Blog #59

I hate when people don’t hold the door open for me.  It’s just common courtesy to hold the door open for the next person.  Didn’t your mother teach you anything?  Today someone held the door open for me.  He was 55 or 60-ish.  He looked at my gray hair and my face, held the door and said, “After you, sir.”  I hate when people hold the door open for me.

The St. Louis Chess Club is proud to be hosting the US Chess Championship and US Women’s Chess Championship this year.  It’s going on right now and ends next Monday.  Somehow, when I heard the two separate tournaments announced, it hit me the wrong way.  Women’s chess championship?  I can understand separate women’s basketball -- men are, as a whole, taller and stronger.  Or women’s tennis or most other sports.  But chess?  Are men naturally smarter than women?  I think not.  The National Spelling Bee is sexually inclusive.  Mensa is not segregated between men and women.  Jeopardy does not have a Women’s Edition.  There are no Bridge tournaments for one sex only. Why chess?  If I were a woman. I’d be sorely insulted.  And, for that matter, why is the King more important than the Queen?  And what’s with the black pieces and the white pieces.  Is this a racist thing?  And Kings and Knights and Pawns just reek of class inequality.  And Bishops?  What happened to Separation of Church and Chess?  I think we should boycott the tournament and Chess in general.  It’s just some silly, Medieval, racist, sexist, homophobic waste of time!  And who decided to spell Medieval that way?  Ok, I feel better.

I just re-read that part and was struck by the phrase – If I were a woman.  How ridiculous!   I could never be a woman.  I don’t have any fashion sense, I sit at the first table they give me in a restaurant and I don’t think I am right about every damn thing all the time.

Hi there and welcome back.  I hope you are doing well and practicing your chess moves.  Did you know that next Tuesday is May Day?  Wikipedia tells me that May Day “is an ancient northern hemisphere spring festival and a traditional spring holiday in many cultures.”  Isn’t Wikipedia great?  You can look up absolutely anything – from Princess Grace of Monaco to Knob Knoster State Park to anal bleaching.  And don’t tell me Wikipedia is wrong.  Anything wrong on Wikipedia gets corrected in very short order.

Where was I?  May Day is also a world-wide celebration of workers which has come to be most celebrated in communist countries.  After all, Workers of the world, unite!  is from the Communist Manifesto by Karl Marx.  Too bad Karl wasn’t the silent Marx brother.  Anyway, on May Day the Communists march and the labor unions march and people celebrating Springtime march and women march and high-school students march and teachers march and there are so many marches, it should have been called March Day and held in March.  But it’s not.

I had a physical with Dr. Primary.  I’m perfect, but to arrive at that conclusion, they had to stick me with needles.  Blood tests and shots and pin pricks – by the time I was done I had more holes than . . .  Ok, here’s your chance to create your own simile.  I had more holes than – pick your favorite:

A pin cushion, a Swiss cheese, a Chinese Checkers board, a miniature golf course, a sponge, a spaghetti strainer, Fearless Fosdick, Donald Trump’s alibis.

Go now, not later, now.  Google Fearless Fosdick and click on “images”.  You’ll notice he has a hole in him.  I don’t make this stuff up, you know.

Back to the physical.  Every time I encountered a new doctor, nurse, technician or office staff – they asked for my date of birth.  Over and over.  The person who drew my blood -- a nasty, evil-looking, vampiric creature – must have asked me four times.

The Nurse I call Lady Macbeth

Asked my date of birth with each breath

It’s ok - I let her

It’s surely much better

Than asking for my Date of Death.

I think I’ll have a hat made up with my date of birth imprinted on it.  That will save time.  And probably make more people hold the door open for me.  I like the idea, actually.  Everyone should wear a hat with their age in large numbers.  Hey, at our station in life we’ve stopped lying about our age and started bragging about it.  The age on the hat would save all the guessing and arguing.  Maybe it should have who we voted for as well.  Then you would know who to talk to and who to pepper spray.

Yes, I know I just made a mistake.  I should have written, “Everyone should wear a hat with his age.”  My favorite English teacher, Mrs. Gottlieb, taught us that the word everyone is singular and should be used with a singular pronoun.  So “everyone should take their seat” is wrong and “everyone should take his seat” is right.  But wait!  If I use his, that’s sexist.  So I should use his or her.   “No-no-no” – I hear you whine.  The new gender-neutral movement considers his or her inadequate because now there are more gender-selective pronouns than Bill Cosby accusers.  I give up.  I’m going to stick with their.  I’m sorry, Mrs. Gottlieb.

I just got the mail.  Let’s see – a discount on hearing aids, an invitation to visit the new elderly facility, a free dinner if I listen to a money manager, 30% off at Kohl’s and a whole bunch of stuff addressed to Resident, Occupant or Loser.  Is this too exciting for you?  This is my life!

But wait, what’s that?  A small envelope with a hand-written address and no bar codes.  It was from my granddaughter – snail mail.  Not an e-mail or a fax.  Not a text or a tweet or a twit or a twoot.  Not a Facebook or a YouTube or a Snapchat.  Just a little old envelope with my name written on it in pencil.  I dove for it like a pelican after a sardine.  Isn’t it funny how something as simple as an actual letter can be so exciting?

Ok, another week.  Seven damn days closer to the future.  Well, one good thing the future has – next week’s blog.  Don’t miss it.  Stay well and count your blessings.

Michael                                            Send comments to:  mfox1746@gmail.com

I just re-read the blog again and noticed I did not mention my wife once.  Hi, Honey.

Blog #58

It’s the rainy season here in St. Louis.  Carol hates rain.  Rain is anathema.  I’m not sure whether it’s a hair thing or she’s related to the Wicked Witch of the West.  Maybe I shouldn’t have said that.  She is constantly attuned to a weather app so she can plan when to leave the house.  My oldest daughter is like that too.  We were on a vacation in North Carolina with Jennifer and had stayed inside the whole night because Carol and Jennifer had determined that the forecasts were ominous.  It did not rain a drop.  Then the next morning, right after breakfast, the two of them, whom I had begun to refer to as Cloudy and Cher, were watching their electronic devices again.  “I think today is the day we should stay in the house; the forecast is 60% storms.”  While the Storm Sisters were thus preparing to ruin my day, I was on the porch where I could see a beautiful sunny sky with not a cloud in sight.

The women just sit and complain

“The forecast is calling for rain!”

If Columbus’ crew

Had included those two

We’d all still be living in Spain.

Andre Gide said one doesn't discover new lands without consenting to lose sight of the shore for a very long time.  That probably includes getting wet as well.  Did you know there was a mutiny on Columbus’ first voyage?  The crew said they were going home.  “Not all of you are going home”, said Columbus.  “The ones that I kill are staying here.”  I must confess that story is apocryphal and does not occur in official histories, but I like it.  And yes, I do my research to validate all the things I tell you.

I just got a new medication prescribed.   It’s some nerve something and I looked it up online to check out the side effects.  See, there’s that dogged research again.

Here’s what I found – dizziness, drowsiness, weakness, tired feeling, blurred vision, headache, strong cravings for McDonald’s in the morning and a strange compulsion to read Moby Dick.  I’m pretty sure I can handle it.

I will add the new pill to my already impressive menu of pills, capsules, ointments, salves, nose sprays, lotions, potions and soft gels.  I have carefully categorized pill-takers into four groups.  I have so much free time!  The groups are Free Lance, Organized, Anal and Screwball.   Free Lance includes those of you who simply know what pills to take and when to take them.  Organized pill-takers need some additional help and use a pill box with seven compartments marked with each day of the week.  Anal pill-takers – you know, maybe that’s a poor choice.   By anal, I don’t mean suppositories; I mean someone who makes sure the oven is off before leaving the house – five times.  Or someone who goes to McDonald’s every single morning.   Anal pill-takers have a pill box with fourteen compartments so the medicines can be split between a.m. and p.m.

And then there is the Screwball category which includes me.  I just fill each compartment with one kind of pill.  When it’s time to take pills, I open them all.  I still think a great parlor game would be for each person to write down all their pills on a piece of paper and throw it into a pile.  One list would be chosen at random and everybody would guess who it belongs to.  We’d call it Who Wants to Be a Pillionaire?  Kind of like Colonel Mustard in the Kitchen with the Stool Softener.   I confess I’ve used that line before, but with your memory? -- I’m pretty sure you’ve forgotten.  That’s because you take too many pills.

 

Carol and I went to Whole Foods.  She shopped while I maneuvered the cart in the constricted aisles clogged with hungry, health-conscious do-gooders clad in jogging gear and clutching reusable sacks.  As we passed the egg department I noticed a sign assuring us that these eggs had been harvested from cage-less chickens.  I read on and learned that the chickens responsible for these pearly ovoid beauties are not kept in individual cages but are allowed to roam around the barn where water and food are available at various stations.  This was beginning to sound appealing.  Free food and drink, lots of exercise, no work, no tax returns, no Joy Behar and all you have to do is lay eggs.  Do you think I could learn how to do that?

When I got home I flew to the Internet looking for egg-laying lessons and found a bunch of bitchy Vegans complaining that cage-less chickens were still overcrowded and never let out of the barn.  What do they want the farmer to do, take these birds to a Broadway show?  You knew a list was coming, didn’t you?  Here it is, Broadway shows for chickens:

The Best Little Henhouse in Texas, Hatched Yesterday, Guys and Fowls, The Gizzard of Oz, Ham(and egg)ilton.

Lighten up, Vegans.  I know eating cumquats and nuts all day can purse up your brains, but Jeesh!  Anyway, after reading for a while, becoming a cage-less chicken began to lose its appeal.  Mainly because you have to get screwed by a rooster. 

Do you have a middle name?  Do you remember your middle name?  Is there any reason for having a middle name?  I am convinced that the sole purpose of a child's middle name is so he can tell when he's really in trouble.  If my mother called out “Michael”, she just wanted to see me.  If she yelled “Michael Bruce”, I knew some serious punishment was on my horizon.  Some people have more than one middle name, like Julia Scarlett Elizabeth Louis-Dreyfus.  I have a granddaughter with two middle names.  And then, of course, there’s Picasso, or should I say:

Pablo Diego José Francisco de Paula Juan Nepomuceno María de los Remedios Cipriano de la Santísima Trinidad Ruiz y Picasso

By the time he wrote all that on the canvas, there was so little room left he had to squash up the faces.  I’m about ready for this letter to be over.  Are you?  I thought so.  May you have wonderful days and crisp clean nights.  May your troubles be light and your delights many, and may you have peace and happiness all week long.  Sounds wonderful, doesn’t it?  Hell, I’d settle for the whole week to go by without getting sued by Stormy Daniels.

Please stay well, count your blessings and come back to me next week.  What would I do without you – lay eggs?

Michael Bruce                                   Send comments to:  mfox1746@gmail.com

Blog #57

Have you done your taxes yet?  They’re due April 15^th, you know.  Well, not really, because April 15^th is Sunday, so the due date will be pushed to Monday, April 16^th.  But wait, April 16^th is Emancipation Day.  Emancipation Day celebrates the day when Lincoln freed 3,100 slaves living in the District of Columbia.  Remember Lincoln?  He’s on the penny.  All the Federal workers in DC are off on Monday.  So I guess your taxes are due Tuesday.  No, no, hold on – Tuesday is National Bat Appreciation Day (look it up!), and no-one’s going to leave their house on a day like that.  So I guess it’s Wednesday, except that Wednesday is National Animal Crackers Day, and no-one who celebrated Emancipation Day is going to file their taxes on a day dedicated to Crackers.  Well, shoot!  Don’t file your taxes at all.  Nobody cares about your damn taxes anyway.  Certainly not your politicians.

Our society has changed so much it is as unrecognizable as Aunt Sally after her third facelift.  Just think about this – the Supreme Court has ruled that a state cannot regulate video-game violence because of Free Speech rights.  But California and other states are banning toys in Happy Meals because they entice children to eat “bad” food.  So, apparently, it is ok for 10-year-olds to spend hours a day online training how to slaughter people with automatic weapons as long as they’re not eating Chicken McNuggets while they do it.   Have I misstated the case?  What have we become?

Now I heard a story that a watchdog group is lobbying McDonalds to get rid of its Ronald McDonald character, saying the clownish Ronald is attractive to kids and makes them want to go to McDonalds to eat.  Isn’t that the point?  No, says the group, not when the food is loaded with fat and calories and altogether bad juju.  They’re asking that Ronald at least tell the truth.  Here’s the new ad:

Come visit us at Mickey D’s

And try our McFatso with Cheese

The new Crappy Meal

Will make the kids squeal

And fill them with McCalories.

Would you like fries with that?  Listen up, Mothers out there, Ronald McDonald or Happy Meal toys mean nothing if you don’t drive your kids there.  And if you’re too much of a softy to say no to your kids, don’t blame Ronald.  Lighten up.  Have a Big Mac.

I know you think I talk about McDonald’s a lot.  Well, I’m there every morning -- alone, in the corner, sipping a Diet Coke all by myself and reading some old, dusty book.  Hugh Hefner would have been jealous.

The NFL has announced a new rule for next season which forbids helmet-to-helmet tackling.  By the way, the NFL is the National Football League for those of you who have lived inside a pistachio all your life.  I have been telling the NFL for years how to stop this kind of tackling – outlaw helmets!   A player without a helmet will never tackle with his head first.  Guaranteed! 

Ok, that last paragraph was for my guy readers.  But I have another great idea for my girl audience.   Wardrobe History Tags.  Attached to the hanger holding that cute little black dress will hang one of my Wardrobe History Tags, a small, round, smart, voice-analytic device.  We’ll call her Dressy.  When you pick out what you’re wearing tonight, just press the button and say, “Dressy, I’m going to Tony’s tonight with Fred and Ethel Mertz.”  Dressy will respond, “Hello, Carol.  You wore this dress to Tony’s last November, but you’ve never worn it with Fred and Ethel.  It’s ok to wear it tonight.  Try those little black boots with the silver buckles.  The pink nail-polish will look fabulous!”

I know I’m in trouble with the ladies because I said the NFL bit was for the guys.  Yes, girls, I realize that some of you, like my daughter Jennifer, are big football fans.  Sorry I insulted you.  I’m pretty sure, however, that the chances that one of my male readers will have any interest in the Wardrobe Tags is about the same as Stormy Daniels being appointed Secretary of State.

You know that I don’t drink.  But that doesn’t prevent me from giving you some rock n roll lyrics about alcoholic beverages.  You like quizzes, don’t you?  Humor me.  Here are the lyrics.  Remember, the songs are about alcohol.  Answers later.

1.     Who lost his jigger of salt?

2.     Where did the Captain say they hadn’t had those spirits here since 1969?

3.     Good ol’ boys were drinkin’ whiskey and rye, but what were they singing?

4.     When the microphone smelled like a beer, what did the piano sound like?

5.     I met a gin-soaked barroom queen in Memphis.

Random news:  In New York, a man was convicted of second-degree murder for killing his father and hiding the body in the basement.  And that’s only second-degree? What would make it first-degree, I wonder?  If he made the old man go to a Blue-Man Group concert first?  What could be more fun than a concert that starts out with a man spitting Cheerios in your face and ends with your being strangled with toilet paper?

More random news: The First Episcopal Church in Ocala, FL completed the installation of an 80-foot high white metal cross on its grounds that doubles as a cell-phone tower.  Can you hear me now, Jesus?     

There’s a new movie called Chappaquiddick.  If you look at the legally required cautions, you will find a PG-13 rating followed by these exact words:  Thematic Material, Disturbing Images, Some Strong Language, And Historical Smoking.  I’ve never heard that Historical Smoking warning before, but someone has determined that smoking is bad for children to watch.  It’s probably bad for the actors as well.  I have always wondered why they have to show the actors smoking.  Yes, we all did it back in the 50s and 60s, but the story would not be changed if we eliminated the smoking, would it?  I mean, he didn’t burn the girl to death with his cigarette butt.  And don’t give me the argument about historical accuracy.  That didn’t seem to bother anybody when the show Hamilton made George Washington black.

It’s time to leave now.  Here are your answers to the lyrics questions:

1.     Jimmy Buffet – Margaritaville

2.     Hotel California.  (Eagles)

3.     Bye Bye Miss American Pie.  (Don McLean).

4.     A carnival.  (Piano Man, Billy Joel)

5.     Honky Tonk Woman. (Rolling Stones)

Stay well, count your blessings.  See you next week.  Oh, and no historical smoking.

Michael                                             Send comments to:  mfox1746@gmail.com

Blog #56

I’ve lost my wife.  I thought it would be to a rich, handsome dude with a good sense of humor, an addiction to Candy Crush and a love of round tables.  But no – I’ve lost her to a smart-phone.  She talks to it, fights with it, plays with it.  She sits in bed playing Scrabble on it.  She plays bridge on it and reads books on it.  She gets alerts on it.  In the middle of the night I hear her saying, “Cher’s Birthday!”  She has a different ring-tone for every person in the Western Hemisphere.   She has an app to tell her where the nearest toilet is.  Or the nearest Vietnamese woman with a nail file.  And what is Candy Crush anyway?  I cannot compete.

Have you ever gone into a car dealer and bought the first car the salesman showed you?  Well, that’s how my wife feels when the hostess leads us to a table at a restaurant.  It’s obviously the worst one, the one they want to fill because it is somehow flawed, and the hostess must think we are ignorant losers who will accept a horrible table.  Therefore, the first table offered is never acceptable.  Never!  I hope they have round tables in Heaven, because, if not, she’s going somewhere else.

Last weekend, we had finished dinner (at the second table they offered us) and it was time to pay the bill.  There were five people and coupons for two free entrees and the ensuing confusion of how to allocate the free entrees reached Carol’s Threshold of Impatience, which, I don’t have to tell you, is about the size of a cricket’s eyebrow.  I could feel the Earth tremble as I looked at her.  “I just wish I were the Dictator and I could tell everybody how to do this,” she whispered through clenched, but beautifully white, teeth.  “What do you want to have happen?” I asked.  She told me and I immediately took control, exerted my dominant masculinity and did exactly as my wife told me.  I just need a little direction sometimes.

There is actually one thing at which I am really good.  I’ll give you a few seconds to come up with it.  Ok, I’ll give you a few more seconds.  Well, I’d better give you a hint – I can name any song from the 1950s, 60s and 70s before the second note.  Just play one note and I’m screaming Sam the Sham and the Pharaohs or Little Anthony and the Imperials.  I’m almost never wrong, and it used to be an important talent to have.  But no more.  Carol found Shazam!  She holds her iPhone to the radio and Shazam tells her the song and artist and even downloads it if she wants.  So much for my only talent!  I’m useless!  I feel like a snake trying to ride a bicycle.  Or a guy who is fluent in Aztec.  Or a man who repairs typewriters.  Or Donald Trump’s humility coach.  I am no longer needed.  I cannot compete.

Welcome back to this week’s craziness and rantings.  I hope you are feeling well.  I’m sorry about that last bit, but I become easily frustrated by all the technological nuances that have changed my world so much.  Plus, I get angry at all the silly political correctness.  Now they’re even changing the Bible.  Yes, the Catholic bishops have come out with a revised Bible which has replaced “booty” with “treasure” and “fine flour” with “bran flour” and God knows (appropriately) what else.  Of course, the Reform Rabbis have already changed the Torah to expunge any reference to God as a man by changing Father to Parent and King to Ruler to avoid bruising any tender feelings.  It’s all very politically correct.  Re-write The Bible to avoid all references to gender, harmful foods, sexual preference or non-efficient light bulbs.

The words of the Bible are pleasant

But they must be brought to the present

So now what is right

Is “Let There Be Light

“As Long As It’s Not Incandescent”

Be fruitful and use Common Core.  And who knows what they’re going to do with My Cup Runneth Over.  I think that’s the name of Stormy Daniels’ new book.  (Ok, I’m not proud of that.)

The PC Police have even begun “modernizing” all of Shakespeare’s plays.  Look what they’ve come up with now:

If music be the food of love, choose Non-GMOs.

Romeo, Romeo, allow my Google Maps to access your location.

Bubble, bubble, fiery pot – Beware, your coffee cup is hot.

To be or not to be. Call Suicide Hotline at 555-0164.

Is this a dagger which I see before me, and have I passed the background check?

Have you ever been to rehab?  I remember my first day of cardiac rehab, walking in there knowing I would hate it.  I was right.  Some nurse, who was so sweet bees were nesting in her hair, greeted me and made me fill out a whole bunch of questionnaires that no-one will ever read.  Then the doctor came in, listened to my heart for four seconds and left.  He had the charisma of tuna salad.  But, ok, I can deal with officious nurses and supernumerary doctors.

What I could not deal with were the other patients.  There were about twenty of them exercising on treadmills and bicycle machines.  Two of them were younger than me, twelve older and six were dead, but their machines hadn’t stopped yet.  And they all had little pink hearts with their names in crayon taped to their machines.  Gag me with a tofu and spinach salad!  And they were all looking at me.  New meat!  I had to walk for six minutes as fast as I could on the carpet surrounding all these old cardiac-challenged strangers.  This is not me!  I do not like strangers; I do not want to talk with them; I do not want them watching me; and I assuredly do not want my name on a little pink heart.  I felt like a heifer at a beef auction.

News from Yellowstone:  two scientists, a Russian and a Czech, had been studying grizzly bears in the park, but they had disappeared.  The Park Rangers found their camp destroyed and also found a male and a female grizzly lying there fat and happy.  They had to put the bears down, of course.  The head Ranger cut open the female bear.  “There’s the Russian,” he said.   “Yes,” said the assistant, “but where’s the other one?”  “Well,” said the first, “if the Russian is in the female, it’s obvious that the Czech is in the male.”  (I’m not proud of that either.)

But I am proud that I have such loyal readers.  Stay well and remember what Mark Twain said, “Always do the right thing.  This will gratify some and astonish the rest.”  And count your blessings.  See you next week.

Michael                                             Send comments to:  mfox1746@gmail.com