June Cleaver Nirvana

In honor of spring break we are taking a trip back in time.

Not just any trip.

A road trip.

Not just any road trip, but the obligatory road trip of my childhood.

My family was obsessed with the road trip. It was a well-oiled machine of efficiency.

There were basic rules to the family road trip. These rules are set in stone. Any deviation is strictly forbidden:


I need to emphasize that you need to re-read rules #1 and #3. If you are unprepared, it could be disastrous.

Now way back in the 1970s my family had 3 options for our travel vehicle:


Legend:
Vehicle A: Family car. Purple Citroen. Great looking car. Cool inside. Drives approximately 167 miles between break-downs. Looks great sitting on the side of the highway.

Vehicle B: 1969 Pontiac. Car given to my family by relative. Large car. Lots of power. Can sit approximately 12 people comfortably in the bench backseat. Reliable. Gas tank capacity rivals a tanker truck.

Vehicle C: Late 60s "conversion van" that can be borrowed from my grandparents. Has a full kitchen and bathroom. Advertised to sleep 5. Actually can sleep one comfortably (and not that comfortably). Down-side is that family has to drive to West coast to pick up vehicle.

Let's pick Vehicle B!

Now let's choose a route:


Please make note that all car routes require around the clock driving. Please note that all arrival times must be between 2 and 5 am because relatives that we were visiting loved when we, a family of four rolled into their driveway in the middle of the night.

Let's drive to California!

We aren't pansy travelers.

We are weathered.

Experienced.

Insane.

So what are we going to eat along the trip?

Howard Johnsons?

Big Boy?

Wall Drug?

Puuuuleeeeease people! We have already forgotten rules #1 and #3. Eating out requires a stop of the vehicle. Eating out costs money. And for your information, money doesn't grow on trees.

So mom is going to pack a cooler:


We are ready to roll!

We have filled our rectangular suitcases full of necessities and dad has placed them with precision in the trunk with skill that rivals an experienced brick layer.

The trunk is full. So full that a piece of notebook paper placed on the top of the suitcases would cause the trunk to pop open. A few extra things are placed on the floor of the back seat because children don't need legroom.

In my family suitcases were NEVER tied to the roof. My dad would have seen this as a sign to the world of packing failure. That would be unacceptable.

Let's show a little road trip pride!

Even though the backseat measures about 72 feet in width. This is necessary:


And then this will happen:


Tears were the ONLY drink available because of rules #1 and #3. Unlucky was the child who realized pee urgency within the first few hours post fill-up.

Dehydration is the goal here.

Who needs drinks when the sandwiches are of the floating variety?

Then this would happen:


To keep the kid's minds off their full bladders game mania ensued:

I spy.

The license plate game.

Punch bug.

We were road warriors!

No amount of crying, screaming, bladder explosion or road trip songs would make my dad turn around and head back for home.

Nerves of steel.

We didn't need a portable DVD player!

We could occupy ourselves the old fashioned way with whining and fighting...

But every once in awhile there was a quiet moment that I wish I could recreate with my own kids:


OK, not exactly this quiet moment since in the 1970s it was perfectly acceptable for children to lay in the back window.

But something close to this. A moment of complete road trip bliss when the kids are quietly listening to dad making up stories about road signs. A moment filled with family memory magic.



My favorite one is the 'Legend of Falling Rock'...

All through the house not a creature was stirring,
Not even a mouse.



No one should be stirring!
It was 2:30 am.



Chirp. Chirp?

I don't hear anything.
*pause*
*silence*
*keep listening*
*nothing*



Chirp. Chirp?
CRAP.
Where is it coming from?
*pause*
*silence*
*keep listening*
*nothing*

Chirp. Chirp.
CRAP.
Where is it coming from?

*turn on lights*



We spread out to listen.
The chirp. chirp. is not frequent.
The chirp. chirp. is separated from the next chirp. chirp. by at least 90 seconds.

90 seconds feels like 10 minutes at 2:36 in the morning.

We devise a plan.
When we hear the first chirp. we are going to run around to see if we can figure out it's origin during the second chirp.



There is a lot of running and listening.
There is very little chirp. chirp. origination identification.

We run.

Chirp. Chirp.

We listen.

Chirp. Chirp.

After more running and more listening and more chirp. chirp.ing we finally narrowed it down to a smoke detector that we thought might be located near the middle of the house...



There is a smoke detector in the middle of the house in the stairwell!
Let's sit down and listen.

Chirp. Chirp.

YEAH! Origination identification completed.

I will go get a nine volt battery to place in the complaining smoke detector...



I will go get a nine volt battery to place in the complaining smoke detector that is on the ceiling two stories up.

I think I will also get a ladder.

A tall ladder.

Chirp. Chirp.



That doesn't look safe.

That doesn't look tall enough.

Chirp. Chirp.

Let's have a strategic planning session at 2:43 am!

It was like one of those corporate team building exercises. Without the corporation.

Go team Nirvana!

Get to the top of the 2 story ceiling and replace that nine volt battery in the complaining smoke detector and learn to trust each other...

Chirp. Chirp.

We planned.

Chirp. Chirp.

We built.

Chirp. Chirp.

We balanced.

Chirp. Chirp.

We overcame...



It took 2 wooden boxes, a large left-over piece of plywood, a 10 foot ladder, Holly's yoga balance 2 steps above ladder manufacturer's warning, blog-Stedman's strong grip and a 9 volt battery to overcome the complaining smoke detector obstacle.

Go team Nirvana!

Team Nirvana figured it out.

Team Nirvana deserves to go back to bed.


All through the house not a creature was stirring,
Not even a mouse.



No one should be stirring!
It was 3:24 am.



Did you hear a bang?
Yes.
Do you hear a chirp. chirp?
No.

Let's go back to sleep!



The next morning I looked up and saw this:



That was 8 months ago.

I am not about to get out the corporate team building exercise for anything but a chirp. chirp.

Oh, and when I DO get out the corporate team building exercise for the chirp. chirp. please remind me to replace that burned out lightbulb...




If you are curious what Holly looks like in her shorty pajamas WITH her snake fighting boots, click for another Holly's Animated Life adventure.

Holly got ready.

Ready for something she hasn't done in years.



Holly realized that she had only one pair of jeans that fit well. She had no choice but to go shopping for another pair.

Why has Holly not been jean shopping for years?



Maybe because last time she went shopping for jeans she entered the store as a confident woman and exited the store as a huddled mass yearning to be free of her obvious body disfigurements.



For you see, in non-jean-shopping-life Holly is OK with her body. She is not in love with her shape, but has accepted it and moves on...



Yet for some reason, in jean-shopping-life all that changes.

Holly's non-jean-shopping THIGHS are OK, but her jean-shopping THIGHS appear like over-stuffed, dimpled sausage.

Holly's non-jean-shopping WAIST is OK, but her jean-shopping WAIST creates plumber-effect.

In non-jean shopping-life Holly never met a tailor. In jean-shopping-life Holly has never met a pair of jeans that didn't require a skilled one.

Holly recruited a friend for moral support. Holly wasn't sure about the morality, but could really use the support.



Soon Holly was back in a dressing room with an ever-growing pile of ill-fitting jeans.

*Hold me*



Just about the time Holly was about to slip into her pre-existing Post-Traumatic Jean Shopping Syndrome, the sales clerk asked her to try on one more pair.



Holly tried on the jeans.

Holly was puzzled.

Something was different.

Very different.



The jeans fit.

*cue the angel choir*



Where did you find these jeans that fit so perfectly?



The men's department.

Yep.

In jean-shopping-life Holly is a boy.

Holly was once a teenager.



Although Holly is naturally perky, the teenage years turned Holly's perkiness into springy teenage angst.



Springy teenage angst can be identified by continuous eye-rolling and hyper-debating.

Holly's bobbing head in off-beat time to her walkman was seen wandering around her room and on the well beaten track to the bathroom she shared.



It may have been because Holly lived directly across from her parents bed room...

It may have been because the family needed a break from all the eye-rolling...

It may have been because someone needed to go to the bathroom...

SOMETHING caused Holly's dad came up with a brilliant idea!



Genius Holly's dad...

Let's build Holly a room in the basement!

Holly's dad built walls.

Holly's dad built a bathroom.

Holly's dad put carpet on the floor.

This new room was very helpful in containing Holly's teenage angst.

This new room was very helpful in containing Holly's mess.



Holly did not live alone in her mess.

Holly's dog didn't seem to mind the long hours in the bathroom, the constant eye-rolling or the mess.



At the time Holly thought the room was nice.

Now that Holly is no longer suffering from teenage angst she can fully admit that the room was teenage nirvana.



Well, almost teenage nirvana. There was one time when Holly found a small garden snake under her bathroom rug.



And then Holly suffered from legitimate angst.

The End.

This is not the end of the story!

There is more...

Part II IS told by Jennifer from Thursday Drive HERE.

Part III IS told Thursday by Madge from Mad Madge World HERE.

Now GO!

Go see Jennifer and Madge before I start rolling my eyes...

Once upon a time not far from Holly's house in a popular suburb of one of the countries largest cities was a pumpkin patch. And by pumpkin patch Holly means a large picturesque field where pumpkins are trucked in and laid in neat rows.



Holly and her family visited and enjoyed the pumpkin patch very much. They looked forward to the following fall so that they could visit again.

The next year Holly was surprised to see the WHOLE field full of pumpkins. She couldn't wait to go visit the super-sized pumpkin patch.



Hey, wait!

It wasn't just one pumpkin patch. It was now two.

Practically identical pumpkin patches sitting right next to each other.



Holly wasn't the only one that noticed the phenomenon.

The pumpkin patches noticed each other.

Soon each patch had new signs:



And then some more signs:



At this point some legal action took place that Holly is too tired to review and report back to you. She assumes it involved lawyers, judges and a whole bunch of pumpkin patch proceeds.

She would also like to make the following legal disclaimer: Holly has no further understanding of this case then what is obvious to the general public while driving a minivan past the patches at no more than 50 mph. Nothing drawn in marker should be construed as fact, opinion or slander.

Once the case was settled, things settled down a bit at the patches.

One of the patches received a new name!



And so it went for a few pumpkin seasons. The Patch and Village coexisted in a civil manner. As civil as two fighting children required to sit next to each other.

Then a new sign appeared this fall on the patch formally known as Village:



It appeared they had changed their name to Park.

Why Park?

Holly thinks that it might have something to do with the fact that when you drive from town toward the Patch, you cannot tell that there are two separate pumpkin entities. All you are looking for is pumpkins and a place to park:



That Pumpkin Park is so sneaky it is downright scary.

Holly has been cutting blog-Stedman's hair for years.

Years and years and years.

She has some fancy hair cuttin' scissors.
She has some electric clippers.
She has no formal hair cuttin' training.



Every once in awhile she has to remind blog-Stedman that he gets what he pays for.



Overall, it has worked out well...

Well, except for that time back in '92 when Holly accidentally cut a bald spot in blog-Stedman's temple the day before he started a fancy new job. Shhhh...that time is long forgotten.

So, imagine Holly's delight when she watched Oprah the other day. Oprah was interviewing America's most frugal family.

America's most frugal family cuts their own hair!



Yeah for America's most frugal family.

Yeah for Oprah.

Yeah for Holly.



Wow. Holly should be on Oprah!

And then Holly had what Oprah calls a lightbulb moment...



Holly should share her hair cuttin' joy with her three boys.

That is what America's most frugal family does.

Holly is sure that is what Oprah would do if she had three boys and wasn't rich and famous.



Holly paused the television and ushered the boys into the kitchen. She sat them down one by one on a hair cuttin' stool and covered them with a professional cape.

There was a lot of clipping.
There was a lot of cutting.
The hair was a flyin'.
There might have even been a bit of complainin'.

When Holly stood back and assessed her work, she smiled.



She smiled and maybe even giggled a bit.

And then she rushed to her computer.



After Googling, "mullet reversal", Holly decided that the next time her hair cuttin' scissors wanted to save money she would think about clipping a coupon.