Flem!

After lunch I was pressed into service to make a beef stew for my daughter, son-in-law, grandson and us. I make the very best beef stew! It was a push to get it all done so it could simmer the proper amount of time as I also had to get on the other side of town to pick up our grave heater from a friend that was sand blasting it. I also had a job about 50% done [hanging a door] and I wanted to finish it today. I had just put the stew on simmer and was already savoring the first bite. I was trying to determine which bread should go with it tonight. The phone rang and it was our boss reminding us of the Historical Society meeting tonight at 6:30. The meeting would consist of a meal [stuffed chicken and not my favorite] and a speaker. We would go to the meeting and take 1/2 of the stew to our daughters family and save the rest for us tomorrow. Talk about blown expectations. I headed for my door job where I was replacing the old cedar, lap, siding around the door with new cedar. I was nailing the siding into old oak lap siding, 100 years old or so, and it wasn't going well at all Almost every nail was bending. I headed to the lumber yard and bought stainless steel nails at $7 per box instead of $3.50 and gave them a try. They worked but I had lost so much time on the bent nails it was time to think of a shower.

I was rushing to get my tools put away, put the materials away [cedar siding] and get to taking a shower as no one needed to smell a sweaty carpenter at the meeting. Reminds me of last night when we were suddenly going out with the kids to Taco Bell as I was informed, by my wife, as I walked into the house. I said "do I need to change my shirt or anything". She said "naw you look OK, unless you smell". I said "unless I what"? She walked up to me and almost put her nose in my armpit, took a sniff, and said "go put on a clean shirt". That really took me back as she has never done that to me before. I told out daughter on her.

Getting back to my story I showered and put on clean clothes. Looked rather spiffy, I might add. All green and mean. While I was taking a pee, I coughed up some flem and spit it out. It was kinda sticky so it hung together. It did a backwards double flip off my bottom lip and landed square in the middle of my, clean, green shirt, right where my belly protrudes out a bit. Quickly I attacked the problem by reaching down grabbed the offending flem chunk with my thumb and 1st finger and flicked it into the toilet. That would have been fine except that's not where it went. It bypassed the toilet rim and landed right, square, in the middle of my right, brand spanking new, shoe. I grabbed a paper towel and cleaned up my shirt to a spotless condition and then I lifted up my right foot to the edge of the toilet and wiped off the offending flem from my shoe. I checked myself out, in the mirror, and looked absolutely breathtaking so off to the Historical Society meeting we went. On the way I had to drop off a urine sample at the hospital and I'll spare you the details on that one. I reported the story to my wife and she felt it was worthy of a chuckle.

To make a long story a wee bit shorter, I jump back to our house after the meeting. I was getting ready for bed when I stood up in front of my wife with my arms wide open and said "how do I look". The reason for that was to have her inspect my shirt, with a discerning eye, and decide whether I could wear the shirt again tomorrow if necessary. My main concern was salad dressing or other food stains that were withheld from my inspection because of my robust shape. With a disinterested and annoyed look she said "Your shirt is OK if you need it tomorrow". Then she shouted "No it isn't, you've got snot all over it, remember, throw it in the dirty clothes hamper". I retorted,"It's not snot"! Get it, "it'snot snot?" God, I'm so clever I just kill myself sometimes.