My niece Kennon is going on a 18-month Spanish-speaking LDS mission to Dallas. She gave a farewell talk at church this morning. She did a great job along with another young man going on a two-year stint to Cape Verde which is just off the coast of Africa.

We were invited to a family luncheon at my brothers place which happens to also be the home where I grew up.  My wife fixed up a nice bowl of watermelon, pineapple, raspberries, cantaloupe and honeydew melon for it.

She had to run our daughter Meg to the airport so she could fly back to Phoenix. Michele asked me to take the big fruit assortment to my brothers place for the lunch.

The Vette hadn’t been run for a week or two so I carefully placed the large fruit platter on the passenger floor and idled down the road without so much as spinning a tire. I made 95% of the trip without incident.

However, on the last leg up the hill, there was a circle irrigating the road and adjoining field. This particular circle doesn’t just come close to the road, its end tower spans over the road and drenches everything in sight.

I could see that I was going to have to wait for 30 or 40 minutes before the circle moved out of soaking distance if I was going to keep water spots off the Vette. Since the lunch on the hill had already started, I needed to get going. I calculated if I put the pedal to the metal, I would get through the spray without picking up too many hard water spots and if I kept up the acceleration, the water that did reach the car would immediately be blown off.

It went down just as I planned. I hit 60 in a few seconds and then jumped on the binders as I flew around the bend and arrived in Brent’s parking lot.

This is the hill I was accelerating up although today it was about 80 degrees warmer. In contrast to me racing up the hill, Brent was racing down it.

I crawled up out of the seat that is just inches from the pavement and went to the other door to carry in the beautiful fruit assortment.

I was dismayed to see the colorful and formerly carefully-placed fruit scattered off the bowl and on to the floor mat, under the seat and any other place it could meet up with a chunk of dirt, gravel or germ.

This was the scene…

I was dismayed. My wife’s carefully arranged masterpiece was now my sloppy, sticky and unattractive floor mat.

What was I to do? I thought fast and then ran even faster into the house. I grabbed the quickest thing I could find that would hold some dirty fruit. I think it was some kind of a grease-catching pan for their oven. I ran back out to the car before anyone in the house crowd of family members could ask me what I was doing.

I picked up all the soiled fruit that had been on the floor and threw it on the grease pan. I tried to rearrange the clean fruit into a decent looking display on the tray without much success. The damage had been done and any future manipulation on my part would just make it worse.

I thought about taking the dirty fruit into what we used to call the mud room. I could run the faucet or shower on the fruit and maybe it would wash the debris off while retaining what was left of the fruits attractive texture and appearance.

But after a moment of thought, I realized the fruit was probably beyond redemption. I abandoned the clean-up idea and took the pan into the garage and placed it on the dumpster lid for later disposal.

I went back out to the fruity-smelling Corvette and retrieved the partially-filled fruit tray. Back in the house, I slipped the large tray in between all the other food offerings. People were already taking food helpings so the picked-over looking tray seemed right at home.

After lunch was over, I planned on going back out to the garage and throwing the fruit in the dumpster and returning the pan.

We had a nice lunch. There were probably 40 or 50 family members there. After a couple more hours of conversation, I decided to head home. As I walked out the door, I remembered the soiled garden scraps. I went to the garage but there was no grease pan or accompanying items in sight, especially on the trash can.

I got a little worried but was still hopeful that maybe Brent’s wife Kashann had seen the soiled garbage and tossed it. I found Kashann and asked her if she had noticed any fruit in the garage.

Kashann is one tireless and quick-moving lady. In fact, she drives so fast that after her second or third car wreck, I started calling her Krashann. She can talk on two phones while she’s driving with one leg and still watch a movie on their van TV.

She’s very efficient. She gets the job done. She informed me that she found this wonderful bounty of fruit and couldn’t imagine why anyone would put it in the garage, especially on the dumpster lid.

Without asking anyone if the fruit contained bubonic plague, rat poison or droppings from a Corvette floorboard, she gathered it up, brought it in and emptied it on the fruit trays in the house.

After hearing of her health department violations, I ran into the house and looked at the slices of fruit still left in the trays. The fruit was essentially gone as was any evidence of floorboard impurities.

No one complained about chunks of gravel or layers of sand. There was no notice of disfigured fruit or abnormal coloration.

Some of my sisters pride themselves on their fine gourmet tastes. After this little incident, when they start patting themselves on the back, I’m going to share a little bit of floorboard reality with them.

If I don’t hear of any deaths, sickness or hospital visits by people who attended this event in the next 3 or 4 days, I’ll post this event.

If I do hear of ill effects or ambulance calls, this post will never see the light of day.

We still have no cash winner of the $500 pot. Sign up to be a follower at the top of this page or you might miss out on future posts. In a few hours there will be another drawing. Don’t miss out!

Most of my books I sell are paperback. Yesterday I got an order for a hardcover. I figured since he was spending the extra bucks, I would ask him if he wanted it signed or unblemished.

Here’s the note I got from him…

Signed would be amazing.

If you’ve got the book, make points by sending some copies to your friends.

If you don’t have it, now’s your chance to fix that omission.

Click on the book to see what you’re missing out on.

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