In a Fix

Astrology demonstrates that each of us is born under a star sign.  Signs include Pisces, Libra, Scorpio, etc.

Me?  I’ve determined that I was born under the sign of Repairman.  Odd, isn’t it?  I know it isn’t on any astrological chart; but, more and more, I’ve come to understand that somewhere, beyond our telescopic capabilities, there is a constellation of stars that form a figure in overalls with a toolkit in his hand.

That’s my sign.

How else to explain the fact that I seem to have more repairmen than Paul Mitchell models have hair.

A perfect example:  there I was minding my own business in my Palm Springs condo a few weeks back.  I had cleared my schedule to allow myself plenty of “me” time:  long walks, movies, lunches or dinners with friends.  Yummy notion.

Then it was blown to smithereens by my stars apparently aligning to create more needs for repair people than you’d find in the Yellow Pages.

Rain damage:  check;

Fixing front door damaged from the rain:  check;

Patching wall damaged from the rain:  check;

Write a check for the work:  check;

Getting a whiff of a gas leak:  check;

Call Gas Company to verify: check;

Identifying an underground gas pipe as the culprit:  check;

Necessitates turning off all heat:  check;

Necessitates turning off all hot water:  check;

Unable to turn heat back on:  check;

Unable to get hot water back:  check;

Working to get the latter two working:  check.

Write a check for the work:  check;

By now, I’ve reached the end of an endless round of calls, appointments, fretting, having bills handed to me and writing checks to pay the bills.  Three days later, it’s also the end of my intended “me” time.  Oh yeah - the end of my rope too.

By now, my nerves are as frayed as bad wiring.  I don’t dare utter such a statement aloud, for fear of mistakenly wandering into Repairman alignment.

I know I‘m not alone as someone living under this tool-carrying sign.  Any of us who are “lucky” enough to own a home know the syndrome: faucets leak; pests invade; paint chips; ceilings crack; terrazzo stains; pipes break; roofs age; units break; power fails; water seeps.

We’ve all gone through it.  And the unnerving fact is:  it doesn’t stop.  Oh, the most recent problem will get fixed.  Once you pay the bill, you’ll generally feel relieved, saying, “Well, I’m happy that’s done.”

Except it isn’t.  Either the problem itself returns or the repair person will.  Because then there will be a new problem.  Then another.

Now this may not necessarily occur in one fell swoop as my own recent turnstile-of-tradesmen did.  But occur it will.

While my colleague, Lene Andersen, notes in her column this month that more women are becoming Do-It-Yourselfers, I - a proven klutz - am definitely not among them.  A power drill in my hands would be a disaster waiting to happen.   Which is why I pick up the phone - versus a tool - when repairs need doing.  Besides, when you’re born under the sign of Repairman, you just do what ya gotta do.

Irreparably yours,

  Andrea

 

™With permission to The Desert Woman March 2008

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Home Based Business? Better Limber Up!

Jack Be Nimble is great advice to anyone considering working from home. Those of us who’ve done it quickly discover that nimbleness is as vital to succeeding as talent and determination.

You learn to answer phones, work the printer, copy and fax machines, do your own filing, invoicing, shredding and hoisting.

Here you are, your own microcosmic IBM. Every so often, you remember exactly what you’re in business for. This usually occurs somewhere between re-starting the modem and realizing that the fax machine is jammed.

Contrary to what you may think, I am not suggesting that you avoid having a home-based business. The statistics are in our favor!

1. According to IDC, a top research firm, there are approximately 35 million home office households in the U.S.
2. Entrepreneur magazine estimates that home-based businesses generate (hold onto your hat or visor) $427 billion. They apparently forgot to include people like me who generate, oh, a zillion zeroes less than that.
3. Income earned by Home Business owners is estimated between $63,000 to over $1 million (yet again, I must’ve been out when they called.)

I, on the other hand, have a sneaking suspicion that what’s really risen is the number of chiropractic and orthopedic visits for us Home Basers. Here’s where the Limber Part separates the men from the boys, the women from the girls, the aches from the pains. As our editor, Barbara McClure, and I have laughed and cried about together, many is the day when we’re on our hands and knees, crawling, extending and convoluting in what I call the “Techno Twist.” You won’t see it on Dancing With the Stars. You’ll only see it on Dancing with Home-Based Business People.

It goes like this: your computer freezes; you remember your tech guy (the one who is never available when you need him) telling you to unplug everything. Here’s where the crawl part starts. All the plugs and wires, modems and jacks are somewhere under your desk or behind shelves. You crouch, like so, turn your neck into a newly-unnatural position to find the plugs and un-do the cables, and - if you’re me under my desk - you hit your head on its underside as you are re-emerging.

Do you think it’s any accident that my medicine cabinet now carries more ligament creams than Walgreen’s?

Here’s the way Barbara described her own recent Human Pretzel-ing to me: “Suddenly, I couldn't get my computer to turn on.  I went crazy and finally reached AppleCare. They walked me through it, instructing me to re-start it by putting my fingers on four different keys at the same time.  I’m not sure Liberace had a finger span like this. Now my hand
hurts...”

Lest you think the Techno Twist is purely computer and internet-related, let me twist the record back to 1973. During the Watergate investigation, President Nixon’s secretary, Rosemary Woods, was asked to replicate the position she took which - according to her testimony - caused her to erase a crucial 18-minutes from an Oval Office tape. She demonstrated it. There she was, seated at her desk, reaching far back over her left shoulder for a telephone as her foot simultaneously applied pressure to the pedal controlling the transcription machine. Huh????

The resulting backward over-the-shoulder acrobatic twist was the picture heard round the world.

Frankly, I’m no longer sure it didn’t happen precisely the way she said. Just yesterday, I found myself in that very same position.

Oops, have to go. The chiropractor can see me now.

Limberly Yours,
Andrea

™With permission to The Desert Woman September 2007

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A Fashion Idea Bears Fruit

It’s amazing how many of us are struggling to find wearable fashion. With a few boutique exceptions, where-oh-wear did the concept of fashion designed to flatter our figures go?

A perfect example: a dear friend, a beautiful woman, describes her body as an apple. She’s big on top, smaller on the bottom.

I’ve never had top-heavy problems. In fact, another friend recently told me her waist was 29 inches. “That’s my bra size,” I retorted.

So I’m definitely no apple. Me? I’m a pear. There’s more of me as the eye heads South. And we all know how much of us goes South at some point.

Now I have to imagine there are bananas out there, too. For instance, Popeye’s girlfriend Olive Oil would be a prototype for that straight ‘n narrow from top-to-bottom figure.

And, goodness knows, we all know the oranges and cantaloupes in our midst: round all around.

It’s quite an assortment. Maybe we can mount a show called the Fashion Bowl. We each get to dress as the fruit our figures most resemble.

But that brings me back to my original contention and dilemma: what do we wear? It’s an all-too-common problem: we go into department stores or once-upon-a-time-favorite shops determined to get some new things. It’s time! Maybe our old outfits are tiresome; or we’re going on vacation; or we need something to perk ourselves up that doesn’t have sugar and caffeine in it.

Before we know it, we’re going through racks of clothes that have apparently all been designed for perfect figures in the approximate age range of 12 to 12-1/2 years of age. Bare arms, bare shoulders, open backs, skinny bodices or skirts.

Who’s designing this stuff? Have they never heard of flab or tummies or backsides? Do they think we have no shame? Until mirrors are officially banned throughout the kingdom called Earth, nothing we try to hold in as we shimmy into these items keeps us from the sinking feeling we get when we actually see ourselves.

As a pear - a short-waisted one at that - I know exactly what works for my figure type. One doesn’t get to be over 12 years of age without having a pretty good beat on what looks good.

Regrettably, I don’t sew. That would solve a lot of problems. And when I’ve tried to have things made for me, it has turned into a too-expensive or too- disappointing experience.

Ready-to-wear would suit me fine - if it were only ready-to-love, as well.

I have a great idea for any fashion-aware, figure-aware designer: design a line of clothes called Fruit of My Labor (unfortunately, Fruit of the Loom is taken). We can even name categories accordingly: Apple Of Your Eye Sportswear; Pears of Pants; Berry Beautiful Cruise Wear.

You’d be doing millions of women a really yummy favor. You’d allow us to flatter ourselves, to look in mirrors without wincing, and to have our mates delight in our produce inspired transformation. Heck, we could even show them the hangtags that say, “Get fresh with us!”

How utterly delicious that would be.

Fruitfully yours,
Andrea

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Death is A Fact of life

No one sets out to be old. We set out to live a long happy life. As we get older, the two become strangely incompatible.

With age comes knees and backs that ache; skin that crinkles; friends and family who die; more Memorial Services than are likely held in most cathedrals in any given month.

Oh, and assisted living facilities. Yes, those bastions of organized boredom. Most recently, a friend of 46 years moved into one of those. It’s actually a good move for her. She doesn’t mind living in what is essentially a one-room apartment – with bedroom, kitchen and living room in a row, punctuated by a bathroom in the middle. She likes the company of other people, which had become lacking in her home. Both her sisters had deceased; even her dog bit the dust.

I am not Jewish. But I say ‘Oy’ more often than most rabbis.

I myself review my burial instructions about once a year; the caveat being that I haven’t died already.

It is oddly not depressing for me to do that. I chose a cemetery that’s as pleasant as one could find: it’s called Westwood Memorial Park. It is the repository of more celebrities and movie stars than most Academy Award ceremonies. The final resting place, as the phrase goes, of Marilyn Monroe, Dean Martin, Gene Kelly, Truman Capote, Jack Lemmon, Walter Matthau, Rodney Dangerfield, Frank Zappa, Janet Leigh…on and on.

Finally, I can afford to live in the same zip code as these luminaries. Of course, many of them have fancy sites, complete with marble walls. My own humble abode is a ground plot approximately the size of a postage stamp.

Finally! I’ll be able to fit into my own clothes – well, at least the ones I was wearing before the cremation.

It seems my innate characteristic of being aspirational lives on, even if I don’t.

I only hope the stars really do come out at night, and I get to play among them (a favorite lyric, “Fly me to the moon, and let me play among the stars.”)

And so, while it’s as close to a happy ending as I could devise, I am quite contentedly still alive; though I am all too aware of the aging that comes with being my current age of 79. When I stoop to pick something up, my groans are loud enough to remind me I ain’t the woman I once was. I find myself laughing as I get back up – sometimes holding a counter, other times, going so slowly that the only thing it could affect is how long I’ve held my breath to make sure I’ll make it.

I’m reminded of an old joke (the ones I mostly know). A patient says to a doctor, “My knees hurt when I bend. What should I do?” He answers, “Don’t bend.”

Ah, Life. It is a glorious experience. I hope mine goes on a very long time. I have people to see; places to go; doctors to visit.

Meanwhile, whatever age you are – enjoy. We only go ‘round once, it is said. I hope so. My knees can’t take it anymore.

Still here,
Andrea

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What's in a Name?

I have no doubt there's some study that confirms what I've long suspected:  easy-to-pronounce names provide a real advantage.

It starts with a job interview.  “Tell me about yourself, Miss Taylor,” is a lot easier to say than “Tell me about yourself, Miss, uh, Jumbrown...?  Uh, Jimboree?”  That's me.

My name is Andrea Giambrone.  To Italians, or anyone accustomed to the Italian language, pronouncing it is a piece of cake, or - more accurately - a piece of cannoli.

In fact, it's a quite mellifluous name:  Andrea Jam-bro-nee.  It's pretty to say and to hear.  The problem is, I almost never hear it - unless I'm saying it myself.

It's pronounced correctly maybe once in twenty times.  I've been called Jambone, Jimbro, Gambrown; and it's almost always preceded by clear embarrassment for the person attempting to say it.

All this helps one appreciate Arnold Schwarzenegger's success all the more.  Obviously, his name had nothing to do it. (Quick - spell his last name.  See what I mean?)

Movies are filled with marquee-easy names:  Hugh Grant, Julia Roberts, Brad Pitt, Eddie Murphy.

TV also allows you to aim your clicker at those you know: Gayle King, Bobby Flay, Pat Sajak…

The territory gets a little trickier with Oprah Winfrey.  I'm sure she was called Opera more times than “La Boheme.”  I would imagine Ellen DeGeneres has also had her share of mis-pronounces.  “Uh, Miss De Jeaners...”

Writers, too, seem to have a successful time of it with easy-to-say names.  Danielle Steele, Louise Penny, Walter Mosley, Jim Patterson - enormously popular, best sellers.  Fess up:  when was the last time you bought an Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn book?  Or went online searching for Jerzy Kosinski’s latest tome?

Whoever said it's all in a name knew what they were talking about.  I have no doubt that's why “Mr. Smith Goes To Washington” was a hit.  Who's gonna go see a movie titled “Mr. Bacigalupe Goes To Wacahoota?”

Recently, a letter instructed me to contact Ms. Mlycnyzk.  I couldn't begin to tell you how to pronounce it.  I stared and stared, spellbound by the fact that this was a name with no vowels (I do not count  'y' as a vowel). 

Whatever else Italians are full of, we are full of vowels.  A-E-I-O-U's amass amid consonants like pepperoni amid pizzas.   Vowels adore Italian names and flock to them to decorate, adorn, decorate as though each name were an individual work of art.  Aha!  A flourish here, a curlicue there - bravissimo!  Vowels everywhere!

I dream of how different life would be if I had another name:  I once thought of assuming my mother's maiden name:  Maida (May-da). Until a friend stared at me and asked, “Made a what?”    So much for that.

Then I think about everything that's involved in a name change:  from contacting Social Security to contacting my long list of friends, colleagues, acquaintances, subscription services, the phone company, the insurance company. I would grow old letting people know I have a new name.

One good thing, though:  when someone doesn't know me, it's obvious as soon as I answer the phone and hear, “Uh, Miss Guy-am-bron...?” 

“Who's calling?” I ask.  Typically, it's a telemarketer, I can honestly tell them that Miss Guy-am-bron isn't here. 

Finally, a difficult name makes something easy.

Hello My Name Is yours,
Andrea

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