My son asked for “censorship glasses” for his Halloween costume. You know, the black bar you see over a person’s eyes when whatever form of media wants to hide their identity.

These are the glasses:

I like to read Amazon customer reviews. This one did not disappoint.

My mother’s maternal grandmother passed away when I was almost three. She was great. Her name was Minnie Belle and it really didn’t fit her because wasn’t a dainty little thing like my grandmother, Patsy. I didn’t get to know her, but I remember what her house smelled like and her chickens at her farm. I have her Hoosier cabinet from the farm by the stairs in my living room.

My great-grandmother that I grew up with was Katie Ruth, whom we called Mammaw Lewis. She was very no-nonsense, went to church whenever the doors were open, enjoyed having us around, but she was old when I was young. She sent us maybe two dollars for our birthdays and five dollars in one of those printed boxes with a kitten and ribbon printed on it for Christmas. I love her and she cracked me up. Even when I was 16 or 17 sh’d call me into her bedroom in my grandparents house and ask me to count the change in her change purse, then would tell me to keep a quarter for myself.

When I was a teenager I’d go spend the night at my grandparents’ every once in awhile on off weeks when Mammaw Lewis was staying with my Aunt Joyce and Uncle Dutch. I slept in her room and would try hard to sleep under this clock of Jesus.

And now you know where my sense of humor was born.

No, Mammaw Lewis would not appreciate this. At all.

I saw this last night and found it delight.

My right knee is practically a mess of bone shards as if I’d been Tanya Harding-d with a pipe. I can’t get a knee replacement yet because reasons. And so, today I had a small syringe of Lidocaine and a large syringe of Dippity-Do injected into my knee. It really hurts right now and I’m supposed to stay off of it. Yeah right.

This morning I brushed my teeth, I washed my face with Nutregena Acne Wash, then I did an expensive facial scrub/mask made from lava (I don’t know how), tea, cucumber, and flowers and left that on my face for ten minutes. I got in the shower, washed the lava mask off my face, shampooed and conditioned my hair with stuff that is supposed to keep the coloring from fading, and used a cucumber body wash. Then I put three different products in my hair that would probably do the same thing as one. I put a whole bunch of clown makeup on my face so I feel good enough about myself to go in public. So I feel accepted by strangers.

I don’t fully feel like me until my Ronald McDonald hair is done and I at least have foundation, powder, blush, lipstick, mascara, and my eyebrows done.

My logical brain tells me I should love myself no matter what I look like. My husband absolutely loves me whether I’m a size 16 or 26 and if I’m wearing or not wearing makeup. I’m still me.

Makeup has been around since the days of Cleopatra, so nothing has changed. But now there are hundreds of makeup brands vying for your money by telling you that you would look BETTER with their products. You need to watch the Instagram video tutorials to see what you need to put in your hair and on your face to look good and to feel loved and to be worthy of love.

We are better than that.

I am good enough and I am loved. You are good enough and you are loved.

Goddamn right.

I could not love this more.

Emily McDowell, keep rocking it!

I love some baseball

They used to wear tighter pants

Nothing wrong with that

When I was in high school I knew I wanted to go into a journalism. I wanted to write. I wanted to be the next Woodward. I wanted to write pieces for Rolling Stone and Sassy magazines. I wanted to be a writer more than anything. I wanted to write novels.

But I was told those things were hard to get into and I had little chance of being successful, so I should go into Education and my family told me the same thing.

But now I’m a grown ass woman and I feel like we should have adult guidance counselors. Maybe I wouldn’t have been the next editor of Sassy, thereby saving the magazine. But that was a million years ago. Now there are brand new careers.

These are the careers I did not know existed in 1993 that I would be PERFECT for in 2019:

Baseball commentator

Cold case detective

Forensic psychologist

Bigfoot hunter

Emoji designer

Plus size clothing designer

Eyewear model

Lipstick/nail polish namer

Political pundit

Album tracklist order engineer

Speech writer

Christmas lawn ornament designer

Hallmark Channel inventor (even though I detest it)

Shiplap purveyor

Quirky beverage flavor inventor

Ghost hunter

Quirky temporary tattoo designer

AI snarky voice

Dumb baby name book author

Gourmet cupcake baker

Sexy costume designer of things that are not sexy

Sleep doctor

Designer dog breed matcherupper

Urban chicken keeper

House flipper

Emotional support animal advocate

And blogger extraordinaire

Everyone knows I love/hate Christmas lawn decor. I hate-hate Halloween decor, but give me some tacky Christmas lawns! Blow-ups are the worst. I want to throw darts at them. If you like them, go ahead with your bad self — but you better put 12 of them in your yard. Not just one.

I stumbled upon Home Depot’s pre-lit Christmas lawn decorations that aren’t blow-ups and are AMAZING.

Let’s go to the photos!

Ah, Christmas commercialism! It truly is the best time of the year.