Fan Appreciation
Squirt, squirt "Are you going to buy groceries today!?" My wife yells at the top of her voice. I look in the direction of the cool splashes and see her moving her lips while using her fingers to keep her hair out of her mouth. "No I'm not going anywhere near Surrey today!" I holler back cupping my hands to form a megaphone around my mouth.
I get off the couch to go toward the kitchen and feel, this time, three shots of water. This must be important. The wife is now coming this way, but her hair is ahead of her and then to the left of her as she moves from one seemingly magnetic force field to the next. Again words rise above the constant wwwwwwwwhhhhhrrrrrr of the room but again I respond negatively to any Surrey destinations.
She points me to the cone of silence, the bathroom, and I do as directed. Now with the door closed all the rooms power down as independent motion detectors detect no life forms.
"Are you going to get groceries?" She asks while fixing her hair in the mirror.
"In Surrey? No I thought I'd go to the Value Save- On Market around the corner." I say.
"Surrey?" She questions my reflection. "Who said,....never mind! Just pick up some plastic wrap for the sandwiches were making for the church social this afternoon. O K?"
"Okay! Message received" I salute her in the mirror, click my heels together and then clap both hands together at the right side of my head, which commands a collection of rooms throughout the house to power up fans that I've hooked up to The Clapper.
I have many fans. My wife not being one of them right now. But not that kind of fan. I mean I have the air blowing and air sucking, 2000 rpm, pedestal, table top, ceiling, 10 inch, 14 inch, 24 inch, 36 inch, finger removing blurry bladed fans! All used in my effort to stay cool, and drive my wife nuts.
I don't mean to drive her nuts and lord knows this isn't my first attempt nor will it be my last attempt to inadvertently do so.
She attains this level of mental instability due in part to the fact that each conversation during this heat wave has to start with a well aimed squirt from the mister bottle. This, because verbal language skills cannot rise above the whirring drone of dozens of fans.
It's the large use of fans that keep me cool during this current heat wave. And it's because of this, spoken word is now substituted with lip reading. And to what level of intensity emitted from the nozzle of a spray bottle sets the tone of the conversing.
A floating mist carefully placed on a whispering wave of air, delivered to the cheek of your spouse is one of passion. Where as a direct couple squirts to the face commands that you must pay attention, now, and is also more likely.
Not only is annoying conversation with a spouse done away with, because of multiple fans, but so also is any clue as to having a kitchen full of fruit flies. With four and sometimes five fans in the kitchen fruit flies are a thing of the past. Oh they're probably there in your handsome kitchen recycling bucket, but the minute that lid is lifted, they are blown to,...? Don't care! It's all good my house of many fans. That is until they become silent.
She,..the wife, made me shut them off!
It was while we were wrapping up all the sandwiches for the church social with the 2500 ft. box of food film I had bought earlier that day that she,..the wife, pulled the plug. And I guess, in her defense she was right to do so. It seems, I, attempting to wrap the first plate of stinky egg salad finger sandwiches had used up half the box of food film trying to get a flat sheet with four, no five fans blowing. The food film kept folding up on itself! And I confess that I had said words that dear Sister Lofstrom, head of the Sunday School, would not of been proud of. And so it was decided to stop all the fans.
And then it was decided that I would now exercise my right to a clothing optional house (since all the kids moved out) and continue this chore in my tighty whitey's with a coffee stain on the crotch (don't ask).
Egg salad, cucumber, chicken salad and smoked salmon sandwich plates, one after the other all wrapped with expert precision whilst donning my official 'no fans no clothes food film wrapping uniform'. Working naked (almost) to help out at the church.
Things were going swimmingly,..until I went to place food scraps in the kitchen's recycling fruit fly container. A cloud, a black cloud of Biblical proportions (appropriate) rose as if angry ,and now with no wind to to hinder their annoying-ness took full advantage of getting in my face. And I, naked and vulnerable to their annoying-ness started squishing them by clapping my hands together.
All five,..no four fans in the kitchen were hooked up to The Clapper. On then off, then on again and then off again my blurry bladed fans met my unrealistic commands. My wife with her back to the situation also let Sister Lofstrom down in her verbal barrage of questions as to just what I was doing. Food film was flapping as waves of warm fast moving air tugged at its corners. Corners were lifted and removed as the on again off again onslaught continued. Fruit flys peppered mayonnaise laden finger sandwiches and stuck like a wet sneeze to a screen door. All is lost. Well not really.
Treating each infected sandwich as if it were a birthday cake we blew out most of the mayo imprisoned little black flies. The rest looked like pepper we thought, (not able to locate our glasses at the time).
And so it was, five dozen tiny sandwiches all made their way to the church social wrapped in about 2000 ft. of food film. All fans were now permanently banned from food preparation areas in our house. The fruit fly box was moved away from the kitchen and dear Sister Lofstrom expressed some unbecoming words upon trying one of our egg salad finger sandwiches down at the church social.
First the kitchen, and now the church,...I'm running out of fans.
Bob Niles
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