Aug19

Because I go to stupid lengths for humor

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Because I go to stupid lengths for humor

Like all great stories, this one begins and ends with zucchini.

Here’s what happened.

As planned, I made [read: commissioned Baking Daughter to make] muffins with the zucchini from the Senseis’ bounteous garden. I showed Sensei:

Lots of mini muffins. Hubby took some to work. Daughter took some to friends.

Sensei said, “Want to make a trade??? You need raw materials, I need finished goods.”

I was actually lamenting not having any more zucchini to fry, so I agreed.

The morning of exchange day, Hubby made bacon. “Perfect!” I said. “Now I have bacon grease for frying the zucchini I’m getting from Sensei today.” Then I mentioned how nice it is that I don’t worry about my appearance when meeting Sensei since 98% of the time we’ve seen each other, it was for martial arts. That’s about as low maintenance-looking as I can get.

“Plus,” I told Hubby, “I always wear the same around-the-house clothes.”

Then, “Hmmm…” I mused aloud.

“What?”

“What if I changed things up and wore a skirt just to be different?”

“Okay.”

“Or maybe I go all out with a dress.”

“Sort of like the toilet pictures?”

I nodded, grinning. “Like the toilet pictures.”

Later, I dug out my fanciest favoritest dress and texted a pic to Hubby.

“Yep. It’s funny. I think I’ll do it,” I wrote. He hearted that.

I got ready. Sensei texted he’d be late.

“This is a good excuse to swap out the diamonds for the gold hoops,” I told Hubby. He was pleased. He likes those too.

Sensei would be later still.

Alright, sheesh. Gold bracelets too.

And later still.

Okay, where are those cheap Walmart beautiful gold rings I own? If you’re going to do a thing, you might as well do it completely, right? But making my hair look nice is a mission even Ethan Hunt would find impossible, so I didn’t concern myself with that.

Also, despite the nice dress, I donned sensible footwear.

Party on top; the business of “my feet hurt” on bottom.

Finally, it was time, so the kids and I loaded up our muffins and books and headed to the library. Unfortunately, I had my back to Sensei when he first spotted me, so I didn’t see his initial reaction. He did smile, however, with his brow furrowed.

“Why are you so dressed up for the library?”

I explained my idea of going to the opposite extreme of my usual attire. And wouldn’t you know it? He had had the exact same idea! Here we are:

Doesn’t Sensei look nice? JK. That’s Philip Rivers, former quarterback of the former San Diego Chargers. We were at one time acquainted.

“What did you tell your kids when they asked why you were wearing a dress?” Sensei asked.

“I told them, ‘To be funny.’ There were no follow-up questions.”

He also had no further questions. So the kids and I left with three zucchinis and three full boxes of books. It had been a WHOLE WEEK since we’d been to the library after all.

Hubby, later: “So, how’d it go?”

“Kind of anticlimactic. He didn’t laugh. Maybe he smirked when he first saw me, but I missed it.”

“Mmm. Sorry.”

“That’s okay.” Though I almost didn’t blog about this because I didn’t feel it had an ending to make the story worth sharing.

Then I remembered how all good stories end.

With zucchini, in this case, frying. Yum.

And so I am satisfied.

Last Q: Where in the body would you find metatarsal bones? That would be the foot, people. The blasted foot.

New Q: In mountaineering, these multispiked items affix to your boots to aid in climbing during icy conditions.

Completely unrelated P.S. Sunday was the school’s annual family picnic to kick off the new school year. When I arrived and wended my way through the throng, a small person rat-mazed to me and threw her arms around me. I looked down to see little sour face girl from day one of self defense camp smiling up at me.

That camp:

  • Gave the girls more confidence–yes, hopefully.
  • Enabled them to fight off a bad guy–probably not something they’ll need, but okay.
  • Helped a little girl feel more comfortable starting at a new school full of strangers–Yes.

And that last one alone would’ve made the whole camp worth it.

P.P.S. Got word today! WISH I WAS HERE is now available for presale!

That means I should have had book 2 done by today. Hahahahaha!

Everyone who tells me they ordered wins a prize! I think I still have some of those tattoos with my face on them around here…

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89 responses »

  1. Trivia answer: Without looking it up and off the top of my head I believe they’re called crampons.
    Zucchini? You can have my share, thank you so much for your generous offer.
    The book sounds like a blast and I am heading over to pre-order it now.

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  4. oh my goodness, you know Philip Rivers? Great photo.

    And still laughing with this:

    “Party on top; the business of “my feet hurt” on bottom.”

    Side note, we are watching the documentary “becoming Led Zeppelin” and before Robert Plant joined the Yardbirds – and before Led Zeppelin unfolded – Plant noted that he was in a band where they lit incense on the stage and he wore oriental clothes – and your dress reminded me of part of his outfit.

    anyhow, truly fun to change up the wardrobe with that dress and seeing the photo on the toilet box – your feet were injury free – wow – and they will be again soon

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    • I did know Philip once upon a time. I remember seeing him at another event. He said, “Hey,” and gave me a side hug. 🙂

      I love that dress. I was so happy when I found it at Goodwill. 🙂

      I look at the toilet box photos and think, “Wow. I was able to wear those shoes.” 😛 Thanks, PH!

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  5. Along with all the others, the answer is crampons. We have a version of those for work. Rubber that fits over your boots with the metal claws to keep you from sliding around on ice. Pain in the butt to put on and off, but when you’re dealing with glazed ice, they’re your best friend 😀

    I like zucchini bread so I assume I’d like zucchini mini-muffins too. But. I don’t like straight up zucchini. I let Mrs B have all of that!

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  7. Oh, that sensei is slick. It takes a lot less work to grow and supply the raw materials than it does to create the finished goods. I’m keeping my eye on him. 😉
    You look lovely, toilet and garage notwithstanding.
    Sensible footwear, or sensei-able footwear?
    You can’t tell from the picture, but I’m sure you could kick Philip Rivers’ a$$!
    Crampons! I wore them once when we climbed a Colorado fourteener… in JUNE! It was still snow-covered!
    Congrats on the book!!

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  9. Love your spunk! Love your dress-wearing-ambush-adventure…all for the love of muffins.
    And anytime I get to see the toilet sitting pic, all formal and fab….its a smile-worthy moment!
    Thank you for the best thing I’ve read all day (mind you it’s 5am)…………..
    I adore the phrase “rat-mazed”. 😜❤️😜

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  11. No follow-up questions from the kids? Priceless! That is a beautiful book jacket! Congrats! It’s looking like our garden is going to produce ONE zucchini this year. What to make, what to make?

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  15. Great photos! Thanks for sharing the toilet photo with those of us who haven’t seen it before. 🙂 You looked really nice for Sensei! Men! At least your husband approved. My husband would have LOVED you – for frying the zucchini in bacon!

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  16. I’m glad to hear you’re outsourcing zucchini production. We have exactly one zucchini in our garden and so far there has been 2 zucchini loaves, daily zucchini for dinner, apparently you can turn zucchini into “zoodies” which substitute for spaghetti … we haven’t have zucchini muffins yet, but I fear that day is coming.

    and our neighbors are avoiding us — I think out of fear we’ll give them more zucchini.

    and crampons (so call because you cramp them on to your boots) — not recommended for fighting with as you might step on your own feet with them.

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  19. Stupid lengths for humor. No way. As one who has gone to great lengths for a laugh or two, I’m right there with you. A laugh is a valuable thing. In many ways, priceless. Laughed out loud at the toilet pics. I laughed at the Rivers pic, but for a different reason. You see these athletes on TV, you forget how big they are in real life. He looks like he could still play. And congratulations on the presale. Now I have another book to add to my list. So happy for you. Congratulations.

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  21. See, this is why I liked your rare Monday post last week. I went from being 1st to 62nd. Not nearly as impressive and way too late for trivia.

    What do you mean, your blog isn’t all about ME?!

    I have no idea who Ethan Hunt is. Unless you meant Ethan Hawke. I totally know who Ethan Hawke is. Which reminds me, Tara and I are having a heated debate: Winona Ryder choose the wrong guy in “Reality Bites”? Should Leilana have ended up with Michael instead of Troy? Super curious about your response.

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    • Laughing so much at this, mostly the last part, but super sad that I CANNOT REMEMBER!!! Sort of like you prompting me to rewatch Singles, which Hubby had NEVER SEEN!?!?! So, I’ll have to get back to you on that.

      I know. I know. I even wrote it Sunday to post Monday, but I needed to let it rest first, which then enabled me to add the bit about the book now being live, FWIW. But I really truly thought of you and the conundrum I was putting you in, but, you know, we’ve gotta let other people have a chance too, right?

      Oh, and Mission Impossible, you goof.

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  23. Hilarious! I wonder what the folks at the library thought too. I recently went to the library to use their computer to test whether or not Delta really is using dynamic pricing (price was the same, also anticlimactic) but I was there for approximately three minutes and I’m sure the librarian thought I was looking up how to dispose of a body or something.

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    • Lol. That’s a great story, Theresa! I did see one librarian staring. After that, I decided to not make eye contact with anyone. Once I was at the library in a normal dress, and a patron asked for help finding something. I think he thought I worked there. I was not super helpful. 😛

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  25. Maybe I should always wait a week before reading your posts. The last thirty comments were a hoot. As for my own contributions, a) I thought Rivers was Sensei before I saw the photo caption so I was thinking, “Dang, Sensei is TALL”, and b) “Zucchini” is a strange word but “crampon” is even stranger. When I think “crampon” I think about either a sharp pain in my side or a feminine hygiene need. Whomever came up with the word should’ve stuck with “clampon” (although THAT makes me think of The Clapper and now I wonder if anyone buys those anymore). Speaking of purchases, I just bought me a book from Black Rose!

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    • You’re amazing, Dave!!! Thank you!!!! And I’m glad the comments are entertaining. 😛 And totally about clampon being not only better but more logical. Excellent question about The Clapper. I smell Dave’s next blog post topic!

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  28. In a dither: which is my favourite pic: the frying zucchini or Betsy in a cheongsam?

    Of course, it is you in your fabulous red dress!

    I chuckled with I pictured you increasingly layering on your fancy goods … and showing up at the library … and missing sensei’s reaction.

    We have been thinking about zucchini too – we have seen many baked goods (sweet ones, but no frosting) which incorporate this squash. But as I told Younger Child, too expensive in Singapore to be baked into cake. If I am paying this much for them, we are stir-frying it like Betsy!

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    • “But no frosting”–Haha! Making LOTS of cupcakes for my birthday party/book launch party tonight, and they will all be frosted! Stir-frying to get the most out of their taste, when you can hide a vegetable is just about any baked good, is a good call, Ju-Lyn. I hope you enjoy them!

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  29. An entertaining read, Ilsa! What fun that Philip also dressed up for the zucchini/muffin exchange. We could have used someone like you to rescue us from a bumper zucchini crop a few decades ago. One lay hidden under the vines so long it grew more than two feet long!

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