Christmas 2021

Dear Family & Friends,

            It’s beginning to look a lot like Crap-mas  

            On the Franklin’s lawn…

            Yes, it’s that time of year again, when the Franklin’s holiday newsletter dances through your sugarplum fairy dreams like those pink elephants in the movie Dumbo. Where does the time go? The only way Nancy and Joe knew what day it was, was by looking at the letter on their pill organizers every morning. This year, in between getting shots, Nancy and Joe were drinking them.

            Joe started the first year of his 4-year Manhattan Beach City Council term after his ‘razor edge’ victory last year. That ‘razor edge’ was what Nancy swore she was going to take to her wrists just after the election was certified until she discovered that City Council work keeps Joe out of the house most days. Unfortunately, that also means that Nancy’s ‘honey do’ list has just become a ‘honey can’t’ list forcing Nancy to hire really buff handymen if she needs anything done at the house. Nancy needs a lot of things ‘done’ around the house.

            So far, so good, for Joe, who believes he can reach across the marital mattress, as well as the political aisle, to achieve détente. He is, however, keeping one eye open in case Nancy decides to muffle him with his own My Pillow®.

            Joe is busy attending every ribbon cutting, hair cutting and lawn cutting event in the city. Nancy has promised Joe that if he does anything to embarrass her, chestnuts won’t be the only nuts roasting on an open fire this holiday season.

            Taylor, now 29 and observing life like an angry owl mentally eviscerating prey, continues to do well at the Westdrift in Manhattan Beach. She runs the place like a lion tamer at Ringling Bros. Barnum & Bailey Circus: with leather boots, a whip and an attitude. The L.A. Chargers, USC Trojans and L.A. Rams stay there on home game weekends. Taylor can provide color commentary on team players while you’re watching any one of their games and it will only cost you a couple of añejo tequila shots and a small donation towards her ‘get me out of here’ fund.

            As for Nancy, now old enough to have only archeologists interested in her, she continues to write about all things absurd and ridiculous, which turns out to be mostly about her family. She finished her second novel just this past November. Now, with two unpublished books, she has that second doorstop, an additional booster seat or a matching bookend to hold up all the other books she’ll write that won’t be published. She has decided to adopt Hemingway’s style of drinking while writing, which should make everything funnier. To her.

            However, she was published by random satire websites this year. They were clearly in comas when deciding to accept her work. If you’d like to read Nancy’s latest musings before she is committed to a state mental institution somewhere, you can visit www.mirthquakes.com.

            But real kudos this year go to Jimmy, 30, and his family who are now living their best Duck Dynasty life. Earlier this year, someone in the Marine Corps decided that the only one who could hotwire a CH-53 helicopter was Jimmy, a skill he learned when stealing his parents’ cars during high school. So they offered him a job teaching his other fellow Marine maggots how to do it. This, however, necessitated a move to Richlands, North Carolina, 2,267 miles away from his parents.

            Why anyone would want to move 2,267 miles away from their loving parents is still being debated, but Nancy and Joe are sniffing their armpits anyway and deciding to up the number of weekly showers they take.

            Now, Nancy isn’t one to criticize anyone’s choice of living arrangements; she voluntarily criticizes everyone’s. But North Carolina is home to just about anything that can kill you in these United States. Setting aside the hurricanes and humidity, there are six types of venomous snakes, including Copperheads and Water Moccasins which, Joe and Nancy had to explain to Jimmy, were not references to new Marine recruits or shoes you wear in the water. There are also Black Widow and Brown Recluse spiders, alligators and fire ants. These latter little insects tend to swarm when irritated and have a vicious bite whose venom makes it feel as if your entire limb is on fire. Your only option is to plunge the offended limb into the nearest source of cold water, which—if it’s a river, lake or stream—is where Water Moccasins and alligators live!

            Ever wonder where they got the sound that emanates from your phone during an Amber Alert? That piercing, high-pitched scream that jump-starts your pacemaker and makes you pee a little in your pants? They got that from a 4-year old who put her sandal-clad foot into a fire ant hill when her grandmother wasn’t looking….Just sayin’.         

            Anyway, after Jimmy and Christie dropped the bomb of the move to N.C., Nancy and Joe asked how they were going to get there, to which Jimmy replied “We’re going to drive.” A 6-, 4- and 18-month old in a car with a cat and suitcases. After Joe and Nancy stopped laughing, they calculated the amount of time it would take before the first “Are we there, yet?” would be heard and who would still be alive after five days. Grandchildren being held in high regard in the Franklin household, Joe and Nancy quickly volunteered to take the kids for two weeks and make their way across the country by plane while the kids’ parents drove and set up the house in N.C.

            Jimmy and Christie, not having anticipated such astounding good luck, threw a stroller, car seats, a cubic ton of diapers, two suitcase, a large Marine-issue duffel bag and Liam, Caroline and Maci out of their moving vehicle, then laid a patch of rubber in the Franklin driveway that can be seen from the orbiting International Space Station.

            There are many things you forget about traveling with children—like all of it. Fortunately, Joe and Nancy were able to enlist Taylor (“This will be FUN! And did we mention we’ll pay for all of it?”) to come along for laughs and so Joe and Nancy wouldn’t forget the children in an airport somewhere.

            Another thing you forget is that no matter how much water you introduce your 18-mo. old grandson to (Pacific Ocean, Lake Washington, Lake Sammamish, Puget Sound, hotel pools, showers and the Atlantic Ocean), his favorite body of water to play in is a toilet bowl. Other things to remember: never give a kid Pirates’ Booty when he’s near the toilet bowl.

            You can learn many things from children. The Franklins learned the difference between adjoining rooms and connecting rooms in a hotel. Adjoining rooms are rooms next door to each other but separated by a wall so you can shove the older grandchildren in with your daughter and forget they’re there. Connecting rooms are two rooms connected by an interior door which can inadvertently slam shut and lock most of you in one room and your 18-mo. old grandson in the other room by himself. And because you never took the chain lock off the main hall entry door of the room with your 18-mo. old (now screaming) grandson in it, you now have to call hotel Engineering to come and take the door off the hinges. Grandchildren can be a great comfort to you in your old age. So can a shot of tequila after they’ve all gone to bed.

            And so the Franklins made their way like an air-born outdoor bazaar caravan, across the country, finally ending up on the Atlantic Coast where they happily turned three living kids back to their parents and flew, first class, home with all the alcohol they could consume.

            Once again, the Franklins give thanks for their health, vaccinations, time with children and grandchildren and for you, our family and friends. May you have everything you wish for this holiday season!

Love—Joe, Nancy, Jimmy, Christie, Taylor, Maci, Caroline and Liam Franklin