Month: May 2020

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G-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r!

It’s 9AM and I’m already about to blow a cork—and I’m not talking about champagne! I’m a grown-up, literate woman so I’ll go for an appropriate tie metaphor and settle on wearing a Bow Tie o’ the Day made out of cork.

What got me all ticked off? I got the annual bill for my tie-o-the-day.com site security. For some reason, my account was billed 3 times for the same site security license. But that’s not the part that got me angry. I knew an innocent mistake had been made somewhere in the Land o’ Billing, so I calmly called the company to get things straightened out.

Of course, I reached the voice of a phone menu. After I had tried everything on the phone menu to no avail, I decided I needed to communicate with a sentient being. The phone menu voice told me it could understand full sentences, so I asked the voice to connect me to a living human being. It did not understand my request. I then asked for “a representative,” then for “a customer service representative,” then for “an operator.” The menu voice still did not understand my simple request. Finally, I asked to speak with “a person.” “Person” was the password. I was ultimately connected to a lackluster, but helpful, gentleman to whom I was quite polite, despite how frustrated and ticked off I was by the time I finally spoke to him. The error was supposedly fixed. We will soon see for sure, when autopay does its scheduled thing.

So far, I have managed to put on a civil facade to write a post which is honest about what happened, but reigned in substantially in tone. If I were to write this with the words and attitude that correspond to my real feelings about my phone-y morning thus far, this post would look something more like the following:

blah, blah, blah, cork Bow Tie o’ the Day, blah, blah, blah, #@&*”:?!@!#&^&(>”@$#(+(+”@#$%$%&%@”#%$%@!)&*@>:”:}#$%##$*&*@?%!~#@&^(*%^7!!!!!!!!!!!!!#&^@(*)%#

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And A Thing About Mom’s Phone Number

Dad’s actual cell phone—with its paint and scuffs—joins me and bees Bow Tie o’ the Day for this post.

Early in the 2000’s, Mom was fine with the kitchen wall home phone and an answering machine. Dad got a cell phone early on because he dragged his bees from here to California and all over creation, and he hunted coyotes who-knew-where before dawn daily. Bee yards and coyote dens rarely have phones or phone booths, so Dad packed his clunky cell phone in his Dodge truck in case of emergency—along with the other lifesaving travel essentials: water, toilet paper, and matches. He rarely made or received a call. Mom finally frequently called his cell from the home phone to check on him towards the end of his days here on the planet.

When Dad went to The Big Coyote Hunt in the Sky, in 2007, Mom naturally inherited his cell phone. With it, she also inherited his cell phone number, and she began the process of gradually becoming one with the cell phone, as we have all done with our own. The landline home phone number which had belonged to Mom and Dad for close to 70 years was only shut down a couple of years ago, but Mom had quit using it long before that actually happened.

He’s been gone close to 13 years now, but I’ve never taken Dad’s name off my cell phone’s contacts list. Nor have I added Mom’s name to my contacts. I call Mom by dialing for Dad. There is something eternally reassuring about calling Dad’s phone number and having Mom answer. Really, it’s just like it always was with our kitchen wall phone. Its number was perpetually listed under Dad’s name in the annual Delta phone book. But it was always Mom who answered the ring.

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The Helen And Ron Wright Family Wall Phone

Bikini Bow Tie o’ the Day couldn’t get Mom to answer her cell phone. I even tried using the old wall phone from our old kitchen in my old kidhood house. Mom didn’t answer that phone either. For a few days last week, nobody could get in touch with Mom. As most of you know, Mom is on pandemic lockdown at Millard Care and Rehab, where she has resided for the last 18 months. No visitors are allowed, so the only way we can keep track of her and remind her we love her right now is by calling her cell phone.

At first, I thought Mom was maybe boycotting me for some reason, by not answering my calls. But over the course of a couple of days, I received many texts and calls alerting me to the fact that Mom wasn’t answering her phone for anyone. Aha! If Mom was boycotting, I wasn’t the only one being boycotted.

I’m the point-man for Mom’s phone issues because her line is on my account, and everybody in the family knows it. So if Mom’s unreachable for some reason, I get screamed at. Mom has occasionally had real phone troubles, but nothing major since she quit answering it with wet hands while washing dishes or cooking. She went through 3 phones in the 3 years before she went to live at MCR, where she is not allowed to do dishes or cook. Since taking up residence there, her phone problems have had to do with her accidentally turning down the volume, or otherwise touching a wrong key.

Normally, I would text my/my sister’s hubby, Gary, to drive the mile to the care center to see Mom and solve her phone issue, but that’s not currently a possibility, thanks to the COVID-19 lockdown. After calling Mom’s phone for the zillionth time, I figured she had most likely accidentally turned it off. I texted MCR and requested they check out Mom’s cell phone to make sure it was turned on. Someone at MCR solved the problem by simply turning Mom’s phone back on. Sure enough, Mom had somehow used one of her many superpowers to turn it off, but she apparently has lost the superpower that turns it back on. When you are approaching 90, you naturally lose a superpower here and there. And that’s ok. MCR can help you fix it.

BTW Mom is doing dandily. She did ask me to send her some spiced jelly beans though. I’ve been saving them to give her when I see her again, but I think I better mail them ASAP.

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I Got Nuthin’

Usually, if I wear a Bow Tie o’ the Day, something remarkable eventually happens. At the very least, I eventually think remarkable things, which I then try to hone into a chuckle-worthy tblog post. But today, I have bow-tied up to the keyboard a dozen times, and I’ve percolated a total of less than zero ideas. I’ve got nuthin’. I believe it’s in everyone’s best interest—especially my own—that I call a “soft closure” on the story/joke/myth section of my brain until tomorrow.

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‘Merica

The patriotic Ties/Bow Ties o’ the Day got together this afternoon to give a good ol’ salute to those on the front lines of healthcare, law enforcement, and our food supply—and to other essential workers. A specific shout-out to educators and students who are doing their best to figure out how to do something that hasn’t been done before. Kudos to the technology that allows the nation to keep teaching and learning, without school buildings being open to students. Appreciation, as well, to the rest of us who are doing our best to find toilet paper and follow the sometimes-confusing, recommended guidelines for defeating this pandemic. It is my firm opinion that as masked, social-distancing, trying-to-stay-at-home ‘Mericans, we are all essential workers. As always, if your actions are for the benefit of your fellow beings, you can’t go wrong.

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Necessary Pandemic Changes

Today, Suzanne went off to her decades-old Champagne Garden Club. They take turns gardening in each other’s yards once a month. But notice that in their official name, the word “champagne” comes before the word “garden.” If ya know what I mean.

COVID-19 can’t completely disrupt Champagne Garden Club, but precautions must be taken for the safety of all persons and plants involved. Along with social distancing in the garden, the ladies have to wear face masks, and they must drink a disinfectant version of champagne which was created by Miss Heidi, whose beauteousness peeks out from behind her mask in this photo. No, I do not know whether the gardening gals remove their masks to quaff their champagne cocktail, or whether they just drench the mask and suck on it. I’ll ask Suzanne when she gets home.

So what did I do all day, while Suzanne has green thumbed it at Miss Heidi’s? Spades, wood Bow Tie o’ the Day and I hung around the house with a couple of pillows of sealed air. Yeah, it was as fun as it sounds.

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Sleep Is The Most Important Meal Of The Day

The Tie Room 2020 Census continues. Here again is my one and only blow-up Tie o’ the Day. It was given to me by my bro-in-law, Nuk, my oldest sister’s hubby. If you’re whitewater rafting and you and your tie fall out of your raft, Tie will stay afloat so somebody can find it and your body that it’s attached to. Tie can also act as a pillow for you when you’re bored at the office or in church, and you just need to close your eyes for a minute. Tie stands alone in its Census description category.

I must admit that The Tie Room Census has been a rather welcome and important distraction from the continuing, sometimes boring, drama of COVID-19. The Census gives me a good reason to do some bigly needed re-vamping of The Tie Room. My collection needs both a more streamlined organization, and a more jumpy-outy-but-presentable way of being exhibited to visitors. I have so massive a neckwear collection that sometimes I can’t find the precise piece of neckwear I’m searching for. Also, there are folks who visit us who would like to gawk at the amazing adventure that is The Tie Room. Maybe I’ll sell tickets. You’ll be invited, of course.

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Bad, Bad Bow Tie

Look what I found sitting outside my front door! Can you guess who ate all the pretty, bigly cookies before I remembered I should have taken a picture of them to show y’all. That’s right— a jumbo Bow Tie o’ the Day ate ’em. Apparently, I’m hangin’ with a bad crowd.