Let's Buy Stamps

     You know you’re really blond when you don’t get blond jokes. 

     I was at a friend’s house when she started telling me how her blond sister thought it would be smart to buy a bunch of stamps before the price went up. My friend was laughing about how absurd that was, but I didn’t get it. It made sense to me.

"Wish my Name was in a Movie"

      I have a friend named John, who is a very sweet guy. He happens to have a lot of blond moments even though he constantly teases me for mine. The one that stands out in my mind was over the topic of movies.

     No one, I repeat, no one has the name Evangeline. Ok, so there are a few, but we are such a rare and treasured species that we’re exceptionally hard to find and we hardly ever meet each other. It was nothing short of a miracle that there was an Evangeline in Disney’s Frog and the Princess. (Even though they pronounced it wrong.) I loved the movie and since it had my name in it, John and his awesome brother Ian, bought it for me.

“It’s so cool to have my name in a movie,” I gushed happily.

“Yeah, I wish my name was in a movie,” he replied.

Really, John?

Is That How You Spell Your Name?

     I work in admissions at my local hospital, and unfortunately, the blond monster rears its ugly head there, too. Sometimes it’s just downright aggravating. Here I am, trying to look like a competent professional, and then I do something stupid and the patient begins to wonder if maybe they should have gone someplace else for healthcare. I mean does everyone at the hospital eat suckers while they work and try to hide them in a cubby hole when a patient appears? How are they to know that I’m the only one that does that? I mean, come on, it’s a logical concern.

     I could also become the only person in the world fired for doing cartwheels at work. If anyone ever brings up my occasional cartwheel  in the lobby as a concern, I will point out that I make sure no one is around, particularly patients, when I perform my gymnastic feat. The only ones privileged to see my sacred ritual are my coworkers on second shift. And may I point out that they enjoy it very much.

     Older people can be very crotchety and make you feel like a fool or be very sweet and make you feel like you could do everything wrong and they would be fine with it. Thankfully, I had the latter one weekend when I was competently filling out a payment form for a nice, old lady. I kept trying to look up her name in the computer, but Dorthy Drive just wasn’t popping up.

     “Is that how you spell your name, Dorthy?” I asked, slightly smug that even if the biller had spelled it incorrectly, that I would have the skill to still find her in the system.

     I looked at the bill harder and realized that Dorthy Drive was her address. Just for the record, that COULD have been a name. In fact, I might name one of my kids that someday…

Why I Don't Like Gas Stations

     Gas stations and I have had a long, eventful history. I didn’t get my driver’s license until I was eighteen, which is probably a blessing to the whole world, and I really didn’t start pumping gas until a few years later because I drove my parents’ cars, and my brother and I kept track of the miles and paid my parents in cash. My dad would usually pump, but once in a great while, I had to face the harsh reality that the car or truck would run out of gas before I reached my destination, and I would be forced to fill it up. I hated filling up. There were several good reasons for this.

     One reason was because I couldn’t get the truck’s gas cap off. I usually could eventually, but one time, I pulled up to the pump at the gas station, got out and tried and tried to get the cap off. It frustrated me so badly, that I finally gave up, got back in and drove away. If you can’t do it, give up. That’s a pretty good motto and I stick to it.

Another time, I was at the gas station battling the gas cap as usual. You know that point where you turn it to the right and it doesn’t budge and then your turn it to the left and it doesn’t budge that way, so you decide the thing must not be designed to open? Well, I was reaching that point, when I heard a voice over the loud speaker at my pump.

     “You want some help with that, sweetie?”

    “Sure,” I admitted, turning red but relieved that I actually wouldn’t have to drive away with an empty tank this time.

     The clerk came out and got the cap off with a flick of her wrist.

     “Thanks,” I said sheepishly.

     “No problem, honey.”

      When you’re blond, you learn to be humble and grateful.

     I now own my own car and her name is Sweet Char. She’s very sweet and when she’s healthy, she’s very nice. The first thing I asked when I bought her was how well the gas cap came off. Not. It was only the second thing.

     Another reason I don’t like pumping gas, other than the obvious reason that you have to empty your entire week’s wages into the tank, is the fact that there are multiple ways to pay. Some, you have to prepay before the pump will give any gas, others will let you swipe your card, and others will let you pump and then pay inside. It’s always a guessing game to decide which method the particular gas station and pump uses. It’s usually a good idea to read what is on the pump. Sometimes I skip that little detail and try to figure it out the hard way.

     There’s a gas station I visit frequently on my way to school that generally has the best prices, but you have to pay inside, which is really annoying. Anyway, I figured I had the whole method thing down since I’d been there multiple times, so I went in to prepay. I hate prepaying because I like to top off my tank and I can never guess how much that would cost. I was standing there, trying to decide how much money to put down, and the lady said, “Oh, you can just pay after you’ve pumped.” Aargh! Why didn’t I remember that from the last five times I had been there?

     Now that I’m older and much more experienced at pumping gas, I don’t have any more blond moments at the gas station. I mean, it’s not like I pulled up to a diesel pump a few weeks ago or anything like that…

The Day I Almost Hitch-Hiked

     Before I begin my hitch-hiking story, I’ll just say that everyone who gave me feedback on whether to use blond or blonde, thought I should leave it how it is. Therefore, you will not notice any spelling changes in the pre-existing posts, title, etc. J

     We have friends that live about six to eight miles away and I sometimes ride my bike over there to go swimming in their pond. It’s great exercise. A few days ago, I decided to bike there, meet my mom who was already there visiting, and go swimming with her.

     It was all fine until I got to the train tracks. A train was slowing down and didn’t look like it would clear the crossing before it stopped completely. I started to walk my bike down the way to go behind the train, when it finally stopped. Hurrying back, I made the decision to climb over the hitch of two of the cars.

     The hitch was higher than my waist, so it wasn’t easy trying to lift my bike over. The train started to creak and groan and being a little apprehensive that it might start up again, I threw my bike over and climbed over myself. On the other side was a truck with a trailer full of hay bails behind it. The person driving probably thought he was seeing things when a bike, then a girl flew over the hitch of the two cars. Anyway, I picked up my bike and realized that something was terribly wrong.

     Instead of being horizontal, the handlebars were diagonal. Undaunted, I hopped on and tried to steer using that cockeyed position. That would have been ok, but I quickly found out that my pedaling did no good since the chain was off. I nearly fell, but managed to steer clear of the truck with the hay bales, and as I went past, the old farmer inside waved amiably to me as if seeing someone throw their bike over a train hitch and then try to steer their mangled bike was an everyday occurrence. I decided not to ask him for help.

     I ended up walking my bike down the country road, trying to decide what to do. It was nearly 100 degrees in the sun as we have been going through a hot spell, and my mind jumped to all sorts of conclusions about horrible sunburns and heat stroke as I was probably a good two or three miles away from my destination. I had no cell phone or water and my flip flops kept sticking to the hot tar on the road which was really annoying.

     After awhile, I decided that I should get a start on my bucket list by hitch-hiking. I started to practice using my best hopeful, helpless expression while sticking out my thumb. A few cars went by, but I just couldn’t do it. I mean, what if the person who picked me up was just waiting for someone to murder? You have to think about these things.

     “I’ll make sure it’s a girl,” I told myself. Usually, girls don’t murder people.

     Sometimes it was hard to tell what the person looked like until they were just passing me and by then, it was too late.

     “I’ll make sure it’s a girl in a truck or SUV,” I further clarified to make sure my bike would be picked up, too. Beside, girls in trucks or SUVs are less likely to murder someone than girls in cars. I’m sure that’s statistic somewhere.

     I just didn’t have enough guts to do it, so I walked almost the whole way, until my mom came looking for me in the car, taking away my last chance to truly hitch-hike. I can’t say I really minded.