Have you ever wondered how many people collect matchbooks? I have. I was curious for no apparent reason. It was one of those things that enters my mind as if it were a message sent from my home planet. I’d been working on my pocket knife collection. I have one in my vast collection — two if I could find the other one — when a matchbook grabbed one of my glittering … [Read more...]
Tote that bag or go to tote bag camp
The weather was close. That’s how my mother would have described it. Stifling humidity surrounded me and it wasn’t pleasant company. I’d told stories on stage at the state fair and had a break before yapping again, so I took a stroll on the fairgrounds. The sounds of the fair rushed over, by and through me. I enjoyed watching people eat things I’d never eat unless I was … [Read more...]
Like men’s body spray, the fetid smell lingered
Cheap gas! I hit the brakes and swerved off the road because a gas station, long out of business, left a sign proclaiming its ancient gas prices. There should be a law against leaving those signs standing. I’m sure the police had grown weary of responding to rear-end collisions in that spot. I parked and got out of my car, hoping to use the stop to stretch my legs. The odor … [Read more...]
The road worked ahead and gave me some class
I was certain it was a trap to lure me out of hiding and bring me to justice for not turning in my slide rule. I struck out into the unknown. There had been bygone days when gas was cheap and I’d stay on a road just to see where it went. With so much road work ahead of me, I’m never sure where any road will take me. A GPS gives directions with a caveat on what could go wrong. … [Read more...]
The grackle mob put out a contract on my door
I was skipping across the yard. It was more stumbling than skipping. The day traveled at warp speed as I filled a trailer with purposeless lumber. I was laser-focused on slaving away while trying not to be eaten by stable flies. It’s difficult to hit a small fly with a two-by-four. I hate to be interrupted when I’m working unless it’s by a bird, company, a ballgame, food, a … [Read more...]
Investing my time in an NFT (Non-fungible tanager)
A Canada goose sounded like a car horn in need of tinkering. It was an avian tickle as I knuckled the sleep from my eyes. I was teaching writing classes and took some college kids on a nature walk at daybreak in a lovely park, which was one of my happy places. We met in a parking lot. I was easy to find. I’m a miler. You could tell a mile away that I was a birder. Binoculars, … [Read more...]
Each day is a gift you can’t return
I didn’t have to herd cats. My shirt had as many buttons as buttonholes and there were more hills than pills in my life. Those three things are wins in my book. Life is made up of small victories. Here are more. My pillow hadn’t had a restless night and my socks matched. No one had unleashed the flying monkeys. I dropped something on the kitchen floor and it didn’t … [Read more...]
You conquered the grind, now clang the grad gong
Angry hailstones the size of bowling balls had battered my poor car. That was not on my to-do list. OK, the hailstones weren’t quite that large, but that’s what I told my insurance company. That’s not true, either. I haven’t called them. I did call my health insurance company because they denied a $3,000 bill from the clinic because I’d had the right test done at the wrong … [Read more...]
I can’t deal with cards even with an automatic shuffler
Hasenpfeffer, euchre, hucklybuck, sheepshead and pepper. Are they personal injury attorneys? Nope. Card games. Hasenpfeffer (pfeffer) is also a rabbit stew. Hucklybuck is sometimes called hucklebuck. Euchre, shouldn’t be mistaken for Bob Uecker, the Milwaukee Brewers broadcaster who played the announcer Harry Doyle in the movie “Major League” and said things like, “Heywood … [Read more...]
Don’t even think about texting while bungee jumping
He hadn’t run amok. He’d bungeed amok. The historical society hosted a program on ghost towns. Most of the settlements had been tiny and failed because the railroad didn’t come their way, the people didn’t arrive as expected or the residents forgot where they’d put the village. Some of the names were Bancroft, Bath, Buckeye, Crayon Park, Dorwart, Knatvold, Lerdal and Sigsbee. … [Read more...]