Tag Archives: Funny

Karma’s a Bitch, Man

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All I did was kill a few cockroaches and now look what’s happened.

Last week my husband and I rented a condo on the beach in North Carolina. I picked it off the internet so was pleasantly surprised to walk in and see it was very similar to the pictures. Garage on the first floor, living room/kitchen on the next and finally, the bedroom at the top of a winding flight of stairs. There was even, as advertised, an ocean view. Okay, you had to lean over the deck railing to see it, but hey, it was there.

Unfortunately we came home that evening to find giant cockroaches swarming our food in the kitchen. I’m talking GIANT cockroaches. You learn a lot about a person when there’s an emergency. For example, my big strong handsome husband? Scared of cockroaches. I ran upstairs and jumped on the bed — where every woman knows, no pest can reach you, right? I dialed the landlord and through my chattering teeth told them the problem. They explained (quite haughtily I might add) that the bugs were Palmetto bugs. And even though they were harmless water bugs, they would be by in the morning to exterminate.

People who know me, know that I don’t like chemicals. I only eat organic food. I don’t allow pressure treated wood to be used in my house. I even apologized to my trees when the electrical company came by to trim them. But, GIANT cockroaches? Bring on the weapons of mass destruction, baby. I wanted them obliterated!

The next day few days were miserable as the poisoned bugs wandered aimlessly around the condo before flipping onto their backs and crossing their six legs, looking for all the world like a corpse in a casket. All my time inside was spent cowering in the middle of the bed on the top floor of the condo. Payback, right?

Not quite. We made it home without incident and being an avid gardener, the first thing I did was to run out and check my beautiful organic vegetable garden. Somehow, something (giant cockroaches?) had torn/chewed/blown a hole in the netting surrounding my precious greens. So, instead of seeing row upon row of green leafy lettuces, there was only bare ground. My entire crop had been obliterated!

Like I said, Karma’s a Bitch, Man.

Mama Never Told Me

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As a painfully shy teenager, my mother spent hours trying to teach me how to get a boy to ask me out. While Mom lived in fear that I would never go on a date, I lived in fear that I would.
The first thing she tried to teach me was how to bat my eyelashes. Evidently boys found this irresistible.
“When you’re talking to a boy,” she said as we stood in front of the bathroom mirror. “Tilt your chin down and look up through your lashes. Now, blink several times in a row.”
I looked like a bobble head with an eye infection.
The next thing she tried was to shorten all my skirts. She had a friend lug her sewing machine over to our house. I stood in on a chair in the middle of the dining room and Mom gauged how short my skirt should be. “Put your arms down by your sides,” she said. “I think we should mark it at the tips of your fingers.”
“Dad,” I shouted. “Help me out here, would you?”
His only comment as he walked out to the safety of the barn, was “You have to have the right bait if you want to catch a fish.”
Mom’s friend diligently stitched up the hems on all my dresses.
At school I walked from class to class hugging the walls, terrorized of exposing myself but Mom’s idea worked. A boy asked me out.
“And he’s a senior,” Mom bragged to her friends.
He took me to the homecoming dance where I refused every request to move toward the gyrating in the middle of the gym. I calculated that his height would require me to move my arms above shoulder level which would reveal my backside to the entire school.
To my relief (and probably his) we left early. When we were fifty yards from the driveway the engine went dead and the lights went out. We rolled to a stop in front of my house.
“Is there something wrong with your car?” I asked.
He leaned across the seat toward me, lips puckered. I backed up against the door. My mind raced through everything Mom had coached me to do, but the coaching sessions didn’t cover kissing.
“Just a minute. I have to ask my Mom what to do next.” I jumped out of the car and ran to the house. He was gone before I’d made it to the front door.