A Simple Plan Puns

Back a few decades, I was working in a program with a local college in the Middle East.

The name of the program for ExPats has the clever acronym of "IDEA" (hey, I said it was clever); which stands for "Inter-Departmental Educational Adjunct". It's interdepartmental because my particular specialty not only covers field geology but also paleontology and a bit of archeology thrown in for good measure. Everyone hopes to have a good IDEA...

ahem...

Well, we saddle up and head for the Dune Sea out in the west of the country, where the Precambrian, Cambrian, Silurian, Cretaceous, Pliocene, Pleistocene, and Holocene crop out and access is relatively easy and non-injurious.

Well, we caravan out, some 30 Land Cruisers, Nissan patrol, and the odd Mitsubishi Galloper strong. We all get our maps, compasses and split up into 5 or 6 special interest groups ("SIG's"); where each IDEA has his own GPS and LIDAR laser ranging apparatus. Reason being, that there are very few benchmarks out in the desert, and even those are constantly at the mercy of the shifting and ever-blowing sands.

Since we're split into groups and at any one time, ranging up to and including some 50 km2, when a real find is located, a device called the "DIME" (Digital-Interface Monitor Encoder) is attached and programmed into the GPS for location later; it is a digital sort of low-frequency transponder, developed from technology used by offshore drillers and jacket setters where benchmarks are even more transitory.

The way it works is rather simple. When something is to be marked for later retrieval, a series of wooden posts are pounded in a triangular manner around the find and the DIME is set, programmed with the GPS and attached to one or more of the posts.

That's the theory, at least.

Everything works well, especially all the hardened electronics and computer gizmos, but attaching the DIME to the stakes is the real problem. It can't be nailed, screwed or fastened with any sort of metal contrivance as that farkles the magnetic field and causes all sorts of goofy spurious signals. Zip ties don't last long in the heat and duct tape is right out. Many sites have been lost to the shifting sands this way.

Velcro doesn't work too well, as the sand fills the hooks of the receiving piece of velcro and soon renders it useless. String or fishing line work, but that's temporary (they melt). Glue or mastic are out as these are supposed to be temporary. Even plastic sleeves don't work due to the heat out

First off, I'm new here. I've only been a dad for a few years but, I'm not sure i'll ever be able to top this and the circumstances of the set up were so chance and specific, I will never be able to use this again. This is what inspired me to seek you out and tell my story.

So, like most thanksgivings, we went to a relatives house and had very large but unusually early dinner. We went home and by nine or ten o'clock we had the little one off to sleep and my wife and I were getting hungry and wanted something simple. She asked for fast food and I was willing to oblige.

I drove to Taco Bell and it was closed. I called my wife, "sorry Taco Bell is closed. What do you want from BK?". I then drove to BK and discovered it was also closed. Called the wife "Sorry honey, BK is closed. What do you want from McDonald's?". You might see were this is going and, if you haven't already guessed it, Micky D's was closed too."Ok, I'm just going to the gas station. What do you want?" She asked for cheddar fries and I was willing to oblige. Got in side, no cheddar fries! I grab her funyuns. She like funyuns, it will be fine. As a joke (not the one we are leading up to) I called her on my way home and told her the gas station was closed too.

I got home, told her the truth about the gas station and gave her the back up back up back up back up back up plan bag of funyuns. She joked around about the number of times I had failed her in one outing (keep in mind, I had been giving her a hard time through this whole event) and then asked me for a soda from the fridge. So is This when the magic happened. I was opening the fridge when the gravity of the situation and what was at stake here suddenly struck me. I closed the fridge, got out a glass and filled it with water. I brought it back to her in the living room. She says "why did you bring me water?"

THE FRIDGE WAS CLOSED!