Author: Jen Rios

Tune #14 & #15 Inspired by GMFB OR Willow Park and Camping

Last night, my knee popped out and popped back in as my Mom raised my ankle with the biggest crack ever! I think it was even louder than the crack I heard months ago. Needless to say, I fell asleep with my knee throbbing and woke up to pain just as bad as when I went to sleep! It’s extremely frustrating that this pain still happens and frequently because the day before yesterday, my knee also popped out. I was a little bit late rolling to my living room to turn on GMFB.

The moment I turned the TV on, Kyle Brant was talking about Rick Astley. He did a little dance with his shoulders and hands and I immediately knew who he was talking about! I never knew that guy’s name but I remembered seeing the video!

I didn’t even know what they were talking about and GMFB because I just caught the end of the segment before the commercials but that song (which I looked up on YouTube) reminded me of family barbecues at Willow Park when I was young! It was #14 Tune Inspired by GMFB. I thought of my brother, Ray, my brother, Steve, and my cousin, Alex.

I also thought of seeing that video a couple years later on the VH1 show, “Pop-up Video.” The show that has word bubbles pop up during the video with obscure facts. I remember in this particular, “Pop-up,“ I learned that the bartender in the video was really hung over at the day of the shoot! It was only REALLY useful information! I probably saw that show probably 20 years ago if not more but I still remember THAT video and the random things I learned about it!

A little while later on the show, they talked about the incoming draft prospects and how one of them is really into shoes. Nate Burleson is also into shoes and they showed this picture:

Everybody else was making fun of him but I remembered a time one what he was wearing was cool! I tweeted at him and told him not to be ashamed because back in the day, he was cool! I am pretty sure that my brother, Jimmy had something very similar. The rest of the hosts and Will Selva laughed at Nate and talked about Lou Bega and, “Mambo No. 5.”

That song immediately took me back to camping when I was about four months pregnant. I was still walking then and I remember having to climb down a somewhat steep hill to get to the water so Sean’s dad could fish. I made a big deal about needing help getting down the hill because I was pregnant.

We stood in ankle deep water as his dad cast his line. I just stood there and kind of splashed around in the water when a water moccasin came towards me with its head out of the water ready to attack! I screamed and ran back up the hill furiously! His dad noted that I ran up that hill all by myself but I told him that that snake was trying to hurt me and my baby! It wanted to kill us! That song, at Nate’s expense, is the #15 Tune Inspired by GMFB. I LOVE that show!

Lactose NOT a Good Idea

My, “Almond Blossom” mug arrived last night. I used it when I ate of my bun-less turkey burger with mozzarella cheese last night for dinner. I also used it this morning after I ate my sunny side up eggs. Based on the Facebook post I made at the end of March that stated it was good to eat chocolate for your health, I sometimes partake in eating chocolate after my breakfast. I am not “Lactose intolerant,” but rather, I prefer to say that I am “Lactose NOT a good idea” because it really is not! So, as I am waking up, I eat my breakfast and drink a half a cup of milk. Anymore than that is too much!

My friend’s son sold chocolate bars for his baseball team and I bought some for Sean and me. Based on the carb and sugar content, I can have one square a day of the four squares that each bar is divided in to.

Sean has already eaten the caramel and crunch bars I bought for him but since I ration my dark chocolate, I still have a couple bars left. You HAVE to drink milk when you eat chocolate so…

This mug gets my half a cup of milk now! I used to use my Notorious RBG mug or The Late Show with Stephen Colbert mug I got recently but this one will do just fine! I just found out a book about Vincent and Theo van Gogh will come out in the October so I am excited to read that one too! I’m sure I will use this mug well until and after I read it!

ALMOST Forgotten Tune #47

Yesterday, my Mom mentioned Dorian Gray. I vaguely remember a James Blunt song that had a line about him. I remembered my Mom telling me about Dorian Gray when I was still teaching English and the story interested me and I wanted to read the book and eventually teach it to my students. I never did though because my world cracked when my Dad died.

So yesterday, as my Mom and I were talking as we completed our morning routine, I told her that the words, “Dorian Gray” were in a James Blunt song but I couldn’t quite remember it. So, of course I had to look it up on YouTube to play this song for my Mom and to jog my memory.

I’m surprised that I still remember the words once this song started play and I tried to remember when I heard this song. I listened to it a lot in the car but I also listened to it in my second apartment as I got ready for work. After doing a little bit of research, the album came out in October 2004.

It made sense that I remembered to hearing the song a lot in my car because in 2004, Sean and I were still living with my parents because I was still an undergrad. We moved out in August of 2005 just before I started teaching. I listened to the album and loop a lot my first year teaching. It took me a minute to understand why I was listening to this album as I got ready for work in my second apartment. We moved into the 2nd apartment in August of 2006 just before my dad died.

The album has mellow sounding songs that soothed me when my world cracked because I was trying to help my four-year-old son deal with his world that had also cracked. That album played in my bedroom on the dresser as I got ready for work. I had memories of it playing in my car because when it first came out, I was still in college. I remembered the mellow songs that helped me get it together enough to get ready for work.

Music that played on my way to work is a whole different story that I know I have written about before. I think I’m going to search through my blog to find it to repost.

Mom/Abuela

Today, as in most days, when my Mom and I complete our morning routine to get me ready for the day, we listen to a mix I made for her on my Apple Music account. I made it for a surprise 65th birthday party for her that we never ended up having. We can still listen to the mix though! It’s saved on my playlist as, “Mom/Abuela.”

We listen to that playlist most days and in the beginning, she would be surprised that she liked so many of the songs. I had to tell her that the songs were chosen SPECIFICALLY for her, (my brother, Ray, was really instrumental in choosing the songs). All of the songs live in my peripheral memory of growing up and hearing my Mom sing along with these songs either in our kitchen or in the green station wagon. It wasn’t until we started working together in the mornings that I found out a few things.

When this song comes on, my Mom gets a kind of far away look and smile’s. I asked her why she does that and she told me this song reminds her of driving to Oklahoma as a newlywed. She drove at night while my Dad slept so they could get there faster because my Dad had to report it to the fort because even though he was stateside, he was still in the military.

My Mom kind of chuckles when she remembers when my Dad woke up and he didn’t know where they were. When my Mom told him, he asked her how fast she was driving because they were really far! She told him simply that she was driving 90 mph! He protested because the car was new and he told her she should NOT be driving it that fast but as she tells me, she just smiles and says that no one was on the road and it was really smooth so she just gunned it!

I remember seeing a picture of my Mom laying on the hood of the car that was named, “Twilit.” The car was a 1970 Chevy Impala. I pulled up a couple pictures and my Mom couldn’t quite remember the color. It’s between these two colors:

I like hearing stories about my parents when they were first married and before they were parents. I don’t know them NOT being parents! I like seeing the look of, “remember-y.” That’s a word Sean used to use when he was about three years old and I’ll write about that a little bit later…

ALMOST Forgotten Tunes #45 & #46

So, I’ve been watching a lot of basketball with Sean. I haven’t watched much basketball in a while because it is too fast for my eyes to adjust to. Now that I have an eyepatch, I can enjoy the game with Sean. That’s all that counts to me anyway. He’s been to Pistons’ games (which is who we watched today). and I was able to get into March Madness and the NCAA tournament because of him. Today as we watched, the music played when there was a timeout or a violation and I thought I heard this song:

This song was an ALMOST Forgotten Tune until I heard it! I don’t even know if it was that song but I was reminded of this song and being a Junior in high school.

Even though the Pistons ended up losing the game, before the end of it, I heard one more song that took me back to high school:

I put the clean version in and this one because I’m old now…

Almond Blossom

Something I realized a few days ago was that I had no idea how almonds were grown! I guess I never thought about it. I like almonds and I eat them but I had no idea where they came from. I saw an almond milk commercial with a little girl and her grandpa or something talk about how almonds are grown and they showed an almond blossom. I had no idea that almonds grew on trees!

I searched YouTube for that commercial but I couldn’t find it but I watched a few of the videos that explain how they are grown and harvested. I only searched that information after reading a book that I just finished and really liked!

Toward the end of the book, Kaplan talked about a mug that she kept on her desk that she got from a trip she took with her husband to Amsterdam. She wrote about the image of a Vincent van Gogh painting depicted on the mug. The title of his painting was, “Almond Blossom.”

I was not familiar with the painting so I looked it up. But it was after I read her explanation of the how and why van Gogh painted it that my mind was blown! He was in a hospital in the depths of despair and depression when he received a letter from his brother, Theo. Theo had always supported him and often would buy paint or canvas for Vincent. Theo and his wife, Johanna, had just had a son. They named their son, “Vincent” after Vincent van Gogh.

The painting was a, “Thank you” to him. Kaplan talked about being in a van Gogh Museum and seeing that painting juxtaposed to other paintings of death and despair. I understood her having that replica mug of that painting as being proof of hope and gratitude that van Gogh felt toward his brother. I think if someone named their daughter after me, I would have to do SOMETHING as a way of thanks! I can’t paint but…

Reading this explanation, I just HAD TO HAVE that mug! I found it online but being on a fixed income now, I couldn’t swing it. I found a cheaper version on Amazon so I ordered it. It’s coming tomorrow.



You know that, “I love me some mugs” so… for me, it did not even matter that I am spent until my April SSI/D check gets into my account in a couple of weeks. It’s all about, “Simple pleasures” and I am going to have to read up on van Gogh and the reasons surrounding the painting, “Almond Blossom.”

Body Language

My Mom picked up the next book I am going to read for me from the bookstore yesterday. While she was there, a couple books caught her eye and one of them was titled, Body Language, my Mom told me that she has always been interested in learning what someone’s body language means and as I flipped through the pages, I began singing Ursula’s song, “Poor Unfortunate Souls” from The Little Mermaid repeatedly! I had to look up this song to show my Mom the video because she didn’t know what I was talking about as I sang the line with, “Body language” in it over and over!

That’s the type of song that has to be belted out at the top of your lungs as your phone volume is turned all the way up and my Nom just smiled and kind of laughed a little bit at me singing this song with such gusto!

I was really surprised that I still knew most of the words 30 years later! My friends and I mostly sang Ariel’s songs when we were in 2nd grade but we watched the movie so much that I guess, subconsciously, I learned all the words to Ursula’s song as well! This song was in my head all day yesterday, especially the, “Body language“ line and since I didn’t leave my house yesterday, no one was here to be bothered by my singing!

Not only did my Mom pick up my book for me yesterday, she got some books for herself, AND she bought both of us a bookmark!

I have just been using the paper bookmark they give you at the bookstore when you buy books that advertises some book club meeting from back in the beginning of February. At least I graduated from the return envelopes from credit card offers. It’s not like the purple monster bookmark with blue eyes that my student made for me so many years ago that I am somehow hoping it’s stuck in a book somewhere in my house and I will find it one day; but, I will HAVE to use this one! My Mom and I will be MATCHERS!!!

Epitome of Femininity

Last night, I was very tired before the beginning of my Mom’s and my evening routine. My Mom was also tired. It’s a very rare thing when BOTH of us are tired but that’s how it was last night but the routine needed to be completed. When my Mom transfers me, I lean in and wrap my arms around her neck as she wraps her arms around me.

This time, last night, just after I wrapped my arms around my Mom and my Mom wrapped her arms around me we didn’t say anything to each other but both of us let out a very loud and manly grunt as she transferred me. Me because I was tired and her because she was tired as well!

We both matched the length and volume of our grunts and once I was transferred and she let go, we both started laughing HYSTERICALLY for what seemed like a long time and then she leaned into me and let me know that we were, “The epitome of femininity!“ just after she said this to me, I smiled.

At the exact time that I smiled, Sean mimicked both of us from his room and then we started laughing even MORE hysterically!!! Right after we heard Sean’s imitation of us, my mom reiterated what she said earlier, “DEFINITELY the epitome of femininity!”

Despite both of us being tired, we still completed our nightly routine and soon enough, I was tucked-in safely into bed. MS is neither fun nor funny and what I have to deal with is the same. The laughter we shared last night, helped just a little bit!