Intramural Losing Streak

To distract my brain from mind-numbing words like ‘maximum likelihood estimation’ during my too-long school career, I competed in just about every intramural sport they put out. I played volleyball, wally-ball and basketball. I know there were other 'sports' but they’ve apparently been suppressed, probably due to lame sounding names like Intramural Speed Typing. First Place eluded me. I would walk around the office, ranting that I wasn’t leaving this school until I won SOME/ANY intramural event... even Intramural Word Search.

Come spring, we put together our/my last and final attempt at a win – the Statistics Department Intramural Softball Team. It may not strike fear into your heart, but it should. No one does baseball/softball like statisticians. People who love numbers, love baseball and play accordingly. Our professors came out of the woodwork to join the team and showed up, ready to play with their tube socks and ‘70s too-short-shorts. From the waist down, they dressed a lot like Kareem, but could hit and field like the pros.

Finally. I could taste victory. We named our team ‘The BUE’s’ for ‘Best Unbiased Estimators.’ We embraced our inner-nerd. Fear us and fear our cryptic name!

We played well through the season and made it to the finals.... against the Library Science team. Whaaaa?!? *snort* Library Science? Snap. My victory is in the bag.

Daisy Duke steps up to bat for Library Science. She’s got on her namesake shorts and a white, frilly top. We all move in. Then Daisy hits it outta the park. We were doomed and I’ll sum up by saying that I never achieved my goal of winning an intramural award, but my fellow teammates made up for it with this:

The smallish circled word underneath says: (almost). Thanks guys!

------------------------------------------------

Loser of the Intramural Humor-Blog Caption Contest

Brief Friday-the-13th-Wedding Notes

In true Alice/Babycakes form, we arrived at the church as the bridal party was gathering to descend down the aisle. For those who don’t know me, I cannot explain this anomaly since I am PERPETUALLY early to everything else. Being early is my sickness. Unless it’s a wedding. I blame a good portion of that on the massive church compound, locating the chapel on said compound, parking a mile away from said chapel and walking in heels that I wear twice a year.

The priest managed to work in the prospect of spousal death during his REALLY long and boring homily wherein Babycakes and I looked at each other and did the Wha???-face. I then spent many minutes studying the nuances of stained glass and weak air conditioning. To completely class-up the wedding, I put a scrunchie in my hair half-way through before the sweat could bead up any more on the back of my neck.


At the reception, we went through emotions like a rollercoaster.

Down Rollercoaster: Holy hell! They squashed us into the table with 10 people when I can plainly see there are tables with only 7 people.

Up Rollercoaster: Yay! We’re sitting with the WAY FUN contingent of the groom’s family from Georgia! And there’s an open bar!


At our table, there were some lovely white chocolate flowers on the plates.

Alice's Brain: Oooo…chocolate… *shove into face*

Alice's Brain: My, they’re soft.

Alice's Brain: My, they’re bland.

Alice's Brain: My….they’re butter….


I was successfully able to deposit our thrift shop object d’art onto the gift table at the reception. We thought it might be difficult since the crowd was so small and intimate, but I excused myself during the buffet swarm and snuck it in. It’s easy to disappear when there’s a single-minded crowd elbowing each other for green beans.

We drank. We danced. We left to relieve a very good friend we had to abuse for this event. Poor thing babysat for 8 hours and couldn’t figure out our television.
--------------------------------------------------

Click on Humor-Blogs please...for ranking purposes...which could always use a boost.

Ghoulies and Ghosties and Long-Leggedy Beasties

I generally don’t watch much TV unless it’s got the word “Survivor” or “Rock Hard Abs” in the title. But with the kids sucking up the bedroom last night and Babycakes World of Warcrafting on the computer, I flipped on the TV to a show called ‘MonsterQuest’ and found them investigating the Lizzie Borden House in Massachusetts. My good friend Lucy has been trying to talk me into spending a night at the Lizzie Borden House for a while. Our conversations go like this:

Lucy: Let’s go stay at the Lizzie Borden House!

Alice: No.

I’m all about visiting during high noon with plenty of people forming a safety circle around me, but come evening, I’ll be at the HoJo’s with cable reruns of ‘The Brady Bunch’ and a normal heart rate.

With all their fancy infrared cameras and audio equipment, MonsterQuest didn’t really prove anything, but they sure know how to edit a bunch of nothing into a flood of endorphins and creeping scalp. And then the cat goes into alert mode at nothing on the stairwell. That’s it, flip on all the lights.

Here is my great brain divide: in my heart of hearts, I don’t really believe in ghosts. In my heart of hearts, if I think my house is even remotely haunted, the FOR SALE sign goes up tomorrow. I’ve seen Poltergeist and I’m no fool.

About seven years ago, my friend Jill was getting married over in Virginia and I was in the wedding party. Her Mom had a house near the wedding site and she invited me to spend the night there before the wedding the next day. It was an older, Colonial-era house that had been revamped and was completely lovely.

We eat, do some small talk, and start gathering bags to head upstairs for bed. Jill’s brother pipes up, “Did you tell her about the ghost?”

Alice: (WTF! – He didn’t just say that right before I head upstairs. At night. With no HoJo’s around.) *expression halfway between disbelief and grimace crosses face*

Jill’s Mom: Oh, don’t worry, it’s a nice ghost.

I don’t give a rat’s ass if it’s Caspar bringing me flowers – I DON’T DO HAUNTED!

They all start talking about cold spots and candlesticks moving and all I wanted to do was put my hands over my ears, close my eyes and say ‘LALALALA….CANT’ HEAR YOU…’

Jill and I are sleeping in the same room (thankfully). I lie down, clamp my eyes shut and vow not to open them until morning. Around 2 am, all the liquid at dinner is screaming at me to find a toilet.

Nope. I can hold it another 4-5 hours for daylight.

And this is where I discovered that NOT peeing on someone’s furniture trumped possibly seeing an apparition. With head down, I ran to the bathroom and took the fastest whizz I ever took and jumped back into bed. I tell you it's possible to do this fast enough that you will miss any paranormal activity around you.

And I can safely say that I was not visited that night because of my massive mental powers of dissuasion that I was throwing off. Y’all might have felt them.

------------------------------
Lizzie Borden took an axe, gave Humor-Blogs 40 whacks...

Ms. Miyagi say ' Chopsticks are for Suckahs! '

I can't figure out if we're housing the slowest and/or dumbest fly colony, or if this whole fly-catching thing is just what GirlChild's talent is.

For those not in the loop, check out the manifestation of GirlChild's Fly Powers in this post.

She caught three more yesterday.

And when she releases it - IT JUST WALKS AROUND ON HER HAND!

What the HELL?

Was it because I watched 'Rosemary's Baby' while pregnant?

Blue Man Group in Vegas at 5 months gestation?

And she snagged two today.

I mean, seriously, look at this this! My fly-girl's got another one walking the end of her finger!

Nana, fire up the sewing maching. We're gonna need a spandex body suit w/ cape STAT!

So y'all can just take down those pics of your baton-twirling, pink-wearing, tap-dancing daughters and hide them away, because there's a new girl in town.

She who controls the flies, controls the universe. Muahahaha...

And even better, I'm the controller of she who controls the universe - BRILLIANT!

-------------------------

Check out Humor-Blogs for funny stuff not related to flies.

Yard Burn, Oil Slicks and Clutter Tricks

I spent a good chunk of this afternoon mowing the remaining two acres of yard in the 200 degree heat, finalizing the most amazing burn to date.

This far surpasses my previous burn pattern.

I did this while fending off the hordes of deer fly. Do you know how it feels to be stung by one of those? Like a horse fly. Have you seen a chick mow while fending off deer flies? Like a gran mal seizure on wheels. Can you mow a straight line while doing this? No.


I was slathered in a layer of sunblock with a top coat of Backwoods Off. I was plenty slick, and I guess the deer flies just took a look and saw a big ol' KFC special, extra crispy, heavy on the grease.

When the final blade was done, I gazed lovingly at the kid's inflatable pool. A pool that is a tad slimy, a little sandy and has a fine mix of grass clippings floating below an oil slick from the kid's sunblock. I sunk under what looked to be some crude from the Exxon Valdez...and it was HEAVENLY.

In other news, while trolling the blog world - I located a meme here. OK, maybe it's not a meme, but I'd figure I'd give you my advice anyhow.

Give me 5 tips or tricks for keeping your house clean and clutter-free.

1. Walk around with a wooden spoon in your hand.
2. Yell a lot.

See - I'm so good that I only need TWO tips/tricks for keeping my house clean and clutter-free.

--------------------------------------

Every time you click on Humor-Blogs, I'll kill a deer fly in your name!