Mr. Right Up My Alley

I might have mentioned it before, but while lazing in front of the tube watching old movies, the geniuses at Bravo targeted me for repeated airings of eHarmony, Match, and Chemistry commercials. I mean, how do they know I'm single? How do they know when I'm spending all day in my pajamas, regarding brazieres with disdain? How do they know I'm debating a real penis versus some kind of vibrating purple beaver thing? Am I that obvious?

Well, I confess. Their advertising was just too damn effective. Plus, all my friends and office mates (14 women, 0 men) pushed me to "just give it a try" so I don't have to spend all my time in testosterone-rich environments like bars. Not that there's anything wrong with that . . . So I officially lit up my VACANCY sign.

To be honest, I normally date younger men. They're generally more playful, and playful is important to me. But I thought maybe this time I would shoot for someone older, someone with a lot of life experience and time to spend on me. So I entered all the appropriate search criteria and came up totally, disappointingly, vacuously empty. There aren't a lot of hotties who have aged well, and that's important to me too. In fact, most of the pickins are a bunch of bubbas. I don't care if I do live in Texas, I don't want anything to do with a paunchy redneck in a cowboy hat, a tombstone-sized belt buckle, and a cheek-full o' chew.

In fact, the old bucks seem to have given up on presenting themselves in the best light, if the pictures they post are any indication. Yes, I'm judging. That's just part of it. Listen, if you're putting up grainy pictures of yourself in a fishing boat from fifty yards away, or holding a rifle while standing on a moving jeep in your camos, or straddling a motorcycle as an expression of your virility, let me enlighten you: That's not attractive!

Hey, I have standards. First impressions count. Did you ever buy a smokin' New Year's Eve frock (I just wanted to say frock) based on its history in the dress factory? No, it caught your eye from the rack and drew you in for a closer look. You imagined how fabulous and sexy you'd look when you stepped outta the limo in it. Only then did you try it on, see if it fit in all the right places, seal the deal and buy it.

The one scholarly guy I took a chance on for coffee and dinner turned out to be a latin Eeyore. While he had a few things in his favor (LA-tin!), it all ended rather abruptly and unpleasantly. Ladies, gender communications issues have still not evolved beyond, "I'll never understand women."

On broadening my search criteria and accepting that I just can't hang with a stodgy old fart, I did manage to find a couple of yummy prospects. By yummy, I mean intelligent, successful, family-oriented, adventurous, confident, a little vulnerable, playful, hot, and normal. Which begs the question, did your sister fill out this profile form for you? Because you're saying all the right things!

Since things are looking up, you can expect another episode of Fragrant Liar's Search for Mr. Right Up My Alley. Meanwhile, where's that catalogue with the vibrating purple beaver things?
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My New Most Embarrasing Moment

I've ruined my daughters. At least my oldest two. In my kitchen last night, candidly discussing sex (where they explained how it all works to me), TeeGee revealed what she had witnessed at roughly age eight. It's totally embarrassing but too funny not to tell my closest blogging buddies about. So just keep it between us, okay?

Twenty years ago, apparently my then-husband and I were not content to mess around in our bedroom. The details are so vague that I didn't remember this. However, my daughter, even at 30, still remembers -- a memory so vivid that she will undoubtedly grimace and squirm for the rest of her life over it.

Laying in the dark of her room one night while her younger sisters slept, TeeGee heard some racket in the hallway. It was then that she saw her stepfather lugging something over his shoulder -- me -- as he hurried down the hallway, both of us completely naked.

TeeGee's recollection stunned me, as I had no idea she had ever seen me in any kind of compromising position ever. EVER!

All I could do was cover my mortified face in my hands. "Are you serious?" I bellowed, peeking through my fingers. "You saw us? Naked?"

"Mom, I have one word for you. Floppy."

I busted out laughing at the same time I wished for a deep, dark hole to squeeze myself into and zip shut.

"And I heard weird noises from the living room, Mom. I was scared and I couldn't go to sleep."

Oh. My. God. It all came back to me then. I remembered that night. Actually, quite fondly . . .

TeeGee rolled her eyes in revulsion. That's when my other daughter, Scoots, said to me, "That's nothing. One time, I saw you . . ."

Ah, but that is a sordid story for another day.

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Sentence Enhancers

I feel such love after my last post. You get me, you really get me! All my fellow cussers seem to get all warm and fuzzy inside when the air is punctuated with a well-spat Shit!, Damn!, Fuckin-A!, or other favorite expression of extreme emotion. Just like me! It feels like, Ah, yes. I've been heard! I've made my point. The world is as it should be.

Over the years, these spicy sentence enhancers (in the venacular of kiddie phenom Sponge Bob) have evolved, much like apes into men, from knuckles dragging the ground and fists pounding their chests to -- oh wait. Um, oh yeah, evolution like not dragging us around by our hair anymore. So while cussing is more acceptable today than it was during the last couple thousand years, adults have adopted special ways of teaching their children about it.

Now, as my parents begat six world-class cussers, so did I beget four trash-talkers -- sort of like those Native American wind-talkers but more readily decipherable, especially where sign language is involved. A quickly flipped middle finger is like sending a Hallmark card, when you care enough to send your very best without an envelope or stamp. So everyone in our family makes grand efforts to curb our joy of profanity so that our littlest ones won't get in trouble at school for saying things we shouldn't -- er, things they shouldn't. But try as we might, some stuff gets through a child's undeveloped filter zone. They just aren't quick enough with the cover-your-ears LA-LA-LA-LA-LA defensive maneuver.

Once last summer, four-year-old Miss America was waiting in the car with her mom, TeeGee. Since it was unbearably hot outside, TeeGee had the A/C blasting. From her car seat in the back, Miss America told her mother, in her very sweet, tiny voice, "Mom, it's fuckin' cold back here."

In the driver's seat, TeeGee's head rotated a few times before she could set her eyes on her angelic daughter. "What?"

Miss America: "It's fuckin' cold back here."

So as not to make a big deal about her daughter's lack of etiquette and encouraging a repeat of those magic sentence enhancers, TeeGee simply turned down the air temp and redirected the fans. Then she called me on her cell and remarked how funny and cute and bright her daughter was. Tee-Gee would never be able to explain this sense of pride to Miss America -- at least not until the kid was old enough to send her own Hallmark cards.

I think TeeGee handled the situation correctly. How would YOU have handled that situation, you modern millennium people?

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Let's Cuss

Inspired by hypersensitive people with squeamish sensibilities and ridiculous pretensions (or those who just don't get that I was born with a dominant irreverence gene). Stop giving me the stink eye. And now, a little history . . .

I'm a cusser. I make NO apologies. I have been a cusser since I was about nine, and my tomboy cousin Cheryl and I discovered we were accomplished wordsmiths in disguise. Blonde hair pulled into pigtail braids, we saucy fourth graders had been set free on a hot summer day to walk 500 yards to the Safeway store for gum. As we crossed the dusty field behind my grandmother's house, Cheryl said these words: "Let's cuss."

This was the pinnacle of bright ideas, and I quickly tried my hand at it. I forced a word out of my voicebox to see how easily it fit in my mouth, floated off my tongue, and hung in the air. "Fa-a-art."

Not quite the taboo obscenity of the time, but I was working up to the big stuff. We laughed out loud. What else can you do when someone says fart? It's reflexive. Say it: "Fart." Try not to giggle. Bet you can't.

Cousin Cheryl wasted no time in lobbing a return. She uttered the cuss word my father had tossed around since I could sit on the pot by myself. She said: "Shit." Pretty much the mother of cuss words in my little world. We both gasped and volleyed more lewdness until we ran out of material. In other words, thirty seconds. We then began to use select words in complete sentences, sort of like a vocabulary lesson in a self-paced learning environment. You get that, right Vodka Mom?

Cheryl: Bobbie farted like a balloon loopty-looping to the ceiling.

Me: He quit laughing when it turned out he pooped his pants! Oh, wait, he shit his pants!

Yeah, we were crazy out of control, marveling at our ingenuity, keen usage of the forbidden, and bravery when no one else was around to slap the bejeezus out of us.

I remember fondly, circa 1972, when my mother shouted at my sister, Dee, who as a preteen had been caught slinging an F-bomb at my brother (he totally deserved it). My mother clenched her teeth and shouted, "Stop that cussing shit!" When she realized the irony, even she couldn't hide a smile. See? In the genes.

Thirty-some-odd years later, this form of expression is just part of my everyday vernacular. I try to refrain from it in mixed company (a meager effort, yes, but I'm a natural-born pleaser). And I admit I can't really quit anytime I want. I'm destined to be a crusty centenarian, heading to the sweet by and by with a fulfilling vulgarity rolling off my tongue.

Shit, yeah.

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Wee Wisdom #1

Miss America's Poignant Pearl of the Week

Five-year-old Miss America, in her jammies: "You should be nice to me."

Me, dragging my butt in around 8:00 pm after a very long, emotionally draining day: "Oh yeah? Why's that?"

Miss America props her butt up onto my bed and points to her nose. "Cuz I got a bloody nose."

I immediately stop brooding and check her, but see no sign of the red stuff. "What happened?"

She glances at the ceiling and then the window and then back at me with her face scrunched up like a hand puppet. "Well, I acceedently had my finger in my nose, and, and den I poked it and sorta scratched it, and den it camed out all bleeding."

"So why did you have your finger in your nose?"

Miss America hesitates, perhaps remembering admonishments to keep her hands out of her messy breathing apparatus. "Um, well, I was on da floor, and um, um, ts, um, my legs was in de air and um, um . . ."

I picture this. "And somehow your finger got up your nose?"

She heaves an exasperated sigh. "I was on da floor doing yoda!"

Okay then.

"So you gotta be nice to me."

I nod, because after the day I've had, this makes perfect sense to me.

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Obamasized!

Fragrant Liar has been Obamasized. You too can get your face all wonky in red, sorta white, and blue -- fer free! Just say Obamasize Me!

Which one makes me look more like a liar?

I Got Nailed!

You read me right (unless you read me dirty)! For the first time in five decades, I got my nails done by a professional. Not just a mani either. I got the works: artificial "solar" nails. They look awesome. It's just that . . . Well, know what you can’t do with fake fingernails?

* Can’t pick your nose. Square tips make it impossible to get past the porthole. (Vodka Mom, those rugrats still mining for gold in class? Get those little booger bugs some French tips!)

* Can’t pick up change from a flat surface, not unless you tip one edge into a crack. Ditto for paper clips, bobby pins, buttons, and sharp, sharp, sharp thumb tacks. Did I mention sharp?

* Can’t text. Total blackout on communication, folks. Opposable thumbs don’t matter when all you can text into your cell phone is “yh3s3 fuvkin nals r kihhing mee.”

* Typing on my laptop has been a challenge but, hey, my speed is picking up. I banged this out in six hours!

* Trying to work a zipper is a whole ‘nother story. Spent a lot of time in the bathroom today, most of it standing up. Hunched over. Squeezing my knees together. And cussing.

* NEW ONE: Can't scoop your finger into anything creamy, like night cream, liquid foundation, and frosting. It all gets gooped up under the nail -- 'course, if you find frosting later, that might be a nice treat! ;)

All I gotta say is, Thank god I wear thongs. If I had to pick a thick wedgie out of my butt, I’d slash a hemorrhoid – if I had one, I mean.

Note: Yankee Chick says if you put on pantyhose, "be vewy, vewy careful not to poke your thumb nails thru them." You know what she means, girlies. You could run those puppies from your ankles to your uh-uh! And how sexy is an unsightly run? Gentlemen?

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It's Not a Wedgie

I have stripped down to my skivvs in my closet, and now stand deep in thought about what to wear, when I hear someone gasp behind me.

"Oh my god!" says five-year-old Miss America. "Don't tell me you got a wedgie! Gross!"

I am relieved to find that it is only a small child who gasps with her face at eye level with my naked gluteus maximus (emphasis on the maximus).

I turn toward her, clutching my arms across my bare chest as she tries to peer around me, determined to get a better look. "It's not a wedgie," I inform her, leading her in circles.

"I's in you butt," she points out with concern. "I's a wedgie. Can you pull it out?"

"It's not a wedgie, and it's not stuck. It's a thong, the kind of undies that are supposed to fit like that."

Her curling upper lip and raised eyebrow portray her disgust. "In you butt?"

"Yes. In you butt. But you don't feel it in you butt because there's not enough material there to bunch up and bug you."

She grimaces doubtfully, and then gives me the palms up. "You can't put ice in you butt."

I gape. Miss America giggles. Takes me a few seconds to get that she has seen somebody put ice in somebody else's pants.

"That's right," I say. "No ice down my pants. A good thing for you to remember."

She skips out of my room. "Cuz you got a wedgie!"

I shout after her, shaking my fist in the air like the distraught Elephant Man, "It . . . is not . . . a wedgie!"

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Oh, Wii Is Me

If you haven't been so fortunate as to experience the frenzy over the new Wii game systems, let me give you the skinny. In a big household like ours, the adults line up right along with the kids to get their chance at Guitar Hero, and they don't play nice.

Kids are fascinated by the hands-on relationship between the pretend guitar strapped around their necks and the virtual world on their TV screen. Their little minds grasp the distinction between reality and imagination. "It's only a movie," loops through their brains. See angelic children below, exhibiting delightful engagement in a fun, new activity.

Adults, on the other hand, are ecstatic and overwhelmed by the pure awesomeness of projecting themselves onto the TV screen as kings (or queens) of rock and roll. An abrupt seachange washes over them and lights up their cerebral cortex, causing erratic hip movement, ravenous eyes, and bad manners. They become sudden musical afficionados -- wild creatures, undaunted in the all-encompassing hero worship of SELF.

Who's next?
Me, Me, Me! they shout, each would-be rock star clamoring to cut in line.

Even waiting behind other players (see adults at left) is cause for hysteria.

For those shouting "Woot-woot!" in the audience, uninhibited physical gyrations and silliness are not unheard of. ------>

I have only one complaint. If my own mother (Great Grandma Mama Salla, our septagenarian matriarch) wanted to play with the Wii, the whole damn family would shuffle her into position and strap a would-be-Stratocaster around her. Everyone would huddle side-by-side to witness the precise moment when Grandma shredded her first solo. So why then shouldn't I, "Nana," enjoy the same respect too? No one should ever jab his thumb over his shoulder and growl to me, "Back of the line!" Right? That's just rudey-toodey. I deserve the same respect and adoration, maybe a little awe. I mean, I'm almost the family matriarch (don't tell anyone). I should never hear, Back of the line, lady. Should I?

Oh, Wii is me.

Peas, Please

The black-eyed variety. In our neck of the Hill Country, it's a long-standing rule that the natives must eat black-eyed peas between midnight on the first day of the new year and 11:59 PM of the same day. This is to ensure that we all have good luck for another 12 months -- at which time, we must again immunize ourselves against the funky fickle finger of fate with another oral dose of black-eyed peas.

Naturally, if good luck isn't a concern for you, there's no point in forcing yourself to swallow. (After all, those little black eyes watch you the whole time you scoop them up and shove them in. Once, I think I even heard them scream.) And if, like me, you're not really a native, but a transplant, then you must weigh the folklore for yourself and decide if it's worth the possibility of fracturing that mirror just when you got all your bills paid. The redneck jury is still out on whether seven years of bad luck can be trumped by legumes with peep holes, but why take chances?

Me, I generally follow the rules, if not the superstitions (unless I don't like them). So today, as I do on this day every year, I will eat my black-eyed peas. It's an acquired taste that's taken me, oh, about 20 years to acquire. To prevent gagging (and feeling guilty), I enjoy my good-luck fiber in a savory dish called Texas Caviar. It's actually quite tasty, and since one can never be too careful with lucky breaks, I won't be shy about getting seconds.

What about you? Double or nothin'? Or shall I pass the black-eyed peas?