Your thoughts on a new post.....

So....I have officially finished my story on Tornadoes, and I never want to type the word tornado again. I think the story was definitely a raging success with most of my readers....with the exception of Anna. She complains that the last segment was boring, and also that I made her sound like a wimpy little girl.... so I would like to add a little something to my story to make ammends for Anna's disdain of my story. This is to replace what I said when talking about the kids playing handball in the basement before the t*****o.

*Adam, Jessi and Jared were usually forced to play 1 on 1 on 1 because, alas, their 4 year old sister Anna was too busy with her own schedule to play with them. Jessi snuck a glance over at Anna, who had already worked up a sweat with her daily weight lifting program. Anna, at the age of 4, already had more muscle mass than her 11 year old brother. As Anna was lost in her reps and breathing control, Jessi shot a look at Adam that said, "Should we even bother to ask her if she'll play?" Adam, interpreting Jessi's look, shrugged his shoulders, and then decided it was worth a try. Jared, on the other hand, was sort of wishing that they would just leave Anna be. The last time they had convinced her to play, she had pegged him from her spot in centerfield, on his way to home plate, and he had been left with a bright red welt for a week! And this was with a squishy ball that the kids had gotten from Chuckie Cheese! But, Jared didn't speak up soon enough, and Adam called out to Anna.
"Hey, Anna"
"Yo!" She responded, as she let out a loud breath, finished her bench press, and put the weighted bar back on its holder.
"If you're almost done, do you wanna play handball?"
Anna sat up, and lifted up her wifebeater to wipe her forehead with the edge of it.
"I dont think so, when I'm done with this, I'm goin' outisde to do a little target practice."
Anna had her own handgun, and she was a regular Annie Oakley, just a little more on the macho side. After saying this, she picked up her favorite plastic Sylvester Stallone cup that she always used during workouts, and spit an enormous loogie into it.
"Dang, its amazing how much spit I can work up during just one workout." She commented to no one in particular.
By this time, Adam had turned away, dissappointed. Jared was breathing a large sigh of relief, and Jessi was just wondering to herself if one day Anna would really be a cage fighter like she always talked about. Jessi was pretty sure it would happen, and she already pitied any of Anna's future opponents. *


Hope you like this Anna! I personally think its a large improvement. Thanks for the idea!
Now, I need everyone's help. And by everyone, I mean my 4 readers, Jake, Anna, Furf, and Adam. What do you want me to post about next? Another fake story? something real? my daily life? a character sketch? a book review? baby looney toons?? See, the possibilities are endless. I know you can't comment me, so I guess I'll just have to settle for your suggestions in real life. Let me know! Peace out.

Rocky Vs. Apollo Part Dos

Adam pushed Jared and Anna behind the door for protection as he opened it just wide enough for Jessi to slip out. Even that small opening allowed a huge gust of hot wind to begin to fill the entryway in which they were standing, and it kept swirling around the room as long as the door was open, making the three siblings feel as if they were experiencing their own mini tornado while still indoors. Anna, being a very aware four year old, noticed her biggest brother struggling to keep the door open while holding onto the belt rope to keep reeling out more slack for Jessi as she made her way to Rocky. So, Anna, without being asked, grabbed the door, and continued to wrestle with holding it open for Adam throughout the rest of the rescue process. This left Adam free to concentrate fully on guiding Jessi with the belt rope. Jared took his place behind Adam, holding the rope securely to the railing. This was no small task, as every 10 seconds or so a gust of wind would grab onto Jessi, causing the rope to yank hard at the railing it was anchored to. It was an old house, and an old and rickety railing as well, but it had been their best option for an anchor. Meanwhile, Jessi was outside, battling the elements, slowly making her way toward Rocky, who was all the while barking loudly above the wind, seeming to know that help was on the way, and that his barking was spurring Jessi on towards him and his rescue. While making her way slowly and very shakily to the spot where Rocky was chained, Jessi looked about her, trying to assess the damages that the tornado had brought about so far. From what she could see, things weren't too bad....yet. There were trees down all over the yard, but the barn was still standing, as well as the pop up camper, which unluckily happened to be set up. By the end of the storm, neither the barn nor the camper would still be standing. Just as Jessi finally got within sight of Rocky, she heard a noise coming at her from her left, and was able to duck a giant piece of metal (that came from who knows where) flying towards her head. Later, when cleaning up the yard, she and Adam would decide that these pieces of renegade metal had come from the roof of the barn, which was at the present, just starting to be torn apart. Jessi made one last lurch towards Rocky, which luckily put her right withing reaching distance of his collar, which was where the chain was hooked. She pulled herself up, fighting the gales of wind. With her left hand she grabbed Rocky securely by his collar, with her right hand she unhooked his chain, which was instantly picked up by the wind, and went flying into the side of their brick house. As soon as he realized he was free, Rocky started bounding towards the house, knocking Jessi off her feet once again. She tried to keep her hand around his collar, but with the combination of Rocky's breakneck pace, and the swirling winds, no matter how hard she tried, there was really nothing she could do. With a desperate cry of "Inside Rocky!" Jessi's grip on her dog's collar was lost. Contrary to the older four Nelsons kids wishes (they were forever trying to get Rocky ready to enter "That's My Dog, a show that did not even exist anymore), Rocky was really not a very well trained dog. With 5 children in the house, neither of the Nelson parents had much time or energy to invest in dog training. So, all of this goes to say that when Jessi shouted for Rocky to go into the house, she really had no idea if he would actually obey her or not. Luckily for them all, the one thing that was on Rocky's poor terrified mind was to get inside the house as fast as he possibly could. Withing seconds, Jessi thought she could hear the door opening, and Rocky being pulled inside, so she struggled to her feet, and yelled, "Guys, pull me in!!" At this same time, Anna had just finished swinging the door open wide for Jared to usher in the dog. Adam saw that although Rocky had made it safely inside, Jessi was nowhere in sight. Then he heard her voice calling, "pull me in!!" He knew he shouldn't yank too hard, because he assumed she was either unable to get to her feet, or unsteady enough that she couldn't make her way back to the house without some help. So, Adam used the rope to gently guide Jessi back to the carport through the raging tornado winds. Finally she was just steps away from being inside the doorway, when Adam saw a giant silver piece of metal spiraling towards her head. He barely had time to scream, "Jess, duck!" As he let go of the rope and dove towards her, tackling her to the ground. The chunk of barn roofing barely missed the two of them, as it continued flying through the air and ended its journey by slamming into the door that Anna had closed just in time. By this time Rocky had already hightailed it to the basement, and was happily laying on the old couch, oblivious to all of the turmoil still going on because of him. As soon as they heard the crash of the metal against the door, Anna and Jared reopened the door, and grabbed the rope to pull in their older siblings. By this time, Adam had grabbed onto the rope and was helping Jessi get to her feet. They were safely helped inside, then they slammed the back door and locked it for good measure. The four adventurers raced downstairs, to find that while they were away, all of the basement windows had been cracked to bits. They grabbed Rocky, and took cover under their blankets anyway. As they waited out the rest of the tornado, in what now seemed like a very calm and safe environment, they triumphantly discussed how they took on, and defeated the tornado of '95. The four siblings knew it was a story they would be telling for the rest of their childhoods, if not for the rest of their lives. Rocky didn't seem to be as enthused as his young owners were. He fell asleep minutes after they put him under the blankets with them. Adam said this was just because he was the "rescued," not one of the "rescuers." Jessi, Jared and Anna had to agree. They were all proud to be among the ranks of the "rescuers."

Rocky vs. Apollo (aka the Tornado of '95) Part I

"Rocky!" Adam, Jared, and Anna all echoed Jessi's exclamation.
"We've gotta go out there!" Jessi declared, already jumping out from under the blanket.
"We can't go out there now, it's too late!" Adam decreed. "Y'all haven't seen the severe conditions that are going on." He continued seriously.
"He's all alone..." Anna said, unintentionally aiming large worried eyes towards Adam.
"Yeah," Jared added. "It's him versus the tornado, and he's handicapped by his chain!"
"Come on Adam, we can do it. Rocky needs our help!" Jessi pleaded. The three younger Nelsons knew they had to have Adam in on the rescue mission. Although they already had the "want-to," they needed Adam's brain power and leadership.
"Fine," Adam conceded. "Lets take on that twister!"
He spoke with perfect timing and inflection, his sentence sounded like it was straight out of a 3 ninjas movie. Jessi, Jared and Anna's eyes lit up, and they spontaineously stacked their hands together in a huddle, then simultaneously brought them down a little bit and back up yelling "Go!" in unison. It was a perfect 3 ninjas/kid power moment. But none of the four took the time to bask in the greatness of the moment, because they had a job to do. An important mission of mercy to carry out. A monumental battle to fight!
"OK," Adam called out, "We need something to hold onto, or something that will hold onto us, so that we won't get swept up in the tornado when we go out there."
They all took a minute to look around the basement. It was filled with all kinds of random playthings, and they were sure there had to be something helpful to them in their mission. They knew they had a long piece of rope that was very thick and would work perfectly, but it was out in the barn. They had been using it to play Indiana Jones just the other day.
"I know!" Jared yelled, with a triumphant look on his face. Adam and Jessi swapped a wary look. Jared was forever coming up with elaborate and somewhat hairbrained ideas that weren't really practical. They were afraid this might be another one of those type of ideas. Luckily for them, and for Rocky, it wasn't.
"Let's tie together all of our karate belts, and use them!" Jared finished.
"Perfect!" Adam and Jessi aprroved heartily.
"Yeah, we can even use my pink belt." Anna volunteered. This was a big sacrifice for Anna, she loved her specially dyed pink karate belt, and usually didn't allow it to be used for the various games and plans for which the kids used their karate belts.
So they got to work, getting their many and various colored karate belts out of the bucket that held all of the dress up type clothes. Adam Jessi and Jared were all currently taking karate (although Jared wasn't quite as serious about it as his two older siblings). Adam was a brown belt, Jessi a purple belt, and Jared a "lowly" orange belt. This meant they had a total of 14 belts. 3 old white belts, 3 yellows, Jessi and Adam's old orange belts, 2 green belts, 2 blue belts, 1 purple, and of course, Anna's pink belt. Adam, Jessi and Jared kept their current belts (orange, purple, and brown) upstairs with their karate gis. Once they had gotten every single belt tied tightly together end from end they had quite a rope. It was probably more reliable than the length of real rope they had left hanging from the loft in the barn. Next, they made their way up the flight of stairs to make their way to the back door, which, by this time was missing the 3 glass panes at its top. The kids could hear the wind swirling angrily through the broken glass. Even though the door was closed, it was shaking violently inside of its hinges. Rocky's bark could be heard, frantically trying to rise above the chaos of the elements. They knew they needed to act quickly before things got worse.
"So, are we all going out there?" Jared asked seriously, his voice mixed with excitement and trepidation.
"No!!" Adam and Jessi chorused.
Adam took action, vocalizing the plan he had formed in his head long before they had finished tying the belts together.
"Jess, you're going to have to be the one to go out there. You're lighter than me, plus I'm the strongest, so I need to be here anchoring the belts."
"Just what I was thinking." Jessi agreed.
Adam started tying one end of the belt rope to the end railing that ran all the way up the stairway to the basement. He was tying what he called a Polamer knot, which he had doubtless learned from one of the fishing books he was forever reading. As he worked quickly on the knot he turned to Jared and Anna.
"You two have to help me make sure this rope stays in the house with us, no matter what! And also, when Jessi gets back to the door with Rocky, you two grab him by the collar and pull him in, while I make sure Jessi is in, and the door is shut."
Jared and Anna nodded intently.
Adam finished tying the first end to the railing and turned to Jessi, who already had the roped wrapped around her waist. He tied an even tighter Polamer Knot and reminded her to hold the knot secure around her waist as long as she possibly could.

To Be cont......

3 Ninjas...oh yeah, and Douglas

So, there they were, four children, they had made their decision to hang at the hizzy rather than go to the dreaded Wally World. There was of course another child, young Jacob, he was nearly 2, and had no real say in what he would do or where he would go. In this case he was going to Wal Mart with his mommy. So, Adam, Jessi, Jared and Anna were hanging in the basement about to start a heated game of handball. They were among that lucky group of children who's parents did not forbid them to play ball in the house. They usually snickered at the Brady children on tv who were denied this privilege. There had been a few broken windows in the Nelson basement from these games of handball. They usually came from the hand of Jared. He had the power to hit it to the windows, but not the aim to keep it away from them, like his older siblings Jessi and Adam. Then there was Anna. She was only interested in handball because she had to be. It was essential to her survival. She was needed for the sake of even teams, therefore she was not allowed to say no. Anna was nothing if not compliant (at least as a young child. She quickly grew out of this trait by the age of about 8). So, the game started up, all the while, unbeknownst to the four, a storm was brewing! The Braves had come on earlier that day, but after the game was over, Jared had switched off the tv. Living as far out in the country as they did, the kids had no sirens to warn them of the impending tornado, and even if they had heard a siren going off, chances are, they would have thought it was sounding to alert them of an escaped prisioner from the Limestone County Correction Facility that was just down the road. So, on they played, making it to the 3rd inning before anything out of the ordinary happened. Jessi and Jared were just switching up from defense to start batting, and Adam and Anna were taking the 2-5 steps it took to "take the field." Out of the blue, the very same window that Jared had cracked about 2 weeks before shattered, causing Anna to jump back into the "infield."
"That wasn't me!" Jared said quickly, his eyes as wide as saucers. Of course Adam and Jessi knew it wasn't Jared, the ball was in Adam's right hand. But neither of them had a clue what had actually happened. All of the sudden they heard the most deafening wind that had ever met any of their young ears. Then an almost whistle like sound that wouldnt stop! They all looked to Adam, who already had a guess as to what was going on outside of their house.
"Tornado!"
He said confidently. Adam was always sure of his assessments, whether they were right or wrong. This time he was right.
"Adam, Jess, what do we do??" Jared's eyes were even larger than they had previously been.
"I'm scared!" Anna said quietly, not really expecting an answer.
"We have to stay in the basement for one thing." Adam said with authority.
"We've gotta have blankets for the flying glass!" Jessi blurted out somewhat frantically.
"I'll get them, you guys stay down here, in the very middle of the room, stay down low." Adam called over his shoulder, already on his way out the basement door." Jessi started moving to the middle of the basement, herding Anna and Jared along with her.
"Is our house gonna be swirling around inside the tornado?" Anna asked worriedly. She was probably recalling The Wizard of Oz.
"I don't think so, that's not a real movie y'know?" Jessi answered her, recalling the Wizard of Oz herself, and assuming correctly that this was the image floating around in Anna's head.
"I'm gonna go up there and help Adam!" Jared said all of the sudden, with a determinded gleam in his eyes.
"Oh no you're not!" Jessi said, grabbing him by the arm and holding him in place. "He'll be back any second now."
As she finished the sentence, Adams burst through the door with 3 large blankets filling his arms.
"Its crazy up there!" He panted. "The sky is black, and I think I saw a tornado, who knows if there's just one out there! It felt like the windows were gonna shatter any minute!"
Anna ran up to Adam and wrapped her arms around his knees, relieved that her big brother had survived his brave blanket mission. Jessi and Jared looked a tiny bit dissappointed that they had not gotten to see dramatic scene Adam had described. Little did they know that they would get to not only see this dramatic scene, but experience it very very closely.
Just as they were huddling in the middle of the basement under the thick blankets, Jessi let out a yell.
"Oh my gosh! Rocky's out there!"

To Be Continued.....................

Tornadoes Tornadoes everywhere, and not a twister to fight!

Well, in light of the incessant tornado announcements I have been hearing all morning/afternoon on the radio while at work, I have been thinking a lot about.....you guessed it.....tornadoes! Yes, as all of my readers(because as of now all of my readers are Randall, Anna, and Jacob aka 50 cent) know, the Nelson household was fatefully and callously struck by a tornado in the early summer of 1995. None of us were home at the time, but upon arriving home, and throughout the whole cleanup process I can recall myself as a 9 year old at the time thinking....

how obnoxious of this tornado to include in its self centered path: our house, yard full of beautiful trees, charmingly rustic and useful only for playing in and posing for pictures in front of barn, beloved camper, and of course the poor hapless and chained Rocky I.

I also know that as much as Adam, Jared and I talked about how glad we were that we had chosen to accompany Mom to wal-mart, I think there was a glimmer of a wish inside of our kid power programed brains (thanks to our obsessive viewings of 3 ninjas) that we would have actually chosen to stay home like we so often did. I mean, come on, how brave would we have been?? I'm sure we could have somehow single-handedly battled the tornado and the little tantrum it pitched in our yard as well as in the greater area of Harvest. Of course we wouldn't have tried to protect the whole Harvest area, just our house, yard, camper, trees, barn, pool, and of course the dog! So, in honor of today being as I have now dubbed it, "Twister Day" I would like to write a little story with the central characters being Adam, Jared, Anna, and me. Ages: 11,9,6, and 4. It will be like one of those choose your own scenario books, and we will be choosing the option where the four odd little children choose to stay home from the good old Wally World. This concludes my post for now. Stay tuned because I will hopefully be posting my short tale tonite, maybe after I get off of work. I know you are on the edge of your seat in anticipation!

My first creepy mommy blog!

Why hello there! While I am neither creepy, nor am I a mommy, I thought this was a very appropriate title for my first post! It is in no way a shot at mommy bloggers out there. It is in fact, more of a shot at me, compliments of my lovely sister. She seems to think I read too many blogs written by mommys. And I ask.....so what? Anyways, I have 15 minutes left at work, so I better get back to my actual job. No, I am not a slacker, I am just trying not to run out of work to do before the day is over. I will be back! Maybe not today, and maybe not tomorrrow, but maybe tomorrow. hahaha!