Black(Brunette) Friday...The Saga Continues

Years ago, when I was in college, I used to walk into hair salons and say, "Do whatever you think will look good."

This was not one of my better ideas. I might as well have said, "Make me look like a freak." Some of my more memorable looks included a punk rocker (minus the safety pin through the nose), the bride of Frankenstein, and Peter Pan (which may have worked for Mary Martin and Kathy Rigby, but on me only brought back traumatic memories of childhood haircuts by my mom.).

Have gotten older and wiser (?), I now try to be as specific as possible with my descriptions. Unfortunately, this does not always work out so well for me either.

Six months ago, the guy who bore the awesome responsibility for keeping me blond for the past five years moved, so I needed to find someone new. After much surfing the net, pestering everyone I knew and wallowing in angst, I took the plunge.

First, the root touch-up was too dark (oh, goody, let's make the gray even easier to spot), then, I became Jean Harlow's twin (harder to spot the gray, but coupled with my skin tone, I was getting mistaken for an albino). When I asked for some contrast, I became a honey blond (translation:an orange). Finally though, I was an acceptable shade of blond with only a few remnants of orange. Until last Friday.

In a moment of pure insanity, I asked for the removal of all "orange" color and a more "natural" multi-dimensional look. What I got was brunette with some blond hightlights that bordered on greenish. Natural perhaps for someone in a carnival sideshow, but not really what I had in mind.

After living with the results for the next twelve hours, I decided to cut my losses and call a new place to see if they could make me look human again (actually, it was Tim that was living with the results, and for some reason, he did not appreciate being married to a suicidal nutcase...go figure). I got an appointment for Monday evening, took a lot of deep breaths (along with contemplating buying a very large hat), and kept chanting,"this is not the end of the world(although I didn't really believe it) over and over. (Tim, meanwhile, started looking for cheap rates at local hotels.) I almost convinced myself too, until the phone rang Monday morning.

The perky receptionist at the salon was just calling to confirm that my appointment that night was for a "consultation" not color (apparently, she did not understand the severity of the situation and the thin thread my sanity was hanging by). After reducing her to a stammering mess (that will teach her for being so chipper when the world is coming to an end), I accepted an appointment for the following morning with a different colorist.

Tuesday morning, the phone rang again. Uh oh. Seems the new guy was sick, but they would be happy to palm me off on a third person, who apparently wasn't even important enough to have a name. Was this a joke, or was it the cosmos way of telling me I should stop fighting mother nature and become a brunette again? Never!

In desperation, I called the person who had done this horrible thing to me (something I swore never to do), and made an appointment for that afternoon.

This time, however, I was going in prepared. I pulled out a few photos from the past several months to show her what I did and did not want.

"Oh, sure," she nodded and smiled, "I can do that." Which is all asked for in the first place.

P.S. I am blond again (whew) with some darker "lowlights" that I am now willing to embrace, and Tim has cancelled his reservation at a nearby hotel.

Allow Me To Introduce My Wife

Five years ago, I became blond (courtesy of a makeover). Before that, I was a brunette with lots of reddish highlights (courtesy of CVS and Miss Clairol). Before that, I was gray (courtesy of Mother Nature). And before that, I was a minor (courtesy of my mother--I just had to inherit the premature gray instead of the thin thighs. I really won that spin of the genetic wheel).

At first, this sudden change caused great confusion (I also lost over two feet in length as part of the same makeover). Tim let me walk right past him before doing a double-take the first time he saw me (good to know that after fifteen years, I could still surprise him).

The best reaction though, came from an employee at one of our favorite restaurants.

Approaching the table where we were holding hands, he greeted us, then pretty much turned his back on me to inquire frostily of Tim, "How's your wife ?"

Perplexed, Tim nodded his head toward me and said, "This is Ann."

"Nice to meet you, Ann," Ron clipped out over his shoulder, apparently believing Tim was clever enough to find a girlfriend with the same name as his wife. "So, where's your wife ,Ann, tonight?"

If possible, Ron's tone had grown even chillier and a bit more belligerent. Rarely at a loss for words (okay, never), Tim simply stared at him, jaws agape.

Barely able to contain my amusement, and afraid the situation might become physical, I interrupted. "Ron, it's me, Ann."

"Yes. I know. Nice to meet you." Head down, eyes locked firmly on Tim (clearly, someone had aced Intimidation 101), he still wouldn't look at me.

"My wife , Ann," Tim rallied, choking back the laughter, as he nudged Ron to look in my direction.

Aha! You could almost see the light bulb switching on over his head.

Thoroughly embarrassed now, Ron apologized profusely. He even sent over a bottle of champagne although I assured him I was pleased rather than offended by his reaction (It's good to know who your friends are, although now Tim knows where not to go if he ever does decide to have an affair).

Anyway, after five years of being blond and reintroducing myself to people all over again, you can imagine my shock when, last Friday, I went to the hair salon for a touch up (you know, to keep that "natural" look), and came out as a brunette (The only thing worse would have been coming out with a recreation of my big '80's perm. Then, I would have had to find a store that sold tops with huge shoulder pads instead of just a hat.).

To be continued.....

Waiter Approved

This week, I visited my parents in Florida where we spent our days swimming, sunning and, of course, eating. The first two we somehow managed on our own. The third activity apparently needed guidance and approval...at least according to our waiters.

The first night, we went to a restaurant specializing in fish. Our waiter, an elderly German gentleman (and by elderly, I mean 110), eventually toddled over to give orders, I mean take our orders.

My dad and I opted for a fish which the menu suggested be served broiled. "Good choice," our waiter's head bobbled vigorously like one of those dolls glued on the dashboard of a runaway car as he scribbled busily in his pad. "But you want it pan seared; it is better that way."

"Also, you want the steamed vegetables with that," he directed without so much as glancing up at us. "Now, what kind of salad do you want?"

"Um, Caesar?" I ventured hesitantly, afraid that if I made a second wrong choice, I might be rapped on the knuckles with his pen, or worse, subjected to another head wagging, and I didn't want to be responsible for his chiropractic bill.

Thankfully, I got only a brief nod of approval before he moved on to my mom. Whew!

Not one to be easily intimidated, she opted for a steak (it's a bad habit of hers and we are staging an intervention over Christmas). Ah, but our waiter was prepared for this ruse. "How do you want it done?" he queried slyly.

"Rare," came the ready reply, teamed with direct eye contact (my mom is not from New York for nothing.

Bzzzzzz. Thank you for playing. "Medium rare," he corrected, dismissing her feeble attempt to maintain control of her diet. Apparently, being German trumps being a New Yorker. "And for a side? Also steamed vegetables?"

"I'll have a side of pasta," she threw him a curve ball. "And the house salad with thousand island dressing." I held my breath and watched him from under my lashes, but her choice of salad must have mollified him because he let the whole pasta issue go without comment.

The next day at lunch, we once again needed to seek the approval of the wait staff. My mom and dad got it immediately with their sandwiches, but mine was a bit harder to come by. I had opted for a chopped salad where I got to select the ingredients from a whole case of prepared choices. Fortunately, each choice was greeted with a hearty, "Good one," by the waiter/chef. Until I got to the dressing. As he listed the choices, I hesitated a moment, contemplating which of my two favorites I felt like, the balsamic vinaigrette or the raspberry vinaigrette.

I had barely pronounced the B-sound when the waiter jumped in, finishing the thought for me.

"Balsamic is, of course, the only one you would want with this kind of salad," he decreed, already scooping up a dripping ladleful. "Good choice." Okaaaa y. And for my beverage? How about dessert? Maybe you can advise me on which table to sit at so that the salad will be presented in the best light?

Dinner that night, lunch the next day and dinner my last night there proved to be more of the same. We got mildly chastised for all ordering chicken (albeit three different kinds) at the Italian place for dinner. We got beamed at and all but patted on the heads like good little boys and girls for ordering fish and chips and shrimp cocktail. Ordering a warm salad with beets and Gorgonzola cheese brought our server to a happy place, but trying to refuse the ice cream sundae that came with the meal at Friendly's was a real downer for our server there.

My father, who hasn't eaten sweets in about fifty years, finally caved and ordered a strawberry ice cream (which he palmed off on me) just to avoid the tears which were threatening to overflow from our waitresses eyes. I have never seen anyone work harder to push a topping either. "Nuts? Sauce(she then proceeded to list all eighty-seven choices)? Fresh strawberries? Whipped cream? Crumbled cookies? Anything? Everything? " How about nothing?

Dejected, but not totally defeated, she slumped away only to return with our sundaes: one plain strawberry ice cream, the other loaded to the gills with all the toppings we had refused. "See," her baleful glance said as she put my mom's down with a flourish, "all this could have been yours, had you chosen wisely."

I'm thinking that when we go back for Christmas, we may have to eat in more. I just can't take the pressure associated with ordering a meal down there. I don't want to be responsible for that much unhappiness during the holiday season.

Computers--Now You See Things, Now You Don't

Although my sister would say I am completely helpless when it comes to computers, that is not true.

I can do e-mails, shop, surf the net, shop, generate word documents, shop, download, upload, set up files, shop, create shortcuts and I even know what a cookie is and how to delete it. Oh, and have I mentioned that I can shop? All this and more. When my computer lets me do it, that is.

Sometimes, it turns on me. Like when I first decided to blog. Every time I tried to get onto blogger.com on my PC, all I got was a page with streaks of color. All the other websites were fine. I just couldn't get onto blogger no matter how hard I tried. Even a call to my sister, grand high exalted queen of computers, didn't help. I just couldn't get on the site.

Puzzled and frustrated, I gave it a whirl on my laptop--and got right on. Hmm. Interesting.

A month later, it got even more interesting. I could get on blogger, but I couldn't access the Sirius website.

Two weeks later, I could get onto Sirius, but not Gifts.com. Now it was getting personal. It was impacting on my shopping. Was I typing things in correctly? Had I somehow opened some sort of weird virus? Could I blame any of this on Tim?

Than, total disaster struck. No Word. Every time I tried to open a word document, I got either a blank gray screen or a series of dialogue boxes saying I needed to install the disk, it was searching the net for the correct program, it was screwing with my mind, etc.

Wait. When had I uninstalled Word? Had I been sleepwalking lately, or somehow hit some sort of secret delete key I didn't know about while searching for a YouTube video? More importantly, could I, in any way, blame this on Tim? So many questions.

And to make matters even more puzzling, Word was listed when I checked under programs and I could generate a word document.

Before I could figure out this cute little twist, my laptop decided to join my PC and make sure I had a nervous breakdown.

It stopped going online. No signal except for maybe a half hour between ten and eleven pm. That's it. Period. "Cable Unplugged", it told me. Ha!

I checked and there was no cable unplugged. I even unplugged and replugged. Maybe there was an elf living in the basement who was getting his jollies unplugging the cable? Perhaps it was the ghost from next door who had gotten bored and wandered over, looking for something new to do with her time? Could I, in any way, blame Tim for this?

Before I could answer any of these questions, the latest string of computer frolics occurred.

Word miraculously returned to my PC, but my address bar disappeared. I can only go to a site by not typing www, but only the site name in the topmost google box. I don't go to google, but directly to the site.

I can also get online with my laptop most anytime I want, but once I go to a site, I cannot get home by clicking on the little house icon because it is gone. Vanished into cyberspace.

Once again, I am left with many questions, the main one, of course, being, "Can I blame Tim"?

The Great Disaster of '98

Last week, Tim was away on business for two days which gave me the perfect opportunity to decorate for Christmas---alone.

It's better that way. Really. There is no cursing at tangled lights (well, okay, some cursing), grumbling about the Christmas music marathon, disparaging remarks about my Jingle Bell Rock Dancing Santa, arguing over who is in worse shape and should not be moving the armchair to accommodate the tree, or, most importantly, destruction of my Christmas village.

Years ago, I started painting ceramic buildings for my under-the-tree-village. Eventually, I ended up with a tiny metropolis of close to forty. Then, in the spring of '98, I found a class that taught how to make platforms from heavy duty construction styrofoam and water using wax and spray paint.

Naturally, I dragged Tim along, luring him with promises of tools and fire (what could be more manly than buying supplies at Home Depot and Radio Shack?), and other guys (which there were...even if they were eighty). Oh, and the promise that he would never, ever have to actually do any of this once the class was over.

And so, with visions of styrofoam plum trees dancing in my head, our basement became Santa's workshop. I spend hours planning the village. There was the downtown with it's shops, theater, hotel and government buildings. The two-lane highway leading from town where you could buy a used car or stop at Flo's Diner, the residential area with single-family homes ranging from craftsman style to Tudor and the nearby school, to the wooded area on the outskirts of town where the mill sat at the edge of a lake which flowed down to a camping area near town as a river.

I cut, and painted and glued. I spent hours with a soldering iron cutting miniature cobblestones and bricks and marking off parking spaces and grand staircases. I was obsessed (Tim was also obsessed---with avoiding all of this).

Finally, it was time to move it all upstairs for the grand unveiling. The tree was up, dancing Santa was happily doing his Elvis impersonation, and the house was decorated within an inch of it's life.

Tim started grabbing sections of the village (with the delicate, fragile, handmade, very breakable --can you see where this is going?--houses on top) and carrying them up the stairs (the cold, hard, sharp, steep and unforgiving stairs) against my objections.

Perhaps it was Santa's eighty-second chorus of "Rockin Around the Christmas Tree" that fried his last nerve and prompted this foolish decision, or maybe he had become disoriented by the pine scented candles and sprays and oils which filled every nook and cranny of the house, but either way, it was not one of his better ideas.

Halfway up those cold, hard, sharp, steep and unforgiving stairs with the second to last section, there was a loud crack and an even louder expletive. Then, "Don't come down here."

Right. Like anything less than a herd of wild elephants could have stopped me from rushing down those stairs.

And there it was, I mean, there they were...fragments and shards of the hotel (the only hotel in town. Where were all the people supposed to stay now?), and the hospital (hopefully nobody in town would get sick or hurt over the Christmas season), as well as a few small mom and pop businesses that were gone for good (breaking the hearts of many a villager).

The disaster even claimed the lives of several inhabitants of the small, close-knit community and maimed others (one poor man had half his face blown off while feeding the birds, and another young boy lost part of one hand, making for an eternally lopsided snow-angel). It was tragic.

As I sat on the bottom step, mourning the loss of so many good people and the senseless destruction of property, a hand appeared next to me, holding a peace offering -- a glass of wine, and a dustpan. He tried being hopeful. "Look. We can glue on this guys leg." But in the end, there was little that could be done except make a trip or two out to the garbage, and rearrange the village.

And that is why we reached the very mutual decision that I, and I alone, should decorate for Christmas.

Cable and Internet and E-mail, Oh My!

My parents have recently decided to give the whole retirement thing a shot, and are renting a place for the winter in Florida. Kind of like a test run (my sister, brother and I are making book on whether this little experiment will end in murder, suicide or divorce. Right now, the smart money is saying divorce by the middle of December, although we can't rule out the possibility of death completely.)

One of the many details that needed to be taken care of prior to the move was their cable/internet. Since the condo they are staying in comes with cable, my mother contacted Comcast and suspended their service at home, not realizing that while she wouldn't need cable, she would still need the internet service to get her e-mail.

Since it seemed like it would just be easier to take care of this myself than explain it to her for the 100th time, I offered to call Comcast and get it straightened out. Big mistake.

Here is how it went:
I dialed the 800 number, pressed 1 for English, pressed 2 for internet, pressed 2 again, listened to a commercial, listened to another pitch regarding billing, listened to them give me the number to call to reach them (duh! How could I be listening to this message unless I had just dialed that number?), entered my phone number, finally got a real person on the line, told them what I needed to do and...

They told me that my call had gone to the office of the state I was calling from. What I needed to do was call the office in Pennsylvania and talk to them, since that is where my parent's had the cable service. And so they transfered my call...back to the main 800 number.

I pressed 1 for English, pressed 2 for internet, pressed 2 again, listened to a commercial, listened to....well, you get the picture, except this time, I entered my parent's phone number and spoke with someone in Pennsylvania who told me that they could not help me, because what I needed to to was call the office in Florida and talk with them since that is where my parent's needed the service. And so they transfered my call...back to the 800 number.

I pressed 1 for English, pressed 2 for internet, pressed 2 again...but when I had to enter the number, I was in trouble. I didn't have a phone number for them in Florida, but the PA guy said I could just punch in the zip code which I did have. Turns out that was not an option. (Perhaps he was just trying to get rid of me?). Anyway, ten minutes later, I ended up back in Virginia.

I tried reasoning with the operator(after I had pressed 1, 2,2 and so on...again). They were all the same company. Surely, they must have the number for the office down in Florida. Maybe they could even (dare I suggest it?!) transfer me directly to that office and bypass the 800 number?

Apparently not. Their advice? Get a Florida phone book, pick any number at random from the city they lived in and enter that to talk to the Florida office (Naturally, I had to point out that if I had a Florida phone book, I would just look up the number for the local Comcast office. FYI, the operator's don't appreciate either irony or sarcasm.) Anyway, back I went to 1-800- you are screwed.

Eventually, somewhere around hour two, I did manage to reach the Florida office, and, after punching and listening to the same thing for the eighty-second time, they told me that I would have to set up a new account since the old account was in a different state, then call PA and have them release her e-mail address, then call Florida back and have them assign the address to the Florida account. (I was beginning to realize why people went to satellite TV, got a hotmail account, and sat at Starbuck's with their laptops where the wireless is free). I guess nobody told these people that THEY ALL WORK FOR THE SAME COMPANY!!!!! Oh, and by the way, we would have to go through the whole process again in the spring. Charming.

Anyway, two days and two thousand hours spent on the phone with Comcast in FLorida and Pennsylvania later, the Comcast guy showed up to install the cable modem in the condo (and almost got himself pitched into the ocean from a fourth floor balcony by my father who didn't quite get the difference between internet modem and wireless modem), my mother got a hotmail account (courtesy of my sister and her ability to control my mother's computer by remote control), and I unplugged my phone and began looking up sanitariums that didn't have cable, internet or e-mail addresses.

But She Never Said, "I Told You So..."

After sitting in traffic last Thanksgiving for over six hours (for what is normally a less than four hour trip), we decided to be smart this year and travel back early on Saturday instead of waiting for Sunday. Apparently, fate had another plan.

Since my sister-in-law, Rose, had her car, and Tim and I had ours, I decided to travel back with Rose and her dog, Murray, the first half of the trip, then, when her ears were bleeding from listening to me talk for two hours, I would switch cars and make Tim listen to me for the second half of the trip.

We had been following Tim for less than a half hour when he suddenly pulled off the road (which was barely enough time to complain about how much we ate and how fat we were). Puzzled, we pulled up behind him on the shoulder only to find that his left front tire had gone flat. Surprisingly, he was taking it quite well (only three or four curses, and no kicking the tire, car or roadside debris).

After emptying a can of Fix-A-Flat into the tire and having it hiss and foam back out at us from a slit near the bottom, we decided to call roadside assistance and see if we could get the tire replaced (250 miles on a doughnut? Please. Just the thought of having to drive two miles on the highway while keeping it under sixty was making Tim break out in a cold sweat.)

So there we sat, Tim, Rose, Murray and I (foul mood, bad back that was out, sore throat and clogged sinuses, and needing a bathroom -- and Rose, Murray and I were not in happy places either), when Tim's brother, Tom, came along and pulled in as well to commiserate. (Wohoo! a tailgate party!)

Fortunately, help arrived within twenty minutes (which was what Rose had optimistically predicted). That was the good news. The bad news was that there was not a replacement tire to be had within a, well, 250 mile radius. Great. Another six hour trip. Our happy places now were in the land of Far, Far Away.

Thirty minutes later, we were on the road again, but this time I was with Tim and we had convinced Rose and Tom to go on ahead of us (Rose was the hardest sell, wanting to follow us in case we had problems with the doughnut, but we finally insulted her enough and got her to go on ahead. In retrospect, it was like watching the last lifeboat from the Titanic head for the horizon while we danced to the final verse of "Amazing Grace".)

Several hours of Christmas music later (which was not making our day either merry or bright), we were finally nearing the end of our journey. Only an hour and a half to go. Tim was holding it together pretty well, although there had been one or two tense moments such as when a carload of senior citizens passed us (and I'm pretty sure they flipped us off) doing a speedy sixty in a sixty-five zone. But the worst moment came when we were passed by a Winebego--towing a car! I never thought it was possible for someone's skin to simultaneously turn white and red until I looked over at Tim, who was clenching his teeth and the wheel with equal force.

Just as we were discussing where we should have dinner, it happened. The right front tire went flat. As we coasted to the side of the highway for the second time that day, and discovered that that tire too was beyond help, I waited for it. I was sure it was coming any second now. The Rumplestiltskin dance.

But there was no stamping. No spewing of cuss words. No disappearing through a whole in the ground, never to be seen again. Amazingly, Tim calmly called roadside assistance and ordered a tow truck. (Meanwhile, I was wondering who this stranger was and what he had done with my husband. Had he been switched out for a Stepford husband, or had aliens taken over his body? Would a pod shoot out of his stomach at any moment and attack me?)

While I was still pondering the possibilities, Rose pulled up behind us once again ( she had stopped for a bathroom break--for her and the dog-- and shrewdly stayed some miles behind us, anticipating this very thing). After transferring our luggage to her car, we all sat and waited for the cavalry to arrive. Which he did one and a half hours later (after he finished watching his movie--no sense everyone having a bad day).

By then, darkness had fallen, Rose and Murray had fallen asleep and Tim had fallen into the long anticipated but expected foul mood (there he was... the guy I married!).

After a truly speedy trip to the dealer (Who knew a flatbed tow truck could do eighty?) Rose drove us home where we went to the diner for dinner (and I got moldy bread with my tuna sandwich---the perfect end to the perfect day). It had only taken us eight and a half hours to make that four hour trip.

Before she left to go home though, Rose made one final prediction...on the price of the tires. Tim disagreed. Two days later, after speaking with the dealer, we found out that, once again, Rose was right!

iTouch... Not Intended For Mature Audiences

Last week, we bought my mom an itouch to replace her dying first generation ipod. It was a tough sell.

"Look, you can get on the Internet." "Why? I have a laptop." "You can use it as an alarm clock." "I have an alarm clock--your father." "You can keep your Christmas card list in it." Yawn. Time to bring out the big guns: "You can download pictures of your grandchild." Bingo! We have a winner.

In retrospect, I should have kept my mouth shut.

Clearly more excited about it than she was, I charged it as soon as we got home only to find after two hours that it was fully charged, but not working. Used to the regular ipods and nanos, I was a bit perplexed, but still fairly optimistic.

I tried syncing it with my computer and itunes library, but it was still not giving me anything other than the full battery screen and a zzt zzt noise. (Hmm. I can see the headlines: Woman electrocuted by itouch. Film at 11.)

Not nearly as optimistic, I tried the website. No help there (seriously, they really should have an over forty section there--a basic "dummy" handbook with large print. Oh, and a warning label on the box in big red letters: Do Not Attempt to Use Without the Help of a Teenager).

Definitely pessimistic now, I tried the helpline. An hour later, beyond pessimism and progressing quickly into totally ticked off, I was back in the store where the guy was as perplexed as I was (he was only the manager though and clearly over forty, not a "tech guy". Good to know: Avoid asking the store manager for help.), but he got the home screen simply by connecting the thing to one of their mac's.

The tech guy(who looked to be about twelve), came over and explained that I probably needed to upgrade a certain program on my computer and sent me a link (BTW, he was also perplexed, but unconcerned--probably because it didn't happen to his itouch-- by the lack of the home screen when it was fully charged.)

Returning home, I began downloading stuff that they estimated would take twenty minutes. What they neglected to say was that that was in dog years. Six hours, fourteen dozen times of Tim saying,"Something must be wrong. This download should only take a few minutes.", and many gray hairs later, the programs necessary to install before installing the necessary program finally finished downloading.

Pathetically, Tim and I greeted each finished section with cheers and did the final five countdown with more gusto than when Dick Clark ushered in 2000 (we would have played Prince's Party Like it's 1999 , but, ironically, we still couldn't download my library.)

Next morning, bright and early, I began the download process again. Three hours later...I was wishing it was five o'clock, so I could start drinking! Finally, finally, the new upgrades were complete. With weary anticipation, I plugged in the itouch and...it still wouldn't sync because the computer was reading it as a camera!!!!!!

After I managed to unclench my fist from around the itouch and back away from the window I was seriously thinking of hurtling it through, I once again called the helpline. Oddly, the girl on the other end seemed to see nothing unusual about a nine hour download time, and was sure she could solve the problem. Oh, and she was cheerful as well as optimistic. I hated her from "hello".

After leading me through a series of right and left clicks, the problem was solved (although I did have a brief moment of satisfaction when I clicked on one particular thing, told her what the screen said and, after a brief pause, she said, "Oh. It's not supposed to say that." Another pause. "Maybe I can fix it. I think." Not so optimistic now, are we? he he).

Eventually, it was up and running. Since they do not include an instruction booklet (it is online, of course and only takes thirty-six hours to download:) ) I decided to learn by trial and error. Excited by each new function I discovered during the next week, I showed it off to my fourteen year old nephew, who, after having it in his hands for less then three seconds, was expertly whizzing through the home screen, searching for album covers and connecting to the Internet.

Like I said. Clearly, this device needs a rating: for kids only.

Assault of the Batteries

This week, my parents came to visit for a few days. Since Tim's birthday was yesterday, and my mom's is the second week in December, it was the perfect time to go shopping.

First up, my mom. Her old ipod's battery (first generation) recently died, so we went to the Apple store to upgrade her to something a little more current: the itouch, which is kind of like going from the Model T to a spaceship.

After the sales staff finished laughing themselves silly at her old ipod, and it was packed off to the Smithsonian to sit next to the T-rex, we took her new one home to charge it before I downloaded her music onto it.

Less then two hours later, it was fully charged according to the giant picture of the battery on the screen, but it wouldn't work. At all. It just kept taunting us with the full battery symbol.

I pushed every button (actually, there are only two, but I pushed them many, many, many times in every possible combination.) Nothing. Then my father tried every possible combination. Still nothing. (I grabbed it before my mother could go through the same useless ritual, since I was already on my last nerve and my Valium supply was low.) I even hooked it up to my computer and tried to sync it, hoping I could fool it into actually working. Once again, nothing.

I got on the Apple website and found the same picture listed there (Yeah. That was a huge help. It told me that it was fully charged and to sync it with my computer. Well, duh!), but no explanation of what to do to move on. In other words...nothing.

I tried calling the Applecare helpline, but my cordless phone battery died before I got to speak to a live person. (Great. One device fully charged, one that can't hold a charge, and they are teamed up against me. I soooo love modern technology.)

Long story short (not really, since I am already planning another blog with the whole agonizing ipod story), I ended up going back to the store.

Meanwhile, back at the mall, I had bought Tim a digital camera for his birthday, along with two rechargeable batteries and a charger which we had also plugged in to charge (the kitchen counter was beginning to look like a Radio Shack display case at this point). Excitedly, we watched the charger light up, indicating higher and higher percents of the full charge (we obviously don't get out much if we considered this our evening's entertainment. For New Year's Eve, we might go really crazy and plug in a couple of cell phones to see which one has more bars after an hour:) ).

Anyway, we did manage to tear ourselves away from this fascinating and mysterious display long enough to go have dinner (and a trip to the Apple store), and when we returned...magic! The solid light on the charger indicated a full battery. Popping it into the camera, we turned the camera on and...nothing! We were now two for two. We popped it back into the charger, just to check and see if we had misread the symbol. Nope. Full battery.

Since we didn't know at this point whether it was the battery or the charger at fault (it couldn't possibly be us), we opened the second battery and began to (hopefully) charge it. Two hours, and much cursing later, we had another fully charged battery (maybe). With bated breath, we popped it into the camera and...success at last! Well, one out of three wasn't so bad.

Feeling much abused by all the new battery operated devices from Hell, I finally tumbled into bed somewhere near midnight. Tiredly, I reached for my alarm clock to turn it on. But wait. Something was wrong. It was not 3:30 in the morning, and the year was definitely not 1999. Picking up the clock, I discovered, upon further inspection that it hadn't been Tim trying to mess with me that had screwed up my alarm clock (so I put down the pillow I was planning on beating him with). It was just that the clock had...you guessed it...a low battery! (I swear you can't make this stuff up!)

Needless to say, next year, I am giving them both something that does not require batteries. I can't think of what that might be, but I have a whole year to figure it out.

For Everything...There is a Season?

Our niece's birthday is at the end of September, and this year, she wanted ice skates.

Since the Halloween decorations had been out in the stores from about the middle of August and at least one major department store began decking the halls in mid September, I figured ice skates would be no problem. I was wrong.

Footlocker, Sports Authority, Dick's Sporting Goods, Target, Ski Chalet; they all looked at me like I had lost my mind. Ice skates? In September? Uh uh. But if I wanted flip flops, I was in luck. Still tons of those available, and new shipments arriving daily!

I eventually ended up going online where, thankfully, there is no such animal as "seasonal merchandise".

So now it is November, and the last time I looked, that qualified as the beginning of the winter season. The mornings are getting colder, the days cooler. Perfect time for buying kid's winter coats, right? Wrong again!

The perfect time was apparently last month when it was eighty-five degrees.

After wandering around the first store on our list, unable to find winter gear (shouldn't it be relatively easy to spot it among the shorts and sleeveless tops?) we finally had to ask where they were hiding it.

Giving us one of those pitying "really, you waited this long to buy winter coats" looks, the salesperson directed us to the clearance racks. Thinking this was an aberration, we trundled down the mall corridor to the next store...and once again ended up at the clearance racks.

After visiting about three dozen more children's departments/stores, we were waving the white flag and considering making the suggestion to Tim's brother that they move to Florida. I'm pretty sure Howard Carter didn't have this much trouble discovering King Tut's tomb (although at this point, we were feeling pretty much cursed--either that or we were cursing a lot--is that the same thing?)

All we wanted were a couple of jackets the kids could wear to school. Was that asking so much? It's not like we had our hearts set on matching coats made of carefully blended virgin Tibetan wool from a yak named Edna and double-cocooned silk from a Chinese worm named Dwayne!

Finally, after visiting about three dozen children's departments/stores, we found it...the Holy Grail. One pink coat in our niece's size, and a whopping two in our nephew's (thankfully, neither one of them was pink). Snatching them up, we ran to the register and purchased them before any other poor unfortunate soul who had been lulled into a false sense of complacency by the summer-like temperatures found them.

It was a long, tiring, frustrating day, but I have learned a few valuable lessons from it. One: buy in season (which basically means shopping for winter coats in September/October, bathing suits in January, and back-to-school clothing in July), and two: be out of town next year when it is time to shop for coats!

Celebrity

While visiting friends in Atlanta this past weekend, we played a game called "Celebrity". Each of the six of us wrote the names of fifteen celebrities (living or dead) on pieces of paper which we dropped into a bowl. Teams were then chosen by picking matching numbers out of a pile.

The purpose of the game was to draw papers out of the bowl, and using any descriptions or plays on words, get your partner to correctly identify as many celebrities as they could in one minute.

For better or worse, Tim and I ended up being partners.

This was definitely to our advantage for certain names: "Your cousin Peggy's dead sister (Helen of Troy) (I thought of going for historical context here, but the dead cousin angle was the better bet), or "Your favorite actor" (Danny Kaye) (I actually put that one in, hoping another team would get it and neither person would know who it was--he he.)

Then there were the times when it was clearly a disadvantage to be together. Neither one of us knew who Nora Cross was (yes, Pat, before you can post your anonymous, snarky comment, I know we are old.)

Also, despite my best efforts over the years to educate Tim with regard to the names of each and every star in Hollywood, I knew we were sunk when I pulled out Debbie Allen: "Dance teacher in Fame " (um, what?) "Phyllicia Rashad's sister" (Uh, something Rashad?). It was sort of like the Odd Couple episode where Felix and Oscar go on Password and can't get any of the clues. Needless to say, we ran down the clock on that one, and let's just say I can sympathize with Felix. (Everybody should know that pencils have graphite and not lead.)

Our fellow players were, of course, very helpful pointing out to me afterwards that if I had simply said Blank Does Dallas, Tim would have gotten it right away. (Of course! Why didn't I immediately think of a porn movie for my first clue? I feel so stupid!)

We did pull out a few that surprised even us though, like Tim Horton (we are still both a bit unclear on who he is), but his first name sure made it easier. And Ghengis Khan (I am sure the guys could have come up with a porn reference for this one too, but we chose to take the historical route, although if Tim hadn't gotten it from "an invading Mongol", I'm not sure where I would have gone with it since I don't know his sister's name.)

Overall, it was quite an eclectic mix of names with only a few repeats: Olivia Newton John "Let's Get Physical" (interestingly that seemed to be the first song the guys associated with her, but I'm sure it had nothing to do with the skin tight leotard she wore in the video. Right.)
George Washington "Father of our country" (Even the Canadian got that one right off the bat)And I think Robin Williams may have been mentioned more than once (but, oddly, I don't believe Mork from Ork was even used as a clue. Go figure.)

Tim and I tried our best, but we came in second, for which I blame his lack of Hollywood trivia (This is the man who once had dinner with Norman Lear and had to call me to ask me if he was anybody big. Um, yeah. Kind of.)

Anyway, I am already thinking up names for next time. Oh, and we will definitely be watching more ESPN and E! Television. There may even be a subscription to People Magazine in Tim's future.

Warning! Never Offend the Gods of Travel

Last Thursday, my friend and I made our bi-annual pilgrimage to NYC by train, and in the process, somehow offended the gods of travel.

Oh, things started out well enough. We got to the station early enough to have breakfast, we got two seats together that were not in the quiet car (which was a lucky break for everyone in the quiet car), and we arrived in Midtown with just enough time to have lunch before our 1:00 appointment (clearly, we live in great fear of missing a meal).

I should have known our luck was too good to be true. Maybe we weren't appreciative enough, or maybe we just took it all for granted. Either way, we were about to pay for it.

Going directly to our "usual" Italian restaurant, we discovered that it didn't open until 11:30. Hmmm. This was new. Oh well, no problem. We would just take a little walk around, do some window shopping and and still have time to stuff ourselves before 1:00.

Unfortunately, we soon found out that they considered that 11:30 time more of a guideline than a hard and fast rule. At 11:35, the door was still locked, and the waiters were all sitting at the tables folding napkins. At 11:40, they were unpacking bottles of wine from crates littering the main aisle. Meanwhile, we stood outside, tapping our toes, pointing to our watches and glaring at them through the glass windows, all to no effect. At 11:45, we gave up our intimidation tactics and decided to explore our other options.

Since this was a mostly high end shopping area (ever see Dolce and Gabbana haute couture on someone over one hundred pounds?) there weren't a lot of them. A few doors down, there was the Four Seasons (anyone for a thirty-eight dollar hamburger?), and next to that a sushi place (fifty dollars for a plate of raw fish?). On the other hand, we could go to the take-out place (Yummy. Pre-packaged sandwiches fresh from yesterday!), or how about some chestnuts and hot dogs from the cart on the corner (yes, but what would we tell them at the ER when they wanted to know exactly what had caused the food poisoning?).

While all of this was tempting, we decided to give the Italian place one more chance, and this time, we weren't taking no for an answer. Returning to the restaurant, we banged on the door until one of the waiters (undoubtedly, the one who drew the short straw), grudgingly let us in and seated us at a tiny table in the front window.

After serving us bread and water, he informed us that the regular menu items would not be available for another five to ten minutes, and the specials for at least another ten after that. He then attempted to make his escape. The fool. Did he really think it would be that easy? Apparently, he had never dealt with women suffering from low blood sugar before (hey, it had been almost four whole hours since we had eaten!).

After a quick game of "torture the waiter", we did get our food (which I'm pretty sure they spit on), and made our appointment in time. Then, the gods struck again.

Emerging out onto Fifth Avenue at 4:20, we attempted to hail a cab to take us back to Penn Station for our 5:00 train. Since there were about ten cabs scattering the block waiting at the red light, we thought it would be easy enough. Wrong.

The first cab rolled down his window just enough to refuse us. The second cab pretty much had the same response. Odd. When the third cab inched away from us as we approached, we began looking around for the hidden cameras and Ashton Kutcher.

As the light changed, we decided to walk over a block or two and try our luck there. Coming upon a cab just letting people out, we went to jump in, but the driver yelled something in a language neither of us spoke and took off. Now, it was getting really weird. Maybe we should be looking for a tourism office and bowing down before it, trying to appease the gods instead of hailing cabs. The next cab didn't even slow down, but I think it veered toward us a bit before zooming off.

This was pretty much the pattern for the next twenty-two blocks until we reached the station at 4:50, hot, sweaty and a little bit cranky from doing the two minute mile, only to discover a long line of cabs happily letting people out and picking new people up as though it were the most normal thing in the world.

Fortunately, we made our train, but the gods were not through with torturing us yet. The only two seats together were at a table for four with an older gentleman who alternated between telling us jokes even older than he was (and I'm guessing he entertained the troops at Valley Forge with the same jokes) and paying us what I'm sure he considered to be compliments, but which would probably get him sued in the workplace.

By the time we realized what we were dealing with, every available seat on the train was taken (don't think we didn't look), and, of course, he stayed on until the very end of the line.

I'm still not sure what we did wrong, but next time, I'm not taking any chances. I am going to find the nearest tourism office to Penn Station and pay a visit before trying to eat or catch a cab. Maybe I'll even buy one of those I love New York T-shirts or baseball caps just to be on the safe side.

Happy Halloween

Halloween (my feast day as Tim calls it) is here, so, of course, I've decorated the house to within an inch of its life.

I've got every table (and a few couches) shrouded in black, a coven of witches, a truckload of pumpkins, and a platoon of skeletons scattered throughout the entire downstairs, not to mention a (fake) black cat or two, and my Edgar Allen Poe raven perched on top of the grandfather clock in the living room overlooking the "cemetery" in the fireplace. Welcome to 13 13 Mockingbird Lane!

Every year, when the decorations come out, Tim comes home that night, looks around with utter disgust, shakes his head and proclaims,"Well, the Great Pumpkin has crapped all over here again." It's our own little Hallmark moment.

And every year, I add or replace something to make it better or creepier (okay, partly to make it better, partly to mess with Tim's mind). And mostly, the reaction to each new addition is a grunt or roll of the eyes and a quick mental calculation of how many more days are left in the Halloween season. (Although, with the stores starting it earlier and earlier each year, I think I may actually have seen him choke back a sob the last year or two.)

This year though, I got a little more reaction than usual. Not once, but twice.

About a month ago, I was at the craft store where they were having a sale on decorative scarecrows. Perfect. The ones in my outdoor display (you didn't seriously think I limited myself to indoors, did you?) were several years old and starting to look like they had tangled with the Wicked Witch's flying monkeys and lost (don't you just hate it when that happens?). Since we were having the work done in the basement, and I couldn't get to my Halloween boxes, I decided to store them temporarily in the dining room on the floor. Laying them down, one on top of the other, out of sight, I put them out of my mind.

About three evenings later, Tim was on the phone and, as is his habit, wandering around the house while talking. The next thing I knew, he was standing next to me demanding to know what I thought I was doing. (I believe my answer was, "Um. The dishes?" with just the right touch of sarcasm.)

After an equally sarcastic response back, which I can't repeat here, he motioned to the dining room and babbled something about "bodies". Apparently, he had entered the darkened room and practically stumbled over my life size (did I forget to mention that?) scarecrows, which gave him quite a start and the person on the other end of the phone a punctured eardrum. ( What exactly does he think I do when he's not here? Perhaps he believed I took Alicia's comment about Arsenic and Old Lace seriously, and decided to start serving elderly men a glass of Elderberry wine in the afternoons.)

Anyway, after his heart rate returned to normal, and I decided to be amused rather than offended (good to know what your spouse of twenty years thinks you are capable of), we had a good laugh. And I got another one just last week.

This time, it was a spider that did him in. While out looking for more pumpkins (You can never have too many big, orange vegetables hanging around. Check with Martha Stewart. Really.) I came across these large metal spiders attached to thin chains for hanging. And they were on sale. Perfect. Three spiders, three lamps with shades just crying out for decorations in the living room. It was destiny.

A few hours later, I happened to be standing in the kitchen when Tim walked through the front door, and, out of the corner of his eye saw one of my new decorations hanging from the lamp about a foot to his left. With a leap that would have done Barishnikov proud, and the reflexes of a trained athlete, he started to swing his briefcase toward the lamp.

It was like watching one of those movies where they put everything in slow motion and you can hear someone (me) shouting, "Noooooooo!", but you know what the disastrous end result is going to be anyway.

Thankfully, he realized that the spider was only a decoration while his assault weapon was still a few inches away from my Waterford lamp and managed to pull back at the last minute(perhaps a bit of an overreaction?). This time, it was my heart rate that needed to return to normal.

Maybe next year, I'll stick with things that are a little less life-like for both our sakes.

I See Naked People

And speaking of things you don't need to see....

Tim has an uncanny ability to see naked people (and find great parking spaces, though fortunately for our car, not at the same time.)

This talent revealed itself early in our marriage when he was in the laundry room of our first apartment building. A young woman wearing a tube top (clearly, we have been married a long time) was standing opposite him shaking her laundry out of its bag and into the washer...a little too vigorously. On about the third shake, the final bit of laundry dropped down, and so did her top.

This sighting was followed a few months later by a rooftop visit to avoid the intense heat in our apartment due to brainless management and a prolonged summer. While trying to catch a breeze, Tim also caught a good look at a guy in his apartment trying to beat the heat another way (apparently, he didn't take into consideration the L-shape of the building or lack of shades when he came up with this little brainstorm).

Someone else who didn't consider building shape was the couple who decided to sleep out on the balcony, naked, because, since the guy had roommates, doing so in his room might have proved embarrassing. (We actually happened to know this guy, so Tim took great delight in calling down and waking them up, then watching the ensuing scramble.)

After we moved out of the apparent nudist colony we were living in, the sightings came less frequently, but they did not stop.

While out at dinner one night, Tim's chair faced a window, which faced an apartment building, which contained a naked couple who owned sheer curtains, but no shades. Needless to say, the woman playing the piano was no competition for Tim's attention compared to the floor show across the way.

And speaking of shows, we used to have neighbors across the street who, well, provided a nightly one. They were a free-spirited couple that, despite living there a few years, still didn't have shades (have none of these people ever heard of Next Day Blinds?!? How about an old sheet or even wax paper? This isn't rocket science!). So when Tim would be coming in late from work, there was a strong possibility that he would catch the second show. (Rated PG 13--according to the neighbors on either side, the late show had an R rating at least)

And then there are the foreign naked people....

Like the time we were on a cruise and mistakenly ended up on a clothing optional beach (I guess the huge billboard behind our chairs should have clued us in, but somehow we missed it and were surprised by all the flesh-colored bathing suits until we realized they were birthday suits.)

Or the time in Paris when we were sitting at a little cafe on the left bank and a guy staying at the small hotel on the opposite corner decided to treat everyone to a strip show from his balcony (He had obviously had too much to drink, and we had not had nearly enough.). There are definitely some things better left to the imagination, like the amount of body waxing someone has had done.)

But, at the beach in Cannes, the naked people got their ultimate revenge on Tim.

It wasn't the lady selling bathing suits on the beach who, in her eagerness to display her wares for Tim, displayed, well, her wares for Tim when she whipped off one suit to put on another.

And it certainly wasn't the eighteen year old Sports Illustrated model who used the beach shower (topless, of course) to wash off all that pesky, clinging sand about three feet from his chair.

No, it was the last day when we were out on the pier and an older woman (and by older, I mean somewhere between ninety and death) was given the chair directly in front of Tim. After setting down her bag, she nonchalantly removed her turquoise one-piece to reveal a bright yellow thong!

As it this was not enough, she then proceeded to arrange her chair, towel, etc. for a good fifteen minutes (or at least until Tim was uncontrollably weeping, "Make it stop!").

Meanwhile, his sisters and I , who had been forced to listen to him extol the virtues of the eighteen year old the previous night at dinner (FYI, forty-something women do not want to hear how, at eighteen, everything is "in place") couldn't have been more pleased with his punishment.

Finally, here was incontrovertible proof that God was on my side.

Love is in the Air

It must be the unusually warm weather we've been having lately, but I have been seeing a lot more of some people than I ever wanted to see.

Walking my sister-in-law's dog one afternoon (Murray), I decided to take the path through the park. As we approached from the sidewalk on the other side of the batting cages, I spotted a little, white dog sitting by a bench off the path.

As we got closer, I realized there was a guy kneeling on the bench with his back to me. Odd. Why would someone kneel on the bench? Wait a minute...why did he have four legs, two facing forward and two facing backward?

Before this little fact completely registered, the guy (more like sixteen year old kid) became alerted to our approach and sprang up off the bench (and the sixteen year old girl under him) like an Olympic gymnast off a pommel horse. (His technique was a little sloppy, but I gave him a 9.5 for the dismount overall.)

Clothing was pushed and pulled frantically back into place, buttons were buttoned, zippers were zipped...it was like watching the lightening round of some adult game show from Sweden.

Since it was too late to turn around, I decided to pretend I hadn't seen anything and tried to pass them without making eye contact.

I would have made it too, if the dog (naturally, a female) hadn't trotted on over to greet Murray, who is fixed (or broken as Tim likes to say) and try to show him what had been going on...firsthand.

It was not pretty, and I'm not sure whose face was reddest(and I'm including Murray. Who knew dogs could look that shocked?) by the time we, er, separated them.

Several nights later, Tim, Rose (his sister) and I went out to dinner at a little Italian place. Since it was such a nice night, we were seated on the patio right in front of the window at one end of the bar.

We had just ordered when Rose began choking on her iced tea and gesturing toward the bar where a couple sat with their backs to us. (Actually, come to think of it, the expression on her face was pretty close to the one on Murray's when little Fifi decided to show him what he was missing.)

Tim and I turned to see the guy (not sixteen) rubbing the woman's back...and backside. Oh Goody. Dinner theater.

As if it couldn't get worse, he suddenly reached up and unscrewed the light above them obviously thinking the darkness would conceal his next move (which it did from everybody but us unfortunately).

His hand slowly began an upward journey, taking her shirt with it, while her hand disappeared somewhere I don't even want to think about!

Part of me couldn't tear my eyes away, like when you see a horrible accident and you know you shouldn't slow down and stare, but you just can't help yourself. And the other part of me wanted to throw my hands up in front of my face and shriek, "My eyes. My eyes!"

At any rate, ten minutes later, we had learned three things: 1. her bra and panties matched, 2. art may only imitate real life, but it sure is better looking on HBO with George Clooney and Julia Roberts, and 3. some people are not capable of being embarrassed...even when they should be.

They say that things come in threes, and sure enough, when I was walking Murray again this afternoon, there it was...young love on the same park bench.

This time, I decided to turn around and head directly back to the safety of Rose's apartment and Dr. Phil. With any luck, maybe the topic on his show would be overcoming severe trauma.

Adventures at Home Depot

Actually, anonymous (Pat), I already thought of Home Depot......

After looking at more tile than I ever really wanted to see in my lifetime (do they really need twenty shades of white?), I decided to check out Home Depot, which turned out to be half the price, but ten times the aggravation (who would have thought that was possible?).

Once there, I headed right for the tile section where I quickly selected my tile (brown). Now, I just needed some help with how many boxes...Hmmm. Except for three other do-it-yourselfers, who were also wandering around with dazed looks on their faces, there was no one to help.

After roaming around the area for a bit, I finally spotted two guys in orange vests who were next door in the kitchen section, chatting about football. Barely pausing in their discussion to acknowledge my presence, they told me that they didn't know anything about tile (why would anyone working in the kitchen section know anything about tile?) and told me to go see the woman at the desk up in the carpeting department. Of course...carpeting, tiles, it's all the same thing. Why didn't I think of that myself?

Mildly irked, I approached the desk where there was indeed a woman...sitting and eating popcorn with another guy...who saw me coming and called out, "I'm with someone. I can't help you."

Okaaaay. Biting back the dozen or so things I really wanted to say, I asked her if there was someone else who might be able to (like, I don't know, and employee who actually showed up to work? -- or maybe I should have offered to go get the butter and find better seats before the movie started).

Obviously not pleased that I wouldn't just go away (I think the folded arms, narrowed eyes, flaring nostrils and tapping foot gave her a clue), she reluctantly paged someone to meet me back in the tile section.

Ten minutes of mentally composing my speech for the store manager later, a guy wandered back, looked around and started to leave. The fool. Did he think he could escape that easily? After practically pinning him to the shelves with my cart to prevent his escape, he admitted that he had been sent by the woman, but told that it was a guy that needed help.

A guy !!! Okay, the store manager was definitely hearing about this. By the way, he worked in lighting, so he knew nothing about tile either, and didn't really know why she paged him. Oh, and good luck finding the store manager. He personally hadn't seen him since he'd been hired years ago. As a matter of fact, most of the employees were sure that the manager was really only an urban myth.

After talking me down from the ceiling, he told me that, despite everything, he would help me, if I didn't mind the fact that he had no clue what he was doing. Or, he could page someone else.... Fearing that my nerves couldn't take it, and knowing that the nearest Lowes was in the next state, I agreed to let him try.

Twenty minutes of the most excruciatingly convoluted calculations followed. Einstein did less figuring to come up with his theory of relativity. But at last I had eight boxes of tile loaded into my cart and the promise that I could return any unused portion (like that was worth anything!). To say the guy sprinted away from me down the aisle would be to underplay how fast he actually was going, but if there had been an Olympic scout in the area.......

Next came the paint. Again, the color was selected in mere minutes, but again, no one was at the paint desk. Hmmm. Where would I go for paint? The garden department perhaps? How about Hardware? By now, my patience had completely evaporated (okay, so it had done so half an hour earlier), and I was not in the mood to try and figure out their little system. Grabbing a cashier (I figured they were easy prey being trapped behind the register), I growled, "Help in paint. Now!"

Giving me the same look you see in horror movies when someone realizes that there actually are such things as vampires and werewolves (right before they get their throat torn out), the girl backed away and paged someone. This time, however, I stayed with her until the person showed up.

Returning to the paint department, I was hailed as a hero by the other poor souls waiting there. Even at the register a few minutes later, I had people asking me how long it had taken me to accomplish my mission. That they were not surprised when I replied that I had been twenty years old when I came there pretty much sums up the Home Depot experience.

So, yes, Pat. I went to Home Depot, and it was a completely different experience than I had at the design center (which, by the way, is also a Home Depot). Surprise!

The Devil is in the Details

So Plan C (or B.5) was finally underway...sort of.

We had decided where the walls and the door would be (unfortunately, they were two separate things) so all that was left now was the details: color of paint, tiles for the floor, color of grout. The little things that cause me to break out in hives and have sleepless nights.

First things first...the tile for the floor and the cabinets. For that, I paid a visit to a home design center. And this is where my migraine began.

Foolishly, I imagined that designing the shape of the actual room and placement of the door had been the hard part. Not even close. It was nothing compared to the nightmare that awaited me here.

The first challenge was getting the right kind of cabinets. It started out innocuously enough. I explained what I wanted to the woman at the custom cabinet desk (mostly because it was the first desk I saw that was being manned). Twice. Finally, she seemed to get a handle on what I was saying...and referred me to the kitchen department.

Saleslady: So you are designing a kitchen.
Me: Not exactly a kitchen. A small basement room with our spare refrigerator.
SL: And what else?
Me: Nothing. I just need some cabinets and shelves on either side for storage.
SL: So it's a kitchen.
Me: Okay.
SL: What else is there besides the fridge? What is the purpose of the room?
Me: To hold the spare fridge and extra dishes.
SL: But what are you using the room for?
Me: Nothing specific. It's just a room for the fridge and extra dishes.
SL: But what will you be doing in the room?
Me: I don't know. Walking through it. Getting stuff out of the fridge. Storing extra dishes.
SL: So, it's not really a kitchen.
Me: No. Again, it's just a small room for the extra fridge and storage.
SL: So the purpose of the room is what? What will you be doing in it?

Wait. Was I Abbot or Costello here? Which one of us was supposed to say, "third base!"?

After a few more minutes of this routine, it was decided that what I really needed was a different department (or at least a different sales associate), so I was taken back over to the custom cabinet desk. Uh oh. This didn't look good.

Original Saleslady: So what is the purpose of this room?

I was not going through this again. Gritting my teeth(or what was left of them after grinding them for the last fifteen minutes), I explained in words of one syllable that there was no purpose to the room. It was not a kitchen, a bathroom, a mudroom, a bedroom, a sundeck, a living room or a dining room. I was building a room with no definite purpose, or use, except to hide the junk that was cluttering the rest of my basement, just for the fun of it. No one, at any time, in the history of the world, would be in this room for any reason whatsoever. Forget the fridge, forget the dishes, forget everything except that I wanted cabinets and shelves against one wall. Now, were they going to be able to help me or should I give the bathroom department a shot at raising my blood pressure next?

SL: Oh, so you just want cabinets and shelves for storage, with your fridge in the middle. Like a wall unit or built-ins in a kitchen?
Me: Yes! (finally)
SL: Oh, we can't do that here. I have to send someone out to your house to measure and draw up a plan. How is next Monday? You can choose the wood and the finish from the samples he'll bring. And you are all here because...???

Okay, I was not going to leap across the desk and strangle her no matter how badly I wanted to. Besides, I could almost hear how it would play out in court: But what was the purpose of the room? I would end up in jail for sure after hurdling the table to get to the judge.

Mentally counting to one thousand (ten was not nearly enough), and walking around the store to try and lower my blood pressure to the medium risk stroke range, I headed over to the tile section.

Looking at the eight million styles, colors and types, I went to the desk to ask for some help (apparently, I hadn't learned my lesson. Either that, or I was a glutton for punishment). Once again, it started off fine. The guy there explained that there were many different types of tiles: porcelain, ceramic, terra cotta. Or maybe what I really wanted was a wood floor. It all depended on the purpose of the room........

Plan B

Alicia, thanks for sacrificing, I mean offering John, but I've already moved on to Plan B, which went something like this.....

How about if we close off the front part of the basement near the stairs and make a room with our second refrigerator, some cabinets, and a few shelves. Oh, and we'll need a door so that we can access the rest of the basement. Much simpler, and we don't have to worry about disturbing whatever is living behind wall number one.

It would be a small room, and no pool table, but hey, it would be better than nothing. It was suggested by Tim (actually,he begged) that perhaps we should just put bigger shelves or cabinets up all around the basement and be done with it, but this was my project, and I wanted to make it as complicated as possible. Anyway, his plan did not take into account the many oversize floral arrangements, plant stands, Christmas trees(two), styrofoam cemetery and 6ft. Halloween coffin (it's only cardboard and nobody is actually in it...yet). No, all of this truly deserved a room of its own.

I sat down with pen and paper and began to draw. And then inspiration struck. Since it was such a small room, it seemed a shame to take up almost an entire wall with a door. It would totally throw off the feng shui. There would be too much yin and not enough yang. How about...if the door....was hidden?! Oh yeah. One side of the shelves could actually be built on the front of the door with a hidden latch, and then...Abbracadabbra!..it would swing open to reveal a secret room (filled with junk, yes, but that's beside the point)!

Excited,I spent the next few days measuring and designing and annoying everyone I know with detailed (and animated) explanations (I suspect Tim was trying to get a Ritalin prescription filled behind my back). Design school? Architecture degree? Those were for people without vision. I was beyond all of that. I was a creative genius! (Besides, I saw this done once in a house we visited, so I know it was possible.)

Pleased with myself and the clever use of space (could my own show on HGTV be far off?), I presented my grand plan to the man who would make it all happen ( a.k.a. not Tim).

Once again, I got a lot of head shaking (but at least there wasn't a flashlight involved this time, so I counted it as progress), and long suffering looks. Yes (sigh, eye roll), it was possible, but the door would have to be bigger and thicker than standard size to hold the weight of the shelves and the God-only-knows-what that I might decide to put on them.

Oh, and it would have to open inward because of the air duct that was lower than the rest of the ceiling, and the shelves couldn't be too deep because, otherwise, they would block the opening, and the door could only open to the left because of a support pole that was in the way, and then we couldn't have shelves behind it...and...and....

I don't know how or when, but Tim had obviously gotten to him.

Had Frank Lloyd Wright had this much difficulty when he designed Falling Waters? Had someone moaned and groaned at Thomas Jefferson when he designed all the nifty little devices at Monticello?

After several more attempts to work out my brilliant plan, I had to admit defeat and settle for a regular old set of shelves and a normal, unimaginative door. Clearly, whoever had designed the basement sixty years ago had not taken into consideration any future plans for having it featured in Architectural Digest.

So, Plan C is was. Now to choose the tile, paint and lights...

The Big Plan

I have decided yo have some work done in our basement. Presently, it looks like a prison cell for holiday decorations gone bad. The floor is gray concrete, the walls white cinder block with a few narrow shelves and box after box of holiday creations (orange and black for Halloween, red and green for Christmas - yes, there is an order to my chaos) stacked two deep along almost every wall.

There are two small transom windows set up high which offer a lovely view of the side yard with its scorched grass. They have been painted shut for about thirty years and do have bars across them (courtesy of the alarm company). Occasionally, we get those jumping crickets, but fortunately, the spiders that live down there seem to keep that population under control.

Since our last big project was two years ago and the memories have begun to fade (well, not so much fade as been repressed) I decided it was time to tackle the final frontier, the only space in the house that we haven't redone (which is proof that I have waaaay too much time on my hands and need to get a real job!).

I say "I" because Tim is having no part of this. Just the mention of tile, paint, and lighting fixtures is enough to have his eyes glazing over. Talk about placement of a door, and he is headed for the nearest one as though the house were on fire. Whenever I do manage to corner him and ask his opinion on anything, I get the same answer every time: Let's move. It will be less aggravation!!!

And so, left to my own devices, I made a plan, and a darn fine one it was too, if I do say so myself.

Two years ago, one of the guys who was running some wire in the crawlspace behind the shelves happened to mention that there was actually an entire room back there that was filled with dirt and had never been dug out. This got me to thinking (thinking, obsessing, potato, potauto). What if we broke through the wall and put all the junk into this other room? Then, we could finish off the basement and have a really neat rec room with a bar and maybe a pool table (or at least that is what I told Tim. I was actually thinking more along the lines of a chick room, but, hey, all's fair in love and home design).

Naturally, I tried to talk Tim into crawling around back there and scoping it out for me, but he had some silly objection to snakes and undead, so the most I could do was get him to shine a flashlight around through the three foot opening and mutter, "Let's move." Not helpful.

When my father came for a visit, I tried to coax him to take a look-see but, once again, there was a lot of flashlight waving and head shaking, but no actual progress on determining the dimensions of the mystery room. Since he is over seventy, I let him slide on this out of the goodness of my heart.

Finally, I got the guy who had done our bathroom to come out to the house and take a look. At last, here was someone who would brave the world of the unknown! Wrong again. I had a brief moment of hope when he actually stuck his head through the opening, but then the flashlight came out and well...

He did, however, determine that it was big enough to hold all my stuff, and said he could dig out the room and cut through the wall to make a door. At least that is what he told me.

His face and tone of voice told another story. They clearly said, "Lady, you are insane. Do you know how much work it would be to haul all of that dirt out, bucket by bucket and pass it through those windows by hand???? Not to mention cutting through a cinder block wall, pouring a concrete floor, and don't even get me started on the possibility that the foundation doesn't go down further than three feet over there and we'd need to build a retaining wall!!!

Okay, so maybe this wasn't the best way to go. Perhaps it was time to come up with Plan B

Shop Till You Drop

I love to shop. Anywhere, anytime, for anything. But not in China.

Here, the rules of engagement are simple: You enter a store and stroll through the aisles where some lovely muzak is playing. Maybe someone offers to help you, or even bring you a soda. You choose an item (or thirty), select the correct size (S,M,L or XL --depending on how the diet is going), and pay what the tag tells you (unless it is on sale, and really, why buy something if it's not?) It's all very simple, very civilized.

Not in China.

There, you have to fight your way through a teeming mass of street vultures, er vendors, just to get to the store ("Hey lady, you want T-shirt, DVD, postcards?). Then, once inside, you fall prey to the pack of salespeople waiting to pounce upon the next victim. The hunter has become the hunted. (Muzak? who can hear anything except, "buy, buy, buy"?)

You wander, dazed, from stand to stand where everyone is selling the exact same things ("No, really, these are real pearls and diamonds for five dollars. See, I can grind them under my heel and they don't break." Yeah, always the mark of fine jewelry. I understand that's how De Beers tests their diamonds.)

If you pause or make eye contact, they have you and it's all over.

Suddenly, you find yourself surrounded by an endless sea of merchandise. You like rings? They have rings. Silver, Gold, Platinum(aluminum, painted aluminum, tin). Tiffany, Cartier, Harry Winston. (Riiiight) Watches? Rolex, Tag, Patek. (all made of lead) Trays and cases and boxes of whatever you want, or think you want, magically appear. Soon, you are buried under an avalanche of fakes, er genuine imitations.

What size do you want? XL,XXL, or XXXL? (Don't even think of looking at S, M, or L unless you make a supermodel look fat or are six years old. Not a real ego boosting experience when they refer you to the men's section because they don't have anything large enough to fit you in women's. The Chinese are seriously tiny compared to us huge, hulking Americans.)

Finally, desperate to escape, you make your selection. Then, the real fun begins.

They tell you it costs $400. It doesn't matter what it is, everything costs $400. (Of course, in Chinese money, this is eighty million dollars, and you have to do the math in your head, which is always fun.) You offer $1.

They pull at their hair, beat their chests, gnash their teeth...and drop the price to $300. You offer $2.

They tell you how pretty you are. How sweet you are. How smart you are. How that ring/watch/shirt was made for you, and only you because no one else would look good in it...and drop the price to $200. You offer $3.

By the way, this is all conducted via calculator. They enter their price, you hit clear and enter your price, they hit clear...and so on, and so on, and so on...Try that at Neiman Marcus.

Anyway, this goes on for some time. You start to walk away, they follow you, grab you, all but body tackle you. They swear you are killing them...slowly.

Finally, you pay $5-$10 for something that is worth fifty cents, and you are free -- sort of. You still have to fight your way back to the door and the bag you are holding labels you an easy mark.

When you do finally escape, exhausted, you sort through your haul only to find that, caught up in the moment, you now own an enormous pile of junk.

However, now that you've refined your bargaining skills, you are ready to go home and buy that used car you've been looking at for $5.

Here a Squat, There a Squat, Everywhere a Squat

There is a reason I don't go camping (actually, there are many, many reasons). But a really big one is that I can't squat behind a tree. Seriously, I think I am missing the squatting gene. Maybe, like some other diseases, it skips a generation, or maybe I was switched at birth with a member of the Royal family...yeah, that's it. (I mean, can you imagine HRH Liz hanging with Yogi, looking for a nice, leafy shrub to duck behind?)

Whatever the reason, China should not be on your top ten list of places to visit if you don't squat. Personally, I think their flag should be a toilet with a red line through it instead of a yellow star(s)! Much more helpful.

You had to squat at the wall, the palace, the Forbidden city, and most restaurants. The temples, the terra cotta soldiers site, even the airport all had squat toilets (picture a seat set into the floor with footprint guides on either side). Apparently, everything really is made in China except for toilets.

For someone who has managed to avoid squatting her whole life (and this includes two summers at camp) this was not good. And, as if the situation wasn't bad enough, the smell in these places was blinding! Imagine the elephant cage where the entire herd has been given Metamucil filled bran muffins on a ninety degree day and the air conditioning is broken. That would be an improvement.

To make matters worse, if, by some minor miracle, you did manage to get lucky and behind door number one was an actual toilet...surprise, no paper! I don't mean they ran out, I mean no paper. Ever. Not even a holder. Most of us, fortunately, had been forewarned and came prepared for just such an event. What we were not prepared for was the fact that you did not dispose of your paper in the toilet, but in the wastebasket next to it. (There's a job people are standing in line for!)

You didn't dare do otherwise and clog the only toilet for miles around that wasn't floor level or the sixty people in line behind you(all Americans of course) would have beaten you to death with their purse sized packs of Kleenex and bottles of anti-bacterial gel.

Now, since I don't squat (I was not about to break a life-long record), I didn't drink much during the day (to heck with worrying about germs and parasites, I was more worried about my shoes). Never was I so happy to see the hotel at the end of the day. Tim quickly got used to being second in my affections to a hunk of porcelain. He understood completely when I rushed past his outstretched arms to go embrace the toilet instead.

The hotel staff also took it in stride. They simply unloaded a case of water onto my bedside table every night and placed the recycling bin for the hotel outside our door. Either I am not the first person to ever try and rehydrate at night, or they suspected we were harboring a camel.

After a week of opening doors only to quickly shut them again, I decided it was better to be safe than sorry. Before getting on the plane for the return flight home, I did check out the bathroom situation. You can't be too careful, and thirteen and a half hours is a long time to wait for a seat.

The Great Workout...I Mean Wall

You can't go to China without visiting the Great Wall--once.

Arriving in Badaling (insert your own Sopranos joke here), we got off the bus and proceeded to run the gauntlet of vendors selling everything from watches with Mao frantically saluting every second to "mag-a-nets" the size of the wall itself to "genuine imitation" (I swear they actually said this) purses, clothing, jewelry, etc. And they did not want to take "no" for an answer.

As if this wasn't daunting enough, we then passed through a short, single lane tunnel competing for space with cars and buses who all seemed to be playing a game called "pick off the tourists" (personal safety is apparently not a big issue for the Chinese people) to climb the steps that led to the Great Wall.

Our guide explained that if we went left on the wall, we were following in the footsteps of Nixon and other great (?) world leaders. In fact, all eighty gazillion Chinese people went left when they came to visit. If we went right, we were a bunch of weak little American sissies who needed our mommies to wipe our noses.

Naturally, since it was a matter of national pride, we all headed left and, after about ten minutes of foolish bravado and excruciating pain, we realized we should have wimped out and gone right and to heck with being macho (Meanwhile, all the Chinese people who, in actual fact, go right were having a good laugh at our expense!).

The first incline really wasn't too bad. It was only at about a mere forty-five degrees. Even the first flight of steps wasn't too bad. There were only two dozen that randomly ranged from two inches to twelve inches in height. It was the second through 142nd inclines and flights of stairs that did us in, where the incline increased to ninety degrees and the steps became the stuff of nightmares. Oh, and did I mention that the only railing was about six inches off the ground, so you couldn't even pull yourself up? I hadn't realized that they had consulted with the Marquis de Sade when building the wall.

Except for a few fitness freaks of nature, we pretty much dropped like flies. At each and every plateau, we found someone waving the white flag and trying not to cry like a baby. This thing would have brought Jack LaLane to his knees! Most of us tried to push on to the fourth tower and end of the section, but we were just kidding ourselves. Oh sure, maybe if we'd had two weeks, a Sherpa and a system of pulleys and levers.....maybe. But an hour to get up, down and back to the bus???

We tried to make the most of it though, stopping to admire the scenery and take photos, but it was really all a cover. What we were actually doing was gasping for breath and surreptitiously checking for signs of heart attack and stroke.

Meanwhile, an eighty-year-old Chinese man with a cane passed us by around the third tower as though he was merely out for his daily constitutional around the block. To add insult to injury, when you finally did drag yourself up to the next tower or plateau, there were vendors waiting for you with tables and trays and cases full of more "genuine imitations", T-shirts and paintings.

I like to imagine that they are air-lifted up to work each day since I could barely drag myself up that far. Either that or they simply live up there, coming down to visit the family on holidays and replenish their supplies. Any other explanation is unacceptable in my fantasy land. You almost want to buy their stuff just to applaud their stamina. (Although if they were selling oxygen tanks, they could make a killing).

Coming down was only slightly less traumatic than going up. First of all, the vendors knew this was their last shot (forever), so they began chasing us and pushing their wares in our faces, rapidly dropping their prices ($60...okay $30). Fabulous. The wall wasn't enough of a challenge, now we had a human obstacle course to maneuver around.

Stairs that had seemed impossibly steep on the way up now looked like ladders that you were somehow supposed to go down forwards, without taking out the two hundred other people struggling to climb up.

They told up that when the men building the wall died, they were simply buried in the wall (we suspect they died because they wanted to). It made us wonder if the renovated sections might not be filled with hapless tourists who decided to turn left instead of right!

Chicken, Dumplings and Goldfish

You know you're in trouble when you visit a country that has a KFC on every corner which the locals consider "five star dining at one star prices", and it is the go-to-place for the all important first date.

Our first night in Xi'an (she-an), Beth and I ate at House O'Dumplings (a.k.a. Defachang Restaurant) which boasted 180 different kinds of dumplings shaped like everything from porky pig to Buddha.

The meal started innocently enough with four small appetizer dishes of tofu, peanuts, beans and corn. Then they brought four steamer trays of dumplings...then four more trays...and four more after that. Would the madness never end?!

There were walnut dumplings (China is not the place you want to be if you have a nut allergy), fried rice dumplings, spinach dumplings, chicken, beef and pork dumplings (remind anyone else of Forest Gump?) and some with fillings we could only guess at, but which we suspected might contain the turtle that had been swimming in the tank by the reception desk. Of course they swore that anything unidentifiable was chicken, but that turtle had looked scared. Real scared. Like he knew something we didn't.

The steamed dumplings courses were followed by, surprise...dumpling soup! It was only when the watermelon came (the Chinese idea of dessert...have they never heard of Entemen's or Pepperidge Farm?) that we knew were were finally saved from the relentless parade of dumplings. (FYI, you do not want to go to bed too soon after eating your body weight in dumplings. It is not pretty)

Our first meal in Beijing, at a place called the Green T, proved just as interesting, but for different reasons. Walking through floor to ceiling white curtains which billowed constantly despite the fact that there was no breeze, we found ourselves transported to a black and white version of Hogworts where candles hung in midair over long tables whose chairs had backs reaching halfway to the twenty foot ceiling and purple boa feather pillows. Flute music was provided by a young woman perched atop of what looked like an ice sculpture set on top of the bar. (for someone who turns on their heated car seat in July, my bottom grew numb just looking at her!)

Even the bathrooms provided entertainment for us with clear glass walls that magically clouded up as you entered("okay, you stand our here and yell when you can't see me any more." --Tim can kiss that ambassadorship good-bye!) and stalls completely lined with mirrors--inside. ( I definitely could have done with a little less entertainment there.)

As for the food, we all steered clear of anything that sounded suspicious including the green chicken and something that still had feet and various innards. We found that nothing was completely safe, however, when the woman sitting next to me ordered a vegetarian dish only to have it served with a wineglass containing a live goldfish. We weren't sure if he was a garnish or for downing like a chaser, but we named him Larry and debated flushing him to freedom. (He actually looked even more scared than the turtle, and I think I saw him mouthing,"Help me!", at one point during dinner)

After several more days of meals involving many courses of things that may have previously barked or meowed (and not a fortune cookie or piece of chocolate in sight), we celebrated our last night in China with a trip to (another) funky restaurant that looked like it had been designed by the Picasso, Poe and Addams Family firm. (This time, the floor to ceiling bathroom mirrors were tinged green. And I thought the clear glass was bad?).

Despite things like Shark lip soup (who knew Jaws had lips?) and oysters the size of my head, (can you say mutant, boys and girls?) the meal was good. All eighteen courses (How do these people not weigh 1000 lbs.?) Even the watermelon dessert.

An Auspicious Start

Our trip to China had finally begun.
Turns out my travelling companion, Beth (our friend who works with Tim), is just as anal as I am, so we were at the airport way early. There were maybe six people in line and security was a breeze, plus they were able to check our bags all the way through to our final distination (we we landed in Beijing, and had to change planes to get to Xi'an to see the terra-cotta soldiers). Could life get any better?

Since we were there so early, we decided to celebrate with coffee at a cafe across from the gate, a major decision for someone who normally sits at the gate anxiously watching every move made by the gate aagents, knowing that the minute I leave, even to go to the bathroom everyone will be hustled aboard and the flight will take off without me (paging Dr. Freud). Either that or all the overhead storage space will be taken, which is worse.

So there we sat, sipping and chatting when we looked up and realized that, oh no, our flight was boarding (early) and the waiting area had completely emptied out (who's crazy now, huh?).

First to arrive, last to board. Not good for someone who makes the Rainman look like a fly-by-the-seat-of-your-pants kind of guy. Especially when it takes me a good fifteen minutes once I'm actually in the seat to perform my pre-flight checklist (book, ipod, sudoku, blanket, pillow...the list goes on and on and that's just for a two hour domestic flight).

As if it wasn't bad enough, somehow I handed over the wrong ticket which they put through the machine and ripped in half (how was I going to explain that sixteen hours later to someone who spoke Chinese?). Then, I couldn't free my passport holder from the pouch inside my bag, or the passport from the holder. I also managed to get tangled up in my jacket after dropping it twice. This was beyond Lucy. I had become Jerry Lewis! Of course, Beth was a great help, doubled over laughing.

Once on the plane, the comedy of errors continued. Trying to lug my bags up the narrow stairs to the second level (and by bags I mean a suitcase I could live out of for several weeks and a "purse" that could house a family of four -- packing light to me meanns not bringing my out of season clothes) was like trying to wrestle an alligator while juggling jello.

At this point, my jacket was wrapped around my neck and my passport and boarding pass were clenched in my teeth. Concerned for the safety of my fellow passengers and possible personal injury lawsuits, the flight attendant relieved me of my suitcase at the top of the stairs.

Now all I had to do was unpack and settle into what would be my home for the next thirteen and a half hours. Refusing a pre-flight glass of OJ, I leaned forward to open my bag, not realizing that my seatmate had decided that a nice glass of juice would hit the spot and was reaching for it behind my back. Unfortunately, I chose that moment to sit back rather abruptly and the juice hit the spot allright. It hit several on my shirt, my chair, my pillow....
The rest of the flight passed uneventfully, but by then the tone was set. Therefore, it was no surprise when we landed in Beijing and I got patted down by a security agent who got further around the bases than Tim on our fourth date. And then Beth walked into a table, knocking over a soda (karma for laughing at me)...yep, it was going to be an interesting trip.

Like Mother, Like Daughter

They say if you want to know how a girl will turn out, look at her mother.

My sister, annonymous, seems to think Tim should have looked more closely twenty years ago. Although she disagrees, I think, that of the two of us, I dodged that bullet more successfully than she did.

Like my mother, I may exhibit a certain lack of coordination, but, unlike her (and Pat) I don't tempt fate.

In her fifties, my mother took up skiing. In her sixties, she went parasailing. And last year, at seventy-one, she jumped out of a plane in New Zealand.

Skiing? No thanks. My first (and last) attempt ended with a trip to the first-aid station to bandage my thumb which, after an unfortunate encounter with a ski boot clip had no nail--at all. Sitting by the fire sipping a hot chocolate is definitely more my speed.

Parasailing?!?! The only way I am getting off a boat in the middle of the ocean is if it is sinking.

Sky-diving? I had a massage while she was plunging to the ground from nine thousand feet up. Trying a new massage oil is enough of a risk for me.

Like my mother? Please. I consider driving my four-door sedan three blocks to the store without a seatbelt an unnecessary risk.

My sister though, is just like her. Skiing? You bet! And this after she broke her arm twice (in the same place) rollerskating. Hellooo? Having wheels on your feet was not dangerous enough?

She has also jumped from great heights...attached to a bungee...over concrete. No soft, water landing for her. That's for sissies! Even my mother bypassed this opportunity in New Zealand.

And then there are her motorcycles. One is for going fast. The other is for going faster and farther. She and my mother even attended the motorcycle convention in NYC last year (Hell's Angels, watch out!) . I have to take a valium just to get into a NYC cab.

Pat has always been far more the daredevil than I. Years ago, on a trip to the Catskills, we were all in separate cars. Somehow, two trucks got between Pat and my father and refused to let her pass. She solved that problem by creating a middle lane for herself between them (This was the same trip where, when Tim got out of the car with a sunburned arm, she told him not to worry...he could even things out when his other arm burned on the way back---definitely shades of Mom!).

And finally...you know you are just like someone when you are the only one who understands what the heck they are talking about.

Some time ago, the family got together for dinner, and, appropo of nothing, my mother suddenly informed us that, "Wood is on shark". Silence greeted this announcement as we all struggled to decipher her meaning. Had she seen some National Geographic episode the rest of us had missed? Was this code for, "I'll have the surf and turf"? Had she lost her mind?

We all gazed at each other, helpless, until Pat decoded it for us.

Apparently, James Woods was set to star in a new show called Shark !

Yeah, she's not at all like my mother.