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Location: Chicago, Illinois, United States

Thursday, February 08, 2007

In Search of Heat

Who poured Tabasco sauce all over the radiator last night?

I did.

But why?

It was cold in my apartment. The radiators have not turned on for days. I called the landlord. I found unsatisfactory his proposed solution of "put on another sweater, Nancy." He pronounced Nancy "NON-see," like a real Sally ("SOLL-ee"). I hung up on him and opened the medicine cabinet. To my horror, my last bottle of K-Y Warming Liquid was just over half-full, leaving none to coat the rest of my body (I have problems finding pants that fit).

So I consulted my good friend Sapphire from Bombay. She laughed at my dilemma.

"What's to laugh at, Saph? I could lose a toe. I could lose the little one."

"Dear, paranoid, crazy Sprout," she said, "don't worry. Come back in twenty minutes. I can fix everything."

I consulted her again. My face glowed rosy red.

I consulted her again. I gyrated in the mirror: "Lasso, lasso, whip!"

I consulted her again. My nose grew larger and more like cottage cheese.

And so I awoke this morning with the vague, ghostly memory of cackling as I shook vinegar and fermented liquid peppers down between the silver painted segments.

The neighbor, as is his (paid) custom, slipped under the door a typed record of what he could hear through the walls the previous night. It read:

"Saph, you are magic. I-love-you-I-love-you-I-love-you!" (He has such good syntax.)

Then: "The Spoonful! (cue falsetto [he's a former stage manager]) I believe in magic -- in a young girl's heart...(silence)... and it's magic, if the music is groovy...the magic's in the music and the music's in me...(silence)...Do you believe like I believe?...(louder)...Do you believe like I believe?"

It might have been a screaming nightmare, I thought. But the smell of burnt vinegar told me otherwise.

Burnt?

2 Comments:

Blogger carmilevy said...

I wonder if the rental board in your part of the world would appreciate the "put on another sweater" advice from your landlord.

Some landlords deserve to be neutered.lss

9:57 PM  
Blogger amadea's world said...

Nice, to have a neighbouor with the name Sapphire. Beautiful name. My neighbours are called Heidi, Hedwig, Bruno and Gotthard.

5:06 AM  

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