Sentenced on Saturday

Today is the last day of my "sentence,"
 aka working most of the week while Mr. & Mrs. Boss are at a trade show in Vegas.  They're flying home on Monday so then she'll work Tuesday and all will be back to normal--or what passes for normal around here.  One good and bad thing has been the near perfect lack of customers all week.  I'm sure no one was inconvenienced when I was closed on Wednesday because the only message on the machine was from a business, not a person, and yesterday was sooooo long.  I worked 9 straight hours with one paying customer (JJ) and the other a guy in for "where to snorkel in Cozumel" info.  I found him a back issue of a dive mag with a big article on Coz in it and also gave him info about getting him and his family certified to dive.  The kicker was that they were there AT THE SAME TIME.  In that whole long day you'd think that they could spread themselves out a bit but, no, there they were, shoulder to shoulder, plus that was when Durwood called to tell me that the hawk was hunting in the backyard too.  Gah.  Some days customers seem to be lured in by the aroma of my lunch soup but this week they were not--in spades.  I'm glad I went to knitting too.  It was good to sit and knit with people around me.  PEOPLE, people, actual live humans talking and moving around, interacting with me, I barely knew how to act.  But I managed.  I haven't been inspired by the last couple days' Photo a Day themes.  Friday's was "the view from your window" and not only was I busy early and didn't have time to take one, this blah scene is what I see lately.  It's a far cry from the vivid pinks and dark grays of the sunrises at the end of October, don't you think?  Just endless blah, misty gray and brown.  Ugh.  Today's theme is one I always have trouble with, "the last thing you bought."  I don't buy things, don't really shop, not as an entertainment, and I don't need or want new clothes.  I'm perfectly happy with my broken-in jeans, long-sleeved tees, and solid-color pullover sweaters.  (I have a very hyphenated wardrobe.)  So I was standing in the kitchen just now stymied as to what to snap when I saw the bags of birdseed I bought the other day and haven't taken out to the bins yet.  Birdseed.  I bought that last weekend.  It's the last thing I bought.  God, I'm boring, but there you are.  Now I'm caught up.  Whew.

November 17--France, Theatrical Armor.  "Well, it looks like armor," Lincoln said, "it looks like it would work."  Macklin shook his head.  "It's papier mache, even a stage sword would hack right through it."  Lincoln turned this way and that, admiring himself in the mirror.  "But it looks good.  Don't you think it looks good?"  "Yes, like the real thing.  From the third row back no one will be able to tell the difference.  It's lightweight and it won't clank.  You'd hate it if it clanked.  Now hold still."  While he spoke Macklin sewed a rip in Lincoln's tights while he wore them.  The actor crouched with his hands on his knees and his rear thrust back while Macklin sat on a low stool, his glasses perched on the end of his nose, and a needle and thread flashing in the light of the goose neck lamp.  The door opened and Sheila the stage manager poked her head in.  "Five minutes, Linc.  Oh sorry, I didn't know you were..."  She shut the door.  Macklin started to sputter and his hand began to shake.  Finally he was laughing so hard he could barely see to sew.  "Just don't sew the tights to my bits," Lincoln said, which sent Macklin to his knees.

You think I made that up, don't you?  Well, I worked costumes on a St. Norbert College summer production once long ago and had to sew up the ripped ass-end of a pair of tights with the ass-hat still in them.  Naturally he was one of those middle-aged men who makes every interaction into a sexual one.  Was I tempted to sew the tights to his hairy bits?  You'd better believe I was.  But I didn't.  One of us had to be mature.
--Barbara