She Wanted to Call 911 But She Didn't Know The Number

People keep telling me not to blog about them, but they keep giving me great material, so how can I not? Well, here I go again, disguising somebody else (or is it the same somebody – you'll never know).

Beebeeshababa was alone in her apartment when she heard a noise outside. When she ran to the window, she saw a couple of strange men trying to break into her SUV. She panicked. She had already had her CD player stolen and she wasn't about to lose something else.

So Beebeeshababa grabbed her phone to call the police. Again and again, she tried and she tried to call the police. Again and again she failed and she failed to reach them.

In desperation she called her best friend Shalalala and cried, "I keep calling 911 but it doesn't work for me. Can you call it?"

Shalalala was mystified. "How could it not work for you?"

And Beebeeshababa, who couldn't believe her best friend was wasting precious time, while her SUV was getting ransacked, cried some more, "I don't know, but it doesn't? Can you do it for me, please?"

But Shalalala wouldn't let it go. "It's impossible for 911 not to work, Beebeeshababa. What exactly are you dialing?"

"1-815-911."

How Sushi Became an iPhone

Every year as a combination birthday/Christmas present, my son and his family fly me out to visit them in Oceanside, California. Usually, because my daycare job doesn't allow me to stay longer than a weekend, I am there for only 3 days at the most. This year, however, I was lucky enough to spend 5 days with them!

I've missed a lot of my son's life over the years. As a U.S. Marine who was born in Illinois (where I live) and who is now living in California, Greg was stationed in North Carolina and has been to Japan (for a year), to Thailand (for several months), to Iraq (four times), and to Kuwait (twice) – so whenever I am given the opportunity to spend time with him and his family, it never matters what we do, where we go, what we eat – what matters is that I am spending time with him and with them.

One night we were discussing what to eat for dinner and everybody (I thought) decided on Chinese. Fine by me. As I said, it doesn't matter to me where we eat or what we eat.

So when we pulled in front of a sushi restaurant, I thought, hmm, well, I must have missed this part of the conversation. I've never had sushi, but if this is what the family has decided, I'll try it. Greg was the only one to get out of the car, so I assumed we were picking up the sushi (and not the Chinese) and taking it home.

Then Greg asked me if I wanted to go with him. Well, yeah – anything to spend time together, even if it's just picking up sushi from the local sushi stop. But as I was getting out of the car Michelle warned, "You'd better bring your purse. You'll need your ID."

Oh, OK. They NEVER ask me to pay for anything and, as a matter of fact, REFUSE to allow me to pay for anything, so I was more than willing to foot the bill for dinner. But why would I need an ID to purchase it?

Well, come to think of it, this IS California, and I've heard that sometimes people die from eating sushi, so maybe the state of California is keeping track of who is eating it.

Yes, I really do think that way.

But we walked past the sushi restaurant and into a store that sells iPhones. What? We're not eating sushi?

No, we're getting you an iPhone. Their reason for giving me an extra present was that they were "paying me" to watch the kids. I don't think I'm senile (though I'm sure somebody in my family would argue with me about that). I honestly don't remember ever doing anything that would require them to pay me for doing it.

So this is my reasoning: I take the kids to the park and I get an iPhone. What would they give me if I took the kids to the zoo? A laptop? Or how about a trip to Disneyland? My own plane?

Still this is the greatest toy ever (besides my computer)! And I am so grateful to them for receiving it.

So – Greg, Michelle, Taylor, Kaden, and Zac, thank you thank you thank you – for the trip, for always making me feel welcome, and for giving me another way to keep in touch with you.

Photo of sushi is from Wikimedia Commons. Photo of iPhone is from Apple.

Sarah, This Blog's For You

Every time something happens to a family member or friend that could be construed as being even a tiny bit embarrassing, looks dart in my direction and voices command me, "DO NOT blog about this."

So you don't know even a tenth of the stuff I COULD be writing, although I do manage to write about some of my friends and family anyway by disguising the person enough so that anybody outside the family won't know anything, which makes blogging completely pointless. (You can read more about that HERE.)

But I ramble.

So imagine my surprise when one of my granddaughters, Sarah, said, "Grandma, how come you blog about so and so and so and so, but you never blog about me or my brothers?" I don't remember blogging about her sister, either, but the fact that she left her sister out means I must have, but I have forgotten. I'll have to look at all my blogs to find her.

In my defense, I'm hardly ever with her brothers and sister or her and her family, so it's hard to write about something WHEN NOBODY TELLS ME WHAT'S HAPPENING! Also, EVERYBODY LIVES TOO FAR AWAY!

And yet – I do remember blogging about one of her brothers HERE – it was my first (and only – so far) video blog. Maybe Sarah missed that one.

(Use Ellen's voice here) anyway, I decided to blog about Sarah. You see her above with her husband and daughter. Sarah looks like her mommy (my oldest baby – who just celebrated her 40th birthday – I wrote about her HERE), and Ayla, Sarah's daughter, looks just like her mommy. All three of them are so much alike in so many ways, in fact, that I call them the Clone Heads.

OK, I really don't call them the Clone Heads.

And now to relate a Sarah story to you: Once upon a time in a tiny village waaaay south of Chicago, Sarah's grandma bought a trailer in June the year Sarah was born. Sarah, who was born that following December, and her mommy and daddy (before her three brothers were born), lived in an apartment in Chicago.

When Sarah, who always saw everything as food, was finally able to articulate her thoughts, she looked intently as we drove down the street and asked, "Why do we live in a cracker house and you live in a hot dog house?"

And I wanted to say, "How come you see everything as food? Do your parents never feed you?"

But I didn't. So we went to my house where I fed her crackers and hot dogs.

The truth is I wish blogging had been around when they were little, because now, when I remember things that happened, I don't remember who they happened TO. For instance, was it Sarah in this scenario:

I always tickled (still do) my grandchildren and said things like, "You silly little goof ball." And then one of them – was it Sarah? – said to me once, "You silly little football."

Now that I think about it, it couldn't have been Sarah, because a football isn't a food item.

Wanna Be My Friend

While visiting my son and his family this past week, I spent some time at their local park with my grandchildren. My grandson, Kaden, whenever he saw somebody he thought would make a great buddy, would say, "Wanna be my friend? I'm 4. I'm Kaden."

As you might expect, he never lacked for friends. One day, as he went through his introduction, one little boy responded, "I'm 6. My name is Clark Kent."

How appropriate, I thought. Of all the characters on the planet, or in that case, the Daily Planet, what better choice than a Superman character for my grandson to know! Kaden's daddy, a Superman/Smallville fan, would be proud to know his son was a friend of Clark Kent's.

Clark Kent's mom put her youngest son in the swing next to my other grandson, Zac, and we talked. I told her about how her son had introduced himself as Clark Kent. Guess what? That's his real name. Mom drew the line though, when her husband wanted to name his baby brother aLEXander, though. You can take being a fan only so far.

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