Blog #9

Number 9?  We’ve been doing this for nine weeks?  Let’s see:  52 divided by 12, square the hypotenuse, multiply by seven – that’s over two months.  Thank you for your loyalty and patience.  Let’s talk about old people.  I seem to do that a lot, but giraffes have giraffes, apples grow on apple trees and old people talk about old people.

For instance, I’m sure you have noticed that old folks, to a large degree, are slow drivers, and I want to explain to you why we are.  It’s not that our eyes are blurred or our reflexes are poor.  And it’s not because our cars are old and decrepit.  The real reason we drive slowly is that we are no longer in a hurry.  Where do we have to go, Walgreens?  It can wait.  When you’re young you want everything to come fast.

·        I can’t wait till I get rich.

·        I can’t wait till my kids are grown and I have some time to myself.

·        Just ten more years and I’ll have it made.

·        Just ten more years!  I can’t wait.  I can’t wait.

Well, what young people are waiting for is exciting – success, freedom, prestige.  I have never heard a senior say, “Just ten more years and I’ll have it made.”  We can wait.  We have nothing else to do but wait.  Besides, what could I possibly be looking forward to in ten years – Caitlyn becoming Bruce again?  So what difference does it really make if I miss that green light?  I’ll just get to the Dollar Store thirty seconds later.  So don’t honk at slow drivers.  Relax, slow down, take a breath.  One of these days you won’t be in such a hurry any more.

If you’re driving behind someone slow,

It’s likely an old person, so

Don’t get red in the face;

We just drive at this pace

Because we have no place to go.

But I do have to make a confession about my driving -- I have a tendency to pass up where I’m going if I’m talking.  I really never could do two things at the same time.  I can’t read with the television on and I can’t talk and drive at the same time.  I miss the turn every time.  So when I drive alone (nobody to talk to), I’m fine, but when someone’s in the car, I mess up. Always.  I look at it this way: even though I can only do one thing at a time, at least I can do one thing at a time.  So far. 

Ok, confessions are over, limerick is done.  How are you doing?  I’m fine, but I must admit I’m a little aggravated.  My wife has the television on all the time, and it’s just one continuous and cacophonous stream of talking heads.  Today they were talking about playing games with your young kids, and the conclusion was that, after the age of 4, it’s bad for the kids if you let them win at Crazy 8s or ping pong.  Where do they get these people?  And what right do they have to tell us how to raise our kids? These are the same pompous busybodies who for years have been telling us that there shouldn’t be any winners or losers in children’s sports.  That no-one should keep score.  That everyone should get a trophy.  That no child should have his self-esteem damaged by being on a losing team.  Now these same bobbleheads are telling us to beat the crap out of our five-year-olds at ping pong.  Did they go to college to learn this preposterous drivel?  How is a child ever going to get interested in anything if he fails every time he tries it?  “Oh, Honey, you really tried hard even though I beat you 21-0 for the 19^th time today. Wanna play again?”  What monumental idiocy!  Of course I let my girls win at cards, at ping pong, at baseball. They were five or six or seven.  Do you think they would have been anxious to play again if every time they played, their old Dad would beat their butts and chuckle?

A couple of weeks ago I went to a funeral of a sweet lady named Margie.  It was a lovely service.  I saw a bunch of you there and I know exactly what you were thinking.  “Will this many people be at my funeral?  Should I be in an open casket? What should I wear?  What are they going to say about me?”  Well of course they will say nice things about you – I promise.  Have you ever heard anything that wasn’t nice?  Like: “My mother-in-law was an old witch and I’m going to make sure they bury her deep enough so she can’t claw her way out.”  Of course you haven’t, but I’m not taking any chances.  I wrote my own funeral.  Really, I did, and it’s sealed in an envelope with instructions to have it guarded by anybody except Faye Dunaway.  I’m serious.  It’s all written and ready to go.  Don’t miss it.

My daughter Jennifer has always been a big football fan and plays in a Fantasy Football league every year.  She just told me the league has changed its scoring rules for next season.  You get six points if your player scores a touchdown, nine points for a DWI, thirteen points for beating up a girlfriend and twenty points if he is convicted of murder.  Let the games begin.

I try every week to make this blog fit into three pages.  Remember pages?  We used to have pages to measure the size of a book or an article or a spectacularly clever and humorous blog.  Most likely you are reading this on your smart-phone or iPad.  You start at the top and, if you have the stomach for it, read to the end.  There are no pages.  My wife reads books on her iPad, and when I ask her what page she is on, she replies, “I’m 30% through.”  Now I suppose that’s informative, but it sounds so – modern.  It’s like something my grandchildren would say: “Oh, Poppy, you silly old man, there are no pages anymore.”  And yet, every week I look at my blank computer screen and realize that I have to fill up three pages, about 1150 words, with something that will entertain you.  And boy are you tough!  When I’m finished and have posted the blog, I print out those three little pages and stack them with the previous installments.  Silly?  Old fashioned?  Retro?  Guilty!  But when Kim Jong Whatever hacks into our internet and Kentucky fries all of our computers, there I’ll be – with all my pages.  So if your computer starts smoking and smelling like Kimchi, just come over to my house and I’ll read to you right from the beginning.

And that’s it – three pages.  I hope you enjoyed.  Come back next week or just come over to the house for my post-apocalyptic reading.  Either way, stay well.

Michael

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