Stamp Out . . Never Mind. Don't Stamp Out Anything, Please. Who Am I to Suggest What Should Be Stamped Out?

What I once needed to know about.
 I learned it well.

David's brilliant and he knew when he hired me in 2007 that he wanted to get me well-established in the office and then send me to carpet cleaning school. I was neither eager nor resistant. It was just on the to-do list. When the time came, I went to university and was immediately intrigued. I found I did know a little about the subject since I'd worked  with textiles a lot in life and I am of the era when females were required to take home economics in school. Oh, we not only made pillow cases and ruffled aprons, we learned all bout the process of milling the fabric from cotton, warp, woof, weave and more. We were well rounded girls. In my carpet course, I was the only female, so I got extra attention from the instructor: read this "tutoring/mentoring", not "arranging a date". Man, I can talk warp, woof, fourth generation nylon and the synthetics made mostly from recycled plastic bottles (hell for carpet cleaners - plastic doesn't clean as easily as natural fibers). When it came time to take the test, I was hooked - a carpet cleaning nerd - and took a notion to ace the test. David and I later laughed: when he noticed it was time for the test to begin, he thought, "She's going to try to ace it." We knew each other that well 3 months after meeting one another. I didn't ace the test. I got 96% or 97%, an achievement I held over the heads of the actual carpet technicians for years when they got cocky with me. Knowing about carpets and cleaning them was good for me. I could talk to customers so brilliantly, I'm sure their eyes glazed. I could take fine woolen rugs from walk-in customers and dazzle them with my superior grasp of the care and feeding of their valuable asset. The one time I attempted a few swipes across some carpet with "the wand", I learned what separated the men from the woman, but I still knew my stuff, intellectually. David called that one beautifully. Make certain the person on the phone knows something. My certification expired last month. I didn't renew it because that wasn't part of my life any longer.

What I need to know about now.
I'm learning at warp speed.

Generally speaking, my immediate new task is to bring one narrow finger of David's and George's successful business empire into the 21st century. Oh, this slim portion of the enterprise has been quite promising for years, but it operates on the "write in pen on copied forms kept in 3-ring binders" model. Oh, and "don't forget this - write it down somewhere". So things have been written on scraps of paper and kept in perpetuity. Important things. Things that should not be entrusted to paper scraps, perhaps. Once more, it's my role first to make this business run like a modern-day operation. No. David wants more than that. David wants this machine to run like a world-class business. After all, it's highly successful and we're looking to g-r-o-w. Quickly and exponentially. That means I need to know a little something about what it is we do. What we do here is locate collectibles and sell them to collectors/investors. The primary focus is on valuable postage stamps. There is a 75-80 year demonstrable history of this investment losing virtually no ground,

The Inverted Jenny

 ever. Oh, yeah, their value grows about as quickly as watching grass propagate on delayed-action film . But they don't lose and they do increase in worth. I knew how to spell philatelic, pronounce it and understand its meaning. That was about it. In the first week, I learned some things: the first postage stamp was a product of the British Post Office in 1840. In quick succession, the Penny Black, Penny Blue and Penny Other Colors appeared, and their cost today may startle the reader. I learned inside 5 days the difference between the Blue, the Black, the Red, the Brown, and not by looking at their color. I know some of the provenance and urban legend and the reasons these items are more valuable than the better-known Inverted Jenny with the biplane accidentally printed upside down. I still have everything in the world to learn, but here's something else I deduced in just a few days: my crash into alcoholic hell didn't wash away all my brain cells. I can still learn. And fast.

Stamp Girl - my newest, 
temporary (?) alter ego. 
Long may she stamp!

True story. Summer of 2007 when A1 Carpet Care still shared digs with David's and George's other interests. Though we'd known each other only a month or two, David already knew I was drawn to vintage, venerable things, paper ephemera, history and romantic notions. "Would you like to see something wonderful?" Sure I would! Who doesn't want to see something wonderful? He held it out in a pair of tweezers and began to speak. " . . British, 1861 . ." Well, I am a human being. I did what I am hardwired to do. Yep. Reached out my hand and took that stamp between my fingertips. Very bad form. The realization hadn't hit me yet when he began to tell me all the reasons why we didn't handle them barehanded. He never raised his voice, flinched or used colorful language. I didn't damage the stamp. I learned something. It must be noted, I also "shop" with my hands. I buy nothing I haven't touched. If my hands are soiled or if I damage the goods in some way, I'll remedy that, but I "see" with my paws. But no longer with stamps. I've now handled a few. I  have tweezers and white nylon gloves and archival paper sleeves and . . . hey, you live, you learn. Given my degree of efficiency and the speed at which I take on life, we're lucky I didn't affix that stamp to an envelope and await dictation of the recipient's address!

George, David and I met for awhile each of the 5 days of the first week. Mostly, I brought an agenda, a list, questions, suggestions. Mostly they made decisions and heard my arguments in favor of this or against that. Ultimately, they asked me to lose every shred of hesitation, to move forward fast in combat boots and to ask forgiveness later (if needed), which they would grant. Apropos of not very much, the one who knows me best brought it up. I didn't mention it and hadn't really thought of it. "She hates 'secretary'. I don't want anyone to call her 'secretary'." And I do, too. It's the word and perception mostly. I am helpful and accommodating to anyone who comes my way in business, but if one calls me anything other than "Les", I'm touchy about what appellation is chosen. George looked startled. "Why would anyone call her that? That's not what she does here." David and I began the chorus: "only female among men, pleasant to everyone, greeter, sits near the front of the business." OK. George got it. "Well, we'll get business cards and a name plate. What are we going to call her?" Ah ~ a business meeting with time spent on weighing words . . my idea of heaven. I suggested "queen". They laughed, but did not agree. We settled on "manager". I am the manager of the business. I like that one!

A quote that pleased me: "The philatelist will tell you that stamps are educational, that they are valuable, that they are beautiful. This is only part of the truth. My notation is that the collection is a hedge, a comfort, a shelter into which the sorely beset mind can withdraw. It is orderly, it grows towards completion, it is something that can't be taken away from us." - Clifton Fadiman in Any Number Can Play.

To my surprise: No one - no one - commented on the picture of me in the previous post shooting a gun in the desert, Diet Dr. Pepper at the ready, tattered bullseye targets at the table. That would be a sight calling for the quick and firm application of brakes, folks!

Something that charmed me to tears: Justin returned to work upstairs as a carpet cleaner. He'd been banished much longer than a year. Justin doesn't ask permission for hugging. Justin hears the news, comes downstairs looking for me and says (arms extended), "Hey, Girl, come here." I did. He did. "What's new, honey?" "Same old, same old, Les." "Not me, Dude. Everything is new and wonderful!" "OK, Les.  Me, too!" Good! Now, go earn money!

Readjusting to the Good (Work) Life

Mornin', Junior!

How you doin', boy?

Give 'em hell, Champ!

What? What? What do you mean that's a weird collection of stuff? I've always written about what a funny, quirky place it is, world class technology utilized and excellent work product emitted from simple business systems that work because we work at them until they do work. Oh, yeah, if an uninitiated person looks around in a discerning way, he or she might be startled by some of the sights. But not me. I am now surrounded by $1 gwillion worth of Steve Kaufman art and I'm not complaining. From the Earnhardt, Jr. that I pass on the way to disarm the security system to the Ali who stares straight at me from across the lobby, fists at the ready, I'm in a slightly different world here. I'd like the readership to meet My Dog, a large, quiet plastic fellow who guards those telephone directories diligently, despite the apparent Exacto knife attack to his mouth. You should see what people toss into that aperture! "Is that an ashtray?" Uh, no. That's My Dog. I've been thinking of maybe taking My Dog home on a weekend, put him in the backseat of my car, perhaps. Give him a little ride in the sunshine.

I have a brief spell of solitude after I arrive and before the troops arrive. I make coffee, check emails and voicemail, perform all the wake-up tasks to be completed before others demand my attention. On my second day, the door chime told me someone had come in. Boy, howdy! My home dudes - those carpet cleaning chuckleheads I love! "Hey, Les, can I hug you?" Well, yeah. It was surreal to see them march in, route sheets in hand, forms to report for the day that I had created so long ago and that were still in use. As my new troops arrived, they were startled to see so many men hanging in the lobby. "How are you, Les?" "Sober, homes, and happy to be here." "How's the car running, Les?" Ah! The subject of the ages. My car, Lucy Sue, who still has not crossed 24,000 miles and who has never had a true mechanical issue, is a magnet for crazy maladies. Cesar and the other homes have saved my bacon many a time, and last summer got me ready for a road trip feeling confident about the car. "Well, homes, it's unanimous. All four window motors have gone out. Her windows are all at different heights. It's hell for hot when I'm driving." Silence for only a moment. "Got any suction cups, Les?" I did. I'd bought them and brought them purposely on my first day back at work. And suddenly, before my eyes (well, out the window), there were home dudes scrambling like squirrels in, out, over and around my car. And I liked that. Later in the day I told David my guys had come en masse to see me. "I knew they would," he said. Then he told me he'd rehired Justin - Justin who had problems, too, and who was fired long before I crashed into the mountainside. "He's done some growing up. He's worth giving another chance." Amen.

 The heat is on ~ ~ I grew up in the LA and Salt Lake City areas. My dad read the LA Times and the Salt Lake Tribune. There were choices about one's newspapers in those cities, and those were Dad's choices. I don't know if these were or are world class publications, but I suspect they pretty accurately reported the news, with their individual political and social agendas being worked. When I first came to Las Vegas in 1976 as a 23-year-old, I laughed out loud at The Review-Journal, still the only game in town. This publication (then and now) has to dedicate a fair portion of print space each day to correcting (not retracting) yesterday's and last week's and last month's errors in reporting. The local newscasts aren't far different. It's tough to get reliable news here.

Each morning I listen (only listen, because I can't stop to watch) a local newscast while I get ready for work. This is a carry-forward habit across several years. I love the meteorologist, Sherry, who tends to get things really, really right. I suspect she does her own research and script writing. The anchors please me less, a 20-something, obviously educated, but needs-to-be-spanked woman and a way, way too conservative (for me) man in his 40s. It seems clear they use prepared scripting, and they often stumble during the delivery. I frequently snicker as I blow-dry, thinking I'd have used the word "fewer" instead of "less", "many" in place of "much" or that at least I know how to pronounce a word that flummoxed those in the spotlight.

So Sherry announced that we're very hot and dry, though cooler than normal, and the monsoon is being held down in Arizona until perhaps this Sunday when we may get showers. She was right, too! I've got proof. I leave home at 6:30 a.m. and it's 80-85 degrees. By noontime, it's in the high 90s and we peaked at about 106, guaranteeing at least 104 for the afternoon commute. Girl can predict the weather! The sensor in my car has shown 119 a few times, but it's down at the blacktop, not measuring ambient air temperature. It's indescribable getting into the car after it's been sitting for hours. Yes, the heat is on.

At 4:00 a.m., a semi-truck/trailer crashed and burst into flames on the busiest southwest/northeast interstate artery through Las Vegas. Burning diesel followed by the necessary inspection of the integrity of the burned asphalt promised hours of gridlock. It turned out to be 11 hours. What caught my attention was that three people were reporting on this breaking news, an on-the-scene reporter and two in the studio. On the third regurgitation, I realized they were alternately reporting 9,100 and 91,000 gallons of combustible to burn. I glanced at the TV. Yep, they were distressed. Their eyes were widening like panicked dogs as they took turns tossing out the number which, apparently, no one could nail down for certain. There's a slight difference between 9,100 and 91,000 gallons of burning fuel. I mean, I"m neither mathematician nor grand abstract thinker, but if the larger number was correct, wouldn't the burn be larger and/or longer by about ten times? Just sayin'. Was I going to be quizzed on the precise numbers? Certainly not. It was their transparent discomfort that got me hooting. Why not just say "a tractor-trailer with a full payload"? Thursday morning, it was reported that the freeway surface was damaged by the fire and had to be repaired before traffic could be allowed. They reported that "thousands of gallons of diesel fuel" burned. No number attached. It must have been hellish in that area during the conflagration. The heat is on.

My office is kept at a temperature appropriate to hanging freshly slaughtered meat. I have no illusions of growing visibly older in there. No, I'll just be preserved as I am today. The men strut around, "Man, it's pleasant in here," while my teeth chatter and my hands tremble. I took in the SOS (Shitty Office Sweater) and am using it ~ funny, while it's triple digits outdoors ~ contemplating the use of gloves for use while typing. Esteemed blogger CramCake crocheted a delightful little pair of demi-gloves I might be able to well use if I could replicate them. Thursday the A/C system went out on one side of the building. The men began to wilt. The telemarketers slowed to a stop, silence engulfing the normally noisy rooms. Someone said, "Les, you're pretty perky this afternoon." "Yes, Sir, first time I've been restored to normal human body temperature in a week." "Where's your SOS?" "Don't need it this afternoon." The heat is on.

For illustrative purposes only. This is not actually me modeling my SOS.

In my ears right now: Here's a heat wave worth hearing, even if it takes an extra step or two to get there. My woman, Joan Osborne.

Little Charmer ~ Not ME, the Rug!

In my last post, I told about the wool megalo-rug that nearly beat me in a dust-up. Rugs come in all shapes and sizes. Some are more charming than others.

In our small carpet cleaning business, we do things as simply and consistently as we can. It makes us efficient. It makes us credible to the customers when both the office and the technicians say the same thing about any situation. David and I are good communicators. Everyone knows everything he needs to know about any subject. Some of our touchstones include explaining pet urine damage the same way to every customer every time, quoting room prices the same to everyone who calls in, and explaining carpet repairs in precisely the same way every single time. But perhaps the most deeply ingrained piece of information we share is our minimum service charge. Each of us could tell that number in our sleep. It's a simple concept. We cannot roll a van with one or two technicians, all of the equipment, all of the cleaning solutions, the cost of the business license, liability insurance, advertising costs . . . for less than a particular dollar amount. In most cases, that minimum charge does not come into play. Most people have their entire homes cleaned at one time, and the cost exceeds the minimum service charge. I never even have to utter those words. But once in awhile, Mrs. Las Vegas only wants one room in her home cleaned and the minimum sounds a little pricey.

When the technicians arrive at a customer's house, their flexibility quotient rises dramatically. Now someone from our company can see the carpet. I've given the estimate over the phone based on the customer's own description of the carpet's condition. But one person's idea of "filthy" is another person's concept of "not too bad".The technicians might recommend a little preconditioning treatment or a rotary scrub, or pet damage restoration. They are free to price these services as they see fit (within a loose framework). David's philosophy is, "They're out there. We're not. They've assessed the carpet and the customer. We have not. Let them secure the job." Sometimes we have to work a little extra to hold the job. "Let me call the office and see if I can offer you a small discount. If the office OKs that, may I get started right away?" I sometimes ask the technician if it is even worth doing the work if the customer is asking to pay an extremely low amount. If the technician says, "No. It's not worth it. This will be trouble forever. They're cheap and demanding.", I tell him to roll up his hoses and roll on down the road.

The (wonderful) flip side of taking money away from a customer in exchange for services is that we also have the ability to give a good customer extra attention. My technicians see every kind of situation every day of life. Single parents struggling, elderly people just trying to get by, an obviously really fine individual who has been laid off three times in a year. The men are quiet when they tell me, "That poor woman, Les. She is living in hard times. I knocked out a couple of rooms of premium service and didn't say anything or ask for more money. She needs help." Or, "Les, that couple were in their 80s and have been in that house since 1965. The carpet was so clean, I don't know why they called us. Maybe they just had a reminder on the calendar they didn't question. I gave them a couple of rooms of Scotchguard for free." We've had days where a woman customer has asked a technician to walk her to her car because of a domestic dispute. Not comfortable for anyone. We help people up from the floor when they've failed to heed our warning, "Be careful stepping from the wet carpet onto the tiles." And one of the commonest "gimmes" is to clean a few small area rugs without charge. When one weighs a $500 cleaning job against 3 minutes of work on the rugs, it just makes good business sense. The kindness is remembered, and the customer will invite us to return in a year. There exists a friendly rivalry between the technicians. They watch each other closely. "How much did you sell today?" It should be no surprise that our best carpet cleaners are also our best salesmen.

A woman called to ask me about cleaning an area rug. She knew more than the average caller. She knew the dimensions of her rug and she knew it was 100% wool. I quickly calculated the square feet and applied our price per square foot. I held this up against our minimum service charge. Yikes! This was going to be an expensive rug cleaning. I started my usual presentation: "For our minimum service charge we could do another rug or perhaps a room of carpet . . . " She doesn't like people coming into her home. Um, OK, the rug could be brought to our office. She took our address and I forgot about her for a week.

Yesterday, I looked out on the deck. A small woman, probably very near my own age, struggled along the breezeway, a very appropriately named passageway here on the second floor. Windsock might also be properly descriptive. She turned the corner and aimed for my door. I greeted her and she commented that we were very hard to find. I don't agree, but then I've come here almost every day for nearly three years. "Well, yes, up on the second floor and on the back of the building," I allowed. She had something with her that she proceeded to unfold for me. It clicked immediately! This was the woman with the tiny wool rug. I inspected it and felt on solid ground, even though I don't clean carpets every day like the homes. It certainly was wool. My good eyes told me the dimenstions she had mentioned were about right. It had some pet hair on it and a few spots that gave me some concern. I quoted her our minimum service charge, knowing she'd already heard me say that dollar figure over the phone a week ago. This number so alarmed the woman she had to take a seat in my office. I let her sit. I let her ponder. "Gee, I was hoping you'd do it for about half that amount." I told her, not unpleasantly, all the reasons I had to charge her the minimum service charge. I reminded her we could come to her home and she'd get more value for her money, but that I could not charge less than the minimum. She left the rug and walked away looking pensive.

On Thursdays, David conducts staff meeting and I am second fiddle. On the other days of the week, I conduct "huddle". "Huddle" means, "at 7:00 sharp, gather in the office, have your work orders and your route sheet in your hand, have a pen, pay attention. She who must be obeyed is about to speak." In huddle, we go through the day's work, team by team, van by van. I tell the men everything I remember about each job or customer. I tell them if a job is simply unremarkable. The homes have come to appreciate huddle, because I possess an uncanny ability to call people for what they are, for reading a situation for what it is, even though I've only participated in one telephone conversation. It is a rare day that someone does not come in and say, "Les, you had that man dead-on. It made me able to work with him better, understanding what kind of person he is." In huddle, we also share our daily stories from our adventures in the big city. It's a safe place to talk, to tell, to ask, to share. Sometimes someone has a need to bite in huddle. That's OK, too. We leave huddle as friends. And better informed. Invariably, before and after huddle there is much good natured milling around, coffee being consumed, "good morning"s, bustle.

Huddle was almost over this morning when Matt noticed it. "What's that on the floor?" I'd nearly forgotten to mention the rug. I grinned. "Oh, it's a handkerchief I booked. The customer brought it in. I need it to be cleaned so she can pick it up." They all stared at it. I like to have fun, too, so I put on a little show. Got a little smarty assed. I picked the rug up and spun it on my hand like Luigi tossing pizza dough. They stared at me. "Is that all there is for this job?" "That's it homes. Just the one little hankie." It got really quiet. "Um, Les, how did you price that out?" I said I'd charged the minimum service charge. "And somebody went for that?" "Well, you're looking at the rug, homes." There was some shuffling of feet and gazing at the floor. "What? What's up?" To a man, they agreed that this rug was one of the size and type they'd clean for free on any job where the customer had been half-way pleasant. It was simply the right thing to do. "Well, let's talk about this, guys. How would it be if I let anyone walk in off the streets and give me things to clean and I gave it to them for free? I don't have the advantage you have. I'm not in their home doing lots of other work and just adding this as a little nicety. I have to insist on the minimum service charge." They averted their gaze and shuffled their feet again. I saw shoulders start to shake. I heard some snickers and someone said, "God damn. She's never cleaned a carpet in her life and she just got the highest paying job we've ever had for a rug if you consider its size." We all cackled. It was Matt who came up with the idea. "Let's put her in a war wagon, send her out ahead of us to knock on the doors of every job for the day. She can sell the jobs and we'll just follow her, cleaning carpet!" I just stuck to the script. We take minimum service charge very seriously here.

Joseph and Justin cleaned the hankie. It had issues. The spots that concerned me were curry, Joseph said. Curry doesn't come out. It's permanent. Joseph has 35 years experience at carpet cleaning. Joseph has celebrity clients in Hollywood. I don't doubt those spots are curry. I don't doubt curry is a permanent stain. How does the reader think I'll deal with the customer? The rug cleaned up beautifully except for the curry spots. What would you do? I already know what I'll do!

In my ears right now: Miss Fiona of Sunnybrook Farm. Yes, I like it!

Something that charmed me: We were driving west on a major boulevard through the city. We'd had a great afternoon together and were chatting, thinking about dinner. We stopped at a traffic light in an older section of the city. Here many small old houses have been turned into business offices - an insurance agency, a florist, etc. One of them, neutral in color (mainly) and otherwise unremarkable, caught my eye. For the upper 20% of the building was given over to a brightly colored, eye-catching promotion. Superimposed over stripes of the red, white and blue was a good likeness of the U.S. president. In large, tidy letters was proclaimed "Obama Pedicure ~ $9.99". What the heezy? I've scratched my head for days. What does the reader suppose might make that pedicure distinctly Obaman?

Beauty is in the Eye of the Beholder

I have worked in some places where the decor of the office seemed almost more important than the mission of the enterprise. At a certain business where I was lady in waiting to a three person executive committee, there were high standards set even for the administrative assistants who sat in tiny cubicles barely large enough to contain their desks, chairs and computers. One framed 5" x 7" photo of the family or pet was allowed, a clean coffee mug may be placed on the desk if it sat on a coaster, a single flower in a bud vase (not wilted, please) was allowed, but not a green plant . . sheesh. However, should some administrative assistant decide she didn't care for the restrictions and would simply not decorate . . . oh, bad mistake. She was perceived as not being a team player. In my own office in the corporate wing, I displayed objets d' art worth a month's salary, and purchased by me personally. It was expected. That was then. This is now. I'm not corporate any more.

A couple of posts back, I wrote about David providing the best of everything we need to do our jobs exceedingly well. It's true ~ he does. So come on, board my bus and ride with me to the door of my much loved workplace. I'll give you the tour!

Here is how the technology serves me. Dual monitors show me the jobs pending and YouTube. GPS shows me where each of the home dudes is at any given time, whether his ignition is on, how fast he's going, whether he's at a stop, and how long any of that has been going on.








I could take pictures and write words about the fine equipment and machinery the homes have at hand, but I'm not sure readers of this blog would find a dissertation about solution hoses and buddy jugs and HydroForces and throttles all that exciting. Suffice it to say we are all provided with what we need to execute the job well.

And then, in the spirit of the corporate paisley palace, we have certain aesthetics we enjoy. On one small space of wall, I display framed Badger art and a plaque with a favored Lincoln quote, "Whatever you are, be a good one." There are lovely, healthy plants, as well as the bromeliad sisters. Mr. Redfish occupies one corner of my desk alongside his stuffed cat, and the parakeets enjoy a sunny spot in a window. But there, I suspect, ends any resemblance to any other business office one can think of. I think the rest of what we have going on would please Lewis Carroll and others who are freethinkers and whimsical. Traditionalists probably would not find us charming. That's OK. I'm not corporate any more.


After one scratches the surface of our high-tech environment, it turns out that we are simple people, elemental and quirky ones at that. If anyone remembers the rallying cry from the movie The Perfect Storm, "We're Gloucestermen!", we have a similar one. "We're carpet cleaners!" We know what we are - no illusions, no pretensions. We know how to use technology, but we do many things simply in ways that work. Period. No frills. So while I sit at a cherry desk suitable to the CEO of a Fortune 500 company, the other furniture surfaces in the room are folding tables and a bookcase so laughable it defies description. Though I sit seductively attractive under my mood lighting, when the front door opens and the sun shines in, one could get a snicker or two. I was musing on why I get so many nasties on the telephone, while virtually everyone who walks through our doors gives a large smile. Some of them stand in the entryway with their faces nearly split in half by a big old cheeser. What? Nasty people only use the phone and nice people only come in person? That's a bit hard to accept. And then it occurred to me. Maybe the in-person visitors are laughing at us! Especially the ones who ask about certain objects or get the grand tour. Come on! Join me. I'll show you around.

The white rectangular object is my portable safe. Inside it, I keep all the things a small business manager would keep inside her safe. On top of it I keep but two of my vast collection of coyote gourd maracas and a piece of dried coyote gourd vine, placed before a lovely framed print of some gourds. The X you see is a pair of large ancient, heavily rusted nails from the abandoned mines at the dunes where I spent solstice. On the paper plate are rocks I collected at the Valley of Fire and the dunes. I've met few rocks in the desert that I didn't want to bring home. A visitor to our office who was seated pretty far across the room from me thought I had a paper plate filled with pieces of meat. I wouldn't want to bite into my rocks! I don't eat meat. My safe is bolted to the middle of a six foot folding table. Any thief who thought to leg it with my safe would have a terrible time maneuvering it all through the door! The little vignette on top of the safe is art to me. I'm not corporate any more.

Behold two shelves of the Through the Looking Glass bookcase. I will describe the items displayed and the reader will draw his own conclusion. It is an explanation of the bookcase items that generally brings on the fixed smile to the visitor's face. There is my coffee mugs that says "Don't make me bring out the flying monkeys." This is warning from me to the homes. See my plaque that says "Learn From Yesterday", my bag of potpourri, four rocks collected in the desert outside of Baker and my coyote leg bone with hide and sinew clinging. The coffee mug that says "meticulosity" was selected for me by a young fan who considers me her mentor. She said the word should be tattooed upon my forehead so everyone will know from the beginning. There is a small collection of books on the upper shelf and a collection of more serious books on the lower, including a volume of Emily Dickinson and a large 1920s Spanish/English dictionary. There is a ceramic seashell holding an artificial lemon and there is a lovely decorative gourd made for me by Mother Badger featuring a strawberry design. Every single item on those shelves means something to me. Each has a story and I like sharing space with it all. I'm not corporate any more.

World class data collection and storage system: this one was difficult for me. I am not the sharpest tool in the shed about some things. Our radios go off continually, new information coming in at a quick pace. Who bought fuel, where and for how much? Credit card payments need to be recorded, and daily bank deposits. David, Troy and I can each take the radio transmission and it was impractical to have all three of us accessing the same reports and documents at the same time. How to manage all of that? Well, I'm a natural at creating the charts and spreadsheets. But we all needed to have access to all the information all the time. It was David who showed me how to insert a pushpin into the drywall, place the chart or spreadsheet on a bright plastic clipboard, and voila! No pre-existing policy or procedure, no required forms at hand from the beginning. Just figure it out and make it work. I'm not corporate any more.

Our world is replete with every imaginable kind of alert tone, announcement noise and attention grabber. Some of the tones are common to all of us and some are highly individual. A few of the homes are partial to an announcer that sounds like a toddler giggling and then farting. When the Badger drops me an e-mail, it is announced by the sound of a bicycle bell. One morning, a noise was heard that caused everyone to stop talking and look toward my desk. "What the hell, Les? What's that one?" "That's my timer, homes." For I get up from my desk every half hour and do something. I hula hoop or do wall push-ups. I use the wobble board or do stretches or use the weights or resistance bands you see pictured. My job can be deeply stressful. I need to break the tension and keep my body healthy. I do this for me. I'm not corporate any more.

I'd like to thank the reader for joining me on the bus ride and the tour today. Please come again, as there is much more to share about this little world. I like to share. I like to connect in some way with others. I'm not corporate any more.

In my ears right now: I posted a Gloria Estefan song in my last writing. Thinking about Gloria Estefan makes one think about Jon Secada and I went into a reverie. In 1992, a two-year-old thought I was the most remarkable, amazing and wonderful woman. She wanted to be just like me. She wanted blue eyes like mine, even though I think her nearly black ones are the most lovely I've ever seen. She wanted to wear clothes that looked like mine. We each had a "twirly" skirt. In our twirly skirts we danced to Jon Secada. The video is unremarkable 1990s MTV, VH1 video and the song is merely "catchy". But when Jon put his hands and arms in the air and moved his body, we put our hands and arms in the air and moved our bodies. And we twirled. And we danced.

Something that charmed me: Cesar worked for 10 years running a route for a porta-potty business. He knows every street in this valley and he knows when most of the developments were built within that 10 years. He knows every intersection and which ones have stop signs or lights. Cesar and Justin were partnered one day, Cesar at the wheel like always. Too late, already into the intersection, he realized a new stop sign had been put up at a spot that had not previously had one. One does not want to try to stop one of our war wagons on a dime so Cesar kept rolling, quickly checking his rearview and looking from side to side. The cops had him in a heartbeat and he thought, "Ticket!" as he pulled over to the curb. He rolled down the window and looked for the approaching officer in his rearview and side mirrors. No cop! What was going on? Typically, they do not hide themselves. In the meantime, Justin was fumbling at his belt for his BlackBerry holster. For, you see, I had just chirped Justin. And Justin had assigned to me the police siren alert tone.

I Don't Do All Things Well ~ I Don't Have To

Over at Elisabeth's there's been some discussion about things one does well and things that are more challenging or do not come naturally. I am a person who must fight the urge to try to be perfect at everything I attempt. Oh, yes, my good head knows that perfect is impossible. But my gut still says "Do it perfectly." It comes from temperament and conditioning. It is exhausting. I've only been trying to resist it for about two years and it is difficult for me to find the welcoming place between frantic perfectionist and self-indulgent slacker. I've struggled learning to ask others for help after a lifetime of refusing to do that.

I am lucky to work in a place where the players are all so diverse, there are probably few things in this world that we couldn't tackle together. There is a completely non-judgmental air so it's OK if one is a girl and doesn't know how to adjust the alternator on the steam cleaning machine. If one of the homes isn't all that literate, we'll work around it - that's why I'm in charge of writing. We're a small group in close quarters who have weathered much together in the name of the team. Here there is a deep understanding and admiration for each person's special talents. No one is beaten up for things they don't know how to do. Which is not to say there is much tolerance when one of us gets stuck on stupid. We share information and model behaviors for one another, the idea being that everyone has something to teach everyone else.

As one might imagine, some roles and niches have developed. Troy is a mechanical sort. He can and does build anything. He can repair motors and engines, machinery and broken furniture. I know where to go when I want some shelves installed or when my office chair blows a wheel! He impresses me because I am not mechanical in any way and I don't want to touch tools. That's what I have him for. He owns every tool in the world, the toolkit to carry it, and he knows how to use it. When I have him come to my home on a Sunday, I have a long honey-do list, the payment for which is cash.

Cesar is a fixer. He knows how to fix most anything one can name, even if parts are missing. He can find an ingenious way to repair some item that "can't be fixed" and have it work. Cesar also fascinates me because of the odd variety of things he can do well: paint, alter a wool suit or coat and give a credible razor haircut. [He once offered to razor Justin's hair and I immediately said I'd rather give him my haircut money than anyone else. "Uh-uh, Les. If I mess up Justin, I can just shave his head. If I mess up you . . . "]

The way I help the homes typically has something to do with paperwork. Maybe it's time to register the car or renew their business licenses or complete papers for a traffic ticket. I've helped some of them open their first bank account and taught some to use software programs. One asked me to teach him the ropes about building websites and blogging and another requested I explain the intricacies of the Excel spreadsheet and formulae. I've gone farther afield from time to time, though. Once I exchanged ironing two dress shirts for an oil change in my car. And once I sewed a pair of ripped pants for the same home dude who came out with me to cheer the Badger at a criterium and showed me how to take video of the event with my BlackBerry.

Some of my favorite hits:

I alternate more pairs of glasses than Elton John in the 1970s. Often a screw goes missing or a temple piece needs to be reattached. The John Lennon glasses throw a trifocal lens fairly frequently. For the price of a fast food lunch, Cesar will sit for an hour rehabbing the collection so I can be cool again. He's great at shortening or fixing jewelry, too.

At the first of every month, when our fleet of service vehicles is being inspected, I get a chirp on my BlackBerry. "Hey, Les, toss your keys down. I'll check your car's body fluids. All the other hoods are up, why not yours? I'll check the tires, too!" I write myself a note to provide pizza later that day.

Sometimes one or more of the guys asks me to make an eBay purchase on their behalf or create a spreadsheet to help keep track of their deductible business expenses or locate something on craigslist. These are things I do well and without difficulty. I usually find a Starbucks giftcard on my chair the next morning, or a Fresh & Easy pass.

It's a beautiful thing, this helping one another out.

Late in August I went to the granddaddy of all craft shows. I was looking for really special birthday gifts for my girlfriend and I found them there. I bought myself a duplicate of nearly everything I bought for her. One stall that drew me featured Chinese charm bracelets. These pieces are slender black laces, each with four charms that have different meaning. One gets a card that tells the meaning of each charm. There seemed to be no two bracelets alike, and there were many tens of thousands of them spread out in a heap on long display tables, longer than I am tall, and as deep as I am thick. I was snared when I touched the first one.

There is no small legend surrounding the selection of the charm bracelets. If one is enlightened and pure of heart, a spiritual energy guides one to the charm bracelet best suited to her needs, says the legend. An example is my bracelet that has the charms for eternal youth and everlasting love, a pot of gold, bamboo for strength and a peacock for colorful romance. I'm asked to believe I selected that bracelet because those were the things I most needed for fulfillment as I stood at the table in the Cashman Center that hot afternoon. And one can select for another person, too, as I did for my girlfriend.


Although the picture makes it seems as if one just ties the bracelet on, that's not accurate. The bracelet is actually long enough to practically serve as a belt and each end of the lace passes through a pair of beads. One pulls the ends to tighten, loosen or adjust the bracelet. But I didn't figure that out. I asked others who came in and out of my home and who may get off the farm more frequently than I do. No one could figure it out. The bracelets sat for months. Sometimes Virginia Woolf would make off with one that I'd find in some strange spot. I know it was she because Dylan is not obsessive about small shiny objects. Finally I brought the bracelets to work a couple of weeks ago.

During our morning huddle, I told the legend of the bracelets and explained I needed help. Cesar didn't say a word, but walked toward me with his hand out. I gave him the bracelets. He took my wrist and went to work. Meanwhile, Troy mused that these that worked in exactly the way I was about to learn they did work. He was right! He knew because his daughter has some. Good, I'm selecting teenagers' jewelry again.

Two of the other homes were looking at the card that tells the meaning of the charms. They began to pepper me with questions. "Les, do you have a bell?" I do. "That's 'may your prayer be answered every time the bell rings'." Well, good! "Is there a yin and yang?" I have one of those, too. "That's for balance and good decision making." I can use a little assist in that arena. "If you have a little stone purse, that means 'may your money bag always be full'." I'll take two of those! "Do you have a fish, Les?" I looked. No fish. "Are you sure?" I looked again. No fish. "Look once more." No. I'm tired of this game. "There's no fish, homes." Big grins. "I guess you didn't need any freedom, prosperity and good sex that day, Les."

It's a beautiful thing, this helping one another out.

In my ears right now: Much loved R.E.M.

Something that charmed me: My bracelets, of course! The reader knew I was going to say that.

One photo credit (the wrist of LimesNow - January, 2010): J.D. Morehouse

What the Hell is the Matter with People (Chapter 2)?

It's not that I am completely consumed with angst about what is the matter with people. It's more like I'm scratching my head about things I see and hear. Maybe it's more a "what the heezy?" than a "what the hell?" Regardless, I do wonder what is the matter with people. It occurs to me sometimes that maybe I am the person who has something wrong . . . nah!

When our company was new, we rather flew by the seats of our pants, but we've formalized a number of policies and procedures over time. Weekly staff meetings were the stuff I cut my teeth on professionally, but none of the home dudes had ever been exposed to such a thing. It took a very long time - much more than a year - for the pained expressions on their faces to ease. It took longer than that, and a few changes in the cast of characters, for them to begin to speak up, participate, make suggestions, bring up tough topics . . . but now they do. Our staff meetings have become interactive, productive, efficient and eye-opening. From the most senior veteran to the newest technician, everyone has something to say. David encourages the notion of our office being our sanctuary - the place where we all gather among those who are on our team, our side. Since we are a small group, most of our stories, tales and legends spread pretty quickly, but it's often good to chew on them one more time in staff meeting so we can hear what David has to say about it.

The staff meeting agenda is presented on a white board in David's office. Most often it is I who writes down subjects to be discussed. Once, a technician asked if he/they were also invited to put up something to be talked about. "Yes, of course!" said I. David shoots from the hip each week. He needs no written reminders of what to talk about. At some point in each and every meeting, he asks, "Does anyone have any questions, complaints, comments, quibbles, gripes, bitches or gritches?" While that invitation met with dead silence and averted gazes for at least two years, that's no longer the case. Nearly everyone has something to say nearly every week. We like that!

As a union representative for almost two decades, I've advocated for people who encountered trouble at work more times than I can count. Sometimes people mess up. Sometimes the planets are misaligned. Sometimes people are falsely accused. I'd submit that few people have more adverse working conditions than my carpet cleaning technicians. Their work is tremendously physically hard. They have no set hours. They may begin their day at 2:00 a.m. and go until 11:00 p.m. They may have a void of six hours between two jobs and nothing to fill that time with. They jump from convenience store to fast food joint to eat all meals of the day sometimes. They suffer working with hot water in both scorching heat and snow. When the phones ring off the hook, they make very good money, because when the phones ring, I book jobs. When the phones are quiet, they make bupkus. When it's rainy, cloudy or snowing, business is down. When it's bright and sunny, business goes up. At holiday times, all bets are off - we run nearly 24 hours a day surrounding the holidays.

Customers treat my guys in all manner of ways, partly driven by the customer's personality, and partly by the technician's I am sure. Some of them cultivate fan clubs of repeat customers. Each of them is treated condescendingly sometimes. They hear comments such as, "I wouldn't have believed it could come out so well!" They see facial expressions that suggest, "Hurry up, moron." Although each of them takes care to say "The floor is very wet. Be careful when stepping from the carpet onto the tile," they see a tremendous number of people crash to the floor. Some customers follow them from room to room, not making any effort to hide their concern about burglary. Once in awhile, a meal is offered, or a sandwich or a cold drink. Sometimes they are told they can use the garden hose for a drink of water.

Those are all the known quantities - the "givens". That's what we deal with daily. Now enter the wild cards: "What will happen when we knock on the doors today?" Our first clue is how the customer interacted with me on the phone. You see, I have a stunning memory and a remarkable ability to connect with others. If a customer gives me a phone number with a 619 area code, I say, "I'm from San Diego, too!" When a hear a squalling newborn in the background, it's "Mine is 19 years old now - enjoy it while you can." If the caller sounds quite elderly, I let them know I'm an AARP member. Pet damage call? "I understand, I keep cats." I make the connection any way I can and I'm good at recalling what struck me as I booked the job. We begin every morning with sales huddle, and the guys have truly come to enjoy Limes' rendering of "Today's Tales in the Big City." I either tell them there's nothing remarkable about a customer or I'll say, "Here's what I think you're up against . . . " Often, many times a day, I'll get a radio transmission to say, "Limes, it's just what you figured. I'm glad we talked in advance." Or, "Come on, Limes, how do you do that with just one phone conversation?" It's just what I do. It's my contribution. It's my way of preparing home dudes to ponder "what the hell is the matter with people?" before they arrive at the door.
Home dudes' personalities are all over the map. So are their life experiences and the way they react to things. There ages are widespread, as are their tastes and interests. I know each of them very, very well. I can tell on the radio when Matt is about to require a little anger management moment. When Cesar sounds a certain way, I can picture the look of disgust on his face. When Justin calls in, I can tell by his tone of voice on "Misssss Limes, come on in . . . " if he's about to deliver good news or difficult.

Some of what they encounter:

Cesar is a good, knowledgeable carpet technican, non-threatening, quiet, respectful, good looking with a radiant smile. I've predicted that when the company is 5 years old, 20% of our business will be Cesar's repeat customers. Last week he went to a customer's home for the fourth time in two years. He remembered her during huddle, "Oh, yeah. She's nice. Couple of nice little kids." He radioed to tell me he had arrived, how long he'd be, and the amount of the job. He sounded a little off. Soon he radioed again and he sounded way off. "Uh, Limes, I'm just calling in to talk to you . . ." Huh? Calling me in the middle of a job on a busy day to chat? "Cesar, what's up?" "Limes, this family is moving out and it's pretty crazy. The mom is busy packing and there are people helping. The little girls are running around the house naked." "Cesar, what?" "In the house, out in the cul-de-sac, up and down the sidewalk."

What had concerned this decent man, the father of three young children himself, was that all the adults in the home were packing boxes downstairs while the 4- and 5-year-old naked girls were dogging his footsteps upstairs as he cleaned the carpet. He tried to shoo them downstairs, which they thought was a grand game, especially the part where they sneaked back up to holler "boo!" He asked the mother to keep them downstairs for their safety. "Oh, sure, thanks for reminding me." That lasted about 5 minutes.

"Cesar, get back in there and get the job done. Then get out of there. Tell the mother again, as you pass her, that you're working with water at 240-degrees and she needs to keep the children downstairs." He finished that job in record time and I didn't hear from him again until he was rolling in the van. He didn't have to say much. I could hear it in his voice. "It's 2009, and you have a house full of people not watching the naked children and there's a strange man upstairs, and you live in a big city full of questionable characters . . . ."

Naked lady sightings, women in the shower with the door open next to the room where the carpet is being cleaned, and offers to barter favors for extra services are too common to individually enumerate here. Offers of beer or the harder stuff ~ a daily occurrence. Customers curled up on the couch smoking whatever and offering to share - at least once a week. Percentage of customers who leave underage children home to let us in - high. We don't go in under those circumstances, whether the youth is a young man or a young lady. None of the current technicians seem to be renegades. They value their jobs. They know David's standards for anyone who drives that van and wears that shirt identifying him as one of ours.Yesterday I told Cesar I was writing this post about his customer. He shook his head from side to side and that dark, angry look crossed his face. He added details I hadn't heard before. It seems that one of the little naked girls was pretty notorious. She'd been found as far as three blocks away from home, naked in the streets. The mother kind of thought she had a pretty spunky little firebrand of a daughter . . . . and I repeat: what the hell is the matter with people?

In my ears right now: Today it's a Marvin Gaye collection - and i like it!

Something that charmed me: Sunday I was shopping in Target and there was a young mother of two pushing her children in a cart. She was busy shopping from a list, but every time someone came into proximity, including me - a small, middle aged woman - she checked them out like a hawk. She made herself aware of what was going on around her children. I like that.

The Other Bicycle Misadventure

At 18, I was keeping body and soul together by living in at a foster home, helping with housework, cooking, shopping, laundry, yard work, the mountains of paperwork involved in fostering minors for Los Angeles County, and general mischief. It was a place with all kinds of dynamics for potential disaster and disgrace. The parents were a regular Joe Iowan displaced to southern California and his extremely unusual French Moroccan wife. They had two young adopted children, although they were in their early 50s. Gary was 5 and Arlette was 3. There was Limes, 18. And 8 adolescent males ranging from 15 to nearly 18. There were more intrigues, attractions, connections and fallings-out than one can imagine. And these "parents" were oblivious. They'd go off for long weekends or mini-vacations, leaving Limes in charge. Come on, it was 1971. What do you think went on when an 18-year-old was left as the "adult"? Ours was known as the party house.

None of the fostered young men owned a car. A couple owned bicycles. On a warm afternoon, I asked if I could use one of the bikes to take Arlette for a ride. She was an adorable child. If one were a doll designer, one would want the face to look like Arlette's. I'm ashamed today to say I thought it was OK to put a 3-year-old on the handlebars of a bicycle and pedal her up and down a blacktop alley. Helmets weren't yet heard of, at least by me. She giggled and we chatted and I took her up and down the alley for probably half an hour.

The German Shepherd showed himself after we'd been at it for awhile. I'm not a big fan of dogs, and particularly not big dogs. It began to lope along just behind us to the right and I didn't care much for that. I said nothing to Arlette, but I was a little concerned because he kept steady pace with us and seemed aggressive. He wasn't going away. At the point in the alley where I was the farthest away from home, two other huge dogs joined the Shepherd and started circling us. They took turns snapping at the back tire. I was having trouble landing on what I should do.

I pedaled hard toward home, thinking I'd holler out for some of the guys to help us. Drew near the House of Mirth where some dozen people lived . . . nobody in the yard! Kept pedaling fast and hard, back and forth, yelling at those miserable dogs as much as they were snarling at us. Arlette didn't seem to notice anything. The dogs were leaping into the air just at the back tire, snapping . . . . pack animals seem to get more excited as the chase progresses. Not that I'm a dog psychologist.

On my umpteenth zoom toward the house, there were suddenly a number of home dudes in the yard. I screamed out my plight and caused a little commotion. Young men scrambled everywhere, whooping like warriors, picking up rocks, a broom, a rake and a chair to shake or throw at the dogs. I hoped no one would hit Arlette or me. But one of the guys seemed to keep his head - this was Ex. I saw him gesture to one of the others, "come with me". They stepped out into the alley and I aimed toward them, slowing the bike. From their perspective we had to look pretty frightening - moving bicycle, frightened child, frightened chick and a maelstrom of mangy curs. Ex executed a pretty nifty yank of Arlette off the handlebars and swiftly handed her to the other young man.

Relief hit me pretty hard as I watched the home dude carry Arlette inside. My feet were on the ground steadying the bike, but my knees were knocking. I saw Ex turn back toward me after handing Arlette off. The noise from the dogs was deafening and I could smell them. The world kind of stopped for a moment and that's when that German Shepherd took a flying leap ~ the animal bit me sufficiently to remove a piece of my 501s and my glutes. Ex executed another pretty swift move, just as the pack of my protectors descended on the pack of dogs. He yanked off his T-shirt and wrapped it around the middle of me so my humiliation could not be seen by the others. He went with me to the emergency room and sat in the hallway while I was stitched up.

I married him 7 years later and had a child with him 19 years later. He was in my life 32 years - by far the longest of anyone I've ever known. Our divorce was ugly, but I have to give him this: he was a good man to have around in a pinch.

In my ears right now: Judy Collins ~ Who Knows Where the Time Goes. I owned that album when the dog bit me.

Something that charmed me today: the picture above that looks like a huge dog is about to devour a child . . . . is actually a beloved family pet trying to get to the bubbles the child is blowing.