Blog #467                                         February 19, 2026

 

While driving around the other day, I saw a sign.  It was a green sign, which always indicates some official message like how far it is to the next town or which dead Highway Patrol officer the street is dedicated to.  This sign said “WILDLIFE VIEWING AREA” with an arrow and an image of binoculars.  It is a sad sign really.  Its obvious translation is: “A few miles down this road we actually found a place with a few animals left.  Bring your binoculars because there aren’t that many and they stay pretty much away from the road.  And hurry!  There’s a new Cracker Barrel coming next spring.”  Pretty soon the only animals left will be at the zoos and no-one will remember how they evolved or became extinct.

 

Message from Shakespeare, the three-legged cat:  Thou callest me a dog before thou hast cause. But since I am a dog, beware my fangs (Merchant of Venice).      Why is he looking for other animals?  Am I not enough?  Is he going to bring another animal to live here?  He’d better have good health insurance.  Purr.

 

I’ve always loved animals, even fish.  For years, I had a tropical fish tank in my home office.  They were so pretty!  I used to leave the television on for them.  Their favorite shows were Dancing with the Starfish, Eel of Fortune and Orange Roughy is the New Black Roughy.  Or I would just put on a tape of South Pacific.  Their favorite song, of course, was Salmon Chanted Evening.  I had a cat named Misty at the time, and Misty loved to sit next to the tank and watch the fish.  One day, she inadvertently rubbed the heater control and the fish were cooked to death.  Sad.

 

And speaking of animals, when the St. Louis Zoo opened a new grizzly bear exhibit a couple of years ago, Huck and Fin, the grizzlies, tried to get out, digging under the glass that separates them from the tourists.  The exhibit was closed while the enclosure was reinforced.  Shame on those Terrible Teddies, those Silly Smokies, those Bad News Bears – trying to break out of a cage!  What were they thinking of?  Probably freedom.

 

Whole Foods cares about animals.  It has terrific presentation and a wonderful prepared-foods department and it is totally attractive and hip and “in”.  But come on!  Some of the hype that goes on in there is ridiculous.  There was a cooler case with a sign that read “Five-Star Animal Welfare Rating”.  Ok, the sign made me wander over to inspect just how well the animals had been treated.  They looked dead to me.  Not only dead, but dismembered and shrink-wrapped.  One package of shrink-wrapped body parts said “Fresh Young Chicken”.  Seriously? If that doesn’t bring up a scene of intense, bloody cruelty, nothing does.  Here’s a gaggle of fresh young chicks in the prime of youth with their whole lives to look forward to – snatched, butchered and pulled to pieces.  Do visions of Jeffrey Epstein come to mind?  But we were kind to these “Fresh Young Chicks”.  We played Mozart for them and old Foghorn Leghorn cartoons before we ripped their bodies to pieces.  How humane!  Pass the barbecue sauce.

 

Hi there and welcome back.  I hope you are feeling well and enjoying all the special days of this special week.  Saturday was Valentine’s Day; Monday was Presidents Day; Tuesday was Fat Tuesday (in French, that’s Mardi Gras); Wednesday was Ash Wednesday and today is Limerick Oyster Day.  Aren’t you happy?  Let’s get to it.

 

Have I told you about my brother?  I’m sure I have.  He was one of the wackiest people I have ever known, lovable, but eccentric in the extreme.  For instance, he did not eat during the day, only at night.  Maybe he was a vampire.  I was throwing out the trash today when I saw a clump of lint Carol had taken from the dryer.  It made me think of my brother.  He never threw out lint.  Instead, he saved it and used it to stuff his chairs at home to make them softer.

 

Just tell me, to win all the money,

Who acts most peculiar and funny?

I’ll give you a hint

He recycles lint

And never eats food when it’s sunny.

 

I am not making any of this up.  I don’t have to make up weird stories about my brother.  Sometimes I think he may have been a Klingon.  He abnegated spending more money than necessary, so when he was suffering from the last throes of cancer, I would take him grocery shopping.  First, we had to go to a farmer’s market for grapes.  Then we had to go to Aldi’s.  Have you ever read Dante’s Inferno?  There’s a chapter about grocery shopping in Hell that was patterned after the Aldi experience.  No carts, no brand names, no bags, no personnel above the Cro-Magnon level, and a thousand crazed, impoverished souls fighting over the last carton of generic taco shells.  From there, we moved up the food-chain to Shop n Save.  They’re so cheap, they couldn’t even afford all the letters in their own name.  And then we were finished, three different stores to spend a total of $7.75.  How much could he have saved?  A quarter?  He wasn’t just from a different planet.  He was his own planet.  He died in 2001.

 

Weekly Word:  Abnegate means to renounce or reject something.

 

Recently, I was driving with two of our grandchildren and Carol in the back seat. They were loud and raucous, so she created a challenge.  “Let’s see if we can go for a whole minute without talking.”  I was appointed the official timer, but I knew we would never make it to the finish line, and I knew who would lose.  About 35 seconds in, Carol started talking.  You’ve heard of The Elf on the Shelf?  My wife is The Yak in the Back.  I think the 35 seconds was actually a new record for her.

In the 1850s, German physicist Rudolf Clausius proved the impossibility of Perpetual Motion.   But old Rudy never met my Whirling Dervish.

 

Oops, gotta go.  Carol is calling me.  I’m late, I’m late, no time to say “Goodbye-Hello”.  But time enough to say stay well and count your blessings.  See you in a week.

 

Michael                                    Send comments to mfox1746@gmail.com 

 

 

 

Blog #466                                February 12, 2026

 

Do you remember our Weekly Word last week?  It was philippic, and it meant a bitter attack or tirade. Well, I’m about to go on one.  Fasten your seatbelts.  The Winter Olympics have begun, but I can’t get excited about them.  Here’s why:

 

·        I am currently at home watching Olympic Curling.  That’s the event where they slide a big rock (which they call a stone) down the ice while sweeping its path with a broom (which they call a broom).  It’s played like Shuffleboard or Bocce and has all the excitement of a Lawrence Welk accordion solo.  I know you have to be good to compete, but would you call that “athletic prowess”?  Should darts be an Olympic sport?  Or chess?  How about canasta?  To me, Curling is a Winter Olympic embarrassment. 

·        And some of the newer events are too strange and silly for me.  Seriously, skiing should be one event – Downhill.  The one who gets there first wins.  I like things simple.  But now there is skiing with little zig-zags, skiing with big zig-zags, skiing over bumps, skiing over bumps while doing somersaults.  There’s skiing and shooting.  Now there’s a sport for you! It’s called Biathlon.  Ski for an hour, then start shooting the guy ahead of you.  That’s what the Darwinian spirit is all about.  It certainly isn’t about survival of the sweeper.

·        Many Winter Olympic events, Bobsled, Luge, Ski Jumping are nothing but a combination of nerve and gravity.  I know they take skill, but they’re just not interesting to watch.

·        Snoop Dog is an honorary torch bearer.  Yes, the same Snoop Dog that gave us the lyrics "Bitches ain't sh*t but hoes and tricks” and other wholesome and memorable obloquies.  Maybe we should let Harvey Weinstein sell T-shirts and Bill Cosby give out the medals.

·        I don’t like sports that are decided by style and grace.  Ice skating, for instance.  The Olympic Motto is Faster, Higher, Stronger.  It is not Cuter, Biggest Smile, Best Hair-do.   The gold medal for the downhill skiing event is given to the skier who gets to the finish line the fastest.  Nobody cares what he (or she) is wearing, or whether he’s got his fingers in his ears or his hand up his ass.  Get there first and you win!

 

While curling contestants are sweeping

It’s Snoop Doggie’s lyrics I’m bleeping

If I have to choose

Between watching the Luge

And taking a nap – I’ll be sleeping.

 

And what does my wife think?  It’s always fun watching the events with Carol.  We were watching the figure skating last night.  The announcers – you know, the blonde lady and the guy whose hair looks like a pineapple?  Well, these announcers were describing the triple flippers and the quadruple moocows and the quintuple lollipops.  The skaters were magical, flying down the ice and soaring through the air.  And you know what Carol said?  “I don’t like her outfit.”  These skaters have practiced for thousands of hours – exercised, suffered, sacrificed.  They are superb and seasoned athletes.  But one polka-dot out of place?  Get the hook!

 

Message from Shakespeare, the three-legged cat:  That is my home of love (Sonnet 109).  Cats have a winter sport.  It’s called Purr-ling.  We slide a dead mouse across the kitchen floor until it gets stuck under the refrigerator.  I’m not good at Purr-ling because I’m missing a leg, but I used to like watching the other cats play back at the shelter.  I’m really happy to be away from the shelter and living in my wonderful home.  Thank you, Pops.  Purr.

 

Hi there and welcome back.  I hope you are feeling well.  Did you enjoy the Super Bowl?  How about Bad Bunny?  Or was it Kid Rock?  What have we come to in this country?  We cannot have a State of the Union address by the President without having a Response by the opposition.  Now, we can’t even have a Super Bowl halftime show without having an alternative performer on a different station.  Do we have to protest everything?  Is it just because Bad Bunny speaks Spanish?  Well, actually, Football is basically an American sport, though they play a version of it in Canada, and the Super Bowl is one of the most celebrated days of the year.  I think it was pretty strange to have the halftime entertainment in Spanish.  I’ve heard that next year, they’re planning to sing the Star-Spangled Banner in Spanish.  It starts:  Jose, can you see?  To tell the truth, who cares what language he performs in?  He could speak English, Spanish, Vietnamese or Esperanto and I still wouldn’t know what he was talking about. 

 

Here’s something I care about –shingles.  A friend of mine just got shingles.  I’ve had it before. What a ridiculous name for a disease!  It sounds like some kind of building material, as if the doctor said you had acute drywall.  Or hardening of the concrete or a pain in the asphalt.  There actually is a medical condition very much akin to construction, and a lot of my friends have it.  It’s called having a screw loose.

 

And speaking of names for diseases, I think history will come to show that constant cell-phone usage will prove to have been a mistake.  I see those teen-aged thumbs texting and clicking and clacking four miles a minute and I just know in a few years there will be some disability attributable to it all.  So naturally I have begun to come up with some names.  It pays to think ahead.   How about:  Thummy-ache or Digitalis or even Textually Transmitted Disease?

 

Back to the Super Bowl.  It’s just me, I’m sure, but I couldn’t seem to understand what the Super Bowl commercials were trying to promote.  There were a lot of graphics and movement and music, but when it was all over, I didn’t know what they were selling.  Except the Budweiser ad, of course.  I loved the little Clydesdale.

 

Obloquy, of course, is our Weekly Word.  An obloquy is strongly condemnatory and abusive language.

 

I have to go now; I’m exhausted.  Being clever and witty tires me out.  And thank goodness I can’t hear any of your smart-aleck comments to that!  Maybe I’ll write next week’s issue in Spanish.  Let’s see how you like that, mis amigos.  Hasta luego, stay well and count your blessings.

 

Conejito Malo                                    Send comments to mfox1746@gmail.com

 

 

 

Blog #465                                February 5, 2026

 

I had a slice-and-dice session with Dr. Skin.  It was a basil-cell thingy and she sliced it off and cauterized the wound.  Her young associate actually performed the procedure, and had asked me beforehand if I had a pacemaker or defibrillator.  You see, they were going to cauterize the wound by using an electric charge.  I said, “Whoa, Hoss.  I have (pointing to my chest) a pacemaker, a defibrillator and a 26-inch flat-screen in there and if you set one of them off, it will not be pleasant.” 

 

Your fancy electric device

Might shock me and that isn’t nice

My heart will go boom

And I’ll light up the room

And my body will turn cold as ice.

 

Dr. Skin said she thought it would be alright, and it was.  It is a sobering fact to realize that the beating of my heart is controlled by a device assembled by the lowest bidder.  Plus, the defibrillator has an internal siren that sounds like a Nazi police car and comes out of my chest.  They test it every once in a while, and, believe me, it is very spooky to hear that Gestapo sound coming from your own chest. I hate the Nazi siren.  I would rather have music; even Nazi music would be better. 

 

Oh no.  I knew this was coming! Now he is going to come up with some stupid list of Nazi songs that he made up.  It’s bad enough we have to read his dumb limericks, now we have to suffer through this stupid thing.  Exactly!  Get over it.  Here they are – Nazi songs!

 

Well It’s Bad, Bad Eva Braun, We’re So Sorry Uncle Adolph, Hitler With Your Best Shot, and yes, I have a favorite: Come On Baby Light My Fuhrer.

 

Welcome back, everyone.  I hope you are feeling well.  Are you fed up with all the political squabbling?  I am, but let’s forget it all for a while and look forward to Spring.  That’s right, it’s February, and that means Spring is around the corner.  Which reminds me – Monday was Groundhog Day and Punxsutawney Phil peeped his furry little head out of his hole.  Let’s see if I remember the rules:  if Phil sees his shadow, it means six more weeks of Winter.  If he doesn’t, it means an early Spring.  If he sees Tom Homan’s shadow, he’ll be deported to Guantanamo Bay.  Do they have groundhogs in Cuba?  Maybe not.  Anyway, Phil popped out, saw his shadow and scurried back in immediately to avoid being interviewed by Don Lemon.

 

Message from Shakespeare:  Come, woo me, woo me, for now I am in a holiday humor.  (The Tempest).  Why an ugly, old groundhog?  Why not a beautiful cat?  We could have Cat Day and I could be St. Louis Shakespeare and everyone could pet me.  Purr.

 

I don’t know what to talk about this week.  No funny stories, no goofy poems, no vitriolic philippics.  Oh, there’s a story actually.  I was reading a biography of Winston Churchill, and the word philippic was used.  I had never encountered that word, so I looked it up.  It means a bitter attack or denunciation, the kind of thing I launch into with you once in a while.  It was such an unfamiliar word, I decided to share it with you as our Weekly Word, which I have just done.  Then, Sunday night, as we – wife, daughters, grandchildren – congregated on Zoom to destroy the Sunday New York Times Crossword Puzzle, we came upon a clue.  Philippic, it read.  No-one had ever heard of it, and neither had I until a few days before, so I told them the definition and we came up with the answer of tirade, which fit nicely into the puzzle.  I thought the coincidence was spooky.

 

I am also reading another book, a novel, and it has a very religious undertone.  God, of course, is referenced as HE.  In last week’s edition, I mentioned God and employed HE.  Carol previews each edition of my blog before I send it to you to make sure I don’t make too many stupid mistakes.  When she read last week’s, she said, “Can’t God be a SHE?”  No, I replied, I’m pretty sure God is a HE.  But there was a Mrs. God.  SHE was the one sitting around reading a book one day when she said, “Honey, it’s really dark in here.  Can’t you turn on a light?”  Let There Be Light boomed out God, and the rest is history.  And don’t ask me what book Mrs. God was reading.  How should I know?

 

Maybe SHE was reading a magazine.  Can you guess the magazine with the largest subscription?  It’s AARP The Magazine.  In second place is AARP Bulletin.  They each have about 23 million readers.  By contrast, Time, National Geographic, Cosmopolitan, Sports Illustrated and Readers Digest each have about 3 million readers.  It seems that AARP has the Old People market under control.  What we need are magazines for Dead People.  Here are a few proposals: Good Hearsekeeping, Corpse Illustrated, Better Plots and Gardens. 

 

I had lunch with a friend yesterday.  Naturally I got there early and, as I patiently sat, reading my book and sipping an iced tea, a lady (my age I suppose) came in and sat at a nearby table.  She told the waiter, “I’m waiting for one more -- short, balding, glasses.”  Is that how we talk about our loved ones when they’re not around?  With some trio of defining characteristics?  Is that how Carol would describe me to a waiter – gray hair, carries a book, Nazi siren coming out of his chest. 

 

When I describe her, it’s always in glorious and adoring superlatives – I’m waiting for a beautiful dark-haired woman.  I would never say, “I’m waiting for one more – short, walks fast, won’t like the table.”  Anyway, when this lady’s husband came in, I knew him immediately from his wife’s description.  He was short and nondescript and lost and generally husband-looking.  I almost just waved at him and pointed him to his wife’s table.  But he found her.  We always do.

 

That’s all, folks.  Another normal week – Nazi music and magazines for dead people.  And you keep coming back?  There must be something wrong with you.  See you next week.  Stay well and count your blessings.

 

Michael                                    Send comments to mfox1746@gmail.com