Social media posts as picture postcards, just faster

Summer reading of the best kind--I got a postcard from my grandson in the mail from Omaha's Henry Doorly Zoo. How awesome is that? Personal hand-printed mail that traveled across geographic space over ticking hours and minutes and days to land in my physical mailbox. Woo-hoo! Sting rays and bats and tigers, oh my!

I'm struggling with my lunch break reading of Gretchen McCulloch's consideration of social media linguistics, Because Internet.  I'm intrigued by our turbo-changing informal writing culture. My problem is keeping track of McCulloch's cohorts of internet and social media adopters: Old Internet People, Full Internet People, Semi Internet People, Post Internet People and Pre Internet People. Really, they just need catchier names. The important idea is that we are in an era of unprecedented informal written communication  activity. People who would never have picked up a pen or typed out a memo are communicating by text, tweet, and post. They are creating new ways to add intonation, layers of meaning, emphasis, breath pauses, and speech-mimicking spellings.

McCulloch compares Beatle George Harrison's postcards with brief messages and doodles mailed in the '70s with use of emoticons and emojis today. Brief informal written communication isn't new, but the number of people participating is vastly different. Doodles and tiny faces are just attempts to indicate mood in a tiny box for a message.

Across cohorts and generations we still have some gaps of interpretation and understanding. My "NEW fiction" may just indicate a special library shelving location, while my coworker takes it as a shouted criticism of her shelving efforts.

We may need to identify and acknowledge those internal critics, editors, and even mentors perched on our shoulders with red pens and twinkly star stickers. Who is grading us for spelling, punctuation, legibility, and turning in our work on time? How do we feel about what goes into our Permanent Record? On my shoulders sit toga-clad judges who happen to be my great-aunt Emma and Miss Helen Madsen from seventh grade English class.

I am often guilty of being too flip, too blunt, too esoteric in speech and writing. Social media is a complex Venn diagram of audiences -- those we have in mind when we post, those with access to the post now, those viewing the post in the unknown future, those lacking the Rosetta stone to unlock the meaning.

What about the sensory experience of texting or posting? I don't get the joy of twirling the display rack of color postcards  (5 for $1.00) in the corner of the souvenir shop. Across the generations I DO get the XOXOX hugs and kisses I received from my grandmothers via the U.S. mail.

© 2013-2019 Nancy L. Ruder

Fungus vs. Snickers

How to write an effective request email to Human Resources:

Joanna,

I had a dumb-as-fungus moment this afternoon when I had a craving for a Snickers. The # is missing for that selection in the snack machine, so I punched in the price 1-0-0. Doh! 100 is the # for those icky cinnamon rolls. That cured my whole chocolate craving, but if you have contact with the snack machine vendor I would appreciate having the selection number back. Otherwise, I will surely do the same dumb thing again.

If you like those cinnamon rolls, there’s one on the break room island for you!

Thanks,

N

Getting results!

1. I received an instant reply requesting information about dumb-as-fungusness.

2. The Candyman vendor got an instant request for snack machine repair with forwarded message.

3.  A young friend showed me a fossilized mosasaur jawbone with six teeth he found at the river yesterday, and it looked more appetizing than the petrified cinnamon roll.

4. There's an amazing fungal growth in the lawn across the street that is larger than a pan pizza from Pizza Hut.

5. I first learned the expression "dumb as fungus" when Dave Barry had a syndicated humor column in the Omaha World Herald when Reagan was president. My father preferred "like a rock only dumber" but I have always been partial to fungus.

6. My sister, an extremely successful,highly-regarded music education professional who shall remain nameless confesses she feels a lot of pressure to punch in the numbers and/or letters as soon as the coins go down the chute in the snack machine, resulting in occasional performance anxiety.

7. Would Betsy DeVos recognize a fungus if it jumped up and grabbed her Snickers bar?

8. How do we define intelligence, and what is the sensitive term for "dumb" in a world where the rules are in constant change?

9. Are you as smart as a  slime mold?

10. Who wrote that book about smart tree roots?

11. Do you take it personally when the vending machine spits back your dollar bill? Yes, it's worse than a quarterly performance review.

SING A SONG OF  SYNTAX

DAVE BARRYTHE BALTIMORE SUN

A significant reason why the United States is having trouble competing in the modern industrialized world is that most Americans, through no fault of their own, are, in the words of U.S. Department of Education Secretary Lamar Alexander, "as dumb as fungus."

That is why this newspaper, at great expense and physical risk, is once again presenting "Ask Mr. Language Person," the educational feature that answers common questions about grammar, spelling and punctuality.

© 2013-2019 Nancy L. Ruder

Over the edge

There's one piece of the jigsaw edge very nearly fitting perfectly, except not, and it is throwing the whole framework off square. The color matches perfectly. The shape is just a sliver off.

The stand-off between our ridiculous Congress and the asinine President comes down to just one edge piece or one hammer.

Using a  hammer will not solve a jigsaw puzzle. It will just knock pieces off the table. Don't nobody vacuum!!

Young children use a combination of force and insistence on the rightness of their puzzle piecing. I expect a bit more reasoning and careful consideration of the shapes and colors from elected officials. Go stand on the other side of the table, turn on a lamp, or squint for heaven's sake.

© 2013-2019 Nancy L. Ruder

Great American taffy pull

This country has been heated to hard crack, pulled and stretched, pulled and stretched, and we are getting burnt and brittle. It's time to dig through the recipe box with the index cards and cursive handwriting for a new frame of mind.

Waiting at Walmart for the pharmacy to reopen from its lunch break, I pushed the cart through the cereal aisle. Thanksgiving is the traditional time to make our family's Chex Mix, known as "Kris Kringle Krunch." As usual, I got a big box of Corn Chex, when what I really need is the elusive Wheat Chex. It's okay. When it comes to Chex Mix we can all be a bit flexible.

Walmart on the Sunday before Thanksgiving is a great unifier. Where else can you find a man in a tailored suit holding a box of Reynolds Wrap under his arm right next to a full-bearded tattooed man in a full-length floral skirt peering together at the Ocean Spray cranberry sauce options.

Americans are divided into Pyrex bowls of polarized extreme disconnect. But this is not the first, nor the last time our nation will be challenged to find its moral center, its line in the sand of dignity, respect, and humanity. So let's chat about taffy.

In the late Sixties my mom, Fritzi, tried to reach a detente with her parents, Fred and Effa Dale by calling up the great memories of pulling taffy together in a farmhouse with kerosene lanterns and no indoor plumbing. We kids were just the hapless re-enactors, buttering our hands to pull and stretch the very hot taffy. We had already been tasked with preparing the squares of wax paper for wrapping the taffy. Grandmother Effa Dale was perched on the kitchen high stool to direct the fun, and her hearing aide was squawking.

We're gonna wrap the taffy in wax paper.      vs.     What's wax paper?

This potato looks just like Richard Nixon.    vs.    Who's Richard Nixon?

Each year American families gather to share Thanksgiving with a spirit of detente, an easing of hostility and strained relations. According to Wikipedia, the term is "most often used in reference to a period of general easing of the geo-political tensions between the Soviet Union and the United States; it was the distinct lessening of the Cold War. It began in 1969, as a core element of the foreign policy of U.S. president Richard Nixon, in an effort to avoid the collision of nuclear risks. The Nixon administration promoted greater dialogue with the Soviet government, including regular summit meetings and negotiations over arms control and other bilateral agreements."

These days just thinking about taffy threatens my dental work! No peanut brittle for me either. Must locate Wheat Chex, Cheerios, and pretzel sticks. (When I reached the self-check the box of Cheerios popped open like a bad 3 a.m. tweet.)

All we are saying is give peace a Chex.

© 2013-2018 Nancy L. Ruder

Mind your manners, monitor your moles

Queued to sign in at the doctor's office behind a huffing older man and a mom with three little girls all in summer sundresses, matching hair bows, with butterfly-shaped iPads to start my latest medical Monday. The mother was talking calmly about how this wait would go. The girls could choose where to sit, but they would all sit together. They were here because grown-ups don't always protect their skin from the sun, and they would sit quietly until it was mom's turn to see the doctor. What a pleasure to observe this gentle instruction in patience.

Ahead there was a hold-up. The huffing man with the orange-gray hair wearing the Hawaiian shirt did not want the clipboard with forms to update. He was not a new patient. He should not have to do this. The receptionist explained about the new system, and how all patients had to fill out the forms. With a big sigh, the Hawaiian shirted huffer took the clipboard and went to a chair.

The waiting room was filling up. The oldest gentleman of all seemed pleased to be on an outing with his nursing aide to this happy place. He was sitting beneath the big screen tv, so not watching the recap of a trade advisor named Peter Navarro (with sound blessedly muted) spouting on FOX about a special place in H-E-double toothpicks for people who resist Donald J. Trump.

In the month since I was told to have a dermatologist  "monitor my moles," I've worried a lot about grown-ups like me who don't always protect their skin from the sun, about dumb choices made in my bikini days, about my parental negligence to keep my own little kids slathered in sunscreen, and about every other dot, spot, or blemish on my permanent record. Life is for those who practice prevention and early detection, so I was doomed. But my forms were filled out and printed ala pdf.

"I'm not a new patient! I should not have to fill out the *#!* forms!" The Hawaiian-shirted huffer stomped up to the receptionist. She ever so calmly explained again about the new system.

Nobody likes to fill out those forms. Nobody. But we do, and we wait staring at the Sunday interview with the blessedly-muted presidential advisor.

"THIS IS BULLSHIT! CANCEL MY APPOINTMENT! DON'T BILL ME!"  Huffer threw the clipboard back at the receptionist, and steamed out of the office. The three little girls with their hair bows were alarmed. "Sometimes grown-ups act ugly," the mom quietly told them. Sometimes grown-ups need to check their reactions and their blood pressure, we all mused.

"He's coming back," warned a younger man with a view down the hallway. I hope he's not armed, I thought.

"GIVE ME MY INSURANCE CARD AND DRIVERS LICENSE," the HUFFER demanded. But the receptionist had handed them back earlier. Patting his pockets and fuming, face red, the disgruntled jerk with orange-gray hair stormed out again.

Wear sunscreen.

© 2013-2018 Nancy L. Ruder

Evicted

Evicted by Matthew Desmond is the Dallas Morning News Points Summer book club discussion topic. I'm still psyching up for that read. On the other hand, I've done something a great many Americans wish they could do. Yes, I have evicted National Embarrassment from a white house in a muddy swamp. The next time the toilets broke, it was going to be a "cesspool." The eviction wasn't easy. Unfortunately, the white house was bulldozed in the process. Still, it was more fun than dysentery on the Oregon Trail.

In this summer of discontent and chaos, an evening hour spent playing SIMS4 is way more affordable  than therapy.


© 2013-2017 Nancy L. Ruder

Can I book my kid's birthday party?

Like many Americans opening their laptop, or quaintly, their newspaper, this week you may have wondered about the pictured field trip to an interactive kid-friendly museum.  Can you book this glowing orb place for a birthday party? You had the Critter Lady for last year's birthday party, and the bouncy house the year before that. Kroger could make a glowing global sheet cake, easy. Maybe the museum hosts overnight lock-in slumber parties for preteen scouts and church groups.

© 2013-2017 Nancy L. Ruder

Vocabulary study sheet

petulance Reluctance to admit the president-elect reminds you of the elderly irritable yippy-snappy Pekingese in the yard across the street from your grandma's house, you know, chained out there next to the tractor tire planter filled with red geraniums and barking at every kid walking past.

emoluments Beauty regimen slapping emojis all over your face to promote healthy, glowing skin tone in trying times.

authoritarian populism when the assistance principal in charge of vice pretends to be your friend in the hallway at dismissal bell.
accrue ac·crue  əˈkro͞o/
Accrued vacation pay is the amount of vacation time that an employee has earned as per a company's employee benefit policy, but which will likely be spoiled by high mountain cedar pollen counts. SEE sneeze into your elbow.

fake-snooze Waking up at 3:40 a.m. to worry about the vocabulary study sheet and current events quiz, but finally getting back to sleep around 4:50 a.m, but then the alarm sounds at six a.m. and you keep hitting the snooze button but not actually getting back to sleep.

I keep thinking he's fixing to sing that old Cub Scout song.

© 2013-2016 Nancy L. Ruder

Scrambled goldfish

"Maybe if you bought a goldfish your life would be more perky,"said the sneering plastic figurine balanced on my shoulder as I stared at the cracked egg 's happy yellow yolk. The coffee had not kicked in, and the fiendish bobblehead accurately read my perkiness deficit.

It's not pretty after a late night trying to win the next level on Ancestry.com. Your attitude stinks. Ain't nobody gonna tossle your hair and take you fishing, Opie. You can't keep hiding from current events in the upper branches of your family tree.

But still, there are some great names for imaginary goldfish in the high branches. Just today I found Keziah  Cooley. Elizabeth Knott Strange would be perfect for a molly. Patsy, Polly, and Phoebe are guppies. Maybe I should buy some neon tetras, since I have good names for them:

• Bede is short for Obediance
• Mitty is a nickname for Submit
• Wealthy is short for paying the rent
• Nellie is short for Eleanor
• Bessie Veronica is just perfect for an early silent movie star
• Minnie is short for Hermione
• Hitty is short for Mehitabel

I

The coffee begins its magic. I could be Keziah Cooley, Private Detective.... 

© 2013-2016 Nancy L. Ruder

The Radish Project

Awake from two to four again, I pondered my recent radical escalating approval of radishes.

In these days of Hamilton mania, I remember how Gore Vidal's version of Aaron Burr informed me sleep would become a precious commodity at an advanced age. Consciousness of internal organs and aching joints in the middle of the night are what I remember about the novel thirty years on.

As my parents aged, the number of condiments in their refrigerator mushroomed. Why on earth did they need four kinds of mustard? Hmm. In the middle of the night I realize my fridge holds three.

How did life get so complicated? When did there become so many vegetables? Why does kale taste like grass clippings + styrofoam packing peanuts? And why have I never figured out how to make charts and graphs?

My former supervisor was a graph artist. She could make Venn diagrams and splatter graphs and info graphics I could almost understand and could have hanged over the sofa.

No data was harmed in these chart attempts. Plotting the complexities of historic breakfast preferences finally lulled me to sleep for another few hours.

© 2013-2016 Nancy L. Ruder

Step Inside This House

Tonight I am filled with gratitude for the two gracious, kind, wise women named Janie who independently and separately introduced me to the music and storytelling of Guy Clark twenty years or so ago when that was exactly what I needed.

Hold this piece of glass up to the light comin' through the door.

© 2013-2016 Nancy L. Ruder

Soft on bathroom tissue

Cruz calls Trump "soft on bathroom issue"

No, it wasn't Mr. Whipple!  Creepy Ted (video) is the blaster, ranting about Trump in the little girl's restroom. Sociopath Trump is the blastee. Charmin is the issue.

Top to bottom:

• Dear Gilda as Emily Litella
• The Dallas Morning News Opinion blog
• Mr. Whipple

Planks in the outhouse party platform:

•  Never buy store brand unless you need sandpaper
•  Stockpile at least 24 rolls and 2 cases of beer  in case of blizzards
•  Flush twice. Omaha needs the water.  
•  "Three squares are plenty for most jobs."--Fritzi

This is not the election to shrug and say, "Never mind." Don't sit it out.

© 2013-2016 Nancy L. Ruder

Inside out and backwards

No thanks to my silent coworkers, I wore my boatneck shirt backwards all day. When I went on a retail therapy fitting room excursion at my dying local mall after work I discovered the truth. No wonder I got all those smiles and muffled chuckles. Maybe tomorrow I should wear mismatched socks, and then on Saturday it's inside-out day!

All those years of teaching preschoolers we just celebrated when kids got dressed all by themselves, and weren't too picky about the details. Concurrently, all those outings to Outback and Red Lobster with my 80-something father in his plaid PJs, with his walker and his very loudly expressed opinions when I mostly wanted for Scotty or Spock to beam me up...

So, now, here I am sporting an un-proofread fashion statement wardrobe dysthymia turtle backwards in its shell.

© 2013-2016 Nancy L. Ruder

Farewell, my Albertsons

I was 100% clueless when I whipped in to get tomato sauce and that magic dishwasher additive for removing film and spots. My sorry old Albertsons was already at 15-30% off in the Inventory Blow-Out Sale as it prepares to close.

The old, old, very wrinkly and possibly wise check-out lady with the twinkly eyes told me the store was over forty years old, a dinosaur in Plano's time scale. Through grocery wars, take-overs, and consolidations the store has survived, but always as a fairy godmotherless stepchild.

When I dropped a gallon in the sloped parking lot one night, it slid and tumbled, cracked open and left a Milky Way trail down to Custer (the street, not the general). Stranded in that parking lot, I've waited for Mr. Rescue to jump-start my pumpkin coach. I once backed out of my parking spot and collided with a woman backing out of her parking spot across the way, an unpleasant, but no-fault, chapter.


In my fifteen minutes of fame, I even wrote an op-ed about using the self-check at Albertsons for the Dallas Morning News. The self-check fad waned and disappeared at the store. My volunteer op-ed gig waned faster.

There were moments of conflict in the saga when gift cards were improperly validated. .. Lightbulb inspirations for art classes with autumn vegetables, office supplies, or packaging materials. .. Bitter fights with recalcitrant shopping carts. .. Humiliating moments when checks bounced during the divorce. .. Cosmic instants of enlightenment understanding the true equality of all humans. .. and hubris about my holier-than-thou plastic bag recycling.

Would this dilapidated store on the way home from work have the same significance for me if I had not written about it so many times?


© 2013-2016 Nancy L. Ruder

A measure of control

a gauge of rainfall
a measure of anxiety
a tiny bit of breathing room

walnuts

strange growths on the balcony
mushroom swelling beneath mint and trumpet vine

gnats
eye of newt
a blast of trump
spores galore but better every day
gaining

© 2013-2016 Nancy L. Ruder

I'm a waitress in a donut shop

In a flash of flames at the bagel shop the meaning became clear -- all the dreams, the omens, the acronyms, the spuds with SEE and SEE ALSO references made complete sense.  For once, it was not my green chile bagel setting off the smoke alarm, but the healthy nine-grain best-intentions/fiber choice for the elderly marathoner living longer and skinnier beside me in line.

Those dreams, nightmares really, flummox me in the cosmic extreme parking garage with NO EXIT EVER. The bizarre appearance of my sister wearing a pink Flo waitress outfit chasing me and haranguing my lack of diner hash lingo comprehension was a new and terrifying twist.

POTUS on a raft; SCOTUS with a shimmy and a shake, BOUTROS BOUTROS-GHALI and ATTICUS please use toll tag lane.  No wonder I'm craving baked potatoes with sour cream. POTSCUS!

https://www.pinterest.com/pin/277252920780923848/

The CD player on my ancient computer has gone AWOL. Dan Hicks made witty, wonderful music with a vintage radio jazz/folk vibe and a tiny dash of Sixties psychedelia I can't play on my darn defunct contraption. May he rest in sequined chaps swing.

© 2013-2016 Nancy L. Ruder

Omens with/without alligators

The white dribbled from the cracked shell right down the tiny space between the kitchen counter and the side of the range. That the oven was preheating was a bonus/curse. I could not move the darn major home appliance to clean up the mess. Still, with enough baking and broiling the egg white might petrify and prock off.*

It was not a good beginning, and I was already rattled about the alligator recipe dream. I mean really, how many limes does it take to marinate alligator steaks? Why doesn't my cell phone ever work in dreams?

Did I start the day over, as we used to advise the preschoolers? No. I went forth into the world and got a ticket in a school zone. Truly, I shoulda stood in bed.

Standing on the bed to dust the ceiling fan, I remembered how Grandma Halma broke her hip falling off a stepstool when balancing herself with a broomstick to replace the bulb in the hanging light over the chenille bedspread in the pink room. Grandma did not have a smart phone or a life alert button. She dragged herself through the house to the telephone in the living room to call  0 for operator. Halma coulda cooked a mean alligator, though.

"Prock off" was a weird expression used by Halma. Scabs prock off. Crusty stuff procks off surfaces. I can't find an origin for the idiom when things dry up, crumble, and fall away.

Reading Rick Moody's Hotels of North America consisting of fictional online motel ratings posts brings me to consideration of crusty stuff procking or not off. I nod, gasp, and chuckle behind my hand. My own essay collection of childhood vacations, "Memories of the Blue Fox Motel," still hasn't got past the title page.

We coulda, shoulda, woulda played  or ploud.

Halma played pinochle, cribbage, bridge, and any game that was going. [I am a card game failure. After Crazy 8s it just didn't connect.] In the blink of an eye between rounds, Halma would whomp up a midnight supper of pressed chicken sandwiches, or steamed tamales.

Just finished Empire of Deception, the account of frauds and swindles perpetrated by Leo Koretz in 1920's Chicago. Koretz out-ponzied Ponzi, and set a shining example for Bernie Madoff. The more things change, the more they stay the same.


© 2013-2016 Nancy L. Ruder

Aaron and the porcupine eggs

For spelling questions I start with the which-looks-right test before trying Spellcheck, Google, or the dictionary. Two of us were dueling through all the options trying to sort out "bur". We had seen "bur" and "burr" so many times they both looked wrong and were both likely correct. With prickles in my brain I headed home.

After a deep cleansing breath I opened the dear old Big Red Dictionary. Had to dust it off and apologize for my long neglect. A true servant should not be relegated to the bottom shelf. I had forgotten the sensory pleasures of the indented letter tabs and the light, thin pages.

The lesson plan under construction is using our senses to learn about seeds, seed pods, and a bit of seed dispersal for young children. They will not care if "bur" or "burr" wins. They will be unimpressed by the rough trilling of the letter r, as in Scottish pronunciation. Floating bur oak acorn caps in the water tub is more their style. And yes, bur oak seems to need only one r.

What burs attach in the memory? What hooks on the seed pods? I know exactly what I was wearing the day my Aunt Shirley and Uncle Rollie came to visit us in Edmond, Oklahoma. I bought the outfit at Anthony's on Broadway, not the Bryant store. That pink shirt is in the Great Shirts of the Late Eighties Museum collection. It was a stripe print over-dyed. Rollie, ever the bull**** storyteller, brought my kids a small box of carefully cushioned ancient "porcupine eggs". The boys were appropriately impressed, and did not touch the artifacts. We kept that box of cocklebur prickles in a drawer for at least a decade. Bur. is the abbreviation for bureau and Burma.

http://essmextension.tamu.edu/plants/plant/cocklebur/

cockle n. Any of several plants often growing as weeds in grain fields

cocklebur n. Any of several course weeds of the genus Xanthium bearing prickly burs. 2. The bur of any of these plants.

Cockleburs are poisonous to livestock in the seedling stage, and were used in Greece as hair dye. I'm guessing we are trying for blonde, since xanth- indicates the color yellow.

Burrs (or burs) are an amazing adaptation for seed dispersal. The curriculum guide suggests I put a big sock over one shoe and leg of each preschool student and send them out to wander in the meadow to unwittingly pick up Velcro-esce seeds, The guide doesn't explain what to do with all the stickers in their jeans on the other leg.






bur oak  A timber tree. Quercus macrocarpa, of eastern North America, having acorns enclosed within a deep, fringed cup. The Big Red Dictionary is positive about the spelling of this name.

bur1 n. Also burr. 1. a. The rough, prickly, or spiny fruit husk, seed pod, or flower of various plants, such as the chestnut or the burdock. b. A plant producing burs. 2. A persistently clinging or nettlesome person or thing. 3. Any of various rotary cutting tools designed to be attached to a drill. [Middle English burre, probably from Scandinavian, akin to Old Swedish borre.]

bur2 1. Variant of burr (rough edge). 2. Variant of burr (guttural trill). 3. Variant of burr (washer)....a washer that fits around the smaller end of a rivet... Not your Maytag.

Bur and burr keep dancing around doing variations on a theme. For most situations you can spell it whichever way passes your looks-right test.

Burr, which follows burp gun, is the name of the Vice President of the United States under Thomas Jefferson (1801-05). That would be Aaron Burr, 1756-1836, who famously fatally wounded Alexander Hamilton in a duel. Burr (copyright 1973) was the first novel by Gore Vidal I ever read. Checked it out at the Benson Branch of the Omaha Public Library in about 1984.

Xanthippe  the wife of Socrates; proverbial as a shrewish and scolding woman....You could say she was a prickly presence in the philosopher's life, or a burr under his saddle. Page from my Greco-Roman notebook project with Xanthippe in a VW:

Nuts!? Am I nuts?! Surely not, Shirley. We will discuss seed dispersal by wind, water, gravity, and scat some other time.

© 2013-2015 Nancy L. Ruder

What to my wondering eyes did appear

Zillow informs me my former condo is listed for sale. No nostalgia for the good old days of waiting for repair persons and paying big condo association fees for me. Once in awhile I miss being in a space I had alternately endured and cultivated for a dozen plus years. Like a farmer with years of drought, years of floods, plagues of grasshoppers, and never a dime to show for it, I had a certain fond spot in my heart for the old sod house.

Two years ago I started an insane endeavor to rip out the carpet, and then stain the concrete floors. It was satisfying in a strangely sweaty, sore muscle way, and I liked the results 92.75%. And then I had to sell the condo.

The buyers reimagined the old homestead through a different lens, as I noted the few times I went over to pick up old mail. No problem. I never told them about the rat snake on the patio...

Nowadays Zillow informs me that the condo is back on the market, and the owners want big bucks. I'm okay with it. I did what I had to do when I had to do it. The bad news is Zillow sends me photos of the condo as it looks now. I question my memory and my sanity looking at them. Have I really forgotten a red brick fireplace?

Forced to reinforce my memories with photos, I tracked down images taken at the end of the concrete floor adventure. That fireplace was NOT red.

And that rat snake was real.

© 2013-2015 Nancy L. Ruder

Snaps crackle at staff meetings

My turn to lead the biweekly staff meeting is not as demanding as, say, being the leader of the Free World, but it does cause anticipation anxiety. I try to not hyperventilate or lock my knees, but I sure would like to fake having a nosebleed and go hide in the restroom. Hey, it worked in high school Spanish class!

Our agenda template includes a prohibition against Rabbit Trails. Being fond of rabbits and their calming presence in the preschool classroom, I think introducing rabbits into the office environment might be an improvement.

The most confounding part of the agenda is Snaps. We go around the conference table announcing we "have Snaps" for our coworkers who have accomplished amazing acts of heroism or just held the door for us when we entered the building. What are Snaps? Why do we have Snaps for _your name here    instead of giving Snaps to _your name here?

Although it is still early in the agenda, I get distracted. The Addams Family song plays in my ear. Sadly, this will be the last staff meeting with our water educator, Pugsley.

But what about ginger snaps dunked in hot black coffee? Or Rice Krispies?


And from that happy thought, I boomerang to bra straps in junior high school. Boys would walk up behind young ladies and pull bra straps out to snap back against backs or shoulders, through clothing, of course. This sort of tween harassment was considered perfectly normal behavior of boys-will-be-boys. To have your bra strap snapped in the late Sixties was less humiliating than not having a bra strap to snap. Either way, this obnoxious behavior was just something girls should accept. Huh???

• Maybe SNAP is a management acronym. Acronym meanings for SNAP make a long, long, unmanageable list. 

• The library has a new book, Snap strategies for couples: 40 fast fixes for everyday relationship pitfalls, by Dr. Pepper Schwartz. It sounds like quick casserole recipes!

• What are the rules of Snap? Kiddie card games were popular birthday gifts and favors in the Sixties. Snap showed up in packages with Animal Rummy, Go Fish, Hearts, Authors, Old Maid and Crazy Eights.

Before I get my sled runners back in the groove, I must mention the strange Scandinavian children's books starring the triplet boys, Snipp, Snapp, and Snurr.

 

Corresponding blonde girl triplets in the book series, Flicka, Ricka, and Dicka, might have belonged to a sorority where applause was too loud and disruptive, and so they invented "Snaps" for meetings.

© 2013-2015 Nancy L. Ruder