Author: The Jody

As everyone should on Memorial Day weekend, we spent most of yesterday driving to the Vermont Country Store in Rockingham VT. Cause if you have cheese money and a need to buy soap that you can’t buy anywhere else, this should be your destination. If you haven’t been there, it’s hard to explain, but to me, it’s just one of the best stores ever. Penny candy, barrels of pickles, samples cheese, crackers, jams, sauces, etc. etc. are in every aisle. (Yesterday I had samples of 4 kinds of cheese, cashew butter, dill dip, green tomato pickelilly (I have no idea how you spell that), artichoke hummus, some kind of sweet dip (there was no card) and venison summer sausage. I mean, it’s heaven for folks who like single bites of food on little hard crackers.

We got a cup for making slushies at home, candy, pickles, cheese, two boxes of oyster crackers. Junior got a mood ring. We wanted to get a tabletop hockey game but my dad and Mr. Dump wouldn’t let either me or my mom buy it. Boo to them. I wanted to buy one for a family Christmas present last year and couldn’t find one. I’m going to get one of these things if it’s the last thing I do!

All these items should be available at http://www.vermontcountrystore.com. But really, you need to go up there yourself, and then keep driving another couple of miles to Chester VT where you should have lunch at Raspberries and Thyme. You will not regret it!

When I was a young lass (not that long ago, thank you) I was a Girl Scout. I really liked being a Scout, and one of the things we did was march in the Leominster Memorial Day Parade. One year we sang patriotic songs at the Elks (for the Elks). The parade was cool, though, because you felt soooo important. I got to be the flag bearer one year – I think because I was the tallest girl in my troop.

But the songs we sang were the old standby classics – This Land is Your Land, America, etc. etc. This morning I went to a Memorial Day Extravaganza at Junior’s school. 218 (!) second graders sang for about 40 minutes. It was, and I’m not just saying this, a really fantastic show. I didn’t really know most of the songs, and that helped. The fact that my kid was in it also helped, but I think I would have enjoyed it anyway. And my God, when 218 little voices first start singing, if you don’t get a lump in your throat you are an evil soulless person. It was just very touching.

I’m glad that we had some soldiers there as special guests – I like that the kids actually understand what it’s all about. So even though it’s early, I just want to say thank you to all our Veterans, our enlisted men and women, and those who have gone on before us. Happy Memorial Day.

Update: I was seated fairly far, and didn’t have the big camera because I was going straight to work after. I got pictures and all the kids’ eyes appear to be glowing white. Freaked me right the hell out.

I think one of the medicines I take has the side effect of “hallucinations”. Not in the Movie of the Week sense, but in the “I wake up freaking out because I thought I just saw a skunk crawling around on my bedside table.”

Yes, that’s right.

Poor Mr. Dump. He just puts up with my waking him up to take care of things that aren’t actually happening in real life. Usually these “dreams” take the form of me thinking there is something in the bedroom that shouldn’t be there. People. Bugs. Small animals. 80% of the time, I jump up and start flailing my arms because a spider or some other bug is just about to land on my face. About 20-30 seconds after the freakout, I realize what it was (nothing!) and calm myself back down. And apologize to my husband for shoving him to wake him up so we can sneak out of the room before the skunk on the nightstand notices us.

Oy.

My dining room table is a mosquito-free zone. I know that because I can smell Junior’s citronella bracelet. I think it’s over on the other side of the table but I’m too lazy to hunt it down. But I can smell it, so that means no mosquitos will bother us while we’re eating dinner inside the house. Cool, huh?

I am not selling anything, don’t worry. Unless you want to buy something. You tell me what I have that you want to buy, and how much you want to pay for it, and I’ll sell it to you. Say for instance, you want to buy my Emeril page. That’s cool, I’d consider letting it go if the price was right. So you write a number down on a piece of paper and slide it across the table. I’ll let you know what I think. I may write down a different number and slide the paper back across to you.

Actually, I only wrote that down because Mr. Dump just sent me an email letting me know that Staples is having a big sale today, and I was driving around Sunday evening looking to buy some HP 4×6 photo paper. Target was out, and Staples and Office Max were closed. I was forced to go into Barnes and Noble and spend all my cheese money on books. But I still need the photo paper.