Lunch is a good meal to eat.

It is the only meal in my day that has a special time set aside for it, as opposed to catch what catch can on other meals.

I had a nice lunch the other day with some friends and then went back to work and finished up the day.

I talked to several people, had a meeting with a number of people and so on. After all that, I worked over for a couple of hours to catch up and then went home. I walked into the bathroom and what did I see? A large piece of something green in my front teeth. It was about seven o'clock and I hadn't had any supper. I had to think for a few minutes before I remembered that I had lettuce on a sandwich for lunch. Oh, the shame of it all.

I always try to tell people when they have green stuff on their teeth, or when they have black stuff on their face, or when they have pieces of odd stuff in their hair or whatever.

If it looks like it shouldn't be there, I try to comment on it, sometimes even joking about such things with those I consider friends.

Sometimes it doesn't go over well, but I feel like I should. I try to treat people like I want to be treated. I can suffer a few seconds of embarrassment now and clean my teeth, rather than have everyone think I have some mysterious green fungi growing in my mouth. I couldn't believe no one told me all day long. From now on, I will make a point of checking my teeth after meals without exception. I usually do, but it figures that the one time I don't, I have an entire head of romaine lettuce hanging out of my mouth like a garden advertisement. "Eat more salad."

Perhaps it was really an advertisement for toothbrushes. "Brush your teeth or look like this." I could be the new "Mr. Yuk Mouth."

The other day something similar happened. I was in a hurry to get to work and I pulled a clean shirt out of the dryer and put it on. My laundry room, which is really just a little entrance way into the bathroom, was the closest place I could find clothes to wear to work. I pulled out a pair of pants and then walked into the living room to dig beneath the coffee table for shoes. I found one shoe and found the other, after a good deal of search and struggle, behind the garbage can in the kitchen. The shoe was there for a good reason, as I recall. A friend and I were in my car when a curious and offending odor hit my nostrils. I was running the heater and the smell was getting worse and worse. I was eyeing him with suspicion, certain that such a rank odor couldn't be coming from me. I am sure he was doing the same, I could tell by his tell-tale sidelong glances across the car. After the smell didn't pass for a good while, it was time for someone to take the plunge and admit that the car was beset with a foul smell. Being Mr. You've Got Something On Your Tooth, I said, matter-of-factly, "Something stinks.' "I smell that, too," my friend said, twisting his face. "What is it?" "It smells like you stepped in something," I noted nonchalantly. So we did the shoe test after some deliberation and found out that I was actually the offending party. Apparently, I had followed the path of some prehistoric animal with gastro-intestinal problems earlier in the day, judging from the size of the blot on the bottom of my shoe. Perhaps it was a mastodon, I thought as I pulled over and tried to scrape my shoe on the road and in the grass, leaving the door open - anything to help air out the car. When I got home I cleaned the shoe and left it on the linoleum to dry.

That is why the shoe was in the kitchen, if anyone cares to know. I have no reasonable explanation for the socks on the couch, other than the fact that I have seven or eight pairs of white socks, all of which seem to be slightly different. It is like one of those puzzle games to match them up. Some have wide ridges on the elastic, some have narrow, some have varying sizes of hem at the top, some have taller elastic than others, some are longer or shorter, some are foot-shaped and some are tubular.

It gets downright difficult just trying to find matching socks. Sometimes I just don't worry about it, but I still have that fear of being in an accident like mother warned me about. Never go to the doctor with unmatched socks or dirty underwear. Bad things will happen to you. On the bright side, when you are a single guy, you can get away with having socks upon, or even beneath, couch cushions, shoes under the coffee table or in the kitchen, unmade beds, papers and books scattered about and dishes in the sink. I know this because someone came over the other day, looked at my house and said, "Wow, this is pretty clean." I don't know where they draw the line between "pretty clean" and condemned. It is a fine line, you know.

At any rate, I was getting dressed out of the drier a few minutes ago, remember?

I got to work and later went out to lunch. Afterwards, I saw my friend in the parking lot. We chatted for a few moments and then I headed for the back door when my friend called out, "Are you trying to smell nice today?"

"No more than usual," I said with a slight smile, thinking that he might be making a teasing reference to the mastodon droppings incident.

"In that case, pull that dryer sheet out of the back of your pants," my friend said with a laugh.

As I did so with another air of embarrassment, I thought to myself, oddly enough, "How can something that sticks to your clothes eliminate static cling?" I thanked him.

I had gone half a day with a portion of a dryer sheet peeking out of the back of my britches. Maybe tomorrow I can come out of a public restroom with toilet paper on my shoe or go to work with shaving cream in my ears. Oh well, incidents like those make life worth laughing at.

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