Susan and her family attended her youngest niece's high school graduation over the weekend (Hooray Liz!) and came home to a house that smelled like dog diarrhea which had been baking in a hot airless environment for hours because Susan, ever paranoid of home invasions, locks the windows every time she leaves the house.
Was that sentence too long?
Well, she's not changing it.

The source of the stench was located behind the couch, a cleanable area. Susan walked away and let the husband clean it.
In the meantime, she sent the kids over to be nice to the dog who was cowering in the hallway with her tail between her legs.

As Susan listened to the sounds of dog diarrhea being cleaned off the floor she reflected on how how lucky she was to have a husband who takes on dirty tasks without being asked.

When he finished they retired for the evening.

A few hours later the dog requested to use the restroom by sticking her wet nose in a sleeping Susan's face. Susan let her out into a dark yard then went over to investigate the cleanliness of the crime scene while she waited. Gasp! It was splattered with diarrhea again!

It was Susan's turn to clean.

On Monday Susan knocked her son's brand new Old Spice bodywash off the shelf in the shower and onto her foot.
Ouch you m*therf*cker, ouch!
She watched as a monstrous red bump rose immediately from the instep of her delicate size 10 foot.
She wore flip flops to work even though Acme Sweatshop does not observe a flip flop dress code.
Every day she watched the mark on her foot get larger and purpler, eventually it began to reverse course and get lighter because, how much damage could 16 fluid ounces really do? By Friday her foot was back to normal.
The end.

Susan thinks she fell asleep in front of an Excel spreadsheet. Late in the day she rested her eyes for the teeniest moment, the next time she opened them three columns of information were missing and her head was about to crash into the desk.

She's fallen asleep in public before, but that was back in her twenties and she was usually drunk.

Her old man used to fall asleep in church all the time. He'd listen devoutly for as long as he could before his attention span gave out and sweet sleep came to rescue him. Slowly he would tilt forward in his seat until his head jerked back and he'd wake himself up. A teenage Susan found this horribly embarrassing and poked him awake as often as was necessary.

Susan has always been a BIG fan of the nap. The ability to remove oneself from consciousness for an hour is the height of luxury. The absolute tops.

Susan dropped off the map for a little bit to spend time with her folks and then recover from having spent time with them. Over the weekend she held her BIG happy birthday party, the one from which she banned all children. In fact, she banned everyone under forty and it worked out so well she may employ that criteria again. The day after the party she felt the full effect of having stayed up late enjoying her guests, drinking and smoking cigars.

Susan struggles with entertaining and tried to avoid the areas of previous party failures like not having enough food, chairs or ice. She rarely provides enough soda because she doesn't think anyone should be drinking it to begin with. In the past she's had to stop mingling in order to wash dishes, hunt down serving utensils and climb up on chairs to look for more red plastic cups.

This time she did as much planning as she was physically able to tolerate but still found herself making critical decisions the day before she needed to feed and entertain people. She abandoned most of the food she was going to make in favor of things she could purchase, and a trip to the health food store provided her with all sorts of options for the compartments of her '70s lazy susan.

She took Friday off from work to clean her pantry, it's not what she intended to do but it's what she ended up doing. Saturday was spent stomping around the house in a completely humorless state taking care of all pre-party tasks. She found the time to scream at the husband when the CD player stopped working even though she knew there was something wrong with it two years ago.

Don't say anything, she's aware that CD players are ridiculously '90s.

She cleaned the bathrooms, strung colored lights along the deck, set the table then jumped in the shower where she relaxed and unclenched her jaw. Susan emerged refreshed, put on her party dress and had a lovely evening.

In a day or two she'll tell you about the wonderful gift she had to hand back to the givers.

When Susan got up yesterday morning Wild Bill was on the couch under a pink Barbie quilt and her folks were drinking the weak coffee her mother makes. When she got home they were gone. Susan read the note they left, did laundry, went through a week's worth of newspapers, returned a few things to their regular locations and advised her son how to get spray paint off his hands.

Her parents were pretty good guests, they ate what they were served as long as they didn't think they were eating onions, garlic or peppers, they were nice to the dog even after she growled at Susan's old man, they even read one of the books on Susan's shelf.

During their visit both Susan and Wild Bill's daughter had birthdays so there was plenty of cake to eat. There was also take-out because the husband was away for three days and he usually does the cooking.

Even though Susan missed her company she quickly fell back into the rhythm of her normal home life and felt very un-TWISTED.

Saturday morning Susan, her little sister and their mother went yard sale-ing and OMG did Susan get some good stuff! Five dollars went to a stylish rattan handbag then another five went to a dead lady's black beaded necklace. Her biggest yard sale coup came in the form of a genuine 1970s artifact; a red, orange and gold ceramic lazy susan which she purchased for a dollar. Absolutely horrible.
It would be perfect for her impending birthday cocktail party.

Even though Susan's been planning her party for two months one very important component is starting to fall apart; the food. Susan researched intriguing recipes fitting the criteria of what she'd like to serve and has been roadtesting them one by one,
thus far she doesn't like anything. She has a week to get things together or she'll be mixing Lipton onion soup mix into sour cream and serving chips.

Anyway. In the afternoon Susan took a break from never spending any money on her children and brought them to the mall. The son needed sneakers and a soccer ball and the daughter needed shorts and a giant icecream drink with whipped cream.

The daughter's friend came along and Susan allowed the girls to shop without her as long as they kept in touch via text. The son didn't mind sticking with his mother for awhile which was a pleasant surprise.

Susan's daughter texted her location almost immediately. Good girl. Then she texted another location. Good again. Susan left the son in one store so she so she could go across to another.

While in the dressing room the son texted something requiring a response, so Susan sent a quick text back.

Then the daughter texted something requiring a response. In the interest of expediency and because Susan was in mid strip she phoned and got the voicemail. Susan texted Answer your phone! which solved the problem.

Little sister was headed to the mall with one of Susan's nieces, she texted wanting to know Susan's location. Susan texted back.

Then Susan's mother phoned wanting to know what everyone was doing for dinner.

Then Susan's husband called to let her know that he was on his way to the airport to come home from where he had been for the last three days.

Then Susan's son texted looking for her.

Then her daughter texted requesting that Susan come quickly with her charge card.

Then little sister texted looking for her.

Susan's still in that dressing room stripped to her underpanties.

Hugs and kisses from Susan to all her bloggy pals who take time out of their regular lives to write nice things and make her feel good every day.
Simple Jack probably best captured how she feels when he said
'You m-m-m-m-m-make me happy!'

Susan turned 50 today, hooray for her!

She cartwheeled out of bed and was greeted by applause everywhere she went.

What a day.

But really folks, it was a great birthday that started with a pumpernickel bagel and ended with cake. In between there were mojitos & a nap, Wild Bill's garlic soup, unbelievably fantastic mashed potatoes and fried chicken cutlets. Oh, Susan got a couple of good gifts including a brand new laptop just for her!

Susan's house guests took their babies and went back home. For the rest of the day she still heard them in her house even though they weren't there.

Susan likes having guests although she can't always adjust to having their stuff in her house. She found herself looking for a balance between completely turning off her OCD brain and collecting, cataloguing & grouping everything together in one location every five minutes.

During their stay they turned Susan on to

3o Rock and 992 coupons while Susan made mojitos and shared Fawlty Towers. After they left Susan occupied herself by washing all the towels in the house to prepare for the next wave, her folks in two days.

Susan's been writing late at night which has resulted in a decrease in her ability to think up funny sentences.
She's sorry. She wants to be funny for her modest fan base but her little BLAHgy paragraphs take up a lot of time as well as mental effort and she can't do any of this stuff at work because she's really gotten used to being employed. But she takes notes during periods of inspiration and tries to get to the computer before midnight.

Another problem comes from knowing who reads her BLAHg which limits what she is willing to write. Like, her mother. She could have gone in a whole other direction with that. Mothers are funny to make fun of anyway. I mean, wouldn't it be hilarious if she wrote that her mother was like the monkey who ripped the hands and face off that lady? Susan's LOL-ing just thinking about writing that.
But she can't because her mother would cry and that's not funny. Susan absolutely does not want her mother to cry, she doesn't want anybody's mother to cry. You know, because of her.

Susan decided long ago that she didn't want to be mean, just angry. Mean is better done in person when vocal inflections and facial expressions can be employed. Words are easily misunderstood if the right ones are not used in the proper order. Susan's much more comfortable with anger, it sort of fuels her day. Besides, there's plenty to be angry about.
Being broke is a scream, OMG is that funny!
TWISTED bad moods? Funny.
Farts? Funny.
The husband talking while Susan reads the papers? Funny.
Dentists, banks, drunk neighbors? Stop, stop! Susan is doubled over!

Enjoy your Sunday, guys.

For the third time this week Susan came home to a hot house and began yelling at people to open the windows. Susan exempted her house guests only because the regular occupants of the house are completely aware of what they must do when they get home; open the f*cking windows! Holy crap, how difficult is that? Surely they must recognize when they're hot. Susan feels like she's living in bizarro world with this bunch.

Susan's house is not equipped with central air conditioning, which is perfectly fine because she likes open windows, fans and cool drinks with ice cubes in them. When things get particularly brutal she jumps in the pool and floats around. She floats because she doesn't swim. She wouldn't mind learning how to swim except for the fact that she's really not keen on being in the water to begin with, it's a little claustrophobic for her. So, she floats and paddles and is very comfortable as long as she can touch the bottom. Touching the bottom is good.

Susan didn't grow up with a pool, she had a sprinkler.
She remembers being pretty happy with the sprinkler,
it was cold and wet and got the job done. The summers of her childhood included low tech ice pops made of frozen juice which she guesses were better than nothing. Sometimes they'd go to Carvel and Susan would get a Cherry Bonnet. OMG, Susan still loves Cherry Bonnets!
In fact, she ate one belonging to a houseguest today.
The husband tried to get some of it but Susan wasn't sharing and sent him away.

Susan had a bunch of nice things happen to her over the last week.

Every morning she found a happy gurgling baby and his big sister mashing bananas into goo and spilling Cheerios.
Plus, they were always glad to see her.

Susan's little sister, inspired by a particularly TWISTED tirade about a broken patio umbrella, bought Susan the most beautiful patio umbrella ever made anywhere, ever. Susan spent all weekend having cocktails, reading the papers and enjoying her guests in shaded splendor.

Susan's co-workers surprised her with a cake, a verse of Happy Birthday a fantastic handmade necklace and a generously stuffed card which Susan turned into her summer wardrobe on the way home.
She spent that money crazy fast.

Lastly, Susan received two interesting compliments in one day. The first was provided by a foot fetishist acquaintance of hers who said that she reminded him of Princess Diane. At first she thought that the deepness of her new turquoise shirt messed with his brainwaves but then realized he was just responding to her good breeding and regal authority. Later in the day a lady stranger told Susan I love your hair and admitted that she had been admiring Susan in such close proximity that she was surprised Susan didn't feel the lady stranger breathing on the back of her neck. Susan was flattered and excited to have a stalker, TGIF everybody.