When it’s too Late for the Perfect Gift

When it’s too Late for the Perfect Gift

This late in the gift giving game,you choose what? A gift that will give your loved one a head start on their next garage sale. A gift that has you swearing next year you’ll “know before you go.” A gift that will inspire your loved one to say with sincerity those two little words, “Gift receipt?” No doubt about it; someone is getting a Talking Trout this year, proving once again that it truly is better to give than to receive.

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Getting Back in Gear

Getting Back in Gear

I’m part of an elite group. Only about seven percent of Americans know how to drive a stick shift, and I happen to be one of them. If you aren’t and you want to be, you’ll have a tough time finding a vehicle to learn on, since only around five percent of vehicles sold in the United States have manual transmissions. I read it on the internet so it must be true.

 

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A New Flock of Birds

I’m at the movie The Intern, when someone’s cellphone breaks into song up front. It’s a catchy, little instrumental and I’d probably feel like dancing if I weren’t holding a bucket of popcorn the size of Seattle and trying so hard to hear what Anne Hathaway is telling Robert De Niro. When the cellphone’s owner finally answers it, he tells the caller—and everyone else in the theatre—that he’s in the middle of a movie, something those of us in the audience are well aware of.

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Traveling by Stage

If you’re like me, and I always feel better if someone else is, the length of time you need to pack for a trip is just slightly less than the length of time you have available to do it in. You start out in the “I have all the time and room I need to pack whatever will make me feel at home while I’m away” phase of your journey. You still don’t want to do it though. 

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Calling all Speeders

The worst thing about getting a speeding ticket­­ besides paying it­­is watching your fellow motorists speed by, GAWKING at you, while you sit there being reprimanded. This is especially awful if you get your speeding ticket right next to where you work, like I did. Twice. 

That's why, when I was stopped the second time, I knew enough to pull off the road into the loading area of a neighboring business. I did not want the news of my ticket to get back to the office before I did­­ AGAIN. But, then the owner of the business came out and asked both me and the police officer to please move. Things were not going well. Then they got worse. 

The police officer asked me how I was. What a peculiar question. How is anyone who has just been stopped for speeding? I wanted to say, "How am I? That depends entirely ON YOU!" I didn't. I said, "Fine. Never better." Yes, I LIED to a police officer.

Then she asked me that other question police officers are apt to ask, ­­not that I've been asked it often. "Do you know why I stopped you?" What exactly are they fishing for? Honest, I had not been aware that I'd been speeding. But I was pretty sure I hadn't done anything else illegal either

Miraculously, I was saved from having to answer that question. Saved by the bell. Or rather the ring. Yes, it's true. My cell phone rang while I was being questioned by apolice officer. I was mortified, but I managed to maintain my composure. "That’s probably my bookie." I’m kidding; I didn't say that. I knew it wasn't my bookie.

But I was pretty sure I did know who it was. For two days, I'd been trying to speak to my doctor about the side effects of the sleep medicine she'd prescribed. Namely daytime loopiness—more than usual. They don't show that in the television commercials. 

The phone rang again. The officer looked at me. I looked at my caller ID. It confirmed that my doctor's office was indeed calling. Do you know how hard it is to get a medical professional on the phone? Every time you call them, they're busy with a patient. And then they FINALLY call you back, and you're busy . . . with a police officer.

The phone rang again. That's when I made a serious error in judgment, obviously not my first of the day. I said, "Could I . . . get that?" Amazingly, she agreed.

I realized two things as soon as I picked up the phone. Number one, things wouldprobably go better for me if I didn't talk long. And two, that was just as well. Describingmy strange side­effects might lead the officer to suspect I was impaired, which now that I think about it, I might have been. 

So when the nurse asked me what the problem was, I said, "That medicine is . . . is making me feel funny." Of course, she thought she needed more information. And hadthere not been a police officer, staring into my car, hanging on my every word, I wouldhave told her that I was feeling extremely befuddled and more than a little bit ding­dong. Instead I said, "Could I call you back?"

If you've ever been ticketed, you know that the officer goes back to the squad car to write your ticket and check your outstanding warrants. Depending on how many of those you have, this should give you plenty of time to feel remorseful and fret about your fate. But I didn't have time for that. I used my time to call the nurse who was, by that time, busy with a patient--­­naturally.

To make a long story not quite so long, I did finally get to speak to her, but not until the next day. And I'm no longer taking that particular medicine, which should be reassuring to anyone who drives the same roads as I do. 

Also, the officer said my fine was much lower than it could have been, which was kind of her. It probably helped that I kept the call short.

 

Everything Old is New Again

Everything in my house is new! Well, almost everything. I have a new stove, computer, humidifier, vacuum cleaner, and garage door opener. No, we didn’t win big on The Price is Right. Everything is new because a short time ago, everything was old, and it all quit working at the same time! 

If you’re a regular reader, you might be saying, “Hey wait! Didn’t your oven quit working a long time ago?” Yes it did, which is why I hinted in every holiday column for the last three years that a new stove would make a great gift. Nobody listens to me!

I’ve continued to use my old, unreliable oven because three years ago, the repairman told me if I would add 30 degrees to whatever temperature setting the recipe called for, I could get by for a long time, especially as little as I use the oven. 

Then shortly before Thanksgiving, adding thirty degrees didn’t work anymore. Adding fifty degrees didn’t work either. I threw away a pan of half-baked cookies and went shopping. There were only a few stoves in stock that would work for us. But I decided buying a new stove just because it was in stock and I needed to make Thanksgiving dinner in three days might be hasty, especially since I didn’t want to cook Thanksgiving dinner anyway. (I know what you’re thinking. What could be hasty about taking three years to replace an oven?)

One issue was color. I’m no designer, but I wanted my new stove to match my ancient refrigerator, the one thing in my home that was still working. But appliance manufacturers no longer make anything in avocado. I’m JOKING! My refrigerator isn’t avocado; it’s almond, which is only slightly more common these days. The industry updates colors regularly so that when you buy a new stove, you feel compelled to buy a refrigerator, dishwasher, microwave, washer, dryer, and maybe even a pair of shoes to match. It seems to me, if you buy all that, they ought to give you the microwave—and the shoes. 

I didn’t want to replace all my appliances, so I asked if, since we were buying a stove, would they throw in a vacuum cleaner? Ours had died recently, and I didn’t care if the new one matched. No, they would not. “Okay,” I said, “What if we buy a vacuum cleaner and computer, would you throw in a stove?” It never hurts to ask. 

And we did need a computer. Our antique PC had started dozing off at inopportune times—much like I do. Of course, a computer is outdated the minute you drive it off the lot, but this one really was ancient. I think whatever we were using just prior to it may have had a carriage return and a ribbon. 

Just when I thought I couldn’t take another thing, our humidifier started wetting on the carpet and my garage door opener developed an attitude. Sometimes it worked and sometimes it didn’t—meaning sometimes I could get into my garage and sometimes I had to call someone in the house to come open the door for me. It’s hard to say which of us found that most annoying.

There we were, with everything falling apart around us like a beach house in a hurricane. We replaced the computer first, as most important. We followed with the vacuum cleaner, the garage door opener, the humidifier, and finally, after three years of adding 30 degrees to everything I put in the oven, we bought a new stove. It’s a hard habit to break—I’ve already set off the smoke alarm three times. And after several very expensive months, we’ve managed to replace everything, ensuring that eventually, it will all quit working again at exactly the same time.