A Sioux Song, Brats, and My Way is Better

Last week I had several thousand quarters to count and put in rolls. Now you might think that would be annoying and time consuming. As usual I have figured out a way that takes almost no time and absolutely no effort.

I put the quarters in a big pile on the end of the table at the front of the office. Then as I am doing something else I put a few in a roll. Almost everyone who comes in has a better way to do it. Some make stacks of ten, some stacks of four, some count them as they put them in the roll. They all say their way is better and faster than my way. I always say my way is better. They keep showing me why their way is better. Just between you and me “my way” is to let other folks show me “their way” until the job is finished. My way is easy for me.

We had several of the brats and grand-brats for the weekend. We all had a good time. I did realize I could write an article titled, “You know you are a Grandparent when…”  Yesterday the youngest Grand-brat solemnly presented me with a large booger. You know you are a Grandparent when you are presented with a large booger and you take it and say, “Thank you, great job.”

You know you are a Grandparent when you think something the small person does is cute BUT if one of your children had done the same thing you would have been embarrassed or angry.

You know you are a Grandparent when it sounds perfectly reasonable to eat dessert first.

You know you are a Grandparent when you tell the three-year-old it is OK to pee in the lake. Then when he stands on the dock and pees in the lake you just laugh.

The Daughter just showed me a video of young girls doing something called twerping or twerking or something. Then she showed me videos of old folks’ reactions to this new fad. The old folks interviewed were apparently dirty old men.

Twerping has absolutely no useful purpose. It isn’t appealing, attractive or alluring. I think they learned it by watching rabbits. Just for the record, some things should be slow and sexy. We will not discuss this further.

Yesterday was Labor Day. I thought it was interesting that everywhere I went the people who are usually laboring were laboring and the people who are usually loafing were loafing. Nowhere did I find laborers celebrating the day that is supposed to celebrate labor.

I spent the day loafing under the house hooking up the plumbing to the outside water spigots. I put in the spigots ten or twelve years ago but haven’t needed them so I hadn’t hooked them up.

I had to go to Farmville to pick up the parts to hook up the last fitting. The local stores that had the parts were closed and the stores that were open didn’t. Somehow as I was getting out of Sioux (my little truck) I accidentally locked the driver’s door.

It wasn’t really a problem since the other locks don’t work but since I had a spare key in my pocket I opened the door with the key.

Well, that was a mistake. I’ve never locked Sioux and I’ve never opened the door with a key. Sioux apparently realized something was wrong. I imagine she was thinking, “Averett doesn’t lock doors, Averett doesn’t use keys, someone must be stealing me.” She doesn’t know that people who steal cars usually want a higher level of transportation than I.

In any case she responded with enthusiasm. The horn blew, a siren wailed, the lights flashed and she refused to start. The dash lights flashed “Security lert” and she refused to listen to me.

I called the son who looked up how to deactivate the security system on his computer and laughed at me.  After the appropriate apologies Sioux forgave me and we went home to finish the plumbing.

I knew there was a good reason not to lock doors.