Another story

Mom always carries granola bars with her. One of the medications she's on gives her food cravings, and she likes granola bars. In fact she's actually gotten such a taste for them that me brother Phil buys them by the crate at warehouse stores. Very often the staff have to get a hi-lo and bring them out to his van on a pallet. But that's another story.

As Mom and I enjoyed our usual Sunday drive yesterday, I pulled into a Dollar General because I wanted to buy this blood orange flavored carbonated water they have, which is sooooo goooood. I'd never even heard of blood orange until I one day bought a bottle of this stuff at another Dollar General on a lark. Apparently there are oranges with a red pulp, hence 'blood' oranges, with a bit of a raspberry taste along with the expected orange dominant flavor. But that's another story.

When I had finished parking, Mom took about three granola bars out of her vest pocket and put them in the console between us. "I don't want to take these into the store," she explained, "Because they might think I stole them and it would set off the alarms and make all that noise."

"And I wouldn't bail you out of jail," I teased.

"I know that," she replied in mock disgust. "That's why I'm leaving them here."

And that's today's story.

The internal debate

I spent last weekend in the tiny village of Hessel, in Michigan's glorious Upper Peninsula. I'm glad that we weren't a state at the time of our little dispute with Ohio. I'd rather have da U.P. den Toledo. Nothing personal, honest, Toledo.

Anyway, when there I broke myself (I think) of a rather silly habit. On Monday afternoon I wanted a cup of coffee. So I had resolved to drive three miles into neighboring Cedarville and buy a cup at the gas station and convenience store there. My reason for not making coffee at the house was that I was leaving early Tuesday and wouldn't drink a whole pot of it before then. "So don't make a full one," something inside me said to me.

"Don't make a full pot of coffee?" I asked myself incredulously. "Who does that? How would you even go about it?"

"You put in half or a third of the grounds for a full pot using half or a third of the water," I explained to me.

"I can do that?" I questioned myself skeptically.

"Sure you can," I assured me. "You've got perfectly good tap water, and coffee that's already paid for. And it'll be done by the time you'd drive into town."

Shaking my head at my thoughts I said, "I don't know."

"What's to know?" And myself began filling the coffee pot half way before putting the water in the reservoir of the Mr. Coffee, and putting two scoops instead of four scoops of grounds into the container the hot water would run through. "You sure about this?" I asked as I hit the brew switch.

"Trust me," I replied.

Sure enough, in a few minutes I had hot coffee, without the trouble of driving into Cedarville. It seems I can be taught. It just has to by an expert teacher.

The upcoming great TP shortage of 2021

I think it's time for old Marty to stir the pot. I'm going to go shopping later today.

That doesn't seem like a big deal, but here's the thing: I'm going to pick up four shopping carts at the entrance to Meijer. Then I'll head straight to the toilet paper aisle and fill all four buggies to overflowing. I intend to put in every package of bathroom tissue I can keep from tumbling off as high of a stack as I can create in each cart. Maybe I'll bring along the bungee cords from my car to help stabilize the load. Then I'll carefully maneuver the carts to the checkout, doing my best to make sure everyone sees me. I'll go up and down unnecessary aisles for attention.

As I pay for the to TP I'll be grumbling loudly that I hope I'm buying enough. Then I'll head out to my van, openly complaining all over again. It will help that I'll get the carts with the squeekiest wheels possible to draw attention to me. I'm also hoping to buy enough that I can tie a ton of it to the luggage racks on top of the car so that everyone on the road can see me too.

So when the next toilet paper shortage begins, yours truly will have started it.

Quiet, Ron.

Blind drain cleaner

Mr. Johnston was a drain cleaner. And I am not making a joke here; indeed I'm rather in awe. You see, Mr. Johnston was blind. Yet by all accounts he was a fine drain cleaner.

To be sure, he had to have an assistant, someone to drive him to jobs and arrange things. You know, find the cleanout (access point) of the drain and set up the machinery. Then he would lead Mr. Johnston to the opening, give him a pair of gloves and start the cable into the line. But then Mr. Johnston would would take it from there.

I've always understood that blind people have their other senses heightened, and that's how I understand Mr. Johnston did his job. He could feel the cable begin to helix, corkscrew, when it hit a blockage just a bit quicker than others. The sound of the machine gave him clues too as to what was happening. The motor might whine a little bit extra when the machine was under stress. Mr. Johnston could pick that up readily.

It's sounds like a joke but it's true. I knew a blind drain cleaner. By all accounts, he was very good at it.

The only bad thing about Bill Cosgriff

Me Pops was a good man, and I'm not just saying that as a loyal son. He gave back to the community and the Church, serving on the local neighborhood committees and the Parish Council respectively. The old man was good and kind to people. As such, he had earned the respect of many, although a few apparently held certain reservations.

A family friend in the area whom we've known for years, I'll call him Cloyce just to give him a name, related a conversation he'd recently had with someone in the neighborhood. He didn't say who, and that's okay. Cloyce was surely respecting the man's privacy.

In the course of their talk the fella asked Cloyce, "Did you know Bill Cosgriff?"

"Yes I did."

"He was a good man, a good man. It was sad to lose Bill," the guy allowed. "There was only one thing about him."

"Really?' Cloyce responded, intrigued. He was thinking, What could you hold against Bill?

Leaning in towards Cloyce conspiratorially, obviously expecting Cloyce to be in the club, so to speak, and properly shocked, the man whispered, "Bill was a Republican."

Cloyce pretended to consider that for a few seconds, then said, "Well, you know, he might not have been the only one around here."

Confused momentarily, the guy then asked Cloyce, incredulously and a bit distressed, "You didn't vote for Trump, did you?"

"Twice," Cloyce answered, holding up two fingers peace sign-like.

It's a cool story. And I kinda like how Cloyce rather subtly put the man in his place.

Parked in the driveway

I don't know if it's rudeness or stupidity. Perhaps they just can't see it because their blinders are on too tight. But I continue to be amazed at the rank lack of consideration among people today.

As I approached the entrance to my Shop yesterday I saw that a man had parked his bike across the driveway as he checked his bags and spoke on the phone. There were no cars on the street on either side of the drive, and a complete lack of obstructions on the sidewalk. Yet he was stopped, standing astride his bike checking things out right smack in the way of anyone who might want to get to my Shop. Like me.

I sat with my signal on, and he looked at me as though What's your problem? After a few seconds I gave up and circled around to another point of entry. I came in the back, a block away.

And he was still there when I arrived at the front of the Shop. I briefly considered saying something to him yet decided I would not. There was no reason: if he didn't see by then that he was a problem why should he if I brought it up? That just risks escalating a situation and that's when things can spin out of control. Better to be the adult, a task which even I can occasionally accomplish.

It still rankles me though.

Home!

I'm home from Hessel!

Did you miss me?

What to do in Hessel

Nothing. But that's not a bad thing.

Okay, to say nothing isn't really true. There's always something to do no matter where you are, the refrains of your typical teenager notwithstanding. In my case, in the case of Hessel, the nothing to do is in fact something.

I read. So far I've read two Ellery Queen books and a book on the aftermath of World War II in Asia. I've read the Sunday paper and done the Sunday crossword puzzles (still in pencil, Pops). Sometimes I just sit on the porch and sip coffee. 

I watched a hockey game when I actually turned on the TV Saturday night (Vegas won) and listened to two baseball games in the garage. I've even cleared the driveway of cedar tree debris (yes, I was going for the rhyming alliteration there) and a bit of overgrown grass. That last bit was certainly not the nothing I praise. But I felt rather satisfied at the appearance of the driveway when I was done.

Today I will read a little more and finish what food I have, and return home tomorrow. This week, Tuesday is my Monday. I'm okay with that.

Weird Hessel

I know that I'm up here in the off season, so I don't expect a ton of summer activity. But I didn't expect the local pub and grub to be closed.

It's been closed every night I've been here, and it's downright weird to be sitting on my porch and not hearing a thing from that direction (the place is about a city block away). What's even more odd is walking down there at any time of day and into the evening, even later at night, to see no one and no thing. No one in the pub, no cars on the street, nothing. 

When I get a chance I'm going hit the locals about what's going on. The only other Hessel bar is about two miles away and it's closed too. Of course, the casino is open.

I'm sure it's somehow COVID related. But I'd have thought the Upper Peninsula of Michigan would have been beyond that issue by now. But this intrepid reporter will get to the bottom of it. 

Or he won't, because the quiet is nice. Why stir the pot?

Speeding Cloyce

A good friend of mine for many years, I'll call him Cloyce just to give him a name, has always been a speedster. When he drove (I think he's amended his ways somewhat, recently) he really put the pedal to the metal. Though thankfully he's never gotten there, he has driven like Hell.

I'm not sure why he speeds like he does, but it's clearly become enough of a habit that he doesn't seem to notice anything else around him as he drives. He certainly missed the cop the most recent time he was pulled over.

"Do you know why I stopped you, sir?" The officer asked.

Cloyce despondently answered, "Yeah. I was speeding."

The patrolman continued, "Do you realize how fast you were going?"

"No," my friend replied honestly.

"Let me put it this way," the officer explained, "I was right behind another car to pull him over for speeding. I had my lights on and everything. Then you flew by us so fast that I dropped off that car to pursue you." Yep. Cloyce sped faster past a cop car and another vehicle speeding slower than he was without seeing them. Even with the police car's flashing lights on.

I think ol' Cloyce has learned a lesson. Maybe.

TP panic

As I replaced an empty roll of toilet paper the other day, I noticed that there was only one 12 pack of TP left. And I thought, that's the last package I bought during the Great Toilet Paper Shortage of 2020. Somehow I believed that what all we bought would last longer than that. Quiet Ron.

I better rush out and buy more. But discretely, so I'm not responsible for causing the next panic.

8

This is why we play the game. This is why we follow it. This is baseball.

Two nights ago Detroit Tigers pitcher Spencer Turnbull threw a no hitter against the Seattle Mariners. It was the eighth in team history.

For once in my life I'm glad my nervousness woke me early. I had a 700 mile road trip lined up for Wednesday morning. Although I was in bed asleep by 5:30 or so, I sprang awake a little after 11 thinking, stupidly afraid In fact, that I had missed my 1:30 alarm. Wide awake because of that, I turned on the game. Being on the west coast, it hadn't started until 10 PM local time. I wasn't going to leave before 2, so I had time to mark.

I'm glad I did. When Jeimer Candelario robbed a Mariner of a sure double leading off the the Seattle 7th, I knew Turnbull was going to get the no-no.

An hour later on a swinging third strike, he had it.

I love baseball. I love the Detroit Tigers.

Income tax day, a day late

Did you pay your taxes yesterday, if not earlier? Good. You should pay them. Fines and jail time aren't worth the protest.

Still, we should remember that income taxes are flat out immoral. They are legal theft, period and full stop. That's why they were unconstitutional to begin with. Few people realize that the original Constitution decreed that there would be no 'head tax', that is, no tax levied on a person simply to levy it on him so that government could get cash. That's why they had to change the Constitution through the 16th Amendment to allow it. The Supreme Court had ruled that income taxes violated the original document.

The framers intent has been one more time destroyed through a government who knows better than you what to do with your cash. Rest well in that hubris, America.

Parental correction

We, well, the great majority of us I'm sure, had to deal with parental discipline as we grew up. We almost always deserved it too. But while I can't speak for everyone or every family I'll say this about mine: I'd rather have been disciplined by Dad than Mom any day.

Me Pops would cut to the chase and dole out punishment when I done wrong. Don't do that, it's wrong, you should know better, and then the paddling or the go to your room and think about what you did or the grounding would be issued. I might not like it but it was over and done.

Me Mom on the other hand typically wanted to talk about it. Why would you do that? Can you explain that to me? 

What's to explain? I took more cookies because I wanted more cookies. I stayed out late because I was having fun and wanted to keep having fun. I mean, by 8 or 10 years old I think even I realized that she was asking for a justification where it simply didn't exist. I knew it was wrong and I did it anyway. What else was there?

Yet the, I guess it was a sort of discussion about the given incident, would go out interminably. Of course, maybe that was the punishment now that I think about it: rubbing my nose in it.

Countrified music

Country songs seem to merit parody, don't they? This coming from a guy who likes country music, and I mean the old twangy stuff like Hank Williams all the way up to, oh, the late 1990s. I don't know much about any music since then, except for Weird Al. He's timeless.

But country begs for jokes almost more than any other style of music. Maybe it's the lyrics. This morning I happened to hear, I'm so lonesome I could cry. Not terrible, but I immediately found myself thinking...

I'm so hungry I could eat.

I'm so tired I could sleep.

I'm so thirsty I could drink.

I'm in so much actual physical pain I could take a Tylenol or even go into urgent care and maybe have surgery and spent a few days in the hospital recovering.

All right, that last one was kind of forced. But you get the point.

A colonel of truth

When my son was in the Army he was stationed for about 15 months at Fort Leavenworth in Kansas. We visited him several times while he was there.

On one trip, he was showing us around the base. As we walked along a section which was lined by the Missouri River, a man went by, jogging. "Good morning!" I said to him heartily.

"Good morning sir," he replied with a friendly smile.

As I turned back to our little group, my son's mouth was agape and his pallor nearly ashen. He remarked in disbelief, "Dad, that guy you just spoke to was a colonel!"

I replied, "For you, he's a colonel. For me, he's a guy jogging."

I think he was jealous that I was called sir by one of his officers.

Chicken dinner at the point of a shovel

Pop Turner lived near the Shop while his brother in law, who we called Tall Glass, lived nearby as well. Pop's real name was Frank. Tall Glass was actually named, I am not making this up, Clabon D. Goldsmith, a name I have to believe actually sounds regal. Some people called him Goldie because his last name. We called him Tall Glass because me Grandpa Joe stuck that moniker on him. He drank from a long, tall glass, Joe always said with a grin. Pop and Tall Glass were brothers-in-law, Pops having married Tall Glass's sister.

Pop and Tall Glass were both nearly sixty when I knew them. They got along well, but as with many families sometimes a little animosity would break out. Usually this was just a shouting match, and usually when they'd both been drinking. Yet it was rarely more than that.

One such rare day occurred while me Pops (my Dad, not to be confused here with Pop Turner of course) and I were the only two in the Shop and were having a coffee. As it was a warm summer day we had the big truck doors open, sitting by them to catch a breeze. After a minute or two we heard the ruckus. Pop and Tall Glass were at it; the gist was that Pop wanted chicken but he wanted his brother in law to go to the store to get it. Tall Glass resolutely would not.

Soon Tall Glass appeared, staggering down the alley in drunk fashion, half walking and half falling backwards, slowly and uncertainly. He was yelling, "Come on man, no. Stop it," as he stumbled along in slow motion. Next Pop appeared, likewise speed and balance challenged. He was yelling at Tall Glass to go to the store for him, and was in slo-mo function as well. Only Pop was brandishing a shovel, holding it uncertainly above his head like a bat, ready to beat Tall Glass into doing his will.

If he caught him. The guys made their way down the alley, probably the slowest, most serpentine chase scene on record anywhere. Dad and I just looked at each other and shook our heads. Eventually Tall Glass stumbled and fell, allowing Pop to get within maybe 15 feet of him. He begged his brother in law for mercy.

Dad sighed, "I better go do something before one of them gets hurt." He went out and took the shovel from Pop, who in fact surrendered it rather meekly at me Pops' barked command. Dad explained firmly, putting on his dad voice, that wanting chicken for dinner wasn't reason enough to bust a family member's head open. Then he helped Tall Glass off the cement, and escorted the two to their respective homes, making them promise to behave. They did, by then crying and hugging and vowing eternal love and respect for one another after the old man had shamed them properly.

Ah, memories.

1104

Math, a dear friend of mine who interestingly happens to be a math teacher, says, is life. I don't doubt it. When the numbers in the checkbook (does anyone use one of those anymore?) don't add up, it's a problem. But this is more about numbers than full on mathematics (does anyone use the full word anymore?). 

A twice recurrent number in my life is 1104. When you pronounce it eleven-oh-four it rolls nicely off the tongue. It was the address of the house me Pops grew up in and the number of me son's scout troop. That is at least kind of serendipitous, isn't it?

Me Uncle John whom I call Zeke loved the old house. So did me Pops, as I'm quite sure did the rest of their siblings. Zeke used to say if he had the money he'd rebuilt it precisely to spec. 

Me Grandparents moved out of it in 1965. I remember being there as a small boy. As the second oldest grandchild there likely aren't many of us on my tier of the family that also remember it. It was huge. I recall being in the back yard playing with the dog they had at the time, and being in the basement with me Pops and his brothers as they shot pool. 

Then me son Frank ends up making Eagle Scout through Boy Scout Troop 1104. I don't know if Pops realized that, but I have to imagine he did. Some numbers just stick with us and I have the distinct impression 1104 did with him. 

There's other numbers which mean a lot to me but that's the only one which appears prominently in my life two times. I may play the lottery with it today. Third time's a charm?

Weather irony

Dressing for my morning walk yesterday, I put on a fleece hoodie with my winter coat over top. Then I went outside where the sun wasn't quite up but there was significant morning twilight. I could see well, as well as see my breath. And I thought, it's interesting that on a May morning just before six, with a decent amount of daylight already, I'm dressed for winter. Yet there will be September mornings at about the same time where it will still be dark. But it will be warm, and I'll be in shorts and a tee shirt.

Isn't nature weird?

Carlin and Cosgriff

Today is comedian George Carlin's birthday. Born in 1937, he would have been 84 today if he hadn't died in 2008.

Although he could be a bit too crude, he had attitude and could be genuinely funny and inspired. Personally, I've always liked him as Rufus in the Bill and Ted movies too. The character had the persona of just being a good guy.

Yet perhaps what I remember most of Carlin was a chapter from his book Napalm and Silly Putty. It was a list of people you cannot trust. Item seven I believe was 'People who wear pins on their hats'. That's funny because, as those who know me know, the hat I wear while curling is loaded with pins.

That explains why my sweepers wouldn't sweep when I called for it I suppose. 

All you non-curlers among my readers, trust me on this one. It's a funny quip.

Marty is board

The title today is a bit of a pun. Please, let me explain.

I took my walk early this morning, then jumped in my new old van and went to the Shop to get a few things done. About 7:30 I decided to come home and check my email. Yes, I can check it on my phone (we don't have internet otherwise at the old barn) but the screen is so small and my fingers so fat that I can respond to emails better on my home computer. 

Hopping behind the wheel and starting the van, I hadn't gotten up to 10 miles an hour when I heard a rhythmic flit-flit-flit sound coming from my rear passenger's side. So of course I pulled over as even I know a bad sound when I hear it, and wouldn't ya know, there was screw in my tire. But to be fair, it was conveniently holding a piece of board onto the tread.

There were extra scratches along the wheel well, but that's okay. They blend into the existing scratches, so no harm done. As the tire didn't seem to be losing air, I drove it a block and left it by my brother's house. Me brother Phil is pretty handy about patching tires, he really is. I even left the board in place so that he could see where to fix the tire. And I figure with what wood is worth these days, the board will be enough to pay for the repair.

My only worry is that Phil will see this blog first and not to come to work, knowing what's in store for him.

Mom's Revenge

As I left my house yesterday, my wife gave me some sweet rolls to take down the block to me Mom's. On arrival Mom took one to have with her coffee. "Like them?" I asked.

"Oh, yes."

"Cool. I baked them," I joked. And do you what me Mom did then?

She rolled her eyes at me! Just like a teenager would.

I was actually if humorously taken aback. "Don't you roll your eyes at me young lady!" I admonished her playfully as a grin spread across my face.

"Like you never rolled yours at me when you was a young 'un," she replied dismissively.

Wow, Mom. Touche. Mic. Dropped.

Mother's Day 2021

I'm not sure that there's anything more to say today than, treat Mom well. If your Mom is no longer with us, pay your respects.

We all owe Mom a debt we cannot pay. But we can and should try. So at that, Happy Mother's Day to all Moms out there. 

Ernie

Thank you Paul and good evening everyone. Here's the first pitch of the ball game and it's a strike, and we're under way at the corner of Michigan and Turnbull.

That's an approximate recreation of how Ernie Hartwell typically began a radio broadcast of Detroit Tigers baseball. His on air partner, Paul Carey (who had a good baritone voice) would open the game and hand the reigns over to Ernie, who would take it from there. Facebook reminded me yesterday that my son and I had went, along with thousands of others, to pay our respects to the late broadcaster as he lay in state at Comerica Park after his passing in May 2010.

Eleven years after his death and nineteen since he called his last game, Ernie is still remembered fondly by the Tiger faithful. Perhaps I'm simply caught up in the sentimentality of the moment, but I don't know that anyone can ever match his vocal association with the Motor City Nine.

Having a sportscaster who almost is your team seems rare these days. It wasn't only a Detroit thing: there was Vin Scully with the Dodgers, Harry Caray with the Cubs and so forth across the land. Here in Motown we even had Bruce Martyn and his distinctive voice calling Red Wings hockey over the radio as well. Such associations, such distinctive voices, don't seem to be the case anymore.

I'm not going to make the mistake of the reactionary sentimentalists and try argue that sportscasting today is bad. But too many play by play callers are bland and Midwestern. It does, I think, take a bit of the intimacy away. Although I do like the current Tiger radio man (Dan Dickerson) he is in the unfortunate position of not being Ernie. 

To be fair I don't think even Dickerson would put himself in Harwell's class, and at the end of the day I'm not talking moral imperatives but merely differences. Still, no one filled the baseball airwaves like Ernie. Perhaps one day, but I don't see it.

Small and frail

I think the first time I thought me Mom might be getting sick was one day at the Hollywood Casino south of Toledo, Ohio. This was about two years after me Pops had went home.

I had to demonstrate a drain snake for the casino maintenance staff and she had always liked playing the slots. As she had not been to a casino since Dad passed away I figured I'd take her along. She would surely be entertained by the one armed bandits for the hour or hour and a half the demo would take. It would be a good diversion for her too.

The demo took a bit over an hour as expected. I took the unit I had just displayed out to my van and went back into the casino to find Mom. Yet instead of holding court at a slot machine (I expected it would take me a half hour just to find her as she liked to hunt for 'paying' machines), I spotted her right inside the entrance. She was sitting on a chair over against a wall, looking rather lonely and small. "I figured you'd still be playing," I remarked as I approached.

"Oh, I got bored so I thought I'd just sit here and wait for you."

"How long you been waiting?" I asked.

"About forty five minutes," she answered. That was most of the time I'd been occupied.

Admittedly a bit shocked I said, "I'm sorry, Mom, I didn't mean to leave you so long."

"Oh that's okay," she responded, sounding kind of like a 'don't worry about me' Mom. "You had work to do." It actually occurred to me right then and there that something might be wrong, but I quickly dismissed it as, well, she'd always went to casinos with Dad and it just wasn't the same without him being around.

And maybe that was all there was to it. But she looked so small and frail...

Taking aim

As a general rule I side with authority. In that light I told my kids as they became school age that if I got word from school that they were misbehaving somehow then so far as I was concerned, they were misbehaving. Pontificating a moment, I think a lot more parents need to take that attitude too.

Yet teachers, being human, aren't always right either, and I recognize that. 

There was a minor incident one day with my son and another boy.  While a group of boys were playing football during lunch one kid, I'll call him Cloyce just to give him a name, got mad. He picked up the football and flung it at my son Charlie, but missed. Charlie however picked up the ball to return the favor, drilling it right upside Cloyce's head.

As it happened I was the one to pick up the kids from school that day. The principal spotted me and explained what happened. When he was done I said something like, "Oh." I was dismissive of it, quite frankly.

Coughing, the principal asked, "I'm wondering how you intend to handle it."

I shrugged my shoulders and said,  "Not my fault Charlie's got better aim than Cloyce." The principal stood in front of me, speechless.

The way I saw it, then and now, was that it was just boys being boys (they were in sixth grade) and simply no big deal. If anything, Charlie was really only defending himself with a dose of playground justice (and I was admittedly kind of proud of that). On top of it all, the two kids were good friends before the incident and remained good friends after it. Let it go; there simply was no real harm done.

I think they both got detention. Okay, whatever. Perhaps it did merit that. But Mr. Principal was clearly taken aback by what he felt my cavalier attitude. Me? If that was the worst thing one of my kids were to do in school, I could live with it.

Going Bananas Foster

Do you want to know what will break your diet? Do you want to know what will tell your diet to walk out that door and don't never come back, don't even glance over your shoulder? I'll tell you what. But first, a backstory. That always aids understanding, right?

I'm trying to count my calories. Yes, I am. Really. I'm also trying to eat better. Yes, I am. Really. 

As part of all that, I bought a box of Raisin Bran this past Sunday. Bran is good for you right? But when I went to have a bowl this morning, there was no milk. Bound and determined to have that cereal and start towards better health and better eating habits, I ran around to the local supermarket. For a half a gallon of milk. That's all.

I passed right by these delightful iced cinnamon rolls and nearly bought a package. But, no, no, no, Marty. Diet. Calories. Discipline. Raisin Bran. Hold firm old bean. And I did tow the line, I held firm. I did not buy the rolls. Despite how well they go with morning coffee.

Grabbing the milk from the far back corner of the store, I made my way to the cash register via the ice cream aisle. What could go wrong? Because it can't, you know, hurt just to see what kind of ice cream was available.

So you know what will break your diet? Bananas Foster ice cream will more than break it. It absolutely destroys it. It leaves your diet in a mushroom cloud wafting deliriously towards the ceiling. That diet is vaporized when Bananas Foster is through with you. 

So there's always tomorrow to start my diet anew. It's not like I ate the whole half gallon. 

Quiet Ron.

Mom and the one armed bandits

Me Mom used to like to pull the lever of the old one armed bandits with some regularity. Me Pops would take her to the various casinos, playing a few rounds of video poker typically, but he tended to tire of the games more quickly than she did. He would wait for her patiently after he was played out.

She liked to try new places. Once while me Pops was on a sales trip and she rode along, they stopped for a bite in Chester, West Virginia, up in that state's thin panhandle. Noticing they weren't from the area the waitress asked conversationally, "So are you folks going to try the new casino up the road?"

"We are now," me Pops responded with a wry laugh.

Me Mom, Lord love her, always expected that this trip was the one where she was going to hit it big. Wherever they were at, she firmly believed that it was her time, right then, to win the big jackpot. It was kind of sad to see her afterwards, when she invariably lost and was honestly and obviously dismayed she wasn't leaving the betting parlor as a millionaire.

Pops was always more retrospect. "The winners didn't build the casinos," he'd say.

True enough. Still, I would have loved to see Mom win big once. And for more than my own nefarious reasons too, wise guy. 

Alliterative Allowances

I like alliteration. That's when you employ several same sounding sentences in succession. It's sounds funny, and I believe that professional grammarians are warming up to it too.

At the same time I'm also fond of Spoonerisms. They're the famous phrases made popular through the Reverend William Spooner, where you juxtapose two sounds in a sentence. A classic example is when a teacher admonished a student, "You hissed my mystery lecture!"

Alliteration and spoonerisms are so much fun that perhaps we can combine them. Something like: "Oh, no, I'm speaking in spoonerisms! What a sad sight to see!"

Maybe? No?

Peeping Marty

Peeps: the marshmallow sugar infused confection (I'm guessing confection as they don't really seem like candy) we love to hate whose eyes are never quite straight. That makes them cockeyed Peeps I guess. But when you got 'em you gotta eat 'em, right?

I just ate a package of five. They're not nearly so caloric as I would have expected. All five were only a total of 140 calories, so they haven't busted my diet. What I eat the rest of the day will see to that, believe me. But, again, ya got 'em, ya eat 'em.

What struck most was the best by date, though. The package was marked best by January...wait for it...2023. So I could have found them in an old Easter basket stuffed on a shelf in my closet at Christmas 2022, not one but TWO Christmases from now, and they'd still be, well, I suppose fresh.

Were these designed for bomb shelters? Do doomsday preppers stockpile them? One and half, no, better than one year and nine months from now they'd still be fresh. And that's really only the best by date we're talking about. How long would they be any good after that? 

Maybe Peeps are the new Spam. They made the first batch in 1937. They're making the second batch next year.

My apologies. I should have offered a trigger warning for an immanent Dad joke there.

The truth of the matter

Why does it matter whether we accept transgender or gender fluidity or all related issues as legitimate examples of how people can live? To roughly paraphrase a very good friend of mine, it's about truth. If people won't accept truth on a very basic level, in this case that biological men are men and biological women, women, why should we expect they will understand and accept truth on other levels, in other areas?

And that's the crux of it. True is true and false is false everywhere and every day.  Quite often truth and falsity are decidedly obvious. If we won't accept obvious truths how can we possibly find higher ones?