Let's See What Matty Has To Say...

New place to View

2009-02-02T06:42:00.000-08:00

Mortgage business has kept me so busy that I haven't had the time for weekly ideas. I am submitting some to the Orland Park Prairie newspaper ans on-line paper. www.opprairie.com under the Opinion section is where you can find my work every 2-3 weeks. There's a new one there today. So adjust your viewing destination. Thanks.

The Right Tool For the Job

2008-12-11T22:09:00.000-08:00

The upcoming holiday season is a very special time for most people. The next few weeks will be filled with decorating, shopping, angrily uttering dirty expletives while decorating and shopping, and for some, abusing their children by forcing them to sit on the lap of a fat, bearded stranger, dressed in red, ho-ho-ing their kids into future therapy sessions. It’s also a time, when people whom normally satiate their desire for baked goods with a visit to the local grocery store bakery, lose their minds and start baking anything that’ll rot your teeth and add an extra compartment to your already impressive saddle bags. Unfortunately, I am not impervious to such manic bouts with creating scrumptious, Yule Tide pastries, pie, in particular…food of the Gods and the chubby. In order to make the perfect pie from scratch, one must possess the proper tools to handle such a delicate job. That’s when I turn to the drawer in the kitchen I usually avoid the other 11 months of the year; the utensil drawer.

Oh, who am I kidding? Like you, I have more than 1 drawer housing these never used, bizarre gadgets, which I felt compelled to buy, after a few drinks and a heaping pile of guilt served up from an exploitative, friend hosting a Pampered Chef party. We have 2 drawers which can barely contain the twisted, shiny crap. One drawer holds the devices and tools which we use more frequently than drawer 2’s useless devices. Let’s first compare drawer 1, shall we?

3 spatulas: I only have 2 hands and plan on keeping it that way for the foreseeable future. I can’t find any situation where I’d be required to work 3 spatulas with only 2 hands. And honestly, I barely have the coordination to hold a bowl and work a spatula simultaneously. Besides, the only reason to use a spatula is to scrape of the extra batter or frosting so you can shove it your mouth when no one is looking. Fingers work just as well. I’m more of a face-in-the-bowl-probing-tongue-guy myself. Oh, very important…1 spatula must have a curled, burnt end from where you put it in a hot pan and were too lazy to throw it away.

2 can openers: The more modern looking one, I haven’t quite figured out how to use and the other one, looks like I went back in time, circa 1971, and stole it from my parent’s utensil drawer.

2 wooden spoons: Mom used to smack the hell out of me and my sisters with her wooden spoons. We use ours to grow dangerous bacteria in the porous wood fibers and to make anything you sample, via the spoon, taste like you’re chewing on a popsicle stick.

1 potato masher: Bulky and odd shaped, it’s never used because we make instant potatoes. Its’ sole purpose is to get entangled with other objects and piss me off by jamming the drawer.

11 knives of differing shapes and sizes bought from a late night infomercial: I’m guilty on 2 fronts there, as I have Ginsu’s and an enviable collection from Ron Popeil. Mock if you must, my surplus of cooking shanks, but I’m quite prepared if ever attacked by the cast of “West Side Story.”

1 knife sharpener: Guaranteed to whittle off dangerous, tiny bits of metal shavings into your families food, all in the name of having a knife that can saw through a tin can, then slice a freakishly, thin tomato slice.

An ice cream scoop: Filled with dangerous anti-freeze, so the impatient diet-breaker can carve through a frozen block of “Cherry Garcia” without having to wait a whole 2 minutes for a natural thaw.

A giant turkey baster: It’s that plastic tube with the rubber bulb on the end of it. It looks like a gigantic version of the gizmo we utilized to suck boogers out of my infant daughter’s nose. I have never seen anyone baste a turkey. Most people use this to suck off excess fat. Why? What the hell are you doing!?! Fat is flavor…cooking 101.

Meat mallet: This is used to tenderize your meat and impress people with your skills in preparing succulent dishes. TIP: Lose the mallet and impress your friends by forking over a few extra pennies for edible cuts of meat, rather than beating your meal into something palatable by means of construction tools.

Aside from a smattering of other strange devices, that about covers utensil drawer number 1.

Drawer number 2 is where we keep the utensils we’ll need when Hell freezes over. They seemed like a worthy purchase at the time but booze tends to lower your inhibitions, making pinching the ass of your best friend’s wife and buying stupid kitchen junk really cool things to do!

8 pairs of corn on the cob holders: Back in the day, these were cleverly shaped like little ears of corn. Genius! We have these green, cork screw things that are impossible to screw into a piping, hot ear of corn. We’ve never used them… but we have them… in case a visiting dinner guest simply can’t proceed with the meal until he/she has something to protect their digits from nasty buttery corn. Chances are I will punch them in the throat for being a pain in the ass, well before the meal is over.

4 dwarfed, pudgy butter knives with carved fruit handles: One day of the year, we serve an appetizer that can be spread on something else. It’s comforting to know we have these hideous things.

6 metal shish-kabob skewers: Metal skewer + hot grill + dopey host, half-way through a twelve pack = blistered hand and a pool full of k-bobs.

Hard-boiled egg slicer: Good for putting the finishing touches on a Cobb salad. We’ve had one for 16 years now…the welling, anticipation of that first, damn Cobb salad is almost more than I can handle. I’m sure we’ll put that to use one of these decades.

Not 1, but 2, count ‘em, 2 melon ball scoops!: I like to carve watermelon into chunks as big as the heads of the kids whom are eating it. The melon ball scoop is only used when I’m feeling randy and re-enact the “Aunt Jemiamah treatment” scene from “Stripes.”

An assortment of twisted, wacky, plastic straws: Ok…I use these.

Plastic popsicle forms: We spent $12 on 10 pieces of 2 cent plastic, so we can make popsicles that cost about $4 for 100 in the local store. So did you!

5 giant clips for sealing chip bags: Never been used in our house as an opened bag of chips is an eaten bag of chips. I put the clips in my hair sometimes to act like a sissy man and bum out my daughter. I do that a lot.

2 broken meat thermometers: I don’t tell guests they’re broken. I place one in cooked meat, pretend to be reading the meter, confidently announce, “and yes, that’s it…perfect…let’s eat!” Then I pray no one gets worms or Dysentery from eating undercooked meat.

And that about covers it. I feel liberated, openly sharing what we have in our utensil drawers. Honesty does that for people. As long as we’re being honest, I must confess a falsehood I said earlier about pie. I don’t make pie. I eat pie but since my famous second grade mud-pies, I’ve never made one. Strange…isn’t it. A guy with all those tools and doesn’t make pie. A rational person would throw out all that crap but I can’t. You never know when friends will pop over this holiday season, aching for corn on the cob-shaped ice cream melon balls, toting kids with boogery noses and in need of a good ass slapping with a wooden spoon. I love the holidays.

Great To Be Back!!!!!

2008-12-05T11:24:00.000-08:00

Just got back this week from Thanksgiving vacation and was hit head on by a pile of work from the unbelievably low interest rates. I'll have this week's blog up Saturday morning. Tell your friends. Feel free to contact me about the rates as well, if you or somebody else wants to take advantage of theses historic lows! matt@promortgagepartners.com

Growing Pains

2008-11-21T09:17:00.001-08:00

I apologize for skipping last week’s installment but I was physically unable to write and I’ll explain why a bit later. Moving forward, throughout my childhood, I suffered the same pains most children endured as part of our natural progression toward acne and body hair. Somehow, I managed to survive the torment of K-Mart clothes, my mother’s ability to synthesize odd foods into “casseroles” and the dawning of music from “The Captain and Tennille.” The worst youthful pain I was forced to bear came courtesy of the senseless, unprovoked violence from the sixth grade bully at St. Michael’s Elementary School, whom we'll call Bernie. Actually, his name was Bernie but I’ll withhold his last name in case he ever hears of this and wants to kill me.

As young minds are prone to do, the rumor mill was cranked up in high gear, when it came to stories about Bernie and his upbringing. Some say he shot his neighbor’s dog with a 12 gauge shotgun. Other’s said he lived in a wooden shack on the outskirts of town and everyday, ate a breakfast of cold, White Castle hamburgers and his granny’s ox-tail soup. I tend to believe this last rumor, as Bernie had a knack for dispelling gas with such ferocity that I’ve witnessed first-hand, classmates vomiting and small children crying from breathing in the noxious fumes. As I said, Bernie was the class bully and proudly executed the duties which were inherent to holding such a prestigious office. Aside from the usual recess beatings he randomly administered to unsuspecting 5th and 6th graders, he had a signature move, uniquely his own, which he violently shared with just about anyone he came in contact with. He employed this technique when he was running short on time and couldn’t devote the proper time and concentration to give you a full-blown ass-kicking. He called it a “jap-slap.” Obviously, political correctness was not high on Bernie’s list of desired traits and to remind him of this meant certain death. The slap was simply an open-handed whack upside the back of your head, which accelerated the brain into the front of your skull, resulting in double vision for the next ten minutes. The only response to the jap-slap was a nervous laugh while hiding the pain, “Huh, huh, huh…good one, Bern! Huh, huh, huh.” Then you prayed he found a new victim. He’d also accompany the slap with phrases that were complete gibberish but still managed to scare the crap out me. My favorite was,

“Hey Red! You need discipline…like Buffy, you round-headed wall-swamper!” Then he’d blast the back of my head and I tried not to cry. I discovered the “Buffy” he referred to was his dog. Just what the hell a wall-swamper is, and a round headed one no less, I’ll never know. Although Bernie inflicted pain with a style all his own, the schoolyard bully, in general, was something most of us suffered. As time passed, a new “bully” emerged to replace Bernie and with it, came a whole new world of pain. I’m referring to the onset of old age.

Recently, I’ve suffered some fine examples of once previously harmless activities, which have now caused me unbelievable pain. Perhaps you’ve experienced something similar. For example, last winter I made my way to the couch for a Saturday afternoon of sitting. As I stepped between the couch and the ottoman, I felt a soft presence with my foot but was unable to see what I was about to crush because of the darkness and armful of gooey, snacks blocking my vision. As a pet owner there are certain rules you must adhere to. If you step on something soft and you’re not sure what it is, assume it’s a paw and take immediate action to step elsewhere. With my cat-like reflexes, I did just that. Quickly, I shifted my weight off the paw with a slight leap…2 or 3 inches…tops. That tiny leap was more than enough to pop my hamstring! It didn’t twinge, strain or stretch…it popped! Somehow I managed to safely set down the snacks, then I proceeded to hop around the family room on one leg, swearing at the dog and accusing her of “doing it on purpose.” I don’t know which was more embarrassing…the fact that I was seriously implicating our dog in a conspiracy to harm me by sleeping on the floor or that while in agony, I first sought to make sure not to spill my food. I had a black and blue bruise, from the back of my knee, all the way up to my butt cheek. When people inquired as to why I was limping, I thought it best to lie and tell them I did it during my daily 5 mile run. Unfortunately, people aren’t stupid and my ruse fooled no-one…but they were polite, kept there mouths shut and didn’t press me for the truth.

A few months ago, while mopping the kitchen floor, I noticed a stubborn piece of funk stuck to the area of floor I had just cleaned. I bent over to scratch off the offending speck with my fingernail and when I stepped on the damp floor, all hell broke loose. My right foot quickly slid across the floor, while my left foot remained stationary and although I hadn’t had any formal training or instruction at any level, I found myself involuntarily performing a less-than-perfect splits. Again, with cat-like reflexes, I managed to manipulate my body to avoid the impending slamming of my genitals on the freshly cleaned kitchen floor. With the dexterity and fluidity of an overstuffed sack of dirty laundry, I came to a flopping crash on the floor. As I lay there, I found myself doing what most people over the age of 30 do, after any kind of fall. Before getting up, I stopped and starting from my head and slowly working my way down, I gave myself a diagnostic check to see if all functions were operating at normal capacity.

“Ok…I can move my head…neck feels alright…both arms seem to be functioning…stomach…stomach feels a bit soft…gotta work on that…legs are moving…okay…I’m good to go.” Only after this examination could I have attempted to get up, for fear something may have been broken or leaking. Some falls, I’ve heard…never experienced myself, can actually make the “fallee” pass gas on impact, which brings up a whole other level of embarrassment. My fall was thankfully void of rectal fireworks but it did put a hurtin’ on my groin muscles. Word to the wise…mopping is dangerous and should be avoided at all costs.

This brings to me why I missed last week’s blog and my most recent example of adulthood pain. I planned on writing the blog last Saturday afternoon, right after doing some yard work. After completing my yard work, I discovered the new “bully” hell-bent on making my life miserable. It’s the common leaf rake. All I had to do was rake up and bag a backyard full of leaves. Sounds pretty simple. After a few minutes of raking, I deduced an increase in speed would make the chore go a whole lot faster. So, I spent the next hour raking like a madman…sweat pouring off my face, cheeks all red and hot…both sets of cheeks, I might add. From my chest, my heart was pounding out a loud, deep, resonating tone which sounded like the vibrating base of a punk teenager’s car stereo system. I stared death in the face and beat him back with a rake and a good lathering of sweat coming from bad places. After completing my task and a long period of still-time to recover, I tried to get up to write my blog…“tried” being the operative word here. From what I was experiencing, I somehow managed to snap my neck. My lower back on the right side was completely seized up and in direct correlation; my left ass cheek was on fire. I couldn’t move. All this pain from raking leaves…unbelievable!

It’s tough getting old but it’s something we all have to deal with. If I’ve learned anything in my life, it’s that I should accept what life brings you and try to make the best of it. I’ve taken steps to do this and to settle some old scores, while I’m at it. Next time I have to rake the leaves, it won’t be me do the raking. You’ll find Bernie out in the yard, working off some past jap-slaps, which will free me up to write. Thanks Bernie.

The True Path To Salvation

2008-11-07T13:49:00.000-08:00

I have yet to pilfer the few remaining treats from my daughter’s Halloween candy stash and when I look around at the local stores, I find we are steeped in the holiday season. Thanksgiving doesn’t get equal billing with Christmas. In fact, this late November feast has become nothing more than an exercise to stretch our stomachs to handle the upcoming December pig-outs, which then leads us to the January 1st rebirth into fitness and healthy eating, followed immediately by the January 2nd diet failure and depression. It’s a wonderful time of the year. There are those who would say that this is a despondent way of viewing, what should be, a time for joyous celebration with family and friends. They’re called “skinny people” and I hate them. Those of us, whom haven’t actually made direct eye contact with our toes in some time, have a more realistic outlook toward the holidays. Thankfully, while I was out shopping the other day, my friend Chuck called to remind me of another interesting, yet seldom contemplated, aspect of this season. I’m referring, of course, to the numerous charitable donation stations of The Salvation Army.

What Chuck found so fascinating is that there are no other documented branches of the Salvation war machine. Why isn’t there a Salvation Navy…hmmmm? This could be a very useful way to get much needed pool equipment or water sports gear to those in need. Imagine yourself trying to fight back the tears when you see a muddy-faced, street urchin being presented with his very first kayak or a wrinkled, old man trying on a newly acquired, and barely used, Speedo. All this inspiring magic, courtesy of The Salvation Navy, would surely bring a lump to the throat of the most cynical, wretched bastard, which is really what this season is all about; making the intolerable, tolerable for a couple of months, so we don’t kill them in shopping lines. I don’t think I’d trust anything supplied by The Salvation Air Force. I could be way off here but I’m fairly certain most, not all, but most indigents have no need for used air-sick bags and complimentary headsets, which have been previously inserted into the waxy, ear canals of complete strangers. I could see potentially, the creation of The Salvation Reserves in the near future. Volunteers would only be required to work one weekend a year and they can keep their full-time jobs. They wouldn’t see any real action braving the cold, outside crowded malls, no sir! These troops would be deployed inside the confines of warm restaurants and nightclubs. Of course, a rift between the “real” Salvation Army workers and the reserves would eventually boil over into an all-out, bloodbath in the streets across America. Senseless violence and streets piled high with the dead are the kind of things communities tend to distance themselves from, especially during the holidays, so perhaps the Reserves isn’t such a good idea after all. The time spent contemplating this organization opened my eyes to a disturbing fact, that as a writer, I’m bound to share with you. Brace yourselves…The Salvation Army isn’t really an army at all. This mind-blowing truth made me start to question other aspects of our armed forces that may not be all they’re cracked up to be.

Keep this information on the down-low, as it’s highly classified. Navy SEALS aren’t actually seals. They’re not the amicable, slippery, oceanic mammals we thought they were but instead, an elite and highly trained contingent of soldiers, specializing in deadly warfare. So deadly in fact, rumor has it they can kill you, using nothing but a short length of licorice whip and a throw pillow. When I was 8, I saw “Day of the Dolphin” wherein assassinations were being executed by trained dolphins. I just figured, over time, the Navy decided to use a mammal capable of killing in the water and possessing the ability to waddle out onto dry land, assume an undercover role in a circus, honking horns and balancing large colorful balls on their snout, then kill unsuspecting, potential terrorists who were out for a day of fun under the Big Top. Brilliant!

Get this, I found another misrepresentation by a specific group of our fighting forces. Commando’s, do in fact, wear underpants! Shocking! Whenever I’ve treated myself and the “fellas” to a day or two of unconfined undie freedom, I’ve always referred to it as “Going Commando.” Well, after checking this out for myself, and a severe beating I might add, turns out they’re required to wear briefs at all times. These disturbing revelations have made me question another thing about the army which has been troubling me for quite some time.

I know, in WW II, we defeated Hitler and the Third Reich. The world celebrated and we moved on. Simple enough. Well then, why am I the only one fearful and talking about, the blatant lack of concern over the First and Second Reich curiously, still at large? The Government has hushed it all up and yet, those rogue Reich’s are out there…plotting…waiting to strike again. Combat rule number one, laid down at the Lake Geneva Convention; don’t be content destroying Reich number 3, when 1 & 2 are still out frivolously “Reiching.”

Perhaps I’ve underestimated our countries defense. Maybe that’s the mission of The Salvation Army, to sniff out and destroy factions of the free running Reich’s, under the guise of bell-ringing, common-folk dressed like the Maytag repairman. If you live long enough, you learn many interesting things you thought previously innocent and harmless. This year, I learned something vital to my future efforts on this blog…if at all possible, avoid suggestions from my friend Chuck. It can lead to WW III and who wants that so close to the holidays?

A Vote of Confidence...I Think

2008-10-31T07:38:00.000-07:00

“All men’s wallets should be waterproof and required, by law, to be worn around the neck, like soap on a rope.” This would be my platform for election, if I were running for the office of President on Tuesday, November 4th, which probably explains why my name isn’t on the ballot. I don’t feel my passion for this key element of my platform is the reasoning behind the snub from Democratic and Republican committee leaders. Perhaps the impetus of my wallet reform campaign has precluded me from achieving the Presidency. I can’t say that I blame them. Can you really trust the well-being of our nation to someone who can’t remember to take his wallet out of his pants before NOT putting said pants in the hamper?

Recently, I was rifling through my wallet, which just finished a refreshing spin in the permanent press cycle, searching for items that weren’t destroyed. As I flipped through the contents of my wallet, I came across 2 plastic cards stuck together, which I found to be a strange, yet fitting, pair. Liquidly sealed together were my voter’s registration and Cardinal Fitness membership cards. As I dried them off, I couldn’t help but see the similarities in voting and belonging to a health club.

Extensive study has proven that simply carrying a health club membership card will not guarantee weight loss, unless of course, the card in question is made of stone and well over a hundred pounds. Since we have progressed as a species out of the Flintstone era, I don’t think that’s a possibility. Likewise, possessing a voter’s card and not showing up to vote, gives you no say in government. You must exercise your right to vote for this card to be effective. Those whom don’t physically exercise can’t complain about being doughy and those whom don’t vote can’t complain about our government. It’s that simple.

Some people say they can’t find the time to vote/workout. Both the polling stations and health clubs open early and close late, providing ample time to get there. If you’re one of those who go after work, you’ll suffer the same long lines waiting for a machine to open up. Hopefully the person, who uses the voting machine before you, extends the same courtesy of health club apparatus usage and towels off any disgusting pools of sweat.

Both voting and workout machines can be intimidating and lack of knowledge on how to use them can be very embarrassing. Case in point; I needed to develop some neck muscles, as nothing is sexier than a thick, girthy, veiny neck. For 3 weeks I used a machine at the club for this purpose, although I wasn’t sure if I was correctly doing the exercises. I wedged my face between 2 pads set 3 inches apart, so that my nose and lips stuck out in the middle, similar to when your face gets caught in the closing doors of a bus. The pads had a peculiar stench and the exercise motion was cumbersome but I figured, no pain, no gain, right? The last time I went to the club, I stopped one of the employees during my neck workout and with my lips being smushed together from the pads asked,
“Excuse me, miss. Am I doing this neck machine right?” The young girl smiled and with a puzzled, almost frightened, look responded,
“Well…first off, that’s a glute machine. Your head goes down there and your rear end goes up against the pads where your face is.” That explained the strange odor. Similarly, voting machines can be difficult to operate. That’s why they give you a booth with a curtain. So nobody can see a grown adult struggle with something any 5-year old could figure out. Also, I find the drawn curtain and booth to be exactly like the shower stalls at the health club, except for the canister of liquid soap on the wall, the threat of acquiring a foot fungus and a naked, singing man in the booth next to me.

Once inside the solace of the voting stall, safely removed from the discerning gaze of educated people who’ve actually familiarized themselves with candidates, policies and crap like that, the inner turmoil and true democratic process begins. The efficient voter will choose 1 party and punch that ticket across the board. This takes all of 2 seconds to do but this type of voter is cunning, as well. They’ll purposely stay in the booth for a few minutes to create the illusion of carefully analyzing their choices. Lazy, uninformed and deceitful; with these credentials you should be running for office rather than voting. Another type of voter decides strictly on familiarity and can’t be bothered with silly things like issues and policies. This person carefully scans over all the candidates to see if possibly they know someone with a recognizable name, as it would be rude not to vote for a friend, relative or someone that attended the same kindergarten class as you. Once names have been checked, votes are usually cast after considering candidates other key attributes, such as nationality, gender and most importantly, how you feel when hearing their name. Anyone running for office with a name like Stalin, Hitler, Mussolini, Judas Iscariot, Darth Vader, Beelzebub or Skippy should probably consider another vocation. Similarly, anyone named after a body part doesn’t stand a chance either. I just can’t throw my loyalty behind someone named “Fred Testicles” or “Stella Nipples.” Finally, we come to making selections for judges. After forgiving yourself for having no clue as to the difference between the Supreme Court, Appellate Court and the Circuit Court, you base your voting decision for each judge candidate on one essential criteria…”In the past few years, have I been screwed over in court by some asshole judge!” This could range from being fined for speeding, a large settlement over a dispute with a neighbor or perhaps, an unfair death sentence over an impulsive, yet accidentally, killing spree. Since no one remembers the names of judges, the choice is simple. If you’ve been a good citizen and kept yourself out of a courtroom, all judges stay. If a judge has pissed you off, then they all must go because you can’t take the chance of voting for a judge that screwed you over. Uninformed vindictiveness…this is exactly how voting should be considered.

From everything I’ve read or seen on T.V., our country is in sad shape, both politically and physically. We need to become strong again and the only way to do that is exercise…our bodies and our right to vote. Do yourself and our nation a favor this November 4th. Go out and vote and let your voice be heard. As long as you’re there, if you find none of the candidates to your liking, feel free to write me in for President. The Wallet-On-Rope idea is gaining momentum.

A Halloween Cut-Up

2008-10-24T11:01:00.000-07:00

Halloween is but a short week away. This weekend, the family and I will put the final touches on our home’s ghoulish decorations by partaking in one of my favorite holiday activities; pumpkin carving. Just like Michael Jackson’s plastic surgeon, I enjoy taking a knife and carving up a face that will hopefully scare the pants off small children. No Halloween can truly be complete, without first engaging in the ritualistic stabbing, cutting and gutting of an innocent fruit. To accomplish this, a victim must be plucked from a pumpkin patch.

The week prior to Halloween, the family makes a pilgrimage to the nearest farm selling pumpkins. For a good hour or so, we’ll search out the giant, orange mounds for the most perfectly shaped pumpkins, all the while breathing in the inescapable stench of manure and fending off the farmer’s mangy dog from humping my leg. Once we’ve made our selections, I load our pumpkins into the complimentary provided, rusty, wheel-barrow with the half-flat tire and plow my way to the check out line. The pumpkin sales transaction is performed in a small barn, which during the other 11 months of the year, is the primary spot for the farmer’s barnyard animals to eat, mate and poo. While the farmer’s wife/cashier weighs our future jack-o-lanterns, it’s my job to subdue my wife from buying other crap, like dried stalks of corn and giant bails of hay. Why pay for something we can steal from any number of the farm fields we pass on the way home? Then, dizzied by the excitement of the holiday or the fumes from the cow dung, I gladly overpay .75 cents per pound for a fruit, which during the other 11 months of the year, sells for about .03 cents per pound. This is actually quite a deal, considering the extra foodstuffs gained from pumpkin carving.

An ancillary treat from gutting a pumpkin are the bountiful seeds. Unfortunately, modern technology hasn’t devised another method of extricating the seeds, so they must be scooped out by hand. As a man, it’s my job to stick my hand in disgusting places to retrieve objects. This also holds true for toilets, clogged dryer vents and any of the dog’s orifices. Women’s equality ends when the arm must be plunged into something moist or gross. After I remove all the seeds, and my hand is painfully cramped from the violent scraping, my wife preps them for baking. She spreads the seeds out on a baking sheet and lightly dusts them with, oh…about 2 pounds of salt, then cooks the hell out of them. You can tell if they’re done just right by popping a handful in your mouth and chewing. If it feels like your eating the wood chips from your landscaping, they’re perfect. The health benefits from consuming the wad of dry, splintered seed husks are significant. As the coarse mass passes through the digestive tract, especially Mr. Colon, it scrapes and scrubs the walls of your lower intestines clean. Eventually, when Mother Nature calls and it’s time to part ways with your colon-cleansing friend, it may feel like your passing an eagle’s nest but your bowels will thank you.

Pumpkin carving has always been big in our family. In fact, aside from coloring Easter eggs, it’s the only time we covered the kitchen table with newspapers. Times were much simpler back then. Dad issued each of us a pumpkin and a sword. Normally, my parents wouldn’t trust me with a pair of nail clippers for fear I’d lop off a toe but for one day out of the year, they were completely at ease with me jamming a 9 inch blade into pumpkin. The only real decisions I had to make were, “Do I want triangle eyes or do I want really big triangle eyes?” and “Is the beating I’ll get from the old man worth flinging some pumpkin guts in my little sister’s hair?” Such is not the case these days.

Long gone are the basic, triangle eyes, triangle nose and single toothed smile, which was the gold-standard for carved pumpkin faces. Now, kits with books of specialty patterns are all the rage. The selections vary from simple to the extremely ornate. In the past few years, I’ve carved a wolf howling at the moon, a witch whipping up a cauldron of smoky brew and a dancing skeleton. Each year, the carvings get more and more complex. This year, seeing as there’s an upcoming election and I’m feeling quite political, I’ve decided to carve the full likenesses of all 435 members of the House of Representatives, engaged in a conga-line dance around the Jefferson Monument. The carpal tunnel syndrome I’m sure to suffer while poking the necessary 2 million holes will be well worth it. Thankfully, these specialty kits come with their own plastic carving tools.

Over the years, my wife has saved all the different odd-shaped carving instruments and kept them safely in their very own giant Zip-Lock storage bag, marked “Pumpkin Carving Stuff.” They’re made of colorful plastic with dull, rounded metal teeth on the blades, specifically designed not to pierce skin or pumpkin flesh. After using these pieces of crap for an hour or so, your hand will spasm and you’ll scream out, “These things @#*#@* suck!” Then you’ll grab a steak knife or drywall saw from the garage and finish the job. Actually, before we start carving, my wife sets the different tools out neatly on the table. They’re some of the strangest looking hooks, scoops and blades I’ve ever seen. In fact, I’m not sure if the family is about to carve a pumpkin or disembowel Mel Gibson, like they did at the end of “Braveheart.”

As you can tell from my picture at the top of this article, I really do enjoy carving pumpkins. Nothing is more rewarding than creating something to display Halloween night, sure to scare people. I think this year I’ll carve a pumpkin which shows the bottom line of my 401K…now that’s scary!

Snake and His 2-Wheeled Pony

2008-10-17T07:32:00.000-07:00

A few weeks back, I found myself with some unforeseen, but welcomed Saturday afternoon free time. I seized the opportunity to grab my golf clubs and head out to the field behind our house, to fine-tune my golf game. After about twenty minutes of launching divots, or in layman’s terms; huge chunks of sod, and inventing some exciting, new curse words, my neighbor John came out to join me. I fully expected him to greet me with a judo-chop to the Adam’s apple but his pleasant demeanor indicated he hadn’t discovered the ball of mud I dropped in his pool, courtesy of an errant 5-iron. We exchanged pleasantries, talked some golf and before he left me to continue strip-mining the meadows of our town with my clubs, he offered a suggestion.

“You should write about the village's new bike path.” I thanked him for the idea, as I always welcome thoughts from readers, and started thinking of an angle for a column. I wasn’t all that familiar with the bike path and it was this lack of knowledge, which resurrected some past wisdom from my father. He told me, “Son, before speaking about a subject, be sure you know what you’re talking about.” He also told me not to wedge my head in the spindles of a staircase railing. The latter has nothing to do with this article but it’s just darn good advice I thought I’d share.

To familiarize myself with the bike path, I went to the town's website. I spent the next half-hour angrily clicking around the site, inventing more curse words, and thanks to my daughter’s skills at web navigation, I was able to pull up a map of the path just before the bulging vein, in the center of my forehead, exploded all over our computer. On the page in front of me was a tangled collection of multi-colored, lines, dashes, dots and stripes. I tried to make sense and follow all the twists and turns but my frustration reached the same level as when I look behind the T.V. and try visually sift through the 13 or so, gnarled cables, to single out a cord to unplug. Eventually, I just grab the mass of cords and violently shake them, until the one I’m seeking disengages from the power strip. However, no matter how hard I shook the computer, I still couldn’t find my way around that map. I just want to ride my bike! Why can’t bike riding be simple, like when we were young?

When I was a kid, my bike was my horse, laying peacefully on the driveway behind one of the back tires of the old man’s car, waiting for me to bust out of the house, saddle up and peddle off like a fool, down the street. It was pure freedom. I’m certain you remember this, as well. We didn’t need a path. We didn’t need a destination. As long as we could ride no-handed for a stretch, jump a brick-supported, plywood ramp or “pop a wheelie,” we were happy. As I’ve matured, my relationship with bike riding has changed.

My first bike was a shiny, red tricycle. I was seven and ridiculed. But that didn’t stop me from using my tricycle in the manner in was meant to be used. I’d turn it over, grab on to the peddles and while rapidly turning them, scream out, “Ice cream, ice cream! Who wants some ice cream!?!” I don’t know why I associated a spinning bike wheel with distributing frozen dairy treats, I just did.

A couple years later, all the cool kids were riding BMX dirt bikes. The medium-cool kids rode imitation BMX bikes called, “Huffy Thunder Road.” I rode a gold, Schwinn 2-wheeler with high, loopy handle bars and a huge black, banana-style seat. One thing I’ve noticed about bike seats, in general. When I was young and had a butt the size of a postage stamp, bike seats were as big as surfboards. Now that my rear is the size of a Fedex envelope, bike seats look more like a suppository. I’m not sure if my angst about riding a bike stems from losing control and plowing into a prickly bush or the embarrassment of soliciting the neighbor’s help in extricating the tiny bike seat from my ass.

It was also imperative to accessorize your bike with cool gizmos. BMX-ers had studded tires called “knobbies.” That’s all they needed. Other kids slipped a small, black box over the end of one of the handlebars. It had a handle which, when turned, made an intimidating roaring noise. I believe it was called “Raw Power” and I didn’t have that either. For my eleventh birthday, I received a shiny, metal horn with a big, black rubber bulb on the end. When I squeezed the bulb, it emitted an embarrassing honking noise, like a bad comedian after telling a joke in a burlesque show. “Guys, wait up!!! Honk! Honk!!” I also had a license plate from a box of Honeycomb cereal. Unfortunately, the sticker sheet which accompanied the license plate, had no duplicate letters, so putting “Matt” on the plate was out. I always wanted a cool nickname, so I became “Snake” Foley, according to my Honeycomb license plate.

Having a bike that looked cool was important but the tricks you could do on your bike really defined who you were in the neighborhood. Many summer days were spent perfecting these bike maneuvers and as far as tricks were concerned, I could manage a respectable wheelie and I could ride the entire neighborhood no –handed. As far as my parents were concerned, they were pretty indifferent to my impressive two-wheeler tricks, except for one. I remember one evening, I met my dad at the street corner and challenged him to a race home. It was his silver 1976 Chevy Nova with red, felt interior and black-wall tires against my gold Schwinn, tricked out with a clown horn and smelling of Honeycomb cereal. As usual, he kept it close until we were half-way home, then he blew my doors off. Way to go dad…big man! Anyway, this particular night, I couldn’t wait to show him the new trick I learned. Dad exited his car and watched me as I approached the house. Then, just before I reached our driveway, I jumped off my bike and watched it ride itself to a crashing heap, right in front of our house. Out of breath from peddling and excitement over my newly developed trick, I wheezed out,

“Did you see that!?! Wasn’t that cool? It’s called “Ghost Riding.” Immediately, I felt a firm hand settle on the back of my skinny neck, followed by a tugging sensation on the back loop of my Toughskin jeans. From the general red/purplish hue radiating from his angry face, I started to sense that he wasn’t impressed with my new trick. He hoisted me up by the neck and pants, like he was toting around a plump, lawn mower bag full of grass clippings. With each pounding stride he took, the coarse Toughskin jeans wedged further and further up my ass. When we came upon the closed front door, I offered to open it, seeing as my dad’s hands were full and I wasn’t doing anything but dangling. Quickly, he rushed through the front hall and stopped at the base of the second floor stairway. With a mighty heave, he “Ghost Rode” me all the way up the stairs and like my bike, I fell in a heap outside my bedroom door. Then he yelled at me to get in my room and stay there until I stopped doing stupid things. Lucky for me, he eventually showed leniency or I’d still be up there, as I just can’t seem to break the habit of doing stupid things.

Boy, I’m sure glad John sent we off digging up such fine memories. Sure makes me want to unhook the old bike from the garage ceiling and take off. Better yet, maybe I’ll just ride the stationary bike in our bedroom, that is, if I can get all the hanging shirts off the handle bars.

The Book On Reading

2008-10-09T10:33:00.001-07:00

I apologize for the missed blog last Friday. I was taking some much needed time off from work and I used the vacation to re-energize my thoughts and catch up on the wide variety of “Judge” shows afternoon television has to offer. Also, this blog marks the 2 year anniversary of wowing you with quirky observations and madcap personal mishaps. Anyway, I decided to do something constructive during my vacation, something meaningful, fulfilling and certain to impress other people, whom over the years have been completely unimpressed by my life, thus far. I read a book.

Not just any book, mind you. It was over 100 pages with no pictures, punch-lines or centerfold pull-outs! I can tell right now that you’re looking at me in a whole new light because now you know I’ve recently read a book. It’s an impressive feat, no doubt. That’s why when adults get together, you can elevate yourself in status by announcing to the group, “Hey, I’m reading this fascinating book…” This proclamation has a two-fold effect. Instantly, other adults stop what they’re doing and fixate on whatever you say because you’re a book-reader, an intellect, a scholar. This places you one rung higher on the social ladder than the mindless non-readers. Consequently, the non-reader will think to themselves, “ I have GOT to start reading again. I’m just lazy.” Now your audience starts to question their own abilities and mentally criticize themselves, which knocks them down at least 2 rungs on the social ladder. By my math, a public admission of reading a book gives you respect, makes others feel bad about themselves and widens the gap of your social standing by three whole rungs! And isn’t that what life’s all about; building yourself up in the eyes of others, while they tear themselves down?

If you really want to make them feel bad, offer to give them the book so they can read it. Most people will accept the offer because rejecting it would be a public admission of wanting to remain stupid. Politely, they’ll take the book, knowing full well they have no intention of reading it. They’ll bring the book home, place it on the table in the living room, next to the reading chair…the chair never used for reading. Some will even go so far as to place their reading glasses next to or on top of the book, to create a realistic picture of someone in the middle of reading a book. And there it will sit…unread…while they watch T.V. Only a fool would return the book the next day, so most people adhere to the universal, 2-week possession rule for book borrowing. Any amount of time less than that and you’re tipping your hand that you didn’t really read it. Exceeding the 2 weeks and you run the risk of people thinking you’re a moron for taking so long to read a book. Perpetuating the façade of reading, to cover one’s laziness, is a viable reason why books go unread. There are medical reasons, as well.

I’ve heard people complain that when they read, their eyes itch and start to water. They’ll swear there’s something small in-between the pages, which causes their eyes to burn. The tiny particles that bother people’s eyes are called letters. String them together with other letters and you make words. Combine words and you get sentences. The burning sensation is due to friction caused by ocular overload…or reading. The watering of the eyes comes from a different source.

Books are nothing more than really thick, hard-covered or paperback, sleeping pills ingested through the eyeballs, which causes yawning and thusly, watering of the eyes…drooling is not out of the question, either. This explains why some people read in bed and why the Department of Motor Vehicles frowns upon reading while driving. After a page or two, the reader will, more than likely, be unconscious. Not that it’s a bad thing to be comatose while sleeping, in fact, I highly recommend it. Now driving while asleep, even though I don’t have hard data in hand or haven’t conducted extensive lab studies, exposes one to possible dings, dents and the haphazard, blind slaughter of countless innocents, as you mow down pedestrians while deep in R.E.M. sleep. Again, drooling is not out of the question, either. However, I can’t sit here in good conscience and not admit, I have gone for lengthy stretches of road and suddenly awoken from a trance, wherein I can’t recall for the life of me, where I am and how I got there. I’ll snap to and yell out,

“Holy shit! Where the hell am I!?! Wait…I remember passing a McDonald’s and a Jiffy-Lube. That was like, miles ago! How did I get here!?!”

Then I’ll shake my head violently to awaken myself and put both hands on the steering wheel because we all know, putting both hands on the wheel tells the world, “Dammit, I’m serious about driving!” The same thing happens when reading. Who hasn’t been reading and suddenly snapped out of a trance to realize you have no idea what you’re reading. You’ll turn back a page or two only to find nothing seems familiar. When this happens while driving, we don’t go back and re-drive the areas we can’t remember, so similarly, after reading unconscious for a spell, we’ll justify not re-reading missed chapters by telling ourselves,

“It probably wasn’t too important…a lot of fluff, I bet…otherwise I woulda remembered what I read.” I’ve used this argument myself on entire books and several college classes.

In fact, it was at college that me and my friend, Morty, actually overdosed on reading. Bound and determined to get serious about our college careers, Morty and I found the perfect place to study. Word on the street was, you could really get a lot of uninterrupted study completed in the basement of the Law Library. We descended deep into the earth under the library, with each step the moist air cooled and the itchy smell of ancient, yellowing parchment filled our noses. We found a couple of isolated cubicles, separated from each other by wooden partitions. I opened my book and excitedly started down my new-found path of serious, collegiate study. About an hour later, I awoke, with both arms stretched out from my sides and my neck snapped back behind me like a giant Pez dispenser. Embarrassed but somehow still able to find humor in my failure to remain awake and be a big boy, I peered around the wood partition and laughed to Morty,

“Dude. You’re not gonna believe what I just did.”

When I saw Morty, I knew he would understand my plight. He chose the slumped forward approach for his nap. His arms hung freely down at his side while his full body-weight was supported by just his head. His right cheek filled the void between page 256 and 257 and his agape mouth provided an escape route for spit to soak through the better part of chapter 9 in “A Beginner’s Guide to Modern Engineering.” As we left in obvious shame, we both agreed it was the best sleep we had in years.

So yes, I have accomplished an enviable task. I have read a book this year. I plan on reading another, perhaps in the future. Not the near future because as I’ve told you, I just re-energized from a week long vacation. Right now I feel alive and ready to take on the world. Give me a week or so and I’ll be ready for a good snooze. Can you recommend anything I can pretend to read?

"I'm Sorry. Did You Say Something?"

2008-09-25T11:53:00.000-07:00

I’ve been informed that I don’t listen or pay attention very well. I can’t recall who said it, when or what the circumstances were, but they were pissed. I’m fairly certain it was my wife, as I know she talks a lot but I’m at a loss in regards to the content of her discussions. Women should know this by now about men; if a woman is in direct competition for her man’s attention with a televised sporting event, she will lose…and lose big. To gain my undivided attention, the T.V. should be not only turned off but dismantled into several hundred pieces and placed on the washing machine. This guarantees my attentiveness, as I avoid the laundry room at all costs and I have trouble assembling a sandwich, let alone a Samsung high-def. Making eye contact, yelling and fixing hold firmly on my shirt collar with clenched fists is another way to win my consideration. It’s not that I can’t remember things, as I recall, and recite, obscure movie quotes from countless R-Rated comedies, can talk at length about baseball history and I have an enviable knowledge of all things Brady Bunch. Like most men, the problem must be in the exchange of information from our ears to our brain.

There are 3 pockets of dead space in the male brain that we can’t control, even though outside stimulus persuades us to act properly, we just can’t make the connection. First, is our inability to show good judgment and timing when scratching/adjusting our “plumbing”, if you will. It’s in our nature to insure the comfort and whereabouts of these tools at all times. Whether it’s standing out in right field during a softball game, giving a eulogy at a funeral or making a big presentation at work, we know it’s improper but you’re sure to find us tugging, shifting or tenting for air, our groinal regions. Second, is our refusal to replace the empty toilet paper roll. And really, why should we, when there’s a box of Kleenex sitting right behind us on the toilet tank lid, cotton balls in the cabinet or in a real pinch, a hefty supply of Q-Tips, all within reach and fully capable of getting the job done. Lastly, is our unwillingness to remember what’s being told to us when the T.V. is on. My wife claims I have “selective hearing.”

It’s not selective hearing. I’ve been blessed with the ability to screen out spoken information which requires me to remember a date/time, exert myself physically, clean something or anything that has to do with decorating. In fact, I have perfect hearing or at least I thought I did until the other day. A sound in the house frustrated and perplexed me in a way I hadn’t experienced since my youth.

When I was 10, I vividly remember sitting in my family room on a hot summer evening, only to have my T.V. viewing disturbed by the chirping of a lone cricket hidden somewhere in my midst. It’s amazing how loud a noise 1 cricket can make. Like a kitten playing with a ball of string, finding this cricket presented me with a new adventuresome game. This proved to be more difficult than I had expected. In the insect world, the cricket is what we refer to as a ventriloquist, without the scary looking wooden dummy, as the weight of this prop would surely crush a cricket and most crickets don’t have hands to properly operate a dummy. As soon as I heard a chirp, I rushed over to where I thought the sound originated, only to be mocked by a follow up chirp coming from the other side of the room. This went on for an hour; listen, chirp, run, adjust my winkie, watch some T.V., snack on some Fiddle-Faddle, repeat. Eventually, the cricket tired of the game and hopped out onto the floor. I ran over and placed my tennis shoe over his body. I tried to muster the courage to squish the little bastard but the crunching sound of an insect’s exoskeleton has always given me the heebie-jeebies. So I scooped it up with fistful of toilet paper, took it out to the garage and threw it into the first big spider web I saw. Once again, the circle of life was set in motion as God had intended. Boy sees cricket. Boy corrals cricket with a catcher’s mitt fashioned from Charmin toilet paper. Boy slings cricket into spider web to its’ ultimate doom. I had silenced the annoying sound which interrupted my T.V. viewing and the other day, my hearing skills were once again, put to the test.

A single beep from an unknown place in our home, nearly caused me to lose my mind. Like most people, we have roughly 87 smoke detectors dispersed throughout our house. When the battery runs low on one of these detectors, it emits an annoying chirp, like the cricket, that is impossible to find with the human ear. I was up in our bedroom when I heard the first chirp. It sounded like it came from across the hall in the guest room. When I got in the guest room, I positioned myself under the smoke detector and stared upward for what seemed like an hour. Then I heard the chirp again, only now it sounded like it came from the bathroom. I ran to the bathroom and again, stood motionless staring at the ceiling. Frustrated, I heard the next chirp distinctly coming from my bedroom, where I started my search. In a fit of rage, I stood in the hallway, mumbling curse words through gritted teeth. I poised myself in a ready position, knees bent, hands out like a basketball player in a defensive stance and eyes staring blankly forward, fixed on the wall in front of me. My ninja-like trance was broken by another chirp.

“SON OF A BITCH!!!”

Now I heard it coming from downstairs.

“Okay! Now I’m pissed!” I yelled out as I ran downstairs. “You’re ass is mine!” Rational thought had gone bye-bye, as I was now verbally abusing an inanimate object and yelling out loud threats of what I was going to do to it once I found the faulty detector. The whole process started all over again, as the chirp had me sprinting from the basement to the ground floor and back upstairs again. After an hour or so, I devised a strategy and finally isolated what I hoped, was the bad detector. The chirp rung out every 3 minutes but as I stood below staring upward, the time seemed much longer than that. Slowly swaying back and forth, like a praying mantis stalking a bug, I psychotically giggled over and over,

“Now I got you! Now I got you!” Then from nowhere, my daughter popped out and just as the chirp sounded she asked,

“Hey dad. Whatcha doin?” Her question broke my feeble concentration and I was unable to tell if this was the bad smoke detector.

“Aaawwww! Come on!!!!” I yelled out near tears, while punching the air in frustration and stomping around in a circle. Eventually, I located the bad detector and changed the battery but the angst this search exacted on my psyche, knocked 5 years off my life.
So, I guess I can hear, if something really annoys me. My wife shouldn’t scold me about selective hearing but instead, take comfort knowing that because I don’t hear her all the time, proves I don’t find her annoying. And that last statement of mine is a prime example of the circle of marriage. Man doesn’t hear wife. Man inadvertently insults wife. Wife throws man into a giant spider web to his ultimate doom.

Stop That. You're Making Me Yawn, Too.

2008-09-20T06:33:00.000-07:00

While my daughter and I were enjoying a pleasant Saturday morning breakfast, she looked up from her bowl of Lucky Charms and challenged my intellect with a typical question from a child, posed to prove my stupidity.

“Why do we yawn?”
Being that it was Saturday, and morning no less, my mind wasn’t prepared for such a challenge. Usually, I’m focused on the magically delicious marshmallow bits of “Hearts, Stars, and Horseshoes, Clovers, and Blue Moons! Pots of Gold and Rainbows, and me Red Balloons!” However, I could tell that this was one of those questions my daughter would keep asking me until I gave her an answer. I wasn’t sure exactly why we yawn but lack of knowledge never stopped me before from giving an answer I passed off as truth.
“Well honey, we yawn when there is a lack of oxygen in our body.” My response was short, to the point and very Marcus Welby-like in delivery. She replied,
“So, if we take extra deep breaths, we can stop yawning?” I could tell my answer only opened up a Pandora’s box of more questions, when really, all I wanted to do was shut my brain off and enjoy my marshmallow treats. So I did what most responsible parents would do in my situation. I told her,
“No. If you take too many deep breaths, you can get tumors!” I know, the reply made no sense but the threat of tumors usually quiets the inquisitive mind of a child. Just then, my wife walked in and added,
“Why don’t you tell her the Robbie Benson story?” Damn her!!
As you all know, Robbie Benson was a movie acting genius in the late 70’s and early 80’s and I’m certain, will be sharing his thespian talents once again, here in the zero’s. A few years back, I found myself alone in the house with nothing to do and nothing on T.V. As I flicked around the channels, I came upon a movie starring Robbie Benson. I stopped and started watching. It was about a hockey player who had the hots for this bitchy, ice skater chick, who did nothing but whine and then fell on some ice and went blind. It was fascinatingly terrible but I couldn’t stop watching. I had to see just how bad the movie could get. At the end, Robbie walks down on the ice at a big competition and helps the blind girl finish her performance. During the last minutes of the movie, I let out a huge yawn. It was one of those really long, deep yawns, so deep it made my eyes water. As I wiped the yawn tears from my eyes, my wife walked in the room. She looked at the T.V., then at me and while shaking her head in disappointed shock asked,
“Are you crying during “Ice Castles?” Damn that Robbie Benson!!
The concept of yawning is quite remarkable. I believe it’s the human species polite and discreet way, in which to communicate to others, the message…
“For the love of God, you’re boring the shit out of me!!!!”
There are some interesting reactions are body includes along with a good yawn. For some, yawning opens up the taste buds for the briefest of moments, allowing one to taste the inside of your mouth. After the yawn, you can see a person engaged in such a tasting by the continued smacking of lips together and napping of spit. This is usually followed by an unpleasant, soured facial expression, as the yawner realizes the inside of his/her mouth tastes indeed, like crap. The next biggest yawn lasts a few moments longer than the tasting yawn but is a bit more embarrassing. The extended agape mouth allows ample time for a long, steady stream of hot drool to drip from the side of your lips. It usually soaks a thin line down your shirt and causes the yawner to look around in shock and tell the nearest person whom may have seen them drool,
“Oh my god. Did you see that? Look at this! I yawned so hard it made me drool!” It’s the only time I can think of when a grown person will ask another grown person to look at their spit. Lastly, there’s the mother of all yawns, which I call the Epileptic yawn. I once stayed awake for 40 hours straight. I did this because I was young and liquor was involved. I was at a wedding, on a first/last date with a girl, who unfortunately bore witness to this rarest of yawns. While sitting at the table, I felt a yawn coming on. Innocently enough, I leaned back in my chair and opened up for a large, but manageable yawn. During the yawn, from out of nowhere, a second, even larger yawn overtook me. I was in the clutches of the seldom seen double yawn and I was helpless. The force caused me lean further back, nearly toppling over backward. I would’ve certainly fell over if not for my quick thinking to violently clutch a wad of my date’s hair from the back of her head. With my free hand, I pounded repeatedly on the table trying to get much needed air. I could feel tears rolling down my face and drool running down my neck. I was helpless. Al I could do was pound on the table for air and pull that hair. Eventually, I regained my composure only to find my date wanted to go home early. Go figure.
I’d like to share with you, some compelling observations about the yawn, in general. I believe that yawns were invented by Catholics in the 5th century and the first yawn ever was given birth during a really boring sermon at Sunday Mass. Another person across the church, upon catching sight of the first yawn, could not stop himself from yawning. This chain of yawning kept on during mass and was brought forth to the world where it continues to this day. In fact, the next time you’re at church, Christmas or Easter for those honest enough to tell the truth, look around and witness the yawning chain for yourself. Amazingly, the yawn is the only bodily function I know that we automatically respond to. I don’t cough when someone coughs. I don’t sneeze when someone sneezes. I don’t fart when someone farts, although I try like the dickens to do so, just to top their efforts. In fact, I’ve blown out a neck vein, and some under shorts, trying to flatulently battle back.
The yawn is quite a mystery. I’m curious. I’d like you to be honest and help me out with an experiment. Just how many times during this article, did you yawn? 1-2 and you were mildly bored. 3-4 and I bored the shit out of you. 5-6 and you and I can go see the next Robbie Benson movie together. In the hour and a half it took me to write this, I yawned 18 times! Leave your number in the “comments” tab. I’d be interested to know how boring I can be.

Brotherly Love

2008-09-12T12:33:00.000-07:00

When my sisters and I were young, my parents did their best to fulfill all our wants and needs. We always had food on the table, clothes to wear and every summer, although we couldn’t afford elaborate vacations, my parents managed to take us somewhere which required a long, car ride and gave dad plenty of time to yell at us and threaten our lives. One thing we always wanted was a family pet. In 1976, my parents broke down and agreed to get us a dog. We drove out to some woman’s house, where we were to choose our new dog. Upon arriving, we were greeted by 3 cute, Cocker Spaniel puppies. As my sisters and I played with the pups, one of them sat on my leg and proceeded to paint my thigh with a long line of diarrhea…one of the dogs…not one my sisters. This, of course, was the deciding factor for the rest of the family in choosing our dog, as any pup with the good sense to crap on me must be the dog for the Foley’s. We named her Bouncer. For the next few months, we overlooked some of Bouncer’s bad habits; peeing on the floor, begging for food and my personal favorite, after a healthy dump in the yard…the dog…not my sisters…would seek out a nice, clean stretch of carpet and use her front paws to scooch forward, wiping her ass along the way. Lovely. Unfortunately, Bouncer lacked mental toughness and had an adverse reaction to tail pulling, being mounted for pony rides and having Crayolas inserted into openings where Crayolas didn’t belong. I’m pretty sure I’d try to bite someone if they slipped a “Burnt Orange” crayon in my rectum. That’s just me…and Bouncer, as well, so we shipped her off to my grandparents, whom we were quite certain, stopped sticking crayons in dog’s butts several years earlier. I felt bad after Bouncer left us but then I realized my parents had already supplied me with something better than a pet. I had a little sister!

We called her Beth and at every chance given, verbally and mentally tortured her. Maureen, Kathy and I were each born 1 year apart. There was a 4 year gap between Beth and myself, which gave me the perfect opportunity to tease her that her birth and very existence was a mistake. As an older brother, it was not only my right but my duty to make her life miserable and believe me, I seized every opening to do so. I could fill volumes and Beth could spend months on the couch of a therapist, recalling the some of the wonderful, comical abuse she suffered for my entertainment. However, I’ll share with you one incident, which I hold dearest in my heart.

After a family gathering at Maureen’s house, I offered to give Beth a ride home in my new ’87 Pontiac Grand Am. Leaving the protection of my parents and accepting an invitation to be trapped in a car for 45 minutes with me was her first mistake. The ride started out innocently enough but for Beth, things soon turned for the worse. Maureen likes to cook enormous amounts of Italian food. I like to eat enormous amounts of Italian food. Italian food contains enormous amounts of fat and grease. This means one thing for me; an enormous amount of gas. This was the perfect setting. I had an abundant store of gag-provoking, eye-burning flatulence, a naïve, trusting little sister and thanks to General Motors, a control panel at my fingertips, which controlled the access of all the car windows. In a situation like this, timing is everything. Silently, I set free a healthy portion of gas. After waiting a few seconds and sensing she would be sharing in the experience at any moment, I calmly asked her with a puzzled look,

“Do you smell mint?” Now really, how often do you just smell mint? Almost never, so intrigued by my question Beth replied,

“Mint?” Then she followed up her reply with a deep, nasal clearing sniff…the kind where your chest puffs out and shoulders kinda shrug. I knew my timing was perfect and scored a direct hit when I could see the look in her eyes turn to sheer terror. Her lips soured and face wrinkled in disgust. In a panicked whisper she tried to speak, without actually breathing,

“Oh my God!” With her lips shut tight and cheeks puffed out like she was holding back a mouthful of marshmallows, she feverishly attempted to open her window. Eventually, she found the button to operate the window and as it slowly slid down, she stuck her face out into the rushing, cool, night air to catch a breath. I was feeling generous that night and let her get a single gulp of clean air before I utilized my master control and started to raise her window. Like a little kitten’s paws, poking out between the bars of a pet store cage, her fingers desperately darted out the small crack I left open, in a futile attempt to wedge the window back open. It was great!

After the air cleared and I stopped laughing, Beth voiced her objections to my game of “Do You Smell Mint.” As she yelled at me, I started to get a whiff of something, not of my own creation, which was quite fowl. Italian food has enormous amounts of garlic and apparently, Beth had plenty of it. We made a pact for the rest of the ride home. She promised to keep her mouth closed and I promised to keep my other end closed. As we drove in silence, the smell still remained, which truly perplexed me as I could see out the corner of my eye, Beth looking straight forward and not saying a word. After 10 minutes or so, the odor was relentless and refused to weaken. Overcome by the fumes, I apologized to Beth.

“I’m sorry. Whatever that smell is, it isn’t you. You haven’t said a word but I can still smell it. It’s making me sick! I shouldn’t have blamed you.”

For the last 20 minutes of the ride, I sniffed my clothes, cupped my hands over my mouth and checked my breath, hell, I was tempted to look in the backseat for the fly-infested carcass of a rotting wildebeest. I was in agony. I figured it must be me, as Beth was unfazed by any sort of smell. Just before pulling into the driveway, I turned to Beth to; once again, apologize for wrongfully accusing her of having garlic breath. As I looked, I found the source of my discomfort for the past half hour. While stoically peering straight ahead, Beth had contorted her lips and shifted them to the left side of her face. Her lips formed a tight circle, as though whistling, and they were pointed directly at me. Apparently, the entire ride home she had breathed a steady stream of garlic right at my nose, all the while keeping her head perfectly straight. Truly a remarkable feat of body control but even more impressive, the ability to pull it off without so much as a giggle. I wasn’t angry. I was proud!

In retrospect, having a dog would’ve been a lot of hard work. We would’ve had to clean up poop, feed it, bathe it and pay attention to it. Having a little sister was much better. We made mom take care of all that, which left plenty of time for us to torture her.

Labor Day Reflections

2008-09-04T11:48:00.000-07:00

Like many of you, this past Monday I enjoyed some well-deserved time off to celebrate Labor Day. While I was fixing the downspout, cleaning out the garage, mowing the lawn and de-clogging the bath tub drain of either a freakishly, plump gerbil or a decade’s worth of hair, I took time to reflect on some of the past jobs, or labors, in my life. My employment history ranges from normal vocations like mortgage banking, carpentry and bartending, to some less then glamorous occupations, such as a door-to-door, vacuum cleaner salesman (I kid you, not) and placing the disgustingly obese on specialty beds, geared to hold those who somehow let themselves go a bit…800 pounds and up! I could easily fill page after page with anecdotes from each one of these jobs and someday, probably will. However, today I’ll just focus on my very first job, a job some of you, more than likely, suffered through, as well.

When I turned 10 years old, my dad figured I had enjoyed enough carefree days as a child and was in need of a daily dose of physical and verbal abuse. So, he signed me up to be a paper boy for the Southtown Economist. All you needed, to start a promising career in the newspaper distribution field, was a reliable bicycle, which I didn’t have, a desire to work hard each day, which I didn’t have, and most importantly, a dad willing and quite capable of “putting you through a wall!” if papers weren’t promptly delivered each day.

Our subdivision was quite large and much too big for just one delivery boy. Thankfully, there were several other stupid kids in the neighborhood to help deliver the paper, which nobody really wanted in the first place. Unfortunately, my assigned territory was 75 homes in the old phase of the Catalina development. The routes in the newer sections of the neighborhood delivered to young families, with small children and an acceptance of a young person, trying to make a buck. The homes I had to deliver to were primarily owned by cantankerous, wrinkled people with white hair, trousers pulled up to just below the nipple line, who had plenty of free time to lay in wait, so they could bitch at me daily about my delivery technique, the length of my hair or the high cost of a loaf of bread. The remaining homes on my route housed a 10 year olds worst nightmare; high school kids.

For some reason, I seemed to attract packs of discontented boys ranging from the age of 13-18, with long hair, oily, pimpled faces and an insatiable desire to chase me down, knock me off my bike and kick my ass. Some years later, I read a published study in a medical journal, which proved conclusively, pasty-faced red-heads with freckles emit a scent which drives other kids to chase them down and beat them senseless. Or perhaps it was my bike?

As I said before, I didn’t have a reliable bike. Earlier that summer, I suffered my mid-life crises a few years early and became obsessed with owning a “chopper.” My neighbor, who owned an acetylene torch and a father with a lot of free time, helped me weld an extra fork on the end of my existing bike fork, to make my very own chopper bike. It was great to look at but unfortunately, when I tried to sit, the unbalanced weight distribution caused the front end to pop up and the bike to flip over my head. This, of course, got all kinds of laughs from the other kids on the street, an understanding slap upside my head from dad but regrettably, was not conducive to newspaper delivery. Leave it to dad to come up with the perfect solution.

“You can ride your sister’s bike.”

After removing the white, wicker basket from the handle bars and replacing it with large, metal hooks on each handle, I stepped back to assess my ride. It was a typical 70’s, girly bike, painted a light aqua green with a big white, banana style seat, covered with large pastel colored flowers, which looked like they were pulled off the set of “The Dating Game.” This bike, coupled with the red hair and freckles, were a perfect mix to insure abuse. When I whined to dad about how I would get beat up riding my sister’s bike, he assured me it “would build character.” Why do parents feel ass-kickings, crossing gender lines and public humiliation build self esteem? They don’t. It taught me how to peddle fast and run from trouble. I’m so proud.

After loading my bag with 100 pounds of cumbersome newspapers, I peddled off down the street, with my front wheel wobbling back and forth, trying my best to keep the bike upright. When my route was finished and I had successfully run the gauntlet of burn-outs looking for a piece of me, I was thankful for having my sister’s bike. While fleeing, the combination of unbalanced weight load, sobbing and excessive wobbling caused me to lose my balance and slide off my flowery bike seat. As any guy will tell you, falling off your bike seat at a high rate of speed means one thing: RACKED BALLS!!! But because I was getting in touch with my feminine side and “cross biking”, I avoided smashing my noootz on the bar normally found on a boy’s bike and was able to keep, not only my balance for escape, but my dignity. Well, as much dignity as you can have while running home with the bike frame wedged between your thighs to keep it upright, cutting through the neighbor’s yards and screaming over your shoulder,

“Better leave me alone! My dad’s a police officer!!! My dad’s a police officer!!!”

Actually, my dad sold carbon-copy business forms. Yelling, “My dad’s a carbon-copy business forms salesman!!” didn’t carry the intimidating punch I was looking for.

I’ve found that each one of my past job’s, has prepared me better to handle any crisis that may pop up in my current job. Hopefully, we learn from our mistakes and apply that knowledge to further our careers. Just last month, an issue came up at the closing table for a client’s home purchase. Seems a charge was billed to them erroneously, and they expressed their displeasure at the oversight. Did I panic? No. I simply jumped up from the table, grabbed my balls and ran out of the office yelling, “My dad’s a policeman!!” I look back on my past jobs and I’m thankful they taught me dignity and built a fine character.

Sex and The Fine Arts

2008-08-21T14:02:00.001-07:00

The other day, while running, I experienced an interesting occurrence. Let me clarify that statement. I was in no way, putting foot to pavement, sweating or anything close to exercise. I’ve seen the tiny, silk, shorts runners wear and I’m quite certain, these look-a-likes for women’s panties, will fail to contain my “goodies” during a bounding jog through the neighborhood. My best runs are those exercised around the cable channels, via the remote control. As a man, my search through the numerous cable channels has me hunting for the following; sports, any show where people put personal dignity and injury on the line for my entertainment, funny commercials or anything remotely close to showing partially, better yet, completely naked women. My wife, also in the family room, was busy at the computer with her back to the T.V. As I sifted through the crap that is T.V. these days, I happened on the Spanish channel. It’s a fact, at any given moment on the Spanish channel, you can find a show which has at least 3 large breasted, giggling women in teeny sequin dresses, standing around an older, ugly guy wearing a tuxedo, with greasy, slicked back hair. After ugly, tuxedo guy says something, the girls giggle and bounce up and down. This is good. However, lest I be labeled a pervert by my wife, I couldn’t pause and watch the show. I did what all men do. I burned the channel number into my brain and casually continued my search. After a short while, my wife walked upstairs, which afforded me the opportunity to click back to the jiggling senoritas. I had no idea what they were saying. My unwavering focus was on the screen-full of long, tan legs and the distinct possibility something wonderful was going to pop out of one those small dresses.

“Are you watching something in Spanish?” my wife yelled from the stairs. Quickly, I thought of a response.

“Yeah…I had 2 years of high school Spanish and every now and then I like to see if I can understand what they’re saying. It’s educational…keeps my brain working.” Then, before I could change the channel, she walked back in a busted me.

“You perv! You’re checking out the bimbos!”

Sadly, that wasn’t the only time in my life I’ve used education or the quest to study the fine arts to satisfy basic manly, creepy lust.

I remember faking an interest, in the differing cultures around the world, at an early age. Harry O’Connell’s dad had an enormous stack of National Geographic magazines and many afternoons were spent thumbing through the glossy pages until we found pictures of naked, African tribal women. Granted, most of the women were caked in dirt, pierced with sticks or clam shells and their exposed breasts were dragging on the jungle floor but we didn’t care. They were boobs and they were naked, dammit! Honestly, for guys, any venture, which has the potential to reward the viewer with even a chance of seeing nudity, is well worth the effort. Who hasn’t spent hours with their friends, in front of a scrambled, naughty cable channel, in the hopes the transmission locks up long enough to catch a glimpse of anything resembling a female body part.

“Dude!!! Look, look, look!!!!! I swear that’s a nipple! Awesome!! Wait…wait, dude…what the hell is that!?! Is that a 3-legged Chihuahua!?! What the hell is that?”

When I was 12, I used trips to the mall to satiate my thirst for art appreciation. I’d head over to Kroch’s and Brentano’s and while the amateurish cretins trolled back and forth by the magazine rack, in hopes to sneak a peek under the brown wrapper of the current issue of Playboy, I headed over to the Art section of the bookstore. Classic art is littered with paintings of topless women. I confidently hunted for hand-painted, renaissance porn in the midst of adults, who looked upon me as a red-headed, precocious lover of art. Unfortunately, while there was an abundance of fine looking zoomers, the women of the era were a bit on the chunky side. But I was 12 and any port in a storm, right? One other thing I noticed during my study of the arts. What the hell was Michelangelo thinking when he sculpted the famous statue of David? You’d think if you were going to sculpt a fellow dude’s naked likeness, you’d give him a little more south of the border. They should change the name of the piece from, “David” to “David, After a Swim In A Really Cold Brook!”

Years later, I expanded my search for all things naked to the written word. When visual aids weren’t readily available, I’d turn to the dictionary to expand my mind and quest for all things dirty. Many a rainy day was spent looking up filthy words and then giggling like a fool. Actually, my studies were helpful in that it shed light on some words I thought were dirty but really weren’t. Words like nape, crevice, uvula and pianist were words I avoided saying in mixed company. Honestly, I still avoid saying “pianist” because it makes me laugh whenever I hear someone else say it. Go ahead. Say “pianist” 10 times in a row, really fast and try not to laugh.

Years ago, being perverted could go hand in hand, with all things considered, “The Arts.” Lost, is the journey to find creative ways to satisfy the need for the finer things in life and smut. Simply staring at the T.V. for images of nude women is quite frankly, old and overdone. What we need is a new avenue for cheap thrills. I wonder if you can get dirty pictures on the interenet?

First Day of High School...Quite A Pickle

2008-08-15T05:56:00.000-07:00

Today marks the official start of my life as the parent of a high school teenager. I look forward with great enthusiasm to many fun-filled nights, scrutinizing potential boyfriends, lengths of skirts and thickness of make-up, especially eye make-up. My daughter occassionally slathers on the eye liner as though she's trying to capture the look of either an ancient Egyptian princess or a raccoon with a penchant toward prostitution. My old man had the same problems with my sisters and I fondly recall him shouting out with reddened face and bulging neck veins, like a over-zealous Baptist minister from the pulpit,

"You've got too much eye make-up on! You look like a "whoooooooooore!"

For some reason he stretched out the "oo" sound and threw in a couple of extra syllables in the mix, so that a 1 syllable word now had 3 or 4. I have yet to accuse my daughter of "hooking" but it's funny how concerns and worries never seem to change. Just as my daughter is today, I was a little nervous about starting high school but for different reasons, altogether.

In 1979, when I began freshman year at Marist high school, an all boys catholic school mind you, I had only one fear. I had no physical defects, clubbed foot, swollen facial chancres or a wandering sniper-eye, nothing like that at all, which was prime ammunition for upper classmen to give you some terrible nickname that would stick forever. Fortunately, I had "sprouted" pubic hair in all the necessary locales to avoid locker room abuse and I dressed as nerdy as all the other incoming freshman. I was, for all practical purposes, normal. My only fear was riding a school bus for the very first time.

Since I attended a private, catholic grammar school, we weren't allowed to ride the public school buses. It was the 70's, and as I've said before, nobody had any money in the 70's. The luxury and expense of using a bus was out of the question. My parents conspired with 2 other families to take turns each week carpooling us kids to school. We alternated driving with the Hennessy's and the Noonan's. All together, there were 8 kids and one adult stuffed ever so comfortably into the car. I don't recall much of an issue, aside from having to ride with one of your brothers or sisters on your lap, when it was our turn or the Hennessy's week to drive. However, when the Noonan's week rolled around, it was a living hell. First of all, Mikey Noonan was too young to leave at home and had to sit up front, so this added one more body to the already over-populated back seat game of Twister. Mrs. Noonan drove a dark, green Chevy Impala and joining her in the front seat were Colleen and Mikey Noonan. The manufacturer's suggested back seat capacity was 3 adults sitting comfortably or 7 children stacked to the roof, ready to kill each other with a #2 pencil or Little Debbie snack cake. Along with me, trying to survive the crush of humanity in the back seat, were my older sister Kathy and my little sister Beth. As I was a gentleman, I offered to let Kathy sit without having another kid on her lap. Actually, she was bigger than me and not only possessed the physical abilities to kick my ass but tenacity and willingness to drop a beat-down on me at a moment's notice. Even today, I'd rather whack a beehive with my genitals than mix it up with her. That left Beth to sit on my lap. She was small and I could slap her around, if need be, without any fear of retaliation. Next to us were the Hennessy boys, Tom, Steve, Jack and little Jimmy. Since there were 4 of them, they stacked up neatly like patio resin chairs, without incident. In the 70's, child restraint devices were shunned so that more kids could get shoved dangerously in cars and off to school. The cramped ride itself was not the problem, as our limbs were pinched and pressed to the point of cutting off blood circulation and our bodies went numb for the twenty minute drive. Mrs. Noonan was the problem. She was a smoker.

She chain smoked Pall Mall's. In fact, while most smokers took an occassional smoke-break, Mrs. Noonan would try to squeeze in a moment each day to breathe some air. Unfortunately, she never took an "air-break" while driving us back and forth from school, so when we exited the car, we had an amber tint from the free floating tar and smelled like a 60's, beatnik coffee house. Opening a window was out of the question because she needed to have the AC cranked and god-forbid she wasn't completely comfortable, while giving us kids a well-deserved dose of emphysema. Thankfully, I had my little sister on my lap and could place my mouth on her shirt, then breathe, using her shirt as an air-filter, of sorts. I probably should have shared my discovery on battling the second hand smoke with my sisters but Kathy got to sit without a kid crushing her lap, so I figured, "Screw her!" she deserved to be exposed to deadly fumes. Beth, on the otherhand, was my little sister. It was my job, as an older brother, to exploit and torture her in any way I saw fit. Besides, if I warned her about it she may have hindered me from using her as my own personal gas mask. Actually, because of the density of the air-born carcinogens, the smoke was classified as "first and a half" hand smoke, not quite as deadly as hot-boxing a cancer stick ourselves but certainly not as refreshing as a lung-full of second hand smoke. The 7 of us sat silently in the back seat, daring not to speak for fear of the other problem driving with Mrs. Noonan presented.

If, by chance, one of us said something mildly amusing, Mrs. Noonan would laugh. Public expression of merriment is normally nothing to fear but in this case, along with the guffaws from a good belly laugh, came an uncontrolled fit of coughing. And not just any cough. Her's was a smoker's cough, thick with the sound of rolling phlegm that seemed to originate from her feet and eventually spewed forth from her wide open mouth, like a pyroclastic cloud of spittle and lung butter. Again, I was protected by Beth's shirt from breathing in anything disgusting. However, our exposed skin was unprotected from the landing of spit droplets. It was a crapshoot and you just prayed silently to be spared the fallout. Sure, carpooling had its' drawbacks but it was familiar and cancer risk aside, a safe way to get to school.

As I said before, concerns and worries never change, from one generation to the next. My daughter, like me, was apprehensive about riding the bus but for a different reason. She's been riding buses to school her whole life, so that wasn't the problem. Apparently, she heard that part of the high school busing experience included the older kids hazing the freshman in a rather strange way. "Bennying" freshman is nothing new but this rumor she was freaking out about even had me a bit troubled. She's afraid of getting "pickled." I've never heard of that but from what she claims, the older kids make you stick a pickle up your butt, walk up and down the bus aisle and then eat it. Sounds like something I'd try on my little sister Beth but certainly not something to be feared while trying to get an education. After calming her down, I told her she has nothing to worry about and at no point during the bus ride will she have a Vlasic hamburger chip wedged in her crack. Kids...where do they get this stuff from? My fear was much more simple than having pickled vegetables forced into body cavities. I just didn't want to get beat up, which is still a concern of mine to this day. Public humilation I'm comfortable with, it's pain and weeping in front of others that bothers me.

Now that my daughter is embarking on her high school journey, a new batch of problems and issues face not only her, but me and my wife, as well. I'm sure we'll go round and round with her about boys, drinking, curfews and many other topics. As parents, my wife and I are confident that we've prepared our daughter for most situations, save one. If she finds herself in a place where people are smoking, as an only child she'll have no little sibling to use as a human respirator.

Summer Sprinkle

2008-08-01T10:04:00.001-07:00

Today is hot. Thankfully, I’m fortunate enough to have a pool so I can cool down in this oppressive heat. I’m also “fortunate” enough to have to vacuum it, buy countless expensive chemicals and extract gobs of human hair and large, scary looking bugs from the filter. There’s only 1 thing better than owning a pool and that’s knowing someone who owns a pool and using theirs for free. I also have a Speedo bathing suit. It’s royal blue with an autographed likeness of 7–time, Olympic gold medalist, Mark Spitz, strategically located in the groinal region. I think I look better in trunks, as do the frightened neighbors, but I find the Spitz Speedo keeps the free-loading moochers at bay. Kids today are spoiled when it comes to surviving a hot summer. Most of the hot days are wasted downloading music, playing video games and “texting” fellow suburban hermits, all in the comfort of central air-conditioning. Occasionally, my daughter will swim but only if the water temperature is just below boiling. I pity her generation, that they’ll never know the wonders and joys of alternative methods to cool down on a hot summer’s day.

Kids in my dad’s era were very tough. Nobody owned swim trunks. Every kid’s summer attire consisted of sturdy, heavy denim, blue jeans and a plain white T-shirt. Not only was it fashionable, it was versatile, as well. By rolling up the pant legs and slipping off the T-shirt, you were instantly ready to tackle any form of water and create one helluva case of inner thigh chafe, from the rubbing of wet, stiff denim. There were 2 ways to cool down back then. On really hot days, the local fireman would open up the hydrants and let the kids run through the dangerously high pressured stream of water until either the water pressure waned or the kids’ skin peeled off. The other way to cool off was at a watering hole. There were 2 types of watering holes. 1). The inner city spa, which boasted a rusty bathtub, on a garbage-strewn vacant lot, filled with rain water and other discarded fluids from abandoned automobiles. 2). For those who wanted to get away from it all and relax in nature’s splendor, one of the city’s parks was sure to have a stagnant pond, fully equipped with an over-hanging tire swing and an abundance of nearly hatching mosquito larvae. Those were tough kids, risking pestilence and malaria, all for the sake of cooling off. My generation had much easier, and less deadly, means to beat the heat.

When I was 10, we didn’t have a pool so my dad bought the family a “Slip & Slide”, which was an 18’ long strip of bright, yellow plastic that was hooked up to the hose. I remember the first time we used the Slip & Slide because it was also the last time we used the Slip & Slide. The picture on the box showed insanely, happy children sliding across the lawn, while a cooling mist of water helped ease their twisting bodies over the length of the plastic. What the box failed to show was an irate father with shaking fist, cursing loudly and complaining to his wife, while looking down on the 18’ patch of dead grass left behind by the Slip & Slide. The box also neglected to warn kids that if/when you slide off the end, the innocent looking blades of grass will, in fact, tear up your chest and arms with stinging, paper cut-like wounds. As I said, we never “Slipped” or “Slided” across the lawn again but dad had another suggestion.

Dad decided he could kill 2 birds with 1 stone by letting us kids run through the sprinkler. Not only was this helpful for the grass but at the same time, shut-up a lawn full of sweaty, nagging kids for the rest of the afternoon. There are many ways to run through a sprinkler and the following is a brief description of the varying techniques.

The Baryshnikov Style: This was my preferred technique. First, I approached the sprinkler by sprinting like a complete fool, arms flailing, tongue out and screaming some kind of strange noise. Just before entry, I planted my left foot and with head thrown back and arms out to the side, I’d jump through the water in a manner which could be best described as a “fairy leap.” I’m not proud of it, it’s just what I did.

The Clairol Technique: This style was implemented strictly by girls. However, if I found myself alone and the old man couldn’t see me, I’d bust this move out myself. Again, I’m not proud of it…I had some issues. Anyway, the girls (or I) would crawl up to the sprinkler and stick just the hair in the streaming water. After a good soaking, they’d run their fingers through their hair, as though shampooing, and sing loudly,

“I’m gonna wash that gray right outta my hair!”

The Dead Head Style: At the age of 10, none of us had found the time to experiment with mind altering drugs. You know, with Little League, collecting baseball cards and building forts, there just wasn’t enough time in the day to drop some acid and lick the sky. You could however, work yourself into a psychedelic trance by using the Dead Head Style. These “wierdos”, as we referred to them, usually were uninvited neighborhood kids that nobody talked to. They’d just stand next to the sprinkler and silently grin as they slowly passed their hand across the streams of water. Completely mesmerized by the different patterns they were making, they’d occasionally let out a slurred,
“Wooooow” or “Cooooool.”
Then they’d pee on our lawn and ask us for munchies.

The Squatter: There was always that 1 kid who would squat down with his butt a few inches above the sprinkler. What this did for him, I’ll never know. I found it creepy. Perhaps he was practicing for future use of a bidet, which is French for “drinking fountain next to the toilet.”

I wish there was someway to rattle these kids of today to get outside and take advantage of alternative ways to cool off. I think I’ll strap on the old Spitz Speedo and chase the neighborhood kids around for awhile. That’ll get ‘em all hot and sweaty and I’m certain they’ll jump in the pool. I’ll also find an alternative manner in which to cool down as I’m sure after I’m arrested, the back seat of the squad car will have plenty of air-conditioning.

You Know You're Old When...

2008-07-25T11:53:00.000-07:00

You know you're getting old when...

1). Although you're not a smoker, every morning you manage to cough up lung cookies in the shower.

2). You get up from sitting in a chair and unconsciously, make noises from the stress of standing up. Also, while sitting in the chair, you make other disgusting noises, which can also be heard or smelled when you're in the shower, sleeping, eating dinner, watching T.V. or whenever there's an uncomfortable silence and the family needs a good laugh.

3). You've mounted a bike and truly feared for a brief moment that you might not live through this experience.

You know you're getting old when...

4). You discover your arms are too short to read a menu.

5). You are willing to clean your ears with anything...especially matches, hair pins, car keys or if you haven't had any coffee, a very small screwdriver.

6). ...wait...what was number 6? I had it a second ago...

You know you're getting old when...

7). You have to pass gas and you're really scared because you're not absolutely sure if it's going to come out in gaseous or solid form. And when you decide to "go for broke" and let loose, you literally breathe a sigh of relief when it comes out gas, as though it was some kind of accomplishment.

8). You've thought you were in the midst of having a heart attack and actually sat down at the computer and Google searched the tell-tale symptoms of a heart attack. You've also, at some point, did some research on other lumps, moles, hairs and involuntary muscle twitches that you were certain to be symptoms of a life threatening disease.

You know you're getting old when...

9). The soda induced belches, in your youth, which you so loudly expelled are now replaced with painful acid reflux burps discreetly performed with closed mouth, to keep deadly stomach acid from spewing forth and miaming friends and family, like the creature from Alien.

10). You dance at weddings and you incorporate, in your dance moves, any of the following.
-clapping
-any pointing and moving of the index finger held up in the air
-doing "the monkey"
-finding another old person to do the "can-can" with you
-any move associated with "The Charleston", especially the illusion of knocking your knees together.

11). You're cultivating eyebrow hairs as coarse as banjo strings and as curly as pubes.

And lastly, you know you're getting old when...

12). You announce to the family your intent to have a bowel movement.

"Does anyone have to get in the bathroom? I'm gonna be in there a while."

Also, other signs of aging include, taking up residence in the bathroom for more than 1 hour or you bring a newspaper in with you. Also, you know you're old if you've ever heard any of the following terms associated with a one of your visits to the bathroom.

"crippled"
"wrecked"
Or if upon entering the bathroom after you finished up, someone felt in necessary to invoke the Almighty's name in disgust,
"Good Lord!"
"Jesus!"
"Christ Almighty!"
...and followed up invocation by questioning whether or not you were human.

If you found that any of these traits applied to you, don't be embarrassed. Embrace your maturation with dignity and class. Just don't come over to my house.