Sitting on Cold Porcelain

Sitting on Cold Porcelain

by

Rose A. Valenta

SMASHWORDS EDITION

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PUBLISHED BY:

Valenta Associates, Inc. on Smashwords

Sitting on Cold Porcelain

Copyright © 2010-2011 by Valenta Associates, Inc.

Smashwords Edition License Notes:

This ebook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This ebook may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each person you share it with. If you're reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then you should return to Smashwords.com and purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the author's work.

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Disclaimer

This is a satirical work. All events, characters, and institutions in this book that resemble the real deal are somewhat coincidental, but exaggerated... poorly."

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Dedication

This book would never have been published without the help of the good Lord and my muse.

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Acknowledgements

I have received much appreciated words of encouragement from family and friends, who know that writing this book has been on my personal goal list for many years: my husband, best friend and muse, Charles A. Valenta; daughters Ramona Carey, Cheri Hurly, and Karen Wade; Tarmie Foster and Patrick Wayne Burg, with whom I grew up and spent many years honing a warped sense of humor; published authors and Facebook friends: Wanda Argersinger, Tracy Baron Beckerman, Joanie Buettgen, Eric Deckers, Horace J. Digby, Sharon D. Dillon, Roberta Beach Jacobson, Madeleine Begun Kane, Gordon Kirkland, Steve Kramer, Raul Ramos y Sanchez, Brian Webb, Dawn Webber, and Jody Worsham who offered encouragement; and Cathy and Clint Beatte of Alfonso’s Philly Cheese Steak House in Ferris, TX, for all the great feedback.

Many thanks to faculty and members of the Erma Bombeck Writers’ Workshop at the University of Dayton, the Robert Benchley Society; and The Humor Writer’s, NetWits, and Southern Humorists news groups for giving me the motivation to kick-start this book.

Special thanks to all my readers at Rosie’s Renegade Humor Blog, who love the laughs: http://www.rosevalenta.blogspot.com

Also by Rose A. Valenta, Rosie’s Renegade Humor Blog – http://www.rosevalenta.com

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Foreword

I first met Rose Valenta when I was teaching at the Erma Bombeck Writer’s Workshop at the University of Dayton. I must say that Rose was a particularly good student, excelling in the classes like, The Art Of Making People Shoot Hot Coffee Through Their Noses, Incontinence: The Best Reason For Writing Humor For Seniors, and Political Unrest: How Humor Writers Can Keep Politicians Awake At Night.

Like all good humorists, Rose’s world is just slightly skewed, while still being believable, sort of like looking at a painting of the Last Supper, with all the guests in party hats. She winds daily life, politics, and pit bulls with irritable bowel syndrome through her stories, creating a tapestry of modern life.

Hidden just beneath the humor found in having a six-year-old ask pointed questions about oral sex and Nobel Prize winning brassieres is a biting social commentary that casts a questioning and slightly disapproving glance at  politicians, media personalities, and ordinary North Americans.

Rose is not afraid to ask the tough questions in her stories. She takes on the likes of Glenn Beck, Rush Limbaugh, and Sarah Palin in one breath, and then asks, Can you alter the fragrance of elephant dung with food? with the next. Somehow it all seems related, in a strangely marvelous way.

Or maybe it’s a marvelously strange way. You decide.

Gordon Kirkland

Award-winning Canadian author, humorist, and writing instructor, http://www.gordonkirkland.com

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Introduction

It’s been a difficult day at the office and you're exhausted. Your eyes hurt from working on a computer all day, not to mention the crimp in your neck and back and sore Maxine (escape key) finger.

You turn on the evening news to find out that all sorts of crazy things are happening in our world. Terrorists are trying to kill us, our Vice President made another gaffe at an important event, our political pundits are calling for impeachment, a famous designer has introduced a line of bullet-proof clothing, another politician has gotten himself involved in a sex scandal, PETA is making yet another smoker ad, a scientist wants to give Galileo a posthumous eye test on a stimulus grant, and the term Brangelina now refers to a gay variety show at the Boston Roxy; you know that because your 10-year-old grandson told you.

You try to find out if your v-chip works for news programming, as the kids are doing homework in front of the TV. They are not asking about protractors and math manipulatives.

You could describe the way you feel as punch drunk, only there are no Marquess of Queensberry rules here.

You get into bed feeling warm and cozy; your significant other is snoring loudly at your side. Icicles are forming outside. You fluff your pillows, turn on the heating blanket, set the alarm, and insert the ear-plugs - all is right with your world.

Then, at around 3:00 am, at the very beginning of your crucial Rapid Eye Movement (REM) sleep (the three-hour sound sleep window that keeps people from going crazy), you begin dreaming about soaking in a hot tub, you wake up suddenly before you pee yourself, make a mad dash into the bathroom, quickly squat, and find yourself - sitting on cold porcelain.

Realizing that the culprit is still sleeping soundly in the next room, totally unaware of your predicament, and probably dreaming about lunch with the guys at Hooters, you scream loudly, as if to wake up the dead or at least that slug stuck in a salt ring.

He comes running into the bathroom, completely naked and wild-eyed with a Colt 45, ready to protect his damsel in distress. He looks around quickly like a buck protecting his turf. He almost pees on the wall to mark it; then, he looks down and spots a puddle of water and his damsel, who is stuck in the commode.

You, his damsel, begin to spew a Dennis Miller monologue, worse than anything he has ever heard on the O'Reilly Factor, he aims, and you karate chop him. The weapon falls into the commode. It can't rust, so he stays up for an hour cleaning it out and oiling it. You are still beating his ear an hour into REM sleep. Both of you are red-eyed, resembling vampires. You go back to bed. There is still an hour left.

No, this is not a sneak preview of the next Super Bowl prize-winning GEICO caveman commercial. Some people call it Murphy's Law every time things go wrong. I feel justified calling it Sitting on Cold Porcelain.

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But Most of All I Remember Portnoy

When my children were young, Erma Bombeck was still appearing on television and Aunt Erma's Cope Book was more valuable to me than Doctor Spock.

I read If Life is a Bowl of Cherries What am I Doing in the Pits? at least 6 times. My kids were driving me nuts and it suited my predicament, even though I knew by that time, Erma Bombeck was about $31 million richer and having lunch regularly with Joe Dionne, McGraw-Hill's Chairman. She was being driven all over NYC in a limo, while I was sneak-writing humor pieces with a flashlight in the back seat of my old Chevrolet Biscayne, away from the prying eyes of my mother-in-law, Surly Kate, who had the sense of humor of a wasp.

I grew up during the depression she said. No one had time to write, we all had to get real jobs.

I have to do this soon, or my children will grow up and I will run out of great humor material, I thought.

I went out and got a real job.

The urge to write never subsided and I still wrote humor pieces in the bathroom like Portnoy, mostly to my friends.

E-mail came along and I had a field day entertaining my co-workers.

You should write a book they all said.

I just married off my last daughter and ran out of material, I thought.

Surly Kate and a few years passed, grandchildren came along, and I was again energized.

My grandson came home from school with an F one day, then got into the Doritos and spilled them all over the floor, tipped over his soda, yelled Avast! and kicked the dog.

My daughter said You know, Mom, I have never forgiven you for not allowing me to take oboe lessons when I was 12. What were you thinking with the trumpet lessons?

What does that have to do with little Johnny's behavior? I asked.

It’s all your fault, she said. You wanted Harry James, and I could really give a rat's ass about any flight of the bumble bee.

OK, so you want oboe lessons, or the real book on Pirate Parenting? I asked. I was becoming my mother-in-law.

It's too late, I'm 30 years old.

Then it occurred to me, kids are like squirrels. The whole time you are raising them, they gather evidence against you like nuts, so they can pelt you with them after they grow up and fail Parenting Skills 101.

Yes, you are finally reading that book.

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'Frosty the Inappropriate Snowman' or Mushroom Syndrome?

"No, Virginia, I hate to break this to you, but CBS lies, the concepts are false. Snowmen can’t dance. They have no rhythm. They just stand there and succumb to the elements. Viagra won’t help."

Frosty the Snowman has been making headlines. Not corncob pipe and button nose headlines, but rather the thumpety thump thump variety. We once had a pet rabbit that we named Thumper for a similar reason - he had a wood chip fetish.

I don’t know which is worse, the mushroom syndrome of my generation or the pop culture of today. Both teach false concepts.

With mushroom syndrome, you were kept in the dark about everything and not told about sex until you reached the age of 18, unless you asked. Life was simple and you were simple minded. Network television was censored and anything aired during prime time had to be family-oriented. You never knew for sure if there was a toilet in Beaver Cleaver’s house.

By the time you were 12, you began asking questions like Do you think Santa will get my letter? and Do you think my snowman will run away during the night?

People had a sense of pride in those days. My grandmother, who was a professional baker at The Olean House in NY, found a recipe for "Mock