I Was Grounded / We Were Poor

I was grounded a lot as a kid.
I often watched Carol Burnett with my mom. When I got older, I could see Carol’s angry scowl face as my mom yelled at me. That squinted eyes and severely puckered lips. I am like no way, where is Tim Conway and Harvey Corman. I also had a crush on Vicki Lawrence, I was really stupid and told my ex-girlfriend that and she says… ha ha you have a crush on Mama from Mama’s Family.
It then turned into a school yard thing...
yes you did
no i didn't it was Vicki, not mama...

I often was grounded for impersonating Jack Tripper’s physical comedy. My mom did not find any humor in me tripping over a bucket of water, but it was funny when Jack Tripper did.

How long can you get grounded for? Many times my sentence childhood.
Dollar! your are grounded until you are 18. I was like 9 or 10 the first time this happened. I was devastated, thinking wow as long as I have been alive, I am grounded for that long. I don’t even remember how long I have been alive. This bothered me, I started to think of a way to escape. There was no way I was going to do 8 or 9 years of hard time of solitary confinement in my room. Even worse the person having control knows more about you than you do. Telling you all of the things you did as a baby or toddler.

I had many of the same reasons / convictions for being grounded.
Not calling, coming home late, lying. But I had very good co-conspirators.
My uncles, yes they kept me loaded with an arsenal. They helped me off to a bad start right away. They provided pull string pops, and cigarette loads and always provking me to cuss. Why b/c it is hilarious when a 4 year old says ahh shit. Or sitting on the roof of a car with a PA yeah you remember them CB's and PA's.. saying asshole, shit. Then my uncles would run away and there I am all alone cussing, as my mom comes flying out the screen door to yell at a 4 year old.

There is nothing better than rigging a pull string popper to the toilet seat. Imagine someone already has to pee and you shock their system when they are already anticipating the relief only moments away and begin to relax for that then pop. Lets just say that the boys were not the only ones to piss on the seat at our house. My uncles even bought me extra string, for more creative rigging.

Cigarette loads. Now there is my first childhood sentence. I was devastated.
My mom was going out with a girlfriend to the local bar. And I had loaded cigarettes before. So she would always light them and hold them down and away form people for the first part of it. I would stay up until they got home (but pretending to be asleep) to hear of any success with my evil little plans. Well I had found out what she was doing. So I used a toothpick and pushed the explosive wood sliver further into the cigarette. That night was one I won’t forget, I thought I went too far, I thought I was going to military school.
My mom at the bar her cigarette blew up as she was toking on it and put tobacco in several nearby drinks and all over her hair and large 80’s style glasses, it sounded horrific. My mom is yelling I oughta wake his little ass up right now and spank him. Little did she know I was always awake when she got home. She is practically screaming, I still am covered in tobacco! I almost laughed out loud. He could have injured me or someone else, and she is going on like I am a criminal. Then I was reassured, when her girlfriend says, yes but it was funny. It scared the shit out of everyone…. Then I let out my devious little smile and went to sleep as they laughed about it. I knew that I would get a stern scolding in the morning.

We were poor
Yes we were poor when I was a kid. I can remember not having a car in the early 80’s, we lived in a tin hut complex. I still drive by there once in awhile let out a smile and think, ahhh I remember when that was home. Now it is so much different, almost all of the trees there are gone because of wind and lightning, they used to have bushes and landscaping. Now have dog chains and gas grills that have been converted to charcoal grills, car parts. But the silver siding and matching roof are still the same. Ahh yes home sweet home..

We had food stamps you know they were all different colors and real embarrassing to use and the WIC program free milk and cheese. I remember going to another town to pick up WIC, I told my mom, mom we are not poor anymore we have a car, they are going to catch us.
Shut up! And yes we are still poor, then I got that Carol Burnett scowl….
I said but if you didn’t spend that $10 on gas to get over here we could have bought milk, butter, & cheese.
Yes, but now we have gas a-a-a-a-and milk, butter, and cheese.
I said now you are just being greedy.

Being poor was not always that bad. Like once I figured it out...
My mom threatened me and said I’ll send you to military school...
I said no you won’t we can’t afford it. I am not going to get a scholarship with this attitude.

As a kid my mom once said, after I made a light of a bad situation. Do you think everything is a damn joke?
I was mad and wanted to say Yeah! BUT I said No.. but at least we can afford it. I was grounded, but this time the joke was on her, because I was still grounded from the last offense.

In school when I was directed / asked to pay attention,
I replied, do you take food stamps?

My first trip to Canada. I exchanged currency, b/c everyone said to. Otherwise if you give them American money they give you Canadian change and you are getting ripped off. So I thought they aren’t going to rip me off. so I changed in like $200 and she hands me this rainbow of paper. And I said uhm excuse me, but I gave you cash and I think you gave me Canadian food stamps.
She said no sir this is Canadian currency or cash.
I said oh. Well in the states we have green cash and colored food stamps so we can point and stare at the poor people.