Geez, trying to keep up with Nanjeanne’s blogging is going to be tiring. We do everything together, dontcha know.

I decided to hold off on the Sgt. CB story about backing into me as that just happened in April and it’s too new. Instead, we shall relive the story of the great canoe buying adventure. Much to my chagrin, he discovered ebay last year and decided that he just had to have a canoe. There are three lakes in my town and so he thought it was a shame that we’ve never actually been on them. (I reminded him that up until 4-5 years ago, swimming in our septic system would have been less hazardous to our health.)

So, he started looking on ebay for a canoe. Except he didn’t know about putting in maximum bids and he refused to pay the “Buy it now” price. So, he kept trying to bid and he kept losing. Personally, I was amazed at how many people were unloading their canoes in the first place, especially since he was only looking within an hour’s drive of our house.

Then he had an amazing idea. He found a canoe that was about an hour and 15 minutes from our house. I was going to be heading out to Providence for the RI NAT show. He thought it would be just PERFECT if I could stop on my way to the show, get the canoe and throw it on the top of the car before I went to Providence. I said NO. He said I could take his van. I said NO. I am not showing up at a concert in the van (with no CD player) with a red canoe strapped to the top of it. He said “pick it up on the way home again”. I said NO, I am going to work the next morning from Providence and they will steal the canoe.

He called me on my cell while I was in Providence and asked for our Paypal password. Uh oh.

It didn’t matter because he lost that one too. He did eventually win one and he has used it a total of ONE time. He rigged some contraption in the garage so it hangs from the ceiling, right above my poor Clackmobile.

So, if you see a red canoe on ebay next month….please bid high.

Speaking of the Providence NAT concert, that is where Nanjeanne found out I have a fear of crossing bridges. She found this out because we got lost (which we do all the time) and we had to go over one very big bridge. I saw it coming and advised her of my phobia as I white knuckled it over this bridge. Of course, since we were lost we had to turn around and go back over the same bridge. It was a toll bridge but if you tell them you are lost, they give you an “I’m too stupid to drive so please don’t charge me the toll twice” slip for your return. Of course, this means the guy at the other side knows you are too stupid to drive and he proceeded to tell us we had been going in the right direction the first time. He told us he was kidding when it looked like I was going to cry.

OK, today’s Marketing blog word of the day is SPIN.

There is a season, spin, spin, spin. OK, I know it’s Turn, Turn, Turn. As an aside, my Mom used to sing that song to me when I was little if she had to put a belt on me. She would sing it as she pushed it through the belt loops. I heart my Mom. She is a big Clay fan. She thinks Clay looks like Sgt. CB the first time I brought him home. Yeah, he rolled his eyes at that big time.

See, I warned you I was the queen of tangents.

Anyway-SPIN. Spin is a marketing term for LIE. OK, not lie but how about “guide” a story in the direction that you want. Sometimes spin is good because it deflects attention from something that you don’t want to talk about yet, even if it is good news. Sometimes spin is meant to deceive, other times it’s meant to correct a “whoopsie” after a CEO, pop star or politician puts a size 13.5 in his mouth.

What I didn’t realize is that spin for this meaning was only coined in the mid 1980’s. It is believed to have derived from spinning the dice or topspin on a ball, which changes the direction on purpose.

Bad spin is when your publicist is your sister (see Cruise, Tom) and her reply is that is a “crock of Shi…stuff” I think she must have failed the spin pop quiz in graduate school.

Other uses for the word spin.

Well, it seems MommaJudy thinks it is for washing clothes. I wouldn’t know about that, the tall guy in my house does the washin’. (He’s really anal about his work shirts and since they often have icky things on them, I let him handle it.)

You can spin and you can twirl or sway. I have a couple of copies of the “S’Way. One to play and the other in my Clackbox.

You can spin a yarn but I haven’t had much time for other hobbies since this Clay guy sang “Take”

Spin is what happens to my head when Clay posts things like he and his new executive producer who he can’t name but who has worked with a couple of AC singers, have just started looking at songs. That’s an attempt at spin for the right reasons done in the wrong way. Nice try, Clay but I’ll give you a C+.

You can have a Spin Doctor-one who is really good at spin. I’d like to play doctor with Clay. He doesn’t have to spin if he doesn’t want to. Well, then again he can make my topspin.

And finally….

S’Pin is a pin of S’Von.