Red Riding Hood's Diary

Friday, October 15
Chocolate: 3 pieces
Exercise: twenty minutes of high-impact cardio running from troll under the bridge
Mood: Frustrated

Dear Diary,
What a dreary day. Well, I suppose it wasn’t ALL bad. I did go to Rapunzel’s 40th over at the castle this evening. Mother of PEARL is she overdue for a trim! And I DON’T mean her hair! She’s got toenails like a sloth – I’d hate to be sleeping next to those feet !– and I’m surprised her husband hasn’t needed stitches after a night with that Cryptkeeper! She really needs to see a professional about that. I don’t think there’s a clippers in all the kingdom that would cut through that chitin.

Ate too much birthday cake, no shocker there. I swear, the diet starts tomorrow for sure! Aunt Gretel keeps hounding me to do that lo-carb thing, “It’s the best diet in the world!” she claims. Easy for her to say! After that little incident at the Gingerbread house, I’d surely be traumatized into avoiding sweets forever myself! Frankly, Aunt Gretel has an eating disorder whether she wants to admit it or not. When she turns sideways she all but disappears! I had half a mind to toss her a cheeseburger or two last week at the Woodland Potluck. Pretentious witch just sat there and sipped her tea, didn’t so much as nibble on an hors d’oeuvre! No “20 trips to the chip dip” like the rest of us. She really needs to see a doctor about that.

No, no, no, Diary…no trendy diets for me, I think I’ll just try to eat more sensibly. Maybe I’ll go for a walk tomorrow. I haven’t been to visit Nana since her last episode and the fresh air will do me good.

Must go. Hear the evil sMother ranting about something again. It’s well past time I ventured out on my own. Might take a look at that nice brick house for rent over on Wolf Lane.

Saturday, October 16
Chocolate: 4 pieces plus ice cream
Exercise: Leisurely walk
Mood: Indifferent

Dear Diary,

I decided to put off my visit to Nana until tomorrow. Completely forgot that she gets her hair done with Cinderella and Sleeping Beauty over at Goldilocks Locks on Saturday afternoons. Now THERE’S a joke. “Goldi”-locks my eye! More like “Goldi #452 Preference by Loreal.” Her roots are as dark as the bags under her eyes. I know I’m being catty, but I’m just calling them like they are! She gives great perms, I’ll give her that…not like Nana who once gave me her special “home” version and I was pulling out tufts of curl for months afterward. Took a week for the chemical burns to heal. Nana is a sweetheart but not the sharpest tool in the shed when it comes to grooming. Hence, the weekly hair club for women.

Went off for a walk in the woods anyway, headed out around 10:00 this morning. I really wanted to leave earlier but sMother had just completed her morning fiber purge and I had to let the loo clear out for a good half hour before I could stomach the 30-second trip inside to empty my own bladder. She really needs to see a doctor about that. Mom spends more time on the thunder bucket than she does at the spinning wheel, and she’s a weaver, for Pete’s sake! I kid you not, Diary…Last winter she fell asleep on the throne in the middle of the night! I actually had to wake her. I knew I was in trouble this morning because she took the Woodland Free Press in there with her. Pretty sure she finished it too.

Weather was nice, not too hot. Even in October it can get rather cloying here in the forest. The cool weather today was a blessing for me because you KNOW how I tend to get that inner-thigh rash when the humidity is high. Talk about feeling the BURN! Ouch! Anyway, the walk started off nice, but then just as I had passed Dwarf Mansion, who should I meet but Mortimer Wolf!

I’ve heard things about him. Oh, yes, I have.

Snow White told me that he was the one who blew down Sammy Hogg’s straw house. Now, I don’t know Morty Wolf well, but I wouldn’t put him past it. You know how those Wolfs are, and Snow White isn’t one to go around spreading rumors. Really, she’s just not the gossiping kind. However, she was two sheets to the wind after those 4 shots of Jaegermeister the Prince bought her at the Stiltskin Tavern, so who’s to say if it was her talking or the booze. I mean, once she claimed to have seen a pumpkin turn into a coach at her Aunt Cinderella’s house. It’s a fact. Snow White is a big lush. She’s got more Lounge Lizard in her than a gecko sipping martinis at Studio 54.

So, back to the Wolfmeister. I’ve never been one to go for the Bad Boys, or Bad Canines in this case. Plus, Morty Wolf smokes Camel Unfilters. Camels! I mean…yuck! Nothing like a little tar and nicotine to take Dragon Breath to the next level. I think he needs to see a doctor about that.

Anyhoo, I don’t normally flirt with dirtbags…but there was Mr. Studwolf was standing all coy and macho against a tree, trying to act cool by blowing smoke rings into the air. He looked at me kind of cockeyed and said, “Hey, where you going Sweet Cheeks Riding Hood. “ And I said, “To Hell if I don’t change my ways. “ I don’t know what I was doing flirting like that but Morty must have thought that was pretty funny because he started laughing.

But then I almost puked when he showed his nasty brown teeth. Well, “Teeth” is a stretch. Maybe he was rabid, heck I don’t know. But there was something foul coming out of that wolf’s snout. I actually dry heaved (which I don’t usually do unless I’m around smoked oysters) but I don’t think he noticed because just then he inhaled a little to hard on his Camel and the lung torque threw him into a coughing spasm. I almost busted a nut laughing. What a bonehead! If he hadn’t looked so mean and mad I might have said something, but I could barely breathe from laughing anyway. I think I made him pretty mad though, because the LOSER flicked his lit butt right at me and ran off down the lane.

Hello? It’s a good thing I went easy on the Aqua Net this morning or we could have had a Fire Marshall Bill situation on our hands. Needless to say, my peaceful, meditative walk was ruined.

Sunday, October 17
Chocolate: 8 pieces plus an entire cake
Exercise: Too much. Ran home from Nana’s after traumatic experience (more later)
Mood: Excited and Nervous

Dear Diary,

What a day! I can’t believe I made it through in one piece!

Went off to Nana’s early this morning. Decided to bring her a few goodies I thought she might need: some Spearmint gum; her apron, which she left here last weekend (couldn’t get out that chili stain from the front – I think I’m going to buy her a bib one of these days); a bookmark I made for her; that unmarked package that she had delivered to my house because she didn’t want Pappa to know about it, the one that buzzes when I shake it; extra batteries for her new purchase; some strawberries I picked from the garden; four Playgirls I borrowed in August for the yearly “Girl’s Night Out”; Captain Morgan’s Spiced Rum.

Loaded everything into a hideous Longaberger basket my sMother got at the church rummage sale which I didn’t want to use, but the parental witch washed my favorite backpack in bleach and burned a big hole in the bottom. Senile. That’s all I can figure.

The walk was very nice indeed. There was a pleasant breeze and the sun shined warmly through the tall trees. Nothing eventful to report along the way except A) that wiener Morty Wolf was stalking me again – couldn’t see him but his gasoline breath is unmistakable and I’m sure I saw smoke behind a rock about ½ mile from Nana’s, and B) the Three Bears have GOT to take a few of those old rusted trucks to the dump. Trashy. Just trashy.

Anyhoo, I got to Nana and Pappa’s and something just didn’t seem right. First of all, their door was ajar. Nana and Pappa aren’t the paranoid type, but I know how Nana gets about flies in her kitchen. She’s got that house sealed up like a German sausage. But, I figured maybe Pappa forgot to shut it when he went out to cut his morning wood, so I went inside.

Nana was nowhere to be seen, which concerned me a little. She has that “grandchild” radar that goes off whenever I’m in the area and usually meets me at the door with a cookie, if not halfway down the lane (Nana sometimes forgets that I’m not five anymore). But today there was no Nana to be found. After scanning the kitchen and parlor, I called out to her and heard a faint, hoarse response from the bedroom.

Oh no. Dear God, let it not be true. Nana was sick. I thought to myself, “Run and hide now, Red Riding Hood. Flee while you still can.”

When Nana has one of her “spells” she’s worse than any mental patient in town. But, if there’s one thing my mother instilled in me, it was a sense of guilt, and maybe Nana was really sick, right? So I peered into the bedroom, hoping that this wasn’t one of those “episodes” where Nana was dancing around the bedroom wearing nothing but a pink turban and bunny slippers. Can’t deal with that again, Diary. Too horrible.

Thankfully, no pink. The covers were pulled up high and I could see Nana’s nightcap poking from underneath. She sounded HORRID, like she had pneumonia or something. Her breathing was hard and labored and I feared she might really be sick – either that or her afternoon hair appointment with the girls turned into an all-night bender at the “Happily Ever After” saloon. Time to lay off the booze, Nana.

Guilted into assuming the worse, I approached the bed and freaked when I saw Nana’s eyes, all bloodshot and yellow. After her worst binge I had not seen her look so bad.

“Nana, what the he--?? What big, nasty bloodshot eyes you have this morning!”

“The better to see my sweet, succulent young granddaughter with!” she coughed.

Her nightcap twitched and I could see that it fell rather oddly on her head, like she had some sort of weird hydrocephalous or something.

“Nana, do you have a brain tumor? What big ears you seem to have today!”

She replied, wheezing, “All the better to hear your sweet, innocent voice.”

Just then she doubled over in a fit of cough. I considered using my cell phone to call the doctor but I was mesmerized by the horrid condition of my dear granny. Well, plus, I WAS roaming.

“Nana, did you run out of Colgate? What big, sharp, brown, nasty teeth you have!”

“The better to EAT YOU WITH!!!” she screamed!

Nana, chill, I thought. I couldn’t believe what happened next. Suddenly Nana threw off the covers and leapt up, growling with her arms upraised as she stood over me on the bed. At first I thought it was another spell, like the time she thought she was a chimp and tried to swing from the trees and ended up breaking her left hip. But this was no spell, Diary! I kid you not, that wheezing, hacking thing under the covers was NOT my Nana. It was that SKANKY, SMELLY FREAK MORTIMER WOLF POSING AS MY GRANDMOTHER!

Not only that…but I could see that Morty’s normally svelte shape had changed drastically overnight and in fact, his stomach was bulging and twitching like he was bearing the baby from hell and it wanted to get OUT. Then it hit me. Not only was he POSING as Nana – but he ATE HER AS WELL!

Diary, I am not an impulsive woman. But at that moment, I totally lost it. Sure, Nana has some problems with gas and she’s not altogether present in the here and now sometimes. But she’s all Pappa has in this world and after all…she IS my GRANDMOTHER!

Before that Loser Wolf could exhale another toxic breath, I tackled him off the bed and onto the floor. He tried to get up and run out the door but Nana’s obsession with cheesecake in her later years apparently helped to slow him down. I body-slammed him into the wall, then dropkicked him in the chin and followed up with a knee to the family jewels. I could have left him at that, but frankly I found it impossible to resist stomping on his thigh as he lay in the corner. Hitting him over the head with the lamp was just gravy. Unnecessary, yes. But still gravy.

“Nobody,” I told that scumbag, “NOBODY…eats…my…Nana!”

I don’t think Mortimer Wolf was in any position to hear me at that point. I guess those big ears weren’t so useful after all.

Just then Pappa came running in from the woods, axe in hand, wondering what the fracas was. He helped me open up Morty’s belly and we let Nana loose just in time. She had all but run out of air in there and was in dire need of a shower, but otherwise none the worse for wear. I hugged her tightly even though she was covered with Wolf slime and handed her the basket. Pappa tied up the “Big, Bad” Wolf and called Constable Sneezy. I suspect that after his surgery and long stint in the Big House, Morty won’t be bothering any old ladies in the near future.

And so here I am, Diary. Back home safe and sound after a grueling day in the forest. Guilty though I feel, I think I deserved that chocolate cake, don’t you???