Gin & tonic's were a longtime ago.

I ended up waiting outside her house I was across the 60' roadway.

I reached in back of the passenger side chair for a partially frozen bottle of water. I though about sending a text. I thought a text would be easier to interrupt if the phone ran with the return call I was waiting for. The text would travel clear across the nation. I hadn't thought about what would specifically be in that text but it would have been on the nature of just saying hello, the thought of it aroused me. I wondered what would have happened if I thought about shaking hands. I said softly out loud, "Relax fella's".

I looked up and across to the second floor and wondered. I knew that there was a wireless router beyond the curtains, I pulled out my iPod and went to 'Settings' and her connection came up with a little symbol of a lock next to it.

I touched the connection and it asked me for the passcode so I typed that in.

I started a blog post when my phone ran.

It was about 1:00PM, we had agreed to meet in the morning. I asked how long she was going to be. She said she was on the way.

I gave up on the blog post and sat there as my iPod charged and broadcast itself onto my truck radio at the frequency of 88.3.

Then I took out my camera.

I have these magnets on my frig. They are of my eyes: one left, one right. I thought it would be a little disconcerting to have eyes just staring at you. The eye magnets get moved around as magnets are sometimes needed but eventually they get put together.


Eye shine is important. Photographers strive for it and sometimes will add it if it is not there.


The camera has but one eye.


My two eyes took turns staring back.


I'm still surprised at how incredibly close I had to hold that camera to my eye.

I was like, "Dude, back up. You're freaking me out."

I saw her pull into her driveway, she has a free standing garage in the back of the her house. I met her as she struggled a little to unlock the back door while holding a case of cranberry juice.

I replaced her dimmer switch then I worked at fixing the CD player that is hooked up to her sound system. I found one problem but it didn't solve what she was complaining about so then we swapped out the CD player, after I told her the wiring was correct. The CD player we swapped, had it own problem which I fixed after I took the case off. She can now play Christmas music.

She smelled of cigarettes.

She then asked me not to forget about the mouse. The mouse that she called me about the day before. The mouse that had its life ended in one of the traps. I disposed of the mouse and freshly baited all the traps.

That was the end of all she asked me for until she added hanging two wreathes up. I hung one but then had questions about the other so I went to find her. She was in the living room talking on the phone. I let her know I was looking for her and waited in the dining room. I then found what I needed and went back to the third floor.

About seven minutes later she called up to me from the second floor. I met her at the landing. She still smelled of cigarettes but now I could smell hard liquor too. I worried a little but kept my mouth shut. I told her all that I done as I stared at her ass as she went down the stairs, before we got to the bottom, someone was at the front door. She opened the door and introduced me to the guy.

She said, "This is Tim. He works with me over at MCM and he just fixed the CD player," I offered my hand. We shook. She then started a conversation that didn't concern me so I left. I walk to the living room where her red plastic cup sat. It had a lot of ice in it, it was at least two-thirds full. I picked it up and took a sniff. It was gin and tonic, heavy on the gin. I used to drink gin and tonics all the time but very rarely alone.

I then walked to the kitchen to see if I could find a gin bottle out in the open. There wasn't any that I could see so I walked back to the front of the house where she met me in the hallway.

She started summing up the day and also the party that was scheduled for the day to follow. I thought about the cup with gin. I glanced up to get a read from her eyes. She was genuinely happy to have her music. I thought about asking for a gin and tonic because I don't like folks drinking alone. I glanced again.

I'll only chance glances with folks that know me because they know when I look longer than a glance then something is up, that I'm trying to search their soul, and I only soul search if I think there is a problem. I can get similar information from the glances but it isn't as accurate. It like trying to figure out what's going on inside a house while driving by the windows. It's easier if you just stop and look. I got that she was just a little tired. A lot of the last decade has been tough on her and it has trickled down to me.

I asked myself, "No drink then?" I replied, "Gin & tonic's were a long time ago."