Mom will be mom

My mom left early this morning, but not to be forgotten, she left us with an amusing memory last night. For those of you who know my mom and some of her nutty antics, it may be funny to you. If you don't know her, it may not be as funny. But to give you some history, here's one story that comes to mind to give you some idea about her....

Back in college I was dating this guy and he was coming with me to some family thing - the first time he was meeting my family. We were talking with a few people when my aunt mentioned that she'd almost missed her flight there because it had taken her so long to get through security. She kept setting off the metal detector and finally had to be hand-wanded by some male security guard. "And think of how embarrassed I was when he finally figured out it was the underwire in my bra that was setting it off!" she said.

"Huh," says my mom, somewhat absentmindedly, "I wonder what he would have thought of this?" as she pulls a wad of keys (and I mean a wad - like 25 keys, trinkets, rings, etc) out of her bra. My boyfriend did a huge turn-the-head-away, woah, I did not just see that move.

Yeah, I've heard of keeping a couple dollar bills in your bra before, but um....???? Maybe there are reasons that relationship didn't work out.

Or I could mention all the letters she's sent me in her life. Like on my mission, I remember opening envelopes with no writing, no explanation, just something totally random (or totally inapplicable while you're on a mission) like a newspaper article entitled, "Raw egg yolk cures acne," or "Low iron levels lead to poor math scores." Or having handwritten on the outside of an envelope as an afterthought or something, "80% of Botswana has AIDS. Don't share needles."

So, anyway, back to last night. Ryan had just returned home with a new baby:


Yes, a new 46" Sony Bravia. Our old tube tv finally totally and completely bit the dust. I told him he had until Monday night to get me a new tv before my mom left town so I could at least take a shower or something when all the kids were up. So, being the dutiful husband that he is, he obviously did not disappoint (although now I'm having - um, I think this is too big, and it's actually just going to be playing Sesame Street all day issues - so you could show some support in his favor if you want to let him keep his new toy). It was quite late though by the time he got the whole tv in and set up and what with getting over this sickness and being up fairly late for various reasons the past few nights, we were all a little exhausted. But we turned it on and the initial setup started. And then it starts scanning for channels. So we sit and wait because of course we can't go to bed until we at least see some picture on this thing.

And we wait.

And we wait some more. I guess the signal is scanning the whole universe because it ticks up about one number every 30 seconds or so while we sit and wait. And just watch the numbers go up one at a time. I'm not sure why we didn't move or go do something else while we were waiting. I guess we didn't really realize how long it would take and we were partly too excited that we might see something any second and partly too tired to move. Finally after about 20 minutes, my mom gets up and starts puttering a little. She goes over and adjusts the shutters behind the tv. She starts looking at the side of the tv a little. And then. She pushes a button. And turns the tv off.

Stunned silence. Mouths gape open slightly in disbelief. Did she just... ??what was she...??? Confused stares turn to my mother.

"Oh," she says, ever-so-innocently, " That probably wasn't very good, was it?"

Um, what????

No. That probably wasn't very good. Ryan turns the tv back on and of course, the setup process starts all over again. Now about 11:30 at night. And we have to wait another half hour for it to go through and find all the channels so we can see some dang picture! But we're finally letting some exasperated giggles escape as I ask, "What are you??? Two??? You just couldn't resist those shiny silver buttons???"

She really had no explanation as to what she was thinking or what came over her. I'm a little bleary-eyed today after the late night and the 5am airport run and have pulled out the diet Cokes, but oh well. At least I know she's still, um, normal.