“Just why are you here?” Candy demanded.
“Hey!”
“Is it something Harriet told you?” she asked.
“What? No. Campaign procedure. Mother’s never done this before. I’m her campaign manager—I thought Daryl and I should establish some ground rules.”
Candy pointed a red-nailed finger in my face. “You’d better not ruin this for me!”
And she marched back toward the house, leaving me standing in the driveway, wondering what that was all about....
A Trash ’n’ Treasures Tip
Sometimes white elephant sales have a “preview night” where buyers—for an added price—can have a chance to buy before the general public does. Mother splits the cost with a friend . . . then attends for both of them, cell phone at the ready.
Chapter Four
The Sick and the Dead
Dearest ones!
Vivian here, taking the narrative ball from Brandy, which I know will please many of you in the “Viva Vivian!” crowd. But before I continue with our exciting tale, I simply must get a few things off my bosom. (I know the term is “chest,” but that has such a harsh sound, don’t you think?)
The other day I was having lunch at a local eatery, noted for their exceptional haddock plate (best sampled early in the week). Anyhoo, while I sat ruminating (wonderful word!) over my after-meal coffee, a young waitress stopped by and refilled my cup. I responded with the appropriate, “Thank you,” and she replied, “No problem.”
So I asked her, “Oh, was there a problem?”
And she replied, “Huh?”
Then I said, “Because I thought keeping my cup filled was part of your job, not a favor you were doing me.” Well, she gave me a dirty look and left (and didn’t refill my cup again). I’m afraid this latest generation has lost all sense of polite behavior.
Since when did no problem become interchangeable with you’re welcome? It’s not as though saying the former saves any more time or effort than the latter. And the phrase no problem consists of two negative words. Talk about sending out bad vibes!
Replying “no problem” is appropriate only after someone asks someone else to do them a favor, the response indicating the askee is receptive to the idea, as when I was caught downtown without wheels and needed to get promptly elsewhere, and flagged down a young man on a motorcycle. When I explained my dilemma (I may have exaggerated just a teensy bit by saying it was a life or death matter), he replied, “No problem.” Correct-oh-mundo! So I hopped on the back of the Harley, glad I was wearing slacks, and off we went, the wind having its way with my hair.
So I’m asking you, dear reader, to join me in reversing this abomination of misusage by pointing it out (politely, of course) (assuming you want more coffee) whenever you encounter the unfortunate response, “no problem.” Together we can change the world, one waitress at a time!
You’re welcome!
While I’m on the subject of restaurants, something else I’ve regularly been subjected to has been gnawing at me like a miffed Sushi with one of Brandy’s shoes, specifically the overuse of the word awesome, often uttered by waitstaff after my positive response to a meal. How can my pleasure in a meal possibly be awesome? Worse yet, sometimes my very order has been deemed worthy of such a superlative!
Awesome is used nowadays for the most mundane things, which emasculates the term. Among “awesome” occurrences would be a shooting star, a dog that could talk, or my bunions not hurting after a long walk. So let’s put the awe back in awesome!
(Note to Vivian from Editor: Would you please move the narrative along?)
(Note to Editor from Vivian: Yes, ma’am.)
(Note to Vivian from Editor: Awesome.)
(Note to Editor from Vivian: No problem!)
The Red Hatted League was formed by myself and a few close friends who had become disenchanted by our experience in the Red Hat Society, an organization of ladies aged fifty or older (I just barely made the age requirement!) who meet regularly for lunch wearing red hats and purple dresses, and whose mantra is just having fun.
Well, our RHS group was having a little too much fun, accused as we were of intemperate imbibing (is that redundant?) during dinner, leading to more than a few fender-benders in restaurant parking lots. I do not drink myself—doing so interferes with my medication (once I partook of spirits and ended up in Poughkeepsie, remembering neither how I’d gone or why) (well, by bus), nor did I find flattering festooning myself in red or purple (just try to find a purple dress!). So I approached a few like-minded members to spin off the main group, like Rhoda from The Mary Tyler Moore Show, and join me instead in a mystery readers’ book club.
Granted, our little group of five didn’t seem to be critiquing many books of late, having a much better time gathering at our homes (instead of a noisy restaurant) to share Serenity intel, and enjoy each other’s company whilst partaking of wonderful homemade desserts.
We meet twice a month because once a month is not enough time to catch up on all the news (Brandy aside: gossip), and once a week did not provide enough newsworthy material to justify an every-seven-days assault on our various waistlines, due to too many fattening desserts. This is not to say that we don’t ever discuss a mystery novel—our average is a respectable two per annum.
This evening Frannie Phillips was hostess, and I was the Bestower of Dessert (a floating officer position), as we didn’t feel it fair that the hostess should have to straighten her house and bake something. (When I was hosting, I only cleaned the room we’d be in, and the downstairs bath. Climb the stairs, you take your chances!)
By some miracle, Cora and I arrived at Frannie’s in one piece, the woman even managing to parallel park her Buick without hitting those fore and aft, although her car took root about a foot and a half from the curb, and when we exited the vehicle, I had to grab Cora’s arm to keep her from getting out in front of a swerving pickup truck.
Cora was petite, with bird-like head movements reminiscent of the English stage and screen actress Elsa Lanchester in Bride of Frankenstein, although Cora didn’t have a British accent or for that matter white streaks at her dark temples (actually, Cora had dark streaks at her white temples). At one time she (Cora not Elsa) had been a courtroom secretary, and knew all the lawyers in town and their business, which had encouraged me to get to know her. I do need my sources!
Frannie met us at the door of her one-story redbrick bungalow. With her long face, pointed chin, and wiry gray hair, she reminded me of Margaret Hamilton, The Wizard of Oz’s Wicked Witch of the West, sans green face, of course. Frannie was a retired nurse, knowledgeable about many things medical, which, at our age, made her handy to have around.
Cora and I stepped inside.
Since Frannie had retired from the hospital, she’d become a much-improved housekeeper. Back when she was working, and wives were still expected to do all the housework and cooking, Frannie used a trick that I thought was brilliant.
Just before her husband was due home from the office, she’d set out all of her cleaning supplies, tie a bandana around her hair, and drag the vacuum out in the middle of the floor. Then, when he pulled his car into the drive, she’d get busy. Hubby would come in, see her working hard, feel her pain, and offer to take her out for dinner. I bet Frannie only cooked once or twice a week back then!
The other two members of our club, Alice Hetzler and Norma Crumley, had already arrived and were seated on the floral couch in the living room, their Rex Stout books in their laps.
Alice was tall and thin, plain and proper, recalling Jane Hathaway of The Beverly Hillbillies. A former middle school English teacher, Alice had an opinion on everything, and in my opinion, was batting about .300.
(In response to a rare critical review of a prior book, I must state that, no, not everyone in Serenity resembles a TV or movie star. A surprising number do, however, and anyway, as an actress myself, I tend to think in showbiz terms. Can anyone claim that these little comparisons don’t help
a reader “cast” the characters herein? I rest my case, as Raymond Burr used to say. Loved that man—wish an eligible bachelor around town looked like him!)
(Note to Vivian from Editor: Mrs. Borne . . . get a handle on these digressions. . . .)
(Note to Editor from Vivian: Yes, ma’am. But you sound just like Sergeant Carter on Gomer Pyle!)
Norma was a newbie to our group, and at fifty-five the youngest (I always leave myself out of these calculations). She was zaftig (isn’t that a lovely word?) and kept her short hair dyed black, though frankly wore a smidgen more makeup than need be, and quite overdid the jewelry. If I took off my glasses and squinted, she looked like Elizabeth Taylor during her Michael Jackson/Studio 54 days.
As a human, Norma was an acquired taste, considered by many pushy and loud, but a prominent socialite in the community before her banker husband found a younger wife, leaving Norma alone to bask in her settlement. But once he dumped her, so did most of her friends, because those “friends” apparently had only put up with Norma because of him.
We didn’t mind spending time with her (in small doses), because she was still the best conveyer of news in town, gathering all kinds of interesting tidbits from her cleaning lady, hairdresser, manicurist, and stylist, conduits to which the rest of us lacked regular access.
Frannie relieved me of my plastic-wrap-covered dessert plate, conveying it to the kitchen, and I moved to a straight-back chair opposite Norma and Alice on the couch. Cora settled into an overstuffed easy chair next to me, her feet barely touching the carpet, like a first grader at a fifth grader’s desk. Our hostess returned and took the only spot left, a recliner next to the sofa.
I should mention one other member who inevitably joined us at Frannie’s—Miss Lizzie, a bearded dragon lizard. Brown and yellow, about a foot long, she usually stayed in her aquarium in the corner, but Lizzie rather seemed to enjoy our company and, once Frannie took a seat, Miss Lizzie would climb out of the glass box, slither over and up Frannie’s chair to perch on her mistress’s shoulder.
Oddly, the reptile seemed to listen to our discourse, wearing a perpetual smile, alert eyes moving from speaker to speaker. Now and then its (her?) mouth would open as if Miss Lizzie had something to add to the conversation, but couldn’t find the words, flicking a tongue to lick the air, and shutting its fly trap yet again.
Still, I preferred Frannie’s grinning lizard over Alice’s squawking parrot—the ex-English teacher having no more luck teaching it to speak properly than she’d had with decades of students—or Cora’s nervous, never-housebroken Chihuahua, or Norma’s fat, ever-eating, ever-being-fed tabby. These pets were part of the proceedings only in the individual homes of their mistresses. Of course, all the girls loved Sushi when they came to our house.
Opening my book, Death of a Dude, I said, “I believe we left off in chapter three, just before Nero arrives at the dude ranch.” It was a rarity when the corpulent, rather lazy sleuth left his brownstone.
Our hostess said, “Don’t get me wrong, Vivian, but could we do an author other than Rex Stout if we ever finish this one? You’ve insisted on Nero and Archie ever since we formed the club.”
“Possibly, at some point.” I had not revealed to the girls that I intended the league to keep reading Stout until Brandy and I won a Nero Award (we were nominated twice!). “So Nero Wolfe is just about to arrive. . . .”
“No,” said Alice, “he’s already at the ranch—we’re in chapter four. I remember because a taxi brought his luggage separately.”
“You’re both wrong,” countered Frannie. “We’re in chapter five, where Archie and Nero go for a hike so they won’t be overheard, and Nero takes a tumble down a hill.”
“He almost fell down the hill,” Cora corrected.
“Poor Harriet,” Norma remarked.
We stared at her. I didn’t recall a Harriet in the book.
“Harriet Douglas!” Norma scolded, in a how-soon-they-forget tone.
“Oh!” we all said, followed by assorted appropriate adjectives—terrible, horrible, unfortunate, etc.
Miss Lizzie’s smile, however, was inappropriate.
“Viv,” Alice said, voice dripping with concern, “I heard you were there with Brandy just before the explosion, and that your daughter actually got hurt.”
“Brandy’s fine,” I said with finality, not wanting to waste time on the girl’s minor injuries.
“Tell us what happened,” Norma said eagerly.
“Yes, do!” the others chimed in.
So I did, beginning with our visit to Harriet’s apartment, and ending with the big bang.
When I’d completed my discourse, Frannie said, “I warned Harriet not to smoke around that oxygen tank.”
“You’ve seen her do that?” I asked. Frannie regularly volunteered her nursing skills at Sunny Meadow and would be in a position to know.
“I never actually saw her do it,” Frannie replied, “but her apartment smelled like the aftermath of a bonfire whenever I’d go in.”
“Well, I did see her do that,” Cora commented. “I paid her a visit not long ago, and there she was, puffing away next to that oxygen tank. I said, ‘Harriet—smoke outside and away from that tank!’ And she just shrugged and said, ‘Usually I do . . . but it’s raining.’”
Hadn’t it just started to rain, when Brandy went back to give Harriet our book?
Norma was saying, “I’m not surprised something like that happened at Sunny Meadow, considering all the violations imposed since that Burnett character took over as manager.”
My tongue flicked out like Miss Lizzie’s. “Violations?” I asked.
Norma looked aghast. “Vivian, where have you been? You’re usually on top of all the local tittle-tattle.”
I was feigning ignorance, a tactic I fall back on frequently. I had heard the tittle-tattle about violations, but didn’t mind letting Norma feel superior, if it meant getting information I might not have.
Cora piled on. “Why, there was a two-part front-page article about the trouble at Sunny Meadow in the Serenity Sentinel. Didn’t you read it, Vivian?”
I had not. I’d dropped the newspaper some time ago, in retaliation for a lackluster review of my one-woman performance of Libby Wolfson’s masterpiece, “I’m Taking My Own Head, Screwing It On Right, and No Guy’s Gonna Tell Me That It Ain’t.”
“What did the article say?” I asked.
Cora deferred to Norma, who settled deeper in the couch. “Well, since Mr. Burnett took over out there, Sunny Meadow has been fined for”—the socialite started counting on fingers loaded with expensive rings—“having insufficient nursing staff, accidents due to inadequate supervision, nonfunctioning security cameras, errors in dispensing medications, not maintaining the patient’s personal hygiene—”
Alice interrupted: “Louise Rockwell told me she had a bed sore that got so bad they nearly amputated her leg!”
“That would have put a crimp in her ballroom dancing,” I said sympathetically. Louise and her late husband had made Dancing with the Stars look ridiculous.
Leaning forward, more bird-like than ever, missing only a branch, Cora said, “And I heard from Arthur Fillmore that Burnett had such trouble getting help, what with the low wages he paid, that he’s taken to hiring ex-convicts.”
Miss Lizzie opened her mouth as if to add her two cents, but closed it again, keeping her (its?) opinion to itself (herself?).
I said, “Well, having made the acquaintance of a convict or two, in my travels and travails, I find it admirable, employing those who’ve served their penance to society.”
“Maybe so,” Norma said, “but when I went to see Goldie Goldstein, just after she took that terrible fall last year? She said the pain pills she was given didn’t work at all. I mean, pain pills should work, shouldn’t they?”
Frannie had been quiet throughout this exchange, but now the retired nurse, and volunteer at the facility, spoke. “Girls, I don’t think you realize how difficult it is to run a nu
rsing home. The majority of patients are on Medicaid, and the government can be slow in paying and creditors don’t always understand that. I’m sure Mr. Burnett works hard to keep Sunny Meadow afloat, grappling with ever-increasing costs, while trying to comply with a growing list of both state and federal regulations.”
Considering the number of violations that had already been imposed, I wondered if Burnett thought paying fines was more cost effective than implementing expensive recommendations. But I reserved that thought for myself.
Frannie went on, “Furthermore, I don’t think it’s helpful to spread rumors about nearly amputated legs, or pills that don’t seem to work, or ex-convicts possibly hired as help . . . rumors that are, in my opinion, either exaggerated or unsubstantiated.”
Her feathers had been ruffled, so I tried to smooth them.
“You’re right, of course, dear. Assisted-living facilities are only going to become more and more important to society as the Baby Boom generation ages, particularly as a cure for Alzheimer’s disease remains out of reach, what with the general population living longer and longer. We can all take a page out of Frannie’s playbook by volunteering at such facilities.”
Except for me, because I had essentially been banned from the local facilities, my volunteer work mistaken for “snooping.” Can you imagine? No good deed!
I continued, “Even a few hours a week would bring smiles to lonely faces and give the overworked staff a little support.”
There, that should do the trick where unruffling our hostess was concerned.
The others murmured their agreement.
“Thank you, Vivian,” Frannie said. Then the woman dropped a real bombshell. “What does concern me is the unusually high death rate this year at Sunny Meadow.”
No one spoke for a moment. But my antennae were tingling.
I asked, “There’s, uh, nothing untoward about those deaths, perchance?”
Frannie looked startled, though some of that may have been due to my invoking the little-used but effective perchance.
Antiques Wanted Page 6
