I have a friend/co-worker who had to intervene. She is the kind of friend who will tell you when you have a booger hanging out of your nose, she will tell me when an outfit doesn’t look right and that is the best kind of friend to have at work. It happened on Wednesday, she told me the shoes HAD to go. Actually, the first time she told me was weeks ago and I laughed it off and said the shoes were staying. But this week she meant business. She bought me a new pair of black shoes and forced me to throw away the old pair. So the shoes are gone and my friend is happy but my feet are hurting. I would wear my old trusty pair of black shoes instead of the new but the crazy woman threw them in the dumpster! Not in the trash bin in the office but the actual dumpster outside the building. I would have to crawl inside the dumpster to retrieve them and I would have to do it after hours because she threatened my life if I so much as looked in the general direction of the dumpster. So thank you crazy friend, my feet are killing me and I am sooooo not going to tell you the next time you have spinach between your teeth.

But I digress…

Over the weekend she was combing my hair. She began this process very gently and soon turned into my Mother, minus the smack on the back of the head when I moved an inch. It started to hurt a little so I said ouch and this exchange took place.

Me: Ouch! That hurts.
Maddie: No Momma, not hurt.
Me: Well, yes, it does kinda hurt.
Maddie: NO MOMMA, NOOOOTTTT hurt.
Me: Ok, Maddie just be gentle.
Maddie: Me be nice Momma, not hurt.

Aunt Pilly was in the room and mentioned that Maddie has probably heard that from me when I was combing her hair. She’s right! Maddie has a very tender head and I contstantly chase her with the brush, hold her down, tell her to “Suck it up Maddie! Your hairs a mess and I have to brush it. It doesn’t hurt! Stop! I have to brush your hair!”

So basically she is a gentler version of her Mother. Maybe the teenage years won’t be too bad.

She wanted to help me address the envelopes, we have the nifty address labels so I let her help. She left the room and I had 15 minutes of peace and quiet so that I could finish balancing the checkbook (Note: Big lie, I haven’t balanced my checkbook in 7 years). I was really surfing the internet for 15 minutes.

I left the office and found Maddie in the dining room with the address labels and she had managed to label every object that she could reach. She labeled the globe, the candle holders and I am still finding random objects nicely marked with our name and address.

Today at work someone noticed that I had something stuck to the bottom of my shoe. Without looking, I responded “Address label, you know, in case I lose my shoes.” Most of my co-workers think I am crazy and it is the only form of entertainment in my very long, boring day.

Tonight I found the remote was labeled and I thought that wasn’t such a bad idea. I haven’t removed any of the labels and it makes me smile when I see them. Because the next time we have company I want them to wonder why we have so many things marked with our name and address. Are we afraid that someone might steal our cheap candle holders?

No, we have a two year old who was occupied and content for 15 minutes. Don’t even think about taking that away from us.

At the end of the display they stop you at the gate to give you hand outs on the services they provide and they also minister to anyone who will listen.

I rolled down my window and a gentlemen handed Maddie a candy cane.

Man: Did you have fun looking at all the pretty lights?
Maddie: Piss ‘em trees and Poman
Man: Huh?
Maddie: Piss ‘em trees and Poman and Antas and piss ‘em trees!
Man: What did she say?
Me: Christmas trees, Snowman and Santa.
Man: Oh, ok then, have a Merry Christmas.

Next time they come knocking at the door, I will send Maddie to answer it.

Not so much. This house was frightening to me and it scared Maddie half to death. She clung to me like a velcro monkey and her eyes were about to pop out of her head the entire time we were there. Everything in this house moved and made noises. The Mickey Mouse desk lamps, phones and just about everything else talked, moved and totally weirded us out!

This woman has collected Disney “things” for over 20 years. She has over 500 Disney snow globes. Who the heck buys 500 snow globes? Crazy people do! There was a life size Santa in the basement and from her reaction, I was sure it would ruin her Christmas spirit. Now when she sees Santa she will forever say “Scary Man, Momma! Scary Man!”.

We saw a 15 piece marching band of life size bears perform just because we moved in front of them. It was loud, obnoxious and scared the hell out of us. There were things moving that we weren’t expecting to move and there were things talking that shouldn’t be able to talk. It defied all laws of nature and I was certain that if we made the owner angry she could command all the weird animated creatures to attack and carry us to our car.

The only good thing about the evening was all the food that this dear woman prepared for her guests. I have never seen more food prepared for one event in all my 30 years. And you must remember that my Mother is the Queen of preparing food for a small army that does not exist in our family. There were crock pots of meatballs, little smokies, 15 different dips, cheese, dried fruit, veggies, cookies, fudge and the list goes on and on. After the scary tour of the house we decided to stay in the safest place, the kitchen. We ate and ate and ate some more.

And then we quietly made our escape past the animated Disney characters guarding the door. We walked quietly and I watched Maddie eyeing all of them. I didn’t want to set them off but I wasn’t successful. They all started singing, dancing and Maddie thought they were after us. I have to admit I thought they were coming for us to. We ran for the car and when we were safely inside Maddie said “Momma. I saw Mickey Mouse, Santa, Poman, Minnie and…” This conversation went on, non stop until we pulled into our drive way 30 minutes later.

When Maddie felt safe in the car she must have looked back on the experience and thought that overall it was a good time. I am not so lucky, I will never buy a Disney product again. My friend has enough of them for all of us!

She stands about a foot from the edge and says “One, two, s, m, n, o, P!” and then she jumps. So I am declaring that she knows how to count AND say her ABCs.