Belle Weather: Mostly Sunny with a Chance of Scattered Hissy Fits by Celia Rivenbark

Maybe it’s just pure coincidence, but my favorite humor writer of all times is Celia Rivenbark, who also has the wisdom and good fortune to live on the Carolina coast. Seriously, she just makes me laugh. A couple of weeks ago, in a funk peppered with irritation over things so mundane they’re not worth mentioning to people other than my husband, I picked up Belle Weather: Mostly Sunny with a Chance of Scattered Hissy Fits, and couldn’t put it down, despite the fact that I’ve read it before. The book is a series of humorous accounts of various events in her life as well as her thoughts on all things from pop culture to hometowns. Her account of home restoration in her book, for instance, made me laugh so hard my kids thought I had come down with a case of “fun asthma.”

The first time I read it, almost three years ago, I was sitting at midnight on a card table in a “temporary living situation” (don’t ask), homesick as all get-out, and I started reading the first chapter, chronicling the purchase and subsequent renovation of her home in Wilmington, NC. In it, she describes an unfortunate event that occurred during renovations, when she “let slip an ill wind, so to speak,” thinking she was alone, only to realize post-delivery that she was, in fact, not. I’m not going to say anything more, other than, you have to read it.

Another favorite chapter involves pest control. As those of you who have lived or vacationed in the South know, we have what my Midwestern friends would call cockroaches. When we first moved here and were looking for a house, I saw a dead roach in one of the houses and asked the realtor if it was indeed a roach. Neither confirming or denying directly, she replied that it was a water bug. Stupidly, I went around for days afterward trying to decide if that was just Southern for “yes, ma’am” or if it really was a distinct and therefore less nasty bug.

At any rate, the chapter begins with a discussion on cockroaches and the Southern approach to their elimination, moves on to the dead possum discovered under her house during renovations, and concludes with a story about an unfortunate event involving a snake where the only men around were Northerners who couldn’t be bribed with beer to “eradicate” the snake. As a side note, maybe my experience is anomalous, but I happen to know several Midwestern men that could be bribed with even just a beer coupon. I’m just putting it out there for the sake of truth. At any rate, she realizes that she “needs a Bubba.” A Bubba, apparently, is a Southern man that takes care of rodents for you. In the end, don’t we all need a Bubba?

See, this is one of many reasons why I moved to the South.

So, the point of all this is, you need to read the book. Put the kids to bed, pour yourself a super-sized glass of Zinfandel (Loquacious Cabana Boy recommends Old Vine), and have at it. And if you like it, she’s got more. In fact, she has another book coming out in August, You Don’t Sweat Much for a fat girl, that I’m preordering. As a second side note, she is a little, well, “rough around the edges,” which generally adds to the humor, but I don’t want anyone to mistake the book for a tea-time read-aloud at the Ladies Refinement Club or anything. Just putting that one out there too. Although, actually, if you know of a Ladies Refinement Club where reading Celia Rivenbark would be considered appropriate, please let me know, because that might just be the kind of “refinement” I need. Actually, I need the other kind too, but hey, life is short, so I have to prioritize.

As a third side note, while he doesn’t really look it, LCB is kind of a Bubba. In this regard, ours is a marriage made in heaven.

As a fourth and final side note, Celia Rivenbark, to my knowledge, is wholly unaware of my existence despite the fact that she also lives in coastal Carolina, and my glowing report is based solely on my unbridled enthusiasm for her writing.