Knock, knock - Destiny calling! Oh, wait. Just kidding.

Yesterday at about 11am, my cell phone rang.

Exhausted from trying to scale the wall of Validation for my writing, I sighed to myself, "Let it be an agent, please...even if they're calling to personally tell me 'thanks for wasting my time.' I need something..."

I dug in my purse and fished out my phone. The screen was blue, not a picture of my dog (Mom's caller ID photo) or my cat (Doug's caller ID). Instead, there was writing on the screen. "Call from...N..e..w..Y..o..r..k."

Holy crap.

I flicked the phone open and steadied my voice. "This is Katie."

"Oh. I, um...you said 'Katie'?"

"I also go by Elizabeth," I said. "Elizabeth, Katie, one and the same."

"Oh. I think I must have the wrong number."

"Who are you looking for?" I asked, hoping that by keeping the staffer on the line an extra five seconds, he'll realize that he was looking at the wrong name on the Excel spreadsheet in front of him and it was in fact Katie that he was looking to tell that his agent boss wants to buy the rights to every word that ever comes out of her head.

"Tessa," he answered.

"Tessa what?" I asked. (I have no idea why I kept pressing this.)

"Um, Pina..."

"Oh. Well, I guess that's not me."

"Nope. Sorry for wasting your time," the guy said as he hung up the phone.

"That's okay," I said. "Maybe next time." For all I know, he was calling on outstanding warrants and was looking to make sure Tessa Pina kept her standing reservation at Riker's.

I do know one thing, which is slightly disturbing - I was more shaken up by this mistaken-identity phone call than I am when I'm offered receipt of collect calls from Geiger Corrections Center. And they say television isn't desensitizing.

Purchase Power

I had to go to Walmart the other evening after work. Already drained from a day of, well, work, I had to make some serious withdrawls from my reserve bank of energy to make it through the crowded cesspool of humanity that is Walmart.

A quarter of the way through my shopping trip, I exited an aisle, purchase in hand.

My cart was no where to be seen.

I looked up and down the rows, and finally spotted my cart, being pushed with a baby in the front basket. I didn't recall having a baby while at Walmart, nor did I bring one along for a fashion accessory. I walked up to the cart and faced the woman.

"Hi," I said.

She began to blush furiously. "Is this your cart." It was a statement, not a question.

"It is."

"I'm so sorry," she said, as she started to pull her purchases from it while fumbling for aforementioned baby.

Humanity kicked me in the groin. "Don't worry about it," I said. "I'll get another cart. But if it's okay, I'd like my sweatpants back."

I trekked back to the entrance to get another cart, sweatpants rolls tucked underneath my arm. (When did they start packaging clothing like sushi rolls?) I grabbed an empty cart rather than an unattended cart, and retraced my steps.

My route led me past the prescription and first aid section. An idea dawned on me.

I know exactly how to prevent my cart getting stolen again. I strode down the "feminine needs" aisle and plucked a box of Vagisil from the shelf with the self-confidence of someone not in personal need of the product in question.

I positioned the package front-and-center in the now baby-less front basket and resumed my shopping.

Eggs, yogurt, rice, enchilada sauce, corn tortillas, gluten free Bisquick, necktie for cat, strawberry jam.

I unloaded my cart and paid for my purchases. Once home, I put away all my groceries. I spied a stray bag on the floor. Picking it up, I could tell that there was still something in there.

I don't really need to finish this story, do I?

Money does grow on trees!

Side note here - I italicized the word "does" in the title using HTML! I am so proud of myself! I didn't use the "italics" key or anything (mostly because it doesn't exist for the title, only for the body of the post). Hah. My $17,000 Masters' brain isn't worthless afterall!

As I was saying, I made the discovery this past week that money does, in fact, grow on trees. I retrieved my mail one evening to find in there a rebate check from our local energy company. It seems that my energy use in the past year was so frugal that I had been overpaying into the "comfort billing" cycle. (I have a sneaking suspicion that overcharging, and resulting overpayments, are built into their billing system. That way they get a steady stream of revenue off of which they can collect interest before returning the original overpayment to its rightful owner each fiscal year. But that's just a suspicion.)

Oh well. I got my $200 back. How exciting!

I went back into the house. Setting the mail on the kitchen table with one hand, I opened the back door with my other. "Go on, Truman. Go forth and annoy thy neighbors."

I joined him outside, taking in the fresh air and beautiful evening sun. I looked to my right. My neighbors across the way were barbequeing dinner. I looked to my left.

There is a gigantic 15-foot tree laying across my yard. I stared at it for several seconds. Tree=upright.

I finally regained enough composure to call an arborist to give me a bid to remove the fallen tree. He came out the next day to survey the damage.

"Yep, you've got bores, that's for sure. All four trees are going to need to come out. See that saw dust piled around the base of the trees?"

I looked.

"That's obviously been building for some time. You haven't noticed it?"

"I thought that was just bark sloughing off or something," I said meekly.

"Bark." He looked at me skeptically. "You have realized that the trunk flakes off in paper, not bark, right?"

"So, how much for all four?" I asked, changing the subject.

"Fifty per tree, so that's...two hundred dollars."