The Notification

Tue, 19 May 2026 06:00:00 -0500

The other evening Don and I were watching Wheel of Fortune. I had the answer. I was certain. Seven letters, Person & Place, and I was leaning forward, ready to shout it at the television the way Don and I shout at the television every evening, because that is how game shows are meant to be watched.

Then my phone lit up on the coffee table.

It was not a call. It was not a text from one of the boys. It was a notification from an app I don’t recall installing, informing me that my grocery rewards points were about to expire. I have never intentionally accumulated grocery rewards points. I didn’t know I had them. But apparently I have forty-seven of them, and they expire in three days, and the app felt I needed to know this, and the app was perfectly comfortable interrupting Wheel of Fortune to make sure I did.

At Large on Sunday Evening Review

The Notification