Lola Is 40

So my husband has a few obsessions.

Cars,

motorcycles,

Shoes…

wait…that’s me.

jewelry,

Damn. Me again.

And movies.

But not all movies.

About a dozen movies.

Of those movies, these are the top 3:

1. Rocky (I, II and parts of III. Then they get sucky)

2. First Blood

3. Roadhouse

My husband knows almost every line from each of these movies and he will watch them as many times as they are shown on t.v.

And they are shown pretty much every day on some channel or another.

Anyhow, when I found a birthday card that played the theme from “Rocky” when opened I knew the birthday gods were smiling down upon me.

I just wish I had known that they were only smiling with the intent of fucking with me later.

The boys and I gave hubby his card on his birthday.

Yeah. Just the card.

cheap?

Who the hell asked you?

Besides, I am NOT cheap.

I merely did not get my husband a birthday gift because I had just bought MYSELF a very expensive new handbag.

See?

NOT cheap.

Selfish?

Um, yeah.

That one is about right.

Back to the story.

Hubby loved the card.

As a matter of fact, he loved it so much that he made sure to open the card and replay the theme song to “Rocky” with everything he did that day.

If he opened the frig to get a snack?

He played the theme to “Rocky”.

If he opened a box of pretzels?

He did it to the theme of “Rocky”

If he entered the bathroom?

Yeah.

There too.

It was bad enough that every stupid thing he did seemed to, in his mind, deserve it’s own triumphant theme song.

It was made worse that he continued with this ridiculousness for 3 straight days.

Until one day…

…mysteriously…

…the musical component to the Rocky card disappeared.

Ahem.

Anyway, it’s a mystery we will never, ever solve, so we should probably just all forget about it and move on.

Really, People.

Move on.

THE END.

Yeah. That’s it.

No moral.

No punchline.

Just The Fricking End of this story.

And now, I’m off to make dinner.

Although, I’m thinking that while I pound the living shit out of the chicken?

I might need an empowering theme song…

So, I’m at the pet store with my cricket carrier.

Yes, I said cricket carrier.

Or as it’s officially called, my “Kricket Keeper”.

Kute, right?

It’s a little habitat designed specifically to house crickets so that they can be easily transported and fed to your pet without you ever having to handle them.

The Pet shop people put the crickets in for me and when it’s time to feed our pet, I simply take out a tube and tap the little suckers into the aquarium.

Ingenious really.

Why do I have one you ask quite naturally?

Because, if you recall, I bought my 9 year old a tarantula for his birthday.

This tarantula.

Yes, I realize I’m a dumbass and a sucker.

I didn’t ask for your opinion.

Besides, as I wait in line at the pet store for the cashier to retrieve the nastyass crickets that I have to feed to the scaryass tarantula, it’s pretty fucking clear that I’m the dumbass.

Anyhow, my dumbassness is really not the point.

Someone else’s dumbassness is the point.

In this case the BIGGER dumbass is Jim.

Who is really Tim, but I wouldn’t want to incriminate him so I changed his name.

Nice of me, right?

Back to my story.

When I first enter the store I ask the cashier if someone can get me 5 large crickets.

Less, and the tarantula (who we named Charlotte. Her real name and not an alias.) is still hungry and quite bitchy and bitey.

More, and she just wraps the leftovers in her web, much like miniature cricket burritos, and I have to clean them out later.

So FIVE is the magic number, People.

FIVE.

Anyway, like I said, I asked for five crickets.

The cashier tells me to go the the “aquatic animal” section where I will see Tim. Jim.

Really? Who the fuck cares.

When I find Jim in the aquatic section of the store, he is standing amongst a pile of Mealworms on the floor.

Big ones.

They are scattered all over the place because, clearly, Jim has spilled the Mealworm container.

He is sweeping them up quite casually (like, any more casually and the broom would not be moving) when he notices me.

“Um, did you spill?” I ask him.

Duh.

Obviously Jim spilled.

Either that, or it’s a Mealworm prison break.

“uh..yeah.” says Jim, still sweeping.

Then he stops what he is doing, completely.

Which is kinda hard to tell and I only know for sure that he has stopped because he looks up.

At this point, I can’t help but notice that several Mealworms have taken this opportunity to make a run for it.

A slither for it?

Well, they are trying to get the hell out of Dodge.

Jim looks at me expectantly as I watch the worms making their way down the aisle.

He either doesn’t notice or doesn’t care.

I’m betting both.

Finally I look up again, realizing that Jim is waiting for me to speak and will, not now nor ever, use the phrase, “can I help you with something?”

He is going to stand there, broom in hand, worm situation out of control, until I say something.

“Can I have 5 large crickets, please?” I ask and smile politely.

“Five?” repeats Jim.

“Yes. Five.”

Jim moves to a large rectangular container that reaches his waist.

He lifts the lid and grabs a scooper.

As he does so, several crickets jump out.

They are making their way down the aisle, apparently following the Mealworms’ lead.

I try to pretend not to notice their escape.

I also pretend not to be tiptoeing around the dozens of Mealworms around my feet.

Why am I pretending?

I don’t really know.

It just seemed rude to do otherwise.

Then, as long as I was pretending?

I pretended to be British royalty.

I figured, as long as there’s so much pretending, why not?

I give a royal wave to the escaping animals, as I embody Princess Kate, and although Jim sees me, he is polite enough to pretend not to. He has enough to deal with.

He dips his scooper deep into the box and dumps it into my cricket container.

As you can imagine during this time, more and more crickets have joined the mass exodus.

The scene is a bit reminiscent of Moses’s ordeal in Egypt.

Were crickets one of the Passover plagues?

No.

Locusts.

Close though, right?

Whatever.

I pretend to be Moses.

“LET MY PEOPLE GO!” I exclaim and start to giggle incessantly.

Jim doesn’t seem amused.

He hands the cricket container back to me.

There are like 2 dozen crickets inside.

I hesitate, unsure of what to do now.

“Ummm? Jim?”

“yeah” he says as he is replacing the lid back on the box, not bothering to collect the escapees who are now holding the cashier at gunpoint, opening the cash registers and taking all the money.

Ok, not quite.

But it did feel like some sort of animal anarchy.

I am still stepping over Mealworms and a cricket has landed in my hair.

I remain calm and simply state, “this is too many. I just want FIVE. FIVE crickets”

BWAHAHAHAHA.

Get it?

Like “The Count” on Sesame Street?

“So, you wanted EXACTLY five?” he says.

“Yes. FIVE. Not TWENTY-five. Not FIFTEEN. Not even SIX. I want FIVE crickets. The others will just go to waste.”

“Oh. ok” he says and takes the cricket container away from me.

He opens the lid to the rectangular container as well as the lid to my carrier.

He then proceeds to SLAM my container against the side of his container.

HARD.

He does this again and again, until the crickets all tumble out. Some dead, others maimed.

I am speechless and horrified.

Not that the crickets are being maimed.

That’s silly.

I’m horrified that someone can be this moronic!

Really dude? You couldn’t just tap the little buggers out? Shake ‘em a little?

When the container appears to be empty, Jim starts the process of filling it again.

This time he counts aloud.

“ONE…TWO…THREE…FOUR…FIVE. There. FIVE crickets.”

BWAHAHAHAHAHA

I take the container and hopscotch over the Mealworms and maimed crickets that are scattered across the floor.

The scene ressembles “Platoon”.

I mean, if that movie had starred insects and not Charlie Sheen.

Anyhow, long story longer, I pay a whopping 64 cents for my crickets and I’m on my way.

As I’m driving home, to put the crickets at ease, (you know, before feeding them to Charlotte), I decide to tell them a few of my best jokes.

Well, as it turns out, crickets have absolutely no sense of humor.

As a matter of fact, the only sound after each punchline?

You guessed it…

crickets.

CHIRP CHIRP CHIRP