Free I've Got Sand In All the Wrong Places by Lisa Scottoline

big-box store when I’m sober, but if I shop while I’m drinking, I’ll shop until I drop.
    Or until I drip.
    Or both.
    I might buy EVERYTHING.
    Whether you think drinking-while-you-shop is a good thing depends on whether you’re the massive corporation that owns the big-box stores or my retirement fund.
    Either way, I’m in.
    It certainly improves people’s attitudes about running their errands on the weekends, if they can do them beer in hand.
    It changes your Things To Do list into a Things to Drink list.
    I’m wondering if the shopping carts will have cupholders in the shape of wineglasses or maybe tiny ones small enough to hold a shot glass.
    Shot! Shot! Shot!
    Shop! Shop! Shop!
    But what happens when people start drinking while they’re driving those scooters in the store?
    I foresee major collisions.
    It brings a whole new meaning to, “Pick up in aisle four.”
    Employees will come with a broom.
    And a Breathalyzer.

 
    I Saw the Sign
    Lisa
    We’re coming up on the anniversary of Mother Mary’s passing.
    But this isn’t going to be sad.
    Nobody hated sob stories more than Mother Mary.
    You know her well enough to agree, if you’ve read the stories that Francesca and I have been writing about her for the past six years, in the newspaper and our books.
    You may even have met her, if you came to one of our signings, where she was happy to monopolize the microphone.
    I was delighted to have her at signings, because she did a hell of a job.
    Also the price was right.
    She told every family secret there was to tell, and when she ran out, she made them up.
    In other words, it’s in my DNA to write fiction.
    She also dressed better than Francesca and me, standing out in her lab coat like a geriatric Doogie Howser.
    She often brought her backscratcher to the signings and hit me with it, for effect. Otherwise she used it to scratch her back in front of the crowd.
    We Scottolines don’t always confine our personal grooming to the house.
    I could go on and on, saying things I remember about her, and those of you who have lost family members could do the same, about your loved ones who are no longer with us, in a physical sense.
    You don’t need me to tell you that they are always with us, in spirit.
    And in fact, what’s great to remember about Mother Mary is her spirit.
    I always loved the story about the time I made her fly north to avoid a major hurricane heading for Florida. When she got off the plane, she was approached by a reporter who was interviewing people about the hurricane. The reporter came up to her, asking, “Did you come north because you’re afraid of the hurricane?”
    Mother Mary replied, “I’m not afraid of a hurricane. I am a hurricane.”
    This story is especially relevant because of something I’ve noticed in the time since she’s been gone.
    Because I think she sent me a sign.
    Have you seen a sign?
    I’ve talked to my friends who have lost family members, and many of them think that their family member has sent them a sign from beyond, or wherever we go when we’re not hanging around the kitchen anymore, standing in front of the refrigerator looking for something to eat.
    One of my friends says that when she sees a monarch butterfly, she knows it’s a sign from her late mother, who loved monarch butterflies. Another friend of mine thinks that a double rainbow is a sign from her late father, who loved double rainbows.
    Even famous people see signs.
    I heard Paul McCartney give an interview, wherein he said that after he lost his beloved wife Linda, he sat on a hill at night and asked for a sign from her about whether he should remarry. An owl hooted, and Paul decided that it was the go-ahead, so he married Heather Mills.
    Whom he later divorced at a cost of $48 million.
    After the Paul McCartney story, I started to be skeptical about signs from the departed.
    I mean, come on, Paul.
    Owls