The Duh-Ho Factor

I was outside today helping the hub with yard work. Some people call it "gardening" but I know the truth. Its a yucky albeit necessary part of being a home owner. Plus it reminds me of my niece. Not that there's anything yucky about her but when she was little, just learning how to talk, she came up with the greatest word for something disgusting I've ever heard.

She must have been around two when she first uttered it. She looked at something my sister gave her to eat and she said "duh-ho". It didn't come out as baby babble - it was clear as a bell - "duh-ho". Another time the sister unit brought home some dresses for her and had her try them on. The first one met with her approval and the niece smiled in the mirror. My sis put the next dress on her. The smile disappeared and she dropped a "Du-ho." From then on "duh-ho" was the default family word for anything gross.

As I was doing yard work today, I gloved up and bent down to pick up a pile of decomposing leaves and pine needles. It was stinky and gross and I looked at it and reflexively thought "Duh-ho". Much house and yard work has a major duh-ho factor. Dog poop has to be cleaned up (and though I am a fervent feminist - I consider this man's work)

Dirty laundry has to be cleaned. And when you think about what makes laundry dirty, its really duh-ho. Dishes need washing. And in our house, we have a compost bin by the sink which gets really gross and drippy when you dump it in the big compost pile outside. Disgusting doesn't come close to describing it. Ew.

There is much about life that is duh-ho. Most of it is physical; goo, slime, doody, snot and decomposing vegetable matter. There's also mental and emotional duh-ho. This is mostly caused when people are too involved on their own stuff to think about others. This occurred to me when I was watching the President's speech last week.

Some of the people watching were so wrapped up in their own messes that they were unwilling to admit that they were in the presence of brilliance. Anyway, one side of that place was rife with duh-ho. When I saw those people sitting there, looking like sphinxes while the place was erupting in standing ovations, it was like a flood of duh-ho coming through my TV screen.

Anyway, I imagine that to the president looking out into that crowd was like looking at a pile of half decomposed leaves and pine needles, a yard full of dog poop, or some drippy compost juice. Duh-ho. Major duh-ho.