Words with Family

Mom's Birthday

The first big "thing" every March is usually my mom's birthday. So, midway through the past week, Athennia and I realized that time was running out on our window to make Mom's present; and we decided to sit down and build it.

From scratch.

But you don't get to know what it is until like four paragraphs from now.

Then, on Saturday the 8^th, we headed over to my parents' house and had an awesome dinner of slow-cooked beef with carrots, onions, and mashed potatoes for dinner with my parents and Kelly's family.

Oh, but wait—first we had a before-dinner dinner, prepared by Chef Hannah and brought to our table by our not-so-fastidious-but-otherwise-very-attentive waitress Olivia...

Umm, the food was... okay? At least until we all felt nauseated a few hours later. Something tells me they may have a cleanliness issue in that place...

Anyway, someone—who wasn't me—must've made an anonymous call to the Health Department, because the restaurant got shut down shortly thereafter.

Chef Hannah was devastated...

At any rate, I'm sure Chef Hannah will be servin' up typhoid and salmonella floor-food again one day real soon :)

After-dinner dinner was delicious as well. Amateur restaurateurs though they may be compared to the girls, it turns out my parents actually follow modern-day food-preparation guidelines.

So, nobody puked.

Especially not Liv, because she didn't even eat anything.

And then it was time for presents!

Is everyone ready?

They look... mostly ready, I guess.

GO!

Here's my mom getting hit right in the feels by a birthday card (and also, Liv's brain must've been itchy)...

Then it was our present's turn to get opened.

It's a stop sign; but don't tell my mom!

It's not "Words with Friends"; it's words with family...

Granted, I acknowledge that we've inadvertently limited my step-siblings' options when they get married; but, you know... you guys still have some leeway...

But anyway...

...And so there was...

The Russian had struck again...

...How does that guy do it?!

Then it was time for cake—and, if it's my mom's birthday or Kelly's, you know it's gonna be chocolate with white icing...

Liv approved though!

The Drought

While we were at my parents', Riley made plans to sleep over at her friend Kassie's house; but she hadn't showered yet that day and was trying to decide whether she should take extra time to shower back at home before going to Kassie's, or have us drop her off at Kassie's on our way back so she could just jump in the shower there...

But Kassie made that decision for her: Apparently Brian and Noelle couldn't pay their water bill last month; so now the whole house is on a regimented water-use schedule; and... wow. God, that must suck.

Ordinarily, this would be something I wouldn't dream of putting on the blog in a million years; but, oh, that's right: Noelle has never been shy with her comments and insinuations about my wife being somehow inferior to her as a single mom—or the location of our apartment being somehow more dangerous than that of their house all of a mile and a half away.

Aaaaaand, unfortunately for Noelle, my wife's husband is mercilessly sardonic, has the memory of an elephant, and is not without a casually vindictive streak...

The Attempted MURDER!

Sunday evening, Athennia and I had just picked Riley up at Kassie's around 8:15 P.M.; and we were back home for maybe 10 minutes, when all of a sudden I heard a woman outside screaming, "Stop! Stop! Let go of me! Get your hands off me!"

I've called the cops on so many noise-making assclowns in the two years I've been here, I don't think they'll even come out anymore. So, I ran into Riley's room where she and Athennia were hanging out, and I told Athennia, "I'm pretty sure we need to call the cops. It sounds like someone's getting butchered out in the street back here."

Athennia threw Riley's window open and summoned her loudest I'm not fuckin' around Mom voice to scream, "I'M CALLING THE COPS RIGHT NOW!"

And then she did.

Meanwhile, I had returned to our bedroom so I could peer out the window to try to see what was going on. (I only saw a black woman laying in the middle of the street; but Athennia, Riley, and our neighbor Rosie would later tell me they all saw a man holding her by her hair and repeatedly punching her in the head and face.)

At any rate, the next thing I knew, I heard Athennia telling Odin, "Get out of the way!" and then I heard our front door open and slam shut!

I scrambled to put my shoes on...

...Then got halfway to our door before backtracking for my keys...

...Then got halfway there again before backtracking for my knife...

...Then raced downstairs to chase after her and make sure that, if someone did get killed tonight, it wouldn't be Athennia.

The assailant was gone by the time we got out there, and the woman was sitting in the driver's seat of her SUV (Jersey plate—surprise, surprise) over in the alley between the last building in our apartment complex and the first building in the next one.

She was bleeding from her forehead and visibly shaken; and as Athennia comforted her, the woman confided that the man was her boyfriend... But it was clear that she wasn't going to provide any further details than that.

Gotta protect the guilty, after all.

Keith and Rosie had seen and heard us run outside; so they came out as well. Keith and I watched the cop car go up and down the main road thrice before the jackass finally arrived—albeit on the wrong side of the guard rail, such that he had to backtrack yet again to finally be where he'd been summoned.

Our tax dollars at work!

Meanwhile, some black lady two floors up opened her window to ask all of us, "Did y'all see the black SUV that sped away?"

But I kept my mouth shut.

There was nothing to do.

It was clear that this stupid woman who might otherwise have been beaten to death was going to remain silent and protect her shitty boyfriend so he can do it all over again someday—whether to her or to the next lucky lady.

I don't know how to fix that. I'm guessing the rent-a-cop doesn't either.

When we all finally returned to our building, Rosie invited us in because she had some coffee from the Dominican Republic that she had been meaning to give us...

Athennia and I ended up hanging out with her and Keith in their living room for close to an hour before we headed back upstairs.

And then, since we were still wired and coursing with adrenaline, we wound down with an extra half hour of mindless YouTube videos before bed.

A True Loss

Finally, I just want to take a moment to acknowledge the recent loss of a true patriot: Former whistleblower Mark Klein died of pancreatic cancer at age 79 on Saturday, but he will always be remembered for pulling back the curtain on the NSA's grimy partnership with AT&T to surreptitiously and indiscriminately suck up millions of innocent Americans' data.

If you didn't follow that story ~20 years ago when it began, please consider reading about it here.

And thank you, Mark, for trusting your gut. May you rest in peace.