Blog #125

Have you been to a Pharmacy lately?  I still call them drugstores.  We used to have Kranson’s and Glazer’s and Gallant’s Drug Store -- small and friendly with maybe a soda fountain.  Now we have Walgreen's and CVS – big and unfriendly and loaded with security cameras.  To get a package of razor blades, you have to move a plastic cover device that triggers a camera.  Cigarettes are behind the counter because they have to check your ID.  That’s also where the cold medicines are because they can be used to make meth.  And over-the-counter eye drops are not over the counter anymore.  They are locked up as well to avoid those friendly neighborhood shoplifters.  At Kranson’s Drug Store, back in the Day, the only thing behind the counter were condoms.  Now that’s the only thing that’s not locked up.  What a miserable world we live in, full of shoplifters and drug addicts and people who throw buckets of water on police officers. 

Hi there and welcome back. I hope you are feeling safe and well.  Sorry about that hate fest above.  I really don’t hate everything.  There are lots of things I love – or used to anyway.  I loved smoking – gave it up in 1995.  I loved wine – gave that up in 2007.  Then there was popcorn at the movies – not since 2009.  Chocolate – 2018.  Ice cream – 2019.  What’s left to love?

Well, I love my wife and my family.  I love to read.  I love to write.  I love the sunshine and the Zoo.  I love to teach.  I love all you loyal readers out there and I love to be with my friends.  You see, it’s not individual people that I dislike; it’s the accumulated mass of humanity.  I mean, there are terrorists and people trying to steal my credit card and mass shooters and car-jackers and spammers and I hate them all!  Oops, sorry.  I’m going to start trying to love everybody.  Can’t we all just get along?

Friday night we went to services at a Jewish temple.  The service was 90% singing and a few announcements.  There was a four-piece band on stage plus the young Rabbi with his guitar.  They brought everybody on stage who had a birthday in July and a few people with anniversaries.  Then more songs.  It was like the Grand Ole Opry without Minnie Pearl.  But I kind of liked it.  To me, it was more like a big family gathering than a ritualized religious routine.  And they had bagels.  See, I’m trying to get along.

They have an activity at the temple called Men’s Club or something, where men with free time get together and split up into groups that have the same interests.  My interest is being by myself.  I wonder if there’s a group of men who get together to be alone.  Must be called the Hermit’s Club.

It’s August.  My how the time flies!  I wonder who first said that.  Shakespeare -- remember him?  He’s the one who said "When shall we three meet again in thunder, lightning, or in rain?  Or was that The Squad?  I forget.  Anyway, Shakespeare, in a 1609 Sonnet entitled Lover’s Complaint, wrote the swiftest hours, as they flew.  Alexander Pope wrote swift fly the years in a 1712 Christmas hymn called Messiah.  Do you even care about any of this?  I didn’t think so.

Whoever wrote it must have been an old person.  It seems to us that twenty, forty, fifty years have just gone by in a snap.  I remember the first time I saw my wife.  It was 56 years ago in the High School cafeteria.  Fifty-six years, but I can still see her standing there and still remember the love at first sight feeling.  I wonder who said that first.  Probably Kim Kardashian the first time she saw a camera.  Or Donald Trump the first time he learned how to tweet.  Or my wife the first time she looked in a mirror.

One thing that makes the time fly is a movie date with your grandson.  Grandchild #4 (Tyler-13) called.  Hey Pops, come over and watch a movie.  If you’re going to ask someone over to watch a movie, I’m the perfect choice.  I showed up with soda, popcorn and candy.  Don’t tell his mother.  It seems that when my grandkids and I are together, we inhabit, for a while, a warm and idyllic place called Poppyland, where the kids don’t have to go to sleep, where sugar is good for you, where you live right next door to the Zoo and where my hip never hurts.  We settled in, Tyler loaded up Star Wars Episode VIII and we munched and cheered for three hours.  But I do have a few questions.

First, why the Roman Numerals?  Were there Romans in any Star Wars episode?  Was there a Darth Caesar or a Nero the Hut?   Next, why are the episodes out of order?  The Episodes (I’ll use more familiar numbering) were released in the order 4-5-6-1-2-3-7-8.  Who numbered these episodes that way?  Probably the guy who did Donald Trump’s tax returns.  It’s crazy!  Maybe that’s just the way it was back in the days of Jedis and Lightsabers.

The numbers come out the wrong way

It just doesn’t make sense today

But perhaps it was so

If you are not a Star Wars fan, then you have no idea what that was all about.  Trust me, it was cute.  More trivia –John Williams won an Oscar for Best Musical Score for the original Star Wars, and Chewbacca won Wookie of the Year.  Still haven’t heard of Star Wars?  What eggplant have you been living under for the past 40 years?  But am I unhappy?  Am I aggravated?  Am I in any way dislodged from my love-fest with the Human Race?  Not me, Sunshine.  I am Happy Personified.

Tell the truth, didn’t you like it better when I was a miserable curmudgeon?  I’ll get back to normal next week and pick on somebody.  Probably Carol.  Don’t miss it.  Until then, stay well, count your blessings and May the Force Be With You.

Yoda                              Send comments to:  mfox1746@gmail.com

(Star Wars Episode IX comes out in December.  I’ll bring the popcorn.)