Announcement, some general notes and a phone call from Dad.

HEAR YE. We found a way to make the purchase of a “Sorr about the” bag even more tempting. A portion of the profits from the sale of each bag will go to starving children in Africa.

SIKE. We’re really going to set aide an amount of the profits to fund a new blog feature, “2 Birds Investigates.” Meg and Chris will be going undercover to bring you, dear reader, the scoop on some of the Eastern Seaboard’s wackiest gatherings and subcultures, filtered through a lens of snark and ethanol. Monster truck rallies! Star Trek conventions! Maybe a bondage club? We’ll be going where you never wanted to go, but always wanted a friend to go and report back. So the more bags you buy, the more hijinks we’ll get into. Coming soon.

Also, I want to say thank you to everyone who has made me feel welcome to the blog. I appreciate it. I also want to explain that I’d like to comment and interact with our readers more than I do, but I don’t have internet access at home, so I can’t do as much as I’d like. I do read and enjoy your comments, but it’s usually far enough after the fact that I doubt anyone’s still following the thread. I also have access to the chris@2birds1blog.com email now, so… you know, holla. [Editor's note: Also, clearly, Tulane Chris will now be blogging in Ex Co-Blogger Chris Green instead of purple. Is it because I'm too lazy to think of a joke that corresponds with "Meg blogs in red, Chris blogs in purple?" Yes. Yes, it is. And while we're on the subject of Tulane Chris being welcomed on the blog, miscommunication between the two of us was the reason for yesterday's No Post Monday. So kindly direct some of your hate towards him. Perhaps at chris@2birds1blog.com. K, BAI!!!!1]

Several people commented asking about the origin of Giant Camel’s nickname. He looks like a camel (light brown, big brown eyes, sad mouth), is four inches taller than me, and wears a size 16 shoe. It’s not even a story, although I now plan to invent one.

I did have a few closing remarks about the Kotex post. To the commenter who said that a tampon fits neatly in a cleavage: I’m sure it does, but Kotex’s words were “stuff a few.” Stuff. A few. I’m still seeing Hilda Clump grabbing a fistful and putting them all in one cup. It reminds me of the conversation my mother and grandmother apparently had prior to my mother going on her honeymoon in Mexico:

Grandmother: “Put your money somewhere safe, they have pickpockets. I hide mine in my bosom.”

Mom: “Oh, I put mine in my sock.”

Grandmother: “Your sock is not as safe as my bosom.”

Yet somehow, whenever I say I feel “safe as Grandmother’s bosom,” I get looks. As far as Diva Cups go, they don’t alarm me. I know a woman who uses one and swears by it. My first reaction was “that must save money,” and my next thoughts were the usual ones men have confronted with complex vaginal logistics, as in “So it just stays up there? What if she laughs really hard or has an orgasm, does it fly across the room?” We don’t have an instinct for these things, which must be why a friend emailed me a news article about a woman stealing a flash drive by hiding it in her vagina, “nature’s purse.” I would have been worried about moisture damaging it and, you know, explaining myself, but I guess she was in a hurry.

Onward and downward. I have had a shitty two weeks. A family problem came up, not a “I’m-calling-in-to-work-so-I-can-go-to-Atlantic-City” family problem but a real one. Giant Camel is gone for the summer. Finals. You know the drill. Anyway, yesterday I updated my Netflix to the five-at-a-time shut-in Super Saver plan that allows me to get a whole season of “Designing Women” at once, bought some candy, and settled in for a good, old-fashioned sulk. Then Dad called and fixed everything.

Phone rings. “The Munsters” theme song (I love my ringtone so much that sometimes I miss calls intentionally so I can hear it.)

Me: Hi.

Dad: Hey, bud. (He never calls me “bud” except when he answers the phone. It’s a thing.)

[Five minutes of generic catching up.]

Dad: So, I have news. It’s weirder than when Grandpa wanted to get married.

Me: Married to the schizophrenic, or when he tried to elope to Virginia?

Dad: Both.

Me: Oh, God, Stepsister’s not getting married, is she?

Dad: Not even close. Not even the same ballpark. Stepmother swabbed my cheek and sent it to Ancestry.com.

Me: What?

Dad: Ancestry.com has a program where you send in a cheek swab and they get DNA and try to match you with other people in their database.

Me: You just let her swab your cheek and mail it to the internet? They might clone you into killbots or organ donors. Also, why’s she so grabby with your DNA? She has a family.

Dad: She did all hers. Besides, it’s some Y-chromosome thing only men can do.

Me: Like driving and word problems?

Dad: Kind of. Anyway, this kid in Missouri popped up as a 1st-generation male-line match. I call him my “love cousin.”

Me: Don’t… don’t call anyone your love cousin.

Dad: This kid is your generation. His father was born in 1955 in Oklahoma, and was adopted by this woman, the kid’s grandmother, and they don’t know anything about his birth family. So the assumption is that this guy was fathered by someone in my father’s family, one of the three brothers. I think I know who, since it’s polite to assume it’s not one of the two ministers.

Me: Oh. Well. Uh.

Dad: The kid was very polite on the phone. He seemed to know it was going to be awkward. Here’s the punchline, though. He said his father is “very dark-skinned.”

Me: We have black cousins.

Dad: Well, I don’t know. Your cousin John is dark-skinned.

Me: No, John tans. He’s not “very dark-skinned.” We have black cousins.

Dad: Well, maybe. I’m going to ask for pictures. I’m sending them ones of me and my Dad so they can see do we look alike.

SO THERE YOU HAVE IT. My great-uncle had an… “adventure” and now I have black cousins, just like those Jefferson descendents. Here’s the best part about it: that kid is probably typing on his blog right now, “I have white cousins.” I have no idea what the etiquette for this situation is. Should we invite them down? They’re family, apparently, but we’ve never met them, so it seems kind of… abrupt to just have them down for the weekend. On the other hand, they’re our cousins, so we should. Also, no lie: I kiiiiiiiind of hope they invite us up to Missouri for a trip to Branson, America’s Ozark Wonderland. I imagine Branson as Dollywood without the grace and glory that is Dolly. Eager families pushing past each other to fill up at the buffet in time to catch a The Band cover band called “A Band” is not my idea of a great time, but my God, I would have blog material for a month. Also, does anyone remember “The Patty Duke Show” about the identical cousins, both played by a pre-drugs, pre-Lord, pre-moving-to-Idaho Patty Duke? It’s a long shot, but WHAT IF THIS KID LOOKS JUST LIKE ME? Think of the crazy stunts we could pull!

Also… what if he’s hot? I figured it out. We’re half-second-cousins (I think.) It’s not that related. We have two out of sixteen great-great-grandparents the same (I think), which is further apart than most Hapsburg or Kennedy marriages. I’m just keeping an open mind, is all. And it’s not like we’d accidentally make kids with flippers and tails. God, this just turned into a Jeff Foxworthy moment. “If you go on Ancestry.com to get dates, you might be a redneck.”

But what if they’re awful? What if they try to convert us to some weird, recent religion that Chinese people do in the park? What if they’re in a really shitty father-son Sublime tribute band? (Why are those the first two potential problems that come to mind?) How do you get rid of long-lost, ethnic family members if they suck? “It’s not the long-lost thing…and, uh, it’s not the race thing… it’s just… I’m sorry, we just can’t stand you. You clean your ears with your keys, and then clean your keys on your pants, and I’m fairly sure you peed in the houseplants. Here’s your ‘Sorr about the’ bag and a box of Thin Mints. I need you to go.”

So now it’s your turn. You knew what to do about widescreen DVDs, menstruation, and parasites as allergy relief. I turn the debate over to the loyal 2Birds Army. What do I do? What do I say? What do I wear?