Seriously?

Once again, I thought I was being punked, or was on Candid Camera. Seriously, why do these things happen to me?

At the end of the Indiana Homeschool Convention, I traipsed to the ladies room before packing up by booth. There was one stall door in there that didn’t match the others. It was brown, obviously a replacement, and the rest were beige. Not only did the lone door make me want to sing “One of these things is not like the other” but it was the only gateway that didn’t rest in the closed position. All the beige doors looked like they were locked, even when they were guarding a vacant stall.

For some strange reason, I chose the loner door at 6:05 on Saturday night. As I entered my chosen throne room, I surmised, “This must be the most used stall because you have to bend over and look for shoes surrounded by pant legs to see if the others are available.” That should have been a clue to me. But no. I was a tad on the tired side… tuckered out… to say the least. I had just finished speaking six times. I LOVE speaking, but it can be draining.

Well, I was right. It WAS the most used stall and guess what it was plumb out of?????  Yep. TP.

It was too late for me to re-choose a new stall by the time I figured out my dilemma. Good gravy. Surrounded by silence, I wondered if I was alone in the bathroom. Oh, dear baby Jesus, please no.

Feebly I made public my private situation, “Help!”

No response.

With a little more gusto, “HELP! Is anyone out there?”

A lone woman was with me, and probably trying to ignore the first call for assistance. Her entire response was, “Yes.” Seriously? Couldn’t she have asked what I needed? Or how she could help? But I guess she did answer my question.

Pleading, I requested that she hand me some toilet paper. “Sure.” My prayers were being answered. I heard toilet paper being removed from a receptacle in another stall. Then my guardian angel asked which stall I was in… because the only one that stays open was shut and locked in front of my nose and knees.

Sticking my hand out under the door, she placed the golden paper in my fist…. all three squares of it. Seriously? At first I thought it was funny. Personally, I have handed my daughter two squares when she asked for help in my same precarious position. BUT THEN I HANDED HER A WAD and we laughed!

My guardian angel left. Exited the lavatory. The exterior door shutting behind her was the last noise heard in the bathroom… until I started laughing. Seriously?

I folded those three precious squares very carefully.  VERY carefully.

But it was not Candid Camera. I did not get punked. It was real life in a day of Laughing with Linda. I’m thankful I can provide entertainment for others.

You’re welcome.

STOP! In the Name of the Law!

Tonight I was reminded of a story from my high school days which I gladly share at this time. It is a homeschool science lesson in the making, mixed with art and civics. Thank you for bringing this story to the forefront of today’s news, Connie, my partner in crime more than once in our late teen years.

It has escaped me where I obtained this gem of a fashion statement, but somehow I got my little 17-year-old hands on a pair of these stop sign sunglasses.

This is EXACTLY the pair that I chose to wear in high school. See how they have shatter-proof lenses? Safety first! See how it says for children 5 years or older. It should have said for children ages 5-15… let me explain.

The lenses on these beauties were green and they were quite dark, which aided my shielding of the bright California sunshine while donning them. One bright shiny day, I was cruising down El Camino Real in Sunnyvale, California (But not cruising at night on El Camino Real in Santa Clara….. that was naughty) minding my own business… wearing the above glasses… because I was fashion conscious. I’m sure I had on a red or white or royal blue Izod polo shirt with the collar turned up with a matching cherry red patent leather belt in the belt loops of my 501 Levi jeans. (Button fly! Rock on!)

Unusual, to be sure, the stoplights were out on El Camino that day! I was quite surprised that so many in a row were out… block after block. I approached each intersection with caution, stopped, looked both ways and proceeded with care.

Next thing I know there was an officer of the law flashing his blue lights at me in the rear view mirror. Odd. I had never seen them only flash blue. (Not that I had much experience being pulled over… ahem.) After pulling my car to the side of the road the nice police man came to chat with me. He asked why I was running all the red stop lights on El Camino. WHAT? “They were all out, officer! That is why I treated them like stop signs.”

Then I pulled off my awesome stop sign sunglasses and realized his patrol car WAS flashing red and blue… but I couldn’t see the red lights with the green lenses in my fashion eye wear. Figuring he would believe me as I made the discovery and explained it to him….. he simply stood there looking at me like I had used too much VO5 hairspray for too long in too small of a bathroom.

Finally, I handed him the glasses and offered, “See for yourself!” He did. He put them on, glanced around at his police car lights and the red street light in the next intersection, removed them and handed them back to me shaking his head.

The kind public servant did not give me multiple tickets for running multiple lights that day, but did instruct me to NEVER wear the stop sign sun glasses while driving! OKAY!

Here is the science lesson part of this story from physicsclassroom.com:

A pigment that absorbs a single frequency is known as a pure pigment.

Pigments absorb light. Pure pigments absorb a single frequency or color of light. The color of light absorbed by a pigment is merely the complementary color of that pigment.

And so, dear students, green lenses on fancy sunglasses shaped like stop signs absorb red traffic lights because green and red are complementary colors on the opposite sides of the color wheel. You cannot see red lights with these glasses on! Don’t try this at home!

Be safe! Don’t drive with green or red lenses! And there you have it, from the archives.

Pandemonium at Petco!

Again, back story first. My car collision was more than two months ago, but I am still “enjoying” the pain-numbing effects of a Fentanyl patch, such as lack of energy, emotional instability, forgetfulness that my arm doesn’t work right yet and frequent break-outs as a sweaty mess when I do too much.

Fast forward to yesterday when I attempted a fieldtrip because one dog is late on his rabies shot and the other dog is due.  The close and handy Petco (read: not in the ghetto) only has a shot clinic on Friday night and we had a conflict. SO, my two daughters and I along with the two pooches planned a mid-morning trip to another not-so-handy and not-close-at-all Petco (read: in the ghetto).  Little did we realize that everyone who lives in the slums also decided to get their dogs’ rabies shots yesterday morning.  The pain patch + 2 squirrely dogs + Petco full of dogs and “interesting” people = pandemonium to the third degree.

We parked in the lot and discussed who would hold the leashes while we crossed traffic and entered the store BEFORE we opened any of the doors.  That was the only moment when things went down as planned.  Being unable to hold a yanking-leash in my right hand, I held onto my little girl’s hand.  My big girl held the wiener dog and had the rat terrier on a leash. So far. So good.

As we entered the store, Ringo, the wiener dog decides to announce our arrival with his big-dog voice and won’t shut up, which invited all the other dogs in the store to welcome us as well.  I glanced to my right and saw the clinic table set up and three people in line. We made our way down the center aisle of the store with our heads glued to the right as we were overcome row after row at the length of the line. Finally toward the rear of the establishment, we discovered our place right behind an over-fed and under-socialized huge yellow lab.  At our arrival, the lab went ballistic barking and pulling his owner off balance (a full grown man) to get to our puny doggies.

Breathing deeply though my nose to gain composure and accept the fact that we were in for a long wait, I suggested to my eldest that she get a cart to put our doggies in for their own protection. In the blink of an eye, the red leash on the rat terrier was handed to the little nine-year-old hand that didn’t close in time to stop the escape of Trixie.  Without thinking (obviously) I screamed, “WHAT ARE YOU DOING?” which was pretty obvious….. she was not holding the dog leash.  It has been many years since I have moved that fast.  Trixie was running with her ears back and her tail tucked and was bee-lining for the front door. It must have been quite a sight for all the people standing in line seeing the teeny white dog dragging a red leash followed by the flash of a woman at the end of the row. Near the registers I was able to step on the end of the leash and clothesline the AWOL fugitive.  Trixie’s head stayed in place and I’m sure she was trying to figure out why her tail just passed her head. While reaching down to grab the red restraint, my sun glasses tumbled out of my purse and made a sizable raucous to draw more attention to the woman who couldn’t control her tiny mongrel.

Victoriously I gathered my glasses and my hound and casually walked back to the rear of the store not making eye contact with anyone who just witnessed the overthrown departure (read: hot sweaty mess, shaky hands, emotionally volatile).  A ten-year-old terrier wasn’t going to get the best of me.  No sirree.

As previously planned, my eldest went to retrieve a cart to protect our pets.  Meanwhile, back in the ghetto, Jim Bob’s homemade collar on the fat yellow dog gave way and the mutt pounced on my pup.   His owner sluggishly slurred, “Well, how’d that happen?” as he slowly made moves to re-tethered his pooch.  That dog was going to have to get through ME to have one mini sniff at my dog’s rear end!  Not happening.

At that moment, I didn’t care how lofty the fines were for not meeting the deadlines for rabies shots.  “We are leaving NOW,” slipped out through my tight lips and we made our way back through the shop, crossed the poorly planned parking lot traffic and went home.  Before collapsing on my bed I took three ibuprofen (because stabbing pain was searing through my arm) and two stool softeners for good measure.

Come back next week for Friday night’s version of Rabies Shots 2nd Attempt.