Tag Archives: life

October 25, 2026 · 3:58 am

I vote that we vote

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Jackie Wells-Fauth

I am a serious American citizen. I believe all American citizens should vote. I just wish the process didn’t resemble the entrance line at Ellis Island. It’s involved, full of traps and can promote disease if you are there too long!

First, there is the sign up. I am always amazed when I get there and they find me on the register. I make certain I come with my driver’s license…and my passport, just in case…and oh yeah, I take along a few pieces of mail because I heard that was good…also, I have my notarized signature ready to go…and I always bring two people who were present at my birth (and those are getting harder and harder to find!).

Between all of that and a dog (who recognizes me on sight), it’s sometimes hard to fit through the door and someone always tells me that I may have overdone the “legal identification” requirement.

“Ma’am, you just need a photo ID,” they patiently remind me.

“Oh I know, but just in case, I have this affidavit from God, stating that Jesus is my savior. Would that be helpful?”

Once I’ve established that I am who I say I am (and why would anyone lie about being me?), they hand me a clean, crisp ballot and direct me to a small booth and that’s when I really begin to sweat. First, because I have claustrophobia and those little cardboard dividers are very small. It takes me back to elementary school when they put those around us so we wouldn’t cheat. In vain, have I tried to convince the pollsters that no one would want to cheat off of my ballot.

And that brings me to my second problem: Who and what do I vote for? My first instinct is always—when in doubt, mark C. Except in most cases, they don’t have a C choice. My father always said if you mark all one party or the other, it means you were too lazy to study the choices. He knew me so well!

And that means every time I stand in that little cubicle, I’m asking myself if it was John Smith who promised lower taxes (but didn’t say how) or Jane Jones who was going to bring in new businesses (but didn’t say what)? Now, I don’t want you to think I just randomly pick someone. I generally vote for the best-looking one. Oh, wait a minute! You’re not supposed to do that either!

By now, that little cardboard divider is really beginning to close in and I’ve reached the worse part of the ballot—the hell that is initiated measures and Constitutional Amendments. Who thinks this is a good idea? I can barely tell you the difference between them, let alone read all the political jibberish and make a decision about the best ones. In vain, do I get a sample ballot and explanations of the issues. I make myself a cheat sheet and when I get in that little booth, with the walls closing in, I start second-guessing my choices.

“Now, is this necessary or will it trap us into the billionaires’ clutches?” And even worse, “If I vote yes does that mean it changes or does it stay the same? And why are the only choices Yes or No? Why don’t they have “I don’t know” as a selection?”

In the end, I submit my ballot, secretly, (so no one knows how I voted) and I always hope the sweat marks will dry before they count the votes.

I go home, fix myself a nice, soothing cup of tea and shut off the news. I’ve had enough stress, I don’t want to hear progress reports! Just tell me the results when everything is counted and I’ll try to be satisfied.

After all the pain and agony, the main thing that counts, of course, is that I voted…which entitles me to complain about what the government does that I don’t like. I would wish the same kind of fun for you!

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October 10, 2026 · 3:48 am

Zoomba with a Roomba

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Jackie Wells-Fauth

I probably shouldn’t admit this, because someone is sure to question my sanity (like that hasn’t been done before) but I carry on a running fight with a household appliance. I have a confrontational relationship with my Roomba, which is what I call my automatic floor sweeper, even though that’s not the brand name of this one!

I’m well aware that the fact that I take the trouble to fight with my floor sweeper indicates that I have too much time on my hands, but everybody has to take a stand on something—I simply choose to do it with the Roomba!

If you have never used an automatic floor sweeper—good for you; cherish your broom. But, for those of us who have been so foolish as to install one, let me explain how it works. The stand for the Roomba sits in one corner of the living room. The round body of the sweeper sits on the base of the stand and charges when not in use. To operate it, you simply press the home button on the top and the sweeper moves out onto the floor, turning round and round, its little brushes picking up the dirt as it goes. Simple, right? Not for me!

The most unnerving part about the Roomba is that it talks to you. I will say that my broom has never done that! I have long argued against machines that mimic the human voice. They aren’t fooling anyone. They have limited language. My Roomba has a few choice phrases and is talented at getting herself into situations so she can use them.

Press the on button and she immediately backs out over your feet, announcing, “Starting to clean.” The first thing she does in my house is go under the media table and tangle herself in the cords. I believe she is having an unnatural relationship with it! As the sound of the television goes off, Roomba can be heard announcing, “Impediment detected.” She doesn’t add, “Ha ha! I unplugged your television system and now it will take you three hours and a half a dozen tearful calls to the provider to set it up again.” She might as well, though. Because if I am not smart enough to block that table with everything but the kitchen sink, that is just what will happen.

Rugs are her favorite meal. I admit, I don’t replace my rugs as often as I should. That is not an excuse for her to grab a loose thread, wind it securely around her working parts while unraveling the rug and then announce blithely, “Tangle detected.” No kidding, half the rug is now one long string around her engine and I am in for an hour of trying to pull it back out, calling her a lot of names (besides Roomba) while I do. If this babe had been around when Rapunzel was letting down her hair, it would have snatched her bald!

The worse part, however, is when I find myself talking to her like an unsatisfactory employee. “Just a minute, Cookie, you’ve been past this spot three times and there is still some grass on the floor. What’s the deal?” I pick it up, move it over and set it down as it is announcing, “Impediment detected. Please re-position and press continue.” “Oh, I’ll reposition you, alright!” (No I don’t know what I meant by that.)

“Did you go through this section at all?” I will demand, pointing to the cookie crumbs and various cooking items I never pick up as I’m working in the kitchen. She swivels her little body around at that point and announces, “Returning to base. Time to charge.”

That’s when I find myself chasing a small, round appliance through the house yelling, “You aren’t done! Get back here right now.” By the time I get that out, she is back at the base and has activated the vacuum to clean out her dust bin. She’s a quick little thing when she thinks she is done.

And usually, it ends with her announcing, “Malfunction, please check bin.” Oh great, she picked up something along the way (lord knows it wasn’t dust) that has blocked the vacuum cleaner. That means I will have to manually deconstruct the vacuum system, scattering dirt everywhere to find the pen, grocery receipt, ect., that is blocking the way. “There!” I announce, “I have got everything cleaned out. And you are going to clean up this whole mess, young lady!”

So, if you hear yelling coming from my house, yes, I am involved in an argument, but it probably isn’t with any human source. It just means the Roomba has struck again!

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October 1, 2026 · 4:47 am

Giving it up

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Jackie Wells-Fauth

No, I’m not giving up writing, so I hope you really didn’t have your hopes up. The title is appropriate; the subject, however, is not my writing!

It so happens I was listening to a monologue from Bill Engvall. I love his straight from the hip humor and occasionally, I get the feeling that he and I might think alike (no insult intended, Bill). He was talking about the things that he had decided to give up because he is older (and wiser, perhaps) than he was before. This idea struck me as a good one!

Now, this might be as far as we go in our similarities, because he was talking about not watching his cholesterol, and eating Lucky Charms to give him life meaning. The things I would like to give up because of my advancing age are somewhat different.

I would like to give up scales. Surely at my advanced age, I am shrinking, not growing, right? Why must I then have the every morning downer of stepping on the scale and having it blatantly lie to me about how much I weigh? I have frequent dreams about pigging out on doughnuts—lots of filling and icing—and using the scale for a plate. Take that, you heartless numbers bag!

I would like to give up medical checkups. Yes, yes, I know. These are conducted for our own good and they keep us strong and healthy into our distant years. Blah, blah blah! There is nothing more upsetting than taking off one’s clothes so that the body can be poked, prodded and otherwise invaded and then be told, “Well, it doesn’t look good, but we’ll study it for a month or two and if you’re still around, we’ll let you know!” Just do the test and can I have a drumroll please? Give me the answer now!

I would like to give up phones. Not just the beasts hanging on the wall, though. Those phones have been reduced to the status of “If I Answer This Call, It Will Be A Hoax, Con, Sales pitch, etc.” No one, who still has one of those, ever answers it on the first ring and generally regrets answering it at all. Just leave me a message—if I feel so inclined, I’ll call you back, but you probably shouldn’t wait by the phone.

I would also like to give up those little handheld monsters that can do everything from make phone calls to paying bills to making out your will and driving your car. Tell the truth, am I the only one it makes nervous to know that I can wave that thing (provided I don’t have my nose stuck in it) over any electrical appliance and it conveys my hard-earned cash to someone else? There is something about handing over that foldable bill with the presidents’ pictures on it that gives me more security than a small machine that can not only make me trip over my feet but take a “selfie” of it!

I would like to give up wheat bread. Certainly, at my age, I should be able to choose the type of bread I want. I hate having a waitress ask me what kind of toast I want, and having to whisper, “white,” so the people around me don’t hear and judge me. Wheat bread is not as moist as white bread and in addition, it doesn’t make as pretty a piece of French toast or toad-in-the-hole! Is there no way to get the benefits of wheat bread without having to actually EAT wheat bread? Is every scientist working on things like cancer cures, when they could be helping me with this? (Come to think of it, keep working on the cancer cure.)

I would like to give up AI. I don’t want to take an automatic survey, I don’t want to press fourteen buttons to get the opportunity to speak to a person, and I don’t want AI judging whether my problem is important enough for their systems. I don’t need to see pictures of dead people reanimated and I don’t wish to watch fifteen minutes in a movie, that are all an AI generated car chase or epic battle. Let’s do those things the old-fashioned way, by wrecking cars and injuring extras! I realize this is a dangerous thing to put down on paper, because some AI configuration is going to read it, find my house and arrange an “artificially simulated” accident for me, but I’ll take the chance!

The final thing I would like to give up is arthritis. Who would have thought just a few years ago, that my fingers would ache by the time I was finished spewing my weekly nonsense? Who would have thought getting up from a chair would require five minutes of repositioning? The meanest joke God can pull on an old person is to hit them right in the joints with some finely honed arthritis. I really want to give that up!

I could probably think of a hundred other things I’d like to give up with my advancing age and so could you. But, like Bill, my time on this subject is limited and so now, I would like to give up this rant! Have a good week.

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September 25, 2026 · 6:38 am

Insecure Security

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Jackie Wells-Fauth

I have done quite a bit of traveling in my life, mostly with Roy. I very much enjoy all the places we go (well, maybe not the campgrounds) but I will admit there is one thing I will not miss when my traveling days are through: security checks. Whether it’s into a building or across a border, I admit those uniforms and badges make me nervous.

Now I want to make it clear that I am not smuggling guns or drugs (although I think my picture is on the Crest wanted posters for trying to smuggle an illegally large tube of toothpaste through airport security) but there is something about security points that bring out the worst in me.

I’m a nervous joker. When I am uneasy, I make jokes at the worst possible times—like in doctor’s offices or during a job interview. I’m uncomfortable, so I make a remark about an embarrassing rash or I talk to a prospective employer about how I might have left my last job due to an unfortunate shortage in my cash box at the end of the day. They are jokes and the people I make them to usually realize they’re jokes, but it tends to make them wonder about me.

But the worst is when I am in a security line and they are all looking at me. I try hard not to make jokes about bombs in my handbag and I smile and hope I don’t look like the sort of person who would be smuggling a kilo of cocaine in my sock. But I am nervous nonetheless.

My first time going through JFK Airport in New York City, my briefcase caused quite a stir. It was my dreamed-of trip to New York and I had really gone heavy on the souvenirs. As my briefcase went through their scanner, it set off alarms all over the place, and suddenly, there were armed guards standing over me calmly demanding that I open the briefcase. I was so rattled, I couldn’t unlock it! At last, frantically sweating bullets, I got the locks undone and opened the lid to reveal…my souvenir mugs. They put their guns back in the holsters and I put my heart back into my chest and we all went our merry ways. No jokes necessary.

I feel bad for border guards. They have to determine within a few questions and observations if you are a simple tourist looking for a good time or whether you just look  like a simple tourist so you can smuggle drugs, weapons and assorted terrorists into the country. On our recent trip to Canada, the border guard made the decision to search our trunk. I don’t know what motivated him to do this, but what he got was a trunk full of my hand-washed underwear, laid out in the trunk to dry. I don’t know what he was thinking, but I know he did not linger back there!

And then of course, there is the time I unintentionally propositioned a very nice border guard in Ireland. Last year I was in an airport in Dublin and as I went through security, I nearly hanged myself trying to take off my jacket without removing my shoulder bag first.

“One thing at a time, love,” said the security guard in a heavy Irish lilt.

Flustered by the line, the foreign system and his very Irish voice reminding me I was far from home, I answered, “Thanks! What else do you want me to take off?”

Now, before your mind goes to the gutter, I was actually thinking about things like shoes, but I will admit that the astonished look on the guard’s face was rather memorable. And it was my only time (I hope) that I will accidentally proposition a security guard.

I should have just made the joke about the bomb in my handbag, right?

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September 10, 2026 · 3:04 am

A Cane Mutiny

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Jackie Wells-Fauth

Some people do not care for canes, disliking not only the inconvenience, but also just the need for one. I don’t always need a cane, but when I do, I have always been very grateful.

My only complaint has been the fact that the cane mutinies every so often. If I brace it against a chair, it flops over, if I hitch it to a table, it always crashes and if I lean it against a wall, it invariably falls, forcing me to do another thing I can’t do: lean over to pick it up!

After my recent knee surgery, I have kept a couple of canes pretty close, and when I went on vacation, I brought them along; the mutiny-prone cane and a heavier, less flighty one that can be handy. The only time I really felt I needed a cane, however, was when we were in the mountains, where I can sometimes feel a little unsteady.

So when we climbed up to a walkway overlook near the Continental Divide, I brought the mutiny cane along. I was so impressed with the view, I thought I needed to get a picture, so I leaned the cane against the railing…the open-barred railing. Of course, the cane immediately slipped through the bars, bounced on its rubber tip against the rocks and disappeared in the brush below, completely out of sight.

“Oh dear!” exclaimed the wife of a couple who were on the walkway as well. But I was not bothered. That cane had mutinied one time too many. As far as I was concerned, it could get eaten by the bears. Served it right.

While I was thinking these things and writing the cane off as lost, the husband of the other couple suddenly exclaimed, “Oh, there it is!” And he pointed to a spot some distance from the walkway.

That’s when my husband mutinied. He went down to the lowest part of the walkway and began testing the railing, looking for a place to swing a leg over. I was horrified. He wasn’t really going to risk his neck over a cheap cane that wouldn’t be lost if it had behaved!

As he was scrambling over that railing like an Olympic athlete, I was quietly saying, “Roy, don’t do that. It’s risky. The cane isn’t worth it. I have another one.” I didn’t want the other couple to think I was an hysterical idiot, so I spoke calmly—I think.

But in my head, I was screaming, “What are you doing, you idiot? Are you insane? You’re going to break a leg and then you will just stay there. I’m not coming to get you, do you understand? I will simply leave you here for the bears and drive away!” That last was an empty threat; I’m terrified of driving in the mountains.

By this time, Roy had dropped to the ground and retrieved the cane. He set it up on the deck and then looked for a place to scramble back up onto the walkway. He tried first at the place where he had rescued the cane. He was going to do it, too, except just as he swung his foot up and over, it hit the post and knocked him back to the ground, much to our horror.

“That’s it!” my inner voice was shrieking, “He’s broken a leg or a hip or something and we will have to fashion a make-shift stretcher and rappel him down the mountain!”

By now, he had returned to the spot where he had gone over in the first place and was climbing on the rock and this time, got his leg over and climbed back on the walkway. I was furious!

“I won’t say thank you,” I snapped, “because you were crazy to do it.” The other man, who had hung around, I think, to see if he could be of help, turned away to hide a smirk. I wanted to hit him with the cane: After all, he was the troublemaker who discovered where the cane was and then couldn’t keep his mouth shut!

“Have we got any Band-Aids,” Roy asked next. And pulling up one pantleg, he displayed a long, bloody scrape on his leg.

“I knew it! I knew you would get hurt doing that crazy stunt!” I said, feeling righteously justified and marching off for my first aid kit.

For the rest of the trip, I will admit I used my heavier, more sturdy cane. I was too mad at the cane that had mutinied and caused all the trouble to trust it. As for the 70-something, Olympic athlete wannabe, I don’t have a spare husband, so I’m going to have to keep him. After all, someone has to drive us out of the mountains!

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September 3, 2026 · 2:14 am

Even Pilate washed his hands

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Jackie Wells-Fauth

Yes, yes, I know, Pilate was symbolically washing his hands of Jesus, but the Bible does say he washed his hands. And that gives me a good entry into the topic of my column this week; washing hands.

On a road trip recently, I was reminded of one of my pet peeves and that is people who don’t wash their hands—particularly, people who are using the public bathroom—you know, where there are signs everywhere that say, “Please wash your hands”?

I know I should be minding my own business in there, but it always raises my blood pressure when I hear someone else in a public bathroom who flushes the toilet and leaves the bathroom without washing their hands. Even worse, is the person who leaves the bathroom without flushing the toilet or washing their hands! Then of course, they proceed to touch everything I need to touch, starting with the bathroom door!

This happened on the road last week. I was in the bathroom stall, minding my own business, when the person next to me got up, with much audible sighing and mumbling, and left the stall and the bathroom. No comforting sounds of a flushed toilet and no comforting whoosh of water in the sink!

I finished, flushed my toilet, flushed the nasty one in the next stall and then scrubbed my hands at the sink. When I left the bathroom, having used the tail of my shirt to open the door, I refrained from standing in the dining area and bellowing, “All right, who is the farm animal who not only did not flush the toilet, but also left without benefit of soap and water on their hands?”

I did, however, after having gone through the buffet line, drown my hands with a pocket-sized Purel—one for each hand. One can never be too careful!

One of the first responsibilities I had as a child was to flush the toilet. Then, when I got old enough not to flood the bathroom with my efforts, I was left to wash my hands on my own. So I, and most people know what you are supposed to do. And we are so lucky.

Think about it: back in the bad old days, they didn’t have the option of flushing the toilet. They just sat on the bench and enjoyed the remains left by everyone else for the last few years. They also didn’t have toilet paper, so the outdated Sears Catalog did its outgoing duty, thus making their hands even more dingy. After that, you wiped your nose on your sleeve and went off to play, blissfully unaware of the germ cloud following you.

That cannot excuse the people today. I see modern bathroom fixtures being put into people’s homes. They should make flushing the toilet and washing your hands a pleasure.

Have I ever, in my own home, left the bathroom without washing my hands? Of course, because the phone and the doorbell always go off while I’m in there. However, I already know what bacterial communities are thriving in my own personal bathroom. And I know enough not to touch anyone until I have found some soap. It also explains my pathological need to constantly Lysol the phone receiver!

However, having said that, I am meticulous about washing up after I use the public bathroom. As for flushing, that probably explains why so many places are installing self-flushing toilets. Those do scare me a little; frequently they go off while I am still seated, making me wonder if I’m going to go down as well! But they do solve one problem.

Now, if they could install a device that blocks the door and repeats over and over, “No exit, without hands washed,” I would be happy. I imagine some people would sue for kidnapping, but washing their hands would be the only ransom they had to pay.

So, my sad little rant about washing hands now ends. But I do find it a little ironic that I am using Pilate as the poster child for washing hands!

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August 20, 2026 · 2:27 am

What happens when therapy gets physical

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Jackie Wells-Fauth

You know those round, silver disability buttons you can push to open a door? Those are a remarkably handy invention. And it’s one I always thanked heaven I didn’t have to use. In fact, I thought it would be kind of a lazy act for a person who can perfectly well open a door to push those silver buttons. Hold that thought.

After the rigors of having my knee replaced, I was passed on to a process known as physical therapy. Everyone told me, “Oh, just you wait! Physical therapy is also known as torture. You are in for a horrible experience.” Well, I’m still waiting for that myth to happen!

Now, I don’t know how many of you have been in the physical therapy section of our local hospital, but I have spent enough time there lately to consider myself a bit of an expert on the topic. In fact, I have learned several truths about physical therapy.

For instance, they don’t mind at all if you whine. I go in frequently (early in the morning usually) and I always feel like I’m sacrificing myself by going. After all, that’s a lot of work and my knee is sore, and I’m tired, and I’d rather go out to breakfast. As I said, they don’t mind at all if you whine. They also don’t listen. They have heard it all, and they further know that in order to get me past the whining, they are going to have to (as my grandmother would say) turn a deaf ear.

Now, that’s not to say they are unsympathetic. They are extremely sympathetic and they work hard on their facial expressions to keep it sympathetic. It’s just that if they listen to all of my complaints, and all of my whining about the machines being too heavy and my knees being too delicate, they know that in a few months’ time the machines will still be too heavy and my delicate knees will not have improved at all. And that is not the point of my being there!

Second thing I learned: there are some words they don’t know the meaning of. For instance, they seem not to know what “can’t” means. “But Kayla, I can’t stand up without using my arms.” “No Marissa, I can’t walk over those little track hurdles of yours.” “Forget it, Bobbie, I can’t bend my knee that far.” “You must be joking, Tim, I can’t go upstairs with a walker.” They apparently don’t have a definition for “can’t.” They continue to stand and look at me until I move.

And upon reflection, this part might be my own fault. After telling them I can’t do something, it is not good training for them if I turn around and do the very thing I said I “simply can’t do.” This behavior gives them the idea that I was just whining, and since I have eventually done all of those things, then I most certainly can do them! How did they know?

When you are in physical therapy, it is important to keep your eye on the therapist, because they are kind of tricky. “Why is it so much harder to move that forty-pound weight today? I could do it last time!” I will grouse; certain I have gone backwards. “That’s because I put up the 60 pound one today,” will come the answer. I never saw that coming.

And that brings us to my biggest observation: the ankle weights. They insist on having me do some of the exercises with an ankle weight. In vain have I told them that I will not be wearing ankle weights in normal activities. And there again, you have to keep your eye on them. “Wow, this five-pound weight is heavier than I remember.” “That’s because it’s ten pounds today.”

The biggest observation I have made about physical therapists is that they have to have a tremendous amount of patience. They have put up with my whining, changed my bandages, pushed me farther than I ever thought I could go, and because they did it all without strangling me, I have a new knee, and I am on the road to taking full advantage of it.

And that brings me back to those silver disability buttons to open the doors. I normally don’t use them, because they are for those who truly cannot open doors. However, after a good physical therapy session, I always push those buttons; not because I really need to, but because I figure that on those occasions, I’ve earned it!

Want to feel better in a real hurry? These guys have the answer. Thank you, physical therapists, I couldn’t have done it without you!

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August 13, 2026 · 2:46 am

Deep thoughts on deep-cleaning

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Jackie Wells-Fauth

I found a dead bug in the bottom of my stove this week.

But, I’m getting a little ahead of my story. Let’s go all the way back to the beginning. A long, long time ago…

As a teacher, I have been trained over the years, even in retirement, to conduct an annual, ritualistic deep clean of my house. I don’t know what there is about it, but the idea of returning to the classroom always seemed to spur me into making sure the house was in good shape…a cleaning that was to last the entire year and never be thought of again during the nine-month rush of lesson plans, corrected papers and gradebooks, and dramatic performances—on the stage and in the classroom!

I know what you’re thinking—one cleaning a year does not make for a clean house. I agree with you; but one true, deep cleaning a year is about all I can scrape together the enthusiasm for, since, as I have mentioned before, I’m not a cleaning fan and school duties did keep me very busy.

I have since ditched the teaching responsibilities, but the inclination or habit, if you will, to commit—I mean, conduct a deep cleaning of the house every August is very strong. The weather heats up and I’m looking at dresser drawers that won’t close and a freezer that won’t shut, and I’m thinking it’s time to do that thing we do every August. (I don’t even like to say “deep clean”.)

Now, when I say—that phrase—I don’t mean sweeping floors and dusting the furniture. Oh no, I mean cleaning out closets, defrosting the freezer and cleaning behind cupboards and appliances.

It has been suggested to me that at the hallowed age of 70, perhaps I shouldn’t be turning mattresses and dragging around heavy furniture in the August heat. I would definitely agree, but I can’t leave this sort of thing for my lovely housekeeper: one look at the frost buildup, confusing array of half-emptied frozen vegetable bags and tinfoil-wrapped packages of mystery meat in my freezer and my very fine housekeeper would quit! No, the deep-cleaning is the cross I must bear.

But I digress. We now come to the kitchen deep-clean this fall…and the bug. After wiping down cupboards and scraping the unidentified gunk off the refrigerator door, I was ready to face the stove. My stove is located in the middle of two counters and there is enough of a distressing gap between stove and counter to allow spills. The first time I encountered this, I had been in the house for several years when it finally occurred to me to clean behind the stove. The two were so glued together with food residue, that some of the molding around the counter had attached itself permanently to the stove. Now, I try to get to it at least once a year—during the deep clean.

So, as is my August habit, I pulled out the stove and discovered a year’s diary of cooking disasters, written on the sides of the stove and the counter.

The sides of the stove where they joined with the counter were a positive artwork of cooking dribbles and drab running all the way to the floor. The worst was a drooled sheet of red spaghetti sauce that looked like I’d been making blood stew for Dracula. And it was while I was scrubbing the months-old spaghetti sauce off the stove and floor (not happily) that I happened to notice the bug. It was lying in the spaghetti sauce and was glued to it on the floor. It was lying on it’s back and had all six legs sticking straight in the air.

Now, in normal circumstances I might suppose it had drowned in the spaghetti sauce. But since I am a little paranoid about my cooking, I thought its position suggested that it might have tried the spaghetti sauce and was poisoned. I quickly cleared away the evidence, but it might be a while before I serve spaghetti again!

Next year, during deep cleaning—Roy gets to clean behind the stove. He won’t care what killed the bugs, as long as they are dead!

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August 6, 2026 · 12:51 am

Letting It Hang

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Jackie Wells-Fauth

My husband and I are in agreement on a great many things. That probably explains why we are still married. However, I will admit that we are a mixed marriage on a small number of issues and this month I have been reminded of one of them. If Shakespeare were to state the problem, he would say, “To hang, or not to hang, that is the question.”

No, I’m not talking about an execution; I’m talking about the laundry. Roy insists that the smart and economic thing to do is to hang clothes outside to dry. I, on the other hand, from a very young age in Sunday school, have always believed that if God intends us to hang clothes out on the line to dry, He would not have invented the dryer! That is such a clear sign from above that laundry lines are evil!

It is obvious to me on several levels that Roy did not grow up hanging out the laundry. He had two sisters and a hard-working mother and laundry is clearly “women’s work.” That means he never had the pleasure of standing out at the laundry line trying to wrestle a sheet over that flimsy string in high wind. I still remember the time my father looked at the laundry after I had finished slapping on the clothes pins and remarked, “It looks like it was hung by an indifferent drunk.” He was half right: I was definitely indifferent!

The only time I remember getting in trouble in elementary school was when we were reading The Long Winter. When they described laundry day, I blurted out, “What? Are they crazy?” The teacher pursed her lips disapprovingly and told me that further observations on my part would not be necessary; in that way teachers have of letting you know that the next “observation” will be shared with your parents.

I shut up that day, but seriously, those people took clothes outside in the middle of a blizzard-after-blizzard-winter and hung them up in the freezing cold! Then, they brought in the frozen remains and hung them behind the stove so they could both thaw and then dry! Am I the only one that thinks this does not make sense? Just let me sit in the cold shed and twist hay into burning sticks—at least that activity had a useful purpose!

Now, I should state here that when Roy insists the laundry be hung outside, he is willing to do the hanging. But I am not willing to deal with the results. Let’s start with the towels. I don’t care how much the wind is blowing, towels always come off the clothesline with all the softness of a pan scraper! I went to take a shower the other day and I had to go down four levels to hit a towel that I had washed and put in the dryer.

I think we may have reached an agreement on towels, however. Even he can’t deny that a towel dried outside has all the desired textural comfort of sand in your shoes. I see that in his last round of laundry, the towels actually made it to the dryer and not the line.

And so we go on to the rest of the clothes. Now, on a personal note, I like my neighbors far too well to subject them to the sight of my bedraggled undergarments hanging on the line like dispirited and grungy flags. On top of which, we have the same texture issue. My sister used to dry them for ten minutes in the dryer and then hang them out. That might have taken care of the texture issue, but it didn’t take care of the “I’m way too lazy to do that much work” issue!

And that leaves my outer clothes. I will never be a snappy dresser, and I generally wear my clothes until they are pretty much falling off. But when Roy puts them on the clothesline, they come back with all the smoothness of an accordion. I am then left with two choices. I can either wear them as is and hope nobody notices, or I can iron them. Now, we all know that I am not going to go through the “sprinkle clean clothes lightly, roll them up and put them in the refrigerator (usually until they’ve picked up refrigerator odor) and then take them out and IRON them!” No thank you, I’ll just tell everyone the accordion look is in!

Until I am back to full strength from my knee surgery, Roy is in charge of the laundry, so the question of whether to hang the clothes or to conveniently throw them into the dryer which is right there, will continue to plague us. But nothing will ever change Roy’s mind that it’s more practical to hang clothes out, nor change my mind that laundry lines were meant to be seen and not used, so I guess we will remain a mixed marriage on this issue!

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July 31, 2026 · 6:12 am

Boiled Fly, Anyone?

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Jackie Wells-Fauth

Now, I know that every summer, we are inundated with flies and every summer I whine about hating them. So since it’s summer and there are flies, this column should come as no surprise to anyone!

Most of the time, I’m just irritated by their ability to annoy. They fly in my face, crawl up my clean windows and buzz when I’m trying to sleep at night. The one thing I have not written about, however, is their threat to my food supply. But this week, they even crossed that line.

I was preparing one of my favorite meals which requires a pot of boiling water to cook the pasta pockets in. I made the pockets, got the water boiling and then, took off the pan lid. I walked back to the counter, grabbed a pocket and came back to the uncovered boiling water. I threw in the pocket and then noticed there was something black on it. That made no sense! There was nothing black on the pockets!

That’s right, you guessed it. It was a fly. Now, I’m fairly certain that there was no fly on the pocket when I picked it up, so the only explanation is that the fly willingly jumped into a boiling pan of water! Isn’t that the way they used to execute people in the Dark Ages?

A full pan of boiling water and a pasta pocket that took some considerable work to make: what to do? Should I chuck the whole works and start again, or fish out the fly and pretend it never happened? Now, I’m gonna be honest; a lot of me wanted to do the second thing, but I have not yet been reduced to eating fly residue, and there was no way to be sure that Roy would be the one who got the fly-flavored pocket, so I chucked the whole thing and started again!

I try to be careful when I have food around  and it’s fly season. I cover things on the counter and try to keep the area as fly-free as possible. But those buggers have not gotten the memo that they are not welcome, and they are not particularly fussy about what they will eat.

Especially is it difficult to keep them out of drinks. I think liquid must be the fly equivalent of the Viking Valhalla, because they jump into every liquid imaginable, hot or cold! This must be a direct route to fly heaven and much preferred to being caught on a sticky tape or smashed with a flyswatter.

While I was still teaching, I had the awful habit of bringing coffee into the classroom. Knowing that flies crawling into warm liquid are at their worst in the early fall, you would have thought I would be more cautious. But on one memorable occasion, I was helping a young lady with her project, holding onto my coffee cup, and I took a sip. The minute the saturated fly touched my lips, I knew what had happened, and automatically did the reflexive thing. I spit that coffee everywhere, including all over the astonished young lady I was attempting to help. I apologized, sent her mother a note offering to clean her clothes and dumped that coffee with the fly carcass out the schoolhouse door. However, there is at least one student who does not remember me for inspiring her. She will remember me as the teacher who vomited hot coffee all over her! And it’s all that fly’s fault.

I have read reviews of restaurants where someone complains that they got a dish of something which contained a fly and they will never go to that restaurant again because of health issues, cleanliness failings, etc. However, anyone who has ever been in a South Dakota kitchen as July melts into August knows how easily this could happen…and it has nothing to do with health or cleanliness. Having said that, I would definitely send the fly-enhanced dish back, but I wouldn’t boycott the restaurant—unless I saw the cook stirring the stew with her hands!

And on that note, you are all welcome at any time for a meal at my house. I do know how to prepare most dishes without a fly as an ingredient. I will be very careful for your sake, but I do advise you to keep your eyes open. Cause you never know…the flies might have other ideas!

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