Sex is kinda like that race between the tortoise and the hare.

. . . Except that as many times as the hare slows down to let the tortoise catch up, he usually wins the race anyway.

As in, “I wonder what they were thinking.”

Long ago I learned to accept that women’s apparel is neither sensible nor functional. Secretly, I believe that these clothes are designed by men who continually come up with more and more ridiculous garments in the hopes that ladies everywhere will reach the peak of their frustration and swear off clothing altogether.

There is no other way to explain the single most idiotic piece of clothing I have ever experienced the misfortune of trying on. We’re talking stupider than guachos. More pointless than crotchless underpants.

The midriff sweater.

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Ok, it’s like this. I am about 5′3″. Maybe 5′4″. In no uncertain terms, this means that I am, in fact, short.

Yes, I am aware of it. I am conscious of my not-tallness. And while it is very nice of you to point out this detail to me and wait expectantly for me to revere your wisdom as if you had just imparted the meaning of life, in reality your identification of my vertical challenge is on par with saying, “But Lieutenant Dan, you ain’t got no legs.” Unfortunately, my darling Master of the Obvious, you are not as endearing as Forrest. Please leave me the hell alone.

Anyway, so what if I’m short? Sure, being tall is great if you want to be a supermodel, or reach the top shelf, or ride roller coasters, but really, being not-so-tall has its advantages too.

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At one time during my childhood, my mother, siblings, and I used to regularly attend Sunday service. With that weekly dose of holiness, my mother was certain that her children were oozing purity from every pore.

My brother was whipping my sister in the head with a pussy willow on the drive home from church one morning when he gave pause to ask, “Hey Mom, why don’t they give out palms on Palm Sunday?”

“They do,” my mother replied. “They were out of palms by the time we got to the altar. All they had left were the pussy willows.”

My brother thought about that for a moment. Then, with all the innocence of a child who has not yet received a proper public school education (or at least never read the backseat of the bus), he asked, “Well, if they always have enough pussy willows, why don’t they just call it Pussy Sunday?”

My brother, the atheist, bringing people back to the church.

Mom was never really fond of yard work. To be honest, there were parts of the backyard where she’d prefer never to venture. But after Dad’s second back surgery, all of the physically strenuous chores became her responsibility. She would have been glad for help, but her children were still far too young for hard physical labor (we were only old enough to work in sweat shops at the time). And so she inherited the arduous task of mowing the lawn.

The job wouldn’t have been nearly as loathsome if we had a nice, flat yard. Unfortunately, very little of our property was flat. We lived, more or less, in the middle of the slope of a hill. Other than the area leveled off enough to build a house on, the yard was a huge bank of earth. Our backyard was informally divided into two parts. There was the bottom lot — a narrow strip of coveted level land where we were allowed to play as children — and there was the top lot — the peak of our slope (slightly leveled off) where our swimming pool and fruit trees were located. For some reason the grass grew unusually fast on the top lot, which prompted a deadly fear in my mother. Because, as anybody who lives in a rural, wooded area knows, where there is tall grass, there are snakes.

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