Is That You, Uncle Emory?

I was thinking. I bet it would be embarrassing to the Feared One himself as well as to his visitee if the Grim Reaper had to go fetch a human, and it happened to be the Reaper's monthly laundry day, leaving him with really nothing much to wear.

Icribums and Inphezzles

From the Tough Way To Lose Weight Department:
"Dead Guitarist Now Slimmer and Trimmer" (newspaper headline in Fresno, California about a guitarist for the Grateful Dead)

From the Unanswerable Questions Department:
"And you are how old a woman, sir?" (courtroom transcript from a lawyer questioning a woman in Lansing, Michigan)

From the What Does Illinois Have against Horse Comedy Department?:
"A judge in early July upheld that law by the Illinois Legislature which forced the nation's last operating horse-laughter facility to shut down this year." (in the Arkansas "Democrat-Gazette")

From the So THAT'S Why You Didn't Serve in the Military Department:
"So many minority youths had volunteered . . . that there was literally no room for patriotic folks like myself." (former Republican U.S. Representative Tom DeLay explaining at the 1988 G.O.P. Convention why he and vice-presidential nominee Dan Quayle did not fight in the Vietnam War)

Back to the Confessional

I moved my butt to church this morning for Palm Sunday and Holy Week. When the little woman and I arrived, I had her drop me in front, and had her drive her way to the far back side of the giant parking lot, because, well, she just needs more practice in weaving in and out of lanes.

While waiting for her to walk back to the front door of the church, I could see inside that all of the many religious statues and pictures were covered with long red cloths. Four different couples in their 30s walked past me to enter, and upon seeing the covered objects, they themselves exclaimed to each other, "Look at that. I wonder why all the statutes are draped like that?"

I seized the opportunity to tell each couple, "Good morning, folks. Well, today begins Holy Week, and it's so important, all pastors have the duty once a year at this time to test the religious knowledge of their people. So after the service, our pastor will conduct an important quiz with the statutes and pictures. We'll have to name from memory all the saints and scenes under the coverings."

"Ohhh, no," was the response of every one of them as they proceeded with looks of surprise and apprehension to leave me to find a pew for seating.

Never underestimate the religious illiteracy of the American people.

Where's the Other One?

It was enlightening. In my dream last night, I temporarily "died" in surgery, and my soul visited not heaven, hell, or purgatory but limbo. Limbo, of all places. Enlightening because when I peeked into limbo, I saw thousands of unclaimed, unmatched socks.

Old Macs, Big Macs, and Last Snacks

As I was delivering Meals on Wheels to elderly shut-ins in Seine, I began to wonder as I handed each package of food to its recipient. In keeping with the subconscious trend in the American population to eat more and to be served bigger meals, were these packages larger than before, containing much more food than, say, in the 1960s or so? As far as that goes, I wonder if last meals for about-to-be-executed prisoners in U.S. prisons are larger than they were thirty or forty years ago? That wouldn't be healthy.

No-Bull Lock

I recently violated my own advice to you not to visit Austin, Texas. Temptation swayed me to go there for its music and film festivals. Let me tell you, days on a Greyhound bus from Delaware to Austin, stopping at every little town day and night, eating nothing but fried chicken and grits, made it doubtfully worthwhile. I can firmly advise you: don't travel more than one or two hours by bus to anywhere.

Anyway, I was in Austin when the news broke about the marital trouble between Sandra Bullock and Jesse James. Yahoo! At last, my chance to make a move on pretty Sandra. But after three nights of camping behind some trees across from her Austin house, I saw only a dark-window van enter and leave her place just twice. And after all the tickets I've bought to see her movies. Maybe I can mail her a request for a partial refund---or just leave it in her house mailbox. Still, I don't want to find myself lassoed, run over by a race car, or shot in the back.

Non-Jack of All Trades

Well, it's official. The count now stands at eight by "Big Brother," nine by "Survivor," five by "Dancing with the Stars," and eleven by "Jeopardy": rejections of my applications to be a contestant.

Who needs 'em anyway?

Eye of the Beholder

Ugh. The eye drops which my doctor placed into my eyes left me with blurry vision. When I returned home and had some coffee and buttered toast, that food tasted blurry.

Vimash and Velkobmis

From the Making Points Clear Department:
"We've all lost it, but there's losing it, and there's losing it---and that's the latter." (commentator on Britain's Radio 5 Live)

From the Better Lose Some Weight Department:
"Bargain: 4-inch-wide divan bed and mattress. Excellent condition" (a classified ad in Britain's "Cambrian News")

From the I'll Try To Remember That Department:
"Every Monday in August except July 3rd, 8:00-9:00 p.m." (a flyer advertising dance lessons at a club in Baltimore)

Parrothead

I dropped in on Crazy Emory, my neighbor, for chit-chat, when I noticed that his parrot's cage was empty.

"Hey, Em'," I said, "what's with the empty cage? Where's Warren?"

"I had to take Warren to the pet shrink," Emory replied.

"A pet psychiatrist? Are you kidding? For what?" I asked.

"Well," said Emory, "Warren reached the point at which he wanted more than crackers, but just didn't know how or didn't have the courage to ask."

Go Midwest, Young Man

I just returned from the Midwest where I attended conferences in the attempt to bolster lagging sales for my beets and squash crops. I also tried to do some cultural siteseeing. I say "tried," because that wasn't so successful. In Minneapolis, e.g., I wanted to see "the land of a thousand lakes," but the lake-tour bus I took showed us only six. The tour driver was not at all cooperative in honoring my demand for my money back. When I further complained, he offered to sell me a ticket for the next bus to Wobegone, Minnesota. I didnt' want to see Wobegone. Next in Dubuque, Iowa, a pleasant small city on hills, called "the San Francisco of the Midwest," I was anxious to meet the famous "little old lady from Dubuque." When I asked some locals about her, they directed me to a residence which turned out to be that of the city's retired Catholic archbishop. Very funny. On to rural Iowa where I tried to track down the famous "Field of Dreams"; where I was led to, instead, was a large field which contained only a dumb ten-foot-high, "world's largest" ball of string.

I hopped a bus to Chicago to experience "the Windy City," and found it to be merely calm and cold. I hit the road then to downstate Peoria to its one and only performance theater to see how well the touring "Phantom of the Opera" would "play in Peoria." Alas, the theater recently had been burned down by some phantom arsonist. Down to St Louis where I anticipated meeting the famous "St Louis Woman." When I inquired about her on the streets, a guy in a large hat and a long coat brought to me not one but two "St Louis women," as he called them---but for a price.

Back to Delaware where I think I'll stay for a while. Things seem to be a little more exciting here.

Lighting Bolts

When I was a kid, a couple of kids (a brother and a sister) lived three houses from ours. They were the Bolt (maybe Bult) family, and our two families were mortal enemies of each other. I don't know why. But my parents would encourage my older brother Mike and me, and Mr and Mrs Bolt would encourage their kids, who were the same age as Mike and I, to engage in an almost-weekly ritual of throwing rocks at each other across the front yards. The rocks were plentiful from the dusty, rocky, gravel street in front of our houses. At times, Mike and I would dart for protective cover into the deep ditch which ran along side the street; then the Bolt brats would take their turn in the ditch.

One night, Mike, rascal that he was, persuaded me to join him in slipping out the house and into the Bolts' backyard. There we found their wash hanging on their outdoor clothesline (as was customary for all households in those days), and we proceeded to apply mud from the freshly wet yard onto their sheets, shirts, underwear, etc.

We never were seriously hurt from the rock throwing. Our mother received an irate phone call from Mrs Bolt about her muddied clothes, but Mom simply celebrated the victory with us. I don't remember the Bolts ever attacking us again.

Mike was, as I said, a rascal, who led me astray at times, and whom I would at times keep in check. It was good to have a brother who could batter lightning Bolts. Still, we had to learn our lesson, which would come to us later in the form of four two-year stints in the state juvenile reformatory.

Ear Ache

I don't know why, and don't ask me why---but I think that just about the two silliest-sounding words in English are the Spanish-background name "Raoul" and the noun "youths." Both words just crack me up. I pray to God one of my grandkids won't be named Raoul. And I swear on the little woman's dowry that "youths" is the dumbest-sounding plural of "youth." Just leave the plural at "youth," okay?

Tillmos and Trulwups

From the That Clears Things Up Department:
"He was a state sponsor of terror. In other words, the government had declared, 'You are a state sponsor of terror.'" (President George W. Bush on Saddam Hussein)

From the I'll Try Anything Once Department:
English-language menu items in a restaurant in Cordoba, Spain: "Embezzled egg" and "Pudding with scum"

From the Astonishingly Fascinating Books Department:
Actual book titles in Britain: "A Study of Hospital Waiting Lists in Cardiff, 1953-1954," "Parish Ministers' Hats," "The Toothbrush: Its Use and Abuse"

From the Is There One Person out There Who Understands This? Department:
"There's more secrets in my family than there is in a hot dinner." (British talk-show host Jeremy Kyle)

From the Expert Predictions Department:
"A.A.A. Says Record Gas-Price Predictions May or May Not Come True" (headline in the Kingsport, Tennessee "Times-News")

Can't Elope

Know what's good? A few slices of fresh cantaloupe with scoops of vanilla ice cream atop them. What? No, I don't have any cantaloupe for you. Wanna try some beets or squash from my fields?

But You Promised

Doggone it, I forgot to stop at Office Depot yesterday afternoon to buy more memory for my computer.

Open Wide

You might recall that my neighbor, Crazy Emory, doesn't play with a full deck; or, as the locals around Seine like to say, he can't tell a beet from a squash. Well, we were chatting about our old-age aches and pains when he said that a couple of days ago he confused his Preparation H with his Poligrip.

"Jeez louise," I said (I kinda like expressions from the '20s), "that must've caused some unpleasantness."

"Naw," said Emory, "now I talk like a butthole, but at least my gums don't itch."

Anti-Clericalism

I thought the following happened only in blogs: I was in the hall of the hospital, having visited my bedridden mother-in-law. I was standing next to the open door of the adjoining room when a priest arrived to visit that other person who, I knew, was dying.

"John," the priest called to the patient upon entering his room. "John," again. But no reply from John; and the relatives near his bed said nothing.

"John," the priest said again as he sat next to the dying man. No reply. The priest pressed the old man's shoulder, "John, it's your pastor. Is there anything I can do for you?"

John half-opened his eyes. Then to the surprise of the bystanders, he raised his head toward the priest and almost shouted, "Stop mailing me [offertory] envelopes!"

The Yellowed Rose of Texas

What's with the city of Austin, Texas? An irate local taxpayer did a suicide flight in his small airplane straight into the city's I.R.S. building. Austin's large lake suffered such a drop in water level, two abandoned, dumped vehicles linked with past, unsolved murders became visible in it. The city and its metro area have been favorite locales for the filming of vicious slasher movies. Texas' governor's mansion, situated in Austin, was almost totally burned by an arsonist without the state trooper-guards noticing anything was wrong. The governor there has called for Texas to secede from the union of the U.S. states. The Longhorns football players of the University of Texas in the middle of the city are driven by fancy air-conditioned buses, instead of walking, only two blocks from their hyperexpensive locker rooms to their practice area. Austinites are such dog lovers, they are ready to equate the mistreatment of dogs with the murder of cops or the kidnapping of children.

Cigar-chomping, pot-smoking, irascible, Willie Nelson-type country singer Kinky Friedman of Austin continuously runs for governor or some other state office, and is given serious attention. The city council of Austin honored a couple of homeless, mentally challenged persons, who recently died, after they for years interrupted council meetings with their strange speeches, and were tolerated in doing so. Hundreds of thousands of bats annually fly into the city to inhabit caves at its downtown bridges to the delight of the locals. The downtown museum dedicated to the famous author, O. Henry, who briefly lived in Austin in a small house which is now the museum, is almost totally unknown to the public. The state legislature in Austin came very close to legally allowing students at the giant U. of Texas campus to keep private firearms in their dorms, and even to carry the weapons into the classrooms. The official slogan of the city is "Keep Austin Weird."

I can tell you that Austin is one strange, ominous city which I'm certainly going to avoid at all cost, and I urge you to do the same. Try Omaha.

Lisbon Antigua

Frightening. I suddenly awoke at 2:00 this morning, and suddenly began speaking fluent Portugese for about ten minutes, even though I've never studied the language nor been around someone who speaks it. I forced myself to return to sleep.