The 409 Incident

My mother is a special kind of lady. Not like most mothers are special ladies. Mine is absolutely batshit crazy. I’ve known this since I was about 7 years old. Generally, something is wrong when you are 7 years old and you can already tell that you need to learn how to ignore everything your own mother says if you want to live a normal life.

Mom has spent her entire life pushing people away from her. She is an angry lady and will always find a fault in everyone and will decide that they suck… and that they need to be cut off… family and friends alike. Pair this with the fact that she is also stubborn, and you get a lady who hates everyone and hold grudges for pretty much the rest of her life… over imaginary problems.

So since the divorce in 1992, she’s decided to be alone… doesn’t stop her from bitching about it every chance she gets… but she’d rather be alone than play nice. And due to her stubbornness… she never asks for help. She will curse your name later for not being there, but she never lets you know what trouble she’s about to get into, so how could you have known. Basically it’s an excuse to be mad at you for not wanting to be around her every waking moment… but I digress.

Despite her ranting, raving and utterly bizarre behavior, the things she does are often flat-out comical… especially to my friends who I’ve shared the stories with… but none have ever been quite as popular as what has become known as “The 409 incident”

One day I go to her house to check on her. She says “oh I’ve been sick. I couldn’t move for 3 days”

I had to do a little digging here because my mom often exaggerates or makes arching statements. “What happened?” I ask. She said “stupid flying grasshoppers BITE me!” (you have to imagine a thick Korean accent on top of all this)

“Flying grasshoppers? What are you talking about?”

Apparently she was doing yard work in the back yard when she noticed “dirt” on the underside of the eaves of the house. “I wonder what IS” she said… and got closer to inspect it. “Flying grasshoppers jump in and out of it”

“Flying grasshoppers? Mom… you mean WASPS?”

“What those?”

“They’re like bees but they don’t make honey… and they sting you. What the hell did you do?”

She was trying to wash the hive off of the wall with the hose when the wasps started stinging her. But my stubborn mother, instead of backing down, got angry instead… went to the garage and grabbed (no bullshit) a rake and an aerosol can of formula 409 with the old logo and a gemco price tag on it… and came back to wage war on an entire hive of angry wasps.

First she knocked the hive clean off the side of the house with the rake handle… then proceeded to swing the rake at the SWARM with one hand, while spraying them with 409 with the other hand.

“Ohhh STUPID flying grasshoppers… it HURT!” she said, wincing from the memory. Eventually she had to back down and retreated into the house where, instead of calling me to tell me about it, laid in bed all swollen up for three days cursing the stupid flying grasshoppers for biting her.

So that, my friends, is the now infamous 409 incident. The can still resides in my friend’s garage to this day as a decoration/conversation piece.

Tags: family, haw, humor, mom

My Ridiculous Mother

FINALLY!

After being denied for three icanhascheezburger submissions and two failblogs, i was beginning to worry that something was wrong with me. Maybe there is. But there is definitely something MORE wrong with my mother… and at least THOSE stories are worth reading about.

Check out my first approved submission:
http://mymomisafob.com/2008/11/26/unsatisfied/

This site cracks me up and gives me kind of a warm fuzzy at the same time. (and for once i’m not talking about Mike’s mom when i say warm fuzzy.) There are so many stories here that sound JUST LIKE my mom… I kind of assumed that she was a special brand of crazy, but it looks like i’m not alone. There are others out there like her, and thusly there are others out there like me… half endeared and half annoyed.

I don’t even want to get into the farce that was my thanksgiving visit with her… suffice it to say things went well for the 1st visit and i should not have returned for a 2nd. Things escalated (like they tend to) rather quickly and left me in sort of a state of shock. Unlike many of the moms on that website, mine is truly evil-incarnate, and i am never prepared, no matter how many years i’ve dealt with her, for her spitefulness and selfishness.

Also:

Audio clip: Adobe Flash Player (version 9 or above) is required to play this audio clip. Download the latest version here. You also need to have JavaScript enabled in your browser.

Here is an extremely ironic snippet of audio that i sampled from her while testing out my new digital recorder… If this isn’t foreshadowing, i don’t know what is.

Tags: family, haw, humor, mom, your

Your Daily Engrish Report

So I drove my mother to the Korean store last night and for the first time I wasn’t bored out of my skull. I decided to go around documenting all the best examples of engrish that I could find.

It wasn’t hard.

This is an abridged list of the best ones… aside from these gems, the makeup/skincare counter is chock full of crazy phrases… It’s like you get a haiku with every purchase!

There is also some strange fascination with nano-technology in korea or something… not the reality of nano-tech… just the exploitation of the buzz… I’ve never seen so many products claim to have “nano particles” in it… or that they are natural plant-based products made by nano technology…. ????? I guess there’s no truth in marketing, even overseas…. ESPECIALLY overseas.

for example… ENPRANI makes an “innermost hydro softener” that boasts an “Inner sphere Nano 60 Triple Hydration System”… dermatologist tested of course…

Ah the joy… I will never be bored in that store again.

Tags: engrish, mom, sacramento