The Sweet boyfriend showed up bearing a turntable and vinyl:

Giant cupcake in honor of Sweet One’s birthday!

There is much levity in the Feisty household.

Yesterday afternoon Sweet One was loving on the dogs who were imitating furry rugs in the living room, as it was still bitterly cold outside.

Mom had spent part of the day washing and rolling her hair. She had just brushed it out when she walked into the living room as Sweet One finished petting the dogs.

“Ewww,” she said, “my hand smells like Skeet now, Maw Maw.”

Mom made a face and said: “Don’t touch me!”

The chase was then on with Sweet One trying to tag her grandmother with the dreaded dog hand.

Normally just a silent observer, the husband switched gears and before my mother could dash by him, he caught her and held her while Sweet rubbed her hand into mom’s freshly washed hair.

All was fun and games with much laughter. There was no indication from the husband he was going to let her go, until she said gained instant release when she exclaimed: “Let me go or I pee on you!”

Yes, that pretty much does it every time.

Much later, while we were enjoying a rib-eye roast for supper, there was more teasing of the event at my mother’s expense.

She managed to garner the last word, though.

“That’s okay,” she said before motioning toward Sweet One and the husband, “do it again and I poison both of you.”

At least, I am not the only one she is trying to kill.

My mother arrived in the middle of December.

It is now January.

While extremely clean and fastidious, my mother generates clutter and chaos much like the dirt cloud followed Pigpen in the Peanuts comic strip.

As soon as she arrived, stacks of useless crap began to cover each and every horizontal surface while the amount of trash generated quadrupled. It boggles the mind how much disoriented confusion one small human can create.

Most all of the crap is imported.

Prior to making the trip to my house, it took her three full days to pack her small SUV.

Why?

Because one never knows when a 108 piece socket wrench set will come in handy or because there are no grocery stores within ten miles of my house (this is simply a fallacy) and I fail to feed my family for months at a time or it necessary to pack every single article of clothing of one owns for a six week visit, including towels of her own.

For the record, mother has no clue what to do with a socket wrench, but, by God, she has a set that any mechanic would envy, including a telescopic handle-thingy.

Need a hole punch or a little duct tape?

Wait just a moment and give her a chance to dig through her ride. There is no doubt she will come up with something of questionable use.

Then, she has the audacity to complain about the poor fuel mileage when she drives half-way across the state of Texas to see me.

Slowly, by inches, every damn thing in that vehicle of hers manages to make its way into my house.

Why am I complaining?

She is now trying to kill me.

There is a rectangular island in my kitchen. Navigating around it yesterday, I kicked a G*d-F*@&ing-D@$n stool arbitrarily placed along one side of the island and managed to torque and wrench my back, as well as throw my knee out trying to keep from hitting the tile with the force historically reserved for baby mammoths.

No, I did not hit the floor, but it probably would have been less injurious if I had. In fact, I would be a helluva lot better off if I had simply been hit by a Mack dump truck.

What the hell?

To add insult to injury, the husband scolded me for complaining about the damn stool to which I responded: “If that had been you, we would still be hearing about it.”

Husband: “If that had been me, I would still be on the floor.”

Much later, my mother attempted to apologize. “Why you no see stool?”

Me: “What the hell was it doing in the kitchen?”

Mom: “I short, you know.”

Me: “Why are you trying to kill me?”

She shrugged before adding: “Guilty unconscious, I guess.”

This morning I awoke to find my back rear tire sitting on its rim in the driveway.

Fortunately, Sweet One has a brand new car I was able to borrow to get to the office.

The tire on my car will require attention when I get home. I wonder if my car will explode when I try to start it.

She is only eight years old, almost nine.

Please allow me to imitate my good friend Oddy: PIE!

This is a big deal because I am not much of a pie girl, I usually bake the lusciously rich stuff in the form of cakes laden with cream cheese and chocolate; however, Wee One wanted to try something different.

So, she and I made a pecan-oatmeal pie and a sweet potato pie, both completely from scratch. My crusts lacks artistry, but they appear flaky.

The husband’s contribution was a shot of bourbon to the sweet potato pie…

You will have to ask him the verdict later today.

UPDATE:

As requested by Mostly Cajun, here is the link for the Pecan-Oatmeal Pie. The only thing I changed to the recipe was adding at least twice as much pecans as listed.