Thursday jerk

I discovered with a shock that I haven't posted since Wednesday. After an exceptionally boring winter, suddenly I'm busy all the time. This is good.

I volunteer at a large clinic on Thursdays. My job is to sit at the lobby desk and direct people to the floor their appointment is on, fetch wheel chairs for those who request them and generally be friendly and helpful. It's a low stress job and I meet lots of interesting people of all nationalities.

About five years ago, the State of Minnesota passed a law that businesses and public places must post signs if they did not want people who carried concealed weapons to enter the building. Our sign reads:
"HAPPY HEALTH PROHIBITS FIREARMS ON THESE PREMISES"
Personally, this seems like a no-brainer. Why would anybody take their gun to a colonoscopy?

On Thursday, a middle-aged man came up to the desk with his hand inside his coat. "Can I leave my gun with you?" he asked. I was stunned--I didn't even want to see a gun! He slowly drew his hand from his coat to show his finger in pistol position. Then he laughed and said, "Every time I see one of those signs I've wanted to do that!" Then he walked away.

JERK!

I quickly got over it but it gives me pause that it could have been a real gun.

So, How Come...?

A few years ago, Miss Manners column in the newspaper included a letter from a woman who stated that her mother would always correct her when she said, "How come". The mother insisted this was colloquial and one should properly say "why" instead. This came as a shock to me since I had been saying "How come" my entire (admittedly middle-class) life.

The funny thing is, arguing against the use of "How-comes" is fighting a losing battle. The most commonly heard one is, "If we can put a man on the moon, HOW COME we can't...?

Our lives are full of How-comes when you think about it. Like, how come:

-there are always a dozen guys standing around doing nothing at road construction sites?

-cooking shows always use exotic ingredients you would never have on hand? (goat cheese, arugula, fresh raspberries and Balsamic vinegar...really!)

-our outside image ages so much faster than our self-image? (Who is that old lady in the mirror?)

-we can never quite reach our own expectations? (If only I had tried harder.)

You can probably come up with much better How-comes. Let me know your favorites.

(PS-Breckenridge escaped the flooding and all is well. Thanks for all your well-wishes.)

I used to be a spring chicken

I checked out the movie Savages from the library the other day. It's about an adult sister and brother dealing with their elderly father's dementia and facing their own futures. What I found most charming, however, was the film opens with a song from my childhood.

"I don't want to play in your yard,
I don't like you anymore.
You'll be sorry when you see me
Sliding down our cellar door

You can't holler down our rain barrel,
You can't climb our apple tree.
I don't want to play in your yard
If you won't be nice to me."

(Here's a picture of an old-fashioned
cellar door. Cellars were used for storing
fresh garden vegetables, home canned
goods and also for tornado shelters.)

Over the years, I've been collecting expressions and words from my childhood that have gone defunct. Many have been replaced by cruder expressions (eg. remember when "smart asses" were called "smarty pants", "smart alecs" or "wise guys"? Now "wise guys" are what used to be called mobsters or gangsters. And gang members refer to each other as their "crew". There was an old radio show called, "Gangbusters" about police who effectively put gangsters in prison. The expression then evolved to whenever something that was going fast and effectively, it was "going gangbusters".

Every once in a while, I will hear a word or expression coming out of my mouth that I haven't heard for decades. I feel like a ninny when that happens. I think I'll go to the ice box and get a bottle of pop. I could go on like this till the cows come home, but it'll probably give you youngsters the screaming mimis.

The flip side of Spring

My granddaughter Lindy lives in Breckenridge MN with her husband and three little girls. Their house is only a short way from the swollen Red River which flows north along the Minnesota-North Dakota border past Fargo and Grand Forks into Canada.


The girl's bedrooms are in the basement so the threat is serious. Lindy and her husband, a police officer, have been joining all the other locals and volunteers sandbagging along the river. If the rain keeps up, they predict the river may crest higher than ever before. So, all together now:

"Rain, rain, go away, come again some other day".

Of dandelions and daffodils

Ten years ago, a friend and I went on a one-week tour of England. We went in March before the higher tourist season rates went into effect. As it turns out, that is a great time to go.

When we arrived at our hotel, our room wasn't ready yet. As luck would have it, a tour bus out front was just leaving for Windsor Castle. Off we went to see the green, green grass of England dotted with daffodils. It was incredible! There were daffodils growing like dandelions everywhere. This impressed me more than the castle.

Then in 2005, my sister and I went to Iceland for a week. There were big beautiful bunches of dandelions growing there. Not the wimpy little dandelions like you see in Minnesota, these were big, healthy dandelions of spectacular size. Clearly they were in their preferred environment.

I suspect the Vikings brought the seeds to Iceland in 978 the way the Scandinavians brought them to Minnesota in the 1800's. I went online to try and find a picture of Icelandic dandelions, but nothing came close. If the plants had been evolving and adapting to Icelandic climate for a thousand years, our American dandelions have a long way to go before they adapt to our climate.

Sadly, daffodils have never taken hold in this country. You have to go to England in the spring to
see them bobbing in pastures, ditches and woods. My passport expired a year ago and I didn't have any reason to spend $100 to renew it. The chances that I will ever go abroad again are negligible.

But then, I have already been to England in the spring!

Spring happens

Yesterday was the first day of spring. I was all ready to run out in the yard and do my "dance of spring" when I was pulled up short by a fresh coating of snow. Gee, it would have been such a spectacularly dramatic dance, too.

Oh well, there's always next year.

Today is warm (60 f) and sunny. The four cats are taking turns

sitting in the open window listening to the few newly-returned

robins and smelling the fresh air. The neighbor kids are on their

way to a birthday party. Peace hangs in the air.

I went to the library to pick up a tax form so my friend AF can

do my taxes. I have tried to do them myself but I get so anxious I can't think straight--literally. It's pathetic, I know, because I don't have anything complicated and I'm a fairly intelligent woman and should be able to think it through. I have really tried but I invariably turn into a blithering idiot after the first page.

"It's not my fault! I'm a words person, not a numbers person!" Anyway, happy spring to you all.

Memories of donuts

One of my favorite online humor sites is Engrish.com. They post pictures of signs and T-shirts etc. that have been badly translated from Asian languages to English. Some are incomprehensible but all are really funny.

This reminds me of several signs that used to make us laugh in Savage MN when my mother was living there. A local doughnut shop had mounted a large sign across their building that read, "Have you had your dougnut? (sic) Today!" Across the street was a non-descript little building that had a sign identifying the place as "Savage Barbers".

There used to be donut places all over the state. There was Mr. Donut, Duncan Donuts, Winchell Donuts and Donut Huts--not to mention every grocery store, hometown bakery and convenience store sold donuts. Those were the days when everyone was happy to eat lard (see previous post of March 11th) because it made really good donuts.

Several years ago, after all the other donut chains had gone out of business, Krispy Kreme made a foray into the Twin Cities. They built a new building out in trendy Maple Grove to a great deal of fanfare. Their huge grand opening caused traffic jams as everyone scrambled to be the first to bring a box of Krispy Kremes into the office. But the enthusiasm didn't last long. Soon Krispy Kreme was selling their donuts at Target Stores, Cub Foods and gas stations. After a while, they too went out of business.

There are any number of bagel shops replacing the defunct donut shops, and heaven knows, the bagels are much better for you. But I still have fond memories of Mr. Donut angel-creme filled donuts. (Sigh)