The staring contest

Old Amos was tight. He was a good man yet he was very careful with his money. Consequently, me Grandpa Joe would often send Amos out to buy this or that for the welding business. He knew Amos would get him the best deal. One story me Pops liked to tell involved such an event.

I can't remember now what it was Joe wanted, but he sent Dad and Amos after it because it would take two people to handle whatever contraption he wanted to buy. Dad drove, and then simply stood back to watch Amos at work.

Amos tried every way in the world to get the seller to back down on price. He begged, he pleaded, he pointed out flaws in the machine. The guy wouldn't budge. It reached the point where Amos stopped talking and began pacing. He would pace a few steps beyond the man and then return. On his return, Dad said, Amos would stop abruptly right in front of the guy and spend a few seconds just glaring at him. Then he'd walk on, return, and do the same thing. He must have been trying to intimidate him, was all Pops could think.

After as few minutes of this, during which the seller did exchange a quizzical look at the old man, the guy finally said, "Look, just give me my price. But I'll put a lower one on the bill of sale to help you out on the sales tax."

Amos would have none of that. "Now, listen here. I want to get the best price I can out of you," he explained to the seller. "But what goes on paper is going to be right no matter what we agree to." Amos then resumed his pacing tactic.

As I recall (I wish I'd have listened more closely to Pops' stories) they eventually agreed on a price and Dad and Amos took the thing to the Shop because Joe had to have it. But I sure would have liked to have seen that battle of wills, that staring contest.

Tax Day

There are points which I will admit that I love to belabor. One of them is quite appropriate for this moment, as today is April 15, when we're supposed to have paid our income taxes for the previous year. And as I always will assert, I will always shout to the high heavens, income taxes are immoral. Period.

I'm not so libertarian as to argue that all taxation is theft. But the income tax is (the property tax too, and for similar reasons). Basically, the majority of Americans are saying that because person y made x amount of money he must hand some of it to said majority to spend however they want. If that's not theft I don't know what is.

Don't argue, but democracy! If democracy voted that you had to hand over your house or car would you have to? Of course not. Why so with your money?

The government can get cash from sales taxes and user fees, bond sales, and even import taxes. But how could it pay for all it's paying for now? It couldn't, I readily admit. Government would have to get farther out of our lives, which would be a great moral good. Or have you not noticed the wonderful job it has done on inflation, gas prices, poverty, education, or dozens of other things?

I will only allow this: pay your income taxes, but only because the alternative - fines and jail - are worse for you. In short, your payment of income taxes is predicated on a threat to life if not limb. That's exactly how more honest thieves act.

Beatles Dental Care

Two minutes. That, I've long understood, is how long you ought to brush your teeth. Yet how can you know you've accomplished that?

It was suggested to me that an easy way to do it was to listen to a song in your head which was about two minutes long while brushing. So I 'play' the Beatles' Can't Buy Me Love in my mind as I take care of my twice daily dental chores. That's not a terrible earworm either.

I wonder if Sir Paul ever imagined that his rock standard would be used for the health of an old Detroiter in 2026? Hmm...I bet he doesn't give it a second thought. Or first for that matter.

He's Just Joe

The term Grandpa Joe for my paternal grandfather came about as a compromise familiar. You can read about that here: Mom and Joe. Basically, Joe wanted his grandkids to call him Joe exactly as he taught his own children to call him by his name. When he confronted me Mom about it, seeing as me older brother and I are his oldest grandchildren, she'd have none of it. Grandpas were grandpa or pawpaw or poppop or grandpappy or something like that. The compromise became Grandpa Joe.

I get me Mom's point. I do believe that elder family members should be addressed by a traditional family moniker of some sort. Grandpa, Nana, Aunt, Uncle, as the case may be. Even people we just met ought to be called by some title, Mister, Missus, Ms, Sir, Ma'am, something, until we are familiar enough with them to call them by first names (or instructed to by the person in question). It's a respect we take too lightly in today's world.

However, I kind of understand Joe's wishes too. If he's okay with Joe, even from his progeny and their offspring, I don't see anything wrong with it. It's one of the reasons I consciously call him Joe many times in my blogs. It's what he wanted. As no real evil is involved, what's to debate?

So why did he want to be Joe rather than dad or pop or what have you? I really don't know. He simply preferred it that way, I guess, for whatever psychological reason. I never really questioned it. And the older I get, the less he's Grandpa Joe to me and more just Joe. That's simply who he was.

The Masters and John Cosgriff

I don't watch golf very often. But I always watch the Masters. Although I do find that I like the game more and more as I grow older, there's a part of me which still doesn't really see the allure. Hitting a small ball hundreds of yards into a cup maybe twice the size of that ball just doesn't seem a very entertaining way to spend an afternoon. Still, I find that golf and I have a history. Lately that's been played out through 'swing and sweeps', combined golf and curling tournaments. They're great fun, especially if, as a curler (as I am) it gets you two more curling games per season. I do look forward to them.

But more than that. My father's youngest brother, my Uncle John, liked to golf. He always bet something or other with a coworker on the outcome of the Masters. He and his boss would pick five guys alternately, and who had the winner won a sleeve of balls. I'm not sure who won most often. But I know my uncle was always proud of his picks.

I golfed with him many times years ago, when he was young and I was younger. We'd go out for nine holes after work many a summer's day. Those evenings were always good fun. If I could relive just one...we would joke and laugh, and simply enjoy the quiet and the game.

He was a lefty. That was fairly rare in golf at the time. His swing seemed unusual even to me, but for a duffer he was okay. I scored my only birdie to this date while golfing with him. The Eighth hole at Dearborn Hills, a 170 yard par 3, a Thursday night in an August which escapes my memory. I made the green off the tee with a four iron, and hit a 25 foot putt which ran hard left to right right into the cup. I made him sign the scorecard to attest that I had birdied. He remarked, "No one will believe us, because I'm family". It was lightly drizzling as he signed the card under the glare of my car's headlight after that round. I still see him doing it. Why do such things stay in our memories? But when he died, the first thing I did was dig up the scorecard and the ball that I birdied with.

When he had decided he was through with golf he gave me his left handed clubs. Several times I played rounds with them. If you have any idea how poorly I golf, you would know that it hardly mattered from which side of the tee I would address the ball. Might as well play lefty.

I kept those clubs for years. Then I bought a better-than-mine set of used right handed clubs (used better than I ever will), and decided to sell Uncle John's clubs at a yard sale. Who needs two sets of clubs, especially opposite sided ones, right? A young left handed guy practiced swung a few of them, decided that he wanted to golf enough so that it mattered that he ought to have his own clubs, and bought them.

I watched him walk away, dragging Uncle John's clubs behind on the cart which went with the deal. I felt a pang of remorse as the man disappeared with his new found treasure.

I sincerely hope that he has golfed well with them. And I wish I still had those clubs.

Saturday Night Stoogery

It's said that you can't beat the classics. I find that true.

Whatever you might say about the Three Stooges, while they are repetitive and childish, they are also timeless. Their shtick just never gets old. I know this because I'm old but they're still fresh.

Every Saturday night they're on MEtv from 6 to 8, and I rarely miss them. They aren't exactly high comedy. In fact, they don't even sniff at that. Yet there's something about their lowbrow slapstick which just appeals to the masses. 

Bread and Circuses? How about Stooges and Saturday? What say ye?

Bookended

My curling season ended with a loss last night. The wheels came off and we were set down 9-3. That's too bad, because we had a good, solid year. The boys played well in front of me from October through April and made it easy.

Interestingly, we lost yesterday to the team who beat us in the very first game of the season of Thursday league play. We got bookended. In between we were 12-5. On the year, I finished 16-5 as a skip and 20-7-1 overall. Not bad for a guy who didn't think he'd have a curling season last September. But that's the benefit you get when the guys you play with are good curlers, and simply good fellas to curl with.

Here's to the 26-27 season. It's looking good already.