Amen, Dear Brother

On Sunday, Grandma J decided to bring Phillip Johnny Bob to the earliest Mass ever church at 7 A.M. because they serve breakfast burritos afterwards, and they beat the heck out of the donuts after the 9 A.M. Mass. Being a nice guy who wants to bond with Crab in the worst way.....PJB asked if Crab could come with us. Grandma J, who loves to volley between referring to herself in the first and third person the idea of inclusiveness, said sure, why not?

So it was off to church without incident.





Afterwards the Phil and Crab seemed to be getting along, and I could see that eating burritos attending church together was a good idea.






Until Crab went for PJB's throat!





Crab was made to ride shotgun where grandma J could keep an eye on him. But all this brings up other issues that could be contributing to Crab's behavioral problems because I don't think most crabs live in Texas attack bears.

There are some ideas coming down the pike, or since we don't live near a pike, the cow trail. By ideas, Grandma J means a contest...a contest with a super gift.

Check back tomorrow for the details, and how you can be the big winner of the best contest ever. By ever, Grandma J means the best contest ever sponsored by her..

Once upon a time, when the earth was still flat full of green grass and blue skies, Grandma J was just a little girl.

On Sundays, after church her whole family would take a ride to her grandma and grandpas' farm. They had goats, cows, chickens, turkeys, a blind cat with no teeth and a dog or two.

Since we always wore our Sunday best on these visits, we could fill our skirts with chicken feed and run like the devil try to sprinkle it about a little at a time. But, the chickens chased us for the feed. Grandma J used her original dump and run technique.

One day, when Grandma J's father decided he had it up to here with the winter blizzards and snow shoveling, he loaded up the family and headed to California.....almost that fast!

Once in California, the Sunday drives after church were long drives to the mountains to pan for gold in the babbling streams...in our Sunday best. Sometimes we headed to the desert to hunt for treasures....ummm Grandma J's father had some strange concepts to fill the grandparent void. I mean, when you live at the beach, wouldn't it be a no brainer to stay home and frolic in the surf? Collect shells? Driftwood?

Fast forward to today. After church, Grandma J and Phillip Johnny Bob stopped and picked up JJ.

Since she was longing for the good old days, she took them for a ride to see some bulls.

Not the same pretty bulls they saw a few weeks ago...no sireeee...today it was the big black ones.

The ones with the funny duck/bird things hanging around them.

No one got too close to these guys because they were big, and not as friendly looking as the pretty brown and beige cows.

click photo to enlarge

Who knows what those feathered creatures are? What's the story here? JJ thinks they are picking bugs off the bulls? Just a wild guess! I know someone knows....please?

FRIDAY MATINEE.....
...on any freaking day there is always a matinee worth talking about.

Grandma J had a blast on Easter Sunday. There was mass in the morning where arriving forty minutes early didn't guarantee a parking space in the church parking lot. That's because all the good friends of the Easter Bunny got there two hours earlier. These are the same friends of Santa Claus that show up on Christmas. You know where this left Grandma J. That's right, parked far away on a soft shoulder, and walking in the rain, crossing one of those dangerous FM routes to get to the church.

All was good...we ate a nice big breakfast at Cracker Barrel, then we went to the movies. The first movie of the day is cheaper, and Grandma J loves a bargain, but you knew that. Here in Central Texas, the seats in our new Cinemark 16 are only $5.50.


We went to see Observe And Report starring Seth Rogen. Yes it's rated R, and yes A-Ron and newly Permitted to Drive Granddaughter went.



We like to sit up against the handicap rail so we can kick the disabled put our feet up. That's right, Classy is our middle name.



And as you can see Grandma J had no problem asking a complete stranger to take our picture. She was slightly disappointed that he wouldn't let me use his popcorn and large Icee as props.

Oh yeah, the movie........



If you saw Mall Cop, you probably wished Paul Blart would get some balls and quit being such a wuss. Well, in Observe and Report, Ronnie Barnhardt is a vulgar, fowl mouthed, gun happy thug who is head of mall security. He is basically deranged and psycho.



He lives with his alcoholic, sleazy mother who, when asked by Ronnie if he was the reason his father left them, says "Yes".


Ronnie falls for a pretty blonde makeup girl from a kiosk in the mall similar to Paul Blart falling for the pretty girl in the wig kiosk in Mall Cop. The difference is, the makeup girl, Brandi, played by Anna Faris, can't stand Ronnie, but when she drinks she gets vulgar and raunchy.


The mall falls victim to a streaker, flasher, and this gives Ronnie the opportunity to prove that he is smarter than the detective assigned to the case. Some of his tactics are delusional and scary. I have to say, there is plenty of humor too. But there is also plenty of nudity.............


And when the streaker, who is older and fat, runs through the mall for what seemed like forever.....with us getting a full frontal view of his little noodle competing with his belly in the jiggling department...some of us laughed and someone covered their face.

Oh yeah, Ronnie shoots the streaker....and dispite all the blood and guts he is still alive, though barely.




I give this movie two out of five Easter eggs . Yeah, I thought it was that bad.

SER.I.OUS.LY POSTED

Today I was off to a mission.....

....and this is what I got. Can you guess?

My Lentin Ashes. Not a sign of grace, but an outward sign of graces needed.

*this post in no way resembles or was a knock-off of Bossy's popular Guess and Press. But if it was, I hope Bossy is flattered. ..maybe.

SUNDAY IN CALIFORNIA...........

.........is much the same as Texas!

Honestly, I wanted to make today a red letter day. The sky was clear, the sun was warm and the morning coffee was excellent.

I'm Catholic, and in Texas my parish is St. Paul Chong Hasang. It was established by a small community of Korean Catholics, and now serves a much larger community with most masses in English. I love my parish.

So here in Southern California, I chose not to go to the local St. Josephs, but I went to mass at St. John Paul II, which is a unique parish that caters to the Polish community. I never knew there was a Polish Community, but the parishoners come from all over Southern California. I loved the mass, and then the festivities they have afterwards with authentic music and food. It's become somewhat of a tourist attraction with all the Polish art, crafts and culture.

Now that I was all holied up, I attended a Little League Baseball game for my grandson Ryan. Just the thing I would probably be doing in Texas. He pitched, caught and played second base and had three grandmas and a great-grandma cheering him on! What fun!

Late afternoon we headed a few miles in the opposite direction for a Harvest Festival at another church. We had some good rockin' gospel music.....not unlike churches in Texas would have, and then we went inside the hall for some bingo!

Yep, of course it was another Catholic church, because didn't they invent bingo?
I won two games in a row, each paying $30. We headed over to the beer garden for some more music, then headed home.

And pictures? I took plenty...but my memory card was in the slot on my laptop and not in my camera. I don't have my cable to download them.

So Sistas? When are you going to start circulating that Blogging for Dummies Book?

I may go to a mattinee tomorrow....maybe....a big maybe