Wednesday, August 26, 2009
We had a landscaping Dude, (artist, engineer, whatever they're called), over to the house last night and I wanted to punch him in the face.
We're needing a makeover for our yard and My Hubby liked this Lawn Dude's work and wanted me to see his portfolio.
I wasn't even aware Landscape Dudes had portfolios. I thought they just had plants and shovels and trailers hitched to their trucks which they drive at incredibly slow speeds, usually without any brake lights. (It's the one commonality I've found in Landscape Dudes, their driving is terrible. I think it's all the sun and the fertilizer.)
This guy had a fancy slide show on his laptop displaying all the lawns he's designed.
Everybody's going high-tech these days. Pretty soon the roofers will be going around with their laptops and slide shows, showing off all their roof work.
So, this guy had a lovely green thumb, no doubt. I didn't have any problem with his plant work, it was just his idiocy and obviously poor skills at judging age.
We were sitting there, admiring the laptop slide show . . . well, the men were sitting there watching the plant slide show, I was busy flitting back and forth, multi-tasking between signing all the forms my high schooler had for me from her first day of school, helping my middle schooler out with her homework and running back to look at stupid plants.
Since at times I was holding up the slide show, I apologized to the Landscape Dude, explaining to him that the chaos was due to the first week of school. He mentioned that his son had just started at a local middle school and I commented that I had gone to that same middle school.
And this landscaper Dude looks at me with his big, fat, bristly mustache, (I hate big, fat, bristly mustaches, the ones that look like walrus mustaches. I like goatees and the regular kind of mustache, but something about a beefy mustache by itself smacks of porn star), and he says, "Oh, you must have been like my parents. They went there when it was the high school, too."
If I'd had a minute to think about it, I would have shoved him off the bar stool and told him to F*#@k off and take his porno, icky mustache with him.
The middle school was, at one time, our town's high school, but they converted into a jr high when I was a TODDLER. I was still in diapers, ignorant of the ABC's, when it was the local high school.
And this porno, Lawn Dude was no spring chicken himself. I'd say he was maybe, five years younger than me, if that.
Pushing him off the barstool, would have been a better option, but I was so shocked I just gasped. I couldn't remember what I said exactly I was so dismayed, but my Hubby felt the need to remind me of this whole episode over and over again today and he said I hissed like a snake when I said, "What are you talking about! I'm not that old, Dude!"
He was a little bit sheepish, but not enough in my book.
I told My Hubby this morning not to hire him. If he guesses that I'm 15 years older than I am, well he's just going to have to take his pornstache business, elsewhere.
I had to have a glass of wine to get over his comment.
It was as bad as the time a little kid dressed like Woody the cowboy ruined my Halloween. Odawg was little and her trick or treating never lasted more than a few houses. She was at the age where she enjoyed giving out the candy more than she did begging for it.
A pack of kids came to the door and she and I were tossing candy into their open bags, when this one little dipshit said, "Are you gonna have a baby?"
My voice came out like a whimpering squeak when I said, "No! No! I'm not having a baby!"
His mother immediately clamped her hand over the little Woody's mouth, almost smothering the poor kid as he tried to speak and said, "I'm so sorry. He's three."
Like that was going to make up for anything.
I don't give a crap how few brain cells he had yet, his mother should have drilled it into him, NEVER, NEVER, NEVER ask a woman that. Even if she looks 9 months pregnant with twins—hint around! Come out with a, "Soooo, anything new?"
Asking a woman if she's pregnant is worse than walking through fire, man. Just Don't.
I yelled to the mom as she dragged her muffled, trying to breathe, Woody away, "I did have a baby, just two months ago! And this is a peasant dress, a quite deceptive piece of clothing, on even the skinniest people, I'll have you know!"
Some men are just too stupid, no matter if they're a toddler in Woody chaps or a Lawn Dude with a pornstache. Unbelievably stupid.
Besides being called ma'am and being mistaken for someone eligible for the AARP, I've found another recent unsettling discovery to my age.
It's the older thing.
I noticed it a few years ago.
My beautiful niece Marie, before she grew up and flew away, used to spend every summer with us. She is and will always be my fourth daughter. She decided one summer when she was 16 and I was...older that she wanted to join me on my daily bike ride. I had nothing to offer her but little girl bikes, so we went down to a neighbor's house, a very fit, very handsome military man who was awfully swell to watch when he was mowing his lawn without his shirt on. I knew he had bikes and I liked to take every opportunity I could to talk to him. We walked down to his house and knocked on the door. He answered, shirtless. I'm thinking now, he must have known how swell he looked, because he seemed to spend many a moment shirtless. He very generously pointed us in the direction of his bike.
As we walked his bike down to my house, I sighed, "Isn't he hot?"
Marie looked at me, like I'd just asked her if Nick Nolte in his mug shot was hot.
She went. "Um. I gueeesss, if you like old, hairy dudes."
I was crushed. My niece was sophisticated. She'd walked out of Pirates of the Caribbean, swooning like me over Johnny Depp instead of a teenager's right to Orlando Bloom. This guy wasn't hairy... well, maybe a little- but he certainly wasn't old! He was my age.
Fast Forward to last week. The Hubby and I went up to one of our fave dining holes, a little upscale Mexican restaurant. We have a regular waiter there, a dashing, young Hispanic man who kisses me on both cheeks every time we come in. He was moving away the last time we went in and we were sad to see him go.
We had a new waitress, a young girl who was good, she just wasn't a kisser. In the midst of making my tableside guacamole, I asked her about our waiter, if he'd moved away yet. She couldn't picture him. I was describing him to her and she said, "Oh right, the older gentlemen with the heavy Spanish accent?"
I was all, "Nooo, he's not an older gentleman. He's probably 30-32."
And she's all, "Yeah, the older gentleman."
Dear Lord. When did this happen?
The President is now the same age as me. The Hubby and I are now the parents at the high school football game. The children that now populate the clubs are immature assholes and their music is stupid. I know the words to the Muzak at the grocery store. Lawn Dudes with pornstaches are mistaking me for 60 year olds. I'm called Ma'am everyfreakinwhere I go. Some of my friends on FB are grandparents. And the other day, I found myself picking the comfortable shoe to wear instead of the really, fabulous stiletto, because, I told my daughter, "This one gives me better arch support."
She said, "Mom. No. I won't let you do this." And made me wear the stiletto. My arches killed me all night.
Oy Vey. Pass me the cottage cheese and wrap around sunglasses. I'm done for.
Today's Download: "Wouldn't It Be Nice" by the Beach Boys. I'm old enough to remember all of the Beach Boys tune and I remember thinking, "Wouldn't It Be Nice if We Were Older..." Now, all I can think is, "No, it wouldn't. It freakin wouldn't!"
But, mainly because this is one of the most perfect songs ever made. It is said that Brian Wilson drove himself mad trying to capture the harmonies in his head. If this is what is lies inside a musical genius's brain, let me live there. I'm not sure, Internet, if you've ever really sat down and listened, really listened to this song, but it is pure gorgeousness, so complex and full of harmonious sound. I simply adore this song.
I gotta go to the grocery store. Maybe they're playing this or maybe if I'm really lucky, it'll be some Donna Summer or even a little Pink Floyd.
I'm gettin down tonight at the Publix.
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1 comment:
Hilarious! I received the "do you have a baby in your tummy" questions from a 3-year-old recently & promptly threw away the dress I was wearing. The blessing & curse that is the empire waste. I also was looking at a friend's bio on FB the other day & saw they were 30. I thought, I'd love to be 30 again. You're right, when did this happen?!
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