Bonanza, Voodoo and Starbucks

I was able to get to the bank today to cover the check I wrote for the ac repairman. Disaster averted once again, just a day in the life of Spam suckin' trailer trash :)

I wanted to thank all of you for your self-tanning lotion advice. Who'd a thought you could get duck feet from a bottle?

Some of the events in my life lately have seemed comically similar to the beginning of a "B" horror flick. First there was the snake invasion at work, then my car, the coffee maker (which was mysteriously resurrected) and the ac dying all at once. Then, it seemed, everything I watched on tv seemed to revolve around a central theme, namely.... VOODOO!!!

Last weekend, the amazon and I watched "Skeleton Key" with Kate Hudson. I knew only that it was a spooky movie, having no idea that voodoo (or hoodoo, as the script points out) was the central theme. Then, I innocently sat down to watch "Eve's Bayou" which, one could argue from the title, I may or may not have had an inkling that voodoo could be involved with the story line in some way. I took passive notice of these things, chalking it up to a coincidence and sort of joking about it with the amazon.

Then, this morning as I was getting ready for work, being denied a fresh recording of you know who from the night before because it's Monday, I stopped to watch the news. Depressing fare, lost soldiers in Iraq, suspected to have been kidnapped. I didn't want to hear it hashed over yet again, so I flipped over to the Hallmark channel. There's a spiritually centered show called "New Morning" which I occasionally watch, although it's serene, calming nature makes it hard for me to get my brain going first thing in the morning. I think I dozed off a few times before I started getting dressed and slapping makeup on my face. As I headed out the door, I picked up the remote to change the channel back to ABC. Yes, I leave the tv on when I go to work. For the dogs. Ya'll hush.

As I aimed the remote towards the tv, something stopped me. I had this.... thought. Leave it alone. Whatever is on when you come home for lunch will be something you need to see.

Well, okay then. Far be it from me to argue with "them" whoever "they" may be. I had no clue at all what came on the Hallmark channel at noon. I was a little confused when I came home for lunch (after stopping at the bank) to find "Bonanza." That's right, my all knowing, all seeing spirit guides felt I needed to spend my lunch break with Little Joe, Hoss and Pa. I looked at the tv, one brow raised, glanced skyward and thought, "this better be good."

I was force fed Bonanza when I was growing up, along with all the other early western series'. I don't recall, however, ever having seen this particular episode. The guest star of the week played a character named "Marie", which in itself was a little close to home, given my real name. She looked at Little Joe and said, "Do you ever go fishing?"

He answered yes and said something about a big bass, I wasn't really paying attention that closely. Then she got that weird crazy eye that all the tv psychics get (Anthony Michael Hall's "Johnny" on Dead Zone has the cheesiest crazy eye ever) and said, "There will be fish... an arrow.. and something black.. these will bring you harm."

After that she started going all wonky about how she was always told she would bring EEEEEEEEVILLL to everyone around her, Pa Cartwright was trying to console her, I think Hopsing had to make her some opium laced tea to chill her out or something, like I said, I wasn't exactly glued to the screen. Anyway, she'd apparently run off from a wagon train making it's way from Louisiana (rut roh!) and there'd been a raging diphtheria epidemic and some children, obvious early students of hammed up method acting, had died. Maria, convinced that the children had died because of her EEEEEEEEVILL... thingie... had somehow ended up at the Ponderosa, where you'd think by now Pa would have put his foot down about the boys bringing home all these weird strays.

I missed part of it because, well, a girl's gotta pee sometimes and I'd tackled an entire thermos of coffee prior to coming home, followed by a bottle of Starbuck's Frappuccino with lunch. When I came back into the living room, the people from the wagon train had shown up on the Ponderosa, had Maria on a horse, a noose around her neck and were in the process of giving that big "we're fixin' to hang your ass" speech they always give in these old westerns. Then, this one goober lookin' mofo looks at her and says (I shit you not) "Please, remove the diphtheria before you die, please, do it fer the chil'ren."

Now, if a bunch of yoohas had a noose around my neck and were well on their way to snapping my fragile little female neck with their rope, I'm not sure I'd take too kindly to honoring any requests. I think I'd be hellbent on working some serious mojo on their pretty little heads. I mean sheesh, the nerve.

It's all sort of a blur after that, Pa showed up JUST in the nick of time, waved his girly little pistol around, demanding that she be freed. The yoohas complied, then Marie commences to looking skyward, pulling a medallion (the size of a dinner plate mind you) from a chain tucked down into her blouse, which has a LOVELY fanged slithery beast engraved on the front, and begins chatting away with the unseen Madame Somethingoranother, saying, "I will come to join you in the darkness Madame Somethingoranother, just as you foretold" or some similar nonsense. Not an advisable way to be acting when just seconds earlier you were one horse whip away from swaying in the breeze. Marie was a heifer shy of a herd I'd say.

So anyway, she's freaking out saying, "I killed your son, I killed your son with my EEEVIIIIILLL." But then Little Joe shows up wearing a stylish black sling, to match his hat, on his arm and a shit-eating grin, totally blowing Marie's fragile little mind. I think she must have had to sip a little more of that opium laced tea because, the next thing you know she's asleep, muttering about arrows and fish and EEEEEEVVVIIIIILLL. While she's in never-never land, her mother shows up and has this in depth conversation with Pa, where he reveals that some doc back east has been doing studies on people who seem to know things are going to happen before they happen and how they don't CAUSE the EEEEEEVVVVVVVVIIIIIIIILLLLLLL they just foretell it. Then, Marie's mother says, "It is my fault she thinks this way. When she was young and sick, I took her to Madame Somethingoranother for some herbs to make her well, instead of taking her to a doctor. I didn't know that Madame Somethingoranother was.......

A VOODOO PRIESTESS!!!!

On Bonanza for God's sake.

I relayed all of this to a friend when I returned to work when we decided that this was usually the point in the "B" movie when you're screaming at the screen, "Why doesn't she get it??? Why are all these characters in these movies so stupid????"

Because, you see, this was when we realized that the name of the hotel I'm staying at in Las Vegas is.. The Orleans. New Orleans was known for it's association with the occasional voodoo priestess.

Coincidence?????

Well yeah, probably.

*grin*

All of this could have been avoided if I'd just had my morning dose of Craig Ferguson.

Note: Please take this post in the tongue-in-cheek manner it was intended. There is no need to send the men in little white coats for an intervention. I probably am a little crazy, but I won't be peeking around every corner of my hotel, expecting to see a lurking voodoo priestess.

My heart goes out to the still suffering people of New Orleans and the rest of the Gulf Coast as they continue to attempt to carve out some sliver of normalcy in their lives, all while facing yet another hurricane season. They are all in my prayers.