"If I quit before noon should I bring my lunch home?," my dad used to ask my mom across the Cheerios breakfast table. I knew that meant he was mighty tired of his job and coworkers, and probably of carrying his sack lunch on the bus. His sack lunch usually had a thermos of soup along with a sandwich, fresh fruit, and cookies, so it wasn't all the lunch's fault. Maybe indecision over whether to carry the brown bag back home or to abandon it caused him to just eat it and keep his job despite the aggravations. Many days this mustard and mayo dilemma paralysis makes perfect sense to me, and keeps me employed through another afternoon.
In a team-building/corporate-training/pass-the-monkey seminar a few years back our facilitator stressed the use of Day-Timer calendars to set goals as well as record appointments and assignments. Much of this seminar whizzed over the heads of our team of "look at all the pretty colors" art and drama teachers. Still, I've carried my Day-Timer to work and back every day since 2000 and managed not to get paint all over it. My calendar has been annotated with birthdays, soccer schedules, and zit doctor appointments for my kids all this time.
Yesterday was a busy one in Lincoln. Two bank robberies in one day! One suspect was nabbed after she walked the four blocks from the bank to stand in the long line at the Subway sandwich shop in the center of downtown during the noontime rush.
Plan your day. Should you bring the loot home if your rob the bank before lunch? Should you carry a sack lunch with a thermos of hot Campbell's soup, a roast beef sandwich, fresh fruit, and some cookies to the bank job? Order the fresh fruit cup instead of the chips and pickle? Maybe eat a late brunch so you won't be all that hungry after robbing the bank, and can just hop the first train out of town? Stop in at the Christian Science Reading Room after robbing the bank, and use the bag of loot for a naptime pillow?
My extensive reading about the James and Dalton Gangs, thanks to Nebraska novelist Ron Hansen, leads me to believe the usual routine is (1) have a hearty breakfast or at least lots of strong coffee; (2) rob bank; (3) get out of town; or (4) worse case scenario, have your bullet-ridden corpse displayed at county fairs all over a tri-state area. Again, I stress using your Day-Timer (if your fingers are too fat and your vision too poor to program your calendar into your cellphone!)
Bank robber, or robberette, Eva Fischer, spent her misguided moments in the stomping grounds of my youth. We could ride the bus downtown to swim lessons at the YWCA at 15th and N, then shower, dress, and buy a giant Tootsie Roll for a nickel. Walk next door to the main city library at 14th and N to check out some books, then continue on foot to Dad's office building at 13th and N to pick up prescriptions, have a dental check-up, and make a lunch rendezvous plan. Next walk south on 13th to Brady's Juvenile Shoes to get back-to-school oxfords and ride the giant rocking horses. Back north to the old Sears Roebuck with the wood floor at 13th and N to buy some Buster Brown socks and undies, then on over to Miller & Paine at 13th and O to meet Dad for lunch. Sometimes we ate in the tearoom on the fifth floor, and sometimes at the lunch counter in the bargain basement. The macaroni and cheese and the cinnamon rolls were the same either place. After showing Daddy our new shoes, he would go back to the office. We would cross 13th and pass the Walgreens with its lunch counter. Heading east along "O" Street we might visit the Toy Castle before proceding to Hested's to look at the bolts of corduroy in bright colors to sew back-to-school jumpers. If we ventured west instead we could windowshop at the more fashionable Ben Simons store, then pick up a Milton Bradley game or some "notions" at Woolworth's. I liked the Woolworth's store because the entrance was at a 45 degree angle to the street.
My parents would suggest that Eva stop in at the Cornhusker Hotel right there by the bank to have a Reuben sandwich for lunch. She could pop into the Sharp Building for a haircut before catching the bus back home with all her loot.
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