Please Hold

Thought for the day: If it weren't for electricity, we'd all be watching television by candlelight. [George Gobel]

[image courtesy of morguefile]

And if it weren't for telephones, I reckon we'd all be sending smoke signals.

To tell the truth, I had no idea what I was gonna write about for today's post. Oh, I had a few nebulous ideas, but nothing that stirred much enthusiasm in me.

Then Monday happened, and serendipity struck.

When I went to my ophthamologist last week, she prescribed another eyedrop to add to my daily regimen, and told me to come back in a month to have the pressure remeasured.The staff kindly made a return appointment for me, and I went on my merry way.
That afternoon, Smarticus' next surgery was scheduled, and you guessed it... it fell on the same day as that aforementioned appointment.

No problem, right? I simply went online and canceled the appointment, and figured I'd make a call to the (ugh!) appointment center on Monday to reschedule.

OY! Big problem! First, after dutifully entering all the required information into the automated system, the robo-voice told me all lines were busy, and there'd be a wait of anywhere between 56 minutes and an hour and 23 minutes... (Where do they come up with arbitrary numbers???) so did I want someone to call me back. To sweeten the offer, I was assured that I "wouldn't lose my place in line." A no-brainer, right? So I left the required information, and about two hours later, give or take, I got that promised call-back. Cool, huh?

Nope. Not cool. An automated voice once again informed me that all lines were busy, but the next available assistant would take my call. (Why, why, WHY did they call me back, if they were only going to put me on HOLD again?) Silly naive me thought it'd only be a short wait. After all, I was next in line, right?

I gave up after waiting for more than an hour, and I've gotta tell ya, it gave me enormous pleasure to slam my phone receiver back into its cradle. (One of the pleasures of owning a landline. Also... I have NEVER accidentally dropped my phone into the toilet or run it through the washing machine. Just saying...)

Then I took the phone off the hook. Phooey on 'em! I had stuff to do, dammit!

And I was MAD! SOOOOO mad, I wanted to punch the wall and scream. So natch, I did what any other perfectly normal weird irate writer would do... I wrote a silly poem that evening:

'Tis a sad and tragic story,
But one that must be told,
About a most unlucky fella
Whose call was put on hold.

A recorded voice informed him
There'd be a slight delay,
'But your call is quite important,
So please don't go away.'

Then began an endless loop 
Of an irritating tune,
Plus timely saccharine assurances
That someone would answer soon.

'I'm sure this won't take long,'
The foolish man did say.
'I'll simply sit and wait my turn...
Why not? I've got all day.'

Minutes passed, and then passed hours,
As life went on around him.
Yet still he sat, phone pressed to ear,
For his determination bound him. 

The longer he waited,
The more he had to stay.
His call'd be answered any sec,
So he mustn't go away.

With zero sleep and little food,
He clutched his phone for days.
He began to hum that damnable tune,
And his puffy eyes looked crazed.

Then finally, on day twenty-two or three,
The music stopped; he held his breath,
And he heard a woman say:

'Thank you for your patience.
I'm so glad that you could stay.
Now won't you kindly tell me
What I can do for you today?'

'Your mattress stinks; I'll not return
To your crummy store Sweet Slumber.
I demand my money back!'
'So sorry, sir. Wrong number!"

***********

On Tuesday, I played it smart. I called the dreaded appointment center first thing in the morning. So first thing, in fact, after dutifully entering all the required information into the automated system, I was informed that the place didn't open until 8 AM. (The slackers!) There was a happy ending, though. I called on the stroke of eight, and by golly, I was first in line, and the task was accomplished in a matter of minutes. From now on, I will ALWAYS make that call at 8 AM. Burn me once, shame on you. Burn me twice, shame on me.

So are automated telephone systems and being put on hold the banes of your existence, too? Oh, and let's not forget those delightful robo-calls. (I guess there weren't enough people being duped via email, eh?) If none of those things make it to the top of your pet peeve list, what does? (Why not write a poem about it? HA) And, ya know,  if we can't beat the system, we might as well laugh at it...

                                     

Kinda makes ya nostalgic for the good old days of telephone, doesn't it? Well, except maybe for those pesky party lines. You know... when you knew your nosy neighbor was listening to your call, because you could hear her open-mouthed  breathing. Oh, but remember those really sweet helpful operators? Remember... Earnestine?

                                    Until next time, take care of yourselves. And each other.

Showing Love to a Stranger

Thought for the day:  I think it's incumbent on anybody born on the thirteenth to consider that number... lucky. 

Friggatriskaidikaphobia is a freaky cool word that means fear of Friday the 13th. Since Friday is considered by some to be an unlucky day, and thirteen is feared by some as an unlucky number, it should come as no surprise that when the two converge, superstitious fears multiply accordingly. We could say that

Unlucky Friday + Unlucky Thirteen = Unluckier Friday

Me? I'm not superstitious. Matter of fact, I think of thirteen as a lucky number. It's the day I was born, and I always think it's extra cool when my birthday falls on a Friday... like today. Yep, today is my birthday. (whoopee)  I'd like to send all kinds of good wishes to someone else who's celebrating a birthday today. Please join me in wishing  Jon a very happy birthday... and many more. [Happy birthday, cowboy!] If you've never visited his blog before, go check it out. And if you enjoy poetry, check out his books, too. Well... no, don't just check 'em out... buy 'em! His Love Letters to Ghosts is an unforgettable collection of haunting poems that resonate like an anguished cry in a darkened room. Trust me, you'll treasure them and  read them more than once. I sure have. And his collection of poems for children is absolutely delightful. I gave a copy to one of my granddaughters last year, and she loves it. Birthday wishes also go out to Geo, another one of my favorite blogger dudes, and to cat, sweet lady and poetess extraordinaire. Not sure exactly which day their birthdays fall on, but it's right about now, give or take... Guess that makes us all Sags. Some of us more than others... :) (I prefer to think of it as a loose fit...)

[Morguefile]

 So anyhow, if you folks in the southeastern part of the United States happen to see a massive glow in the sky today, fear not. It's not Armageddon, or anything. It'll just be the blaze atop my birthday cake. (You know you're getting old when the candles cost more than the cake!) I have a feeling our local firemen are sick and tired of coming to our house every year to extinguish the bonfire... which wouldn't be necessary if Smarticus didn't light the darned candles with a blowtorch... so maybe it's time for us to think about skipping the candles from now on. The truth is, I'm creeping ever closer to that age where there'll once again be a single candle on my cake, and everybody will tell me what a good girl I am if  I can summon enough hot air to blow it out in a single try.

Know what? Maybe it'd be better to skip the cake too, and just have a glass of wine.

Hey! I'm OLD. I can do that if I wanta.

Youth is the gift of nature, but age is a work of art.  [Stanislaw Jerry Lec]

                      (Too bad my work of art is being painted by Picasso...)

You don't stop laughing because you grow older. You grow older because you stop laughing.  [Maurice Chevalier]      

I'm happy to report that my inner child is still ageless.  [Jane Broughton]

                                     

You can't help getting older, but you don't have to get old.  [George Burns]

I am old enough to see how little I have done in so much time, and how much I have to do in so little. [Sheila Kaye Smith]

[image courtesy of unsplash]

Attitude, a sense of hope and humor, along with the feeling that one is not alone, is vital to a person's well-being, especially when fighting a deadly disease like cancer. Over the past few months, I couldn't help but notice some patients were at the cancer centers... alone... with no family member or friend along to share the burden.

Sure, we spoke to each another. Matter of fact, it's astounding how much and how quickly camaraderie develops within the confines of a cancer center. It's as though everyone's a member of the same club that no one wanted to join.

Still, it troubled me to see people there alone.

I told Smarticus that once we get him healthy, I'd like to volunteer at one of the centers. Maybe some of those loners would enjoy having someone with them during their lengthy chemo infusion...? Someone to chat with or play games with...? (Smarticus and I played a LOT of Yahtzee.)

He said maybe those people WANTED to be there alone. That thought had never crossed my mind, but it gave me something to chew on.

Still, it bothered me to see people there alone with no visible sign of support. Surely I could do... something.

Then serendipity struck. An article in the newspaper alerted me to a non-profit group that sends handwritten letters to breast cancer patients. The opening paragraph of this article, written by Erika Mailman, stated: A single card, written by a stranger, became a touchstone for a woman who had been diagnosed with breast cancer. She read it every night before bed. She brought it to every appointment. 

Ah HA! thought I. Such a simple... yet profound... way to offer encouragement and show support.

Girls Love Mail was started by writer and breast cancer survivor Gina Mulligan, and to date, this group has collected and forwarded 145,000 handwritten letters and cards to cancer centers all over the U.S. The article went on to express how much these letters mean to the women who've received them. In a world of sometimes social disconnection, these letters buck the trend... and they make a difference in these women's lives.

Making one person smile can change the world. Maybe not the whole world, but their world. 

Although these letters and cards currently go to breast cancer patients, maybe if the organization receives a large enough volume of them, they could be sent to other patients, as well. I dunno... but maybe. And although this organization serves patients in the U.S., maybe there are similar non-profit groups in other countries, as well...

Try to be a rainbow in someone's cloud. [Maya Anglou]

Not all of us can do great things, but we can do small things with great love. [Mother Teresa]

                                               
                               Until next time, take care of yourselves. And each other.

The Adventures of Three Old Poops

Thought for the day:  One aspect of serendipity to bear in mind is that you have to be looking for something in order to find something else.  [Lawrence Block]

Thanks to our anniversary trip to Dahlonega in May, Smarticus and I have a new-found interest in rocks and minerals. (Believe me, no one is more surprised by this unexpected development than I.) Anyway, because of this new interest, we went to a rock, mineral, and gemstone show a few weeks ago.

[Psssst! Guess where it was held? At a museum. Woo- HOO!]

See, as many of you already know, I'm an unabashed sucker for museums. Even though Tellus Museum is only about an hour's drive away, we'd never been there before, so by sheer serendipity, we were once again exposed to another new adventure.

Most of the rock show was set up outside, but the admission price included entrance to the museum, as well. The show was fun, with lots and lots of gorgeous rocks, jewelry, and fossils, etc, to gawk at, and I even bought grab bags of goodies from a couple of the vendors. (Okay, so I'm a sucker for grab bags, too.)

But enough of that. I want to tell you about the museum. Especially blogging pal Sherry... she and her family will be relocating to Georgia pretty soon, and I just KNOW her Bubba would love this museum...

Its transportation section contains a nifty collection of motorbikes, cars, airplanes, and even space age displays. There's plenty of variety to capture interest, but not an overabundance of any one thing. This 1886 Benz Motorwagen is the world's first automobile.

The museum's rock and mineral collection is large and eye-catching.   The little boy in this picture (a future geologist?) stood transfixed in front of these fluorescent minerals for quite a while, watching them transition from being illuminated by artificial light to startling glow-in-the-dark luminescence when the light was turned off. His dad finally had to pull him away.

In addition to all the geodes, gems, and whatnot on display, there's also a place in the museum to pan for gems and hunt for fossils. Smarticus wasn't interested in digging in the dirt for itty bitty fossils, but we did pan some teensy weensy gems.

Another section of the museum is called My Big Back Yard, and it's specifically designed for children to explore and learn. It looked like fun, but we're a little outside the demographics for it, so we didn't spend any time there. Now, the last section... the last section is my favorite. Dinosaur fossils!

Check out this bad-ass! The dunkleosteus, meaning terrible fish, had bony armor over most of its body, grew up to twenty feet long, and instead of teeth, had sharpened edges in its super powerful jaws. Needless to say, he was at the top of the oceanic food chain. This particular specimen, however, must have been a loner: he had no body. Nope. He's just a scary-looking head attached to a wooden cut-out.

I've always loved pterodactyls; don't you? Of course, none of them have ever chased me and tried to nibble on my flesh, either.

Of COURSE I touched it. What kid could resist? Boys, especially, love to be grossed out at the idea of touching an old pile of fossilized dinosaur poop.

I don't remember what this guy is, but he's kinda cute, isn't he? For some reason, he reminds me of a dog that should've been part of Mad magazine's Spy vs. Spy cartoon.

Naturally, Tellus has its very own fearsome-looking T. rex.

I tried to lure Smarticus into posing in front of this big-mouthed fossil with his mouth opened wide, but darn it, my favorite old poop wouldn't bite. However,  I had no problem with acting the fool. Actually, come to think of it, the role comes rather naturally.




So there ya have it. We went to look at a bunch of rocks, and discovered a whole new museum to explore. A terrific museum, with a diverse smorgasbord of exhibits from rocks... to old cars and satellites... to kid's stuff... to dinosaur poop. What more could ya ask for?

{The following weekend, we had another kind of adventure. After going to a car show, we stopped at a new-to-us place in Lawrenceville to have pizza. Best pizza we've ever eaten in the state of Georgia! For all you locals reading this, the restaurant is called Romeo's. Fantastic! Everything in this New York-style pizza place is handmade in-store, except for the cannolis, which they special-order from a bakery in New York City. Mama mia! They have-a some good food!}

                                      Until next time, take care of yourselves. And each other.

     [Don't be a procratinataur... embrace an adventure today! It's life's whipped cream.]

Serendipity Shines

Thought for the day:  It's a bizarre but wonderful feeling to arrive dead center of a target you  didn't even know you were aiming for.  [Lois McMaster Bujold]

The stones found in our first scoop of pay dirt.

Ms. Bujold is absolutely right, and what she's describing is what I'd call serendipity, which Lawrence Block defines as Look for something, find something else, and realize what you've found is more suited to your needs than what you thought you were looking for. 

Have you ever experienced something like that? Happens to me all the time.

As mentioned in a couple previous posts, for our forty-fourth anniversary, Smarticus and I decided to celebrate our golden years by going to the north Georgia mountains for a few days to try our hands at gold and gem panning.

 I promised to tell you today what kind of gem I picked to have cut, polished and mounted for a necklace. Although tempted to go with the large emerald, I decided on a garnet. Surprised? So was Smarticus. Before I show you the finished product, and tell you why it turned out to be such a serendipitous choice, how about some fun facts about gems?

• Sapphires come in all colors of the rainbow, not just blue. How 'bout that? And get this: know what red sapphires are? Rubies! Who knew?
• Amethyst (violet) and citrine (yellow) are made of the same mineral... beryl. Excessive heat can change a stone's color from one to the other. (Hmmm, that'd make for an interesting necklace choice for a woman experiencing hot flashes, eh?)
• Aquamarine and emerald also come from the same mineral.
• Violet-blue iolite has the same polarizing capability as a pair of sunglasss. Allegedly, Vikings used to look through a piece of iolite to help them locate the sun on a cloudy day.
• Ancient Greeks named amber from their word for electron, because if rubbed, it gives off static electricity. (I'll give ya some static if you rub me the wrong way, too.)
• Fossilized tree sap must be at least 30 million years old to be considered amber. (Prior to that, I guess it's just stale sap.)
• If you sand malachite, it can give off a poisonous dust.
• When exposed to radiation, diamonds turn green. (Hmm, I wonder if there's an industrial application to take advantage of this quality?)
• Marlene Dietrich was renown for her massive jewelry collection, especially her emeralds, which she wore in most of her movies. However, when hosting a dinner party one evening, she couldn't find her mega-carat emerald ring anywhere. (The report I read said 37.41 carats, but I find that hard to believe.) Anyhow, the ring turned up, safe and sound. Inside a guest's slice of cake. (I'm guessing there was no finders-keepers rule invoked.)
• The word amethyst comes from the Greek methustos, which means not intoxicated. The ancient Greeks often made their drinking vessels from amethyst, in the belief that using them would prevent imbibers from getting drunk. (But offither, you muthn't arreth me... I'm methustos.)

                                             Okay, ready to see my garnet necklace?

Beautiful, isn't it? It has a deep reddish purple color, and no, I didn't pick it because the color reminded me of a nice glass of merlot. Okay, so maybe I did. So sue me. It's a pretty color. But in spite of my shallow choice based on a pretty color, choosing a garnet for the occasion actually turned out to be ... how shall I put this?... a brilliant choice.

Are you familiar with the Greek myth about Persephone? She was the daughter of Demeter, the goddess of the harvest. When Persephone accidentally fell into the Underworld, Hades wanted her to stay and be his wife, but Demeter was so distraught, she said she wouldn't let anything grow on Earth until Persephone was returned to her. Before allowing her to leave him, Hades gave Persephone a pomegranate, the sweet fruit of the dead, in the belief that if she tasted it, she would come back to him. She ate six of its seeds, and as a result, she thereafter spent six months of the year with her mother, and the other six with Hades.

So what does that have to do with a garnet, you ask? The garnet got its name from the Latin punica garanatum, which means pomegranate... partly because the coloring of some garnets is similar to the color of pomegranate seeds, and partly because the ancient Greeks considered the garnet to be a symbol for lasting love, and would give them to their lovers to ensure their return.

See? A perfect anniversary present, right? Talk about serendipity! Sometimes serendipity is just intention unmasked. [Elizabeth Berg, The Year of Pleasures]

                                           Oh, and that's not ALL...

Here's a picture of three of our grandchildren taken a couple years ago. The cutie sitting on the toy car? Believe it or not, her name is...  Persephone.

Yep, serendipity out the wazoo.



Serendipity is looking in a haystack for a needle and discovering a farmer's daughter. [Julius Comroe, Jr.]

Serendipity is putting a quarter in the gumball machine and having three pieces come rattling out instead of one — all red. [Peter H. Reynolds]

Serendipity is having the good sense to fall in love with your best friend.  [me]

Oh, that necklace isn't the only perfect memento we brought home with us. We also found these smooching salt and pepper shakers in an antique shop. What can I say? I love whimsy.

                                    Until next time, take care of yourselves. And each other.

When love feels like magic, you call it destiny. When destiny has a sense of humor, you call it serendipity.