1st October, 2006
Zippedy Doo Dah, Zippedy Ay!
by
My friend of over fifty years, Alison, e mailed me that she’s had ten visitors in the last three weeks, but that none of them sang “Zippedy doo dah, zippedy ay! My oh my, what a wonderful day!” each morning. I had done this on several of the days of my visit with her in the spring. I told Denis, who said, “more’s the pity.” He is very used to that kind of display first thing in the morning. I can imagine that it could be quite upsetting to the people who are not perky first thing.
Gord and I have been baking like fiends, and I often feel like Basil Fawlty to Gord’s Manuel. I’m a nervous wreck while baking, as I want each batch to be perfect, so often have to ask, “What the hell are you doing, you crazy idiot?” To which he calmly replies with whatever it is, and which anyone can plainly see, that he’s doing.
I then vacuum sealed, affixed labels, and packed boxes for the entire day. I looked wistfully at the sunny day, but thought, there’ll be plenty of sunny days to enjoy once the world has discovered Nuttier than a Fruitcake. Daydreaming, I see myself yucking it up on Oprah, being a riot. Soon, however, the pain in my back from bending over forces me from my revelry, and I realize that I’m still just a fruitcake-baking schnook.
Perhaps not for much longer. I have six cases (24 fruitcakes in each) heading for Vancouver tomorrow. They’ll be sold at Stong’s on Dunbar, and Meinhardt’s on South Granville. Then, yesterday I delivered a dozen to a store at the Kelowna Airport, so perhaps they’re going to be like the pods from Invasion of the Body Snatchers. They’ll be transported all over the world, and from sleeping fruitcake haters, fruitcake lovers will emerge.
My dear sister-in-law (one of Denis’ two sisters) who lives in San Diego, sent me the obituary of L. W. McNutt, the president of Collin Street Bakery, which sells twelve million fruitcakes a year. She wrote, “Paul and I saw this in the paper today and thought, gosh, now Moni can take over the world.” Very kind sentiments indeed, but as I am half dead from the piddly amounts I’m flogging, I think several million would be the death knell (for me).
The other night Ricky refused to come in, then, when he did he spent half an hour cleaning his muzzle on the couch cushions. The next day, Denis said, “did you see this?” and brought in a pound of butter, half of which, along with its wrapper, were gone. I guess I must’ve dropped a pound on my way into the house, and the clever dachshund, ever the opportunist, must’ve come across it and hidden it away some place for himself.
Butter is the zippedy doo dah of a dog’s day.