Dear Kid,

Once upon a time, babies were brought to their families by a stork. Then Paul Bunyan was born, and it took 5 supersized storks to carry him. After that the storks went on strike and babies were delivered by Uber.

Baby Bunyan continued to be bigger than big. He ate fifty eggs and 10 containers of potatoes every day. After a year or two of that, the chickens went on strike. Paul Bunyan was not known for being well-liked in the avian community.

Not only was Paul bigger than big, he was stronger than strong and faster than fast. He was so fast he could turn off the light and jump into bed before the room got dark.

Paul spent most of the time cutting down trees because he was a lumberjack and that’s what lumberjacks do: cut down trees and wear plaid.

One day, it started to snow. Not just snow, blue snow. Paul thought blue snow was pretty nifty and went for a walk in the blue snow. On his walk, he found a baby ox stuck in the snow. Paul did the only reasonable thing to do in blue snow and took the ox home. (Well, come on, what would you do if you found an ox in blue snow?)

Once the baby ox warmed up, he was still blue. So Paul named him Babe (because he hoped the ox would play baseball once it was invented) and they became BFFs.

Babe grew bigger than big very quickly. One night, Babe went to sleep in the barn with the other farm animals. The next morning, Paul found Babe calmly eating breakfast in the next valley over. Babe had grown so much overnight that he’d walked to the valley with the barn and all the animals on his back.

At that point Paul’s parents decided things had gone far enough (who needs a mobile barn?) and told Paul to take Babe and go become a tall tale. And being a good kid (and a good ox), off they went.

Paul Bunyan could chop down a forest with a single stroke of his axe, and Babe worked right along with him.

One time, there was a road that was too twisty for the lumberjacks to easily remove the cut trees. So Paul tied one end of the road around a tree stump and gave the other end of the road to Babe. Babe pulled with all his strength and straightened out the road. Rumor is he pulled out all the potholes too.

Tomorrow: The Absolutely True Tall Tales

Love, Mom

Dear Kid,

What a lovely weekend we’ve had so far.

First we visited you, YAY!

Yesterday, we did a lot of gardening. The never-ending weed pit we call our entire property gives us plenty of time to spend together.

Last night we were going to go to an event at the Observatory but Dad decided the cloud cover would make it difficult to see things which would annoy me and frustrate him. Unless it would frustrate me and annoy him. Anyway we didn’t go.

Instead we decided to do some nighttime gardening. Weeding by firefly light. Someone (me) thought it would be a good idea. Someone (Dad) thought we should wear long sleeves and long pants. Someone (me) agreed to wear jeans but absolutely refused to wear a long-sleeve shirt in 90 degree heat with 90% humidity.

Someone (Dad) suggested he married someone who was silly and stubborn. Someone (me) didn’t disagree and compromised by putting on bug repellent. Out we went.

Someone (the Puppy) patrolled the area, decided it was safe, and assumed guard position by curling up in the mulch and going to sleep. Never seen him sleep in mulch before. He actually slept for a bit, got up, turned around, rearranged the mulch to his satisfaction, and went back to sleep. Dad tried to take a picture but the pre-flash kept waking the Puppy up. Imagine him with his head tucked under his wing and little baby snores floating around his head.

Eventually it got too dark to see what we were doing so we went in. Someone (me) of course had been thoroughly munched. Someone (Dad) suggested long-sleeves might be in order in the future. Someone (me) pointed out that it wouldn’t have prevented the bite I got on my face and if he didn’t stop talking and start helping with the hydrocortisone there would be bigger problems than bug bites. Someone (Dad) compromised by lecturing while he helped with the hydrocortisone. Someone (me) very maturely thanked him while ignoring the lecture.

Someone (Dad) asked if I planned to wear long-sleeves in the future. Someone (me) suggested he was out of his mind for even thinking such a thing.

Someone (Dad) has perfected his long-suffering sigh. He’s currently online, buying stock in whatever pharmaceutical company manufactures hydrocortisone.

Love, Mom

Dear Kid,

I took my poison ivied face to work yesterday.

CoWorker 1: What the…
CoWorker 2: Shut up
CoWorker 1: But did you see her face?
CoWorker 2: She has poison ivy. You knew that. Shut. Up.
CoWorker 1: It looks like her face is falling off.
CoWorker 2: You’re on your own. I warned you.

CoWorker 3: We should take photos
Me: No
CoWorker 3: Seriously. We could probably sell them to National Geographic
Me: I can and will kill you
CoWorker 3: They’ve probably never seen anything like this before
Me: I can and will break your camera equipment
CoWorker 3: Just lift your chin a little. That is your chin, isn’t it?
Me: Grrrr
CoWorker 3: She gets nasty when she has poison ivy

CoWorker 4: You definitely look worse than yesterday
CoWorker 5: I feel bad for you
CoWorker 4: You really look worse than yesterday
CoWorker 6: I think she can turn people to stone with that stare
CoWorker 2: I’m telling you. It’s time for a new subject

CoWorker 1: We’re going to have to change the presentation
CoWorker 5: Really? I think it’s fine
CoWorker 1: The presentation itself is fine
CoWorker 5: So What’s the problem?
CoWorker 1: Well, we can’t let her present. She’ll scare people away!
CoWorker 5: That’s true. I feel bad, but it’s true.

CoWorker 1: Don’t mention the poison ivy
CoWorker 7: What poison ivy?
CoWorker 1: On her face. Don’t mention it. We’re not talking about it
CoWorker 7: You have poison ivy?
Me: Yes
CoWorker 7: I’ve been talking to you for an hour. I didn’t notice
CoWorker 3: You didn’t notice? How could you not notice?
Me: I’m not sure which is worse, the noticing or the not noticing

Love, Mom

Dear Kid,

Some people can pull weeds without getting dirty. Mom isn’t one of them.

But I’m getting ahead of myself.

Last night, Mom came home with a Determined Attitude. She was Determined to do some weeding, which was fine with me because I got to go Out. I figured we’d just be out for a little bit because it was time for my dinner.

Since Mom-wanting-to-weed is a pretty rare event, Dad came outside with us. According to Mom, we have more weeds per square foot than any other home in Ohio and she decided she’d rather be in second place.

Mom attacked the weeds with all the grace of a rampaging hippo. She dug out dirt. She dug out worms (which are boring). She dug out rocks (which are even more boring). She even dug out a bunch of weeds. I lay down in the grass to watch the events and wait for dinner.

Then she started in on a Really Big Weed. She gave it A Look which should have withered it, but weeds aren’t known for being particularly smart and it stayed leafy green. She used a bunch of Bad Words and a lot of dirt went flying.

Dad told her it was a tree. Mom said it was a weed. Then she gave Dad A Look. Dad should have withered (or at least stopped talking).

Dad: You know its root system goes down at least a foot or two right? You’re not going to be able to get it out with a hand trowel.

Oh, Dad, Dad. Not the right thing to say. I stayed safely on the grass watching the rest of the world and wondering when someone was going to feed me.

Mom continued to dig.

I have pointed out in the past that We Are Not Supposed to Dig, but apparently there are different rules for weeds.

After a while, Mom said: Do you think this is important?

Dad: That’s a scary sounding question. What is it?
Mom: I have no idea.
Dad: Is it metal? Leather?
Mom: Not metal. Don’t think it’s leather.
Dad: Well don’t hurt yourself with it. It’s not important whether it comes out of the ground

Oh, Dad, Dad. Not the right thing to say.

Mom gave the Thing a Look. The Thing wasn’t that smart, because it didn’t do anything. Then she started digging again.

After a long, long time (my tummy was rumbling really loudly—I could hardly hear myself think about dinner), Dad walked over to where Mom was still digging.

Dad: Would you like some help?
Mom: Yes, please

Dad smashed through the rest of the root system and the tree weed fell down. The Thing stayed in the ground (it didn’t sniff like anything interesting). And I finally got dinner.

Mom went off muttering that the only good reason to deal with weeds is to get a blog topic but she was too tired to write.

Dad pointed out that she had a lot of dirt on the back of her legs.

Oh, Dad, Dad. Not the right thing to say.

Love, Your Favorite Puppy

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Dear Kid,

There will be no DearKidLoveMom post today on account of too little writing and too much weeding which has me now resting on my back. The weeding, not the lack of writing.

I am typing this with the laptop on my tummy. I don’t recommend this position as one that is terribly good for accuracy and speed. The “backspace” button is my new best friend.

On the plus side, one-third of one-tenth 0f the weeds down by the iris are now gone. On the downside, I left lots of little weed piles for Dad to clean up. He’s guaranteed to be pleased about that.

Hopefully, he’ll direct all his “pleased-ness” at the lawn mower people. He took the mower in for repair the other day (don’t ask why. I have no clue nor any interest in finding out). Today, he discovered that they gave him back a squeaky mower. He had a marvelous time playing with the lawnmower and the WD-40, and then set out to mow the lawn.

I don’t exactly know what the current problem is, but it involves a lot of new and interesting expletives and a  lot of not-so-great sounds from the lawn mower.

I expect someone will be getting a call on Monday.

Rule for Life: Lawnmowers only break on weekends. Lawnmower repair people never work on weekends.

Have a great weekend, sweetheart.

Love,

Your Horizontal Mom