Lazy W Marie

Carpeing all the diems in semi-rural Oklahoma...xoxo

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That’s Not Funny…LOL

August 9, 2011

   Shamefully, against my will, and much to the chagrin of my friends and family members, I am definitely suscestible to bouts of inappropriate laughter.  Lots of terrible, serious things make me grin, and no matter how old I grow I remain powerless against this weird force of nature.

It’s just laughter, though, so how harmful can that be?!?!?! 
   If an old person fall down, well good grief, apparently just thinking about it is making me laugh!  I don’t want anyone to get hurt, but that is FUNNY STUFF.  And obviously I am a bad person.
   If a small animal, but especially a cat, makes any kind of offensive maneuver against a human, that is giggling gold to me.

   If I hear a man scream in fear like a little girl, no matter the mortal danger, it is hilarious.  I crave to hear a squeaky, panicky voice shred a grown man’s face against his will.  And if either this or the cat-human thing happens on television, you can bet your angry scowl I will be rewinding and watching that bad boy for an hour and a half.

   This next one is bad.  It could cause you to stop reading my blog forever and shake your head slowly in disgust, breathing dramatically as you click the X button in the upper right hand corner of your monitor.  Ready?
   When my husband or one of our children or maybe one of my parents or siblings has suffered a M-I-N-O-R injury, maybe something that just causes some momentary stress or requires little more than a dab of N-n-n-neo…  Sporin… and a bandage, well, it is embarrassing, but I do laugh.  Out loud.  It has caused a few fights, rest assured. 
   I like to think that it’s part of my maternal instincts, actually.  You know, maybe the annoying (and potentially infuriating) giggles from your should-be caregiver can distract you from your pain.  That kind of thing.

   Today Handsome was mad at me for something.  Something kind of big.  And I had to cover my face with both hands and pull on the skin beneath my eyes to try and settle down.  Because the madder he got the funnier it was to me.   I COUDLN’T HELP IT!!!  It was uncontrollable!  Try as I might, I could not wipe that stupid grin off of my guilty face, and of course that fueled his anger fire a bit.
   He broke for a just moment, chortling at me with adorable mercy.  But then to compensate for this breach in strategy he dove into further explanation of why he was so mad at me, and GOD HELP ME it was funny!!!
   I think maybe I am allergic to crisis and laughter is how the allergy manifests itself.  Lots of things make it worse and nothing really makes it better except to just laugh it out.
   If you are ever the unhappy victim of my inappropriate laughter, just let the goofy flame burn itself out.  Don’t bother trying to reason with me at all.  FOR SURE do not say, “I am serious!!!”
   Oh man, anyone who is serious is instantly hilarious to me, that’s just how it goes. 
   Thank you, MamaKat, for prompting me to admit this terrible truth.  I feel better, sort of.  At lots of other people’s expense.

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Filed Under: writers workshops

XIV

August 8, 2011

   Today our youngest daughter is celebrating her FOURTEENTH birthday!  She is the sweetest, smilinest, song-singinest, hug-givinest girl you will ever meet, and I am just floored that another year has already passed. 

 Just for fun I would really groove on sharing some essential truths about this beautiful human being whom I am blessed enough to call Daughter.  Who is fourteen years old now.  Which hardly seems possible.  Because time flies.  It is slipping slipping slipping, into the future, right at this moment.

At an animal refuge in Tuttle,. OK, Februrary 2007
   Carrying her in pregnancy was easy and comfortable, and carrying her as an infant was just delicious.  She loved to cuddle then as much as she does now.
   She greatly prefers sour candy to chocolate and delights in challenging family members to see how much sour they can tolerate.

   Given a choice, she’ll always pick bowtie pasta over spaghetti noodles and marinara sauce over alfredo.

    She loves long showers and can often be heard singing in them.

   She is a talented writer and voracious reader, despite some difficulty getting started in the reading department years ago.  There is no adult in my life whose conversation about books I prefer to hers.  She is insightful and sensitive far beyond her fourteen years.

   For most of those fourteen years, orange has been her favorite color.

 

Spreading her very happy eagle wings at Martin Nature Park, OKC, eight 1/2 years old

   She laughs musically.  And regarding smiles that light up a room, there is no comparison to hers.

   She can COOK.  I mean, not just pretend to cook like some kids, which is adorable, this girl can COOK.  She is trustworthy in the kitchen and a true asset to the family meal.

       She can identify wild tomato plants just by sniffing their fruitless stems, and she understands that lemon and basil are nature’s perfume.
       She has impeccable telephone manners. 
       She is an avid rope jumper.  She used to practice jumping rope while her older sister practiced with the basketball team, and I would count for her.  One day she jumped a consecutive 694 times!  No break, no joke.  She was rightfully amazed.
       She is as tireless on the trampoline as she is with a jump rope.
    She is gentle with animals, endlessly affectionate, and has a calming nature about her. 
    Her pet rooster named Rocky knows he is her favorite and has made her his.
   
   She is loyal to a fault, defending her siblings and her close friends against all pain and all opposition.

   She knows how to pray; she knows that God heals; and she will share her faith with people, but gently.

She would swim 24 hours a day if we let her but never compains when it’s time to dry off. 
Handsome and I gave her this boat for her twelfth birthday, late at night,
and she was so excited that she filled it with pillows and blankets and slept there. 
The next morning she was on the water before breakfast.



   Once upon a time our girl was elected Chaplain of her Sunday School class, and while she held that office she took the job very seriously.  I used to love hearing the scriptures she selected each week and then her personal comments on them.  She displayed the best poise, the greatest respect for the Bible, and the strongest sense of teamwork I have ever seen in a child at church.  Noone was prouder than Handsome and me.

   She has always become deeply attached to her teachers at school.  And her teachers have always had lovely things to say about her, constantly praising her passion, discplined efforts, and sweetness-without-borders in the classroom.
   She loves to fall asleep having her back tickled and her hair stroked, listening to Raindrops on Roses or made up stories about the Pine Forest.
   She likes cranberry-orange juice in the morning and warm milk with honey at night.
   She endured brain surgery twice as a toddler and recovered miraculously both times.  The details and memories are seared into my heart, and the resulting gratefulness for her survival and healing keeps bitterness over other things sort of mild.  God has surprised us over and over again.

   It seems like nearly every friend of hers has claimed her as “BEST friend.”  Because she really is. 

   When she turned thirteen last summer, she had just moved into the upstairs “Apartment.”  We’d installed brand new carpet, very soft and exactly the color she wanted, and one of her wishes was a vacuum sweeeper all to herself.  We bought her a smallish, bright pink one, and she swept the entire floor I think every day for two weeks.  She would then empty the canister and survey the contents, evaluating whether people might have been walking in her room with dirty shoes. 
   While it is fun to receive gifts you really, really, really want, it is even more fun to give those gifts to your children.  The sillier the beter.  She isn’t here now, but every time I see this pink sweeper I giggle.

Kinda looks to me like Picachu knows exactly what’s coming.  Yikes.

   She is a MAJOR fan of pinatas.  Looking back through her birthday party pictures over the years, I found only three that did NOT include a tissue-covered, candy-filled object of pretend childhood wrath.  She is tiny but quite strong.  And every year that Handsome strung up a pinata for her and her friends to bash, she did so with ferocity and laughter that would frighten Katniss Everdeen.
   In addition to being super clean, she is a born nester.  Once, I discovered she had applied personalized wall vinyls to her bed nook without any help, and she has always enjoyed rearranging her bedroom, fluffing pillows, changing doll clothes, organizing her book shelves, etc.  I cannot wait to see her own adult home in the future!
   She values modesty, even in her new adolescent beauty.  Which is enormous, by the way.  She is one of those true ladylike beauties, needing no embellishment but knowing how to use it tastefully.

   Like any parent, I could write non stop for days and days about my child.  She and her sister are the light of my heart, the sheer amazement of life.  
   My words cannot do justice to her beauty or her spirit, so I can only close in saying, “HAPPY BIRTHDAY CHICKEN!!!  You are the picture of softness and sweetness and vulnerability.  You have been given treasures of femininity and love that not many women enjoy.  You have a heart for the Lord.  You are the sort of friend everyone needs in life.  You have a voice that fills empty spaces and drives out shadows.  Your tanned, skinny arms are strong enough to squeeze the breath out of a grown adult, and I miss them.  Be happy, be healthy, take it slow, and enjoy every day.  I love you forever, no matter what, no matter where we are, no matter how long!  Love, Momma.”

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I Just Love Those Damn Dirty Apes

August 2, 2011

   Since way back in my ten speed days, I have been a huge Planet of the Apes fan.   Like so many great television shows and movies from that era, this series boasted just the right amount of kitsch to be classic and delicious.  It posed a dozen important moral dilemmas and social questions at once but could never be taken too seriously because of the terribly flat green screens, inconsistent face masks, and overly dramatic close ups. 

THIS STUFF IS FANTASTIC!!!
   I like the original movies from 1968 starring Charlton Heston and Roddy McDowall.  I reeeaaally like the 2001 Mark Wahlberg reboot.  I am eagerly anticipating the James Franco prequel later this week.  Awaiting it even more eagerly than I am (gasp) the Hunger Games film.  
   Yes, I said it.  Am I kicked out of book club permanently?
   The issues Apes raises are always worth revisiting:
  • animal cruelty
  • perceived intelligence and how that impacts a creature’s worth
  • gender dominance
  • social order
  • racism
  • nuclear arms
  • war and peace
  • authority and revolt
  • violence
  • worship and idolatry
  • cultural preservation
   GOSH the list goes on and on!  What’s NOT to love about this story series?
   But importance aside, these movies are full of monkeys.  I (heart) monkeys.  And the other Planet of the Apes images are absolutely irresistible to dorky girls like me.

I totally groove on the adobe chimp houses, all decorated in perfect 1960’s macrame style. 
I am happily terrified by the gorillas’ dark, militant aggression. 
Depending on my mood, sometimes I root for them.
Oddly enough, it’s the pacifist orangutans that scare me most. 
Let’s pretend like Zira and Cornelius are Couch Surfers.
They are welcome at the farm anytime!
And Nova’s loincloth wardrobe? 
Yep, my personal fitness goal is to look  exactly like she does in this outfit
and have naturally smooth, shiny legs at all times.
Apparently, along with human civilization, the future has done away with Velcro.
  
   Never has an Apes installment ran on television that I changed the channel and opted to watch something else.  These movies and reruns have the ability to nullify my to-do lists and cause me to pop popcorn and curl up in our Green Room like the outside world doesn’t exist.  And I never feel guilty about the diversion because, as mentioned, the content is plenty beefy enough.  If pressed on how those hours of my life were spent, I can always answer, “pondering the larger issues and struggling with my humanity.”
   Take away my Apes, will you?  “You bloody bastard.” 


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Filed Under: Planet of the Apes, Social

Seared Tuna Salad in Florida

August 2, 2011

   Vacation food is almost always exceptional and fun, first of all because it usually means restaurants.  And at restaurants you don’t have to find recipes, shop, cook, and clean up afterward.  Also, at restaurants each person can have exactly his or her favorite thing, eliminating the need for a menu compromise when appetites and preferences are in a standoff of Alamo proportions.  So that’s nice once in a while, even in your hometown.  And vacation food tends to be both abundant and right in step with how much energy is being expended, so a person’s body gets what it needs, uses what it gets, etc.
  
   But my biggest reason to love vacation eating is that while out of town I tend to be more adventurous, ordering things I might not order at home, trying to focus on local fare and customs and capitalizing on the spirit of adventure that my alone time with Handsome tends to inspire.
   On our tenth anniversary trip, we tried several local spots, some we’d visited before and others unknown to us.  In Destin I stumbled on one menu item in particular that pretty much entered my personal Food Hall of Fame after bite number one:  Seared Tuna Salad.
   At home, tuna salad means canned tuna, drained and mixed with mayo, pickles, celery, maybe halved grapes, etc.  This is good for a lunch by myself but certainly not how the seaside menu lured me in.  I ordered it based on a vastly different description and waited with a little trepidation .  I’d never eaten an actual steak of Tuna before, and up to that point my experience with fresh seafood had been a mixed bag.  My fears were soon eased.  They ended up serving me something that was as beautiful as it was healthy and filling, and I would love to tell you all about it…
   The first thing I noticed was something this salad was not…  It was not the typical entree salad made up of anemic iceberg lettuce, chopped too large then thrown apathetically onto a lukewarm coaster.  Being a frequent orderer of lots of restaurant salads, I am used to getting such a let down.  But not that night.
   That night the salad bar was raised forever.  Well, not that salad bar, but you know what I mean.  Don’t you?
   After a nice long delay, during which time Handsome and I watched boats pass in and out of the harbour, the waiter appeared with our food.  Showing great reverence for what he must have known was an exemplary dish, he lowered onto the table a platter as red as poppies in bloom.  It was nearly as wide as my ribcage and freckled with those wonderful little frost droplets, indicating the platter itself had been chilled.  I L-O-V-E it when people or restaurants remember to chill salad plates!
   The red porcelain was covered to within an inch of its margin with a deep bed of mixed lettuce greens.  I saw at least four different kinds of lettuce in there, and it was all reduced to delicate little bite size pieces.  Among the leaves, some deep forest green, some as bright as Granny Smith apples, others purple and bronze, I saw chopped ripe tomatoes, shredded carrots and cabbage, hard boiled eggs, fresh julienned bell peppers, cold, firm mushrooms, fragrant cucumbers, and really heavily herbed croutons.

   And tuna steak.  The cold, crisp salad was practically genuflecting beneath a slab of meat about the size of two decks of cards and just a little thicker.  It was, as promised, seared till almost blackened then drizzled with a zig zag stripe of their special mayonnaise-based dressing.  Really garlicky and wonderful. 



   I am a tuna steak convert!  I have seen the freshness light and will forever now have trouble purchasing those flat little cans of the shredded precooked stuff.  Which means, at upwards of ten bucks per pound and landlocked in Oklahoma against ocean freshness, I might not be having tuna very often.  But that’s okay, this food is worth the wait.

  
       Back to the salad.  It was delicious.  Filled with texture changes and saltiness and creaminess and firmness.  Hot and cold, crunchy then succulent…  The tuna itself was as firm as a rib eye beef steak but tender enough to cut with the bossy edge of my fork.  It was juicy and flaky at the same time.  It had zero fishy taste, all protein and lusciousness.  I started weeping at one point from Salad Bliss, and Handsome had to explain to concerned onlookers that it was our anniversary and I was feeling really sentimental.

   The funny thing about this lovely entree was that it just kept getting better.  Every time I subtracted a bite from the poppy-red platter and stirred the remaining contents with my fork, the new combination of colors and textures was even more appealing than before.  And when I requested additional dressing, the waiter brought me something different from what I expected but it was even more delicious!  Then I added freshly cracked black pepper and ground up some sea salt on top of it all…  W-O-W.

   My goodness, the grittiness and flavorfulness of those two fresh seasonings will not soon be forgotten.  I might be the last adult woman in North America to purchase her own salt and pepper mills, but it will be happening.  Soon.

   I was physically and emotionally spent.  Unable to consume the entire salad but completely satisfied, I snapped a few photos of the platter (can you hear Handsome groaning in disbelief across the table?) then pushed it away from my full belly. 

   My body was replenished of all the calories and nutrients I had spent at the beach earlier in the day, and my mind was brimming with inspiration from this artistic expression of food.  It was a good meal, one of the all time best, vacation or otherwise!  Thank you, Destin Harbour, for the yummy memories.

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Filed Under: Destin Florida, Vacation

Pinterest, Where Have You Been All of My Life?

August 1, 2011

   So do you Pin?  Do you know about this newest way to spend the lion’s share of your computer time?  If you are even just slightly visual, even the tiniest bit prone to magazine inspiration, or otherwise on the hunt for soaking up other people’s great ideas, no matter the subject matter, then you need to join Pinterest.  By that I mean you need to get invited to join Pnterest.  They have a unique system.
   But I should warn you, the site is addictive.  Moreso than Facebook and waaaay moreso than just flipping through print magazines or browsing your fave decorating-gardening blogs, this new internet activity has the uncanny ability to numb your clock-watching senses. 
   Because on this site you get to gather up all the images that groove you and move you.  By clicking on the images you like and organizing them into virtual bulletin (Pin) boards, you can collect, organize, label, and share inspiration to your nest-feathering little heart’s content.  Then you just sit back and enjoy your pinned boards as if you are the magazine editor of all of your own favorite things.
  
Sigh…
   The thing is, on top of reallocating my laptop time to include less People of Wally Marks and more Pinterest, now I also have to reallocate my doing stuff time in order to accomplish some of these fantastic home-worthy ideas.
   Here is a link to my Pinterest page, where I have started with just a few different boards.  As mentioned before, there is no end to the inspriation available on the Web and little end to how much time can be spent looking, drooling, and Pinning.  So browser beware; don’t let any one thing, not even a thing as awesome and cool as this, suck your life away. 
   Gotta go.  My blogger buzzer just sounded and real life awaits.

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Hi! I'm Marie. Welcome to the Lazy W. xoxo

Hi! I’m Marie. This is the Lazy W.

A hobby farming, book reading, coffee drinking, romance having, miles running girl in Oklahoma. Soaking up the particular beauty of every day. Blogging on the side. Welcome to the Lazy W!

I Believe Strongly in the Power of Gratitude & Joy Seeking

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