topotales

I’ve been thinking about all the weird stuff I misheard, then misperceived in gradeschool, and wondering why nobody ever sent me to an audiologist.

1.  You know how the pledge of allegiance has that line “And to the republic, for which it stands”?  I spent at least a year thinking this was “…for witches stance”.  I kept wondering why those witches were standing around the flag, and in which kind of stance, exactly.  I actually spent time picturing them in various poses.  And I thought all the witches got burned in Salem?  Was this written before that, when America loved witches?  (Hey, it was the early eighties -I had a lot of time to think about it since we said the pledge every morning back then.)  Luckily, somebody took the time to correct me (thank you, Ms. Kociak).  But still I did not hear “for which it stands”, no, I heard “for Richard Stanz”.  Who the hell is this guy?  A president?  The person who wrote the pledge?  It took a couple of years for me to sort out that there WAS NO Richard Stanz.  Which totally fucked with my entire world view.

2.  My mother’s father is to blame for this one.  Mom told me he used to go to church for Christmas and sing “Oh Hell, Oh, Hell” (instead of “Noel”).  I got a little turned around on which -Noel or Oh Hell - was embarrassing.  I’m pretty sure I sang “Oh Hell” at least once, sure I was singing it the ‘right’ way.  And, because I’ve matured so much over the years, I still can’t get through church on Christmas without snickering about it (though, to my credit, I haven’t been to church in over 7 years).

3.  Another Christmas song.  This one I blame on Caitie, who lived in the apartment above ours in Chicago, and was my best childhood friend.  Her sister was quite a bit older than both of us, and taught her things which she promptly passed on to me… wildly out of context and utterly misconstrued, obviously.  ”I wanna wish you a merry Christmas” was, to my ears, “I wanna wish a Jew a merry Christmas”.

4.  And back to the patriotism, care of our national anthem wherein I thought “Bombs bursting in air” was actually “bums bursting with air”.  I have no excuse for this.  I was a weird kid.

5. I once passed a love letter to a kid in class that read: “I like you because you are a toad-head”.  This was my attempt to compliment him on his platinum blonde hair.  And I seem to remember (though this may just be one of those warped memories due to the humiliation involved) that he crossed out toad-head and wrote over it, in red, “I think you mean towhead” before passing it back to me.

This was all, mind you, before the third grade.  Except the toad-head.  I won’t mention when that was, except to say it was definitely BEFORE college.

Please tell me I wasn’t the only half-deaf second grader who spent time wondering if Richard Stanz was possibly Santa’s daddy?

At the tattoo shop in Rockaway, New Jersey.

Pnut and I get on the plane to Venice tomorrow.  Besides throwing a bunch of stuff into a backpack, here’s the extent of my preparations:

me: Oi ciao recion come ti sta?? Zio beco che merda!!6:37 PM Paolo: me: Paolo: where did you see those??? me: http://nonciclopedia.wikia.com/wiki/Truzzo_veneziano 6:38 PM Chetasboro to nona zogava! Paolo: nonono wait a second this is campagnolo not real veneziano6:39 PM sorry…me: what’s zio beco? Paolo: 6:40 PM God cuckold makes no sense in english me: AWESOME! Paolo: but it’s a good one in veneziano not to be said on the streets though me: Oh, I am SO GOING TO USE IT! Paolo: you are going to get arrested.6:41 PM me: pah. I’ll just say you told me it meant “good morning”6:42 PM me: GESBORRO! Paolo: too many RRRs me: GESBORO, ZIO BECO! Paolo: 6:43 PM me: … maybe you should bring some bail money… just in case… Paolo: I leave you there, wtf me: Fine by me. It’s probably nicer than Jersey…6:44 PM Paolo: better than a Jersey jail…that’s for sure.6:45 PM me: …and without all the fist-pumping… Paolo: just fist fucking. big fists the venetians, you know!6:46 PM me: Oh. my. god. Go back to work.

UPDATE: Pnut made me come back and change all the D’s in this post to Z’s.  Apparently, it really is a big deal.  Sheesh.  Why make up a swear word if you can’t ever use it?  Bloody Italians.

I find myself in the extremely awkward position of wanting to get pregnant.

I don’t particularly like babies.  I’m the woman who, when you bring your new baby to the office, quietly slips out for coffee because I find the oohing and aahing incredibly annoying.  Or, if that’s not possible, I hold your baby at arms length by the armpits, bounce it once or twice, say “uh… yeah, …nice… baby” and then hand it back as quick as possible.  I’ve always found babies rather boring - at least, other people’s babies.  They don’t talk, they don’t do much moving around.  They just lay there, gurgling and pooping.  Once the baby gets its legs under it and starts moving its mouth intelligibly, my interest knows no bounds.  Kids have great imaginations and I am always up for a game of ‘mixing magic potions’ or ’sardines’ or whatever else can be cooked up.  But until then… SNORE.

Also, I hate all those birth stories women love to tell.  The stories about water breaking, labor, stitches, incontinence, etc.  They make me think - are women totally INSANE?  Seriously -WHY- would somebody knowingly sign up for nine months of torture with the grand finale of getting to push a bowling ball out of their vagina?

Point: being pregnant was never something that excited or particularly interested me.  Before this year, if I had to describe my thoughts about it in three words they would be: OUCH, CRAZY, HELLS-NO!

But earlier this year, when I was pregnant, all that stuff just sort of melted away (except probably the terrified for my vagina part). It shocked me that I could be so nonchalant about it.  I’m sure it’s hormonal, but once you actually GET pregnant you don’t really use your brain to think about anything except about how much you love whoever it is in your belly and all the cool shit you’re going to do with them.  And your entire realm of physical existence revolves around the various crazy changes that are happening to your body, and what you can do to manage the madness.

I don’t know what my point is.  Losing a baby made us realize how much we would have loved to have one.  Yesterday morning I had a nice long pee on a pregnancy test for the third day in a row.  I know, ridiculous.  But waiting for actual period day is tough when you’re ‘trying’**.  My heart sank at the one stripe that showed up- and I found that feeling totally surreal.  Me?  Disappointed NOT to be pregnant?  Eight months ago I would have laughed in your face if you told me I’d be in this place.  Yet, here I am.

Since I’m being all open and whatnot, I should add that every week I think “this week I would have been x weeks pregnant, and in x weeks I’d be having the baby”.  And then sometimes I’ll go look in the pregnancy books to see how big that would be.  Also, I am really, supremely, cattily, nastily jealous of other pregnant women in my family (Pnuts sister-in law, some close family friends, a few others).  Mainly because everybody gets all excited about it, and then I think “FUCK YOU, people, my baby didn’t make it”.  One has nothing to do with the other, obviously, so it’s totally irrational, but what can I say- the feeling is there all the same.

I’m not sure all this perseverating is healthy, but that’s the point- I’m in bizarro world.

**My brother finds the word’trying’ both funny and disturbing; when pnut mentioned it: “Thanks… thanks for that.  It’s basically telling me that you’re having a bunch of unprotected sex my sister.  I really don’t need to know that about my sister.”   So obviously, it’s a popular word now.

I just can’t get enough of this song lately.  What I love the most about Rammstein are their metal-crass but highly intelligent word plays (translation for this song is an example though nowhere near their best).  After watching this particular version Pnut and I immediately decided that sometime in the very near future we are going to Tokyo and we are going to a heavy metal concert there.  And, of course, to get tattoos.

I may have bedazzled the dog.  Yep, that just might have happened.

Five intensive weeks of Anatomy & Physiology are finally over!  Huzzah, I pulled an A!

To celebrate, Pnut and I headed to Findlay, Ohio (what, not your idea of a party town? pshaw.) to meet up with my dad’s side of the family.  Eight hours each way in the car, as usual, resulted in some very bizarre conversation.  Here are my favorites…

(On the way to Ohio)

topo: (singing) On top of spaghetti, all covered in cheese… I lost my poor meatball when somebody sneezed…  It rolled off the table and onto the floor, and then my poor meatball rolled out of the door…

pnut: Stop it topo!  Oh, please stop singing!  It makes me so sad!

topo: Uh, it’s not a sad song.

pnut: Yes it is, it’s a horrid and terrible sad song!  The saddest song ever!

topo: Uh, it’s about spaghetti and meatballs.

pnut: I know, but the poor kid doesn’t get to eat his meatball.

topo: Riiiiggghht.  That would make you sad, wouldn’t it?

(On the way back from Ohio)

topo: (singing) … spagheeeeeeeeettttiiiii….

Pnut: nooooooooooooooo!!!!!!!!!

topo: (singing quietly) …cheeeeeese…..

Pnut: Poor, poor little meatball!

topo: Babe, I think maybe the guy gets to eat the meatball at the end.  Just because it fell on the floor doesn’t mean he didn’t eat it… maybe he picks it up off the floor and just pops it in his mouth.

Pnut: I hope so!  That’s what I would do!

topo: I know.

And then I felt really bad for making my husband so sad, so I looked up the end of the song online.  And it made Pnut’s entire day that indeed, the kid gets to eat his tasty if slightly mushy meatball… PLUS he gets a meatball tree in his back yard.

Anyone want to take a roadtrip with us?  Lyrics to the song can be found here.

Pnut: It takes balls to sing about dicks like that

R: Not if you’re French!*

* R is French, so he can say that.

Learning comes easy:  The guy at the fishing store really does know which lures to use.  Pnut caught 2 bass this week (and some trout, but he released them).

Learning comes hard:  bass guitars aren’t the only bass with scales.  Our fillets produced a chorus of crunching noises of questionable taste.

Avoidance is best: we had salad.

Our trip to Mexico was a load of fun.  It can be summed up with two basic conversations that Pnut and I had in variations over the course of five days.

Conversation n°1: The Travel Snobs

topo: Gawr, more drunk obnoxious Americans.  How hard is it to treat people with respect in their own country?  I am so ashamed.

Pnut: I think the crazy one is actually Canadian.

topo: Canadians are just Americans without guns.

Pnut: You have to admit, they’re more fun than British on holiday.

topo: Americans are just loud Brits without tea.  We are never doing an all-inclusive again.

Pnut: Have you seen my flippy-floppies, muthafucka?*

[*note: this is the consequence of introducing an Italian to Lonely Island]

Conversation n°2: Pacific Topo

topo: (underwater screaming, sounds of swallowing water, thrashing noises to the surface) OH MY GOD!  OH MY GOD!  Did you SEE THAT FISH?  It was right by my face!  RIGHT BY MY FACE!

Pnut: topo, settle down.  It’s not interested in you.

topo: But it could TOTALLY have BITTEN ME!

Pnut: It doesn’t have teeth.

topo: Well, I don’t want it rubbing its fishy gums all over me either.  And I swallowed half the Pacific!

Pnut: Put your mask back on, I’ll hold your hand.

topo: Like that’s going to keep the sharks away.

–(five minutes later)–

topo: (muffled by snorkel mask) BARRACUDAAAAA!!!!  BARRACUDAAAAA!!

Pnut: Nobody can hear you screaming underwater, you know.

topo: (mask removed) AND I GOT STUNG BY A JELLYFISH!  Oh my god!  It hurts! It hurts!  OW!  I just got stung by another!  OW!  AND ANOTHER!  OW!…

Pnut: Are you SURE you were a swimmer?

topo: WE PRACTICED IN A POOL!

Yup, that was us in Mexico.  Pnut did convince me to try scuba in the end, and I loved it.