Tuesday, November 6, 2007
Our '53 Chevy
As she carried us over the hill, a sleek silver hood ornament adorning her blue-and-white skin, the old girl moved faster. Returning from the beach at Pepper Park, with sand on every exposed part, she needed a bath. Numerous days spent in the sun and salt air had damaged her complexion. Not much to look at in her old age, Reliable Nellie had been around and looked it. But could she ever hum when she had gas!
Mack and the White Powder Incident
Back during the Fall 2001 anthrax scare, my 86-year-0ld neighbor, Mack, and I took a trip to Princeton, NJ, with his wife's ashes to be spread over her family's plot. They had no children. We drove his wife's Cadillac up so he could give it to her sister, then rented a car for the return trip back to Jacksonville, FL, down the I95 corridor.
At 5:30 pm, about 2 hours after returning the rental car to the JAX Airport location, my home phone rang. "This is Sgt. Harris of the Jacksonville Sheriff's Office." [I'm thinking this is another phone solicitor trying to get a donation and am ready to say I'm not interested and hang up.] "Is this ...?" Well, now that he has my full name, he's got my attention.
"I'm calling in regard to a rental car you returned to the airport today. They found a plastic bag containing white powder in it, and we wondered if you could enlighten us as to what the powder is?"
ENLIGHTEN??? I don't like the sound of that.....YIKES!!!! This could be BAD!!!!
After a few horrified moments, it dawned on me. "Oh my gosh! I had my 86-year-old neighbor with me and it's his Weight Gain! It's a diet supplement! It comes in a big canister, and he didn't want to carry the whole thing with us, so he poured a bunch of the powder into a gallon-sized Baggie! [I'm in a panic, talking fast, envisioning life in prison as the reward I get for doing a good deed.] He set it on the car seat for the trip, but then we decided we should hide it with all this anthrax stuff going on. We didn't want people to look in the window and think we had anthrax or cocaine. We must have left it under the floor mat in the back seat! In fact, I don't think he even used it. We forgot it was there!"
As I paused to take a breath, the sergeant said he'd been trying to reach me unsuccessfully by phone for some time, but the line had been busy. "We tried twice to do an emergency break-in, but you were apparently on the Internet." He informed me that a police car was currently en route to my house.
I imagined the officer bursting through the front door, gun drawn, skeptically listening to my pleading as he handcuffed me. What would my children think when they saw the headlines with my picture on the front page of the newspaper? Mom Arrested!!! ---they'd have to cook their own Thanksgiving dinner this year.
The sergeant told me to get the exact name and manufacturer of the white powder from Mack so that I could tell the officer when he arrived. [Maybe there was hope for me yet???] When the squad car arrived, I met the officer at the door with the information and offered to take him across the street to Mack's so he could see the exact source.
Fortunately, in addition to having a friend who also used Weight Gain, the officer had a sense of humor. "Last week," he told me, "a woman called to report she thought her son had Amtraks."
Whew! I would remain a free woman. And Mack would have a story that he'd never forget.
At 5:30 pm, about 2 hours after returning the rental car to the JAX Airport location, my home phone rang. "This is Sgt. Harris of the Jacksonville Sheriff's Office." [I'm thinking this is another phone solicitor trying to get a donation and am ready to say I'm not interested and hang up.] "Is this ...?" Well, now that he has my full name, he's got my attention.
"I'm calling in regard to a rental car you returned to the airport today. They found a plastic bag containing white powder in it, and we wondered if you could enlighten us as to what the powder is?"
ENLIGHTEN??? I don't like the sound of that.....YIKES!!!! This could be BAD!!!!
After a few horrified moments, it dawned on me. "Oh my gosh! I had my 86-year-old neighbor with me and it's his Weight Gain! It's a diet supplement! It comes in a big canister, and he didn't want to carry the whole thing with us, so he poured a bunch of the powder into a gallon-sized Baggie! [I'm in a panic, talking fast, envisioning life in prison as the reward I get for doing a good deed.] He set it on the car seat for the trip, but then we decided we should hide it with all this anthrax stuff going on. We didn't want people to look in the window and think we had anthrax or cocaine. We must have left it under the floor mat in the back seat! In fact, I don't think he even used it. We forgot it was there!"
As I paused to take a breath, the sergeant said he'd been trying to reach me unsuccessfully by phone for some time, but the line had been busy. "We tried twice to do an emergency break-in, but you were apparently on the Internet." He informed me that a police car was currently en route to my house.
I imagined the officer bursting through the front door, gun drawn, skeptically listening to my pleading as he handcuffed me. What would my children think when they saw the headlines with my picture on the front page of the newspaper? Mom Arrested!!! ---they'd have to cook their own Thanksgiving dinner this year.
The sergeant told me to get the exact name and manufacturer of the white powder from Mack so that I could tell the officer when he arrived. [Maybe there was hope for me yet???] When the squad car arrived, I met the officer at the door with the information and offered to take him across the street to Mack's so he could see the exact source.
Fortunately, in addition to having a friend who also used Weight Gain, the officer had a sense of humor. "Last week," he told me, "a woman called to report she thought her son had Amtraks."
Whew! I would remain a free woman. And Mack would have a story that he'd never forget.
Friday, November 2, 2007
The Great Fall
You know those movies where the hero/heroine slides down the steep slope and it ALMOST looks like fun?????
So....it's sunny and 47 degrees out...a perfect fall day...gentle breeze blowing the rest of the leaves off the trees...and I'm outside raking [yeah-I realize the breeze could be a problem for this task, but the weather is only supposed to get colder, and I'd rather deal with the breeze...]
We aren't supposed to put leaves out with the rest of the garbage, but since we live at the top of a hill with nothing but trees and vegetation behind and below us, this is not a problem. We just toss the yard stuff over the steep bank out back [you can see where this is going, can't you?].
So I'm two-feet-deep in leaves around the backyard, and I decide it's time to start scooping, carrying and tossing. I'm way too lazy to continue to sweep the ever-growing piles all the way to the edge...my arms are exhausted and the blisters are starting on my hands. Far easier to stoop and scoop. I approach the edge of the cliff carefully because I realize there could be DANGER there. Twenty times I approach the edge carefully and make the toss. But then, on about the twenty-first approach, instead of looking at my feet, I look up and out through the gap in the trees at the city of Ambridge. There's often a haze, but this time the view is clear. And breathtaking. Blue skies, hills covered in autumn browns, yellows, green and oranges. Just a ribbon of the Ohio River, looking blue from a distance. This is God's country! A truly perfect spot on a truly perfect day. Is there anywhere on earth that could....YIIIIKKKES!!! I am on my butt and on the way DOOOOOOOOOOWWWWNNNN the hill. FAST.
I'm reminded of the time I went down the slide at Lowry Park, using wax paper to increase my speed. But I was only about seven then. And limber. I'd like to recommend dry leaves as an environmentally sound alternative to wax paper for today's youngsters. CUT-RITE has nothing on dead leaves.
I suppose it might have been worse. The dead stump broke only my descent. I was able to pull myself back up the bank by clutching at the vines and shrubs that survive in the shadowy ground under the trees. And, thanks to Tecnu, the poison ivy just may not get the best of me....
So....it's sunny and 47 degrees out...a perfect fall day...gentle breeze blowing the rest of the leaves off the trees...and I'm outside raking [yeah-I realize the breeze could be a problem for this task, but the weather is only supposed to get colder, and I'd rather deal with the breeze...]
We aren't supposed to put leaves out with the rest of the garbage, but since we live at the top of a hill with nothing but trees and vegetation behind and below us, this is not a problem. We just toss the yard stuff over the steep bank out back [you can see where this is going, can't you?].
So I'm two-feet-deep in leaves around the backyard, and I decide it's time to start scooping, carrying and tossing. I'm way too lazy to continue to sweep the ever-growing piles all the way to the edge...my arms are exhausted and the blisters are starting on my hands. Far easier to stoop and scoop. I approach the edge of the cliff carefully because I realize there could be DANGER there. Twenty times I approach the edge carefully and make the toss. But then, on about the twenty-first approach, instead of looking at my feet, I look up and out through the gap in the trees at the city of Ambridge. There's often a haze, but this time the view is clear. And breathtaking. Blue skies, hills covered in autumn browns, yellows, green and oranges. Just a ribbon of the Ohio River, looking blue from a distance. This is God's country! A truly perfect spot on a truly perfect day. Is there anywhere on earth that could....YIIIIKKKES!!! I am on my butt and on the way DOOOOOOOOOOWWWWNNNN the hill. FAST.
I'm reminded of the time I went down the slide at Lowry Park, using wax paper to increase my speed. But I was only about seven then. And limber. I'd like to recommend dry leaves as an environmentally sound alternative to wax paper for today's youngsters. CUT-RITE has nothing on dead leaves.
I suppose it might have been worse. The dead stump broke only my descent. I was able to pull myself back up the bank by clutching at the vines and shrubs that survive in the shadowy ground under the trees. And, thanks to Tecnu, the poison ivy just may not get the best of me....
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