QR Codes?

My husband was the first computer science graduate from his country.

That’s something I learned about him years and years after we met, got married and immigrated here to New Zealand. That’s probably the most I know about his past aside from the companies he worked at and his first wife’s first and middle name. She goes by her middle name just like my late mother in law and just like I did for decades. I only reverted to my nickname that my family called me when my married last name and middle name sounded like a medical term for an affliction. Shortening it by using Lolly instead of Laurelee sounded much better and it was easier for people to remember. I’ve actually been told that no matter what they called me, they didn’t forget me. I’m not sure if that’s a compliment but I’ve always had this impact on people. When I was in elementary school there even was a Laurelee hater’s club and a Laurelee

lover’s club. I’d escape this conundrum at lunchtime by walking the couple of blocks home to the safety of sitting in front of our new Stromberg Carlson television console while I ate my delicious tuna sandwich I craved every day and drank my full glass of Adohr milk to

red light/green light coordinated by Sheriff John. Any excuse to go home to mommy in the midst of all this silliness was fine with me. But all my life I’ve attracted both admirers that can’t get enough of me, and detractors that never want to see me again. They say I’m a force of nature or something like that. Go figure.

But getting back to John, who also is a bit different than the majority of normal humans, he made me a surprise QR Code as a joke on Mother’s Day. Seeing it I realized again that we need to have his sanity tested, but I went along with the presentation of this esteemed design that was now hanging on the front of our fridge door, covering over photos I like of our relatives. Since I don’t believe that using things like this in our home are necessary, I was curious to see what the message was inside. So after he scanned it for me with a delighted expression on his proud face, even I was very pleased. What a guy. He may be a little strange but wonderfully inventive and certainly one of a kind, my husband. Inside

It reads…        And now for something completely different…

Lollyfairwether.ampbk.com

Without realizing it, he actually made me a very clever ad showing my author’s website. What a sweetie. And tonight I see that he framed

the prototype for a real ad we’re using and hung the image just across from where I write.

When I sat down tonight to create this blog, I wasn’t exactly sure what I was going to natter on about. The well was dry after a busy day cleaning out our bedroom and part of our lounge today. I was not exactly inspired since I missed being outside on this gorgeous fall day, to work on these inside jobs. But as I sat down I noticed that image hanging framed on the opposite wall and I haven’t stopped typing since. But it’s odd that I wrote about drinking Adohr milk since it didn’t occur to me that the sign that hung from their first dairy truck in the early 1900s is hanging on the same wall adjacent to the QR Code. The owner of the company that made such excellent milk, named the company after his first daughter, Rhoda, was born. Adohr is Rhoda backwards. Although we didn’t get our milk delivered by that early truck, my mother knew that their milk was superior to products made in larger commercial companies and it had a very high cream content. Although I can’t remember where I bought it, I’ve owned this oak framed, painted tin sign for almost 50 years. The dairy had ceased operation by then.

Marriages and life are never as we expect them to be and that’s probably a good thing in the long run. John shows very little outward affection to me. That just isn’t his style. But he hung out the washing and hung this print of the QR code quietly without any fanfare. I really do have to make him a pie.