Your Weekly Antics Rest Stop Shenanigans and Septembers Full Moon Edition 9-16-21

Well kids, hope you're all well and having a good week. It's come to my attention that our own Information & Referral Departments Leanne May mentioned the September full moon in the newsletter and I'll tell you this - the I&R department are the original informants of the full and new moons and the havoc these moons bring. This dates back to the days of Linda Wincek Moore working at ESW, I'm only following in her footsteps attempting to provide you with as much warning as possible. Those of us working in social services all know the moons greatly contribute to our cases blowing straight out of the water, admit it. So with that said, our next full moon, the real full moon, not just the chronic full moon that looms over the Protective Services Department, is September 20th. Plan accordingly and Good luck and God speed - let's try to keep it together. Here's what I've got...

1.Somewhere along my travels last weekend, we stopped at a rest stop. Leaving the facilities, I washed my hands and got myself some paper towels. Because I was first in line to the paper towels, after I used my share I prepared the dispenser by pulling on the lever to get the next three, one for each person in my party coming up behind me. Well, a woman approaches me and asks me if I know what Ted Talks are and I mustn’t, because if I did, I would know that according to him only one paper towel is required per person. She said and demonstrated for me, if you wash your hands and then shake your hands twelve times over the sink you will only need one paper towel to dry your hands. She proceeded to demonstrate the handwashing, the hand shaking and the paper towel using. I watched her fling the water off her now clean hands on to the people on either side of her, hold up the crowd trying to exit the bathroom while dispersing this knowledge, and then take her one paper towel, tri fold it as Ted instructed, and demonstrated how to dry her hands with this one tri folded paper towel. I was tired people and didn’t want to be rude, so yes, I sat through this whole demonstration. I thanked her for the tip, promised her I would be more mindful of my abuse of paper towels, and use said tip at my next rest stop visit. Please see exhibit 1…link to this Ted Talk business she was talking about…

https://www.ted.com/talks/joe_smith_how_to_use_a_paper_towel?language=en

2. I’d imagine if you’re an avid reader, you know exactly where this next entry is going. We get to the next rest stop. We go in, order ourselves some much needed caffeine and snacks, use the bathroom and get back to the car and sit for a spell to regroup and get ourselves together. I announce to my fellow travelers that the Ted Talk tip about paper towels is a farce because I tried it and if I see this woman again I plan on telling her it’s a load of bologna. No sooner did these words leave my mouth and there she is, leaving the building at this same rest stop, 100 miles away from the last one, walking out to her car. My carload starts laughing at this kind of luck and I jokingly, mid snack, announce that I was going to get out of the car to tell her this in person and I started choking. Now, one would think my friend of 25 plus years who’s name I won’t mention - okay it was Vickie - would say, are you okay? Do you need help? Or get out of the car to conduct the heimlich but no…instead she looked to the girls, Liz and the youngest Kap kid and said, is anyone taping this? Obviously I survived, but still, good to know who I can’t count on in a crisis... not them. They were one step from telling me to go in to the light....

3. And it continues. For those of you who don’t appreciate the power and influence of the minivan, let me tell you this. Different rest stop. Same lady. After my choking incident I see one of this womans passengers approaching us in the mini van as we were getting ready to head back out on the road. I think, okay, maybe she’s coming to see if I’m okay, or more likely lecture me on paper towel usage again, but nope, believe it or not, she wanted to know all about the Kia minivan. She approached the Kia, came up to our closed drivers side window and motioned for Vickie to roll the window down. Vickie did as she was told because this lady was about 5 feet tall, older than Sue Miller and was wearing a pink face mask, so we figured she was harmless. She started complaining that she should’ve gone with her gut and purchased a mini man like my beloved Battle Wagon instead of going with her smaller Kia SUV. After we established a bond over the Kia, she then proceeded to tell Vickie she should probably take better care of her friends. What can I say? I tend to pick up strays, especially if they’re over 70. I had this woman’s picture for an Exhibit but Meri’s afraid I’ll get arrested for adding pictures without consent, so I removed it. Dam rule follower. Clearly she has no faith in Mike Erlich's defense skills that she fears I'll end up in the clink.

4. So maybe the above never really happened and I imagined it, or I really did enter the twilight zone. I’d like to think that the powers that be don’t really think that society in general is this stupid, but let’s face it, maybe we are. Exhibit 3. Apparently we can’t be trusted to use common sense and avoid using a broken door with broken glass when there’s a perfectly good functioning door right next to it. And you all know as well as I do that some ding-bat tried to use that door at some point that day despite the signage. Exhibits 3 & 4

5. Driving through the McDonald’s drive thru to get my soda addicted friend her morning Dr. Pepper, and this was prior to her letting me almost choke to death in a rest stop parking lot, we hit up the local McDonald's in the one-horse town we were staying in. She orders her 7:30am Pepsi and I thought to myself, this must be how marathon runners feel when they’re hoofing it up Heart Break Hill and come across the volunteer water hander - outers…this is as close to that experience as I am willing to get kids…Exhibit 5, please see the hand and soda hanging out the drive thru window...eerily similar to a road race is it not?

6. Good to know that some of what we say doesn’t always go completely ignored by our youth. I witnessed this first hand when a teenager was riding his bike on a main street and texting at the same time. The kid scrubs out and levels himself off his bike. Luckily he was uninjured - poor kid, I further embarrassed him by asking if he was okay. Much like my traveling companions I spoke about in #2, his fellow bikers only stopped long enough to say, “that’s what you get for texting while riding your bike…dumbass”. Whoever that teenage girl was, she’s my people and may actually rule the world someday.

7. Lawn Mower Joe or more fondly referred to as Joe-Petto, has some down time between lawn mowing and soon to be leaf blowing. He’s using this time to work in his garage and says he’s making me a bird house. Not sure if this is because I’m his bestie or if he knows I’m not a fan of birds and he’s trying to encourage the little buggers to visit me on my deck to poke my eyes out. Either way, check out exhibit 6, Joe-petto and his headlamp, working in his shop in the garage...where all the magic happens.

8. Squirrels - they're shifty and can't be trusted - My elderly clients have told me over the years that one can look towards the behaviors and activities of the squirrels and other woodland creatures to get an idea of what the weather will bring. Some have told me that the more pinecones and acorns that fall and are collected by these little buggers is a sign of a tough and snowy winter. I think we're giving them too much credit. They're shifty and have spent this past week hucking pinecones out of the tree at Harley and I so screw them and their weather predictions. Clearly these squirrels are not versed in my thoughts on running as I noted in # 5 so they can throw things at me all they want, they will not see me break a sweat vacating the premises. I don't need them, their Tom Foolery and half - ass weather predictions. I’ve got Kevin Lemanowicz Fox Weather for that.

9. Take out night in the Kap house. Everyone wants to eat, but no one wants to place the order. It never fails…mid order you’ve always got someone yelling through the house changing his order -putting in special requests - talking to the caller placing the order so you can't hear yourself think, hear the person on the other end of the call or remember what you want to order for that matter. Get it together - don’t come crying to me when your order isn't right upon arrival. You don't like it, don't eat...no food for you.

10. Once the order is made and the food arrives, everyone here pretends they don't notice when the house erupts with barking dogs alerting us that their buddy, the pizza smelling delivery guy has arrived on their deck. God forbid anyone with thumbs should stop what they're doing and make any movements towards the door which only causes the dogs to lose their minds further waiting for us to get a move on. This entire scenarios unfolds in 45 seconds of drool, jumping and barking. This is why we tip well people or that poor bastard would never come back. Exhibit 7, No this isn’t the pizza guy, this is Judge Corey, one of our favorite guys. 😊

11. And last but not least, be grateful - and I don't mean just say you’re grateful, be grateful for real. Someone somewhere is having a worse day than you, so suck it up and quit your howling and whining and belly aching and get it together. Take care of yourselves. Do something nice for someone - I know you're sick of hearing me say it, but it'll make you feel better.

Have a great weekend!