ME: I like this castle you drew.

HIM: It’s a prison.

I. Yesterday morning Jo didn’t eat her cereal. When I asked her why, she said it smelled “like Little Dude’s cage and tasted funny.” Little Dude is the class mouse, who recently came to stay with us while his regular summer caretakers were on vacation.

(He only escaped from his rolly ball and almost got lost in our laundry room once!)

(Honestly? I kind of miss having him here. As long as you stayed downwind, it was fun to check in on him and see what he was doing. Usually, he was building himself burrows and hiding places with cedar shavings.)

(However, I was also relieved to see him go, because he’s at least two years old, and how long do pet mice live anyway?)

II. Opie made one of those paper cootie-catcher/fortune-tellers at camp. These are the fortunes in it:

• You will be a superstar.
• You are a superhero.
• You will have a trampoline.
• You will turn into a mouse.

At the beginning of the year, Jeff received a personalized calendar from a vendor. We both thought this was a bit of an odd choice for a grown man. When is the last time anyone over 13 got excited about seeing their name spelled out in letters made of flamingos (May) or fireworks (January)? We’re all familiar with the power of mail-merge by now, and the personalization bloom is off the rose. Way off, given how much it’s abused by emailers who are lazy (“Dear Mommy Blogger”) or too quick with the trigger finger (“Dear <name>”).

But here’s a tip. If you are going to distribute a personalized calendar, one that says “Designed and produced especially for … ” at the bottom of every page in addition to the flamingos and whatever the heck?

You might want to make sure you are spelling the person’s name right. Or else he and his wife are going to laugh at you for an entire year, because his name is not JEFFERY.

One-oh-one, folks.

Because really, the only words I can come up with are “conjoined” and “Duggars” and “ouch” and “WHY?”

And for those who have been anxiously awaiting the answer, the animal is a cheetah. If you voted for that, or wanted to but were confused by my intro, you win. You also win if you picked leopard, because I concede that those two can look quite similar. The overwhelming answer we get out in the world is … tiger. Stripes, spots, what’s the diff?

Both Julie and Liz have written recently about their passion for writing, and how their blogs provide an important outlet for that writing.

Me, not so much. I can write. I do it all day long, in fact, and I like my job. But on this blog, writing isn’t about perfecting my craft, or even working through thorny problems or surging emotions.

It’s about telling stories. Five years’ worth, and counting. I’ve saved up a few from the last few weeks (when I’ve been busy doing who knows what, instead of blogging), if you’d like to hear them.

*

Jeff and I went to an event at a local community college, a fundraiser put on by the culinary students. Five teams presented five different themed buffets. I’m not sure who decided on these themes: Europe (that’s not at all broad and sweeping, or anything?), Mexico, Hawaii (but not, like, poi and pu pu platters; it was all desserts), Las Vegas (truly! have a crab cake), and … wait for it … Jersey Shore. This turned out to mean mini corned beef sandwiches, cheesesteaks (scandal! I refuse to eat cheesesteaks outside of the city of Philadelphia), and some kind of chowder.

So the Mexican food was the clear winner, and the volcano surrounding the chocolate fountain at the Hawaii table was a nice touch. But better than all of that was one fellow diner/buffet grazer. Although Mayberry is a small town, it is by no means cowboy country. But this man was fully committed to Western wear. He wore a cowboy hat, boots, jeans, huge belt buckle, string tie, and one of those leather jackets with the triangles on the back. But that wasn’t all. He also had the longest handlebar mustache I’ve seen on someone who wasn’t a cartoon character. It extended several inches out on either side of his face and was waxed to a fare-thee-well.

Come to think of it, his name might have been Rusty.

I must preface this by saying I don’t think we eat out all that often. Maybe once a month. And yet:

That right there is 50 plastic cups acquired via kids’ meals at restaurants. Not shown are the two or three more that are in use/in the fridge/in the dishwasher/under the beds/in the car.

I send these things out into the backyard in the summer and hope they won’t come back. I use them to rinse paint brushes and hope they’ll get stained enough to toss. I pack snacks in them for school (because I have 50 matching lids, too, you know) and hope they get forgotten.

AND YET. FIFTY.

Obviously I have a hoarding problem. But they’re not the right kind of plastic to recycle and am I just supposed to throw them away? I guess I spent too many years eating cereal out of margarine tubs. Because getting rid of these perfectly! good! cups! just sounds sinful to me.

… and on the loose. Must be why I found this AP news item so funny:

Wausau authorities have rescued and arrested a drunken man who plunged into the Wisconsin River while chasing a one-legged goose.

The 40-year-old Wausau man told officers he wanted to catch the bird and roast it. He says he took off his shirt and shoes Thursday afternoon and jumped into the frigid water.

Authorities say he was overcome by the cold water and had to be rescued by firefighters. Police say the man had been drinking heavily before the stunt.

Police tell the Wausau Daily Herald that as far as they know, the goose is still on the loose.

You know when you first started blogging or tweeting, your mind began to filter everything into blog post fodder and 140-character bursts of brilliance/mediocrity? (Surely that wasn’t just me. Right?) So now that I finally joined Facebook, I keep coming up with one-liners that sound like Facebook groups or fan pages (or “like” pages or whatever they are).

So far:

• Before the Internet we called the New York Public Library reference desk to ask random questions
• When my chips are too small to dip I stir them into the salsa and eat them with a spoon
• Remember that show with the laughing daisies called the Chuckle Patch?
• Parents against ice cream trucks
• Save a letter, save a word: There is no “e” in “scary” or “tasty”

Bonus points (and sympathy) if you instantly know what show I’m talking about. You can also go here for more goofy pictures.