HERB BENHAM: Key to vacation is Scrabble and unread books
| Thursday, Aug 26 2010 08:20 AM
Last Updated Thursday, Aug 26 2010 08:20 AM
I didn't do a lick of work.
Brought it, thought about it, looked at it and decided against it.
I took 10 books. Eight of them were hard, two were gimmes. I read the gimmes. The hard books never made it out of the red plastic bag in which I carried them.
Such plans we have for vacation. We are going to get smarter, turn into more productive people, become more loving and sow the seeds of future success that will allow us even more free time.
Yes, we have plans and every vacation those plans are dashed like so many ships upon the rocks.
I brought all the bills I've been meaning to pay. I didn't pay one. Wells Fargo can't come and snatch me off the beach, can they? Aren't we entitled to the vacation defense? "What did you expect, I was on vacation. I wasn't thinking clearly."
Or, maybe the defense is, "I was thinking clearly, but clearly not about being a grown up."
I brought the laptop to Del Mar because this was going to be the vacation during which I made solid progress on the screenplay. It really is a winner. Believe me. I could be famous. You'll feel good about knowing me.
I set the laptop on a table in the corner of the living room. That was a good start. A good start until I stacked beach towels on it. Then, I placed my white straw beach hat on top of the towels.
I didn't work, but Sue and I played 12 games of Scrabble. She won 10. Maybe 11.
I know I won one. I'd like to think I won two, but it could have been that I was ahead in the second game and I had put it in the bank and then old Smarty Pants roared back with some insane six-letter word that went out of common usage 150 years ago.
Generally, I kept my cool during the games because I'd like to think I am above the fray and a good sport no matter what the outcome is.
Finally, after one "Bozo" too many, I pounded the table like Khrushchev. I had the the letter "q" and I had held it the entire game waiting for the big kill. In the meantime, while I was committing Scrabble suicide, my opponent put 400 points on the board.
That's a lot of points. Those are the kinds of numbers you put up against your 8-year-old or your foreign exchange student, not your husband. I pounded the table so hard the Scrabble tiles jumped off the board and did summersaults like square clowns in a circus act.
"Circus." That's a good word. Especially if it lands on a triple word.
During the 12 games, I did graduate from two- to four-letter words. Four-letter words. After Sue pasted 400 points on me, I remembered every four-letter word I'd ever used or heard.
I'm going to blame this whole thing on the beach -- 400 points, no work, letting the bills go. When you're from a hot place like the valley and you go to a cool place like the beach, you sort of lose your mind.
It's like being on stage with a hypnotist. You get hypnotized by the crashing of the surf, the changing colors of the ocean, the sunsets dipping beneath the evening fog and the lovely women in bikinis.
You get hypnotized, but then the hypnotist forgets to wake you up. That awakening happens when you drop down the Grapevine into the valley. If that doesn't do it, the stack of bills on the counter, all second notices -- thin and ominous -- do. The letters might as well scream out, "Where have you been? Have you lost your mind?"
Yes, I have. My hope is that each of you had the opportunity to lose your minds too. The stack of thin, angry envelopes are more than worth it.
