April 11, 2006

Overprotective or Overpossessive

"Do it!" my brother laughs hysterically, as he hands me the dog and animatedly mimes running away from her and out of sight. "What is she going to do?" I scream after him... hearing only his diminishing, "Just do it!"

The dog has turned into a dervish in my hands, squirming left and right forcibly, attempting to break free of my grasp, a low murmur rustling in her throat. I count to ten, giving Ian the requisite time to find a sanctuary from her seeming wrath and release.

The beast flies across the house, filling each room with a bounding squall certain to bring even a banshee to white-haired fright. Feverishly she passes from room to room, her eyes darting for any sign of her erstwhile lost master. Gophering on her back legs, Sasha cranes to see onto the beds, peers behind doors, scratches at the closets.. all to no avail.

"Where is she!" he whispers from his hidden site (he had somehow suspended himself above the stairs, spidering the walls, in the stairwell where she couldn't see). "In mom's room." I cough out between laughs.

"SASHA" he screams atop his lungs from his hidden position... making it sound as if the hounds of hell have found him and are thrashing him to bits. Her answering trumpet bellows through the house as her tiny form comes bolting back across the living room to his call. Her screams continue to bounce off the walls as she looks once more in places she already has looked... while Ian is laughing so hard he threatens to sick up.

Finally he falls from his perch, unable to stop clutching at his side from laughing so hard. Naturally, the dog hears the resounding cacophany of his fall and descends upon him like a blood frenzied great white shark, immediately latching onto his pant legs with her teeth and furiously growling between each rattling shake of her head. He impishly grins at me as he stiff leggedly drags her still biting body across the floor like a snarling mop. "See, I told you it was funny!"

Posted by Ravennacht at 12:48 AM

August 19, 2005

Chicken Dance

(Courtesy of Great Aunt Irva)

Whilst Irva and Cicely were youngsters, at best in their pre-teen trouble-making ages, they lived on a farm in Carey, Ohio, with their mother, father, and grandmother.

Earlier they had been raised in the Panama Canal Zone, as their father (our great grandfather), Irving Claude had managed the running of portions of the zone. Having lost his job, the family moved back to Ohio. The kids were unused to the farm life, animals, so got themselves into a great deal of self-induced trouble.

On one such occassion, the kids, Cicely and Irva, watched as their grandmother butchered one of the chickens from the coop. With interest they saw the carcass be defeathered, and disemboweled for dinner. Whilst their grandmother and mother were not looking, the pair seized the chicken and headed outside, where they strolled about the yard with the carcass of the chicken between them, each holding a wing, singing and dancing, talking to the dead chicken.

Their mother soon caught them and gave them a sound switching, however, the chicken had a good time, according to Irva.

Posted by Ravennacht at 12:15 PM

August 11, 2005

Primal Food Practices

• Eating Qwik by the spoonful when the parents aren't looking (I know I wasn't the only one that did this!).
• [*] Mushing potato chips into bologna sandwiches like a topping, adds a great crunchy taste.
• [*] Cramming Bugles (baked corn chip cones)onto the tips of the fingers and acting like you are Freddy Krueger.
• [*] Spoon swirling neopolitan ice cream into a frosty slurry.
• [*] Blowing bubbles in milk (they last the longest!)
• [*] Mustard on fritos.
• [*] Bullseye toast... frying an egg in a hole in a piece of bread.

Posted by Ravennacht at 11:56 AM

July 07, 2005

Teen Boy Survival Guide

My fourteen year old cousin has been here for the last two weeks. I have cemented a few issues with him during his stay just to survive his teen angst filled antics:

1. "Why" as a response to a request is not acceptable. It merely precipitates a cycle of "Because", "Why", "Because", "Why", ad infinitum.

2. The living room is not a shoe closet.

3. The standard human eating cycle includes three square meals, not six, not eight, not ten.

4. A heavy sigh is not an appropriate response to all communication, It merely indicates a breathing disorder.

5. Requests for services should be completed after the first or second request not a day later or when you feel like it.

6. No one's mind is so bad that they need to be reminded of a daily event (take your daily medication, etc)

7. If one is allergic to something, one does not dabble with it (do not eat things you are allergic to, do not hold the cat to your face.)

8. The toilet seat must be placed in the horizontal standby position following use. Additionally, there is no damage to the plumbing system which prohibits the flushing of said system following each use.

9. Percussion is for drums and bands, not tables, posts, etc.

10. The house is not meant to shake when one moves from room to room. It is always best to walk with a light foot rather than club about like an ogre.

11. "Leet" and internet terms are not an acceptable spoken language.

Posted by Ravennacht at 10:42 AM

May 10, 2005

Trike Daredevil

When I was 1-4 years old, we lived at my grandparent's two-story brick home in Lakeview, Ohio. A big concrete swimming pool was fenced in the back yard. Owing to the fact that we are in a snow State, the pool had to be emptied every Autumn and sealed every Spring before filling. This pool went from about 4 feet deep to 12 feet deep at the larger end.

Whilst my mother and grandmother were sealing the pool, one Spring, I took advantage of the interlude of supervision in order to acquisition my Tricycle and trike about the porch surrounding the pool. I was so amused by my performance, that I naturally wanted my Mother to see, so I rode the trike right to the lip of the shallow end of the empty pool and started yelling at her.

She turned and (insert eyes getting freakishly large) witnesses her first son on the precipice of the pool waving. Naturally she yells, which merely serves as a means for shocking my poor little self and causing said tricycle to careen down into the pool and roll all the way down to the deep end, amazingly upright. The pedals of the bike kept slapping my shins the whole way, its a wonder I didn't break my leg or neck.

Not a single trophy did I get from that trick.

Posted by Ravennacht at 02:54 PM

May 03, 2005

The Fire Extinguisher

Ever had a parent leave you in the car while they run into the grocery store or some other place, with the emphatic, "I am running into the store for (Insert any number of inanely mind numbing and unimportant object to a young child's mind herein), I do not want you to touch anything, and I will be right back." How about the more specific, "I will be in the store for a while, I don't want you to mess with anything, especially the fire extinguisher in the back seat." Heed these words and see what comes of it.

Kinda sounds like a dare to me, doesn't it to you? Well naturally an industrious 8 year old would consider it so. Picture if you will my daredevil brother hearing these words and slipping right under the seat like Indiana Jones after an artifact, mere seconds after mother is well out of eyeshot. Appearing disheveled and triumphant, he holds the aforementioned extinguisher above his head like a trophy, drawing a fearful groan from my mouth...this can't be good.

The wisdom of his mechanical mind spills forth from his lips as he proceeds to explain the theory of proper extinguisher use, INCLUDING the fact that the dreaded item cannot be used as long as the locking pin is in. (insert action hereing as he pulls locking pin) Further demonstration showing that EVEN with the locking pin removed, aforementioned extinguisher does not fire unless trigger is pulled.

Here is where things get fuzzy. Did the boy feel compelled to test the limits of HOW far he could pull the trigger before the item fired? Did he believe that he could merely depress the firing apparatus once and that it would stop when he released pressure?

Nonetheless, the extinguisher gets fired, and CONTINUES firing until its contents are completely expelled. A shocked expression is tattooed on the 8 year old engineer's face, mixed with a degree of disappointment over the machine's betrayal of his theory on higher extinguisher mechanics. White flakes of carbon dyoxide float through the air, covering every square inch of the interior of the Toreno, the windows, the seats, the carpet, and most of all, both of us. Its Vesuvius erupted in there, expelling ash to cover everything.

Blink. "We have to get this cleaned up before mom finds out!", he shrieks. I can only manage a weak sigh. Quickly the windows are rolled down and we proceed PATTING the white misty crap out of everything. The extinguisher is crammed back underneeth the seat (no completely discharged and useless). Shoppers stare as they watch our frantic leaping across the seats beating the interior of the car, expelling miniature plumes of ash into the air. "You are so dead, she told you not to touch that.", I worriedly proclaim. "YOU are supposed to watch me. YOU will be in trouble to.", he answers smugly, sealing my doom in certain death.

Twenty minutes pass, and mother finally returns pushing a cart full of groceries, pointedly staring at the car and the fogged windows. "You touched the extinguisher didn't you.", she proclaims with an air of irritation as she wipes some of the ash from brother's face. "I told you boys not to touch that extinguisher." My brother adopts his puzzled face, "But mom, you never said we couldn't fire the extinguisher." I can only hold my head and shudder.

Posted by Ravennacht at 12:04 AM

Stairway Races

Big two story, red house on the lake. My grandparents live here. My grandfather sells insurance, works partially as a police officer, and makes candy in the form of meat and sausage for fairs (don't ask, its one of those weird quirky things). My grandmother works her fingers to the bone as a full time nurse at one of the local hospitals. In her spare time, she must tend and wait on her husband and their 8 children and her sister.

Did I mention that my mother and father live there with me as well. I must have been three or four. It's hard to remember anymore for certain, but that has to be close. My mother is the oldest of the children... nearly 20 years from my youngest uncle. So that places he and I only 3 years apart... like brothers in a long line of Catholic children in this family.

I remember most of all the stairs. It is my earliest memory. Sliding down those stairs on my butt, racing my youngest uncle (who is only 3 years older than me) to see who could reach the base of the stairs on a bumpy tumbling arse aching ride against gravity first. It usually was an even race, considering that he and I were of similar size, even though he was older than I. At least, it was even until he took to riding the banisters in an indiscreet use of unsportsmanlike behaviour... how uncouth, don't you think.

I remember the multiple scoldings my grandmother would give us for these races... "You'll break yer neck!", "That sounds like and earthquake rolling through the whole house!"... admonishing us to stop what we were doing and find something else to do. Yet, I could swear that I had seen her smile as she turned from us to return to her hectic daily monotony. And yes... we certainly continued doing it... cause basically... its fun!

Posted by Ravennacht at 12:00 AM

May 02, 2005

The Timeout Chair

Have you ever had a timeout chair? We did, on top of other capitol punishment techniques. Being the all-questioning child I was, the timeout chair just never seemed to make much sense to me.

"Go to the timeout chair."

Rod marches to the chair and sits down. Rod watches parent walk around corner. Rod gets up and sits on another chair and waits. Parent returns.

"I told you to go to the timeout chair!"

"I'm sitting in a chair!"

"I told you to go to that chair"

"I already sat in that chair, can't I just sit in this one"

"No, I want you to sit in that one there."

"I thought the point was to sit down, do I really need to get up again?"

and on, and on, and on, and on, till said parent tires out and forgets initial transgression.

Posted by Ravennacht at 11:33 PM