Trump’s top five next phone calls

I used to think the next world war might be started by escalations of tensions in the Middle East, or North Korea having a bad day. Now I think it's more likely to be Donald Trump accidentally butt-dialing some random leader with nuclear weapons.

Trump's top five next phone calls:

5. Darth Vader. “Love that death star, big as a planet. Very bigly. Every country should have a death star.”

4. Sauron: “Where'd you get that big eye thing? It's yuuuge. Gotta get one of those for Trump Tower.”

3. Hans Gruber: “Some say you’re just a common thief. I think you’re a terrific thief. Exceptional, just terrific.”

2. Goldfinger: “You think that Oddjob fella could give my cabinet some henchmen lessons?”

1. Gru: “Hey, you’re despicable and I’m deplorable! We gotta get you into my cabinet. Hear you’re interested in the moon. How’d you like to be head of NASA?”

Boating is fun. Having a boat . . . not so much.

Saturday. Beautiful day. So we go down to the dock, hop in the boat and get ready to go, push the button to lower the boat lift . . . nothing. Battery’s dead. Okay, no big deal. We have a portable power pack we always bring along, just in case. Hook that up and . . . nothing. It was plugged in overnight and should have a full charge, but it’s dead. Okay, guess we won’t be going out today after all. Dean set up our solar panel, which we hadn’t set up this year because we’ve been planning to demo the dock and build a new one but didn’t know when exactly that would happen. Sunny day so the solar panel should charge it up.

Sunday morning. Big storm coming so we want to move the boat as far forward on the shore station as we can. The waves tend to hit it from the front and side, pushing it back. So we hit the button and . . . no power. Solar panel didn’t have enough time or sun to charge it and our portable power pack is officially a brick. Okay. Dean goes back to the house to get the jumper cables and we used the boat battery to jump the shore station, got the boat lowered, pulled it as far forward as we could and raised it back up. That’s pretty much all we can do to try to keep it secure.

Sunday afternoon/evening. The lake is a churning mass of whitecaps. Our neighbor calls to tell us “your boat’s really getting pounded.” We went down to check it out. Yeah, just as we feared. Huge waves from the northwest coming up under the boat, lifting it and pushing it back, then slamming it down again. But there isn’t much we can do. It is getting pushed back, but since it was so far forward to start with we’re hoping it will be okay.

When we left it Sunday afternoon, the bow extended about two feet over the dock on the right side of this picture. Here's where it was Monday morning.

Monday morning. Boat’s fine. One of our neighbors wasn’t so lucky. There’s a 34 foot boat belonging to a neighbor about half a dozen docks north of us washed up on its side on the shore south of our dock. Our boat was pushed way back, and the shore station was moved back about two feet as well, but it all looks okay. Until we take a closer look. The shore station is damaged. A bunk is broken and the support in the back middle has cracked, pushing the two back supporting beams outward. We can’t lower the boat because the beams are pushed so far out that they won’t clear the dock on either side.

Monday afternoon. Dean borrows a come-along and portable charger since ours is dead, a friend comes over and they try to pull the two support beams close enough together so they’ll clear the dock. No go. The weight of the boat is pushing them out. The salvage barge is here and they’re working on getting that bashed-up boat out with their big mechanical arm. Dean talks to the guy – he’s the same guy who’s giving us an estimate for replacing our dock. He says when he’s done with the salvage job, he can come back and lift up the back of our boat. Taking the weight off the framework will make it possible to pull those support beams back into position so we can lower the boat. Sounds good. Dean tells him to be sure to call before he comes over so we can take the canopy down first.

Tuesday afternoon. No call yet from the barge guy but he’s probably pretty busy. Lots of damage from the storm. So after work we’re ready to go down and take the canopy off when our friend Gary calls. Our boat is over there tied up in his neighbor’s boat slip. Barge guy just came over without calling us, got it off the lift and took it over to Gary’s. So now we have no god-damned f*cking way of getting the canopy off. Leaving the canopy on over the winter would wreck the canopy for sure and possibly the whole shore station. With the canopy on and without the weight of the boat to hold the shore station down, a wind storm can pick the whole thing up and wreck it. The canopy is 10 feet wide and 20 feet long. Under the right (make that wrong) wind conditions, the whole thing can turn into a giant kite.

So damn damn damn. The canopy is fastened to the framework all around the edges and in a line down the middle. From the dock we can reach a few of the fasteners along the sides but not the front, back or middle.

Thursday/Friday. We had to reject Plan A (making the shore station workable) because upon further inspection it has more damage than we thought. We thought about Plan B (a makeshift platform laid across the 11-foot span of the slip) and finally rejected it as stupid and unworkable. So we went with Plan C. We went over to Gary’s, got in the boat and brought it back to our shore station. We can’t put it up on the lift, though. Which means that in order to reach the canopy, we’ll be standing on a stepladder. A big stepladder. In a rocking boat.

Good thing Dean is tall. He did most of the stepladder work while I did my best to hold the boat steady and maneuver it into position to reach the various fasteners. Got everything unfastened so now we just need to get the canopy off the framework and into the boat. But damn, how do we push it up and out? Even on the ladder, Dean’s fingertips just barely reach the fasteners on the underside of the framework. 

Okay, what do we have on the boat to work with? What would MacGyver do? Hey, we have an aluminum pole with a rubber tip on the end. It’s meant to prop up the canvas to help it shed water when the boat is buttoned up but not under a protective roof. We use that to pop the canopy off the corners and then start the tedious task of trying to roll it back from both ends, over the slats of the framework so we can pull it down in the middle.

When we’re working from the boat raised up on the lift as we normally do, all this is within easy reach and we can usually get the canopy down in about ten minutes. This took over an hour but we got it down without hurting the lift, the boat, or ourselves. Boat, trailer and canopy are all home safely and ready to be winterized.

Boating is fun. Having a boat is mostly work. We’d be better off if we didn’t have a boat and just had friends who did. 

At least we're not this poor bastard. Doesn't look so bad in this photo but it was all bashed in on the side and bottom and it was totaled. We went by his dock and the big (formerly straight)  steel I-beam that supported the end of his shore station was twisted into a U-shape. Guy who owns it also owns the bar and grill a couple of miles up the road, so we figure a burger and fries there will probably go from $12 to around $45.

Cherry helicopters. They're a thing out here.

This is the orchard at the end of our driveway yesterday, after a rainstorm moved through.

The cherries are ripening almost a month early this year. It’s already cherry season, and that means when it rains, these little helicopters come out. The sugar in the cherries will draw the moisture of the rain through the skin into the cherry, and it will keep drawing in moisture until the cherry bursts. So when it rains in cherry season, these little helicopters come out to dry off the orchards.

Fun fact: even though the cherries aren’t usually ripe until the last week of July or first week of August, our annual cherry festival is always held the third weekend of July. Why? “Because we’ve always had it that weekend. We can’t have it the last weekend of July because that’s the car show and we can’t have it the first weekend of August because that’s the Good Old Days festival.”

So yes, that means that most years, cherries for the cherry festival are brought in from Washington, where the crop is earlier, while the local cherries are usually a week or two away from being ripe. Why not have the cherry festival during the time the local cherries are usually ripe? Because “it’s always on the third weekend of July,” and that’s that. But this year, instead of being too early for the local crop, it looks like it will be too late. The first cherry stands are already open. 

Taking the Early Flight from Now On

Yes, I should have checked the flight status before going to the airport, but I had meetings all morning and then had to dash back to the hotel with ten minutes to change, finish packing and catch the airport shuttle. Got to the airport, got through security, went to the gate and checked the flight status before settling down to read a while before boarding started. Flight status: delayed. Five freaking hours. Which meant I would miss my connection in Denver by four hours.

This sucks on any trip, but for this particular one it was extra sucky, because the McQuade softball tournament was going on. That meant every hotel room in town had been booked for months. I spent what seemed an eternity on the phone with United and it was soon apparent that I wasn’t getting out of Bismarck until the next day. So . . . I guess I’m spending the night in the airport? Then I remembered it doesn’t stay open all night. They close when the last flight comes in. So . . . I guess I’m spending the night in the airport parking lot?

I made what I knew would be a futile call to the Expressway Suites, where I had checked out earlier.

“Sorry, we’re all booked up with the softball tournament but I’ll check . . . hey, whaddayaknow, a room just opened up. It’s a king-

“I’LL TAKE IT!”

“You sure? It’s a king-

“I’LL TAKE IT!”

Getting a room on Friday with no reservation with the McQuade softball tournament in town was like hitting the jackpot and winning the lottery. I would have taken a cot in their storage closet. So that afternoon instead of landing in Missoula I’m checking back in to a hotel in Bismarck. Sucks, but I’m really lucky to have a place to stay at all. When the guy checked me in, it took a while and I was getting worried that the whole “we actually have a room for you” thing was a mistake. But he was trying to find the quietest room for me. “I’ll put you in this one. Best I can do. You’re the only person on the floor who isn’t with a softball team. Oh, you’ll want these.” He tossed me a little package. It contained a set of earplugs.

A little later I turn on the local news, and their first story features the guy at the front desk who checked me in. They’re talking to him about how full all the hotels are with the tournament in town. “Oh yeah, we’ve been full for months. Every place in town is full. People make reservations a year in advance. I have one team that always has reservations for the next four years.” I had to crank up the volume on the TV a bit to hear the story, since there was a party going on under my window.

I didn’t use the earplugs. I was afraid I wouldn’t hear my alarm and I had a ridiculously early flight out. I wanted the first flight so I’d have other options in case it was delayed or cancelled. Left Bismarck ridiculously early as scheduled, easily caught my connection in Denver and was landing in Missoula shortly after 10 a.m. From now on I’m always taking that ridiculously early flight.

Summer People Vs. Lobster

No, it’s not the year's worst attempt at a blockbuster summer movie. It’s another sequel in the long-running series of dramatic vignettes that play out in a small blue-collar town where a lot of rich people have summer homes. Our scene: grocery store, late afternoon in June. Dramatis personae: summer woman in casual designer chic and a big burly butcher.

Summer woman: “Where are the live lobsters?”

Butcher: “Sorry, we don’t have any.”

Summer woman: “What do you mean, you don’t have any? I’m having a party this weekend and I’m serving lobster.”

Butcher: “We have frozen lobster tails over there.”

Summer woman: “Frozen? FROZEN? Do you really think I’d serve my guests FROZEN lobster?”

Butcher: “I can order some for our next delivery if you like. Truck comes in Tuesdays and Thursdays.”

Summer woman: “Well, it’s Thursday, so get me some.”

Butcher: “The delivery came this morning. Next one is Tuesday.”

Summer woman: “My party is this weekend. I need live lobsters for tomorrow night.”

Butcher: “I can’t get any until Tuesday.”

Summer woman: “You have stores in Kalispell and Missoula, right? So call them, see if they have live lobsters and have them bring me some.”

Butcher: “Sorry ma’am. Best I can do is order some for Tuesday.”

The summer woman kept going on about how she needed them TODAY. A notable characteristic of the summer people species is that they think if they keep repeating how much they need something, it will magically appear. I didn’t stick around for the denouement. I’ve seen how this ends. So sorry about the milk, checkout lines, regular cheese, free-range beef, kobe beef and ice cream cones, doing your own shopping, and other indignities you suffer here. Hope the scenery makes up for it.

Dean Must Be Having Me Followed

I’m convinced Dean is having me followed. The conversation with the private investigator probably went something like this:

PI: “So, you want her followed?” Nodding his head knowingly.

Dean: “Yes, every Friday. She usually leaves around noon.”

PI: “Goes to see her boyfriend, huh?”

Dean: “She’ll probably be going to the hardware store.”

PI: “Oh, that’s where she meets him?”

Dean: “No, we just always need stuff from the hardware store.”

PI: “Right. Then she goes to meet her boyfriend.”

Dean: “Then she goes to the farmer’s market.”

PI: “Okay, she meets him there.”

Dean: “No, she looks for fresh produce.”

PI: “Okay, then what?”

Dean: “Then sometimes she’ll go to the salon.”

PI: “I see. Getting her hair done for the boyfriend.”

Dean: “No, just getting a trim.”

PI: “Okay, then she goes to his place.”

Dean: “No, then she goes to the grocery store.”

PI: “Getting something for a special dinner with her boyfriend?”

Dean: “No, just the usual stocking up. Then she comes home.”

PI: “Home? No boyfriend? So why the hell do you want her followed?”

Dean: “Call me when she turns into the driveway. I always like to get home exactly five minutes after she’s finished putting the groceries away.”

The Easter bunny’s top five complains about his job:

5. Millennials telling him his baskets aren’t “Instagram-worthy.”

4. Trying to deliver to Washington. Congress always blocks him, complains when they don’t get any candy, and blames Obama.

3. Delivering to the Trump household. It’s hard to find a basket that will fit those tiny, tiny hands.

2. Hops his ass off all day but doesn’t even get a trending hashtag.

1. Thought he had enough baskets for the Cruz household, but it turns out he needs five more.

So much for vacation

We couldn’t have picked a worse week to take vacation. Last week was awful. Smoky, smoky, smoky. We had fires all around us so it didn’t matter which way the wind blew. It brought in smoke from every direction. We had planned to go boating, maybe spend some time in Glacier Park, and take a drive down the scenic Swan Valley just east of here. Instead we sat on the deck looking at the smoke. We couldn’t even enjoy the view of the lake or mountains. Just smoke.

There's a lake there somewhere.

Last Thursday we almost went out in the boat in spite of the smoke, but had to admit we wouldn’t enjoy it so we didn’t. But I guess there was one feeble consolation. “At least we didn’t pay a bunch of money and drive or fly across the country for a vacation we can’t enjoy.”

This week the smoke cleared out, but that’s because it’s been raining every day. Dean stopped to get gas today and the customer in front of him was complaining about the weather. It turns out they were having our “at least we didn’t” experience.

They had spent a week here last year and enjoyed it so much they planned to spend two weeks here this year. They rented a lakefront cabin at $2000 a week and invited another couple to join them. They had rented a boat last year but thought it was too expensive so they borrowed a boat and towed it here from their home in Nevada. They were looking forward to two idyllic weeks of boating, exploring Glacier Park and enjoying the lake and mountain views from their deck. Instead they got a week of smoke and a week of rain.

“We went out in the boat one day even though it was smoky because we thought, what the hell, we’re on vacation and we towed the damn thing all the way here. But it wasn’t any fun.” They haven’t been doing anything but sitting on the deck watching the smoke and then watching the rain. And after being cooped up in a cabin for nearly two weeks, they’re getting on each other’s nerves. The good news is the rain is supposed to clear out for at least one day tomorrow. The bad news is tomorrow they have to drive back to Nevada.

Reminded me of this poor bastard.

In which Dean meets a criminal mastermind

Yesterday morning Dean stopped at a convenience store on the way to work. There was a guy sitting by the door to the store trying to sell a boat anchor. “It’s a real good anchor. You can have it for twenty bucks. Probably worth fifty.” Dean declined, went in and paid for his gas. On the way out, the guy had an even better offer. “Tell ya what, you can have it for fifteen bucks. Probably worth sixty.” Dean once again declined. The guy persisted. “You could probably sell it to Don Bell.” That happens to be the name of our county sheriff.

When Dean got to work he mentioned the odd encounter to the news guy, who then made his morning call to the courthouse for the daily cop shop report. One item was interesting – a call the previous evening from a boat owner who reported someone had broken into his boat and stolen a bunch of accessories. So this criminal mastermind probably thought: 1) I’ll sell this anchor and get some money from this guy, and 2) set him up to sell stolen property to the sheriff. Yeah, it’s genius! Instead, he got Dean telling the sheriff the time of the encounter so they can find the video on the store’s surveillance system. But other than that, great plan.

A Walk in the Dark

Last night Dean left his truck in the “pasture,” the big flat area down at the bottom of our driveway. He’d borrowed a trailer to haul some stuff and he didn’t want to back the trailer up our steep, winding driveway. As we walked up to the house, he said, “I’ll drive the Honda down to my truck in the morning.”

Me: “Drive? It would take all of a minute to walk.”

Dean: “Yeah, but it’s dark when I leave and there could be bears.”

Me: “I take the dogs out after dark every single night.”

Dean: . . . . . 

Me: “Keys for the Honda are in the basket by the phone.”

Sure enough, this morning the Honda is down in the pasture. I noticed that when I took the dogs outside first thing this morning. In the dark. 

Accio Chai Tea!

The summer people usually leave around Labor Day, so until next year I’ll probably be spared scenes like this: a grocery cart parked squarely across the entrance to the coffee and tea aisle, blocking anyone else from entering. A summer woman walking down the aisle, manicured finger pointing at the shelves while she mutters “chai tea, chai tea, chai tea, chai tea, chai tea.” She finds the chai tea, walks to the cart that’s blocking the aisle, throws the tea in and moves on to park her cart across the end of the next aisle. She walks down the aisle with her finger in the air, pointing at the shelves: “tomato paste, tomato paste, tomato paste, tomato paste, tomato paste.” Another aisle, blocked, finger in the air, pointing: “Dijon mustard, Dijon mustard, Dijon mustard, Dijon mustard, Dijon mustard.”

At this point I’m not sure if she’s blocking the end of the aisles on purpose to keep the local riffraff out while she does her mysterious shopping voodoo, or if it’s accidental and she just doesn’t know how grocery stores work.

Okay, summer lady:

1. We can all share the aisles. Really. We do it all the time.

2. Don’t glare at us when we move your cart to get down the aisle. You’re the asshole here.

3. Just look for it until you find it, or ask someone where it is. We don’t want to hear your little shopping chant all through the store.

4. If you’re trying to do a summoning charm, it’s “Accio chai tea!” And you can do it without blocking the aisle, Hermione.

Summer’s gone, but on the bright side, so are the summer people. So no more little dramas as the summer people grapple with issues involving shopping carts and aisles, beef, cheese and patience. A few will be back for ski vacations in December, but most of them will be gone until next summer. See you next year, summer people. 

Summer People Vs. Beef

Summer people always think they can find the same luxury items they’re accustomed to in the big city out here in our little blue-collar town of 4,000 people. Dean was eying a rib-eye steak in the butcher case the other day, waiting his turn as the butcher, a blunt, irascible gray-haired guy who looks like he could take a side of beef apart without resorting to knives, served the summer people ahead of him.

Summer guy: “Is that free-range beef?”

Butcher: “Not any more.”

Summer guy: “What do you mean?”

Butcher: “I mean it ain’t ranging nowhere but my butcher case now.”

Summer guy: “But is it organic? Sometimes they say organic but the pasture where they graze is treated with chemicals. Were they all grass-fed, or fed grain and supplements too? How about bovine growth hormones or antibiotics?"

Butcher: “I dunno ‘bout all that stuff, but it’s grass-fed Angus. Damn fine beef.”

Summer guy looked doubtful. “Do you have any Wagyu beef?”

Butcher: “Not here, but if go about two miles west of town, there’s a ranch that can help you out. ‘Course it’s on the hoof.”

Summer guy: “On the hoof?”

Butcher: “Still walkin’ around. Still free-range, you might say.”

Summer guy’s looking a little nervous and confused by now. “Okay, ummm . . . do you have any prime rib?”

Butcher: “Yup. Twenty bucks a pound.”

Wow. The usual price for prime rib around here is $10 a pound, and on sale it's usually around $6.50.

The butcher leaned forward over his case with a conspiratorial, “you look like nice folks so I tell you what I’ll do” expression.

Butcher: “Tell ya what. Buy a nice hunk and I’ll make it fifteen bucks a pound.”

Summer guy: “Uh, sure. Okay.”

Summer guy took his overpriced prime rib and now it’s Dean’s turn. The butcher turns to him with a smile. Hey, a familiar face. A regular customer. A local. Dean always asks him to cut our prime rib (when it's on sale), and he likes it “nicely marbled, small fat cap.” To which the butcher always nods approvingly, as if to say, “there’s a guy who knows his meat.”

Butcher: “What can I do for you?”

Dean: “I’d like a nice rib-eye, good marbling, small fat rim.”

Butcher: “Sure thing,” as he reaches into the butcher case. “How ‘bout this one?”

Dean: “I dunno. What pasture was it raised in?”


Summer people also have issues with cheese and patience.  

Summer People Vs. Cheese

Summer people aren’t used to shopping like regular people. In fact, some of them don’t appear to be used to shopping for anything at all, except perhaps their next wealthy spouse. They expect to hand over a list to a clerk in any store – grocery store, hardware store, WalMart – and have the clerk hunt and gather for them while they clack their French-manicured nails on their smartphones and tap their Prada-shod toes impatiently, as if to say, “It never takes this long when I send Rosita out to do the shopping.”

So Dean’s in the grocery store checkout line. It’s Friday afternoon so it’s extra-busy, with all the regulars, the summer people, weekend people and vacationers passing through. Lines are long and the clerks are checking them out as fast as they can. A summer woman walks up to the harried check-out clerk and says “show me your cheese.”

Clerk: “Cheese is at the back of the store, straight up aisle three.”

Summer woman: “Come and show me!”

Clerk: “I’m afraid I can’t. I’m checking these people out.”

Summer woman’s expression says exactly what she thinks of both the clerk and “these people.”

Summer woman: “I can’t find your cheese. Come and show me where it is.”

The clerk’s starting to look desperate but she sees a free bagger. “Bob, can you show her where the cheese is?”

Bob walks to the back of the store and both he and summer woman are back in a moment, with her giving him a lecture on all things cheese-related. “I saw THAT cheese, but surely that can’t be all you have? That’s just . . . just . . .” cheese-related terminology failed her for a moment and then she found the dreadful adjective suitable for this occasion. “That’s just REGULAR cheese.” Bob’s shrugging an apology for the regular-ness of the cheese section as she rattles off some type of artisanal cheese that she MUST HAVE. Poor Bob can only shrug.

A couple of years ago I joked about summer people wanting artisanal cheese salted with the tears of the poor. I thought I was kidding.