The Masons are moving

As I've stated in a previous post, my family and I live in a Cul de Sac. To our right, is the weird family, you know the one w/ "the lady who must not be named", her weird kids Mary & Joseph & her husband.
To my left is Jack, who's a nice guy that does commercial HVAC work. Since he does commercial HVAC work, he's up mostly nights and is always piddling around outside w/ his giant, triple tri-pod spotlight. When I go into my son's room, Jack's light is so bright outside that it looks like a light is turned on in my son's room. Jack is also a big time hunter & fisher. He has a twin brother named Jimmy that he never bothered to tell us about so one day my little girl was riding her bike and said: "Hi Jack". He said: "I'm not Jack I'm Jimmy". The look on Abbey's face was priceless. I told Jack later that I met his brother & he still didn't mention to me that they were twins. He just said "yeah that's my brother & we work together". I said: "well you sure do look alike". "I'm older", he said. The 2 of them look like mountain men w/ their gray hair a beards. Jimmy's a little thinner though. Brian needed help putting transmission fluid in his car and went over to ask Jack for help. He got the help & when he was done Brian said: "Thanks Jack" and he said, "you're welcomed, I'm Jimmy". "Brian said you 2 sure look alike & Jimmy said, "we should we're twins".
Next to Jack, are the LeChane's. Ms. LeChane's daughter lives w/ her and her daughter's "baby daddy". There could also be any number of other teenagers staying there at any time. Apparently, if they can't go home, they can go to the LeChane's. There are always a lot of cars parked in her yard & "The lady who most not be named" called in a complaint on them for having to many cars in their yard.
Next to them, lives a person I've never laid eyes on but Brian has. He says it's a woman who lives there and she leaves really early for work in the morning.

The house next to that are what seem to be a normal couple who keep to themselves but that I see go to work and come home everyday. Anyway, that couple moved last weekend.
Next to them is a house w/ an ever changing roster. When we first moved here in Sept. of 2005 , 2 brother's were living there and a few months later those 2 moved out, but their 3 cousins moved in & one of those boys had a little girl w/ him and the little girl's mother. I liked her, but there was always some kinda drama w/ them. Either the brothers were fighting or the couple was fighting or she was fighting one of the brothers. In between all the fighting between each other, they got into it with "The lady who must not be named". There was also a lot of coming & going between them, The LeChane crew and the family that lived next door to them. But my little friend (& by now 2 little girls) moved along with her girls dad. So did both of his brothers. But another boy cousin moved in w/ his girlfriend.

Now let me tell you about the house next door to the 3 sets of boy cousins. It's the last house in the Cul de Sac it's across the street from "The lady who must not be named". In that house are 3 teenagers who stay w/ their uncle the Swami. I'm not jokin' that's how he introduced himself; Swami Dave. He wears a turban & has a real long beard. He's never there so the teenagers have free rein. He's always going somewhere w/ a suitcase. I have opinions about what's in the suitcase but I'll get to that in a minute. I keep my front door open when it's nice cause I can't let the windows up, so I see and hear everything that's going on in the Cul de Sac. I'm not nosey, just cheap. Back to Swami Dave's house, constant partying. One time it got so wild someone was asleep on the roof one morning. They're all high on X, when my door is closed at night, we can hear the "thumpa", "thumpa" of the house music being played and see the flickering of the strobe lights or glow sticks. I'm not one for calling the police or code compliance on people, but I couldn't not do it this one time. If you wanna party, that's fine keep it in the house. Early on a Sunday morning there were about 20 teenagers outside Swami Dave's house. House music was blaring and they were high on X and twirling their little glow sticks. That's when I put my foot down and called the police. The police came and broke it up. Back to what I think is in Swami's suitcases. My little friend w/ the 2 girls has been inside the house and she said he has a gun safe the size of my entertainment center.

From the outside looking in, these people are strange. But now I'm gonna tell you how we probably look to our neighbors.

Anonymous commiserators: #1:"This mixed couple moved into that vacant house over there". "The woman is black & the man is white." "You don't see that very often, it's usually the opposite." #2:"Really". #1:"Yeah, they also brought 5 Great Danes w/ them." #2:"5!" #1:"Yeah 5". #2"In that little house?" #1:"That's what I told my husband." #1:"I haven't got to the best part." #1:"They have 2 children, a little girl and a baby boy." #1:"The little girl is about 3 or so, but get this, she's black like the woman and the baby boy is white like the man." #2:"What, how did that happen?!" #1:"My husband doesn't think the little girl is his." #2:"Probably not."
Two moths later: #2: "So how are those new neighbors?" #1: "Well, they're down to 3 dogs now." #2: "What do you think happened to the other dogs?" #1: "I don't know, I just know 2 aren't there anymore". #1: "Anyway, I saw the man taking the little girl riding on her tricycle and she was calling him daddy."
5 months after the last conversation: #1: "The new couple got rid of another dog, I saw someone come pick it up and take it away in a van." #1:"A few weeks later, they got a new dog; it's a Greet Dane and it's striped." #1: "Oh also, the little boy is up walking around and he looks Mexican." #2: I don't think either of those children are theirs...we should start checking those little cards you get in the mail about missing children." #1: Yeah, maybe we should."

The house we're moving to will be the 4th house & neighborhood for us. I can't wait to see what this new one will be like.

Sesame Street

Okay, so I like Sesame Street now and I loved it as a kid. The only thing about watching it now is that I understand the skits and see them from a grown up point of view. For example; does Cookie Monster seem like a crackhead to you? He does to me...all wild eyed and "jonesing" for a cookie. I also find The Count kinda creepy, don't ask me why, I don't know. What's the deal with Bert & Ernie? I think they're supposed to be grown ups and they share a bedroom, and if I was Bert, & Ernie kept waking me up every night singing or playing his bugle, I would have beat the tar out of him by now. And somebody please give The Snuffaluffagus some Anti-depressants.

The Space program

This is gonna be a real short post. I think that the government should shut down America's space program and funnel that money into health care and Social Security where it's really needed. It makes no sense that the people who helped build this country need medicine and can't get it.

June of '05

In the summer of 2005, my Danes Cozette & Sophia had their litter 3 days apart. Let me tell you how it happened. My Aunt Renee' and her little boy were living with us at the time in our giant house on Munger. I was upstairs in the bed w/ the new baby and the dogs had gone outside to do their business. After a while Josh, my nephew, came upstairs and said: "Aunt Jaime, there's a puppy in my room." I thought he was referring to the big dogs because the kids called the big Danes puppies too. Brian said to me: "You don't think he means a real puppy, do you?" I sat straight up in the bed and hot footed it downstairs and sure 'nuff, there was a squirming little newborn puppy in his room. Sophie had birthed a puppy in his room. I wrangled the big Danes upstairs to the birthing area in our bedroom and told Brian to keep an eye on them while I took the flashlight outside to see if she had birthed any in the yard. Luckily she hadn't. Poor Josh has a mild case of Autism and has to have everything just so. When he realized that Sophie had given birth to one of her pups on his blanket, he ran upstairs and said: "Aunt Jaime, there's bw-ood on my bw-anket! BW-OOD ON MY BW-anket!! He almost had a heart attack. That started a long night of mid-wifing for me. Dane births go about 24 hours and that's 24 hours of me trying to keep their energy up and help them out anyway I can.

Sis. Matlock (Extoling the greatness of this great woman)

All day today, I've had Sister Matlock on my mind... I don't know why. For those of you who read this who don't know who she is or what she was like, I'll tell you. She was the Pastors wife at the church I grew up in. 1st. If everyone on earth could have known her, they'd all be Christians. As a child, I had really bad asthma and like most children I wanted my Grandmother or my Mother. If for some reason my Grandmother couldn't take care of me, I went over to Sis. Matlock's house. If my Grandmother said I was going there, there was no panic, I knew everything would be okay. She always had a kind word and a smile. She sang when she went about her chores. Her singing was awful, but it was beautiful because you could tell that the hymn she was singing came from her heart. This woman exuded faith. It poured out of her, if you were near her you couldn't not feel it. Being in her house was like being wrapped in a blanket on a cold day. I was probably 7 or 8 years old before I realized that she was no kin to me. That's the kind of person she was...she made you feel like you were family. One time, I was staying at her house because I was sick and she asked me if I wanted watermelon; now anybody who knew me when I was a child can tell you I wouldn't eat a thing when I was sick, but I ate that watermelon, and no sooner had I gotten it down, than it came right back up. You think she would have been upset but no, she cleaned it up as I lay in bed. I believe being near her was as close to God as I've ever been. She was a true Proverbs 31 woman and if the world was fair, her picture would be in the dictionary as the definition of kindness.