Earthquake Ginsu Labels vacuum Misplaced iPad
Last week’s reminiscence about the Ginsu knife struck a cord..
“...and severed an artery,” I explained to Nazy. “And you were the one who wanted the Ginsu.”
“Dan..”
“My brother David wanted to know if we still had our proof-of-purchase documentation in case something broke in the 15 years remaining on the 50 year warranty.”
“Didn’t you use the Ginsu to clean weeds between the cement blocks on the terrace?”
“Yep. Ginsu also built the blades used on the Tunnel Boring Machine that carved the Channel Tunnel between England and France. And I used it to cut the PVC drain pipes so they’d fit under the sink in Memphis..”
Flashback: 1979 Memphis, Tennessee.
I had just installed a garbage disposal at our residence on Kensington Place. The task, which had taken longer than anticipated, also involved several trips to the plumbing supply store. Shunning measurements, I cut ‘to fit’. The (near) final construct routed drain pipes through a topological space that resembled a three-dimensional Möbius Strip. My (newly acquired) Ginsu had been used to both cut the PVC and gouge space in the plaster back wall. Unmoved by the beauty of my design, which featured two U-traps, Nazy had forced rework with a simple question:
“How does the water know that it should turn right instead of just going straight down?”
“You have a point,” I replied. “The gravity deflector was too expensive and I didn’t adjust my design to reflect that fact.”
I continued work and eventually completed everything. Congratulating myself after installation, I encouraged Nazy to test it out.
She (correctly) turned on the water before engaging the garbage disposal. In a cosmic coincidence, the disposal began to churn at the exact same time a small earthquake occurred in the Memphis area. The house started to shake and..
“Turn it off!” I exclaimed.
End Flashback
More than one reader wanted photographic evidence to convince them of our ownership of a Ginsu Knife. For those skeptics
As we settle into the new place, Nazy and I have wisely divided our tasks. While she put things away, I ordered new return address labels. My careful selection was...
“Rejected! What were you thinking?” Nazy grumbled.
“I eh..”
“They are ugly.”
“Au contraire, my dear. They are colorful.”
“Brown and black don’t go together.”
“Brown?” I asked.
“It’s ugly. I can’t believe that you ordered those without asking me.”
“I can’t believe that you hid the cookie jar behind the kidney beans,” I thought. “I was just trying to help,” I mumbled.
Reader feedback on the divisive issue of return address labels is urgently requested. If you like the label that I selected, send an email:
Subject: I Like Dan’s WONDERFUL choice
to nazmartin@hotmail.com. If you don’t like them, send an email to deadletters@ignore.com.
Last weekend, Nazy went to San Diego to see her sister Saphura and her cousin Laila. She returned Monday evening. On the way to pick her up at the train station, I stopped to get cookies.
“I’ll just replace the ones I ate before she notices,” I thought. I was shopping when Nazy called with the news that...
“... the train will be early,” she explained.
Well-‘trained’, I dropped what I was doing and dashed to the car. Unfortunately, what I was doing was reading a book. With iBooks. On my iPad. And ‘dropped’ is an appropriate word.
I got to the station just as Nazy’s train arrived. We found (not easily) a place for a late dinner and drove home - where I couldn’t find my iPad. Naturally, I reacted calmly:
“Where is it?” I whined. “I had it at the grocery store.”
Nazy was convinced that someone had stolen it when “You didn’t lock the car door...”
“... for the 26 seconds it took to get you...” I thought.
That evening, after I changed passwords on all my accounts, I discussed the situation with Nazy. We agreed that we could afford a replacement iPad. (I am an early adopter - I have the original iPad; I’m a late replacer.) I decided to drive to the grocery store to check out ...
“Do you have a Lost and Found?” I asked.
“We do. Did you lose something?”
“An iPad!” I replied. “Of course I lost something,” I thought. “Why else would I be here?”
“Some people return things they’ve found,” the clerk replied reading my mind.
“Did anyone return an iPad?” I asked.
“What did this iPad look like?”
“It looked like an iPad.”
“Where was this iPad lost?”
“I hope that it was lost in this grocery store.”
“When was it lost?”
“At 9:26PM last night.”
“Not 11:15PM?”
“No.”
“How could you identify this iPad?”
“I’d turn it on and see a photo of me and the family.”
The iPad Photo
“Could this be your iPad?”
“Thank you.”
“Let’s go get a new vacuum cleaner,” Nazy said when I got home.
“Too expensive,” I replied.
“We could afford an iPad, so.”
“An iPad, my dear, is a necessity. A vacuum cleaner...
“We have an iPad. We don’t have a vacuum. Yet.”