Rambling

I’m sitting at my desk in the middle of a hot Utah Saturday afternoon.  I’ve already walked (South Jordan River Trail), journaled, gone to the store (dinner and sundries), picked up the mail (our mailboxes are all in a not-so-central location), filled up my gas tank (I smile each time I get to see again how little gas costs here compared to California), and cleaned up the mess it made when I didn’t close the freezer all the way (how many times is he going to do that?).   I’ve fed my cat, Tyson, twice and groomed him.  He is prone to cat-dandruff, you see.  Yes, he’s spoiled.  I think every rescued cat should be spoiled to make up for their bad luck in being abandoned. I thought I was tired enough to nap but after 15 minutes on the sofa, it didn’t happen, so here I am, at my keyboard with a hankerin’ to post and not a topic in mind.  When that happens, you get a ramble.  What’s a ramble?  Reread this paragraph for an example.  It’s a post that is basically (roughly) 600 words of stream-of-consciousness.  Or maybe unconsciousness.  You decide.

Robo

In the little ranch style house I grew up in in East Haven Connecticut, there was one phone.  It looked like this one, a masterpiece of efficient electro-mechanical machinery, weighing about 2 pounds.  By placing your finger in the hole of the number you wished to dial, rotating the dial until your finger was against the stopper, then releasing it, the internal mechanism would generate that number of pulses and sent them out on the phone line.  I think that phone rang two or three times a day, always answered by my Mom.   It was usually a call from a friend or family, but occasionally it would be a business inquiry from an establishment where my parents did business.  There was a small pad next to the phone for messages in case the call was for someone that wasn’t home.

Life in the Drivethrough

I will confess that I find myself in the drive through at McDonald’s more often than is good for me.   There was a time when I was there for a Quarter Pounder or Big Mac meal, large please with a Diet Coke.   These days, it’s more often a large coffee, two cream in, and a Sausage McMuffin with Egg on my way to the park, or a large Diet Coke on the way home.   I know, I know … that diet soda isn’t good for me.  I came home from our trip to Italy a few years ago with a serious Diet Coke habit.  I’ve got it down to one a day.  Italy is an expensive place to get hooked on Diet Coke, by the way … five bucks for a mini-can.

Like many Mickey Dee’s restaurants, our McDonald’s has put in a two lane drive through.  Two ordering lanes converge in to a single line to pay and collect your food.  When I first saw it, I was sure that our always-in-a-hurry, aggressive Socal drivers would be cutting each other off  trying to be first in, first out.   But after more than a year, I’ve watched customers take turns, left lane then right lane.   The design is such that once a car has pulled forward from one lane, a car in the other lane can pull far enough forward so that it cannot be cutoff.   Brilliant design, I’d say, ever the engineer.  Small things amuse small minds, you might say.  I’d respond that it’s a pretty big drivethrough.

But no drivethrough design is completely immune to human foibles, so customers still manage to slow the pace of service.  This evening my wife and I stopped to get an iced coffee and a soda and a woman in an SUV had positioned herself between two lines so she could choose whichever line moved first.  It’s not the first time I’ve seen the old supermarket strategy brought to the drive through.  There are customers texting in line so they don’t move when the line does, which is doubly annoying because the when they finally get to the ordering station they don’t know what the heck they want.   There are Sally Albright customers who, like Sally in When Harry Met Sally have to customize every food order, something McDonald’s is unfortunately encouraging with their new menu.    There are can’t find my wallet customers and there are have a life changing conversation with the cashier customers.  Happy meal orders are particularly slow … C’mon, Jeremiah, Heather, Andrew and Rebecca … what toys do want? Apples or fries?  You don’t even like orange soda, Heather.

Then there was the little old guy who, while searching his cup holder for loose change, rolled into the Audi SUV in front of him.   Oh, yeah, that was ME.   The driver of the SUV, a forty-something woman dressed for business was all-business when she stormed out of her car with steam coming out of her ears, photographed the back end of her car with her phone  and said to me, Do you realize you just hit my vehicle?   Now, my Inner Curmudgeon wanted to have a little fun.  He suggested, Oh really?  I didn’t notice … or maybe, It was just a little kiss, sweety.   Fortunately, at 73 I am capable of keeping my Curmudgeon Inner, so I said, Yes.  I’m very sorry,  Is there any damage? Disarmed by the politeness of the cute old guy looking up at her, she glanced at her car then back at me, smiled and said, Don’t worry about it.  There’s no damage.  So, that old saw about catching more flies with honey than vinegar is true.  Thank goodness.

So, that’s Life in the Drivethrough for Monday.   Have a great week.  And don’t text in line.

Bad Reputation

We have recently been doing some renovation on our guest bathroom.  As is often the case in tract homes, the builder used a cheap bathtub that rusted through and began to leak water into the garage, which is directly below the bathroom.  Some heavy-duty caulking stopped the leakage for a while, but in July, the drip-drip-drip started again.   We called our friendly neighborhood plumber (he really is, here) and had our tub replaced with a high-quality cast iron one.  The plan was to remove the lower portion of the tile tub enclosure, but when that was done, it revealed some water damage to the framing behind the tile, so we had the entire enclosure removed and the framing replaced.  Then it was time to call our friendly neighborhood masonry guy (also really is, here) to redo the enclosure.   This was turning into a marathon (to the tune of the ka-ching ka-ching of money leaving our bank account).

Purring into the Weekend

Here it is Friday and I haven’t posted since Monday.   The compulsive side of me begins to get a little antsy when I don’t post and no one likes an antsy compulsive side.  My Inner Curmudgeon, usually a reliable source of posts (which my readers find funny and my wife, not so much), is taking a vacation.  Always a curmudgeon, when I asked him to help me come up with something, he just said, *%$@ off.   Yesterday, I started a post on Why police don’t use non-lethal weapons.  It is a complicated subject (contrary to the brainless comments on most message boards) so between research and deciding what to say, even I was bored halfway through the post.  In case you can’t wait to hear what I have to say, I’ll likely post it at some point, so check back now and then.  And get a life.  Like I say, he’s always a curmudgeon.  So, today, you get a bit of fluff.  Feline fluff.