Right now, sitting on the kitchen counter are two distractions to the blank page sitting before me. These distractions come in the form of all too familiar sized boxes of Girl Scout Cookies. One box is red and brown and filled with wonderful peanut butter and chocolate concoctions called Tagalongs. Tagalongs get their name from the calories one hauls around forever after eating the entire box in one sitting.

The second box is a new entry to me. It is mostly yellow on the outside. Inside is the promise of something wonderful called Lemon Coolers. According to packaging, the Lemon Coolers have reduced fat. So it follows that if I sit and eat the entire Lemon Coolers box of cookies in one sitting I will be less fat. Right?

When I sit down at my desk to write, it often seems that distractions pop up everywhere around me. If there aren’t cookies on the counter it will be something else. Suddenly there will be garbage to take out, papers to straighten on the table, a coat to hang up. The humidifier will likely appear to need filling and so too, the paper clip container may look a tad low.

Personally, the worst thing about distractions is that they get me so way off track.

Off track, that’s what happened to charitable giving when every worthy cause started asking for our old cars.

A lot of it has been a ruse!

The Illinois Attorney General’s office recently reported that over 4,000 autos in this region supposedly donated to charity never wound up going to charity. No good came from all that “giving.” However, you can bet somebody made money.

And IRS has gotten interested in this out-ofcontrol fad. New tax rules for 2005 restrict the charitable donation to what the charity actually sold the donated car for, not the over inflated figure many taxpayers were using in valuing their gifts. There’s new paperwork that the charity must produce and the taxpayer must attach if the deduction exceeds $500. No paperwork, no deduction.

I helped out in the case of one auto donated to charity. The deal started out suspect. The representative for the charity insisted that the title to the car be signed and mailed to them in advance of the car being picked up. That was done with a lot of reservations. Why should the title pass without the car being transferred? Weeks passed.

Calls were made.

Then, one evening, out of the blue, a hauler called on his cell phone from somewhere on I65. He needed directions to Adams Township. The hauler was from Indianapolis. An hour later the hauler pulled up in a semi with a flat bed attached. On the flatbed were two sorry looking autos. A third car was hooked precariously on the back of the flat bed, two wheels in the air, and two wheels on the ground. It was an accident waiting to happen.

“Does it drive?” The hauler pointed to the old yellow van he was picking up from us. Mind you, this guy had arrived with a full load. There was no place for him to hang a fourth vehicle off his flat bed. He had made no advance arrangements. He had no information about the vehicle he was picking up.

The old yellow van did indeed run. But it had been sitting unused for some time. I had no idea whether it was necessarily up to a drive to Indianapolis.

But the “charity hauler” had no misgivings about driving it back to Indy. Except, he wasn’t the one that would be behind the wheel. He had an assistant. His 17-year-old granddaughter had accompanied him on the trip. He handed her the keys.

“Follow close,” he said.

The charity folks would have been... horrified or ashamed, I’m not sure which.

The next day I called to complain. Nobody I spoke with was much interested.

Well enough about that. There’s something on the kitchen counter that requires my undivided attention.