Nut Magnet Collection Grows

I've added several new editions to my ever growing nut magnet collection. I know my readers are wondering why I don't take a picture of my fridge and show them to you.

It's because my fridge is full of magnetic notepads, the way God Intended, and also, these are not refrigerator nut magnets, these are the people kind.

Your tired, your poor, your unbalanced, unstable and unwashed all are drawn to me like bees to honey. I literally trip over them on my own doorstep.

Today as I headed out for some errands I saw that I had to have the insides of my windows washed. I could barely see out of the windshield in front or the sides.

Since I was on my way to the post office anyway I dug out a couple bucks to give to the guy who washes windows in the parking lot. He's a nice, decent man, obviously down on his luck, but willing to clean windows for change. He never bothers anybody or begs, but he is always there with newspapers and glass cleaner and a little stool he uses to stand on for the SUV's. I always have him clean my windows, he does a really good job.

So as not to make him feel he needed to hurry, I hung out in the lobby of the post office until I could see he was finished. It was here that I acquired my first Nut Magnet Experience of the Day.

A portly senior citizen man with slipping dentures approached me, already well into a conversation with me before I had made eye contact. He told me all about his pernicious anemia, his vitamin B12 shots, his high blood pressure pill, his daily diet of steak and baked potato, and how he would vomit every day; everything he ate he would upchuck. He told me how he liked to chew on women as well as steaks, and he gave me a leer. I almost asked him if he puked when he fed on women but refrained.

I thought I'd introduce him to the benefits of nutritional yeast but he didn't really have an input valve. Just output. He'd talk right over me no matter what I said. All the while I was trying to peer over his shoulder and around his fat gut to see the progress of my window washer.


It started back in the 70's" he said, apropos of nothing, "That was when they first got to our water. "


"Got to it, how, exactly?" I asked.

"You know, got to it. That was when they did it to all our water. Bio-engineered the DNA."

Now, I happen to know a bit about anemia because I was born with it and almost died from it several times, and I also happen to be a big fan of knowing stuff about DNA. After all, I've lost count of the times I've yelled at the back of a retreating boyfriend, "Get out and take your DNA with you!"


So I already knew that B12 shots are the treatment for pernicious anemia--although if he has a functioning terminal ileum, I don't know what all the fuss is about-- but I have not yet been acquainted with bio-engineered altered DNA in my water source. That just seems like a lot of work for Secret Ops to go to, and for what purpose? To make us a Stupider People?

I can hear them now in their secret labs in the underworld, "This dumbing down of America through Reality TV isn't working fast enough. People still show signs of resisting Twitter. Let's doctor up their Water!"


You know it's just not very likely. Wouldn't they doctor up our Starbucks instead?

I extricated myself from his presence by wishing him all the best of luck with his vomiting issues, and made a beeline for my car.

But Nut Magnet Adventure#2 had other plans. This man, bleary-eyed and somewhat shell-shocked in appearance, waylaid me with this stunner, "Ma'am! Please! That lady right there just farted on me!" I half looked at him and half at the retreating back of a well dressed woman whom, to my quick assessment, did not look like the back of a woman who would take deadly aim and let one rip in public.

What was I supposed to do about it? Run after her and demand she give him is clean air back? Confront her with her intentions? Demand repercussions? Ask her if she'd considered Vitamin B12 shots and introduce her to Nut Magnet #1 who might vomit on her and thus complete the cycle of Karma that I just somehow got snagged into?

I did nothing, alas, except express my deep felt sorrow and compassion for his horrific experience, and high-tailed it out of there with my clean windows as fast as my foot could hit the gas pedal. (ha-ha. Get it? Gas pedal?)

My next stop was the 98 cent store, where, as I was rounding the corner into the food aisle. I ran smack dab into a guy who was shoving a bag of chips in his pants.

This was starting to seem like a day for social torture rather than the joyous gad-about that I had intended.

It was a freeze-in-place moment. I really didn't know what to do. I looked around as if I had done the guilty deed, and wondered if store detectives would be descending in droves. I knew I had mere moments to formulate some kind of response. What would it be? Would I scream, "THIEF!" or "Drop that Bag of Chips, you are surrounded!" ? Or would I look the other way and pretend I'd seen nothing? After all, this was the 98 cent store, where everything costs one dollar. What difference did that dollar make to the store if this obviously homeless man was driven by hunger to steal his food?

Without even thinking I said, "I'll buy that for you, and anything else you want to eat."

But he didn't hear me. He was already moving fast and out the door, and I'll never know if my words had time to register before he was gone.

This morning as I left the house, a friend had told me I looked especially nice today, and that in my new pink blouse I was sure to attract an eligible man.