A Ford Story

On Sunday some guys came over to help Devlyn...do something related to his old truck that graces our driveway with it's rusty, "vintage" presence. Let's see if we can get some insight into the male...mind? Behavior patterns? I'm really not sure what we're looking for here, but follow me if you dare.

Hmmm...curious. Very curious.

Hey what are you guys all looking for? Did you lose something?

Yeah! Jump up and down on him like that!

Where'd he go? No, you can't pull him up that way!

You okay babe? Are your friends hurting you? This is what you invited them over for right?

I'm sorry Webber, someone's butt had to be front and center at some point.
Nice flip flops Glos.

Hey guys! I found the hood! It's not in the engine after all...it's right, oh never mind.

They never listen to me.

The Hitting Syndrome

I don't know what else to call it...but I definitely have it. I hit people. It's just a normal part of interactive conversation for me, the way nodding while talking might be normal for others. I hit to say, "Hey you!" or "Are you kidding me?" or "What the crap?" or "Shut up!" or "Whatever!" or "That's what I was thinking!" and stuff like that. Most people just say those things I suppose, but I'm trying to be more "appropriate" and show some restraint during these days of maturity which I find myself in. Maybe my body does it as a reflex. Like when I hesitate verbally as an act of self control, my body has to rid it's system of the desire to say such things, so I hit the person. I don't know which is better.
I do it without thinking and sometimes I don't even know I've hit someone until I'm told that I've done so. For example, apparently I hit Judy Slaughter or maybe I grabbed her, I can't remember. What I do remember is that she was saying how wives needed to get up in the morning with their husbands. When they get up. However early that may be. I can still see her gesturing with her hands to rise, saying "Get up, get up!" Also, there was something about baking muffins for them at that hour as well...I really don't know when the hitting started, but a witness confirmed that I had done so. What sort of thoughts could I have been repressing that forced my body to physically express them? I just can't imagine.
Another example took place when I went to dinner with a friend last night. Let's make her very mysterious, this "friend" of mine. She shall remain nameless-no, I'll change her name to protect the innocent-Roberta, oooh and she's faceless! That's right I just took creative liberty and erased her face! But forget about Roberta, in this story, she's secondary at best. What? Back to my story. We were sitting in a booth when our server came over to take our drink order. "I know her." I said to Roberta after she walked away. I knew she recognized me from the way she looked at my face, but neither of us made gave any indication to the other that we wished to place the other's face. You know what I mean? Anyway, I'll make a not so long story, even shorter here. Mid way through the meal I decided I needed to make personal contact. So when she came back to ask us "How is everything?" I replied, "Good. Hey do I know you? Do you know me?" She paused, smiled and asked, "I think so. Are you Bethany?" Bethany is my sister. "No." Smack. I whacked her arm. "Jessica!"
"Oh, okay. I wasn't sure. Well good to see you again." And then we mysteriously had a different server for the rest of the night. I don't know what that was about.
What do you think? Is the hitting syndrome a problem? Does anyone else out there suffer from this?

The Jaimie Chronicles

Jaimie shivered as she looked out the window. It wasn't early, but it may as well have been. The winter air was cold and crisp while the gray clouds hung low and motionless in the sky with no intention of moving. They were stuck there. Much like Jaimie.
She looked out the window and down the street through her puffy eyes. She couldn't see anything and was too tired to look much further. Further down the street, further down the road in time, in life, it didn't matter, she was too tired to look and there was nothing there worth looking at anyway. She closed her eyes and leaned her head against the cold window pane. Maybe it would numb her mind.
In the background she could hear her mother ranting and raving about nothing and everything at the same time. Where were her cognac, leather shoes? Where did she put the directions she printed off? And for heaven's sake where was their father already?! He always does this when I have some place to be! The unintentional muttering continued in an all too familiar, intentional way.
Jaimie felt guilty all of a sudden the he was their father. As if she needed to both apologize to her mother for having him for a dad and also scold her father for being late and ticking her mother off. The latter not because she cared that her mother had been made late, but because she cared that she had to sit there, trapped enduring the not-so-under-her-breath complaints.
Outside, a dog barked, a car came to a rolling stop in the muddy gravel and a horn honked. Music to her ears. She grabbed her backpack and headed for the door.
"Oh, nice! Don't get out of your car. Just honk annoyingly and grin like everything's hunky dory with you! Heaven forbid you care about anyone else for a change." Haley's words fell on tiny ears.
"Bye Mom. I'll see you...later." Six year old Noah said later because he didn't really know any other time more specific. Sometimes it was hours, sometimes it was days.
"Bye sweetie. I love you!" Haley proclaimed a little too emphatically. "Where's Jaimie? Is she in the car already? Did I ask her if she's seen my shoes lately?" Slam. Noah shut the door hard behind him.
"The wind must've caught it," Haley thought.

A Gardening Picture Story

Hi guys! It's me Charley. Today we're going to explore gardening! (She
has an Australian accent in this post. It's very crocodile hunter like.)
You're a bit early, I was just getting the proper accoutrements on. It's
awfully bright out here and you know as well as I do the dangers of sun damage! So grab your nearest, stylish, uv ray proof wanna be shades
and let's get going!

That's betta! Now let me locate my tools! Make sure you have a pair of over sized wellies nearby, just for looks!

Hmmm, so these are what gardening tools look like...

"Mom? Is this the right dirt? Should I use this?"

Okay, let's see what we have here...eww, looks like dirt sure enough. I can tell because it looks so...dirty...

Um, yeah on second thoughts...let's just put that dirt back. Don't want to mess up mother nature's plan...the one where little girls stay clean and flowers plant themselves!
See ya next time!

The Forming of my Future Fabulous Life: Part 2

I try to keep my posts fairly short since I don't imagine many of you really want or have time to read a "novel wanna be" online. But since it appears that I only have one reader and she wants more of the previous story, here goes.
Yes, the parents did come home that night. I don't know if it was late, probably, but we were still up for them to say goodnight to. Jacqueline's bed was a twin daybed boasting an abundance of decorative pillows, but under her bed was the best kept secret in my opinion. She lifted up her bed skirt and slid out or folded out, I can't really remember it was all very mirrors-and-smoke-like, another bed! I had never seen nor heard of a trundle bed, but you could bet there was gonna be one of those in my future life. It was the comfiest bed ever with lots of crisp white linens (I'm not sure what more linens than sheets there could have been, but surely there had been so much more luxury and comfort than just sheets). And as if that wasn't enough, there were feather pillows to top it all off. The whole bed seemed to swallow me up and whisper sweet nothings in my ear all night. I thought at the time that if I had been Jacqueline, I would sleep in the trundle bed every night. I loved sleep (I still do).
I also loved breakfast food. In the morning the kitchen was hopping with voices and coffee. There were incredible looking waffles being consumed by Katherine and Kate. I say incredible looking because I didn't actually get to try them.
"Jessica, are you a big breakfast person?" Jacqueline's mom asked. I made the mistake of replacing in my mind the word breakfast for morning.
"No, not really." What? Where did those words come from?
"What do you usually eat for breakfast?" I was one of four home schooled kids. I ate cereal for breakfast. Quickly. I had to be done with breakfast by the time the timer went off or I didn't get any and had to start school on an empty stomach.
"Cereal." Where were these words coming from and how did I make them stop! Who cares what I normally have for breakfast?! I'll take one of those waffles now please! But as fate would have it, Jacqueline was not a big breakfast person and being her friend meant, I wasn't either. Jacqueline was having poached eggs and toast for breakfast. I had never heard of poached eggs and wasn't sure I would like them. Her dad let me watch him make them, probably thought it was funny that I had never heard of poached eggs let alone know how they were made. I was surprised too, I mean I was ten and thought I had a pretty good handle on the different ways you could cook eggs. Scrambled, fried, over easy. That's right, I'd been to Bob's Big Boy a few times.
Turned out, I loved the poached eggs and couldn't wait to bring back this piece of culture from the Suburbias of Glendale to my house. To my surprise, it never quite stuck or even caught on at my house. However, I am happy to report that poached eggs are in fact a regular part of my current fabulous life!

The Forming of my Future Fabulous Life

You know how when you're young, you are totally immersed in your own immediate family's culture? Well at some point you start to get a glimpse of other family's cultural norms and it's a little bit shocking because you thought everyone's parents were like yours and so on and so forth. Then you realize, that when you grow up, you can do things however you want!
I remember being about ten and spending the night at my friend Jacqueline's house. She was a friend from church whom I loved. She was fun, fun, fun. So naturally I was very excited to sleep over at her house. Before I describe my experience, you should know that we were renting a house in Southern California on a very tight budget. I am the second oldest of four kids whom my mother stayed home to home school...not just me, but all four kids!
Okay so having said that let's go to Jacqueline's. Her house was in a beautiful neighborhood in Glendale. I ran up the steps and waved to my mom, signaling to her and the suburban to please leave now so I could start having the time of my life.
The inside was just as beautiful as the outside, boasting a spiral staircase, gorgeous hardwood floors with expensive looking rugs on them and a big shiny kitchen with barstools that matched their kitchen table and chairs. Everything matched. I decided then that when I grew up, I wanted a spiral staircase.
It was just about dark at the time I arrived but Jacqueline wanted me to go out into the backyard with her and meet her dog Bell. Bell was a young black lab. I'd say puppy but you know how they get big and look full size but are still puppy-like? That was Bell. I was at that time, very fearful of dogs. All dogs. But Jacqueline was persistent, really wanting me to pet Bell. She tried to hold her still, straddling her using her whole legs and holding her head with her hands. This didn't make Bell look calm and friendly, it made her look psychotic as she was trying to wrestle Jacqueline out of this pinned position she found herself in. "She's a really nice dog!" Jacqueline insisted. Bell foamed at the mouth. "She won't bite you. And if she does, she'll get hit on the nose really hard!" What?? I didn't want her to get hit on the nose, I wanted her to NOT bite me! Finally Jacqueline's dad came to my rescue, "I don't think Jessica wants to pet Bell." I was not going to have a dog when I grew up.
That evening Jacqueline's parents were going out for dinner and a movie with some friends. This was something my parents never did, remember the tight budget? They got all dressed up and left us with Jacqueline's older sister, Katherine. Katherine was thirteen. Katherine had a friend over that night as well, Kate. She was equally as cool as Katherine.
In no time at all the older girls had decided to do a fashion show with Jacqueline and I as their models. Kate took Jacqueline as her protege and I was Katherine's. She did my hair, put together outfits for me and Jacqueline and I took turns strutting down the runway, I mean hallway, while the older girls announced what we were wearing. "Jessica is wearing faded wash, bootcut jeans from The Limited, with a light blue oxford shirt under a yellow cardigan also from The Limited." I had never heard of The Limited, but I was shopping there in my future life as well.
Later that night, the girls showed us the dance to My Achey Breaky Heart. They had learned it in gym class at school. I was going to public school in my future life. That and definitely getting an older sister.

The Crawdad's Fate; A Picture Story

It has come to my attention that there are many pictures on my hard drive just sitting there. Not in a physical scrapbook, not even in a virtual scrapbook, but just sitting there. So it's story telling time folks. They say a picture is worth a thousand words so at the painful thought of me not using anymore words, I give you "A Photographic Memoir" for lack of a better title.

Boy meets creek. (Okay there will some narration!) Boy meets bucket and creek!



Boy hunts crawdad and finds a crawdad!


Boy is scared of crawdad and calls for backup...of the dad kind.



That's better. Now boy feels tough again.



Boy is successful. Boy feels proud!

Crawdad feels less successful, and a little warm...is it getting hot in here? Why am I magenta?!!

Have You Seen This Kid?

This is Tanner Johnson (the one on the right). He goes to our church and I believe he's in high school. He plays the violin beautifully....unlike me (see below).
Devlyn wants to kidnap him. That's right. I don't know what it is. Could be the hair, could be his size (I must admit, he is the perfect kidnapping size) just something about him makes Devlyn want to drive by and throw him in a white, windowless, van. We've talked about doing this several times.
It started one day when we were out driving, running errands, I suppose and we saw Tanner at a bus stop in Oregon City. It was on top o' the hill, a very unsuspecting location for sure! However, there were a couple of problems with our plan (I say "our" because we're married and part of the deal is that we suck each other into weird stuff that comes out of our heads, weird stuff like this). First of all, we didn't have a van. We had a little SUV with two kids in it. So, not real threatening. Second of all, we decided it would take at least two guys to pull this off (we are not two GUYS). And the guys should be a little more intimidating than Devlyn. You know, bigger, balder, maybe have some tatoos, maybe someone like Jim Chapin?
The other dilemma wasn't really a dilemma after all. See Tanner had a bunch of friends with him. But these were for the most part pint size punks. So we didn't think they would deter the mission at all and actually would serve as a bonus. If you're going to try to pull something like this off, you kind of need an audience to make it all worth it.
So, if you know Tanner, you might want to tell him that weather he knows it or not, he's just walking around begging to be kidnapped! One of these days Devlyn just might abscond with him! That is if he ever gets the right crew of guys, white van-oh and music! We decided the perfect music to be playing in the background would be Shakira's "Objection Tango"-that's also our bank robbing music, but that's a different story.

An Early Performance

I have another one for you. My last post made me think of this. We're talking same Mrs. Brown, same first grade classroom, same little liar (me) the whole scene. There was a girl named Crystal in my class. Two actually, I think, but this story involves the blond one.
It was show and tell day, which I think only came once a month or maybe two since somehow each student had to get their day in by the end of the school year. Again my years of aging and child like memory distort my sense of time. It seemed that show and tell occurred very rarely.
We all loved show and tell, because again all eyes would be on you the "more special than everyone else student" of the day. I think everyone felt this way...I did...yes, I'm sure everyone felt this way!
Anyway, this particular show and tell day belonged to Crystal. She had the big, cloth, blue bag hiding whatever it was she brought from home. To start things off, she gave hints about what was inside and we all raised our hands and took turns guessing. Finally the big reveal came Crystal reached into her bag and pulled out...a violin. Everyone ooowed and ahhed, but not me. I wasn't easily impressed.
She played us a song or two on her violin, which impressed me even less. How easy did that look?! When she finished, everyone clapped and she took a little bow. Brother, I thought.
Mrs. Brown opened it up for Q & A time. "How much did that cost?" someone wanted to know. Crystal didn't know. Mrs. Brown steered the conversation in another direction. "How long have you been taking lessons?" another one of my inquisitive classmates asked. I could do better than this.
I raised my hand. "Can I play? I know how to play the violin. Can I play a song on it?" I asked most confidently. "That's up to Melinda"-hey I just remembered her name wasn't Crystal! It was Melinda! Anyway, Melinda said that I could.
I walked up to the front of the class, gosh this was exciting. I took the violin and the bow from her, placing them in what I thought were the appropriate positions, and began to play. No one in the room could have been more surprised than I was at the screeching that followed. It had looked sooooo easy. Why was it screeching for me? I pulled the bow back and forth over the strings, mimicking just what Melinda had done, but the harder and faster I played, the worse it sounded. I tried not to panic and I definitely wasn't going to stop playing. I needed to keep playing for a couple of reasons. One, if I stopped now, Mrs. Brown and everyone else would know that I didn't really know how to play the violin. So the "fake it till you make it" tactic crossed my mind. Also, I needed to buy myself some time to figure out what I was going to say once I did stop playing.
Now, I did take piano lessons so I knew a little something about music. One was the normal duration of a song. I played as long as I thought a normal song should last. When I stopped playing Mrs. Brown said something like "That was interesting" and "What was the name of that song?" The second thing I'd learned in my year of piano lessons was that the titles of the songs usually sounded like what they were, (i.e chopsticks) so I replied confidently with, "Screeching Cars." And with that I handed the violin and bow back to Melinda who looked a little bit bewildered. And I went back to take my seat thinking I had pulled it off marvelously!
Some punk from the class made a comment like, "That's not how it's supposed to sound!" to which Mrs. Brown (bless her heart) said, "There are many sounds a violin can make. That was one of them." Yeah! I thought. By this point I had convinced myself that I really did know how to play the violin and was ready to add it to my resume. I didn't wake up knowing that about myself that morning, but hey, you learn something new everyday!

An Unproud First Grade Moment

When I was young(er) I was boy crazy. I realize this is probably shocking to some of you, but there's really no two ways about it. I was also a really bad friend occasionally because of it.
In first grade I was in Mrs. Brown's class at C.S Lewis. Part of our daily routine was to go over what the day of the week and month were that day as well as the weather and who knows what else. The cool part about this routine was that each student got a turn leading this activity. There were color pictures, numbers, velcro and felt that went along with this routine. If it was your day to head up this activity, you got to pick out the colorful symbols and adhere them to the board appropriately. Since this was such a big ordeal you also got to pick a helper...to help you with this big important job. Now usually this dragged on probably, oh I'm guessing somewhere around ten times longer than it needed to be. My sense of time has been distorted by my years of aging and child like memory, but bless all those first grade teachers with unbelievable patience just the same. Anyway, the kid who's day it was drug it out because they were in charge. They were the center of attention, while we all sat around with eyes on them, yelling out obvious answers to Mrs. Brown's rhetorical questions such as, "It's rainy and cloudy today! Put up the rain and the cloud pictures!"
Now early on in the school year I became good friends with Sarah McMenn. Occasionally Sarah and I planned to wear matching outfits to school. We also chose each other as bathroom buddies, as we were required to use the buddy system when we needed to leave the classroom for such purposes. We sat by each other at lunch and played together at recess. I even named one of our goats after her-a dying goat, because if it had a name when it died, it would be sadder and I could mourn it more dramatically. (Yes, we had goats, but that's a different story). Somewhere among all this bonding we promised each other that when it was our day to head up the morning routine we would choose each other as our "helper".
Now as fate and the alphabet would have it, Sarah's day came first. (Her last name started with a letter earlier in the alphabet than mine did.) Sweet and true as she was, she chose me for her partner without hesitation. I don't think anyone else chose me for their partner all year except for maybe a semi-mental kid named Josh. (I'm not being mean, I think that's what he was).
Anyway, the weeks went by and finally it came my turn to head up the morning routine. (You know I feel kind of sick just writing this and I'm starting to wonder if Unproud Moments shouldn't be a re-occurring subject label to have on my blog :/ you let me know). Sooo, as I sat there in the little blue plastic chair in front of the whole class-ALL eyes on me and no doubt my dorky home-perm, but I was oblivious to that at the moment-I felt the power!
"You need to choose a helper." Mrs. Brown instructed me. "Oh, I know. I know! Just let me savor this for a minute," I thought. Hands shot up everywhere. My eyes scanned my classmates. I saw Sarah, with a smile. Then I saw Crystal, Josh, Maris, Sarah...this time with a confused look on her face as I was hesitating in my decision. Then I saw Michael Rosenoua (and believe me, it's not easy remembering how to spell a last name like that for twenty years.) Ahhh, Michael Rosenaou, my secret crush. He never said two words to me and now he was looking at me, hopeful, pleading and cute as could be. It was more than I could handle. I pointed, I spoke, I chose. Just like that. The look on Sarah's face was one of confusion and hurt. I hadn't planned on or prepared for the feeling that would overtake me once I saw that look. I felt sick and though I'd like to say that I didn't enjoy my time as the class leader of the morning routine with Michael Rosenoua as my helper that day, I'm sure I did. I'M JUST BEING HONEST!
Though honest certainly wasn't my strong suit that day. I hadn't held up my end of the bargain with Sarah. She'd chosen me to be her helper. I'd gotten what I wanted and I wasn't willing to return the favor to her when it would cost me something. I don't remember what, but I made something up later that day at recess as to why I hadn't chosen her and had chosen Michael. I can't imagine what it must've been, but she bought it! I told you she was sweet and true. Unlike me. I was a natural born liar-there are no two ways about that either!

Perspective Anyone?

So I feel really unqualified to write this post, which a friend asked me to do. But maybe it's best that I write it now since I'm not in this particular season (though I have been). The topic at hand is the pressures of being a SAHM. The question presented to me was "Seriously - if that is your full-time job, don't you expect your kids to be perfect...and if they are not perfect, what does that say about the SAHM..." Here is where I laughed hysterically - j/k...kinda.
I've been thinking about it and I think the root of the pressure lies not only in being a SAHM, but also in the unmentioned chores that don't pertain directly to mothering like the never ending house cleaning, laundry, grocery shopping, cooking/baking (or in some cases cereal-pouring), organizing, errands, etc. (my this is a depressing list!) and dare I say some of you crazies out there even add homeschooling to this list (I kid about the crazy part-don't send me angry emails)! If even a handful of these pop up in the same day as all of a sudden overdue, and your kids are bouncing off the walls at the same time, it's enough to..well, fill in the blank!
So with this in mind. I'd like to ask where do the pressures come from? You know the pressures of having it all done all the time with happy, healthy, "perfect" kids to match? Yeah, those, where do they come from? Here's where it gets really exciting...you, me, us, ourselves! I've been thinking about it and I really can't come up with a better answer. I think we put the pressures on ourselves more than anyone. It's not our husbands (let's face it, if he comes home at night and I'm smiling and not begging him to take his little maniacs out of my eye and ear shot-he thinks I'm a raging success!), it's not our friends, though we can feel that way when we compare ourselves too much, and for the most part it's not our culture. So I think it's us. We want things to be in order and taken care of all the time.
Some of us have personalities that make us harder on ourselves than others (you know who you are!) You just can't make enough charts and calendars for yourself and your kids! And that's fine, whatever works for you, but let's keep our goals realistic otherwise you're setting yourself up for failure.
Back to the parenting issue. The SAHM job is a work in progress. Your kids are not going to be perfect at some magic age and that's why you're there-that's the job! If you could "complete" your job by the time they are three, then you could just sit on the couch and eat bonbons all day (or Oreos, or Noah's Bagels, or whatever floats your boat).
I think seriously though, you shouldn't focus on how close your child is to perfect as a reflection of your parenting. You should focus on your parenting. None of us really give it a second thought when someone else's kid is acting up in front of us, but it's how the parent handles the situation that either makes us smile knowingly or grimace and try desperately not to let our mouths drop to the floor out of pure judgementalness. Most of us don't really even care or remember how the child responds as long as the parent is staying on top of it dutifully and responsibly. So don't let your kids be the measure of your parenting as much as your parenting should be the measure. I say "as much" because surely there is something to be said by how your kids act and respond to you. But they are little sinners just like us and have their own free wills. So do your part to do well by them, pray for them, pray for yourself, enlist your husband of course for help and cut yourself some slack. And remember "Let us not be weary in well doing, for in due season we shall reap if we faint not." When it says we shall reap, let's not limit ourselves to what we think that reaping should/will look like; same with in "due time" for some of us, that may mean heaven.
So what are your thoughts? What pressures do you struggle with the most as a SAHM and how do you handle them?

Edith and Merle

Let me tell you about a sweet, quirky old couple named Edith and Merle. They are still madly in love with each other and tell each other so when they are sitting on their porch, rocking and drinking lemonade together.
They are actually us, Devlyn and I, when we are old. We have given each other old people names (no offense to anyone reading this who happens to be named Edith or Merle). When one of us does something quirky, the other will say something like "See, now that's something Edith would do" or in a tone of a little more desperation, it goes like this, "Merle! Stop that's embarrassing!"
Edith is forgetful. She buys flowers, plants them and then forgets to water them. Sometimes she forgets to plant them before she has a chance to forget to water them and they die ever so young. Such a waste.
Edith can get away with saying anything to anyone. There are things that Edith thought of and wanted to say when she was young, but showed amazing restraint, deciding that it would be more memorable and have more pizazz when she was old.
Edith loves pizazz. Edith wants more drama in her window treatments and garnishes in her ice cubes. Edith freezes garnishes in her ice cubes!
Edith is not a pack rat. She purges things from the house impulsively not wanting useless junk to build up and clutter the house. Sometimes she does this so impulsively with her mother's voice running through her head saying, "When in doubt, throw it out!" so loudly that she throws out things she regrets. She is then forced to beg and plead with Merle until he agrees to go down to the hospital thrift shop and buy the item back. Merle would do this for Edith without all the begging and pleading. He would do anything for Edith. But he does love it when she begs and pleads.
Merle does things like puts out five ones side by side on a table at a restaurant when they first sit down and lets the waitress know that she has already earned that much tip. Now, she can un-earn dollars throughout the coarse of the meal or she can earn additional dollars. Merle loves this game. He sits there with his stack of ones watching her every move, speaking slowly and cryptically when he orders making sure he is not misunderstood. Merle orders liver and onions for no reason other than it grosses Edith out. He also orders diet cola. He drinks diet coke, he is addicted to diet coke, but should the particular restaurant establishment feature Pepsi, RC or some other cola, he doesn't want to know for sure that what he's drinking is not diet coke. Merle puts miscellaneous items like coconuts in Edith's purse just so he can watch her confusion and embarrassment when she reaches in and pulls them out in front of the teller at the bank.
Merle insists that Edith trim his toenails for him. When she doesn't, he picks and tears at them when he's in her presence, like when they are in bed or when he is driving the car. He insists that it's because she doesn't trim them for him that he's left with no choice but pick, rip and tear at them at that very moment! This picking noise drives Edith NUTS!
If Merle had to choose between letting Edith eat him with a spoon or spread him on toast, he would choose...toast, no wait spoon...yeah, toast. Definitely toast!
Some of these things Merle and Edith do, we do now, some of them no. You can use your imagination to decide which are which. Though I do buy accessories sometimes just for Edith to wear in the future. I think she'll appreciate it. Don't you?