I had planned to complete this Randomly Thinking post two Fridays ago, but obviously I am behind. Part of the reason is a yard sale we decided to throw together the one week. Before you ask, it was a failure. Tons of work, aching feet, total exhaustion and almost no profit at all. I’ve now sworn off all yard sales. The one good thing about the sale was being able to meet so many interesting people.

First there was Bread Santa, then Chatty Motorcycle Guy, Negotiating Jersey Woman, The Grandpa Car Club, and a few other characters. I’ve decided to break the yard sale out into a separate post for either this weekend or early next week.

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My son showed me this cool interview with Elijah Wood where he had to eat hot wings while answering questions. There is some language in this one, if you are offended easily. I am sometimes, so that’s okay if you are.

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When I wrote my post about cats last week, I forgot to mention that six of my last seven pets have been all black or black and white. I have no idea why. Just worked out that way. In fact, the dog my family had as a child was also black and white.

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I believe I have mentioned this before on the blog, but I have a corn allergy. That means I can’t eat anything with corn. Corn is in everything, of course, due to high fructose corn syrup being such a cheap and popular sweetener. Our neighbors gave us some fresh New Jersey corn a couple of weeks ago and my kids were ecstatic since they don’t have a corn allergy.

My son pretended to make a sword out of an ear of corn and I joked with him that if he ever wants to keep me out of his room he could just line his door with corn. He took it a step further and said he would make corn syrup tipped arrows. That’s when I told him I am never buying him a bow and arrow.

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I watered my neighbor’s garden while they were gone. They have a metal water hose, which is very light, if you don’t drag the entire thing off in one pile and twist it up and then try to drag it all up the hill to water the garden, which then results in you having to untangle it all again to wind it up on the hose holder.

I ended up with this thing wrapped all around me, twisted different directions, and had to call my son for help to get untangled. My neighbors have a very lovely house, garden and backyard and I was petrified I would somehow damage it. While trying to untangle the hose, I knocked over their watering can and broke the top off of it. Luckily, I was able to fix it, but then I tripped and knocked a couple of bricks they had for decorations and I really started to panic. What else was I going to break?

My son agreed to help me water the rest of her lovely flowers, even though she hadn’t asked me to, and Little Miss said she wanted to help too. So, after we wound the hose back up, we headed toward the front of the house and when I turned, I noticed every single one of our animals was following along. The dog was off her lead, the all-black cat, Pixel, is allowed outside and the kitten had escaped and climbed up the neighbor’s tree in their front yard.

I felt like the Clampets in Beverly Hillbillies. My daughter was putting flowers that had “fallen off” the neighbors’ flower display in their fountain (“It fell off! It did!”), my dog was trying to get into their house to see if they were there, so she could beg a treat off them, and I was dragging the kitten from the tree all while hissing, “Get out of there! You are going to damage their beautiful tree!”

Next time they go on vacation, I’m going to suggest they ask someone else to help out. Someone who isn’t completely inept.

By the way, when they got home, they let me know the hose was so heavy and hard to untangle because I had left the water on and when water is going through it, it is heavier. Sigh.

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Our cat Pixel sometimes brings us dead mice, or at least leaves them dead on the back porch. My mom said cats are bringing you gifts when they bring you a dead animal they caught, so I guess that is what she is doing.

The other day my son went to bring the dog in, and the cat decided she would come in too. I heard this from where I was sitting in the living room, “No. Drop the mouse. You are not coming in here with that mouse.”

She dropped the mouse.

Straight in my husband’s work shoes.

Sadly, she retrieved it later.  We were hopeful my husband would find the mouse when he went to put his shoes on later in the week.

The week after that, my son and husband were in the yard across the road from our house, cleaning up from the yard sale when my son said they heard high pitched squealing. They turned and Pixel came out of the bushes with a mouse in her jaws.

The Boy said it was awful and her eyes were wild. Worse, she dropped the mouse, smacked it around several times, playing with it, then caught it again and then started to eat it in front of my husband and son.

“I’m traumatized,” my son told me. “I will always hear the squeals of that poor mouse while she tortured it. She’s brutal.”

She came in later and cuddled with him, her brutality behind her.

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The back of my ankle was cut a few weeks ago when the dog ran around me while on her lead and caught me, causing the lead to dig into my skin. I treated it every day for a couple of weeks and Little Miss enjoyed telling me that white blood cells were coming to help the cut heal. I have no idea how she knew that, but I was quite proud of her.

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The Boy has become quite sensitive to the cold and when we visited my parents’ pool recently, he decided within three minutes the water was too cold and he wanted to get out.

Little Miss, 6, almost 7, announced to him, “You’ll be fine! You just need to get acclimated!”

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The other day my husband told my son he was being dramatic to which my son replied, very dramatically, in a flawless British accent: “HOW DAAAARE YOU! I AM NOT DRAMATIC! I AM A PERFECTLY CALM PERSON, FATHER! I AM NOT DRAMATIC IN THE LEAST!”

For the record, our entire family is a bit dramatic at times, but none more so than my husband on some days (and me when it is time for my “time of the month”.).

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My husband has started making comments about my son’s hair almost every day because it is growing long and curling in the front. My son had two bad haircut experiences and now refuses to go to a barber. My husband and I have agreed to let him be a teenager and express himself, but my husband still can’t resist trying to give him pointers about how to comb his hair.

“You know what I do with my hair?” my husband asked.

“Lost it?” my son asked.

There was a quick apology from The Boy who said he just couldn’t resist the slam because my husband left himself wide open.

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My son and I were coming back from taking our dog to the groomers last week when a trashy song came on the radio. Within two seconds I knew that station needed to be changed and I did, much to the delight of my son who burst into laughter. He said my expression was pure “Mother Protecting Her Child From Dirty Lyrics.” He was right. That was one of the dirtiest songs I had ever heard, and it only took me two seconds to know it wasn’t going to get any better. And no, I have no idea who was singing.

So that’s my random thoughts for this time around.

How about you? What are some random thoughts or events you have had happen recently? Let me know in the comments.