Our Big Sissy (Sister) Myrna

Michael TOM and I both grew up without an older sister. We didn't have an older sister to sneak into her room and read her diary while she was on her first date with someone who looked like David Cassidy or one of the guys from "Dukes of Hazzard"...
But that all changed when we met Myrna. It's pronounced murn-uh, but me and my country boy voice quickly changed it to mear-nuh. And since she loves us, she doesn't make me try to say it the right way.
Shortly after meeting Myrna, we felt a bond between us that was not like any other friends we had. We'd cry on each others shoulders, and seemed to always send "just the right e-mail" at "just the right time" to one another. Finally, I just started calling her "My Sissy", not because of a fear of hand soap, but like "My Sister" but remember I am a country boy and can't talk right. Michael TOM and I soon became her "kid brothers" and it didn't require signing one adoption paper or reading the others diary.
The above picture does kinda look as though I may be constipated, but I was actually just jet-lagged and was happy to see my sissy. And "Yes!", maybe just a tad sun-burned.

We both absolutely love this picture! Why? Cause we both look so thin! (Note: the goatee was colored prior to the picture being taken) The pretty lady with just one eye and white hair in the lower right-hand corner is Momi...Myrna's mom. We love her...she gives great hugs and didn't bat an eye when I demanded 35 years of back allowance. She did say a few choice words unsuitable for print, but did not bat an eye.

Sure wish I had Photoshop! It may only look like white teeth, but the white teeth on the left are mine, center belongs to Myrna, and on the right belong to my sweetie. Just had a disturbing thought...if Michael TOM and I are her kid brothers, and Michael and I just had our 1 year wedding anniversary, does that make us from Arkansas? I might be a country boy, but that's just so many levels of wrong!


Big Sissy Myrna and Lus. The picture doesn't show it, but Lus has angel wings. Lus knows just the right thing to say to make you feel better. And she also doesn't sugar-coat what she wants you to know. Love her! It was Lus who had me in stitches at Myrna's house not too long ago and turned my nose into a margarita dispenser during a particular laughing fit. But that's all gross, so I won't tell you about it.

Anyways, we love you Myrna...no matter how you pronounce it! We may not be brothers and sister by biology, but by God we are!

Now lets go take some more pictures where we look all skinny. And unconstipated.

Blue Lake Camp

Every summer, from the time I was eight years old until I was fourteen years old, I would beg my parents to send me to Blue Lake Camp. This was a church camp, but not a preachy church camp. It was non-denominational, and besides the 30 minutes of a bible story, and some odd "prayer songs" at meals (God come down in sort of a twist and give me french toast the size of my fist...that seriously was one of the prayers!), and being told whenever I did something really bad that I would burn in hell, it was not all that churchy.

There were no parents. There were no major rules...until some of us were so bad, they started enforcing some.

The bathrooms were scary. The walls were made of knotty pine, which was not good since the girls bathroom was on the other side of the wall. Us boys would have slivers in our noses from peeking thru the knot holes. Saw my first booby and lost a lot of sleep that night. Scarier than all those ghost stories by the camp fire!

I was dared to run to one of the other cabins, hit it and run back. This was during "quiet" time when everyone could take a nap or go on a nature walk with a buddy. Not to be called a chicken, I did it. And on the way back to the cabin, some girls came around the corner and they scared me. Oh, and did I forget to mention I was dared to do this nude? Almost got sent home that year early.

One of the kids, Fred, was always so much smarter that all of us other troublemakers. Fred was convinced that the girl camp counselor was having sex with the boy camp counselor named Patrick. Since Fred was so smart, he felt Patricks sleeping bag and it was wet. The bed is wet because the girls pee their panties when they have sex. Scarred me for life. But the story continues...

Since the girl counselor was now pregnant, we kept looking at her stomach the rest of the week at camp. We knew that we could see her belly getting bigger by the hour. I told Fred and my other cohorts in crime that I saw the baby kick. Didn't take long for the pregnancy story to get back to Patrick and the unfortunate bloated girl counselor. One of the rules that you don't cuss was thrown out the cabin window when Patrick started yelling at us. We cried and hid under our bunkbeds until Patrick left for a cigarette. Fred told us that Patrick was upset because it was really true, but to keep our mouths shut. And like true boys, we kept the story going.

Fred always got me into trouble. That butt-head. Nice to hear that when you grew up, Fred, you and your wife became manager and cook of a greasy spoon restaurant that serves cold burgers and limp salads. Loser. Hope that you can upgrade to a double-wide trailer once you pay off that 1975 Pinto.

And I hope your wife pee's in ya'lls bed.

Why I dislike this picture...

Ever have one of those pictures that you thought, "Oh, let's try this pose. It'll be so cool."


And then you see the picture after it is taken, and think, "Now I see why Tyra Banks isn't requesting my presence on her "America's Next Top Model"...


I nearly screamed at the size of my belly. And love handles. And this "Thinking Man" pose looks more like "Bored Man Taking A Poop On A Rock" or something equally as gross. Now, I know I'm not chunky or whatever, but look at how this pose just makes everything look so...I don't know...out there. Thank God I was never brave enough to pursue nude modeling. (shudder, shudder)


Back when I was in college I was approached by a girl we will call Sharon (not to protect the innocent, but I just don't remember what the hell her name is) who was a photography student and wanted to take some pictures of me. In exchange, Sharon would let me have all the pictures I wanted of the "photo session."

We went to the Las Colinas Riverwalk and I struck all these insane poses she asked me to do. I decided to try my hand at directing and told Sharon some poses I wanted to do. I would be in this old-timey photo booth and be talking on the phone. Since I was modeling for free, she went ahead and let me have my moment of glory.


A couple of days later we met at a Denny's restaurant to go over the pictures. Waiting patiently for Sharon, I sipped my coffee and by the time she showed up with the pictures, the waitress placed the cherry cheesecake in front of me. We looked at the poses of me on the stone bridge, the pier with my back to the camera and hand in the back pocket of my Silver Tab Jeans, me laughing at some old lady who slipped on the slick pavement...stuff like that. And then came the pictures that I chose the poses for.


First one, my eyes were shut. Next, it looked like I was sticking the quarter up my nose. The others looked as though I was held down and stink bait was rubbed under my nose. But the most horrible Sharon saved for last.

I saw the bald spot on the top of my head. I was in the phone booth and had bent down to pick up the quarter that I dropped. My white shirt was wet with sweat. And I looked like I had a killer wedgie.

But I saw the bald spot.

I didn't eat the cherry cheesecake. I asked Sharon to burn the negative. I also swore off directing my posing. I called Dad for some Rogaine. I also started collecting hats.

Think I would have learned not to try to model...

To relax after May...

We had such a crammed month of May! I wrote a "short" list of just some of the things we had going on during the month of May. Thought I'd share it with you. Quit complaining and keep reading! Gosh!

In no particular order, mainly due to the fact that so much happened, don't know what happened first, here is just a few things:

1. Michael TOM had his birthday
2. Michael TOM and I had our 1st Anniversary
3. Michael TOM and I had our 6th Day-We-Met-Anniversary (#2 and #3 both required gifts)
4. Mothers Day Brunch
5. My Grandparents came into town and we visited with them
6. Our niece Stephanie graduated from high school
7. Our niece Stephanie had a graduation dinner (not on the same night as the graduation)
8. Michael TOM's aunts came into town and we visited with them all day on a Saturday
9. We got a new roof. Got a bid, got the insurance check, and had it installed all within 1 week.
10. Two of my coworkers were on vacation and I got to cover their desks. I know, petty complaining, but no one said I had to always be happy!
11. Sister Chrissy had her birthday
12. Brother Jason had his birthday
13. We had our family weekend at Turner Falls, Oklahoma with my side of the family
14. I had my 1 year and 6 months without a cigarette. Yes...another petty thing, but still a valid excuse to spend more money on myself. I bought me a shirt.

So, after all this, we were excited to pack our bags and spend a couple days with some of our girl friends from church and social gatherings at beautiful Lake Palestine in East Texas! Our friends, Diane and Doris were both having birthdays this weekend! It was Michael TOM, me, and a bus load of girls headed to the hills for a good time! We were ready to give each other manicures, ugly green facials, and I was going to learn how to french braid! It was going to be a regular "Marsha Brady Slumber Party" with chardonney instead of Kool-Aid!

There were no manicures or ugly green facials. I'll learn how to french braid some other weekend. But I do remember there being chardonney!

Some people went to the marina and fished. Since I won't touch fish, worms, or stink bait, I got to be the official "untangle-the-fishing-line-from-the-bushes-and-rocks" guy. Yea, cause I'm butch and a manly man.

I was a master and untangling the toughest tangles. I'd jump down there on those rocks, lean way over the bushes growing out of the lake, never fearing I'd fall in the water. For 2 days there wasn't a tangle I was afraid of.

After one particular male-grunting act of butchness on my part, I was resting with some of the other non-fishers, bragging to them about the tangle I just got done untangling. One of the girls decided to point something out to us from a rock I was standing on moments earlier:
If you can't see it, double click on the picture and it'll make it bigger. That's a friggin snake! Long, ugly, leg-eating, choke you to death snake. Every ounce of lingering butchness in my body left me at the moment of eye contact with the snake. My voice suddenly became the same pitch of nails on a chaulkboard. I did a pee-pee dance and tried to jump on any higher object. It is safe to say that any tangled line after that point was a lost cause. I was ready to leave!
Here we all are at happier times...before that snake came to crash the party.

It was a very relaxing weekend and we look forward to spending another weekend with our friends down there. Away from the rocks where snakes hide and want nothing more than to eat my leg off.

Oh, and next time I will learn how to french braid.