The Gang Member That is Peggy

I haven’t hung out with my mom in a really long time. I keep telling her that I will, such as a busy parent promises their youngin’ that they will definitely go fly that kite/see that movie/take that trip to Salem and then the idea gets eaten by the fringes of time.

I decided to call my mom two days before her 67th birthday and let her know that I’d be picking her up the next morning so that I could take her out for birthday breakfast, a day early. One thing I said to my mate on the morning of picking up mom was, “I’d better call her and see if we can go to xyz place for breakfast or else she will choose a diner and then the mall to walk around all day.”

She picked up the phone and I cheerily asked if she had any ideas of what she wanted to do.
“I thought we’d go to the ZYX diner and then to the mall!”

Yay. The diner and the mall. Quick reality check….this trip isn’t about ME….it’s about my mom who wants to ignore her high blood pressure and hit up a diner for greasy food and then the mall! My mom works at the mall, running the carousel. She knows this place inside and out and will give you the report on what’s opened, what’s closed and who got fired. Even if you don’t know them.

So at least the diner she chose was one of the cleaner ones. I used to work for the family in a different diner and my hands grew cacti out of what became dry landscape where soft skin used to be. You didn’t even need a plate for your food, we used bleach and burn victim temperature water to clean the tables.

Mom chose the Anti Low Pressure plate and allowed her Brooklyn to run wild when asked what kind of toast she wanted. Rye of course. But wait….does it have seeds? No? Then whole wheat is fine. I don’t think in all my previous waitressing years I’d ever been asked this question. In fact, I didn’t know a toast order’s livelihood even rested on caraway seeds!

We ate, we discussed the things of life that you discuss as an adult. The child rearing, the job crannies, the ins and outs of relationships. And as I was being the adult child, I quietly acknowledged the little me by quietly pulling all the egg out of my wrap as we spoke and leaving it in a pile to the side. I have my weirds and they’ve been more subtle as time goes by. There are times then that I don’t feel bad about indulging in an occasional weird. We have our chicken girls here at home and maybe there is a slight psychological guilt when I attempt to eat an egg from another lady! My mind also goes through the list of reasons why our eggs are better to eat than eggs outside of the house. Oh the guilt! The hormones and the bad lives of factory farms!

And I just didn’t like how it tasted. Plain and simple. Like grilled bacon with a hint of doggie smell.

Although she didn’t ask, I offered quietly, in between Other Subjects, ‘I’m used to our eggs at home.”

And being a total coffee snob, I wouldn’t even attempt to try to make good of what they had in the urn. Water is fine. Starbucks will greet me later at home made with French Press.

Next stop, the Mall! And what a surprisingly fun time!

Nothing out of the ordinary, just simple walking around, Christmas décor and window shopping. I swore that I wasn’t going to spend anything at the mall. I was going to be the Online Shopper with what little I do have to shop with. As it turned out, I found Humanling’s ‘BIG’ gift for a decent price along with a Kid Behind the Counter to answer questions about it. Major plus!
Mom also needed to purchase her hubby’s Christmas gift and seeing as it was on sale, Macy’s was on the list of required stops. She is tired of hubby’s Wolf Cries of wants for specific items that once obtained, are used about three times. She states that he’d BETTER (see look on her face below) use this ice cream maker and that she will NEVER EVER buy him anything that smells like an appliance again if it ends up like this unused meat slicer below.

While walking around a mall, you have to do crazy things….WILD things…things you wouldn’t do on a normal work day! So I talked her into having some ice cream caramel milkshakey type of shot in a Dixie cup. To make her a bit more edgy, we’ll pretend there was alcohol in it. But with her blood pressure, I’d say this was a pretty risky move, so maybe we CAN leave the brass knuckles out of it.

I’ve personally never seen a creepy Christmas ornament. Until this. I never ever want to see one of these materialize into real life. The vampire thing is different….I’m still waiting and putting wax teeth under my pillow for that one. But a Merman? Ewwwwww!!!!!!!! No legs? No um, JUNK? Merry Christmas…have a Eunich Fish with a Toolbelt!

Diner, mall, Merman….I wouldn’t have spent the day any other way. There are many lessons in life we learn the hard way. After seeing how dear friends don’t have their moms, I realize that I’m lucky to be able to hang out with mine. Moms are one of those things that you just don't appreciate soon enough. And every mom deserves a blog post. Happy Birthday Mom!