My husband is calm, rational, caring and as grounded as the beloved electronics that are his hobby. In other words, a true gentleman or mensch, if you prefer the Yiddish word.

I only know of one pet peeve that he has, and this pet peeve gathers strength with time. Years ago, my spouse finished filling the car with gas, got back in the driver’s seat and announced, “I will never buy gas at this station again.”

“Why not?” I inquired.

His reply, “The screen on the pump did not say ‘Thank You’ when my fill was complete. THAT IS ONLY ONE LITTLE LINE OF CODE!”

It took me a second to catch on. He’s a programmer and was referring to computer code. In my husband’s world, gas pumps as well as people should be well mannered.

I can always tell by the look on his face if a gas pump has been polite or not. I now also look for the final “one line of code” when I’m pumping my own gas. “My husband would not like you,” I’ve been known to mutter at an ungrateful gas pump.

The other day we drove into a car wash. The menu inside lighted up as various operations began……Stop, Rinse, Clean, Rinse, Protective Coat, Air Dry, Thank You.

“Look”, it says ‘Thank You!’ ” I said to my polite husband.

“It hasn’t actually lighted up yet,” he replied. “Wait and let’s see what happens.” We did, and the sign lighted up as we exited. However, I did notice that four tiny lights in the sign were burnt out. We may not be returning.

The title of the book jumped out at me from the shelf in the art museum shop. “Geometry Makes Me Happy” it proclaimed. Math has always been my nemesis with the exception of geometry where I got to draw pictures.

I opened the book and found every page to be a delight and inspiration. A compilation of the work of many young artists from around the world whose art is based on geometric elements, the volume highlighted fine art, photography, graphic design, illustration, industrial design, street art and architecture.

I normally weigh purchases carefully, but this decision was instant. The book needed to go home with me. The books I add to my collection are all working books. I use them to develop art projects and gather information for my young people’s programs. Rarely do I leave the house for school without a bulging book bag. The quality of the reproductions in art books far surpasses those on a Smart Board……and the network doesn’t go down.

“You will love this art project” I told my middle schoolers when we began our geometric art unit. They did. Check out samples of their creations below. Geometry made us all happy. How sad that art is being eliminated from so many schools all over America.

The topics for my weekly blogs come by serendipity. When I posted about waffles last week, I had no idea that pancakes would follow. Life, however, intervened and presented pancakes on a platter.

My husband and I were staying at a Holiday Inn Express and went down to the breakfast room in the morning. The extremely cheerful and pleasant young woman in charge of the breakfast buffet noticed our indecision about breakfast choices and suggested that we should try the pancakes.

“They automatically come out of this machine,” she said pointing to a rectangular box with the name Popcake on it. “I wouldn’t want to work here if everyone were pouring those little cups of batter all over everything.”

I readily agreed with her. I’ve seen the breakfast buffet crowd, including unattended children, attempting to make their own waffles. The mess left behind is world class.

Loving all things tech, my husband decided to give this pancake printer a try. He pressed the OK button. A bar indicator starting creeping along measuring off the progress to the 90 second mark. And then, viola, a pancake came out of a slot on the side of the machine ( via a conveyor belt ) and slid itself onto a waiting plate. A second pancake arrived shortly after.

“Kids go crazy about using this,” our helpful lady added. They are not the only ones, I surmised.

Returning home, I did a bit of computer research on the Popcake. It is not a product of Yankee ingenuity. Created in Sydney, Australia, the invention took six years and many botched pancakes to develop. It came on the market in 2008 and is only sold to commercial food service operations. The price is a whopping $3,700.

I predict that in a while knock offs will be made, the price will drop, and the automatic pancake maker will turn into the hottest, must have Christmas item one of these years.

I now know how to determine if I am in an emergency situation…….I check out my local Waffle House. If it is closed, the world is ending.

Unfortunately, I do not have a local Waffle House. I live in one of the 25 states that is Waffle Houseless. Therefore, F.E.M.A. will not know that the tornado, flood, blizzard or earthquake has ravaged my community. I’m doomed.

Let me explain. A recent Marketplace Report on N.P.R. told how F.E.M.A. determines  the extent of a natural disaster in an area by checking on the status of the Waffle House restaurants. This southern based chain of 1,500 restaurants prides itself on 24/7 service to its customers, and they have excellent plans in place to stay open no matter what horrific event occurs. If they are forced to close, a disaster of major proportions has struck. I do not fault F.E.M.A. for taking cues from waffles: we should all learn from others who excel at what they do.

Don’t expect to eat a waffle if you take shelter in a Waffle House during a horrific storm. Their emergency menu will have kicked in. The waffles aren’t made as they take too much electricity to produce. Bacon is banished as well as it takes up too much grill space. However,  you will be fed and the lights will be on thanks to emergency generators.

I love road trips and have passed by the iconic Waffle Houses thousands of times. But since they look as lonely as the Edward Hopper painting “Nighthawks”, I’ve never stopped in. Now I plan on visiting one in tribute to their excellent preparedness skills. And besides, I checked out their menu online. They serve twelve different kinds of hash browns. I just won’t visit during an emergency.

I recently read an inadvertently hilarious article in the New York Times business pages, a section that usually induces more sorrow than laughs.

The headline read,”A Visit to McDonald’s, Celebrity Chef in Tow”. The piece began by noting McDonald’s drop in sales for the last five consecutive quarters and Consumer Reports ranking its burgers the worst of 21 chains. Then the reporter and his invited lunch guest, a celebrity chef, visit a Manhattan McDonald’s to critique the situation. The article notes that the chef serves a burger and fries at his own restaurant for $22.00, supposedly making him an expert on burger matters.

After taking a bite from a quarter pounder, the chef delivers his verdict: “The food could be better”.

Who among us could not have written this assessment?

The super star chef goes on to give thumbs up to the fries and coffee. The fact that McDonald’s serves killer fries is not a revelation: it is common knowledge that the fries are killer good and that they will kill you if made a daily part of your diet.

McDonald’s coffee is not a thumbs up; it is not even half a little finger up. The truth is that their coffee ranges from passable in an emergency to so awful it is undrinkable. And unless you’re a refugee from the Good Ship Lollipop needing a serious sugar fix, avoid McDonald’s “lattes”.

I’ll conclude with the scariest line in the article. The esteemed chef states, “I can assure you that if they had a great story and a better company culture, the same burger would taste a lot better.”

No it wouldn’t. Sometimes even a great newspaper can serve up junk.