Who ya gonna call...on Halloween? Count the Ghostbuster quotes challenge

As always...it involved an epic battle of biblical proportions but the 4th grade team finally got their act together enough to embody the finest supernatural comedy created for audiences of 1984. I won't lie to ya...it was a little funky. Slimer sprouted legs and the Staypuff Marshmallow Man danced a mean "Stanky Leg" but we pulled it off.

"What do you mean, We pulled it off," growled Geri who had labored for weeks on making an authentic Ghostbusters uniform while the remainder of the team opted to save time by taking the Amazon route. "You didn't produce anything!" Geri fumed, "You've never been out of classroom! You don't know what it's like out there! I've worked in the private sector. They expect results." Naturally, we ignored her. The costumes had already been ordered. The was no sense in worrying about it now. Why worry, anyway? Just because each one of us was carrying an unlicensed nuclear accelerator on her back?

"Mrs. Mosiman, I don't believe that your costume is appropriate for school," one of my little cherubs dressed as an American Assassin character, proclaimed. I decided to save my lessons on "irony" and "hypocrisy" for later. "The school handbook says that you can't have weapons and your proton pack is technically a weapon." I scowled at him. "Actually, when it comes to teachers," I told him, "it's more of a guideline than a rule." But my little guy wasn't the only one to pass unnecessary criticism regarding my outfit. As I was walking down the hall, my friend Pat caught a glimpse of me, brightened immediately, and then exclaimed to her companion, "Did you see Geri's costume? It was amazing!" Her companion whispered, "I think she can hear you, Pat." I breezed by this former friend, in my nearly see-thru, flimsy Ghostbusters outfit and said, "I don't have to take this abuse from you. I've got hundreds of people dying to abuse me."

Our fourth grade flashmob was a success. We were a little nervous as we entered the gym for the costume parade. I took a deep breath. "See ya on the other side, Kel," I said to my cardboard-carrying friend dressed as the Ghostbusters-mobile. "It was nice working with you, Mrs. Mosiman," she answered as we took our places.  Accustomed to leaving as soon as the parade concluded, some audience members began to get up. But the fourth grade thought, Maybe if we start dancing, other people will join in. And before you knew it, the entire gymnasium was pulsating like they were participants in the biggest interdimensional cross rip since the Tunguska blast of 1909. Two pairs of girls cartwheeled and did splits in a photo-finish finale as I screamed, "Don't cross the streams!" "How did I do," I gasped, passing Geri. "You were the best one in your row," she admitted before adding, "but I had the best outfit."

Is it "Stanky Leg" or "Skanky Leg?"

http://www.kappit.com/tag/short-old-jokes/

So it was...that four good friends gathered on the veranda of a fine old inn nestled in the forest to enjoy one of the last few precious evenings of Fall. Hot toddies were ordered and the women settled in for an enjoyable hour or so of intellectual discourse rivaling the sophistication of the great literary salons of the seventeenth century. Let's take a moment and join them...shall we?

"So there I was, riding my unsaddled donkey, when he takes off like a shot," shared Pat, "Naturally, I realized there was only one thing for me to do." "What," her friends asked, transfixed. "I leaped off and hoped I wouldn't break my ass," she concluded, shuddering at the memory.

Bruised tail-bones weren't the only injuries incurred...cerebral bullying caused one member to experience soul-sapping damage to her ego when she was the only one NOT to have heard the miraculous tale of the swallows of Capistrano. "Of course you've heard about it," Geri snapped, sipping her toddy, "EVERYBODY has heard of it." "Yes...yes," Sandy and Pat agreed demurely. I...er, uh...Amy just sat silently, stirring her toddy, convinced that all the amaretto had simply sunk to the bottom.

"You know how to get healthy hydrangeas to grow in this area," intoned Sandy as the four friends admired the inn's finally-fading flowers. I rolled my eyes...oops...Amy rolled her eyes but was unable to close her ears to hear, "You plant nails in the soil." Great, Amy thought, signaling the waiter for another dose of butterscotch schnapps to strengthen her toddy, there's another piece of useless knowledge that's permanently gummed up in my brain...next to the stupid swallows.

After listening to Geri drone on for fifteen minutes about her profound relationship with her sitting room spider, Pat broke in with another helpful tidbit about the healing properties of spider webs. "What," I said, staring glumly at my now empty glass, leaving the obvious TF off my question. Pat eagerly clarified. "Well, occasionally, when I trim my goat's hoof too close, I'll simply grab some webbing from around the barn and attach it to the wound." I stared at her dumbly...Well, aren't you just a regular flippin'' Martha Stewart of the barnyard. Startled, I looked around quickly. Did I say that out-loud?

We concluded our elegant evening of witty repartee discussing our grade level's Halloween "flash mob" to be performed on Friday. Eager to learn some of the moves, the women coaxed me...uh...Amy to demonstrate. As our portico was empty, I complied...showing them the complicated maneuvering of the Duff...the Bop...the Whip with its accompanying Nae Nae...the Break-Your-Leg and finally...the Stanky Leg. "Stanky Leg," Geri yelled, hitting palm to forehead, "I've been calling it the Skanky Leg." Suddenly, in mid-Stank, the porch fell silent. "What's wrong," I...nope, make that...Amy asked, slowly following her friends's frozen stares into the window of the inn where guests had been enjoying an unexpected dinner show. It was time for our four good friends to finally depart...and so we shall say, farewell.

Avoiding the obstacle run

My friend, Darlene, has been pestering me for weeks to join her for a 5K inflatable obstacle course run of which I had energetically been avoiding for an equal amount of time. I believe I may have dropped several calories by simply dodging Darlene. But Darlene was determined and would not be thwarted by my exhaustive list of excuses. I carefully chronicled my injuries:
1.  40 pound Greek and Latin workbook box shoulder injury. "That happened when you were still teaching 6th grade," Darlene countered, "plus you described your miraculous recovery despite months of atrophy."
2.  Kickball knee. "Again...6th grade."
3.  Monkey arm. "You need to let that one go," Darlene sighed, "getting scared at the movies while simultaneously reaching for popcorn would immediately be rejected by even the most compassionate workman's comp claim."
4. I knew I had her with this one...Blueberry foot. "Okay... that one WAS actually pretty recent," Darlene admitted. But I could still see the gleam of secret hope in her eyes.

And then, of all people, Brad Mosiman saved me. "Hey, I'm going to need the truck Saturday," he told me. "What for," I stupidly wondered. Note-to-self:  Rarely is a real truck used for "fun." "I'm hauling and unloading three tons of pellets," he explained.

Oh.

All right. This was a tough one. Could I get away with sitting on the couch, watching television, while this activity occurred right outside my living room window? I could close the drapes maybe. And turn up the volume. Was it too late to call Darlene and participate in a 5K inflatable obstacle course run? How much could three tons of pellets possibly weigh? (Yeah...I know) I mentally brainstormed every expletive in my repertoire before engaging in the ridiculous conversation where I show a somewhat sincere intent to help while Brad insists that he is glad to do it himself.  From the picture, you might notice that, somewhere along the line, Sydney must have had a similar conversation with her father. So I whiled away the morning moving massive bags of pellets thinking, "All this and I don't even get a free t-shirt." "There was also games, music and food," Darlene described later. Dagnabbit. All I got for my trouble was a case of Pellet pelvis.

Game 3

Never have I fallen so short of my not-so-secret desire to be the most beloved person on the planet. I had my first inkling that my popularity ranking had slipped a bit as we approached the line to enter the Toronto Blue Jays stadium and were decisively boo-ed. Really...all because of a t-shirt? It turns out that there is a BIG difference between royal blue and blue jay blue. Clearing security didn't make me feel secure at all as the lady handing out free Blue Jay "swing-in-the-air" towels snatched the box away from me as though I had a communicable disease. New to the art of sports fandom, ("Go Bills!" My friend Zach gives me a new Buffalo Bills player name every other day or so to build up my communication roster. The problem is, though, that players seem to get traded faster than I can memorize them.) I was surprised by the politely passionate hatred expressed by Canadians--a people who couldn't come up with anything better than a leaf to slap on their flag (Shhh...don't tell our neighbors to the North, but we have maple trees here too!) and whose national anthem has to include some nifty French phrases to jazz it up. Yeah...French.  So 50,000 Blue Jays fans (because they have no one else to root for) and three brave Kansas City Royals fans settled in to watch Game 3 of the 2015 ALCS Playoffs. It was rough...I won't lie to you. But I believe that the Royals realized that, if they had won the game (like they surely would have), the Mosiman family would have been ceremoniously thrown from their level 500 seating.

Two particularly rowdy Jays fans (No foam finger here...big blue foam "J"...Sesame Street would be proud:  "Tonight's game...brought to you by the letter J") imaginatively chanted "Let's go, Blue Jays" (clap, clap, clap-clap-clap), shouted "You suck," to no one in particular, and occasionally hissed at us...all while dressed in man-sized uniform pajamas. Adorable.

Even more adorable was the 7th inning stretch song...it could have been performed by Robin Sparkles! Those of you who just missed my "How I Met Your Mother" reference, IMMEDIATELY stop reading and binge watch all nine seasons. Instead of "Let's go to the mall," we have "Let's play ball!" Sydney and I, of course, tinkered a bit to make it fit..."Let's go play some ball!" "How I Met Your Mother" fans are already singing...you're welcome.
 I was really looking forward to a cute picture of Brad and I at the game. He is remarkably resistant to dressing like my twin so I had to strike while the iron was hot. My friend, Josh is always posting sweet photos of himself with his girlfriend, Sam, wearing sportswear so I thought...this is my time. Sydney aimed the camera...I put on a sultry pout and struck a pose. Reviewing the result on the 3 1/2 hour ride home, I asked Brad if he thought I was coming down with Bell's palsy as my sultry pout looked more like left-side-of-the-face paralysis. And forget the 7th inning stretch...I looked more like 9-month-old stretch marks as obviously an unexpected breeze must have come out of nowhere to blow up my shirt to make me look like a pregnant platypus (remember my sultry pout...duck-billed). A quick review of Sydney's pictures reveals that she looks fantastic in every one. I just can't win.

Connecticut road-trip with Joan: Celebrating "Fun"-tober

 My friend, Joan and I have traveled quite a bit together and, as a result, have been through a lot. We have committed bizarre children's audio stories to memory... "It's a very good game"..."Play it again, Mom!"...have been yelled at by a pastor for being too loud at bedtime and consequently almost decapitated a big toe as we attempted to stifle our giggles over being yelled at by a pastor and, have been irrevocably scarred during the great string cheese carsick caper of ought two.  So naturally, I was looking forward to our week-end roadtrip to Connecticut to visit my oldest daughter, Savannah.

"Amy, would you like some cheese," Joan asked, rummaging through her magical cooler of snacks as we hit the open road. Would I? I lit up like a Christmas tree. "Oh," said Joan, after a moment of searching, "I must have forgotten to pack it." We might as well have turned the truck around right there...I was devastated.

I managed to soldier on...past the gas station where I inadvertently tried to put fifty dollars into someone else's gas tank..."No," I yelled, racing back into the store, "Not pump 5...pump 3!"...past the murky mist of Witch Meadow..."Forget looking for Connecticut deer--they're the size of cats...watch out for witches," I told Joan as she peered diligently into the darkness...until we finally reached the safe harbor of Savannah's apartment.

The highlight of the trip (other than seeing Savannah, of course) was witnessing the christening of the USS Illinois so what were we going to do after that? My impromptu purchase of a children's book answered that question as we raced around Connecticut, visiting the places mentioned in the story.

Getting to Gillette Castle turned out to be almost as much fun as the actual castle as we had to be ferried across the imaginatively-named "Deep River." I was immediately transported to the epic ferry scene in "The Outlaw Josey Wales" and began to whistle "Dixie." We leaf-peeped and frog-spotted as we toured the park grounds, defying the laws of probability by eventually finding sixteen acorns with intact lids for my 4th graders.

We awoke each morning, bright-eyes and bushy-tailed (Thanks to my cell phone alarm that I kept forgetting to turn off so a happy little song blared out of it at 6 am), ready to take on new adventures. Our children's book mentioned the Mark Twain House, so we headed over to Hartford. "Hartford," Joan shivered, remembering our perilous ride through Connecticut's capital where I kept repeating, "Hartford is bad," as we waited for a sudden left exit that would appear out of nowhere. "There!  There!  There!" Joan yelled as I screamingly careened across two lanes of traffic to enter an exit with a 90 degree turn.

We ate ice-cream (with candied pecans) at a sidewalk cafe, collected sixteen sea shells, visited Mystic Pizza (again) and were horrified that Savannah has never actually seen the movie and tortured my daughter by forcing her to Google every little wonderment that popped into our heads. "Savannah...look that up" became our catchphrase. She was horrified when she fell asleep, leaving us to watch Judy Garland in "A Star is Born," as we quickly filled up her search history with movie-related trivia questions that we simply had to know.

Our time with Savannah went by, as usual, too quickly and it was time to go. We said a fond farewell to her and her "wish-you-would-just-get-it-over-with-and-adopt-me" cat, Little Buddy and started for home. "Would you like some cheese," Joan asked, rummaging through her cooler. I glared at her suspiciously before she brandished a cheese stick at me like a magic wand. I was entertained for several minutes as I watched her futile attempts to wrestle it open. "Like you're counting money," I finally advised. She handed me my snack..."Remember the cheese string carsick caper of ought two," she smiled evilly. We recounted the ruined remnants of Savannah's poor pillow and how it took our combined efforts to get the regurgitated remains of Sydney's cheese string out of her hair. "That memory just gets better with time," I thought, swallowing my last, delicious bite of cheese, "Just like my friendship with Joan."

The Christening of the USS Illinois

I've never attended the christening of an ocean-going vessel before so I wasn't sure what to expect. Add to that, the fact that the First Lady would be wielding the bottle of champagne and I was at a total loss regarding perfunctory protocol. Savannah, of course, was a BIG help. "Wear closed-toe shoes," her informative text directed. Does the First Lady have something against my piggies, I wondered. I could assure her that, given a popularity poll, her toes would certainly outshine mine. I could practically hear Savannah sighing from Connecticut. "You're walking through construction spaces and over docks," she clarified impatiently, already beginning to regret her decision of inviting me to this prestigious event. But it was too late now...my friend, Joan and I had already made the seven hour journey to Connecticut, closed-toe shoes firmly in hand.

To Savannah's relief, we made it through the first wave of security without too much fuss although I did pause to point out that I had just that morning chopped my bangs so any discrepancy between my current appearance and my passport photo could be attributed to that. The Secret Service thanked me for my forthright honesty and patriotism before asking me to move on. The second wave of security also went relatively smooth except I involuntarily adopted the dramatic Charlie's Angels pose during the pat-down. "She's clean," the Secret Service Man reported and I beamed proudly. "Mom," Savannah interjected, interrupting the chronicling of this national event, "You do realize that those men were just regular security guys...not Secret Service agents, don't you?" I smiled gently at my daughter...she's so naive.

We walked through the submarine hangar in our closed-toe shoes, marveling at the larger-than-life ships. A woman handed us an event program and a pair of sunglasses with their own little cloth case emblazoned with the date and the name of the submarine, the USS Illinois. This was the pivotal moment where we realized that we weren't attending just any ol' christening. No one just GIVES you glasses. Even in Disney, you have to hand back your bright yellow 3-D glasses after Mickey's

Philharmagic. And then we hit the food. We stared in wondered confusion at the lines and lines of Chicago-style sandwiches being prepared before our very eyes. Disbelieving, we searched for a cashier but no...it was free. Savannah and Joan immediately grabbed a barbecue brisket-style sandwich on artisan bread stuffed with colorful peppers. Knowing that I'm not really a beef type of gal, Savannah pointed to a foil-wrapped grilled chicken sandwich. There were bags of chips, fruit, Ben and Jerry's ice cream, soda, and "christening" water. This was, obviously, the most thrilling moment of our lives.

We procured the perfect seats across from the podium and settled in for the three hour wait. Savannah and Joan wolfed down their sandwiches like it was lunchtime rather than 8 am. The unveiling of my chicken sandwich was a bit of a let-down and I spent the better part of the next hour expressing my displeasure while daintily tipping potato chip crumbs out of the bag directly into my waiting mouth. A Blues Brothers tribute band kept the crowd entertained as we eagerly awaited the arrival of Michelle Obama as well as an impressive number of governors, senators, and congressmen. Joan and

Savannah waited until the stadium seating was filled to capacity before deciding to crawl over thousands of spectators for a second helping of christening cuisine. As this trip benefited me, I withheld judgment.

Soon enough, the one hundred thirty-three membered crew of the USS Illinois assembled on top of the sub and stood at attention for the next hour and a half as each programmed guest made remarks. Any illusions that I would be plucked from obscurity out of the crowd to join Michelle Obama as she prepared to break a bottle over the bow were quickly cast aside. This was not Marineland. I would not be kissing a whale or holding Michelle Obama's purse. I was, however, completely swept up in the patriotism of the moment. Aware of the dedicated service and sacrifice of the one hundred thirty-three men assembled aboard that vessel. I was aware of the blue sky, the rustling of the giant flag, the gentle movement of the water and the one hundred thirty-three motionless men who stood, at attention, for over an hour, on the ship that would be their home for

an indeterminate amount of time. The speakers were gracious and appreciative. The spectators were attentive and respectful. The food was fabulous. But finally, the moment that everyone was waiting for arrived. Michelle Obama earned a collective chuckle from the crowd as she adopted a batter's stance and choked up on the stem of the bottle, offering a practice swing. What's that saying? If it were easy...everyone would do it? One...two...three times the charm and the USS Illinois was officially christened.  The crowd cheered. The First Lady beamed and turned victoriously to her admiring fans to wave where I captured my favorite photo of the day as my friend Joan delightedly waved back.

We ALL waved back and I realized that this wasn't about politics and policies; it was about patriotic pride and national service. I love my country EVERY day but I especially loved it today. God bless the travels of the USS Illinois and God bless this incredible country of ours.