The Prairie Spy

Alan “Lindy” Linda

It seems like lately that the sexual revolution keeps taking new directions.  But I’ve felt safe at home. At least there, such issues are overshadowed by the frozen septic system drain field, the dentist’s bill, and a new pair of shoes that hurt my feet.

So it was with some dismay that General Electric, the washing machine, called me down to the basement last night in his normal fashion: He had walked–or rather, kind of waddled–clear to the end of his hoses,  and was sending clanking sounds of unbalanced discontent up the stairs.

I hurried down there. He is, after all, a general. Ignoring generals comes with some risk. So does paying attention to them, come to think of it. They’re a problem. I really wish Sir Nautilus the Water Heater would have taken command of the army of appliances in my basement. He’s noble born, very soft spoken, and extremely political. He is pretty timid, though, and has never really outgrown his wetting the floor period.

So I’m stuck with General Electric. Since I speak Appliance, I asked him what in the heck he thought he was doing, bouncing around in a six-foot circle (the length of his hoses)  like a maniac.

“You know what I was doing,” he crisply replied, as he spat soap fluff and water out onto the floor. The general could be a real pain in the butt.

No, I don’t. What is it exactly that you’re doing?

“Trying to get your attention, Mr. President, that’s what I was doing.” It’s not good when General E. calls me Mr. President. He knows I like it, but because I know he knows that I like that, I know that he only does it when he’s sucking up.

You’ve got my attention, I told him as I popped his hat off and looked at his wiring to see if he’d come loose in there anywhere.

“I heard a rumor,” he said.

What kind of rumor, I asked?

“The kind I don’t like to hear,” he said. “Rumors destroy armies; loose lips sink ships; a penny saved is a penny ……”

Ok, I said, hold on. (When he gets like that, you have to rein him in, or you’ll be listening to platitudes all day.) I asked him to detail the rumors.

“I heard you’re replacing Lady Kenmore the Dryer,” he said.

Well, she burns my socks and won’t run when I want her to, I said. Furthermore, I added, she’s temperamental three weeks out of four, and won’t work for the company that comes on the weekends.

Yeah,” the General agreed, “she does get kind of cranky.”

Cranky? I said? Cranky would be her on a good day.

“Well,” said the General, “she’s having a crisis.”

And what kind of crisis would this be? Last time she had a crisis it was because I had left my cell phone in my clothes and she had dialed 911, and said she had been kidnapped. She told the cops that some hippie had tied her to the wall with an electric cord, and was torturing her.

Luckily the police don’t speak Appliance. Which I do.

Back to the crisis, I asked the General. What can I do to help her?

“She wants to go to the next Gay Pride parade in town.”

Oh, that is so wrong in so many ways that, I told the General, I don’t know where to start.

So I approached Lady Kenmore and asked what I could do to help her.

“You can take me to the Gay Parade,” she said, “get a trailer or something, and I need some different clothes to wear.”

“And oh yes,” she said, “I need some tattoos.”

Like what kind of tattoos, I asked her, although I was kind of afraid to do so.

To make a long story short, I agreed to use Magic Marker to write some things on her nice white front. Like: “Women power!” And, “I burned my bra.” And, well, you get the picture.

We ended up friends again, once she saw I was sympathetic to the cause. She gave me back a couple of socks that have been missing for almost a year. 

I always wondered where socks went. Now I know.