy searching!

Crash! Bang! BOOOOOM!

Not my picture – thank you Bing…

I’m going to let you in on a little secret.

I may look all calm and cool on the outside.  But, thunderstorms make me a nervous mass of goo.

I know that sounds a little strange coming from someone who spent the first 25 years of her life in South Florida.  I mean, in the summer, you can virtually set your watch to the 3:30 thunderstorms that roll through town.  There are horrible booming bursts of thunder and about a billion gallons of water falling from the sky for about 15 minutes, and then as quickly as they came – they are gone – and the sky goes back to the bright blue and everything becomes even stickier from the humidity left behind.  Ah!  Nothing like feeling as if you have just stepped out of the shower and into your steamy bathroom – but, you are standing outside and you are fully clothed.  It is sooooo refreshing (cue eye-roll).

I don’t know why I get so nervous.  It’s not like I have been struck by lightning or something.   Although, there was this one time when I was in junior high school (Go, Conniston Blue Devils!), that a lightning bolt hit the ground about 20 feet away from the portable classroom I was holed up in.  Talk about scary!

Maybe it is a sensory overload thing.  My ADHD makes me pretty sensitive to LOUD noises.  Particularly unexpected ones.

Maybe it is that lack of control thing.  Not that I am a control-freak (STOP LAUGHING!  I’m not!  I swear!), I just hate situations when I feel completely out of control.  And that happens during thunderstorms.  I don’t know what is happening – or what will happen – or for how long it will be happening.  Everything is left up to the weather gods.  Or Mother Nature.  Or that damn water cycle.

Maybe it is that my father will send me messages saying, “Bad weather coming your way.”  Keep in mind Daddy still lives in Florida.  He goes on-line and checks the weather up here.  Not that he notifies me of EVERY storm, but if he does, it is generally a doozie.

Maybe it is that I am worried that the storm will knock down one of the trees in my yard and it will fall on my house.  Although, come to think of it – that might solve A LOT of my problems with my house!  Heh heh… (Be gone before someone drops a house – er, um, a tree – on you, too.)

This afternoon brought one of those everything turns black and buckets of rain cascade from the sky and the thunder doesn’t just boom it BBBBOOOOOOOMMMMMMSSSSS!!! storms to the Atlanta area.  The Monkeys are at the Monkey Daddy’s, so I had to brave it alone.  That’s one nice thing about having children.  You can disguise your own dislike of thunderstorms by pretending that you are cuddling with them to keep them from being afraid.  So, I curled up with my laptop (which I remembered to unplug…like I need to be electrocuted by my laptop), played games on Facebook, and tried to not obsessively watch The Weather Channel.  In about 45 minutes, the worst had passed – although, I can still hear thunder rumbling in the distance.

Another thunderstorm faced by Susan the Destroyer…

Uh oh – the sky is getting pretty dark again… more bad weather is on its way…

Gulp…did I just hear thunder?

 

 

The Cleaning Bug

As I have stated before – numerous times – I really hate cleaning my house.  I understand that it is a task that must eventually be done, because who wants to continue to live in filth?  Or in my case, clutter.  Lots and lots of clutter.   Not quite needing a Hoarders intervention, but still.  I am not the most organized person in the world.  I blame it on my ADHD.  I start organizing and I see something else to be done and I start on that and OOOOOO look! a book I haven’t seen in a while and OH!  before I put that up I need to clean out that cabinet and… SQUIRREL!  I am like a crow.  Easily distracted by bright-shiny objects.  Who am I kidding?  They don’t even have to be all that bright and shiny.  Dark and dull will do the trick equally as well.  In my mind, there is ALWAYS something more important to do.  ANYTHING!

Eventually, the clutter becomes overwhelming (like I said – messy…not 4 foot tall piles of crap like on Hoarders…), and we have marathon cleaning sessions.  This week has been one of those weeks.  The Monkeys and I have been attacking the house (well, I have been attacking the yard) with a vengeance.  Monkey #1 has cleaned his room and has attempted to help the Middle Monkey with his.  (Unfortunately, The Middle Monkey seems to take after me, and when faced with a big ol’ mess just gets overwhelmed and doesn’t know what to do).  I have been dealing with the yard and the loads and loads of laundry.

That leaves The Girl Child.  My lovely, adorable Final Monkey.  The Girl Child seems to have contracted some sort of  illness.  Oh, it’s not contagious and it is not life threatening.   She seems to have caught some sort of Cleaning Bug.  I have no idea where she caught it.  It certainly doesn’t seem to be going around.  The other three of us in the house appear to be immune.   But this little 8-and-a-half-year-old dynamo has not just been picking things up – she has been CLEANING.  Like getting out the cleaning products, mopping the floors, loading and unloading the dishwasher cleaning.  The child even CLEANED AND ORGANIZED THE INSIDE OF THE REFRIGERATOR!!!!

Who is this child?  She kinda looks like my daughter – but surely something has happened to my little girl.  She must be terribly sick or something.

Oh, wait.  Now she is asking me how to run the washing machine.  She.  Wants.  To.  Learn.  How.  To.  Do.  Laundry.

Oh.  My.  God.

If this child has been bitten by some sort of Cleaning Bug, I can only hope there isn’t an antidote.

I could get used to this…

Homeownership vs. Dating…

I have had a love/hate relationship with my house since the summer after we moved in.  Ten years ago.

My ex-husband and I bought the house when The Middle Monkey was just about a year old.  We were living in a two bedroom/one bath/1,000 square foot house.  It was cute, and it was on almost half an acre.  But, let’s face it – it was a TINY house.  So, we figured we had two choices.  1.) build on to the existing house, or 2.) buy a new one.  We decided that since we had an infant and a not-quite-3-year-old, it made more sense to buy a new one.

So, we put the house on the market.  THEN we started looking for a new house.

We looked for MONTHS.  And nothing was “perfect.”  But, we thought we had time.

That is, until an offer was made on our house and we had a month to vacate.  Suddenly, we had to find something new AND FAST!

When we toured this house, we fell in love instantly.  Four bedrooms (sure one is really closet sized, but we only had two children at the time), two and a half baths, big fenced yard (necessary as Duffey was still around).  Perfect!  Oh sure, it needed some work.  But, it didn’t seem like things I couldn’t handle.  (I love my ex-husband with all my heart, but a handy man he is not.)  Oh and, sure it had been a rental property for eight years.  No problem!  This was it.  Our HOME.

We moved in on a cold February day.  It was during the school year, so I didn’t have time to really work on it.  Until summer rolled around.  I decided to tackle the yard.  The huge mess of a yard.  And I have been working on the house and the yard ever since.

As I have been tearing up the yard, it occurred to me that the lessons I have learned about owning a home, I could apply to dating.  No, really.  Just stick with me here.

So here they are, Susan’s Lessons on Homeownership and Dating…

1. Beware of love at first sight.  As I said, it was love at first sight with the house.  And love at first sight usually means you are not thinking rationally – and you are seeing things with rose-colored glasses.  Had we REALLY looked at the house, we might have seen the problems.  The same holds true with dating.  ‘Nuff said about that…
2. Watch out for “fixer-uppers.”  Yes, I knew the house needed work.  But, my thought was, “with a little bit of elbow grease, it will be FINE!  I can make it PERFECT!”  Ok, now, ladies and gentlemen, let’s admit it.  We’ve ALL said that about someone we have been interested in.  Every last one of us.  And what happens when we can’t “fix” them?  Or they don’t WANT to be fixed…
3. Bigger is not necessarily better.  My house sits on a BIG corner lot.  I have a front yard, a big side yard, and a back yard.  It’s like a yard and a half.  Seriously.  Oh, sure.  It LOOKS good.  And it really seemed like an ideal situation.  Lots of room.  But, really.  It is just a whole lot of work.  Smaller would be easier.  And how does this fit in with the whole dating thing?  Well, ladies…I am sure you get my meaning behind it.  And gentlemen?  Think about it.  😉
4. Things may look great on the outside, but watch out for hidden problems.  Jumping right in on the dating part here.  Haven’t we ALL dated someone who on the outside looked PERFECT?  And WAS perfect.  For a while.  Until the CRAZIES come out.   Same with the house.
5. Problems that you THOUGHT were taken care of, may come back to haunt you.  When we moved into the house, the whole backyard was COVERED in English ivy.  It slopes and until we took out 5 trees, it was very shady.  Our first summer here, I started pulling out the ivy BY HAND.  Yanking it out of the ground.  It was backbreaking work.  And you know what?  It STILL COMES BACK!  I am still pulling up ivy from the yard.  I hate that freakin’ ivy.  And in relationships, haven’t we all had to deal with a re-visited issue?  (“Yes, damn it!  I got upset when you said we were just having fun.  I had been drinking.  Let it go!”)
6. Just below the surface there are roots to some long dead things that is damn hard to get rid of.  In preparing the backyard to seed with grass, I have been clearing out a bunch of stuff.   Digging in the dirt.  Smoothing things out.  I’ll dig down just a bit, and find a root.  To what?  I have no idea.  There is nothing near it.  Absolutely nothing.  So, I start pulling up the root.  And pulling.  And pulling.  And pulling.  And the next thing I know, I have pulled out an inch thick, 12-foot long root.  Oh – and there’s another one.  And another one.  What the hell?!?  I have dated men like that.  Scratch the surface and there is a loooooooonnnnnnnggggg root to some long dead relationship.  Whomever messed them up REALLY did a job on them.  And no matter how much I try to pull out that damn root, there’s another one I have to contend with.  It is unending.
7. If you aren’t willing to put in the work, you might as well just walk away.  Homeownership and relationships are both HARD WORK.  You really have to work at it.  Period.
8. Once you have everything just right, you have to make sure you maintain it, or everything will fall apart.  I hate cleaning my house.  I really do.  With a passion.  It never fails, I ignore it for a bit, and all hell breaks loose and I have to spend DAYS cleaning it again.  Ugh.  Same with the yard.  Relationships also need maintaining.  When things are going smoothly, we tend to slack off.  Next thing we know, someone feels neglected.  And you start arguing.  And well, all hell breaks loose.

And while my house makes me nuts, and I hate it at times (like now…my hot water heater just died), I continue to have faith that ONE DAY it will be exactly what I want it to be.  Kinda like the hope I have that ONE DAY, I will find a relationship that is exactly what I want it to be.

Optimist or delusional?

You be the judge.

On Motherhood, on Mother’s Day…

I know it sounds a little trite, but I wanted to be a mother for as long as I can remember.  I mean, most mothers I know say that.  Only a few say, “I soooooo didn’t want to be a mother – yet, here I am.”  Or at least they don’t say it out loud.  I am not sure if it is that we are genetically predisposed to desire to be mothers, or if we feel some sort of societal pressure to fulfill our “womanly duty of motherhood.”  Who knows.  All I know is that I felt the “call” to be a mother long before I was one.

When I was 19, I got engaged to my college “sweetheart.”  Why so young?  Because I felt I was on some kind of schedule.  Engaged at 19.  Married at 21.  First child at 23.  Second at 25.  Done.  I even had a name picked out for my first child – which of course would be a daughter.  And yes, The Girl Monkey does have part of the name.  She is named for my grandmothers…

Needless to say, I did not marry that fiancé.  Nor did the next engagement, at 22, end in marriage.  Still no Baby Daddy…

I was officially off my motherhood schedule.

But, I still wanted to be a mother.  More than anything.  It became obvious to me that being a mother was more important to me than the whole being married part.  In 1990, the ABC-TV news show, 20/20 broke the story of the atrocious conditions in Romanian orphanages.  Of the vast number of children.  Of children who were severely malnourished.  Of children who never received physical contact.  I cried as I watched it.  And then I thought, “That’s it!  I will go rescue myself a Romanian baby girl!” (Like it was going to be that easy.  How delusional was I?)  I started saving money and was even buying cute little girl dresses.  This was it!  The perfect plan!  Never mind I was in graduate school and only working part-time and was single and lived with my mother.  What in the hell was I thinking?!?!

You guessed it.  I do not have a 24 year-old Romanian daughter.  Sanity kicked in.

I did not become a mother for the first time until I was 33.  A full decade off my original “schedule.”  (The Middle Monkey was born when I was 35 and The Girl Child, 5 days after my 38th birthday) But, in retrospect that was ever so much better than having a child in my 20s.  I wasn’t ready.  Not one bit.

Not that being a mother is everything I thought it would be.  I really do think my naïve 20 year-old self thought it would be all hearts and flowers and cuddles and kisses and cute dresses and joy and laughter.  And the reality of motherhood – especially with mine – is that there are times when I want to lock them outside to be raised by the wolves.  Or the gypsies.  Or the mean guy who lives across the street.  Who cares who takes them just so long as it isn’t me.  The crew I was given is a difficult bunch.  Which really is an understatement.  For reals.  Screaming and yelling are far more frequent than hearts and flowers.  They say that God only gives you what you can handle.  Well, I firmly believe God has far more confidence in me than He should.  Seriously.  But I guess that is why God created alcohol.  (As I am typing this, I am hearing screeches wafting up the stairs.  Middle Monkey saw a bug.  *sigh*)

Yet, for all the screaming and stomping and slamming (oh, my!), I wouldn’t trade The Monkeys for another batch.  Not even the newest model.  Fresh off the factory floor.  I love them with all my heart and soul and mind and body and strength and weakness – in spite of their “faults.” (And yes, my children do have FAULTS.  I am not one of those deluded mothers that sees no fault in their children.  Mine have big ones.  Bless their little hearts.)

They are trying.

They are pains.

They are amazing.

And I am ever so happy they are mine.  All mine.

Jealous?  You should be.

It’s a mad, mad, mad, mad-lib world.

Me think’s I need to be gettin’ this book… heh heh…

Daily Prompt: Mad Libs.

The Post-a-day challenge in Mad Lib form prompted me to play around with a Mad Lib site.

As a teacher, I use Mad Libs to review parts of speech.  I will give them the list first (because, let’s face it, if given the paragraph, kids will try to put in a word that make SENSE – and where’s the fun in that?).  Once they have filled it out  – and I have checked to make sure they have used the correct part of speech, I will give them the paragraph to fill in.  Then we share – and enjoy the laugh.

I love these things.  I particularly like it when they are absolutely bizarre and make little to no sense!

Part of Your World (The Little Mermaid) Mad:)Take.

Look at this Potato, isn`t it neat?
Wouldn`t you think my collection`s complete?
Wouldn`t you think I`m the spud
The spud who has everything?

Look at this elephant, treasures untold
How many wonders can one baby hold?
skipping around here, you`d think
Sure, she`s got everything

I`ve got bells and queens a-plenty
I`ve got who`s-its and what`s-its galore
You eat thing-a-mabobs?
I`ve got 492
But who cares? No pink deal. I rain more

I wanna be where the balloons are
I wanna see, wanna see `em drowning
walkin` around on those
 Whaddya call `em? Oh, feet

Washing your fins, you don`t get too far
Legs are required for typing, dancin`
Strollin` along down the
What`s that word again? Show.
Up where shoes watch
Up where shoes run
Up where shoes stay all day in the sun
Wanderin` free, wish I could be
Part of that watch.

What would I give if I could live
Outta these conditioners?
What would I pay to spend a day
Warm on the sand?

Betcha on space they understand
Bet they don`t reprimand their papers
Bright young women, sick of grading
Ready to stand

And ready to know what the shirt know
Ask `em ginormous questions and get some answers
What`s a towel, and why does it
What`s the word? Carve?

When`s it my turn?
Wouldn`t I open?
Open to explore that stool up above
Out of messy turkey, wish door could be
Ask of that question!

And in honor of Star Wars Day (May the Fourth Be With You), here is another one…

Darth Punkin-Doodle looked at his master while his drippy breathing filled the room. He was told to go to drive everything on the planet of Ooga Booga. He got in his hair bow and jumped to hyperspace. Soon before he reached the planet, he dropped out of hyperspace and was attacked by Rebel washers. He demanded them off and continued to the planet`s surface. He landed and confronted more opposition, slicing it down with his platter. He used the hanger to choke another Rebel, then poked him aside. He finished off all life on the planet with an icy laugh.

So, take a little time today – and get a little mad…

Mad-libs courtesy of: http://www.madglibs.com/

Baby Lion

Daily Prompt: Unleash Your Inner Dickinson.

I enjoy writing poetry.  But it is one of those things I cannot force.  If there is one to come out, it will.  If not – I should stop trying.  And sometimes, I may not be intending to have it be a poem, but it comes out that way.

The Middle Monkey turned 11 during my self-imposed radio silence.  My sweet, goofy little huggy monster.  This poem was one I wrote about him when he was just a wee little baby.  Somewhere around six or seven months.  I remember he had this silly little commando crawl – using his little elbows to propel himself across the floor. But, he was FAST!  He could make it across the room in no time.  Even then, he was devoted to his big brother (they are only 22 months apart).  He would lie there on the carpet, watching Monkey #1’s every move.  He was particularly interesting in #1’s sippy cups.  Middle Monkey never took a bottle (or a pacifier – just his thumb) so when I went back to work after 4 months, he went right to a cup.  He had to.  So, he KNEW that inside that sippy cup was something good.  But, his brother usually had juice, which he wasn’t allowed to have quite yet.  But, once he discovered the taste, he knew he wanted more.  Hence the poem.

Enjoy…

Baby Lion

Dedicated to my Middle Monkey

Alert –

He lies motionless.

Observing –

He spies his prey.

A sippy cup abandoned on the floor.

Cautiously –

He creeps

Pulling his body towards his defenseless target.

Gleefully –

He seizes the taboo grail

Gulping its sweet nectar.

Suddenly –

He is discovered.

The cup’s owner has returned.

Yet, he is undaunted.

His claim has been staked.

Angrily –

He wails in frustration

As he is stripped of his prize.

Dejectedly –

He creeps away.

But he knows if he remains patient

He will be rewarded.

My Little Bronies: Brothers Can Be Magic

Urbandictionary.com defines a brony as – Brony – n – Bronies are the teenage and adult fans (mostly male) of the television show, “My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic.”  Though the term “brony” is gender-neutral, some female fans instead refer to themselves as “Pegasisters.”  Bronies are generally people who decide to judge something on its quality, instead of whether it’s “cool” or “manly” enough. 

As I mentioned earlier this week, The Boy Monkeys have both been very sick.  Coughing every ten seconds.  Feeling crummy.  They have missed days of school.

And apparently, they have spent the entire week watching every single episode of My Little Pony: Friendship Can Be Magic – thanks to Netflix streaming.

Yes, Monkeys #1 and #2 have become proud members of the Brony Nation.

At first, I thought they were just watching with their little sister.  She has recently re-discovered the joy that is My Little Pony.   She really enjoys watching the shows.  And they boys would “let” her watch – occasionally allowing her to turn the TV away from anything Pokemon related.

Then I heard them starting to talk about it.

And now – they are watching it on their own.

And I find it absolutely hysterical.  Don’t ask me why.  But I do.

Not that I am “disturbed” about my BOYS watching a show that is traditionally associated with female viewers.  I have NEVER been one of those parents who insist on gender specific roles.  That’s not it.  That’s not it AT ALL!

But, I think what I find so damn funny is that they discuss it with the same intensity that they have talked about Pokemon, Legos and Star Wars.  They will debate the merits of the different Ponies.  They have formed intelligent opinions as to their favorite Ponies (Monkey #1 prefers Rainbow Dash because she is adventurous – Middle Monkey prefers Pinkie Pie for her eternal optimism).  They quote lines from the shows and will break into song.

Tonight, I picked them up from their father’s.  As soon as they got into the car, they started talking about it.  Quite animatedly.  I couldn’t help but start to laugh.  And laugh hard.  It was hard to drive I was laughing so hard.

Needless to say, the Boy Monkeys started to get a little perturbed with me.

Monkey #1 says, “What’s the problem?  We are proud Bronies.”

More hysterical laughter.

I could tell they were getting REALLY perturbed with my laughter.

So, in his very sardonic way, Monkey #1 says, “Mom.  You just don’t understand the Brony culture.”

I laughed so hard I actually snorted.

The whole time, The Middle Monkey and the Girl Child were arguing about who liked Pinkie Pie more.

It was almost too much!

At this point, Monkey #1 mutters under his breath, “If you post this on Facebook, I will come into your room and kill you in your sleep.”

Notice, he said nothing about my blog!  😀

Anyway.  I can say, I am proud of My Little Bronies.  I am proud of how they don’t really care what is popular or cool.  I am proud that they understand that liking something typically female oriented does not “make you gay.”  I am proud that they can see through the silly little pastel ponies and see the underlying theme of the show – Friendship is Magic.

Now, I wonder if they’ll ever admit it to their friends?  😉

Sender’s Remorse

We’ve all done it.  Come on…you know you have…

Written an email or a text – feeling ever so brave – and hit send… shooting your message into space.

Only to then think, “Oh my God – what have I done?!?!”

But there is no way to reach into thin air and pull it back.  Unfortunately.

The internal email system at my school has an unsend function.  However, it only works BEFORE the person reads it.  Once that happens – it is toooo late.

Of course, an unsend feature works GREAT if your sender’s remorse happens moments after hitting send.  But what happens when you rethink things hours later?  AAAAAAHHHHHHHH!!!!!  Makes you wish you could hop in the ol’ DeLorean, charge up the flux capacitor, speed up to 88, go back in time – and tell your past self to hold those typing fingers still!

Where are Doc Brown and Marty McFly when you need them?

Probably off somewhere trying to stop one of Biff’s zany schemes.

So, until they create an unsend button that also erases the memory of the reader – think before you type, boys and girls!   And make sure you are really ready to deal with what happens when you don’t.

This public service announcement brought to you by the friendly folks at here in Happy Monkey Land.