DC Tax Ladies

Nothing happened in the way of progress on the house this day. I don’t believe I even went in the place. I’ve been preoccupied with the DC tax ladies—two fiftyish women who decided they would treat the tax coffers of the DC government as their own personal piggy bank. Thirty million dollars later, they got caught. Didn’t really see it coming, by all accounts. Here’s how it worked:

The ringleader, the one who decided to embark on this enterprise, has a good deal of tenure in the tax office. Twenty-five years she’s been there, through several administrations, different mayors. Earning a little over eighty-thousand dollars a year, she was doing all right. Not only that, she had a generous retirement to look forward to—a comfortable and worry-free end run that would allow her the freedom to pursue whatever she wanted to do. She’d talked of this, of wanting to leave her position, of finishing up her career and entering retirement in her mid-fifties.

During the last seven years or so, she’d methodically written tax refund checks to phony companies that would then launder the money for her, take a cut for themselves, and generally spread the green around, put it into different accounts and use it to buy property and luxury items. She drove a Mercedes Benz convertible, a car that would easily cost more than the homes that many of her subordinates (and possibly her supervisors) lived in. She told everyone that her father had done well for himself, had been a banker.
“He took good care of me,” she said. “When he passed, I inherited a lot of money.”
“Okay,” her colleagues said.
She had to personally approve these checks—bogus or otherwise—and knew how to streamline the process, especially when one of her special checks needed to get through the system with little scrutiny. She’d been there for twenty-five years, after all.

She needed help, so she called on family members to get in on the action. I imagine it went something like this: After church one Sunday, she gathered her brothers and sisters together.

“Listen, everyone—I plan to be rich like you wouldn’t believe. I can do it alone, or you can help me. If you help me, you’re going to be rich, too—and you really don’t have to do that much. It isn’t like real work, see.” Then she went on to explain to her assembled guests: “I can write checks like crazy, because the amount of money in the DC tax account is probably more money than in the whole wide world—if that makes any sense. You know what I mean.” Everyone nodded; they knew what she meant. She added, “In any case, I heard someone who knows how much should be in there say that it is enough to buy a battleship or a lagoon.” When some of her guests asked what a lagoon was, she responded, “You know, a place where there’s palm trees and little huts. It’s kind of tropical-like. People wear hats and sandals.” She’d seen a movie once with a lagoon, and had been taken with the idea of having one. Her guests nodded; they agreed that, even though they still didn’t know exactly what a lagoon was, it might not be bad to have one—just in case.

So she roped them in, and they were caught, too. No one had anticipated this. If one of them, ANYONE at all, had picked up the newspaper every once in awhile, plugged thirty-five cents into the corner machine and glanced at the stories, they would have learned quickly.

“Look here,” one of them would say, “This woman who was stealing the teacher’s union money got caught. Now she’s in jail.”

“And look at this one: It says here that this person was stealing from his company, and then took a DC job and stole some more from the government. He was caught and it says he’s in jail.”

“Here’s two more where people were stealing from their employers and got caught. Look—they’re both on the same page, even though it’s two different people. I wonder if they knew each other.”

Politicians, white-collar crooks, financial finaglers, doers of misdeeds, and the once lofty and highly-regarded are regularly chronicled in the daily paper, their fall from grace into the ranks of criminals thoroughly documented. They should have taken a dollar or two of the first million bucks or so and bought some newspapers. By all accounts, if they’d stopped early enough, it’s likely they would have never been caught. Or—if they eventually were found out—it would be too late. They’d all have their own lagoons by then, would be wearing sandals and hats and living in a tropical paradise.

So this has been a source of constant entertainment for me, the stories—one after the other—of what the fiftyish women and their cohorts bought, the houses, the clothes and shopping sprees, every angle studied to extract the maximum human interest and sell another thirty-five cent paper. This has kept me quite busy.

The other day I had an actual job downtown. I worked the equipment, got the stuff recorded, and then broke for lunch. All this time my car was parked illegally, saving me twenty bucks in parking. I put the car in the most obvious place in the city, where everyone could see it, and it was not ticketed. I don’t know why, but I do know that if I push it, I will eventually be ticketed and probably towed. For now I’ll be judicious in my extended parking stays there. For lunch I wandered over to the Five Guys burger place and had one of their good hamburgers and greasy fries. The fries were way too much for me, but I wanted them anyway, tried to give some to one of my colleagues on the job. She’d wisely brought her own lunch.

Today I had a similar job, this time with free parking out in front of the office building in a town nearby. It didn’t last too long, and I used my new camera for the first time. It is easier to carry around and I was able to put everything into the little convertible. During the job I listened to some of the happenings in a southern man’s life--the man who was the subject of the litigation. He’d had an accident, had fallen off a piece of heavy equipment that he was cleaning, and was left hanging in an awkward position for a little while until a co-worker could extract him. After that he seemed all right. As I recorded the doctor’s testimony, I learned in passing that he’d also been injured by a shotgun blast when he was younger. After his accident with the heavy equipment, he was involved in a car wreck. Then, at some earlier point in his life, he’d been “run over by a tractor-trailer,” according to the doctor. At his examination the doctor reported that the man was animated, in good spirits, happy to be examined for the lawsuit.

An hour after the deposition started, we ended the proceedings and packed up to go. My camera had done a magnificent job. There was talk of another attorney, someone I’d worked with before—an unpleasant, wild-eyed woman who made life difficult for everyone around her. This particular witness said he would not work with her again, wouldn’t tolerate her antics. There was a good deal of discussion about her behavior, and I listened with half an ear to the things I already knew about her. She’d borrowed my cell phone once, needed to make a call because she said her law office was “too cheap” to give her a phone. When the call was concluded, she leaped into the air and yelped a high-pitched “YES!!” that scared the crap out of me. I didn’t see it coming. She’s rather a heavyset woman, and her acrobatics surprised me almost as much as her vocal outburst.

Afterwards I stopped at the trendy chain store that got its start in California, gradually swept the country and is in many places on both coasts. The employees are almost universally youngsters with an alternative air about them, making me feel like I am stuck fifty years in the past, can’t possibly keep up with their hip, avant-garde outlook. They almost all wear black. They do quite a bit of running around, stocking up the refried beans and cans of alternative cat food, yelling things to each other, making announcements. Sometimes, the loudspeaker will come on:
“Hello, crew members! We need all available help at the checkout lines! All available crew members to the checkout lines!” Then they will run through the store in a mad dash to the front. God help you if you are in their way.

Out front I found an electronic gizmo on the walkway. It was a palm-pilot, its parts scattered about the cold pavement. I picked up its battery, inserted it into its slot, and watched as the little communicator powered up. I’d never held one in my hand, and it felt expensive. Its screen started saying things, making me feel like I was intruding into someone’s living room or their private office, and I quickly looked away, wanting to be rid of the awful gadget. I took it up to the store’s front desk, where a man wearing a flowered shirt and possibly sandals stood behind the high counter. I handed it to him.
“I found this out front,” I said. “Someone will probably be looking for it.”
He took the device from me, said he would try to find the person’s number in it. I’d assumed that he would simply pick up the store’s public address microphone and yell something into it about a lost palm pilot, tell his crew members to round up all the customers until they found the one with no cell phone or other electronics.
“We found him!” they would yell. “This one has nothing—it must be him!” They would force the lost thing on him, push him out the front door with lots of shouting and yelling and words of encouragement.

Tomorrow I may go to the big-box store to buy some wood for the shed’s floor. With the floor in place, I can start moving things into the little storage space. I’ll have to fire up the old pickup truck, sitting idle for a few weeks now. I’ll also pick up my car, now repaired and waiting for me. Someone who saw it in the shop wanted to buy it, but I called him today to tell him no. After cramming all of my equipment into the little convertible, I decided that selling the station wagon would amount to an act of insanity. For the little bit of money that it would fetch, it makes more sense to keep it for the moment. I may change my mind, but I hope not.

"Everything half-price for you"

Another unproductive day for the house next door. I don’t believe I went inside even once. Oh—there was that one time when I went over after dark to fetch my bib overalls to join my friend and the broken car at his shop. He’d gotten the necessary part delivered during the day and was ready to put everything back together again.

During the day I took care of some bills and other housekeeping chores, making the rounds of the different banks to make deposits and so on. With that accomplished, I took a drive over to the big mall to visit their Sears. I wanted a couple of cordless drills and screwdrivers—the kind that are powered by long-lasting and robust rechargeable batteries. The man with the tools asked in a perfunctory kind of way if he could help me find something. I told him what I was looking for, noticed that he didn’t seem much interested one way or the other, so I kind of let my words trail off into a puddle of senseless drivel---somewhat like a stream with no conviction ending up in a swampy area that swallows what was once a direct and purposeful little bubbleway. He seemed happy to leave things like that, went over to stand near a display where he wasn’t doing much of anything. I was happy to be left alone.

I found what I was looking for—a powerful drill and cordless screwdriver set that came in a plastic carrying case. These things would probably last at least until the other house was finished, maybe longer. The set cost a hundred bucks and came with two batteries and a charger. I often use one tool to drill holes, while keeping the other tool handy to drive in screws and other fasteners. Having two of these tools helps save time and makes tedious jobs a little less onerous.

Out in the mall fairway I had some offerings from the Popeye’s chicken joint. I don’t like fast-food chicken, but I actually enjoy the red beans and rice at this place. I had some of that and an order of their mashed potatoes. None of this food is really that good, but it is something to do while at the mall—a place I don’t often frequent. To get a better idea of what people were into these days, what was driving the popular taste of the masses, I stopped at a kiosk that sold artwork—photos actually, with undulating lights that implied some kind of movement. Many of the scenes had water in them: waterfalls, a beach in Jamaica, more waterfalls, and so on. You had audio with the scenes as well. You could turn a little dial to hear the sound or make it softer. The salesman demonstrated all of this, even though I’d told him I had no intention of buying one of the photos with undulating lights and accompanying audio. He was a good salesman, not to be deterred by a customer saying flat out that he didn’t want the things.
“We’re just talking here, no pressure—you don’t have to buy anything.”
“Ok,” I said.
“But if you DID want to buy one, which one is your favorite?”
This was a fair question, so I looked over the offerings again.
“I like this one,” I said, pointing to some mountains. “And this one with the lake. The movement effect is minimized in these,” I added. “I don’t really like that effect; it looks phony.”
“Tell me about it,” he said, sympathetically.
“Yes—these ones are good; you can hardly tell the lights are moving. At least they’re better than the other ones,” I added.
“Ok—so if you were to buy one, would it be for yourself or as a gift? You know, for Christmas?”
“Well, since I am not going to buy one, it would not be for either purpose,” I said. We were getting into strange territory, things were getting a little too philosophical, too theoretical for me. The odd but brilliant photos did have an effect on me, however—especially the ones where you couldn’t really make out the fake lighting effect so well.
“But,” I added, “Since everyone I know hates this kind of thing, it would definitely not be a gift.”
“Ok,” he laughed, then lowered his voice. Now he was going to let me in on something.
“You see the price of the large one—that one up there?”
“Yep,” I said.
“Two hundred dollars,” he said. I already knew that, since it was mostly my interest in the price that had made me stop in the first place. I wanted to know what people were shelling out for these days.
“For you, one hundred dollars,” he said, his voice lowered to a whisper. “This one, this smaller one is a hundred and fifty dollars,” he continued. “For you, seventy-five dollars. Everything half-price for you,” he said, his tone conspiratorial, like we were both in on a secret.
“You’re a good salesman,” I said. “Lots of luck to you.”

I walked down to the See’s candy kiosk, where overpriced sweets from that venerable west coast confectionary were being offered for the holiday season. I pondered a small candy bar—a Bordeaux with a soft cream filling priced at a dollar-fifty. Long I considered this item, the disinterested girl in her See’s outfit lounging on her high and uncomfortable stool. I put the small candy back, headed out to my car where it was raining in earnest, and headed home. My purchase—the drill set in its large box—took up almost the entire trunk of the little car.

I got washed up, fetched my overalls from the other house, and drove over to my friend’s shop to help finish up my car. He was putting the finishing touches on it, was almost done by the time I walked through the door. I took an air wrench and put the front tire back on, tightened the lug nuts the rest of the way with a regular hand-wrench. He reached inside the car, turned the key. The engine fired up, strong and smooth. It never sounded healthier.

At the shop I phoned the woman who’d wanted to do something nice for her daughter, make sure she had something reliable to drive out in the rugged wilds of western Maryland. She’d been interested in my car—just before it broke down. I found her number in my phone, guessed that the unfamiliar digits dialed on that cold Friday morning were hers. God bless cell phones and their unerring accuracy and attention to detail.

“Hello?”
“Hello, Janey? This is Gerrit from Maryland. You were interested in my car; I just wanted to let you know that it’s fixed now, the problem wasn’t that serious; just a broken thingamajig on the motor. You know—one of those parts that spins around. They break every once in awhile.”
Oh! Yes, hello! Well, I’m back in Wisconsin now. We were just in town for a little while, for the holidays; I guess we’ll have to pass on the car, but I appreciate your calling me back!”

I wanted to cry. Not for the lost sale of the car, but for the woman—with her child—fending off the loneliness and uncertainty of a new life brought into her world, her world where someone, way off in Wisconsin, might have brought some little bit of stability, some comfort in knowing that a neat and well-cared for compact car was parked in the driveway for her use, for those times when she absolutely needed transportation, couldn’t rely on others. She and her new child were going it alone, from what I had heard. I wished the woman’s mother well, thought that she was maybe taking the easy way out, but can’t say I blamed her. She hadn’t seen the car—only knew that the last time she’d spoken to me it was broken down by the side of the road.

Of course there is this: In my foolish mind I envisioned only the purest and most noble of creatures out in the wilds of Allegheny County. A young maiden, struggling against the whims of nature and the unfairness of her fellow man, caring not only for herself, but for the new life she’d brought into the world. My mind, ever skewed towards the ideal of feminine beauty, pictured the young woman in a modest wooden-framed house, perhaps a small pasture with an old well from bygone times a little apart from the dwelling. Sunlit mornings would find her in a fine, billowing gown, her hair done up hastily against the turnings of the night, the intrusions into her sleep by the new child—the child that she herself was not so long ago. With the small and helpless creature relying on the young mother for everything, the two would venture out into the pasture, the sun glinting off the shimmering hair of the mother as she held the babe to her bosom. She would show the wondrous swaddler the new world and—laughing—gather up a small bouquet of wild flowers.

The reality I never wanted to entertain, didn’t want to admit to knowing it—to even think it possible. The young mother was most likely a lumpen mass, an unhealthy specimen with little regard for herself or the new child. Life was a never-ending chore, a non-stop cycle of trips to the convenience store to pick up bottled soda and maybe some baby formula. On the television would play out the lives of others, of those California beauties that stepped right out of a glossy ad from a magazine she’d never heard of. She’d see them through a fog of cigarette smoke, the haze illuminated only briefly by the flashbulbs of light emitted from the glowing tube. Darkness would envelop the untidy dwelling—an apartment in a dingy part of town, the outsides not at all wholesome, but strewn with broken things, broken cars and people; the baby would cry from the other room, and she would turn up the volume on the television.

I left the car there at the shop, drove home in my little convertible. My friend said that it could stay there until I came by to pick it up—it wasn’t in the way. He refused to take any payment for the repair, for his help in getting the car to the shop. I’ll be forever in his debt.

The next day I had my young market helper come to do a few odd jobs around the house. Earlier in the year—maybe last year, actually, I’d built a little walkway and a staircase down to the bottom part of the yard. The brick landing that you step onto just as you leave the patio was never really finished; some bricks had to be cut at irregular angles to make them fit right. He brought his saw with a special blade and did a phenomenally good job of making the cuts and fitting the last few bricks into the little landing. I was more than impressed with his good work. Later, after a brief lunch break, we started on the shed again—the horrible little steel structure that will house my tools, my garden tractor and so on. The more I look at the awful thing, the more I am convinced that I should have just left the tools lying about in the yard, as has been my habit for the past ten years or so. This little shed is not much of an improvement. It is almost finished, however, and that is what matters most at the moment.

To market

I took out my powerful propane-fired heater on Saturday, warmed my cold-benumbed hands on the frosty November morning, the air clear and cold, the post-Thanksgiving shoppers—faithful to the market—coming to buy some breads and pastries. My helper, a young woman home from her university studies, was glad to be back, happy to help at the market again—and thankful for the heat from the red-glowing gizmo atop the propane tank. I’d initially been a little afraid of the contraption, didn’t like the idea of having a powerful blast of flame in such close proximity to the fuel. But I’d seen others at the market using the things, concluded that they must be safe. No one had been blown up as far as I knew.

The new truck from Ohio wobbled to the market on its worn and eroded front tires. The steering components held together for the short trip, but I don’t know how much longer I can count on the loose ball joints, the tie-rod ends that need replacing. The truck will go into the shop this week for the necessary repairs—about a thousand dollars’ worth of work in all. The truck caused something of a stir on this cold day, the other sellers at the market noting the larger vehicle, wanting to know about it, what my plans were and so on. Mostly people were concerned with staying warm and tending their businesses. I was happy to talk about the truck, however, my trip out to Ohio to fetch it, the obvious disparities in the seller’s description and the actual condition of the vehicle. I’ll soon pare the story down to a few bare essentials, give my eager listeners a thumbnail sketch of the whole business. If anyone wants further information, I’ll be happy to have a question-and-answer session.

My broken car is at a friend’s shop now. On Saturday afternoon I gave in to temptation and called him, explained my predicament. I wanted his help only in getting the car back to my house so that I could check it out, see if the cam belt was the culprit—as I expected. Of course he offered to take it to his shop on the spot, look it over and get it running again. I said ok, even though I knew there was no way I could adequately repay him. He is exceedingly reluctant to accept money for these kinds of things, but he’ll have to make an exception in this case.

We got the car back to his shop, opened up the front of the engine to expose the timing belt area, and found that it was shredded, broken apart. He knew, from his many years’ experience with all things mechanical and automotive, that something had caused the belt to fail. Looking a little further, he found the reason: a seized tensioner pulley—a small wheel that puts pressure on the belt and makes it taut so that it can do its job properly. With the little pulley seized up, the belt overheated and started to shred, making the engine stop as I drove to my rendezvous with the prospective buyer.

I helped a bit as we toiled over the engine, the two of us alone in the cavernous repair shop, his projects scattered here and there. Over in the corner was a large chunk of an older American car that he’d dragged back to the shop, cut into pieces to use later on maybe. The engine was there, some other mechanical parts, the rear axle and leaf springs as well. I of course was interested in all of this, wanted to know all about it, was incensed that he hadn’t called to tell me he was getting this thing, was going to spend an afternoon tearing it apart. The rest of the hulk was out in the parking lot—the body and trunk of the car still intact with red primer dabbed—like leopard spots—all over the old car.

We drove to a local auto parts store, picked up a new belt for the car, checked on the pulley, which the store did not have. The men tending the counter were retirement-aged, their long grey hair tied back in ponytails, packs of Marlboros making neat rectangles in their shirt pockets. The store was brightly-lit and deserted, with one of the men taking a smoke break by the front door. He was the one my friend had described the part to—the little pulley that we needed to make the car go again. On the phone the man said that he was uncertain, didn’t know if the thing he had at the store would work or not. So we drove there, saw that the little pulley my friend held in his hand—about the diameter of a silver dollar—was nothing like the large and clunky part that the man had brought up to the counter.

About eight in the evening I left the shop. I still had to get the truck in order for tomorrow’s market, would have to go home and ready myself for the next day’s activities. We’d been dealing with the car since around three in the afternoon. Across town, in a comfortable subdivision populated by trees and generous homes, a party was getting underway. Friends were congregating for an evening of music and food and drink—an annual post-Thanksgiving celebration. I’d wanted to go, having missed this event for the past year or two.

I drove to where the truck was parked, worked in the cold and the dark, trying to make sense of the new and unfamiliar space, and went home. I was in bed by ten o’clock.

I set up the display on Sunday morning, having gotten enough rest the night before, not really in much of a hurry to get going. This being the end of the big holiday weekend, I did not expect a huge turnout—much less an early crowd. My expectations were borne out; my small offerings went fairly quickly to the few and loyal customers who wandered in, and by the end of the market I had practically nothing left. I could have used some more pastries, but was not terribly concerned about it; I tend to be a terrible businessman in this respect—wanting more to sell what I have than to have leftovers at the end of the day. As a result, I am often too conservative about what I bring to the market.

Some French people came by, pointing to a bag of bread sticks called fougasse, remarking—in French—that you could buy the whole bag for two bucks. I pointed out that the price of the breads was two dollars apiece—not for the whole bag. They were incredulous, not wanting to believe that each stick of bread sold for such an outrageous price. They moved on.

I packed up the truck at the end of the market, took to the city streets and a day considerably warmed by the brilliant autumn sun shining in a clear blue sky. I did little in the way of work on the other house—venturing over only for a little while to fasten some remaining roof panels on the little shed my helper and I had recently erected. It is still unfinished, wanting the addition of sliding doors for the entrance. I may get to it this week--maybe not.

"There I am"

Just before Thanksgiving one of my market helpers came out to help erect the shed. This is a miserable structure—one of those low-lying storage cubes you see in people’s yards sometimes. This is the one I’d bought from Sears, spent an afternoon doing some preliminary work on it, then put it aside. That was over six months ago. The instructions had been explicit: “If you don’t have the time to finish this today, DO NOT CONTINUE,” it said. I heeded the advice.

Now the rusted and discolored and dirty panels, made from ultra-thin sheet steel, were ready to be put in place. They’d attracted dirt and weeds and vines from the time spent lying out of doors. Some of the vines had even grown THROUGH the plastic tarp that I’d haphazardly placed over the shed’s parts when I’d abandoned the project. My helper had brought some of his own tools, which turned out to be of no small benefit. First the corners went up, the flimsy metal waving uncertainly in the slightest breeze. As soon as these were in place, it was possible to put some bracing in between—which helped stabilize the sides. I was able to breathe easier now. We worked pretty well as a team, feeling out each other’s strengths and getting a time-saving rhythm going. When all of the sides and most of the roof were installed, we called it quits. It now remains to finish up some trim on the roof and to install the doors. The whole thing cost around three hundred dollars, if I recall correctly, and that money might have been better spent just putting together a “stick-built” building from scratch. It would have taken longer, but the results would have looked better. The shed will do for the time being, housing my riding mower and assorted tools that I have lying about in the yard.

With darkness shrouding the backyard, we put away the tools and loaded up some of the firewood I am giving the young man as partial payment for his efforts. Then we went up the street to the corner restaurant and took away some Thai food. Altogether, we’d been at it since about ten-thirty in the morning.

Early on Thanksgiving I went over to the other house to work a bit on the bathroom. This is work that should have been done long ago, has fallen victim to those lapses when I don’t enter the house, don’t want to think about it. Nothing gets done during those lapses. I chipped away at the remaining wallboard, sending bits and chunks onto a green canvas tarp I’d spread out on the floor. A conservative voice of the people was shouting things over the am radio—the only station that comes in decently. He would yell and yell, lambasting the liberals, the injustice of it all. Then someone would call in and applaud all his yelling and he’d be off again. I chipped away at the poor bathroom, having imposed this sentence of drudgery on myself, knowing that the voice on the radio would go home to a lavish estate with palm trees, swimming pools, a private spa, and so on. All of this paid for a little bit at a time by the anonymous and hard-working dwellers of cornfields, the men with weather-lined faces and neat denim shirts, their wives knowing just what their men need, just what the kids need, just what their world needs. They didn’t like so much to go around yelling all the time, were happy that this voice, this calculating persona on the radio, so deft at exchanging shouts and jabs and insincere bluster for hard cold cash on the barrelhead, would do more than enough yelling to last their lifetime. In turn, they would go out and buy his pomades, his hair gel, the stuff that he says can drastically improve their lives but that he wouldn’t be caught dead with. Not at his place, not with the lavish pools, the tennis courts, the palm trees. No sirree.

I boxed up the debris, now not as voluminous as before, got it ready to put out with the trash, and cleaned up a bit before joining my family for thanksgiving dinner.

This morning I got a few small things accomplished, called a woman who had contacted me about the little station wagon I want to be rid of. A nice, economical car, I thought it would make someone a good, dependable vehicle. With the convertible sports car now in the stable, I didn’t need another car cluttering up the place. She wanted it for her daughter, a new mother of a four-month old baby. Living in the western part of the state, I pictured the new mother with the handsome little car, going out to start it on a cold morning, motoring about the rugged and wild landscape in the sturdy wagon. With dual airbags she would be well-protected, her little daughter strapped into her car seat in the back. I’ve driven it on these roads, know that it is right at home, even on unpaved highways. It has never broken down or left me stranded, I told the concerned mother—the one who was now in the area visiting with family. She and her husband thought that maybe such a car would benefit their daughter, give her an occasional vehicle to use or in the event of an emergency.

I got the car cleaned up a bit, had already vacuumed the interior on a previous occasion. On this cold morning I went out and put twenty bucks worth of gas in it, making the needle rise to about the halfway mark. I drove the quiet and smooth-running car into the wash bay, put in ten quarters, and followed the instructions for the various wash cycles. The cold spray was bitter on this frosty morning, but the car looked fantastic—the alloy wheels gleamed, the paint was shiny and even a little lustrous. We would meet at noon, about an hour hence—the new mother’s parents and I.

On the way home, maybe four or five miles from the house, the car stopped dead. It was finished—had driven its last mile. One minute it was rolling along at a brisk sixty, the engine putting out a comforting warmth from the car’s heater, everything working smoothly and as it should. Now this clunk, a small clunk, and the instant loss of speed as the engine stopped simultaneously with the sound.

I called the mother, the one who had so thoughtfully and generously wanted to make life easier for her daughter and her new grandchild.
“You can cross this off your “to-do” list,” I said. “The car is dead.”
We were to have met in about forty-five minutes.
I offered by way of consolation: “at least it didn’t happen on YOUR watch.” I would have felt terrible if they’d driven the thing away, had it fail on them immediately or even in the near future. At least this was my loss and I could deal with it as I saw fit. A trip to the metal-salvage yard is not out of the question. I should mention that I have not determined what caused the breakdown, but I suspect that the problem is costly and most likely terminal.

Later I was to meet the man who wanted to buy my van. He was going to be late, he said. Yesterday he couldn’t make it, either; his landlord had wanted to talk to him, had wanted to see him in person. He explained that he didn’t have a choice; the landlord wanted to see him and he HAD TO GO. I thought that maybe using the phone for such a matter would save both him and the landlord time and money—gas being ridiculously expensive these days.

I cleaned out the van on the cold afternoon, the stuff mostly going into the new truck I’d brought back from Ohio. Some of it will go back home or into the trash, but for now it went into the spacious new truck. The van’s buyer called from the road, said he’d been involved in a “fender-bender” in a nearby town, that the police were there and that he would be delayed for about an hour. I continued with the truck, finished up what I had set out to do, and headed to the big-box store for some eye-hooks to screw into the wooden slats along the truck’s sides. These would help secure some of the heavier items I would be putting in there. At the hardware store I walked along the row of mostly-empty aisles-- hardly anyone shopping on this Friday after thanksgiving. I came to the aisle where I knew the eye-bolts to be; these were things I’d bought on many other occasions. They’re very useful, you see. The aisle was closed off, with two men getting ready to operate some machinery that would lift them up into the air. I tried not to explode, held myself steady, got it through to them that I needed eye-bolts, didn’t mind waiting if they could maybe get them for me.
“They’re down at that end,” I said, pointing.
They let me in, I got a couple of bags of the things, and let myself back out of the aisle—thanking the two young men for their cooperation. This was one of those days—the breakdown, the near-sale of the car that collapsed precipitously, the “fender-bender,” the seller delayed in a nearby town while I waited for him to come and take the van away. Now this.

I drove back to the van with my purchase, not really able to put the screws to use on this cold evening. It would have to wait, would need the help of a power drill, an extension cord and so on. Presently the man and his friend arrived in a luxury SUV. Now there was a problem with the money, as I’d assumed there would be. The man was short one hundred dollars. He had the rest of the sum in cash, had hundred-dollar bills there to show me, and could I just settle for that, please? It was his landlord, see—the one who’d wanted to talk to him, had needed to tell him in person, not on the phone, that he was raising the rent, that things weren’t going well for him financially, that now the mortgage cost more because of the higher taxes.

I just wanted to sell the van, wanted it out of my life. But on this day, there were other factors at play. Things were starting to have a cumulative effect on me, and now one hundred dollars sounded more and more like a lot of money—like it was just about the most important sum in the world. I’d had the sale of the other car so brutally yanked out from under my feet, with little in the way of warning. I’d been counting the money I’d anticipated from that sale—a paltry fourteen hundred dollars; had seen myself flipping through the crisp bills, fluffing them up a bit, maybe going back to make sure they were still there, still real, and not just a dream. I would pay some bills, would pay for the horrific repairs that the new truck needed. It would all fall into place for once—the extra green easing the way just a little.

“I’ll just give you your deposit back,” I said. I actually had one hundred dollars with me—the amount he’d given me as a deposit. With little fanfare, I called his bluff—took out the bills and handed them to him.
“Good luck,” I said. I was selling the van for a giveaway price, knew that he would not find another vehicle as good as this one.
He managed to produce the additional one hundred dollars. His friend came up with the money, handed it to him. I signed the back of the title and watched as the two drove off.

On the way home I slowed a little on the high-speed road that leads to and from the airport. I was passing my broken-down car there in the breakdown lane—two wheels in the dirt, and two wheels on the more stable and crumbly blacktop.

“There I am,” I thought to myself.

"You're him!"

Yesterday I delayed going over to the other house until rather late in the afternoon. With little light remaining, I put the tall ladder in place to rip out the rest of the black cables snaking their way up the side and onto the roof. They’d once terminated where the unsightly satellite dishes had been, but those were now gone—smashed and ruined on the ground. Good riddance. I snipped at the little plastic ties that held the cables in place, took care not to topple off the high ladder, and threw the scraps into the box where I’d been collecting the castoff and unwelcome material. It will go to the salvage yard at some point—these wires containing a bit of copper in the middle that can be reclaimed.

Inside the house I looked again at the stripped-down bathroom, bereft of tub, toilet, sink, radiator, walls and ceiling. I’d had it in mind to cut away the floor entirely, put sturdy plywood in place as a subfloor, but wasn’t so sure of this approach anymore. Once I reexamined the space, I reassured myself that this was the proper approach; there seemed to be enough room to cut away the old and splintered pine boards and allow for my new flooring material to fit properly.

Earlier in the day I’d wanted to get started on chipping away the last remaining bits of wallboard still stuck to the framework of the bathroom. I’d mostly done a rough job of it up to this point, simply ripping large sections of drywall away and getting the big pieces smashed into smaller ones and discarded. Now I had to make sure the rest of it was done away with; there would be no rebuilding of walls without first getting the studs cleaned up of all nails and remaining drywall. It shouldn’t take more than an hour or so.

I was getting myself in the mood to start on this cleanup work when the phone rang. It was my elderly French friends who live nearby. The husband was on the phone, sick and gasping, telling me he needed to go get some medication, get some blood drawn as well. He sounded worried, and in the background I could hear his wife yelling contradictory things, saying it wasn’t really necessary that I come over, they could take care of it. I told him I would be over in a few minutes. I felt that the rest of the day could potentially be spent dealing with this, but actually welcomed an excuse not to go mucking around with the powdery and dusty drywall.

I arrived in my little convertible to see them already out front and getting into their car. I told them I would drive, took the keys and got underway. I had a general idea of where they were going, the wife having told me that the Kaiser Permanente medical facility was in a nearby suburb of Baltimore. But I didn’t know the exact address, so I had to rely on their often conflicting directions, yelled in more and more excited tones as I wheeled the car through the afternoon traffic.
“At the second light go left.”
“NO!” (this was the wife) “It’s the THIRD light!”
“Make a right here.”
“Go straight! Go straight!”
The wife, who was seated up front with me, seemed to know where she was going, so I ended up mostly following her directions. Occasionally Jacques, who was in the back, would yell something that sounded plausible, so I would sometimes do as he instructed. We ended up getting there without incident.

At the clinic we got the prescriptions filled, the pharmacist explaining that one of the medicines had already been topped-up just a week or so ago. There should be plenty, she said. I explained this to my friends, who didn’t really understand what was going on. With limited English, they are often at a loss to figure out what others are saying. They accepted that it was quite possible they had already filled the prescription, didn’t seem too worried about it, actually. Upstairs the phlebotomist drew the blood required to determine correct dosages for one of the blood-thinning medicines, and we were on our way pretty quickly. I commented to Jacques, who was breathing much easier, that he seemed to be doing better.
“L’air frais me fait du bien,” he said.
Apparently he thought that getting out and about helped a little, allowing the bright sun and cool autumn air to soothe and calm in a way that medicines couldn’t. I took an alternate route home, following the surface roads instead of the beltway, and prolonging the trip a little. They both seemed to enjoy the ride.

Later I drove over to pick up some bags for the markets. In the huge warehouse of fifty-thousand square feet or more, the forklifts were busy filling orders for mega-businesses, the large chains of restaurants, eateries, and the like that consume napkins, paper towels, hand-soap, all manner of things related to carry-outs, eat-ins, and everything in between. I’d placed my order earlier in the day, wanted to get there before it was too late on this Friday. With a grand total of only around sixty-two dollars, my business barely registered as a blip on their radar. I wrote a check to the man at the front counter, the person who takes my orders over the phone. He is a dead ringer for a supporting actor on one of my favorite television sitcoms—“King of Queens.” His counterpart plays Danny, the cousin of the show’s star—named Doug in the series. I don’t know his real name. I first met him Doug’s cousin on the show) there at the huge paper goods warehouse. I was speechless, my mouth hanging open.
“You’re him!” I said.
“King of Queens?” he asked.
“You’re Doug’s cousin, Danny! He’s hilarious! I mean—you’re hilarious!”
“Yeah, I get that a lot,” he said.
“Well, you do a great job on the show—I only wish we saw more of you. Can you talk to the producers about that—you know, try to get them to maybe write you into more of the shows?”
“I don’t really have much input, but I’ll see what I can do,” he said.
I thanked him for the bags, got underway, and headed home.

Later I missed a photo exhibit that a friend was showing her work in. I thought for some reason that it was going to be held on Sunday. On Saturday afternoon I checked the date and time, found that it had actually been held Friday evening, between seven and nine. I’d missed it, and it was something I was looking forward to. I will drive out and see it on my own some other day.

All you need is Love's

Yesterday I got on a plane at BWI, flew first to New York, then took a flight to Columbus, where the new, larger truck awaited me. My Baltimore-to-New York flight was delayed, leaving the plane with its passengers sitting on the runway for about an hour. This gave me about fifteen minutes to catch my flight in New York. That flight went smoothly, and—because I’d taken two flights in one day on US Air and its affiliates, I scored not one—but TWO—little snack bags of pretzels. I was surprised that anything in the way of food was offered at all; I imagine it’s a good way to calm down otherwise irate passengers. “Here—give them a little bag of pretzels and a soda. That’ll quiet ‘em down for a while.” We all sat and happily munched our pretzels.

The truck was horrible, not at all what the seller had described—both in our conversations and online. All maintenance had been neglected during the time that he owned it, the front tires were choppy, worn out, on the verge of failure. I pointed out the obvious things to him, told him that they contradicted what he’d told me, added that the truck was going to need a lot of work to get it through the state safety inspection back home. He agreed to reduce the price by another five-hundred dollars, which is something of a help. Still not enough, but something. He’d made no preparations for my coming to pick it up, was cleaning the cab out as I arrived in my taxi from the airport—some ten miles away. There was enough trash in there to fill a good-sized trash bag. I got together a little pile and added it to the mix. In the back was an old carpet, some other things. He kindly offered me the rug, something that he didn’t want to throw out because it was so big and cumbersome.
“No thanks,” I said.

He wheeled the spare tire out of his garage and put it in the back of the truck. He was proud that he’d gone to the trouble of procuring an emergency spare in case of a flat.
“Look at that,” he said, pointing to the worn-out specimen lying in the truck’s cargo area—the tired and bald rubber barely holding air.
“Any tire-changing equipment? Tire iron, lug-nut wrench—jack? Anything?”
“Nope—nothing,” he said.
I didn’t bother to ask why he’d gone to the trouble of getting a spare, but no tools to put the thing on the truck in case he actually needed it.

His was a house in a Midwestern subdivisions, just outside of Columbus, the neighborhood being about five years old, he told me. The trees were all very small, when there were trees at all. The cheap and quickly-built houses suggested that the residents there had arrived—with garish and clashing windows, little thought to how the different elements of the houses would work together. They were basic abodes, gussied-up a bit to give just a little hint of style—albeit style that appeared unexpectedly, and not cooperating at all with other components that might have helped with the overall effect. Out front, some of the houses had the Cadillac Escalade, the bright bauble that is not entirely out-of-reach of the working class, that bespeaks a financial status that the owner may or may not actually have. It is probable that such a car costs about half the price of one of these houses.

“They sent out a letter telling us to cut down all the trees,” he said, referring to the people from the county, whose job it was to oversee things such as trees in new housing developments. They’d supposedly approved them in the first place, the small and unhealthy specimens struggling and hanging on for dear life. God bless them—they’ll make it, if the county doesn’t have all the residents chop them down first.
“Then they sent out another letter telling us to hold off on cutting them down,” he said.
Apparently no one had rushed right out to cut down their trees after the first letter.

At least the truck runs ok. I got on the highway, finding my way back to Interstate 70 with no trouble. That part of Ohio is easily accessed by I-70 and its offshoots. I exited at the old highway, Route 40, to see if any tire place or garage would be interested in putting two new tires on the truck. It was close to five o’clock, and too late for anyone to take on this simple job. I drove on, the cupped and noisy front tires reminding me that they were rolling along on borrowed time.

At a Love’s truck stop, I checked the truck over for proper operation of all lights—especially ones that the police might stop me for. The tag light was dark. It being after sundown, this was an issue for me, and an obvious reason for a curious state trooper to pull me over to check things out. I didn’t really want that. Of course, it was not merely an issue of replacing a bulb and being on my way; I quickly realized that the assembly for the tag light was half-missing, had been gone for some time, wasn’t really a concern for the previous owner. I looked over the selection of items in the Love’s store, picked out a few things—some electrical wire, some connectors, duct tape, a little tag light assembly that cost around five bucks—and went outside.

A young maintenance man at the truck stop, who’d worked there for five years, became interested in my project. I explained to him that I’d just bought the truck, was driving back to Maryland, and didn’t want to be bothered by the police. He seemed to understand. He told me of his life in the area, this being mostly farmland. He hunted white-tailed deer, turkeys, opossums. I asked about the opossums. Yes, he ate them, as long as they were young; the old ones were like biting into rubber, he said. He volunteered the loan of some tools, which helped me greatly; he expressed regret that I’d bought the items to do the repair, owing to the fact that he had most of those things at his disposal. I felt that—owing to his and the truck stop’s hospitality—I could at least spend some money there.

He watched with interest as I wired the new part into place, tapping into an old wire that was dangling underneath the truck and that I guessed had once been for the purpose of powering up the tag light. Using the duct tape as a temporary fastener, it held on just above the license plate I brought with me from back home. Now was the moment of truth: I turned on the headlights, and heard his excited yells as he saw the new tag light glow white, illuminating the once-dark area back there. I was grateful, more than he knew, for his help, for his tools, for his talk of opossums, white-tailed deer, for being there to help and encourage me on as I worked in the bright glare on this mild autumn evening outside the Love’s Truck Stop.

With all the lights working properly, I pushed on, only about a hundred miles into the trip. To get to my front door, the truck’s mile-counter would have to read about 425 miles. I was not making great progress. I stopped at a Cracker Barrel, thinking maybe I’d have some of their beef stew or pot roast. They had them both, the roast beef being a special that day. I opted for the stew, knowing that I would not finish the bulky meal entailed with the roast and its two generous sides. I could barely finish the stew, the mashed potatoes, and a corn muffin as it turned out. I’d mainly stopped because I knew that later on these places would be closed. Cracker Barrels don’t keep late hours. On these horrible, grinding trips, I usually keep on driving until everything is closed—the only offerings being the snack foods hanging in bags from a brightly-lit travel plaza or convenience store. I hate that. So I ate my Cracker Barrel food, washed it down with a good Coke, and left.

Central Ohio has a progressive radio station that plays exceptionally good late-night offerings. There are no commercials either. One obscure artist after another came on, played a selection I’d never heard before, then there would be more good music after that. I seem to recall that a specialty of this station—or one of its features—is to interview, in depth, an artist and then play their music. This happened on the trip, while I listened to a man who styled his music as “country ghetto.” I don’t recall his name, but he seemed to have some good things to say to the interviewer, despised living in a country where all people strive to be the same, to want the same things, to look the same. His songs were mostly good.

Then it was lively jazz and some classical music as I ground out the miles, the truck running well, with no problems other than the obvious safety ones relating to the worn tires and a long trip with no tools. As is typical, the rain started with about a hundred and fifty miles remaining. On these trips it rains in the most treacherous section—the mountains going through western Maryland. I kept my speed at around sixty, let the big trucks roll by, their fog-storm of spray and mist washing over the windshield as I struggled to see on the dark highways. I stopped once, pulling into a deserted post office just off the main highway in Flintstone. At around two-thirty in the morning, it was wet and deserted, the leaves of the surrounding woods coming down, sticking, post-it-note-style—onto the shiny black parking lot. A lone American flag stood sentry, the cold front’s wind enlivening it and whipping it about. I looked at my tag light. Still bright, the license plate readable in the small glow of the little bulb. A few state troopers had passed me. I was happy.

At four o’clock in the morning I was home. I’d turned down two jobs for this trip. It has been maybe a month since I’ve been called for a video job; I planned my trip to Ohio, held my breath, waiting for the inevitable. Right on cue, one of my clients called to ask if I could work on the day of my trip and the following day as well. I never quite know how to figure this one out, mathematically; I could say, well—there goes about a fourth of the truck’s price in income I’ll never see. Or I can say I just added twenty-five percent to the cost of the truck. I think, sadly this latter assessment is the true gauge. I hope someone, whoever is in charge of scheduling things in the universe, of seeing that video jobs are covered and that poor schlubs humping across Central Ohio in an abused truck regret every single mile, is laughing. I fail to see the humor in it.

Sweet-Tee!

Today the water shutoff tool worked. I hammered its heavy iron jaws a little, making them a bit narrower in order to get a proper grip on the meter’s valve. Although it was still a bit loose, it held on enough to turn the water off out at the street. The tool cost something less than ten bucks; the water company wanted fifty-five dollars to come out and do the same thing, so I feel that I came out ahead on this one. Also, the water people could not guarantee which day they would stop by, seemed fairly casual about coming to turn the valve back on as well. With the cold weather looming, it’s important for me to have the water stopped before it gets to the house; not doing so would risk bursting the short section of pipe I have where it comes through the basement wall. With the heat not running, the temperatures inside the house can drop to freezing and below.

I wanted to stop by the hardware and tell Lydia, the young store clerk, all about it-- regale her with heroic tales of turning off the water, how I’d had to modify the tool, reminisce about how fun it had been when she accidentally charged me for two of the things. We would re-hash old times. Mostly I would talk, benumbing her young mind with inexplicable stories of water meters, long-handled tools, how I hadn’t shut off the valve completely the first time, had to go back out to the street to try again. I’d realized my mistake when I’d gone down to the basement to turn on the ancient gate valve there, the corroded thing still actually keeping the water at bay. The clear and cold liquid came gurgling and bubbling out, into a little pail I’d put there—just in case. She would no doubt listen with glazed eyes as I breathlessly told her how I went back outside, turned the thing off the rest of the way, and stemmed the flow from the street for good.

Then I would recite a poem I’d written for the occasion:

Auburn-Haired
Hardware clerk
Keeper of the brooms
Mistress of
Tiresome work
Merchant of spring blooms

Knowing not
Always true
Purpose of your tools
Entertain
Albeit
Ogling, monstrous fools

Bags of Mulch
Spongey Mops
Make up your dire realm
Auburn-haired
Youngstress keeps
Steady at the helm

Weary man
Tinkerer
Troubler of old pipes
Cleaver of
Rusted things
Harborer of gripes

Worn-out eyes
Meeting hers
Is that smile for me?
"There you go
Thank you, sir
Don't forget your tee."

I anticipate a smattering of applause there at the checkout, the line of customers wanting mostly to pay for their purchases, their bags of nails, of bug-killer, maybe a large box of trash bags to put the autumn leaves in. They hadn’t really bargained for this.

Sheba on the Table

“Hey, they take those big-ass steel I-beams here?”
Suddenly I was an expert on scrap metal.
“If you can get it here, they’ll take it,” I said.
“They must weigh around four hundred pounds each!” he yelled, proud of how much steel he was envisioning bringing to the place. The young man was leaning out the window of a worn and work-blasted pickup. It looked even worse than mine, which is something of an accomplishment. In the bed was the usual assortment of scrap steel, odds and ends, maybe a backyard grill, some bent and twisted playground equipment. I’d just collected thirty-two dollars for my offering: The old Frigidaire from the 1940s which I could not get anyone to take away, but which was probably in pretty good condition, assorted steel pipes from the house plumbing, some copper ones, the water heater, which I’d just removed. All told, about six hundred pounds of steel went into the collective pile, to be picked up by long-armed machines, their claws grabbing as much as they could in one haul, and deposited into another machine that would pulverize everything into nice small pieces.

On my way to the exit, I moved the truck slowly over the grounds of the scrap-yard, wanting to relish the experience. Off to my right, a monster tractor was easily lifting an entire city bus—the biggest kind they run—into position. Gently, it set the old bus down next to a mountain of scrap metal. The sign at the entrance said that buses and trailers would be bought for three dollars per hundred pounds. Assuming that the enormous bus weighed at least ten thousand pounds, the donor of the big people-mover could expect to walk away with around three thousand dollars or more. I want to work myself up to that level of scrap—I’m tired of the little offerings, the refrigerators, stoves and so on. I want to arrive one day with an entire city bus.

I’d drained the water heater, a relic dating back fifteen years or so. That it was still even working is a marvel; it was one of those economy models that made no claim it would last more than a year or two. But it had hung on all this time, the sides stained with old plumbing leaks, grime, and dirt. I pulled off the pressure-relief valve and loaded the thing into the truck. Without its tank full of water, it was pretty manageable. I cut the natural gas line to the tank before removing it, having already turned off the main gas supply to the whole house. I’d also emptied the lines of whatever residual gas was there, and had capped off any places where I’d removed some of the gas line. I have a new water heater, or one that had only been used a few months. Back when I’d bought the house, someone was selling their recently purchased model, and I remember buying it for around sixty dollars. Since then, it has sat in the basement, waiting its turn.

Back home, I picked up the package that had been sitting on the table for the past two months or more. It was an attractive thing, the dark box bespeaking taste and elegance. It looked to have been sent by a rich relative, someone who knew how to wrap and present a little offering so as to extract the most benefit from its presentation. It was a can of cat food. I knew this all along, had never quite gotten around to giving the cats the thing that had arrived in the mail for them. They didn’t know it had arrived, that the people who make Sheba brand cat food had though of this campaign, had decided to send me some food for them, knowing somehow that there was a cat in the house. The cats couldn’t give me a hard time over something they didn’t even know existed, didn’t know was waiting on the table for them. Now it was time. I got the small can undone from its expensive and tasteful wrapping, peeled back the lid. The cats immediately went into a frenzy, knowing that sound all too well. It’s not a sound that they hear too often, as I hardly ever give them food from a can. I looked inside, was amazed at what I saw. There, delicately shredded, was the most delicious-looking chicken meat I’d ever seen. Done up in a nice gravy, the cats would surely enjoy this. I wanted to eat the stuff—or at least try it. I read a little of the literature that came with the cat food. It said that only the best chicken breast was used--only white meat for a healthier cat. For once they devoured all their food, leaving not a trace. At least they have good taste. I threw the promotional literature into the bin for my paper recycling; the expensive box with the image of an exotic and discerning cat, its green eyes suggesting that only this food would be worthy of such a cat—offering it anything else would be just a waste of time. I threw away the coupons, knowing that my two cats would easily become such an animal—refusing their daily allotment of dry food, pacing the floor and meowing miserably for these high-priced offerings. I could foresee the day when I sat before an empty dinner table, my only sustenance some cold peas and a glass of tap water, because I couldn’t afford decent food after the enormous sums spent keeping the two lamentably lazy felines happy. I vowed not to let this come to pass.

"That's just a little bit of all right."

I climbed about on the roof today, something I’m not quite as comfortable with as I used to be. Not that I ever really liked it, but just now have gotten it into my head that—should I fall—things wouldn’t go so well for me. This climbing on the roof came at the end of the day, as a kind of reward for getting through the other, more mundane chores. First I cut some shims for my floor support—the section that needs shoring up just as you enter the house. I discovered that—quite by accident—if I set my table-saw adjustment on a slight angle, the resulting thin slivers of wood come out as nice shims. These worked perfectly for the section of floor I’ve already described in some detail; there is now almost no movement when you walk over that area. There still remains one support to be added from below, and I’ll be sure to keep it company with some of my home-made shims.

Next I disconnected the section of drain that was the only bit of plumbing still connected to the bathtub. I cut some of the bathroom floor away and got access to the plastic pipe that made the final run to the house drainpipe. Then I cut the pipe itself, got the other pieces removed from the tub’s two drains (the bottom one and the one at the top, used as an overflow drain), and then tipped the bathtub over on its side to see how it would go out the door. Getting it on its side was enough work for me: I didn’t want to risk rupturing myself by dragging the tub around—something I don’t think I could do even if I tried. With encouragement from two able bodies, it might make the trip out into the dining room with not much trouble. Then it will remain to chip the last few pieces of wall still clinging to the sides of the room, get things tidied up a bit, and remove completely the splintered and broken pine boards that make up the bathroom floor. I’ll eventually replace the floor with thick plywood, then some nice tile to make things look polished.

With the above work behind me, I took out the tall ladder I’d just bought out in Frederick and climbed onto the steep-pitched roof. My aim was to remove the satellite dishes that were up there. My television-hungry tenants had wanted cable television, which was just fine—the house was already wired for that. Then they decided that they would like this new kind of television, called “direct tv.” Sitting over in my own house, with only regular broadcast television to look at, I didn’t care really what they wanted, so long as they were happy and mostly left me alone. So I said ok. This was a big mistake; the installers—a series of mostly incompetent and low-skilled workers from the direct tv people, put wires all around the house, making the place look like a dump. Then, up on the roof, they installed not one—but TWO—ugly satellite dishes. The tenants seemed pleased with their new service, since I heard no more talk about getting additional things added to the house. So I accepted the hideous hardware that had been installed on my nice new roof, and kept quiet.

But I hated the things—always did, actually. Their moon-faces interrupting the roofline of the little house, the garish satellite dishes pointed upwards, swiping at the heavens to grab an episode of Three’s Company or a long-forgotten program of Julia Child cooking some kind of duck. The more I thought about these things the angrier I became. Then, during my excursions around the neighborhood, maybe walking or riding my bike, I would notice these same satellite dishes mounted in places that WERE NOT the roof. They were in people’s yards, on a post, or in some other location. So I had stupidly agreed to allow these things a place atop the house, and it may very well be that it was not at all necessary. The mistake had to be undone.

I first cut all of the wiring inside the house, every last cable that linked the place to some pay-for-tv service. I know that it will have to be replaced in the future, but I want it done right. For now, it was enough to know that it was gone. Then I loaded up my tools, climbed onto the roof, and unfastened the many bolts that held these monstrosities in place. I’d planned to just cut away at their supports with my metal-cutting saw, but—owing to the dangerous pitch of the roof, and the heavy weight of the saw-- decided that this plan was too risky. Anything to reduce the risk of falling would be all right with me.
I got the smaller antenna apart, inched close to the edge of the roof, and threw the whole business onto the hard concrete patio below. It smashed to the ground with a satisfying clang—hopefully disabling its innards for good. The other satellite dish was more problematic; it was much bigger, for one thing, and weighed a lot more. The writing on it said that it was a “Super Dish.”

I got it detached from its mooring, the legs and supports no longer holding it in place. I then gently lowered the cumbersome thing to the roof, so that it was resting on the asphalt shingles at a dangerous angle. I got away from it, not exactly sure what I should do next. It kindly decided for me, sliding—first slowly—down the steep roof, then picking up speed as it approached the rain gutter. It grated over my new shingles, jumped the gutter, and plummeted heavily to the ground below, where the plastic parts shattered, and the solid pieces of steel bent with the impact.

I looked down. “That’s just a little bit of all right,” I said aloud.

The Incredible Hulks

This day was not especially productive. I arose around eight o’clock, got some bank deposits together, and figured out what I currently owed for the most recent invoices on hand. If I’d stopped there and did nothing else today, that would have been a fairly high level of output for me. However, I did more—I took a walk in the woods.

I met my brother at his house, he suggested that we drive over to the park to enjoy the fall day with a hike under the colorful canopy of leaves—and to look at some old automotive relics scattered in the woods. This is one of my favorite things, finding these old hulks from the forties and sometimes earlier.

We parked along a road that winds through wooded parkland, the narrow lane carrying a little traffic between Catonsville and Ellicott City. Walking into the woods, we soon came across some old buildings made of the local stone that is abundant in the area. All that remained of these old farmhouses was perhaps a couple of front steps that led to a stone foundation that revealed a basement hewn from the rocky soil. The wooden parts of the houses were long gone, victims of time and weather and the natural forces that erase—after a certain time—everything that man has made. Trees grew up from the enclosures where once the main part of the house stood. The foundations and basements were remarkably intact, seeming to invite new settlers to build upon what the departed ones had abandoned. With trees growing everywhere, it was difficult to imagine the land as the people there knew it—the pastures carved out of the woods, the fences still mutely outlined with sturdy posts that stood solitary, each one a separate entity, not bound to each other any longer. Here was an old gateway, the rusted hinge pins still protruding from the wood. And, a little removed from the main house, was a deep well—a dangerous hole lined with stone, dug straight down into the earth. These things can be twenty or thirty feet deep—or more. This one had some old metal building materials thrown over it to help keep the unwary from falling in. I pulled one of the metal pieces away, peered in, but could not get a feel for how deep the well had been dug.

And of course there were the remnants of automobiles. The oldest ones were from the 1940s—a large Buick with an inline eight-cylinder engine exposed to the outdoors for the past fifty years or so. Its pistons were frozen in time, locked in place by the snows, the rains, the hot summer days and the brittle winter cold that were no match for the old car—rolled unceremoniously out into the woods or what was once a field and left for dead. Its sheet metal had become paper-thin, the rust was now the color of the earth that surrounded it, that it was sinking into, was returning to. Sometimes a sturdy chrome bumper held fast, just at ground level—the rest of the car slowly lowering to meet it. Time had done its work—not aggressively or in a showy manner; but little by little, the inexorable forces had hammered away at the machines out there, slowly coaxing them to a thorough and peaceful destruction.
Some of the other cars were more recent, even had motors and a fairly rare transmission. The one with the motor and rare transmission was one of my favorite vintage American rides: The venerable but little-heralded Ford Falcon. Often these cars came with the standard transmission—a three-speed on the column, most likely. But for a few dollars more, you could ride in deluxe style, eliminating the need for a clutch down there next to the brake pedal. Simply select the gear, press on the gas, and go. This particular car was from around 1964 or so. Although most of the rest of the car had succumbed to the forces of nature, the engine and transmission—being made of more sturdy stuff—were still mostly intact.

We finished our tour in about an hour or so, finding the remnants of what was once a little community out in the woods, and locating about a dozen hulks of old cars. The most recent examples were from the mid-to-late sixties.

Back home I posted an online ad for my work van, wanting to rid myself of it in order to buy a larger truck. I contacted a man in Ohio who has for sale exactly the kind of truck I want to buy. His was offered for sale in an online auction some time ago, and it never sold. I contacted him using the phone number listed in the auction, and talked about the vehicle and the price. He said he needed to sell it for $5,000 in order to pay off his loan and get the title free and clear. I told him I would consider the price, get back to him. I later called him, asked if he could please lower his price to $4,500. This was taking into account the fact that I would have to fly out there, drive the truck back home. The airfare is not that expensive—only about a hundred dollars—but the price of gas is also a consideration. The trip is almost exactly four hundred miles. He said he would see what he could do.

I should add that it would make more sense to find a similar vehicle right in my area and just buy it. The problem is that these trucks are fairly scarce, and command premium prices around here. Out in Ohio they seem to be more reasonably-priced, even taking into account the cost of transporting the truck back home.

I went over to the other house, just to be able to say I did something—anything—in the way of meaningful work. This was later in the afternoon, after the sun had set, and the house was fairly chilly on this cold day. With my heavy work-jacket, dust mask and gloves, I was soon fairly warm. I went down in the basement to see what I could do to rectify a problem up at the entrance of the house. You see, just as you enter the front door, there is a section of floor that was once patched. The floorboards match up pretty well, but there is a noticeable soft spot—so noticeable that, if you walk upon that section just right, it feels as if the floor is going to give way and you’ll end up falling straight down into the basement. This isn’t exactly the effect that I wanted visitors to the house to experience. There is no real danger, but the situation must be corrected.

I looked at that area from below, found that additional support was needed in the middle of the patched area, and cut away some unneeded pieces of wood that once supported the drop ceiling down in the basement. Now the floor was more accessible, and I would be able to screw into place some sturdy lumber that I have on hand. Fastening it directly to the floor joists, it should have the desired effect of making the floorboards upstairs feel sturdier—not like they are going to collapse beneath the weight of a particularly heavy person.

As I was down in the far recesses of the basement, I came across two small bags of poison. Fearsome stuff, labeled with the distinctive skull and crossbones, it was identified as “Arsenate of Lead.” I carefully removed the two bags from their hiding place, put them into a plastic-lined box, and sealed it up. I then threw away the gloves I’d used to handle the bags with. This stuff had been bought at a local hardware some fifty years ago, this kind of thing being pretty much the norm back in those days. It was used as an insecticide, a rodent-killer, and some other things besides. People applied it to their vegetable gardens to ward off or kill certain pests. I can’t even imagine; just saying the words, “Arsenate of Lead,” sounds like it should be toxic. But the family man back then, in his big pants and large, rounded car, thought nothing of it. Walking into the hardware to buy some screws, a sheet of screen for the storm door, maybe some tikki torches for the weekend barbecue, might pause—there was something more, something he’d forgotten:

“Oh, yeah,” pointing to a spot high on the store’s worn wooden shelves, “Gimme a bag of that rat poison.”

The store clerk would comply, putting the poison in the bag—along with the screen, the metal screws, the tikki torches. Out on the street, the family man in his big pants would throw the stuff into the massive car, put the machine in motion, and head back home. It was 1956 and everything was good for you.

"The bike went up, then it went down"

I tried out my new street-tee. It didn’t work, as I well expected. The opening at the end, where it grabs the valve key, is a little too wide. I will heat it to red-hot with my torch, close the opening to the point where it will fit more snugly against the valve, and try again.

I cut away the old cast-iron waste pipe that once led from the toilet. Down in the basement, I banged on it with my heavy maul until it started to break apart at the connections. Then I banged on it some more, finally pulling away the curved section leading down from the bathroom to the main section of pipe. The main section extends down along the basement wall, disappears through the north wall of the house to join the big sewer out in the street. I once probed this section with a video camera, thinking that I could fix a problem I was having with a perpetually stuck toilet. I had all the high-tech gear—the snake with the video camera and light on the end, coiling its way through the pipe, but all I could see was the insides of a very old sewer line. It looked fine, no blockage that I could see. The machine I was using even came with a videotape recorder, so that I could record the action of going through the sewer line. When I finally got a professional to come out and look at my problem, he informed me that I needed a new toilet. This is a fairly typical scenario when it comes to an amateur trying to handle an unfamiliar problem: All of the far-fetched possibilities come to mind; the theories are endless as to what the source of the problem might be. In the end it is usually solved simply and quickly by the trained hand of an experienced professional.

After I’d finished the small amount of work to remove the sections of waste pipe, I went outside to throw the scraps of material into the back of the truck. There was a commotion.
“Stop! Come back here!”
A neighbor was calling out to a thief that had just stolen his son’s bicycle. The young bike-thief and the bicycle were disappearing over another neighbor’s fence a few houses down. The thief was not interested in stopping.
The man giving chase came close to my yard. Plodding along in his stocking feet, he picked his way delicately over the tufts of grass that make up the uneven ground. Apparently he had not thought to put on shoes before taking off.
“Want to use my phone?” I asked, thinking he might want to call the police—since this was the kind of thing they specialized in.
“Yes, yes—“ he grabbed the phone, called the emergency number, gave the person on the other end the particulars of the situation. He handed the phone back to me, headed off in the direction the bike-thief had taken.

I walked out front, thought I’d see how things were unfolding. The half-wit and her grandkids were there in the driveway. She was holding a garden hose, spraying water onto the car. This was the white car that the good lord had sent them. I wanted to have some fun.
“Did you see the bike?”
“What bike?” She paused with the hose, her mouth open in bewilderment.
“A man just had his bike stolen.” I said.
“Your bike was stolt?” She asked.
“No—a man’s bike,” I replied—knowing that this would only add to the confusion.
“What man?”
I glanced at the road, a few feet away at the end of the driveway. At that very moment the man in question was running by in his white socks, his shoeless feet padding softly on the street.
“That man,” I said, pointing to the white-socked man running by.
“He stolt your bike?”
This went on for a little while, each exchange making less and less sense. Then it was the grandson, the little boy who answers everything I say with the same bewildered, “Huh?”

“Eirf who whaf bake dat ware bo?”

He was asking where the bike went. There was really no way to explain; everything I utter is absolutely incomprehensible to the little boy. I said, truthfully: “The bike went up, then it went down.” The bike actually did go up and down, as it made its way across the fence.

“Huh?”

The house is now mostly cut off from its water supply and sewer outlet. It still has electricity and—for now—I see no reason to sever it from that source of power. The light helps me see what I’m doing, for one thing. Likewise, the gas line is still hooked up, although I’ve shut off the valve inside the house. Since the fixtures are mostly removed from the bathroom, it remains to get the tub moved out. I am not looking forward to this; these things are made of heavy cast iron, don’t even have to be fastened in place because they are so hideously heavy. You just set it where you want it and hook up the plumbing. I’ll need to remove it, however, before taking apart the old pine floor.

"You heat it up right in the carton"

The chicken fried rice was actually pretty good. A dismal end to an otherwise ok day, I drove up the street to the all-night convenience store for something to eat. I’d been looking forward to going out and sitting down to a nice meal with my newspaper at the seafood place I like. Instead, this. It got too late for the restaurant, so I evaluated my options. The big supermarket just down the street closes early on Sundays, seeming to change its hours every few weeks, so I went to the brightly-lit store up at the corner. The young man tending the place was out front, taking a smoke break. I told him as I entered that I would be looking around a bit, so there was no need to hurry to the counter. I’d probably be awhile. I found, in the refrigerated case at the back of the store, a carry-out container of Chinese food. You could heat the food up in the microwave and pour it into a dish. Just like that. Even I could manage with such simple instructions. The other things in the case were the typical Hungry Man dinners, with depictions of mounds of food like Salisbury steak and meatloaf on the brightly-colored packages. I know from experience that this is terrible stuff, strictly a last resort in an effort to stave off starvation. They had a carton of shrimp and fried rice as well, but I chose the chicken fried rice instead. I took it and a bag of Fritos and a super-large Nutty-Buddy ice cream cone with nuts to the front counter. The place was deserted, with only a woman behind me wanting to know if the store had children’s strength aspirin for her young child. The clerk answered her query and took my items, one-by-one, to get scanned into the computerized cash register. He stopped when he came to my Chinese food. Amazed, he uttered a “Whaaa? I didn’t know we had this stuff.”
Things got better for me immediately. Here, in this forlorn place, at eleven o’clock on a Sunday evening, with a woman looking for medicine for her child, and me having forsaken a good meal out for this---there was a glimmer of hope. The commonality that links us together, that connects the wires of humanity, was stirring to life. In this case it was the ability to wonder, to be amazed. Ok, so it was only a carton of carry-out fried rice that had stirred the interest of the store clerk, but I’d take it.
“I know,” I said—in response to his wondering appraisal of the package still in his hand. “You heat it up right in the carton, with the wrapper and all; I’ve never tried it before.”
“Huh? In the wrapper?”
“That’s what the instructions say,” suddenly feeling just a little bit important, as I was, for the moment, the expert on this stuff.
“Wow, you’d think the plastic would melt all down the sides.”
“You would think, yes,” I said. “Like I said, I’ve never had it before, so I’ll let you know how it goes.”

It went pretty well. The food had a decent taste, was infinitely better than a Hungry Man dinner of ANY kind, and besides wasn’t loaded up with a lot of additives or preservatives. I would like to tell the store clerk that. I would like to say that the chicken fried rice, that cost only $2.89, was a wonderful surprise, that the taste was actually quite good. There are so many other things I’d like to tell him. So many things. The desolation of a lonely Sunday evening, in a deserted store, the machinery of enterprise slowing to a halt as two human beings exercise their right to be living, thinking people. The wonder of it all.

"Oh, Lydia!"

Last night I managed to rid myself of two things I no longer wanted: The old Montgomery Wards riding mower that I’d intended to fix in order to mow the elderly French couple’s lawn, and two video cameras from the VHS era—when people were happy with the idea of inserting the large videotapes into their camcorders to capture the family vacation, weddings, and so on. This was only a few years ago, actually. These two cameras have been sitting idle in the closet for a good many years, but they work fine. A young man—an aspiring filmmaker—drove all the way from the eastern shore to fetch them. At twenty-five dollars for the pair, he felt it was worth his while. The place he was coming from is some one hundred miles distant. He arrived right on time, said the online classified ads in this area yield few results, compared to back home in the northwestern part of the country. Practically everyone there uses the forum, he said. At the moment he is living with a relative in Maryland, biding his time until he can get something started with the filmmaking.

The other respondent to my online ad arrived shortly after the young man who bought the cameras. He happily paid me what I’d paid for the tractor, loaded it up, and was off to a town nearby to try to fix it for the new house he’d just moved into. It is rare for me to have people actually show up for these online ads; it seems they initially show a great deal of interest, want to know if the item is still available, then sign off—never to be heard from again. Last night was an anomaly. I’m glad it worked out.

This morning I ate at the diner out in Ellicott City. The waffle was excellent, but the sausage was not. The two links appeared to have some age on them, and a small bite revealed that they were not very fresh—had a tainted aftertaste, in fact. I sent them back, asked for bacon instead, and finished up my meal.

I went next to the hardware store, where I returned an item I’d bought for the other house. It was the cutoff valve for the water supply—the one located in the basement. I knew when I bought it that it was probably the wrong size, but wanted to see if it would work anyway. The return went smoothly, then I looked around the store for the meter-wrench I would need to turn off the water supply out at the street. I decided that, if I could just buy the tool, it would be a better use of my time than trying to fabricate one. I found the simple tools—in two lengths—sticking up from plastic tubes that held them in place. No identifying tag or sticker gave a clue as to what they were or how much they cost. I took them to the front, where the same pretty young girl who’d taken care of my exchange was working. There were quite a few young people there, actually, and they all seemed to be running the place—a good-sized hardware store that is part of a national chain. I tried to explain to her what the tools were, calling them “meter wrenches.” I suspected that I was not using the store’s terminology, so gave up after a while. The two of us—the pretty girl and I—took a walk back to the area where I’d found them. This little promenade was actually encouraged by another of the young people up at the checkout counter; another girl there thought I was better-qualified to show where I’d found the inexplicable tool, and for a short while was glad to have washed her hands of the affair. I was elated, even though it only entailed showing a young woman where I’d found the uninteresting tools. I located the display, noted that they came in two lengths, and then we set about trying to find something that would help identify them for the store’s computer and pricing system. She found a torn and ragged tag on the floor, partly under a display shelving unit. It said “street-tee.”
“That’s it!” I said, delighted that we’d located something relating to the simple tool. I thought we were quite the team, nosing about—detective-style—there in the hardware store. I fancied they could maybe make a tv show about the two of us: I would be the grizzled old veteran, engaged in some kind of sleuthing, and she would be the pretty, intelligent counterpart, showing me at every turn the error of my ways, discovering the clues that had been right under my very nose. It might need some fleshing out, actually—not sure how the hardware store, with its tools, building materials and so on will play to the general public. Then, a thought seized me. Wanting to prolong our time together there in the store, I had a notion of taking the young girl in my arms, of making her listen, to hear me out, to please let me take her away from this world of hardware, of mulch and garden supplies, irritated customers who can’t find the right gardening gloves because their hands are too sensitive to dirt. Motioning to the plumbing fixtures, the toilet parts, the pipes and faucets and—of course—the street tees, I would tell her I could show her so much more, could bring her into my world, where I often arise at ten o’clock, pad around in my stocking feet, pause to scratch myself in a listless way, then perhaps go back to bed. Then, suddenly taking a sharp detour into the Victorian era, my speech becoming flowery and literary:

“Oh, Lydia (her name tag said Lydia), please let me show you the happiness, the pleasures untold, that I am certain awaits us!” I might give her a little shake just for emphasis. “Seeing you here in these ignoble surroundings, working with steely things that surely must feel harsh against your smooth and gentle skin, must grate against your finer sensibilities—this pains me to know that a beautiful flower cannot thrive in the midst of darkness, of lowness, of the terrible things that you should never concern yourself with! Be ye not enticed by these hell-sent baubles of Satan, these fixtures, these dribblers of water, turnstiles of gases and malodorous things. Elevate thine senses above the conveyors of liquids, the endless tubes, rigid in their structure and purpose. Be ye yet acquainted with the lustrous things, the wholesome and fresh offerings from the out of doors, a romp in a summer garden, a day spent in the simple toil of picking berries, of milking a goat, of running like a newborn foal across endless meadows of green, towards a horizon unblemished by worry and the jarring geometry of galvanized pipes!”

Working myself up to a fevered pitch, a last-ditch appeal to the pretty young girl standing next to the street-tees, at the end of an aisle offering pipes, fittings, straps and other inelegant things, I would say:
“Let me transplant you! Let your beauty and mind flourish in a way not possible amongst these awful plumbing fixtures, these gasping faucets and spitters of mire and muck!”

“Okay,” she would say, responding in her simple, innocent way.

Then, giving word to her manager that she was leaving, turning in her name tag and store-issued apron, the two of us would depart to start our new life together. We would walk out, making our way past the brroms, the mops and buckets--the full-size cutout of Mr. Clean grinning insanely as he waves us good-bye.

I went to the front counter, paid for my purchase, and left the store. The checkout process actually turned into a comedy of errors, as Lydia rang up BOTH of the long-handled tools. I only needed one of them. This of course prolonged my time there, something that I was happy to accept as part of my life on this day.

Earlier in the day I drove over in the old truck to fetch the cement mixer. I put the ramps in place, put old scraps of smooth wood over them for a more viable surface to roll the creaking old machine up and into the truck, and got it in fairly easily. The wheels groaned and squeaked, practically crying out for some oil. I sprayed some of my heavy-duty penetrating lubricant on them when I got home and quieted them down some. The mixer came with a tarp, something I’m always glad to have. Can’t have too many tarps, that’s what I always say. I parked it in the driveway, where the now-departed Wards mower used to be, and covered it up. I’ll have to see how the machine does with a bag or two of cement in its big mixing bowl. More importantly, it remains to be seen how I’ll actually manage when I have the cement mixed up and ready to pour. Being no expert on the subject, the results may be interesting. I plan to do part of my driveway and all of the front walk for the other house with fresh, new concrete.

More pipes

I removed much of the plumbing today, going down in the basement to expose the pipes by taking away great sections of the drop ceiling. While I was there, I cut away the pipes I knew would no longer be used, and removed others that needed replacing. They will all go, eventually—I would just like to retain an idea of how the pipes ran—by leaving some of them in place for the moment. I disconnected the water heater, which will be replaced, and took away the gas line to the old stove that I already discarded. I’d already capped off the line, but could not remove the actual pipes before. Now, with the ceiling gone, it was fairly easy. Most of the pipes I simply cut away with my metal-cutting blade. Attached to the reciprocating saw, it makes quick work of removing the ancient and corroded plumbing. The few pipes I tried to remove with a wrench simply snapped at the nearest connection. Inside, the old steel lines are a lesson in arteriosclerosis, old-house style. Rust and scale had built up over the past fifty years or so, and many of the pipes were probably older. I threw them all in a pile to be carted off to the scrap-metal processing place. I look forward to another visit there. The water heater and refrigerator—still lying outside the basement door—will also make the trip. Everything will go together. It will be fun.

Upstairs I disconnected the hot-water radiator in the bathroom, watched the water pour from both ends, and couldn’t do much about it. I had no way to catch it, so I just put some rags around and let the old radiator gush. Now it is freestanding, able to make the trip out into the dining room while I get the bathroom rebuilt. It will go back in another location, since I plan for the tub to occupy the space where it was standing. These things are fiercely heavy, as are most fixtures in old houses. Made of cast iron, they were meant to be put in place and stay for a while. The only thing remaining is the bathtub. I’ll need help to move it, no doubt. I don’t know how I can budge it on my own. It is only hooked up to the drainpipe still, but not for much longer. It will take only a minute or so to cut off the pipe and leave the tub free and clear. I will cart it out into the main living area while I rip up the floor, replace it, then make the space ready for the tub again. Its hiatus from the bathroom will be lengthy, no doubt.

"NO--not the building!"

Today I dropped off my two elderly friends at the cruise ship terminal for a trip on the waters of the Atlantic. I don’t actually know their destination, just assume they mostly like riding around on the boat. They have taken many such cruises, so they are veterans of this kind of travel.Everything was a problem on the short trip to the cruise ship—starting with their bags, which were enormous. For nine days at sea, they had packed three large bags that could not be carried. They had to be wheeled around. Getting these bags and a wheelchair and two smaller bags into the car was no easy job. We were given something of a break on the way to the terminal, as a large sign over the highway read—in brightly lit letters—to take another exit than I’d planned to get on the cruise ship. This meant not going through the tunnel, which saved us about two bucks.

At the receiving area for passengers, two men in a little booth gave me baggage tags to put on the bags, making sure that my friends’ cabin number and other identifying information was on them. I showed them to the wife, hoping that she would be pleased with how well I’d done.

“No names! Oh my god, no names!” She was immediately frenzied again, a state that had only abated for a few minutes while I went to get the baggage stickers.
“What will we do? There are no names on the tags!”
I went to borrow the black marker from the two men in the tent, inked their last name on the tags, returned to show my worried friend my handiwork. It turns out there is another passenger on the boat with their last name. How they knew this is beyond me. It is not a common last name—something on the order of Oorskleesnkiwotz. I wasn’t going to redo the name tags. You see, we are speaking in French, these friends and I, and I am not always understanding what they say the first time. Their communications with me are universally urgent, even for things that could not be more mundane, so I am also burdened with the problem of choosing which things to just ignore, and trying to understand the ones that I should pay attention to. I should mention that these bags are distinctive: The color is hot pink, and they are exceedingly large. They are probably visible from the moon.

It came time to drop them off. We got the baggage unloaded, and the wheelchair properly unfolded and set in place. I pointed to the check-in building.
“You have to go in there,” I said.
“No, no! Not the building!”
“You have to go in the building,” I said, more firmly this time.
“We don’t want to go in the building!”
I’d asked the man at the baggage drop-off, which was just opposite the building, and he said there was no getting around it—you had to go into the building.
“You go into the building, then get on the boat,” I said, trying to reassure them.
“We just want to get on the boat; we don’t want to go in there!”
“First the building, then the boat,” I said.
I left them like that, wishing them bon-voyage. The wife, perpetually worried about practically everything, will hopefully get a little enjoyment out of the trip.

Toilet Time

I took out the toilet today, not something I was looking forward to. A toilet can be a heavy thing, actually. You don’t really think about their weight so much, these things being pretty stationary. You usually seek one out to do what you need to do, don’t have much occasion to go carting one around. They attach simply enough; you loosen a couple of small nuts attached to long bolts, back them off, unhook the water supply at the tank, and lift the whole thing up and away. Down where it meets the waste pipe, there is a wax gasket—a thing that does a remarkably good job of keeping the muck and ooze and stinky stuff that finds its way into the toilet from leaking around and all over the floor or basement. These gaskets cost a couple of dollars and are renewed whenever a toilet is removed for some reason. I put this toilet—which is fairly new—on a useful piece of strong cardboard and dragged it into the dining room and into a corner. Most of the water was already drained out, and very little leaked from around the bottom.

With only the tub still in place, I was able to knock out the remaining wallboard, having better access to these areas in the confined space. Now I was able to get at the old radiator underneath the window. Still hooked up to the network of heating pipes, it had been many years since anyone had loosened the big steel nuts that fastened the thing to the plumbing. I gave them a few good whacks with my short-handled maul and then applied force with the big pipe wrench I’d bought at one of the Friday sales for ten bucks. The nuts backed off easily, allowing the remaining water in the radiator to spray and dribble out over the floor. The floor will be wrecked and removed anyway, so this didn’t worry me at all. However, the water was leaking into the basement, and I went down to put a bucket in place. What I found was—in all of the places that this radiator could be leaking water--it was raining down all over the new electrical panel I’d paid around two thousand dollars to have installed. I fully expected, as these things go, to hear a gigantic explosion as the moisture infiltrated the vital electrical components and crossed the two poles. I went back upstairs and tightened the fittings, cutting off the flow of residual water. I’d revisit this again, when I could adequately cover the electric panel down in the basement.