NYNIAGAR-FOLKS-L Archives

From: "Vee L. Housman" <>
Subject: The end of a "perfect day!
Date: Sat, 17 Jul 2004 00:57:59 -0400

Dear Folks,

I guess I just HAVE to tell you a bit of the dismal events that happened
yesterday even before my near disaster with the new answer machine. Early
afternoon yesterday I had my errand itinerary planned to perfection. First
I would go to the Base Exchange and buy myself a new answer machine, from
there I would head straight for Aldis, a very-low priced discount grocery
store. I had a few things I especially wanted to pick up at bargain prices,
and from there stop at Smokin' Joe's gas station and smoke shop on the local
Tuscarora Indian Reservation with bargain gas and cigarette prices. From
there I'd head right back home with everything accomplished and would live
happily after after. But the minute I got out the side door I knew that my
day wasn't starting out very well.

I had managed to carefully get down the few stairs from my kitchen into my
entry way, I managed to unlock the door and open it with a bit of difficulty
(it's a steel door) managed to push my way out of the storm door (that has a
very tight spring closure on it), lock the door behind me (not that easy of
a job) and then since I was home free I headed confidently toward my
barn/garage where I always park the car. However I wasn't even half way to
my car when I realized that with the shopping I wanted to do I definitely
wouldn't be home by 4:00 when the R.U.O.K? robot would be calling me to make
certain that I was really OK.

Therefore, I had to retrace my steps, unlock the door, get myself back
inside, climb the few steps and go to a phone where I could alert them the I
definitely wouldn't be home by 4:00. No problem. Once I managed to lock
the door on my way back out of the house I knew that I was on my way.
However, I hadn't driven but 1/4 mile up the road when I realized that I was
still wearing my computer glasses, not my distance glasses. Oh, great! I
considered turning around and driving back home to exchange glasses but
eventually figured I could see out of my computer glasses well enough to
drive, especially if I was very careful.

I drove up the throughway, got off at the proper exit and made mental note
that at the exit I could see Aldis very clearly right ahead of me and if I
took the exact same route back from the Exchange, I could easily pull into
their driveway. I drove to the Exchange, bought my new answer machine, got
back in the car and headed straight down the road to Aldis. However, comma,
I got a bit confused. Even though I really knew where Aldis was I made the
wrong turn, realized that road wouldn't get me close to Aldis but since I
was a bit familiar with that I knew that I would eventually find a
connecting road/large parking lot that I could use to end up very close to
Aldis. No problem. I managed to find a parking space at Aldis that I felt
was even closer than the handicapped spaces, shuffled my way into the store
and then to search out what I had especially wanted to buy.

In the first place one of our listmembers had suggested that I would find
cheaper potato chips if I bought them by the case at Sam's Club. That
sounded like a great idea. However in order for me to shop at Sam's Club I
would have to go there with someone who was actually a member of it, meaning
my niece Deb. I called her, she had no problem with her taking me to do
some shopping but when I mentioned the case of potato chips being cheaper
than the local Tops super market brand in large brands, she quickly knocked
that idea out of my head. Deb knew what a case of potato chips at Sam's
Club consisted of--small individual bags of chips and in the long run they
would be more expensive than the large bags from Tops. She suggested that I
check out the prices at Aldi instead.

OK, one of our listmembers had suggested that I consider pop corn as an
alternative to the more expensive potato chips. Hmmm, that sounded tempting
and I asked Deb if Aldis carried pop corn in the large bags. Frankly, she
couldn't recall every seeing them packaged that way there but she certainly
knew that they carried microwave popcorn at a cheap price. It took me
awhile to find the microwave popcorn but when I found it I made careful
study of it's price per box, $1.29 (containing 6 envelopes of pop corn), its
overall net weight, and the resulting price per pound. The price per pound
was $.99 which I believe was comparable with the large bags of potato chips.
I bought two boxes of the pop corn, continued to shop around for what I
really wanted to buy. However, I suddenly realized that the total amount of
cash I had in my wallet was only $16.00 plus change and I knew that if I
went over that amount, I'd have to abandon a few of the items so the I could
pay cash for the rest. Aldis accepts only cash from their customers. No
credit cards.

I got through the checkout line with no problem and the total amount of my
purchases was $9.63. Whew! I went back to the parking lot, loaded the few
items in the trunk of my car and I knew I would be sailing away to Smokin's
Joes from there. However, when I went to sit down in the driver's seat of
the car I found that I was having greater difficulty than usual. Usually I
just very cautiously grab onto both sides of the steering wheel and use the
strength in my arms to pull me into the car seat. Actually I managed to do
that but in the process I didn't pull myself in far enough and when I
eventually plunked myself on the seat I found that I was sitting on the very
outside edge of it and instantly knew if I didn't pull me any further into
the car right at that moment, I would more than likely just slide off the
seat and land on my fanny in the parking lot of Aldis. And then what would I
do? After I had finally got myself properly seated I thought of the
possibly of my landing in the parking lot. Yes I had my 911 cell phone in
my purse right there and could have dialed 911 to let them know that I had
slid out of the seat in my car, I was sitting in Aldis parking lot and I
couldn't get up. At the same time I knew that if I waited long enough,
there would be shoppers returning to their cars nearby and I could at least
"yoo hoo" to one of them and ask them if they could help me get up. There's
no doubt in my mind that they wouldn't immediately rush over to me, get me
back on my feet, help me into the car, I would have thanked them profusely
and they would have responded with a big smile on their faces and assure me
that it was no bother at all.

When I got back on the road, I headed straight toward Smokin' Joes. Well,
actually can't head STRAIGHT to his gas station and smoke shop. I had to
remind myself to make certain I took the Lewiston exit off the Robert Moses
Parkway, make a left turn on to Ridge Rd. (Route 104) drive a couple of
miles down the road, stop at the first stop light, make a right turn onto
the bottom of Indian Hill and within a very short distance I could pull into
his parking lot. I don't know how many times I reminded myself to make
certain I took the Lewiston exit. Well, it won't come as a surprise that I
just sailed by it, then realized my mistake and knew that I couldn't just
make a U-turn right then there to get myself headed back to the exit from
the other direction. No, in order to make a legal U-turn I would have to
drive another couple of miles, get to the next exit, use that one and
eventually get myself back on the Robert Moses headed toward Lewiston.

Well by that time I was pretty much wiped out and even though I wanted to
kick myself, I knew that I would have to give up that urge because I no
longer had any strength left in my legs. I continued on home and when I
eventually parked my car in my barn/garage I felt so relieved to be home.
However, Boys and Girls, when I tried to get out of the front seat of my
car, I found that my legs wouldn't support me whatsoever no matter how much
I tried to pull myself up on my feet. I tried over and over again, I'd get
just so far up on my feet when they'd just collapse and I had to push myself
back into the car seat. I sat for awhile to figure out what I could do next
and the only thing I could think of was to call 911 and explain to them that
I was sitting in my car in my barn/garage at home and I couldn't get out of
the seat. Oh what a pretty picture that would have painted in their minds.
It didn't take me long to get determined enough to the point that there was
no way would give up doing it myself and with that extra burst of
determination, I was soon back up on my feet heading back into the house.
From that point I eventually told you what happened afterward regarding the
near disaster of installing my new answer phone

However, there was one thing I didn't mention last night that frankly put
the icing on the cake. After the near disaster was eventually put back in
order I realized I had a bad case of the munchies and I figured that last
night was a good time to drive test the microwave popcorn. I took one bag
of popcorn out of the box, studied the instructions very carefully, followed
them very carefully and the only goof I think I made was getting confused as
to whether I should open the bag where it said "pull apart here. I decided
that's what they wanted me to do, I started opening the bag but stopped
short when I realized that they hadn't told me to that at all.

Next thing I wanted to know was just how much time to set on High on my
microwave. I swear it said from 1-5 minutes. Even though I knew that was
quite a spread I decided to set it on 2-1/2 minutes and then check how
things were going. When the 2-1/2 minutes were up I checked the bag out and
since I sensed that everything was going OK I decided to set the timer for
another 1-1/2 minutes making a total of 4 minutes on High. It sounded just
about right to me. (However, in rechecking the next bag of pop corn tonight
I realized that it actually said to set the timer for 4 minutes but the
actual cooking time would be between 1-1/4 minutes to 4 minutes and I was
warned to keep a close ear on the sound of the popping.). I stood right
there at the microwave keeping my eye on everything but when I started
seeing smoke pouring out of the microwave, I knew I was in trouble. I
turned the oven off, found that the smoke was pouring out from the partially
opened end and there was a definite odor of scorched food,. Oh, just GREAT.

I opened the bag, poured its contents into the right size plastic container
and studied what I had been left with. Well frankly I realized that at
least of the pop corn had scorched to the point where it was clinging to
each other in large masses, totally stuck together. Oh well, that was only
1/2 of the pop corn. There still was the other half that had remained
unscathed or at least not that scorched to be inedible. It didn't take me
long to sort out the unscorched from the scorched and manage to enjoy the
other half to a degree.

All that was left for me to do was to empty the container with all of the
scorched pop corn in it right into my kitchen garbage can. Then the only
thing left for me would be to rinse out the container, set it aside and go
to bed. But don't breathe a sigh of relief just yet. That's not the end of
the story of my "perfect" day! Certainly dumping a comparatively small
amount of scorched popcorn into a kitchen garbage can requires very little
skill whatsoever. And maybe because I was certainly aware of that I guess
that's why I didn't pay all that much attention to what I was doing. As a
result, the next thing I knew was that only half of the scorched corn ended
up in the garbage whereas the other half missed it completely and landed on
the kitchen floor in one great big mess. I stood there for a moment or two
trying to figure out the easiest way out of the dilemma and the thought
occurred to me that although I was totally wiped out by then, at least I
still had the strength to bend down, pick up the big chunks and take better
aim at the garbage container. Yes that would work; however I'd still be
left with a whole bunch of individual kernels and bits of pieces of pop corn
that would eventually have to be gathered together with the aid of my dust
pan and brush. OK, I could still leave all of that until tomorrow.
However, as I backed up a few steps I realized that I was stepping all over
and on the other kernels and crushing them to dust. I also knew if I just
ignored them until tomorrow that by that time I would have tracked popcorn
bits and pieces all over the kitchen floor.

So once again I made the supreme effort. I got out my dust pan and brush,
bent over and brushed as much as I could into the pan, dumped them into the
garbage can, brushed the floor again and then for the third time brushed it
again. Even though I had still missed some of the crumbs, by that time I
just totally gave up and didn't care what would happen to the few remaining
crumbs. Frankly I had had enough of my "perfect day," took my evening
medications, turned out the light, turned out all of the other lights,
changed into my night clothes, turned off that light and felt my way to the
bed without incident. I flung myself on the bed, turned over on my side and
went fast asleep.

It seems to me that there was a song once, "Make the World Go Away!" Well
that's how I felt last night.
vee

This thread:

• The end of a "perfect day! by "Vee L. Housman" <>