Unrelated details

It's been a bad week. Instead of updating, I will share ridiculous things. It's truly the greatest gift. Ridiculous things, I mean. Exactly.

Claire wants to sue the ice cream man. Every afternoon he rides around our neighborhood, teasing the kids with that canned, jewelry-box-music version of "How Much is That Dog in the Window," and PASSES UP our street. Claire, Emma and Christopher stand in our driveway waving and hollering, and the dude still passes us up. The other day Claire had taken just about all she could stand.

"He can see us too," Claire fumed. "He passes us up on purpose! I'll sue!"
"You'll sue?" I said, giggling.
She frowned at me. She wasn't kidding.
"I'm not kidding," she said.

Pity the ice cream man who crosses my daughter. She has a good argument. One could suggest that she stand on another street to catch him, but he never comes around at the same time, and once she hears the music she's only got a minute or so to scramble around the house for money and dash outside.

That was the exciting thing about the icecream man. By the time I heard the music there was only thirty seconds or so to successfully beg my parents for money and run out the door. It was like a race. But of all the times I missed him, I never thought about filing suit. Of course, I never experienced the snub that my children endure every afternoon. My old ice cream man would atleast turn down my street. Honestly, in this economy can he afford NOT to hit every street?

Anyway, I'll let you know how Cancienne vs. Mr. Freezie turns out. Speaking of letting you know things, I never gave you a report on my night out last Friday. I had a great time. Fred is the bassist for a band called The Fuzzy Dice. They cover 50's/60's rock n' roll/rockabilly, like Elvis, Buddy Holly and stuff like that. When liquored up enough I can get up and dance. Last Friday, before I mustered the courage to do that (or before I was tipsy enough) a scary lady took my hands and pulled me off my chair onto the dance floor. She wore a green dress and had long, bleached blonde hair and tanned, leathery skin. She danced with her back to the band, all the better to (Christy and I supposed) shake her ass in their faces. Her dancing prompted one audience member to say, "All she's missing is a pole."

Dancing with her was awkward because my style of dancing is...well, different. It's not meant to turn anyone on, it's meant to try not to turn anyone off as much as possible. I've always felt too big to dance, unless I was in a mosh pit. Moshing is just slamming into someone else. Dancing has grace. Or atleast it's supposed to. When I first start dancing I feel stiff and I'm never sure what to do with my arms. I felt this way with the pole dancer until my third gin and tonic. I was still selfconscious, but mildly so. Christy began dancing with us after a while too. Unfortunately, so did the guy with the missing teeth.

This guy didn't talk much. He just danced with me, Christy and Pole Dancer, with this huge, toothless grin on his face. It was like being cornered by a dentures advertisement. But it wasn't just that he was missing teeth. Everyone, including me, will eventually reach an age when we'll have more gums than bite. This guy had that dirty old man feel about him, and he wasn't even that old. It was in the way he danced. His face was confident, but his body didn't seem to understand what he was trying to do with it. His arms and legs jerked around as if each appendenge was tring to escape. His hips swung from side to side in a tragic Elvis impression during "Heartbreak Hotel."

What added to the classiness of the whole experience was when Pole Dancer leaned in towards me and Christy and yelled (refering to the band), "Aren't they cute as shit?"

"Uh, yeah," me and Christy said.
"I'm a grandmother," she added for no reason.
"Oh," I said.
"I've got three grandkids."
"I've got three kids," I told her.
"And I've got four of my own kids," she said.
"Yeah?"
"And one on the way."
"...Oh."

Me and Christy couldn't figure out if she meant that she was pregnant or if one of her kids was expecting. Since she was smoking, drinking, and hitting on the drummer we hoped it was the latter.

So yeah, it was fun. The band played great and I got to hear Fred sing "Hang on Sloopy." Christy and I had fun dancing and joking around. Christy, am I forgetting any details (that aren't about me)? Do I embellish a tad, or do I hit the evening on the nose? It's always interesting to blog about something when someone who was there is reading it!