So Norton made it through a Trance Family holiday mostly intact – slightly bored, I believe, but mostly intact. His mother couldn’t make it, so it was just us, my family, and my friend V.

Norton is kind of a quiet guy, and we are all big talkers. BIG talkers. I knew as soon as my stepdad found out that Norton was in the National Guard and was a fellow serviceman to his country, all bets were off. When he discovered that they were both Air Force men and Bears fans, Norton had made a friend for life.

The stepdad was no problem, and neither was my mother, who already liked him. We had some good Mexican food and chatted it up throughout the meal.

Then my friend V. showed up. Now V. will talk the paint off of a car, and if you put the two of us together in a room, we will A) drink a twelve-pack of beer, B) smoke two packs of cigarettes (which I did NOT this time, thankyaverymuch), and C) ignore everyone else in the room due to our incessant talking.

Norton watched, listened, and laughed, but he was probably horrified by half the shit coming out of our mouths, I’m thinking.

V. and I are sometimes not very nice people. I believe “crass” is the word I am looking for.

Also, I was drinking some beers; because as I have said before, I rarely, if ever, seize while drinking, and I really didn’t want to fall out on Mother’s Day. Plus, I like beer.

So things were a little raucous, if you will. A little loud, a little talky, and I could not help but wonder what was going through Norton’s head.

Probably something like, “Get me the hell out of here.”

He did tell me later on that he had a good time but was a bit bothered by the smoke (my mom, my stepdad, and V. all smoke). So perhaps in the future I will be bitchy and force everyone to smoke outside or in the basement.

They should anyway, really.

Norton was supposed to take me for a brain MRI this morning, but the J-Man is at home puking again, probably due to a serious overconsumption of tacos rather than anything viral. Therefore I’m going on Thursday.

My last vision exam was for serious shit, so they are worried that my funky little brain is doing something odd again.

It never ends, I swear.

In other news, the J-Man and the kid from down the street are friends again after a somewhat serious fight in which J. got put in a headlock and CHOKED. J. actually bit the offending child in order to weasel his way out of the move, and when I saw the bruises on his neck, I was all for that bite. Jesus.

The standoff lasted for two weeks, yes, two kid-from-down-the-street-free weeks in which I did not have to hear his sonorous whine, but in the end I felt badly about the whole thing and called the damn kid’s mother and said, “Hey, our kids be fightin’, let’s squash it.”

So now the kid from down the street is back in full effect and going to the Summerbash with us.

Sigh.

Hopefully he will smell fairly non-offensive for the car trip down. That’s ALL I ask. That, and no more physical fighting, ever again.

In still other news, I ate too much on Mother’s Day and have a mild tummyache. How are YOU?

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