Blog # 315                                         March 23, 2023

 

O, wind, if winter comes, can spring be far behind? – Percy Bysshe Shelley

 

Percy certainly had it right.  Spring is here, and with Spring come blossoms, warm showers, longer days, protests.  Students around the world skip school to demand action on climate change.  Paris students protest retirement laws.  Am I missing something?  When did we decide that we should encourage 13-year-olds to take over the world?  Think about that.  Teenagers?  Vaping, drugs, twitter, messy rooms, rings in their eyebrows, Spring Break in Miami!  We want them making decisions for the planet?  They can’t even find two socks that match.

 

When I was thirteen, my mission was to realize how much I did not know and to do my best to learn some of it so I could earn a living and raise a new generation.  Now, it seems to me, children are taught that they can do anything they want, be anything they can be and that it’s ok to spend their lives sitting in a puddle, painting eggshells while other people pay for their food and internet access.  

 

And what sort of parents allow their teens to skip school and march with profane signs and get arrested?  The people who should be out there marching and carrying signs are us old folks.  Signs like GREY IS BEAUTIFUL, OLD LIVES MATTER, or my favorite -- WE’RE OLD AND WE’RE COLD – WE LOVE GLOBAL WARMING.

 

Message from Shakespeare:  In springtime, the only pretty ring time, when birds do sing (As You Like It).  I love the Spring because Pops opens the porch windows and I get to watch and listen to the birds.  Birds are beautiful, especially fried.  Purr.

 

Congratulate me, my student loan was approved.  Do you get those phone calls?  My student loan was approved, my credit card is compromised, hearing aids are on sale and there’s an old woman in Nigerian who wants to send me two million dollars.  How do they find me?  They must think I’m one sandwich short of a picnic. Maybe they found out that each Monday I stand in a tanning booth at Dr. Skin’s office, in my boxers, reciting The Raven.  Seriously, what lunatic fool would memorize 108 lines about a ghastly, grim and ancient bird who could only say one archaic word?  Now you know what you’re dealing with. 

 

Last Monday, however, I didn’t go because I awoke not feeling too great – a little sour stomach and what not.  It was the kind of morning that if I were nine or ten, I would have whined, “Mommy, I don’t feel so good.”  Actually, I was a precocious little nerd and would have used the word “well” instead of “good”.  My mother would have let me stay home from school, and if she thought it was bad enough, she would have called the doctor.  Doctors made house calls back then, but I wasn’t afraid of the doctor.  I was afraid of Nadine.  She was the nurse who showed up at my house and chased me around the bed with a needle.  I was petrified of getting a shot, but Nadine always won.

 

I’m over my fear of shots now.  After all, I’ve had dozens of shots in my eyes alone.  But I still am anxious about having my blood drawn.  The nurses are nice and get me to talk about my grandchildren to take my attention away from the needle, but even though they are young and friendly, any woman with a needle reminds me of Nadine.

 

Have I said hi there and welcome back?  I hope you’re feeling well and enjoying March Madness.  No, not protest marches.  March Madness means basketball, in case you’ve been living in the back seat of an Edsel for the past 60 years.  My daughters attended Duke, Princeton and Indiana, all of which had teams in the tournament, so there was plenty to root for.  Go Blue Devils, Tigers and Hoosiers.  All three won their first game, but now only Princeton is left.  My family has over 40 years of higher education among us, and all we care about is basketball.

 

And who publishes the brackets and keeps track of our special Fox NCAA Pool and even donates the prizes?  Me, of course.  Keeping track is what I do best.  It’s my métier -- keeping track, keeping score, keeping records.  I am the Count of Accounting, the Prince of Precision, The Earl of Anal.  Long live the Earl.

 

Weekly Word:  Métier is a great word.  It means an occupation or activity that someone is very good at.

 

I’m feeling better now.  My sour stomach is gone, but I’m becoming a bit nervous about the news.  Every day is an escalation of the war in Ukraine, and every day brings more news about the instability in the banking industry.  It’s beginning to feel like the crisis of 2008, which was about as much fun as having your fingernails pulled out.  Money talks, doesn’t it?  It’s a shame all mine ever said was “goodbye”.  And I honestly don’t trust our government to tell us the truth, let alone come up with a solution.

 

We’re sending Ukraine all our tanks

We have no more trust in our banks

It’s worse every day

What does Washington say?

More Government! I say no thanks.

 

I just bought Lucy a birthday present.  Lucy is Grandchild #8, lives in California and will be 10.   Did I go to three toy stores, walk up and down the aisles, choose something and take out my credit card, schlep the package home, wrap it up, attach an address label, drive to the post office, wait in line and pay $20 to ship it to California?  No, I pushed six buttons with my formerly nicotine-stained fingers and it was done.  Five minutes, free shipping.  And that’s why TOYS Я US Я GONE.

 

I have a box with cut-out newspaper headlines I thought were interesting.  I found one (and it’s real) that read:  FOUR DEAD WHEN SKYDIVING PLANE CRASHES AT GEORGIA AIRPORT.  It was a skydiving plane -- why didn’t they jump out?  I guess they were too busy reading my blog.  Stay well, count your blessings and come back next week – unless you are skydiving.  If you are, stay away from the Space Needle and the Empire State Building.  Ouch!

 

Michael                                             Send comments to mfox1746@gmail.com