A New Addiction

I think I am addicted to cream cheese. Is that possible? Whenever I start eating it, I cannot stop until either I am gorged or it is finished. That is the sign of an addict. Right?

Before I took my Christmas vacation, I bought two bricks of cream cheese (they were on sale) and put them in the door of my fridge. So they were sitting there unopened when I got back home. Not a problem. As long as I don't open the cream cheese, I am fine. But, like an unconfessed addict, I made the mistake of thinking I could keep my addiction under control if I made just one brick of cream cheese dip. Cream cheese, after all, is grain-free. It fits into my diet plan... sort of.

Big mistake. I now have NO cream cheese in the door of my fridge. There is not one tablespoon of cream cheese in my fridge anywhere. It has all made its way to my hips and belly. What's worse is that

continued... 7 pounds

I was sitting in my favorite lunch restaurant, munching on a cheeseburger and fries, my diet completely abandoned. I was almost done when my friend, Mary, passed by my table. I could have ignored her but I caught her attention. I wanted to say something to her. I did not much care what I said. I just wanted a 30-second chat. So I told her that I was craving chocolate and, in fact, I had been craving chocolate every day since I got home.

I was kind of expecting a typical response about emotional eating and how I must be stressed. After all, that is how I would have responded. But not Mary. Mary knows "stuff about stuff." (I know stuff about stuff, too. I just know stuff about different stuff than Mary knows.)

Mary said, "You need more Magnesium." We got into a nice discussion about candy cravings and Magnesium. We also talked about vitamin B. Both are good supplements to take. I then went out to

7 pounds

One thing that invariably happens while vacationing is unwanted weight gain. Being sedentary instead of exercise, dining out instead of in, casually munching calorie laden morsels with friends (and more often than usual) all contribute to the inevitable.

Before

Having been traveling for almost a full month, I was pretty sure I had gained weight and my pictures agree. (I think most of it while I was chomping on yummy Tex-Mex in Texas!) Not wanting the new additions to my waistline to stay, I determined while I was still on the road that I would measure the damage as soon as I got home and then begin dieting right away.

After

However, remember, my parents were at my house when I got home. So the diet had to wait until they left.

I will have

The Resurrection and Death of my Prize

If you have been reading my blog for a while, you may remember my excitement to have finally gotten an avocado seed to sprout after roughly 20 years of trying. Here is the link in case you don't remember: http://awritersblot.blogspot.com/2013/09/a-different-angle-to-method.html  Since then, my avocado plant has grown quite well and I have transplanted it to a couple of different pots.

I like to use self-watering pots so I don't have to worry that my prize plant will die of thirst. But knowing that I would be gone for almost a full month, I knew I needed to make arrangements for

Princesses for a Day

I grew up visiting New Orleans. My grandparents' house was in uptown and we visited them about once a year, usually for about a week in the heat of August. When we visited, Dad always took us down to Jackson Square and usually also to +Cafe du Monde.

This was the only time during the year that I got to see my dad's family and I wished our visit could last all year long. Then Grandma and Grandpa sold their house in uptown New Orleans and moved to Kenner. I was a senior in college that year. I know because the house was sold in summer and my parents went down to see it one last time. I could have gone with them, but that was the year that I took summer classes. So I could not say goodbye. Now, as an adult, when I find myself in New Orleans, I always wind up driving down Napoleon Avenue to look at grandma's old house and

Meeting the Neighbor

I mentioned, a few posts ago, that my son was ill the day Anne and I arrived at his house. What happened is that he was nervous about the condition of his house because he had just moved in a few months earlier. So he had a friend come to help him unpack a bunch of stuff and straighten up a bit. My son works nights, so I imagine he took a nap before picking his friend up but I am not certain. 

All I know is that the day we arrived was the first day of his weekend and he took his friend to the McDonald's in Bastrop, TX when he drove her home. He had a sausage biscuit that he said did not

The Joke

My parents drove up to visit and help me with some household construction over the long, Labor Day weekend. "We" (by which I mean mostly "they") put up crown molding in my entryway (aka foyer or vestibule or any number of synonyms in my mother's extensive vocabulary), patched some holes in my walls that I did not know how to attack, used power tools they brought to cut and lay down laminate flooring, and repaired a hole in my ceiling that magically appeared when the crown molding was being installed. It was a huge job that took the better part of two and a half days. Thank goodness for Mom and Dad!

At either the beginning or end of a lunch break, I can't remember which, my mom was up and in the entryway while Dad was sitting with me in the

War

Have you ever had a project where things seem to just not work?

Seriously, I am going nuts with this cans-tle project. It was intended to be an affordable and easy way to gather public attention for my historical fantasy e-series. I figured a castle made of soda cans... get people to donate their used soda cans, glue them together... Voila! Castle. Put it in my front yard, which is right on a business route, and draw some attention. Maybe get into the local newspaper or something. No Prob!

Not so easy. But I have to laugh a little. This is funny in a pathetic kind of way. (I know I am not

Shortest Strike Ever

I think it was the shortest strike in history. Here is what happened...

When I drove down to pick my daughter up from the university, this year, she informed me that she was not going to be very useful over the summer because she intended to take two summer classes. They were online classes, so she would be home, but she would need to study for them. Also, she added, she had a few summer projects of her own that she wanted to work on.

Not a problem. I am all for studying to pass classes. I also have an appreciation for summer projects. I have several of my own. So, all summer long, I was very considerate and left her alone except for

Memories and a Wedding

I remember my own wedding, years ago. I wanted a big, church wedding with all my family present. So even though we could not afford it, my honey and I went to my church and reserved the date. For some reason, the date I wanted, July 3, was not available so we reserved for the last Saturday in June.

Then life happened and somebody crashed his car into a tree late at night... twice. He just could not get enough of me and would not go home when he was still awake enough to drive. So I decided to

A Pretty Good Day

I have been looking for a "real" job for quite a while now. That is to say one that, unlike writing, pays me instead of my spending time and money to do for free. Yes, I know I am demanding. (Sorry.) I have been working with a couple of agencies for about a year and finally found a job that I could do from my home office... or at least I thought I did, and I had great plans to hire a book publicist with my new income. How exciting!

I did a short, unpaid training and passed through to the next step, the paid training. (Yay!) I got my office all set up with a computer and a dedicated phone line, then I began my paid training. I worked two days of eight. Then my instructor took ill (or had personal problems or something). I wound up

April Fool!

I am rather pleased with myself today. 

This morning, I was on a conference call doing some job training... Yes, I have finally buckled under the financial pressure of incoming bills combined with the almost no book sales and finally gotten a "real" job... and one of the other participants mentioned the date.

Eeek! I thought. I need to fool someone. Who can I fool? Not my trainer or any of the other call members, certainly. I am not going out of my house today and I expect no company, so who?? I let

Frigid (part 2)

-- continued from Frigid (part 1) --

My dad has never even looked at my year and a half old furnace. I don't know what Mom expected him to tell me to do to fix it. But she handed over the phone and he came up with something. He told me to call my neighbor over to look at it. Dad also encouraged me to stay at home until I could get a repairman out to my house for a diagnosis of the problem. After all, the thing needed to be fixed. That meant someone needed to look at it and I could not very well pop back to open my door from 4 hours away.

My neighbor definitely deserves some kind of baked goods in appreciation for trying to rescue two ladies in distress from quickly dropping interior temperatures. He came over within about two minutes of my phone call. Guess what? He figured out right away (and without looking at the manual) how to open up the furnace and find its "pilot light." (Yay neighbor!)  

Note to self: Newer furnaces do not have pilot lights. They have on-demand ignition. My furnace's on-demand ignition was lighting just fine. The fire stayed on for about 3 seconds, then it turned off. Half a minute or so later, the pilot went on again. Then it went off again and the process repeated.

The neighbor groaned, "Ohhh... I don't know if I can do anything with this." He opened another door to reveal a circuit board. "Yep," he confirmed, "It has a circuit board. I can't do anything. You'll have to call a repairman."

THAT is when I thought of my personal prodigal (who used to be my personal super-hero before he turned toward the forces of evil). If my personal prodigal were here and still serving the forces of good, he would peel out that circuit board, activate his superhero tools to figure out its problem and fix it. (He would also have a more flattering super-hero name.) Oh for the good old days! Alas, those days are long gone.

(Side note for disbelievers: Anne thinks that her dad would not have been able to repair the furnace's broken circuit board. She says repairing a circuit board is just way too hard. I disagree. That kind of repair might be too difficult for many, but I have seen her dad's super-powers at work and he could do it. He built and repaired circuit boards for a living when I met him, after all.)

I thanked my neighbor for his help, asked if I could bring some of my plants to his house in the morning, and let him go home. My next step was to call a local pet-friendly hotel. The last-minute price for a night's stay was very much more than I was willing to pay so I informed Anne that we were going to rough it for the night.

Before I called my mom to see if it was okay to come to her house, which was before she told me to ask for my dad's opinion and before the neighbor was called over to rescue me, I had told Anne to start getting her things ready to go back to school. I did not intend to return home after going to Mom and Dad's before driving Anne to meet her friend for their carpool back to the university.

Ice formed on the inside of the window.

By the time I was finished with the neighbor and the furnace, Anne had her things all ready to go. That left her free to help me batten down the hatches for the cold night ahead. I sent her to set up my small space-heater in her bedroom (my room has no door), start it going and close her door while I pulled out the plastic sheeting that I had not yet put up on my windows and called my mom to let her know what the neighbor had said.

When Anne came back downstairs, we covered all but three of my windows with plastic (One was so cold that ICE had formed inside of its glass!), let the dog outside one last time, changed into our PJ's and took the dog with us to bed in Anne's somewhat warmer (from running the space heater) bedroom.

-- To Be Continued -- 

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Frigid (part 1)

It was the day before New Year's eve and I was buzzing around, doing my thing. Anne, my daughter, was home from her university for the holidays and had decided to use the desk in my office to play online games with her friends. She wrapped herself up in a blanket and snuggled into my desk chair. Being winter in northern Wisconsin with the outside temperatures quickly dropping, neither one of us thought much about the chill.

Around 5:30 pm, Anne emerged from my office, still wrapped in her blanket to sit on the love seat in the living room and talk about dinner preparations. She was hungry.

Snickers, our dog, walked over to nuzzle her. He had been acting like he wanted to jump up into my lap all afternoon but would not sit with me. He had torn his dew claw earlier in the day and it was very sensitive. Now that Anne was in the common room, he went to her. I'm sure he was hoping that maybe Anne would figure out what I had not.

He was right. She did. No sooner did she touch him than she said, "Oooh! He's shivering!" Then she picked him up onto the loveseat, careful of his injured paw, and covered him with her blanket. He settled down instantly, resting his head on her leg and closing his eyes.

I went over to touch his head and sure enough, his fur was cold. Anne's discovery that the dog was cold led to a brief discussion between Anne and me where we both agreed that we were also cold. She asked me what the temperature inside the house was. I walked over to my thermostat and looked... all the while stating with confidence that it was 71 degrees (21.67 C) inside.

Well, the thermostat was indeed set to 71 degrees and it was turned on. My furnace is only one and a half years old, so it should have been 71 degrees inside the house. But it was not. The inside temperature was 59 (15 C). No wonder we were cold!

At Anne's brilliant suggestion, I went into the basement to see if the pilot light was on. (She had a pilot light issue in her campus housing earlier this year.) Unfortunately, I could not figure out how to open up my new furnace to see the pilot light. So I felt the outside of the furnace. It was cold. I took the furnace's information booklet into my hand and went back upstairs with it. Before opening the booklet, I turned off the thermostat and then turned it on again. I hoped maybe that would restart the pilot light. It did not.

Trying to read the booklet to figure out how to open the furnace and just check for the pilot light was an exercise in confusion, frustration and futility. So I did what any normal adult woman would do under the circumstance: I called my parents to tell them I was coming over. Mom tried to tell me what I needed to check on my furnace -- all of which I had already done. She then agreed that we could make the 3+ hour drive down to their house but first she wanted me to talk to my dad.

- To Be Continued -

The Chair

I have been looking for a job. The other day, I went out to apply for one that was listed in our State employment network's database and, while I was out, went to apply for a cashiering position at our local home improvement store. As it turns out, I got there at just the perfect time because the hiring manager was there and did an on-the-spot interview with me. (!)

When I got home, I was overflowing with excitement. This job would be such a God-send if I got it and would enable me to buy my daughter's flight for her semester study-abroad. I entered my house and walked directly into the living room to bubble at her about my unexpected interview.

There she sat on my sofa, still in her pajamas and under a blanket, typing away on her computer. (She says she is trying to develop a video game.) I came in and sat in my favorite chair, words cascading out of my mouth to relay my excitement and share my stories.

"Uh huh," she said, not looking up.

Then, "Mm hmm." Fingers typing, she still did not look at me. Her responses were very unsatisfying.

"I'm going to call my mother," I decided aloud. I got out of my chair and proceeded toward my office to get the phone. I did not make it. No, I took one step into my straight-shot dining room/kitchen (on the way to the office) and stopped cold.

"Why is there a chair in the middle of my kitchen?" I asked. It was sitting in the middle of the kitchen floor, underneath the ceiling light, and a fly swatter was on the countertop beside it.

"Oh! I have a job for you," called my almost 19 year-old. "Come back here."

I returned to the living room to inquire, "What?" I was thinking that maybe the light needed to be changed or maybe she needed help catching a fly or something.

"Well, I was cleaning out the fridge while you were gone and I found a few things that I wanted to ask you about."

"Okay... " I answered, "But why is there a chair in the middle of my kitchen?"

"Oh, I put that there so you would ask about it and then I would remember to tell you."

"Tell me what?"

"About the fridge. I figured you could sit on the chair while we went through things."

Sigh. Kids.

13 Cents At A Time

I think the high temperature at my folks' house was 12 degrees (-11.11 C) on New Year's Day and I was visiting for the holidays. Even though I knew I should go put gas in my tank so my fuel line would not freeze, I did not want to go outside. My sister-in-law, however, borrowed my car to brave the cold and run something to my brother while rescuing their son from a dead car battery. She would have used her own car, but her door lock had frozen. Get the picture? It was very cold outside.

The next morning was warmer than the previous day's high. I planned to go to my sister's house in the evening and wanted to fill my car with gasoline while the day was light and relatively warm. Around midmorning, I drove down the hill to the gas station, swiped my card and put the nozzle into my tank. The lever clicked off right away. I depressed the handle again and it clicked off again. It would not stay.

"Something must be wrong with this handle," I figured.

I put away the handle, drove around to the other side of the pump, swiped my card and put the nozzle into my tank. Again, I depressed the lever and the nozzle clicked off right away. This time, I noticed a little gas overflow.

I puzzled. Then it hit me. My heart sank into my stomach as I realized that my fuel line must be frozen.

"Alright," I thought. "I am a problem-solver. How am I going to solve this problem?"

Problem 1: I was completely out of gas. The needle on the gas guage was below the line and I had to drive out that evening.

Problem 2: I was at the gas station but I could not get gas into my tank because the gas line was frozen.

Obvious solution: Unfreeze the gas line... Now, how was I going to do that?

"Aha!" I thought, remembering a coupon I had in my car: $7 off and a free car wash on a full service oil change -- and the lube shop was right next door! I hopped back in my car and zoomed over to the lube shop, where my car was immediately taken into a bay.

I was the only customer in the waiting area as my car was being tended, but a mechanic sat behind the counter doing some paperwork. I commented about the cold to engage him in conversation, but I did not say anything about my suspicion of a frozen fuel line. I did, however, mention my coupon for the free car wash. That's when he told me the car wash was not running because he had just gotten the water lines unfrozen and wanted to wait for a bit to make sure they were working alright.

His comment about the frozen water lines confirmed to me that my fuel line being frozen was not unreasonable.

When my oil change was done, I drove back over to the gas station with crossed fingers. Maybe the warmth of being in a car bay had softened the ice in my fuel lines enough to get some gas into my car. I swiped my card and put the nozzle into my tank. It started to fill but the lever clicked off right away.

I got back in my car, started the engine, looked nervously at the gas guage needle buried past the line, and headed to the nearest gas station with a car wash -- 3.5 miles away. With a sigh of relief, I made it there without incident.

After a thorough soaking in hot water, I headed to the gas pump. Surely, I would be able to fill my tank NOW. I swiped my card and put the nozzle into my tank. It started to fill but the lever clicked off right away... again.

Frustrated, I drove back up the hill and stopped at my parents' house. I popped open my trunk and pulled out a bottle of "HEET" gas treatment. Then I went inside and warmed it up in a bath of hot water, came back and poured it into my tank. The whole bottle went in and I thought, "FINALLY! The warmth of the car wash and the warm HEET got it unclogged."

I hopped back into my car and drove down to the gas station where this all began. I swiped my card and put the nozzle into my tank. It started to fill but the lever clicked off right away.

"Well, I can't keep charging 13 cents at a time," I thought, "or my credit card will get frozen." So I went into the gas station to buy a gas can. Sure enough, I got to the counter to pay for it and my card was declined. I paid with a different card. Then I bought 2 gallons of gas and went back to my parents' house to get help figuring out a solution to the problem. When I got there, my mom was just coming downstairs.

"Say. Mom. What are you doing?" I asked.

"Why? What's wrong?" she asked, coming into view.

"Well," I began, "my gas tank is completely empty and..."

"No, it's not," Mom interrupted. "I just put $40 into it yesterday."

I stopped as realization crept over me. Expecting that my tank would be empty (like I had left it), I had been reading my gas guage backwards.

Happy Anniversary

Yesterday morning, I woke up and came downstairs to call my mom to wish her a happy birthday. But it was not really her birthday that was on my mind. Twenty years ago, yesterday, was the day I called my mom's pastor, John, to ask if he would like to perform a quick wedding. I was not pregnant at the time, if that is what you are thinking. But my fiancee and I had a wedding license that was about to expire and we had decided to use it before it did.

So, my honey and I drove out to meet Mom's pastor for a few minutes' talk about the commitment of marriage. Then we went home and called our families to invite them to our exchange of vows. (We were very careful to not call it a "wedding" because, like so many women, I still dreamed of a wedding ceremony. That ceremony did not come for seven years, but it did come. It was almost as small as our original wedding and our only family there were our children.) Then, twenty years ago today, Pastor John left during the reception dinner of another wedding he was performing to meet us in his church and officiate the exchange of our vows and rings.

After our exchange of vows, we ate some leftover chili with our family in the basement of the church and opened our single wedding gift (a beautiful ceramic eagle sculpture which was later broken by a certain young man in my living room with a basketball), following which we went to a nice dinner alone with each other and then back to his parents' attic room, where we slept. (Not as romantic as it sounds.)

All day, yesterday, the burden of our upcoming twentieth anniversary loomed over me. You see, this November also marks the fifth anniversary of my discovery of my husband's infatuation with another man's wife -- which also marks the beginning of HIS unbiblical divorce suit against ME. (I wrote down that story, by the way, and called it The Disposable Noble Wife. Although being rated at only 3 stars by Amazon.com readers due to a handful of highly negative reviews, the book won the 2011 Reader's Favorite Silver Award for Christian Romance and has sold thousands of copies!)

Since the discovery of the infidelity and even through our legal divorce, I have been doing something called "Standing for" the restoration of my marriage. It has been a long and gruelingly painful journey, but I have been blessed with many miracles during it, have grown incredibly and have found groups of other Standers to share our burdens with each other. In addition, our daughter has seen miracles and grown in spirit. Still, I dreaded today with its memories and significance. So I got online and shared with just two of my Stander groups about my dread of today. Within minutes, people from across the country had lifted me up in prayer. I started to feel a little better and was able to get to sleep.

LIFTED is the operative word! This morning, I woke up with a heart full of JOY! What a blessed day! I spent most of the morning typing a letter to my estranged husband, reminding him of where we were 20 years ago and how far we have come since then. I imagined his reaction to what I had written. I could not be anything but cheerful and positive and anticipating of his homecoming. I told him to quit his job (near Austin, Texas) and start driving toward Green Bay, Wisconsin (near where I live). He would think I was crazy. I did not send the email.

When I finally went to take my shower, I shouted aloud, "THANK YOU, LORD, FOR RESTORING MY MARRIAGE!" Then, I took myself out to lunch at the restaurant where my friend works. She told me I was GLOWING -- and without ANY makeup! While there, her friend / my acquaintance, an Hispanic server, informed me that he was going to ask me out. It took a few minutes for me to convince him that I cannot date him.

So let's recap: Feeling depressed last night, feeling great this morning and typing a letter to my ex-hero that did not get sent, was told I was glowing, was asked out by an acquaintance... Oh, yes. THEN that same acquaintance started talking to me, out of the blue, about intending to hire an English teacher to help him improve his English.

Believe it or not, I began taking a class last June to become a TEFL (Teaching English to Foreign Learners) certified teacher. I never finished the course, but I do have all the lessons and am now going to go through them -- because I have my first student! Woo Hoo! What a fantastic day!

Do you remember where I said I was 20 years ago? Living with my honey's parents and beginning our new life in such debt we could not afford an apartment.

Twenty years after we took the big plunge, where are we? Well, he is in Texas with his mistress, miserable by the occasional contact I've had with him, and still trying to win a losing battle against God. BUT, as I told my friend today (and she agreed), once the Holy Spirit gets ahold of my husband, he will be a whole new man -- and I WANT that man! ALL the restored marriages I have ever heard of are the happiest of couples. So I am Standing today of all days and full of joy. I am BLESSED with two award-winning books (out of four written), a world-read blog, a mortgage-free house, my first student AND, soon, a restored marriage. (I can feel restoration in my bones!)

What a happy anniversary. (Catch me tomorrow and maybe I will have regained my "sanity." -- Not.)

Practice Makes Perfect

The other day, I was just finishing cooking a batch of stroganoff to divide and freeze for winter when it occurred to me that maybe my local set of priests might like to have some. I kind of shrugged off the impulse to hop in my car and take it to them, remembering that I took them some pierogi just the other week.

After a few moments, I thought, "Well, I do need to ask that these offeratory envelopes stop being mailed to me. I was just going to call but I suppose I could use that as an excuse to go in to the office." I looked at the kitchen clock. It was just about 3:00.

The parish office closes at 4:00, so I sighed to myself, "No... I need more containers from the grocery before I can even put away what I have cooked, let alone give some to the priests."

By that time, my stroganoff was finished. So I turned off the stove, popped the lid on my pot, slipped on my jacket and headed out the door to the grocery. The first grocery I went to did not have the size of containers I wanted, so I went to another. That store did have the containers, which I bought and then I went home. I divided up my stroganoff into the containers and looked again at the clock. It was roughly 3:30.

"I suppose I'm not going to shake this feeling till I drive some stroganoff over to the priests," I resigned myself. So I grabbed one of the containers and grabbed my purse. I was just about to turn my key in the ignition switch when I remembered the envelopes that were my excuse to go in. (Oops.) Whew! I remembered just in time, and got them from the house before leaving.

When I made it to the parish office, I purposely left the stroganoff in the car. I was glad I did when I found out neither of the priests was there. So I took care of my "business" and chatted for a few friendly minutes with the church secretary. On my way out of the building, guess who should be walking in through the same door? Yes, the pastor.

"Hello, Father," I greeted in passing.

"Hello," he responded and stopped in the doorway. "Who are you, again?"

I have to admit that I was a little surprised he did not recognize me, as I just finished working on a church project that required me to sit at a table in the back of the sanctuary, setting appointments with parishioners before and after mass -- for six weeks. Nevertheless, he did not know my name so I gave it to him, "I'm Beth." He did not seem to recognize me, so I added, "I'm the one who made the pierogi."

The pierogi he remembered instantly, "Oh! Say, those were good!"

(NOTE: If you want people to remember you, give them something good to eat. They may not remember you, but they will remember the food!)

This was my opportunity to offer him the stroganoff (under the condition that he must share with the other priest), which he accepted. We chatted pleasantly for a few minutes. As I handed him the container, I issued the following warning, "Now keep in mind that I only have TWO good recipes according to [my personal prodigal] and you liked my pierogi, so obviously that must be one of them." [Not quite true. I never made pierogi for my personal prodigal. The pierogi I made and gave to the priests merely had some of the good elements from one of my "mediocre" recipes that I made for him.]

"Two good recipes," repeated the priest quietly. It took a moment before he added with confidence, "and stroganoff is the other."

"Nooo!" I contradicted, instantly.

The priest broke out laughing. (I can only imagine what he must have been thinking.)

"Stroganoff is my mother's recipe."

"Well," he encouraged, still chuckling, "practice makes perfect."

[Note: It feels nice to be appreciated for a change.]

Joke of the Day

I went to my second Toastmasters meeting yesterday (not an organization of cooks who have mastered the art of making toast but, rather, speakers who are learning to master the art of making toasts). It was a smaller group this visit than my first and, again, nobody had a prepared speech. Still,
I met two new faces and I officially joined the group (under a fictitious name, of course).

One of the fun things that Toastmasters meetings do is give members random topics that they need to stand up in front of the group and answer in a one to two minute timeframe. I did my first talking topic yesterday and did pretty well, judging from the audience reaction I received. (Of course they enjoyed my speech. My answer involved ice cream. Everyone likes ice cream!)

One other fun thing Toastmasters meetings involve is that there is a Joke Master of the day. Our Joke Master, yesterday, was a pleasant-looking, middle-aged woman with absolutely stunning hair. Her hair was so lovely that if I had not been sitting beside her, I would likely have spent the whole meeting staring at the perfectly laid, tawny curls cascading over her shoulders.

The joke told by our Joke Master was pretty funny and mildly religious, so when I got home from the meeting I called my mother to share it. We chatter for a few minutes and then I began.

In a small town not too far from here, there lived two boys named Tommy and Robbie. Now these boys were quite mischievous. Wherever there was trouble in town, you could bet they were in the middle of it. If they weren't in the middle of it, then they still needed to explain what they were doing instead of being in the center of the trouble. Their poor mother tried every form of discipline, but nothing worked. She did not know what to do with them. But one day a new preacher came to town and he was rumored to be very good with children. So the mother asked the preacher if he would talk to her boys and he agreed to see them seperately. The net day, she sent Tommy to talk to the preacher first. He went in and sat down in a chair in the preacher's office. The preacher introduced himself and then got to business. He asked, "Tommy, where is God?"

This is about how far I got before my mother burst into laughter.

Only two thirds of the way through the joke, I asked, "What?"

"I think I just got the punch line," she answered, "But go ahead. Maybe I'm wrong. Finish the story."

"No. I'm not going to finish the story if you already know the punch line. What do you think it is?"

She fed it to me almost word for word.

On the other end of the telephone line, I grimmaced. Go figure that my mom would figure out my punch line before I could even deliver it. But, just as quickly as disappointment touched my heart, I realized something that perked me up.

"I'm sorry I ruined your joke," Mom said. Her tone was really apologetic and I could tell she felt bad for spoiling the joke. I decided to let her in on my realization.

"Don't worry about it," I answered. "This way, I got you to laugh in fewer words and without having to worry about botching the punch line. As far as I'm concerned, it is a win-win."

It Took A Rocket Scientist

I just got back from driving my daughter, Anne, to her first semester at college. We left on Thursday afternoon in a jam-packed, rented SUV. Our plan was to drive a liesurely 2 days. It was a nice vehicle with low mileage and almost fit all of the things Anne decided she could not live without for a semester.

Two and a half hours into the drive, Anne opened up the lower of two glove boxes. I forget what she pulled out, but when she put it back and tried to close the glove box, it would not close. Of course, I was driving and could not stop, so she wiggled around the glove box door for a while to try to figure out why it would not close. She could not get it, saying it felt like there was something behind there, but she could not get it out. So I stopped at the next roadside rest area.

I proceeded to wiggle the glove box door, just like Anne had. It did feel like something had slipped behind the back of the box and into the hinge. But, like Anne, I could not get it ot and I could not close the door for fear of breaking it. Still, it was uncomfortable for Anne and possibly dangerous in the event of an accident to drive with the glove box stuck open, so I called the Hertz emergency line. My wait was short and I was impressed that the first question out of the agent's mouth was, "Are you safe?" (If I had been driving the Hertz vehicle the following Sunday night when I got a flat tire in the Milwaukee "Hood," I would have exclaimed, "NO!" Sigh. I should have kept the rental until Monday morning, when it was due to be returned.) So that part of the Hertz service was good. But when the operator found out what the problem was, he put me on hold until I was disconnected.

I called Hertz back and reached another agent. He also put me on hold. The day was waning so after a couple of minutes on hold, I handed the phone to Anne and began to drive. The agent came back on the line just before I exited the parking lot. I heard Anne give him our location so I stopped the SUV,  backed up a little and parked. As it turns out, I should have just kept going because we were instructed to go in to one of the Hertz two rental locations in the town where we had reserved our room for the night.

We did just as instructed, but we arrived in town so late that we could only visit the airport location. The storefront was closed. First, though, we checked in at our hotel. I asked the hotel receptionist for directions to the airport and, being the open book I am, wound up telling her what was going on with the glovebox. She asked if she could take a look, so I showed her. Just like I had done, she wiggled the glovebox door. She said it felt like something was behind it, but she could not see a way to get in there and get it out.

At the airport, I was offered a new vehicle but nobody would help us move things (including a small fridge, microwave, computer equipment, etc.) from one vehicle to the other -- not that we really wanted to move into a different vehicle, but I thought I would ask. I then asked if somheone could just look at the glovebox to try to get behind and get whatever was in there out. I was informed there was no staff to do that. I asked what time in the morning a mechanic would be there so I could come back. The information was repeated: No staff was available to look at the glovebox. I wondered how vehicles got repaired if no staff could repair them, but I did not ask. (No mention was made of the other Hertz location, by the way.) I just left. I was tired.

The next morning, Anne and I decided not to waste time going to the other Hertz location. We wanted to get to her school in time to talk to some people. Instead, we bought some duct tape at the service station where we filled our tank and taped the glovebox as closed as we could without breaking it. We went on without further incident, arrived safely and took care of our business. That night, my parents arrived in town and checked into their room at our hotel.

We all met at breakfast the next morning. As we talked, I told my dad that he was welcome to ride with me if he wanted, but he should be aware of two things before he made a commitment: 1. I play Country music as I drive so that I don't fall asleep, and 2. My glovebox was broken so that it would not close and it might be uncomfortable to ride in the passenger's seat.

No sooner did I say the word, "broken," than my dad's ears perked up.

"Your glovebox is broken?" He asked, eyebrows raised.

With a groan, I nodded.

"What's wrong with it?" He wanted to know.

I told him the problem and why it could not be fixed.

He got up, said, "C'mon, Anne. Let's go have a look," and headed toward the door. I handed Anne the keys, rolled my eyes and just looked at my mom. She mirrored the expression that must have been plastered all over my face right back at me. My thought, "Everybody except the Hertz agent has to look, but nobody can fix it."

Now, my dad is a physicist and, therefore, a problem-solver. He loves a puzzle and is excellent at solving problems (Just one of the qualities that earned him a post-doctoral position on the Voyager 2 design team, I am sure). But what he is NOT is a mechanic. In fact, I asked him to just supervise as I changed my own brakes a couple of weeks ago and he refused, stating he had made such a mess the first time he tried to change brakes that he would never try it again. So when Dad walked back into the breakfast area with Anne trailing behind him, all of about two minutes after he left, I assumed he had seen the glovebox problem and determined, like everybody else had done, it needed to be removed to take out the object from behind it.

"It's fixed," Dad announced.

I was in disbelief. They had only been gone 2 minutes! But Anne confirmed my dad's claim. I demanded to know how it was fixed so soon.

"Well," said Dad. "Plastic has a tendency to be flexible."

I looked at him, stunned. "It's HARD plastic," I protested.

He shrugged, "Ehh... Not really."

Then he continued with his solution to the problem, "So I bent the plastic forward, stuck in my hand and pulled out the object that was keeping the glovebox from closing."

He held up his hand. "Small hands," he announced.

Okay, so a glovebox is not a rocket, but nobody except my dad was able to fix it. So I guess this time it did take a rocket scientist to solve the problem. Thank goodness my Mom brought one along for the ride!