I doubt you're getting a check.

Yesterday, my mother's car broke down. Naturally, this meant my mother broke down as well. Once she stopped berating my father (who was at fault for the breakdown by virtue of having been behind the steering wheel when it happened) she decided AAA would pick up the car and bring it to the dealer.

I was waiting for my parents while this all unfolded. I had no idea what was happening, of course, until she called me in total hysterics (and I mean total) on her pay-as-you-go cell phone which was crafted in 1998 by elves. Her screaming into the phone was punctuated by shouting abuse at my father, who was audibly grunting and cursing in the background.

While on the phone, I'm sitting in a Chinese restaurant dipping noodles into a bowl of duck sauce, contemplating the vegetables. Of course I have to then pick my parents up. My father leans into the window before my mother reaches the car and asks me if I have any connections who can get Thorazine. I drive them to the Chinese restaurant where she proceeds to use her antediluvian cell phone to contact Toyota. I have no idea what happened prior to the moment at which she hollered, "I can't hear a ()&$@!*& thing!" Then she hurled herself into a chair.

"What happened?" (Guess who asked that.)

"I can't hear a damn thing. And then this moron at Toyota wants my name? What does she need my name for? Is she cutting me a damn check?"

I need a new broom.

My father's uncle married my mother's aunt. It's not as incestuous as it sounds. The point is, they've almost always known each other, and - perhaps most integral to this tale - their families always knew each other.

My mother's mother had three sisters.

My dad's mother had two brothers.

One of my mother's mother's sisters married one of my father's mother's brothers. And thus, a dynasty was born. A dynasty of crazy.

It was over a year ago that my father locked himself out of the house one morning. He was on the porch, in his underwear, smoking a cigarette. The sun hadn't yet come up and he was going to get his pants out of the dryer. (At this point, I feel like I know too much, solely because I've had to mention my father out of his pants.) Somehow, he got locked out.

He sat on the porch for around 5 hours until his coworkers came to the house to find him, expecting him to be dead, I imagine. At the time, my mother and I were visiting her mother (Nana, the cat-hater).

When we got word that my father had been sitting, in his underwear, on the porch, with temperatures in the low 40s, we were a) glad he was alive and b) concerned. Much talk was had about how someone gets locked out on the porch. How couldn't he get back in? Why didn't he check the door? Who ever heard of such a thing?

And then, one of my mother's sisters pipes up: Wasn't there anything on the porch he could have used to break back into the house?

My mother says: No. We have some chairs, our washing machine and dryer, and maybe a broom.

Silence for a few moments while we all absorb that mental image. And then, from Nana: I need a new broom.

Yeah, why bother.

Today was the Great American Teach-In. For those who don't already know, this is a day when adults flood the US school system to share their experiences and insights with children who don't belong to them. I'm one of those adults.

I teach Ethics, so I talked about ethics.

When my mother heard what I did today, she said, "Oh, do you think the kids got anything out of it? No, probably not, right? It just went over their heads. But at least you didn't have to go to work."

It's All About the Furniture.

I told my sister I started this blog. When she finished panting from her uncontrolled laughing jag, she said, "Don't forget to include what Nana said to me about Mojo." (Mojo is her dead dog. He died when he was still a puppy, of parvo [a totally avoidable disease but that is not the point].)

I had to admit I didn't remember the conversation about Mojo.

"Really? You don't remember her calling me when I was still devastated about losing my six month old puppy?"

Well, no.

"Here's what she said. She said - at least he died before he got so big that he could eat your furniture."

It's Not a Real Cat.

My grandmother, who is 89, had a bout of trigeminal neuralgia a few weeks ago. I'm not particularly close to my grandmother, for reasons which will unveil themselves throughout the course of this blog, but nevertheless it's not as though I wanted stabbing pains to shoot through her entire face. (Until last night. Ah, I kid. I kid.)

So, l recently sent her a card - a benign card, not a get-well-soon card - just a little cheerer-upper, with an illustrated cat going through the motions of a day in the life of a cat. You've seen them. 8am - wake up. 9am - lick butt. 10am - stand directly in front of someone's walking feet. Etc.

Last night, I called her just to check in. (And my mother had just flown to see her, and it's always good to check in and make sure they haven't annihilated each other in some form or another.) My grandmother gets on the phone and, after the customary "what did you have for lunch what did you have for dinner oh that sounds like a good snack but not a meal who ever heard of such a thing," she asked why I sent her that card.

I said I sent it because I thought it was cute.

She asked if I associate the thought of her with cats. Because, she explained, I know she doesn't like cats. When she was once preparing my nephew's bottle (you should know my nephew is now 15), my sister's cat jumped on the counter, and that's all Nana needed to see about a cat.

"You know that's not a real cat, right? That it's a card, with a drawing of a cat on it?" I asked.

She then mentioned that I'd bought her two teddy bears over the course of the last 10 years. (Completely true. She told me she used to love teddy bears when she was younger.)

"Well, I just don't know why you make a connection between me and animals."