Tuesday, December 7, 2010

He’s My Favorite Honky

News flash: Kelly Ripa has a stress fracture in her hip. I always knew were were soul sisters. Flat chested soul sisters.

I am off to see the King Tut exhibit in Denver today. With 150 7th graders. Hieroglyphics and hormones. Pharaohs and phuberty. You get the picture.

Through the whole exhibit I will be humming “Born in Arizona, moved to Babylonia…” Remember that song? Then I’ll raise my hands up and clasp them and move my head in a side to side motion. Like a true Egyptian. This will be a sure fire way for Sam to gain new friends and the attention of the girls. Nothing says chick magnet like a really uncool mom. Who runs in the water.

Best line: “He’s my favorite honky!” Don’t even tell me you’re too young to remember that. You suck. I’m old. I was 12 when it came out.

Field trips are okay. I used to love them as a kid because it meant soda with my lunch and a day of goofing off. I’m pretty sure I never learned anything. The only thing I remember from any field trip ever was when some kid from my class got left at the Air and Space Museum in Washington, D.C. Yep, that’s right. The school bus just left him.  He’s probably still there, now 43 years old, wandering around aimlessly in the food court. Poor guy.

I’m not a big fan of chaperoning these things. I hate to ride the school bus and usually prefer to drive myself with my coffee and my Sirius XM (although now I’m a bit freaked out by that Starbuck’s secret camera at the drive thru. I might feel the need to moon at my next visit. Cracking myself up). 

A couple of years ago I made the mistake of riding the school bus for a field trip with the fourth graders and got yelled at by the driver. It was an innocent enough mistake. A semi truck passed us and I did that honking motion thing we used to do as kids to get the trucker to *honk*. The driver yelled, “Hey you. Knock it off. You’re not allowed to do that.” What the hell? Kids cannot be kids anymore and it irritates me. Sure, if the trucker honked, what if some kid got wigged out and wet himself or choked?  Or, what if the honking would distract drivers causing them to veer off the road? We live in a a world of “what ifs” instead of just living.

It’s all about safety these days. Bike helmets, car seats. Don’t even get me started on the leashes some parents use for their kids at the mall. I heard on the news last night that sledding is the new dangerous activity for our kids. Maybe we should just all stay inside on the couch. The world is a scary place.

Alright, don’t have a fit. I know all of these things serve a purpose. My kids always wear helmets. Even in the house.

I come from the no-safety generation. Hell, I fell out of the car once when I was two. No seat belt, no car seat. I was just rolling around in the back seat, my dad went around a curve, the door opened and *whoosh* I was out of there. My brother leaned up, tapped my dad on the shoulder and said, “Beth’s gone.” My dad found me laying on the side of the road, crying. That explains a lot, right?

Okay, off to the Tut,

SUAR

Don’t forget my necklace giveaway! Ends 12/12.

Also, Marcia at Mom.Wife.Fitness.Wife is doing a really cool Endorphin Warrior Giveaway. Check it out HERE. Head over there and enter!

54 comments:

  1. A few bumps and bruises is how kids should learn! At least that's how I did and I'm still alive!

    ReplyDelete
  2. "We live in a a world of “what ifs” instead of just living." Fantastic point, and so true. I think I'm going to print that out and put it on my fridge. I'm too guilty of this!

    ReplyDelete
  3. OMG -should not read your blog when at work.
    Coworkers wonder why I am laughing so hard...

    ReplyDelete
  4. YES! The world IS a scary place...just ask the news. You know...the news that likes to scare the shit out of you so you'll watch the crap. Good luck today!

    ReplyDelete
  5. You really fell out of the car! That is scary. I love that you said your kids wear a helmet in the house. Hilarious. I have told my mom a million times to stop saying 'what if' and just enjoy life. Great post and you are such a good mom to go and chaperone!

    ReplyDelete
  6. So true so true! How did we all survive? :-)

    One of my favorite childhood memories is being about 5 y/o, topless, in a convertible, on a road trip with NO seatbelts and doing the honk motion at every truck on the road. Good times.

    ReplyDelete
  7. Have fun on the field trip and sorry the bus driver yelled at you. No fun for kids these days.

    "you'll shoot your eye out!"

    ReplyDelete
  8. Too funny...helmuts in the house....maybe thats what I need!!!

    ReplyDelete
  9. a) I listened to that Steve Martin album (yes, album) over and over and over -- "honky" - heh.
    b) I love that your brother calmly informed your dad that you were "gone".

    ReplyDelete
  10. I very nearly fell out of the car when I was a baby! I was sleeping beside my mother, who was driving. I was swaddled and tucked in beside her on the bench seat in the front. She went around a curve and the door of her Dart flew open and I took off! I think the swaddling made me faster, more aerodynamic. She managed to grab me before I escaped.

    Don't spend too much at the gift shop.

    ReplyDelete
  11. great post! let's just live :) and please do moon the next starbucks you are at.

    ReplyDelete
  12. Air and Space is the place to be if you have to wander around a museum for 43 years.

    ReplyDelete
  13. You never fail to crack me up - love Steve Martin, and it's a very good thing some of us aren't there with you - "Rockin' Tut! King Tut!"

    ReplyDelete
  14. I love your comments about the no-safety upbringing ... I remember that every time my mom or dad would hit the breaks ... they'd give a nice karate chop on the chest to keep me from face-planting on the dashboard!

    Here's something along that line from Stephen Colbert (this video may contain peanuts).

    ReplyDelete
  15. BTW "breaks" is actually "brakes"! sheesh

    ReplyDelete
  16. But we had so much fun back in those days! (and I realize that my "those days" are not the same as yours...). Safety ruins all the fun!

    I wonder what KR did to earn herself a hardcore hip stress fracture. NOT training for a marathon, I'm guessing. You win.

    ReplyDelete
  17. Have fun at the field trip! I have yet to go on a field trip with my kids yet, but I dread the bus too! As a teacher, it's bad enough, but as a parent...ugh!

    ReplyDelete
  18. Love the tune! Good luck at the exhibit with the rowdies.

    ReplyDelete
  19. Three things. 1. I saw Tut exhibit in Dallas and so good.

    2. So my only field trip memory is going somewhere (and for the life of me, I wish I knew WHERE! For better or worse, I think it was a jail) and seeing a discarded empty box in the cooking area. It was marked "grade D but edible." My stomach still turns and I think it was instrumental in making me a vegetarian about 20 years after I saw that box.

    3. My dad recently reacquired the car in which I was brought home from the hospital after I was born, an old corvette. I asked where mom sat. He said right here in the seat next to me. Then I said, well where was I and he said I was on her lap. Love it. Now I've heard hospitals even make sure your carseat is properly installed before they let you leave!

    ReplyDelete
  20. old school steve martin is the best! I can't get enough of that video. Have fun on the field trip and be good!
    LC

    ReplyDelete
  21. Ha, omg I love Steve Martin and I had not seen that yet. FUNKY TUT. Awesome.

    Hope you guys have fun in Denver today! It's an interesting museum, but don't waste your dollars on the movie downstairs. Oof, not good.

    ReplyDelete
  22. I love Kelly Ripa! She is my woman. Can't believe she has a stress fracture in the hip, too. You ARE soul sisters!

    ReplyDelete
  23. Thanks! :)
    Have fun at the museum! Try not to embarass your kid. Well, on 2nd thought, please do and report back here promptly! ;)

    ReplyDelete
  24. Kelly Ripa is my second God.

    Have you seen the woman's shoes?!?! Where are your heels?!

    ReplyDelete
  25. Don't forget rubberized playground (wonder what fumes come out of those in full sun), pesticide and herbicide sprayed but smooth and even grass areas. Soon parks will require parachutes for kids on play structures.

    ReplyDelete
  26. The last field trip I went on w/my mom, while riding the bus someone whipped a pretzel which landed right in her eye. Good times. Wear eye protection with that helmet!

    ReplyDelete
  27. Oh, the memories of hanging at the skating rink, grooving to Steve Martin's King Tut! Thanks for the blast from the past. Now I just need a pair of Dittos and some feathered bangs..........

    ReplyDelete
  28. Totally remember that song and era--we're old together, girlfriend! And field trips. Sigh. Painful, but as long as my kids want me to go, I will. Hope yours went smoothly.

    And thought of you today--swam this a.m. while the p.p. was in full out bobbing mode. Joined them in the hot tub afterward. Good times.

    ReplyDelete
  29. Holy crap. This had me cracking up. You fell *out* of the CAR!?!?!

    ReplyDelete
  30. Crazy…all of the ‘padding’ that we put on kids these days.
    It’s no wonder they’ve been putting on ‘padding’ of their own.
    Can you imagine…being too scared to lets kids go sledding?
    “There, there Billy…you’re safer on the couch playing Playstation”.

    P.S. I’m pretty sure I’d having nothing to do with you or your blog had you not fallen out of that car when you were two. The world was better for that incident.

    ReplyDelete
  31. I find it dumb that we have laws to tell people to use common sense..I remember bouncing in those big green bus seats! HAHA!!

    ReplyDelete
  32. I too ♥ Kelly Ripa!

    You are so funny! I remember laying in the back window of the car during family road trips...those were the days...
    Have fun on your field trip!

    ReplyDelete
  33. ha ha ha... :) you always make me laugh i need a SUAR sticker.....

    ReplyDelete
  34. shameless plug - my kid has a facebook page called "save the kids on leashes" you should check it out.
    friggin' hilarious (he gets that from me)

    ReplyDelete
  35. Hope the tut was fun! But I'm sure the bus ride wasn't.

    I posted about a bus ride for a 2nd grade field trip a few weeks ago. Nightmare. Plus I got in trouble too - for eating on the bus :)

    ReplyDelete
  36. Love your stories!!

    And Steve Martin's 'King Tut' was the best! Brings back high school memories of all the guys trying to do his act, one had it nailed!

    Seat belts?? I remember when we got our first car that had them (I was 8) and Dad preceded to stuff them behide the seats, said they just got in the way. My favorite place to ride was on the big back dash.

    Here's to 'Just Living!'.

    ReplyDelete
  37. Go ahead and embarrass the hell out of Sam. It's our DUTY as parents to embarrass them. It helps build resilience (or they end up with deep-seated emotional issues. I can't remember which one it is.)

    ReplyDelete
  38. I wonder how many of us fell out of cars when we were little. I did and so did my husband. Maybe GM was cutting corners back then on the contraption that keeps doors shut when an object from the inside rams into it? Who knows.

    ReplyDelete
  39. The minute I saw your title for this post I thought of Steve Martin - glad I'm not the only one old enough to remember this stuff!

    And the story of you falling out of the car literally had me laughing out loud - makes you wonder how our generation ever survived childhood :)

    ReplyDelete
  40. LOL!! As a teacher, I got a kick out of your perspective as a parent chaperone - I've often wondered what parents think about field trips!

    I took a group of high school kids to New York a couple of years ago. One of my awesome chaperones (who is also a teacher at my school) was in Chinatown with a group of girls and somehow ended up following some Chinese guy through a series of alleys and back staircases into a "secret" place where they were selling knock-off designer purses for like $10. The girls absolutely LOVED the adventure of it, but I nearly had a heart attack when I was told about their little side trip. (I secretly thought it was pretty cool, though - what a story those kids have to tell now!)

    You're right, though - sometimes we worry too much about being safe and forget how much fun it is to take some risks every once in a while. I need to remember that!

    ReplyDelete
  41. I remember riding in the FRONT seat without seat belts of course and if my mom had to slam on the brakes out came her arm across me. yes, that will keep me from hitting the windshield. lol

    ReplyDelete
  42. I went to a very small school and we never had a field trip until grade 8. Not a good memory though. It was a nature outing, not too exciting when you are in grade 8 and we were going down a steep embankment to get to some falls. You had to grab onto tree trunks to steady yourself. Too late, we noticed the trees were covered in tent caterpillars!! Ughh! That was my one and only field trip - bad association - that and putting up with the singing of 100 bottles of beer on the wall all the way home.

    ReplyDelete
  43. Holly guacamole!! I am laughing and trying not to feel too bad about it but you fell out of the car....oh poor little Beth but that is too funny about your brother and the way you told the story so matter of fact like.....hahaha! I remember those days of no seat belts.

    My brother, dad, and I were driving somewhere to take some horses to the college for a vet check and my bro and I were bored. For some reason I decided to squeeze open my bag of potato chips and instead of the air squeaking out it exploded and my dad screamed and jumped and we swerved all over the road. The horses in the trailer freaked and started jumping around which jostled the truck too.
    Not the same as school bus shenanigans but it just goes to show you that potato chips eaten on the road are dangerous.
    No horses or children were harmed in this narrative although my dad sure wanted to knock some heads :)

    ReplyDelete
  44. when i was a young boy....love that song. funky tut ....

    did you read the book glass castle ??? falling out of the car was in there as well...

    ReplyDelete
  45. So why does it have to be a 'himself wetting his pants?'

    I'm not sure why it has to be a boy that goes in his pants....can you shed some light on this and why it couldn't be a girl that did that?

    ReplyDelete
  46. Jason, b/c girls don't pee. Seriously. I'm a girl and I have never once gone.

    ReplyDelete
  47. I have been yelled at by a bus driver on a field trip, too. NOT cool.

    ReplyDelete
  48. So I work at a place where safety can be a real issue. Think explosions, fire and death. These things don't really happen, but the potential is there. So there is a huge emphasis placed on safety, which I understand and respect.

    But sometimes we get a little...carried away. The other week #2 on the food chain (out of 1000+ employees) interrupted our lunch to call me out (in front of everyone) for not holding the handrail while walking up the stairs on my way back from the cafeteria. Apparently I'm to make two trips or forego the banana in order to free up a hand.

    Really? If only he knew of all the crazy things I do on my free time. Like run.

    ReplyDelete
  49. Kelly Rippa = hubba hubba. I'm with you Sister, way too many controls going on these days. I cannot believe you got shut down for that benign move.

    ReplyDelete
  50. Hay I live in Africa and anything goes...

    ReplyDelete
  51. Thanks for clarifying. As long as it wasn't a reference to a certain somebody just letting it go during a race I'm cool with that.

    ReplyDelete