Herbs and Laughter, and Herbs FOR Laughter, so on.

“This is the stuff blogs are made of.” I said to Misty as we began watching “Preparing Herbs for Holistic Purposes” VHS rented from the library. If ever a chic flick were made especially for people like us, it would be this film.

Perhaps it was the name of the presenter, the totally flower-child name “Kay Moon Dreamer”, that convinced me to pick it up from the non-print media section at the library this weekend. I saved it for the perfect night too…

First, our basement flooded. And who lives in the basement? Yep. I do. Luckily, this was the laundry room; some how the washing machine disconnected and spilled out several inches of water on the floor below, making its way to the carpet as well as many cardboard moving boxes still piled in the corners. Great!!! I didn’t quite know what to do. The One Who is Due Any Day Now and my machismo hubby began moving things around in a plan that only they seem to understand, and since Verity was screaming her brains out I was able to retreat for a bit until things calmed down. Hubby plunged the drain and got the water to filter down while they mopped up and sopped up and moved out and all that good stuff. One of the fantastic aspects of living in community with others is that there is never a shortage of people to call for help. Call Heath! Call Dan! Call Tom! Tom answered and had the wet vac we were after, so Seth brought it home and the men got to work finishing up the water spillage catastrophe. Now all we can do is summon the gods of NO MOLD with incense and burnt offerings.

What did I do this whole time? Seriously, I was like, “Um… I’ll just go bake cookies.” And I did. I literally threw stuff together and called them “A Wing and a Prayer Cookies” and you know, these little double chocolate pecan chocolate chip crunchy cookies were pretty good! A little red wine and coffee were prepared for every one having a mental breakdown and wa-la, the night was ready to be completed by the Herbal Hippie Video of the Century!

Lacey, Misty and I gather in my room with the cookies. The video begins with a lovely a capella hippie song about giving thanks to the garden and the earth and the gnomes and the little purple elephants with angel halos… My jaw literally gaped open in disbelief. I was secretly SO tickled that the video was starting THIS BAD.

The lovely host, Kay Moon Dreamer, turns out to be Ben Stein’s voice inside my step-mother’s body twenty years in the past. Susan, I love you, but why oh why didn’t you tell me about your starring role in herbal videos in the early 90’s?!?! And I love the name you gave yourself as a cover!

Otherwise, the video was pretty interesting, if you are interested in herbs, that is. I definitely want to know more now!

At the conclusion of the film, a series of related videos produced by the same group are previewed. The one for energetic yoga featured a bearded guy in briefs head banging on his knee, lightening speed Cat-Cow curls, and air humping. Supposedly, if you do these things, you will instantly have greater energy. Or just a headache. But suffice it to say, the three of us were laughing so hard that tears and pee were said to have come out. (Okay, it was only me who said that. Shoot. I’m such a bad exaggerator.)

Oh, but I sure needed that! Thanks, girls, for joining me on this memorable evening. It will be so disheartening to return Miss Dreamer’s film to the library, but I find solace in the fact that it will bring some one else great mocking material someday