Monday miscellany

1. I think fried eggs are inherently funny. I'm not sure why, but toy fried eggs and pictures of fried eggs usually make me smile. Forks also strike me as slightly funny, though not as funny as fried eggs. (And of course sporks are funny, but that's more obvious.)
   
   
2. On Saturday Cartoon Network had a phone-in contest to win a $30 Transformers toy, and my 6-year-old was one of only 100 kids nationwide to win one. The same day, my husband won a $20 "Wii Points" card from the Wendy's contest where they give contest codes on their drink cups. (I think it's good for buying old-style games for the Wii, so when we get a Wii, and someday we will...we can use it.) Not to miss out on the good luck, my brother got offered a full-time job (a Hollywood job!) that day, after being out of steady work for quite a while.
   
   
3. If your restaurant chain sells a drink called a Frosty and for more than 25 years, the only flavor it came in was chocolate, then chocolate should still be the default flavor when someone orders a Frosty from you, even if you've recently started selling vanilla ones, too. Just saying...
   
   
4. Also, if a vending machine is sold out of the drink you want, it should give you back your money instead of making you buy a drink you don't want. Especially if nearly all the other drinks in the machine are also sold out, so you have to get a diet soda, which you don't drink (I wrote down the code from the bottle cap and threw the drink away).
   
   
5. Today we took the older kids to Vacation Bible School at the church where they both started preschool, nearly 7 years ago in the case of my oldest. What a blast from the past! I ran into 3 different people I'd known (from elsewhere!) years ago, and also saw the teachers who taught my son's 2-year-old class, now that he's almost 9. After dropping them off, we had some great breakfast burritos...and speaking of blasts from the past, and soda, I also had an RC Cola in a glass bottle!
   
   
6. 12-packs of Dr Pepper (my lifeblood) no longer exist. After 3 stores including Walmart didn't have them, I mentioned it to the convenience store clerk, who told me they were all taken away, & were going to be replaced with 8-packs. Coke will apparently be doing the same. (I'm sure we'll soon be paying as much for them as for 12-packs...and I'll need 3 hands to carry 24 cans.)
   
   
7. My sweet, rarely-crying baby has been replaced with a wildly restless, active, and frustrated one who will probably not calm down or stop moving and kicking until he finally learns to crawl, walk, or run! He's only 4 months old now, so I don't know whether to hope this happens soon or not...but he longs to be on the move.
   
   
8. I heard the song "Hey There, Delilah" by the Plain White T's on the radio yesterday and thought it was sweet and catchy--the kind of song anyone would want written for them, so I bought it from iTunes today without even hearing it again first.
   
   
9. The above made me think that even though Elvis Costello's "Alison" is not the greatest song to have as your namesake song, I have had a song and several poems written for me in real life, and I'm happy about that. (Also, considering that I'm a writer and have written quite a few poems over the years, it's surprising how few poems I've written for other people, though there have been some.)
   
   
10. I think it would be really cool to have a '57 Chevy, a '63 Corvette convertible, or a '65 Mustang convertible. But my other dream car is a minivan! I loved my bright blue van and I really miss it. I also miss having a car with a power moonroof (which I had in my '84 Oldsmobile, once upon a time).
    
    
11. This morning I was annoyed with people for complaining about their (nice) vehicles when I'd be happy just to have 2 vehicles--or even 1 big enough or reliable enough vehicle--for our family of 5. Then I realized I'm not grateful enough for all the things I do have that other people may lack--children, a husband, a house, my eyesight and hearing, mobility, an education, a safe neighborhood, a computer, food, air conditioning, etc., etc. Now I'm feeling very appreciative for all that I do have, and I hope I can keep that perspective in mind!
    
    
12. In a Real Simple magazine section on favorite summer memories, a couple of people mentioned lazy drives, and rides in convertibles. I remember lots of lazy drives with my parents, often with stops for snow cones. I also remember one summer night in my teens, when I went for a ride late at night in my friend John's huge old yellow convertible (one of those 70s boat-sized cars) with him and another friend. We drove out towards nowhere with the top down, with no destination and no place else to be. I'm not sure that the guys were having much fun, but I felt free, like I was flying, without a care in the world. It's just a snapshot in my mind now, but it's still one of my favorite memories.