zanie lands in another
sticky situation
By Zanie Anne Wilder, Guest Contributor
Oh, Zanie, stay away from cold “goo” guns!
“My full name is Zanie Ann Wilder. I write for an online women’s magazine. I might have to use this experience in an upcoming story.”
The response was immediate and dripping with irony—not surprising, given all we had experienced together that evening. “That explains it! If you had told me your name before I started, I would have known you were trouble right then and there.”
Perhaps, for the benefit of those of you not there to witness the entire event, I should back up and tell you how it all began.
Since he was working a lot of overtime and gone many hours, including overnights, my wonderful husband decided I needed more than my trusty baseball bat for protection. Plus, he really wanted me to have the ability to participate in his hobby of target shooting. I had received a gun for this purpose a few years prior. But to date, I had only actually fired it three times. That was enough to convince me it was way more complicated than I wanted to enjoy. Due in large part, to the fact I could not easily work the slide or even load the dumb thing without help; nor could I remember how to take the safety off from one time to the next. I decided maybe I just liked the idea of a gun, rather than having to learn to use one myself. This was an attitude I had gotten by with, until my boys grew up and left home and were no longer around to shoot targets when their dad wanted a companion.
To this end, he surprised me with a new gun. This one came sporting a bright pink handle. It looked and felt more like a child’s toy than a real gun. But the accompanying ammunition convinced me it was real enough. When I sent a picture of it to my oldest son and told him it was really pretty, he had the nerve to immediately call and laugh at me. Then, in a condescending tone, inform me weapons were never to be referred to as pretty. I beg to differ; anything with a hot pink handle runs that risk. I decided right then and there, it was on. Any and all accessories I got for this new hobby would now have to be glamorous, as well.
In keeping with my resolve to prove a girl can have pretty equipment to use while she is busy blowing holes in pieces of paper—or in my case, the dirt surrounding the paper—I encouraged Mr. Wilder to attend a second amendment rally in a neighboring town to help me find hearing protection.
The ugly black ear muffs I saw at our first stop were not something I even wanted on my head, nor did they look comfortable enough to wear for very long. Sensing my resistance, my hubby led me on to other booths to investigate their wares. One such booth we visited displayed brightly colored molded ear plugs.
I thought, “Awesome this is exactly what I need! These will keep the loud gun pops from making my ears ring for hours on end. Most importantly, they possess the desirable trait of looking “pretty” enough to drive my son to distraction.” The latter thought almost had me giddy with anticipation.
Mr. Wilder agreed that we should each get a pair only because he had studied about different types of hearing protection and felt these would be the most comfortable to wear while engaging in our hobby. Naturally, I just knew he would be attracted to the manly-looking camouflage green, orange or even the dark blue ones. Personally, I was having a hard time deciding between the pale pink, bright yellow, or the dark purple ones. Since I was taking longer to make up my mind about the color, he paid the man, who introduced himself as Bob, and volunteered to go first as the plugs were made on the spot.
Bob began by first explaining to Mr. Wilder, that he was not to move, talk, laugh, smile or even swallow for a full three minutes after they injected the rubber molding stuff in his ear canal. At this point, I began to wonder, “Could I actually go the required amount of time without talking or laughing when it was my turn?” I finally decided, if I was allowed to at least breathe during that time, I could endure just about anything. This was a concept that would soon be tested to the fullest degree.
Inserting the small white foam plugs attached to a string way down in each of hubby’s ears canals, Bob asked his assistant, who I later learned was his wife, Debbie, to give him the dark blue my spouse had chosen. (See, I told you he would go with the manly color.) As she did, she pointed out it had been a popular color with all the men that day and they were nearly out of it. Bob examined the solid white double tubes and decided he could get one set of earplugs out of what was left in the cylinders. I wondered how they knew it contained blue because there were no apparent markings or other color on either tube, but figured they must have some small code on them I could not readily see from where I stood.
I watched in fascination, as they screwed a fresh blunt-end plastic syringe tip on this white double-barrel apparatus with a trigger at the back of a plunger. It reminded me of a small double-barrel caulk gun. Then Bob proceeded to put the tip down in my husband’s left ear canal and squeeze the trigger on the device, which caused the two separate cylinders to feed down and swirl together before coming out the tip.
I asked him why the thing needed two tubes as both sides fed into one tip before it came out. He explained one tube was the hardening agent that helped the rubbery base in the other tube to solidify so the mold was able to be removed in only three minutes. His wife, Debbie, went on to explain this was the same process that was used to make hearing aids. She told us that with as hot and humid as it had been all day keeping the stuff in a cooler, until it was needed, was a big help.
The response was immediate and dripping with irony—not surprising, given all we had experienced together that evening. “That explains it! If you had told me your name before I started, I would have known you were trouble right then and there.”
Perhaps, for the benefit of those of you not there to witness the entire event, I should back up and tell you how it all began.
Since he was working a lot of overtime and gone many hours, including overnights, my wonderful husband decided I needed more than my trusty baseball bat for protection. Plus, he really wanted me to have the ability to participate in his hobby of target shooting. I had received a gun for this purpose a few years prior. But to date, I had only actually fired it three times. That was enough to convince me it was way more complicated than I wanted to enjoy. Due in large part, to the fact I could not easily work the slide or even load the dumb thing without help; nor could I remember how to take the safety off from one time to the next. I decided maybe I just liked the idea of a gun, rather than having to learn to use one myself. This was an attitude I had gotten by with, until my boys grew up and left home and were no longer around to shoot targets when their dad wanted a companion.
To this end, he surprised me with a new gun. This one came sporting a bright pink handle. It looked and felt more like a child’s toy than a real gun. But the accompanying ammunition convinced me it was real enough. When I sent a picture of it to my oldest son and told him it was really pretty, he had the nerve to immediately call and laugh at me. Then, in a condescending tone, inform me weapons were never to be referred to as pretty. I beg to differ; anything with a hot pink handle runs that risk. I decided right then and there, it was on. Any and all accessories I got for this new hobby would now have to be glamorous, as well.
In keeping with my resolve to prove a girl can have pretty equipment to use while she is busy blowing holes in pieces of paper—or in my case, the dirt surrounding the paper—I encouraged Mr. Wilder to attend a second amendment rally in a neighboring town to help me find hearing protection.
The ugly black ear muffs I saw at our first stop were not something I even wanted on my head, nor did they look comfortable enough to wear for very long. Sensing my resistance, my hubby led me on to other booths to investigate their wares. One such booth we visited displayed brightly colored molded ear plugs.
I thought, “Awesome this is exactly what I need! These will keep the loud gun pops from making my ears ring for hours on end. Most importantly, they possess the desirable trait of looking “pretty” enough to drive my son to distraction.” The latter thought almost had me giddy with anticipation.
Mr. Wilder agreed that we should each get a pair only because he had studied about different types of hearing protection and felt these would be the most comfortable to wear while engaging in our hobby. Naturally, I just knew he would be attracted to the manly-looking camouflage green, orange or even the dark blue ones. Personally, I was having a hard time deciding between the pale pink, bright yellow, or the dark purple ones. Since I was taking longer to make up my mind about the color, he paid the man, who introduced himself as Bob, and volunteered to go first as the plugs were made on the spot.
Bob began by first explaining to Mr. Wilder, that he was not to move, talk, laugh, smile or even swallow for a full three minutes after they injected the rubber molding stuff in his ear canal. At this point, I began to wonder, “Could I actually go the required amount of time without talking or laughing when it was my turn?” I finally decided, if I was allowed to at least breathe during that time, I could endure just about anything. This was a concept that would soon be tested to the fullest degree.
Inserting the small white foam plugs attached to a string way down in each of hubby’s ears canals, Bob asked his assistant, who I later learned was his wife, Debbie, to give him the dark blue my spouse had chosen. (See, I told you he would go with the manly color.) As she did, she pointed out it had been a popular color with all the men that day and they were nearly out of it. Bob examined the solid white double tubes and decided he could get one set of earplugs out of what was left in the cylinders. I wondered how they knew it contained blue because there were no apparent markings or other color on either tube, but figured they must have some small code on them I could not readily see from where I stood.
I watched in fascination, as they screwed a fresh blunt-end plastic syringe tip on this white double-barrel apparatus with a trigger at the back of a plunger. It reminded me of a small double-barrel caulk gun. Then Bob proceeded to put the tip down in my husband’s left ear canal and squeeze the trigger on the device, which caused the two separate cylinders to feed down and swirl together before coming out the tip.
I asked him why the thing needed two tubes as both sides fed into one tip before it came out. He explained one tube was the hardening agent that helped the rubbery base in the other tube to solidify so the mold was able to be removed in only three minutes. His wife, Debbie, went on to explain this was the same process that was used to make hearing aids. She told us that with as hot and humid as it had been all day keeping the stuff in a cooler, until it was needed, was a big help.
I was so absorbed by what I was learning that when Bob suddenly jumped, so did I. He simultaneously jerked the apparatus further away from Mr. Wilder. It took a moment to realize what had happened. The tip seemed to have exploded, spewing stuff everywhere and engulfing my husband’s outer ear in blue gummy stuff. All of the people standing around to watch froze and stared in shock, as my husband sat perfectly still like a statue. Bob exclaimed in a mortified tone to Debbie that the tip had just blown out. So began a steady stream of profuse apologizes and statements of how he had done this for years and this had never happened to him before. This would become his mantra for the rest of the evening. He and Debbie insisted he had done hundreds of ear plugs, including several that day and this had never, ever happened.
When he moved to lay the still oozing gun on the table, I had my first good look at hubby’s ear. There he sat on a stool, under the rapt scrutiny of several onlookers with a big wad of stringy blue stuff streaming down off his head like an odd-looking earring. As Bob continued his mantra and examining his gun to figure out what had caused the blow out, the goo dripped in slow motion almost down to hubby’s shoulder. It looked like dark blue melted mozzarella cheese.
Poor Bob just kept apologizing profusely, trying to stop the lava-like flow slowly oozing its way towards hubby’s shoulder. He swiped the biggest glob dangling from his ear. But it was still in his sideburn, covering his ear, and continuing to ooze downward. Bob put some sanitizer on his fingers and patted the biggest bulk of it in the opening of hubby’s ear.
Recovering from my surprise, I giggled, which elicited a glare from my husband. I knew he wanted me to stop laughing at him, but I just could not help myself. I managed to tame it to a snicker. For once, I was glad he could not talk for a number of minutes.
He was forced to sit perfectly still while this still dangling goop, solidified. Bob explained once it hardened, it would easily come off, but if you messed with it while it was still wet it became embedded in any surface it touched and then it was a nightmare to remove. This was a fact I would soon become all too acquainted with. I assured him it would be okay. He continued to examine his tube and then got more flustered when he realized, because of the explosion, there was now not enough blue left in the tubes to do the second ear.
Still unable to speak, my husband gestured to the ones on the table and looked at me beseechingly. I knew exactly what he wanted. We haven’t been married for 30+ years, without mastering a little unspoken communication. I immediately told Bob that we were really okay if they didn’t match. It might help us to distinguish right from left that way. Bob picked up the little sample tray with its array of colored samples and held it over for my husband to point. I suggested he choose a pretty pink or purple for his second one, but he chose the manly orange instead. Big surprise there!
Obligingly, Debbie opened the cooler and retrieved the white tubes containing the orange mix and laid them on the table.
While she was digging in the cooler, she asked me if I had chosen a color yet. I told her I wanted the sunny yellow. She took it out of the cooler for Bob and laying it on the table, announced she was going to the concession booth to get supper and a bottle of water. Then she left Bob to his own devices. I suspect, she just wanted to go where she could have a good laugh and not suffer either of our husbands’ glares.
Still shaking his head and mumbling, “This has never happened to me before!” Bob proceeded to put a new tip on one of the tubes Debbie had laid out for him and inject the stuff in hubby’s right ear. While he was doing this, I was avidly watching the left to be sure that stuff did not drop onto the shirt I would be responsible for scrubbing out later.
With the concoction now hardened, Bob carefully removed it by pulling on the white strings attached to the stopper under the now solidified rubber, and laid it on the table. He proceeded to scrape the dried strings of goo off his outer ear and face. Not able to resist any longer, I giggled again. Once the required time was up for the second one and it was safely out of hubby’s right ear. He immediately swiveled around on his stool and malevolently smiled at me, wiggling his eyebrows for affect. He said, “Get it out of your system now honey, because you’re next.”
That sobered me up in a hurry. I took another step back, debating whether I really needed earplugs after all. The ugly black things were looking prettier all the time. I fleetingly imagined a pair of those with a hot pink bow tied on the muff part. However, after considering that my husband had already paid for these, and being the good sport that I am—or just out of simple stupidity—I gamely stepped forward for my turn. I did warn Bob that it had better not end up in my hair. I had worked hard over the course of several years to now have hair well below my shoulders, and I certainly did not want that gooey junk in it.
Bob assured us they had been using the same bag of tips all day long, and was sure what had happened to Mr. Wilder was a fluke and could not possibly happen a second time.
Asking again what color I had settled on. I told him I needed something pretty like the pale pink, but when I thought about searching for earplugs in my bag with its black interior, I settled for the lemony yellow.
As Bob inserted the tip in my left ear, he assured my husband that there wasn’t any chance of another exploding tip since he had never had one do it before. Nevertheless, I pulled my hair over toward my right shoulder as best I could.
Soon I felt the cool stuff enter my ear. Then to my horror, I felt something lightly hit my left shoulder. I knew from this sensation and Bob’s swift movements that the impossible had just happened again. I quickly reached my right hand around to my left temple to grab any stray hair that might still be near my left shoulder in order to pull it further from the stuff that I just knew had landed on my best shirt.
Imagine my surprise, when instead of feeling the warm dry hair above my ear, my hand landed right in the middle of a big cold blob of gummy stuff! Having returned moments before with another couple that were obviously friends of theirs, Debbie belatedly warned me not to touch it. Looking at my hand now covered with white and yellow bird poop-looking stuff, I realized the tube had exploded upwards instead of just down like it had on Mr. Wilder. Debbie handed me a series of wet and dry paper towels to wipe my hand off. While both rushed to assure me that it would harden in a moment, and then it would just come right out, as long as I did not touch it while it was still wet . . . at least, they were pretty sure it would.
Silently, I fumed “What! You’re only pretty sure now? You were sure earlier when the biggest consequence would have been shaving a sideburn!” My expression must have betrayed my thoughts, because immediately, they pointed out that I had grabbed a blob of it and that might change things. Then their words from earlier came like a lightning bolt to my mind: “Usually, if you touch it while it is wet, it stays permanently attached to whatever it touches.”
I realized, as I sat there, reminding myself to breathe in and out—slowly—so I did not hyperventilate—or pass out, that I might be in a sticky situation here. I tried to remember if my stylist, Sara, had said anything about going out of town for the weekend, as by this time it was about 6 PM on a Saturday night. I contemplated just how much begging and groveling I would have to do to get her to come to the shop and cut nearly all my hair off before church the next morning.
Meanwhile, both Bob and Debbie proceeded to examine the tips and tubes littering the table and debate why this had happened twice in a row. They decided it had to have been a series of bad tips.
‘Really! Now they decide that!’
Only then, did they elect to switch to a completely different bag of supposedly non-defective tips.
I watched, aghast, as they selected one and screwed it on the double cylinder of stuff. ‘What? There was an alternate bag of tips available the entire time?’ These thoughts practically seethed through my mind as he came around to my right ear. Lucky for both of us, that one went perfectly. Only then did Bob set the timer on his phone for the requisite three minutes. Before he went to re-examine his white tubes and tips, he reminded me not to move, talk or swallow, no matter what.
Seriously, who was he kidding, by now it had occurred to me that the three minutes of absolute silence was probably not as necessary as a waiting period for the stuff to set up as it was a cooling off time for his hapless victims. It was going to take that long for me to get a grip on my runaway thoughts and the flood of emotions now assailing me. It was a very good thing I had to keep my mouth shut for the additional three minutes, because what was going through my mind at that moment was neither kind nor charitable.
Strange. When it was Mr. Wilder in the hot seat, I immediately felt pity for Bob’s distress.
As I continued to watch him profusely apologize to us and wring his hands about what my hair must’ve looked like at that moment, I did, once again, feel for him. When he finally removed the plugs from my ears, I was glad I had had three minutes of silence before I could speak. This practice is one I need to employ more frequently in my life. It helped that I got the impression Bob was bracing himself for an eruption from me. I assured him it would be okay, and that I had suffered worse things.
Then we sat there with Bob and Debbie and the other couple, who were now seated in their lawn chairs under the open-sided tent and discussed the fact that even though they had never seen their rubbery mix in anyone’s hair to this extent, they were absolutely sure—or nearly so—it would come out . . . maybe. But, Debbie pointed out, “they were unsure if it would damage my perm.” I laughed at this, and assured them that I did not have a perm in my hair. I told them it had turned naturally wavy when I started menopause. This triggered a conversation about curls and straight hair and hormones and the horrors of menopause among the three couples sitting around waiting on the gooey stuff to set up.
Bob, Mr. Wilder and the other man commiserated, discussing the trials of living with a hormonal woman. At one point, I sternly looked at all three men and huffed, “If you think living with a woman having serious hormone issues is rough; you should try living in a female body completely wacked out on them, while she is doing her darndest to not kill her mate like a praying mantis.” I think it shocked them, because they quieted their moaning and complaining after that. Perhaps, I looked scary enough to them, with this huge yellow mess stringing down from above my ear that they didn’t want to press me further.
For the next 20 minutes Debbie periodically came over to check and see if the glob was dry enough to start removing. As luck would have it, it didn’t dry well, because the hardener had not gotten sufficiently mixed with the rubber before it had detonated in my hair.
We sent Mr. Wilder to the van to get a comb, thinking perhaps when it dried, it would be easier to remove if we had a brush or comb to use. I told Debbie, I doubted she could get a comb through my hair as I could only accomplish that if I had a bunch of conditioner in it. The rest of the time it was a mass of knots.
Finally, after what felt like an hour, the stuff was dry enough that she began removing it. Because I had reached around and touched it before I knew it was in my hair, I had mixed it more deeply into the mass. Debbie spent nearly an hour picking through my hair and pulling miniscule chunks of yellow rubbery junk out of it. She was trying to be so careful not to pull it, which was very thoughtful of her. She assured me that she thought the residue left behind would wash out when I got home. I couldn’t help wondering how she would know it would wash out.
With my humor restored by the waiting period of silence, I reassured them the worst that could happen was I’d have to go get my hair cut. Further, it was only hair and would re-grow in time. My uncharacteristic magnanimous attitude had hubby eying me suspiciously with one of those long, squinty-eyed looks. You know the ones, which effectively say, “Who are you and what have you done with my wife? Because, I know that if she were here right now she would be either screaming or sobbing!”
This I elected to totally ignore. I was on a roll and refused to change my attitude. It had been a great evening for me and I was not going to let a glob of rubber, albeit stubbornly affixed to my hair, ruin it. I had gotten a text from my editor while in my three minutes of silence that, had I been able to smile, would have had me grinning from ear to ear.
I could tell Bob was still extremely concerned about the entire situation. I imagine a man looking at a woman’s long hair with a big hunk of gum-like stuff rubbed into it, and knowing he was responsible for it, would be very distressing indeed.
At one point, as Debbie was carefully pulling semi-solid goo out of my hair, I had a flash of a picture I had once seen of a monkey standing over another monkey digging through its hair and pulling something from the other’s coat. This made me start to giggle all over again. When I explained to Debbie what I was giggling about she giggled as well. Once she had most of the obvious stuff out of my hair and I was left with just a stiff gummy residue in it, she assured me it looked good enough to walk around the rest of the evening and look at the other booths without being too embarrassed. We decided the wavy tresses brought on by menopause were working in my favor for a change, as it made the stickiness and clumping less noticeable.
As we left to walk around, they assured us that they would have the earplugs ready in about 30 minutes. We walked off in search of something to eat for supper as we waited for them to be smoothed with the Dremmel tool and dipped in silicone.
We ran into Tim, a friend of ours, and visited for a few minutes. He had been cooking at the concession booth and was busy getting ready to close things down for the evening. As we headed back to retrieve our hearing protection, we heard there was going to be a drawing. I didn’t pay a lot of attention because I normally never win anything and had no recollection of entering any drawing.
Strangely, however, I heard my last name called over the speaker system. Immediately afterwards, I felt my husband nudge me and say, “Raise your hand, raise your hand, they’re asking for Mrs. Wilder.” I didn’t have any idea of what the drawing was even for, let alone how they had gotten my name. But, dutifully, I raised my hand and walked up to the trailer that served as a stage and said,” I’m Mrs. Wilder. Did I win something?”
The man on stage shook my hand and said, “Congratulations, you won a free pair of earplugs!”
I thought, “Are you kidding me? There is no way I’m letting that man near my hair with another gun filled with cold gooey rubber. I want to be able to go home sometime tonight!”
But, I smiled and accepted my little slip of paper that entitled me to a free set and turned to my husband insisting, “You take it, or save it for one of our boys later.”
The adorable chicken immediately replied, “Zanie, the man said you can trade it to somebody else; you can give it away as a gift, sell it or you can use it yourself. It just has to be used before the vendor leaves tonight. So why don’t you go get another pair?”
I gave him my best withering glare. Then, as inspiration struck I lit up and said, “I know, let’s get Tim to do it!”
I did have a momentary twinge of conscience about my motives though. The poor guy had no idea what could happen to him, unless I told him—something I was not sure I wanted to do.
As I wrestled with my conscience, I concluded that I really hoped it would only be a nice gift for a good friend, who had kindly offered to come out and help us build a target practice area. We had noticed several more satisfied customers leaving the booth and figured what had happened to us was the kind of aberration that has become far too familiar to the Wilder family.
However, if the worst did happen, knowing Tim’s wonderful sense of humor, we would all get a great laugh out of it. At least, he did not have shoulder length hair to spend hours picking through.
My husband found him. When he replied that he didn’t own a pair and would love to have some, we rushed him to the booth behind the concession area. Arriving at our destination, we explained to Bob that Tim was taking my place as I had won the free pair. Bob smiled and said he was relieved he didn’t have to do any more for me, because I was big trouble. To which, I flippantly remarked, “I had nothing to do with that mess. I was just the mannequin, sitting innocently in the chair, when I was rudely attacked by exploding yellow goo.”
At Tim’s concerned look, I briefly told a bit about what had happened to us earlier. I could see a hint of apprehension in his eyes and rushed to assure him that according to Debbie and Bob, it had never happened before us and Debbie added they had done a couple of others after we left and had had no problems. So Tim agreed to go ahead and get his made. Debbie, her friend and I again began to recount our experience that evening. It so irritated Bob that he snapped at Debbie “Just stop talking about it.”
Then, I noticed all three men were searching for something on the table behind me that held all the finished earplugs. I heard my husband remind them that after the explosion with the blue, he had chosen orange as an alternate color. He proceeded to sit in a chair with a blue plug in one ear. He looked like a king on his throne waiting for his royal subjects—or, in this case, maybe royal jesters—to comply with his command.
It seemed, however, the orange earplug was doomed to remain on the missing-in-action list. There was only one to be found, and it was too small for my husband’s ear. With an air of superior knowledge, Bob informed us that each ear is unique and no two are exactly alike, so the plugs were not interchangeable from person to person.
We searched all over, before Debbie pointed out that perhaps since Bob was so flustered after the gadget exploded that first time, he had not noticed he had actually used the yellow mix, meant for me, instead of the requested orange. I had been wondering the same thing and agreed. Bob was sure he could not have done such a thing. Nevertheless, just to prove us wrong, he picked up a lone yellow one resting on the table and inserted it. It fit perfectly.
He was almost comical, in his self-recriminations for having made yet another error in front of us. We all had the good sense to keep our mouths shut though.
With Mr. Wilder’s second one now claimed, Bob immediately attached the lanyard and put them in a cup with his name on it and handing it over, said, “Now, do not let those out of your sight until you get home.”
In a fashion that is so typical of my life, mine were not as easily retrieved. Poor Bob! Before we were done with him, he was shaking his head and moaning aloud that he had never felt so incompetent in his entire life.
Turning my direction, he said, “You had yellow, is that correct?” I affirmed this was indeed the case. Debbie pointed out mine must be the ones sitting in the open toolbox, to which he replied, “No, those belong to that other guy.”
After a couple of minutes of heated debate, however, Bob threw up his hands and stated, “There’s one way to tell for sure.” So once again the fittings began. He sanitized the yellow pair and tried them in my ears. The left one fit perfectly, and as he got ready to put the right in, he reminded everyone who was now standing around waiting with baited breath, “This will tell us for sure, because no two people have the exact same ear canal and if it’s a perfect fit we know they belong to her.” With this announcement, he put the right one in my ear. It hurt. He took it out and tried again—and then again. It still hurt. I felt like one of the ugly stepsisters in the fairytale, Cinderella, trying to not let him see that it hurt. I just didn’t care anymore. I simply wanted to go home and let Bob finish with Tim, who was sitting oblivious to nearly everything around him with stoppers in his ears and white strings fluttering in the breeze waiting patiently for his turn.
Finally, Bob decided the left one had to be mine, but the right one absolutely could not be mine. “I just cannot figure out how I could have mixed this many of them up. This has never ever happened to me before.”
Debbie suggested that perhaps because I had been so distracted by the yellow junk in my hair, I must’ve swallowed or talked while the mold was still drying in the right ear. I knew this was not the case, but didn’t see the point of arguing with her.
Probably out of pure desperation to get rid of me, Bob stated, “I will just redo her right ear and that will fix the problem.” With this, he grabbed his dreaded white cylinders of yellow goo and came toward me. He tamped a plug in again and while I held my hair in a tight bun, praying the whole time, he re-shot stuff in my ear.
While we were waiting for my right ear to solidify, another couple walked up and the man said, “I need to pick up my yellow earplugs.” Then the game of musical ear plugs began in earnest.
I admit to having been a bit worried about Bob’s ever increasing level of anxiety and irritation over realizing he needed to come up with yet another whole set of yellow plugs. He couldn’t figure out which yellow earplugs belonged to this man either. The left earplug, of the only remaining pair, fit me perfectly and I certainly didn’t want it to disappear.
I watched helplessly—not being allowed to speak—as once again, Bob sterilized my left one and inserted it and its mate in the other man’s ears. Sadly, they both fit the newcomer perfectly. It was then determined that the man and I had the exact same left canal—which was theoretically impossible. Nevertheless, I had to watch what I had thought of as my left ear plug walk away from me. I just sat there dumbfounded, ‘Dang it! This is just not fair.’
I began to wonder about my chances of avoiding another exploding tip, as he re-did my left to match the right that was still hardening and crackling in my ear. I thought I had survived a third attempt tonight, but what were the chances of lucking out this fourth time. I feared the odds might be stacked against me. Since there seemed no option, I resigned myself to my fate, and gathered my severely sticky hair into a bun again and began praying for another miracle. I was relieved when this final one went off without a hitch.
Then we all watched with trepidation as Bob finally injected the goo into Tim’s ears. We all breathed a collective sigh of relief when he finished without mishap.
Waiting for all the remaining plugs to be trimmed, sanded and dipped, we visited a bit more. Meanwhile the rest of the vendors packed up, loaded their merchandise and began leaving.
As things began to calm down, we finally pieced together how everything had transpired. We had all been so shocked when the thing blew out a second time and all that ooze was sitting in my hair that no one had noticed my second one was actually the orange that had been set out for my husband. I could easily see how this could happen, because all the colors looked alike in their white tubes. To prove this theory, Debbie sterilized the lone orange one left on the table and put it in my right ear. Not surprisingly, it fit. We all just shook our heads in disgust.
Despite all the foolishness, I decided I really liked Debbie and Bob and enjoyed talking with them. That is, until Bob half-jokingly pointed out that he had lost a lot of money on me—what with all the remakes and me winning the free pair on top of it.
I remarked, “How was it my fault you had to do all the remakes? Besides, I didn’t enter that silly drawing anyway.”
When he moved to lay the still oozing gun on the table, I had my first good look at hubby’s ear. There he sat on a stool, under the rapt scrutiny of several onlookers with a big wad of stringy blue stuff streaming down off his head like an odd-looking earring. As Bob continued his mantra and examining his gun to figure out what had caused the blow out, the goo dripped in slow motion almost down to hubby’s shoulder. It looked like dark blue melted mozzarella cheese.
Poor Bob just kept apologizing profusely, trying to stop the lava-like flow slowly oozing its way towards hubby’s shoulder. He swiped the biggest glob dangling from his ear. But it was still in his sideburn, covering his ear, and continuing to ooze downward. Bob put some sanitizer on his fingers and patted the biggest bulk of it in the opening of hubby’s ear.
Recovering from my surprise, I giggled, which elicited a glare from my husband. I knew he wanted me to stop laughing at him, but I just could not help myself. I managed to tame it to a snicker. For once, I was glad he could not talk for a number of minutes.
He was forced to sit perfectly still while this still dangling goop, solidified. Bob explained once it hardened, it would easily come off, but if you messed with it while it was still wet it became embedded in any surface it touched and then it was a nightmare to remove. This was a fact I would soon become all too acquainted with. I assured him it would be okay. He continued to examine his tube and then got more flustered when he realized, because of the explosion, there was now not enough blue left in the tubes to do the second ear.
Still unable to speak, my husband gestured to the ones on the table and looked at me beseechingly. I knew exactly what he wanted. We haven’t been married for 30+ years, without mastering a little unspoken communication. I immediately told Bob that we were really okay if they didn’t match. It might help us to distinguish right from left that way. Bob picked up the little sample tray with its array of colored samples and held it over for my husband to point. I suggested he choose a pretty pink or purple for his second one, but he chose the manly orange instead. Big surprise there!
Obligingly, Debbie opened the cooler and retrieved the white tubes containing the orange mix and laid them on the table.
While she was digging in the cooler, she asked me if I had chosen a color yet. I told her I wanted the sunny yellow. She took it out of the cooler for Bob and laying it on the table, announced she was going to the concession booth to get supper and a bottle of water. Then she left Bob to his own devices. I suspect, she just wanted to go where she could have a good laugh and not suffer either of our husbands’ glares.
Still shaking his head and mumbling, “This has never happened to me before!” Bob proceeded to put a new tip on one of the tubes Debbie had laid out for him and inject the stuff in hubby’s right ear. While he was doing this, I was avidly watching the left to be sure that stuff did not drop onto the shirt I would be responsible for scrubbing out later.
With the concoction now hardened, Bob carefully removed it by pulling on the white strings attached to the stopper under the now solidified rubber, and laid it on the table. He proceeded to scrape the dried strings of goo off his outer ear and face. Not able to resist any longer, I giggled again. Once the required time was up for the second one and it was safely out of hubby’s right ear. He immediately swiveled around on his stool and malevolently smiled at me, wiggling his eyebrows for affect. He said, “Get it out of your system now honey, because you’re next.”
That sobered me up in a hurry. I took another step back, debating whether I really needed earplugs after all. The ugly black things were looking prettier all the time. I fleetingly imagined a pair of those with a hot pink bow tied on the muff part. However, after considering that my husband had already paid for these, and being the good sport that I am—or just out of simple stupidity—I gamely stepped forward for my turn. I did warn Bob that it had better not end up in my hair. I had worked hard over the course of several years to now have hair well below my shoulders, and I certainly did not want that gooey junk in it.
Bob assured us they had been using the same bag of tips all day long, and was sure what had happened to Mr. Wilder was a fluke and could not possibly happen a second time.
Asking again what color I had settled on. I told him I needed something pretty like the pale pink, but when I thought about searching for earplugs in my bag with its black interior, I settled for the lemony yellow.
As Bob inserted the tip in my left ear, he assured my husband that there wasn’t any chance of another exploding tip since he had never had one do it before. Nevertheless, I pulled my hair over toward my right shoulder as best I could.
Soon I felt the cool stuff enter my ear. Then to my horror, I felt something lightly hit my left shoulder. I knew from this sensation and Bob’s swift movements that the impossible had just happened again. I quickly reached my right hand around to my left temple to grab any stray hair that might still be near my left shoulder in order to pull it further from the stuff that I just knew had landed on my best shirt.
Imagine my surprise, when instead of feeling the warm dry hair above my ear, my hand landed right in the middle of a big cold blob of gummy stuff! Having returned moments before with another couple that were obviously friends of theirs, Debbie belatedly warned me not to touch it. Looking at my hand now covered with white and yellow bird poop-looking stuff, I realized the tube had exploded upwards instead of just down like it had on Mr. Wilder. Debbie handed me a series of wet and dry paper towels to wipe my hand off. While both rushed to assure me that it would harden in a moment, and then it would just come right out, as long as I did not touch it while it was still wet . . . at least, they were pretty sure it would.
Silently, I fumed “What! You’re only pretty sure now? You were sure earlier when the biggest consequence would have been shaving a sideburn!” My expression must have betrayed my thoughts, because immediately, they pointed out that I had grabbed a blob of it and that might change things. Then their words from earlier came like a lightning bolt to my mind: “Usually, if you touch it while it is wet, it stays permanently attached to whatever it touches.”
I realized, as I sat there, reminding myself to breathe in and out—slowly—so I did not hyperventilate—or pass out, that I might be in a sticky situation here. I tried to remember if my stylist, Sara, had said anything about going out of town for the weekend, as by this time it was about 6 PM on a Saturday night. I contemplated just how much begging and groveling I would have to do to get her to come to the shop and cut nearly all my hair off before church the next morning.
Meanwhile, both Bob and Debbie proceeded to examine the tips and tubes littering the table and debate why this had happened twice in a row. They decided it had to have been a series of bad tips.
‘Really! Now they decide that!’
Only then, did they elect to switch to a completely different bag of supposedly non-defective tips.
I watched, aghast, as they selected one and screwed it on the double cylinder of stuff. ‘What? There was an alternate bag of tips available the entire time?’ These thoughts practically seethed through my mind as he came around to my right ear. Lucky for both of us, that one went perfectly. Only then did Bob set the timer on his phone for the requisite three minutes. Before he went to re-examine his white tubes and tips, he reminded me not to move, talk or swallow, no matter what.
Seriously, who was he kidding, by now it had occurred to me that the three minutes of absolute silence was probably not as necessary as a waiting period for the stuff to set up as it was a cooling off time for his hapless victims. It was going to take that long for me to get a grip on my runaway thoughts and the flood of emotions now assailing me. It was a very good thing I had to keep my mouth shut for the additional three minutes, because what was going through my mind at that moment was neither kind nor charitable.
Strange. When it was Mr. Wilder in the hot seat, I immediately felt pity for Bob’s distress.
As I continued to watch him profusely apologize to us and wring his hands about what my hair must’ve looked like at that moment, I did, once again, feel for him. When he finally removed the plugs from my ears, I was glad I had had three minutes of silence before I could speak. This practice is one I need to employ more frequently in my life. It helped that I got the impression Bob was bracing himself for an eruption from me. I assured him it would be okay, and that I had suffered worse things.
Then we sat there with Bob and Debbie and the other couple, who were now seated in their lawn chairs under the open-sided tent and discussed the fact that even though they had never seen their rubbery mix in anyone’s hair to this extent, they were absolutely sure—or nearly so—it would come out . . . maybe. But, Debbie pointed out, “they were unsure if it would damage my perm.” I laughed at this, and assured them that I did not have a perm in my hair. I told them it had turned naturally wavy when I started menopause. This triggered a conversation about curls and straight hair and hormones and the horrors of menopause among the three couples sitting around waiting on the gooey stuff to set up.
Bob, Mr. Wilder and the other man commiserated, discussing the trials of living with a hormonal woman. At one point, I sternly looked at all three men and huffed, “If you think living with a woman having serious hormone issues is rough; you should try living in a female body completely wacked out on them, while she is doing her darndest to not kill her mate like a praying mantis.” I think it shocked them, because they quieted their moaning and complaining after that. Perhaps, I looked scary enough to them, with this huge yellow mess stringing down from above my ear that they didn’t want to press me further.
For the next 20 minutes Debbie periodically came over to check and see if the glob was dry enough to start removing. As luck would have it, it didn’t dry well, because the hardener had not gotten sufficiently mixed with the rubber before it had detonated in my hair.
We sent Mr. Wilder to the van to get a comb, thinking perhaps when it dried, it would be easier to remove if we had a brush or comb to use. I told Debbie, I doubted she could get a comb through my hair as I could only accomplish that if I had a bunch of conditioner in it. The rest of the time it was a mass of knots.
Finally, after what felt like an hour, the stuff was dry enough that she began removing it. Because I had reached around and touched it before I knew it was in my hair, I had mixed it more deeply into the mass. Debbie spent nearly an hour picking through my hair and pulling miniscule chunks of yellow rubbery junk out of it. She was trying to be so careful not to pull it, which was very thoughtful of her. She assured me that she thought the residue left behind would wash out when I got home. I couldn’t help wondering how she would know it would wash out.
With my humor restored by the waiting period of silence, I reassured them the worst that could happen was I’d have to go get my hair cut. Further, it was only hair and would re-grow in time. My uncharacteristic magnanimous attitude had hubby eying me suspiciously with one of those long, squinty-eyed looks. You know the ones, which effectively say, “Who are you and what have you done with my wife? Because, I know that if she were here right now she would be either screaming or sobbing!”
This I elected to totally ignore. I was on a roll and refused to change my attitude. It had been a great evening for me and I was not going to let a glob of rubber, albeit stubbornly affixed to my hair, ruin it. I had gotten a text from my editor while in my three minutes of silence that, had I been able to smile, would have had me grinning from ear to ear.
I could tell Bob was still extremely concerned about the entire situation. I imagine a man looking at a woman’s long hair with a big hunk of gum-like stuff rubbed into it, and knowing he was responsible for it, would be very distressing indeed.
At one point, as Debbie was carefully pulling semi-solid goo out of my hair, I had a flash of a picture I had once seen of a monkey standing over another monkey digging through its hair and pulling something from the other’s coat. This made me start to giggle all over again. When I explained to Debbie what I was giggling about she giggled as well. Once she had most of the obvious stuff out of my hair and I was left with just a stiff gummy residue in it, she assured me it looked good enough to walk around the rest of the evening and look at the other booths without being too embarrassed. We decided the wavy tresses brought on by menopause were working in my favor for a change, as it made the stickiness and clumping less noticeable.
As we left to walk around, they assured us that they would have the earplugs ready in about 30 minutes. We walked off in search of something to eat for supper as we waited for them to be smoothed with the Dremmel tool and dipped in silicone.
We ran into Tim, a friend of ours, and visited for a few minutes. He had been cooking at the concession booth and was busy getting ready to close things down for the evening. As we headed back to retrieve our hearing protection, we heard there was going to be a drawing. I didn’t pay a lot of attention because I normally never win anything and had no recollection of entering any drawing.
Strangely, however, I heard my last name called over the speaker system. Immediately afterwards, I felt my husband nudge me and say, “Raise your hand, raise your hand, they’re asking for Mrs. Wilder.” I didn’t have any idea of what the drawing was even for, let alone how they had gotten my name. But, dutifully, I raised my hand and walked up to the trailer that served as a stage and said,” I’m Mrs. Wilder. Did I win something?”
The man on stage shook my hand and said, “Congratulations, you won a free pair of earplugs!”
I thought, “Are you kidding me? There is no way I’m letting that man near my hair with another gun filled with cold gooey rubber. I want to be able to go home sometime tonight!”
But, I smiled and accepted my little slip of paper that entitled me to a free set and turned to my husband insisting, “You take it, or save it for one of our boys later.”
The adorable chicken immediately replied, “Zanie, the man said you can trade it to somebody else; you can give it away as a gift, sell it or you can use it yourself. It just has to be used before the vendor leaves tonight. So why don’t you go get another pair?”
I gave him my best withering glare. Then, as inspiration struck I lit up and said, “I know, let’s get Tim to do it!”
I did have a momentary twinge of conscience about my motives though. The poor guy had no idea what could happen to him, unless I told him—something I was not sure I wanted to do.
As I wrestled with my conscience, I concluded that I really hoped it would only be a nice gift for a good friend, who had kindly offered to come out and help us build a target practice area. We had noticed several more satisfied customers leaving the booth and figured what had happened to us was the kind of aberration that has become far too familiar to the Wilder family.
However, if the worst did happen, knowing Tim’s wonderful sense of humor, we would all get a great laugh out of it. At least, he did not have shoulder length hair to spend hours picking through.
My husband found him. When he replied that he didn’t own a pair and would love to have some, we rushed him to the booth behind the concession area. Arriving at our destination, we explained to Bob that Tim was taking my place as I had won the free pair. Bob smiled and said he was relieved he didn’t have to do any more for me, because I was big trouble. To which, I flippantly remarked, “I had nothing to do with that mess. I was just the mannequin, sitting innocently in the chair, when I was rudely attacked by exploding yellow goo.”
At Tim’s concerned look, I briefly told a bit about what had happened to us earlier. I could see a hint of apprehension in his eyes and rushed to assure him that according to Debbie and Bob, it had never happened before us and Debbie added they had done a couple of others after we left and had had no problems. So Tim agreed to go ahead and get his made. Debbie, her friend and I again began to recount our experience that evening. It so irritated Bob that he snapped at Debbie “Just stop talking about it.”
Then, I noticed all three men were searching for something on the table behind me that held all the finished earplugs. I heard my husband remind them that after the explosion with the blue, he had chosen orange as an alternate color. He proceeded to sit in a chair with a blue plug in one ear. He looked like a king on his throne waiting for his royal subjects—or, in this case, maybe royal jesters—to comply with his command.
It seemed, however, the orange earplug was doomed to remain on the missing-in-action list. There was only one to be found, and it was too small for my husband’s ear. With an air of superior knowledge, Bob informed us that each ear is unique and no two are exactly alike, so the plugs were not interchangeable from person to person.
We searched all over, before Debbie pointed out that perhaps since Bob was so flustered after the gadget exploded that first time, he had not noticed he had actually used the yellow mix, meant for me, instead of the requested orange. I had been wondering the same thing and agreed. Bob was sure he could not have done such a thing. Nevertheless, just to prove us wrong, he picked up a lone yellow one resting on the table and inserted it. It fit perfectly.
He was almost comical, in his self-recriminations for having made yet another error in front of us. We all had the good sense to keep our mouths shut though.
With Mr. Wilder’s second one now claimed, Bob immediately attached the lanyard and put them in a cup with his name on it and handing it over, said, “Now, do not let those out of your sight until you get home.”
In a fashion that is so typical of my life, mine were not as easily retrieved. Poor Bob! Before we were done with him, he was shaking his head and moaning aloud that he had never felt so incompetent in his entire life.
Turning my direction, he said, “You had yellow, is that correct?” I affirmed this was indeed the case. Debbie pointed out mine must be the ones sitting in the open toolbox, to which he replied, “No, those belong to that other guy.”
After a couple of minutes of heated debate, however, Bob threw up his hands and stated, “There’s one way to tell for sure.” So once again the fittings began. He sanitized the yellow pair and tried them in my ears. The left one fit perfectly, and as he got ready to put the right in, he reminded everyone who was now standing around waiting with baited breath, “This will tell us for sure, because no two people have the exact same ear canal and if it’s a perfect fit we know they belong to her.” With this announcement, he put the right one in my ear. It hurt. He took it out and tried again—and then again. It still hurt. I felt like one of the ugly stepsisters in the fairytale, Cinderella, trying to not let him see that it hurt. I just didn’t care anymore. I simply wanted to go home and let Bob finish with Tim, who was sitting oblivious to nearly everything around him with stoppers in his ears and white strings fluttering in the breeze waiting patiently for his turn.
Finally, Bob decided the left one had to be mine, but the right one absolutely could not be mine. “I just cannot figure out how I could have mixed this many of them up. This has never ever happened to me before.”
Debbie suggested that perhaps because I had been so distracted by the yellow junk in my hair, I must’ve swallowed or talked while the mold was still drying in the right ear. I knew this was not the case, but didn’t see the point of arguing with her.
Probably out of pure desperation to get rid of me, Bob stated, “I will just redo her right ear and that will fix the problem.” With this, he grabbed his dreaded white cylinders of yellow goo and came toward me. He tamped a plug in again and while I held my hair in a tight bun, praying the whole time, he re-shot stuff in my ear.
While we were waiting for my right ear to solidify, another couple walked up and the man said, “I need to pick up my yellow earplugs.” Then the game of musical ear plugs began in earnest.
I admit to having been a bit worried about Bob’s ever increasing level of anxiety and irritation over realizing he needed to come up with yet another whole set of yellow plugs. He couldn’t figure out which yellow earplugs belonged to this man either. The left earplug, of the only remaining pair, fit me perfectly and I certainly didn’t want it to disappear.
I watched helplessly—not being allowed to speak—as once again, Bob sterilized my left one and inserted it and its mate in the other man’s ears. Sadly, they both fit the newcomer perfectly. It was then determined that the man and I had the exact same left canal—which was theoretically impossible. Nevertheless, I had to watch what I had thought of as my left ear plug walk away from me. I just sat there dumbfounded, ‘Dang it! This is just not fair.’
I began to wonder about my chances of avoiding another exploding tip, as he re-did my left to match the right that was still hardening and crackling in my ear. I thought I had survived a third attempt tonight, but what were the chances of lucking out this fourth time. I feared the odds might be stacked against me. Since there seemed no option, I resigned myself to my fate, and gathered my severely sticky hair into a bun again and began praying for another miracle. I was relieved when this final one went off without a hitch.
Then we all watched with trepidation as Bob finally injected the goo into Tim’s ears. We all breathed a collective sigh of relief when he finished without mishap.
Waiting for all the remaining plugs to be trimmed, sanded and dipped, we visited a bit more. Meanwhile the rest of the vendors packed up, loaded their merchandise and began leaving.
As things began to calm down, we finally pieced together how everything had transpired. We had all been so shocked when the thing blew out a second time and all that ooze was sitting in my hair that no one had noticed my second one was actually the orange that had been set out for my husband. I could easily see how this could happen, because all the colors looked alike in their white tubes. To prove this theory, Debbie sterilized the lone orange one left on the table and put it in my right ear. Not surprisingly, it fit. We all just shook our heads in disgust.
Despite all the foolishness, I decided I really liked Debbie and Bob and enjoyed talking with them. That is, until Bob half-jokingly pointed out that he had lost a lot of money on me—what with all the remakes and me winning the free pair on top of it.
I remarked, “How was it my fault you had to do all the remakes? Besides, I didn’t enter that silly drawing anyway.”
Finally, Debbie admitted she had entered Mr. Wilder and me in the drawing. Regardless, Bob insisted that when all was said and done, I had come out way ahead on the deal.
He could just think that. I was still worrying whether I was going to have to roust Sara out of bed to chop all my hair off. I would not exactly define all I had experienced as ‘coming out way ahead on the deal.’
Handing me my lanyarded and cupped plugs, Bob remarked he was astonished that, ‘For a woman, I was being an amazingly good sport about everything that had occurred.
Our final product! My sunny yellow and his leftie/rightie.
‘My brain silently corrected him—that ‘for anyone, I was a good sport about all of this tonight.’
I told him he was just fortunate I been texted by my editor with great news before I could speak earlier. I told them about the Blooming Women magazine I write for and how it was now read in over 100 cities across the globe including seven countries and five continents. Not much could really faze me after that.
Their response to this was, “Oh you’re a writer?”
“Yes, but only an amateur one.” I went on to explain, “It’s a new online magazine and my publisher, who happens to be a friend, is understandably desperate for articles, so she encourages me write for her.”
To this, Debbie asked the questions I am starting to love, “Where can I get a copy? What name are you listed under?” I gave her the website where my articles were found. Then, for the first time that night I said, “My full name is Zanie Ann Wilder.
At Mr. Wilder’s urging, I stated, “I just might have to use this experience in an upcoming story.”
Smiling, Debbie responded with “Zany and wilder as in unusual or clown-like and extreme?”
To which I replied, “Yep the name describes my life as well.”
This elicited a snort from Bob. In a voice that was dripping with irony—not surprising, given all we had just experienced together that evening, he groused, “That explains it! If you had told me your full name before I started I would have known you were trouble right then and there and could have been more prepared.”
I am not sure I can take the credit for this, just because of my name, but perhaps my personality tends to inspire chaos where ever I go.
Laughing as we got up to leave, I assured him I would change their names and send them a copy of the article. I figured no one, besides those who had witnessed the craziness of this night, would believe I had gotten us in another sticky situation anyway!
Arriving home hours after we had intended to that night, I immediately took my sticky, stiff hair to the bathroom and soaked and scrubbed and conditioned and combed it until all the residue finally came out.
My last comment to hubby before we fell asleep was, “Wow, in addition to getting to keep all of my hair, I now have a pretty set of yellow earplugs.” He simply smiled, because he knows me so well.
He knows what I was really saying was, “I am anxiously anticipating my son to come for a visit, so I can prove to him a girl can have a ‘pretty’ weapon and ‘pretty’ earplugs to use while she blows holes in the dirt surrounding a tiny paper target.”
He could just think that. I was still worrying whether I was going to have to roust Sara out of bed to chop all my hair off. I would not exactly define all I had experienced as ‘coming out way ahead on the deal.’
Handing me my lanyarded and cupped plugs, Bob remarked he was astonished that, ‘For a woman, I was being an amazingly good sport about everything that had occurred.
Our final product! My sunny yellow and his leftie/rightie.
‘My brain silently corrected him—that ‘for anyone, I was a good sport about all of this tonight.’
I told him he was just fortunate I been texted by my editor with great news before I could speak earlier. I told them about the Blooming Women magazine I write for and how it was now read in over 100 cities across the globe including seven countries and five continents. Not much could really faze me after that.
Their response to this was, “Oh you’re a writer?”
“Yes, but only an amateur one.” I went on to explain, “It’s a new online magazine and my publisher, who happens to be a friend, is understandably desperate for articles, so she encourages me write for her.”
To this, Debbie asked the questions I am starting to love, “Where can I get a copy? What name are you listed under?” I gave her the website where my articles were found. Then, for the first time that night I said, “My full name is Zanie Ann Wilder.
At Mr. Wilder’s urging, I stated, “I just might have to use this experience in an upcoming story.”
Smiling, Debbie responded with “Zany and wilder as in unusual or clown-like and extreme?”
To which I replied, “Yep the name describes my life as well.”
This elicited a snort from Bob. In a voice that was dripping with irony—not surprising, given all we had just experienced together that evening, he groused, “That explains it! If you had told me your full name before I started I would have known you were trouble right then and there and could have been more prepared.”
I am not sure I can take the credit for this, just because of my name, but perhaps my personality tends to inspire chaos where ever I go.
Laughing as we got up to leave, I assured him I would change their names and send them a copy of the article. I figured no one, besides those who had witnessed the craziness of this night, would believe I had gotten us in another sticky situation anyway!
Arriving home hours after we had intended to that night, I immediately took my sticky, stiff hair to the bathroom and soaked and scrubbed and conditioned and combed it until all the residue finally came out.
My last comment to hubby before we fell asleep was, “Wow, in addition to getting to keep all of my hair, I now have a pretty set of yellow earplugs.” He simply smiled, because he knows me so well.
He knows what I was really saying was, “I am anxiously anticipating my son to come for a visit, so I can prove to him a girl can have a ‘pretty’ weapon and ‘pretty’ earplugs to use while she blows holes in the dirt surrounding a tiny paper target.”
Copyright © 2014 by Rent's Due Publications
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means, including photocopying, recording, or other electronic or mechanical methods, without the prior written permission of the publisher, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical reviews and certain other noncommercial uses permitted by copyright law. For permission requests, click a button on any page to send email with details of the request.
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means, including photocopying, recording, or other electronic or mechanical methods, without the prior written permission of the publisher, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical reviews and certain other noncommercial uses permitted by copyright law. For permission requests, click a button on any page to send email with details of the request.