Elections, Tricks, Leaves, & Cat Vomit Casseroles

The following column appeared in the October 29, 2008, issue of The Smith Mountain Eagle.

Howdy! Ida B. Peevish coming at you from Ida’s Salon of Beauty & Live Bait Shop in the heart of downtown Rock Bottom US of A, where we running our Pre-Election Special, wherein we make you look as much like the candidate of your choice as we can. We are also running our Pre-Halloween Special wherein we’ll make you look as creepy as we can, although some of our customers don’t need help in that department. Finally, we are running our Harvest Hair special, wherein we will glue hair we cut off somebody else on to the thinner areas of your head. We only ask that if you opt for the last special, you do not put on a hat for the rest of the day unless you are really attached to that hat—because it will be attached to you for several weeks. Now lessee what we got in the mail:

Dear Ida B. Are folks in Rock Bottom excited about the up-coming election? It’s only a few days away!—Pol Liti Gal

Dear Pol: Folks in Rock Bottom rarely get excited about anything, especially something that happens on a pretty regular basis as often as every four years. Most Rock Bottomittes think that having to get up from their recliners and go to the polls where they don’t even get a free lunch or the chance to watch mud-wrassling is more trouble than it’s worth. Also, since the typical Rock Bottom couple rarely agrees with each other, they figure that it’s a waste of gas to go out to vote when the wife’s vote will cancel out the husband’s and vice-versa.

Dear Ida B. I have figured out what to do with all the campaign literature that has been sent to me. I’m going to stuff it in the bags of all those pesky trick-or-treaters who will be coming around my house. What do you think of that?—Boo

Dear Booed: I think you will be the victim of several Halloween pranks after the kids see what you gave them. Good luck getting your outhouse down off your roof.

Dear Ida B. The leaves have been falling pretty hard in my yard lately, and everyday my wife keeps nagging me to rake them up and bag them and haul them to the dump. However, with all the football on TV, I just can’t get myself out of the recliner to rake them. What I have been doing is, after both my wife and the next-door neighbor go to work, I take my leaf-blower and blow all the leaves next door. However, the next morning after I get off from working the night shift, all the leaves are back in my yard and my wife starts in on me again. Do you think my neighbor is getting suspicious because he doesn’t have any trees in his yard?—Not-Rakin

Dear Knothead: Yes. For all the effort you have spent blowing those leaves next door everyday, you could have blown them into the back of your pick-up and hauled them off. Please tell your wife that all the nagging she’s been doing has probably put a strain on her and she needs to come down to Ida’s Salon of Beauty & Live Bait shop for a complete makeover. Also, we will clue her in to the most efficient ways to nag you.

Dear Ida B. I am in an awful fix. My in-laws were coming to supper the other night and I had just set the table when the cat hopped up on it and threw up. Well, I scraped up the mess and threw it into an empty casserole dish and meant to take it to the garbage but then the door bell rang, so I just left the dish on the table when I went to answer it. Don’t you know, there stood my mama-in-law and her sister and a couple more assorted in-laws way earlier than I was expecting them. Well, we all got to talking, and then the oven timer rang and I went into the kitchen to take the cornbread out of the oven. I forgot about that casserole dish. In the meantime, all them in-laws went in the dining room and started without me. By the time I had scraped the burnt parts off the cornbread and joined them, they’d eaten just about everything on the table except the pattern off the plates. That casserole dish was empty! The worst part was my mama-in-law said it was the best thing I ever made and could she have the recipe. Ida B., I can’t tell her the truth and I have been putting her off for several days now. What can I do? She can be real persistent. And I can’t lie to her, can I?—Perplexed

Dear Perplexed: About all you can do is confess. Just tell her that it’s something you threw together at the last minute and you can’t quite remember what ingredients were actually in it, other than they were leftovers. That explanation would be about as close to the truth as you can get without actually telling the whole truth.

Well, that’s it for this go-round. Remember, you get what you pay for, talk is cheap, and my advice is free.

~

Failures, Tree-savers, Newcomers, and Haunted

This column originally appeared in October 15, 2008, issue of The Smith Mountain Eagle.

Howdy! Ida B. Peevish coming at you from Ida’s Salon of Beauty & Live Bait Shop in the heart of downtown Rock Bottom US of A, where we running our Palin special for those of y’all Republican ladies who’ve got enough hair for me to tease up on top and hang down on the bottom and who want to emulate the vice-presidential candidate on election day. I have always said that big hair will come back, and doggone if it hasn’t. Whether this trend will last for the next four years is anybody’s guess, but it will at least last until early November. For y’all Democrat ladies, we are sorry there ain’t no female vice-presidential candidate for y’all to emulate, but maybe next time. Now lessee what we got in the mail:

Dear Ida B: I notice that in the office of Rock Bottom High School (where Bubba Jr. spends a lot of his time when he ain’t actually suspended), there is a banner that says, “At Rock Bottom High School, failure is not an option.” Does that mean that failure is a requirement?—Bubba’s Mama

Dear BM: Actually, that is only half the banner. What it actually says is “At Rock Bottom High School, failure is not an option; failure is a tradition.” According to principal Alma Motter, the only tradition at Rock Bottom High School that has endured through the generations is failure. She is sorry they did not have a wall big enough to put up the whole thing.

Dear Ida B. Recently I went out to one of them real classy eating places (where they even offer a combo instead of making you order the drinks and fries separate). Well, I decided to go to the indoor privy (I told you they was classy!) where I heard you could also wash your hands if you hand a mind to, which I did since it was free. However, they didn’t have a towel or even a roll of paper towels. What they had was some gizmo that blew hot air onto your hands. There was a little sign on it that said using it save trees. Well, I looked out the window and didn’t see any trees being saved, but I figured they was being saved someplace else. Anyhow, I used it about ten times so I figured I saved ten trees. What I want to know is how do I go about getting them trees?—Needs the Wood.

Dear Woody: There ain’t any trees actually saved, but every time you use that electric air-blowing gizmo, you are helping to remove part of a mountaintop in West VA or Kentucky or SW VA, because that’s where the coal is coming from to make the electricity to power that gizmo. The trees that would have made the paper towels are part of a crop that a tree farmer plants specifically to sell to the paper mill. Not using paper towels to save trees is like not eating Fritos to save corn. Now, if the tree farmers around Rock Bottom can’t sell their crop on account there ain’t any demand, their wives won’t be able to afford to come to Ida’s Salon of Beauty & Live Bait shop to get their hair done and I will lose money. Also, trees are renewable, but it is doggone hard to put back a mountaintop the way it was after its insides have been scooped out.

Dear Ida B. I have been a resident of Rock Bottom for nigh onto twenty years, but I was recently told I am not a resident in good standing on account I am still a newcomer. How can I get to be a resident in good standing?—Wants to Belong

Dear Wanting: Very few residents of Rock Bottom are in good standing. Standing takes too much effort, even if they slouch. Most are sitting down, especially in their recliners. If you mean when will you be fully accepted as an official resident of Rock Bottom, that can take generations. If your grandma had gone to school with everybody else’s grandmas, that would have helped. If members of your family have lived in the same house for over fifty years, that shows a commitment, especially if y’all still have all y’all’s previous cars and trucks used as yard art.

Dear Ida B. Will there be a haunted house in Rock Bottom this Halloween? I just love creepy stuff—Tricker Treat

Dear Tricksy: Well, you have come to the right town. There isn’t just one particular haunted house because we have plenty of creepy places so as it is. Just go knock on the door of any run-down looking house in Rock Bottom (which will be most of them) and offer to pay whoever answers a quarter for you to come in a look around. Odds are good they’ll let you in, but some might hold out for fifty cents. You’ll see plenty of dust, cobwebs, spiders, and maybe even a few snakes. There is no telling what else you might see, so don’t say I didn’t warn you. If you don’t have a lot of time and just want to be scared real quick, come on down to Ida’s Salon of Beauty & Live Bait Shop before a few of my regular customers get their make-overs. They’re pretty scary until I have worked on them for a while. If seeing them don’t give you a scare, we can throw a handful of expired bait at you when you aren’t looking.

Well, that’s it for this go-round. Remember, you get what you pay for, talk is cheap, and my advice is free.

~

Fair Pig Fatalities, Ear-Cleaning, & Fashion Fits

This column originally appeared in the October 1, 2008, Smith Mountain Eagle.

Howdy! Ida B. Peevish coming at you from Ida’s Salon of Beauty & Live Bait Shop in the heart of downtown Rock Bottom US of A, where we running our pre-Halloween special, “You Might Look a Fright, But Your Hair Don’t Have To.” You would be surprised at how the right hairdo can take folks’ eyes off all the sags, bags, zits, and pits your face is packing around. If you can’t afford a facelift, you can probably scrape up enough for a new hairdo. Now lessee what we got in the mail:

Dear Ida B. My prize sow. Porky Soo, had a freak accident at the state fair the other day. She’d just won “Best in Show” and was taking her victory lap around the ring when she jumped the fence and ended up in the bumper car ride where she suffered fatal bruises. The Rev. Al E. Looyah, of Rock Bottom Church of the Surging Inner Spirit, just happening to be exiting the hoochie-koochie tent where he’d been ministering to those poor gals who hardly have any clothes to wear. Well, he administered last rites and said he’d see to Porky Soo’s cremation and arrange a nice service for her, but he had to hurry home for a blessing of the backyard barbecue in his subdivision. I helped him load the body of my deceased sow into the trunk of his Cadillac. He drove off, and I went to the hootchie-koochie show to take my mind off my loss. Two days later he calls and says he has her ashes for me and we can discuss what kind of service I want and/or can afford. I pick up the box of her ashes, and while we are discussing the service, he gets a phone call from what must be some kind of literary program (at least I heard him use the word “bookie”) and he thought he better continue the call in the other room. While he was out of the room, I peeked in the box and noticed several half-burned charcoal briquettes in amongst the ashes. I left before he got back. Ida B., there is something suspicious about this situation. Can you shed some light on this?—Bereaved

Dear Bereaved: I probably could, but I think you can figure it out for yourself. All I will say is that Rev. Al’s wife Glorie Hallie was in Ida’s Salon of Beauty and Life Bait Shop yesterday, telling everybody what a great pig roast they’d just had in their new barbeque pit. She said that money has been a little tight lately and she couldn’t believe how lucky they were to get something to cook for all their guests on the spur of the moment like that.

Dear Ida B. I took a gal out to dinner on our first date the other night. I really wanted to impress her, so I let her order the combo instead of just the Big Mac. Midway through dinner, I felt my ear clog up and I had left my keys under the seat of the truck, so I didn’t have a key handy to dig out the earwax. The fingernail I use as a back-up ear-cleaner had broken off when I opened my last can of beer so it didn’t reach far enough. I didn’t know if it was good manners to ask if I could use her keys for ear-cleaning purposes, so I decided not to risk it. Anyhow, I couldn’t hear real well through the rest of dinner, so I just nodded to anything she said. I am now afraid that I might have agreed to things I wouldn’t have agreed to if I could have known what it was she was asking about, because when I called her the next day, she was talking about setting a date. Can you help me?—All Ears

Dear Earfull: It is never good manners to clean your ear with someone else’s key—especially somebody you are trying to impress. That is why you always carry an extra key just for that purpose. You could have excused yourself to go out to the truck, but that is risky on account some gals might see a better looking guy in line and will make his acquaintance by the time you get back. Anyhow, if you think this gal is planning for the two of y’all to get hitched, you have two choices: go through with it or don’t go through with it. If you go through with it, consider how cheap you got off. Now you don’t have to spend any more money trying to impress her. If you want to break up, it is best to let her do the breaking up. Next time you take her out, wear a wedding ring and tell her that there’s something you’ve been meaning to tell her. She will see the ring and immediately break up. Be warned that she might throw something, so try to do this in a public place when y’all are eating burgers and not big plates of spaghetti. Another reason for being in public is that there will be witnesses in case she does serious harm to you.

Dear Ida B. My teen-aged daughter Bubbette saw on TV where the new fashions are gonna be based on jumpsuits, relaxed pants, and stripes. She is pitching a fit for me to get her them things, which I cannot afford. She says her friends will make fun of her if she don’t dress in the latest fashion—or at least retro fashion. Ida B., what is a mama to do when her daughter pitches a fit to get high-fashion that we can’t afford?—Fit Pitcher’s Mama

Dear FPM: You are in luck. The Rock Bottom Jail is having its annual yard sale, wherein they are selling out-dated coveralls. These coveralls are kinda like a jumpsuit, only more relaxed, and they’re striped (plus being as old as they are qualifies them as retro), so you can cover all the fashion bases in one outfit. I recommend you buy several.

Well, that’s it for this go-round. Remember, you get what you pay for, talk is cheap, and my advice is free.

~

Wedding Hassles, Sharing Feelings, Hauling Mermaids, & Finding Yourself

This post originally appeared in the September 17, 2008, Smith Mountain Eagle

Howdy! Ida B. Peevish coming at you from Ida’s Salon of Beauty & Live Bait Shop in the heart of downtown Rock Bottom US of A, where we running our pre-fall special, “If Your Hair is Falling Out or Falling Limp, We Can Help.” You would be surprised at what we can do with superglue and heavy-duty hair spray, as well as hair we have cut off other folks that is still perfectly good. Now lessee what we got in the mail:

Dear Ida B. I have just started a new business, Weddings While You Wait. I noticed a lot of Rock Bottom folks are putting off getting married on account of all the hassles of getting married—especially the arguments between the mama and mama-in-law on who does what and who foists off the expense of all the decorations and food onto who else. Well, I have a perfectly good house and a nice yard in a rural area. It’s a lot more house than I need, so I decided I might as well use the downstairs as a combination wedding chapel/reception area for them that wants to get married without the usual hassles. All they got to do is show up. What do you think?—Wedded Bliss

Dear Wedded Blues: Part of the appeal of a big wedding is the hassles. If everybody can get upset, complain about the expense and who is (or ain’t) invited, argue about where to have the wedding, and lament about what to wear, etc. before the actual wedding takes place, it gives the two families involved time to see each other at their worst and decide if they really want the two families to join up. If you rob them of all the hassles, there is no telling what might happen after the wedding when some suddenly realize they don’t see eye to eye with their new in-laws.

Dear Ida B. I’ve been married for two months now and my husband won’t share his feelings with me. I don’t have a clue what he is thinking. Also, he is hanging out with his buddies more instead of giving me his undivided attention. What should I do?—New Bride

Dear Newbie: You should be glad he don’t share his feelings. That means he ain’t got anything to complain about. You should also be glad that he ain’t hanging around the house. If he hung around the house, you’d have to keep cleaning up after him and fixing him whatever he wanted to eat. I have addressed the question of shared feelings before, with the same answer. However, I understand that the term “share his feelings” is out-dated. Some of my younger clientele tell me that men now text-message their feelings. Trust me that you do not want your husband’s undivided attention except when you are nagging him. What seems so flattering when you are young can get to be a real nuisance once you hit thirty and want some time to yourself or for a girls’ night out with a dozen or so of you best friends or when a couple of screaming toddlers also want your undivided attention. Be glad he is hanging out with his buddies and not underfoot.

Dear Ida B. I was traveling this summer, and passed a small spiffy white van on I-95 with the logo of “Mermaid Transportation.” I got to wondering—how could a mermaid drive? She'd only have a big tail and fins, right? How could she put on the brake suddenly? Maybe the van was transporting a mermaid. You know, she could have been inside a tank, sloshing around. I figured with you bein’ in the bait business, you might could answer my questions.—Puzzled

Dear Puzzled: If the van was indeed transporting a mermaid (which I doubt, but stranger things have ben transported in the back of Rock Bottom pick-up trucks, so my customers tell me), odds are good she wasn’t the driver for the reason you have given. Likely she was sloshing around in a tank. While I am indeed in the bait business, I have never heard of anybody using a mermaid for bait. For one thing, what are you gonna catch with it? And how would you put it on your hook? While Slick Water Lake has some pretty big fish (based on the stories of “the one that got away” reported by several of my bait customers), none would justify using a mermaid for bait. On the other hand, maybe you could tie a rope around the mermaid’s tail and she could catch fish with her hands and fling them into your boat.

Dear Ida B. I just graduated from Rock Bottom High School and have decided to take time off to find myself before looking for a job or going to college. My problem is I don’t know how to find myself. Can you help?—Undecided

Dear Unemployed and Uneducated: Just come on down to Ida’s Salon of Beauty & Live Bait Shop. We have some real big mirrors. Just stand in front of one and look. There you are! Keep in mind, that I do charge a finder’s fee. While you’re here, you might find that you need some help in the looks department. We can help with that, too—for a fee. By now, you ought have noticed that everything has its price, and the only way to pay it is to get a job or to get some education that will help you get a job. You might want to see if you can find yourself in line at the employment agency or at Rock Bottom Community College.

Well, that’s it for this go-round. Remember, you get what you pay for, talk is cheap, and my advice is free.

~

Micro-Beer, Excess Veggies, & Meddling Parents

This column originally appeared in the Sept. 2, 2008 Smith Mountain Eagle.

Howdy! Ida B. Peevish coming at you from Ida’s Salon of Beauty & Live Bait Shop in the heart of downtown Rock Bottom US of A, where we are running our “Salvage Your Looks Before It’s Too Late” special in conjunction with the Rock Bottom House of Polyester’s annual spandex foundation garment sale. If Father Time has already taken away what Mother Nature gave you, you need to stop in to see us so we can disguise as much of the damage as possible Also, if your hair is limp on account of the high humidity from last week’s storms, we can fix that too. Now lessee what we got in the mail:

Dear Ida B. I hear tell some guy was gonna open a microbrewery in downtown Rock bottom only town council wouldn’t let him. What’s with that? Granted, I’d rather have a maxi-slug rather than a micro-sip, but I’ll take what I can get if it’s convenient.—Beer Belly

Dear Beer Gut: What you heard was correct. Seems like the other businessmen in town didn’t want a legal enterprise taking away their business (though they’d like to make it very clear that what they isn’t actually a business—it’s merely a sampling of a home remedy for medicinal purposes for their special friends), so they put pressure on town council to oppose it. Even Rev. Al E. Looyah of the Rock Bottom Church of the Surging Inner Spirit says it might even cut into the church’s all-the-communion-wine-you-can-drink special.

Dear Ida B. I didn’t plant a garden this year, so everybody that did has been giving me vegetables. At first it wasn’t so bad, but when I got home yesterday, there were so many zucchinis piled in front of my door that I couldn’t get inside. And that was after, I crawled over the pile of tomatoes on my porch, which I could hardly see for all the cucumbers stacked up on my steps. If folks would just ask me if I needed any vegetables, I could refuse them, but they sneak their excess onto my property while I’m away. What can I do?—Desperate

Dear Desperate: I suggest you bag up all the vegetables and wait until about midnight. Then have your kids disguise themselves and leave the bags full of veggies on the neighbor’s stoops. Tell the kids it is like a reverse Trick-or-Treat. The reason you want to have your kids make the drop is that they can run a lot faster than you can but can’t carry as much, just in case someone should come out and make you take double the veggies home.

Dear Ida B. I am a first year teacher who just can’t cope. My 25 students are all wonderful, but their parents won’t leave me along. Every day, several call “just to keep in touch” and it takes my entire planning period to talk to them. When I get home, I have a dozen or more emails from the ones who didn’t call me at school. Some of the persistent ones text message me in class to see if their kids are all right. Last night, at least six called to tell me they hadn’t finished their kids’ science projects yet and could they have an extension. What can I do?—Swamped with Work

Dear Swampy: This is a modern problem. When I went to school—back in the days of parental non-involvement, parents didn’t want to know what was going on at school, figuring that what they didn’t know wouldn’t cause them grief. The important thing was that the kids were out of the house and not messing it up. A few years ago, the helicopter parents started hovering. Now, we got the jet-ski parents: they rush in, make waves, demand your attention, and leave you bobbing about it their wake. About the time you’ve recovered, they zoom in again. If you change phone numbers and email addresses every couple of weeks, you might get a little relief. But don’t bet on it. However, if you are so frazzled from dealing with them that your hair is a mess, come on down to Ida’s Salon of Beauty & Live Bait Shop and we’ll fix you up.

Dear Ida B. I have several kids in the Rock Bottom schools, and their teachers just won’t cooperate with me. I know it is important for parents to be involved, so I try to call each teacher daily to let them know that I’m there for them and my kids. However, yesterday when I called the twins’ teacher to see if they’d eaten all their lunch that I spent nearly half an hour packing, she hung up on me. When I called my daughter’s gym teacher to make sure that Bubbette sits on the bench instead of doing aerobics so she doesn’t get over-heated on these hot days, she hung up on me, too. At the high school, I couldn’t even get through to Bubba Jr.’s science teacher to tell him I needed more time to finish his science project. He wouldn’t answer his cellphone, and the school secretary wouldn’t even let me talk to him because they were having a fire drill or something. Well, Ida B., it ain’t like they have real fires during the drills! She should have put me through. I have tried calling the teachers at home, because they’re bound to be there at midnight, but all of them seem to have unlisted numbers. What can I do to stay involved in my kids’ education? —Concerned Mama

Dear Meddling Ma: The only way you can stay really involved in your kids’ education is to homeschool them. The Rock Bottom teachers will thank you. Your kids might not be so grateful though. But you can communicate your concerns to yourself whenever you want without having yourself hang up on you or refuse to pass on a message. Another possibility is that you get less involved with your kids and more involved with your looks. Ida’s Salon of Beauty & Live Bait Shop can help you with that.

Well, that’s it for this go-round. Remember, you get what you pay for, talk is cheap, and my advice is free.

Boat-bangers, Designer Dawgs, & Cover-ups

This column originally appeared in the August 20, 2008, issue of the Smith Mountain Eagle.

Howdy! Ida B. Peevish coming at you from Ida’s Salon of Beauty & Live Bait Shop in the heart of downtown Rock Bottom US of A, where we are running our Back-To-School Special that will get your kid fit to be seen in public after lying around all summer and letting his/her hair grow wild. Not only will we give your kid a decent haircut and/or style that his/her grandmother would approve of, we will also attempt to patch up any pierced places. However there is a limit to what can be done with duct tape and Superglue, so don’t get your hopes up to high. Also, we will dye over any weird colors that your kid’s hair might be while he/she attempted to find himself/herself this summer. If our dye-job won’t cover the weird color, we will shave his/her head. Now lessee what we got in the mail:

Dear Ida B. Out here in my cove at Slick Water Lake, the stripers abound. However, so do the fishermen. Many of them have been banging on their boats with poles because they say it attracts the fish. Ida B, I don’t see how it could do that. I was taught that you have to be quiet when you fish. What is going on? All this banging is driving me crazy. And my visiting grandkids can hardly hear their heavy metal music on their iPods.—Tired of the Noise

Dear Tired: Every time the boat bangers appear in your cove, give your grandkids a set of drums and an electric guitar and have them make their own music on the dock. The boat bangers will get the message. Or else the fish will leave and they will follow them.

Dear Ida B. My kids are pestering me to get them a dog. They don’t want just any old dog. They want one of them designer dogs. What the heck is a designer dog?—Doggone If I Know

Dear Doggone: Back in the old days we called designer dawgs by their proper term: mutts. If we were being polite, we said crossbreeds. Anyhow, somewhere along the line, somebody must have owned an expensive lady poodle that had a brief but passionate affair with a traveling male lab. Knowing that the puppies weren’t registerable and he’d be stuck with them, the poodle’s owner called them labradoodles and extolled their virtues. Plus they were rare. Folks want what is up-scale and rare, so the breed took off. Well, it wasn’t long until folks were breeding puggles and yorkie-poos and peke-a-poms and goodness knows what. What you do is go to the pound and pick out a slightly used dawg that looks personable. If you can find out what breeds it is, fine. If not, make up a couple. Just tell your kids the blueticoodle or dober-poo or rotty-pom you got is the latest designer dawg and they are the first in the neighborhood to have one. The dawg will be grateful you adopted it, and the kids might be grateful, too—at least until they figure out what they want next. Just be glad your kids don’t want one of them little accessory dawgs made popular by the Chihuahua that Paris Hilton used to tote around in her purse. Ain’t nothing like reaching into your purse or pocket for your keys and being bit by a little dawg to ruin your day, even though it does discourage pickpockets.

Dear Ida B. What with school starting soon, I am about ready to buy my kids some school clothes. I was kind of waiting for Rock Bottom High School to issue it’s dress code for this year, so I don’t get stuck like I was last year with a couple dozen tube tops and Daisy Duke shorts that my gals won’t be allowed to wear. Now I hear that kids can wear anything they want to school. How can that be? Don’t the school officials realize what some of them kids are likely to wear (or not wear as the case may be)?—Concerned Mom

Dear Mommie: Don’t worry. While the kids can wear anything they want to school, whatever they wear has got to be covered up by blaze orange coveralls as soon as they walk in the schoolhouse door. According to principal Alma Motter, the school got tired of arguing with the kids over what was and wasn’t appropriate attire. Some of the gals argued that if it was good enough for Britney Spears to wear in public, it out to be good enough to wear to school, but her style don’t cut it in Rock Bottom. Anyhow, it was determined that wearing coveralls was equally unfair to all and still allowed kids to wear what they pleased as long as nobody else could see it. The coveralls have plenty of pockets, so kids don’t need designer backpacks to tote around their iPods, cellphones, and other overpriced electronic doo-dads. Plus, if kids cut school, that blaze orange really stands out. If they’re sentenced to jail, they’re ahead of the game. And don’t forget how handy it will be during deer season. Kids won’t even have to go home to change anymore before heading to the woods. Alma Motter expects other school districts to follow the Rock Bottom trend.

Dear Ida B. some school systems are considering a four-day week. Will Rock Bottom do this?—Hopeful

Dear Don’t Get Your Hopes Up: It is unlikely. Parents wouldn’t put up with it. Some members of the Rock Bottom PTA have even asked for seven-day school weeks so they don’t have to have their kids underfoot, but the teachers can’t stand them for that long, so the seven-day week ain’t gonna happen. The current five-day week is a pretty good compromise.

Well, that’s it for this go-round. Remember, you get what you pay for, talk is cheap, and my advice is free.

Fish Pedicure, Dawg Park, Reality, & DNA Tests

This column originally appeared in the August 6, 2008, Smith Mountain Eagle.

Howdy! Ida B. Peevish coming at you from Ida’s Salon of Beauty & Live Bait Shop in the heart of downtown Rock Bottom US of A, where we are running a special on “Fish Pedicures” (see first letter), the latest trend in foot beautification. It has been so hot that folks don’t want their hair fixed, but they are glad to set down and stick their hot feet in a bowl of cool water no matter what they got to share it with. Now lessee what we got in the mail:

Dear Ida B. I saw in both the Big Mall City paper and on TV that “fish pedicures” are the latest thing. You stick your feet in a pan of carp and they nibble all the debris off your toes. It seems to be you’d have a headstart on this, what with the live bait and all. Are you gonna do it?—Sounds Fishy 2 Me

Dear Fishy: We figured it’s worth a try down here at Ida’s Salon of Beauty & Live Bait Shop. Like you said, we’ve got an advantage. At first we thought about just having customers stick their tootsies into the bait tank, but the crawdads might become too attached to the feet and some customers have a low threshold of pain. What we are doing is dipping out a bunch of minnows, putting them in a pan of water, and having the customers stick their feet into that. We do require that feet be clean before they do so. Otherwise, the minnows might not survive, and they are our best-selling bait—but only if they’re alive. We also offer a half-price special on minnows that have known your feet up close and personal if you want to take them home to do fish pedicures on your own or use them for bait or a combination thereof.

Dear Ida B. I heard tell that Rock Bottom town council wanted to close the skateboard park on account of so much vandalism and that they didn’t want to build a dawg park that some other folks wanted. Do you know whatever came of all that.—Skate N. Dawg-owner

Dear Dawg Skater: You are in luck. What they decided to do was combine the two. They figured that having dawgs run loose in the park will keep vandals from vandalizing and keep skaters skating—probably faster with a bunch of dawgs snapping at their heels and/or wheels. Plus the dawgs will get plenty of exercise, which is what folks wanted in the first place. This is a win-win situation for everybody except for the vandals who will just have to take their spray paint elsewhere if they don’t want to be gnawed on, possibly to the Rock Bottom Museum of Art’s interactive exhibit where nobody will notice.

Dear Ida B. I have been watching that reality show where teenagers have to raise babies and I want to know how I can donate my triplets to them. As I see it, it would be like getting free babysitting for however long the show runs and I would finally have some time to myself. Also, has there been any talk about having a reality show in Rock Bottom? If so, what would it be like?—TV Watcher

Dear TV addict: You are outta luck. They already have all the babies they can use on that show, plus the show is over. There has been some talk about a Rock Bottom Reality Show, but nothing has been decided yet. For one thing, Rock Bottom reality is pretty boring. If there was to be a “Survivor Rock Bottom,” for instance, everybody would want to be voted off first. A “World’s Greatest Mule” reality show might draw a little interest, but how long can you watch plowing?

Dear Ida B. My next-to-last ex-wife has been pestering me so much about the child support payments, even though I have told her it is a waste to buy all them boys shoes in the summertime, that I came up with an idea that maybe if I could prove the kids ain’t mine, I wouldn’t have to pay and could use the money for payments on my bass boat. What I done was arrange for them kids to get DNA tests just like they do on Jerry Springer and Montel and all, only I used a ringer for me, so my own personal DNA wouldn’t be involved. Anyhow, my long-time buddy Bubba agreed to play like he was me after I got him drunk enough. Bubba and the boys took the test, and it came back positive. Now the judge says the test shows I am the daddy and I got to pay up. Now, if I was to fess up to the judge that I didn’t actually take the test, he would hold me in contempt of court like he has threatened to do on other occasions when my ex-wives took me to court. What I need to know is, given how things turned out, do I have to pay Bubba the $100 I owe him for playing like he was me, or can I put that toward my boat payment?—Bubba’s Former Friend

Dear Former Friend: We have discussed your problem at length down here at Ida’s Salon of Beauty & Live Bait shop and we all find you pretty contemptible. The honorable thing to do is pay Bubba, regardless of how unhonorable he might have been in the past. We all came to the conclusion that you and Bubba probably deserve each other’s friendship, but your ex-wives and the kids deserve better.

Well, that’s it for this go-round. Remember, you get what you pay for, talk is cheap, and my advice is free.

Staycations, Recliners, & Scantily Clad Gals

This post originally appeared in the July 23, 2008, issue of the Smith Mountain Eagle.

Howdy! Ida B. Peevish coming at you from Ida’s Salon of Beauty & Live Bait Shop in the heart of downtown Rock Bottom US of A, where we are running our mid-season bait clearance, so come on in and get some great deals on stuff that likely won’t live much longer in all this heat. We ain’t running a special on much else on account it has been so hot that most of the regular customers have just stayed home and let their hair wilt.

Now lessee what we got in the mail:

Dear Ida B. I keep hearing about all them “staycations” where folks don’t leave town on account of the gas prices but still try to have a vacation. Does Rock Bottom have any staycation opportunities?—Ready to Do Something

Dear Ready: Not many folks stay in Rock Bottom if they can help it, but what with high prices and all, they are now forced to do so. Consequently, some groups and individuals have come forth to fill the vacation gap—or maybe widen it. Anyhow, here they are:

• Haycation: Local agrarian professional Haywood “Hay” Fields will be cutting hay before long and offers the opportunity for city folks to experience farming up-close and personal as they help him load hay. Why pay expensive gym fees when—for a lot less money—you can get more exercise and a great tan on any exposed body parts, plus work up a better sweat lifting heavy bales in the hot sun?
• Daycation: O. L. Buzzard of Buzzard’s Taxidermy and Day Care will keep you kiddies amused as they watch him do his thing and help him clean up afterward. Since nothing but varmints is currently in season, most of what he stuffs during the summer is interesting roadkill. Watching him do this can provide the educational opportunity of a lifetime to your kiddies that you need to get out of the house because they’re driving you crazy.
• Praycation: The Rock Bottom Church of the Surging Inner Spirit is offering an alternative to Vacation Bible School—Bingo Camp. They are praying that lots of kids will sign up to work on their math and alphabet skills as well as get them hooked on the Surging Inner Spirit’s main fund-raising activity. If you want your kids to experience the unique fellowship that can only be found at a Bingo game—and possibly win a little money, call the Rev. Al E. Looyah and get them signed up right away. A free Bingo marker will be given to the first fifty kids signed up.
• Waycation: This is mainly a do-it-yourself kind of vacation suggested by certain Rock Bottomites who wish to remain anonymous. What you do is go to an out-of-the-way cove on Slick Water Lake where there are a lot of cars parked near one of the houses. Park your truck several hundred feet away so you don’t arouse suspicion. Then go in and greet everybody there like you’ve known them for years. Odds are good that by mid-summer, so many Slick Water Lakers have had so much company that they’re pretty shell-shocked and will assume that anyone dropping in is somebody they know even if they can’t remember your name. After you’ve had plenty to eat and drink, move on down to the next place that looks like it’s having a party.
• Altercation: This is one of the current specials down here at Ida’s Salon of Beauty & Live Bait Shop, wherein we will fix you up so good that you won’t even know yourself when you leave. Be warned that our “Big hair With Flair” special will alter your looks so much that even your hubbie is also unlikely to recognize you. Several ladies who partook of this special in the past ended up getting a dee-vorce on account their hubbies, who didn’t recognize their own wives, made some lewd remarks to them. But don’t worry—our altercation special comes with a discount coupon for dee-vorce representation from Maycomb Philmore Payne, my personal dee-vorce attorney. Since altering your looks can take some time, plan to spend the entire day at Ida’s Salon of Beauty & Live Bait Shop.
• Laycation: This is what a lot of Rock Bottom males do most of the time—lay in their recliners and demand their wives bring them a beer or a sandwich. In fact, this has no doubt inspired the next letter:

Dear Ida B. Since my husband retired, he gets no exercise whatsoever. All he does is lay around in his recliner and channel surf the TV. What should I do?—Concerned Wife

Dear Conned Wife: Hide the remote. Then he will have to get up to change channels. It ain’t much, but it’s a start. The other thing you might do is get replace the recliner with an exercise bike and duct-tape the remote to one of the pedals. Then he will at least have to peddle a little if he wants to change channels.

Dear Ida B. A couple weeks ago, I went to what the Church of the Surging Inner Spirit’s scholarship pageant with my husband. I thought it would be an educational experience for us and we might learn something. Ida B, them gals hardly had a stitch on during part of the competition! Do you know why?—Incensed

Dear Insensitive. I talked to the Rev. Al E. Looyah the last time he was in to beg me for a discount on bait, and he said it was to keep the contestants honest so they couldn’t hide any answers in their clothes. Also, he said it was a lot easier to find judges if the gals didn’t wear much, plus it was what was in their hearts and minds rather than what they was wearing on their bodies that really counted, so you got no reason to complain.

Well, that’s it for this go-round. Remember, you get what you pay for, talk is cheap, and my advice is free.

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Enlightening, Fly-swatters, Holy Clothes, & Fools

This column originally appeared in the Smith Mountain Eagle on July 9, 2008.

Howdy! Ida B. Peevish coming at you from Ida’s Salon of Beauty & Live Bait Shop in the heart of downtown Rock Bottom US of A, where we are running our Big Bang Left-Over 4th of July Special on dynamite hairstyles, booming bait, and fizzled-out fireworks. If you need a new look or a properly baited hook, y’all come see us. Now lessee what we got in the mail:

Dear Ida B. Rumor has it that you have been writing this column for 10 years this month. Is that true? If so, don’t you ever run out of stuff to write about?—Incredulous

Dear Incredible: Yes, I have. Time sure flies when you’re having fun. And the remarkable thing is that I have not aged one bit in the last ten years. The column started because some of my customers, who need enlightening in more ways than one, told me, “Ida B., you ought to take your advice and give it to someone else, so that is what I did. Since I am so good at telling folks what to do and where to go, Scoop Manyure, the editor of the Rock Bottom News, gave me space on the obituary page when not enough folks had died to fill up the space. I also figured that if I wrote a column, then I could use the new computer down at Ida’s Salon of Beauty & Live Bait Shop as a tax write-off, just in case using it for bait research, new hair-do ideas, and making my manicurist Honey Sue Sweetwater’s presence known all over MySpace (she has 1,375,867 friends) wasn’t enough. Anyhow, I moved from paper to paper and now I’m here, still enlightening them what need it.

Dear Ida B. I am suffering a lot of stress not that my triplets and two sets of twins are out of school. They keep hitting each other and complaining they are bored or hungry or both. They go in and out and let flies in. The slamming door wakes the toddler and the baby. I can’t afford to keep buying fly spray. Plus, the slamming door wakes the toddler and the baby. One of the kids read your column last month where you talked about going green, and now they are saying I’m so out of it on account I haven’t gone green and it is damaging their self-esteem. What’s a Rock Bottom Mama to do?—At Wit’s End

Dear Witty End: It seems like I give this suggestion every summer, but here I go again: Get them kids some fly-swatters and let them go at the flies and maybe each other. The fly swatters will help your kids with eye-hand coordination, will let them find an outlet for their violent tendencies, and will substantially reduce the fly population. Swatting flies is a heck of a lot greener than spraying, as well as considerably cheaper. If your kids really want to go green, have them put in some gardens and grow their own food. Digging and weeding a garden will keep them too tired and busy to cause much trouble, and kids naturally like to play in dirt. Getting a flyswatter for yourself might be a good idea. You can give them kids a swat when they don’t listen to you, and a few swats might discourage your hubby when he comes flitting around you, too.

Dear Ida B. I just heard that the Rock Bottom Church of the Surging Inner Spirit is selling holy clothing. Now, Ida B, I have heard of holy water, but never holy clothing. What’s with this?—Wants to Know

Dear Wanting: It ain’t holy clothing—it’s holey clothes. And they’ve already been sold. Whatever your source of gossip is, it’s running a couple weeks late. I recommend you come down to Ida’s Salon of Beauty & Live Bait shop where our gossip is always current and sometimes even originates here. Anyhow, Rev. Al E. Looyah’s wife, Glorie-Hallie, cleaned out her closet last month and found out that the moths had been busier than usual. Before she could sell her clothes at the church’s weekly yard sale, she had to convince folks that the holey clothes were worth buying, and she did. For instance, she convinced some folks that kids like ripped up clothes, so anybody that wears clothes with holes will naturally look younger. Plus the holes give a little ventilation, so that helps during the current hot weather. Glorie-Hallie made enough to buy herself a whole new wardrobe up at the Rock Bottom House of Polyester. However, everybody else she knew was sporting the holey clothes, so she felt left out and had to cut some holes in her new clothes so she’d be as stylish as everyone else.

Dear Ida B. If a fool and his money are soon parted, does that mean I should only date foolish men so they will spend more money on me? Should I marry a fool?—Confused

Dear Confused: If your potential dates are fools, how did they have the sense to acquire much money in the first place, and if they did, why didn’t they part with it before meeting you? If you think marrying a fool is the only way to get money, then you are just fooling yourself.

Well, that’s it for this go-round. Remember, you get what you pay for, talk is cheap, and my advice is free.

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Living Cheap, Fat, Warm & in Jail, Etc.

This post originally appeared in the Smith Mountain Eagle on June 25, 2008.

Howdy! Ida B. Peevish coming at you from Ida’s Salon of Beauty & Live Bait Shop in the heart of downtown Rock Bottom US of A, where we are still running our 4^th of July special. If you are feeling blue, a new henna rinse and some bright red lipstick will perk you up. And if your skin has that while pallor of somebody who can’t afford to soak up sun at some expensive resort, a few dips in our tanning tank will bronze you right up. Now lessee what we got in the mail:

Dear Ida B. I keep hearing about this global warming. What I want to know is, how do I get it to heat my doublewide? It got pretty cold in there last winter.—Frosty

Dear Frosty: Town Council is currently studying this, but they ain’t been making much progress. One of the big problems is, if they get it, how they would turn it off in summer when it’s plenty warm anyhow. As soon as they come up with a way to do it that don’t cost much, I will let you know.

Dear Ida B. I heard that the obesity epidemic has just about bottomed out, so folks ain ‘t getting much fatter than they have been. I wonder if this means that my current wife Junie Bugg will stop gaining the thirty or forty pounds she’s been packing on every year since we got married ten years ago. Also, does this mean I can drink all the beer I want and not have my beer gut increase any more. Our singlewide sags substantially in the middle. Will it spring back into place, do you reckon?—Heavyweight

Dear Heavyweight: The answer to all your questions is “probably not.”

Dear Ida B. It has got so expensive to live that I am looking for a cheap way to live. I can’t hardly afford more than one meal a day, and I can’t afford gas to move my car that I am living out of to another parking lot because Wally World is getting suspicious. Do you have any ideas?—Maxed Out

Dear Max: Several guys in Rock Bottom came up with the idea of getting arrested and sent to jail where they get what they refer to as “three hots and a cot.” Arrestees also are given an orange jumpsuit, so that pretty well covers clothing. They say that the jails in bigger cities also have TV, but the one in Rock Bottom doesn’t, except for the cell that overlooks the window of Rock Bottom Appliance Emporium. However, Rock Bottom Town Council recently voted to charge prisoners room and board while they are incarcerated, an act which has reduced the Rock Bottom crime rate substantially. Consequently, if you want to go the “three hots and a cot” route, you ought to leave town and get arrested someplace better.

Dear Ida B. I am vacationing at Slick Water Lake and want to send postcards to the folks back home. However, I am concerned that personnel at the Rock Bottom Post Office will read the messages I write. How can I prevent that?—Tourist

Dear Tourist: Put the postcards inside envelopes. Then duct tape the envelopes.

Dear Ida B. My step-mama has been real hateful to me for years. She always favors her own kids over me and makes me do all the drudgery stuff like clean out the gunk in the sink drain and de-poop the dawg pen. Daddy is pretty clueless, plus he is always off in the woods somewhere. I got me a camera and took a bunch of pictures of her doing all kinds of mean things, and I sent the film off to be developed. What now?—Cindy Rella

Dear Cindy. Someday your prints will come. Then you can contact Dr. Phil.

Dear Ida B. I have been appointed to the casserole committee at Rock Bottom Church of the Surging Inner Spirit for its after-Bingo-all-you-can eat buffet, although I had my heart set on the congealed salad committee because that is so much easier. Anyhow, do you think I should use name-brand mushroom soup as the sauce for my casseroles, or will the store brand be OK? It is so much cheaper and I plan on using Velveeta, which everyone knows is a name brand, for one of the other ingredients.—Cook N.

Dear Cookie. Go with the store brand. I have seen some of them Bingo players eat. They work up such an appetite during the game that they pretty much wolf down whatever is in front of them, without even bothering to see what it is. I would also suggest that you select soft ingredients rather than crunchy ones. A lot of Rock Bottomites sometimes forget to wear their store teeth, and they appreciate having something to eat other than congealed salad. That’s where your casseroles come in. They will bless you for using ingredients that don’t require excessive chewing, regardless of brand name or not.

Well, that’s it for this go-round. Remember, you get what you pay for, talk is cheap, and my advice is free.

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