DOD

Delicate little daisy petals--

Do you have pet names for those you love? Your parents, your siblings, your progeny, your piece, your pets (hell, even my pet has pet names!)?

My sister and I call our dad "DOD." Stands for Dear Old Dad. Anyway, last Thursday, DOD called me at the worst possible time. Each day last week was worse than the day before, and Thursday was just awful. How awful? At 9 am, I got my feelings hurt so badly that I promised myself that I would hold it together the rest of the day and treat myself to dinner in a wine glass and tears for dessert.

Look--I try to stay upbeat. Everybody's got their own problems and they don't need to hear about mine AND things usually don't seem so bad once some time passes, so I try to keep a sense of humor and I sometimes gloss over my hurt feelings. But Thursday was not a gloss-over kind of day.

My bottom lip was quivering as I pulled in the garage. The first tear fell as I checked the mail, and I cried for the whole duration of Lucy's end-of-day Glamour Walk. I poured my dinner and headed upstairs to change, but I just sat on the edge of the bed and cried. (Awesome, right? Don't you SO want to be friends and hang out with me???)

Anyway, pretty much as soon as I sat down, DOD called. I answered with a quivery, measly "hello," and when DOD asked me if everything was alright...well, the flood gates opened. I BOO HOOed, y'all. And DOD just kept saying, "Aww, hun...aww, hun." DOD's "aww, huns" are like hugs from Jesus.

And since the feedback is pretty good on my "as my dear old granddad would say" posts--and in honor of DOD--here are some words of wisdom for you kittens. Lean on these when you need strength (or a snappy comeback...zzzzzzzzzzzzzing!!!).

Don't get all wrapped around the axle over this. DOD uses this expression when he thinks you're too worked up over something.

The sun don't shine on the same ass every day. Attributed to "Grandaddy Maples," provided by my dear associate William. This is just a warning to be nice, because what goes around comes around.

DOD's mother (MeMa) had the following advice about men:
If it's got tires or testicles, it's going to give you problems.
If a woman steals your man, the meanest thing you can do to her is let her have him.

And my sister reminded me of this one, a way to show that you'd really, really prefer to not do something: I'd rather drink turpentine and piss on a brush fire.

Sometimes it's all in the pronunciation. DOD pronounces the word "intense" not as "inTENSE," but as "IN. TENSE"--same stress on each syllable, as if it's two words. I told him about this here excuse for a blog and he said, "Well. Ain't that IN.TENSE."

DOD's gift for words and delivery has become legendary, at least in our family. Last summer, as I was describing some fool's unbelievable craziness to my sister, she said in total disbelief, "My God. His cheese has plumb slid off his cracker." As soon as she heard herself say that, she exclaimed, "Oh, God! I've turned into DOD!"

Keep 'em comin', bleadership--what words and phrases do you love to quote?

And thanks for suffering through my "woe is me" post. Y'all are the BEST bleaders!