As you get to know me better, you’ll know things that my kids may someday pay you to keep to yourself. This is a great reason to keep track of me. Think of it as retirement planning. Just fill out that email signup over there and the money may well come flowing one day. No promises, though.
Don’t you, by the way, get annoyed with promises coming at you in the mail and on your phone and email? You know what I mean. I have gotten a garden catalog in the mail for years. Most of the catalogs have a big red sticker on the front: “Warning: this may be the last catalog you receive unless you order.” Yeah, yeah, big promises. I’ve never ordered. I’d be OK if this were the last catalog but no such luck.
I’ve been promised that the IRS is about to pick me up if I don’t pay my past-due IRS bill with a Target gift card. And that this is my last chance to get that great loan (no fine print mentioned). What? They’ll leave me alone if I miss my last chance?
I don’t make promises like that. I promise.
OK, I digress. I call this squirreling, but I’m not going to explain that today or I’ll never get to my story. What was I talking about again?
Oh, yeah, I’ve had several jobs in my life, none related to the one before as far as I can tell. I’ve been a property manager for four years. Managing rental units provides endless story possibilities. That’s almost a good enough reason to keep managing.
As you can imagine, we occasionally have tenants who don’t pay their rent. This particular tenant not only got behind on his rent, but he had creative excuses. One month, his check must have gotten stolen since we hadn’t gotten it.
In fact, the police had contacted him about the stolen check, and he was getting another one issued. We asked, could he send us a copy of the police report? Of course not, since the police were in another state.
What, they hadn’t heard of faxing or email?
He did get that rent payment paid. It was sort of the sweet-and-sour-sauce with that tenant. One month, he was great and the next, lots of complaints and no rent.
I reported the final events to my business partner, who is also my sister, Ann, via texts:
Me; “Guess what? No rent today again.”
Ann: “Still nothing? Didn’t he promise?”
Me: “Yep.” Captain Obvious is my texting handle.
Ann: “Can’t you just email him and tell him to send us his kidney.”
I was typing, “I’m OK with a kidney,” when Ann answered, “No! Ack! Money. Not kidney. Money”
When you think of the sounds of Christmas, you may think of the gentle guitar tones of “Silent Night” or the wistful notes of “Silver Bells.”
I have young kids rushing through my house regularly so I get to hear other sounds. Like Big Mouth Billy Bass, for example.
I had hoped yet again this Christmas to find out how rich Christmas could be without this rubber fish flopping on a wooden plaque while emitting holiday songs.
It was not meant to be.
The Ghost of Christmas Gifts Past
A seven-year-old boy uncovered Big Mouth Billy Bass in a box of hidden Christmas ornaments. You haven’t lived 'til you have seen a fake fish sing “Jingle Bells” with his tail flipping in time. Punctuated by “YeeHaw.” I blame my sister for Billy being in my garage.
The seven-year-old wanted to know how Billy worked and why I didn’t have this fish mounted front and center already.
The Fatal Mistake
One of my character flaws is not being able to think of a misdirection quickly enough.
I told him Billy was a nuisance. That didn't deter him. I said it was goofy. He didn’t care. So I added, “It doesn’t work because it needs batteries.”
I know, I know. That was not a smart answer. But this thing was so old that I assumed I didn’t have the right batteries in the house.
The Encore
I was wrong. He found four fresh C batteries in the back of the junk drawer.
Billy Bass rejoined the world of the living.
When it comes to Christmas animals, one time is never enough. Kids push the red button so Billy sings over and over and over until the adults smash the gadget to smithereens. Theoretically.
Christmas is always a memorable time of the year. Especially with children around.
Even before the blue cloud surrounded the house, I was very sorry I had knocked on the door.
My sister, Ann, and I used to manage several rental houses for landlords. One day, we had to deliver a notice to a late-paying tenant to either pay up or move out.
These have to be hand-delivered to the unit, and we thought that meant knocking on the door and handing the form to the tenant.
What innocents we were.
By then, the air was turning blue. The only clean words were, “Hey, get back here, Foofie.”
I knocked, intending to hand over the form. When the tenant didn’t respond immediately, I started taping the paperwork to the front door.
Then the door flew open. The tenant stormed out, grabbed the paper, crumpled it into a tight ball, and threw it on the ground. “I don’t accept notices on my door.”
She said a lot more, but I filtered out the swear words.
Then she bolted into the street, chasing a little dog that scooted past our ankles. A dog she wasn’t supposed to have.
I stood at the front door, coughing from the blue air, and watching the tenant darting around the street like a defensive back trying to tackle a quick-footed running back. Foofie kept skittering just out of reach.
I enjoyed the entertaining romp for a moment, but then I remembered my vulnerable position on the front step. I smoothed out the page, taped it to the door, and sprinted to the car. I was ready for a fast getaway, but Ann said, “I’m not moving until that dog is gone. Just what we need is to run over the dog, too.”
We finally escaped through the blue cloud. After that, we flipped a coin to see who went to the door. No knocking. We did a tape-and-run.
I often travel with my sister, who is as into to-do lists as I am. She called me the day before we left on a trip last month. “Are you packed?”
“As much as you are.”
Which was code for, “I haven’t even done my laundry yet.”
We had decided to visit family in Wyoming.
I actually booked a motel room for us ten days ahead of time at the Arrowhead Motel. I had several emails confirming the reservation. All from the Arrowhead Motel.
I was ready to order the “New Great Planner” award for myself as we started out for Sundance.
As we neared the town, my sister (who was driving) asked for directions to the motel. So I just punched “Arrowhead motel, Sundance” into my maps app.
Um, no Arrowhead Motel in Sundance.
I didn’t panic. I had at least five emails from Arrowhead Motel, so it must exist.
But did I dig into those emails? No, because I had a better plan. (As the New Great Planner).
Our brother had told me he and his wife were staying at the Bear Lodge Motel, which was right beside our motel. So I just needed to search for Bear Lodge Motel. That’d be faster than rummaging through all those emails.
I typed in Bear Lodge Motel, and the map found it. “Take a right at the stop sign,” I told my sister. “We need to go about a mile.”
Sure enough, a mile east we spotted a big bear sign on the corner with a sign Bearlodge right by a building about the size of a three-car garage.
Sundance was a small town, but really? That was a pretty small motel.
“That’s the Bearlodge Ranger District,” my sister said. Not nicely, either.
Whoosh. My planning award flew right out the window.
I hadn’t looked up the population yet (that’s more planning than I’d do) but learned it was a town of 1,143, small enough to accommodate driving up and down every street.
“Every street, huh?” My sister didn’t say that nicely, either.
I had a smart retort loaded into my response tray, but then I spotted a sign. Bear Lodge Motel. And right behind it was a building.
The size of a car wash. In fact, it was a car wash.
The Bear Lodge Car Wash?
A block later, we spotted a big sign for Bear Lodge Motel and a little sign beside it for Arrowhead Motel.
What did I learn? That Wyoming small towns seem to like names like “Bear Lodge” and “Arrowhead.”
My morning's confidence should've been a giveaway. But, no. I confidently assured my fellow travelers, who had to go through airline security with a baby, that I’d wait on the other side of security for them.
After all, I have TSA PreCheck. I didn’t have to shed my shoes or jacket. The TSA people in my line always brought me chocolate mints and an arm flourish as I walked through. (OK, I might have exaggerated that part.)
But that morning, I cleared the metal detector with no problem, only to watch my carry-on bags slide to the other side of a glass wall.
How was I supposed to get them over there?
Some Good Sense...
I did have the good sense not to reach over the barrier or I might be writing this from a cell.
Before long, I realized that the other side of the glass wall was reserved for suspect bags.
Like mine?
They were flagging quite a few, so I stood by patiently–which of course I always do (stand patiently, I mean)–until they got to my bag.
The attendant peeled back the zippered cover and went digging. She snagged my shaker bottle with the plastic bag of powder stuffed inside.
“That’s just protein powder,” I said. She didn’t even look at me. Instead, she scurried to another counter, dipped a small sample out of the bag, and dripped something onto the powder from a bottle that looked like it held eye drops.
“It’s protein powder,” I said. In case they were confused.
Nope. Not confused. My powder tested positive for something–they didn’t know what when I asked–and so my suitcase innards, my electronics, and I all got a pat-down.
Then they re-packed my suitcase, including the protein powder, and sent me on my way.
Repacking It All
I texted my hosts for the week: You may be housing a terrorist.
She texted back: Is it too late to run a background check?
Haha.
My morning’s confidence had melted away in the pat-down, but then I thought about my fellow travelers. Have they made it through security yet?
Right then, their text message arrived. Oh, good. I could still help. Maybe carry the baby. Or a bag.
Then I read the text: We’re at the gate.
I Learned
I once held the belief that airport security lines took forever. Long snake lines measured in eons.
But I’ve learned. Nothing takes as long as being threatened with protein powder prison.
I thought I had found my publisher. He had earnest blue eyes and an idea for a series.
I was all in.
Then I learned he wanted me to write his book for him. The first of his six-book series.
He amped up his determination and locked those blue eyes on me.
“OK,” I said. “What are we writing this book about?”
“I need you to tell me a story about Buzzy the bee.”
“You’re not going to tell the story?”
“I don’t know it yet.” Connor shrugged like seven-year-olds sometimes do.
Buzzy the Bee's Adventure
I threw together a quick story while we sat together.
“Yeah, that’ll do.” He nodded. “OK, go type it up.”
In short order, we had the story in a digital file.
“Now we have to print it,” Connor said.
I copied the text into a formatting program, bumped the type size to sixteen-point, and widened the margins.
Voila! We had a three-page book. Because I could.
Hoping to impress this young author. Publisher. Probably both, like many are these days.
Making the Book Cover
“Now we need a cover.” Connor had this book stuff down better than I thought. “Maybe Eric could make us one.”
Eric is his nine-year-old brother, who nodded enthusiastically. “What do I draw?”
The technology bug hit me again. “Let’s create a Photoshop version while we’re waiting for Eric.”
Connor liked that idea.
Photoshop churned out a yellow-and-black bumblebee soaring over a field of flowers—Buzzy in all his glory. I slapped the title above him and added Connor’s name.
We printed it and Connor was happy. “That works.”
As the printer chugged out the first cover, he was already planning his marketing plan for his second book. (I am not kidding.)
Eric studied the book cover. “Why doesn’t it say ‘Illustrated by Eric’?”
“Well, you didn’t illustrate this one,” I told him.
