Conceding the Gap

It’s interesting how the generation gap makes itself evident every once in a while.

Sometimes it’s even kind of awkward.

One evening after work last week, I was unwinding with a drink, my iPad, and a Bluetooth speaker on the back deck by the pool. I have tons of old music loaded on a media server that sits in the living room, but no matter how much music I add, I never seem to find the music I am in the mood for at a given moment. I never really know what I'm in the mood to hear until I hear it.

Such was the case this evening.

So I switched the setting of my app to simply play random selections in “shuffle mode”.

One song comes up from a live Bruce Springsteen concert album. You can hear the cheers and crowd noise in the background and then the base guitar kicks in hard with a familiar repeating riff interrupted by the smash of drum and cymbals  between each. And then the Boss starts in …

I’m driving in my car …

I turn on the radio …

I start pulling you closer …

At that point my youngest daughter Ashley-Rae comes out, bored from a summer day with nothing to do, and sits down beside me.

“Ash, this is a great great tune … listen …” I said to my fifteen year old who thinks music before 2012 is too old to be bothered with.

I hit the double arrow icon on the tablet to start the song over. The crowd noise rises again as it did before, and Ashley-Rae sits patiently to humor me.

I’m driving in my car …

I turn on the radio …

I start pulling you closer …

But you just say No ….

You say you don’t like it …

But I know you’re a liar …

Because when we kiss … ohhhh …

Fire …

“Dad, is this song about rape?” asks Ashley-Rae.

“Huh? What? No …. No no no”, I stammer … shocked at this twist, not sure if she’s teasing me or seriously asking. “No this about when a man … you know … and he thinks the girl is playing hard to .. you know …”

And I stopped.

“Dad, no means no”.

“Uh yeah – yes it absolutely does … “ remembering my audience is my very pretty fifteen year old daughter that I am very proud to hear say this back to me.

“So is this song about rape?”

At that moment the neighbor lady across the corner came to the back gate announcing her arrival with “Hellloooo?”

Perfect timing. I jumped up and hurried my way to the arbor gate and let her in. She was asking to borrow a garden tool. I found it surprisingly quickly in the shed and as I was handing it to her I asked “Hey do you remember an old Springsteen song … “I’m driving in my car …”

“I turn on the radio …” she continued and she sang the next two lines as she did a little dance.

“Ashley-Rae just asked me if that song is about rape …”

The nice neighbor lady looked up at me surprised. “huh?” and she started to sing the next lines … “ohhh … gee … I don’t know … it’s such a great song … how do you handle that?”

At that moment that I realized that whether or not we thought it was a great song or not didn’t matter.

“ASH” I yelled, hoping she was still outside.

“Oh hi miss Melinda”, she said as she appeared around the corner.

“I asked miss Melinda, and she agreed that the song is about rape”, I said and the nice neighbor lady played along by nodding, accepting her new stance, understanding why.

“Okay” said Ash as she spun back around to go back in the house. “Too bad though, it’s a pretty good song”.

Ode to the Eccentric Computer Programmer

I’ve been in the IT industry for 30 years now.

The most memorable people I have worked with have been software developers.

I’ve seen the change from guys wearing white short-sleeve dress shirts with pen protectors in their breast pocket and thick black rim glasses punching holes in cards and running them through card readers to compile the code to run on the only computer in the company or institution, to guys wearing ear-bud headphones listening to their playlist of death-punk rock as they pound out code on the keyboard and reviewing it on the top middle monitor out of six that wrap around their workstation.

And while it seems like these guys are totally different, they are in fact the same guy.

They don’t live in the same world we do.

Their view of art is code that compiles cleanly the first time and passes every unit test without fail. 

They dare the testers on the QA team to find a bug, and offer them a reward if they do.

They tell jokes using binary code and tape them to the office fridge, taking joy in the fact that nobody else understands it, let alone gets the punch line.

They stay late. They come in early. They would rather be at their workstation than out in the world of social interaction. They decorate their workstations with strange posters and knick knacks of comic book heroes and science fiction space ships. They greet you with the Vulcan salute of the raised hand with the middle two fingers spread apart.

They speak perfect Klingon.

They only venture out in public when a new Star Wars movie is opening, fully dressed in their best Darth Vader, Storm Trooper, or Jedi Knight costume – but they look nothing like the character. And the weeks afterwards are spent dissecting the movie, where it betrayed the historical knowledge of that universe, and how they believe it should have been scripted.

These people are different.

They are committed.

They should be committed. But we need them.

I have known so many of these guys.

They care little for the real happenings in the world.

They do not pay attention to or are oblivious to the office politics that arise in every IT department.

They are loyal to the systems they create, not to the leadership of the team. And they will defend their creations to the death if they have to, often grabbing the nearest light sabre at their desk to defend themselves, leaned against the wall next to the skate board they rode to work that day.

And when you do convince them that there is really and truly a bug in their code, using rational they understand and test case scenarios targeted specifically at that trouble spot, they have it fixed before you can return to your desk, and unit tested, and promoted to the staging environment, and they appear as you sit down with your fresh cup of coffee that you poured on your way back from your desk expecting you to test it right there and right then to prove to you that it works – and for you to take back all those mean nasty things you said about the quality of their compiled application.

If they could, they would promote right into production. After all, to them, it’s more important that the world uses their code in perfect condition than any of that pomp and circumstance layer of protocol, process and paperwork that a production release entails.

“Just let me deploy it”.

And they debate the requirements that you gave them, and explain to you again and again how your requirements are really wrong, and this is what the code is supposed to do.

And when there is a problem someplace else in the system, an application that is not theirs, they dive into that problem like a wake of vultures attacking a now dead possum on the side of the road – looking for the bug, and telling the unfortunate programmer responsible how to fix it, and sharing between them the comments of how stupid the bug was to begin with.

And they hate peer reviews.

I love these guys.

But it’s hard to keep these guys around.

They move on. Usually for the next most exciting project they can find, or for an environment that sees their odd behavior as pure genius. They want cool stuff to work on, and your respect of the obvious fact that they are the very best there ever was.

They rarely move for the money. Or the benefits.

These guys can drive you nuts.

If you should find yourself out in public with these guys, like at a Friday lunch at the local hangout, or a team building night out at the local watering hole, you will find yourself quietly sitting, looking at your watch or your phone, waiting for this genius to finish regaling you with their word by word dialog re-enactment from the scene from Star Trek Wrath of Khan where Spock dies inside the chamber that powers the warp engines and Kirk watches helplessly outside.

And in that restaurant, this brilliant programmer will end their re-enactment by screaming “KHAN!!!” at the top of their voice, and once they get their breath back, state “I love that scene”.

They don’t make movies about these guys. At least not where they are the central character. Who would pay to watch a guy sit at a keyboard, staring at a monitor, shaking their head to the beat of the guitar silently playing through their ear-buds.

Okay, there was Zuckerberg in The Social Network. But he was rarely at the keyboard.

And he’s a billionaire.

A rare find to see the guy who wrote the code wind up in charge and with all the money. Ask Bill Gates or Steve Jobs who wrote the code.

So Zuckerberg is an anomaly.

There should be a story about a team of these guys – all as eccentric as I have described – faced now in a world where there is no electricity or computers – and they have to survive.

I’d pay to see that movie. Even before one of these eccentric fellows put it up on Kodi to stream for free.

Now, before I get an inbox full of women saying “Hey, dipshit, women are programmers too ya know!”, let me just say that in 30 years, I have never met an eccentric female programmer. They have been brilliant, but not eccentric. They are highly organized persons who can juggle many things at one time, understand the requirements without you having to specify them, and their code compiles and runs as perfectly as their male eccentric counterparts.

But I haven’t met even one yet that is nuts.

And these guys are all nuts.

And I love them for it.

I just don’t want to have one for a roommate.

Timely Advice

When it comes to life in general, there are two schools of thought.

Some will tell you to live for the moment. Look no further than right now and savor it.

Others will tell you to live your life today in preparation for tomorrow.

Today is just a passing thing.

And tomorrow never comes.

But every action you take today will have an impact on your tomorrow.

You cannot see your future today because you have not taken the steps yet that get you to tomorrow.

So we set goals. Objectives. And we plan.

We plan for tomorrow. But when tomorrow gets here, it is always today. There’s another tomorrow to plan for. And we spend that today planning for the next tomorrow.

But technology, it seems changes everything. So far it has changed how we communicate, how we learn, how we are informed. And how we travel.

Technology is not done yet. It’s just begun. And much of what we have today was dreamt up in science fiction a hundred years ago.

So what’s next?

A time machine? One that takes you back in history, and forward into the future? So many stories have been written and movies made about time travel, that well, given our drive to make these science fiction dreams come true, it just seems inevitable. Impossible just doesn’t exist anymore.

But as I sit and ponder this for even a moment, it becomes clear to me that if we were to build a time machine, one that takes you forward in time, that machine would use totally different calculations than one that would take you back in time.

To travel back in time would simply be to retrace the steps that we have already taken. Kind of redundant, don’t you think? So the bigger opportunity would be to invent one that takes you ahead in time, to the unknown.

To move forward in time, you would not simply pick a date and wait to be surprised at where you land. No, it would be more like the navigation system in your car. You pick a destination, and the system tells you step by step how to get there.

My car has a cheaper version of the GPS. It does not show me the route I am about to take, but it simply points me down the next road. I blindly follow the female automated device. And voila … I reach my destination.

So in the future, time machines may very well have the same types of features and models, based on price range.

If it were to be possible to set your time machine future destination and then to be at that spot instantaneously, you would then look back at the history of the steps that were taken, and you would see what you did to achieve your goal.

If you were to type in a destination of a wealthy future, once you arrived, you may find yourself sitting in a jail cell, waiting for your trial.

“How did I get here?” you would ask. And you would look at the travel log, and see that you did despicable things. And you would say “this is not the future I hoped for”. So you would use your one phone call to call the customer service desk of future travel device.

“How may I help you?” would answer the voice on the other side.

“It appears that your device has landed me in jail, awaiting trial for fraud.”

“What destination did you enter into the user interface?” the voice would ask.

“Wealth”.

“Oh. Yes. Did you read the instruction manual?”

“I tried, but it was a little too quantum physical for my understanding”, you would reply. “I just wanted to test it out and see how it worked”.

“So you jumped right into the “Wealth” option then?”

“Yes", 

"Did you select a route?"

"Uh .. no".

"Well, the default value is 'fastest route possible', and you didn't take the time to go through the options to teach it about you as a person. You really should have read the instructions".

"How can I undo this?”

“You can use the ‘back-in-time’ feature”.

“I only bought the future traveling model. I couldn’t afford the back in time feature”.

“Oh, I see. Well, Mr. Brill, I see here that you did accept our end user agreement”.

“Yes, I clicked on the ‘accept’ button. Who has time to read all of that legal mumbo jumbo?”

“And you didn’t read the user manual either then?”

“No, I told you that”.

“Well, I am very sorry, but you are where you are because of your own actions”.

“Look, if you don’t fix this, I will sue you for every penny your company has!”

“But you already waived us of any liability for the use of our product when you clicked the ‘accept’ button on the end user agreement”.

“Can I buy the ‘back in time’ model now?”

“Will you be paying in cash?” asks the customer service representative.

“Well, no, I do not have any cash on me and they have taken all my personal belongings, so I don’t have my wallet, but apparently I am quite wealthy. Surely you can accept my credit?”

“Mr. Brill, you are on trial for defrauding everyone you know and love. Why would I accept your credit? Besides, it says here in our records that all of your accounts are now frozen”.

“So I am screwed?”

“You did it to yourself Mr. Brill”, says the customer service representative, with a deep sigh, likely because they have answered this same type of call a thousand times before.

“Is there anything else I can help you with today, Mr. Brill?”

Later, at the trial, the lawyer approaches the bench to speak to the judge.

“Your Honor, it appears that Mr. Brill was just testing his new time travel device”.

“Let me guess. It was a Fabco Time-Forward 3000” replies the elderly judge, peering down over his bifocals impatiently at the lawyer.

“And this fellow bought his device before the Federal Government shut them down for reckless endangerment to the public …”

“Yes Your Honor”.

“And he didn’t read the user manual”.

“That’s what he said”.

“And he clicked ‘accept’ on the end user agreement …”

A deep sigh from the lawyer. “Yup”.

“And he can’t afford to now purchase the “Back-in-Time” model …”

The lawyer hung his head. “All of his accounts are frozen. I am doing this pro-bono.”

“So in fact, he did all the things he is accused of”.

“Uhhh … yes, it’s all documented in his Time-Forward 3000 history log.”

“And all these people sitting in this court room should just forgive him, it was all a big dumb mistake made by an impatient idiot too lazy to read the instructions?”

“Well … yes …?”

“Guilty”, and the judge slams down the gavel. “Next Case!”

It’s just a matter of time before this technology is invented, and just a little more time until a company like FabCo develops a means to deploy it to the masses. In all of its models, with various options available at affordable and not-so-affordable prices.

And when this time comes, my advice to you is read the user manual. And understand the end user agreement before you hit accept.

And pay the extra thousand dollars for the Back-in-Time feature.

I did.

I got a buddy, eh ...

I don’t care much for self-proclaimed experts.

For all that I have met, there is one guy who sits at the top of my list.

When I was a younger man, still living in London, I played on a fastpitch softball team with some friends and we were a pretty good team.

The guy who coached us was a bum of sorts. And we dismissed him and usually coached our team by committee. If we all agreed we did it. And this guy would always say that it was his leadership that brought us to our conclusion.

Anytime this bum needed to sound authoritative on any subject, he would always preface his next statement by saying “I got a buddy eh, …” and he would go on to tell us what this expert buddy told him.

And for every subject there seemed to be a different buddy.

This guy was not so likeable that he would have that many buddies. Or that they would all be so incredibly knowledgeable, and more so to be so generous with their knowledge to share it with this bum of a coach guy.

It drove me nuts, and the tripe that spewed  out of his mouth after declaring his buddy status was usually quite useless.

So I have never really held much credence to those who start to impose their wisdoms with the sentence “I got a buddy, eh …”

Until now, because you see …

I got a buddy, eh …  a fellow I work with who over the last two years who is a coach of a much older team than my girls play on. His daughter plays on this team and he has always described her as very good. And we would talk about softball, usually with me asking questions and he giving answers. His answers have always been very good ones.

One day this spring I was telling him about our upcoming trip to a tournament in Toledo. Let me first say that the level of play in Toledo is fantastic, with clubs that that recruit players from up to a hundred miles away. Their coaches are paid instructors – not the volunteer parents and neighbors our leagues here offer. Not coaches like me, who try to work with the basic knowledge of a fan.

So I was telling him about our Toledo trip and he told me to try to get the girls ready to be beaten badly – mercied  if you will –  every game.  Then he told me “spend the remaining part of your time teaching your girls how to defend against the bunt. These teams will test you early, and if you can’t make the right plays, they will spend the whole game simply bunting on you and taking your defense apart.  Train them every scenario with runners in every combination – runner on first. Runner on third, runner on first and third – bunting up and down the first and third baselines – teach them all of those until they know it cold.”

So I shared this knowledge with our team manager, but I prefaced it by saying “I don’t know what level of authority this is coming from … but here is what he told me …”

Our next practice was devoted entirely to bunting – just as my buddy Len had suggested. And it paid off. While we did get beaten badly every game - losing by ten runs easily as we entered the third inning of each – the other teams only tried bunting on us once or twice, maybe three times a game, and our girls handled most well enough that the other teams just resorted to hitting home runs and line drives to every open spot they could find on the field. And when batting, we only had one base runner that entire tournament.

The next week, when I saw Len, he asked how we made out. I told him how humbling the experience was, but that his advice about bunting was great advice that worked, and even though we got completely annihilated, it wasn’t because they bunted us to death,

Our second tournament in Toledo we won a game from a Toledo team, and played close in a couple others, but annihilated by the best teams.

He smiled and told me that was great progress.

This week, I ran into Len in the hallway again, and he told me with beaming pride about how his team actually won that weekend’s tournament in Toledo.

“Really?!, That’s fantastic!”, I said.

“Yes, but we have a lot to work on still he replied”.

That struck me.

Thursday, our coach mentioned that we were going to have one of the other clubs coaches come to one of our practices. I was curious, so I looked at the other clubs website to find out about this other coach. As I was weaving my way through the teams on their site, I tripped over their under 18 girls team. And there was my buddy Len as the coach.

And below in the list of players – his daughters name was listed. And above that list there was another list of accomplishments.

Ontario Provincial Woman’s Softball Association Silver Medalists

Len’s daughter was listed as the PWSA Top Batter from two seasons before, and the PWSA  most valuable player last year.

And I realized the true quality of advice that I was getting.

And I felt kind of silly in my boasting of my own two girls, who are both doing very well and I am very proud of, but not anything like Len’s daughter.  We are truly just beginning.

All of Len’s advice had been excellent advice, and I did take and followed it when given. But I did not realize the level of authority that my buddy held when he told me.

But now I have this conflict. I really don’t want to sound like that bum of a coach that we all dismissed on that team from long ago.

But I’m afraid I probably will now.

I can just hear me during our next practice, standing at the fence with the coaches, and saying ….

“I got a buddy, eh …”

June Perfection

Not my yard!

I love the month of June.

If it were possible – my dream would be to live in a place where every day takes place in the first week of June.

The weather is still perfect. It’s not too hot – but warm enough for swimming. The gardens are still perfect and most everything is green, lush and in bloom. The lawns are still perfect. The grass is still green and not yet stressed to turn brown.

Perhaps we have misunderstood the scientists of the world – perhaps this is the purpose of global warming – to make every day of the year feel like the first week in June.

I doubt it.

But today is perfect. A wonderful morning to sit out on the back deck by the pool and look out over the gardens under the patio umbrella as the mid-seventies breeze blows across the skin.

Man the coffee tastes good on a morning like this. It’s a real shame I quit smoking.

But to be honest, had I not quit smoking, the gardens would not be quite so perfect, nor the grass be so perfectly green and trim. It seems smoking was the root cause of my procrastinating ways.

Today every muscle in my body aches. The blisters on my fingers have broken open and are sore, and the Motrin I took this morning is just now starting to melt some of the aches away as it mixes with the mocha flavored Kailua in my piping hot cup of coffee.

My faithful black lab Suzy is in her own paradise now – stretched out on the deck in the sunshine enjoying the breeze. She’s dreaming about something – likely lying on a deck in the sunshine like this in a breeze like this one.

That’s my guess anyway.

It’s one of those days where – well – you just have to come to the conclusion that all Darwinists hate – that such a day as today – with all the beautiful birds enjoying this day in our back yard – that a day like today could not simply be the result of random evolutionary chaotic coincidence.

There just has to be a divine plan.

A master designer.

There has to be an artist deity who knows just how much blue goes in the sky and how to swirl it with the white of the clouds – matching it with the greens in the grass and the leaves and the brown in the woods of the bark and the plant stems.

There must be a master aromatologist – a master of creating the most perfect aromas – as a deity – to mix the smells of lavender blossoming and cut grass blades and tree leaves that waft across in a gentle breeze – it can’t just all be Darwinistic coincidence.

The Darwinists will all comment here that such a thought is absurd.

But I bet deep in their own hearts – to experience such perfection as is today – to see such amazing beauty – more beautiful than any of the great masters could ever paint – more wonderful than any event planner could ever construct an experience – deep in the Darwinist’s heart they would find the awe that leads one to believe in a power higher than ours.

A God.

There must be.

Hoppy the squirrel just popped up on the fence that borders the back of our property. And Suzy took notice and scrambled down and across the yard – all the while Hoppy knowing Suzy’s limitations as a black lab – merely stands on the top of the wooden fence mocking her by cleaning his hands and face.

Yeah, there’s a God alright.

Or maybe I’m just a bit more sentimental today – on this beautiful June morning. Maybe I am just more emotional because of the aches in my body from all the work I did yesterday weeding and primping the gardens and trimming and feeding the grass to bring out its best shades of green.

Or perhaps it's due to that very exciting win the Detroit Tigers pulled off in the bottom of the ninth inning by a walk off pop fly hit by new rookie catcher Omir Santos to knock in the runner from third to defeat those bastardly New York Yankees to hopefully put the Detroiter’s back on track this season – perhaps that has me a bit more wistful this morning than usual.

Damn those Yankees.

Or maybe it’s just the Kailua in my coffee.

Yeah, that’s likely it.

But there is no denying this is a perfect June morning.

I am savoring every nuance of it. All the way down to how the sunlight twinkles on the top of the dancing water in the pool.

It’s all so perfect.

Until a neighbor in a nearby yard decided to start his lawn mower.

Crap.

Perhaps if I pour another cup of … coffee.

Too Cool For The Stones

I had the Rolling Stones playing on the radio this morning in the Jeep.


I was driving my two lovely young daughters, ages eleven and nine, to school on my way to work.

The song was Honky Tonk Woman, and the school is only two and a half blocks from our house. My two little princesses could easily walk – but every morning – even beautiful warm spring mornings like this morning – I drop them off on my way to work.

It's two and a half blocks out of my way.

Now I like this song. Who doesn’t like a good Rolling Stones song? At home – the Stones are littered all throughout my playlist that we listen to downstairs playing pool and hanging out, and they seemed to like it – sometimes they even dance to it.

But this morning, as we approached the front of the school – packed with kids milling about waiting for the bell to ring, my eldest Alannah asked from the back seat of the Jeep …

“Dad, can you turn that off, we’re almost there”

“Huh? Why? Don’t you like the Stones?” I asked.

“Daaaad … please … c’mon”, replied Alannah in that eleven year old diva ‘no-you-di-int’ type of hip hop attitude.

Ashley-Ray, sitting in the front seat, reached over and pressed the on-off button – and the car went silent.

“Hey … what’re ya doing?”, I asked as I pulled the car over for them to get out and join a group of their friends. I reached back over – like any good father would do … and I turned my Stones song back on. And I turned it up just a bit …

“Daaaaad .. hmmmph …“,moaned both the girls. The car doors closed as my daughters rolled their eyes and explained to their friends that … well … their Dad just isn’t that cool.

And I drove off thinking … since when did the Rolling Stones become .. un-cool?

I know they are in their seventies now … but this was the original song.

“... she blew my nose and then she blew my mind ...” screamed my car radio as I drove away – now with the windows down.

As I turned the corner to get on the main street, I wondered to myself “What the hell happened?”

When did the Rolling Stones become un-cool?

Do they have to rename the magazine?

Now I will grant you, at the age of fifty, I am older than most if not all of my daughters' friends' parents. In fact, quite often when we are out – there inevitably is someone who will comment

“Isn’t it nice that your grandfather brought you out today.”

And all three of us get a kick out of that and we play along, so as not to hurt anybody’s feelings.

But this is the Rolling Stones we are talking about here?

Their music – their rock and roll has passed the test of time better than even the Beatles.

They are so cool they made Elvis look like Evil Kneivel without a motorcycle.

And the only guy who was cooler than Elvis Presley was Johnny Cash.

My Dad loved Johnny Cash. He never cared much for Elvis.

When my brother Paul and I were little boys in Jackson Michigan, younger probably than my two daughters now – my Dad would play his Johnny Cash Albums on Saturday nights – and my brother and I would dance around the living room – using the old top to a crystal whiskey decanter as a pretend microphone - and we would sing all the lyrics to all the Johnny Cash songs.

Even Cocaine Blues.

Early one mornin' while makin' the rounds
I took a shot of cocaine and shot my woman down
I went right home and I went to bed
I stuck that lovin' forty-four beneath my head.

Okay – that’s kind of violent – especially when you realize he sang it in the early sixties –

Dad loved Johnny Cash He never cared much for Elvis. And he never really got the Rolling Stones – they were a bit young for him.

“I don’t really like that boom-boom bang music” he would say.

I remember one time, Dad had an old Johnny Cash 8-track tape in the car that we would listen to … and we would all sing along to. And I remember him pulling up to the school one day to drop me off – while “I Walk The Line” was playing, and I reached over and I turned it off when we pulled up in front of the school.

Funny, I don’t ever remember thinking Johnny Cash wasn’t cool. I guess I thought I wouldn’t be cool if my friends saw me listening to Johnny Cash.

Huh.

I guess it makes sense after all.

You know what’s really funny? My little girls like Johnny Cash too.

Only I don’t think they know all the words to Cocaine Blues.

A Tale Of Two Grandmas

My Mum is up from Pensacola visiting for the next few weeks.

We are very glad to have my Mum up for a visit. We are also very glad to have Darlene’s Mum over when she comes to visit as well. Her family lives on the other side of town.

Both Grandmas are fine ladies. Resposible and dependable.

Last week we were very glad to have the both of them visiting at the same time.

You see, Darlene had to go into the hospital in Detroit for a couple of days to have her nerve stimulator adjusted. And she had to stay overnight. The two Grandmas were going to stay to look after things at home.

Both my Mum and Darlene’s Mum enjoy each others company. They spend most of their time together laughing, although we are not always certain at what.

Since Darlene had to be at the hospital for 5:30 am, we did not see the two Grandma’s before leaving that morning.

As I was sitting in the surgery lounge waiting, I received my first phone call from the Grandmas at about 7:30 am.

“How do you work the can opener?” asked the Grandmas.

“What are you opening?”

“We went to make a pot of coffee and saw we had to open another can. This can is huge, how do you open it?”

I spent probably twenty minutes on the phone using my long forgotten customer support skills. “Hold the can in one hand, the bottom lower than the counter top …” I said, explaining how to open the awkwardly large can.

“Whirrrrrrrrr” came the sound crackling through my cell phone.

“Did it work?” I asked.

“No” said the Grandmas. “The can is spinning but not cutting”.

“Okay, try pushing the …..” I continued. Finally there was success. Finally the Grandmas could make coffee.

And I could return to reading my Mark Twain novel on my PDA.

At about 9:15 am, I received another phone call. It was the Grandmas.

“How do you work the TV?” asked the Grandmas.

We have a satellite tuner below the TV. The tuner must be turned on, the TV must be turned on, and the TV must be set to AV mode (not to channel 3 like our old Cable box). To further complicate the matter, the satellite tuner is plugged into a socket that can be turned off by a light switch. This plug was meant for a light, and I had meant to rectify the problem since discovering it the week before. But I hadn’t yet.

“Is light switch turned on?” I began.

“What does that matter?” the Grandmas answered.

“Well you see the tuner is plugged into the plug that the switch…” I began. Forty five minutes later I heard the sound of daytime TV through the crackle on my cell phone.

“It looks like we’re in business” said the Grandmas.

Around 1:30 PM my cell phone went off again. We had just gotten Darlene into her hospital room after the surgery.

“How do you move the driver’s seat up in your car?” asked the Grandmas.

“My car?” I asked. “Uh .. there is a knob on the side. It’s all power driven. Push it forward it moves up. Push it back it moves back” I said, not knowing where to start or where to go with this explanation.

“It’s up all the way but my feet don’t touch the pedals” replied the Grandmas.

“Well, if you can’t reach the pedals, then you can’t drive my car” I replied, and I snapped shut the cell phone.

Darlene asked “What in the world was that all about?”
I explained that the Grandmas wanted to do some shopping and wanted to use my car.

Darlene took my cell phone and tried to call. The phone was busy.
I tried to call. The phone was still busy.

Around 3:00 PM another call came on my cell phone. It was the Grandmas. They had borrowed somebody’s cell phone.

“We locked the keys in the trunk of your car” said the Grandmas.

“I didn’t think you could drive my car? The pedals were too far back?” I asked – stunned at the new development to a problem I thought was solved by the last call.

“We asked a nice man walking down the street at your house to help us” came the reply. “He was so nice .. and boy did he laugh”.

I bet he did.

“So the keys are in the trunk?” I asked knowingly.

“Yes. We are so sorry”. The explanation followed of how the keys fell into a bag of groceries as the bags were set down in the trunk”.

“Okay, accidents happen. Okay.” I replied. “How are you calling me?”

“We borrowed a phone from another nice man” said the Grandmas.

“And did he laugh too?”

“Why yes, he is still laughing” answered the Grandmas.

“Are any of the car doors unlocked?” I asked.

“Why yes, they all are. But the keys are in the trunk”.

“Next to the steering wheel is a button – left side. Push it”, I instructed.

“Ker-Thunk” I heard the trunk open through the cell phone.

“There are the keys” said a Grandma.

Shortly after, I called home to make sure the Grandmas got home alright. The phone was still busy. That’s when I knew it was off the hook somehow. So I explained to Dar that the Grandmas could not be reached because the phone is now off the hook. I had better get home.

So at 4:30 PM I kissed Darlene and left her in the hospital room to rest.

After crossing the border to come back to Windsor, I made my way home.

My car was safe in the driveway. I walked around it to check for dents or broken lights, scratches or flat tires. The car was in fine condition. I sighed a breath of relief.

When I went into the house, the wireless phone was sitting on the counter. The talk light was still on. I pressed the “end” button and held it up.

“The phone has been off the hook all afternoon” I announced to the two Grandmas. They were playing cribbage and laughing.

“Was it?” they giggled. “We have had such a day” and they started to tell me.

“Oh I know all about your day today ladies”. I replied. “I would have thought by having two experienced Mom’s at home that things would have gone smoothly.”

And we had a lovely night after that.