Hi Laura, Thanks for letting me know that the story worked.  I was unsure about the strength of the clues I dropped in at a distance from each other.  With regard to your edits, I took all, except the one about: Jewish artichokes? laughed Frank.  Instead of laughed, I inserted sniggered. Any thoughts?  Also, the sentence where Frank orders the artsy crackers, I think a comma was needed in that sentence, to read: Okay, Gwendolyn, well try the cage-free cheese, the artsy crackers.  Is that okay, or do I need to put in a and the artsy crackers.  ??
Getting back to your thoughts about the stories Ive written: The next piece coming your way is titled: Four Old Farts. Its about the 4 guys sitting in the booth at Bernies Bagelry.  It is being told by another customer who is the kid from Scranton and protege of Fix.  The kid has left the Slab and ends up in Zenna Falls.  The kid is also the person who tells the story about the guy from San Diego coming into Bernies ( A Stiff Breeze). The kid, now several years older, is a weekly customer at Bernies for about three years. He leaves and goes somewhere else. So far there are seven stories that are connected, but not woven into each other:  Lifes a Poem; Bless You; The Front Door and Me; So Not San Diego; A Stiff Breeze; Four Old Farts; and ,The Corners. I wrote The Corners last year, its about a scene in Zenna Falls where a group of religious folks who come to town in a van (on fair weather days) and occupy a couple corners at the main street intersection (referred to as The Corners) and proceed to shout out their cause for repentance, with signs, etc.  It ends up creating a frenzy of activity that was great fun to write.  The piece was edited by a colleague of yours from Editor World. In addition to the seven stories here, I have another eleven completed (grand total: just over 30,000 word count) and another ten or so in the works. So, thats where things stand.  I dont know where all this is headed, but, so far, its been a fun ride these past couple years. Take care, Dan