If my head wasn't attached, I'd lose it

I am a creature of habit, particularly when it comes to shopping. I tend to go to the same grocery stores and the same pharmacies. As a result, many of their employees have come to know me.

It was kind of fun this morning when the clerk, whom I had seen and visited with many times before, said, "Aha! You got a new driver's license!!" Now how would he know that unless he had seen and remembered what my old one looked like? He wouldn't, of course, and that begs the question, "What DID my old driver's license look like?"

Well, it looked like something had chewed on it. Indeed, something had, and here's the story.


I was visiting a friend. The friend had a new German shepherd, not much older than a puppy. While I was leaning over to pet him, my driver's license fell out of my shirt pocket and landed on the ground. Before I could bend over fast enough to safely retrieve it, he had grabbed it in his mouth and begun playing with it.

Well, you can imagine! Teeth marks all over it and bent beyond any hope of being straightened enuf to slide through a machine, I thought of paying for a replacement. I decided against it. After all, my birthday would be coming up in less than a year* and most places where I shopped knew me and would accept the poor mutilated thing.

[*Drivers' licenses are renewed for eight years in Texas.]

I took to writing my driver's license number at the top of each check along with the expiration date, which could hardly be read, and this worked out well except for the occasional time or two when I went to a new vendor. Then I'd have to go through the whole story all over again.


The clerk then said, "I'm going to have to do that." Just as I was starting to remind him that he could do that by mail (as I had), he continued. "I left my driver's license on top of the car last night when I was getting back in to go home from McDonald's."

I immediately thought, "Oh, oh!" "Not that I had much money in it," he went on. "My business card was in there. Maybe they'll call me and return it." (Fat chance of that happening!)

Lord love us! The clerk must have meant that he left his wallet on top of the car, which reminds me of another story. "Is there no end to your stories, Goldenrod?" Probably not. Actually, hopefully not! Ready?? Or not, here it comes!


We were in Tomahawk, Wisconsin, shopping at the Indian reservation for (in my case) moccasins and anything else (in my mother's case) that seemed a likely candidate for a souvenir to take home.

We had arrived in two separate cars. Hubby and I would be returning south to Indiana. Mom and Dad would be going back to Munising. We all pretty much left at the same time.

We hugged and kissed (and did and said all those other things that normal people do who love each other and who are family).

Then, as hubby and I watched them pull away, we noticed that Mother's purse was still on the top of their car. Not only that, but it was open and all sorts of things were spewing out!

So there we were, running as fast as we could after their car, one of us trying frantically to pick up each flying object and the other screaming at the top of his lungs to get them to stop.