Stick Horse Cowgirls

Just when you thought levity was going to reign for a while in this blog, I have to have a middle-of-the-night rant episode. Sorry. I've just had it. It has been a long week, and this one has been particularly full of sorry-men stories for me--even for a divorce lawyer, they've been coming out of the woodwork at an amazing rate. A bunch of them in their 50's and, I can tell you, I am relating...as you know... ad nauseum , I'm sure. And I'm helping women deal with the wreckage of their lives that they don't deserve. This week has caused me to think on this subject on a larger scale. Look at these folks: Here's poor SC Governor Mark Sanford. He's just lookin' for love...in all the wrong places. See how sorry he is--wipin' his tears away an' all? Yesterday Politico website reported that, according to recent polls, half his constituency favor his stepping down as a result of his affair with the Argentine bombshell. Only about a third...

As promised in my last post, this is your chance to WIN!! If you read the previous post, you will see that I am intrigued by by-gone etiquette rules. I have two copies of this book, one dating from 1945 (for which you can all vie) and one from 1950. The questions I am asking below are from the 1950 book because I had not yet dug the other one out when I starting composing this one. The topics we cover in this quiz seem foreign to me, and we think they will to most of you, since the classes are so mixed up these days. Emily, herself, notes this trend. You can almost hear her sniff as she says in her introduction on Page xii: The smart and the near-smart...are all mixed up together. The walls that used to enclose the world that was fashionable are all down. Even the cartracks that divided cities into smart and not-smart sections are torn up. And, I must say, V and I probably hail from the "not-smart" side of the tracks...sigh. Okay, here are the rules (such as they are...

This weekend we held a shower at my house for V's soon-to-be-daughter-in-law. V's middle child will marry this sweet girl on September 5--I am certain there will be pictures on this blog. Weddings always bring etiquette to my mind--all those rules about whose (bride's? or grooms?) responsibility this or that is and whether you are "supposed" to do this or that thing. I observe the everyday rules of etiquette most of the time, like writing thank you notes and telling someone "so nice to meet you," but weddings, well they bring out the Emily Post, don't they? About 20 years ago I was doing library duty at my son's elementary school and I ran across the Emily Post book,"Etiquette: The Blue Book of Social Usage" from 1941. As I whiled away time between checking books out for kids, I read through it. It was so fascinating that I took it home to read and, finally, I just had to buy it. The librarian recognized that it had little use in h...

My brother-in-law taught me a new term yesterday: “Tell.” Apparently, in playing poker any body language that tends to give away is called a “tell.” Google provided list upon list of them: eyes shifting quickly toward the chips can signal that a player is nervous about the strength of his hand; acting nonchalant (“ Oh, is it my turn? ”) can indicate that a player’s hand is strong. These are involuntary. Oddly enough, the whole conversation that introduced me to “tells” had to do with my tractor and my lying husband. Only this time, it was the kind of lying that one hears referred to as B**LLS**T. (Cleaned up to maintain my PG-13 rating). I was telling my BIL about hubby’s reaction to my tractor woes. A friend had borrowed it a couple weeks ago but returned it promptly, saying it just was not powerful at all and he was worried about using it. Great! A few days later I got on it and it was fine, then I had to baby it along, and, finally, it just quit in the middle of the pasture...

No one is beat till he quits, No one is through till he stops; No matter how hard Failure hits, No matter how often he drops, A fellow's not down till he lies In the dust and refuses to rise. Fate can slam him and bang him around, And batter his frame till he's sore,. But she never can say that he's downed While he bobs up serenely for more. A fellow's not dead till he dies, Nor beat till no longer he tries. Edgar A. Guest This has been some kind of summer! Most years, I yearn for summer. The sunshine, flowers, farmer's markets, Fourth of July picnics, etc. all help dispel the gloom after months of our grey, dreary winters and our too cool for comfort, rainy Spring seasons we have here in our neck of the woods! But this summer brought with it stress induced illness, my empty, lonely nest, my son's impending wedding, my daughter's expected baby in October and news that my job is changing to a new position which make...

Well, it is bound to happen. Ours is a mid-sized city--our metropolitan area holding just under 400,000 and, truthfully, most of my "circle" frequents one particular area of the city. So, my sister and her family ran smack-dab into my husband, his honey, her two kids, and their new baby. In Target. Awkward. She said that she and my hubby had that "deer in the headlights" startle, and both groups bounced off each other like same-pole-magnets, heading quickly in opposite directions wordlessly. Sis says that the babe was in a carrier but she could not tell me whether the blankie was pink or blue, so eager was she to exit the scene. My youngest niece is eight. She was my husband's particular favorite at the time he left (the youngest always is). She ran to him each time she saw him, and he would scoop her up, carrying her around. My sister went a long time after our separation without saying anything to her kids except that Uncle C was "away," thi...

I've been side-tracked, ranting about cell phones and being nostalgic about my Dad. Meanwhile, back at the ranch, things are progressing. Those of you who are just tuning in to the little mini-series melodrama of my life can find the back story at my June 16 post, "Ruth and Naomi..." (I cannot get my link thing to work...me, I'm sure) My mother-in-law is getting settled, but it is a much, much slower process than we had hoped. We are giving ourselves pep talks about how we have no schedule but our own, and I think we're relaxing a bit. One problem is that I am so stinkin' busy. This is, really, a good thing. I am blessed to have lots of business (although, this is, of course, a mixed blessing in that much business for me means others are divorcing...oh, yes, there's plenty of that, unfortunately). I am working long hours, so there is not a lot of time for me to help MIL settle in physically. She has contracted for her deck. The materials have been de...