It sure is cold enough for me. This morning I had to get up early to go to a dentist appointment over in Monterey. When the old alarm clock said, “It’s time to get up,” I just pulled the covers up and said to myself that my teeth aren’t hurting just yet. So I decided to go back to sleep until the heater warmed up the house.
As I was just about back to sleep, my angel of a wife rolled over and said, “Oh honey, don’t forget, you have a dentist appointment today.” Curses, I thought. She caught me again! My bride is the most together person I have ever met.
It’s a darn good thing because as I get older, appointments are not something I am good at remembering. Not that I ever was good at remembering to see a dentist. I had my fill as a small child living with another together woman, my mom.
I’ll tell you, just thinking about that dentist that I frequented when we lived in Santa Maria sends me into full trauma. This guy would give Seymour from the “Little Shop of Horrors” shivers. I swear I saw him laughing one time when I told him he was hurting me. Of course, he lied and told my mom he wasn’t hurting me, but she was no fool. She knew I didn’t cry unless I was in severe pain…
Or at least that’s what I told her, and she would believe any of her boys before she would listen to any sadist that also took her money. I quit seeing that dentist shortly after that miserable day. That was one of my many mistakes from childhood. I could go on from there and start naming my mistakes from my younger days, but you didn’t tune in to my scribbling to hear a story of misery.
Let me finish telling about the furnace and who was going to turn it on this morning. You probably don’t want to hear my tales of woe. But perhaps you may learn how to get the furnace turned on in the morning. After all, you probably have a much easier method of warming up your house.
I remember Dad telling me that I would really get warm fast as soon as I started picking up the potatoes that we were to harvest that day. You know he was right. I started to get warm fast as soon as the tractor dug up some potatoes for me to sack. Of course, that was another place and time. This morning I didn’t have any potatoes to pick up, but I did have a dentist appointment
So we lay there and played rock, paper, scissors to see who was going to get up this cold morning and who would be able to lie there in comfort. Since paper covers rock (I lost), I was the chosen one, so I gritted my teeth and swung out of bed.
We have a real good furnace. It came with the house, so I don’t know if it is better than yours, but it works great for us. Of course, someone has to get up and push the button, and since I am always telling Lorraine how mechanical I am, she often asks me to prove it. I guess you know I had to prove it today.
When you turn on your furnace, does it sound as if you can hear money being burned? This morning I was sure that we had quit using natural gas and started burning our children’s inheritance. At least it seemed that way after we got our bill for last month. If we only burned one dollar bills, it probably would be cheaper to just burn money.
Obviously I am stretching credibility by telling you that it might be easier to just burn money. We burn enough of that putting gas in our cars and putting food on the table. I don’t want to belabor the situation, so I’ll get back to this morning and how cold it was.
After I had turned on the furnace and started getting dressed and my hair combed, I heard a strange sound coming from my bed. Upon investigating the noise, I was led to the bed where I heard some sort of stifled laughter coming from under the covers.
I immediately deduced that my lovely bride was giggling like a 10-year-old that I had to turn on the furnace while she lay warm as toast in bed. I wanted to make sure that she knew that I had heard her, so I stepped into the bathroom and filled up one of those plastic glasses that some folks keep handy.
I thought I would let my favorite woman in the whole world know that she didn’t marry a dunce, no matter how often I had to wear that hat in class. I tiptoed over to the bedside and asked in a whisper if she could find it in her heart to give me a kiss. I think I got through to her at that point and she slipped the covers down from her face. That’s when I poured the water over her beautiful face. It wasn’t warm water, that would have been too easy.
I will be truthful at this point, and tell you that I started laughing and running at the same time. Any woman that can move as fast as she moved was not a woman to be trifled with.
Ah, but this tail wouldn’t be complete if I didn’t tell you that I am now on probation. I have to be the main heater turner-oner from now on. I mean, I don’t have to be the only one, but if I want to eat or find clean clothes more often than not, I am going to be the best furnace turner-oner she has ever known.
I should close with this little warning. Do not pour water on your wife no matter what you are burning in your furnace.
God Bless.
