West of Mayberry

30+ Day Challenge, Part 36 – Something You Ate Today

Hershey’s Kisses.

Or Hershey Kisses, without the apostrophe-s, as I called them as a kid.

I have a big bag of them.

I know there’s a lot of fancier and finer chocolate than Hershey’s.

It’s a little bit bitter and a little bit waxy.

But it’s a whole lot of good.

Plus those fancy ones don’t come in kisses.

I love kisses.

Chocolate or otherwise.

Hershey’s Kisses always been a big part of my life.

Especially on Christmas or my birthday.

I would always get a bag from Granny as a gift.

Silver foil on my birthday.  Red and green on Christmas.

After having dinner with his mother on Thanksgiving, the Attorney showed up at our house with a pumpkin pie.

I don’t like pumpkin pie.¹

“I know you don’t like pumpkin pie,” he said, before I could comment. “But Granny does.”

It was sweet of him to think of her.

But, he thought of me, too.

By bringing me kisses.

Chocolate and otherwise.

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1. In fact, there are only 2-3 kinds of pies I like.  I’m much more a cake and cookie man. [↩]

30+ Day Challenge, Part 35 – Your idea of the perfect first date.

This one has me stumped.

First dates are not something I ever think about.

Perfect or otherwise.

In January, it will have been five years since my most recent first date.

That one was with The Attorney.

It wasn’t the first time we spent time together.

Before that, there was a hot tub and pancakes: a wonderful first impression and a good time, but hardly a first date.

But then eighteen months later, there was the official first date.

A movie; pizza and beer; and heavy condensation on the inside of my truck windows.

Was it perfect?

Maybe.

I definitely don’t plan on ever having a first date again.

What’s the need?

My last first date work out perfectly.

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I wish I had come across this video in time for my previous post, because it would have been a good one for the “30+ Day Challenge.”

While the timing may not have been perfect for the blog, it was kind of perfect for me.

The Attorney and I have been butting heads a bit lately.  The issue mostly stems, admittedly, from my own stubbornness.

I have always been fairly independent.  I sort of pride myself on handling things myself and being a provider.  I never want to be beholden to anyone for anything.

I will do whatever I can for someone else, but often I have trouble accepting even the simplest gesture in return.

Unfortunately, this tends to manifest itself in The Attorney feeling closed off from me.

This video has given me an epiphany, perhaps even a wake-up call, that to forge a bond you can’t only give unconditionally, you have to accept unconditionally, too.

Watch this video, and you will understand why I need to learn this “more than ever.”

This is the real deal, folks:

I picked this up from handsome blogger Kennethinthe212 who got it via Towleroad.

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30+ Day Challenge: Part 34 – A YouTube Video

I can’t remember where I saw this recently.  I think it was on Tosh.0.

Wherever I saw it, it continues to crack me up:

I love slightly twisted humor.  But I especially love it when it is twisted on several levels.

Which reminds me of my favorite joke, which also continues to crack me up after 20 years:

How does a mother from Louisiana know that her daughter has started her period?

Answer: see footnote.¹

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1. She can taste the blood on her son’s cock. [↩]

“Amaze.”

It used to be a verb.

As in “Your butt amazes me.”

But these days it’s also apparently an adjective.

As in “Your butt is amaze.”

What used to be “amazing” is now simply “amaze.”

At least that is the way I heard it used on the TV show about the Hollywood stylist.

I was only half-watching, but I’m pretty sure I heard her nasally refer to a dress/jewelry/shoes or something as “amaze.”

I was “appall” (ed).

But then again, she had the Oscars, and Fashion Week, and a photo shoot, lunch, and her baby crowning all at once, so when was she going to have time for an extraneous third syllable?

I should be more “understand.”

I’m sure she was not the first to say it.  Nor will she be the last.

And I think there will be lots more abbreviation of spoken words to come in the “futch.”

It looks like “FUHch,” but pronounce it “FyOOch.”

It’s the “abbreve” for “future” we will use in the “futch.”¹

Abbreves are meant to be spoken, not written.

Totes.²

But, thanks to texting and Twitter, there’s plenty of written abbreviation going on, too.

Except these digital age abbreviations are really more of an avoidance of vowels.

With our youngest generations communicating almost exclusively with their thumbs,³ I wonder what will happen to our ability to spell.

Don’t be surprised if in 30-40 years your grandkids are competing in the school Texting Bee.

Or more likely, “Txt B.”

Poor little letter “e.”

Isn’t it ronic that the most common vowel in our language seems to be the biggest victim of the digital-age.

Flickr.  Tumblr.  Grindr.  The list goes on.

It’s only a matter of time before “e-mail” drops a vowel and becomes just “mail.”⁴

To be fair, the blame for vowels becoming extinct could actually be placed squarely on the shoulders of  ”The Wheel of Fortune.”.

Just about everyone who uses social media and digital communications heavily was a child at some point in the long  run of the game show.

We were not just being entertained by a glittery spinning wheel and a more glittery mannequin turning light-up block letters.  We were being indoctrinated.

We were taught that vowels cost money.

All the other letters are free.  Use them as much as you want!

But don’t waste your hard-won cash on vowels.

Should we be surprised that the decrease in vowel usage blew up a few years ago when the economy went south?

IDK.

It’s amaze to think about.

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1. Yes. Even the word “abbreviation” has been abbreviated.  I heard it on a different show. No joke. [↩]
2. Totally. [↩]
3. And here we thought opposable thumbs put us at the top of the evolutionary chart. [↩]
4. Literally and metaphorically, I’m afraid. [↩]

30+ Day Challenge -Part 32: A Hobby and Part 33: A website

I’m suffering blogger’s block, so I’m falling back on the 30+ Day Challenge again.

I’m combining #’s 32 and 33 into one post, because they really are about the same thing.

In a way, over the past 7 years (!) web sites have been a hobby of mine.  I started my online journey with a naughty picture web site that a friend put together.  The only real hobby part of that for me was posing for the pictures.  I didn’t create or know how to operate the site.

Then came the LARGETONY Blog. It was to help promote the picture site.  Keeping it going is how I began to learn how to control the look of websites and some minor technical stuff.

But, that blog (and the picture site) ran its course, so I decided to leave blogging.

That lasted about 4 months and I returned to blogging with West of Mayberry and a bit of a focus shift.

Along the way, I had created a couple of suggestive T-Shirts as gifts for friends.  It was a fun hobby that I recently decided to try to build a little business with.

That’s when LT-Shirt Company was born.

» Read the rest of this entry «

We were naked on our bellies, watching ESPN and eating cup cakes.

“Be careful of crumbs.  I don’t want any chocolate smears on my sheets.”

The Attorney was concerned what his once-a-week housekeeper would think.

As if it would be the first time she’d find a post-coital stain on a sheet.

But, I wasn’t going to argue with him.

Not when he was in such a relaxed mood.

I’ve mentioned before that The Attorney can be little uptight in his manner.

Lovably so.  But still a little uptight.

He’s very meticulous and generally lacks the comfort with his own nudity¹ that I have.

But, tonight he was hanging around naked and eating in bed??

Who is this man???

I don’t know if I would have been any more surprised if there had been a syringe and rubber band on the night table.

“I can change a little,” he said, when I commented on his ease.

Ah-hah.

He wasn’t loosening up.  He was proving a point.

As Attorneys² are likely to do.

His point went back to earlier in the evening when we were going out to dinner and I said I was content to get a burger.

It was our date night, so I think he had in mind someplace a little more…more.

“Oh, come on.  You can get a burger anytime.  Let’s go somewhere you can get something you really love.”

I love burgers.

I really do.

He sighed and shook his head.

“You know, one of the things I love about you is that you are who you are and you don’t change.  And one of the things that frustrates me about you is that you are who you are and you don’t change.”

Says the man who folds his dirty laundry because he believes it takes up less space in the hamper and he doesn’t like to see it spilling over.

But, he had made his point.

Satisfied that I got it, he finished his cupcake, put his underpants back on, and washed his hands.

The chameleon reverted back leopardhood.

Which is really how I like it.

You know where you stand with a leopard.

And we leopards should probably stand together.

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1. he’s fine with mine. [↩]
2. a group who never wants to be wrong [↩]

Some of you commented on my post about The Attorney wanting to take up pole vaulting by saying to “let him go ahead,” or other things to that effect.

Like he was wanting my permission.

That made me laugh, because ya’ll just don’t know The Attorney.

He was just letting me know it was something he was planning to do.

He’s not the type to ask my permission.

And I’m not the type to expect him to.

It’s why we get along.

We each do our own thing.

That’s not to say that we don’t have our opinions.

Because we do.

But, when it comes down to it, he’s his own man.

That’s just one thing I love about him.

He may be my man, but he’s his own man, too.

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