Camper, Oh Camper...

For some reason, my family really likes to camp. "Yes," we frequently say to each other, "let's drive several hours away to enjoy primitive plumbing and uncomfortable sleeping arrangements." Our camping hobby began with a tent, which my little brother attempted to set on fire by cramming his pillow into the space heater that was struggling futilely to keep us from developing frostbite. Those were the good old days, stuffed into a nylon hell that smelled persistently of Dad's socks, experiencing Togetherness and Love whether we wanted to or not. I can still smell the s'mores singeing and feel the sharp rocks digging into my spine.

Later, we moved up in the world. My parents purchased a pop-up. For those of you who are not campers, first of all, I commend you on your choice, and secondly, a pop-up is the result of a tent mating with a trailer. You wind a handle and the top of the pop-up expands upwards, extending nylon sides. This way, you get  to feel slightly superior to the "Tent People," as Phyllis calls them with a disapproving sniff, while still having the joy of walking in the dark to the communal campground bathroom, which is usually carpeted with angry frogs.

The pop-up inspired my dad to write his classic hit, "Pop-Up, Oh, Pop-Up." The lyrics are quite moving. I have reproduced them here in entirety:

Pop-up, oh, pop-up, a twelve-foot pop-up
Queen size bed on one end
Pop-up, oh, pop-up, a twelve-foot pop-up
Won't you go camping, my friend?
[Repeat endlessly]

Eventually, our population of dogs outgrew the pop-up. We decided to make the leap to a real camper, with a real roof and a bathroom. Dad had to rework his song for this step up:

Camper, oh, camper, twenty-eight-foot camper
King-size bed on one end...

The first camper my mom and dad picked out was a real beauty, decorated in shades of teal and featuring a bathroom so small you had to shave your legs by standing in the shower and extending one leg into the sink, teetering precariously over the miniscule toilet and desperately attempting not to topple through the flimsy door and into the dog-packed living area.  This camper also featured bunkbeds that were nearly completely enclosed. You clambered into them through a two foot-wide opening, covered with a pleated curtain, and then spent the night imagining the coffin-like walls closing in on you. There was, to be fair, a six-inch wide window, through which you could watch the parade of Tent People march to the bathroom for more water to extinguish their space heater fires.

Luckily, a couple years ago, Mom and Dad got into the big leagues and bought a new camper with a slide-out section in the living room which expands the area marvellously, from a cramped space into a slightly less cramped, awkwardly shaped space. This camper has a larger bathroom, featuring a shower that my brother can almost stand upright in, and a dining table that converts into a bed. It is almost, but not quite, one tenth as comfortable as just staying at home.

Phyllis loves camping. Her thriftiness extends into the rustic wild; for example, Dad grilled steak one night, and Phyl discovered that she had no Tupperware or Ziplocs in which to preserve the last cubic inch of steak that we didn't eat. She couldn't bear to part with this prize, and so she carefully wrapped the scrap of meat in a plastic salad bag and squirreled it away for the next day. I'm sure she felt an immense glow of pride when she ate that half-bite of beef for breakfast.

But the ultimate best display of thrift has to be the Camping Pillows. Mom has a special set of houseware for camping - plates, cutlery, linens, etc. The Camping Pillows are pillows that were so flat and pitiful that nobody would sleep on them in our actual house. Dad wanted to throw them away. But don't worry! Mom saved the day. She cut up some foam egg-crate material and stuffed the pieces into the pillows. Dad was so impressed he had to take a picture.

Another successful money-saving venture. Let's all go camping!

The Garage Sale from Hell

Andy and I are buying our first house. It's been an awful experience and I've hated almost every second of it, but we're getting a beautiful older home with amazing renovations in a really neat neighborhood, so I know it will be worth it. To prepare for the move, we decided to hold a garage sale, since our self esteem wasn't already low enough. It's a little ridiculous how bad it makes you feel when someone drives by, looks at your old junk, and drives off. I was very hurt by their lack of desire to paw through my old t-shirts. Luckily, I had Phyllis to cheer me up.

We decided to hold the garage sale in Mom and Dad's front yard, since Andy and I currently rent an apartment in a tenement building surrounded by meth labs (I exaggerate only slightly). Mom decided that she should go through her house and sell some old stuff, too. And then the fun really began!

Beanie Babies with the plastic tag protectors still on. Souvenir cups from restaurants at the beach. An endless supply of can koozies. A plaster cast of Mom's teeth, found in the kitchen cupboard. The discoveries piled up on one another in a great creeping pile of absurdity. Mom started out with excellent intentions, but as the day progressed, she just kept finding things she desperately needed to keep, although she hadn't seen them in decades. "Oh, my wooden napkin rings! How I have missed them! I shall clasp them to my bosom and sob with relief and joy that you have unearthed them from under the two-foot high pile of old playing cards!" She got really emotional when we dug up her collection of melon ballers. Phyllis has never balled a melon in her whole life, but "they're Pampered Chef!" She had several sizes of melon ballers, in case she wanted to have melon balls in small, medium, and large, I suppose for if Goldilocks's bears came over for tea. We also discovered many egg separators ("I need those!") and an egg-shaped microwave egg boiler ("I might use that!") Mom and I had several epic tug-of-war battles, but we managed to clear out three large boxes of crap just from the kitchen.

I am intentionally avoiding dwelling on the canister of cornmeal that expired in 1999.

Once we dragged all of Phyl's treasures out onto the yard and added our mounds of crap, we had a pretty decent garage sale. The highlight was definitely the woman who exited her car, picked up an ice cream scoop, asked the price, and, when told that it would cost twenty-five cents, heaved a sigh, set the scoop down, and left. I apologize to you, Our Lady of Ice Cream Scoops, for breaking your budget.

Hello, My Name Is Town.

Weird nicknames run in my family. Some families have diabetes, some have red hair, we have nonsensical monikers. Phyl's mother, Elinor, was probably the one who started this. I don't think my mother and her two brothers even knew their real names until they started school. Mom was generally called "Gags" around the house. This is an awful-sounding word, but not nearly as bad as her other nickname, which seems to have just spurted out of my grandmother's mouth in a torrent of verbal diarrhea - "Pubus Regonia." Read that again. See if you can say it without either laughing or throwing up in your mouth. Can you imagine a childhood in which you are known by something as stupid as "Pubus Regonia," or, for short, "Regs?" I can. I was and still am generally known as "Town." Just "Town." Sometimes my family sings a medley of songs to me that involve the word "Town." I'll walk into a room and hear "When you've got worries go doooownToooown! O little Town of Bethlehem!" and et cetera. I would say it's the stupidest nickname I've ever heard, but for my poor brother, who has had so many ridiculous names that he now answers to almost anything shouted up the stairs. It doesn't even faze him. Some of my favorites have been Flumby, Line Pine, and Goobsie. Yes, my brother, the future lawyer. Goobsie.

I blame this on my mom and grandma, but so help me, I'm just as bad. I've called my father "Pim" for years. I have no idea why. And my husband, Andy, has been Hobs now for about three weeks. It just tumbles out of my mouth like a toaster in an avalanche. I have no control over it. Ask my son, Charlie, who has never been called anything except "Scoob" in the fifteen months of his strange little life.

To top it all of, my mom's name isn't even Phyllis. It's Gayle. This whole blog is based on a lie.

I need to lay down.

The First Day of School

I was not an attractive child. I was very overweight and for some reason Mom thought my hair looked good in a mullet. I was also the tallest kid in my class (although I stopped growing and am now a member of the Lollipop Guild). I tell you this to set the stage for the first day of sixth grade. We had just moved to Virginia and I had exactly one friend, who was not going to the same school as I was. Also I was very into wearing boys' clothing, such as plaid polo shirts and corduroys. So. There I was, the most awkward girl on the face of the earth. And I needed to buy school supplies.

Phyl is always on the lookout for a bargain or some creative way to use crap from around the house. She saved Cool Whip containers for years before I finally buried them in the backyard during the dark of night - she was certain she could repurpose them as, I don't know, tiny bedpans or something. Anyway, this particular school year, Mom had accidentally bought me folders that had no pockets in them. I pointed out her error and was taking my mullet-festooned self out to the car for a return trip to the store, when I heard, "Well, wait a minute..." And then I knew that this would not be a good first day of school.

Mom's brilliant idea was to cut up a brown paper bag and staple sections to the folder to create pockets. I don't know if you heard me, so let me reiterate: SHE MADE FOLDER POCKETS OUT OF A BROWN PAPER BAG. Do you know how much a clasp folder costs? Thirty cents. To save thirty cents, Phyllis was going to force me to go to school with folders MADE OUT OF PAPER BAGS. She might as well have dressed me in burlap and smeared chicken blood on my face.

I don't remember how I responded to this; I think I was speechless. Mom was extremely proud of her paper bag pockets and showed them to Dad as soon as he got home from work. And then, thank God, my dad took a stand against Phyllis' thriftiness, and he took me to the store and not only bought me new folders but also Lisa Frank stickers with which to decorate them. I still had to contend with the hairstyle and the clothes and the excess adipose layer, but I did not have to go to school with supplies made out of garbage.

Mom still insists that those folders would have worked just fine. And they would have if I was going to school in the Third World.

I wonder what she was planning to do with the thirty cents? Probably buy more Cool Whip.

The Will of the Woe

Phyl is the worst song lyricist in the entire world. She has a really pretty singing voice, but she cannot for the life of her get a single lyric correct in the songs she sings. One of my favorite examples is the Rod Stewart song "On the Radio," which Phyl sings as "Under Any O. " Which makes sense. "Dancin' to the music / under any O."  Ahh, how we used to love to dance under any giant letter "O" we could find. Generally we would stop at a Waffle House and do the Twist directly underneath the "o" in "House." Good times.

Another classic is "I Believe in Miracles" by Hot Chocolate. Of course, in Mom's warm, sunny, M.C. Escher-esque mind, this is translated to "I Believe in Malacos." Malaco is a Swedish candy brand. It makes sense to believe in them.

 They are, after all, "Gott & blandat."

Sometimes Mom doesn't even bother trying to sing lyrics that are even close to the originals, or even real words at all. A favorite substitute for an actual word is "scooby," as in "You make me scooby like the sun." It's very moving to hear, belted out from the driver's seat, Mom's rendition of "Fun, Fun, Fun" by the Beach Boys; it goes something like this: "She'll have fun, fun, fun / 'Til her scooby takes her scooby away!" Vast improvement on the original, I think.

Another trick is to just mumble or hum when you come to an unfamiliar part of the song. Mom will often attempt to sing along to a song she's never even heard, so all you hear is a vague rumbling and some semi-formed words: "It's been one wuh hmmhmmhmmhmmhmm, hmm huh head hmmhmmhmmhmm angry" is how Mom sings the chorus to "One Week" by the Barenaked Ladies. We have pointed out that it might be more enjoyable to simply listen to the song instead of trying to sing along if you don't know any of the words, but she can't hear us over her passionate version of Garth Brooks' anthem, "I've Got Fruh Hmmhmmhmm Low Faces."

And here's our absolute favorite, which has passed into family parlance: "You're the One That I Want" by the cast of the movie Grease. Mom is convinced that they are singing "You're the Will of the Woe." Dad has tried again and again to explain that this makes zero sense and is one hundred percent wrong, but Mom's swift retort is always and forever, "Well, that's what they SAY." And she's right. Sandy is the will of Danny's woe, and vice versa. Andy is the will of my woe. Romeo was the will of Juliet's woe. And Mom is the will of everybody's woe, because she is constantly entertaining and amusing and we love her in spite of all the crazy.

Two Degrees of Separation

When we go out to dinner, we rarely spend any time with my dad. He is inevitably cornered by either an old man wearing a World War II cap and wanting to reminisce about the those damn Japanese, or some flight school friend he hasn't seen in thirty-seven years. We usually regain his company around the time dessert is served. The conversation then generally goes one of two ways:

OPTION ONE:

Mom: "Who was that?"
Dad: "I have no idea."

OPTION TWO:

Mom: "Who was that?"
Dad: "You remember Steve Flockman!"
Mom: *Stares blankly*
Dad: "From Ft. Campbell? He was the S3 of the First and Two-Thirteenth?"
Mom: *Eyes glaze over*

My husband Andy is just as bad. No matter where we go, he finds someone to talk to, and then I am forced to listen to the sinuous thread of acquaintance that brought the two together. Andy is from a miniscule town in northern Alabama, with a population of approximately twelve (not including livestock), and yet, somehow, he knows someone who knows someone who knows the person he just talked to. He calls it "Two Degrees of Separation." It's always something such as, "That was John Flitterbottom! He's married to a lady whose mother used to assist with my grandfather's prostate exams!" And then he beams happily, warm with the knowledge that his social web is now that much more complete, while I stare at him in disbelief over my empty plate.

It gets worse when we visit Andy's hometown. After church on Sunday, or at any social function, we are bombarded with Andy's friends and relatives. I love meeting these people and really do enjoy putting faces to names and fleshing out the stories Andy's told me about his past, but invariably I am forced to listen to an introduction as long as "Moby Dick," i.e., "Honey, this is Mary Cogginhoofer! She's my mother's brother's second cousin's aunt! You know, Uncle Jack's sister!" And then my head explodes.

I like it when whomever I've just been introduced to departs, though. After gushing about how great it is to see him or her, Andy waves goodbye and then turns to me and, in a low whisper, tells me all the dirt. "Bye, Mary! Great to see you! *She's insane! When one of her dogs dies she makes soup out of the carcass!*" And then I laugh bemusedly, and it's on to the next old friend or distant relative.

All my family is across the country, so I feel pretty left out in the father's cousin's wife's brother area. I might have to start making things up when I introduce Andy to people just so I can feel better about myself.

ME: "Andy, this is June! She's married to my mom's aunt's husband's sister!"
JUNE: "No, I'm not. I'm just here to read your meter."
ME: "DAMMIT, June!"

Just Add Water!

You know when you've got about half a serving of Ranch dressing left, and damned if you didn't forget to pick up a new bottle last time you were at the store? Phyllis has a remedy - just add water!

Poor Dad was introduced to this the hard way one evening at dinner. He upended the bottle of what he thought was Ranch, and his salad was inundated with watery, beige-ish liquid. Immediately, he checked the expiration date, but, surprisingly, the bottle was still new. Mom saw his perplexed expression and cheerfully told him that she had extended the life of the dressing by as much as several weeks by adding tap water to the remaining dregs and shaking vigorously. Voila! Now we had half a bottle of dressing, thanks to Phyl's creativity!

Unfortunately, nobody else has found this to be a pleasing subsitute. We eventually had to start clearly marking the old bottle of Ranch ("Phyl's Dressing) so that we wouldn't end up with our plates swimming in heavily diluted, watery, tasteless dressing. In the year or so since Phyl first came up with this idea, she has put a spin on it by adding Tabasco to the concoction. She insists she prefers it to original Ranch and is constantly trying to get us to try her recipe. Mmm, leafy Romaine with off-white Tabasco-flavored water on top!

What I don't get is that Mom is a really, really good cook. She can make any recipe well and can usually improve upon the original. So why, when it comes to salad dressing, is she so bizarrely tasteless? I think I've figured it out:

My grandma smoked while pregnant.