A Moment of Inattention, A Place Lost

A Moment of Inattention, A Place Lost

It's so unlike me.  I can't understand how it happened.  The recording regularly interrupted the muzak of the call waiting to apologize for keeping me waiting, but pointing out that the Social Security Administration oversees benefits for more than fifty million people and that they were taking the calls in the order received.   (So, Wait Your Turn!)

This went on for forty minutes before I began making dinner.  Grilled flounder is usually cooked on foil, I was told.  Just apply some non-stick spray and place the flounder,  skin side down, on the grill after seasoning, of course.  You can't really over-season fish, or so the contributor at Cooks.com had observed in the recipe I found when I posed the question--"What the heck do you season flounder with when you grill it?" to Google.  I know, I'm supposed to say I googled it, but I am being circumspect about grammar and usage today, having read and written a good deal about grammar and usage in the past few days.  (That's yet another draft lurking on the underside of this collection.  Right now I am working on three of them, and am not satisfied that any of them is "finished."  Suddenly, I feel the need to finish things I publish here?).

Back to last evening--I was ready to shift my attention to the grill, which I had to light with a log lighter as the sparking mechanism that usually ignites the grill is either hibernating in the "cold" weather we've had, or has succumbed to corrosion due to near-constant habitation by humidity.  I almost chose "erosion" back there, but the waves have not been lapping at my grill--they remain at the beach, wearing away our piped-in sand which must be brought in about once every eight to ten years in a process known as beach restoration.  I guess the theory is that the sand being sucked up about a half-mile or so out in the water was once our sandy beach, and piping it in as a slurry, then repeatedly running it over with giant bulldozers to wring the water out and flatten the surface is a "restorative process."  Tell that to all the crustaceans, who--if they survive the crushing force of the bulldozers--find themselves lying in the sun (with eyes having no lids or lashes to deal with all that light and dry sand) instead of lying beneath fifteen or so feet of water.  I'm thinking they don't feel "restored" at all.

Where was I?  Oh, lighting the grill, so I maneuvered through the door, holding the log lighter, squeezing the phone between my chin and collar bone and administering a light hip-check to the dolor.  I lit the grill, and waited five minutes more (with at least eight repetitions of the abject apology, accompanied by a preventive scolding if the selfish desire to move ahead of any of the fifty million others being served by the Social Security Administration, who apparently are all on hold, should be starting to form i my dulled consciousness induced by all this muzak, constantly interrupted, etc., etc., etc.).  After waiting five minutes to heat up the grill, I quickly wire-brushed it and was ready for the flounder.  I went back into the house and got the two pieces of flounder, now sitting on little aluminum foil rafts awaiting the voyage on the grill.  I placed each on the grill one-handed (the other hand was still holding the phone).  I then realized I had no tool with which to move the flounder around with on the now-hot aluminum foil and grill.  I walked back into the house, hung up the phone and picked up a spatula and started back out to the grill.  As I reached for the door, I realized it, I was missing something.   I actually had a hand free to turn the knob and push the door open.  My hips were not required for this maneuver, and nothing was squeezed between my chin and collar bone.  I had hung up the phone.  No multitasker here.  An hour of holding wasted.  I have lost my place in line.

It's morning now, and I am ready to call the SSA again, although I find it increasingly difficult to stop myself from reversing those initials I just mentioned.  OK, where's that number--I wonder if I could just hit redial.  OK, I am on hold again, waiting my turn.

What's for breakfast, an omelet perhaps?  Where's that frying pan?  The Pam spray...Oh, and eggs, a little cheese, pooh, and there's some green pepper I can slice up and saute in that other little frying pan if I pull that out and light this burner.  Now, if I turn this burner on....