Call me Popeye

After a weekend learning about the indelicacies of White Castle, I was prepared to take it easy on my internal system this week. I did a fairly decent job of placating my angry intestines and was rewarded with an amazing chicken pot pie at Tina Noel's Euchre Club. (Julie and I also won but that's another story...)

Next up was Friday Book Club, and as we were reading a book based in India, Indian food was the theme. I'm the only one in my house who loves spinach, and hoping there would be left-overs, I had offered to bring the creamed spinach and cheese dish I always start with at the Indian buffet -- saag paneer.

So Friday comes and I go to a great Broad Ripple Indian restaurant we love, wondering how to order this dish, which is generally a side.  We always eat in when we go there, and I had zero ideas about the actual quantity I needed, let alone whether they had an adequate take-out bowl to put it in.

Here's where not wanting to admit I had difficulty with the waiter's accent came back to bite me. He quite rightly initially assumed I wanted lunch, then thought I wanted to order dinner carryout. 

I explained that I only wanted enough spinach to feed a party of eight as part of a pitch-in offering. Oh, and while I was at it, I might have an appetizer, too, also enough for eight.

We were having a great conversation. Everyone was happy. He asked if I also wanted Naan -- the bread they make on premises. I declined, saying another Book Club member was on Naan duty. "It's a pitch-in," I said, again, thinking that explained everything. 

"You'll need rice, then," he said, clearly worried about me not having Naan. Shalimar's Naan is amazing and he was aright to wonder why I was skipping it.

I thought, "OK, sure," and pictured our Chinese carry-out which always has at least one white carton of rice. 

"Soup?" he asked.

Their lentil soup is also amazing. "Sure," I thought. "I'll skip bringing wine and alert Kate so she can adjust if need be."

He tells me it'll be ready in 25 minutes and off I trot to the other errands on my list. I go back to the restaurant. He greets me with two bags, one medium-sized and one small. I'm thrilled. He says he'll help me carry it out.

I'm sure I looked at him funny. From the Book Club book, I've learned a little about traditional Indian culture, which is heavy on the man being charge. But I can carry two bags. And then I see the rest of my order.

The spinach was in a 9x3 aluminum pan. If my math is correct, that's at least 12 cups of saag paneer. A nutritionist will tell you that a serving of saag paneer is 3/4 of a cup.

That pan of yummy goodness was big enough to roast a Thanksgiving turkey if you're feeding a family of four. And with it was an equally sized pan of rice. 

I had apparently indicated that our dinner of eight was vegetarian and that we would be eating only spinach, rice, soup and vegetable samosa. And that "pitch-in" meant I alone (other than the phantom Naan supplier) was feeding this small army of anti-carnivores.

I swallowed hard, smiled brightly and handed over my credit card. The overage was entirely my fault for not just owning up to the language/accent barrier. So, I had saag paneer for lunch. And then I had more at Book Club. I have a couple tubs in my freezer, too.

Later that night, I was in bed shielding my ears from the angry shouting of my intestinal tract and wondering if you could die from spinach poisoning. And if I did die from it, would I be found in a puddle of green ooze? Was there a green-tinged cloud of noxious vapor hovering over me already?

Turns out spinach can, indeed, be toxic. It's the oxalic acid that'll do you in. The interwebs told me, it would take about 25 grams of oxalic acid to cause death in a 145-pound person, which is about 7.3 pounds of spinach. 

That's about 14 bags of grocery-story spinach, right? Cooking spinach greatly reduces its size, so what does 7.3 pounds of cooked spinach look like, I wondered. Plus, saag paneer has other ingredients in it, so after much internal anxiety, I decided I'd probably survive the night. Spoiler alert: I did.

But at 2 a.m., I wasn't as confident as I am now. It's possible I prayed not to wake up dead. And that any residual gaseousness wouldn't do in the Captain.

This morning, all I can hear is Popeye's song ringing in my head. If you run into me this week and I say, "Well, blow me down," in response to your news, don't be surprised.

"I'm Popeye the sailor man.

I'm Popeye the sailor man.

I'm strong to the fin-ich

'cause I eats me spin-ach,

I'm Popeye the sailor man!"

In Alison news, we are still in the college exploration stage. She's been accepted at a few schools already so we know she'll be going somewhere. But she has a few more interviews with fancy schools to go and then the wait for whether she'll go farther in their process.

If you happen to get a call from an Ivy League school looking for intel on the redhead, don't tell them about this blog.

Le Chateau de Blanc and Chateau de Pee-ew

I don't mean to cause any trouble here, but last night I had my first night on my new mattress with a proper foundation. I also had my first White Castle experience. The two will be forever enshrined in my olfactory system.

For those of you not blessed with White Castle in your region, it's a mostly Midwest burger chain that some people -- mostly men despite the photos on its website -- claim is next to manna from Heaven. There's even a White Castle Hall of Fame for those who've gone to great lengths to satisfy "the crave" -- think helicopter delivery to people at sea or in other areas of wilderness where there's not "Whitey" delivery.

Somehow I had escaped the actual eating of a slider lo these many years in Hoosierland. My friend Peter used to bring them in by the truckload at Angie's List, and Jeff always includes it in the rotation when we're trying to find something fast to eat.

Last night at the Christ the King Trivia Night, I caved. They're two-bite sized little things. Warm and fragrant, they have onions and pickles. I love pickles. The wait staff convinced Jeff he needed onion fries and crinkle fries as well, so we had those, too. (Knowing we'd have a bunch of bad-for-us-food, I brought a veggie platter with garlic hummus as one of our apps as well.)

I had three sliders and a good portion of both kinds of fries along with champagne (because, if you're going to drink, you should drink champagne) M&Ms, some jalapeno things, a cheesy-cauliflower bacon thing and some guilt-laced portions of the veggies because I'd gone off the rails dietarily.

There were more than 400 people packed into the CKS gym, and they were loud. Particularly the tables around me. Which was a good thing.

Because one of the side effects of White Castle sliders is flatulence. Thanks for that warning, Jeff. Yeah. Like, a lot. Jeff bought 18 sliders. Some with cheese. There were none remaining so I'm pretty sure we gassed up the place like it's never been gassed before. (It's a gym, so thank the good Lord for high ceilings.)

I'm not one to embrace the fart. It's just not my thing. Jeff celebrates them like it's the Fourth of July, and he's passed this on to Alison. I was just thankful Beth Harriman's party was having a good, loud time.

On the way home, I was discussing my dissatisfaction with the cuisine. More precisely with it's residue, and Jeff laughed. He has a buddy whose new wife won't let him have White Castle sliders if he's going to be in their home. She's away for six days.

What's said buddy doing? Indulging his crave, of course. Probably for all six days. I should have Jeff tell him to light a three-wick candle in every room the night before she comes home. Although a spark might send his house up in a ball of greasy slider fire.

But I spoke of my bed. Yeah. It's finally perfect. Right now it's airing out. It's a good thing I have a lot of candles.

My spate of cleaning last week was inspired by a project to clean my bedroom that came about because we got a new mattress. Getting the mattress meant getting the old box springs and mattress down to the guest bedroom downstairs, getting that set of mattress and box springs up to the back porch awaiting donation to a friend.

You'd think the struggle of moving over-sized, unwieldy items down and around the stairs would have tired me out. But the size of the dust bunnies under the bed frame prompted the cleaning of the floor. That led to the realization that the dust on the top rows of the curtains had to go and then the walls and and then it became an all-out war on the whole house.

Meanwhile, the Captain was in home improvement heaven. He'd done all the research to determine what mattress we wanted and what foundation it would need. He'd gone to Lowe's. He'd gotten out his power tools. He'd measured and sawed and drilled and created the precise number of horizontal slats at the precise width apart and then created new legs running below that to give further support to the Casper foam mattress that arrived via mail because that's how we do things now.

He really worked hard. He'd done a great job. And no blood was spilled during the construction project. We'd avoided any marital spats ala the famous front walk project where he'd come home after I'd spent all morning digging out old stepping stones, widening the path and laying down new, bigger stones. I was sweaty. My arms were approaching noodle status and I had whole families of blisters on my hands. "Did you research the best way to do that?" he'd greeted me. "Did you use a level to be sure the ground is even?"

I was pretty sure we'd divorce before we got the stones in place, or kill each other, but somehow we managed to keep the stones on the ground and not swing a shovel too close to each other's heads.

In Jeff's defense, research is an important part of any project and I confess that I often will dive right into an idea only to find that if I'd slowed down a bit and examined the right way to do something, I'd be better off. (Those stepping stones were no where close to level when he came home...)

While he was exploring the best foundation for the new mattress, he'd asked me if I would be open to having it on a simple bed frame instead of in our sleigh bed frame. "No," I'd replied, not even looking up.

"How about on the floor?" he'd asked. "The hardwood would be good support."

I'd looked up at that one. "We are grown-ups. We sleep in a bed," I'd decreed.

He muttered something about me being an old lady as he turned back to his research, but I stood, well, firm. And thus, he decided we could keep our bed frame, but the current system that held the traditional box spring wasn't worthy.

While he created a better support system, I cleaned in different parts of the house. I quite purposefully stayed out of his way as he trotted back and forth with tools and lumber. Genius, right? I've learned a few things in our 20+ years together...

So. He finishes the slat project. The mattress arrives. We un-box it. I saw it, and I thought to myself. "Hmmm." But I didn't voice anything. I was hoping the thing would inflate a bit after having all the air sucked out of it so it would fit in the box. I think I didn't comment out loud. Here's what it looked like when we first installed it.

In my head, I thought, "No way, buster," but out loud, I think I said, "Uh, honey. Does that look a little low to you?"

He shook me off. He thought it would be fine. We just needed to get used to the look of it.

"Lay down on it and see if it's more firm and better than the old one," he suggested.

I did just that. Now, Jeff is almost a foot taller than me. Our old bed required me to jump up a little to get into it. I had to stoop a little to get into it. I felt like Snow White stumbling into the dwarves' house.

"I feel like I'm sleeping on the floor," I said.

"You'll get used to it," he said.

My pillow fell through a crack between the mattress and the top of the head board that was about the size of a pass-thru between a diner kitchen and the counter area. Later that night, I got out of bed to go to the bathroom, and I stumbled because I was used to sliding down a little bit. In this bed, I had to kind of climb up out of it.

I don't know how to describe how I felt laying in that bed because I've never really thought about the height at which I've slept before. But you've camped out, right? When you camp out, you know you're sleeping on the ground. You don't think about your position in the universe, there's just a lot of it on top of you.

The mattress is great. It was beautifully supported and I did sleep better than in the old one. Jeff did too, but he claims I drift over to him and move around a lot and that keeps him up. The old mattress had formed a bit of a trough which made it easier for me to roll over onto his side. The new one, of course, doesn't have that and apparently I keep more to myself now.

Horizontally, it was lovely. Vertically, though. And it looked weird!!!!

"It's fine," said the man. "You'll get used to it. We are the only ones who see our bedroom, anyway."

When I suggested -- again -- we needed to elevate the mattress, Jeff was less-than-enthused. He had done the research, the work and he had done a great job. It's true.

"Fine," he finally said. "But you're doing the box spring research."

We ended up with a steel box spring that's suggested for the mattress we have. It came UPS. He worked to improve the wooden structure he'd built -- yay! power tools -- and I read the instructions. They were more pictures than words, but I bent to the task.

It didn't take long at all, and of course it required a little more cleaning after all the cardboard bits and pieces were collected.

Alison was home while we worked on this, and she's witnessed our attempts to work together. She found herself a nest in the living room and put on her headphones. (The girl has learned a few things over the years...)

We used all the parts that came with the thing and assembled the steel box. It's literally a steel box with vertical slats covered in a zippered fabric shell. Its light, but strong and will be all the box spring we will ever need.

"I bet that the support you built will make this even better," I said, sucking up a tiny bit, but honestly believing it, too.

It's slightly lower than the old set but I don't have to jump up to get into it. The pillows don't slide underneath the head board and when I go to the bathroom at night, I slide off and over rather than having to climb up to the floor like I'm on a submarine.

Here's what it looks like now. Not that anyone but the Captain and I will ever see it...

It's better, right?! And we are still married...

For the love of God, please

Please don't ever look too closely at the tops of your kitchen cabinet doors. Or the little bit of cabinetry that surrounds your stove. Don't wonder if your hand can fit under that bottom drawer under your oven. And don't consider checking out the back of your free-standing microwave.

These are places you should should never, ever think about.

Heed my warning or you'll end up spending most of your Sunday morning on your hands and knees scrubbing at grime and grease that's been living in those spaces rent-free and happy as a grimy lark for years.

Unless you're better than me and deep clean more often. I made the mistake of looking at the spaces I tend to ignore after telling the Captain I was almost out of Costco's Kirkland disinfectant cleaning wipes. It was an innocent mistake. I'd nearly emptied the packet of them I had upstairs in a bid to eliminate some of the grossness of sharing a bathroom with a man.

To be fair, I shed hair like a Shetland sheepdog undergoing chemotherapy. It's gross, too. But my white tiled bathroom floor is clean now, and there's not a speck of dribble on the porcelain throne.

And it turned out that when the Chief Dribbler and Shopper of the family came home with a new case of cleaning cloths, I was actually almost out of the first pack of the 3-pack they come in. When I realized I was now over-stocked with the handy cloths, I decided to wipe down the kitchen counters.

I was done with that and ready to read the paper when I made the mistake of opening one of the cabinet doors, cleaning cloth in hand.

Ever looked at the inside of your kitchen cabinet doors? DON'T DO IT. Otherwise, if you're a real human being with a real human family, you'll see a CSI unit's DNA wet dream.

Neither Jeff nor Alison is particularly tidy in the kitchen. And they're in the kitchen a lot. I don't usually complain because I tend to get some tasty treats out of the deal. I also get dishpan hands cleaning up after them.

One memorable cookie extravaganza of Ali's left a film of powdered sugar over the entire room. This was AFTER she'd cleaned up. The cookies were beautiful and delicious, I grant you. Jeff can't heat up soup without leaving spots of it from heating source to bowl. (There's a pattern here...)

Anyway, most my kitchen is sparkling right now. I finished the open pack and got about half-way through the second in my original Costco case.

I had to play chauffeur before I got to the inside of the refrigerator, and I ended that task with a trip to the gym. In a surprising turn of events, I managed to keep from driving through the drive-thrus of the multiple Dairy Queens I passed. I was hoping to keep from eating until after the gym, and I did! Personal record, Tracy Wiseman: I didn't eat until 4 p.m. when I got home.

And no, I didn't cook any of it. Thank God for leftovers. I'm too exhausted to tackle the inside of the fridge. If I get my way, it'll be take-out menus for the rest of the month.

They Saw Her Coming

I'm not saying Alison Reed is a glutton, but she has the appetite of a lumberjack in that skinny little body of hers. This is what she left behind after our annual Christmas Eve dinner in 2017:

And this is what greeted us when we arrived back at the site of our Christmas Eve foray this year:

In case you missed it, the sign limits customers to one plate of crab legs.

Despite the limitation, she dove back into the crab, extolling its deliciousness to anyone who would listen. Later, after she'd gorged on other treats, she made room for ice cream. She dripped a bit on her skirt. She snatched up the ice cream with a finger.

"Hmm," she said. "Tastes like crab."

Just as she has every year since she discovered crab, our delicate flower reeked on the way home.

Our Maine Christmas was amazing, as always. We worked a tiny bit of the excess off with a trip to a local skating rink that's conveniently situated on a bay, but also across the parking lot from Bissel Brothers brewing. A little fun for everyone on the party.

We had our usual cookie day, where despite years of honing our decorating talents, Auntie Mary kicked our butts with her better detailing. Yes, Alison turned a stocking into a crab claw. She's a little fixated.

We scored our usual bags of loot and spent lots of great, quality time with the Reeds of Maine. It's awesome there. Except for the times when the snow is taller than me, of course. And the wind howls, sending sub-zero temperatures down your shirt. We'll brave it, though. The benefits are worth it.

Oh, side note: I whined a while ago that I couldn't squeeze myself into my wedding dress, which was the dress I'd planned to wear New Year's Eve to the Indy Masquerade. The good news is, I did manage to get into the thing, zip it and still breathe. I could have worn it if I'd wanted to, but I still have a few more pounds to go to make it slip on with a whisper instead of a gasp.

Following a pattern set by my friend Anna, I started shopping at a vintage Goodwill boutique (it's a separate shop from the main site, where I'd started out but didn't find anything that worked) and found a velvet dress for -- get this: $16 and needed only a small hem to make it work. It did the trick and looked super fancy. Had I not told you where I'd gotten it, you'd have thought it would have required at least another zero.

Happy New Year, everyone.

I was wrong...

I was wrong to not pack the chocolate-covered pretzels.They’d already saved my life once this weekend. How could I have left them behind this morning?!

Let me back up. 

I’m trying to extend the time between when I wake up and when I chow down in my bid to be an intermittent faster. Ali had a swim meet Saturday, and I knew it would start early and go long. So, I took a tall travel mug of coffee and purposefully didn’t put snacks in my survival bag. Instead, I packed a book, a battery in case it went so long my electronics died, my iPhone, my iPad and my PR newspaper. I love my kid, but there were eight schools and a bunch of races my kid (or kids I know) wasn't in. I can feign interest only so long.

Knowing I could get a touch hangry, I threw an emergency container of chocolate-covered pretzels in the car, thinking more of a starving swimmer than myself. I had stopped eating at 8 p.m. the night before, and I was at the meet around 9 a.m.

Four hours later (that's 17 hours without food for a girl who wakes up hungry) I was starting to hallucinate and plot the murders of other spectators who’d visited the snack bar and had the bad manners to bring back the bounty they found there. Fake-cheese covered chips, popcorn, M&Ms, both plain and peanut. Hot dogs. The smells. The crunching. The smiles that full tummies brings. Oh, the humanity!

By this time, my electronics had powered down and up again. I was distracted from mass murder by my friend, Denise, who had hoped to see Ali swim but came in just after her last race and literally hours before her next. She had to go before Ali got back in the water. Denise and I took a walk, and I continued it after she left.

It was raining, so I couldn't go outside, and the only open area of the school included the snack bar. Someone back there was grilling hamburgers. The smell was aggressive to put it mildly. Despite my best efforts, I floated toward it like a cartoon character, following my  nose.It was past noon, the earliest I could eat under my intermittent plan. I had really wanted to wait until the meet was over. I’d thought I could last. Wrong. 

I impatiently waited for the guy and the toddler ahead of me. The little girl couldn’t decide between Cheetos and plain chips. She danced around chanting some nonsense that I'm sure was adorable on some other plane of existence. “Just pick one!!!!!” I screamed in my head. I know it was only in my head because they scampered away unharmed and carrying their damn Cheetos.

Finally: my turn. I order a burger, slurring my words a little bit around the saliva that had accumulated in my mouth. My taste buds rejoiced in premature jocularity. I could see them, smell them, taste them!!! I started a little happy dance of my own.

“No burgers,” said the oldish man standing right next to the aluminum foil wrapped tray of steaming burgers. 

“Uh, are you serious?” I asked, amazing myself by not jumping over the half door. I was sure I could take the guy, but there’d be witnesses.

Apparently unaware that his very life was in danger, he advised me that the burgers were for the “help.” I swallowed hard and reassessed the witness pool, which was only growing.

“I’ll have a hot dog,” I managed to say.

It might have been the best hot dog ever formed. And the most quickly devoured. I immediately wanted more but slunk upstairs to take my place among the better snacked. Ninety minutes, one medal, and a podium visit or two later, the meet finally ended and my swimmer emerged. We get to the car and I’m already driving before she shuts her door. “Taco Bell or Arby’s?” I ask. 

“I’m not really hungry,”she says.

I almost stalled the car.”Well I’m starving, “ I say. 

She tossed my emergency snack stash at me. I’d forgotten all about them. I stopped the car to open the lid and then apparently made inappropriate noises as I gorged on dark chocolate and peppermint covered pretzels..

"Wow," she said. 

You’d think that with that experience fresh in my head, getting Ali to a birthday party in the wilds of Hendricks County the next day would have reminded me to pack snacks. But my plan was to treat myself to something in the nearby town. I'd have a late breakfast in a small town cafe or something where I could soak up some ambiance and read and relax. 

It was going to be wonderful. I'd indulge myself for the couple hours Ali would be with her friends.and I'd get a little work done or read the paper or something. A solid plan. After, I'd pick up the party girl and hightail it to Jenna’s Christmas concert on the northwest side of Indianapolis. Dining solo made sense for both time and mileage as the party site is about 30 miles northwest of our house.

Except that we get to Jamestown only to discover the party is in Greenwood. For you non-Hoosiers, Greenwood is about 50 miles southeast of Jamestown. 

It was almost 1 p.m. when I'd gotten Ali to the right spot and found a restaurant in Greenwood. I was ready to eat my own arm off. 

I run into the restaurant only to be greeted -- eventually -- by the oldest hostess still working a hostess stand in America. She's beyond the need to curry favor from anyone and can't quite reach the silverware she's supposed to give me. Wars have been fought and ended faster than the time it took for her to get me to a table. 

Still, I waited patiently, dreaming of something sumptuous. Pancakes maybe. The breeze coming through the window ruffled the laminated pages of the menu and I contemplated running out to the car for my wrap. Hoping to order fast, I toughed it out and started scanning the menu only to be yelled at by the calorie counts next to the yummy pages. I ended up with a half sandwich and soup, which was the most reasonable of the selections. Even the salads were over the top. Huddled there in the wind tunnel, I contemplated pie. I'd suffered enough, goddammit. (I resisted.)

It wasn't long before I had to get back in the car to get Ali and to head back north. I did snag a York Peppermint Patty for dessert. What kind of restaurant offers candy at the register, by the way? I think I was glad I resisted the pie. How good could it have been if they they have to offer you packaged candy at the register?!

After driving another 40 miles, I wasn't hungry anymore and got through the concert just fine. It was super fun and Jenna was a great entertainer. Now, I'm home and have 90 minutes left in the day to eat. 

Wish me luck tomorrow. If you see me out and you're hungry, I'll have yummy pretzels for you.

Your other right

Alison has never had a strong grasp on directions. North, South, East and West are simply words to her, not indicators. And while she can read and speak Latin, sing songs in various languages and recite every element on the periodic table, she's hard pressed to find her way home on her own.

She had a swim meet in Eastern Hancock County Saturday.

She did well in her first time in competitive water this year, but we arrived at 8:30 a.m. and didn't leave until 2 p.m. I've been trying to do this intermittent fasting thing and had purposefully not brought snacks.

By the time the swimmers left the water, the hallucinations were starting. Not remembering that she needed driving practice, I speed walked to the Subaru and asked her if she was hungry. She wasn't but agreed to plug "Arby's" into Google Maps.

"Not Dairy Queen?" she asked.

"Oooh. Dairy Queen," I said, guessing correctly that if there were an Arby's, there'd also be a DQ. I get a sandwich and then head to dessert. We agree that she'll drive once we get all our dietary needs met.

At DQ, I ask her what she wants. She reminds me that she filled up on the coach's bagels.

"YOU love Dairy Queen," she said. "Oh, but if they have those star things, can we get a box?"

I get her an individual item and we decide we need to listen to Christmas music on the way home. And, I remember that Sambol's Tree Farm is in Hancock County. I got a great wreath there last year and was hoping to get another one but didn't want to make the trek out there.

Thank you, Google, it's just down the road. "Let's go!" I say.

She looks at me as she nibbles on her cherry star. "Uh, I'm driving. I can't eat and drive at the same time."

My little rule follower. We find music, she finishes her treat and we wait for the voice in the phone to tell us where to go. Hancock County abuts Marion. It's not exactly Kansas, but it's not her usual environment.

The tree farm is just down from the interstate ramp, so we had our bearings and didn't need Google to get home. I get my wreath, we get back in the car. I tell her to turn left onto the the state road and then look for Interstate 70 where she'll head west.

She looked at me, uncertain. "Follow the sign to Indianapolis," I say.

She gets us on the interstate and I said, "Just keep west, take the Keystone exit and turn right."

We belt out Christmas tunes. I turned to Candy Crush and email and it wasn't long before I heard her say, "Whoops" and inform me that she'd missed the exit.

I looked up and around as the Shadeland exit grew smaller in the rear view mirror.

"We could have gone home that way," I said. "But let's take Keystone."

"OK," she says, explaining, "The sign said Indianapolis."

Just this year, this kid has successfully navigated herself across Eastern Europe and around the state of Tlaxcala, Mexico. But OK. 

I went back to my game. I was on a particularly hard level, and the girl has got to hone her local navigational skills.

My reasoning was that Keystone is clearly marked, and it's a straight shot home. A few miles north, a left, a right and then left onto our own Castle Row.

"You know where you're going, right?" I say when she exits smoothly onto Keystone.

"Yes!" she says indignantly. "I'll be turning right, right?"

I shake my head in the non-affirmative. "Left," I say.

"I'm pretty sure it's right," she said.

I shook my head.
"I know what I'm doing," she said.

"OK," I say, thinking I've got all afternoon, a power source and a heated seat. I leaned back.

She rants at me a little bit more as she makes sure she's driving the speed limit, not a speck more, and checks traffic to change lanes to the right.

I bite my tongue. With more confidence than she deserved to feel, she turns right on 56th and heads east. I maintain my silence. Moving further away from home, but at a steady 40 miles per hour, she happily buzzes along. We come to Allisonville Road. She looks around a bit as we wait on cross traffic.

I'm still minding my own business in the shotgun seat.

"Hey!" she says suddenly. "I'm on the way to Nikki's house."

"Yup," I say.

We crack up as she sighs and turns right and then comes to the next intersection. "I turn right here, don't I?" she asked.

"I don't know, do you?" I ask.

She looks at me. "I think so," she says. "Yeah. I just came from there, so I'm just going to make a big square. I turn right. Right?"

"Right," I say.

We get back to 56th Street and head west toward home.

"You told me to turn right," she said.

"I said left!"

"No, you didn't. You said right!"

"I did not!"

We're shouting, but laughing at the same time.

We get to Keystone. She stops and looks at me, her foot magnetized to the brake.

I'm incredulous at this point. She's lived in this area for all of her 17.5 years on this Earth. Our Ogden friends used to live just up the street from where we are and beyond that is Taco Bell. I know she can get home from Taco Bell. It is not, however, in sight.

"Well, you have some options," I say. "You can just go straight and we can go home down Dominic's hill."

Dominic is a friend from her Christ the King days. If we biked near his house, we had to go up what was to her elementary school-sized legs and little girl bike, an enormous challenge. That incline behind the Chatard baseball field will forever be "Dominic's hill" to us.

She guns it across the intersection and gets us home without another question.

"You said right," she mutters.