Houston Nous Avons Un Problème

My family doesn’t post much on Facebook these days.   No pictures of the grandkids (which I understand) but Facebook is also how I keep up with where everyone is.  At the end of May, I’m guessing they’re all at home, immersed in the end-of-school activities.

I wouldn’t know, even if they did post, because Facebook has Frenched me.

Oui!!!

How could that happen?  Believe me, I don’t screw around with Facebook settings.  I wouldn’t know how. For years I never checked messages and notifications because I didn’t  know what those symbols meant.

Just now, I ventured over to the buttons on the right in an attempt to bring myself back to my native tongue.  Fat chance!  All the options are in French.

Que diable?

Dearly Beloved, who claims to have had five years of French, didn’t even look up from his book when I told him of my dilemma.   Pretty sure he’s not ignoring me.  It’s more like he’s telling me, “Je ne me souviens pas de la merde !”

Google translate tells me that’s how to say, “I can’t remember shit!”

If you have an idea of how to get me out of de la merde. . . h e l p!!!

If not, “friend” my family members so that you can tell me what they’re up to.

Until then, Au Revoir, Facebook!

 

PS.  Autocorrect changed my merde to merge.  Thank goodness for friends who know that merde!  (I’ve had to change it three times right here in hand-to-hand combat with Autocorrect.)   Phooey!  That one is the same in French or English.

 

 

 

 

 

Reading By Moonlight (2016)

(Last week, our North Carolina weather went from relatively mild to snow, freezing rain, and plummeting temperatures.  The full moon added light, but no warmth.  As always, it reminded me of the interminable winters we encountered during our years in the upper Midwest;  especially one  particular January night some 30 years ago.  Our latest bout of weather has prompted me to tell that story once again.  My original post went much like this:)

Sometimes I still check the weather in the northern Wisconsin town where we lived when our children were young. I see that the low temperature tonight is -6.  Got that?  Not the windchill, but the actual temperature: minus 6.

Weather can fool you there. Bright sunshine and glistening snow, a sparkle in the air…?  Those sparkles are ice crystals.  Stay inside and wait for the cloudy days.

I remember looking out my kitchen window many wintry nights when the snow reflected the moonlight beyond the shadows of the trees.  In fact, it seemed so bright that I could have gone outside and read by the light of the moon,  I preferred the lamplight of my own cozy home.

Our daughter Boo used to call that negative weather, an apt name on several levels. A deep breath of that cold air sent a sharp, knifelike pain into the lungs and left the nostrils frozen. To say that the cold became wearying about this time of year is to vastly understate its effect on the psyche.

I led a Brownie Girl Scout troop at the church next to the neighborhood elementary school. The Jr. Girl Scout troop met at the same time, right after school ended.   Coming up with indoor activities to use up some of their pent-up energy became more challenging each week. The two groups were congenial, so we decided to plan a combined activity: we’d hold a Father-Daughter Square Dance.

The other leader found a square dance caller: a farm couple who did this to make some extra money during the winter months. The wife taught the moves while the husband acted as caller and provided the music. We planned refreshments and rounded up big brothers to come and dance with any girls whose dads couldn’t be present.  I made my own little Brownie a special outfit: a blue gingham dress and bonnet like Laura Ingalls Wilder might have worn.

It didn’t take long for the dance to grow into a much-anticipated event for the girls. A date with daddy!

The temperatures on the appointed evening chilled to the marrow, cold even by Wisconsin standards.   I believe the windchill was -30.  The snow crunched beneath our boots as we trudged from car to fellowship hall, unloading the refreshments and decorations. By the time the girls and their dads began arriving, everything was in place except the caller and his wife.  No word from them.

A few games–Duck, Duck, Goose and Strut, Miss Lucy– entertained the girls for about thirty minutes. The fathers stood around the punch bowl, introducing themselves to each other. The other leader and I led the games and smiled even as we shot each other questioning looks and kept glancing at the outer doors. The caller was bringing the equipment, the music, and the talent.  We had no Plan B.

A blast of cold wind swept through the room when the double doors opened to reveal, not the expected caller, but a uniformed police officer. He walked over to the group of dads and asked which one of them was in charge. The men pointed silently to the two of us. We walked to the corner of the room with the cop where he explained that he had stopped a car for speeding and the driver had said he was on his way to a church function where he was supposed to be the entertainment. The policeman said he wanted to make sure because the story had sounded implausible. We assured him that the man was exactly what he professed to be.

The officer, still looking dubious, went out to the parking lot and returned with a tall, slim, slightly stooped man in overalls and a flannel shirt, followed a little blond girl about the age of my Brownies and a boy who was perhaps 11. The children were thin and solemn. One carried a small record player and the other, a stack of 33-rpm records.

The man introduced himself to the two of us and apologized profusely. “We had to milk the cows before we could leave. It takes longer when it’s cold like this,” he told us, “and my wife is feeling bad and couldn’t help. Don’t worry though. . . I can call and teach too and I’ll stay the full time we agreed on.”

Within minutes he had the group in a circle, explaining terms like “allemande left” and “promenade right”.  It didn’t bring out much hidden talent on our part, but certainly evoked much merriment. Learning “Swing your partner” and “Grand Left and Right” to take the inner and outer circles in opposing directions was easier and officially threw the evening as well as the dancers into full swing.

The other leader, also named Mary, and I couldn’t escape a feeling of unease. Something didn’t feel right. The boy would disappear, leaving the little girl to operate the music for her daddy, then the boy would return and whisper something to his dad. A few minutes later we’d see the little girl slipping quietly through the swinging doors.  When she returned, she’d whisper urgently in her father’s ear as he continued calling the dances.

Finally the man asked would we mind if he took a little break so he could go outside and check on his wife. His wife? We’d had no idea that someone had been outside in that subzero darkness all this time.

“Please,” we urged, “have her come inside. She can sit in the kitchen, she can lie down on a pew… bring her in to get warm!”

The man said he didn’t think she’d do that, but he’d ask her. He came back in alone a few minutes later. He shook his head at our questioning looks and came closer, lowering his voice. “She may be having a… miscarriage,” he murmured. “She doesn’t want to come in and disturb the children.”

It was obvious he meant our children; his own children held critical roles in the family drama and carried them out seriously. They’d politely refused the refreshments we offered. They were not there for fun.

We protested as adamantly as we could without letting the dancers overhear us. “We can cancel this,” we insisted to the farmer. “We’ll do it another time. Does she want to go to the hospital? What can we do to help?”

He was adamant in his refusal, insisting that we’d hired him and he was going to honor the commitment. He wasn’t going to disappoint all these little girls. We sensed that the money–$90, as I recall–was very important.  Health insurance?  No need to ask. We could tell by his reaction there was no way this woman would agree to a hospital visit.

We tried to reassure him that he HAD honored his commitment and had more than earned the payment, but he stubbornly refused to stop.

“I don’t take the pay if I don’t do the full job,” he said firmly and stepped back up to the microphone.

We were the only two adult women in the building, but the other leader’s husband was a physician and after she whispered the unfolding situation to him, he went outside to assist her however he could. The police officer, inexplicably still hanging around, followed him. The doctor was back in about ten minutes, shrugging his shoulders to us.

“She says this has happened before and she knows what to do. Doesn’t want to go to hospital and won’t come inside.  I think she’ll be okay. She’s pretty calm; it’s the cop who is in a panic.”

About 15 minutes later the little girl pulled gently on my arm. “Miss,” she whispered, “my mom says do you have some kind of little container you won’t be needing any more.”

I was confused. Did she need water to drink?  She shook her head. “She says it doesn’t need to be very big, but if it had a lid, that would be good.”

Suddenly I realized why the woman needed a container and went into the church kitchen.  I found a clean cottage cheese container with lid and handed it to the child. She accepted it with that same solemn expression and headed for the door, walking along the wall to be as invisible as possible.  My heart literally hurt as I watched the small figure heading out to serve as midwife for the mother who waited alone in the Arctic-like night.

The policeman rushed back inside and drew the doctor aside, whispering excitedly. The doctor shook his head and spoke briefly as if trying to reassure the policeman, who looked beyond ragged by then.

“He radioed for an ambulance,” the doctor told us as he returned from another trip outside. “The blood scared him.”

The farmer overheard this exchange and asked urgently, “Can you cancel it? She won’t go!”

But at that instant,  flashing lights strobed through glass block windows. The doctor grabbed his coat again and we took another break so that the man could go to his wife and join the growing tableau in the parking lot. Inside, our scouts and their fathers, except for our two husbands, remained oblivious to what was happening out there. The fathers, in an unspoken pact, appeared to be working overtime to make it an evening to remember for their little girls.

The farmer came back inside and began calling another dance for the revelers. The doctor whispered to us that he’d sent the ambulance away and would make sure the man wasn’t billed for it. Ironically, the ambulance fee at that time was $90.

At the end of the dance the farmer did accept a cup of punch while his children packed up the equipment. We did not insult him with small talk, but thanked him, quickly paid him his fee and wished them well. The trio did not look back as they headed out for their car and the woman who had waited in the frigid night for over two hours.

To talk of the incident seemed somehow to dishonor the dignity of that family, so we did not speak of it to each other afterwards, but I know that night affected me in ways I still don’t understand. When I hear of young women expecting “push prizes” for childbirth. . . when I hear Congressional arguments about how we can’t afford health care for all. . .  when I read of blizzards in the midwest or look at the moon on a winter night, I think about that family and what it must have been like driving home on that night.  I picture the mother, who was probably near my own age then, feeling that cottage cheese container in her hands lose its warmth… the father, driving more slowly on the return trip, facing another round of milking and feeding the herd before sunrise . . .and the children, who would help with chores and ready themselves for another day at a school where students segregated themselves by whether they were farm kids or town kids: Dirts or Jocks.  These children would be Dirts.

Other families often have visceral realities so very different from our own, but we see them  through our own small lens.   Until, that is, we step away from our own warm hearth. . .  and learn to read by moonlight.

That Two-Timing Siri!

My computer cord is still missing and we’re still finding Lincoln Logs in unlikely places, but we have been thinking that everything is pretty much back to normal around here:  figurines returned to their rightful places, electrical sockets untaped, dog toys returned to the dog, etc.  Yesterday, my laptop, iPhone and I spent a while bellied up to Genius Bar at the Apple Store, so we’re back on speaking terms with each other.

In the past, our laptops and iPhones have often sported new screen savers or perhaps a new free game or two after the Grandsons’ visits.  As all three of the boys are more computer savvy than we’ll ever be, we generally leave the new additions as they are.  Youngest Grandson (I’ll call him ‘Cory’ here so as not to rat him out) has a particular affinity for our iPhones and loves to quiz Siri with silly questions, not so much for his own entertainment as for the rest of the people in the room.

One particular evening when he was doing this, he told Siri to “Call me Cory,” as she had, of course, been calling him by his Granddad’s name.  Logically so, since he was using his Granddad’s phone.  One of his brothers warned, “Don’t do that, Cory.  It changes things.”

DB said, probably thinking to himself that he never asks Siri questions in the first place,  “Oh, that’s okay,”  and never gave it another thought.

I must digress for a minute and tell you that even though DB is retired, he sometimes contracts to work with large firms to arbitrate legal disputes.  He does most of this work from home and sends e-mails to attorneys and other arbitrators from his personal laptop and phone.  Official stuff, so I have to keep the dog quiet when the Fed-Ex man comes while DB is on the phone or concentrating.  He’s very orderly and professional about all of this.

Last night he was reading an attorney brief from a global law firm in New York City and noticed that the transmittal e-mail addressees included someone named Cory.  He’d seen that in some earlier correspondence this week and assumed that Cory must be a law clerk in one of the offices.  He hadn’t raised the issue, but felt the addition improper.

He read through the list of addressees again.  Oddly, his name wasn’t on the list.  Then it hit him.

HE was Cory.

Few things fluster DB, but this one deserves a large check mark under the Fluster column.   He didn’t know how it happened, but he remembered that evening. . .  Cory’s brother’s admonition. . . and his own dismissal of it.

So what was he supposed to do to fix this?  Ask Siri?

Exactly.

He took the phone out on the front porch, ostensibly because the reception is better out there, but I’ll bet it didn’t hurt that I couldn’t hear the exchange.  When he came back inside, he felt satisfied that he was back as Siri’s #1 man.

This morning he has been on his computer once again with more exchanges on the case.

‘Cory, Esq.’ no longer made the list.  DB the professional was much relieved.  DB the granddad is still chuckling.

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Count no’Count? Hardly!

Since my Dearly Beloved and I happened to be with friends in Oxford, Mississippi the week of William Faulkner’s birthday, we decided to visit St. Peter’s cemetery where he and a number of his family members are buried.  The original Faulkner burial plot was full by the time William died, so another plot was started and he was laid to rest there, as later were his wife and stepson.

The Faulkners are buried on the side of the marker away from the road and his stepson,  Malcolm Franklin, is on the road side.   I took several photos and although not known for my powers of observation,  I saw nothing in that fourth spot, beside Malcolm’s grave.

BUT, a University of Mississippi map of Faulkner sites of interest mentions that this fourth gravesite, long vacant, is now marked with a smaller stone for an old family friend, E. T., who “came home to rest with us.”  The map points out that the whole thing is a carefully guarded secret and that no one, except for Faulkner’s nephew, Jimmy Faulkner, knows who it is.

If the stone is there, it must be very tiny, indeed.  I don’t remember seeing so much as a pebble, although at the time, I didn’t realize there was supposed to be a fourth grave there.   At the top of the steps leading to the plot, the family name was etched.   Alas, no E. T.

Perhaps he phoned another home?

Remember the mysterious visitor–or perhaps more than one– who visited Edgar Allen Poe’s grave for over 70 decades on the anniversary of his birth and left behind a partial bottle of cognac and three roses?

It being the anniversary of Faulkner’s birth,  we (empty-handed, I confess) went to see if Oxford folks made a similar gesture at the grave of their famous citizen and left a special memorial of some kind..

Um. . . not so much, although one person did leave an empty Maker’s Mark bourbon mini-bottle by the  column of the marker.  Faulkner would have preferred moonshine, but if not that, Scotch would do. Still, someone had been there.

Perhaps some Oxford residents are still holding a grudge.   After all, he did say this about the town in an interview with Esquire magazine in 1963:

Some folks wouldn’t even speak when they passed me on the street. Then MGM came to town to film Intruder in the Dust, and that made some difference because I’d brought money into Oxford. But it wasn’t until the Nobel Prize that they really thawed out. They couldn’t understand my books, but they could understand thirty thousand dollars.

To give the man his due, he said enough things–brilliantly–that earned him two Pulitzers and two National Book Awards in addition to the Nobel prize for Literature.   Here are a few quotations from his writings, not among his best known, although I found them interesting.

People … have tried to evoke God or devil to justify them in what their glands insisted upon.  – Absalom, Absalom!

Nothing can destroy the good writer. The only thing that can alter the good writer is death. Good ones don’t have time to bother with success or getting rich.  – The Paris Review, spring 1956

People everywhere are about the same, but … it did seem that in a small town, where evil is harder to accomplish, where opportunities for privacy are scarcer, that people can invent more of it in other people’s names. Because that was all it required: that idea, that single idle word blown from mind to mind. – Light in August

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

EH?

For the past couple of weeks, I’ve had 76 sour trombones messing around in my ears when I swallowed or blew my nose.  I called the doctor after the first week and self-diagnosed that I had fluid in my ears.  She suggested Sudafed, but to call if I wasn’t better by today.

I called first thing this morning and left a message for the “triage nurse.”  It should be noted that in order to do that, I had to hear the “If this is an emergency, hang up and dial 911. . . ” message three times before being allowed to leave the message.   In addition, I also sat through the warning about not leaving multiple messages two times.

Just after I left my message and my home phone number, Dearly Beloved reminded me that he was going to be on a conference call in 20 minutes, possibly for two hours or more.

That meant I had to call and press through the three 911 messages again to leave my cellphone number to be attached to the aforementioned message, thus violating the warning not to leave multiple messages.

Five minutes later, our house phone rang and DB ran to answer it.  The conversation went like this:

Strange little voice:  Grandpa?  It’s your grandson.

DB a/k/a Granddad, not Grandpa:  Who is this?

SLV:  It’s me, your grandson.

DB:  Which grandson? 

SLV:  Michael.

DB:  I don’t have a grandson named Michael.  You have the wrong number.

At that point, the SLV suddenly morphed into a deep, angry voice and shouted,  F–k you, Man! and hung up the phone.

The triage nurse called to ask that I should come at 1:45.  I love my doctor and have followed her to three different locations.  The first one was in the neighborhood, the second 12 miles out in the suburbs and now it’s in the EpiCentre which is located uptown.  If the name sounds familiar, it was the site of much of the activity during the Democratic convention when it was held in Charlotte.  It’s three miles and a universe away.

The office is squeezed between a Five Guys hamburger joint and a movie theater, a short walk away from Whiskey River and Howl at the Moon.  See it?  The small doors behind the trash can?

Inside is interesting, too.

See the light at the end of the hall?  The blue door is the doctors’ office, but the light just in front of it is coming from the open door of Five Guy’s kitchen.  It is amazing how far the aroma of french fries carries.

Back to the subject at hand, which was the fluid in my ears. . . .

It turned out not to be fluid at all.  It was earwax.  GROSS!  Embarrassing!

It took an hour of two nurses and the doctor dropping anchor in my ear and pumping fluids into my ear canal to loosen the wax enough to get it out.  Since it was supposed to be about a ten-minute visit and I was there well over an hour, they will be behind all day because of earwax.  I apologized profusely.

The irony of all of this is that now I DO have fluid in my ears.   My ears are still whistling and squeaking when I swallow or blow my nose.   They said that it may take six weeks for it to drain.

My ears were sore and I was a little tremulous when I left the office.  I had an overwhelming urge to walk over to Whiskey River.

Suddenly the location made sense.

In case you ever find yourself here and need a good doctor, just look for the big phallic building.  The Epicenter is just in front of it.

You know I can’t make this stuff up.

 

 

 

 

 

 

To Pee Or Not To Pee

The City Council here had a policy discussion on gay rights last month and much of the ensuing kerfuffle centered around bathrooms and whether or not an individual had the right to use the bathroom of one’s sexual identification rather than the bathroom of one’s genitalia.    Eventually, they took bathrooms out of the discussion. . . then decided to vote down the whole proposal anyway.

I’m perplexed as to why a person chooses to vote against someone solely because of their sexual orientation.  I’m for putting equality on the front burner and leaving sex to simmer in private on a back burner.   My gaydar antenna is still in the original wrappings.  I don’t care whose team a person plays on–just make the rules fair for everyone.

As for the bathroom issue, I admit that I’d be taken aback if Bruce Jenner walked into the Cracker Barrel bathroom right behind me, but at the same time, I don’t think someone should have to drop their drawers to prove where they’re allowed to pee.  Just make sure the bathroom is clean.

As I’ve mentioned in other posts, my Dearly Beloved and I enjoy going places together, but we have different ideas about the road trip.  While I’m for stopping at interesting places (okay, they usually involve shopping) along the way, he points a laser beam to his destination and would prefer not to stop for anything.   I like to wait and buy gas in South Carolina, where it’s about 20 cents a gallon cheaper.  He fills the tank here the day before we leave and it’s fine with him if we reach our destination on fumes.

He does, however, know that bathroom stops trump everything.  In fact, he even asks me, “Do you need to go to the bathroom or should I keep going?”  because parts of our trips often go through No-Bathrooms Land.

During a pit stop on a trip a couple of months ago, Dearly Beloved pumped gas at one of those Gas/Fast Food/Junk stations along I-85 while I went inside to use the ladies room.  I walked in and headed into a stall like I always do, used the toilet, and walked out.

It was like I’d entered The Twilight Zone.  Although I don’t recall anyone else being in there when I went in, there were FOUR MEN using urinals went I walked out.  I was flabbergasted, but it was minimal compared with the stunned expression on their faces.  They froze.

How had I managed to overlook the Men’s Room sign on the door and the urinals on the wall on my way in?   If I could miss all that, might I have been so intent on my mission that I overlooked a guy or two standing around?   For all I know, Bruce Jenner might have been in there.

I didn’t look up and I certainly didn’t look down.  Nothing for me to do except say, “Pardon me!” and get the hell out of there.  I didn’t even stop to wash my hands.

So. . . I’m not about to attempt to solve the problem of who gets to use which bathroom, but other people have much interest.   I understand that some states are working on laws to ban transgender folks from using the bathroom of the sex they identify with.   Might I have been arrested for an Oops?

I did learn one thing from the experience:  If unisex bathrooms ever become commonplace. . .  as long as they’re clean, I may not even notice.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Get A Room!

When my friend Beanie took two of her grandchildren to the Washington Zoo in the fall, she was expecting that she might hear questions from them about some of the 1800 animals in the zoo.

But she WASN’T expecting to run into this Aldabra tortoise scene right by the entrance.

Hard to tell him to get a room when he already has a house on his back.

Looks like that makes her a two-story.

(Many thanks to Beanie for the picture.)

Hello, I’m Not Your Grandma

Maybe if I had more pockets, I’d do better about keeping track of my cellphone. More often than not, it’s in the bottom of my handbag amongst sticks of sugar-free peppermint gum and wrinkled old sales receipts.  It’s generally off or muted.  That means that I’m a bit hard to reach.

Actually, my most frequent callers are people  I don’t even know.  They leave messages, sometimes several a day, and I have not a clue as to the identity of the caller or the callee.  Since the message on my voicemail greeting is my own,  you’d think they might realize that the grandma they call is not the grandma they know.  Alas, no..

The Missed Call list shows that it’s a Wadesboro, NC,  phone number.  I’ve had messages from various members of the family,  phoning to leave a long message for “Grandma.”  Whoever the caller is, she’ll leave a message, then shout, “Does anybody else want to talk to Grandma?”  A child will then add her own message, chattering away as if she doesn’t expect a response.

I  had this problem years ago when I bought my first cellphone  in North Carolina.  The cellphone company claimed they retired numbers for a year before reassigning them.  Hogwash.  That number was so fresh that even the guy’s own mother didn’t know he’d changed it.  She was leaving messages along with dozens of other callers, most related to the guy’s work.  He was in the entertainment business, so the messages involved  changing bookings,  giving him party dates, etc.  I felt too guilty to ignore them, so I’d call his mother and leave the messages with her, figuring she’d track him down if they were important.

After a couple of weeks of that, I called the phone company and requested a different number.  They gave me the one I’m still using, which has worked fine until the Wadesboro family began calling.

One day, after turning on my phone and finding four long messages from them, including one from the woman telling Grandma that she didn’t know whether Jerome was going to try to make it to Charlotte because of the bad weather.  I called the Wadesboro number and left them a message,  saying that Granny wasn’t getting any of their messages and she’d probably appreciate knowing that Jerome wasn’t coming before she started fixing dinner for him.

And yet, the messages continued.  Sometimes I found my phone in time to answer and each time I’d say they had dialed the wrong number.

They continued to phone.

Once I called them and reached a member of the family, the mother I think.  I told her that I knew that Granny’s number must be very close to mine because I was receiving her messages.  She  laughed and said, “Yes, very close!”   I replied that they were leaving very nice messages and that I felt sure that Grandma would have enjoyed hearing them.

Didn’t help. The messages still piled up.

One night last week, after watching a late movie in bed, I turned off the light and settled under the covers.  I was nearly asleep when I realized that I’d left my phone on.  Since I hate the little beeps that sound to let me know of messages, I fumbled around in the dark to locate my phone and switch it to Off.  Somehow, I hit Redial and a voice answered with a sleepy, “Hello.”

It was a little after 1 AM.

I quickly turned on the bedside light and saw, to my horror,  that I’d redialed the last call received, which happened to be the people in Wadesboro.  I apologized, saying that I had hit Redial and called them by accident.

Would you believe that I haven’t had a single call from them since?   I don’t know the reason.  Perhaps Granny has gone to that great phone booth in the sky, or perhaps they decided that it would behoove them to dial more carefully in order to prevent any further late-night calls.

I’m knocking on wood, however.  I realize that the calls could resume at any time.

It’s probably a good thing that I don’t have granny’s number.  I’d be inclined to call to make sure she’s okay.  She might want to talk awhile and complain about her children never calling.

Some one invented the telephone,
And interrupted a nation’s slumbers,
Ringing wrong but similar numbers.
~Ogden Nash, Look What You Did, Christopher

Anytime I see someone blocking the aisle in the supermarket while talking on a phone, I want to ram that person with my shopping cart. ~Richard Turner

Paper Town? Paper Leaves.

Last fall I received an e-mail that someone was making a movie here and would be filming several scenes in front of a couple of houses up the block from us. The movie was based on a young adult book–Paper Towns. so I assumed the movie would also be one for teenage audiences.  George Clooney had no role in it, so my interest level was not high.

Around Thanksgiving, someone taped a reminder to our front door advising that they’d be blocking off parts of the street during certain hours.  Some of the filming was done late at night, so it wasn’t much of an inconvenience.  There were huge lights placed next to the curb, up and down the street, for use when needed.The trucks left parked on the street were a minor annoyance.  Not as many trucks as when Homeland was filmed in this same area, but since the Homeland crew rented a nearby church parking lot, they’d been out of sigh for the most part.

White trucks lined the street some days and were more of a nuisance.  It’s not a very wide street.  

I apologize for the blurriness; I took all these pictures from the car.  It was slow going on this day.  Here, they were rolling some equipment down the middle of the street.

Although the trees were losing leaves, the storyline must have been set during warmer months.  Why do I think that?  Because men on ladders meticulously removed the scarlet leaves of the two dogwoods near the house and wired fake green leaves in their place.  Also, the crew was constantly blowing away dead leaves.

The first picture shows the trees with their fake leaves and the second is a closeup to show just how real they looked.  Unless they were supposed to look like dogwoods.

Dearly Beloved happened to be walking past when we heard someone yell,  “Roll it!” so he took a quick snapshot of the scene.  If that was a love scene with guys practically breathing into the car, acting must be harder than I thought.  

But here’s my favorite picture from that week.  Alas, I never walked up to take a closeup, but see the little white square in the bottom of the photo below?

It was a handwritten sign telling where the women’s restroom was located.

 The wide screen reminds me of a roll of toilet paper.
-Yasujiro Ozu

 

 

 

Just Because I’m Paranoid

. . . doesn’t mean they’re not after me.  I’m not making up this stuff.  Let me offer this series of unfortunate events that I believe would make Lemony Snicket shudder.

Sometime in December, my brother e-mailed a photo of a baby squirrel, a critter so tiny it looked lost in the palm that held it.  He said he’d rescued it.

I have no idea where the rescue took place–perhaps in the cat’s mouth, maybe beneath a tree.  Don’t know its sex or why my brother named it CAKE.  I am not a very inquisitive squirrel aunt.  He sent pictures of Cousin Cake to his nieces and nephews.

One reason I did not show much interest was sciurophobia–fear that I’d receive a squirrel as a Christmas gift or perhaps as a January Birthday Cake.  It seemed wise to maintain a low profile.

A later set of photos reassured me.  I could start answering the doorbell again.  Little Cake was obviously in the care of professionals.

Maybe I’ll knit it a little vest for Valentine’s Day.

Perhaps I sound overly dramatic about squirrels.  But before you judge, there’s more.  No kidding.  Cake was just the icing on the. . . you-know-what.

Dearly Beloved and I spent our first Christmas away from home this year.  We didn’t even decorate beyond slapping a wreath on the door.  No tree, no holly decked halls, no Carolers on the mantel.  (I’ve mentioned before about those sweet dolls with craters where their little noses used to be–all thanks to an attic invasion of  nose-fetishist squirrels one year.)  

Instead, we drove to Virginia Beach and spent a most delightful holiday with our son and daughter-in-law.   Even Scout the Wonder Dog was welcomed.

We’re not one of those families that sits around watching sappy Christmas movies.  That’s DB’s doings because I like sappy Christmas movies.  His choice is always  National Lampoon’s Christmas Vacation.  The guys in the family always vote with him and the girls don’t care as long because it offers a respite from TV sports.  Over the years, the guys have brought along their moose mugs, their Cousin Eddie quotes, and various CV junk. including one wearing a green dickey.  Oh wait, that may  have been DB.

This year, things got even more authentic.   The night before we left for Virginia, our toilets made a gurgling noise that strikes terror around here.  Sewer line backup.  Or, Yep, we , as Cousin Eddie explains it,  “Sh*tter’s full.”   Ours was, we learned $300-$400 later, was caused by roots of the large oak tree across the street growing into the sewer line.

Christmas morning in Virginia Beach, I was the last one up. I schlepped blindly into the kitchen for a wakeup cup of coffee.  When I was able to open my eyes enough to see daylight, here’s what was in front of me:

A freakin’ nightmare, right?  Two more cups of coffee and it was still there.  It sat beside me on the sofa and stared at me while we opened gifts.  Even fake squirrels can give the evil eye.

Ee returned from Virginia to find the damnsquirrels were partying in our backyard.  One was sitting ON the squirrel baffle, raking seeds out of the bird feeder with greedy little paws, like it had hit the jackpot on a One-Armed Bandit.

Since the best place to buy Christmas tree ornaments here is at our favorite hardware store,  I headed for their after-Christmas sale the day after our return.  Some of the best ornaments had already sold out, but there were plenty of these:

That’s it in a nutshell.  Christmas Past, Christmas Present, Christmas Future.

The strange little glass-domed ornament?  Yeah,  I bought one.  Maybe  I’ll pass it along to BroJoe next Christmas,  A remembrance of his little cupCake.

 

“SQUIRREL!” – Clark Griswald, Sr. – Christmas Vacation

“It is difficult, when faced with a situation you cannot control, to admit you can do nothing.”
― Lemony Snicket, Horseradish