Blog #24

Were you in the PATH OF TOTALITY?  Sounds like something from Scientology, doesn’t it?  Or Alcoholics Anonymous.  But no, it’s just another one of those fancy phrases that Meteorologists invent to take your mind off the fact that they haven’t gotten a forecast right since Elvis died.  It’s like Wind-Chill Factor or Heat Index.  They just want to scare you by making cold weather sound colder and hot weather sound hotter.  Heat Index is some secret and mysterious combination of temperature and humidity that allows these weather experts to say silly things like “It’s 119^o in Phoenix, but it’s a dry heat.”  Have you ever been in Phoenix when it was 119^o?  I have.

The Southwestern heat will take care o’ you

It’ll sizzle and fry every hair o’ you

They tell you it’s dry

But you’re still gonna die.

You just won’t be moist when they bury you.

Speaking of burials, Carol and I were at a party recently.  She looked at me and asked, “Is that the suit you’re going to wear at my funeral?”  “Yes,” I replied. “Is that the outfit you’ll wear to mine?”  “No,” she said, “I just bought the one for your funeral.  It’ll be delivered Monday.”  And I’m not even sick!  I hope the outfit gets dropped off before I do.  I think the worst part of dying is that you don’t get to eat the dessert trays.

Which brings up the question -- do you have a plot?  I have one plot.  It’s in a cemetery that was not too far from the place I grew up.  My father and mother and brother are buried there and there’s one extra plot.  My sister was cremated and her ashes were used to fertilize a tree, but that’s a story for another day.  So that one little oblong of well-kept dirt is for me.  Of course, Carol and I don’t live near there anymore.  We’re at least fifteen miles away, and she has informed me that she has no intention of driving that far to visit some old dead husband.  This whole burial thing is disturbing.  I don’t know what to do.

Some dear friends were looking to buy some plots recently and were shown a nice shady spot that looked fine.  She asked the – what do you call a plot person?  A Cemeterian?  A Grave Maven?  An Elder Bury?  Digger?  I like Cemeterian.  So she asked the Cemeterian, “Who owns the plot next to these?” and when she heard the name she freaked out.  “I’m not spending eternity next to that bitch!”  Then there was my friend Tim who tested out his plot by lying on his back on the site.  He liked the view and bought the plot.

Maybe I should buy a plot in North Carolina.  Most of my daughter’s friends think I’m dead anyway.  That could be because I actually was kind of dead for a while in North Carolina.  You know the drill – heart stops, flat-line, Code Blue, shock treatments.  I have always heard people who claim to have had a near-death experience say they remember a bright light.  Of course there’s a bright light!  You’re lying on your back in the Emergency Room with that circular spotlight shining two feet from your nose.  That thing is bright enough to wake King Tut.  So now when Carol and I are in North Carolina and we meet one of my daughter’s friends, we often get this: “Jennifer, I can’t believe this young-looking woman is your mother.”  Then they turn to me: “And Mr. Fox, how nice.  I see you’re still alive.”

Years before that episode, after my first heart event, the doctors released me from the hospital with a list of restrictions.  I am not making this up!

·        Do not operate a vacuum cleaner.  I can live with that.

·        Do not play Craps in a casino.  Something to do with standing.

·        No sex with an “unfamiliar” partner.  I presume that included the vacuum cleaner.

·        Do not lift anything heavier than Moby Dick.  The book, not the whale.

It has now been twenty years since that attack, and I have followed those rules assiduously, although I do smile at the vacuum cleaner now and again.

Hi there and welcome back.  I assume you used your cute little eclipse glasses and that your eyes are still good enough to read all this.  Do you realize that most of you have now witnessed three unbelievably distant and momentous events?

·        Haley’s Comet (1986) – every 75 years

·        The Millennium – every 1,000 years

·        Total Eclipse – every 500 (??) years

If we can just make it till O.J. gets out of jail, we will have seen it all.

It’s my job to know all the answers at the Zoo.  Where’s the tiger?  I know that.  Where’s the bathroom?  I know that too.  Where can I rent a stroller?  Where can I breast-feed my baby?  I know all of those.  But sometimes I get a tricky one.  I was standing by the sea lions when a little girl saw my sash and asked this question:  How do you tell the males from the females?  I have never been accused of being slow-witted, so I bent down and looked the little girl in the eye.  “You want to know how you tell a female sea lion from a male sea lion?”  She nodded.  “You take it to Nordstrom’s,” I said.  “If it buys shoes, it’s a female.”  She liked it.  I liked it.  Her mother liked it.  And the sea lion laughed hysterically.  Aoh! Aoh! Aoh! Aoh!

I have actually had some experience with that form of question.  Last year, a young girl (why is it always the girls?) asked me what was the difference between male camels and female camels.  Again I answered quickly and with assurance: “The female has bigger closets.”   Well, you really don’t want me discussing an animal’s sexual paraphernalia with adolescent girls, do you?  Suddenly I would replace the polar bear as the Zoo’s #1 predator.

For a week now I have had all three daughters and seven of my eight grandchildren in town for a visit.  Three boys, four girls, ages from 14 to 4.  The noise!  The tumult!  The hectic and rambunctious screeching!  The meals!  The money!  I loved it all.  I’m not as agile and tireless a Poppy as I once was, but the older ones took up the slack and played with the youngsters.  It was all good.  And I even got on the trampoline.  Of course, when I get on, they call it a Grampoline and gather around me to make sure I don’t break anything.  A broken Poppy is not a good thing.

I think I’ll go now.  I hear my vacuum cleaner calling.  Thanks for joining our wanderings today, and remember, there is nothing better than a good friend, except a good friend with chocolate.  See you next week.  Stay well.

Michael                                    Send comments to:  mfox1746@gmail.com