Wednesday, June 19, 2019


Blog #119

Well, it's finally happened!  I knew it would come to this eventually.  Carol has become jealous of my blogging fame and, in a sad effort at piggy-backing on my verbal skills, has begun her own YouTube channel where she reads my latest blog, adding her own snarky little comments.  So, if you want to see the woman I’ve been married to for 52 years and her pitiful display of female self-aggrandizement, go to Limerick Oyster 117 on YouTube and subscribe or sign up or whatever.  She looks cute.

I have four grandsons, so I know what a bris is.  A bris is a Jewish religious male circumcision ceremony performed by a circumciser called a mohel (pronounced moil) on the eighth day of the infant’s life.  Got that right out of Google.  And what, I hear you cry, does Google have to do with circumcisions?   Well, I believe google is the exact sound that comes from a weak-stomached Grandfather during the grandson’s bris.

You see, I had a bris when I was eight days old.  Luckily, I don’t remember most of it, but what I do remember are my exact thoughts upon seeing a strange person approaching me with a razor in his hand.  I was only a baby, but even then my thoughts rhymed.

I think I should go back inside
Where I never spit-up or cried
My God, there’s a mohel
I hope I’m a goil
Cause if I’m a boy I should hide.

I have no sons, only three wonderful daughters.  The first bris I witnessed close up was eighteen years ago when Zachary (Grandchild #1) was born.  There were about twenty family and friends in attendance, and, of course, the mohel.  I was assigned the duty of carrying the clueless little baby to the table.  Poor kid, he knew as little about what he was getting into as people who voted for Trump.  I held him down – me, the poster boy for Vasovagal Reaction -- trying to keep my eyes averted from my boy’s soon-to-be-reduced weenie and the instrument-wielding religious maniac bent on doing the deed.  And then it was over.  I survived, Zach survived, his mother survived, and everybody ate bagels.

Hi there and welcome back.  Now where else, I ask you, can you find someone willing to share such personal and lurid details with you.  Maybe the Jerry Springer Show.  I hope all you Dads had a Happy Father’s Day.  Almost 400 years ago, George Herbert wrote, “One father is more than a hundred schoolmasters.”  One of my favorite sayings!

We had a lovely dinner at my daughter Abby’s house.  The Thursday before that, my wife asked me, “What would you like to eat for Father’s Day.”   As all you married men know, this was not a simple question.  In fact, it wasn’t a question at all, but an exercise in spousal manipulation.  You see, Carol had no interest in knowing what I wanted to eat for Father’s Day.  The purpose of her question was to maneuver me into choosing the food she wanted.  Here’s how it works:

C:  Honey, what do you want to eat for Father’s Day?  You get whatever you want.
M:  Well, I really don’t care.
C:  How about Chinese or barbecued hot dogs or a tossed salad with garlic bread?

See what she did there?  She narrowed my choices to three, one of which was hers.  Now she had a 33% chance of having me pick her favorite.  Then she could look like a loving heroine by saying, “Ok, that’s what we’ll have.  Just for you.”   I usually pick wrong.

M:  I like Chinese.
C:  You know, we just had Chinese two months ago, and I actually didn’t like mine.
M:  Chinese people eat it every day and there are a billion of them. Ok, hot dogs.
C:  Honey, I hate to see you eat something that’s bad for your heart.

Mission accomplished.  She controlled me like an astronaut docking a space module.  She gets what she wants for dinner and makes me believe she was doing it out of love for me.

A praying mantis is a thoughtful creature.  After copulation, the female mantis immediately eats her mate, saving him from decades of mental punishment.  Not being as fortunate as a male mantis, I have been through 52 years of this Lucy pulling the football away from Charlie Brown routine, and this year, I refused to play.  So when she asked what I wanted for dinner, I just said, “I have no input and I’m not answering any questions.”  And anyway, who cares?  It’s only one meal.  It all comes out the same color in the morning.  Oops, that was some more Jerry Springer stuff.  Sorry.

I have to tell you this little story.  My local grandchildren got a hamster.  I love animals, but hamsters are not my favorite.  They bite.  Last night, Tyler, my 13-year-old Grandchild #4, was playing with the hamster when the little beast bit into his fingertip and hung on.  The cage is on the upstairs landing, and Tyler was playing with the miniature Godzilla on the carpet.  The bite hurt and Tyler shook his hand to get rid of the monster.  It didn’t work.  The hamster held on tighter than Kim Kardashian holding on to a spotlight.  Tyler flicked his wrist harder, and the hamster let go on the upswing.  The little furball flew into the air, over the railing and down all the way to the first floor.  Tyler was hysterical, inconsolable.  He had just caused the calamitous death of the poor little pet that he loved.  A hamster falling one story is the same as you falling off a 65-story building.  Except the hamster is built like a Twinkie.  It’s round and compact and covered with softness.  It hit the floor, looked around and crawled away.  He was easily retrieved and put back, unharmed, into his cage.  Tyler felt better.  I told him to throw the little Gremlin down the stairs again the next time it bit him.  It might teach him a lesson.

Ok, enough!  I mean, how much can you take?  But I’ll be back.  Remember now, if you want the truth, come back to me next week.  If you want to watch a bunch of bitter, feminine lies go to Limerick Oyster 117 on YouTube.  Did I tell you she looked cute?   Stay well, count your blessings.  I’m sure counting mine.

Michael                          Send comments to:  mfox1746@gmail.com






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