Monthly Archives: October 2008

As the mother of the groom, your primary role at the wedding is supposedly to “show up, shut up, and wear beige.” This advice presumably applies even more strongly to the stepmother of the groom.

Okay, the “showing up and shutting up” part is no problem. It’s great to be able to enjoy the festivities without having to worry about the details like whether the candles match the tablecloths exactly, and whether technical glitches will mar the slide show of embarrassing childhood photos of the happy couple, and whether it’s safe to seat Aunt Margaret and Uncle Leonard at the same table with Cousin Betty or whether they’re still feuding over that little incident from the last family wedding.

But wearing beige? No way. There’s the elegant red suit that will be perfect for the rehearsal dinner. There’s the slinky black velvet skirt that will be just right for the wedding. And, of course, if the stepmother of the groom wants to be able to wear either of those things and breathe at the same time, there’s the extra five pounds that she really ought to lose.

Two months before the wedding: It’s only five pounds. Eat a little less, exercise a little more, lose a pound a week. No problem.

One month before the wedding: Okay, so losing four pounds will be close enough. Eat a little less, exercise a little more, lose a pound a week. No problem.

Two weeks before the wedding: A couple of pounds one way or another won’t really make much difference. Maybe if I just don’t eat much the day before the wedding?

Two days before the wedding: The answer is so obvious, I can’t believe I didn’t think of it sooner. It’s the instant, no-diet slimming solution. Control-top panty hose.

Not, of course, in beige.

It was a beautiful morning, a perfect day to be outside enjoying the crisp air, the deep blue skies, and the fall colors. Taking deep breaths, we could savor the aromas of October in the Black Hills: charred wood, gasoline, and sawdust.

The deep breaths were a necessity, because we were working hard. With propane prices around two bucks a gallon, we needed wood to keep the Fischer stove in the basement going all winter. Some friends needed to get rid of fire-killed trees on their property. In an attempt to meet both of these needs at once, we were out in the woods like a quartet of Paul Bunyan wannabes.

At least the two of us (male) who were using chainsaws might have been trying to be Paul Bunyan. The two of us (female) who were hauling 12-foot logs to the trailer felt more like Babe the Blue Ox.

Not sexism, just a matter of relative experience and upper body strength. Besides, I wasn’t complaining. I’m perfectly happy to keep my fingers—all ten of them, perfectly intact, thank you—away from tools that are capable of taking off human appendages in one swipe.

So I was fine being half of the log-carrying team, despite the fact that the only place level enough to park the trailer was at the top of the hill. This meant lugging most of the logs uphill, huffing and puffing under their weight like the Little Engine That Wasn’t Quite Sure It Could.

Handling charred wood isn’t the cleanest of tasks, so we were all outfitted in old clothes, boots, and leather gloves. I had on a pair of hand-me-down camouflage coveralls originally worn by my tallest brother-in-law. They fit well enough, except where the crotch was a little baggy around my knees.

In addition to keeping most of the dirt on the outside, the coveralls served as some protection from the tall, spiky weeds that were creating their own miniature forest among the burned trees. Based on my extensive research (looking in two “flowers of North America” guidebooks and spending 7 minutes on the Internet), I think they were common mullein.

On one website, I found them under the heading, “Least Wanted.” After tromping for several hours through mulleins standing higher than my head, I quite agree.

Each woody spike was topped with scores of seeds eager to attach themselves to the clothes of any woodcutter who came too close. Think watermelon seeds covered with Velcro. In case anyone should ever need to know, straddling a mullein plant while carrying a heavy log uphill is an effective but slightly uncomfortable way to strip off a whole lot of seeds at once.

By mid-afternoon, we were worn out. One of the saws had gone through two chains and was out of action. We were coated with enough charcoal to grill a hamburger and enough mullein seeds to plant a quarter section. We were also beginning to realize that our shaky knees and battered biceps probably felt a lot better than they were going to feel the next morning.

But we had a load of logs securely strapped to the trailer. Two more loads were stacked and ready to be hauled. None of the trees had fallen on us, the fence, the cars, the trailer, or the dog. We still had all 80 of the fingers and toes we had started out with. We'd had fun. All in all, a successful day.

There’s an old saying that wood is fuel that warms you twice, once when you cut it and once when you burn it. I’ve never fully appreciated that statement until now.

How much was that propane price again?

It was an exciting Saturday night in Rapid City. We indulged in one of those rare, once-every-few-years experiences.

We cleaned the oven.

Just to be clear—I have cleaned ovens before. Several times, in fact. Maybe up to a dozen times. After all, I have moved a lot during my lifetime, and sometimes a clean oven counts toward getting your deposit back.

But I’ve lived in this house for four years now, without ever cleaning the oven. My partner has lived in this house for 30 years, some 20 of those as a single guy. He refused comment on whether the oven had been cleaned during this period, confining himself to a noncommittal statement about “eating out a lot.”

At any rate—and with no blame implied—it was obvious that the oven hadn’t been cleaned in a long time. It was impossible to see through the window. The sides were a deep brown. There were enough layers of baked-on black gunk on the bottom to keep archeologists busy for years analyzing the various periods of occupation.

Clearly, drastic action was called for. We rose to the challenge, one step at a time.

Step One: Buy oven cleaner. I was surprised but pleased to find some lemon-scented stuff that promised “no fumes.”

Step Two. Scrape off the loose top layers of charred material from the bottom of the oven. Never mind that this destroyed the potential for several Master’s degrees in archeology.

Step Three: Read the directions on the oven cleaner. This can had two sets of detailed instructions, one for “two-hour” cleaning and one for “overnight” cleaning. They were identical in their requirements about using it only on a cold oven, their advice about wiping off the softened gunk with a wet sponge, and their cautions about ventilation and not spraying oneself in the face. The only difference was that one version specified leaving the cleaner to work for two hours, while the other specified leaving it overnight. Why not simply say, “leave cleaner for two to ten hours?” Unless, of course, you’re being paid by the word.

Step Four: Begin spraying the oven. This step was a reminder not to believe everything you read. “No fumes,” my asphyxiation. True, the stuff did have a faint undertone of lemon. But the top notes consisted of classic oven-cleaner aroma in all its caustic glory.

Step Five: Open windows and set up a fan. Finish spraying, covering mouth and nose whenever possible and trying to keep one’s head out of the oven.

Step Six: Wait two hours, and start wiping the gross brown gunk out of the oven. Use lots of water. Change water often. Keep fan running. Remember why cleaning the oven, like having a tax audit or a colonoscopy, is one of those things not to do any more often than absolutely necessary.

Step Seven: Do a second application of oven cleaner on several resistant black spots.

Step Eight: Wait two hours. Try to wipe off resistant black spots. Decide said spots have archeological significance and should be left undisturbed.

Step Nine: Cover newly cleaned bottom of the oven with aluminum foil.

Step Ten: Discover that it’s possible to see through clean window in oven door. (Or, at least, it would be if the light worked.) Open door and admire gleaming oven—from a slight distance, to avoid the lingering traces of the “no-fumes” cleaner.

Step Eleven. Decide to go out for Sunday dinner. After all, when you have an oven this clean, you don’t want to mess it up by cooking in it.

Step Twelve: Bask in the glow of your achievement. Savor the sense of having triumphed over adversity. People who clean their ovens every few weeks will never know this feeling of accomplishment.

All right. We’re on a roll here. Next Saturday night, maybe we’ll clean the garage, organize a couple of closets, or recaulk the bathtub.

Or maybe we could just go to a movie.

It was a James Bond kind of car. The kind of car you notice, even if, like me, you can’t tell a Lexus from a BMW and never have understood the fascination of the ’59 Chevy.

This racy two-seater convertible, though, I couldn’t help but notice as I pulled into the space beside it in the Safeway parking lot and got out. My own baby SUV, normally a petite and dainty lady compared to its usual associates of full-sized sedans, pickups, and SUVs, suddenly seemed tall and clumsy, as if it might trip over its own tires.

With its top down, the sports car—red, of course—scarcely came up past my knees. Its seats were real leather. Its dashboard was real wood. It reeked of expensive, understated elegance. Thanks to the discreet Union Jack on one fender and the word “Triumph” across the back, I recognized it instantly as a British Triumph.

I was surprised to see it in the Safeway parking lot. Not because there aren’t people in Rapid City who could afford such a car. Not because sports cars are all that unusual here, even if this is four-wheel drive country. It just seemed odd to me that anyone would go to the grocery store in a car that had no room in it for the groceries.

When I came out of the store 20 minutes later with my own groceries, the Triumph was still parked beside my Honda. As I unlocked my car to unload my grocery cart, I saw a middle-aged man walking purposefully toward the convertible. He was one of the store managers, still in his apron.

Could the convertible be his car? It was possible, certainly—mild-mannered produce department manager by day, playboy by night. I hoped, though, he would at least take off the apron before he drove off. Somehow, I just couldn’t appreciate the glamour of seeing him driving down the highway with the top down, his apron strings fluttering in the breeze.

Then I noticed a second man behind him. As they approached the Triumph, it became clear that this man had gone in to get the store manager because he had noticed something wrong with the car.

As I put my groceries into my back seat—funny, I had never noticed just how roomy it was—the manger was writing down the Triumph’s license plate. Then he pulled out the keys that the convertible’s driver had left hanging from the trunk. “Thanks for telling me about this,” he said. “We’ll make an announcement on the intercom.”

Anyone happening by who had an uncontrollable longing to own a sports car could have taken the keys, driven away, and been halfway to Nebraska before the owner came out of the store. I’m sure, in many places, that’s exactly what someone would have done.

Apparently, I live in a town full of honest citizens. Or maybe no one with larcenous intent had noticed the keys. Maybe there aren’t a lot of car thieves prowling the parking lot at Safeway late on a Sunday afternoon.

Or maybe the real answer is more practical than ethical. Maybe no one coming out of the grocery store was interested in taking a car that had no place to put the groceries.