My BBF HollowSquirrel went to Amsterdam last month. She took a break from (legally) smoking pot and enjoying the (legal) sex trade that is Amsterdam to mail me a postcard. (You know she wasn’t doing any of those things, right?)

My dear Mrs. Squirrel has no idea how excited that postcard made me.

You see, I’ve been an avid deltiologist since I was a little girl. (That’s just a big word for “Postcard Collector”, or “Nerd”.)

The postcard from Mrs. Squirrel has been hanging on the (totally awful) mirror in our front room since it came in the mail. It has yet to make it’s way into one of my grand, and official, Postcard Albums.

Yes, that’s albums, plural.

For some unknown reason, all of my pre-pregancy clothes are in the storage unit. But the Postcard albums, yeah there sitting on our book shelf. See the one in the back of the picture? Yeah, it has my name imprinted on it. In gold.

Do you want to see some of my favorite postcards from my collection? Good, cause you’re gonna. LOOK, damn it.

When I was about 15 my family took a road trip to LA. You would have thought that we were going to the Moon. It was all very exciting and by far the absolute coolest thing I had ever done. I saved up my money to buy postcards. I used some of that money to buy this postcard.

It’s a wax figure of Yul Brenner, the star of The King and I. Talk about foreshadowing for my own life.

My Mom works at a hospital. And lo and behold, I have a postcard from there. How exciting is this one? You can mail it out while you’re a patient. Write something on it like “wish you were here.” Or rather “I wish I WASN’T here. I mean look at this place. There are NO trees.”

My Dad went to Pittsburg for a conference one year. He was gone for a week and came back with a pile of postcards for my collection. Postcards like this one from the college the confererce was held. I’m thinking this school was voted in the top ten Official Party Schools. Maybe even the top five. (And what’s with the students all being in their 50’s? What kind of a college is this?)

Ahhhh Mesquite, Nevada. Known equally for it’s buffets, plastic ferns and excessive use of those hanging Christmas lights that look like icicles. Tragically hip.

Beaver, Utah. And like I told the lovely Jess Riley, I had a bumper sticker on my car in high school that said; “take a ride on the wide side. Visit Beaver, Utah”. (Marci, you sent this postcard to me. Wait, you didn’t actually send it to me. You just handed it to me. But you did write on it first.)

I’m thinking this is one of those free postcards you get when you stay at a hotel. I’m pretty sure it’s for the Holiday Inn. But I could be wrong. This may or may not be an actual hotel I stayed in. I’m betting I didn’t. One of my uncles probably got it for me on a business trip.

One of my uncles is a pilot. You would think that I would have requested he pick me up postcards from all over the world. But I didn’t. I was afraid he would charge me for them (he wouldn’t have) and I didn’t have that kind of money. I also didn’t have any foreign currency. It was my precious. I mean, what 8th grader had a postcard from the freakin’ United Arab Emirates?

When showing off my collection to The King I noticed what I thought was the exact same picture used on two different postcards. I was in fact wrong. Apparently Grand Junction, Wyomig and Hurricane, Utah look almost indistinguishable from each other.

While they do look almost identical, they both look very appealing. Who wouldn’t want to visit either place? Party towns? I think so.

Ha, ha. It’s Salt Lake City. At night. Get it? Ha, ha.

Oh my goodness, it’s Yellowstone at night. Who writes this stuff? It’s hi-lar-ious.

Another one of my uncles was in the military for a while and was stationed in Greece. He sent this postcard to my older brother. To be completely honest I didn’t know I had this postcard in my collection. Last I saw it, it was hidden in my brother top dresser drawer. FOR YEARS. I would see it, and it would creep me out. (I edited it for today’s post. But you see what it is, right?) It wasn’t until I was reconnected with it that I actually read what it said on the back:

My uncle typed out his message (but didn’t acutally mail it?). And tried to be clever talking about the “fine beaches and soft curves” along the Greek beaches. Ewww. My uncle was also trying to be all cool by suggesting my brother hang it up in his locker at school in an attempt to be popular. Uncle Tony, I hate to tell you that hanging a “pron postcard” (as he called it) in your locker will get you kicked out of school.

Also funny is that fact that my brother is gay. I’m not really sure why he would have saved this postcard in the first place.

These postcards are just the tip of the ice burg. I have pages and pages. All equally as awesome.

I try to convince myself that my postcard collection isn’t as dorky as I know it is. And although it is dorky, it was a fun diversion from regular life as a kid.

So tell me, what did/do you collect?

Welcome to the bullet edition for the week of October 9th. Sit down, have a cup of cocoa. Enjoy.

• Today is a Federal Holiday. The King and I don’t work for the Federal government. Apparently Babboo’s school observes Federal Holidays. Without reminding us. We didn’t know this until The King went to drop of Babboo at school this morning and the doors were locked. He had to go back home and call in “sick” to work. (I hope they have a good day together.)

• Dude, we are bad parents. We should know this type of stuff. Right?

• Kathleen e-mailed me this weekend to tell me she thought she saw me on the streets of Seattle on Friday. But was afraid to come up to me for fear of looking like a stalker. It was me, and I would not have thought she was a stalker at all. Next time you see me, TALK TO ME!

• My parents will be here in 2 days. I’m so excited I could pee.

• Babboo and I went grocery shopping on Saturday. It was note pretty. From now on I’m going to (happily) pay the delivery charge and order my groceries online.

• HollowSquirrel is back from her trip to Hawaii. Again, so excited I could pee. (Mrs. Squirrel, I got your post card in the mail. It will promptly be added to my post card collection. The collection I’ve had since I was about 10 years old.)

• My cousin had a baby last week. Is it horrible of me to regift the Winnie the Pooh pajama set that a nice old lady from Church gave Babboo? (Babboo isn’t into Winnie the Pooh. He’s more into Mr. T and Gun & Roses shirts.)

• Another cousin of mine got engaged last week. He’s 21 year old. Every time I think about how he’s too young to get married, I can’t breathe.

• It’s my sister and her husbands 4 year wedding anniversary tomorrow. She’s only 24. Again, thinking about it makes my heart stop.

• Being married is hard work.

• I really need to clean the bathroom before my parents arrive.

• I love Veronica Mars. If you aren’t watching this show, you suck. (Please watch it so it doesn’t get cancelled. Please!)

• Work is boring. I hope my project starts to pick up. Soon.

• I love my new cell phone. It is NOT flip phone. I have the flip phones. I can’t ever hear when I use one.

• Please make me feel better for not knowing Babboo’s school was closed today. Please.

Welcome to the 4th edition of King Friday. It’s all King, all the time on Friday’s over here at holaisabel.com. If you missed last week’s edition, I suggest you read it first. Don’t forget to leave him a comment. Or a suggestion on what next’s week post should be about.

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Ok. Levis. I spent some time in Berlin when I was 20ish. A year or two. It is the single best city in the world and I would move there in a heartbeat if I had the chance. If you’ve never been, I suggest you go. I’d be happy to tag along and show you around, if you pay for my plane ticket. I promise a good time.

Anyway, I’ve been lucky enough to have had the chance to go back to Europe 3 or 4 times since. I can tell you about other trips some other time. The first time I went back, it was to sell used Levis. When I was there the first time, a used pair of Levis could fetch over $100 easy. So a friend and I spent a month or two here in the US in Goodwills and Value Villages, buying up pants and planning our trip.

We basically smuggled them into Germany on the plane in huge hockey equipment bags. Several hundred pairs. Enough to fill the entire trunk and a good part of the back seat of our rental car. We then spent a month from Thanksgiving to Christmas, driving all over Germany on icy roads, peddling our wares. It was a blast. Levis were still in demand, however, not as high of demand as when I had been there previously. Come to find out, Levis sent their scouts over to Germany and had their lawyers put a stop to the selling of used jeans. I guess they were upset because the price of a used pair had eclipsed the new jeans and nobody was buying the crappy zipper fly, silver tab junk they were producing any more. So we were outlaws, roaming the country in search of vintage clothing stores and swap meets. We went to Frankfurt, Berlin, Hannover, Hamburg, Bonn, Koln, The Black Forest, etc…

We didn’t get rich. But we spent a month having the time of our lives. We met tons of really great people, who let us stay with them when we rolled into town. We ran from the swap meet cops. We nearly crashed our rental car several times. We went into Poland with a 50 year old goth and his 14 year old girlfriend who’s floor we’d slept on to help him bring gasoline and cigarettes back over the border. We hung out naked in a huge swimming complex with a bunch of strangers. And the Levis paid for it all. I think I came home with a few trinkets and gifts for people, but nothing more. We hid the remaining Levis in someone’s attic just outside of Frankfurt. Some day they will find them and remember the two guys they met in a pub that traded them a few pairs of Levis for a place to sleep.

You know, I’m turning over a new leaf, so as much as I wanted to tell about the In-laws and the conversation that Isabel and I had on Sunday morning, and the time they nearly burned down my house, I just better keep it to myself. See, I’m trying to be a better person. Really trying. It may only last a week or so, but at least I’m able to say that from October 6, 2006 to October 12, 2006, plus or minus, I was a better person.

Until next week…

Yesterday I was doing what we all do from time to time. I was trying to make myself feel better.

Isabel: I am totally the hottest new Mom at Babboo’s school.

The King: You think?

Isabel: Yeah. When I went to pick up Babboo today there were a bunch of the other Moms there. So I got a good look.

The King: Well, I beg to differ. I’ve seen about 3 there that look like freakin’ Victoria Secret models.

Isabel: Who’s Mom’s were they?

The King: I don’t know who’s Mom’s they are. Their kids are in the “toddler room” so I don’t know the kids.

Isabel: Oh, the “toddler room”? I was just talking about the “infant room”. I’m the hottest Mom in the “infant room”.

The King: That makes more sense. Yes, you are the hottest Mom in the “infant room”. And then maybe the 4th hottest Mom in the entire school.

Sometimes we just need a good kick of reality. Husbands, gotta love them.

(Tomorrow The King will be posting. I’m not sure what he’s going to talk about this week. Suggestions?)

I know you all love you some Amalah, right? I know I do. And you all love her Wednesday Advice Smackdown, right? My first stop into the blog world was a link to an Advice Smackdown last April. I loved it. And have been hooked ever since.

Of course I was thrilled to be featured in this week’s Advice Smackdown as one of Amalah’s AlphaFoxyMamas. Make sure to head over there right now to hear what I have to say about one of my very favorite hobbies; pretty fingernails.

(Thanks for all of your e-mails and comments about The King’s little car accident. He is still a little achy and has had a major headache since it happened on Monday. I forwarded him all of your suggestions to get himself to a doctor, stat. Maybe he can get in to see someone over at Seattle Grace Hospital.)

The King calls me every morning after he drops Babboo off at school. He likes to tell me what other parents he ran into, or what the other kids were wearing. It’s our thing.

Yesterday’s phone call went just a little differently:

The King: Some stupid cow just hit the car.

Isabel: What was a cow doing in the city? There isn’t a farm near your work.

The King: Not that kind of a cow, numbnuts. A crazy lady ran a red light and hit me while I was making a left turn.

Isabel: (freaking out) Are you okay? Was Babboo in the car? Is he okay?

The King: I already had dropped him off. I’m okay.

Isabel: Is the cow okay?

The King: Who cares about her?! But yeah, she’s okay. Just screaming and freaking out at me.

My first thoughts were; Phew. Everyone is okay. Babboo wasn’t in the car. It wasn’t The King’s fault. It’s okay. It’s okay. Breath.

The King started to tell me what had happened. Apparently this lady flew down a hill, running a red light. The King was in the middle of the intersection trying to make a left. He waiting until the light was red, and then he proceeded to turn. He didn’t even see her coming. He figures she was going 60 miles per hour.

The bumper was just lying in the middle of the intersection. Nowhere near the car. The lady was screaming at The King. Six different people stopped to give The King their business cards saying they would testify that this lady totally ran a red light. They also advised him to get back in the car, before this lady started throwing punches.

Eventually the cops arrived. The lady started complaining that her back and neck were hurting. She also couldn’t provide any proof of insurance. And it wasn’t even her car. She also said she had a witness that says the light was yellow. Nobody saw this alleged witness, but she provided the cop with contact information. Great.

We only have the one car. This isn’t the inconvenience that we need right now. Let’s not even talk about how much this might end up costing us if she really doesn’t have insurance.

And to make matters even worse, after our beautiful European Sports Wagon was towed off to the repair shop, they dropped of a mini van as our loaner car.

The King woke up this morning with a killer headache and a stiff body. And now he has to drive a mini van to work. Poor guy.

They better fix our car fast.