I have been thinking about the movie Five Graves to Cairo lately. Tonight I turned on the TV to Turner Classic Movies and there it was, starting. I called Der Bingle and told him and then I started to watch. I thought, “Oh, heck, I’ll just lie down and turn the light off and watch . . . “; I fell asleep. I woke up when the clock out here chimed 12, which meant it was 11 since it has gotten out of synch and I am thinking that Daylight Savings Time is coming up anyway. For Heavens Sake, this is disheartening.

Then I remembered I hadn’t taken my medicine and so I did; Sydney wanted to go out and he got the whiff of a strange animal and after he came back in, he determined he just HAD to go back out. He wandered around forever and just as I was ready to march out and grab him, the neighbor’s security light went off and I didn’t have the heart to trigger it back on.  Finally he showed up and I sat down to finish this post and now I hear him nuzzling a treat out of a bag.

Oh, Jeez, it was one of the pouches with the resealable opening and he was rapidly eating into the seal . . . and beyond. He is supposed to be an Australian Shepherd – they obey the rules. They insist on rules; Miss Alice used to turn herself in when she broke one. And he’s doing this.

He probably heard me snoring during Five Graves to Cairo and figured if I was that old, he must be getting up there and could start tweaking the protocols.

We stare at each other and I have a feeling we are thinking the same thing because he is rolling his eyes at me and dog sighing.

My son wears glasses and his insurance covers Wal-Mart; so he ordered a pair from there. The promised delivery date was between 7 – 10 days.  That was on February 8th. When Alison checked today I was in the store and when I met her at the front door, she told me they still weren’t in. I said, “I’ll be back.”

I went into the eye place part of the store and inquired about putting a trace on the glasses. A very nice lady said she was already doing that per Alison’s asking if they were in. She could tell me they had been “farmed out” by the first lab. I asked if I could stand there and see what had happened to them and she politely told me it would take some time, so I asked for a copy of the prescription.

She couldn’t give me that because the doctor was not in and would not be until Wednesday. And I asked, “Don’t you have it on the computer?” She went to see if there was a copy on file; there was not; it was just on the computer . . . and Wal-Mart policy is it could only be sent to another Wal-Mart.

I could take the delay; I could take the lack of information about the delay; I found the inability to give us a copy of the prescription before Thursday unacceptable. And I took her so, adding that I realized it was not her fault. I was calm, but definite. She promised to see what the problem had been.

Later, she called and said she had contacted the doctor and he had called the other doctor who was on duty to write the prescription for glasses out so we could have it.

She went the extra mile . . . which meant she marched to the drummer of good service and not to the dictates of the Arkansas Empire.

US 6 – The Grand Army of the Republic Highway – runs coast to coast and here in Indiana, in Northeastern Indiana, it is a weather dividing line. The East Noble School Corporation straddles it and so, with rain to the south and sleet and snow right here a few blocks south of US 6 and just snow to the north, conditions are, as they say, variable. And it is line of variability that is giving East Noble a two-hour delay this morning. Most school systems are going because they have either rain or snow; our system is bisected by the dreaded “mixture” line and that is good news for Summer.

When she awoke, her mother told her of the delay and she exclaimed, “Why didn’t you wake me up and tell me so I could enjoy it more?” Alison thought this was funny, but, to me, it was perfectly understandable. It is called prolonging the savor – or something like that. Probably goes along with the hitting your head because when you stop it feels so good syndrome.

Yesterday I was up digging through a drawer from Mother’s and found a few things. It kind of seems appropriate to post pictures today since, if you look at the two posts below, it is down memory lane day.

Great-Great Aunt Sara(h)

This is the envelope sent to Sarah who had married Sherman Malcolm, a travelling Encyclopedia Britannica salesman – I kid you not. He met her when she was teaching in Michigan. My grandmother thought he was a very nice man and gave her son Malcolm as a middle name. Sherman used to go out and ice fish on Aldrich Lake when he and Sara(h) visited  Grandma where she lived in the first decade of the century . . . and somewhat longer. That was the house that had been unoccupied for awhile and there was a rattlesnake nest in the basement.

And this is what came in the envelope from Bloomington – Sarah Wisler’s transcript from IU. She still had the “h” then. I guess as long as her father was paying her tuition, she had the “h” and dropped it later. I don’t know exactly when, but she did.

Here she is when she was older and on her second husband; at least I think this is Lloyd Dennis -she called him L.D. and so everyone else did as well. They liked to travel but came back a couple of times to stay with Grandma when I was little. L.D. and Aunt Sara where there off and on from when I was about one to four or five. I have a copy of “A Christmas Carol” she sent me from England in 1953. My dad said L.D. told him that he and Aunt Sara each thought the other one had money.

This is the front of a Christmas card LD. gave Aunt Sara and the inside is below . . . Beware.

I think L.D. had a different style than Sherman did.

Okie dokie, this plate did not come out of the drawer, but it was here and I took  pictures of it front and back; there are five others in the set. Great-great Aunt Sara(h) got them in Washington D.C. when she lived there and worked in the Veterans’ Administration. Don’t know where I’ll put them, but somewhere. Oh, my friends at the Peanut Butter Cafe & Roadhouse are grumbling, not to mention my foes. I’ve got plates from Grandma Lydia too. Once when I was showing LZP the sugar jar, I lifted the lid and found a Fisher-Price man Quentin had dropped inside.

Okay, here’s the situation: LZP sent some photos and newspaper clippings to Der Bingle and I posted the clippings but they ate into the sidebar so I am moving them down by putting these pictures in a separate post. Because that is all I can figure out how to do – 0ther than making the clipping teeny tiny at first look . . . before you click on them.

Anyway, here’s LZP and Der Bingle’s dad . . . and there Grandma, who has the same first name as out piano player her at the Peanut Butter Cafe & Roadhouse.

William A. Vance Jr. Graduated high school 1944. Passed away July, 2006

Maybe at Biloxi at end of training or in Italy. We will update this question after batting it back and forth.

My personal favorite. Learning to fly while still in Carthage High School. I’m going to see if I can find an old post that links to that letterman’s sweater.

Lydia Akers Vance. Our piano player has her first name and Quentin has her maiden name as his middle name.

LZP sent some photos from newspapers to my email and I am going to see if I can get them to post.

Here’s a post about William Vance of the Keokuk Chiefs and his reason for doing this: HERE

Every now and then, someone will drop a  pizza pan or a pie tin or a pan lid on the floor of the kitchen here in The Peanut Butter Cafe & Roadhouse and, of course, it sets up a reverberating metallic clatter that elicits an alarm clock response – you pounce on it to stop the vibrating echo. Sort of like soldiers throwing themselves on grenades for their buddies. No, that’s wrong. You throw yourself on the alarm clock or dropped pan because the continuing noise is driving you instantly insane. it is a totally selfish act and if others benefit, well, that’s okay.

This morning the melted and refrozen snow on the driveway was molded into continues waves of ice – rogue waves popping up here and there – and when i got out to scrape the windshield I slipped and went down on hands and knees that slid outward until I was sprawled out flat on gray wavy humps of cold ice in front of car. Cars look really big, by the way, when you are lying on the pavement in front of them.

It didn’t really hurt that much, but it vibrated me. Every bone and joint took a jolt and passed it on until it reached my head where vibration rhythmically bounced around like a cymbal that has been walloped. Cameron was soon looming over me, asking if I had broken anything. No, no. Nothing broken, and, thank heavens, the vibration in my body did not produce sound waves that caused him to throw himself on me.

The temperature is supposed to get above freezing and I am buying ice melter and maybe together, those conditions will make the driveway safe for the Weeble Who Can Fall Down.

I painted yesterday – not pictures, mind you – doors and walls. Light-hued first coats over dark surfaces look really bad, but you can always say, “It’s the first coat.” I could just leave it like that, the way I used to leave the vacuum cleaner in the middle of the room . . . “Oh, hi, you caught me while I was housecleaning.” HA! I’m not much into this great-looking house thing since I have to do it myself. On the other hand, I don’t want to live in a house that looks like a model home – nothing in those places but a bit of furniture and throw pillows. And not always the pillows. If you got locked in that house, you could go crazy trying to find one thing to read or one thing that gave you any other feeling than that of being locked in a sterile box.

I want things – usually my things –  about me, but things avalanche and dust bunnies hide behind them and it takes TIME to be constantly wiping up the kitchen counter and herding everything back into place. I am not the border collie of housekeepers.  I am the junkyard dog – on a good day.

So, I don’t know if I am going to paint today. Maybe I should get a Wagner power paint spray thing and go at it like a commando. I have actually pictured that. Unfortunately, the fantasy involves a prior step – getting everything out of the room. So I have to log in to the scenario of a line of people walking through, each picking up one thing and exiting. They stand outside until I am done and then they come back in in reverse order.

If I could get over my squeamishness about crawling things, I would imagine a horde of housecleaning army ants marching in each night and taking care of things. I tried imagining little elves or the creatures in “Batteries not Included” but they took one look at the place and stepped right into my fantasy and gave me “the look of you’ve got to be kidding”. It is disheartening to realize you have pushed elves to that point; they really don’t like to have to throw in the towel. Well, actually and technically, they do . . . like into the laundry and so forth. I am speaking in what we call “just an expression” and they have to, throw up their little elf hands and throw in the towel when they come face to face with my world. Usually they are sorry to have to do so and most times just gently drape it over my face and quietly file out with their little heads lowered in pity. I, AmeliaJake, gave  their lingo the expression “to drape the towel”.

I may put out the dropcloth again today; I am going to think about it for a while. And I think I’ll just lie back while I think so hard.

To be accurate, I have been up since I took Alison to work and I am still up, although sitting. On these cold winter nights I have taken to visualizing myself in a rustic cabin out in the woods with a big fire going (in the fireplace). Yes, I realize you have to suspend disbelief. Who started the fire? Who is keeping it going? Do fire nymphs really exist?

But, anyway, I’m lying there under my blanket which I see as two or three piled-up quilts  and the fire is going  . . . and I think of switching my mind channel from that scene to the car waiting for me in the driveway. Oh, you should hear the gears smash against each other.

Come to think of it, though, indoor plumbing helps the transition somewhat.