*ripple dissolve effect*

When I was little, sometimes I'd get nasty coughs [as children often do] that would keep me up at night. It would sometimes keept the other members of my family up too, obviously.

On bad nights when no one was getting any sleep from all the hacking, my dad would come into my room, gently pick me up and carry me to the living room, where he'd lay me down on the couch. Then he'd go into the kitchen and make us both a cup of plain herbal tea. He'd steep it till it was just right and then serve me mine. We'd sit in the living room sipping our tea until we were both done, and then he'd carry me back to bed, my throat soothed and heart content. And neither of us would say a single word the entire time.

* * * * *

My sister tends to get into ridiculous situations sometimes, and one of them happened when she was about 6. I had a friend over and all three of us were in my an dCaralee's bedroom, Caralee on the top bunk and my friend and I on the floor. Cao decided to jump off the top bunk by hanging her legs over the side and just sliding off. It usually worked, but this time not so much. She was wearing sweatpants and as she was sliding down the elastic waist band got snagged on a metal piece that kept the mattress in place. I heard a loud RIP and all of a sudden Cao had stopped her descention, mid-flight. This was followed by my sister's screaming.

My mother rushed in to find Caralee dangling two feet off the floor, suspended by her elastic waist band and some of the fabric from the seat of her pants. Quite a sight to behold.

The unfortunate part is that she actually did get hurt in the process. The metal piece she got snagged on also gave her a nice scrape on her butt. But the injury wasn't serious enough to detract from the humor of the whole thing.

* * * * *

My friend Alex is one of the weirdest, coolest people you will ever meet. And she's genuinely bizarre, she doesn't just do crazy things when people are around.

Case in point:

While completely alone and not expecting any company, Alex decides to see if she can fit in her duffle bag. So she crawls inside it and, happily hangs out in it for a moment or two, when Sarah pays Alex a surprise visit.

Sarah finds Alex inside her own duffle bag, and, thankfully, takes a picture. [sorry! couldn't find it. will keep looking.]

Wish I'd been there.

* * * * *

Adventures in Grocery Checking:

A woman came through my lane and I comoplimented her unique purse.

Fast forward several MONTHS.

Same woman comes through and asks if I remember her. After a little prompting, I did indeed remember. Then she says:

"Good! I'd like to give it to you. I'm very religious and after I left that day God told me "You should give your purse to that sweet girl" so I immediately wrapped it and put it in the back of my car. I've been looking for you every time I've come in since and I finally found you! Will you accept it?"

What do you say to that? Complete stranger, giving me her purse, because God told her to. The only way that could have been weirder was if one or both of us had been naked. After telling her how weird I thought the whole thing was, I realized that if she was going to go on a several-months-long quest to give this thing to me, I should take it from her.

I've still got it. Or at least I think I do. It might have been tossed when my mom gave away everything in my bedroom.