Blog #280                                         July 21, 2022

 

I had a little eye issue this week, so I visited Dr. Retina.  In the last three years, he has successfully treated me for a couple of serious issues.  He is a bumptious bastard who exudes genius and superiority and arrogance.  I love him.  He gives me a sense of comfortable confidence when I put my eyes (figuratively and literally) in his hands.  When I called and revealed my symptoms, they got me in on one day’s notice and dealt with me quickly and efficiently.  First, I visited with several techs, each of whom had a different test or scan to take, and I told each one my long story of symptoms.  When all the tests were completed, I sat in an examination room and awaited God himself.  He came in, looking dapper and handsome as he always does.  “How are you doing?” he asked.  Well, I said, do you want to hear my story?  He gazed at me with his holy eyes and replied, “Well, you can tell me your story or I can just examine your eyes and tell you what’s wrong.”  Don’t you just love somebody who’s that cocky?

 

Our Weekly Word, bumptious, means conceited, arrogant and cocky.  Just my kind of guy!

 

Hi there.  I’m back.  And so, apparently, are you.  Welcome, and let’s get started.  I hope you’re feeling chipper.  I came home from visiting Dr. Retina and was met by my lovely wife.  We started to compare stories of the day, but after ten seconds her phone rang.  She answered it, said “Hold on” to whoever it was, and looked at me.  You see, I like talking to my wife.  I like to tell her about the people I have met or how my appointment went or how many times I took the wrong exit on the highway.  What I hate most is getting shoved aside by a phone call from one of her over-talkative friends.  You know who you are.  She recognized my feeling and started to tell the caller she’d call back.  But instead, she looked at me and asked, “Are you going to clean up?”  Clean up?  Did I look dirty?  Well, I knew how to translate that simple question after five and a half decades of marriage.  Are you going to clean up? translates to, “I really would rather talk to this person than you, but I know you don’t like it, so if you have something to do, do it now.”

 

Although I make fun of my wife, you all know I would do anything for her, even clean up when I wasn’t dirty just so she could yabber with her friends.  You still know who you are.  Or give her my socks.  We went to a movie and Carol reached into her purse for a pair of hospital socks to keep her feet warm.  You must have some of those, don’t you?  They’re the ones with rubber on the bottom so when you walk around in the hospital you won’t slip and break whatever you haven’t broken already.  I love long sentences. She has at least one pair of every color of these socks, and the sad truth is that she got them all from the various times I was in the hospital.  I would be lying in the hospital bed and the phone would ring.  “How do you feel? When are you getting out? Grab me a few pairs of socks. I like pink.”  But when she searched at the movie, she realized she had forgotten socks so I removed mine and handed them to her.  Is that love or what?  I have a warm heart.  And cold feet.

 

Message from Shakespeare:  I have no more … stockings than legs, nor more shoes than feet (The Taming of the Shrew).  I do have more shoes than feet, and if Pops got me two pairs of hospital socks, I’d have one sock left over to use as a pillow.  I like pink too.  Purr.

 

Have I told you my wife is speedy at everything?  She likes to call it “efficient”.  Let me put it this way -- if she had been married to Jules Verne, he would have made it around the world in a week.  Yesterday we were at the grocery store and she was running the aisles like a kangaroo with a hot coal in her pouch.  I mean she was in a New York hurry!  And all the while she was talking to me: “Why aren’t these bags over here? It would save so much time. Why are these here? Why aren’t those there? Get that old lady out of my way. Go stand in line at the deli so I don’t have to wait.”  Then she saw somebody she knew and stopped in the aisle to talk for twenty minutes while I stood around shuffling my feet and trying to figure out the difference between a rutabaga and a turnip

 

There are so many TV, cable, Netflix, Hulu, Disney, Apple, Amazon and other streaming services that there are literally thousands of new shows to choose from.  Yet, there are still some old shows that have been around seemingly forever.  The longest running scripted show that is still on the air, The Simpsons, has run for over 30 seasons.  I have never seen one episode, but I’m guessing Bart Simpson has never matured.  Neither, most likely, have the people who watch it.  But there are plenty of programs that have grown older and have decided to change their names to reflect their extreme longevity.  Modern Family is now Ancient Family.  Blue Bloods has been changed to Thin Bloods.  Walking Dead has become Barely Alive.  There’s Hawaii Nine-O, Grey Haired Anatomy and Wheelchair of Fortune.

 

I don’t watch any of them.  Groucho Marx said, “I find television very educational. The minute somebody turns it on, I go into the library and read a good book.”  I whole-heartedly agree.

 

To waste my whole day is a crime

Just tuned in to Netflix or Prime.

I’d rather be home

With a book or a poem

Now that’s a good use of my time.

 

And it looks like I’ve wasted enough of your time today.  It’s because I’m bumptious.  Stay well, count your blessings and stay cool.  I’ll see you next week.

 

Michael                                    Send comments to mfox1746@gmail.com