"Use All The Crayons!"
pre-Christmas shenanigans
Today’s blog post: “Our homes are too clean,” about how we’re overlooking the largest reservoir of “clean” energy; that is the energy being created and expended by anal retentive homeowners who devote countless hours to cleaning already clean stuff. Click here …
Today, sprinkled amid the Christmas jokes, are stories about the snows in Buffalo, why some cities should change their names to be more representative of their circumstances, and the controversial Paul McCartney Christmas tune. Click here …
Received the best complement I could ever dream of yesterday. I’ve been writing near-weekly letters, fatherly letters, to our freshman daughter marooned at Kent State U. in Ohio. She’s had her struggles. She misses her friends and her comfortable routines (maybe as much as we miss her). So I’ve been writing her letters of encouragement, love and support. That’s a bold step. She’s at an age when many kids are indulging in a de facto sort of estrangement from the people who raised them. They don’t want to hear from their parents and our advice is either mocked or dismissed. Knowing this, I asked if my letters were getting through and if they mattered to her at all. Did she want me to cease?
“Oh, no! I like them. They’re very thoughtful!”
I’m not going to lie, my friends. I read that and had a short weep. If the only things I write become letters to her and I never earn another dime then I’ll still consider myself blessed to have become the goofball writer I’ve become
And really, really blessed to be that darling young lady’s father.
I’m torn. We have two more weeks before Christmas, thus two more opportunities to post a really bang up Christmas wrap-up. Or do I take the Christmas week off? I think what I’ll do is in keeping with my entire career.
I’ll do ‘em both, but I’ll do ‘em half-assed! And as everybody knows makes one hole
Will someone please explain the math to me: What happens if I do two tasks half-assed? Does it had up to one whole or two holes?
Randoms (longer entries; shorter ones folo)…
• I remember many years ago being charmed by Jimmy Buffett singing “ran into a chum with a bottle of rum and we wound up drinking all night.” What a pleasant happenstance that must be, I thought. i never dreamed I’d one day have an office in a building with three bars. Every where I turn there’s a chum or two with a bottle of something. It’s amazing I’ve been able to overcome so much Buffett in my formative years.
• I scoffed when I read that a watermelon is 93 percent water. No way. So I decided to conduct a test. I figured anything with that much water is certainly flushable. Wrong! I left that big ol’ gourd in the bowl all morning and it still wouldn’t flush. And, oh, my, were the picnickers pissed at me when I told them why the watermelon tasted like the Ty-d-bol smells. But I will say this: you’ll never seen a more compelling seed spitting contest.
• The typical Swiss Army Knife was invented on this day in 1897 and has 32 functions. It comes in handy anytime a besieged soldier needs to trim a mustache, pop a cork, or trim an unruly pinkie toe. In its entire history there are no recorded incidents of it being used to slay or subdue an enemy and you can’t help but wonder how different European history would be had someone first invented the Swiss Army Bazooka.
• It pisses me off whenever I hear anyone use “fish” to describe tuna. Everyone already knows it’s a dang fish. We don’t say salmon fish, trout fish or flounder fish. But you hear tuna fish all the time. Jelly fish and catfish get passes for sound reasons, but you’ll never be in a restaurant and hear …
CUSTOMER: “I ordered tuna!”
WAITRESS: “Was it the tuna fish or the tuna bird?”
• For something I consume at least once a week in one form or another, I’m remarkably ignorant about the origins of pepperoni. For instance: how do you distinguish between male and female pepperoni? Do pepperoni travel in herds? Do any wild pepperoni still roam the countryside? I may never know. I remember asking these same questions about free-range bacon.
• Spent an afternoon in Athens, Ohio, last weekend drinking and farting with some of the men who taught me all there is to know about drinking and farting. Every time our banter with Lexi, our pretty young waitress began to get playful, a nearby female would scold us and say we were old enough to be the girl’s grandfather. I resented the insinuation. We were behaving. Lines were not crossed. We tipped well. I felt compelled to speak up. “We may be old enough to be her grandfather, but we’re immature enough to be her prom date.” You should have heard Lexi laugh at that one, I think she was diggin’ me.
• The Lazarus story makes no mention of it, but Lazarus became very unpopular. Because he eventually died. Again. A typical complaint: “Didn’t we already go to his funeral? I’m not missing another Steeler game to bury that jack ass. I swear, if that guy dies one more time I’m gonna have to kill him.”
• A friend of mine said he was concerned that conservative elements of the new administration would “crack down” on the porn industry (I didn’t say he was a classy friend). I told him to fear not. A wise porn director will always weigh set and lighting conditions before deciding whether the money shot should be crack up or crack down.
He persisted. "This isn't about smut," he said. "It's about jobs." I told him jobs will always be plentiful wherever porn is produced. Hand jobs ... blow jobs ...
Random (short entries) …
• Still looking for the perfect stocking stuffer? Consider feet.
• Bumbastic people are prone to talking out of their asses.
• Ambitious tailors who work exclusively on 3-piece suits have vested interests.
• True dreamers fly kites with no strings attached.
• Remember, it's okay to cook on a spit, but never spit on your cook.
• Physicians who share waiting rooms often try each others' patients.
• If marriage is so great then how come there’s no Mrs. God?
• My glass is half-full and 100 proof.