One Eleven Eleven

Mark your calendars, it won't happen again for another century.

Day Two at the Frostbite Palace is proceeding just fine. The P.O.S. heater from Lowe's turns out to work after all. (You never want to build up a head of indignant steam and then when the guy who was "currently serving other customers" for half an hour finally does get on the line you go off on him, only to hear him say "Did you press the start button?")

(And then you don't want to compound your entry into the Idiot Customers Hall of Shame by laying into him with "but your *$&&%)# manual doesn't SAY anything about a start button!" but then actually LOOK at the manual and, well, there it is.)

Anyhow, his ego a bit flatter but plenty still to go, Plotnik's studio is a cozy 68 degrees now. Ducknik is working on the sofa and Plotnik is typing away with warm fingers and we'll be just fine as long as the power stays on. The furnace repair, supposedly, is scheduled for Thursday.

Has this happened to you? Last night Plot and Duck went down to Pasta Pomodoro for dinner and when they got done Plot saw a couple in the corner smiling at him. He smiled back and they waved hi, first the woman and then the man. Plot figured they were waving at someone behind him, but when he turned to look there was nobody else there. So he pointed to himself questioningly, "me?"

They smiled again and when he got a little closer to their table he recognized that he did know the woman, but his brain would not call back her name.

Her husband said "Plot and Duck, right?" Then they introduced themselves and, of course, the instant they did so Plot and Duck remembered that they are dear friends of their ex-neighbor Pat who had lived across the street for quite a few years. (In fact she sold her house to another ex-neighbor John the King.)

Plot and Duck had seen this couple and their kids many times at Pat's house, and always enjoyed them a lot. It's probably been ten years, at least, since they saw them, but shouldn't Plot have remembered these faces?

So last night Plotnik dreamed about the couple. In the dream they lived in an enormous and elegant home on grounds as expansive as an English estate (which is what comes from watching the new PBS English aristocracy drama the other night), except it was here in Snowy Valley. The husband showed Plotnik his warm studio, where there were many banjos.

Banjos? Banjos. Plotnik is stumped by the banjos.