She's not crazy, she's my mother!

“I gave up meat for Lent,” my mother told me. This caused me to raise my eyebrows for a couple of reasons. One, she said this as she was dipping catfish in tartar sauce. The other insignificant detail is that my mother is not Catholic – although, this has not prevented her from giving up things for Lent in the past: the year before last she gave up dating for Lent. The year before that, she gave up chocolate. The year before that I think she gave up caffiene (that lasted approximately 4 hours). Lent is an excuse for giving something up. And making yourself feel better.

She continued. “Actually, I didn’t give up all meat (obviously, noting her choice in lunch) I only gave up solid meat.”

Me: “Ok, so you can have meat, as long as its not solid?”

Her: “Yes. Unless it’s fish. Fish can be solid.”

Me: “So… you gave up slabs of meat for Lent? Can you eat ground beef?”

“Yes.”

“How about shredded chicken?”

“Yes.”

“How about spam?”

That’s a quandary. Spam isn’t exactly whole meat. But on the other hand, it is a slab when it slithers out of the can.
She considers. “I think Spam is ok. And lunch meat.”
“How about chicken strips?” My sister in law chimed in.
“No. It’s a slab. A small slab, but a slab nonetheless.”
“But what if you cut it up in little bitty pieces?”
“They would have to be really little tiny pieces,” She replied.

My mother. She is, besides being a once-every-two-years Catholic (during the Lenten Season only), a wreck magnet. In the past 3 years, she has totaled 2 cars and had several *other* wrecks. And that’s just in the last 2 years! Most recently, she totaled her convertible about a month ago. According to her, she was minding her own business (I don’t find that hard to believe – she tends to mind her own business very well when driving – to the exclusion of watching the road and other drivers), when “out of nowhere,” a man driving a rental car turned left across three lanes of traffic and plowed into her. The cop (who’s number she got afterward) also blamed the rental car driver. Damn those rental cars – they give people an excuse to drive badly. So, my mother got a rental car herself until she could find a new car to buy (and, assumedly, wreck someday down the road). She found her new car and I drove with her in the rental to pick it up. We’re driving down the road, going about 40mph to a car dealership I had never been to before. She puts on her left turn signal and drives through an intersection before slamming on her brakes and making a right turn IMMEDIATELY after the intersection (she slowed in 1.2 seconds from 40 to a reasonable 27 mph and two-wheeled it into the car lot). Tires squealing. Sound of crunching metal. She looks at me. “I think those two people just WRECKED!” Uh, yeah, Mom. It might have something to do with your unexpected and untimely turn. “I had nothing to do with it! I was in the parking lot.”
As my brother said, “She goes to the car vending machine every other year, puts in $5,000 and out comes a new car!”

Sigh. She’s not crazy. She’s my mother.

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