Wednesday! Wednesday! Give An Award To My Friendsday!

So!

As you all know, Wednesday is award day here at Almost Quintessence and Halushki.

I would like to start off today's ceremony by giving the Most Righteous Woman This Side of the Vulcan Award to my friend Kathy.

This past Sunday I received a call from her while I was grocery shopping at Giant in Hazleton. She was on her way to get some spring water ...

Um. Ok, I think I might have to explain something.

Here in the coal region you will often find people pulled over on the side of the road filling up plastic jugs with water flowing from natural springs. They are all over the place. Two of the more popular springs I know of are in impossible spots on the road - the one being along the stretch of RT 61 between Frackville and Saint Clair (also known as the Schuylkill County Autobahn where you are taking your life in your hands by stopping along the side to fill jugs), and the second on a hairpin turn along RT 339 coming down the mountain into Brandonville (also probably not the best place to sort of pull your car off the road to fill jugs). These springs are almost always flowing unless there is a super severe drought. People who live "in town" and people who live in areas where there are known septic issues and, consequently, known well issues are the ones who frequent theses spots.

I grew up on the RT 61 spring water, thankyouverymuch.

Back to our shceduled post.

... and she called me to a.) tell me she had a big roll of plastic in her car that she was going to drop off at my house, and b.) it is snowing a whole lot and the roads are getting bad and you might want to get your crazy self home from Hazleton.

Kathy lives in a big old school house with big old windows so she has a unique appreciation for the value of large rolls of plastic. She is my kind of woman. She knows what turns me on.

I think I might have mentioned before my total failure at girlyness. I really stink at it. Really. Here's a not-so-ironic factoid for you. When I was in 6th grade, I was in a sort of regional spelling bee. I came in second place. The word that tripped me up? Femenine. I mean, feminine.

So, if you tell me you have a big roll of plastic, you are my hero. If you tell me you have a multi fuel outdoor furnace and all the piping and heat exchangers to make an old farm house feel as toasty as a mother's womb, I am yours. If you tell me you have an F350 Dually 4x4 diesel dump truck with a plow, ... well ... this is a family blog so I'll just have to stop here.

By the way, if you do have the F350 Dually 4x4 diesel dump truck with plow, look me up on AOL - my screen name is HotLuv2onRearDumpxxxx. I'd loooooove to get to know you(r truck).

Ahem.

I can't wait to see the search hits after this post.

Anyway, what was I saying? Oh yeah.

So, when I came home, sure enough there was a nice big roll of plastic in front of my garage, and I have been busying myself with it ever since. Although, I am now wondering if, rather than making all these plastic window inserts, it might just be easier to wrap myself in the plastic. I admit it sounds a bit selfish, leaving my hubby and children kind of literally out in the cold. But! Desperate times and all that rot.

In conclusion, for seeing a need and filling that need with plastic, I award my friend Kathy with this most prestigious award. I don't even know if she reads this blog so Kenny, Amy, if you see her before I get to talk to her, give her the good news.

And now for my second award.

The Most Helpful at the Home Improvement Store award goes to Pete at Lowe's.

This past week I had to get yet another roll of fence for the evil ... I mean, my charming 4 legged, two horned spawns of Sat... I mean, ... the goats. I went to Lowes and bought the last roll of 4 foot woven wire fence because, why not? We bought pretty much every other roll they stocked this year. So, that and 10 (more) steel posts. All of this amounted to Very Heavy.

I had the load on one of those kooky carts they have where the middle wheels are on the ground but you can only have the wheels from either one end or the other on the ground at a time. So you can never just roll it. You kind of have to rock-and-roll it. I guess it's for leverage (Remember, Archimedes is your friend!) or something. ROCK AND ROLL! AT LOWES! YEEEEEEEAAAAAAAH!

So, I paid for the stuff (first at the store in cash, later with my soul and sanity) and wheel-bump-wheel-bumpity-bumped it out into the parking lot. I had our Subaru station wagon which we pretty much use to transport everything but coal, and that's probably not too far off as well. (Hi! Dump truck!) I was wheel-bump-wheel-bumpity-bumping the cart through the lot and, as I came up to my car, I noticed one of the Lowe's people gathering carts from one of the parking lot depots. I glanced at him and, even though I believe in my heart he tried not to make eye contact, it was too late. He looked at me and saw me. And I saw him see me. And he saw me see him see me. It was a veritable see saw. The tension mounted.

But. Being the independent woman I am, I looked away and thought "Meh, I can load this into the car. I've done it before."

So I wheel-bump-wheel-bumpity-bumped the cart next to my car and opened the back hatch. As I was clearing a space for my purchase, I caught site of the Lowes dude in my peripheral vision. Approaching. Me.

I pretended not to notice.

I clambered out of the car and there he was. Pete.

"Um. Do you want some help with this?" he politely asked.

"YES! YES! Oh, God, YES!" I might have also grabbed him by his red vest lapels and shaken him until his teeth rattled, I can't quite remember.

After we had everything loaded into the car, I turned to him and with all sincerity said, "Pete, today you are my hero."

And he said, "Well, at least I get to be somebody's hero..."


And we lived happily ever after. At least, I'm hoping for the best for Pete.

So, Pete, if you're out there reading this, YOU ROCK! AT LOWES! YEEEEEAAAAAAHAAAAHHHAAAAAHHHHAAAAAA! GUITAR!


This post was brought you by NaBloPoMo and Perrier.