Why WikiLeaks are IckyLeaks

The Prude usually doesn’t get too political but something about these WikiLeaks has her skin crawling.

And while she would love to lecture entire groups of people about
-not saying something behind one’s back that you wouldn’t say to their face, and
-taking good care of items with which you have been entrusted, AND
-not taking items that don’t belong to you that say un-nice things about others
even though the ones to whom they have been entrusted for safekeeping did a lousy job,

the above issues are not what is so repellant to Your Prude.

She scrabbled about in her psyche and came to the following conclusion:
It’s all in the name. WIKI and LEAKS

Let’s begin with the last name first.
LEAKS
Leaks are anathema to Prudes.
There are seldom, if ever, good connotations to the word LEAK.
Leaks are messy. They are smelly. They do damage and are hard to clean up. They mean that something has gone wrong somewhere. And they often involve expensive, extensive repairs.
Prudes don’t like LEAKS.

Now that first name. Wiki.
The techno-savvy Prude realizes there is an entire world out there with a first name of ‘Wiki’
So she had to dig a little deeper in her subconscious layers, all the way down to those formative years of the 1960’s and ‘70’s.
And there it was.
Soap on a Rope.

Amway soap on a rope, to be specific. The one that looked like a Tiki god.
And ‘Tiki’ sounds like ‘Wiki’. Doesn’t it?
In The Prude’s always hazy memory bank, there is an image of an ugly little Tiki-guy
that accompanied Young Prude and her family into the shower.
Think about this.
Young Prude had an ugly MAN with ogling eyes in the shower with her.
He was slimy and slippery.
He had a rope extending from his head, and for some reason Young Prude thought it would be best to wear him around her neck.
Possibly because she could then turn those awful eyes away from her person.
But the rope wasn’t very long and she always felt as if she were choking.


And now, my friends, The Prude triumphantly comprehends the distaste she has for WikiLeaks.
They bring to mind something that is messy, smelly, damaging, slimy, slippery, asphyxiating, and rudely ogling.

If WikiLeaks wants to find any possible favor with Prudes, they may want to consider a name change.

Faulty Thanksgiving Shut-Off Syndrome

The Prude Family members have a problem.  Although they strongly disapprove of gluttony, rash promises and self-deception, these three vices embark on a collision course that results in great misery and foolish promises beginning Thanksgiving Day and cycling through to the following morning.

We call this Faulty Thanksgiving Shut-Off Syndrome and it is Not Our Fault.

It is physiological.

Note- The illustration is solely for enhancement purposes and is not meant to represent any person in the Prude’s immediate or extended family.

 Note #2: The Brain is saying 'I'll Never Eat Again. Ever' in the illustration. This was The Prude's attempt at verisimilitude and making the brain look all squiggly like a real brain.

Here is what happens:

The eyes, nose and taste buds join in a conspiracy on Thanksgiving Day and lull the victims and their tummy shut-off valves into a false belief that they can continue fitting vast quantities of food down the food pipe and into said tummy.

But then the victim consumes a final piece of Toll House pie. The pie wedges the shut-off valve in the ‘jammed open’ position just as the eyes, nose and taste buds disband from exhaustion and fall asleep.

The shut-off valve at this point goes into crisis mode.

It alerts the Stand-by Over Ride Chain which is directly connected to the
‘I’ll Never Eat Again. Ever.’ section of the brain.

The victim repeats this mantra over and over again.

And then  joins the nose, eyes and taste buds in uneasy and painful slumber.

However, while the victim and the victim’s senses doze, the tummy is busy compacting all the turkey, stuffing, sauces, casseroles, vegetables and, finally, the offending Toll House pie.  Then, still while the victim sleeps and dreams of a foodless future- or at most one populated with celery sticks dipped in hummus, the various foodstuffs are redirected away from the tummy to go their merry way.

The layers drop and the Shut Off Valve slams down into place, which disconnects the Stand-by Over Ride Chain which returns to ‘sleep’ mode.

The brain switches from ‘I’ll Never Eat Again. Ever’ function to the ‘What’s For Breakfast’ position just as the eyes, nose and taste buds, alert and refreshed, stretch, yawn, and kick into high gear.

And The Family Prude arises and has leftover Toll House Pie for breakfast.

Praise and Thanksgiving

Praise and thanksgiving let everyone bring 
Unto our Father for every good thing.
All together joyfully sing!

translated from German by E.L. Thomas

All Together Joyfully Sing

Proof the The Prude Takes Thanksgiving Seriously

Yesterday The Prude asked you to return today to ‘discuss’ Thanksgiving, at which point you probably snorted and said, ‘Oh right. As if The Prude ever does anything but lecture us.’
True.
But today she really wants to hear what you have planned for Thanksgiving. If you can fight your way past the dragon that guards her comments section. (The Prude has noted that her Comment Dragon sometimes it doesn’t even let her in)

The Prude wants to know what you are doing for Thanksgiving because
she loves Thanksgiving and loves comments and doesn't want to feel  guilty telling YOU what SHE is doing.

She would love to tell you, without feeling self-absorbed, that her contributions to the Thanksgiving feast are
-a turkey breast that she will cook to the point of dryness to ensure all salmonella bacteria are emaciated,
-a new stuffing recipe that will immediately be rejected by at least 7 people because it contains mushrooms
-her mother’s mashed potato casserole that never tastes like mom’s
-a broccoli casserole with the broccoli cleverly disguised by cheese sauce and cracker crumbs
-the ugly apple slices dressed up with icing
-her piece-d’ resistance: Toll House pie with whipped cream.

Here is what she will be doing the next few days. Lord willing. Because she really loves this stuff.
THURSDAY
-Take the way too much food and the ads for Friday bargains out to sister’s farm.
-Promise everyone we’ll eat at 2. Get food on table at 3:40. Eat. Repeat.
-Clean up with womenfolk while men mysteriously disappear
-Go on hayride. Sing Thanksgiving songs. Hope food compacts enough to support layer of dessert
-Eat dessert successfully. Play a game. Watch a movie. Sleep.

FRIDAY
-90 minute trip to Black Friday shopping. Make new friends while standing in line with bargains. Lunch at restaurant where someone else prepares food and cleans up after.
-Christmas Parade in tiny town. Cheer wildly and catch Tootsie Rolls tossed by 4-H members, local politicians and Santa Claus

SATURDAY
- Pancake Breakfast on Another Farm
-Return home
-Take down Thanksgiving decorations
-Vow to not eat until Christmas.

Your Prude, thankful for friends both known and unknown, would really love to hear something about how you celebrate her favorite holiday. And if you can't get past that lousy Comment Dragon, throw it a turkey bone. Maybe it will choke.

Hold the Toes. Please.

Whenever The Prude struggles with topics on which to expound, she turns to that never-failing supply of $19.95-plus-shipping-and-handling early morning infomercials.
And Voila.
Tuesday’s Post.

Following are the 5:30 a.m. ads that had the most profound effect on The Prude.

Airing on several channels were testimonials of middle-aged people who lost dozens of  pounds after doing Hip Hop Abs or something called Zumba.
Participants contort themselves in a high-speed frenzy to upbeat musical numbers led by very damp and shiny people in various states of undress.
The Prude knows how these people lost those pounds.
During mid hip-hop, or early zumba, something somewhere in the middle-aged bodies snapped, making trips to the refrigerator or pantry impossible.
Consider yourself warned.

Those of you who allow your youngsters to read this blog may want to censor this next section. And keep a close eye on all your children’s early morning viewing habits.

The Prude continued flicking through channels, occasionally stopping to admire the size and variety of permed coiffures and/or mullets on 1980’s ‘Saved by the Bell’ reruns, or taking a second to Save the Date (April 29) for the wedding of William and Kate.
And then.
Then she happened upon the most gruesome infomercial of all times.
One that could be used as filler for a horror movie or possibly an ‘adult entertainment’ show. 
There, filling the entire TV screen, was a close-up of an unshod, totally in the buff, rosy, soapy foot moving in a backwards and forwards motion on a huge, bristled Frankenstein-shaped open boot positioned in the bottom what appeared to be a bathtub.
It is kind of infomercial you don’t want to see alone at night. OR let your hormonal teenage son watch.
The Prude, never a fan of even dry toes, watched in horrified fascination as middle-aged people, possibly those damaged by zumba-ing, described how their lives were changed by this automatic foot washing machine, now that they no longer had to lift their feet to scrub between their toes, or bend at the middle to reach down to said toes. And then the camera would break away from the happy, non-lathered faces for yet another ghastly up-close-and-personal view of those bubbly, Au natural tootsies.

(The Prude hoping to avoid copyright infringement, has reproduced below the foot-scrubber in action.)

But please, don't blame her for any nightmares. She attempted in the above drawing  to reproduce a likeness approved for all audiences.. And she promises you will never see HER disrobed foot on TV. Ever.
Come back tomorrow, if you don’t mind, because we really need to discuss Thanksgiving.

Old Mother Prude

These are the guys who hunt the deer.

This is the one
 who got left behind by
the guys who
 hunt the deer





This is the dog who urped on the carpet
Next to the one who got left behind
by the guys who hunt the deer.

This is the coffee that spilled on the keyboard
which now doesn’t  work

when the dog urped on the carpet
next to the one who got
left behind
by the guys who hunt the deer.




This is thermostat that connects to the
furnace which refused to work

for the one who got left behind
by the guys who hunt the deer.

This is the damp wood

that smoked in the hearth
while the furnace refused to work
for the one who got left behind
by the guys who hunt the deer.





This is the hanger that needed
to be assembled
(not as shown on TV)
by the one that got left behind
by the guys who hunt the deer.



This is the injury

inflicted by the hanger
that needed to be assembled
by the one that got left behind
by the guys who hunt the deer.

This is the end
since the gory clothes that got worn by the guys who hunt the deer
need to be washed by the one who got left behind.

The Prude Solves Airline Security

After yesterday’s post, The Prude realizes she would like to be practical once in awhile. Solve some of the world’s problems. Make it not only more civil, but safer.
In a modest sort of way.
The Prude refers, of course, to the current trend of scanning people and giving them love pats at airports.
And while prudes everywhere are advocates of safety in travel, most of us would rather walk to Europe on foot than submit to photos of us in the altogether, or permit a stranger to play patty-fingers with those off-limits areas between our chins and our knees.

So The Prude has come up with a solution.
One that involves NO X-ray vision through our garments. One in which there is no need for anyone to rummage our anatomy.
One that may (although The Prude is a little fuzzy on this) save airlines tens of millions of dollars a year. After the initial investment, of course.

Behold, The Lozenge.

The Lozenge is a fully encapsulated, poddish sort of movable unit that will revolutionize air travel.

Here’s how it will work:

A line of Lozenges will await passengers at each gate in the terminal.
-Each passenger will enter a Lozenge, which will be transported through the tunnel (ala the Jetsons, or possibly the Tunnel of Love ride at the carnival)) onto the plane, and locked into place.
-Each passenger will spend the rest of the flight in his/her Lozenge, until the destination is reached and the Lozenges will transport their passengers back out into the terminal.
-Each Lozenge will be fully pressurized, or whatever it is that allows one to breathe at high altitudes.
-Each Lozenge will float, allowing one to survive (although possibly upside down) in watery environs.
And- this is the best of all-

-EACH LOZENGE WILL BE IMPERVIOUS TO INCENDIARY DEVICES!!!!!!

Do you see the genius here?
Even if some cretin (The Prude is moved to strong language when speaking of those who willingly kill others) DOES get a bomb on the plane, the only person said cretin will blow up is himself!!!!!

The Prude, while addressing issues such as comfort (note the pillow) tray tables, and ample storage for carry-ons, realizes there are some kinks to work out:

1) It will be difficult to get food/beverages in. This is assuming that somewhere in the world an airline still feeds its passengers.

2) It will be difficult for passengers to attend the call of nature. Which may be partially alleviated by the ‘no food or beverage’ problem outlined in #1.

But every revolutionary invention has some kinks. Remember MS-Dos?

For now The Prude is feeling quite smug and practical.
Today, airline security.
Tomorrow, social security.

Do you need the Prude? Nah.

No, seriously. The Prude is not being unduly modest. She likes her blog.
Sometimes she even makes herself chuckle, although she hopes no one is listening.
But her blog doesn’t share recipes, it doesn’t share housekeeping tips, it doesn’t give encouragement, advice, information, or free stuff. And although at times it may frustrate, irritate or simply confuse, it is never meant to enrage.
So why does The Prude bother?
Why should you, with your busy life, read a light and fluffy ‘Prude Disapproves’, which is seldom interactive, often misspelled, and never controversial?

‘The Prude Disapproves’ has made you aware that this particular Prude has strong opinions on modesty in clothing, cleanness of language, decency of behavior
and a plethora of other notions that have no bearing on anything (remember ‘The Weighted Alphabet’?)

But there is one characteristic about which The Prude is passionate.
It is the reason she began this blog in the first place.
Civility.
She sees so little of it. So little civility in television, politics, religion, the workplace, the classroom, in families, among friends and amidst strangers.

Incivility is often disguised with wit or sarcasm sarcasm.
It is excused because of strongly held beliefs or passions.
It is almost expected in certain realms such as the editorial page and Washington DC, but it has gurgled up, slobbered out, and mucked up everything. Incivility is ubiquitous.

The Prude would like to carve out a little section of the world that, at its core, is cordial.

She has strongly held beliefs on religion, politics, education, society, language, nutrition and global stewardship. But this is not the venue to share them all.

She prefers not to mock, deride, satirize or condemn those whose views don’t match hers.
Not that she believes all opinions and ideas have equal validity.
Not because she doesn’t believe in absolutes.

But she has control over this blog. She chooses every day what to write.
The vast majority is incredibly nonsensical.
But her desire is that it remain one hundred percent courteous (in a goofy sort of way) one hundred percent of the time.

You don’t need The Prude. But she hopes you agree that we all need a more civil world.

The Prude disapprives of herself

Somedays your Prude needs a Prude of her own. One who will tell her not to procrastinate.
Alas.
I am on my own.
And I realize that today is a day I will be gadding about.
And I have nothing, NOTHING on which to write.
Therefore, I plagiarize.
Below is one of Your Prude's Favorite Poems.
I have been nagging- pardon- lecturing, everyone to read it.
So now I provide it, in all its glory.
Enjoy.
And rest assured that tomorrow, Lord willing, I will have lectured myself into a state of preparedness.

The Mist and All

by Dixie Willson
To be read slowly and quietly I like the fall
The mist and all
I like the night owl’s lonely call
And wailing sound
Of wind around
I like the gray
November day
And dead, bare boughs that coldly sway
Against my pane
I like the rain

I like to sit
And laugh at it
And tend my cozy fire a bit
I like the fall
The mist and all

A Prude and her Dog

Prudes are not always consistent people.  We espouse the beauties of organization
even as we have to close a bank account simply to figure out our checkbook.
We extol euphemisms and then write a post on Mucous. Instead of ‘Nasal Cavity Leakage’.
And sometimes we own pets that are not in the least prudish.

The Prude owns this dog.

Who has no compunctions about performing necessary bodily functions in front of an entire troupe of Girls Scouts.  Or nuns.
Who rolls with joyful abandon in piles of bodily functions remains left behind by other dogs. And then leaps, with full assurance of approval, into the Prude’s lap.
Who volunteers her tongue as a sort of One-for-All family tissue to clean out the noses of any and everyone who suffers from the sniffles.

These are the Prude’s dog’s toys.

When the Prude’s children were young she would bleach their toys every week. She would tear the house apart looking for a missing piece from any toy set. She would then organize bleach-stained but completely originally equipped toys on shelves. According to size.

The Prude’s dog has personally shredded and salivated over every one of these toys.
Most at one time had a squeaker in them. Dog can dismantle any toy with a squeaker in less than 4 minutes and then spit out the hated squeaker along with 30 yards of the stuffing that surrounded Squeaker and the little bits of rubber and plastic that gave their lives futilely defending hapless Squeaker.

And then the dog refuses to part with any of these distinctly off-putting, unsanitary, and dismantled toys.

Here is the toy, whose loathsome presence The Prude was unable to bear any longer, threw in the trash.

The dog stood vigil at the trash can most of the day, alternately begging and nagging The Prude to get it back out. So far The Prude has stood firm.

The Prude’s dog has one trait exhibited in Prudes everywhere.
She won’t quit nagging till something changes.

But the Prude will remain steadfast and not return the offensive, fuzz covered half bone. At least until she can bleach it.

The Naughty Nose

Prudes are proponents of ‘A Place for Everything and Everything in its Place’
along with the subset ‘A Task for Everyone and Everyone to its Task’

The various orifices on our faces are perfect examples of each of these precepts.
In most faces the ears, eyes, noses and mouths tend to remain in their prescribed areas.
And each of them has a task.

Ears were designed to listen to lectures.
Eyes were designed to seek those in need of a lecture.
Mouths have the job of either
a) delivering a lecture
b) thanking a lecturer for the lecture
And noses were designed to breathe.

The Prude was beginning to formulate these postulates at an early age.
She bitterly resented when any of these orifices wouldn’t perform in the prescribed manner.
Especially her nose.
When Little Prude had a stuffy nose, she spent most of the duration of her cold in a state of semi-asphyxiation since she refused to let her nose off the hook from its duty of breathing.
Her mouth was too busy lecturing her lousy nose to clear up and get to work breathing.
And Little Prude didn’t want to use it to breathe anyway since that was Nose’s job.

The Prude currently has a cold. Her nose spends most of the day, instead of doing its customary inhale/exhale job, stockpiling large quantities of mucous.
Then at night, Nose takes a nap, at which time Mucous slides right out of Prude’s nose.

So Prude needs to spend the night with tissues firmly at the entrance/exit of her nostrils
to keep Mucous from partying all over the pillowcase.

The Prude’s mouth is exhausted from the extra duty of breathing.

If you see The Prude today, please behave. She doesn’t have the breath to deliver a good lecture.

I Stubbed my Toe- now what?

The Prude, in the course of blogging, learned she has a gift- you may call it a curse. She can take a single day topic, say, of giving you a list of appropriate explosive vocal resonations (exvotions), and then stretch it out to 3 days, with a foot dangling in Day 4.
And only 1 approved Exvotion to show for it.
And even that one has been called into question.

So today, without further ado and with profound brevity, we will complete our
list of Prude-approved exvotions:

1) Oh Dear
The Aunt Bee of Exvotions. Appropriate any time or place and in any company with the exception of a group of rabid deer hunters on opening morning.

2) Honestly
Good for Prudes, who are continually on the watch for honesty or lack thereof in a naughty world.
Exercise caution using this exvotion around existentialists, who will immediately, even as you are nursing a stubbed toe or wiping birdy poo off your head, want to engage you in the age-old dilemma of "What is Truth?"

3) Oh My Goodness
Although decent, this one has its drawbacks. Using it around aunts who remember when you threw sand in their newborn's stroller, for example, may call into question your goodness. Better to use this when you are alone and can nurture the fond illusion that you do, in fact, have goodness to spare.


4) A Small Range of 'SH' Words
The 'SH' sound is a very satisfactory lung-larynx-articulators explosion of sound that can express high emotion in high-emotion inducing situations.  However, it has been misused in a rather earthy, farmyard word that has been around for ages.
Consider, next time you need to express high emotion and only a good, dramatic 'SH' word will suffice:
OH SUGAR!
Your emotions are released, you have at the same time coated a negative situation with something sweet, and in no way can this word be mistaken for the other, more earthy term.

That is about it.
Please note that The Prude discourages the use of any word beginning with the 'ph' sound.
Keep your options limited and Prudes will never need to frown in your articulators' direction.


Having said that, there are 2 exvotions from the Prude's history she would like to share.
Just because.
a) The Prude's husband, in their dating days, came to visit and found himself in some exvotion-inducing situation or other. He took a deep breath and said 'Son of a-' at which point the Prude's mother entered the room and he finished '-Mohigan!' Although not really Prude approved, his effort was not unappreciated.

b) The Prude's mother, when startled, was apt to announce, 'You Scairt My Liver!"
And THAT is The Prude's All-Time-Favorite Exvotion.

Have a good weekend, and I hope your exvotion-producing incidents are few!

Oh HEH

The title gives it away.
One exvotion that is approved by this particular Prude is:
HEH
Short e

Her father used it for almost every situation listed in Wednesday’s post.
 ‘Heh’ had many manifestations and was dependent upon the initiating circumstance such as:

-Circumstance- Young Prude forgets to put the cap back on the toothpaste.
HEH  Manifestation: Small sigh, murmered ‘Oh Heh… (fade out as he searches for cap)

-Circumstance-Young Prude doesn’t clean up puppy poo that the Prude’s puppy deposited outside
the Prude’s parents bedroom door, which is henceforth discovered the next morning by
her father’s bare foot.
HEH  Manifestation- Middle toned, drawn-out HEEEEEEHHHHHHH! followed by a mad scramble for a tissue box, and a continuous negative shaking of the head.

-Circumstance-Teenage Prude, borrowing the family station wagon, turns up the radio to drown out annoying sound coming from under hood, which unfortunately has odorous and expensive consequences.
HEH  Manifestation- Short, explosive HEH repeated often and loudly at various intervals while striding around the smoking vehicle and the penitent young Prude.

The Prude has scrunched up her brain trying to remember other Exvotions used by her father but none come to mind.

He was the King of Heh, a sort of Van Gogh who turned Heh into an art form.
He expressed Heh-ishness with his entire being.

The Prude's Father in a potential Heh-induced situation perpetuated by an over-fed parakeet

He was a Heh Master.

NOTE:
-HEH is not to be confused with the term for the place that is the antithesis of heaven. The Prude’s father was adamant about that.

-HEH does fulfill the necessary and desired release of sound from one’s larynx, past one’s articulators and out of one’s mouth without resorting to blasphemy or coarse, crude terminology.

-HEH is therefore Prude approved, but there are more Prude-approved words in case
HEH doesn’t fulfill all your personal Exvotion needs.

Come back tomorrow as we complete our short list of Prude Approved Exvotions.

'Oh My **** (What did you say?)

Before we list Prude-Approved Exvotions (explosive vocal resonations)  we begin, in good Prude fashion, with what is not acceptable.

Some words are banned from Your Prude’s Lexicon Of Admissible Exvotions.

Papa and Mama Prude made it clear to the young Prude early in life that blasphemy is never acceptable. Or they thought they made it clear.
In her early days, as she was teetering on a razor’s edge of prudishness vs. overt naughtiness, Young Prude made a bold decision. She would test this whole blasphemy issue.

So, on a Sunday Drive in the Country, as bucolic landscape leisured its way past the family station wagon, naughty little Prude-to-be took a deep breath and said,
“GEE! Look at all those cows in the field!”
(it should be noted here that the Prude cared little-to-nothing about the existence of cows or their population in that particular field. She was just Testing Her Limits)

The response from Mama and Papa Prude was immediate. Mama was all for giving her a patchin on her pooket WHILE feeding her bar soap. Papa, however, intervened with a Lecture. A lecture to end all lectures. A lecture that made it clear that:

1) “Gee” is just a soft word for Jesus
2) “Golly” is a soft word for ‘God Willing”
3)”Gee Whillikers” is just a very odd term for ‘Jesus Whiskers’

And in summary, Young Prude was not to take God’s name in vain, but she was free to go ahead and thank Him for that multitude of cows and that field whenever she was so moved.
The lecture stuck. Blasphemy is bad.

NOTE: The Prude realizes that different people may have different opinions on the origin and meaning of the above 3 terms. In a rare politically correct overture, she leaves your (soft) blasphemy avoidance choices up to you
NOTE TOO: Somehow Papa Prude missed ‘Gosh’ while expositing  banned soft words, and The Prude, under extreme duress, has been heard to vocalize it.

Tomorrow: The Yes-These-Are-OK Words

Exvotions- what they are, why they won’t get your mouth washed out with soap

Prudes by nature do not approve of swearing. Watch one of us when a 4-letter word flies around the room.  The Prude present will glare at the nasty word till it shrivels and dies in midair, falls to the floor, and is ground to pulp under a sensible shoe. People sometimes mistake this prudish glare for a shocked look. Prudes are never shocked by naughtiness. Outraged and disapproving? Certainly. Shocked? Goodness no.

But Prudes know humans and their corresponding natures. They know that certain situations call for the generation of more explosive vocal resonations than a simple little ‘Oh Dear!”

Today the Prude will highlight the need for explosive vocal resonations (exvotions for short)

Tomorrow we will list some proper exvotion words. But be aware that exvotions are not, repeat NOT, euphemisms for naughty words. Exvotions are socially acceptable, Prude-approved sounds based on scientific reasoning.  The Prude will throw around words like ‘larynx’ and ‘articulators’ and ‘phonation’ to prove her scientific reasonableness.

The need for exvotions arises when you find yourself in situations such as the following:
- the accidental application of athlete’s foot spray to a new hairdo instead of the more socially acceptable and effective hairspray
- a hail storm that creates craters in a vehicle the day after extended insurance coverage for that vehicle was canceled.
-a graceful leap over a puddle which ends tragically in a mis-step, a tumble, and a bottomside first fall back into said puddle
-The entire subset of accidental dealings with animal waste products, including stepping in them and having them fall on one’s head
-The entire subset of bodily pratfalls, including stubbing one’s toe on one’s husband’s crankshaft left inexplicably in the middle of the kitchen floor at night, walking into a door left inexplicably open in the middle of the night, or banging one’s thumb with a hammer any time of the day or night.

This is merely the tip of  exvotion-inducing circumstances. They all call for a release of sound from one’s larynx, past one’s articulators and out of one’s mouth.
However, there are words you can use that will not be glared into an early grave by any Prude who happens to be present.
And tomorrow The Prude will introduce you to
Prude-Approved Exvotions

Love from the Jawbone Up

The Sunday Paper has plenty of which to disapprove. War, politics, and disasters. They put The Prude in a hurumph-y frame of mind. So much naughtiness, so few Prudes to lecture on it all.

But then, like a fragile flower in the midst of a mass of cow poo, like a lemon verbena scented candle in a high school boys' locker room, or like a full length moo-moo on a Spring Break Beach in Fort Lauderdale, a headline on page 3 stands out from the sordid ‘Woman has Family Under Fake Name’ or ‘Lil Wayne at NBA Game After Release’ stories that muddy the newsprint.

The pleasant, hope-producing headline reads, ‘For long term, men look at face over figure’ (Pamela Paul, New York Times)
Men looking for a long term relationship, (which, incidentally, are Prude-approved if long term=marriage forever and ever) don’t focus so much on a nicely turned ankle, a swan-like neck, or everything in between (which should be modestly covered anyway)
so much as they look at the face, a ‘signifier of emotion and character’

And The Prude wants to say ‘SEE!!!!!!!!!’ Men are not just wolves! They want emotional intimacy! (while she intentionally ignores the rigmarole in the article expounding, with more confusion than even The Prude can muster, on the relationship between women’s eyes and their reproductive capacities)

This is the sort of news story that gives Prudes everywhere Hope.
Today men desire face over figure.
Tomorrow they may desire brains over beauty.

And somewhere in a blissful future? Who knows?
A man may pursue a woman based on the length and breadth and depth of her Prudishness.
They will enter into a long term (ie. marriage forever and ever) relationship. Her reproductive capacity will ensure a new generation of Prudes.

None of whom will be named Lil Wayne.

Why The Prude Doesn't Do a Recipe Blog

Recipe blogs are all well and good for those among us who can cook.
Or can at  least make pretty food.
The Prude doesn't do pretty food.
Any recipe blog she published would be categorized 'bloopers'.

Below is the proof.

The Prude's mother made something called 'apple slices'
Like apple pie, but bigger, more in the parallelogram family, and capable
of feeding more people.

The Prude, having many people to feed recently, decided to give it a try.
The immediate problem stemmed from The Prude's resistance to making homemade pie crusts.
Why bother when the rotund little doughy guy in the tall white hat makes those clever little rolls of  crust?

The Prude decided to stick with what she knows.
Inserting round shapes into rectangular containers takes some ingenuity.
But she persisted.

Something was clearly wrong.
The Prude decided to mush up the seams a bit
and hope that the baking process would add beauty.

It didn't.

But Prudes never give into despair. Your Prude applied the panacea
used by cooks of ugly baked goods through the ages.
Icing.

ENJOY YOUR WEEKEND! AND IF SOMETHING ISN'T LOOKING PRETTY, JUST FROST IT!

 

Playtime for Mommy

If only The Prude's Children had done more of this...

The Young Prude, a rather self-absorbed child, always assumed her mother didn’t like to read. After all, she never sat down with a book. So when, as a teen, she saw her mother with a novel in hand she asked, “When did you start to like reading?”
her mother responded, “I always liked to read. I just never had time while you kids were growing up.”

The Prude’s children probably don’t know that she likes to play. When they were young
she would set aside playtime, but just as the fun was really beginning (Barbie was ready to bungee jump with a too-long cord (around her neck) , the A-team’s van was about to crash into a wall of pure kryptonite, Barney was going to learn the hard way that dinosaurs can’t swim) The Prude would have to run and hang clothes on the line, wash the pots and pans, pay the bills… you get the idea.

Some people call this the tyranny of the urgent. The Prude calls it discrimination against young mothers. But for once she has no idea how to make it right. How does one ensure that up-and-coming young mothers have time to run and play with their children? Short of allotting federal funds for laundering/house cleaning/bill paying services for all mothers of small children?

The Prude’s children believe that her favorite activities are in the kitchen, behind a vacuum cleaner, or making horrible faces at a checkbook.

But today is the day Your Prude catches up on that lost fun. She is having 2 little friends come and we are going to play all day. Dress up clothes, crafts, jumping in the leaves, reading stories, shooting a little pool. Not a laundry basket, dishcloth or utility bill in sight.

Obviously The Prude is still self-absorbed. She is catching up on her own playtime
instead of volunteering to clean etc. for the young mother of the girls. But be gracious to her.
She wants to see if Barbie survives the bungee jump.

What was I Going to Say? Bring Me a Fish.

Your Prude’s memory has a hole larger than the ozone layer.
She walks into a room with vigor and purpose, only to stand, musing, and wondering what the Sam Hill she is doing there.
She will begin a series of directives to her children and/or husband.
In the middle of said directives a portion of her brain will begin to debate on the merits of pork chops or hamburger casserole for supper.
And smack dab in the middle of THAT debate another corner of her mind will sign in and ask if she put a stamp on the bill to the energy company.
Be aware that all this is happening AS she is delivering her directives to her family member(s).
The result?
She trails off the directives before the end of the sentence because she has no idea what she was ordering them to do.
She can’t remember the result of the inner debate on what to cook and the family dines on frozen pizza that evening.
She only retains the vague sense of unease about the whole energy stamp issue and ends up striding purposefully from the room, leaving her family standing in confusion waiting for their marching orders while she stares at the walls of the office and wonders what the Sam Hill she is doing there.

The Prude would blame this on aging. She chooses not to. She has always been forgetful, so much so that as a child her mother would accuse her of not remembering from 12:00 to noon.

So several years ago The Prude rejoiced when she read that Omega 3 fatty acids, squeezed from fish and consolidated in capsules, could improve memory function. She immediately bought a huge jar.

She forgot to take the pills.

But even though she religiously, day after day, forgot them as they sat on her vitamin shelf, they remained a beacon of hope. Once she got herself in the habit of popping a few a day her memory would spring back to life, she was sure, whole and complete and capable of finishing sentences and locating stray keys and coffee cups.

But there is sad, sad news in the paper today. Researchers have learned that Omega 3’s don’t slow declining memory. All those fish gave their lives in vain.

This news makes The Prude sad. Because one day, she was sure, that magic capsule would come galloping to the rescue of her poor memory held captive in a confusing maze of…

Ignore the previous sentence. I forgot where I was going with it.

Voting Tuesday: Pass It On

As a young Prude, I would often walk around the house soulfully singing a song I learned in youth group. It was called ‘Pass it On’.  I thought it was the most beautiful, moving, IMPORTANT song ever written and I sang it till my parents offered me money to change songs, my dog cowered under the bed as I approached, warbling,  and my youth group leader discussed the possibility of transferring me to a different youth group. Preferably on a different continent. Eventually the song, as is the way of songs, was lost under ever new and important songs until I almost forgot it.

But last night as I lay sleeping, the song, long dormant under hundreds and thousands of those other most Important songs ever written, forced its way through the decades and layers of hymns, Led Zeppelin, Raffi songs, Creedence Clearwater Revival, the Newsboys and Vivaldi, and ensconced itself proudly in my Opening Music Box (the one that dictates the song that will be going through my head upon awakening).

At first I was irritated that I would now be stuck humming this extremely EXTREMELY sweet 70’s song all day, but then I realized it HAD A PURPOSE. 
IT was telling ME to tell YOU to PASS IT ON.

Here is how the process works:

You are nagged (via your conscience, your significant other(s) or Your Prude) to make sure you VOTE today. (we usually call this 'lecturing' but time is of the essense)
You vote.
You feel so self-satisfied that you nag OTHERS to vote. They catch the nagging bug and infect others with it. ‘And soon all those around, will warm up in its glowing’ (Pass It On, words and music by Kurt Kaiser)

So now we have the greater populace of the United States voting- thanks in good part to the nagging efforts of a small band of prudes like us. (“It only takes a spark, to get a fire going” Pass it On)

BUT! BUT my dear friends!  The best part is that it DOESN”T STOP THERE!!!!!!!
You and the nation, once you have experienced the Joys of Nagging, will not want to quit.
This is where it gets really good.
The Prude is not interested in telling you how to vote.
Just vote.
And then get to know whoever gets/stays in office.
And NAG them to do a good job. Don’t quit.

Nag them till they either cower under the bed, leave, or start to change things.

We can nag our way to a better nation.
But to earn the right to nag you need to vote.
PASS IT ON.

Be Kind to Politicians, They are Just Prudes at Heart

Yes, you read the title correctly.
Politicians are Prudes.

Read on for Proof:

Politicians dress prudishly.
Have you seen a male politician running  for office with the top inseam of his pants grazing his knees? As you gazed in horror and wished you didn’t know the answer to ‘boxers or briefs’? The answer thankfully is No. Most of them wear their pants neatly belted under their ribcage. (In light of some of the scandals about amorous politicians, they may want to consider adding to their wardrobes a nifty little device called the Chastity Belt.)
And the female politicians, whether clad in pantsuits or skirts, tend to be well-covered in their chestal regions. Which, in light of all the hot air they dwell amidst, is deserving of our praise.

Politicians point out the flaws of others.
Just watch any political debate or commercial. Keep a tally sheet. Mark down each time each debater finds a flaw in the person, work or words of their opponent.  You will run out of paper. These people put ordinary prudes such as myself to shame.

Politicians Know What is Best for You.
They will tell you so. Over and over and over again. Again, Ordinary Prudes such as myself can only look on in envy. To be so wise! So discerning! So incredibly Right! Or Left!  It gives Your Prude pause to reflect on the possibility of a political career herself. Because she really wants to be more Right.

And finally, the most beloved of all Prudish Traits:

Politicians Love to Lecture
Oh! The verbosity, length and sweeping breadth of these lectures! The way their words flow off the tongue into the troposphere and right over the heads of the listeners! But do Our Politicians stop when they see the glazed look of those around them? When they see heads bobbing downward and eyelids fluttering to a close?  No, and again I say NO! They lecture ever onward and upward. Politicians have perfected The Lecture. They call it a speech but we know it for what it is. An  art form at the highest level.

So today, as you weary of the midterm election process, please look at Your Politicians in a whole new light.
Because they want to be Your Prude.