So, the other day my mom called while I was in the middle of doing laundry. Which, sidenote, what the fuck is wrong with people in communal laundry rooms? What are people doing that’s SO IMPORTANT that they put their clothes in the washing machine and then just don’t come back for them for like, hours. I can’t understand this. You put the laundry in and you set a timer. When the timer goes off, you go back up and, oh, I don’t know, get your fucking clothes out of everyone else’s way. And if you don’t, the fine print of being an Adult Person is that someone else has the right to move your clothes into an empty dryer. Not to start the dryer, but to get your shit out of the washing machine so they can put their own shit in there. Right? Right?! This is just how it is. The problem, though, is what to do if someone forgets their clothes during the dryer portion of the laundry adventure. Like, the clothes are fully dry, sitting in the dryer, but NO ONE IS CLAIMING THEM. This infuriates me. Because like, I’m not going to put them on the floor. And I’m not going to put them back in the washing machine (although, really, I should), so then I’m the one stuck in the middle of the laundry room with soaking wet clothes that can’t be dried because some asshat decided to wash all the sheets and towels in the world, put them in the dryer at the exact same time, and then leave to go on safari in Kenya or some shit.
So yeah, my mom called during that, and I’m all, “I’m going to need to call you back later” and she’s like, “No, Nicole, this is important, we need to discuss my funeral plans” and I’m all, “Seriously?!” and she’s like, “Remember how my will states that you have to take my ashes to Lapland and release them off the back of a snow mobile so that I can enjoy eternal Christmas?” and I’m all, “WHO COULD EVER FORGET SOMETHING LIKE THAT?!” and she’s like, “I’m concerned that getting to and from Lapland and staying in an ice hotel is going to be cost prohibitive for you” and I’m all, “I have to stay in an ice hotel? Your will really says that?” and she’s like, “Well no, but have you seen pictures of those ice hotels! Why would you not stay there?!” and I’m all, “Listen, if you want me to be the creepy person on a Lapland-bound flight who’s holding her mother’s ashes and terrifying children by telling them that a dead mother’s ashes will be all over the snow in Lapland and that the snow will melt and turn into water and that Santa’s reindeer will drink that water and then fly the dead mother around in their reindeer bellies next Christmas, I’m happy to oblige.”
There was a long pause after that, and then she was all, “I can’t believe you’d say that to kids. What’s the matter with you?? I’m going to change my will to specifically indicate that you can’t use my ashes to scare children under the age of 10.” And I’m like, “CAN I PLEASE HAVE THE LAST FIVE MINUTES OF MY LIFE BACK?!?”
After the call, though, (and after I was finally able to put my clothes in the fucking dryer), I started thinking about death. More specifically, I started thinking about where I’d like my ashes sprinkled, because I realized that there’s just NO WAY I’m going to let my mother win the family title for Weirdest Place to Make Your Child Take Your Cremated Body. Fuck that noise, my kids are going to have to release my ashes into the ocean off the coast of Bali while riding a blind camel at full speed, belting out John Mayer, and spraying gin all over everything with a giant Super Soaker.
Beat that, future grandkids.
Posted in: day to day shenanigans, i heart my crazy mother, wtf?!
{ 47 comments… read them below or add one }
This post has actually rendered me speechless.
Definitely had to google “lapland.”
Also, I am not sure I can justify wasting gin, unless it’s seagrams.
I’m pretty sure it’s not a waste as long as my ashes get soaked in gin and I can spend all of eternity totally drunk.
Wow. Your crazy ranting style makes so much more sense now. I can tell where the crazy came from.
Now Nicole Bali’s not really cost effective either, but that sounds like a hell of a party!
My head is spinning from the amount of awesome in this post. Really, I feel dizzy. And a little nauseous. Also, I want to meet your mother. She would get along well with my mother, who requested that, instead of putting her in a nursing home, my brother and I figure out how to quietly kill her off. Legally, if possible. If not, that’s fine too, but she requested we decide for ourselves who will take the fall because she really doesn’t want to mediate that particular argument. The whole conversation spiraled down into a half hour discussion about what my brother and I would do with her remains. I think we settled on using them to repave her driveway. Camels and super soakers are much better. Obviously.
Another reason why I love having my own laundry area… I should really be doing more loads of laundry and not just letting piles accumulate.
How fast would that blind camel be going?
Bags. Plastic bags. Take them with you. Stick the other person’s laundry in them and then you have all the mashines in the world for your own use. Take it from a person who regularly forgets it was laundry day and her stuff is lying somewhere wet and waiting for her to take care of it.
I just died from laughing too hard.
hahaha, I love it!! Yours is way better than your mom’s plan!
Well now I’m wondering if you solved the cost problem.
This also reminds me of the time I was seven and my dad reassured me he would never be murdered. He would be assasinated, because that’s what happens to famous people. And that I should pull the plug on him, because there is no way in hell any machine is going to keep him alive. He’s better than that.
I almost spit water out of my nose, at work, from laughing so hard. Great post!
Remember when I told twitter I couldn’t go to BiSC because I have a new kid and everyone was all “BRING HIM! I’M A NANNY/MOM/BOUNTY HUNTER AND I’LL HELP WATCH HIM!”?
I’m referencing this post when I tell them no…..
I’ve always said I wanted my ashes taken to the middle of the pacific ocean and put into a whales mouth. No idea why this sounds good to me, but yea.
I am pretty damn sure you would win for WORLD’S Weirdest Place to Make Your Child Take Your Cremated Body. And I think it would still be possible to use the ashes to scare the crap out of children over 10…..
HAHAHHAHAH! Dude…this rules. And it makes me want to include you in my own ash ceremony, that until now, was pretty undefined, and since this looks more like making you become friends with Joe Perry so that you can put my ashes (plus confetti) into his amp so that when he plays his first chord of “Dude Looks Like a Lady” it shoots out onto the stage like a big fat ash confetti party. And at that moment, you must take two shots of Makers Mark and call your mom (unless she’s in Lapland already…in which case, you call a blind camel) just to say, “hey…thanks.”
Yeah. You in?
Xo,
Sally
Now I’m definitely going to have my kids will have to soak my ashes in booze before scattering them so as to keep me drunk for eternity. Also, I think you might consider forcing them to include a 21 gin-filled super soaker gun salute. Just an idea.
Although at that the rate things are going, at that point our youth will probably be so dumb that you’ll need to include a thorough description and diagrams of everything. Which will double as quality entertainment when your attorney reads it to everyone. It’ll be like blogging after death, Tupac style.
I’ve always thought I would have my ashes packed into a firework and set off. But now I’m inspired to make sure the firework is set off directly into a crowd of children (preferably homeless orphans).
Oh My Gosh. How fabulous would that be?! What about freezing the ashes in a block of ice in Lapland so it can be made into part of an ice hotel. Frozen in Christmas forever. Gosh. Now that just sounds a bit cold and morbid doesn’t it. Scratch that! I like your idea about Bali much better. So much warmer there. More opportunities for yoga and the like. Poor camel will be pretty pissed though that you’re flailing gin around and not sharing it with him, I bet. Oh well.
As for the people that left their stuff……If it’s there for a week, get a cardboard box and write, “Lost and Found – If you take an item, deposit 25 cents – some poor asshole needs the quarters for a timer and the dryer.”
YOU are amazing!
Thankyou! Just emailed this post to my sister stating that is what her children will have to do for me. Im redoing my will pronto!
You know what I do with people’s clothes when they leave them in the dryer? (Actually, what I DID when I actually lived in a place where there were laundromats and not in the middleoffuckingnowherebutwhereIhavemyownwasheranddryer…)
Put them in a big messy pile on top of the table/dryer/whatever is there. Because I HATE when my shit is taken out of the dryer and left in a pile somewhere. THE WRINKLES. OHMYGOD the wrinkles.
ACTUALLY just forwarded this to my mother to make sure I wasn’t under similar obligations. My mom wants to be cremated, yes but she’s always said something about being spread on a baseball field. Which, while not ideal in terms of like, it doesn’t dissolve til it rains kind of thing, it’s way easier than me figuring out where Lapland is and which ice hotel to stay in.
Oh, and if my mom does read this and comes here to comment, she’s probably going to tell you to watch your language. But it’ll be all cute and Doni-mom-like.
Except she likes gin the best, so maybe she’ll forgive you.
PS – Has gin replaced your tequila? Did I miss something?
I’ll just chalk this post up to all the drugs…
You can’t die. Because you are not allowed to stop blogging. Ever.
I think I may love you.
I’m pretty sure that’s my favorite thing you’ve written EVER. I want to go drinking with your mom. But no gin, k? Not even if you’re serving it from a super soaker.
My sister asked me NOT to die on her birthday – and I thought that was a weird request.
Lapland? Ice castles?
Oh the nerve of people! I used to deal with people like that, only our apartment building only had 1 shitty dryer, and 1 that actually worked, so it was even more annoying!
your mom is hysterical and I love that she called you in the midst of that.
While I throughly enjoyed the witty banter and humorous antics on display in this post, it was this line that really got me
“spraying gin all over everything with a giant Super Soaker”
I twisted the words a bit in my head and took it to a dirty, dirty whorish place. Sorry? Normally that would be inappropriate for me to confess to, but then I realized this is Nicole’s blog. And the only thing inappropriate here is being appropriate.
I was with you until John Mayer. But they’re your ashes, so John Mayer it is. I put my dad’s ashes in all the trees in the Castro. You’ve probably inhaled him!!! Is that weird? Too bad. At least no kids were harmed. Just gays.
Are you sure kids is such a good idea?
I’m just sayin.
How dare you make your children waste all that gin. You are a terrible future parent.
My laundry was sitting in the machine as I read your blog post…oops sorry
If the clothes are dry and they AREN’T clothing that goes in the top drawer of the dresser I fold their s**t and rightfully judge their character based on the contents I’m folding.
This is how I came to the conclusion that my neighbors either work at Water World or just like buying their large loud colored beach towels and use them as bath towels: http://www.andreavlewis.com/2010/10/but-its-not-summer.html
WEIRDOS!
My crazy Chinese grandma suggested I spread my mother’s ashes over the California State Fair grounds because “that’s where she liked to go every summer.” I told her, “It’s a sweet thought, Grandma, but I don’t think people would appreciate my mom’s ashes all up in their cotton candy.”
I have no words for either ash wish besides: daaaamn.
Eternal Christmas? Looks like we don’t have to worry about me getting along with your mother.
I love that your mom is down with you scaring eleven-year-old children with her ashes.
I just want my kids to mix my ashes in a bottle of good vodka….
I leave my laundry in the communal laundry for hours. I have a good excuse though.
I can’t tell time or read.
Hilarious and oh-so-true. When I was in college and living in dorms/apartments I would actually fold other people’s laundry and put it on top of the dryer. I didn’t want to be the ass who put them on the floor and I needed the dang dryer, so it was the simplest solution.
I just snorted gin out of my nose.
So somehow I stumbled across this blog and ended up staying here for about three hours! I think I just read the book!!!
LOVE IT!!! I just have one comment for now…….if you love your vagina this much now……..you are in for the time of your life when you turn 40!!!!!
Thank You very much for the fun tonight!!!
Each time my parents mention the fact that they won’t be here forever, I have this instant body reaction mastered during childhood… My hands go straight to my ears and I find myself repeating something like “I can’t hear you, shut (the F**) up… Now, that’s something quite difficult to perform over the phone and in the middle of a public laundry… One smart mom here. Great blog by the way, first visit and surely not the last!
Is there a way you can sprinkle my ashes IN the internet? You know how some people (cough, lilu, cough) add snow to their pages during christmas? I want my ashes to rain down every time someone visits my blog.
SOMEONE MAKE THAT HAPPEN.
OMG. I CANNOT deal with you. I look like the laughing avatar smiley face thing right now. Head back. All 32 exposed. Talk about laughing out loud. Girl, you are hilarious!
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