Blog #298                                November 24, 2022

 

Happy Thanksgiving Day to every one of you and welcome back.  Thanksgiving is a unique and introspective day where we give voice to all the blessings we have.  We are truly thankful for our family and friends; I don’t need to tell you that.  And as for those that we have lost and sorely miss, they are blessings as well. “Don't cry because it's over, smile because it happened.”  That’s a quote, believe it or not, from Dr. Seuss, my favorite poet, and it should remind us to be grateful for the memories that mean so much to us.  We are also thankful for our own lives.  Yes, we may have health issues -- aches, pains or more serious challenges – but look at it this way: we’re doing the best we can, we’re still here and we are way better off than the turkey.  And, yes, there are people who are richer, younger, better-looking.  But we have love and warmth and a wonderful meal to share.  Have a good day, and thank you for giving me the opportunity to talk to you every week.

 

A few days ago, I was at McDonald’s (duh) with my Diet Coke (duh) and my book (ditto).  Seeing me without a book would be like seeing Pat without Vanna, or Fred without Ethel, or Joy without Whoopi.  Whoopi and Joy!  Sounds like a big party, doesn’t it?  I’d rather be at McDonald’s.

 

And I was, reading a few pages, relaxing and doing the Wordle.  When I was ready to leave, I refilled my soda and went out to my car.  It didn’t start.  Deader than Queen Elizabeth.  I went back inside and called AAA.  It was about 9:45 and they told me a service truck would be there at 11:00.  I know them to be very reliable and accurate, so I calmly and patiently settled down for the wait.  The problem arose at 10:15 when I finished my book.  What was I going to do for 45 minutes?  I do not talk on the phone in a public place, so I decided to read everything online about Crypto Currency.  I knew nothing about it when I started, but after reading for twenty minutes, I discovered two things -- I now knew even less and I now cared even less.  I mean, who really cares if some fast-talking twenty-something just lost $75 billion worth of Gypto-Crypto that he made up to begin with when I’m trying to find a better price on a turkey than Aldi’s $1.09 a pound?

 

Then I read the announcement by the United Nations Populations Fund that the 8-billionth person on the Earth was born last week.  They also announced that the population will peak at 10½ billion around 2080 and then start to decrease.  That’s the good news.  The bad news is that by then, there won’t be enough food left on the Earth and the population will decrease because the young people will have to eat the old people.  The UN sent a congratulatory card to Number Eight Billion.

 

Eight Billion – yes you are the winner

You’re a baby and just a beginner

Grow old but not fat

‘Cause if you do that

You’ll surely be Ten Billion’s dinner.

 

Do you think I’m getting weirder?  I think I’m getting weirder.  Maybe I need a shrink.  Have you ever been to a shrink?  Do you know who the first psychiatrist was?  I’ve told you before, but I’ll do it again.  It was Snow White.  Seriously!  When she asked each of her roommates, “Are you Happy?” and six of them said no, she figured they needed some help and she hung up a PSYCHIATRIST shingle on the cottage.  But when customers arrived and noticed that all the people coming out of her office were dwarves, they all said, “She’s not helping their mental problems, she’s just shrinking them.”  And that’s how the term shrink was born.  Aren’t you happy that I give you all of this information?  No?  You’re not Happy?  Go see Snow.

 

I used to go to a shrink.  I like talking to people, as you can tell, and I liked talking to my shrink.  I found it to be quite cathartic.  After all, your psychiatrist will listen more than your spouse or your kids or your friends.  Almost as much as your hair stylist.  The first time I visited Dr. Head, I brought a newspaper to read in the waiting room, and, when I was finished reading, I tossed it into the waste basket.  Then I realized it still had my address label attached, so I retrieved the paper and tore off my name label.  Hey, if you can’t be paranoid in a shrink’s office, where can you?

 

During the first session, the shrink asked what my family was like when I was growing up, and I began to tell him about my lovable lunatic brother and my sad schizophrenic sister.  Wow, he thought he had won the Power Ball jackpot.  He’d never heard of a family so messed up since Morticia and Gomez.  He was as excited as a Vietnamese chef at a dog park.

 

Our Weekly Word is cathartic, which means providing psychological relief through the open expression of strong emotions.  Writing to you is cathartic for me.  It keeps my mental health in tip-top shape.  And if you think this is tip-top, you’re sicker than I am.

 

Message from Shakespeare:  Take from my heart all thankfulness (Pericles). I am thankful today too.  I am thankful that 2½ years ago I chose Pops to be my pet human.  The shelter-lady had just asked him if he would accept a three-legged cat, and he said no.  She said, “Ok, just hold this cat for a second,” and then she put me in his arms.  I looked over at his woman.  She looked to be the absolute boss of the family, and I figured if she could train this old man, so could I.  So I flashed my feline cuteness on him and he was mine.  I suspect that’s how she got him too.  I am also thankful I’m not a turkey.  Purr.

 

Alright, you have relatives to hug and turkeys to eat, and blessings to count, so I’ll let you go.  Stay well and thank you for listening to me each week.  See you soon.

 

Cousin Itt                                          Send comments to mfox1746@gmail.com

 

 

 

Blog #297                                November 17, 2022

 

We spent part of last week in North Carolina.  The flight was fine, but here’s something I don’t understand:  the airplane is a miracle of design and engineering.  It can lift two hundred people into the clouds, defying the laws of gravity, while keeping them warm and safe.  It contains every modern electrical device to determine altitude, speed, weather, air pressure and a hundred other things I cannot even conjure.  And yet -- you knew there would be an “and yet” – and yet, when the flight attendant lifts the microphone to speak to the passengers, all we can hear is mwafszitzuperflaningsg.  Couldn’t they have spent a little more money on an intercom so we could understand what they say?  It’s so flangztsinfl.

 

But, they managed to get us to RDU safely, comfortably and on time and the only glitch was Carol convincing the TSA people at STL that she was over 75 and did not need to remove her shoes.  Nobody questioned me.

 

In fact, nobody ever notices me.  I feel unseen and ignored, as invisible as a Trump supporter in San Francisco.  I programmed my SIRI to call me “Darling”, but she doesn’t do it.  Pretty much the same result as when I tried to program my wife to call me “Darling”.

 

The only people who seem to want me are on-line busy-bodies trying to sell me extended warranties for my car or asking me to help them retrieve their settlement from a Nigerian bank.  One even wanted me to subscribe to some new pornography channel. This one had puppets.  It was called Sodomy Street.

 

Welcome to Sodomy Street

Where Ernie and Bert have turned sweet

Watch Oscar the Grouch

Get laid on the couch

And Kermit and Piggy in heat.

 

And you thought I was sane!  Hi there and welcome back.  I hope you’re feeling well and having good weather.  The weather in North Carolina was fine.  We were expecting bad weather from Hurricane Nicole, but it didn’t materialize.  Did you know that in 2018, there was actually a Hurricane Michael?  I have a serious problem with the name.  My daughters will not allow me to use the terms policeman, fireman or waitress.  Instead, I must use police officer, firefighter and server.  Ok, I get it, it’s a gender thing, but it works both ways.  If they’re going to name a hurricane after me, the least they could do is call it a Himicane.

 

Message from Shakespeare:  You cataracts and hurricanoes, spout Till you have drench’d our steeples (King Lear).  When are they going to have a Hurricane Shakespeare?  It would be a CAT-egory 3 (for three legs).  Purr.

 

I’m embarrassed to tell you that my thumb hurts.  With all the horrible things wrong with some of our friends – well, complaining about my thumb sounds silly.  But it hurt, so I went to Dr. Thumb.  The nurse grabbed my hand - does it hurt here - does it hurt there – tendonitis - the doctor’s going to give you a shot - you ok with that?  So I told her all about my vasovagal reactions.  According to the official dictionary of the American Medical Association, a vasovagal reaction occurs when an intelligent, grown man behaves like a whiny little baby just because somebody sticks him with a needle.  I’ve had this reaction many times, and it is most unpleasant.

 

When she left, a young doctor walked in.  He was tall, dark and handsomer than George Clooney.  He was Dr. Thumb’s assistant.  Does it hurt here - does it hurt there – tendonitis - cortisone shot.  I asked him how long the needle would be in my thumb.  Six seconds, he said.  Then Dr. Thumb arrived.  We talked for a few seconds, after which he said, “You’re going to hate me for about 10-12 seconds while I give you this shot.”  I said, “McDreamy over there told me it was 6 seconds, let him do it.”  We kept talking while he put the needle in and I never felt a thing or had a reaction.  I loved him.  I’m looking for more things that hurt just so I can go back.

 

Doctors have messed with pretty much all of my parts at one time or another, except my gall bladder.  A gall bladder is something that’s just kind of there, but not necessary.  Like a Senator.  Or a Jewish husband.

 

And speaking of Senators, now that the election is over, we can begin moaning and crying that the Good Guys - who lied to us and then lied about their lying – didn’t lie enough to defeat the Bad Guys.  And instead of settling in and running the country, our politicians will resume their real task of insulting the other side so you won’t vote for them next time.  Unbelievable!

 

Carol and I do the grocery store every week.  She shops, I push.  And believe me, it’s work keeping up with her.  She moves faster than a Kardashian heading for a camera, and I move like a silk worm.  Did you hear about the two silk worms that had a race?  They ended in a tie.

 

One young woman at the grocery, dressed in some too-tight slacks and a variegated sweater, actually screamed at me.  “Hey, Old Man, move your asparagus.  The Ensure’s in Aisle 13.”  At least I had the good sense not to talk about her Hawaiian buns.

 

Women talk a lot, don’t they?  Well, maybe not.  A study published in Science says both women and men say about 16,000 words a day.  That just didn’t sound right to me, so I tested it out, counting my words and Carol’s for an entire 24 hours.  And you know what, they were right!  She said about 16,000 words and I said “Yes, Dear” 8,000 times.

 

Weekly Word:  Variegated means exhibiting different colors in irregular patches or streaks.  It’s kind of like ungapotchkit, a Yiddish word meaning – well, ungapotchkit.

 

And ungapotchkit we have certainly been today.  Some of this, some of that.  A little sodomy, a hurricane, my thumb, some politics and a lot about my wife.  Ungapotchkit!  And now it’s time to go.  Thank goodness.  And Thanksgiving.  That will be next Thursday, don’t forget.  We’ll talk about it next week.  See you then.  Count your blessings, stay well and always remember to fasten your shnawzsterjuk.

 

Michael                                    Send comments to mfox1746@gmail.com

 

 

Blog #296                                November 10. 2022

 

Last Saturday we changed our clocks.  Last Tuesday we changed our Congress.  What a seamy, filthy, debasing and degrading process is an American election.  There is no-one you can believe – not the candidates, not the pollsters, not the news media.  For months, we are deceived, lied to, embarrassed and insulted.  But we voted, we tried, with hopes of choosing people who could lead this country in a better way.

 

Sisyphus, a character in Greek mythology was punished by Zeus, who forced him to roll an immense boulder up a hill only to have it roll back down every time it neared the top, repeating this action for eternity.  That’s how our politics strikes me.  We work and strain and sweat every two years to try to make our country better, and as soon as the voting is over, the damn rock slides right back down the hill.  So now the election is over.  Will there be a solution to our national malaise?  Can we ever stop this internecine feuding?  I certainly don’t know.  The only good news is that the political ads are over for a while, and we can get back to watching emus selling insurance, pillow guys selling slippers and fast-talking drug salesmen listing the side-effects of Eliquis.

 

Our Weekly Word is internecine, which means destructive to both sides.  Carol and I do not have any internecine squabbling when it comes to politics.  She’s a pretty smart woman.  She listens to FOX, NBC and CNN and she calls herself an Independent because she has studied both sides.  This is how she explains it:

 

“I listen to those who are Blue

“And the Red ones, I check them out too.

“Then I take what they’ve said,

“Weigh it all in my head

“And vote Democrat when I’m through.”

 

Every time.  So much for independence.

 

Hi there and welcome back.  I hope you’re feeling well.  Did you win the lottery?  Me neither.  But I bet you had it all worked out what you were going to do with the money.  I can just hear you now.  “I’ll give 100 million to each grandchild and 200 million to charity and I’ll buy the Louvre and make it a pickle-ball court and maybe a million to the nice man who writes me limericks every Thursday.”  I have more modest ambitions.  If I win the lottery, I am going to donate all my clothes and buy an entire wardrobe all of one color so that everything will match.

 

Last week, Carol had lunch with her pedicurist.  I thought that was a little bizarre to begin with, but who am I to interfere in a relationship between a woman and her pedicurist? I’m not sure where they were going, either Dunkin ToeNuts or Ruby Toesday, but I was assigned to pick her up.  She told me if I got there early, I could wait at the bar next door.  Early?  I am always early.  Always!  Punctuality is the politeness of kings!  I really didn’t want to wait at a bar, but she said just go there and try to pick up some girls.  She really said that!  How am I going to pick up some girls?  Read them my blog?  I can just see all those young women shoving each other out of the way to get closer to the raggedy old fart reading some kind of limerick gibberish.  It’s a good thing I’m not in the market to pick anyone up.  I can barely pick up my cat.  Instead, I passed the time wondering what you eat at lunch with your pedicurist.  Probably corn chowder and, of course, toe-fu.  I know, I’m corny, but at least I’m on time.

 

Message from Shakespeare:  Scratching could not make it worse .. such a face as yours (Much Ado About Nothing).  I don’t like to be picked up.  It usually means I’m being taken somewhere I don’t want to go, like to Dr. Cat to clip my nails.  The place smells like stupid, filthy dogs.  But sometimes when Pops picks me up, he just wants to turn me over and scratch my belly.  That’s pretty nice.  Purr.

 

I have a new name – it’s Sherlock.  What, I hear you cry?  How did you become Sherlock?  Well, Carol and I went out one morning to do some errands.  On the way to Trader Joe’s it began to pour.  I said, “I guess I’ll be the one running in to get the groceries.”  “No shit, Sherlock,” was her reply.  She likes rain as much as the Wicked Witch of the West.  So I ran in to Trader Joe’s and got drenched.  But never fear, my princess stayed as dry as Death Valley!  A full-fledged Jewish Princess in ultimate bloom is a frightening thing.  I hope my daughters are fortunate enough to follow in their mother’s glass slipper.

 

I actually like going to the grocery store with my wife.  It’s a nice walk up and down the aisles and I get to wave at all the stuff I’m no longer allowed to eat.  The last time we went, I dropped Carol at the grocery store’s left entrance.  What are you doing? she asked.  You see, in Missouri we always shop from right to left, although in Israel, I’m pretty sure they shop from left to right.  I’m miserable, she said.  The phrase I’m Miserable spoken to a husband is akin to the phrase Code Blue spoken to a doctor, and requires the same urgency and attention.  Every morning, Carol walks a few miles on the treadmill, but the thought of walking from the dairy section to the produce is too exhausting.  It’s like Frank Sinatra used to sing: “Oh, it’s a long, long way from milk to cucumber.”   Of course, she could never be expected to shop from left to right.  She’d have to read her list upside down!  So I drove her to the right-side entrance.  Good boy!  Good Sherlock!  I’m not embarrassed.  It is, after all, my proud and sworn oath to protect my bride from unwanted weather or exercise. 

 

And it is also my proud and sworn duty to be back next week with more stuff for you.  It might even be funny, so don’t miss it.  Stay well, count your blessings and buy some more lottery tickets.  Maybe this time, you’ll win. 

 

Sherlock                                  Send comments to mfox1746@gmail.com

 

 

 

Blog #295                                November 3, 2022

 

Carol gets up earlier than I do.  Last Saturday morning, she got out of bed, went to the living room and, of course, turned on the television.  Within a few seconds I heard her scream, “OH MY GOODNESS!”  What could it be, I wondered.  What disaster had she witnessed on the television that could make her so upset?  Had Jane Fonda found a wrinkle?  Had Meghan Markle cracked a nail?  Had some woman claimed that Herschel Walker pinched her Barbie Doll when they were in pre-school?  Whatever it was, I had to come to her rescue.  So, I hopped out of bed (well, I can’t actually hop) and ran to the living room (I can’t really run either).  “What’s wrong?” I inquired.  Her answer?  Extraordinary Attorney Woo is now dubbed in English!

 

That’s good to know.  I didn’t watch it in Korean, and I don’t intend to watch it in English.  Or, as my idol Dr. Seuss would say:

 

I would not watch it in Chinese

Or French or Dutch or Japanese

I do not like Attorney Woo

I do not like it; how could you?

 

How do you even put up with my nonsense?  But I guess you do, because here you are again.  Hi there, and welcome back.  I hope you’re feeling well.  Are you planning any holiday trips?  Carol and I are flying to North Carolina for a pre-Thanksgiving visit, and I am a little concerned.  Holiday seasons always mean more little children are flying and, what with Covid and flu and RSV being so prevalent, I expect a plane packed with sneezing, sniffling, coughing, rasping, puking little monsters whose only purpose in life is to inflict disease upon every adult within range of their various infectious excrescences.

 

Those kids who have not reached maturity

Are full of infectious impurity

With all their diseases

Their snot and their sneezes

They’re threatening airline security.

 

I love children – and animals.  I have just discovered there is a National Specially-Abled Pet Day.  It’s actually in May, but I just learned about it.  Last year they had a special triple-feature at the movies especially for disabled dogs.  The movies were Jurassic Bark, Paws! and The Good, the Bad and the Shar Pei. 

 

Message from Shakespeare:  Speak of my lameness, and I straight will halt (Sonnet 89).  I do not consider myself disabled or specially-abled or whatever they call it.  The fact that I have only three legs is an asset, because when Pops takes me to Dr. Cat to get my nails clipped, he always gets a 25% discount.  Purr.

 

I have told you many times of the ways poor husbands like me are bombarded by disrespect from their wives, but my sweet wife is surely not the worst.  I have seen husbands fiercely excoriated for wearing too “nice” a shirt to Cheesecake Factory, brutally vilified for driving too slowly, viciously humiliated for ordering the wrong kind of food at a restaurant.

 

Is it just me, or are all men so poorly disregarded by women?  Sure, when they need to know how to spell something or a poem for some occasion or to go out on a rainy day and pick up two bananas, one mostly yellow with a little green and one mostly green with a little yellow – they come right to me.  But when it comes to driving, dressing, directions or common sense, they avoid me like Harvey Weinstein.  Am I that useless?  (This is the part where you e-mail poor, helpless old Michael and tell him how respected and important and loved he is.)

 

I know you’re enjoying the World Series, even though your favorite team might not be there.  And speaking of baseball and Harvey Weinstein, I hear Harvey is going to manage a new Major League Baseball team next year, the San Quentin Felons.  Their uniforms are striped and some of these guys actually stole second base.  The pitcher and catcher are known as the Aggravated Battery.  When they announce the lineup, these guys really get in a lineup.  How many more do you want?  The numbers on the back of their uniforms read 5 to 10 or 20 to life. 

 

Here’s the roster: Enos Manslaughter, Barry Bondsman, Ernie Banksrobber, Don Larceny, Roger Clemency, Babe Ruthless and Johnnie Benchwarrant.

 

Ok, maybe you should cancel the nice e-mail after that last bit.  Our Weekly Word is vilify, which means to speak or write about someone in an abusive and insulting manner.  I probably deserve that instead.

 

I’ve made a momentous decision.  I don’t drink any more, but I’ve decided I should be allowed to drink on holidays, like Thanksgiving or Christmas.  Or Easter. Or Passover. Today is National Cliché Day, but we’ve heard that before and Tomorrow is National Skeptics Day, but who believes that?  Actually, both are true and sound like great reasons to celebrate with a drink.  No, I’m only teasing.  Besides, to be honest and with all due respect, the fact of the matter is that I basically avoid cliches like the plague.

 

And how about toilets?  Have you ever looked inside a toilet tank?  Inside this sleek and shiny porcelain receptacle, perfect for the sanitary and odorless elimination of human waste, Kleenex, toenails and eyebrow-pencil shavings, rests the most arcane, jerry-rigged, Rube Goldberg collection of junk imaginable.  Chains and plastic rods and rubber balls jammed inside in such a delicate configuration that the smallest tremor will make the chain detach from the plastic rod or the rubber ball lodge against the side wall or any number of other fatal calamities.

 

This is the 21^st Century, the age of the Internet and the iPhone and the self-driving automobile.  Where are the geniuses of today?  Where is the Bill Gates of plumbing?  Where is Elon Flush?  We have mapped the human genome.  Why can’t we invent a toilet that isn’t filled with non-replaceable, non-interchangeable, non-transferable refuse that looks like it came out of a Fat Albert cartoon?  Well, what do you expect from a device invented by a man named Crapper?  (Thomas Crapper, 1836-1910)

 

The King in Alice in Wonderland advised Alice to “Begin at the beginning, and go on till you come to the end: then stop.”  And so I shall.  But not before I remind you to stay well and count your blessings.  Have a lovely.  See you next week.

 

Michael                                    Send comments to mfox1746@gmail.com