AND THE GOLD MEDAL IN RHYTHMIC GYMNASTICS GOES TO ...

My favorite gas station is directly across the street from a street-side CVS store.  The store is right on Main Street, and the sidewalk in front of the store is a major thoroughfare for walkers, runners, students (public schools, private schools, and college), and tourists.  You can pretty much see anything and everything just by watching the sidewalks that bisect the center of town, and today, anything and everything is exactly what transpires.

Today I see what truly wonderful things can happen when karma mixes together a woman, a CVS receipt, and the wind.

Anyone who shops at CVS knows that the receipts are longer than Yao Ming is tall.  The other day I bought four items at CVS and the receipt was taller than I am, so I know exactly what I am seeing as soon as I see it from my vantage point at the front gas pump at the Gulf station.  I see a woman leave CVS from the front door, walk about six feet in a southerly direction, stop at the fancy open-air trash receptacle, and attempt to throw away her CVS receipt.

She takes the receipt out of the bag, and the wind immediately flutters the multi-foot paper behind her and around her.  With one hand firmly holding her CVS bag full of purchases, she reaches up and begins waving both arms to rein the paper back in.  The paper ribbons around her like it's trying to tie her up like a Christmas package.

When she finally gets control over the flapping receipt, she tries to stuff it into the trash can then has second thoughts.  Oh, coupons!  There must be something she needs.  She begins scrolling through the paper-tape, rolling it around her arms and hands like our grandmothers used to do with skeins of yarn.  She tries to tear off a couple of the coupons, but they are in the middle area of the receipt and the wind is raising havoc with her good intentions.  Round and round and round the paper flies, and her little arms are pinwheeling trying to contain the paper that now looks like Mary Poppins on her way out of London.

Finally, she gives up, stuffs the entire receipt into the trash can, and tries to walk away.  But her hand is caught in one end of the paper.  The wind picks up the other end and the CVS receipt rises out of the trash can like a cobra from a snake charmer's basket.  Eventually, she extricates herself, starts to walk away, and looks around to make sure no one on the sidewalk is watching.

No, perhaps nobody street-side.  However, I am across the street, just finishing up getting twenty dollars of regular gas pumped into my car, and I have been lucky enough to witness the entire routine.  After I drive away, I realize that I should've clapped for her.  I mean, my window had been down.  I look around briefly to see if she is anywhere nearby, but I cannot see her anymore.  Perhaps I just don't recognize her with her Olympic-sized CVS ribbon receipt, which is a shame.  I want to award her a gold medal for her rhythmic gymnastic CVS receipt routine.  It truly was, and still is, memorable.

ALL AUTUMN IN A MINUTE

I don't know what's going on with autumn around here.

First, the limited colors were boring, not vibrant at all, and kind of brownish.  If autumn had been a crayon over the last few weeks, it would be burnt sienna.

Then, we finally got some rain, and, although it may just be an Old Wive's Tale, some of the color started to pop.  Bits of red here, some orange there, yellow starting to come out.  But the sun alluded us, so photos were tame, almost faded without the bright blue background of clear sky.

Suddenly, a big storm started up the coast, bringing with it pounding rains that flooded basements along with gusts of wind that toppled trees and knocked out power.  Many of the trees that were finally getting some vivid color sat naked, completely stripped of their leaves.

Today, though, is brilliantly clear.  The sky is bright blue, and the sun dances through the remaining leafed trees.  I decide to drive the long way around as I am running errands.  I see a yellow tree and ... another yellow tress ... and still another yellow tree.  I stop at two cemeteries in different towns because that's where the colors are usually the brightest.  (If you don't believe me, venture into an old New England graveyard where you'll find the best and most interesting trees.)

More yellow trees.  It's almost as if the wind has stripped any red and orange trees of their chance to shine.  Oh, sure, the yellow trees are gorgeous, but still.  The whole beauty of fall in New England involves the multitude of fabulous hues.  This, however, is like watching fall happen in yellow tunnel vision.

I finally find a partially orange tree that has not been stripped of its leaves.  Somehow it survived storm damage.  This is when I also notice a preponderance of still-green trees.  It's almost as if autumn has not yet happened, is happening, and has already happened, all at the same time.

I truly don't know what's going on with autumn around here, but I can tell you this: I'm glad it's finally here.

COLUMBIA GAS STRIKES YET AGAIN

Apparently Columbia Gas has finally decided to inspect the gas work done on my townhouse a year ago during the Great Merrimack Valley Gas Disaster and General Shit Show of 2018. 

I am not home when this happens because pre-warning people that they're going to actually show up must not be something any of the workers for Columbia Gas are trained to actually do.  Last year the workers walked right into my townhouse while I was typing on the computer and my son was watching soccer on television.  Yup, no knock, no doorbell, just walk right in like you own the damn place.

Since I am not home this time, my landlord lets the workers in to my house.  This is usually okay, except that I am madly packing to move, so right now my house resembles an episode of hoarders.  The kitchen is stacked full of boxes, all packed and marked and ready to move.  My living room is a general staging area for things like newspapers for wrapping fragile items, and it has a tiny sitting area so I can still watch television if and when I feel like it. 

The den, however, which has the access to the basement, is half-stacked full of furniture I am taking with me.  This is the entire reason that I cleaned out the basement a week ago: so I can use the den as a storage area and not have to worry about going into my basement ever again if I so choose to block the door with a chair or something.  Smart me, however, left access to the basement because it is also the path to the only heat register in the entire townhouse.  Yes, every zone gets heat blasted to it if I want to heat just one room. 

But I digress.  Back to today.  When I arrive home after work, I open the door and am immediately hit by the aroma of dusty basement cement.  Yes, the gas workers have left the originally closed and locked basement door ajar so that any varmint or aroma living below the first floor is now welcome in my living space. 

I decide to head downstairs for one more look at my lovely, clean basement and find... sonofabitch.  There's a new pile of rock and cement fragments and general dirt from the stone walls.  There is also a filthy and discarded putty knife left behind.  The doorbell interrupts my inspection, and it is my landlady.  No problem with letting the workers in, I tell her.  She says they came to do the final inspection of the gas work and to finish plugging up the old gas line.

Say, what?

Yes, you read that correctly.  To finish plugging up the old gas line ... 350 days AFTER turning my gas back on after the September maelstrom.  Mind you, my home is fifty yards from the town's Ground Zero gas line rupture, and the house next door to me (where I used to live) caught on fire.  One would think (if one were to truly think at all) that something as important as the final gas line inspection into people's homes may have taken place ... oh ... BEFORE TURNING THE FREAKING GAS BACK ON IN THE FIRST PLACE.

I don't know.  I mean, I'm no expert; I just live here. 

Anyway, there is now a new lovely yellow spot on the basement wall, a new lovely pile of crap in my basement (that they were told not to bother sweeping up... gee, thanks for that), and gas lines that apparently are okay to use, even though I've been using them for almost a year. 

Here's the kicker: My gas stove still has not been inspected.

Yup.  Progress, right?  I mean, it has only been 350 days.  I wouldn't want Columbia Gas to actually make sure their work is safe and up to code.  That might be a disaster.

PACKING AND HOARDING: AND THE DIFFERENCE IS ...

I have forgotten just how big a bitch it is to move because I haven't moved in fifteen years.  I still have a couple of weeks to pack, but I'm at the point where some of the junk I own is actually planning its own move.

No, truly.

Take the hose, for example.  I bought a hose years ago to use it attached to the landlord's outdoor water spigot.  I wanted to do simple things, like wash my car.  Hose wasn't long enough.  So, I went out and bought an even longer hose, but then the outdoor spigot got damaged somehow, so the landlord's leaky old hose ended up becoming permanent.  Now I am stuck with two garden hoses, neither of which I can use, one of which is still brand-spanking new in its original packaging.  Maybe someday I'll need a hose and then I'll kick myself if I get rid of either one.  Apparently, this means the hoses are moving with me.

What about the multiple containers of fabric freshener spray?  I'm quite certain that the bottles are really old, so they'll probably end up in the trash.  However, I only had one child still living with me for a long, long time, and, even though he played sports, he was away at college playing those sports for a long, long time.  Three bottles of fabric spray for his lacrosse and soccer bags?  I think not.  Where did the damn bottles come from, and why, oh, why, do I still have them (all half-full)?  These will not  be moving with me.

I am obsessed with packing each box to its maximum capacity without being so overweight that I cannot lift anything.  Yes, I have thirteen boxes of books, but they're mid-size boxes, manageable if even a little heavy.  But I figure it's better to pack books safely and with a positive weight distribution rather than have the moving company suffer hernias.

It takes forever to pack, though.  I zip through packing a few boxes and think, "Wow, I got a lot done.  I must be pretty far into packing.  I must be about ..." And then I realize that those few boxes haven't even made a dent in what I own.  Not even a smidgen.

Okay, I should be fair.  I'm trying to keep the boxes relatively uniform in size and weight.  Then I come across my skates.  I have old figure skates, two pairs of hockey skates, and in-line skates that need new wheels.  I can only fit two pairs to a box, so I end up packing other stuff into the boxes to fill any random space; other stiff like my beach rock collection.  How do I mark that box?  "Blades and Boulders"? If I write on the box that it is literally full of rocks, won't the moving company employees be agitated?  Yeah, I'll mark that box "Skates+" and be done with it.

I do get the basement completely cleaned out and swept, so there is that.  And, I'm probably going to piss off the trash collectors with another full sidewalk of bags and miscellany.  This alone should be proof-positive that I am trying, truly trying, to thin out my life's possessions.

In the meantime, my home looks like an episode of hoarders.  There are boxes and random unpacked items cluttering every room, and sometimes I have to step over stuff to get from one room to another.  If there's a fire, I'll be hard-pressed to access a window.  But, if there's a fire, I'll certainly have a lot less to move.

I am going to go shower the cobwebs out of my hair now.  Please watch my stuff.  I'm starting to suspect my belongings are multiplying when my back is turned.  I'll continue to fill, tag, and tape boxes as fast as I possibly can, but until this move actually takes place, I will continue to suspect that my possessions are plotting to smother me if I throw out or donate one more item.  If you don't hear from me in a week, send help.  Ill probably be trapped under a pile of useless and already boxed-up junk.