Z is for Zoo

 

The Kansas City Zoological Gardens was proposed in 1907 and built in 1909 in Swope Park. It opened with four lions, three monkeys, a wolf, a fox, a coyote, a badger, a lynx, an eagle, and other birds. It is now a 200 acre nature sanctuary called the Kansas City Zoo, home to over 1,700 animals representing more than 200 species, and their mission is to connect people to each other and the natural world to promote understanding, appreciation and conservation. 

I grew up going there with my family, and in first grade, we went to the zoo on a field trip. Any trip to the zoo (and this was in the 1960s) included taking a bag of large marshmallows to feed to the animals.

For real.

Giraffes especially loved them, and it was fun watching them reach their purple tongues out to take them from your hand.

Somewhere along the way, the zoo keepers or veterinarians decided (and rightly so) that human food is not healthy for the animals. Each animal has specific nutritional needs, and marshmallows are not one of those needs.

I'll bet the animals were sad when the "Don't Feed The Animals" rule went into effect, but I'll also bet they lived longer and had better teeth because of it.

Y is for You’d Think

 

My niece Maggie is getting married today. I have known about this for quite a few months, and more importantly, I’ve known about it since I signed up for the A to Z Challenge just over a month ago. You would think, then, that I had my post for today already written and ready to go, wouldn’t you? 

Yeah, I don’t. 

I’m writing this on my phone while I take a quick break from tying ribbon on each of the bridal party bouquets. The tables are decorated. The girls are finishing up hair and make up and will be getting into their dresses soon. The guys are just hanging out and will spend five minutes throwing on their suits and be ready to roll.

So nothing here except best wishes to Maggie and Ryan for a beautiful life together!

Z you real soon!

X is for Extremely Wrong About THAT

 

I spent my freshman year in college car-less. It wasn't much of a problem, since I lived on campus and could ride home for a weekend and back with any number of friends I knew from my home town, and there wasn't an extra car in our family for me to have anyway.

The summer after my freshman year, I chose to move into an apartment with my friend Lagena instead of moving home. I was definitely going to need a car to get to school and to my job, and it so happened my parents had a drastic life change that included my dad getting a new vehicle to drive, so I inherited his 1970 Chevrolet Nova. (I wrote about learning to drive its stick shift here if you would like to read it.) It was 9 years old at this time and had seen things, but I was comfortable with it and it got me where I needed to go, except the day it didn't.

Because it was 9 years old, parts had begun to go south on it, and on one of my visits home, my dad said he thought the fuel pump might be going out, whatever THAT meant. I really never gave it another thought, or at least not for months.

One very cold and rainy November morning, I was driving from my apartment to school for an 8:00 a.m. class. There were not only students heading to campus but people just headed to work, and the rain was causing traffic congestion, especially at the always busy intersection of Cherry and National, just a few blocks from campus. I inched forward with everyone else, hoping to make the next light so I wouldn't be late to class, when my car died. It's pretty easy to accidentally kill a car engine with a manual transmission; I know, because I did it often. But when I tried to start the car, the engine just sputtered and refused to turn over. In the meantime, the light had turned green, and there I sat, blocking traffic with a dead car. This is it, I thought to myself. The fuel pump has finally bitten the dust.

A man in a car behind me either took pity on me or really needed to get to work, and he approached my car and asked what the trouble was.

"It's the fuel pump," I replied. 

"Are you sure?" he asked, looking at the dashboard of my car. "Your fuel gauge is showing it's below empty. Sure you're not just out of gas?"

"No," I said sadly, "It goes way below empty all the time. I'm sure it's the fuel pump. My dad said it was going out."

"I'm going to push your car through the intersection to get it out of the way," he said, and he did, and when I was safely pulled over on the side of the street, the man said, "I'm going to go get a little gas and just see if that might help."

"It won't," I thought to myself, but I sat there and waited for him (not that I had any other choice; I had already missed my 8:00 class and it was still raining). He was back within ten minutes with a gallon of gas which he poured into my tank.

"Try it now," he said, and I turned the key and the car started immediately.

"Guess it wasn't the fuel pump," I said to the man, grinning sheepishly.

"Not this time," he said. "Don't let your tank get so empty again and be careful!" 

With that, he was gone.

And did I learn my lesson about letting the tank get below empty?

Sadly, I did not.

Not my car, but close. Harvest gold. Can you dig it?

W is for Wienermobile

 

Back in January 2019, I was scrolling through Facebook and saw that one of the local television stations posted a story saying Oscar Mayer was looking for applicants to be a Hotdogger (I'm not kidding) and drive the Wienermobile for a one-year, full-time, paid assignment. 

How cool would that be?!

I went to their website and checked the requirements: outgoing, creative, friendly, enthusiastic, appetite for adventure, willing to drive around the country in the Wienermobile as a brand ambassador of Oscar Mayer through radio, television, newspaper, and personal appearances. 

I could do that!

BA or BS, preferably in marketing, public relations, journalism, advertising, or communications, but applicants not limited to these degrees. 

Perfect, because while I don't have one of those degrees that I am not limited to, but I DO have a BS in Elementary Education!

Traveling to big cities and small towns for special events all over the country.

I LOVE to drive and visit new places!

Organize promotions, coordinate with media, handle public relations.

Pssshhh! In previous jobs, I coordinated photo shoots and recording sessions for country music artists AND I have wrangled children as a teacher for over 20 years. Piece of cake!

I sent them a cover letter that was sure to get me hired:

I would love to be your next hotdogger! I realize there is a lot of competition for this job, particularly since the announcement went viral over social media, but I believe I am just what you need.

Here is what I can bring to the job as an Oscar Mayer Hotdogger:

• I love to drive. Our family vacations are driving vacations, with the trip being just as important as the destination.
• I have a clean driving record. I don't speed, and I know when to use my turn signals.
• I don't drink, I don't smoke, and I don't do drugs.
• I'm used to working with children, plus I know how to pose them for pictures.
• I have a Bachelor's degree, and although it is not in a business field, I believe my eclectic work experience makes up for that.
• I have appeared on local television morning shows to speak about community events in which I was involved, as well as been interviewed by the local newspaper.

My kids are away at college, and my husband has said he would be fine if I got the job. This is, in part, because he doesn't think I have a real chance to get it, but I believe he is wrong.

And I waited. And waited. And waited. 

And they never got back to me.

I WAS PERFECT FOR THE JOB AND THEY NEVER EVEN GAVE ME A CHANCE!

Yes, I'm still bitter.

I went to the Oscar Mayer Wiener Tour Site as I was writing this post, and when I could tell they had revamped the job description, adding wording like "contributing to brand social content". But they changed something ELSE that wasn't there when I applied, and that is adding the words, "graduating college seniors" to the job requirements.

My husband has theorized that they added the part about graduating college seniors because they got an application and resume from a crazy middle-aged woman when they expected this to appeal to a younger crowd. Their loss.

You missed out, Oscar Mayer. I would have been the best Hotdogger you ever had!

This. Should have. Been. Me.

V is for Vanderpump This

 

My husband loves reality tv shows. I don't. Below Deck. Married At First Sight (American and Australian versions). Love Is Blind. The Bachelor (I swear he isn't a college girl). He claims he watches them because they're so ridiculous, but he seems awfully invested for someone who's just getting a hoot out of them.

He started watching Vanderpump Rules a few weeks ago because there was some scandal about a couple of the characters (characters? players? cast members?). The show is in Season 10. I suggested if he's so interested in the show that he start with Season 1, as he has missed TEN YEARS of character development. His answer to that was to watch Season 9 and then continue to watch the new episodes of Season 10 as they are released. 

I can't explain why this irritates the crap out of me, but it does.

We are in the same room when he is Vanderpumping, so I see bits and pieces of the show, but if I ask him a question about a character, he doesn't know the answer. Why? BECAUSE HE WON'T GO BACK AND WATCH FROM THE BEGINNING.

Guess what I've been doing?

Secretly watching Vanderpump Rules from the very beginning. It's my new guilty pleasure. And now I know things he doesn't. 

Shhhh!

U is for Up On The Roof

 

My favorite place I ever lived was in a loft apartment on Music Row in Nashville. It was once a one-story brick house with a cellar (CELLAR, not basement - there's a difference and if you don't know what it is, you've never been in a cellar) and a large attic. The bottom floor of the house had been turned into a studio and an office space (that was leased to a jingle writer), the attic became a loft apartment, and the cellar was still a cellar. The house to the south was an old two-story home that was turned into a studio. Across the street were houses that had been turned into studios and publishing offices and artist management companies, and to the north was Studio 19 (built to be a studio and not a refurbished house). The owner of Studio 19 was (and still is) my friend Larry, and he also owned the house/studio with the loft apartment.

Front of the house. Not terribly relevant, since I
lived above the house and the entrance was in
the back, but I can't find any of my photos of it

Larry usually leased the apartment to one of his recording engineers from Studio 19 as part of their salary. I got the apartment because the engineer that was currently living there needed a bigger place and was moving out, and the other engineer in line for it decided he'd rather have the money than the apartment so he could buy a car (I also bribed him a little with the promise of baking him cookies once a week, which I fulfilled until he started gaining too much weight and said no more cookies). It was an awesome space! Vaulted ceilings, big windows in the front room that looked onto a deck (and across the alley to a high rise apartment building that largely housed Vanderbilt Law School students). There was a skylight above my living room couch, one just inside the bedroom (which was separated from the living room and kitchen by a partition), one in the bathroom above the bathtub, and one in the far back of the apartment above where my bed was placed. The ceilings slanted (attic, remember?) and I did whack my head on them a lot over the years I lived there, not going to lie. 

My brother with my cat Christopher. The door is
behind the cat and the only windows in the place
look out onto the deck.

Helen liked to climb from trash can to microwave
to fridge to cabinets to partition between bedroom
and living area

The day I moved in, the previous tenant handed me the key to the front door as he took the last of his stuff out of the apartment and warned me the key was for the deadbolt only and never to lock the doorknob when I left the apartment, or I wouldn't be able to get back in, as there was no key anywhere that anyone knew about for that lock.

I was living my best life there, working at a record company, living on Music Row within walking distance to restaurants and such, and hanging out with Terri. I was never scared (it's not necessarily the safest place to be at night), because there was nearly always someone in at least one of the studios next door or below me.

Then late one Saturday night (I think it definitely qualified as early Sunday morning), after Terri and I had been out and I had dropped her off at HER apartment, I got home, did a quick visual survey for sketchy people, then went up the stairs to my apartment, but when I turned the key in the deadbolt, the door didn't open because THE KNOB DIDN'T TURN. I was locked out. I couldn't figure out how this could possibly happen, because I was SO VERY CAREFUL about never locking that doorknob, but locked it was, and I had to get in or sleep on my porch swing,

I drove back to Terri's for help, woke her up, and ended up spending the night with her instead of on the porch swing, and early the next morning, she and I went back to my place to figure out how to get in. 

"I'll just climb up on the roof and go in through the skylight!" Terri said, and she stepped onto the roof, crawled a few feet to where she was between the skylight and the porch, and announced, "I'm scared of heights!" and was now frozen in place.

So now I'm locked out of my apartment with my best friend stuck on the roof.

Fortunately, I had a friend whose husband was a law student at Vanderbilt and they lived in that apartment building behind me (which is how I knew it housed a lot of law students). I left Terri on the roof, ran across the alley to my friend's apartment, and woke them up. They came, her husband armed with some tools, and he first got Terri off the roof without either of them falling off, then popped the skylight open and dropped onto my couch (much to the surprise of my cat), unlocked the door knob, and I was in!

It was later that week when I had popped in to Studio 19 to visit with my landlord that he said, "I went out to dinner with some friends the other night and took them in to show them your apartment!" 

"Uhh, was this Saturday night, by chance?" I asked.

"Yes! They thought it was really cute."

"You locked me out."

"What?!"

"You locked the doorknob when you left and you locked me out. I had to spend the night at Terri's and she got stuck on the roof trying to get in and I had to get a neighbor to get her down and go in through the skylight."

He felt really, really bad, but Terri stuck on the roof was kind of worth it, and all's well that ends well, right?

My favorite picture ever of the two of us.

Side note: the house with the loft apartment, Studio 19, and all the other houses and businesses on the block have been torn down and huge, expensive apartment buildings have been built on what was once a quiet, tree-lined street, and it makes me sad when I think about it. And then I remember Terri stuck up there on the roof, and I smile.

T is for Turtle

 

Once upon a time ago, my brother had two pet turtles. I was preschool age, and I think one of them was supposed to be "mine", but they lived in a plastic bowl in his bedroom and he fed them, so I guess they were way more his. 

The turtles were named Sam and Charlie, and maybe this is a coincidence and maybe it isn't, but I think that was also the names of the two barbers in the barber shop my dad used. They were probably purchased at Woolworth's or Kresge's and were red eared sliders, a turtle you can find anywhere in our area living in ponds, lakes, and streams. 

They had teeny, tiny triangular tails and scratchy little feet, and I was pretty fascinated with our little turtle friends and the way they ducked into their shells when they saw me coming. 

Turtles with a shell smaller than 4" were banned as pets in the US in 1975 when it was discovered they transmitted salmonella. The FDA claims this ban saved 100,000 children per year from contracting salmonella, and this may be true, but ours didn't have a chance to give us anything and here's why:

I used to follow my mom all over the house while she did her housework, talking incessantly, and she didn't always pay that much attention to what I was saying until the day I said, "I can make Sam and Charlie come out of their shells!"

My mom stopped in her tracks. "Show me," she said, and we went to my brother's bedroom and stood before the little orange table with the turtle bowl on top of it.

"Like this!" I said and firmly pushed my finger down in the middle of a turtle shell, and sure enough, the turtle's arms, legs, and head popped right out of the shell.

It's probably unnecessary to tell you that Sam and Charlie went to turtle heaven not long after that, may they rest in peace, and even though I've been labeled Turtle Killer ever since,  I surely saved us from contracting salmonella,