"Honey, did you put anthrax in my pancakes?"

"Honey, did you put anthrax in my pancakes?" I scraped them into the trashcan, her guilty stare confirming my suspicions. "That's the third time this week, dear. What's wrong?"

"nothing...." She looked away. "I can't have anthrax in my pancakes, baby, you know that". "Fine" She replied. Oh no. not the 'fine', women.... "Why not put blueberries instead?"

But I had enough experience with women to know that when she said blueberries, she really meant rat poison. So after she'd gone, I fed the pancakes to her Rottweiler.

The dog lapped up the pancakes without dying. A faint voice murmured, "Maybe you are paranoid." Then I laughed because obviously this is exactly what my wife would want me to

say. But not this time, I refused to allow the miserable wrench to fill my ideas with her callous thoughts. She had a way over me, and I loved her, but I refused to allow her to

. But that was nothing compared to what Bertha (my best ratchet) made me do. I can still hear her words when I think back on that time. I had been on the pot, my toolbelt down

, wondering just what I was doing talking to a ratchet. I'd spoke to tools before but a ratchet made no sense. A saw, a hammer, even an open ended socket made perfect sense but in

my time, I have found ratchet's just turn my crank. Their constant, "click-click-click." makes it hard to start a conversation. In my autobiography, "The Tool Whisperer" I tell why

ratchets and clanks churn my butter, eh wot, tallyho & all that jazz, with some steamy gypsies thrown in for flavor. That fuzzy critter has been a good friend when booze ran dry.