The Awkward Handshake

Image by Hatice EROL from Pixabay

I wrote recently about the awkwardness of shaking hands with myself — when introduced to my alter ego. It got me thinking about awkward handshakes.

My most difficult was a doctor introducing me to a new colleague, a nervy young man who rushed politely to proffer his hand from behind me.

I was lying face down preparatory to a minor surgical procedure on my back.

If there’s a position other than lying face down, from which it’s harder to shake the hand of someone standing behind you, I don’t know what it would be.

I was reminded of the way dentists will fill your mouth with hardware and then ask a question that needs a detailed answer. I’m sure that young man was destined for dentistry.

***

Originally published in The Daily Cuppa.

Arachnophobia — A Gender Thing?

I was in the bath, towelling my hair prior to getting out, when a thing dropped from the towel into the water.

I leapt out — Aaaagh! — and flung away the towel. I know spiders don’t come in packs, but who thinks rationally when sharing a bath with an eight-legged monster from hell?

My shriek brought my knight-in-shining-armor to my rescue. He pushed past, carefully scooped up the spider, and carried it off.

Hey, what about my towel?

When I emerged, I found him drying the recovering arachnid with a hair-dryer. He said, “It’ll be OK,” like that was what I wanted to hear.

I thought dark thoughts but said nothing.

It’s a gender thing.

***

Originally published in The Daily Cuppa.

Time Itself Went Walkabout This Week

 

This hasn’t been a conventional week — none of this 7 days 7 nights nonsense, just a maelstrom of activity catapulting us from one high-octane activity to the next. I feel as though any photos taken have been by chance, but can identify only one that I didn’t mean to take.

In busy but fast-moving traffic when we were already running late for a hospital appointment, we met a “ROAD CLOSED” sign. Some closed roads are barely an inconvenience, and some denote a many-miles detour. Guess which sort this one was.

For the rest of the story, CLICK HERE.