Garden tales

The Web is a wonderful place to find serious gardener stuff, such as this direct quote from a venerable gardening source: "Take care to make sure the seeds do not grow willy nilly." Unfortunately this is the type of information that too many gardeners ignore, and they let their seeds grow willy nilly, and they soon reap the consequences: too many zucchinis.

No, just kidding. The overabundance often seen with zucchinis occurs because little gnomes secretly carry them into yards, office buildings, etc. during the night when everyone is sleeping.

There is the perennial garden, and the annual garden, and then there is ours, which could be most accurately described as the Willy Nilly Garden. No matter the amount of discipline I try to impose, a few plants have declared themselves independent, and take orders from no one. They roam about the garden at will, poking their tendrils into everyone else's business, not wanting to miss anything exciting going on.

At some point, if they keep growing, they will discover that the real happening place in the yard is not in the dirt, but in the old ladder hanging decoratively on the fence. Well, that used to hang decoratively on the fence.

The ladder is one of those items that has never had a secure home. At first we propped it against our fence, which gave the appearance of the intention on our part of making nighttime raids into our neighbor's yard. It was then retired to a reclining position, propped on the side of the fence. More than once Joe has offered his opinion that the proper place for the ladder is in the trash.

The yard is not a respite for Joe. It contains too much nature, and this nature intrudes upon his senses, making it impossible for him to relax. Recently he finally agreed to sit and enjoy it with me, provided he could have his coffee at the same time, although this does nothing to help with relaxing. But the tranquility was soon interrupted by a sound, picked up by Joe's keen ears, of chewing. This sound was traced to the ladder, which was discovered to be harboring carpenter bees who, judging from the amount of shavings beneath the ladder, were building a small condominium inside the ladder.

The ladder was promptly dislodged from the fence and dumped unceremoniously as far from the house as possible. We did not actually see the bees we supposed were inside, so we could be wrong. It could be little gnomes, growing hydroponic zucchinis.

Beware the Garden Lurker

We interrupt this important blog post before it starts to bring you this even more important news flash:

Residents of a certain Maryland neighborhood, beware. Reports have surfaced of a Garden Lurker, who is described as having "swishing hair" and "an unnatural hatred for slugs" and has startled several residents in the area with her lurking behavior.

Residents report walking by the Lurker's raised garden bed, minding their own business and in some cases whistling "Zip-a-dee-doo-dah," when suddenly they sense a movement among the flowers. There, crouched down at eye level between dame's rocket and tickseed, is the Garden Lurker, looking for all the world like a giant jackrabbit.

"She scared the bejeebies out of me," said one resident who encountered the Lurker. "It's like a garden statue come to life."

Gardening experts say this lurking behavior is not uncommon. They surmise that the Garden Lurker has become obsessed with ridding her garden of pests -- she has been overheard mumbling such phrases as Death to aphids! while brandishing a trowel -- and is keeping a close eye on her flowers. Experts say the Lurker poses no harm to anyone, unless you are crawling on her plants, in which case she means you great bodily harm.

Some gardeners, according to experts, even lurk among their flowers at night, the better to catch certain nocturnal pests in action, but so far there are no signs that the Garden Lurker engages in nightly vigils. Nevertheless, residents are keeping a sharp eye out during their morning walk to their cars, just in case the Lurker has fallen asleep in the garden.

To date the Garden Lurker has confined her activity to her own garden, but nearby residents worry that her zealous crusade against slugs and other invaders -- and her obvious lack of any life outside the yard -- may impel her to lurk in their gardens. They wonder whether they should be putting any deterrents up around their yards, like signs saying "aphid-free zone."

But the best cure, experts say, is for the Lurker to be removed from the pressures of garden life and taken somewhere to rest and recover and gradually regain a sense of normalcy. Somewhere like the beach.

Have flies, will swat

The flyswatter has been around almost as long as flies have, and has proven to be an effective solution for breaking delicate objects in one's home while one swats at pesky flies and other insects, who generally escape unscathed.

The modern flyswatter was apparently invented in the early 1900s, when a doctor in Kansas, wishing to stir up people's passions against flies because they spread disease, formed the rallying cry of "Swat the fly!" Soon thereafter a schoolteacher named Frank invented the fly bat, which consisted of a yardstick and a piece of screen. We can surmise that schoolteacher Frank was quite familiar with objects whose purpose was to inflict pain and injury on another, and perhaps created his "fly bat" more with unruly students in mind than insects, but nevertheless the invention took off. The doctor -- with a medical person's flair for marketing -- renamed it the insectus mortalis apparatus. No, really, he called it the flyswatter.

I highly recommend owning more than one flyswatter, because it is something you do not want to have to search for in your hour of need. You can, of course, substitute some other implement that roughly resembles the flyswatter, such as an AK47, or a shoe, provided the shoe belongs to someone other than you. We personally have about 17 flyswatters in our home, although I am sure we used to have more, some of which were probably carried away on the shoulders of little determined bands of ants.

It did not take us long after moving into our home to figure out that we needed a doomsday supply of flyswatters. With just one, whenever we saw a bug, by the time we would run up (or down) a treacherous flight of stairs, retrieve the flyswatter and run back down (or up), the bug would be long gone, its laughter trailing after it. The bugs would leave little coded messages for each other, like some sort of Bug Underground Railroad, that roughly translated to: SLOW RESPONSE TIME. HOUSEHOLD LACKS FLYSWATTER ON EACH FLOOR. DOES HAVE SHOES ON EACH FLOOR, BUT FEMALE LOATHE TO USE THEM AS WEAPONS.

And so I headed to Target, that venerable purveyor of everything -- except flyswatters, as it turned out -- to stock up. Unable to locate any, I did locate an employee, who turned out to be unfamiliar with the word "flyswatter," as well as with many other words in English with which I attempted to explain what a flyswatter was.

Now, Wikipedia describes the flyswatter as a "small rectangular sheet of lightweight, flexible, vented material" that is "attached to a lightweight wire or plastic handle." This is EXACTLY how I described what I was looking for to the Target employee. Well, except for the small rectangular sheet part. And the lightweight, flexible, vented material part. And...the lightweight wire or plastic handle part. I believe the actual words I used were "stick" and "smack." But she totally should have understood what I was describing.

So, if you are trying to describe a flyswatter to an individual who apparently has never heard the rallying cry "Swat the fly," I recommend the liberal use of gestures and props, including actual bugs so that you can act out how you wish to use the flyswatter in conjunction with the bugs. Or possibly with the employee.

Wood you be mine?

A much-anticipated milestone is imminent in our household. Besides the final episode of the TV show Lost, I mean, although it is difficult to think of an event that has been more anticipated, at least by me. A certain someone in this household, which is not me, has been utterly consumed by Lost for the last 18 years. "But Lost hasn't been running for 18 years," you say. Obviously you do not know much about the show, in which time travel and other mysterious time manipulations are common, including parallel universes, one of which may very well feature the characters wandering around the island for 18 years.

Despite the excitement this coming event has generated, another happy milestone is approaching: the Hero and the Princess's fifth anniversary. Although no firm plans have been set in place yet, no doubt any celebration will involve the traditional, romantic gift for the fifth anniversary, which is: wood.

This is especially appropriate at this particular season in the Hero and Princess's life, when their lives are consumed by drywall and two-by-fours and decisions about whether to brave discovery of what might be under the wood floor in the basement. Yes, wood is definitely a timely symbol of their relationship.

However, silverware is also considered a fifth-anniversary symbol, presumably because by the fifth year a couple's original silverware has mysteriously dwindled, to the point where they are sometimes forced to eat with gardening tools. This net loss of silverware is especially common when there are any children in the house, a situation that also requires the removal of sharp knives from the home. The Hero has often, for the Princess's safety but particularly his own, contemplated removing sharp knives from their own home, but cannot think of any place the Princess would not be able to find them ("So, THAT'S why you were in such a hurry to seal the fireplace up.").

How might a couple celebrate the "wood" anniversary? Our research has turned up these suggestions:

• With a toast to each other, that their love might grow like the trees around them. Note: This is NOT suggested if the trees around you, like the maple in our backyard, are dying. Decayed wood is generally not considered part of the fifth anniversary tradition.

• With a gift of fireplace kindling. Note: This should NOT include the spouse's prized, handmade bowl from second grade, fashioned out of toothpicks.

• With a gift of a bonsai plant, whose ageless evergreen qualities symbolize the hope for a long-lasting marriage. Unrelated aside: The Hero has often expressed a wish to grow bonsai, and indeed before his marriage had such a plant, which perished under mysterious circumstances after the Princess arrived in the home.

• By carving from a unique gift from wood, unless all the knives have been removed from your home.

Whether the Princess and the Hero plan to celebrate with wood or silverware, we can be assured of one thing: They will NOT be planning a trip to the Lost island, even if it DOES have a lot of wood trees.

What do plants and dinosaurs have in common?

If you are relatively new to gardening, one of the first things you will notice when you are choosing flowers is that most plants are actually named by dinosaur experts, as is readily apparent by two facts: The names are a) unpronounceable, and b) ugly. Argyranthemum, for instance, is a pleasant little daisy-like flower, but it sounds like something that could have hung out with Tyrannosaurus Rex, wreaking havoc on the neighborhood, instilling terror in other creatures ("Argyranthemum invades village, causes havoc, tramples daisies").

There are exceptions to this, of course. Some plants appear to have been named by disease specialists, as we see with Scabiosa, which is a plant with beautiful, round purple blossoms but which sounds like something you would immediately make an appointment to see a world-renowned dermatologist about.

To offset this, most plants have been dubbed with common, more attractive names, such as painted daisy, pincushion, tickseed, etc. Sometimes even these common names become too difficult to remember, and one starts to refer to one's plants as "that plant with beautiful, round purple blossoms," "the yellow spiky thing," "the terror plant," etc.

In our yard we have Hesperis, which is also known as dame's rocket. It is called this because in the second year of its life, with no warning whatsoever, it shoots up like a rocket, towering over other plants in the garden, 75-year-old trees, your neighbors' houses, the local cell phone tower, local dames, etc.

I have discovered that, despite the glowing description of Hesperis on the little card that came attached to it from the nursery ("Delightful purple blossoms!" "You will love this flower!"), it does closely resemble a terrorizing carnivore. It has, in fact, been banned in Connecticut and Massachusetts and some Canadian provinces.The warnings I have been reading about Hesperis include:

• Plant is invasive.
• Will crowd out other plants.
• Will take over the universe.
• RUN!

This plant has already engulfed another one that was nearby, whose names -- Latin or common -- escape me, but this does not matter anymore since the plant is nonexistent now. I fear that mankind's only hope rests in Lamium, also known by the charming name dead nettle, which is located at the other end of our garden and is also considered invasive ("plant-eating"). Maybe the two will meet in the middle and, in some fierce "Battlestar Galactica Green" duel, battle it out.

The hair is the important thing

My hair stylist seemed particularly pleased with her handiwork this time, and asked if I had anything exciting planned for the rest of the day.

"I have to go to the nursery and get flowers," I said, "and then plant them."

She looked disappointed. "It's a shame you have to be out working in your yard, with this terrific haircut," she said. "Don't you have anyplace more glamorous to go?"

"Does the grocery store count?"

She sighed. "Well, at least when you're out there at the nursery" -- here she looked upwards and began to wave a brush around -- "the sun will shine on your beautiful hair, and the copper tints will glitter when you swish your hair around, and you'll look just like an advertisement," she waxed rapturously.

But although the sun did shine while I was at the nursery, no one appeared to notice my hair. Obviously I did not swish it enough.

With that disappointment behind me, I tried to concentrate on choosing my flowers. Since the flowers in other customers' carts always interest me more than the ones in my own, I'm thinking someone needs to implement a fast-food take-out system for nurseries, in which you can just go up and down the line of customers waiting to check out, point to what you are interested in from their carts, and say "I want one of this, three of that, a couple of this one," etc., and voila -- in a few minutes the staff would bring it all to you, and off you would go, after suavely handing over the equivalent of a college tuition for everything.

Or better yet, nurseries could have a select grouping of flowers already IN the waiting carts, and you could just get the whole lot at once. It would really cut down the amount of mental -- and physical -- work you have to do. Kind of like the way a certain family member, in his bachelor days, would buy whatever outfit was on the mannequin, because he was assured that the items all went together in a cohesive manner, which he could not be sure of if he were to depend on his own intuition.

But in the absence of any of these options, I resorted to choosing flowers according to my usual custom:

1. Find several white and yellow and pink flowers to complement all the purple already in my yard. Give self strict orders NOT to buy any more purple flowers.

2. Select several purple flowers anyway, because they are too pretty to pass up.

3. Get more white and yellow and pink flowers to offset all the new purple ones.

4. Get a bigger cart to hold everything.

5. Head to the checkout. Refrain from looking at any more flowers along the way.

6. Look at everyone else's cart to see what they have that I didn't notice earlier.

7. Immediately regret that I didn't pick what they did.

8. Spend the rest of the time in line deciding whether to get out of line and go start over again. Continue to wonder this even after flowers are loaded in car and I am driving home.

9. Arrive home to realize that, really, I don't have THAT many purple flowers.

10. Sigh, plant flowers, and remember to swish hair in the sunlight.

Animals in the (weird) news

The Princess regrets that her regular blog programming does not appear today. She can offer no good excuse for this, other than that she has no boss to provide encouragement, in the form of threats, to produce a post. BUT, she has at least provided some links to stories that may offer her readers some amusement. The Princess will return next week, provided she is not overcome with exhaustion from pulling weeds.

In Finland your stuffed animals can take a vacation. The catch? You have to stay home. Sometimes it's good to know that not all the goofy ideas in the world come from America. http://www.reuters.com/article/idUSTRE64B2Q920100512

On the other hand, if your living, breathing pooch hasn't exactly been a saint, you can try to help him improve his chances of getting to Heaven:

http://www.azcentral.com/offbeat/articles/2010/05/05/20100505church-service-for-dogs.html

This may be my solution to yard work. But will the homeowner's association approve?

http://newslite.tv/2010/05/13/wallabies-sold-as-ecofriendly.html#more

A cheaper way to get a nap

While certain Tiny Family Members last weekend were learning about the intricate workings of the local sewer system, another family member was being introduced to the less-understandable workings of opera. Although attending an opera (a French word meaning "an expensive way to get a nap") was not entirely in keeping with the family member's own free will, she bore it with good humor and graciously shared her knowledge with us.

"We're seeing 'La Trattoria,' I think," she said, waving her hand airily."Or maybe that's the name of a restaurant...something like that."

During the opera she received a call from her husband, inquiring whether the opera was over, so that she could rejoin him and two Tiny Family Members who had been placed in his care during her absence. He was quite sure the opera must be close to being over.

"It's not over yet," she whispered into the phone. "The heroine hasn't died yet. We can't leave until the heroine dies."

It was some time before the heroine departed this world -- "died of a broken heart, of course " -- and in the meantime the rest of us continued with our family dinner, which was punctuated by knock-knock jokes from Tiny Family Members. There was also an abundance of "Why did the ____ cross the ____?" jokes, most of which were made up on the spot and were inspired by objects in sight, e.g., "Why did the carrots cross the table?"

When the heroine had finally expired and the family member returned from the opera, she still thought the name might have been 'La Trattoria,' although she believed it might possibly contain an additional syllable in there somewhere. We were scandalized to learn that there were English subtitles, as the whole point of opera seems to be lost if you can understand what is going on. Understanding the words, however, had evidently not been enough to keep certain patrons from falling asleep during the performance.

"Well," said the family member, "I hope those people had something exciting to do after the opera, because they were all rested up by then."

If one finds going to the opera a bit too expensive of a way to take a nap, one can experience much the same effect from reading Joe's math textbook, which I did on the way home from the family dinner to keep Joe awake. It failed to keep ME awake, but that was irrelevant.

I read page after page of text, which may as well have been in Italian for all I could understand it. "Where are the subtitles?" I said, flipping through the pages.

"What subtitles?"

"You know, where they explain all this in plain English."

Lacking subtitles, I soon started interjecting my own interpretations:

"Tails of all possible distributions can be classified into three categories in bounded distributions which have no tails (because they tragically lost them in a meat cleaver accident...)."

"Extreme value distribution of the ordered data must belong to one of just three possible general families (Smith, Jones, Magillicuddy...)..."

These interpretations were not entirely met with appreciation by the Math Purist, who seemed by all appearances to comprehend what I was reading, and indeed showed some degree of excitement over comparisons of fat-tailed and thin-tailed distributions.

As for me, next time I need a good nap, the opera might be the way to go.

The weekend of the Tiny People

This weekend we attended several family affairs, which seemed to be principally inhabited by Tiny People -- Tiny Family Members, Tiny Neighbor People of Family Members, Tiny Random-off-the-Street People, etc. Although the total number of Tiny People was actually quite low, they were able, thanks to an obscure mathematical principle, to sound and appear as if they were an army of millions.

You see this principle demonstrated in several Old Testament scenes, in which the Lord causes Israel's enemies to hear a tremendous noise and, believing themselves to be pursued by a large army, to flee in panic. Trust me, there were Tiny People involved in this somewhere.

Despite their bustle of activity, the Tiny People were able to demonstrate some astonishing physical feats as they moved about. One was that no matter how much food they heaped on their plate, and no matter how alarming an angle to the ground they carried the plate, nothing ever spilled from it. Nothing. They would transport the plate to some far-flung corner of the house or yard, maneuvering through chairs and tables, Big People's legs, in and out of minivans, etc., the plate tipping precariously this way and that, until the Tiny People arrived at a suitable destination and placed the plate, its contents perfectly intact, on some appropriate surface, such as a Big Person's lap. There, having defeated the laws of gravity and logic, it would promptly be forgotten.

When the Tiny People registered hunger, they would vaguely remember that somewhere in that vast sea of Big People and food was a plate upon which they had placed some special treasures, and in their search to reclaim this treasure, any plate that had food on it looked, to them, like their plate, and was treated in a manner accordingly. Woe to any adult who left an unguarded plate of food within reach of the Tiny People.

One Tiny Person was oblivious to everything going on, and set about looking for an escape route out of the yard. She apparently viewed the fenced-in yard as a giant playpen into which she had been placed against her will, and though it was stocked with Tiny People attractions, they held no interest for her. The other Tiny People had lined up for a chance to break the pinata, and thereby garner great glory and candy, but this excitement was ignored by the Escaping Tiny Person, as was Joe's attempt to interest her in the pinata: "There's candy and violence happening over there!" She ignored it all, and when her attempts to escape finally failed, she promptly lay down in the grass, perhaps hoping to be forgotten until some time had passed, everyone left, and she could continue her efforts undisturbed.

Occasionally a Tiny Person would temporarily tire of the melee, and retreat to a Big Person's lap for rejuvenation. This often involved looking at a book, or eating something off the Big Person's plate. One Tiny Family Member requested Grandpa to read his favorite book, which consisted of photos of Grandpa and Grandma on a trip in the wilds of Montana. The pictures showed the diverse wildlife of the area, moose, eagles, outhouses, etc.

One picture showed Grandma just after she had made an up-close and personal acquaintance with the outhouse. The Tiny Family Member's eyes grew wide. "Is Gamma going to the BATHROOM?" he shrieked.

Grandpa hastily turned the page. "That's a private matter," he said, and looked for something more appropriate for public viewing.

The Tiny Family Member and Grandpa later went for a walk, on which the Tiny Family Member received further lessons on nature, principally the workings of the sewer system. Grandpa asserted that there was water under the manhole cover, just as there was in the storm drain, but since the Tiny Family Member could see no water below the manhole cover, he expressed doubts about this.

"If you picked it up," Grandpa said, "there would be water under there."

The Tiny Family Member stared at the manhole cover, then smiled. "That's super cool, Gammpa."

As was the weekend of the Tiny People.

Reformation

This year I am not giving in. No matter that this spring has been so warm that everyone else already had their gardens completely outfitted by March, whereas mine has large, empty spaces begging to be filled in with beautiful blooms. Everyone else can be enticed by the begging. Not me.

Because I did that once.

One spring we went from February to July, skipping all the gradual warmth of spring. I, wooed by such warm weather and enticed by all the gorgeous plants at the nursery -- and spurred by the fact that my garden was completely bare at the time -- planted my flowers in April. In Michigan we did not even THINK of planting until the end of August, once we were sure the snow was really gone. Even then, to be prudent, we planted only hardy things, like evergreen trees.

The minute I planted everything that year, we skipped from July to December, and there were dire warnings of frost. I frantically collected every plastic tub, tarp, shoe box, cereal box, etc., I owned to cover my defenseless plants. Like the woman of Elisha's time who borrowed her neighbor's jugs to hold her abundance of oil, I was prepared, if the Lord had given the word, to beg for more tubs from my neighbors.

And of course I prayed. Please, Lord, don't let these poor plants (and my wallet) suffer for my foolishness. Please, take me, not them...well, not really.

Luckily the Lord took pity on me. He spared the plants, and I am a reformed gardener now. Though it takes everything in me, I will not yield to the primal urge to plant things before it is time.

Yesterday, the weather forecaster said there was a chance for frost this weekend. I wanted to hug him.

Maybe, if he is right, someone will come knocking at my door, asking for tubs and shoe boxes. Of course I will lend them graciously, along with a tract warning about the foolishness of impulsive actions, and urging people to have more patience.

OK, so last night I broke down and bought a hanging plant. But at least it can easily be brought inside.

D-Day for ants

In anticipation of our yearly onslaught of ants, Joe has been researching various methods of ant "relocation" (meaning "no longer among the living"). Most of the methods he has discovered require only common household items, such as coffee grounds, peanut butter, cornstarch, arsenic, a shotgun, etc. Following are some helpful tips for using these items for ant "relocation."

1. Do you find you have trouble keeping coffee grounds off the counter, floor, table, chairs, etc.? "Relocate" the coffee grounds and the ants at the same time. Move the grounds to a spot where the ants like to hang out, and put up a sign advertising the coffee as "peanut butter" (see Tip #5). Be sure to emphasize that the "peanut butter" is free.

2. Cayenne pepper may also be put down wherever ants like to gather, and is an effective deterrent. Of course, it is an effective deterrent to just about everything else, including deer, dogs, visitors, etc.

3. If you would prefer not to observe the effects of "relocation," cornstarch may be just the thing for you. Put it in your vacuum cleaner bag, suck up the ants, and the cornstarch will suffocate them. They will suffer just the same, but you can remain in blissful ignorance.

4. Cultivate friendships with daddy longlegs spiders, who reportedly enjoy a meal of ants every now and then. Encourage the daddy longlegs to take up residence near where the ants are entering your home. If you have difficulty attracting daddy longlegs -- though we personally have never run into this problem -- make a sign proclaiming "ANT BUFFET -- ALL YOU CAN EAT -- 24 HOURS"

5. Mix boric acid with peanut butter, put it on a cracker, and put the cracker in a box. To ensure that only ants get inside the box, poke some tiny holes in the box, and then tack on a sign that says "ANTS ONLY! ID REQUIRED!" Set outdoors and hope the recycling people don't pick it up.

6. If you see a trail of ants, put some vinegar on a sponge. Use the sponge to wipe out the trail, which will prevent them from finding it again, unless they have discovered the greatness of the GPS.

7. As an alternative to Tip #6, if you see a trail of ants, you could just do what I would do, which is shoot them.

If you follow all this advice, there is no guarantee that you will successfully "relocate" all your ants, although your house is likely to end up looking like the scene of a giant food fight. Be sure to empty the vacuum cleaner bag before you start cleaning everything up. Just don't look inside.

The GPS birthday

As my birthday is at the very end of April, Joe has all month to discover, by various means, what I would like to do to celebrate. This year he suggested that he could make all the arrangements and surprise me.

I thought for a minute. "Okay," I said.

"Really?" he said, sort of weakly. Clearly he had expected me to decline. But he rallied, and expressed how proud he was that I was willing to be spontaneous.

"Don't be too proud," I said. "It's just that I'm not very good at making decisions. This way you can make all the decisions."

As the days wound down to my birthday, he would occasionally bolster his confidence in his ability to keep his plans a secret. "I think I'm gonna be able to keep this to myself," he would say.

When the night of my birthday came, he assured me he did in fact have a plan, and that it was a multi-phase plan.

"Oh," he added off-handedly as we were leaving, "bring the GPS."

The fact that we would need the GPS did not necessarily rule out any nearby restaurant, except for Outback, which Joe knows how to get to. In our house, "bring the GPS" does not always mean we are traveling to some exotic location. It could mean we are traveling to Lowe's, a scant few miles away, but a place we do not go very often, and therefore a place whose location remains nebulous in our heads.

On the highway he suddenly said, "Well, time for the GPS. I thought we'd go to Starbucks first. We need to find a Starbucks."

"Take this exit and make two rights," I said, without consulting the GPS.

He looked at me appreciatively. "Wow, you're good."

After enjoying our coffee Joe asked if I wanted to know where we were going next. I pointed out that Cold Stone Creamery was right next door, and if we were to eat dinner there it would be perfectly fine with me.

"It would be spontaneous," I said encouragingly. "And we wouldn't even need the GPS."

"That's not dinner," he said.

"Ice cream could be dinner," I said. "In fact, if you look on the GPS, it will list Cold Stone under 'Restaurants,' and restaurants serve dinner, so therefore we could have dinner at Cold Stone."

We did not, however, eat dinner at Cold Stone. So much for being spontaneous.

He seemed strongly interested in telling me our next destination, even though I said I was happy to be surprised about it, and finally he said, "Well, I'd have to use the GPS to find out how to get there, but you'll know. We're going to Eggspectations."

"Down the street and turn left," I intoned, like Debbie, or Dorothy, or whatever our GPS persona is.

But even Eggspectations was not our final destination. We left the restaurant after our meal, and before I knew it, I was being whisked away to the exotic location of...Lowe's.

"How did we end up at Lowe's on my birthday?" I said.

He looked innocent. "Must have been the GPS."