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Winter in Central Ohio, Beauty is Where You Find It, I Am the Anti-Football Fan

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I have a hard time finding anything beautiful in a Central Ohio winter.  We don’t get snow like those up around the lake do.  Most of the month of December we had a very small amount of snow cover, which is not typical here, but most of the time winter is simply cold, wet (precipitation forms will vary, but precipitation is a factor on most days) and dark. I can deal with cold and wet, but it’s the dark that gets to me.  It’s dark in the morning when I leave for work and dark when I get home.  Most days are overcast even at high noon so even the daylight hours are usually subdued.  I took this pic at about 5:15 last night.  The pink sky (and the bit of lingering daylight) intrigued me.  Despite rush hour traffic (which sucks) I had to snap off a pic if only for the rarity of a nominally clear sky and no precipitation falling from it.

Beauty is where you find it.

Technically I understand that after the winter solstice (December 21 or thereabouts) the amount of daylight starts to increase by a minute or so every day, until summer solstice (June 21 or so) but during January and February it’s hard to convince me that life isn’t just one big long dark night.

Tonight is a Big Deal among my friends who are into Ohio State Football.  I am not a football fan by any stretch- sure I’m glad they are playing the Sugar Bowl and all that, but I just can’t get ramped up about football.  So I will be nice and rested tomorrow morning, as I am planning on getting to bed nice and early, so I can taunt my hungover co-workers who I know are going to stay up until 1 AM drinking beer and woofing at the TV screen.  Not me.  I’m watching Dirty Jobs.  Later I might troll on over to History Channel or TruTV to see what’s on there.  I might as well get an education.

Cincinnati gets snow even less often than Columbus, but this is the view from my sister’s house on Christmas.  It’s unusual to have a white Christmas in Cinci, so this was kind of cool.

Another Year, SSDD, Be a BOHICA, and Maintenance of the Status Quo

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No one could ever accuse me of being an optimist.   I may be a realist on my best days, a pragmatist most days, and the darkest pessimist on my worst days.  Today I am at my normal level of pragmatism, so right now it’s maintenance of the status quo.  I’m still wondering how I am going to scrounge enough money to get through the month without having vital services shut off, going without either scripts or food or both, and avoiding overdraft charges on my checking account- again, maintenance of the status quo. 

By the grace of God.  Apart from that, I am completely hopeless.

I am usually a tad bit cynical after the holidays.  I’m glad it’s all over as I really don’t enjoy the holidays much.  Maybe it would be different if I’d had some sort of successful life.  Success is not all about financial success- though financial security certainly wouldn’t hurt.  I’ve  lost touch with most of my old friends, a good number of my favorite family members are dead, and Jerry is horrendous to deal with as he goes about jollily rehashing everything I have either failed at or haven’t done for whatever reason in the past 20 years.  Yesterday I had pretty much had it with his incessant whining about food or laundry or the dogs and I decided I would just take off to Mom and Dad’s for the day after church.  He was mad that I didn’t call him but I didn’t call because he would have guilted me into either coming back home first and getting stuck with breakfast detail,  or I’d end up getting guilted into cutting my trip short because there was nobody home to fill the ice trays.

There must be something on that missing part of the male “Y” chromosome that renders human males unable to refill ice trays.  It is a little thing, but annoying as hell when all you have to do is rinse out the trays, fill them with water, and put them back in the freezer.  Since it takes three or four hours for the water to freeze, it makes sense to use the ice, then refill the ice tray so there will be ice the next time someone needs it.  However, in Jerry logic, “I figured if I put them in the sink, you’d refill them,” seems to be an acceptable answer.

If I were to take the same approach to getting things done as Jerry does to filling the ice trays, I could rationalize my whole life away.  It’s the magic solution to having other people do everything for your lazy ass!  Maybe I can try this one- “I figured if I ran out all the gasoline in your truck, you’d refill it.”  That one would go over splendidly for sure.  Better yet, “I figured if I let your dirty clothes pile up until you have nothing left to wear but a pair of whitey tighties with sprung elastic and a big old racing stripe stain up the butt, that you might actually take it upon yourself to learn how to wash your own damn clothes for a change.”

I’m not holding my breath. He would probably take to wearing my clothes instead, which is a visual nobody needs.

I forgot one of the handy acronyms from the texting cheat sheet: BOHICA, or Bend Over Here It Comes Again.  This acronym dates back at least until the early 1980’s.  I remember seeing it on one of Dad’s buddy’s girlie posters in his home body shop.  This dude did amazing paint work and custom restorations- VW’s, Detroit iron, motorcycles, you name it, but he had a real taste for tacky soft porn as was reflected on the walls of his shop.  Back in the day those who worked in automotive were almost exclusively male, so parts stores, dealerships and supply houses would sponsor girlie calendars and posters as promotions for their products.  Today it is considered a bit gauche to sell automotive parts and accessories by placing them next to a nude or nearly nude buxom bimbo, (who likely had absolutely no idea what the carburetor or header or cylinder head she was holding up was used for) but it was common practice then.  Anyway, I remember seeing the BOHICA acronym on one of his bimbo pin up’s T-shirts, with a caption below it spelling it out, and I thought it was funny.  It is a testament to my naivete at the time that I thought that it referred to spankings.  I guess it could, for the S&M fetishist.  Crack that whip, baby!

There is much more to be said for a woman with a mind than for physical beauty .  Beauty is fleeting, but stupid is forever.  Once the beauty is gone, and the pretty young thing is neither, all you’re left with is stupid.  I hope Steve-o gets this through his thick skull, and believe it or not, after his foray into the world of the 34DD bimbos with nothing upstairs, I think he has.   This is probably what starts the whole mid-life crisis for some dudes, when they turn their now frumpy 45 year old in for a 21 year old version.  The irony to this is they don’t have enough sense to see the writing on the wall and realize that bimbo #2 will be just as frumpy and probably even more stupid than bimbo# 1 in 20 years.  I’ve seen it with dudes too, and that’s even more sad.  I’ve seen way too many drop dead gorgeous dudes who are dumber than a box of rocks, but more cocky than a chicken coop.  They attract women like flies, treat them like shit, and move on.  The problem is that twenty years later, when the hot dude is transformed into a balding, paunchy old lecher, he doesn’t have enough sense to know that he’s not hot anymore, so Mr. Formerly Hot Stuff still struts around, grossing everyone out, when he has nothing left worth strutting.  That’s just plain disgusting- unless of course Mr. Formerly Hot Stuff has money, and then the young bimbos seem to have the fortitude to overlook the beer gut, lack of hair and/or teeth, cocaine habit, and dragon breath.

I guess money could overcome a multitude of flaws.  Maybe this is what Hugh Hefner’s fiancee is thinking.  What she doesn’t realize though, is that the Hef could potentially live another 20 years.  I could see him living to be 104. It would serve her right. 

One advantage to being plain and frumpy and poor like me is that you know who your friends are.  I have very few friends, but then again I don’t have much to offer.  I can, however, refill the ice trays.

I must have a purpose!

I’ve been called an ice queen before.  SSDD!

Stuff I Could Care Less About, The Perennial DD, and a Sober Eye on the Festivities

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Ah, the joy of carting the drunk and stupid from one destination to another.  I am so grateful Jerry and his former friend and “drunk and stupid enhancer” Terry had their falling out a couple of years ago. These two guys had the potential to be plenty drunk and stupid by themselves, but get them together and the drunk and stupid and just plain annoying factor increased by a factor of 100.  One night when Terry was staying with us he got incredibly shit-faced, wandered into Steve-o’s room, pulled up the edge of his mattress and proceeded to whiz all over the Christmas presents I had at the end of the bed as well as all over Steve-o and his sheets. I was so pissed I threw Terry out and was rid of him for all of about a month, when Jerry begged me to let him come back over again.  Somehow it just doesn’t seem right to let a “guest” return to your home after pissing all over your kid and your family’s Christmas presents, but what the hey?  When I had to ferry them both back and forth to the campground for Saturday night poker it was occasionally a real nightmare.  One evening they got into a punching match in the car.  Another time, Jerry thought it funny to yank the car out of gear and grab at the steering wheel when he was having a drunk and stupid argument with Terry and Steve-o.   That is not funny at all on the freeway when you’re doing 70 miles an hour.  I do not look forward to shuttling the alcohol impaired, regardless of who is involved. 

Then there is always the potential of the drunk and stupid individual puking in the car.  I remember narrowly avoiding having my 72 Super Beetle spewed in.  Dawne’s sister had been going on with the rot gut whiskey and God only knows what other downers and assorted drugs.  She was notorious for getting drunk and stoned pretty much constantly back then.  I was nice enough to get her a ride home before she ended up getting in a fight, but as we pulled up near Dawne’s apartment, she started to hurl.  Instinctively I reached over her, opened the passenger’s side door from the inside and shoved her out.  Puke smell does not come out of car interiors.  I had to do the same thing to Jerry one night when he got Jagermeister confused with Formula 44.  He narrowly missed spewing all over the inside of my 94 truck.  Of course the Jagermeister Incident should have been more than enough to convince a sane person that drinking to excess is a bad idea, but Jerry isn’t a sane person.

After I had shoved Jerry out of the truck he spewed all over the parking lot and most of the way through the courtyard behind the apartment we lived in at the time.  Somehow I got him up the porch steps and in the door, then he flopped over on the dining room floor, while ranting unintelligibly.  The bathroom of this apartment was upstairs.  The apartment building was built in the late 19th century by German immigrants.  Germans must not have been very tall then, because anyone over 5’9″ would bash their head on the ceiling of the staircase if they failed to duck.  The staircase was also narrow and steep, so much so that the only way to fit a full size bed upstairs would have been to either cut the box spring so it would bend, or to procure two twin-size box springs  and two twin size mattresses and install them on a king size frame.  We put our full size bed in what should have been the living room to avoid this conundrum. 

Anyway, I wanted Jerry upstairs in the spare room (which had a small roll-away bed in it) so he would be close to the bathroom, and so I would be able to try to sleep a little further away from the incoherent moaning, screaming and various noises I knew he would be emitting.  So,  I endeavored to remove his very drunk carcass from the dining room floor and proceeded to more or less drag him up the stairs.  How I got 180# of dead weight up that hideously steep flight of stairs I still wonder, but I do know he ended up with not a little rug burn from the carpet on the stairs.

When Jerry gets to a certain very drunk and very stupid plateau, he doesn’t just pass out like a normal drunk.  That would be too easy.  I got him into the spare room and on to the roll-away bed, only to hear, “Where’sssss my billow, bittcchhhhh?”

I retrieved a pillow from the bed downstairs, opened the door and threw it at his drunk ass and slammed the door.  He had a three day hangover from that little bender. 

I learned my lesson regarding drunk and stupid drinking at age 23.  Waking up in a bathtub full of cold water in a motel room with a half-eaten Domino’s pizza on the ledge has a way of putting one off the liquor.

The New Year’s holiday brings two of my least favorite celebratory activities: drinking (which even if I wanted to, my health really doesn’t permit it) and football, which of course, can be a good babysitter, but it gets old when it seems as if Jerry is going to get bedsores from lounging about in the bed doing nothing but watching football games.  I will find something else to watch or I may take a road trip up to Mom and Dad’s to bring him some beans (gotta love pinto beans and ham) and some pork and kraut.  Perhaps that is not a kind thing to do to senior citizens- bringing them farty food- but I don’t have to stick around long enough to smell it.

I do like the pork and kraut tradition.  I was lucky to find a lovely pork roast (not always easy because there are a lot of people of German ancestry in Central Ohio who do the pork and kraut thing for New Year’s)  so that roast will be wafting its tantalizing aroma throughout my kitchen tomorrow.  The bad thing about pork and kraut is that as far as fart-worthiness, it’s every bit as explosive as pinto beans or White Castles or boiled eggs and beer.

Mmmmm, pork and kraut.  With mashed potatoes and Bean-o.

Next week we return to normal.

Texting Acronyms and Shorthand, aka Insults on the Fly, and More Fun

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It seems that all the music Steve-o is into sounds like bad porno movie soundtracks.  I’ve never been a techno fan so maybe that’s a little unfair, but ewwww!  It’s not my age.  New music- even what the radio stations try to pass off as being rock and/or metal- does bite the big one.  For example, every time I hear the Five Finger Death Punch version of the song “Bad Company,” I want to projectile vomit.  They took a good song and made it suck.   I like the original version that was recorded by the real Bad Company.  Do me a favor and play the real song!  I generally despise modern remakes of good old songs, especially when mediocre bands attempt them.  Then again, with a lot of these mediocre new bands, their original stuff is a lot worse than their lame cover material.  I’m glad most of the old stuff that was really good and that I do like has been converted to MP3, so old farts can enjoy music worth listening to.

I am generally not too big on texting lingo as I get a bit confused by some of the acronyms and abbreviations.  There is a handy decoder site for said acronyms and abbreviations which is proving most useful.  I actually enjoy a few of them, such as:

BBFBBM: Body by Fisher, Brains by Mattel (why are the hot ones usually a little slow on the uptake?)

CINBA: Clad in Naught but Air (could be good or bad, depending upon the message sender)

CRD: Caucasian Rhythm Disorder (I know this one really well, being a sufferer and all!)

DIAF:  Die in a Fire  (isn’t that a lovely thing to wish on one’s enemies?)

FOL: Fond of Leather (again, depends upon the relative hotness of the sender)

GGP: Gotta Go Pee (that’s lame, because there’s no law against texting on the throne, yet!)

HBIC: Head Bitch in Charge (that would be me)

I&I: Intercourse and Inebriation (oh, bloody hell, not since 1993 or thereabouts)

IDGARA: I Don’t Give a Rat’s Ass (also known as the Cliff’s Notes’ commentary on possibly 95% of the crap I see in the news or on TV)

IJPMP: I Just Pissed My Pants (perhaps from a fit of explosive laughter or a severe coughing fit, but never a good thing)

KIPPERS: Kids in Parents’ Pockets Eroding Retirement Savings (no shit! got one of those)

LOPSOD: Long on Promises, Short on Delivery (the Cliff’s Notes’ version of the Obama presidency!)

LORE: Learn Once, Repeat Everywhere (a toddler learning swear words, or a teen girl spreading gossip- same concept)

MTBF: Mean Time Before Failure (pessimistic, but often true)

NWAL: Nerd Without a Life (I certainly get this one.  When I start having conversations with my dogs on philosophical issues, for example.)

PBIAB: Payback is a Bitch (No shit!)

PFA: Pulled from Ass (could mean a lot of things, but not usually good)

POTATO: People Over Thirty Acting Twenty One (Jerry, when he’s partying, only it would be more like People Over Fifty Acting Three- go POFAT s~!)

RCI: Recto-Cranial Inversion (a nice way of saying someone has his/her head stuck up his/her ass.)

RTH: Release the Hounds (I can think of a number of people whose faces Clara might want to chew on, who richly deserve it too.)

SAIA: Stupid Asses In Action (Congress?)

WTHOW: White Trash Headline of the Week (Hot damn, WalMart’s havin’ a sale on ammo, Bubba!)

My son often communicates in text-speak which is a bit awkward for me.  Then again, when I learned to write, computers and word processing were expensive novelties.   We had to actually hand-write assignments, or type them on an old-time typewriter (more of a pain in the ass than actually writing them out long hand, in my opinion.)   Steve-o just writes everything in Word, saves it on his flash drive and prints it at school. 

I have to share this one because it reminds me of Jerry.  He throws a fit if he fails to receive flaming-hot french fries.  This guy in Sandusky had a real problem with his cold fries.

“…Police say they were called when the customer said he wouldn’t leave until he got different fries. He told officers a McDonald’s employee struck him with a mop.

The Sandusky Register reports that a witness said the worker acted only as though he was going to hit the man and said the customer called the employee a derogatory name.

No charges were filed. Police say the man got his money back and left without fries…”

I’m glad the McTeamMember got him with a mop.  I’m also glad Jerry hasn’t gone to Sandusky lately.

As I have said before, any employer who refers to employees as anything other than employees is generally going to be a shitty place to work for. Avoid such employers if you can.  “Team Member” is probably the worst term for employee out there. I particularly despise this euphemism, as firms who refer to their employees as “Team Members” tend also to employ managers who think in terms of sports metaphors (AACK!!!) and who go on and on about “team” this and “team” that. That type of manager means one thing by the dreadful “team” blather, as I have paraphrased here:  There is no “I” in “team,” but as far as I’m concerned, there is a “U”- as in, I expect “U” to do all my work…for the “team” of course.    If your firm refers to employees as “Associates,” the term might as well be abbreviated “Ass,” because you might as well bend over and expect a cornholing.

I think there should be truth in advertising, especially today when jobs are harder to come by.  Let your prospective recruits know that their job titles will reflect the nature of what they will be subjected to on the job.  “Assboy,” “Buttlick,” “Shameless Panderer,” etc. are Truth in Advertising  job descriptions, which, of course, no one would actually use.  I used to have to hire and fire people in better economic times, and then you had to try to sweeten the pot just to get them in for an interview.  I am sure that today the pickings are not quite as lean.  Your potential recruit may actually be interviewing for the position best described as “Toilet Licker,” but you present it to him as if he’s going to be the next POTUS.   Don’t, however, be surprised when he quits within the week, or the first time the technicians’ toilets back up, which ever comes first.  Very few people are accustomed to real work.

Remember: The toilet is not a diving platform.

Lost in the Translation, Christmas for ‘Po Folks, and Helpful Holiday Dos and Don’ts

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I guess “don’t” number one would be: Don’t buy Japanese Christmas cards.  “Chimney” and “Hole” serve similar functions, but are not always interchangeable words.  The nuances of the English language are difficult enough for native speakers, let alone for those who attempt to translate other languages into English.  I know a few native Japanese whose English is at least as good if not better than most Midwestern rednecks’, but these are people who were taught English as well as Japanese from infancy.  However, the most hilarious bad English translations come from the Asian countries, as one may peruse on Engrish.com.

I love the meaning behind the Christmas holiday, but I tend to loathe what our hedonistic society has turned it into.  How much useless crap can one buy for people who don’t need any more useless crap?  How much do I need to reiterate that I don’t need anyone to buy me any useless crap? Now I can use cash and/or Kroger’s or Target gift cards, (help with scripts and groceries is always welcome) but beyond that, it’s really, really OK to refrain from buying me anything.  I don’t need any decorative items, cooking utensils, instructional books, or really anything else that I haven’t already made it a point to acquire or that I can’t afford and therefore don’t need anyway.  I am fussy about clothing and prefer to choose my own.  Many years of wearing my sisters’ old clothes and of Mom picking clothes out for me have made me rather adamant in my clothing choices. I do dress for both economy and comfort, although I like things to fit, and I avoid colors that make me appear jaundiced and/or dead.  This is why I shudder when Mom tries to buy me clothes.  I am not ten years old.  I’m not planning on growing, so I don’t need clothing that’s five sizes too big, and I look hideous in brown, green, orange and/or yellow.  Mom tries, she really does, but sometimes I wonder what she’s thinking when she buys me stuff.  I am still trying to wrap my mind around my mother’s last well-meant, but horribly inappropriate gift to me.  Please don’t buy cookie cutters for a diabetic.  You might as well buy a double amputee a pair of stillettos, or a bra for a rooster.

The commercials on TV are downright disgusting.  Maybe if I woke up on Christmas morning to find a Lexus in my driveway with a big red bow on it, or if I were to unwrap some of that high faluting jewelry with real diamonds and gold that won’t turn me green, I might have a different take on the whole business, but the odds of me receiving either the Lexus or the diamond jewelry are about the same as if I were to wake up and discover that I had been transformed into Demi Moore overnight.  Anyone who knows me knows that the chances of anything listed above actually happening are slimmer than a snowball’s chance in hell.  Knowing Jerry, if he were ever to break down and buy me a Christmas or birthday gift it would probably be a twelve pack of beer, because he knows I don’t drink beer, and I would end up giving it back to him by default.

Radio this time of year is even worse than TV, as the local rock/metal station bombards us with daily ads for the local strip joint’s Christmas party, to be held all day on Christmas day.  It’s bad enough that there are pathetic jackoffs out there who are so morally bankrupt that they would make a conscious decision to spend Christmas day in a strip joint in the company of fellow perverts and strippers, but to make an occasion of it, and to hype it up on the radio, is even more pathetic.  One would think there could be one day for licentiousness to take a holiday, but I guess not.

“Don’t” number two would have to be: Don’t spend Christmas anywhere it is necessary to deposit money in anyone’s underwear in exchange for a lap dance.

Now that I’ve shared a couple of “don’ts,” I probably should include a couple of “dos” to at least sound more positive.  “Do” number one is: Avoid the in-laws.  I made the obligatory appearance at the family holiday party last Saturday night which should exempt me from making an appearance with my in-laws until the same time next year.

“Do” number two is: Do bring activities to occupy the idle hours when the relatives fall asleep.  I have a hard time falling asleep when I am not in my own bed.   Note to self: Bring the charger for the DS, as the battery only lasts four hours.  I already have the car charger for the MP3 player which is right handy as it’s a long drive to Cincinnati.

I haven’t done any Tacky Christmas trolling this year.  Shame on me.  I hope to do a bit down in Cinci- the upper crust does put on some spectacularly Griswoldian tableaux that are worthy of Tacky Christmas status just in the time, effort and dollar amount involved.  I don’t get it but then I’ve never been a person who has had the luxury of money to burn.

I still wish I could find the Bud Light cardboard bimbo display from the west end of Marion that I happened on years ago, but I am sure that after that Christmas (I think it was 2006) it ended up as some Bubba’s target practice or something.

Never leave home without the camera.  You never know what kind of hilarity you will find. (Let’s see if Steve-o ever bothers to read my blog…)

I Need a Video Camera (if only for my own entertainment) and Why Dogs are Better Than Men

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I have a very rude pic of Jerry experiencing the aftermath of a particularly stupid drunk and stupid episode, but I have enough decency to keep that in my own private collection.  I thought about posting it for a moment, but that’s a little worse than my usual passive-aggressive revenge.  That borders on aggressive-aggressive revenge, which I’m a little too soft hearted to engage in even when I know there is little chance of getting caught. There is no actual nudity involved, but he is down to his whitey tighties, and I figure nobody needs that visual.  Nor do they need to see the reason why I spend so much time getting intimately acquainted with the rug shampooer.  Suffice to say that the dogs are housebroken, so unless they have an attack of Montezuma’s Revenge, it’s not the dogs.

I spend a lot of time among members of the species canis lupus familiaris, and even though I trust my dogs more than I trust any fellow humans, it’s good to remember that as far as taxonomy goes (the naming and classification of species) the domestic dog is a subspecies of canis lupus– the grey wolf.   Dogs can be dangerous if they are ill-treated and/or one fails to respect their strength (a 65# dog can easily take down a 250# man, for example) and the potential lethality of their bites.  More humans die as a result of dog attacks than from snake bites.  Even so, I believe the trust I have in my own dogs is warranted.  There is no love more sincere than the love of a good dog.

It’s fascinating that one species can have so many differences in its members.  I am not the reigning expert in scientific matters by a long shot, but the current theory is that dogs have such a high rate of mutations due to what are called tandem repeats– sequences of DNA that repeat themselves multiple times.  Of course we humans have made some genetic diseases in dogs worse by limiting the gene pools (i.e. line breeding.)  I don’t have any purebred dogs at this time- but both of our now departed purebred GSDs, Kayla and Heidi, ended up having to be put down due to rear limb ataxia that progressed to near paralysis due to probable degenerative myelopathy.  This is a genetic disease in GSDs and I am sure that it is more prevalent than is reported.  Since DM doesn’t show up until a dog is 7-14 years old, no one would know if a breeding pair are carriers until they have already reached the end of their reproductive life.  Today there is a genetic test, but not all individuals who carry the gene develop full blown DM.    Even Lilo and Sheena, who are crossbreeds, have hip dysplasia, which is primarily a genetic disease as well.  Most dogs, purebred or crossbreed, carry at least one genetic defect.  Lovely Clara, who is an ideal canine specimen in many ways- and actually has good hips- was born with an umbilical hernia, which would have automatically made her unsuitable for breeding (though she would have been unsuitable for breeding anyway as she is a crossbreed.)

Despite the capricious nature of canine inheritance, and the potential that dogs have to be dangerous if ill-handled, I prefer the company of dogs to humans.  Maybe that’s a bad thing to admit, but dogs are better than men for a number of reasons.

Dogs (generally) don’t drink beer.

Dogs don’t smoke.

Dogs generally don’t dirty up laundry.

Dogs will eat what they are served.

Dogs are always happy to see me.

Dogs don’t care what I look like.

Dogs are always great listeners.

After this morning I am tempted to embark on a bit of aggressive-aggressive revenge on Jerry.  I have threatened for years to video record his drunk and stupid incidents for his review (also for sharing with friends and pretty much most of the free world via You Tube) but I haven’t wanted to come off of the $$ for a video camera.  If I have any tax money left over (yeah right) I may contemplate planting a couple of Jerry-cams in strategic areas.  I will have to have audio too because the comments, as well as the thuds and crashes of drunk and stupid fallings down, are half of the fun.

I am not one of those people who buys the common wisdom of  “alcoholism is a disease.”  What a crock of shit.  I used to be a binge drinker myself.  Drunkenness is a decision.  You either decide to suck down those beers (or in my instance, liquor and/or wine- I never could stand beer) or you decide you are going to stay sober.  If habitual drunkenness is a “disease” then why isn’t smoking considered a “disease?”  Nobody feels sorry for smokers (nor should they- even though smoking is a LOT harder to get free of than drinking) and society makes no provision for the smoker to indulge his/her habit.  Why don’t we treat drunkenness like smoking and just stop tolerating it and making excuses for it?   In my world, as I was growing up, bad behavior carried consequences.  You make a bad choice you pay the consequences.  Get shitfaced and act stupid, then end up as a worldwide laughing stock on You Tube.  I’m thinking about it but will probably be too tender hearted to carry it out.

Survival of the Mentally Fittest (or at least the craftiest) and Understanding Man Logic (or is that an oxymoron?)

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I learned to be covert at a very young age as a necessary survival mechanism.  I am hideously ill-coordinated, and I was a weak and sickly child to boot, so physical fighting was almost always a losing proposition for me.  Avoidance was always the best strategy to prevent as many beatings as possible.  I found lots of interesting places to hide- closets, high up in trees, behind furniture, etc.  There were many places I could go to see but remain unseen.  Keeping under the radar- or above the situation- kept me from beatings more than once, and as I got older, guaranteed me much juicy fodder for blackmail opportunities.  I caught my sisters engaging in all sorts of illicit activities that would have gotten them in loads of trouble had I chose to nark on them.  Usually I didn’t nark if they spared me a beating -or at least stayed out of my stuff.  Knowledge is power in more ways than one. 

Even though I am not living under the threat of continual physical beatings, I still enjoy making detached ivory tower observations.    In some ways this is a bittersweet pursuit because I am haunted by a number of old ghosts who live in my dreams, ghosts who I can’t help but to come face to face with when I am confronted with places from my past.  When I’ve been out of a particular sphere for a long time viewing the residuals as they appear today can be disquieting. 

Last night I had a rather noteworthy dream in that it was a new scene- nothing remotely connected with past places or events which alone was refreshing.  I enjoyed the old metal bridges (late 19th/early 20th century) that one seldom sees anymore even out in the hinterlands.  Better than that there was a lovely waterfall that had been created that flowed over an embankment paved with red bricks into a free flowing river where people were swimming (nobody in their right mind would actually do that in most Ohio rivers these days.)  I don’t know why the bridges and the river stuck in my mind.  The scenery itself was new but it’s an old theme.  One of my favorite places to hide out and smoke when I was in high school was by the Scioto River just outside of Green Camp.  Back then there was an abandoned railroad trestle (since demolished for the scrap metal) one could walk out and sit on, comfortably out of view.  In summer no one would find you if you parked behind the trees.  It was a lovely hideout.

Both of these bridges are long gone which is sad in a way but even I must admit they were dangerous to go wandering out on.  I remember driving over the first one, and it scared the hell out of me even in my little Subaru DL, the way it would creak and moan under its slight weight. That old iron bridge once spanned the Olentangy River.  Though I found its design and its dedication plaque intriguing, I generally tried to avoid actually driving over it.  The second is the railroad trestle where we used to sit and watch the river flow by.  One would not dare swim or wade in the Scioto River up in Marion County even today as it is polluted with creosote and Lord only knows what else, but it was peaceful to simply sit and observe the world going by- as long as there was enough of a breeze to keep the bugs off.  I wonder how many others wandered on those bridges- were they secluded places for lovers’ trysts or set aside for drunken toasts and late night rages against the dark?  How many trains passed over that majestic iron trestle carrying their loads of coal or grain or armaments- or bodies of the fallen dead?  If only the bridges could speak their secrets what stories they might have, yet they stood in somber silence until need or greed came to take their obsolescence away.

I can really get into a bit of a dark mood when my mind goes wandering in such directions.  I believe that we humans very seldom choose the best course we should take. It does disturb me that the past holds echoes of a future that could have been much brighter than today- a future that never was- either as a result of our insolence or ignorance or a combination of both. 

On a lighter note, I have been contemplating the great oxymoron that is man logic.  Last night I watched a show obviously geared toward twenty-something men called “Manswers,” in which puerile young men try to explain the secrets of the universe.  Yes, enlighten me on all the things I really need to know- such as the logistics of having sex while sky-diving.  Then it occurred to me that the probability of me enjoying either of those activities, together or separately is approximately the same as the probability of snow storms in hell.  Sky-diving is an activity that I highly doubt I could muster the courage to engage in.  Sex is an activity I would like to engage in but that nobody else (who qualifies and meets my standards) wants to muster up the courage to engage in with me.  I don’t think I’ll watch that show again.  It was too depressing the more I started thinking about it.

When Jerry loses something he expects me to find it.  If I lose something it is my own tough luck and my business to find it as it should be.  I just hate the double standard.  It also seems that Jerry needs to find whatever object he lost when I am sleeping, eating, “taking the Obamas to the pool,” or bathing, and he expects me to drop the activity at hand to find the item he lost.  Few things can bring me to a seething head of anger faster than having my activities interrupted so that I may go fix someone else’s negligence and/or stupidity, but this seems to be the story of my life. 

That’s depressing too.   I have enough problems without anyone else contributing to them.

Helpful Hints I’m Glad I Don’t Need, a Geezer-Friendly World, and I Just Need Some Cheese!

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Since I knew pretty much from the start that the illustrious Steve-o was going to be an only child, I gave my maternity clothes away as soon as I could fit back into regular clothes.   This is a good thing not only because the thought of enduring pregnancy and/or childbirth at my age (fortunately for me a moot point since the hysterectomy- yay!) is absolutely abominable, and because I can visualize Jerry as the “don’t” illustration in the instructional pic.  It’s fortunate I was not able to have any children with Jerry as he is worse than a toddler himself and he would have been absolutely no help.   I will grant that for some women a hysterectomy is a tragic event.  I have all the sympathy in the world for someone who has to have one because of cancer or trauma, or who has to have a hysterectomy in spite of wanting more children, or someone who ends up having to have a hysterectomy at a very young age.  But each individual is different, and for me the hysterectomy was one of the best things I’ve ever done to preserve my sanity and improve my health.  Had I known what I know now I’d have insisted on having it done 15 years ago or so as the repair work after my c-section was completely messed up (hindsight of course is 20/20)  rather than suffering through years of interminable miserable visits from “Aunt Flo” along with pretty much constant pelvic pain.  Also remembering hindsight is 20/20, I’d been better off had my c-section turned into a c-section and hysterectomy at the same time. Even if I had ever wanted to get pregnant again it would have been pretty much impossible given the way I was pieced back together after the c-section.  I spent 18 years in accumulating and intensifying misery and there are no words to describe my relief at not having to endure the pain and the infernal mess.  So for me- at age 40- the hysterectomy was a happy event.   I wasn’t using it any more anyway. 

I do have a lot of empathy for pregnant women though.  I would not want to have to deal with all that noise today- the expense, the car seat hassles, the late night squalling, all that.  I don’t know if it’s because I’m old or because I’ve been through it before or a combination of both, but kids are fine as long as they aren’t mine- and their parents exert some sort of discipline and control over them in public.  I absolutely despise people who let their rugrats scream all the way through Target or run around like they are being raised by wolves or something.  Perhaps that’s the problem right there.   Steve-o is at least past two major hurdles- he is potty trained and literate- but we need to work on the “gainfully employed” part of the adulthood equation.  All in due time I guess, but I really hate society and government’s cute little expectations that we should extend adolescence far beyond the teen years.  If  kid is supposed to be an adult at age 18, then why does the government think parents should pay for extended schooling and health insurance until they’re 26? What the hell is Congress smoking? Obama, granted, is a Marxist nut job, but come on!  When I was 26 I was working 12 hour days and trying to support my four year old son.  The government sure as hell didn’t help me with that- nor did I expect them to.

I do notice that more and more this is becoming  a geezer friendly world and it’s a bit disquieting.  Every time I turn around there’s all these commercials trying to entice seniors to change their Medicare coverage.  Now there’s even a delightful little device for those too lazy to wash their feet which I find hilarious.  I also get a catalog full of all kinds of medical and other notion type things marketed toward the over-sixty set. 

Somebody shoot me if I get too lazy to bother to wash my feet.  I may not be perfect- by a long shot- but I do take some pride in my personal hygiene.

Last night I had to make a run to Target to get some cheese.  I had forgotten I didn’t have enough cheddar cheese for both Jerry’s tacos and the taco dip I am taking to the luncheon tomorrow.  Normally I would have gotten it at Kroger’s but Kroger’s is out of my way on the way home from work.  Target has shredded cheddar cheese and is on the way.  So does WalMart, but the WalMart on Morse Rd. is not suitable for civilized people to enter at any time, (that place is a freak show from hell) let alone after dark and during the holidays.  So, knowing that all the department stores are dens of insanity this time of year, I bravely enter the Target store on my quest for cheese. 

While Target’s clientele does not contain nearly as much of the criminal and/or governmentally dependent crowd as WalMart’s, the crowd last night was by no means a pleasure.  I truly wish people would either teach their rugrats how to behave in public or leave them at home.  Duct taping their big yaps shut is also an option.  It seemed as if I were playing dodge-em all the way through Target.  Why do people think the store is a place to stand around and socialize or worse, talk on the phone?  I am capable of walking and talking on a cellphone. If someone as ill-coordinated as I can do it then anyone can do it, I assure you. 

Some helpful hints for parents of toddlers/preschoolers:

Do NOT give your three or four year old any package to carry through the parking lot.  He/she will only drop it and then start screaming and stomping his/her feet.  Worse yet, they may decide to roll around in the greasy parking lot slush which is going to be nine kinds of hell getting out of their hair and clothes.

Do NOT let your child munch on items you haven’t paid for yet. That is sending your child the wrong message.  If Sammy or Sadie is going to get the munchies bring something from home.  Better yet, teach them to wait until scheduled meal times so that others don’t have to watch your kids smear used Oreo cookie all over the cart handle.

Do bring LOTS of Kleenex.  Nothing is more gross than looking over and seeing someone’s rugrat smearing copious gobs of snot all over his/her face, the cart handle, the stuff in the cart, etc. and so on.  Control the snot.  Nobody needs that visual.

All I needed was some cheese.

Greetings from Whine Country, The White Death Returneth, and I Finally Put Up the Decorations

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No, this is NOT my house.   Not only is my house far more modest (this Griswoldian display is from my sister’s Cincinnati area suburb- where people consider my yearly income to be weekend pocket change) but Jerry does not permit me to do much in the way of decorating for Christmas.  Since he is terrified of fire I cannot have a live tree, outside lights, or anything that he perceives as remotely flammable.  This decree reeks of I don’t know what, especially after the legendary attempt at fireplace lighting with gasoline, but when you live in whine country, it’s easier and quieter to comply with irrational requests as far as reasonably possible.

I didn’t feel like putting up even my modest decorations this year.  My grandma died a year ago yesterday which was depressing enough, and I’m so damned broke it’s not funny, et cetera and so on. But something in the back of my head made me do it.  Grandma always enjoyed Christmas and always decorated lavishly until she wasn’t able to- and then I would go and do it for her.  Grandma would have been disappointed with me had I failed to at least put up the tree and the Nativity.   So the tree is up, the buzzard is in place (long story,) the Nativity is on the mantle and the wreath is in the window.  It was strangely comforting to put the stuff up. I’m glad I did as weird as that sounds.  I like Christmas decorations- especially when they are Griswoldian and tacky.

I would have been in the west end of Marion today trolling for tacky Christmas pictures except for the weather- there is a minor snowstorm coming through and I don’t want to be stuck up north or worse- trying to get through the White Death on the freeway.  So here I sit all broken hearted…the rest of the line is “paid my dime and only farted,” but a. I don’t have a dime, and b. even back in the day when the department stores had pay toilets, most of the chicks I knew simply slid under the stalls.  I’m in my bed but trapped under Lilo who is enjoying her REM sleep splayed across my chest.   That dog can sleep anywhere.  I have no idea where her dreams are taking her but she is the most dream-active of our dogs.  Her little head shakes and her legs move as if she’s running.  If she has a bad dream she wakes up and then she’s disoriented and clingy for awhile.  This dream doesn’t seem to be a bad one so I won’t disturb her if I can avoid it.  Let sleeping dogs lie- and dream.

Yes, look closely- Lilo is crosseyed.  I can also add bowlegged.  But she’s so sweet.  She’s being patient with Sheena which is amazing too.  Sheena is like a big awkward puppy right now but Lilo doesn’t seem to mind which is surprising me.

So whine country is fairly quiet at the moment- Jerry’s asleep which is nice.  I like that phrase, “whine country.”  If one doesn’t take account of the spelling of “whine” it could sound like I take high faluting vacations.  “I vacationed in whine country” sounds so much different that what it really is, as if I am hanging out with buff young studs and sampling the finest wines in the Napa Valley or something.  It really means I put up with Jerry’s incessant whining for a week straight instead of getting occasional breaks from it while I’m at work.   Going on vacation with Jerry is NO vacation for me! It’s even more work than when I’m at work.   The only way I get a real vacation is if I do what I did last June- I went on vacation to my sister’s in NC with Steve-o, while Jerry stayed home with the dogs.   Works for me, except I missed the dogs.

I have a hard time with the holidays for a number of reasons.  Mostly it’s hard because I never have the means to be as generous with others as I’d like.  This year I’ll be doing good to give cards.  Steve-o has always been cynical around the holidays even when he used to get all the useless crap that kids always want and then end up breaking, destroying or losing before New Year’s.  That’s what happened to the model airplane.  We still don’t know where that puppy ended up.  Probably on someone’s roof.

This was the only pic I could get of Steve-o last Christmas.  I’m so stinking proud of my illustrious offspring.  Perhaps it was fortuitous that he was an only child.

Now Lilo’s eyes are rolled back in her head and she’s snoring.  At least she’s not drooling.  Yet.

 

 

Everything I Never Wanted, Speak English, and elysianhunter’s Wide World of Sports

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Ok, I am not a sports fan.  Even Dad, unlike the other 99% of heterosexual American males, does not care for sports- unless the word “motor” is in front of it.  Even then, Dad is picky about which motorsports he indulges in or bothers to watch.  NASCAR is too boring for him and I can understand this.  I don’t have the attention span nor the ability to consume vast quantities of alcohol that is required to enjoy NASCAR.  He likes the off road stuff with trucks or rally racing- the kind of motorsports that actually look like they’d be fun to do.  We all like playing with VW dune buggies and such.  But my very limited non-motor sports education consisted mostly of 1. what I learned in gym class before I was permanently excused from gym class due to heart valve damage from rheumatic fever, and 2. what I gleaned from watching my sisters play sports, and from going to high school football games to try to (very unsuccessfully) pick up guys.    Jerry had to explain to me that when the ref in football does that funky dance move- rolling his arms one around the other -it means “false start” (WTF?) rather than “travelling” like it does in basketball.  The only reason I know what it means in basketball is that my sister played basketball, and a basketball game actually moves quickly enough to hold my attention at least to some degree. Travelling is when you just run with the ball and fail to dribble it.  Personally I think just running with the ball is challenge enough, but I don’t make the rules.  Nobody would want me to make the rules.  I indulge in physical activity for its calorie-burning/aerobic exercise value, and then only because I have to.  Let’s not make it overly complicated for the chronically uncoordinated. 

I did not grow up in a normal American household where the males of the species can’t miss a single __________(enter sports team name here) game.  This was quite a foreign concept to me until I met Jerry and discovered that a good part of his life and energy are devoted to watching Ohio State football.   Barring Ohio State football he will watch any two teams play football, whether it be NFL or college or Canadian cross-dressers.  At first I resented his football jones, but now I see a 4 hour long football game much in the same way that a mother sees dropping off her toddler at Grandma’s for the afternoon.  Football is a lovely babysitter.  Especially when I can watch TruTV or Discovery Channel in the other room.  There must be something about drinking beer that makes football interesting because in my sobriety I find it incredibly slow moving and boring.  The minute things get interesting they stop the game, and there’s about 40 bazillion cryptic rules that one can break without realizing it.  Then there’s the funky little dances the refs do to tell everyone someone broke a rule.  I play hell trying to decipher that stuff.  I do know there’s an “unnecessary roughness” call which doesn’t make any sense to me at all.  As far as I’m concerned you can avoid roughness altogether by not playing football.   It’s as if there is an “unnecessary wetness” call in swimming.  Getting wet is just part of being in the pool, right?

Swimming is one sport I can say I enjoy- not in the competitive sense of course, but to me it’s the least offensive form of exercise.  Despite my extreme lack of coordination on land I am a strong swimmer and a fair diver- but I very seldom have access to a pool.  To be a regular swimmer here in Ohio you need access to an indoor pool, and I can’t afford the “Y” membership anymore, which sucks.  If I could afford one of those “endless pools” or indoor spas, I would find it delightful to get my daily exercise in rather than finding it a boring (albeit necessary) chore.  Of course I don’t see that happening unless I end up being on the receiving end of some kind of inheritance from rich relatives that I’m pretty sure I don’t have.   Of course, Bill Gates can always put me in his will, or maybe just spare me a million or two because he feels sorry for a pathetic old uncoordinated cougar like me.  This is not likely.  I can dream though, and the endless pool thing would be kick ass.

As far as sports go it seems some of them have more entertainment value than others.  I can’t for the life of me see how anyone would bother watching golf.  I can’t hit that damned dinky ball with a golf club even if I keep on swinging at it.  Granted it must take some talent to golf (which I readily admit I don’t possess) but it’s still boring to watch.  I may be a bit biased too from working at the Infiniti dealership and having to deal with travelling golfers. Every year during the Memorial Tournament I was stuck having to deal with all the pompous asses from Muirfield who would want their ill or poorly maintained Infinitis fixed NOW.  The Memorial Tournament always brought to my service department a rash of presumptious nouveau riche douche bags who claimed to be more important than the next guy because they have Connections.  Yeah, we know you golf.  We can tell by the bad pants and Hair Club for Men hair.  I really don’t give a rat’s ass you’re stranded and from Chicago.  In my humble opinion, you hould have scheduled your maintenance and had a safety inspection BEFORE you made an ill advised 500 mile road trip and ended up in my service department with bald tires and a busted radiator hose.   By the way, half of the world knows the owner of the joint, so don’t try that one to get ahead of the guy who scheduled his appointment a month ago.  Claiming a blood-brother relationship with the owner of the dealership (who likely doesn’t know you from Adam’s housecat in the first place), and a $1.49 will get you a Diet Dr. Pepper at BP.   Not everyone who golfs  is a pompous ass who hasn’t a clue about proper vehicle maintenance, but annoying individuals of that stripe seem to be overly represented among golfers.   So golf really isn’t my favorite sport.  Golf spelled backward is “flog.”  Watching someone (deserving of it of course) get flogged might be entertaining.  Watching golf is sort of like being a turd in the punchbowl, watching paint dry.

Baseball I really can’t say anything too bad about.  I actually enjoyed going to Clippers games.  Before I got rheumatic fever I played softball (the rec leagues where anyone who buys the T-shirt is allowed on the team) so I understand baseball rules relatively well.  Baseball is one of the very few games that is more interesting to watch than to play.  I understand it is really boring standing around way, way out in left field for half the game and warming the bench for the other half, but I royally sucked at softball and it was only fair that the girls who could actually play got to.

Hockey is another sport I don’t really understand but find vaguely intriguing.  There’s lots of fights.  It’s done on ice skates which puts the hazard factor right up there.  I’ve not been on skates (roller or ice) for a number of years which is too bad, because at one time I could skate at least with some proficiency, but I’m afraid of breaking stuff at my age.  I broke an arm just falling on the back porch last year and I really don’t want to repeat that one.

For the life of me though I don’t get it how so many people get into sports so heavily that their whole world revolves around what ______player or _______team is doing.  I’m just not that much of a voyeur. 

Another thing, besides the insane popularity of watching other people play sports, that I fail to understand, is why do other people think I need crap that I never expressed any desire of wanting, needing or even having room for?  Mom has the best of intentions but sometimes she buys just plain goofy little things I have no use for and no desire to possess.  For instance, buying a diabetic a set of cookie cutters is a tad bit sadistic, no?  I used to enjoy baking cookies and cakes and pies and pastries- when I could eat them too.  Might as well just spring for the cake decorating tips, candy thermometer and double boiler while you’re at it.  I’ll get right on fulfilling your pastry, cookie and other sugary snacky desires.  (insert sarcasm here)

Speaking of sarcasm, or should I truly be speaking of sadism, Jerry has found a new hobby in the evenings and is pursuing it with a veracity that I did not realize he could possess.  It seems ever since I switched the home phone over to Time Warner from AT&T some foreign jackoff keeps calling every single farking night to try to convince me to switch the phone back to AT&T.  Now it already pisses me off that they didn’t want to offer me the primo pricing until after I’d already switched to TW, instead of making the good offer one of the many times when I’d threatened to do it but didn’t.  It pisses me off even more that they want my business (?) but can’t seem to spring for sales help who speak English intelligibly and preferably as a first language.  I know plenty of college kids who speak at least intelligible English who would be willing to work for relatively cheap for a few hours a week.  (dammit Steve-o…get a freaking job…)  I don’t like to torment foreigners.  I prefer to ignore telemarketing calls altogether.  As far as I’m concerned, if I don’t recognize the number on the caller ID then I don’t bother picking it up.  Jerry on the other hand, takes great delight in messing with AT&T’s outsourced help.  Last night he answers the phone:

“Yes, this is Peggy.”

“I am selling Girl Scout Cookies.”

“Why am I talking to you if you aren’t buying any Girl Scout Cookies?”

I’m sure that Ringadingasumupoo (aka “My name is John”) has absolutely no idea what the fark a Girl Scout cookie is.  But Jerry will carry on this conversation to its frustrating conclusion.  The only thing I hope that AT&T might gather from this recorded phone call is that maybe outsourcing isn’t such a good idea, especially if Midwestern rednecks are utilizing their foreign help as cheap entertainment.  Personally I find torturing foreigners to be a bit sadistic.  They can’t help it they were born in places that aren’t fit for human habitation and they can’t help it that (most of the time) their grasp of the English language is tenuous at best.  It doesn’t reflect well on the parent companies who exploit these people to save a buck though.   Hire the poor college kids right here in this country.  I would almost think about answering telemarketing calls if I were guaranteed an intelligible voice (preferably complete with the Central Ohio Newscaster Accent that I find so easy to understand, or maybe even an nice, sexy Texas drawl… gotta love the Texans) on the other end of the line.