Ah, memories. When I was looking at photos to unearth from my dusty albums yesterday,I was reminded of the time the town thought I had a bastard child.

My father had remarried to somewhat reclusive 23 year old, mildly amusing OCD stepmother the previous May, and she bore him a son December 27th of that same year. Yes. You, too, can do maths.

Early in January, when the baby was only ten days old, the whole family moved from a bustling metropolis to the quiet resort town I was born in. I rather enjoyed being a big sister to a cute baby, and I took him with me everywhere but school. He was a social child, and the stepmother was somewhat reserved.

Here’s the image that brought it back to me.

Now look in the background, on the clothesline. See all those? They would be diapers. And onesies. And all sorts of baby thingies.*

Somehow it didn’t occur to me that people would not believe me when I insisted this child was not mine. He was a very smart and entertaining kid. Small town. Something fun to do, right?

It was quite a while before mildly amusing OCD stepmother ventured onto the streets of our quaint little town. And when she took the little professor in his stroller, he would recognize people and perk right up. That’s really how she got to know people there. Through the child that had already charmed half the populace.

First, she had to go through the gauntlet.

“Why, you’re taking witchypoo’s baby for a walk.”

“No. This is my son.”

“But he was only ten days old when she moved here with him.”

“When I moved here with my husband, son, and stepchildren.”

This happened so many times that she forayed out less and less. She couldn’t seem to take credit for this remarkable being.

What nobody would tell me is that my boyfriend was Horny McSlutty. I mean that he was doing just about every girl and woman for miles around. The guys really liked him, as he was charismatic, and the girls wouldn’t reveal their own part in him being such a slut. I was extremely naive, to say the least, but it would have been physically impossible for me to have given birth ten days before we moved. You know, the whole sex thing. Generally it’s necessary to get pregnant.

So it seemed natural that Horny McSlutty’s girlfriend had already produced a child out of wedlock. Turns out he had a few of them running around.

Want to know what was really funny?

My father was beyond strict with me. I had rigid curfews. My theory was that he remembered what he was like at that age.

When did he lift my curfews? When?

When I took up with Horny McSlutty.

The one all the guys, including my father, liked.

Irony? I think so.

* The image in the red jumpsuit with the child on my shoulders? That would be the little professor, the one who is in the Air Force today.

Don’t forget to enter my Giveaway. You have until midnight Friday night to post your link. And that can be midnight Pacific time, because, really, I’m all fabulous like that.

I was going through my old pictures yesterday because Loralee posted pictures of her various haircuts. Not one of them was particularly embarrassing. And that was just so wrong. I not only had embarrassing hair, but look at the clothes and shoes!

Nowadays, I have so many different looks and body changes that people seem to only recognize me when I speak. Think Marge Simpson’s older sisters. Yes. Like that.

But I do have strange looking pictures of when I was younger. I was a bit surprised to recall that I wore a few wigs back in the day. Who knew?

Age 16, almost 17. Daisies in hair for wedding of my father and mildly amusing OCD stepmother. She was 23. I’m pretty sure we had our hair done professionally for this event. But I wore this do in a less poufy way for quite a while.

This is mildly amusing OCD stepmother’s (MA OCD SM) signature hairstyle for others. Ringlets. It was my prom. Even the ringlets didn’t stop me from getting naked that night. I shudder with embarrassment at the dress. Check out the shoes.

Evidence of the ringlet-making. This would be Dizzee’s first wife the night before their wedding. Nobody looks happy here. Foreshadowing.

And this would be the result. See? MA OCD SM was all about the ringlets. And Dizzee’s bride was all about the boobies, cuz she was knocked up.

This would be me, with hair in rollers night before Dizzee’s wedding. Note how hard I was trying to appear sober and no fun. That’s because I was posing with my father. Totally wasted.

Self-styled hair. Note the prom shoes. Many years later. Hey, I have Sasquatch feet.

I thought I had uploaded the bedhead photo, but instead, I give you the having a poop photo. Any mother with a kid that young never gets to poop alone. Not all husbands document this, however. Especially when his wife is wearing a Superman t-shirt and leather clogs. Notice how he cleverly distracted me with a cute baby before ambushing me with the camera.

I had a fondness for wigs at one time. And apparently, for over plucking my eyebrows.

The wigs got beat up a little. It was fun to wear them drunk, like here.

One more wig and I’ll stop. This was the mighty afro, which Dances With Shrapnel (also in picture) loved. He said:”Oh, Mommy, I love your hair. It’s aaaallllll MESSY.” So cute. He was coming down with chicken pox there.

Then there’s the matching hair. His was real. Mine was a perm.

My 50th birthday. You’d think I would have Photoshopped out the red neck, but you would be so wrong. The hot flash queen. And? It’s close to the cut I had with the daisy hair at 16. Only less poufy.

My green streaks. I really like green streaks. This was taken last summer or the summer before that. I’m old and don’t remember stuff so well anymore.

Thanks, Loralee! That was kind of fun.

When Ass Burger Boy was in grade five, he had grandiose career dreams. He didn’t want to let that pesky schooling interfere with them, either. No, sir! He started out part time. Because I insisted he still had to go to school and all. He really did not care for his teacher that year. I met her. The kid was no fool.

Inspired by television shows and his favourite movie, Ghostbusters, he decided that he would be a private investigator.

A friend printed up his cards for him. Oh, yes, he had business cards. Like this:

Detective Ass Burger Boy
Private investigator
No job too big or small

And that right there is enough to render any mother into a puddle of melty heart-flutter goo.

ABB is, and always was, resourceful. He distributed his business cards around the neighbourhood, and to business establishments. He’s quite the salesman. Loves to talk. And when he has a mission? Look out.

A few days later, he came home exploding with glee. He had a case! And he announced it to me with shining eyes, eyes telegraphing all the hope he had for his dream career finally coming to fruition. And all this after a mere three days of preparation since the decision! His life was mapped out for him!

His task was to locate a missing dog. I tried to get him to secure a deposit because I happened to know of the neighbour who hired him. Not a pay your bills kind of guy, if you get my drift.

ABB found the dog, and didn’t get paid. The neighbour stiffed him.

And sadly, that marked the demise of his career as a private investigator. He just didn’t want to have to handle the business details.

But for a while there, I could say I was the mom of a crackerjack private investigator.

I’d forgotten how ridiculously easy Dreamweaver is to work with for web developers.

It’s like if you sneeze, Dreamweaver hands you a tissue.

And, it made me absurdly happy to fix my purple plates site. If you have Internet Explorer 6, you can access the site from a link on the page.

I was singing in my head, because that is the only place it sounds good to anybody, “Wooo-oooo, you’re my best friend” and I was referring to Dreamweaver.

I wouldn’t make out with it and have its babies, because, Hello? It’s software.

I’m guessing not much that is soft makes the babies. Where was I?

The reason the site was wonky? One tiny piece of code, three characters long, on one page.

../

Yep, those three. I was too sick over the weekend to tackle any kind of task requiring any smarts at all. I stayed up late last night, poring over code, and had the solution for IE6 this morning. All of the problems with the site had to do with file management.

Or, in my case, file mis-management.

I feel much better now.

Go buy some. They’re awesome. You are too, and you always smell nice.

I know that some of you may be considering a trip to San Francisco for the BlogHer conference this summer, and some others of you may have other travel plans.

I have a $100 voucher for American Airlines up for grabs. It’s valid until August 03, 2008. Sound okay?

Just link to this giveaway for your chance to win. Tell your blog buddies.

It’s a decent prize for the travel minded.

Winner announced on Saturday next

To those who have been wondering: Yes, I’m feeling poorly right now, but with any luck, I’ll live. I just don’t feel pretty and witty right now.

HOORAY! The Purple Plates site is now working in Firefox and IE7. The IE6 code will have to wait until tomorrow.