TP and the Phone Home

by Jody Worsham
All rights reserved for tin can and sting

I am not one of those people whose cell phone has become a permanent appendage that has evolved through a very short evolutionary process.  My husband, as technologically challenged as he is (he till carries a flip phone), is seldom without his phone.

We have often laughed at our friends who will text each other while sitting at the same table or friends who go to a sporting event, but watch it on their i-phone once they get there.

I have come to re-think the "in-house" use of the cell phone.  I was in our bedroom on the far end of our house doing some writing. My cell phone rang but I had no idea where it was.  A search under the bed, in my jean pockets, in the dirty clothes, and my handbag revealed no cell phone.  My hearing is going the way of my cooking, non directional.  The ringing stopped, so I went back to my computer.

Then our land line phone rang.  We keep our land line because, well, I can't ever find my cell phone.  The children discovered that if you place the phone on a tin plate, it will ring loud enough that even I can hear it.  So I went down the hall through the dining room to the living room to answer the phone.  It was Dr. Hubby in the guest bathroom a few feet away.

"Bring me some toilet paper."

"Where are you?"

"In the guest bathroom."

"Why didn't you just holler?"

"I did.  I even called you on your cell phone.  Then I remembered the phone on the tin plate.  I knew that would get you to the phone."

"Why didn't you text me?"  The children found the highest pitched and loudest ring tone available for text messages.  Even if I can't hear that pitch, the dogs can.  They jump up and down to let me know.  

"I know how you feel about texting in the house."

"Well if you had texted me, I could have found my cell phone."

"If I text you, will you bring me some toilet paper?"

"Yes, if I can find my cell phone."

"Say Goodnight, Gracie!"

"Goodnight Gracie.  Do you still need toilet paper?"

Live Long and Prosper, Monkey Pickles

by JodyWorsham
All rights reserved for Translation App

 I have been a guest writer on Monkey Pickles.Com for the past couple of months.  Huntz is the originator?  owner? Webmaster or something at Monkey Pickles.  He just sent out a memo (make that an e-mo) to all us new pickle writers...or maybe it was just me.

I don't know Huntz that well. I've talked to him once, but I'm thinking he may be a tad dyslexic, has fat fingers and keeps hitting the wrong keys, or he is possibly from another solar system. Here is the gist of what he wrote, I think.  I am writing this from memory having accidentally hit the delete button instead of the translation app.  It could be in English but I am not ruling out Klingon.

Huntz:  "Hope you are logging in backwards to Word Press and separating your words with  < and  > and h2o, with text tabs, and Word Stuff."

Login?? Logs in the woods out here.

 Backin?? Backed into a fence once...ok twice

h2o?? Thought that was water

h2o 2o?  Too much water?


Text? A book I had to read in school.

TAB?  First diet soft drink.

Huntz:  "Choose 3 tags from the most used and season well to increase the pipeline."

I go Tag-less since Michael Jordan appeared  in that TV commercial with the question "Boxers or Briefs" and no tag.  My most used tags are "Large, X-large, and Tent."

The only seasonings I have are salt and pepper but I also like fall and winter. Concerning pipelines, we have Mobile, Exxon, and Texaco and a few hundred others running through most of Texas.  That's about all we can handle right now.

In regard to word press, well I have had some experience there.  Our new puppy chewed up the kids' homework the other day so I had to first find the iron and press the paper so the teacher could read the words. So I do press words.

As the newest and oldest living Monkey Pickler writer and the one with quite possibly the shortest writing career in the history of Monkey Pickles, I can cut and paste and e-mail.  That's it. That is  the extent of my computer-ish-ness.

In the event Huntz is waiting for the Mother Ship to return and is doing Monkey Pickles on the side, I say "Live long and prosper, Huntz (and don't back into any pipelines)."