We'll get to the next two posts eventually . . .

But first this week's column.  Some of you may remember this episode . . .

Chapter Ten: Wherein I go to college and learn I want my future kids to do things differently

In this chapter I will discuss how I went to BYU although all the kids who grew up in Provo mocked BYU students heartlessly.  We called them ZOOBIES and tinkerty-tonk!  WE MEANT IT TO STING.

But most of us Provo kids who actually went to college went to BYU because it was cheap and we lived at home where we proceeded to have no fun at all because you know.  We lived at home.  I drowned my sorrows in food and became large-ish, which still did not stop me from becoming a BYU Folk Dancer because apparently you can be chubby if you're good at doing Russian dances.  Which I was.

Anyway.  I made myself a solemn sacred promise that my kids would go away to school and not live at home and gain weight and become BYU Folk Dancers.  And mostly they didn't.  There were two good things that happened to me as an undergrad, though.  I will discuss those in my next two posts.

Knock-knock jokes

Fridays I hang out with my three year-old granddaughter who has discovered knock-knock jokes.  Here's the joke she told me today.

G-daughter:  Knock, knock!

Me:  Who's there?

G-daughter:  Apple!

Me:  Apple who?

G-daughter:  Apple poo-poo!  (This is followed by uncontrollable laughter.  Mine.)

At this point I think it's genetically hardwired in three year-olds to tell a) knock knock jokes that b) are scatological.  Like, in France I'm pretty sure the kids would say knock, knock and their grandmothers would say qui is there and then the kids would say pomme and then their grandmothers would say pomme qui and then the kids would say pomme poo-poo and then I would start laughing uncontrollably again way over here in America.

Carry on, French kids!

Where were we?

Oh yes.  Chapter Nine.  This is the chapter wherein I discuss high school, which, of course, was plenty angsty, but a way better fit for me than junior high school ever was.  I lost some weight and learned to talk to boys without nervously dissolving into a nervous puddle of nervous sweatiness.  Score!  Not that I was completely sweat-free, but now I only sweat under one arm instead of both.

Other high school stuff?

Girls could wear pants.  I fell in love with Led Zeppelin and spent all my money on albums.  My two best friends, Gigi and Becky, started spending more time with their boyfriends than with me, which I understood but which left me feeling lonely.  So I made new best friends with Jon and Stan who were safe because they didn't see me as girlfriend material.  Our poodle died of a heart attack in the driveway when a big dog made accidental eye contact with her.  I started a string of part-time jobs.  I went to Hawaii for the first time and wondered why I hadn't been born there.  I learned to drive and nearly lost my license by the time I was a senior.  You can read between the lines there.  My dad was made head coach.  Joyce Nelson, my AP English teacher changed my life.   I made up a bucket list in our school library one day that said I wanted to write a book, go to Europe, and have seven sons, and if you count my two stillborn babies, I eventually did all of the above.

This n' that

1.  I went to the SLC library tonight to listen to Radagast read some of his poems.  He reads like he writes--beautifully.

2.  I saw Lisa B. there, too.  Maybe I've told you this before--but she's the one who inspired me to blog.  Thanks for that, Lisa!

3.  It's always nice to connect with friends who write--and friends who don't write, too.  Ken and I had French Silk Pie with Rick Horne earlier this evening.

4.  And then I came home and started watching Nashville for the first time in months and yup.  It's just a big hot mess.  And not even a big fun hot mess.

5.  Other hot messes that are no fun anymore?  Scandal and Revenge.  Ugh.  Revenge was watchable for a year before it blasted off into the craz-o-sphere.  Scandal took about two episodes before it did the same thing.

Christmas sweaters that get no respect

Yeah.  That would be MY Christmas sweater.  Read the true story here.

Missing Q

My son:  Mormondom's answer to the Singing Nun.