Halloween must have arrived early, because it seems like we’ve been getting ghosted a lot this summer…
We were scheduled to have our house painted last year. But then the painter we selected had knee surgery and moved our project to this year. We called him several times this summer to see where our house was on his schedule. He never returned any of our calls.
Blessing-in-Disguise Postscript: We just found another house painter at half the price, but he won’t be able to do our house until next spring!
I got a summons to appear for jury duty in county court. It was scheduled for the same day as my bi-monthly out-of-town eye injection. Tough choice, eh? The summons said I could email or call in my excuse. So I did both, twice. Did the Clerk of Court ever confirm my excusal, by email or by phone? No.
Better-Call-Y’all Postscript: Per the court summons, I called the jury-duty line the night before I was scheduled for duty; the recorded message said that all groups were excused. So, we’ll never know whether a deputy would have shown up at my door and hauled me in for contempt of court for getting an eye injection. That might have made the local news.
I have been looking for a good tile guy to re-grout the tile in our shower area. I called one place that got good recommendations; the office manager asked me to email them photos of our shower. I did so. I haven’t heard anything from them since. What a surprise.
Still-Looking Postscript: So I’m still looking. Know a good grout guy?
Late last year, I volunteered to be a member of our HOA’s erosion committee, whose role was to identify stormwater management issues on our mountain and help head off any Surfside-style catastrophe. To make a long story short, I grew disillusioned with the Board’s limited empowerment of the committee and the lack of information. I just felt like a warm body. So I decided to resign.
In late July, I sent the Board an email that my skill set and energies were not a good fit, expressed regrets about leaving them minus a resource, and wished them well. Of course, none of the Board members responded to my email — if they had, I would not be writing this sad and ghostly tale.
Don’t-Hold-Your-Breath Postscript: You learn something about people by what they do and what they don’t do. The Board’s failure to write even a brief acknowledgement to me only reinforced to me that I was a warm body and resigning had been the right thing to do.
So, Happy Hot Halloween. After a month’s absence here, I hereby ghost you no longer.
Maybe it’s just me, but many of the questions the New York Times poses in its headlines don’t seem all that compelling. Consider whether the quality of your life depends on the answers to the following, all posed in its pages over the last month:
◊ Is Pilates as Good as Everyone Says?
◊ Why Is It So Hard to Adapt Austen?
◊ How Does Temperature Affect Wine?
◊ What’s the Best Lingerie for a Grown-Up Woman?
◊ A Taste for Cannibalism?
◊ No More Pet Store Puppies?
◊ Who Will Make Apple Fashionable Now?
◊ Can You Drive Alone in the H.O.V. Lane if You’re Pregnant?
◊ What Happens When a Rock Star Proposes Onstage?
◊ Do Cancer Centers Push Too Many Tests?
◊ Long Ago, I Bought a Human Skull. What Should I Do With It?
◊ What Is Delaware’s Court of Chancery and Its Role in Elon Musk’s Twitter Deal?
◊ How Much Watching Time Do You Have This Weekend?
Just to be fair, the New York Times also posed these more pressing questions:
◊ Why Do So Many Republicans Tolerate Donald Trump?
◊ The Jan. 6 Panel After 8 Hearings: Where Will the Evidence Lead?
◊ The Question You Didn’t Know Needed Answering: Are Gophers Farmers?
I am glad I subscribe, if only to get answers to questions I never knew I should ask.