Captain Underpants

Today's story is about me and how incredibly blonde I can be. 

Okay, so, I was rushing around getting ready this morning and I just pulled on the blue jeans I had worn yesterday, because I feel like blue jeans, much like bras, can be worn approximately 2 million times before you have to wash them. The jeans are really stretchy and comfortable. This is an important fact to keep in mind. 

I rushed through my hair and makeup and sprinted to church and was only a few minutes late. We ate lunch and talked to everybody and then took Charlie to the pumpkin patch down the road from our house. We wandered around and made friends with a family who had a little boy about Charlie's size.

Mom and I were standing near the bouncy house and she said, "Sam, where did Princie kick you that left scar tissue on your leg?" (My horse stomped on me when I was about 12 and left a raised area of scar tissue on the inside of my left knee.) I showed her where the spot is and she reached down and felt the area and said, "Is that what that is? You have a big lump there! What is that?" I too reached down and realized that, in my haste to dress, I had yanked on my jeans WITH MY DIRTY UNDERWEAR BALLED UP INSIDE THEM and had NOT NOTICED because the pants are so stretchy, and then I had TALKED TO EVERYONE AT CHURCH and MADE SOME NICE NEW FRIENDS with what appeared to be a LARGE SQUISHY TUMOR above my KNEE. I had to go hide behind the bouncy house and dig in my jeans and pull them out, and then hide them in Andy's cargo shorts pocket. It was almost as embarrassing as the time I got my finger stuck in a Lysol wipes container and ran through city hall screaming and I had to be cut out by a maintenance man. 

Phyllis gets a free pass on whatever ridiculous thing she does next. 

An Unintentionally Sensual Massage

So at lunch today, Andy and I were talking about our most embarrassing moments. Andy hesitated for a while; he had a story that he had never shared with anybody because it was too horrifying. After much hemming and hawing, he finally told me the Tale of the Back Massage.

Here's the back story (ha!): Andy, former football and basketball star, has a bad back and has been going to see a local chiropractor to try to get himself back in alignment. The chiropractor and his staff are excellent and very knowledgeable and friendly, in spite of the fact that one member of our family who shall remain nameless experienced an attack of flatulence while being manipulated on the table. Anyway, one day Andy's doctor recommended a deep tissue back massage from the on-staff masseuse. Andy had never had a professional massage, but the doctor assured him it would work wonders on the knots in his back.

The doctor left the room and told Andy the masseuse would be in soon.

And that's when things went downhill.

As I said, Andy has never had a professional massage. The only experience he's had with massages is watching Phoebe work on "Friends." So he stood there a minute as the panic set in because he had no idea whether he was supposed to take his clothes off or not.

Now, keep in mind, this is a BACK massage. The masseuse would only be massaging his BACK.

So of course Andy took off his shirt.

And his undershirt.

And his shoes.

And his pants.

Then he laid on the table with a towel covering his threadbare underpants, to which he has a much deeper attachment than he does to me, and he laid there feeling increasingly uncomfortable for several minutes.

He had just decided to put some clothes back on when the masseuse opened the door, brightly said hello, and then caught sight of my poor mostly naked husband crouched on the massage table like a half-hearted exhibitionist. Andy described the pause that followed as "tense." Too embarrassed to explain, Andy just laid back down and the masseuse found her train of thought and started to chat. About halfway through the Massage That Shall Remain In Infamy, Andy blurted out, "Was I supposed to take my clothes off?" The masseuse delicately responded that most people prefer to at least leave their pants on. I'm sure she could see the blush spreading from Andy's cheeks to his other cheeks.

So that's how we both ended up crying with laughter in Zaxby's. Andy has a dentist appointment in a few weeks. I must stress to him the importance of remaining clothed, or he's going to have quite a reputation in the doctor's offices of our town. God forbid he need an eye exam or he may end up in only a thong.

Sometimes When I Open My Mouth, My Mother Comes Out.

So I was eating some pretzels I had brought to work, and I finished them, and I turned around to throw the empty Ziploc into the trash can, and I stopped, and this was my mental monologue:

"I shouldn't throw this away. I can wash it out and use it again. It's one of the good slide-close bags. I only used it for, like, an hour. It's a waste of money to throw this away. Oh, sweet Jesus, I am thinking about WASHING OUT A ZIPLOC BAG AND USING IT AGAIN. I AM TURNING INTO MY MOTHER. This is terrible. I have to start a blog about myself now. [pause] I can't make myself throw this away. This is what Phyllis feels like all the time. I have an emotional connection to this bag now. I'm going to save it and make my family bury my ashes in it. I have to throw this away. I can't do it. It's a SLIDER BAG."

Finally I realized that I had been hovering over the trash can clutching a dirty Ziploc in a death grip, and I dropped the bag in and broke out in a cold sweat. This must be how Mom feels when I clean out her Tupperware cabinets. Mom loves Tupperware. She has Tupperware that is older than I am. She has giant Tupperware that she puts little Tupperware inside. If the house needs a new roof, she can build one out of mismatched Tupperware lids. When KFC started putting side dishes in these things:

Mom thought she had died and gone to container heaven. She lovingly placed her tiny KFC Tupperware with her Cool Whip and Country Crock containers, taking care not to start an avalanche of Gladware lest she be buried alive in reusable plastic. "My God!" the paramedics would have said. "Get one of the rectangular lids to dig her out! No, not that one, that's square. No, the good sturdy rectangle. Not the flimsy one. That one doesn't fit anything, but don't throw it out because she might have lent it to someone and it could turn up and then it would be lidless. I know, spaghetti sauce stains are impossible to get out of clear plastic, but it IS clean. It just LOOKS dirty."

But I'm no better. I can't stop thinking about my poor discarded Ziploc. I guess I know how I'm spending my evening:

Next on my list will be ironing aluminum foil so it looks like new, and then I plan to kill myself.