From The Mind Of Myla MadsonMyla Madson (2,074)    Myla Madson   Myla Madson.com Betty's Not A VitaminPosted Tuesday, July 01, 2008 (5 days 9 hours ago.) Viewed 25 times. Sharing that wealth, at least with me, doesn't seem to be in the cards and I made a promise I had no way of financially keeping without running up another credit card. Considering my daughters past academic track record though, I wasn't all that worried and considered it a pretty safe bet. Even she had covered her bases by getting a part-time job during the school year at the local market. When you live in the country "local" is a relative term and the market was a couple of miles from the house, far enough any way to make her part-time job my part-time taxi service and costing me a fortune in gas! The irony of my life never ends and I recently found myself rooting against my daughter doing well on her final exams. Her 85 on the very last exam, World History of all things, cost me $685 and a month without my little girl. She's been in Florida for about a week now and I miss her terribly. Her inquisitive nature and passion for the unusual keeps me on my toes and filled with writing material and although the other kiddos keep me as busy as ever, that spot in my heart for my first born aches every time I think about her which is every second of every day! I spoke on the phone with her just last night and she said my sister would not allow her to attend a concert down at the waterfront this weekend and could I please talk to her about it. I pretended that I was in her corner and had every intention of making my sister the bad guy in all this. You upset my daughter by not giving in to what she wants and believe me, you will pay dearly for it...did I mention my sister has money but won't give me any? Anyway, my sister got on the phone and said there was no way my little miss was going to any concert, especially considering whom it was that was playing. I waited for her to tell me but all I heard was deafening silence. My sister suffers in silence louder than anyone I know and I could feel her disappointment burning into me on how I've gone about raising such an opinionated and irresponsible child. I've always liked most of my daughter's music and have even accompanied her to a few concerts. Actually, I was the taxi service again and not permitted to acknowledge her existence while at the concert hall, but still, I usually enjoyed myself, happily sharing the experience with other forgotten parents up in the nose-bleed section. A fair compromise I suppose, but my sister would have none of it. She told me there was a story about this band in the paper just the other day and that they were nothing but a bunch of drugged up hippies playing the Devil's music. Oh my, the Devil's music? Yes, the Devil's music! I asked her the name of the band and she said it was, "Betty's Not A Vitamin". My first thought was, cool title for my next story followed by, what the heck does that mean? She said that the lead singer was so stoned (allegedly) one night back in the early nineties, when they were still trying to come up with a name, that he had lined up all the Flintstones chewable vitamins, probably to play some perverted game, and noticed there was no Betty Rubble. His first words upon this realization were, "Betty's not a vitamin". Somehow his band buddies thought this a great name for the group and even though Betty was added to the vitamin line up in 1995, they kept the name. She went on and on about their questionable moral character and such, and I could hear my daughter yelling in the back ground that none of this was true. On and on she went until she finally noticed I had not responded. "Well?" she said with irritation in her voice, "Don't you have anything to say about all this?" I did in fact have something to say. "You mean to tell me that Betty Rubble was not part of the original Flintstones chewable vitamins... Why?" "I don't know why", my sister yelled in exasperation, "She is now, and in fact I think she actually replaced the flint mobile, but what the heck does any of this have to do with your daughter wanting to go see these miscreants?" "Wow", is all I could say, "even Dino was a Vitamin, how could they have left Betty out?" My daughter got back on the phone, I guess my sister had dropped it when she started banging her head against the wall, and told me that I would love this group and that I should go "on-line" and listen to them. Just Google "Betty's Not A Vitamin" she said and you can check them out. Which, of course is exactly what I did and I liked their sound so much I plan to buy their album if I'm able to find it. I also insisted that my sister allow her to go to this concert and that if she did not want to take her, I'd be happy to jump on a plane and go down there and do it myself...if she paid for the ticket, of course. My sister weighed her options and figured her time was not quite worth the $685 plane ticket, plus room and board, and reluctantly agreed to take her to the concert. I cried when I got off the phone because I so badly wanted to share this experience with her but I simply could not afford to. You can't put a price on the time you spend with your children, but in this case it would have been $685. For more from the mind of Myla, go to http://www.mylamadson.com 
Permalink Comments (0) Roosters and Used Cars...Posted Thursday, June 26, 2008 (10 days 7 hours ago.) Viewed 552 times. The other night after dinner, my oldest daughter called for a family meeting... Uh-Oh. These meetings are happening with alarming frequency as my children get older and I become, at least in their opinion, much more difficult to live with. Thankfully tonight my daughter only had two points to make, neither one directly relating to me although ultimately I would end up being questioned by local authorities as a result of my attempts to resolve my daughter's dilemma. Her first point was to mention that her best friend Trish was in the market for a used car and would I happen to be able to shed any light or advice on her purchasing one. As a backdrop to this conversation, I had just upgraded vehicles and had a very reliable used car parked out beside the tool shed. I knew her angle of course. If I sold this Trish my car then my daughter would have a ride to school. She could graduate from the big yellow school bus to the little red Toyota thus saving herself from a lifetime of public embarrassment and ridicule. I thought for a moment about what clever piece of advice I could offer that would have the greatest effect of annoying my daughter and finally said, "Tell your friend that she should never buy a used car that she would be unable to push". To my surprise and disappointment the comment had little effect on her and she moved on to her next point, that of the neighbors rooster. For those that are not familiar with my life story, I recently moved my family out to the country and we have been subjected to all kinds of new and annoying things like well water, septic tanks, nosey good ol' boy neighbors, large bugs and most recently a rooster that crows around five AM every morning, including Saturdays and Sundays. My daughter could not understand why this was necessary as even us country folk have electricity and access to alarm clocks. I explained that the rooster was not aware of this and was just doing what roosters do although I too was growing weary of the early morning crowing. My daughter pulled out a piece of paper from Heaven knows where, probably the same place she hides her vegetables since she was two years old, and said she had been doing some research on the Internet and that I may find this interesting. I took the print out and read the following fact; Roosters cannot crow if they cannot extend their necks. Further down the page was an advertisement for a device you could install on a roosters neck to accomplish exactly that...how very interesting. My daughter said the device was priced reasonably considering the effect lack of sleep was having on her school work and most likely my production at work as was evidenced by the large amounts of macaroni and cheese we had been eating several times a week. I threw her one of my "watch it young lady" glares and told her that the price club had a special on Mac and Cheese that I simply could not pass up and used the old "there's starving kids in Africa" line that has about the same effect as my oft ignored glares these days. I did however, tell my daughter that I was very impressed with her research and promised I would speak with the neighbor about the crowing rooster. Considering how much I hate talking to the neighbors, I decided my best approach to solving this problem was to draft an official looking document, with the counties emblem and everything on it, and mail it to said neighbor pretending to be some bureaucrat from city hall. The document described the laws governing disturbing the peace statutes along with information on where he could obtain the neck restraining device for the rooster in question. A few days later a real city official arrived at my door and informed me that impersonating a city official and creating false documents was a crime and did I care to shed any light on his current investigation into the matter. I began to shake uncontrollably as he produced an arrest warrant and threatened to haul me off to jail. Thankfully it was right at this moment that the neighbor's rooster crowed and woke me up from this awful dream I was having. I don't know if we will ever get relief from this rooster as the average life span of these annoying creatures is 12-14 years. My stupid cat is afraid of the darn thing and refuses to eat him. I've been unable to get a clear shot at that bobbing head of his with my son's bb gun, and although I offered to pay for the neck restraining device, my neighbor took offense to me suggesting that we silence his pride and joys early morning wake up songs and slammed the screen door in my face (country folk slam screen doors instead of real ones and the effect is laughable at best). What in the heck is wrong with people out here? I must be careful though as I noticed grass growing high under my used car parked out by the tool shed. Junk cars parked behind the house seems to be the first sign of a person going "country" and I'm thinking mighty hard about selling my used Toyota to that girl Trish. For more from the mind of myla, go to http://www.mylamadson.com
Permalink Comments (12) June 20th… I Finally Used My Mother's Day PresentPosted Friday, June 20, 2008 (16 days 7 hours ago.) Viewed 614 times. Divorced mothers tend to get gypped on Mother's Day because dad no longer feels compelled, or more accurately, required to take the little ones shopping to ensure a proper gift is purchased for the gal who gives so much of herself to so many people. I have received more school Mother's Day projects, coupons for future chores I know they will never actually do, and dollar store trinkets that fall apart when I unwrap the newspaper the kids deliver them in, than I can shake a stick at. This past Mother's Day was no exception. My son, who managed to save about a dollar of his total year's allowance, bought me a package of gum wrapped in some brightly colored construction paper secured snuggly with about a mile of Scotch tape. I don't even like gum or allow the cheap little gift giver to chew it either, so I had no idea why he thought this gift would be appropriate. The price was right I'm sure and you can get a pack of gum just about anywhere, at anytime, even on the morning of one of my least favorite of all holidays... Mother's Day. Since the entire year is basically "spend the day with your kid's day", I thought this year for Mother's Day I would treat myself to a day at the spa, followed by a night at the movies after a wonderfully fulfilling steak dinner... alone! Which, of course I was unable to do because this was not dad's weekend and my mother nearly fainted at my suggestion that she watch them while I selfishly treated myself to a little rest and relaxation. Of course my daughter is old enough to watch them but considering the gum in the hair trauma my youngest experienced the last time I left them all alone and hence the no gum rule, I didn't want to just create more work for myself repairing whatever damage may have been done while I was out. So, I got stuck spending Mother's Day with the kids, just like every other day of the year and not one decent present to show for it. Now, before you think me so callous, I was already taught a lesson by powers higher than myself. Yesterday, more than a month after the day in question, I found my son crying alone in his room. I usually pretend not to notice these things and back away as slowly and quietly as possible, but I tripped over the boulder my daughter gave me for Christmas last year as a much needed doorstop, and crashed into an end table littered with home-made clay ashtrays and assorted paper weights from holidays past. My son came out of his room, wiping away the tears from his wet face and I felt so bad for him I cleaned the mess up myself as he told me what was wrong. To my horror, he was upset that I had not used my Mother's Day present. "Of course I had", I lied "I chewed a piece just the other day at work". You see, I do know my children have feelings and I took a couple of sticks out of the pack on the way to work shortly after getting his lovely gift so he would know I appreciated it. He shook his head no, the tears flowing freely once again. "Last night you made dinner", he sobbed, "and you cut up the onions and you were crying and I got upset because I don't like to see you crying because it reminds me of when daddy left...and,and.." He couldn't even finish his sentence he was crying so badly, and for the life of me I had no idea what he was going on about. I asked him what me cutting up onions had to do with his giving me gum for Mother's Day and he said through the sobs, "Didn't you read the card"? Uh, the card? I had not seen a card, I swear it to you all. He said he had written a card on the inside of the wrapping paper and that he had spent almost a week getting it just right. Okay, here is a great time to interject that me being environmentally irresponsible is not entirely a bad thing. It generally takes me at least six weeks or so to fill up the recycling bin and there was about a one in fifty or so chance that I had unknowingly tossed his carefully crafted letter there. Please, please let this be the one time I remembered to recycle. I dug through the bin and by God's good grace I found the wrapping paper/slash Mother's Day card, but almost wish I hadn't. Here is what it said: Happy Mother's Day Mommy. I thought about what to get you and figured the best I could do was to try and make you happy, but according to dad I would never be able to afford it. So, I figured some more and thought that if I could do something to keep you from crying that ought to be just as good. I know when you cook dinner sometimes and cut up onions you cry a lot. I know you are not sad but it makes me think about when you were so you must feel that way to. I learned on the T.V. that if you chew gum when you cut onions you won't cry so I just thought that would be the best Mother's day present of all. I Love you, happy Mother's day! Oh my. My little man had actually given me about the best present a mom could ever hope for. I promised to bring home some more onions and we would give it a try and you know what, it actually worked! Maybe I just convinced myself it would because there was no way on God's green earth I was going to shed a tear in front of him. I've since collected all my "cheap" gifts and stored them in a place where they will always be safe because each one was given out of love by the most wonderful children a mom could ever hope to spend each and every day of the year with especially Mother's Day. P.S. My only regret is I did not have this story available for the Mother's Day contest SearchWarp had a while back, I just know it would have come in second or third! Go to http://www.MylaMadson.com to read more from the mind of Myla.
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