Dentexting

Every six months I receive a text from a dentist confirming the date and time of a teeth cleaning appointment for some woman named Meg.  And every six months I respond to the text that I’m not her and that I already got my teeth cleaned anyhow. But the dentist never responds to my texts.  I even called the office one time to tell them they had the wrong number, and that I was not Meg.  It did no good. This has been going on for years. And sometimes Meg blows off her appointments, and then I get even more texts.  Frankly, I’m dying to know if this “Meg” even exists, or if it’s a phony ploy by the dentist to drum up some business. Maybe he thinks that if he sends out these random texts people will read them and think, “I know this text is not for me, but I haven’t been to the dentist in two years.  This dentist sounds nice in this text, and my tooth hurt last Sunday when I was eating that pot roast. I’m gonna call this dentist and make an appointment!” Yeah.  These guys know what they’re doing.

I think I might show up at Meg’s next appointment so I can meet her (if she exists) and tell her to quit blowing off the appointments so I won’t get so many texts.  

Senior Pets

We were at a restaurant in a small town recently where they have those paper place mats with the ads on them from the local businesses. I love those place mats. They give you a feel for the community you’re in and there’s usually something entertaining in one of the squares. Sure enough, this place mat had an ad for the local humane society which has a pet food pantry apparently for pets in need. I was told these pantries are quite common. So yeah, you can get free food for your pet, I guess. That’s a nice service. This humane society also provided a service called “Senior Pet Food Delivery”. It did not specify if it was for senior people or if it was for senior pets. Since this was a Humane Society, I’m assuming it was for pets. It did not state how old your pet had to be to get pet food delivered to it and it also did not state if they measure the pet’s age in human years or in dog years. My recommendation would be that, when you apply for the food delivery, you use dog years ‘cause 70 years old sounds a lot more needy than 10.

Just don’t ask for Puppy Chow. That might give away that you have a younger pet.

Tongue in Cheek?

I know this is Thanksgiving week but I have a beef to share with you. When I was a kid, our family would buy a side of beef every year.  We ate very well. We had this chest freezer in the basement full of these white packages of beef. Only Mom and Dad knew what was in each package.  In hindsight, I guess I didn’t (and still don’t) know what a “side” of beef was. ‘Cause I thought that meant you got half the animal. Apparently that was not the case, ‘cause we always got the tongue and the heart. Unless they split the tongue and heart in two, which I don’t think they did. (I’m gonna ask my butcher about that, but I don’t want it to be when there’s people around ‘cause maybe that’s some obvious thing that everyone knows. I mean, I’m not gonna stand around and wait at his counter for my number to get called and then ask him that question.)

I remember my Mom making some pretty good soup from the heart. And the heart had to be good for you, right? I mean, how could eating heart NOT be good for you? Beef tongue was another matter for me.  It always seemed like it was tasting me back.

So, like, can you get a side of chicken?

Roundabouts!

Roundabouts are the talk of the town. They are popping up everywhere. We mentioned them briefly in our previous post, and, since they are a new concept for some of us, I thought I’d address some common questions I’ve heard regarding these Lazy Susans of the highway. Actually there’s been one overriding question that I’ve heard and that is the following: Once you get on, how long can you stay on a roundabout? Is there a time limit? Well, I’ve researched this and, amazingly, from what I can tell, you can stay on it as long as you like. There is no time limit. For instance, if your family is trying to decide where to eat, picking between, say, IHOP and Red Lobster, you can keep going around until you decide on a restaurant.  Once you decide, you simply exit the roundabout at the appropriate spot.

Contrary to legend, continuing to drive in the circle will not turn you into butter.

Stop Sign of the Times

Have you ever been in your car at a stop sign waiting for a break in traffic when someone pulls up in the lane next to you and crosses the white line and totally blocks your view, thereby eliminating any chance you have of seeing any cars that are coming? That can be frustrating, can’t it? (Can we please ticket this type of behavior?)  Your options in these cases are as follows:

1.        Throw up your hands in disgust
2.        Inch a little further across the white line than they are, thereby blocking their view and risking that the truck coming from the left could tear off your front bumper
3.        Pull blindly into traffic where, granted, you might get killed, but the offending driver at the stop sign would have to live with what they had done for the rest of his or her life

Sorry that I don’t have better options on this. Sadly, many of us would choose the third option. There’s no happy ending there but at least you might get a roundabout named after you.

Monday Morning Running Back

Have you ever seen those signs along the side of the road for these Antique Malls? I really want to stop at one. Who wouldn’t like to go back in time and visit some of those stores, and maybe throw a coin in that cool fountain? Maybe stop at the Bottom Half Store and try on some bell bottoms (you got a lot of material for your money on those pants – just don’t wear them riding your bike) or the Just Pants Store just to see if they might have some shirts way in the back. Maybe I’d go to Spencer Gifts and get one of the gag gifts that a million people had handled. But before I went to any of those stores, I think I would head right for the Orange Julius. I would go there just to satisfy my curiosity ‘cause I never found out if Orange Julius was a food or a person, maybe some old Greek guy. Or was it just a play on words on Orange Juice?

Whatever Orange Julius was, it/he could never overcome that O J Simpson stigma. In hindsight, how did O J not become the spokesman for Orange Julius? That might have kept him out of trouble.