The Road to Good Submissions Is Paved With Text Intentions

I had grand plans to whip some writing into shape yesterday. I was going to be the Jillian Michaels, the Jane Fonda, the Richard Simmons, the Jack LaLanne of manuscript-shapers. Had it all planned out. Had my time budgeted the night before.

Yes, with Genius in Kansas, The Pony at his engineering camp, and Hick at work, I knew I would have a whole day to let my creative juices flow. I might even need a small kiddie pool to catch the overflow of my fertile mind. I planned the time I would arise, the time I would take my medicine, the time I would run to the post office, all the while my literary ingredients simmering on the back burner. Careful to leave a large chunk of uninterrupted time for writing.

The texts started at 6:22 a.m.

I could not go the day, you see, without knowing:

~The IRS updated Genius's tax return information for the first time since March.

~Hick had plans to grill pork steaks for supper.

~Two of The Pony's PEOPLE were at the engineering camp.

~Hick was glad The Pony knew somebody at camp.

~Genius had Chinese for lunch with his Garmin team.

~Hick wanted vegetables to go with the pork steaks instead of green beans.

~Genius should get his tax refund by the end of the week.

~A random picture of SpongeBob's Sandy, sent by The Pony.

~The Pony was mistaken for a counselor.

~The Chinese lunch in Olathe is the exact same price as the Chinese lunch in college town.

~The Pony had corn dogs for lunch.

~The Pony was doing an activity.

~Hick gets a shot at 4:30.

Oh, and a phone call, too. Hick was leaving work right then for his appointment.

I can't imagine why I didn't get more done. A phone call and 20 texts. That's not going to stop a real writer, is it? I must admit, I normally leave my cell phone upstairs when I go to my dark basement lair. But with The Pony two hours away at camp, I thought I would keep it with me for emergency notifications.

The emergency is that Val is not making progress on her writings!

Val Measures Out Her Life In Contest Places

OH...YEAH! (Said with the force and intonation of the walking, talking, wall-breaking Kool-Aid pitcher-man).

Early results are in, and it appears that this ol' Val has not lost her touch. One of her submissions has garnered her a very special award. And it ain't a leg lamp in a crate marked FRAH JEE LAY.

Indeed, Val has achieved an honorable mention in the Saturday Writers "Elements in Your Writing" contest, in the WATER division. That's right. Here's a link for proof, the last contest results on the list right now, lest you think Val is jabbering her jaws, flinging her fingers, carousing her keyboard in an effort to pull the wool over your eyes. Of course I'm anonymous here...so you'll have to take my word that the One Man's Hot Tub story is mine. ALL MINE! I was going to call it One Man's Junk, but I feared that somebody might misconstrue my usage of junk as slang for...well...you know.

Excuse me. I had to suck in some air. I was running out of breath from all of this self-horn tooting. I was nigh on needing to strap on Hick's breather for a moment. And speaking of...that's a whole other story that I submitted for last month's AIR theme. I won't be holding my breath waiting on the results. Heh, heh. See what I did there?

An added perk of this monumental achievement is that my story will be printed in the annual Saturday Writers anthology. My dry spell is over. And with my UPCOMING RETIREMENT fast approaching (I'm only doing this for Sioux. She likes to be updated as often as possible. I'm thinking of putting the countdown at the bottom of each post!), I just might get back into the swing of this literary endeavor before I kick off.

Special thanks to my blog buddy Linda for her selfless help with this hopeless mess we call Val. She fine-tuned this story in its earliest incarnation, and like a mother's saliva thumb-rubbed on a dirty face, made my hairwad hot tub story presentable for the public. Or at least for the judge of the Saturday Writers.

There are still a couple of contests left this year, for any of you who want to get off your duffs and submit. Check it out here. Don't cost nothin' to read, and only $7 to submit. Cheaper than a box of gas station chicken!

Val Thevictorian's Opening Argument

I am firmly convinced that if I was away for an extended period of time, Hick and The Pony would survive on cans of beans opened with a pocket knife, warmed over a fire. Forget the fire part. They would eat them at room temperature.

How can men not grasp the basic concept of package-opening? I give you Exhibit A.
And Exhibit B.

Hick grabbed a bag of chips for lunch, to have with his leftover July 4th BBQ hot dog. You'd think a grown man was capable of pulling open the top of a bag of Ruffles. But you'd only be half right. Hick got that bag open enough to gather some ridged chips. Barely.

That bag was only partially opened. The middle had a hole. I seriously double that Hick's ham hand fit inside. More likely he dumped chips out of that aperture onto his plate. When I went to get some later, I found that the edges were still sealed. The top of that bag looked like one of those rubber coin oval thingies that used to be given away by banks and credit unions. The kind with a slit on one side that opens when you squeeze the ends.

Within ten minutes of the Hick opening, The Pony was sent to get a quart plastic bag to pack his soap for the trip to his engineering camp. You can't just simply set a pump bottle of soap into a suitcase. You know that, right? Apparently, The Pony did not. He huffed a bit when sent to open a box of ZipLocks. Now I know why.

He attempted to open that box from the end. Like it didn't have those little perforations in a smile pattern to pry open and grab a bag one at a time. I don't know how he planned on getting out a bag from the end. But he made sure to unseal and bend back each of the four flaps. Then he ripped the smile just enough to weasel out one bag.

Let's hope nobody severs a tongue on the jagged rim while trying to eat some beans out of the hobo can. And that if they do, they don't try to save it for the paramedics in a ZipLock bag.

On the Anniversary of Our Nation's Freedom, An Old Val's Fancy Lightly Turns to Thoughts of Alcohol

July 4th, a time for patriotic celebrations across this great land!

Or, here at Thevictorians...a time for grilling. No big party. No red, white, and blue foods or drinks. Just a couple of steaks on the bargain gas grill that Hick picked up at the auction, and a six-pack of Michelob Ultra. FOR HICK! Not that he's going to drink the whole thing. He imbibes in moderation. But I'm getting ahead of myself. Best to let the story unfold slowly. Make room for your Rip Van Winkle beard.

Thursday I dashed into the gas station chicken store for a 44 oz. Diet Coke. I don't have one every day. But this one I think I deserved, what with dealing long-distance with my sister the ex-mayor's wife over our impending sale of Mom's house, a process which required four days to get her signature over the airwaves. I decided to throw in some slaw from the chicken kitchen, because we were having shrimp for supper. Yes. The gas station chicken store sells slaw.

I swear, that new chicken girl must have been planting the cabbage and waiting for it to grow. How long does it take to scoop a pint of slaw? So there I stood, hoping nobody currently working would associate me with that demented Madam who ran in there last summer and took pictures of the establishment without making a purchase. I couldn't help but eavesdrop on the conversation between the two clerks and the current customer.

That customer looked very familiar. A small, extremely-tanned, shoulder-length white-haired lady. I knew I'd seen her somewhere around town.

"I could not believe it! She was ringing me up, and when she got to my beer, she said, 'I'll need to see your ID.' I said, 'Are you kidding me?' And she said, 'No. I'll have to see your ID, or I can't sell it to you.' I told her I was obviously old enough to buy alcohol, but she said, 'That's our policy. I can't sell it to you without seeing your ID.'"

"Ha, ha. Did she know you work at Walmart?"

"She does now. Because I told her, 'Listen, honey, I am the one who trains the trainees. You have to learn right, but you have to use common sense.'"

"I guess maybe that's Walmart's policy for the holiday weekend."

"It's our policy all the time. I'm supposed to follow it, too. But when somebody is obviously in their forties or fifties, I don't even bother. I just punch in a date for their DOB that I know will be old enough. There's no need to slow things down and make them mad."

"The Dollar Store cards EVERYONE! For tobacco. They don't care how old you look."

"Well, I'm going to have a talk with the checkers when I go back to work."

So, I took that all in. It did seem ridiculous to tell her she couldn't get her beer without her ID, when she works there and everything. But maybe the new girl was afraid of losing her job, in case it was a secret shopper or something.

Today The Pony and I headed off to Walmart to pick up a few things before he leaves tomorrow for an engineering camp. I asked Hick if he needed anything. Nope. Except, as we were going out the door, he said, "Bring me some beer. A six pack. Michelob Ultra."

Normally, I am not in the habit of buying Hick's beer. For one thing, he rarely drinks it. Every now and then with pizza. Maybe once every couple of months. And he has a cash allowance for that. No need for me to dip into my household budget. But the main reason he and I understand that I don't buy his beer is because...I'm a small-town celebrity. Everybody knows my name, and it ain't Norm. Backroads is full of tongue-waggers who would like nothing more than to dwell on how Mrs. Thevictorian up at the schoolhouse likes her Michelob Ultra. I might as well be Widow Jones not keeping her window shades all pulled completely down, or be caught exhaling Shirley Thompson's breath.

The Pony heaved a sigh. I hollered over my shoulder, "Really? You want ME to push your beer through Walmart in my cart?" Hick got all snotty and told me to forget it, but of course I could not. Seriously. He had already been to town for several hours this morning. Could he not buy his own beer? He knew we were grilling. I implored The Pony, "Can you grab it for me?"

"Um. No. I'm pretty sure that's not allowed. I am not 21."

"You're not BUYING it! Only bringing it to the cart."

"I don't think I can."

"C'mon. It's all the way on the BACK WALL. I was only going as far as...the produce section. We don't have much on our list."

"I'd rather not. Somebody will stop me."

"Okay. I'll go all the way back there and get it, and put it in my cart, and push it, the ONLY item in my cart, back up to the produce section while you're over in the pharmacy getting toothpaste."

"Okay. I can meet you on the soda aisle with the toothpaste and the paper plates and the Lysol. Then you'll have more in your cart."

"Great."

So off we went. I waited and waited on the soda aisle. I had to keep moving, because no matter where I waited, I was in somebody's way. I thought I saw people frowning disapprovingly. I can imagine their blog posts today: 'And there was this woman in the way with only a six-pack of Michelob Ultra in her cart. I don't know what she was waiting for there on the soda aisle.'

We got to the front and I gave The Pony his two dollars for gaming. He has given up the car game lately in favor of one with a fake gun that you shoot at the screen. Playing the car game hasn't made him a driver, so I figure playing the gun game won't make him a shooter. I got in my regular line. It was a new checker I hadn't seen.

OH NO! What if she was the new checker? I had Michelob Ultra in my cart! I looked around to see if there was a sign that said this cashier could not ring up alcohol. Nope. Still. She might be that stickler! All I brought in was my debit card. No ID. Oh, dear. I put the Michelob Ultra on the conveyor. For all to see as they walked by. I figured if Checker wanted my ID, I'd tell her I was a good 30 years past the age of imbibement, and ask for a manager. Or I could holler over to The Pony, "HEY! Go get my purse out of the car!" I could imagine him squinting, and holding his hands palm-up, and mouthing 'WHAT?' as I made a spectacle of myself. I wanted to set that Michelob Ultra down on the floor and leave it. But then I'd have to face a sober Hick.

How do I get myself into these situations?

The girl rang up my items. She made small talk. When she punched in the Michelob Ultra, I heard her register make an odd beep. I held my breath. Tried not to look guilty. Stopped short of humming. Because something like "What do you do with a drunken sailor?" would probably have vibrated from my between my lips.

WHEW! Checker tapped in something and continued. That was a close call.

I can't wait to see who throws this in my face months from now. In the parking lot, as I was putting my/Hick's Michelob Ultra in T-Hoe's rear, I heard, "HEY! VAL! Did you buy enough for me?" It was my cousin, the one who's buying Mom's house. And earlier today, my best old ex-teaching buddy Mabel called me to chat, and informed me that she had been ten cars behind me the other day when I turned onto the county road.

Forget that the hills have eyes. Backroads had binoculars.

A Sordid Tale From Little Val's Childhood

Let's travel back in time, shall we, to the days when Val was Little Val, attending school in an old brick building with creaky wooden floors, transoms above the doors, hissing radiators, cloakrooms, slate blackboards, heavy one-piece brown metal desks with built-in metal chairs that swiveled, and wooden desktops that raised for storing books and Big Chief tablets, with a grooved tray for fat wooden pencils.

When the highlight of the school day was running at breakneck speed over the crumbly asphalt playground surrounded by a granite chunk fence with mortar chipping away, capped by curved concrete, with a thick metal pipe skewered through the pillars, worn smooth by so many kid butts. Like this fence, though the original Little Val fence is long gone.

When nobody cared if we played red rover, slammed each other on the teeter-totter, swung so high on those black rubber swing seats that the chains went slack, picked up Maple tree whirligigs off the ground to stuff in our mouths and make screeching sounds, or lined up for captains' pick for kickball.

Back then, Little Val was what one might call smart as a whip, sharp as a tack, bright as a button. She was fraught with success. Her mind was to academic 'A's like Midas's finger to gold. Little Val was not shy about volunteering answers. It irked her, in fact, when the teacher would pointedly overlook her frantically-waving arm and choose another child to enlighten the class. But Little Val was brought up well. She did not show her displeasure, but only waved more frantically the next time. Because surely, it must have been a lack of attention by the teacher. A mere oversight.

So Little Val did not hold back that day her third-grade teacher, Mrs. Elvins, in her cat's-eye glasses, asked who could tell the class the name of the 13th President of the United States. It did not matter that Little Val, in her own cat's-eye glasses, had been absent the day before, due to an unfortunate orthopedic injury resulting from an evening of cautious roller-skating around her next-door grandpa's sidewalk, where the outside bump of the chimney proved that Little Val was not so accomplished at changing direction on wheels. A slow-motion fall from her strap-on, adjustable-length, metal roller skates that inflicted a greenstick fracture upon Little Val's left forearm, and garnered her a hard white cast from thumb to mid-humerus, held at an upright angle by a cloth sling that looked very much like her mother's dish towel.

Mrs. Elvins whipped the class into a frenzy. Somebody must remember the 13th President of the United States! Somebody...somebody... She even gave a little clue: "I know you remember! His name was Millard...Millard..." One by one, classmates were called upon, voicing reasonable answers, though incorrect. Little Val was on her knees in her chair, right arm flagging back-and-forth, to show Mrs. Elvins that indeed, SOMEBODY did know the name of the 13th President of the United States! Mrs. Elvins looked and looked. No more hands waved. Except that of Little Val.

"Oh, I'll bet Little Val can tell us the 13th President of the United States, can't you, Little Val?" Little Val nodded, still on her knees, still waving her good arm. "Tell everyone, then, Little Val! The 13th President of the United States was Millard..."

"HIGH LIFE!"

It sounded so right as it leapt from Little Val's lips. So right. Yet so wrong. Mrs. Elvins was speechless. The rest of the class hee-hawed and whooped and hollered, a couple of the rowdier boys even falling from their seats.

And that, by blog friends, was the moment Little Val realized that people found her hilarious.

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Thanks to blog buddy Joe H for the inspiration.

The Bank Needs a Triage System

Don't be that guy. At least don't come to Backroads and be that guy. That guy who pulls into the bank's drive-thru lane, but not all the way up to the canister-sucker, and sits there, holding the spot, preventing others from using it.

Don't be that guy. The one who tempts me to pull in behind him, because the other drive-thru lane has a line. Don't come down here to my little bank with only three drive-thru lanes, and one of them always closed. Don't. Just don't. Especially on a day when I'm in a hurry.

Don't be that guy who finally finishes balancing his checkbook for the very first time since he started working, his retirement having gone into effect July 1st. That guy who is counting out his money, which he should have done in his counting house, while the queen was eating bread and honey, and the maid was hanging out the clothes, about to be de-nosed by a blackbird. That guy who succumbs to narcolepsy, grows a long white beard, and answers to Rip Van Winkle through the vacuum-tube speaker.

I SPENT 15 MINUTES WAITING IN LINE BEHIND ONE CAR!

My transaction took ONE MINUTE. Uh huh. All I had to do was deposit a check. I did not tarry to play a game of tic tac toe (best 13 out of 25, apparently) like that guy ahead of me, what with putting something in the canister, sending it in, taking something out, putting something back, sending it in again, etc.

Don't be that guy.

Don't be that guy if Val is close enough to get ahold of you!

A Game of Hick and Mouse

Hick is no lover of mice. He has a not-quite phobia of them.

On the occasion when we would get a cute little big-eared field mouse in the house during the first cold snap, Genius was our go-to guy. He'd set the trap, the old-fashioned kind with that snappy bar, after many a sore-fingered trial, and dispose of the critter when trapping was successful. Genius, in fact, was so tender-hearted that he told me, upon one such disposal, "It wasn't quite dead yet, Mom, and I couldn't stand to kill it, so I threw it out on the front porch so the animals could get it." Yeah. I raised a real charmer.

Years ago, when Genius was an infant, and The Pony was a surprise waiting to happen, Hick and his older boys went to the BARn to clean up some junk and work on the Coca Cola loft. According to the boys, Hick grabbed their coveralls off a nail and started putting his on. He reached his hand into the pockets, and started dancing around, making a commotion, and stripped out of those coveralls forthwith.

"You should have seen him, Val," said the oldest, about 14 at the time. "He screamed like a little girl and started flapping his hands! His pockets were full of baby mice, pink, without any hair on them. He made us clean out the pockets and stomp on them."

I guess this experience stuck with Hick. We came home one evening to find him burning the yard. Yeah. Not the best plan for a house covered with cedar siding, surrounded by a wraparound wooden porch. From the look of the char, that fire had been within three feet of the porch. At that moment, the wind had shifted, and it was creeping out into the field part of the yard. The dogs and cats were laying along the burning edge.

"Get those animals away from the fire! What are they doing?"

"They're not hurtin' nothin'. A lawn grows back healthier after a burn. The conservation department does it all the time up in the state park. Watch."

Every few minutes, one of the pets pounced. They were waiting for mice to run from the fire. Hick did not seem to mind. It might have been his plan all along.

Relations weren't always so fractious between Hick and the rodents. He tells a story of his lowest moment. He had just been divorced, and was renting a ratty trailer in a park just off the highway. His mobile home overlooked the park's sewage lagoon. It was almost Christmas. He had lost his partial plate, and was depressed because he was getting ready for his factory's Christmas dinner celebration. "There I was, all alone, with only the thought of that prime rib to cheer me up, and I knew I wouldn't be able to chew it because my teeth were gone. They'd been missing for two weeks. I couldn't afford new teeth. Besides, the dinner was in a couple of hours. I sat there on the toilet with my head in my hands, feeling sorry for myself. I heard something, and looked up. There was a little hole along the baseboard. A mouse hole. And something was stuck in it. I got down and reached in, and it was my partial plate! I washed it off under the faucet, and left for the dinner. That was one of my best Christmases ever."

I guess the game of Hick and mouse is give and take.