City Comps, Country Comps

Remember when I rode to the casino on two Fridays, with my sister the ex-mayor's wife, so she and he could pick up their casino comps? Sis had been excited all month, waiting for the final comp, a set of non-stick pans. I must say, it came in a big box, and pictures showed about four different-colored-and-sized nonstick pans. Perhaps with lids and utensils. Sis and Ex-Mayor each got one. I was happy for them. The previous comp was a water filtering pitcher of some kind.

Hick and I are no strangers to casino comps. We went faithfully every week one month right after he retired, to get a set of luggage. I use mine now on trips to visit The Pony, and I think Hick gave his whole set to Genius when he was going to Taiwan for work. Ex-Mayor got a different luggage set at their second casino. Sis might regret not using her player's card enough for that one.

Anyhoo... sometimes you can get good stuff. Of course it's not worth what you spend getting there and gambling with. The lure is to get you in the door. But we'd be going anyway, although not as often. That's not really my topic today. It's the difference in the comps offered in city casinos, compared to the more rural ones. I'm not saying it's like this everywhere. Just in the ones we frequent.

Heh, heh. I actually chuckled out loud when I saw the latest comp offers from the biggest casino we go to in Oklahoma.

Are you freakin' kidding me? Is a toilet paper roll holder going to get me in the door? Not-Heaven, NO! Sorry, I know it's free stuff, but that kind of seems insulting. All that's missing is the furry seat cover!

I'm not running down Oklahoma. Our new favorite casino in southern Missouri is giving away a camouflage metal water bottle! Oh, we're going, baby! Hick and I are making special plans to get that sucker this week! If it wasn't such a drive, I'd be tempted to go back in two weeks for that camouflage backpack cooler, too!

Let the record show that Hick and I have coupons to get this, with no mention of earning points. We also have coupons for CASH. No free play here! I have $50 on that day, and Hick has $30. Plus, I have $15 food credit, and Hick has $10. Sounds like a cheap date to me. AND we'll be able to stay hydrated later, with our new water bottles.

Just sayin'. It seems to be cheaper to pull in country folk to squander their money.

One thing I won't be squandering my casino bankroll on is this chair:

I guess the 7th anniversary is the PLASTIC anniversary for a casino. My grocery store had these chairs in a big box, selling for $5, a couple years ago. Again, it's something for nothing. Maybe Hick could make a dollar off of it at his Storage Unit Store. But it doesn't seem like something I'd be touting as an anniversary gift giveaway.

One Hundred Percent of an IceBug Is Below the Surface

Just when you thought Val couldn't stoop any lower to repulse readers...

Let the record show that every day, I carry my 44 oz Diet Coke down to my lair around 2:00 or 3:00. I also take my purple bubba cup full of ice cube crescents from FRIG II, and my yellow bubba cup of ice cube crescents, to which I add NASCAR bathroom water. It's too heavy to carry down water when I already have my magical elixir and two bubba cups of ice.

I add the water, and sip from yellow bubba cup until I go upstairs to make supper. At that point, I pour that water into the purple bubba cup of ice, which has barely melted at all. I take the yellow bubba cup upstairs, dump out the remaining contents, and fill it with ice cubes again to take back down for the evening. I add some to my magical elixir. Then when it's time to shut down New Delly and go to watch TV in my OPC (Old People Chair), I pour the water and ice left in the purple bubba cup into the remaining ice cubes in the yellow bubba cup. This way, I enjoy cold beverages all day and most of the night.

Friday night, as I was making the final water/ice transfer, I noticed something before I put the lid back on. There was a dark spot on one of the top ice cubes. What in the Not-Heaven? Was it a shadow, from a little melted bubble area? I poked at the ice cube in question. It was NOT a shadow!

IT WAS A GNAT!

You know, I have a sciency background. I've always considered myself open to eating bugs. Like, if somebody offered me a chocolate-covered ant, I'd try it. The scorpions in the suckers at the old 7-Eleven store didn't bother me. And when Scott Glenn as that mean old convict rodeo rider Wes Hightower in Urban Cowboy tilted up the bottle of tequila to get the worm and bite it, I was not fazed in the least.

IT'S DIFFERENT WHEN YOU ALMOST SWALLOW A BUG IN YOUR ICE WATER!

No extra protein for me, thank you! I don't need protein in my water. I picked up that ice cube and put it in the bowl I'd used for potato chips.

"Oh, Val," you say. "It's just a little gnat." Well, let me be the one saying that to YOU when YOU'VE almost swallowed it! Take a gander at this thing!

That's one big honkin' Drosophila melanogaster, baby! I studied them in my college genetics class. I've seen them extremely up-close, and have no desire to swallow one! Sure, it's not a possibly-turd-crawling Musca domestica, and likely resulted from one of Hick's bananas that he lets lie once he decides it's too ripe. Still. It's not going over my lips and past my gums if I can help it.

Now I wonder if it got in the first batch of ice, and was possibly poured back and forth, with me sipping from it throughout the day and evening. Or if it just crawled in the straw opening of the bubba cup at the last moment. Due to the location from whence it poured, I'd say it was in the original ice of the purple bubba cup, and had been marinating since around 5:30 in my ice water.

Oh, well. I guess drinking bug water is better than swallowing the whole bug.

Skunked CENTSless

There. You don't even have to read it. The title says it all. Not a single penny was found by Val this week. That's a travesty!

Even Steven must have been ashamed of himself, though, because on Friday, he gave me something better than a penny.

Funny thing about this $100 winner. I had a dream Thursday night that I was in a casino, playing poker. I never play poker. I even remember part of the hand I had showing: Ace, Ace, Queen. When I woke up, I tried to think which of my scratcher tickets would fit in with such a dream. This Casino Royale was it. Not many places have these tickets any more. The Gas Station Chicken Store has it.

When I made my weekly stop for gas on Friday at the Sis-Town Casey's, I saw it in the scratcher case. While I was waiting for my turn, the lady ahead of me bought FOUR of this very ticket! That threw a monkey wrench into my plan. I don't like to buy the same ticket right after somebody else buys one. I figure they got the best one, the one meant for me when I walked in. I knew I could get this ticket at The Gas Station Chicken Store. But still, I asked for it at the Sis-Town Casey's.

It was the first ticket I scratched when I got home. BAM! $100 winner! There's my matching number, right on the aces. I'm sure it was purely coincidence...

Let the record show that the Casino Royale ticket I bought at The Gas Station Chicken Store was a loser. Oh, well. Good thing I defied my instincts, and got this one first. Sorry, random lady who bought the four tickets ahead of it. You were just Even Steven's accomplice.
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2019 Running Total
Penny     still at 103.
Dime      still at 17.
Nickel    still at 8.
Quarter   still at 4.

2018 TOTALS
Penny  131
Dime  17
Nickel  6
Quarter  1

2017 TOTALS (Started in March, 2017)
Penny  78
Dime   6
Nickel  0
Quarter  0
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Oh, Crap! The Ersatz Thomas Jefferson Has Tumbled Off His Boot!

Hick is finishing up the staining of the porch, a project he started about four weeks ago. He took a nine-day vacation to Nevada, so it's not like he's been slacking around the house.

Wednesday, he started around noon, to finish the last unfinished wood on the front porch. I could see him out the front window, Hick and his stool, heh, heh! After a shower, as I was stepping into my shoes for my daily trip to town, I heard a THUMP! There was no sign of Hick in front of the window.

I strolled to the front door, just in case. There was Hick, to the right of the door, on his hands and knees, with his tiny brush, painting stain onto the boards.

"Did you fall? I heard a thump."

"Yeah. My stool dumped me."

"Are you sure you're okay? Before I leave for town?"

"I'm okay."

"Is that why you're on your hands and knees? Are you hurt?"

"Just my pride. It flipped me over backwards. Like when I was working down at the other end of the porch before my trip."

"Oh. I see the dirt stuck to your back now. You're lucky you didn't go over the side, into the rocks." [Let the record show that bordering the porch, we have lava rocks surrounding large decorative rocks and tree stumps that Hick hauled from the creek.]

"Yeah, I know."

I felt a little bit sorry for Hick. Although he should have KNOWN that his stool would throw him. Since it happened before. I really hope he power-washed the next section before staining. Unless he was confident that his sweaty bare back had lifted all the dust from the boards.

Hick was still alive and kickin' when I came home from town. The only part left to stain is the back of the railings. Which are 15 feet above the ground, on the back porch. I hope there will be no stool involved in that adventure.

The Continuing Story of Hick Helping the Helpless

Yesterday, I shared how Hick had repaired the bus-waiting shack that HOS (Hick's Oldest Son) had built last year for some kids who get dropped off early at the bus stop as their parents go to work. Then I found out more details.

I asked Hick if he's the one who left part of a broken broom down there, after telling the teenage girl that the kids could sweep out the broken glass themselves, since he had replaced a window, boarded up a window, and added a door.

"No. Them kids left the broom there."

"I noticed it was gone today."

"It's inside the shack now."

"Oh, so the kids DID sweep it out?"

"No. I swept it."

"But you told them that was their job."

"I seen they'd brought that broom down there. It was laying outside because I'd put a screw in the door to hold it shut. I guess they was trying to get in. They broke my screw!"

"They didn't know! Who expects a door to be screwed shut? They probably thought it was stuck, and kept pulling on it, and it broke."

"Yeah. I guess. Anyway, I went down there to put the latch on the door. I saw the broom. Since I was there anyway, I swept it out."

"That was nice of you."

"Yeah. When that girl was asking me about sweeping up the glass, she said, 'We were going to paint it a different color, but we didn't have money for the paint.'"

"I guess she was hinting for you to paint it, too!"

"I ain't paintin' that shack! It's fine the way it is. I might go down and paint the part where I patched it, though. To protect it from the weather. Them kids oughta be glad they have that shack! Especially when it's raining. There's no place else for them to stay dry. And in the winter, it oughta be warm enough, with them all in there, out of the wind."

"You can't really blame the kids for expecting you to do stuff for them. They come by it naturally, since their dad expected you to use your tractor and gas to blade his gravel for free."

"I forgot to tell you, as I was working on that shack the other day, their dad stopped. He didn't offer to help me or even get out of the car. He said, 'Oh, I see you're fixing up the shed.' Not even a thank you."

"Well. I guess that's YOUR job, to help out his kids."

Not that Hick minds.

Some People Just Can't Help Themselves

Last year HOS (Hick's Oldest Son) built a bus-waiting shack for some kids who live up in our enclave. We're about a mile from the bus stop, and they're at least a half mile past us. They're the family that Hick bladed gravel for, since the dad asked, with no offer of payment or future return favors.

Anyhoo, as with most good deeds that can't go unpunished, the bus-waiting shack has succumbed to ne'er-do-wells. I must admit, that bus-waiting shack lasted longer than I expected. Sometime during September, the windows were broken out. That left jagged glass in the window frames, and scattered around the ground.

Monday, I suggested to Hick that he take some sturdy gloves and a bucket down to the bus-waiting shack, and clean up the danger. He agreed. After all, now that HOS has moved to town to the $5000 house, we are the nearest thing to bus-waiting shed caretakers. Hick didn't bother to mention his plans, but I discovered him and our three dogs down there when I stopped for the mail around 2:30 on the way to town. The dogs weren't helping much. They were wading in the creek, what with temps at 92 degrees.

I didn't take a picture of the vandalized bus-waiting shed, because it made me sad. But here's one of Hick's repairs that I took on Tuesday.

Hick boarded up the end window, and put a plexiglass replacement in the front window. He also added a door.

Hick said he considered a padlock, giving those kids the key, but was afraid somebody would get locked inside. Same with a latch on the outside to hold the door closed. He decided on magnets. I figure they might last a month until somebody pries them loose.

Let the record show that I am NOT this bad a picture-taker! I had returned from getting the mail out of EmBee, and remembered that I wanted a picture of the repaired bus-waiting shack. I reached into still-running T-Hoe, pumping that AC at 72 degrees, and pulled my phone out into the 94-degree heat. Apparently, the lens did not appreciate the sudden change. I tried another one after wiping the lens with my finger:

Still not having it! Doo doo doo doo! Maybe something spooky! Nah. When I got back inside T-Hoe and backed up for the other shot, the picture turned out fine from the coolness of the interior.

Anyhoo... back on Monday, while Hick was putting on the door, the bus dropped off the kids after school. One of the girls came over to talk to Hick about the shack.

"We haven't been going inside, because we're afraid to get cut on the glass."

Hick declared to me that surely they could have picked it up. The girl was about 13.

"I don't think so. Kids don't do things like that for themselves. They're coddled. I'm not so sure a door is a good idea. Now the trespassers will be having sex in it."

"I think they already did. There was a condom in there. That girl said, 'Did you pick up the condom?' I told her I did. THEN she said, 'Did you sweep out the glass?' And I told her, 'You guys can bring a broom down here and sweep it out yourself! I fixed the windows and put on a door!'"

Which is kind of my theme today. HOS went out of his way to build a bus-waiting shack that his own kid didn't have a need for. But of course the ne'er-do-wells couldn't keep from destroying the windows, just for fun. They had no rights to be on the property or in the shack, but couldn't control their pure meanness to ruin it for the kids who need it.

The kids HOS built the shack for seem to feel entitled to it, expecting others to keep it clean and in usable shape. They're not babies. Four of the five of them are 10 or older. You'd think they could keep their bus-waiting shack in usable shape, even if they can't repair windows. It's still got a sturdy roof over their heads to keep them dry, and four walls to keep out the impending winter winds.

Two different kinds of people, neither able to help themselves.
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You might have spied the broken-off broom laying beside the door. I don't know if the kids brought that, or Hick. I'm guessing the kids, because Hick would not leave such a valuable tool behind!
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Small Town Service At the Gas Station Chicken Store

Last week, there was a backup of traffic on The Gas Station Chicken Store parking lot. In fact, I drove by twice before eventually returning to do my business. Sometimes, a lot of people get there at the same time. Sometimes, the card-reader takes a while.

As I was parking, a small black pickup truck darted out from the pumps. I slammed on T-Hoe's brakes (don't tell Hick) as that black pickup sped over to the end of the building, coming to a stop with the front left tire up on the concrete bumper thingy. Kind of unusual. At The Gas Station Chicken Store, you can't use your card at the pumps. They're old. Not Mayberry old, but not equipped with a card-reader. You don't even have to pay in advance. Just pull up and pump, then pay inside. Most of the gasser-uppers are local. They know the drill.

I had about 22 oz of my 44 oz Diet Coke in the cup when an exasperated 20-something gal came in and butted in front of the people waiting. Apparently, she'd been inside already. A bag of fried chicken, and a 32 oz soda, were sitting on the side counter.

"Can I give you my license and go home to get the money and then bring it back?"

I suppose her card didn't work. Or she thought she had money with her but didn't. I guess she went out to move her truck away from the pumps, and look inside for money.

Smiley was the clerk that day. She's one of my two favorites. She pushed Butter's license back across the glass countertop.

"I'll pay for your gas. You take your license and drive home and get the money, and bring it back to me."

As Butter thanked her, and reached for her chicken and soda, Smiley pulled it across the counter and set it aside, out of reach.

"I'll keep this for you until you come back."

I set my 44 oz Diet Coke down to wait. Once Butter was out the door, I said, "Now THAT'S what I call customer service!"

The man whose turn it was laughed. "That's harsh! You could have at least let her have her soda! It's hot out."

Smiley shook her head. "I'll pay for her gas, but she's NOT getting her soda and chicken! That's probably what'll get her back in here. She wants that chicken!"

Smiley has worked there on and off since my kids were young. She's a good problem-solver. No need to have a drive-off and call the police. Or put up a WANTED poster with that gal's picture. She obviously couldn't tie her up and keep her from leaving. She used common sense. Do that gal a little favor to get her out of a bind, and the issue could be resolved. If Butter didn't come back, they'd still have her picture and license plate number on their surveillance camera.

Probably not the way a convenience store clerk in the city would handle it.