YES, THAT’S REALLY WHAT I WANT IT TO SAY!

When our daughter & son-in-law were first married, they lived in one of three small houses that we bought for rental.  Bob, who worked in Bud’s office, lived next door.  Bob had found a box containing a litter of puppies that someone had abandoned on the street.  He gave one (“Fio”, short for “Fiorina”, little flower in Italian) to them & found other homes for the rest.  Our son-in-law was complaining that almost everything they owned once belonged to Bob.  He said, “We have Bob’s dishes, Bob’s sofa, Bob’s table…” & then he looked at Fio & said, “Come here, Bob’s dog!”

Food looks beautiful & tempting in advertisements, doesn’t it?  Do you know why you can never get yours to look that good?  I once took a photography class which was taught by a professional who also shot ads.  You probably know that they use mashed potatoes instead of vanilla ice cream because ice cream can’t stand up under all those hot lights.  But do you have any idea how they get roast turkeys to get so shiny & evenly browned?  With the new photography techniques, I don’t know it they still do it this way or not, but at that time they coated it with motor oil!

You Know You’ve Been Married a Long Time When Dept: Before the days of Netflix or when you could find out ANYTHING on your computer or Smart Phone, Bud & I had been wracking our brains for over a month trying to remember who played the role of “Doc” in the movie “Mr. Roberts”.  No particular reason, it was just frustrating not to be able to remember.  I could picture him, but could not come up with his name.  Early one morning--about 3am--I woke up with a flash of genius.  I shook Bud awake & said just two words--“William Powell”--with no further explanation.  He opened one eye, looked at me & said, “You’re right!” & promptly rolled over & went back to sleep.

We were with our three kids & another couple in Hawaii.  Six of us (Bud & I, our 3 kids & Scott’s girlfriend) were enjoying the sand, the sun & the ocean.  Scott, not so much.  The ocean was too wet, the sun too sunny &, I guess, the sand was too sandy.  We decided to have a Tshirt made for him.  After quite a lengthy discussion with the clerk, who didn’t believe that was what we really wanted, the shirt was made.  It said, simply, “NATURE SUCKS”.  THAT, he liked!

In Hawaii, our daughter saw a Tshirt that she liked in a window.  It said, “YOUR NAME HERE”.  We went in & asked the clerk for a red one in her size. He got an unprinted shirt & asked her name.  She asked him why he wanted to know.  He told her it was so he could put her name on the shirt.  She said she wanted the shirt to say, “YOUR NAME HERE”.  He said, “I KNOW!  So what’s your name?”  Back & forth.  She finally asked him for a piece of paper & wrote down just what she wanted it to say.  After some time, the young clerk, who had apparently taken this job so he could earn enough go to Cal Tech or MIT & become a rocket scientist, made her the shirt.  She wore it for a long time.  It said exactly what she wanted.  It looked something like this:

(not our daughter)

As my husband says, “You’ve got to take the bad with the terrible”----fishducky