Blog #355                                         December 28, 2023

 

Has a stranger ever come up to you and said, “You’re an Oyster”?  We recently went to a fine seafood restaurant for dinner and had a lovely meal, after which I excused myself to use the restroom.  I found the quiet little hallway with the two facing doors, but they were not marked MEN and WOMEN.  Nor LADS and LASSIES.  Nor CABALLEROS and SEÑORITAS.  Nope, some clever little seafood person had decided to label them PEARLS and OYSTERS.  Ok, cute, but now what?  Pearls or oysters?  Was I missing something? I stood there feeling like Monty Hall had just found a hard-boiled egg in my shoe and was giving me the choice of Door #1 or Door #2.  I must have looked sufficiently confused because a waitress passed by, glanced at me and said (you guessed it), “You’re an Oyster”.

 

Duh, I thought, knocking myself in the head, of course I’m an oyster.  I’m the Limerick Oyster.  In fact, I’m your Limerick Oyster, the aged and addlepated clown who has been sending you strange thoughts and stranger limericks for 355 weeks.  Aren’t you tired of me yet?  No?  Good, let’s get started.

 

Hi there and welcome back.  I hope you’re feeling well.  Are you making New Year’s resolutions?  Don’t.  Here’s why:

 

·        First:  you’ll forget them

·        Second:  most of you are so set in your ways that you’re not going to change anyway

·        Third:  as Mr. Rogers said, “There’s no person in the whole world like you, and I like you just the way you are.” 

 

Writing that first paragraph about “fine” restaurants made me recall a fancy French place we went to years ago.  Funny, but the only thing I remember about the place was the bill.

 

At a French café eating your fill

In two ways could turn out to kill

If the duck and paté

Do not put you away

Then the check at the end surely will.

 

Whenever I sit at my desk to write stupid limericks to you, Shakespeare likes to watch videos on his computer.  Yes, he has his own computer.  Doesn’t your pet?  I turn it on and start his favorite video, birds and squirrels running around and making bird and squirrel noises.  He can sit there and be enthralled for a couple of hours, during which time several commercials will interrupt the show.  I don’t understand it.  Do they think my cat is going to buy a Medicare Advantage Plan?  Or that he needs a blood thinner?  If not, who else do they think is watching titmouses eating suet?  The only thing I can think of that would be more boring would be a Republican presidential debate.

 

Message from Shakespeare:  Like a dull actor now, I have forgot my part (Coriolanus.)  My favorite movies are The Squirrel with the Dragon Tattoo and Citizen Crane.  And I like the commercials on my computer.  I just signed up for a Capital One credit card.  It was so easy, I could do it all with one paw.  Purr.

 

Our Weekly Word is addlepated.  Someone who is addlepated is mixed up and confused.  That probably describes each of us at some point and me almost every Thursday.

 

My California daughter and her family are in town for the holidays.  California is a real challenge for me, even the simple exercise of grocery shopping.  In California, the produce is on the left.  Everything in California is on the left.  Naturally, I spent more time opening the little cellophane produce bags than I did shopping.  Those little bags were invented by the Marquis de Sade to torture old men by giving them high blood-pressure and angina.  All for an avocado!  I could break into Hunter Biden’s laptop easier than one of those little bags.  No wonder the blood-pressure medication is right next to the asparagus.

 

And nobody speaks English.  I spent 4½ days in California, which means I had been there longer than 60% of its population and was eligible for a driver’s license.  But I survived, thanks to SIRI.  If I didn’t have SIRI, I would have wound up in Tijuana by the end of the first day.  Hola, amigos.  Este Gringo es muy stupido.  If Columbus had had SIRI, he would have found India like he planned and America would not have been discovered.  We’d still be living in teepees and voting for Elizabeth Warren.

 

 

 

I have actually made a New Year’s Resolution.  This year I resolve to do everything my wife tells me, take her everywhere she wants to go, and sit in whatever seat she chooses.  This marks the 57^rd New Year I have made the same resolution.  It saves time.  But I’m not the only one making resolutions.  Here are a few I’ve collected:

 

·        Claudine Gay has resolved to steal an apology that will get her out of trouble.

·        Gavin Newsom has resolved to borrow $68 billion from Florida to cover California’s deficit.

·        Taylor Swift has resolved to become the most popular person in the world.  Wait, that was last year’s resolution.

 

Just another week of laboring in the vineyards of the Lord, as the Pope might say.  I am not Catholic, but also not above borrowing a well-turned Catholic parable, especially at Christmas time.  I hope you had a lovely Christmas, or, if you didn’t celebrate, at least a peaceful day of relaxation.  Wow, Christmas is over already.  The time just flies.  I haven’t even finished x-raying my Halloween candy.

 

And now New Year’s Eve is only a few days away.  Do you remember when we all stayed up until midnight to celebrate the New Year by counting down the seconds at a New Year’s party?  Then, as we got older, we settled for going home, changing into PJs and watching the ball drop on television in New York.  Now, we’re in bed by 9:30 watching an eggroll fall off a table in Hong Kong.  That’s good enough! 

 

I wish you all a wonderful, peaceful and happy New Year.  Thanks for joining me in 2023.  And as for 2024, I’ll be here all year, telling you to stay well and count your blessings and begging you to come back next week.  But I know you will.  How can you resist me?  Maybe I should make a New Year’s Resolution to be more humble.  See you next week.

 

Michael                                             Send comments to mfox1746@gmail.com

 

 

 

 

 

Blog #354                                December 21, 2023

 

Today is the first day of Winter, and Carol and I have made plans to escape by going to Florida in February to mooch on some friends and relatives.  It scares me a little to go to Florida.  I’ve heard of so many people, healthy people in their 60s, who move to Florida and within thirty or forty years, they’re dead.  We’ll try to be careful.

 

But not yet; we’re still here living our humble lives.  I was in Whole Foods this week, shopping with one of my daughters – they all like to eat healthy stuff – when I saw an interesting box with this label attached:

 

This product is sugar free, fat free, sodium free, peanut free and gluten free.  It contains no artificial coloring, artificial flavoring, refined carbohydrates, preservatives, additives or MSG.  It is organic, Vegan, free range, non-GMO and has not been exposed to plastic.

 

I read the label to my daughter and she suggested I open the box to see what it contained.  I did, and here’s what I found.

 

Sorry, the legal fees to create the disclaimer were so high that we could not afford to put any product in the box.  Enjoy.

 

While she went to do some more shopping, I hung around the magazine section. There were some very interesting issues.

 

·        George Santos was on the cover of Cheater’s Digest.

·        Martha Stewart has one that gives tips on how to decorate your prison cell.  It’s called Big-House Beautiful.  She has another one called Better Homes and Wardens.

·        The Proud Boys were on the cover of Popular Fanatics.

·        Taylor Swift was on the cover of Time.

·        Ron DeSantis was on the cover of Out of Time.

 

Message from Shakespeare:  In jest, there is truth (King Lear).  Pops says I should be on the cover of Good Mousekeeping.  Is that a joke?  I don’t think he’s that funny.  Purr.

 

Hi there and welcome back.  I hope you are feeling full of joy and good cheer.  It’s almost Christmas.  My wife wishes you Good Tidings of Whoopi and Joy.  She’s not here right now.  She’s attending her Jewish Princess Continuing Education class.  This week she’s learning how to tell her husband he’s clueless in seventeen different languages.  Next semester, she is teaching a course on How to Find a Round Table in a Square Restaurant. 

 

Christmas is Monday and Santa is checking to see if you have been naughty or nice.  I know that sometimes you think I’m naughty, but actually I am a nice person.  I’ll tell you a story that is absolutely true. About five years ago, I needed to switch dentists because of a change in insurance.  I chose an office that was close by and that other people had recommended, and I called.  I talked with a nice lady named Karen at the desk.  I gave her my information and she told me to bring in my insurance card when I had a chance.  I asked if I needed to bring in anything else.  It was a very hot day, and she said, “Yes, a milkshake.”  She was joking, of course, but I showed up an hour later with my insurance card and a chocolate milkshake from McDonald’s.  Karen and I have been buddies ever since, and she told me I was one of her nicest patients.

 

Don’t grumble or act cold as ice

Don’t be mean or you will pay the price

Just be humble and kind

And I promise you’ll find

That you’ll make way more friends if you’re nice.

 

I am currently reading a book about the symbiotic entanglement of plants and fungi.  “Of course you are,” I hear you cry.  Yes, I am the same idiosyncratic weirdo that you’ve grown to know and love, and that’s what I’m reading.  One night this week, I was driving my 13-year-old grandson, Austin, to soccer practice.  He said, “Pops, whatcha reading?”  So I told him about the fungus book.  Without pausing he calmly said, “I know a mushroom; he’s a fun guy.”  Then I began to describe how the fungi grow underground, and he said, “I bet there’s not mush room down there.”  I still haven’t stopped laughing.  When did my grandson become Henny Youngman?

 

I could give you a thousand Henny Youngman jokes.  I’ll give you one: A man goes to a psychiatrist. The doctor says, "You're crazy" The man says, "I want a second opinion!" "Okay, you're ugly too!"

 

Weekly Word:  Idiosyncratic means peculiar.  And one thing that makes me peculiar is that I keep track of everything.  I’ve been a collector and record-keeper all my life, and have a list of all my credit-card charges and how much I’ve won at poker and the books I’ve read and anything else I can think of.  That’s just me.  When I finished the fungus book, it raised me to 383,000 pages read since 1979.  That’s one page for every person in Baton Rouge, LA.  Thought you’d like to know.

 

As long as this is the Christmas Issue of L.O., I must mention that on Christmas Eve fourteen years ago my heart started racing faster than a Kardashian heading for a camera.  They rushed me to the hospital where they thought I was deader than Chris Christie’s campaign.  They screamed Code Blue and grabbed a Handy-Dandy Defibrillator and shocked me back to life. Fourteen years!  Amazing!

 

How about another Henny Youngman joke?  I said to my wife, 'Where do you want to go for our anniversary?' She said, 'I want to go somewhere I've never been before.' I said, 'Try the kitchen.'

 

Another week, another surprise party, this for a 70-year-old (just a young whipper-snapper).  She is a fun and very enjoyable friend and seemed to have been truly surprised.  It was a nice party.  If you are having a surprise party, don’t tell me.  I might give it away.  But I guess you wouldn’t know if you were having a surprise party just by the nature of the surprise nomenclature.  Did that make any sense?

 

Today’s the shortest day of the year, so I’ve got to go.  But I’ll be back next week, body and solstice.  Till then, stay well, count your blessings and pray for Israel.  And Merry Christmas.

 

One more Henny Youngman line: I'm offended by political jokes. Too often they get elected.

 

Michael                                    Send comments to mfox1746@gmail.com

 

 

 

Blog #353                                December 14^th, 2023

 

It’s been a slow week.  My date with Taylor Swift was cancelled, so I guess I have more time to write to you.  Too bad, I was going to take Taylor bowling.  That’s what Carol and I did on our first date, and we’ve been together 56 years. 

 

Tomorrow will be the end of Hanukkah, that wonderful Jewish holiday that comes between Thanksgiving and Christmas and celebrates the rededication of the Jewish Temple in Jerusalem.  It also commemorates the Hanukkah Miracle by which a small amount of oil, enough to give light for one day, miraculously lasted eight days.  My granddaughter suggested that was akin to having your cellphone work all day on 1% battery charge.  She’s very modern.

 

The celebration lasts eight days, which allows you to spell Hanukkah a different way each day and to receive eight different presents.  Which is why, with all due respect to my Jingle Bell friends, Hanukkah is better than Christmas.  You see, if on Day One of Hanukkah you receive a present from a loved one that is way better than the one you gave her, you have seven more days to go shopping and buy her something appropriate.  But if that should happen on Christmas, you’re out of luck and you’ll be in more trouble than the President of Harvard.

 

I have been very busy with my Hanukkah shopping, and I know I’ve spent way too much money.  Presents are for kids.  Like my grandchildren, like my children, like me.  Women tend to be more mature, so I only got my wife one little thing – one little, practical, inexpensive, boring thing.  She’ll hate it of course.  She probably already knows what it is and wants to return it before I waste my time wrapping it.  She always hates what I get her.  Too bad, because it’s really fun buying people presents.  I saved the receipt. 

 

Hi there and welcome back?  I hope you’re feeling well and looking forward to Christmas, Kwanzaa, New Years and National Monkey Day, which is today.  I’m not sure how to celebrate National Monkey Day, but it sounds more festive than National Ding-A-Ling Day, which was Tuesday.  I’m not making these up, you know.  You celebrate National Ding-A-Ling Day by calling someone you haven’t spoken to in a long time.  I don’t get it.  If I cared about them, I would have called them long before this.

 

No, I’m not being curmudgeonly.  Well, not yet.  National Curmudgeons Day isn’t until January 29^th.  I’m actually feeling kind of chipper this week.  In fact, I’m as happy as a chicken on Thanksgiving morning.  I’m as happy as a dog with two tails.  I’m as happy as a recruiter who gets paid to replace chancellors of Ivy League schools.  Why am I so happy?  Because I did not participate in Cyber Monday.  Did you?  It’s not really a popular holiday for old people.  Especially people like me who think PayPal and eBay are the Scylla and Charybdis of the modern world.  Sorry, I have a penchant for obscure Odyssean references?  I think old people (you know who you are) should have their own set of holidays.  Not Black Friday or Cyber Monday or National Monkey Day.  How about Medicare Monday or Stool Softener Saturday?  I had one for Friday, but I forget.  Oh yes, Forgetful Friday.

 

Message from Shakespeare:  She hath often dreamt of unhappiness, and waked herself with laughing (Much Ado About Nothing).  I am happy as a cat in sunshine.  Pops says that National Cat Day is in October, but to me National Three-Legged Cat Day is every day when you have a nice home and a warm lap to sleep on. Purr.

 

I have found some reasons that old folks should be happy.  We don’t have to get up and go to work, for one.  And then there are the random opportunities to make a little cash.  I was with my daughter at the grocery store, and when we checked out, she got a senior discount because I was with her.  Aha!  I have an idea.  I will stand outside the grocery store with a sign:

 

In the dairy food or lima bean aisle

Or cruising the organic green aisle

Just take this old gent

And you’ll save 10%

For shopping with someone who’s senile.

 

I’ll get half of the savings.  We’ll call it Shop with Pop.   You’ve heard of Aldi’s?  Well, this is Oldies.

 

There was a special on Public Television last week celebrating the last 50 years of Broadway musicals.  One of the songs was Don’t Cry for Me, Argentina from Evita.  The music from Evita is wonderful, but it has never been one of my favorites.  There’s nobody to like in Evita.  Juan Peron was a murdering Fascist pedophile.  Eva was a lying power-hungry whore.  Che was a brutal and dirty Communist.  Not exactly Huey, Dewey and Louie.  I bet they’d fit in perfectly with the people running for President.

 

Weekly Word: Penchant is a strong or habitual liking for something or tendency to do something.  I have a penchant for going to fun parties, and last Saturday, we went to an 80^th birthday party for a friend, an ex-pro football player.  The party was a blast, with a band and BBQ and 200 people.  One of the highlights was the house where the party took place.  It was the home of the Birthday boy’s son and was full of unique features and surprises.  Huge stone fireplaces, outdoor pool and sauna, a party room the size of a basketball court, closets that could house a circus troupe, 77” televisions.  And the best?  Secret rooms.  Two were behind paneled sections that turned out to be secret doors and one, a bar capable of seating 25 people, was accessible by pulling a large painting away from the wall.  It was so exotic, I thought we were in the Bruce Wayne Mansion and the secret doors led to the Bat Cave.  We had a great time.

 

And I hope you had a great time reading this week’s blog.  Stay well, count your blessings and have a wonderful holiday.  May the star on your Christmas Tree shine with love and may your dreidel spin forever.  So pray for Israel and the hostages and be sure to come back to me next week. 

 

Michael                                             Send comments to mfox1746@gmail.com

 

 

 

 

 

Blog #352                                December 7, 2023

 

I just listened to somebody on The View interviewing a young Palestinian man who was one of the victims of the shooting in Vermont.  Funny, I didn’t see them interviewing a Jewish mother who was forced by Hamas butchers to watch her child roasted to death in an oven.  Oh, wait, they couldn’t interview her because Hamas shot her in the head after she watched her baby die.

 

Hi there and welcome back.  I’m sorry to have exposed my anger and frustration to you, but that’s me, and I know you understand.  Besides, you’re my Thursday morning family and I can talk to you.  I hope you’re feeling well.  Let’s see what else we can talk about.  Maybe I can make you laugh.  Somehow, it seems harder to laugh nowadays, but I did make somebody laugh this week.  My bank no longer has tellers.  Instead, you visit a Personal Banking Assistant who sits behind a desk in a little office.  Mine was Charize, and while she was handling a deposit for me, I sneezed.  “I’m sorry,” I said sarcastically, “I must be allergic to all this money you have around here.”  She began to laugh so hysterically that I began to laugh as well.

 

I have not spoken to you since the morning of Thanksgiving, so I have not mentioned all my blessings.  Truly, it is unnecessary to tell you how much I have to be thankful for.  You already know that I have a wife precious beyond compare, three daughters as bright and lively as the stars, two sons-in-law as warm and loyal as long-time friends and eight grandchildren packed with beauty, smiles and love.  Like I said, it is unnecessary to tell you how much I have to be thankful for.  So I won’t.

 

And then there’s you, of course, and I am humbly thankful for a pack of loyal readers bored enough to listen to a silly old man’s musings.  I am often asked how I can come up with something to talk about every week.  Well, Rudyard Kipling said, “All the earth is full of tales to him who listens.”

 

Here’s a tale for you.  Carol and I went to the St. Louis Art Museum last week for an exhibition on Hip Hop and Contemporary Art.  Our Art Museum always does a superb job, and this was an extremely well-done exhibit.  But, let’s be honest, I know as much about Hip Hop as I do about hot-flashes.  And besides, with all that hipping and hopping, I had to be very careful.

 

Carol and I took a trip

To see how they hop and they hip

But this ancient old Pops

Must be careful of hops

If I hop and I hip, I could slip.

 

And if I slip, I could damage some of the artwork in the museum.  I could crease a Matisse, or smear a Vermeer, or squash a Bosch or wreck an El Greco.  And then the museum would sue me and I would lose a lot of Monet.

 

Hip Hop is the cultural expression of the Black and Hispanic communities that has influenced fashion and music and art since the 1970s.  Part of Hip Hop is rapping, which I know nothing about.  But my little buddy does.

 

Message from Shakespeare:  I saw her once hop forty paces through the public street (Antony and Cleopatra).

I’m the kitten who is rappin’ while I’m sittin’ on your lap ‘n you are nappin’.  Don’t forget I’m the pet you can bet is the best one yet.

So let this cat-nappin’, rappin-cat take a bow ‘cause I know how.  I’m leavin’ now.  Meow!

 

That’s enough caterwauling from the silly cat.  I guess we might as well use caterwauling as our Weekly Word.  It means a shrill howling or wailing noise like a cat would make.

 

My goodness, it’s December already, and all the radio stations are playing Christmas music.  That, in itself, is not surprising, but I happened to tune in to what is normally a political talk-show station and what did I hear?  Political Christmas songs!  Who would have thought of such a thing?  Me, of course.  Here they are:

 

·        I Saw Biden Kissing AOC

·        O Kamala Faithful

·        Trump’s Nuts Roasting On an Open Fire

·        Santos Isn’t Coming to Town

 

Hey, you guys out there.  Do you ever feel like a car?  Sometimes I feel that, to a woman, a husband is no more than a useful, easy to maintain appliance – like a car.  All she has to do is fill it up, keep it clean and it will take her anywhere she wants to go.  It will carry her packages, keep her warm and keep the rain off her head.  Sure, there are glitches here and there – a broken axle (hip replacement), a damaged fuel pump (bypass surgery), but she just takes it in for repairs and it’s fine.  The only difference is they don’t give her a loaner.  But that’s ok, I don’t mind.  I’m just glad she hasn’t traded me in for a shiny new model -- yet.  But I’m getting a little tired of being called Edsel.

 

Here’s something that’s not funny.  I went to a Breadco and placed an order to go.  The young girl who took the order asked for a name.  Michael, I said.  What did you want me to say, Edsel?  The order was ready quickly and the man who read the ticket called out the name Michelle.  Could that be Michael, I asked?  He showed me the ticket.  It read MIKELLL.  And you want to raise the minimum wage?  What exactly should we pay a 15-year-old who can’t spell the single most common name in the English-speaking world?  She probably thought Manual Labor was the President of Mexico and likely didn’t know what night Saturday Night Live was on.  Have you ever noticed that all the machines used to discover intelligent life are pointed away from Earth.

 

Ok, that’s it.  I’m through with you, and you’re happily through with me.  I will not lighten your spirits or tickle your brain for another week.  Today is Pearl Harbor Day and the beginning of Hanukkah.  Stay well, count your blessings and celebrate Hanukkah with a prayer in your heart for Israel and the hostages.  Can you do all that?  Multitask!  See you next week.

 

Edsel                                                 Send comments to mfox1746@gmail.com