I’ve covered this subject before but it bears another look.

I’m beginning to think mirrors are overrated.

I mean, I have several.  There’s a big one in my bathroom over the double sink.  I have a set of full-length sliding closet doors that are mirrored so I can see if my cuffs are the right length.  And I have an “art” mirror hanging in my home so that just before you leave the house you can glance at yourself to make sure your hair is just right and that there’s no wad of spinach on your front tooth.  I take a little pride before I walk out the door.  After all, at my age, I’m no prize, but I believe in doing my best, even though there’s only so much you can do…..with what you have.

But do celebrities have mirrors?  They’re certainly ego-driven, and want to be seen and noticed.  Otherwise they wouldn’t be performers in the public eye.  But as i glance around the internet, I find things that are most disturbing.

Sit.  Let’s discuss.

Can we start with Beyonce?  What is up with her?  You think even if she didn’t own a mirror, her people would tell her if something were amiss, wouldn’t you think?  

It’s clear her show is not G-rated.

And what about Pamela Anderson?  What’s up with her?  

Girlfriend, just stop!  To tell the truth, even if she were not exposed, that dress ought to be banned in at least 28 states.  Just hideous.

Of course, I couldn’t leave out the fabulous Kim Kardashian, could I?  I suspect this was a while ago because she’s like 300 pounds now, blaming it all on a pregnancy.  Seriously, Kim, your beaver?  Really?  And speaking of beaver, there’s Kathren Mcphee from Smash.  What was she thinking?  What happened to “always wear clean underwear in case you get hit by a car?  

I don’t mean to be blunt, but she’s showing tit AND twat!

Moving on.

I love Sofia Vergara, and she’s wonderful in Modern Family, but honestly, people, how could her peeps not tell her?  

That’s a nice color thong for her.  (Although I think we’re not supposed to see the thong, are we?)

It’s  not just the women either.  It happens to male celebs as well.  Here’s Robert Downey Jr. in all his glory.

And I’m not exactly sure who this is getting out of the limo, as I’m not an expert on gangsta rap, but it figures that he’s with that Kardashian woman.  (It is Jay Z?  or Ray J?  or another of those initial people?  Wait!  Is that the guy she made the sex tape with?  That started the whole Kardashian phenom in the first place?)  Oh, and btw, that whole “prison” look doesn’t work for him.  Especially on the Red Carpet, you moron!  

Finally, can someone…..anyone…..explain Nicki Minaj to me?  There was that whole “areola” incident on live television last year on Good Morning America, and now this.  The first picture is simply WTF?  What were you thinking, girl?  

And this one…..well, I just hope her mother doesn’t see it!  

Come to think of it, I believe we need a new telethon.  One that will raise money to buy celeb-u-tards mirrors!!!

I pledge $50.

Remember high school, where you had that insecurity that nobody really liked you, and that you weren’t popular and that people would reject you?  I think it’s a universal truth.  Nobody thinks they were liked in high school, when in fact many of us were.  I bring that up only to convey some feelings later in this piece.

As Alfred Hitchcock used to say, now on to tonight’s tale.

Husband has an ex.  As in ex-wife.  (Yeah, he wasn’t always gay…..imagine that!)  He’s also got two kids and two grand-kids.  But this story is about the ex.  The three of us are all BFF’s.  (I swear.  She’s a great gal, and comes to visit and stays with us and we get along, I’m guessing, better than Sonny and Cher and Greg Allman ever did.)  She’s at that stage in her life where she’s approaching retirement and wants to be near her kids, one of whom lives down here.   So we’ve all been searching for a condo for her to spend part of the year here (snow bird) and part up north with the daughter.  Good plan.  At least we thought it was.

Sit.  Let’s discuss.

We found a suitable condo, she flew down, approved it, and flew home.  It needs work, so the next several weeks were spent with husband and me planning the remodel, (with the help of an architectural interior designer).   Here’s an example of before and after. Not her actual flat, but you get the idea.

It really doesn’t take more than a good eye and few bucks.  Seriously.

All was going according to the plan and her closing was set for this past Friday.  She set up the wiring of the money, booked her plane ticket, came down for a week to shop and plan and discuss and be excited and look forward to a great future.  She had met with the board of directors on her last trip, having put down a deposit, and all that remained was a de facto meeting with The Committee to get approval to move in.  You know how those condo commandos operate.

Thursday night, just before the closing on Friday, she and husband went to this perfunctory meeting, and sat and chatted with the committee and she proudly and excitedly told them of her plans to upgrade this modest condo into a showplace and raise everyone’s property value, when suddenly it took a turn. She told them there’d be a “rent-a-dumpster”  in her parking space just outside her unit to dispose of everything as she was gutting it.

Suddenly,  the committee got weird.  Suddenly they wanted her to post a surety bond for $10,000 in case her dumpster damaged the parking lot.  She explained that her contractor would have that, being licensed and insured, but they insisted on her personal $10,000 bond.  She said no.  Then they carried on about load-bearing walls and how you can’t change the inside of the unit, even thought it’s nobody’s goddamn business if you do.  Then she wanted to replace the front door with a hurricane door (which many units have done), and they balked at that.  What is wrong with these people?  

Finally, it ended with the head of the committee issuing an ultimatum.  Either you put up the personal bond, or we won’t approve you.  (This is 12 hours before the closing).  She said no.

The next morning she got an email from the President of the board, stating that she was an undesirable and that they couldn’t possibly approve her moving in with the likes of them.  They rejected her, flat out.  These eighty-year-old condo commandos, who’ll most likely be dead long before she even parks her car there…..said no dice.

Now, I know what you’re thinking.  She should sue the bastards.  It was all set to close in twelve hours..  But she got all her money back, and now she has NO desire to live with those assholes, so it turns out to be a happy ending.  Imagine finding out that you’re living with those people AFTER you close?  Add to that, the following day, glancing at the condos for sale online, she spotted another in the same building for $10,000 less.  Now she’s really glad it fell through.

So, unlike high school, in this case she really was rejected, but also unlike high school, this time it felt pretty good.

Yeah, it’s that time again.  I had another birthday;  the 14th.  Not an important one, (unless you consider each one important….as opposed to NOT having one, in which case you’ve died).  But it wasn’t a milestone;  40…. 50….60.   Even 65.  Just your average 63.  I can say that with some pride.  Given my life thus far, I honestly never thought I’d live this long, all things considered.  But here I am.

We didn’t plan a party because…..well, to put it bluntly, there comes a point in each person’s life, where a recurring birthday shouldn’t be that big a deal or a cause for major celebration.   But somehow people get carried away and want to be noticed just because they’ve survived another year.   Now, granted, once you pass 75, I think you should make a big deal out of it and the older you get the louder you should shout it out, because realistically, how many can you have?  But the mid 60s are not such a much.

So it’s my birthday.  What to do?  How to celebrate?  This was the day:

I awoke this morning and said to husband,

Let’s go to Denny’s.  They give you free breakfast on your birthday.  You get to build your own Grand Slam.  I’m nothing if not frugal.

So, two eggs over easy, two strips of bacon, hash browns and two wheat pancakes later, with coffee, I sloshed out of Denny’s a happy man.  Happy Birthday to me.

Then, I just had a regular work day.

For dinner, I searched the internet and googled “free birthday dinner Fort Lauderdale“.  You wouldn’t believe the results!

So off we went (husband, roommate and I) to Champps, a sports bar.  Not that we’re the least bit interested in anything on any of the 35 tv screens.  Even with March Madness in progress.  I was only interested in the deal, which was ANYTHING on the menu, at ANY price, free for your birthday.  I would have ordered the Dom Perignon marinated lobster tails (if they’d had them), but I settled for a HUGE rack of baby back ribs.  Happy Birthday to me!  We had beers, onion rings, fries…..all told, I’d call it HELL IN A HAND-BASKET.  Diets be damned.  It’s birthday!

So, there we were, stuffed, buzzed, and drowsy, and our waitress, Karen, suggested a piece of ice-cream cake for dessert…..you know, to share?    How not?  I’ts Birthday!  Well, they call it mile high cake.  Sure, said we, and waited patiently.  And then it  happened.  She brought out this slice.  From a pie, I imagine, that’s the size of Utah.  It was chocolate, vanilla and coffee layers of ice cream, with Oreo cookies interspersed, and whipped cream, Heath Bar chips, chocolate syrup and hot fudge drizzled around the side of the plate.  I know, it sounds decadent, and you figure the three of us each had a couple of bites, right?  Well, take a look at this monster.  I mean, seriously, just take a look.  Ten inches high!   Did you ever?

Well, we ate it.  Every last mouthful.  Acknowledging what pigs we were, but son-of-a-gun, we finished it.

So now I sit here, stuffed, comatose from the sugar, tired from the beer and older than the hills, writing to you.  My bed is beckoning but I’m honestly afraid to lie down.  There’s a nausea factor at work.  I’ll be okay, I’m sure, but I’m thinking…..I’m glad it’s a year til the next one.

Happy Birthday to me.

I ran this piece two years ago and decided that since I have a multitude of new readers, (okay, at least twelve), I ought to run it again.  After all, the holiday rolls around each year, so why not honor it again?  

Happy Saint Patrick’s Day.

You all know who he was, right?  He was born in what was then, England in the 4th century, kidnapped as a boy to Ireland, escaped, became a cleric, returned to Ireland and used the shamrock with it’s three leaf shape to teach Christianity and especially the Holy Trinity to heathens, and essentially brought Christianity to Ireland.  You did all know that right?  Well spoiler alert in reverse if you didn’t.

I’ve always heard some stuff about his driving the snakes out of Ireland.  Let’s put this puppy to bed right now.  First of all, Ireland is an island, (That’s not so easy to say.  Try it three times fast).  It is separated from the land mass of Europe so there were no snakes there.  Nada.  El zippo.   So that’s just a big fairy tale.  (speaking of fairies, i’ll get there in a minute).  So there’s no snake story actually involved, but a similar story is popular about a pied-piper and the rats of Hamelin, but I digress.

Over the centuries, the Irish claimed Patrick as their own, and celebrations began around the 1800′s to commemorate him, involving wearing the color green (to commemorate the rolling hills of the motherland), and of course shamrocks.

The Wearing Of The Green actually began as a political statement in the 1798 Irish rebellion led by soldiers.  You did know that too, right?  Come on people, get with it.

The Wearing Of The Green is a tradition, and people from all over, get in the spirit and wear green, Irish or not.  Why?  Do Jews wear crucifixes on Easter? Do Caucasians wear dashikis on Kwanzaa?  Do we all don Chinese hats on New Year’s Eve Of The Rat?  I think not.  

In more modern times, the celebrations have been formalized into mostly parades and drinking festivals.  Yes, there’s corned beef and cabbage (although i mostly think of corned beef as a Jewish thing, personally.) but apparently the Irish claim it as their own for one day a year, so i just let it be.  No point in making a fuss.  My people claim it the rest of the year.  (And quite frankly, I’ll take a Jewish corned beef sandwich with a potato latke over an Irish one and a boiled potato, any day, but that’s just me.)  As for the drink festivals, that’s a peculiar thing.

Sit.  Let’s Discuss.

The Irish, it seems, are famous, nay, notorious for drinking. (see drunken Irish).  I’m not sure why.  (Yes, i know they drink a lot, but then so do Presbyterians. (Albeit an Irishman’s idea of a good time is a shot and a beer, while the prezzies prefer a highball or a martini.)  It’s not a big deal to drink a lot.  I do it.  Nuns do it too, only they use coffee cups for propriety’s sake.  I even know a lot of gays that drink at least as much as the Irish, although the preference, of course, would be for more lady-like drinks like Cosmos or Appletinis.  (Oh Mary, don’t ask).  As I said, I’m not sure why the Irish have such a bad rap about the drinking, but if an impartial observer took notes on Saint Patrick’s Day, the jury would declare the entire Irish nation a bunch of drunks. (But then again, the same could be said about 100 million people right here in America on Superbowl Sunday, and that’s just a football game, so there.) But hey, it’s only one day, okay?  Ease up, will ya?

So to sum up so far, we have a group of people, identified with a particular island in Great Britain, but living all over the world, of course, who once a year dress up in green, wear shamrocks in one form or another, march in parades, hang out in bars and get drunk and puke.  Hmmm.  When you think about it, it’s not much of a holiday really.  Not like Christmas with it’s presents, or Hanukkah with its festival of lights and potato latkes, or even 4th of July with it’s picnics, bar-b-ques, and fireworks.  It’s not even a day off from work when it falls on a weekday.  I’m truly not sure what the big deal is about St. Pat’s day.  But faith and begorrah, the Irish sure love it.

And about that parade.  There’s usually a big one in lots of cities, but New York’s is perhaps the biggest of them all.   (After all, they do have a cathedral there named for him, and it’s a beauty, too).  Many of the police and fireman are of Irish descent, and in their parade, pretty much all are welcome to build a float, raise your banner, fly your colors and be proud…..except the gays.  (See, I told you I’d come back to it).  For some odd reason, they don’t allow the gays to march in the Saint Patrick’s Day parade in New York.  Do they think there are no Irish gays?  I mean, if Oscar Wilde were alive, would they let him march?  Pretty good playwright, proud Irishman and all?  How about Rosie O’donnell? She’s still alive.  How come she can’t march?  I’ve seen her march in gay pride parades.  She happens to be an excellent marcher and i think she would add something to the festivities, but alas, not allowed.  Hmmm.  I guess that let’s me out too.  Nice Jewish gay boy with Irish friends, forbidden to march.  For a holiday that’s really not such a much, it seems to me they could use all the help, color, style and panache they can get.  (although truth be told, we gays are not partial to green beer.  Too hard to find matching accessories.)

You know what?  Screw it.  I’m putting this holiday up on the shelf with Groundhog Day.  No big whoop.  And this year on St. Patrick’s Day, i’m going to a Jewish deli to eat a hot corned beef sandwich on rye with good deli mustard and a pickle.   (Way better than boiled cabbage and potatoes.)  Rosie and i will see you at the gay pride parade.

Top of the mornin’ to you, and Erin Go Bragh.

Ah, the government at work.   Your tax dollars.  Something went down the other day that I simply cannot describe.  (Although I’m going to do my best to try.)

As most of you know, I take a lot of drugs.  (The legitimate kind).  I have issues.  If you’ve been following, you know this.  I have great health insurance and it covers most everything, (actually it’s Medicare), and the only glitch is the co-pay on some of my meds.  I take a couple where my share, monthly, can be as high as $150/ea per month.  Yeah, pricey.  But there are programs through the companies, (you’ve seen the commercials….If you have trouble paying for your drugs, Astrazeneca can help…stuff like that), so I apply, jump through the hoops and generally find the help I need.

However, this year they changed the rules and Medicare patients need to apply to their local Health Dept for assistance and if turned down, then the pharmaceutical companies will kick in.  Fair enough.  Just another hoop, in my opinion, and I’m a very good jumper.

So I made an appointment with Broward County Health for an assessment, for 11:00am this past Tuesday morning.  How did it go, you might wonder?  That’s the story.

Sit.  Let’s discuss.

I arrived at 10:50, was greeted by a government employee (I only include that to give you the flavor), with a computer keyboard and her smart phone in her spare hand, (obviously texting her BFF),  gave her my name, and this is how it went.

Her:  Good morning.  Please take this ticket (number 52) and go to the lounge to wait.  It will be approximately 1.5 to 2 hours.  

Me:   And now, at 11:00 am, my appointment time, they’re taking number 39 and I’m 52.  That’s a lot of people ahead of me.

Her:  Well, there are six people with the first appointment of the day.   

Her:  I wouldn’t know about that.   

So out I walked, with my appointment card in hand, feeling as though I had jumped through yet another, in a series of hoops.

I have NO DOUBT that there will a second part to this, after the interview.  No doubt at all.

Funny title for me.  I’m SO not a gambling man.

Come to think of it, I’m 62 years old, and have seen and done a lot, and have, in all likelihood suffered every addiction known to mankind, (gluttony, smoking, drinking, sexing, (is that a word?), etc, with the sole exception of gambling.  Perhaps because my father had a  minor predilection for it.  He was an aficionado of the casinos in Atlantic City or a good poker game, and I’m sure the bowling league at the Knights of Pythias had a side bet or two going.  My mother would get steamed (not a pretty sight for a wee one, (me)), so I shied away since early on.  Later in life, when you take an opposing position in a discussion and someone says, I’ll bet you $10,000 you’re wrong.  (Well, actually only Mitt Romney ever said that to Governor Perry of Texas in one of the Republican debates), but you take my meaning.  I decline wagering for the following reason:

If someone says to me, I’ll bet you 50 bucks that the next person to walk into this bar will be a fat man in pink tights, wearing a tutu, singing “I feel pretty”, I won’t take that bet.  I always think, “he knows something that I don’t know.”   That is  the kind of gambler I am.

But the Academy Awards are upon us, and folks everywhere, especially in Hollywood,(and perhaps Las Vegas),  are placing their wagers on the winners.  I’m invited to a party where my guesses will be judged, along with the other guests, for HUGE prizes.  (I made the HUGE prizes part up, but I do love a party).    I should add here, I’ve see none of the nominated pictures, (well, I did see Beasts of the Southern Wild, and loved it, btw, but not a chance for Best Picture,)  so the word “guess” really applies.  But I’m nothing, if not an opinionated bastard.  So what are my guesses?

Sit.  Let’s discuss.

Best Picture:  I think it’s between Argo and Les Miz and Lincoln.  However, I hear Lincoln is great but dry.  So between the other two I want to say Les Miz.  Hollywood loves a good musical.  (Yeah, I know, Hurt Locker beat Avatar, so Hollywood also likes a good terrorism movie:  i.e. Zero Dark Thirty (but everyone hated the torture stuff)).  There’s also that whole Argo fan base.  But I’m rooting for Les Miz, even though Argo is going to win.   I could be wrong.

Best Actor:  I think it’s between Hugh Jackman (sigh), and Daniel Day-Lewis.  Too close to call.  They each won a Golden Globe.  But my money is on Jackman.  (sigh).  I could be wrong.  (Can  handsome beat historical?)  Dunno.  My money is on Jackman. (sigh)

He should, at the very least, win Best Handsome.  (sigh).  The truth is, Lewis will win, but I’m still rooting for Jackman. (sigh).

Best Actress:    They say Naomi Watts was amazing in The Impossible, but nobody saw the movie.  Too depressing about the tsunami in Malaysia.   Then there was that darling Jennifer Lawrence from Silver Linings Playbook who’s all of 22 with her second nomination, but I think that if you don’t win it really young (think Streisand for Funny Girl, Minelli for Cabaret, or  Tatum O’neal for Paper Moon), then you have to pay your dues before you win).  I think Jessica Chastain will take it, but I could be wrong.  

Best Supporting Actress:  Tough one.  They like Sally Field.  They really like her.  And she’s a great actress.  But Anne Hathaway has grown from Princess Diaries to Fantine.  I’ve seen clips and I think she’ll edge out Sally, who will need a therapist to reaffirm that we still like her.  But I could be wrong.  

Best Supporting Actor:  Tough to bet against De Niro, but I’m going with Christophe Waltz.  I think they still love him from Inglorious Basterds, and he’s so quirky and kindof oddball-ish that he’s hard to resist.    Besides nobody saw Phillip Seymour Hoffman in The Master.  But then again, De Niro hasn’t won in like 20 years, so maybe…..But, ya know?  I could be wrong.  

Best Director:  Ben Affleck.  Oh wait.  They snubbed  him without a nomination.  WTF?  He won the Golden Globe and the Academy snubbed him.  That leaves Ang Lee (nobody saw Life of Pi), and Spielberg.  I say the latter goes home with the statuette.  He’s arguably the greatest director ever.  But again, I could be wrong.  

Best costumes:  No, I’m kidding.  I’ll stop here.  Otherwise this might get as boring as the actual awards show.

It’ll be fun to be at a party with a bunch of other, mostly gay, men (some of them in costume, possibly), rooting for your favorites, (even though I’ve seen none of the films).  You think the Red Carpet commentary is fun?  Watch it with a bunch of aging queens.  Talk about COMMENTARY!  Still, it’s always a pleasure for me to see Hugh Jackman (sigh), and I hear that Barbra is slated to show up and actually sing!   It’s rare, but she’s coming.   Seriously…..still, like Buddah.

So those are my predictions.  Again, I think they snubbed Ben Affleck.  But then I think they really snubbed Channing Tatum.  I mean, after all, did you see Magic Mike?  And did anybody all year make your heart beat faster than he did?  

I’m not wrong about that!

Oh boy.  I fucked up.

I almost never start a piece with a cuss word, but I really think I changed the course of world history this week.  It started out innocently enough with my reading Facebook, seeing something which I thought was funny, and re-posting it on my page for my world to see.  The next thing I knew, the politics of the world were shifting, whole religions were quaking on the verge of hysteria and Diane Sawyer was talking about what I did.  This is how it began.  The post on Facebook:

Funny, right?  At least I thought so.

The very  next day, His Holiness, His Eminence, His Excellency, The Pontiff, announces that he’s stepping down from  his position.  (He cited ill health, but I think it’s because of what I did.)  Truth be told, if he’s that thin-skinned, maybe he shouldn’t be Pope.  But that’s just my opinion.  (You don’t suppose he looked in the mirror and rethought his position, do you?)  Not sure.

Suddenly, the Cardinals of the world are gathering in Rome to hold a conclave.  (If you don’t know what a conclave is, either read the book, or see the move Angels and Demons by Dan Brown.  Good story about electing a Pope.  There’s a dark horse in this race;  the Cardinal from Ghana.  He’s black, but that’s not what I meant about a dark horse, I swear.  I meant he’s a long shot.  They’ll probably elect a black Pope right after we elect a black President.  (Oh wait.  Um.  Never mind.  Maybe  he has a shot.)  The Cardinals are all in one form of drag or another, with their red robes and hoop skirts, but I dare not poke fun, lest further mayhem ensue.  

I sincerely hope I haven’t tipped the balance of world power, or even religious position with my offhand, offbeat humor.

Now, here’s the tricky part.  I’m this Jewish kid who doesn’t even practice his own religion, so where am I going to find a place to confess my sin?

About that surgery.  Yeah, the sciatica.  The story I told went straight to the event,  bypassing, (if you’ll excuse the medical expression) the setup.

Having been through the Sports Doctor and his attempts, (including physical therapy, exercise and cortisone), and subsequently the Pain Doctor (which encompassed morphine, Vicodin and ultimately a series of epidural shots in my back, to no avail, I might add, I sought the next level.  (Side note:  Can anyone explain to me why three epidurals in my spine couldn’t stop my pain?  I’ve seen a woman take one shot and push a bowling ball out of her vagina with not so much as a grimace, and I couldn’t get any relief.  Okay, mine were cortisone injections and hers were something a bit stronger, but still).

So having had no relief, I visited Dr. Miracle, the surgeon.  (Not his real name.  I don’t want to get sued for writing, any more than he wants to be sued for ….whatever).  He came highly recommended and so I made an appointment before the cruise, for surgery after our return.   Husband and I arrived for my appointment and the doc was surprisingly prompt.  I took that as a good sign.  He has some nice digs at Holy Cross Hospital so I figured he was legit.  (Personally I hate it when the surgeon has his suite in some building above Weight Watchers’ meetings or even in a strip mall that has a Starbucks an Einstein Bagels and a Pilates Class.  I want to know his rent is higher than that, indicating a modicum of success.)

Having been led into his consulting room, after the preliminary height/weight/blood pressure/temperature business, we sat and looked around.  (Husband always comes in with me.  I know most doctors hate that extra body in the exam room, but at my age my mind is likely to wander after I hear the words incision and anesthesia so I need someone to help me remember what he tells me.   Sitting and waiting I noticed some of the tools of his trade.

First off, there was a human skull on the table.  Now, I know he’s a neurosurgeon but is the skull on display really necessary?  I felt like I was on the set of Michael Jackson’s Thriller, waiting for Vincent Price.  Or on the set of the movie Saw 3.  There it was, just a big old skull on the table.  Hard to ignore.  On the other table there were short sections of spine;  spine alone,spine with screws, spine with fusions, and spine with leaky red crap outside the spinal cord.  Again, a little unnerving and unnecessary.  I get it.  He’s going to cut my spine.

So in he comes, with  my MRI in his hand and promptly shows me my bulbous area around L4, L5.  You doctors out there will know what that is.  You lay people, it means the exact spot on your spine that needs Dr. Miracle’s attention.  He explained that he was going to do a laminectomy,  (the surgical removal of part of the posterior arch of a vertebra to provide access to the spinal canal, as for the excision of a ruptured disk.  I looked it up.  Really  makes you believe that Medical School is not for everyone.)  And that he’d make a tiny incision, use a microscope, clean up around the affected area, and I’d be good as new when I awoke.  Sounded okay to me.  He never bothered to tell me about the hideous, unbearable pain that I’d experience for a couple of days after.  Or the sensation of broken ribs, due to the cage they lay you over while they cut your back, which digs so hard into your ribs that later it feels like they dropped you.  Guess he didn’t want to scare me.  (Have I mentioned how I hate surprises?)

Anyway, I scheduled for Dec 19th, took our cruise, came home, had my surgery, writhed in agony for two days and now I’m right as rain.  (Truth be told, I don’t really get that expression…..right as rain  Rain is not right if you’re having a picnic or at a little league game.  It’s not right at a parade.  So why do we say it?  Dunno.  A subject for another time.)

So as I mentioned in the actual surgery blog, I’m good to go, for now.  And as much as I liked Dr. Miracle and his methods, I really do hope I never see him professionally again.

I’ll bet a lot of good doctors get that from happy patients.

I hope you all enjoyed Husband’s and my travels.  It was a lot to tell and for those of you who made it all the way through, I thank you.  It’s not quite as rewarding as finishing War and Peace, which is 1,440 pages in the paperback version,  (I’m still on page 106), or the Steve Jobs biography, a mere 630, but a sense of completion of a task, nonetheless.  Thanks again.  On to other topics.  Well not exactly.   There is still the matter of the sciatica and the surgery.

So I did it.  I had the surgery to end the ceaseless, relentless pain in my ass.  (That’s not a curse word.  It actually was a pain in the piriformis muscle which is located in your ass.)  Five days after the cruise was the event.

Sit.  Let’s discuss.

I had to stop taking any aspirin products for ten days prior to December 19th, which included five days on the cruise. (It’s a blood thinner, bleeding thing).   At that point I switched from the Ibuprophen 800s to Percocet with codeine.  (Not a bad swap in the 60s, but when you’re trying to snorkel in Bonaire……ya know.)  But I did, came home, prepped for the event, (labs, clearance from the doctor, clearance from the cardiologist, etc….they really don’t want you to die on the table from the anesthesia) and on the morning of the 19th in I went.  I wasn’t the prettiest patient, but then it wasn’t a beauty contest, but rather a question of whether Dr. Miracle could fix me.  He was on stage, not me.  And thank goodness for that.  Take a look.

Talk about brave.  (No, not the surgery, my showing you this picture.  I promise, you’ll only see the before.  The after was too ugly even for my loved ones.)  As you can see, the drip is in my arm already (no, you can’t see the drip, but look at my face, people.  Talk about la la land.)

Fast forward three hours.

As always, the patient regains consciousness and can’t remember anything.  Total amnesia.  Husband said I was a mess.  Begging him for headphones so I could watch a movie, post op.  Delirious.

I slept for almost two hours.  I know.  You’d think you’d sleep longer, but the hospital staff wakes you every two hours for vitals.  And meds.   And blood pressure.  And to introduce themselves on shift change.  And to bring you food you can’t eat.  (I was on liquids…..Jello anyone?)  Literally every two hours.  And I couldn’t move.  My back hurt so much, that as I lay dying, (don’t you love the literary William Faulkner reference?  I wasn’t dying.  Just sounded good in the narrative.  Sorry about that).  So as I lay there, I cursed the day that I agreed to the surgery.  I was swearing that if I’d known the after-pain, I would have lived with the goddamn sciatica for the rest of my life.  People, it hurt!  But, silly me.  After two days of relentless agony it began to abate and that’s when I noticed it.  Oh, my back was still ripped open and it hurt, but I noticed…..the sciatica was gone.  GONE.  After a year of suffering, it left me.  I was on my feet by day three to shuffle to the bathroom (the catheter was out…..yeah, sorry, I can’t tell the catheter story.  It hurts my male readers too much.  Get me drunk sometime and I’ll tell that part).    But inching toward the bathroom with the drip dispenser alongside, feeding me pain-killers, I realized that Dr. Miracle did it.  I was cured.  A mess, but cured.  I remained in the hospital two nights.  By day two they brought me solid food that I couldn’t eat.  Still, progress, I thought.  On day three I came home.

Now it’s three weeks later and I’m walking like a champ.  Still healing, not allowed to bend, lift, exercise, etc.  I am, however, allowed to go into the pool, chest deep and walk back and forth for at least an hour a day.  I’m just glad to be walking anywhere.

So that’s it.  The sciatica saga has come to an end.  I promise not to mention it again.  Okay, I might mention it in passing but I promise not to dwell on it.

After all, there are lots of other things that are a pain in my ass.  No?

Finale, I promise. So with the islands behind us and our digital disks almost full, we set sail for home…..a two-day sea adventure, much like the first one.  (Although truth be told, we weren’t eating as much on the way home.  After ten days we were a tad nauseated.  Oh, not enough to quit eating, just enough to slow down.) For activities, I took a class in how to make Gravlax. (That’s Scandinavian lox for the uninformed.)  I actually know how, and have made it many times, but I thought maybe the sous chef had something to teach me.  Other than the fact that I make a pound at a time and he made ten, there’s very little difference.  He showed us with one giant salmon.  Take a look:   This picture reminds me;  I forgot to mention that it being early December, as we cruised, the “elves” came out at night whilst we slept and decorated the ship a little each night until it was unbelievably festive.   See what I mean? So for the last couple of days, I spent a lot of time writing this account, taking a class in gravlax (okay) , or apps on your tablet (not great), napkin folding (awesome….I can make a shoe!),

How festive is that?  I mean, seriously.  Dinner party, anyone?

Then the  shopping (didn’t buy much….hat, t-shirt….ya know) and generally relaxing.  But one day I stumbled onto one of the cruise directors in the main atrium, teaching the willing and able, how to dance the choreography from Michael Jackson’s video, Thriller.  He was really good at it, and over time, the passengers caught on.  Enjoy this video.

Seriously, how fun was that?  I swear, if I hadn’t been crippled with the sciatica, I would have been haunting the deck with the rest of them.  (Of course, then you wouldn’t have seen it as nobody would have been filming).  But I swear I would have.  Wouldn’t you?

Finally, after the last dinner, the cast, crew and staff did a farewell show in the theater, bidding us a fond farewell and urging us to come back.  I swear I got misty thinking about how much fun I’d had.  

Are ya still with me?  I didn’t realize how many parts there’d be.  This is probably the next to the last one.

The Ports of Call.

After the two sea days, we have six ports in six days. (I know.  I’m tired already).

1)    Antigua.  Knowing we had a huge day coming up the next day, we went easy in the first port.  From the ship, the island looked pretty impressive.  We walked around the town, saw some sights, shopped a bit and went back to the ship.  On-board friends told us later that they did excursions and that it was a very interesting island.  We were fine with that.

2)   St.  Lucia.  (Now that you know the pronunciation. ) This was our big day.  I had booked a tour directly with a local tour operator and his company, not through the ship, and his people were waiting as promised upon our dis-embarkation. (Alex, I’ll take 14-letter words for $200).  I had convinced the ladies at our dinner table to come with, and we hopped into a van with six others; two young kids in their 30s, who would go on to be our new BFFs, an old man on a cane and three elderly ladies who turned out to be real players.  Nothing was going to stop these gals.

So off we went.  He showed us the banana plantations and took us up and down the mountains on the winding roads.  We went to the “drive-in” volcano, replete with its stink of sulphur.    (The town is actually called Souffriere, which means Sulphur in the Air.)  Gorgeous waterfalls, cool pools, mud baths (we did NOT partake of the mud, as the stench of the sulphur was a bit stongrer than we’d anticipated.)  After that we stopped for some local food tastings and I ate things I’ve never eaten before (tamarind, goat, passion fruit, etc) and loved every bite.  Then we were off through the rain forest to a little dock with tiny speedboats which we boarded via ladder down to the crafts and sped away to a beach at the base of the Piton Mountains.  It was breathtaking.  At the beach, I snorkeled and became one-with-the-sea.  The beauty and tranquility of the  water, the abundance of fish, the myriad varieties of the species and the beauty were overwhelming.  

We spent an hour (not enough, in my opinion), and then back onto the craft to take us back to the van.   We saw some landmarks like the Governor’s Mansion and others.  Back to the ship, exhausted, Husband and I fell into a well-deserved nap.  It was a great day.

3)    Barbados.  After yesterday, we just laid low.  Took a stroll into the town, grabbed some wi-fi, touched base with home and got back on the ship to rest.  Barbados didn’t seem like a big deal to us, but many of our fellow cruisers enjoyed their  excursions.  The people were not as friendly as on the earlier islands,  IMHO.

4)   St Vincent.  It was Sunday, so a lot of places didn’t open until 3pm.  It’s a religious island.  The topography was among the most dramatic we’d ever seen.  Giant mansions way up on the mountaintops, gorgeous coastline, and rich blue seas.  See photos:

It was magnificent.  Someday I’d like to go back and really see it.

5)    Bonaire.  For me the highlight.  This island is so beautiful with its pristine waters, gorgeous beaches, clean clean streets.  (I said clean twice.  It was immaculate).  The people were so friendly and pretty (the Dutch, after all).  We hopped a cab to the Plaza Resort of Bonaire and spent several hours  on their beach.  I snorkeled again and my mind was blown away by the life beneath the sea.  It was like being in the movie, Finding Nemo. (I actually saw clown fish)  The photos can’t do it justice but take a look:  

If you look closely, that me, at the bottom of the photo with the yellow diving gloves, emerging from the sea, like the Creature From The Black Lagoon only fatter    Husband and I both said “we’re coming back here, to spend at least a few days”.  Just wonderful.

6)  Finally, there’s Aruba.  A beautiful little island, clean and well-maintained (the Dutch, again).  We simply wandered around downtown, (we were the only ship in port so it was a pleasure), bought some souvenirs and came back to the ship.  After all, six ports in six days is a lot).  Take a look at our last port.  Think CLEAN.  

As we sailed away, we passed the airport.  Small, but good enough to get you to this amazing paradise.   If you look closely you can see the landing strip. 

So as we bid farewell to our ports of call, and set sail on our two- days-at-sea voyage home, we marvel at the wonderful time we’re having.

The final chapter will be on the final two days and the insane activities that the cruise staff dreams up to keep you occupied.  (Besides eating)…..

Stay tuned for Part 7.

I wanted to continue a bit more about the entertainment.

That penultimate night, we had Los Gauchos, who were this adorable couple of (straight) guys, dressed “bolero” style, swinging ropes, doing a bit of Flamenco just being downright sexy and handsome.  They began with a mesmerizing act including black lights and dancing fabric.  I figured out how to show it to you.  Take a look:

here’s another bite:

another:

Wasn’t that just fun and mesmerizing?  Even without being stoned it was impressive.

Now, on to Los Gauchos.  Take a look at these maniacs:

How fun is that????

Finally, the last show turned out to be singing twins,  Gunnar and Matthew Nelson.  Gotcha covered…..WHO???

Come listen to the tale.

Who remembers Ricky Nelson? (sigh).  I’m sorry, his name always ends in (sigh).  He was a beauty.  And a pretty talented Travelin’ Man, as the song goes.  Don’t get too excited. We didn’t see him.  He’s dead.  Pretty dead for a very long time.  Here’s the catch?  Did you know he had twin sons?  Well, yeah, he did, er…does. Er…had, er… has.  Well they’re alive and he’s not.  Anyway they began a musical career of their own, way back when, under the tutelage of dad, and of course Grandpa (Ozzie).  It took them so far, and then I guess the fact that they don’t have much talent caught up with them, so they’re working the cruise ship circuit now, in a show that’s an “HOMAGE” to dad.  (They never once mentioned that dad was a hopeless drug addict, but I guess that’s not really good theater).  So these handsome, 45-year-old twins do this “act”, if you will, telling all about life with dad (the clean version) and then singing a song or two.  Not bad for cruise ship fare.  And for the name-droppers aboard, (and there were so many you could just shit), it was a chance to say, “I saw Ricky Nelson’s kids”.

(I have to add here, that some people are just so starved to be near famous people.  I had a woman tell me that she loaned Charo a guitar string after she broke one onstage playing Granada in grand Flamenco style.  Does that really qualify as “I know her?”)  Anyway…. back to the Nelson boys.  Take a look:  

After the show, I got all up close and personal and was telling one of them about how his Grandpa, Ozzie was legend while I was at Rutgers, and we were gittin’ along all fine and stuff, and then I remembered the Charo story and had to run.  So easy to get caught up in it all, I tell ya.  

Nice boys though.

I’ll come back to the final night and the parade of nations, the teaching of the Thriller video choreography and Staff Farewell at the very end.  But for tomorrow, I promise the actual ports of call.

That’s Entertainment!…..

After each dinner was the corresponding show in the Masquerade Theater.  It’s a gorgeous venue.  Take a look:  (Feel free to click and make it big)….. The entertainment is quite wonderful.  The first night’s was a comic from Brooklyn, with the accent and the smarty-mouth attitude of which I am so fond.  I’m kind of like that myself (in case you hadn’t noticed).  We all had a lot of fun with him.  He did a late show a couple of nights later, when he could step out of “family mode” and was really quite entertaining. At that point on that first evening, it was late, but having found the “Friends of Dorothy” posting in the main lobby, we ventured up to the Viking Crown Lounge to see if anyone would show.  We met a few gay couples, exchanged pleasantries, sat a few minutes, said our goodnights and headed off to bed.

The second night was the first of the RCCL Singers and Dancers, in a Broadway salute that was actually thrilling.  The singers were good, but the dancers were amazing.  These young, beautiful, fresh-faced, young kids.  (I said young twice.  I like young).  All I could think as I watched was, “when the sciatica is gone, I still won’t be able to do any of that.”  There was lots of Chicago, Cabaret, Dreamgirls, West Side Story, et al.  A helluva good time was had by all.   Look at these kids.  Could you just plotz? He had it comin’….from Chicago.  Great number. And then this little number morphed into Dreamgirls…..could you just die?……… Geez, I love those kids. One night there was an impressionist.  He donned different persona and sang as them, using wigs and props.  He even did Sonny and Cher with a wig short on one side and long on the other.  Hysterical!  Take a look:  Sonny:   then Cher.  Pants on one side, gown on the other.  The best!!   At one point he dragged a 12-year-old boy onto the stage and did a Kermit, (It’s not easy being green) number, that was sensational.  The kid stole the show.  Click on this one.  See below.   The young lad was a great kid.  Smart as a whip and a real player.  He was travelling with his mom and dad (a VERY decorated war hero), and his grandparents.  We spent a fair amount of time together and I got to know them all.  They were a really lovely family.  (I wish you could have seen this little guy on Disco Night.  He was rockin’! The next night was a hypnotist.  Now, I’ve been the “hypnotee” previously on a cruise, and I promised that I would stay in my seat and observe the show.  But darn if, during his audience warm-up, he didn’t spot my show-biz ass, pull me on stage to participate and “go under”.  So with his expert direction, and being the player that I am, I  proceeded to become a beauty pageant queen, a sheriff riding into town on a horse, a symphony orchestra player (each of us miming an instrument), and an orangutan, “hoo-hoo-ing” through the audience picking fleas out of peoples’ hair.  Then he called upon us to become amorous orangutans and pick out an audience member and wrap our arms around them.  Well, people, there he was; the hot, black, MALE singer from the RCCL show sitting in the third row and I just couldn’t resist.  I threw my arms around him and buried my face in his neck, with him rolling in laughter the entire time, and me trying not to give it away, (having just outed myself in front of 1000 people.)  The audience ate it up.  Husband actually thought I was under the spell.  For the past two days people have been stopping me on the ship to ask “were you really hypnotized?” But the truth is, if you could really snap your fingers and put someone under, men would get laid so much more often than they do now.  Can’t you see it?

Hey honey, c’mere a minute, I have an idea…..snap…..yeah, ooh baby, that’s good…..watch your teeth…..

Really?  Do people really think it’s that easy?  C’mon guys, get serious.  I guess I’m just a pretty good actor.  It’s fun being in the spotlight for a bit. Then, last night was a funny act.  It was a guy who played he ukulele and sang.  His specialty was taking well-known songs and re-writing the lyrics in comedy.  He was the least entertaining so far, (and the grumps complained), but I enjoyed him, corny as he was.  He was a terrific ukulele player, I might add.

Many days later…..

The entertainment has continued to be outstanding. A couple of nights ago, there was a heavy-set woman in her 70s.  I swear, she was like an old Sophie Tucker, with a little bawdy comedy, some songs and a very engaging style that drew in the entire audience.  She was so funny.  I gathered she was Israeli, (although I suspect she was born before the actual country).   When she did get serious, she sang Wind Beneath My Wings, and she was incredible.  Thoroughly enjoyable. The next night was a return of the RCCL Singers and Dancers in a tribute to the Disco Era.  It was smokin’.  The costumes were gorgeous and the energy level, again, made me wish I had the Bengay concession backstage.  Those kids make me crazy and pissed off that I’m old.  Alas.  After dinner was a continuation of the Disco theme in the main Centrum.  The ship’s staff had the joint jumping.   Take a look at the remains of the Disco era (a bunch of old folks doing YMCA).  This one is an actual video.  So click it!

Last night was this very interesting and entertaining act called “Los Gauchos”….something.  Two wild and crazy Argentinians doing drums and native dance and comedy and audience participation and general merriment.  I gotta say, RCCL has booked some great entertainment for every night of this cruise.  Very impressive indeed.

Well, drats, I’ve gone long.  But I want to continue the entertainment part.  I’ll come back to El Gauchos….whatever….and finish up with the Nelson Twins (you know?  the sons of Ricky Nelson?  I may even tell the family story.  But that’s the next installment.

After that, will be the ports.  The ship was moving after all…..

Moving right along…..

During the two days at sea, swells notwithstanding, we ate, drank, napped, socialized, read and relaxed.  Pre-cruise, there was a group at an online website, called CruiseCritic.com, where people on a given cruise, find each other online, get to know each other, share cruising tips and make plans for the on board frivolities.  As a result, I found and participated in a slot-pull whereby 49 of us, each threw in $15 dollars and we pumped it  ($735 bucks) in the dollar machine!  Then each participant got to pull the slot five times at max bet, which is three bucks a pull, (which, those who know me are aware is an amazing out-of-character moment), and at the end you split the money.  (Gain or loss).  Well, WE WON!  We each walked away with $20, which is five more than we started with.  It was a lot of fun cheering (woohoo!!) and sympathy sighing (awwww!) as we each took a turn.  And I met a lot of great people to boot.

We had a Cruise Critic social (no free booze) , a Welcome Back party (no free booze…okay, rum punch, but seriously), for former cruisers of RCCL, a trivia round and the Captain’s Cocktail Reception (big free booze and lots of it.  Can I get a woohoo for the Captain?   A word about the trivia contest; I sucked.  Big time.  Who made George Washington’s wooden teeth?  (Are you kidding?  Really?  That was a question.  I’m willing to bet nobody knows who.  Okay, it was Paul Revere.  Yeah, him….the silversmith….the British are coming, yada yada…..him.  Get real.  I quit the trivia contest immediately and walked away in shame.  Had there been an actual plank, I might have considered, well…..you know.   The very idea.

(Did I mention the Captain is a woman?  Well, she is).  Captain Liz, one of only four in the entire cruise industry.  Very cool.  We met her and she’s Danish and charming.  See photo:

It’s blurry, I know.  Sorry.  But she was a darlin’.  (Did I mention I have sweaters older than she?)

It’s funny.  There are a lot of “professional” cruisers on board; people who spend most of their time in retirement, on ships.  They know a lot about many things; ports, shopping, excursions, best beaches to snorkel, best modes of transportation, wi-fi spots and on and on.  Most of them are happy campers just because they’re out to sea.  But some of them cruise constantly and are miserable anyway.  “My room is not as nice as on the Freedom”, or “The food is not as good as the Allure”, or “The Double Diamond lounge is not private enough”, (to keep out those of us that are riff-raff, I suppose), and today, my favorite.  One guy (had to be 400 pounds….my gag reflex went off…..), said to me:

Him:  This ship is poor.  Have you noticed that the décor inside the cabin doesn’t match the hallways?

Me:  No, I haven’t.  We’re in an inside cabin, so it’s tiny and I didn’t pay that much attention to the décor.  I was just glad that all of my crap fit in.  

Him:  Well just take a look at it.  And those beds?  So uncomfortable.

Me:  I’m actually sleeping like a baby, even though it’s a thin mattress.  It’s kind of great with the rocking, and all.

Him:  Well those springs are killing me.

Me:  Well, you’re a WAY bigger guy than I so maybe that’s part of it.

Him:  I don’t know about that.  Could be.  Anyway, I’m late for lunch.  Gotta run before they close the buffet.

Me:  See ya.  (under my breath) Wouldn’t want to miss a meal now, would we, ya fat fuck?

Speaking of which, the meals are bounteous and fantastic.  The first night we had the ship’s famous Vidalia Onion Tart as the first course of the voyage.  This tart is, how you say, LEGENDARY.  We were disappointed.  Just didn’t care for it.  I wondered if that was a bad omen.  Fear not.  As it turns out, that’s the only thing I didn’t like on the entire voyage.  We’ve had Filet of Sole Meuniere, (how they do delicate fish like that for 500 people at a time eludes me, but it was lovely),  Escargot  (ooh that pesky garlic/parsley butter with the ship-baked bread for dipping into the tiny pockets of the dish), Filet Mignon (I actually got it rare), with a gorgonzola creme, ….just amazing), Turkey tenderloins breaded and crispy, and a real treat, Asian Duck, (although the head was gone so I couldn’t really tell if  the eyes were slanty, thereby qualifying it as Asian…might have Long Island Duckling masquerading, still pretty good though,) Wahoo, (it’s a fish and it’s lovely), and steak with gorgonzola pasta.  Desserts are magnificent as well.  There has been Mango cheesecake, Pear tart, several chocolate concoctions, assorted pot-de-feu (that’s fancy French for chocolate pudding) and pears poached in cinnamon and wine.  Just an artistic masterpiece.  See below:

My waistline is creeping up, but I’ll do Weight Watchers when I get home.  No sign of the famous baby lamb chops, but I’ve got my eyes on the lookout.  I know the next formal night is lobster.  I’m glad my cholesterol is good.  I can eat a couple with no guilt.  More on the food as we grow…..i mean go.

Moving right along…..

Dinner in the Main Dining Room (hereby known as the MDR for the purpose of these ramblings), was lovely.  It was a beautiful room;  Each  night while we dined, there was a “duo” playing violin/piano.  Sweet lovely sounds filled the room.  They were positioned right “above” our table on a raised area.  They added a lot to the entire experience.  I never did see their faces.  

Traveling “just the two of us”, not with friends or in a group of any kind, we wondered what the seating arrangements in the MDR would be, and if our table-mates would be okay with two aging, but fun-loving fairies in their midst.  Well, let me just say that the Cruise Gods smiled upon us.  We’re a party of six, with a Cuban couple from Florida, and two black women, BFFs, from the Long Beach and Riverside California area, traveling together.  They’re all approximately our age, give or take, and most luckily, none of them weighs in at 400 pounds, so we’re not stuck with watching someone eating everything in sight while we guard our plates.  What a pretty group we made.  Take a look:

The women are great.  One, a recent widow, apparently after a long great marriage, travels alone now.  And she does it a lot.  Very independent, smart, savvy and a great conversationalist.  For this cruise she convinced a good friend to come with, and they’re sharing a cabin.  The other gal is also bright, well-educated and has a great sense of humor. I should also add…..she’s very funny.  We’re having a ball with them.

The Cuban couple is very nice as well.  He’s the kind of guy that you want on a cruise ship; he participated in the “sexiest man” contest, (he came in third), got dragged up on stage into the singer’s act in the main theater, etc.  In other words, he’s “a player”.  His wife is a great sport and has lots of stories, including a collection of “life with the party guy.”  All in all, it’s a great table.

Earlier, we had found the posting that the Friends of Dorothy meeting would be in a lounge at the top of the ship, so after dinner we ventured up to the Viking Crown Lounge to see if anyone would show.  We met a few gay couples, exchanged pleasantries, sat a few minutes, said our good-nights and headed off to bed.

A word about that same lounge.  It turns out, that every night at 11pm, just as we finish dinner (yeah, late, I know), and we’re looking to wander and meet up in fairyland with the others, there is Karaoke going on in that room.  Terrifying.  Why do people do that?  There was one girl who was so terrible I couldn’t help but cluck my teeth.  Tch, tch, tch.  Kind of like the beginning of 60 Minutes.  And I wondered why in the name of all that’s holy, wouldn’t her mate politely say to her, “Oh Honey, maybe you shouldn’t.  Let the others do it” and spare her the embarrassment. But he didn’t stop her.  Minutes later I found out why.  He got up and sang and was worse than she.  So in their family, it’s an epidemic.  They’re both deluded into thinking that they’re good at it.  But…..it’s their vacation too, so I smiled, continued clucking and left on the elevator.  We’re going to have to move Dorothy and her friends to another venue.

As the night wore on, we realized that the seas were mightily, outrageously rough.  Downright puke-worthy.  Mercifully, Husband and I are good seamen (stop the sniggling, it’s a real word…look it up), so we don’t get sick.  But we were weaving and rolling with everyone else.  Walking sideways in the halls, bumping into people on the buffet lines, spilling things, etc.  We thought it would calm down, but it stayed that way for two solid days.  Huge heaving seas.  People keeping to their cabins for fear of coming out.  A lot of Dramamine, wrist-bands, neck patches and pepto were sold in the ship’s store.  I heard dozens of people saying it was the roughest seas they’ve ever experienced.  Us too, only, as I mentioned, we’re good sailors, so we prevailed.  Once we hit the balmy islands, it calmed right down, but everyone was still weaving even after we docked.  It was fierce.

Next installment…..Activities…..

This will be a multi-part series about our recent Sea Voyage.  Part 1…..

If you click on the photos they get huge.

And so it begins,

We’re on the high seas again.  RCCL this time.   For ye landlubbers, that’s Royal Caribbean Cruise Line.  (What’s up with that?  Landlubbers?  Is that a real word?  Ancient English?  Baby talk?  Dunno).  Anyway…this time it’s 12 days.  First, it’s two days at sea to travel WAY south, then six islands in six days, namely Antigua, Aruba, Barbados, Bonaire, St. Vincent and St. Lucia (pronounced Loo-sha, not Loo-see-ah, not Loo-chee-ah, but Loo-sha, thank you very much). The finale is two days at sea to return home.  This is actually day three (we’re at sea.)  I’ll fill you in briefly on events so far.

Boarding the ship went exceptionally well.  Due to the sciatica, they boarded me in a wheelchair, so we bypassed the line and scooted (literally) aboard.  We have a tiny room but it is suitable enough.  The lobby and public areas are outstanding.  Take a look at the Main Hall and the Windjammer Restaurant:

As the days go by, they’ve been adding Christmas (and Hanukkah) decorations everywhere you turn.

Back at the room, our bags hadn’t arrived so we decided on lunch at the buffet.  That’s when we made our first vow.

Me:  I’m going to go easy the first few days, because it’s a long cruise and I don’t want to be nauseated at the sight of food until very late in the cruise.

Husband:  I’m not having any pasta or cheese for the first few days.  I’m going to try not to gain weight.

Me:  Me too.  Let’s go eat.

Walking the ship we noticed two things immediately;

1)    There are LOTS of old people.  We’re talking Ancient.  These people don’t go to visit Ruins on the islands.  They saw that stuff when it was new.  (I’m actually a young whippersnapper on this cruise, albeit a whippersnapper with sciatica).

2)   There are a LOT of people that are…how can I put this delicately?…okay, just say it…FAT.

And I can actually explain both phenomena.

I think the main reason for the seniority of the cruisers in general is that it’s a 12-day-trip and it’s tough for people with school-aged kids to pull them out for so long, especially because Christmas vacation is two weeks after we return.  So, most of the 30s/40s crowd is out (except for the occasional newlyweds or someone celebrating a milestone birthday, like 30 or 40 or 50, or even 60.  But the majority are retirees who, given the option of being stuck home with nothing to do but stare at one-another for years and years until death, or cruising, the ships win out.

As for the preponderance of the larger set, (marauding herds of barnyard animals foraging at the buffet), the reason is pretty obvious.  On this kind of vacation, all food is included, and big people love this concept because if it were pay-as-you-eat, they’d go broke.  But with 36 meals included, (for those who are able to contain themselves to three per day), and more if you can’t, it’s a great value for people for whom eating is their avocation.

So here we are, husband and I, afloat with a bunch of oldies and fatties, trying to fit in.  I keep telling myself that I don’t belong in either group, but alas, I fear I might just be living a lie, as I probably belong to both.

With our “oaths” in mind, we set out for the lunch buffet and both behaved beautifully.  A salad topped with a bit of canned tuna (no mayo), iced tea and a polite “no thank-you” to dessert.

After lunch we toured our new home and found the ship to be very much to our liking.  It’s a good size.  Not too small, but not one of those gigantic floating cities that are all the rage today.  Those ships have a lot of amenities that ours doesn’t, but I wasn’t going to ice-skate, high dive, rock-climb, zip-line or drive golf balls into the sea anyway, in my current state of sciatic decrepitude.  And I’m pretty sure I can add ten pounds to my girth without the presence of a Johnny Rocket food outlet.  So I’m content with a pool, a gym, a steam/sauna and of course, a quiet lounge to set up my trusty laptop and write. Life is good.  I shall not want.

After the tour of the ship, we returned to our room, and unpacked our six bags.  (I know what you’re thinking….  Who takes six bags on a cruise ship?  Well, people, I do.  What can I say?  I have issues.  Fat and old as I am, I still like to look nice while traveling so I need choices of what to wear and how to present my remains to the general public- at-large (large being the operative word).  (Actually, if you’re not carrying food, nobody looks at you.  But still, I try to do my best).

After unpacking, the first of many naps-to-come occurred.  (The beds are great, btw.  You wouldn’t think so to look at them, but they are).

Refreshed, we took a steam and shower at the fitness center.  To say the bathroom in our stateroom is tiny, is an understatement.  The shower is like trying to clean yourself while in an MRI machine.   You really can barely lift your arm to wash yourself.  The shower in the gym is much better.  Then we dressed for the evening, poured cocktails in the room and headed to the pre-dinner “milling around” areas for our first night to meet fellow cruisers.  We had set sail while we were napping and when we awoke, we could feel the movement.  It dawned on husband and me that the ship seemed rocky, but we concluded it was a windy day and perhaps it was churning up the sea a bit.  Take a look:  We’re good sailors so we figured it was no big deal.  More about that later.

I should add that most people on cruise ships are happy.  They’re on vacation.  Oh, you have a small share of miserable husbands who are getting dragged along with wifey on her adventure, when they’d much rather be sitting home, vegging out in front of a series of sporting events on the tube.  So they sit, mostly pouting and falling asleep with their mouths open, in the public areas (as I imagine they do in front of their televisions at home), to embarrass and get even with their wives.  Husband and I try to avoid those people like poison, as they will just ruin your moments.

I simply must tell you about the food.

To be continued…..

It often comes down to this;  the cheese stands alone.  If you’ll remember, I’m often the only one outside a trend.  Remember how I didn’t know about the Live From The Metropolitan Opera  video broadcasts until everyone else was loving them?  Or Avatar?  Or Titanic?    I don’t care for Jackie Evanko, and I think Il Volo is just okay.  Well, I’ve been watching Diane Sawyer’s news each night and I realized that the whole Black Friday, Small Business Saturday, I don’t know what the f*ck Sunday, and Cyber Monday have come and gone and I did nothing.  I didn’t participate at all.  Out of the loop.  Sitting on the sidelines.  Nada.

Sit.  Let’s discuss.

You all know that husband and I don’t do Christmas gifts because it doesn’t work for us on so many levels.

A)  I’m Jewish, grew up without the whole process, learned to love the Holidays through the classical music with which they are associated, (i.e. Handel’s Messiah, etc.),  married two guys (both Goyim) and I eventually got into the spirit.  But being without children, the whole gift thing is really minimized, so as a concept, it’s lovely, I suppose, but there’s not a lot of need for me to be part of the massive throng of animals, er, shoppers busting down the door in a mall to get a deal on an HD TV, and take my life in my hands to save a hundred bucks.  Sorry, that’s just not who I am.

Can you see me there, in the middle? Me either.

B)  Husband is a gentile, but like his Jewish partner, has pretty much renounced religion as a participant, so he enjoys a nice display of lights, Andrea Bocelli singing Silent Night, (I’m a Streisand guy, but you know that), but the whole gift thing is behind him.

As a couple, we buy what we need or want as we deem necessary or fit.  No need to save it all up for one morning in December, in South Florida, where there isn’t even winter, much less chestnuts roasting on an open fire.  (By the way, Broward county law prohibits open fires anyway, not to be too curmudgeonly about it).

So when I saw billions in sales both in stores and online I felt kindof bad.  I felt as if I hadn’t done my part to boost the economy of Walmart and Sears.   But then I found a solution.  We are going on that cruise this Monday, and you can always use a few niceties when you’re being wined and dined for 12 days, So we went out on So Sad You Missed The Economic Miracle,You Lazy, Cheap Bastard  Tuesday, and bought some socks and underwear for the cruise.

I feel better.

Happy Holidays.

It’s me again.  Old man sciatica, checking in.  How have you been?

Yeah, sad to say, I’m still gimping along.  I’m so UP TO HERE with it all, I can’t begin, so don’t get me started.  Well, actually, I’ve already started, so just a bit more.  I think it might be almost over.  There have been some developments.  Sit, let’s discuss.

Since last I complained to you about the endless, ceaseless, relentless pain in my right leg I did two things:

1)  I went for yet another MRI to see what’s up, and

2)  I’ve begun acupuncture, (combined with Reiki).  Acupuncture I think you all know.  But for the uninitiated, Reiki is also a mysterious Asian concept whereby the practitioner moves your energy around in your body, (without touching you, I might add),  aligns your Yin and your Yang, your Chakra and aids in your general well-being.  Yeah, (sigh), I know.  Sounds strange.   But here’s the deal.  It’s helping.  I see these ladies twice a week,  (The one with the needles and the one with the….well….hands), and they do their voodoo on me and jeez Louise, I’m better.  Not all better but MUCH better.  (I call them my Witches of Eastwick…..to their faces, actually).  They chuckle and continue with their Magic Arts.  So I’m thinking pretty soon it’ll all be over.

Not so fast Kemosabe.

Back to #1.

The MRI revealed a bulbous area in my spine;  L5/L6 yada yada.   Surgery is called for.  My reaction?  HUH?  But what about the witches and their magic power?  The surgeon assured me that yes, they can ease the pain, but one day I’ll step off a curb, or lift a suitcase and the entire thing will start over.  (Clutch the pearls.  I can’t do this again.)  So I’ve scheduled surgery.

Fear not.  He assured me it’s a tiny procedure;  a little slit, some scraping, a microscope to guide  him, no scar tissue, sew me up and pat me on my sore piriformis muscle and send me on my way.  Pain gone.  (We hope).

So after our upcoming vacation, (yes, the annual cruise is upon us, complete with stories of our adventures, and of course, my favorite, the baby lamb chops), he’s going to fix me up.  Hopefully, the ten pounds I gain on the cruise won’t get in the way.

The resolution of the tale won’t be until December 20.

In the meantime, stay tuned for Tales of the South Pacific…..okay, not really.  It’s  Tales of the Southern Caribbean.  Close enough.

I know.  It sounds like a sad title, but actually I meant the Republican Party.  Oh it still exists.  Just ask John Boner.  (Did I spell his name correctly?)  You know, the Speaker of the House?  He’s still spitting fire and brimstone and claiming that Obama didn’t actually win, because, you see, the House stayed Republican.  So he’s interpreting that as “the people really love the Republicans, deep down.”  Can you spell delusional?

You know I don’t get political because, what’s the point?  There’s really only one party that’s not completely insane.  But I have a few thoughts.

Sit.  Let’s discuss.

My first thought is that contrary to what POTUS says, there really are red states and blue states.  Lots of them.  Fifty to be exact,  with many Congressional districts.   And the Reds outnumber the Blues by quite a few.  (Okay, they’re  not very populated, but they exist.  So if you add up Congressional districts nationwide, they have more than we do.  So there’s more Congressmen from Red states.  Geez, that’s just math.)  But the Blue states, which are more populated, especially by educated people, have more Electoral Votes so we win the Presidency.  Are you following this?

So Obama wins, and Boner (did I spell his name correctly?) thinks that he won.  Hmmm.  Sad, ain’t it?

The Monday morning quarterbacks, the pundits, the masters of political speak, the so-called “experts”, from BOTH parties are unanimous in why Mittens didn’t win.  Ready?  THERE ARE NOT ENOUGH MIDDLE-AGED WHITE GUYS LEFT IN AMERICA.  Seriously.  Once you alienate Latinos, Gays, Blacks, and other minorities, and most especially WOMEN, good luck getting elected dog-catcher.  (Which is an appropriate euphemism because Mitt actually did catch the dog and put him on the roof of the car).  So Mr. Romney lost.  Oh, the popular vote was close, but he was CREAMED in the Electoral.  Oh well.

And yet Boner, thinks it was a victory.  (Did I spell his name correctly?)

So now, Obama, who does not have to get re-elected, (can’t actually), can get right up in Boner’s face and tell him politely, (POTUS is nothing if not polite), to FUCK OFF.  I hope he does.  I hope he doesn’t cave in to hostage demands from a party with no relevance anymore.  Let’s all go off the “fiscal cliff”  (really?  hyperbole much?) together, and see who’s not around in two years.

Hold your ground Mr. President.  The nation has spoken, and we’ve got your back.  After all, we did win this one.

It’s time again.  Election season.  I usually don’t do political, but I have  few things on my mind.  After all, a lot has transpired since the primaries.  I mean, a WHOLE LOT!  Since then we’ve had serious activity on the campaign trail, such as advertising which began nicely enough and then devolved into political one-upmanship, (is that a word? ), followed by an increase in tone and fervor and then by dubious accusations and allegations, and finally lies and hearsay, all capped with vitriol and hatred (paid for by political PAC committees.  (Nice job, SCOTUS).   Then we had one Presidential debate and another between the VP and his would-be usurper.   And now, here we are, only a mere couple of weeks until the big day.

A moment about those debates.  The third one is this week.  In the first Prez debate, I thought Obama was off his game, didn’t do right in the eyes of his constituents, and essentially snoozed through it.  When he did make points, they were good, but his crowd in the stands was screaming for blood-pudding and he gave them creme brulee`.  Romney, although he clearly gave the better performance, filled it with sophomoric attempts at weaving fiction into facts, and essentially lied his way through it.  It was Mitt’s debate equivalent of Lance Armstrong doping  his way to victory.  (I just hope it doesn’t take ten years to call Mittens out and disqualify him).  But I will say he looked great, spoke authoritatively and was convincing, especially to the people who think that Obama’s best asset is that he’s not too black.

After the debate, the poll numbers shifted, Obama’s team panicked and they pumped-up old Joe B up for the next round.

In the VP debate, Joe Biden came out laughing.  Er, I mean swinging.  Personally, I think he won handily, but to hear the talking heads, (who don’t want this to be over until every last advertising dollar has been milked up to election night),  it was kind of a draw.  (Draw?  Malarkey!   Joe kicked his lyin’-sack-of-shit butt.)  Even Ryan knew it.  He had that deer-in-the-headlights look more than once.  And he drank a lot of water.  (Probably to re-hydrate from the sweating due to the ass-whoopin’ he was getting.)

There are still two more debates to come, both with the top ticket guys.  Obama’s pissed.  He’s crammin’ like a college senior who needs to play the final game but is failing chemistry.   (The difference is, he can take performance enhancing drugs if he wants to.  Who’s going to ask him to pee in a cup?  You?  Me?  Jim Lehrer?  I think not.  Okay, Martha Raddatz, maybe.)  Can’t make Romney pee in a cup either.  Can’t even get him to release his tax returns.  Can’t even get him to let his dog ride in the car.  So the game is on.  My money is on Prez.

Most of us know where we stand on the issues, on the choice of a man, on the future of our nation, on our destiny and on our vote.  But all of this hoopla is because of the undecided;  that pesky 3% of the voters who remain undecided even after all we’ve been through, who can possibly still be swayed and need to be convinced to consider making a choice, while, to the rest of us, it was unbearably clear, painfully obvious on  the day Mitt declared his candidacy.  I mean, what is wrong with these people?  They can’t decide?  I’m NEVER going out to dinner with them.  Imagine them with a menu in their hands with dozens of choices.  WTF?   I’d be home watching re-runs of Gomer Pyle before they chose the Salisbury Steak or the  Meatloaf.  Mashed potatoes or baked?  OMG!  I’m thinking they must eat alone a lot.  If they order tea, please don’t ask them “milk or lemon, one lump or two.”   Can you picture them in a shoe store?  You’re kidding, right?  Pick a pair of shoes?  From all these available?  I’ll need another four years, please.

But the beat goes on.  You see, if the networks give up now and declare Obama will most likely win based on current trends, then people will stop watching, and all available advertising dollars for networks will shift to Dancing with the Bachelorette, or The Biggest Voice, or So You Think You Can….Go Down to the Jersey Shore with the Kardashians.  Shows like that.  So they’ll keep reporting the election as neck and neck until election day at 11:00PM when Obama is declared the winner.  Just sayin’.)

Oh, and for the record?   I’m Davidk and I approved this message.

I’ve been thinking.  (Not always a good thing), and I’ve come to the realization that as old as I am, and as savvy as I am, and as smart as I (think) I am, there are just so many things that I simply don’t understand.

I can explain to  you why snow geese fly in a V formation.  I can tell you the difference in the preparation of garlic dill pickles vs. bread and butter pickles.  I can hear eight measures of an opera and tell you that it’s Rossini and not Bellini.  Honestly.  I can.  But for all that I know, there are just some things that I cannot fathom.  Understand.  Grok.  Things, the logic of which just slip by unnoticed and the world goes on and I’m left in a state of bewilderment.  I’d like to mention a few.  Sit.  Let’s discuss.

1)  Justin Bieber.  Oh, I know who he is and I’ve heard him sing, and as kids go, I suppose I’d have to admit, curmudgeon that I am, that he has a modicum of talent.  And he’s a cute kid too.  So I can see the young girls, (‘tweens, I think they call them these days), liking his music and perhaps his youthful sex-appeal, in an adolescent kind of way.  Ok.  Here it comes.  I don’t understand why he’s so crazy popular that he can no longer land in an airport for fear that crazed teen-aged girls will riot and destroy large aircraft in an attempt to get close to  him.  Or why riot police have to be called BEFORE he comes on stage, and why concerts are cancelled because the frenzy is just too much to try to control.  Bieber?  Really?

Now, I remember the beginning of the Beatles (hey, I said I was old), and along with that came the screaming girls, so deafening, that in concert you couldn’t even hear the Fab Four.  Just the screaming.  But those girls didn’t overturn vehicles, or shut down commerce and industry.  They mostly just swooned, and the dutiful paramedics put smelling salts under their noses and revived them, so as to enable them to continue the frenzy.  (Ah, the old days).

I’ve been in a stadium with 80,000 excited fans watching Barbra Streisand,

Like Buttah

and the only thing that comes to the mob-mind is that the stadium could use a little color.  Perhaps be redecorated.  Some carpeting, drapes, perhaps a sconce or two.  (Well it is a special kind of crowd).  But violence?  Never.

When did love of a singer turn destructive?  I don’t get it.

2)  I’ve mentioned before that I throw like a girl, and that sports is my last category to choose on Jeopardy.  Sports are huge.  Big money, big fan base, big excitement.

Soccer is popular in South America.   And I understand that 100,000 people will pack a stadium and cheer and scream and paint their faces in team colors and have a ball.  What I don’t get is, again, it suddenly erupting into violence, with stampedes, fences being torn down, fans being trampled and death and destruction running rampant, all because the guys didn’t kick the ball quite right and maybe missed a goal.  Really?  Death and violence over a kick-ball match.  Really?  I don’t get it.  Can anybody explain it to me?

Alas, I meant to mention a lot of things I don’t get, but I’ve already gone long, so here are another quick few:

3) I don’t get raisin bagels.  Isn’t the whole purpose of a bagel to have something upon which to put cream cheese and lox?  If you want raisins, buy a loaf of Sun Maid raisin bread.  I mean, really.

4)  I don’t get daily Cialis.   Is an impotent man supposed to take this every day and then walk around in a perpetual state of  ”I’m ready to f*ck something?”  Should he be thinking:  ”Oh look, the barista in Starbucks is hot!  I should show her my boner”.  Is that it?  Really?

5)  I don’t get electronic steam cigarettes.  

Isn’t the purpose of quitting smoking (aside from the health reasons) to be able to walk through life without a “smoking thing”  between your index and middle finger?  Shouldn’t we be trying to break that behavior so that we’re not yearning for a real cigarette for the rest of our lives?   I don’t get it.

6) I love electronic gadgets.  You know I do.  But I don’t get camping out on in a line on the sidewalk for a week, sleeping in the heat and cold and rain, with nasty teeth that haven’t been brushed for days, and clothes that have  now been worn for 96 hours, just to be among the first to get a new iPhone.  I mean, it will be there next week.  And the week after.  And it isn’t even the best phone anymore, it’s just a good phone.  And you already have a perfectly wonderful phone that you’ve been chatting and texting on the entire time you’ve been on the line.   (Look at the guy in the very front.)  So it isn’t as if this is suddenly your lifeline.  But there you are.  Standing on the line.  For a week.  For an iPhone.  Really?  I don’t get it.

There are lots more things, but I think I’ll stop for now.  Perhaps I’ll come back to this topic another day.

In the meantime, I think I’ll sit back, quietly, gently, and listen to Justin Bieber.

It’s that time of year again.  School for the youngsters has started, those hulking giant men are out there again in those shoulder pads and tight pants playing football.   (Remind me again why men in shoulder pads and tight capri pants is not drag?), leaves are changing colors, snowbirds are arriving and are beginning to annoy us native Floridians, and of course, the new TV season is upon us.  There’s lots of new fodder out there as well as returning favorites.  Now, we’re a very diverse nation with a broad taste spectrum, so the networks, at least, offer various selections.  Some good, others, well…..sit.  Let’s discuss.

First up, the much touted Go On, with Matthew Perry.  I saw the pilot today.  A one-word review of said pilot would be “Eh”.  ”So-so”.  (two words?)  The premise is a smarty-mouth wise-guy, whose wife died a month ago, and who is eager to get back to his sportscasting job, whose station manager forces him to go to grief counseling against his wishes.  He goes, encounters the usual sitcom assortment of zanies, banter ensues, the group gels, (sort of ), and a series is born.  Perry is ok.  I’ve always liked him, but he is mostly still Chandler Bing from Friends.  The assorted grief-stricken members of the group are a waste.  There isn’t a funny one, an endearing one, or a charming one in the bunch.  By the end of the half-hour I didn’t give a rat’s ass if they healed or not.  The writing was basic, with a few flourishes where I actually smiled, but unless the second one picks up big time, I’ll take a pass.  Grade:  C

Next is a show called Nat and Kate.  Premise:  A 15-year old girl, mature for her age has a brother who is a tyke trapped in the body of her older sibling.  He’s just a spitball looking for a wall.  She gets knocked-up at 15, has the baby and is raising it by herself while her immature brother is having a series of adolescent adventures around the country.  He pops in from time to time be zany and annoying.  By the end of the pilot, he decides to stick around and help her raise the 5-year old child. (When he himself is mentally barely older than that).  The leading lady is Dakota Johnson, spawn of Melanie Griffith and Don Johnson.  Pretty girl and not a bad actress.  The madcap brother is channeling something between Ross on Friends and Jerry Lewis.  (Yeah, THAT Jerry Lewis).  It was annoying in three minutes.  Writing was a little clever, so it might blossom, but they’ll have to tone down the annoying leading man.  Grade:  C.

The last one for tonight is called The Mindy Project.  I can only say, “I must not be getting it.  I must be outside the loop.  No way”.

They tell me she was a supporting player on The Office, (I confess, I’ve never seen it, but I’ve heard great things, mostly about the writing).  Now she’s graduated to the star of her own sitcom.  So she probably has a following.

Premise:  A 31-year-old girl, raised on romantic Tom Hanks/Meg Ryan comedies, with an underlying “happily ever after” desire, is:

a) a slut

b) a drunk

c) an ob/gyn doctor.

I’m not kidding.  I should mention, that for the first time in my memory, the leading lady is Indian.  (You know me, I’m not good at this.  She might be Pakistani.  or Afghani or from Tajikistan.  (Bet you didn’t think I could spell that last one, did ya?)    She looks like she could have been in Slumdog Millionaire).  Anyway, she’s not funny, not very pretty, and a completely reprehensible character, jumping into bed with anyone that might be a potential mate, and getting drunk when it doesn’t work out.  (There was actually a scene where she was passed out on the carpet, someone woke her to say one of her patients was in labor, and she ran through the streets in last night’s dress, (the walk of shame), running in high heels, only to wash her hands in the hospital and change into scrubs to deliver a baby and then bask in the glow of her “good deed”, when actually THAT’S HER FUCKING JOB!!!

I needed smelling salts.  This is arguably the worst piece of drivel ever.  I’ll give it three weeks.  If the run is longer than last season’s Playboy Club, I’ll shriek.   Grade F.

(There is always the possibility that I’m really  not understanding what they’re selling and it becomes a runaway hit of the season.  After all, I couldn’t have predicted American Idol would run 20 years, so…..)

I’ll watch a few more and report back in a bit.  What are you all watching?  Anything good that I’m missing?  Because so far, I’m 0 for 3.

I can’t wait for Revenge, Glee, New Girl, Once Upon A Time and Smash.  But then, that’s just me.

I know.  Racy title tonight.  Trust me, I’m 62, which is old, and a little feeble, and worn down by sciatica, so when I tell you it’s not a sexual title, take my word for it.

No, it’s more about this past weekend’s activities in South Florida, a/k/a Tropical Storm Isaac.  Don’t you love it?  A biblical name.  Could be Jewish, (There was a Jewish Isaac, way back when.  You know, Abraham, Isaac, Jacob….that whole tribe).  Or, it could be a good Christian name or even Mormon.  Those Mormons love their biblical names.  For example, Mitt Romney  has five sons and three of them are Matthew, Joshua and Benjamin,  Tagg and Craig being the others.  I don’t get Tagg.  Maybe he was named after a sale they had in the driveway, one cold poor winter.  (Oh, I’m sorry, dopey me, the Romneys didn’t have cold poor winters.  They never had cold poor anything).  And as for Craig?…..maybe Job had a kid named Craig that we don’t know about.  I’ll come back to that.

Anyway, there was this tropical storm for the past few days, and I must say, even though we didn’t take a direct hit, it certainly messed up the ‘hood, if you know what I mean.  First of all, it’s been raining since Thursday, and today is Monday.  Then there are the outer bands, which carry the gusts and the rain that comes down sideways.  (I’m sure you’ve all seen sideways rain, but not nearly as often as we do in the Sunshine State.  (Ironic, no?)   The wind knocked down a few of my bushes and shrubs and there were other neighborhoods that had downed trees and pretty substantial flooding.  We got through it ok, (my windows in my  house are filthy from the rain), and there’s tree crap all over the streets, but I’m glad to say there is no damage.

The reason I bring up Isaac, aside from the fact that we just took a wallop, is that it’s convention season for both political parties.  Normally I don’t do pieces relating to politics even though everyone knows that I’m an avowed Dem, and if you don’t like it, then…. oh well, you’re probably not reading this anyway.  But I wanted to bring up the storm in the contect of political activity.  You’ll see the connection in a moment.  Sit, let’s discuss.

Now I don’t know if you remember, but seven years ago, (almost to the day),  when Hurricane Katrina hit New Orleans, several people of prominence opined harshly about God’s wrath and vengeance.  Here are a couple of memorable quotes:

1)  Minister Louis Farrakan asserted that Hurricane Katrina was God’s way of punishing America for its warmongering and racism.  Said Farrakhan, Maybe God ain’t pleased. Maybe this caste system that pits us against each other has to be destroyed and something new and better put in its place.    (Like a lesson in grammar, perhaps). 

2) Ovadia Yosef, a prominent ultra-Orthodox Israeli rabbi, declared Hurricane Katrina to be God’s punishment for President Bush’s support of the August 2005 withdrawal of Jewish settlers from the Gaza strip. He added that black people died because they did not study the Torah.  (Those pesky Blacks.  Can anybody explain why they aren’t studying Torah?  Hmmm.)   Here’s another:

3) Pat Robertson implied on the September 12th broadcast of The 700 Club that the hurricane was God’s punishment in response to America’s abortion policy.  (I know what your’e thinking.   People like Pat Robertson are a great argument FOR abortion).   And of course my favorite:

4)  American evangelist John Hagee linked the hurricane to a gay pride event known as Southern Decadence Day which was to have been held in the town’s French Quarter a few days after the hurricane hit. He said in 2006,  I believe that New Orleans had a level of sin that was offensive to God, and they are — were — recipients of the judgment of God for that. The newspaper carried the story in our local area, that was not carried nationally, that there was to be a homosexual parade there on the Monday that Katrina came.  (So now we know why Katrina hit New Orleans.  The title of this piece is starting to make sense now, isn’t it?)

So here we are, on a Monday night, with Tropical Storm Isaac bearing down on Tampa, Florida with all of its flooding, winds, wrath and fury.  Does anyone know what’s going on in Tampa this week?  Only the Republican National Convention where they will nominate their candidate, Mitt Romney, for President of the United States.  And there are over 100,000 Republicans and Tea Partiers gathered for the festivities.

I, for one, wonder what God is trying to tell us now?

I know.  You’re thinking, because of the title, that tonight will be a fashion blog featuring the above-named famous store.  Not so fast, kemosabe.  Rather, it’s about the state of our so-called Democracy.

Sit.  Let’s discuss.

It’s August 18th.  The primary election was four days ago.  Here’s how it went.  Flashback…..

_________________________________________________________

So here we are, August 13, 2012.  Tomorrow is the primary election, of which I am the Clerk of the Precinct, in charge of a staff of six in their various positions.

I did my “pre-election” stuff today…..took husband, who is my VST (Voting System Technician, for those who don’t know), to the precinct and set up the room.  It was in an elementary school library.  I think we did a very  nice job.  This is the Evid machine.  (Electronic Voter ID).  This is where you check in.

These are the private voting booths, where democracy is executed, standing like an army in defense of our liberty.  (Lump in your throat, anyone?)

This is husband’s station.  The most important one.  (Where we actually scan and tally the votes).  After having verified that the room was ready, I came home and called my staff, to touch base.  Everyone was pretty comfortable with her role in the process.  (Yes, a team of women).   I think we’re good to go.

_______________________________________________________________

Tuesday, August 14th.  Election day.

Husband and I arise early, (freakishly early…..like 4:00 a.m.), fix a supply of food and beverage in coolers and tote bags, sufficient to sustain us (mostly me, I’m the fat one), for a 14-hour day, and arrive at the polling place at 5:30.  (We’ve brought breakfast, lunch, snacks like potato chips and popcorn and Fiber One bars, and dark chocolate M&M peanuts, diet cokes, etc.)  Staff arrives, we do opening ceremonies, (actually there’s a huge checklist of activities to be done before 7:00 a.m. opening time) and steel ourselves for the onslaught of citizens, whom we anticipate will show up to voice their opinions, flex their collective electoral muscles, cast their votes and elevate various ordinary people to positions of authority;   i.e. Senators, School board members, Judges, Clerks of Court, etc.   I must say, this being my first time, I was a little verklempt at both the responsibility that I’ve undertaken and just watching my country….my homeland….my democracy in action.

We had our first voter at exactly 7:00 a.m.  It was like the white sale at Filene’s Basement.  He was waiting at the door at 7.  I was excited.

An hour and 40 minutes later, our second voter arrived.  In between the two, my staff and I became BFFs,  and husband and I drank coffee and ate yummy omeletes that he had made and that we brought with us.  It was a little boring, but the staff, all of whom had done this before assured me that there would be a ”lunch rush”.

Two hours later, (having watched The Manchurian Candidate, the movie, on my ipod touch…..I figured it was a political movie so it was appropriate), our third voter arrived.  It was just around 11:00 a.m.  By now, sitting for hours with two of my workers who are Haitian, and were chosen, I suppose for their bi-lingual skills, I found myself singing along in Patois with the Creole Gospel music on one of the ipods.  (Some seriously catchy tunes, I might add).

Husband brought an 1,100  page novel, Atlas Shrugged by Ayn Rand, read about 300 pages, decided it was a tad too Paul Ryan and just a little too dystopian for his taste, and tossed it in the trash.  (He then covered it with crumpled paper towels, so as not to influence any stray voters that might dig through our garbage.)  He did all of that by noon.

And so it went.

By the end of the day, in a precinct with over 700 registered voters, the grand tally was 34 votes.  Say it with me.  WTF?  That’s it?  34 freakin’ votes?  Less than five percent?  Yep.  Pretty much.

Can you spell despair?  Can you spell disappointment?  I’m just sad.  But I finally understand the state of the nation.  Why Congress is deadlocked, why the POTUS can’t get anything done, why the same corrupt people get elected over and over.  The reason is:

NOBODY GIVES A SHIT!

Hence the title of tonight’s selection.  We live in a society where a mere 5% of the populace elects our leaders.  And if the 5% who show up are horrible, or assholes, or ignorant, well that’s just tough titties.  We, the people, LOSE.

What can we take away from this experience?  Well, I, for one, am definitely working all elections from now on.  If the turnout is going to be that pitiful, then I at least want to know that there’s no hanky-panky on top of it, and with nobody showing up, that’s very possible.  So count me in.

The other thing, dear reader, is that I, as the Clerk, demand that you vote.  Aside from participating in your own democracy, I was bored as crap!  Fourteen hours is a very long day, and even I, have to stop eating at some point.  I think I gained two pounds!  So get out there and vote, for cryin’ out loud and give me something to do.

I thank you.

Short one tonight.  I have good news and bad news.

We always want to hear the bad news first.  That way, no matter how sad or disturbed or perturbed (or other “urbed” word) we are, there’s a high note at the end;  the good news.  So here goes.

I’m probably going to skip a week or two of writing my insanity;  er…sorry…..my observations.  That’s it.  That’s the bad news.  (Lordy, Lordy, I hope that’s bad news).  You see, it’s because I’m busy.   (That wasn’t so bad now, was it?).

There’s something big going on.

Ok.  Now for the good news.

Flashback…..

I don’t know if you remember, but about two years ago I announced that I was writing the Great American Novel.  (Well, a novel, anyway).  And then about a year later, I announced that I had finished it and that I was in the process of trying to get it published, and found myself in the most excellent of company, namely John Steinbeck and J.K. Rowling, both of whom had rejection slips to their credit.   Well guess what?  (I’m thinking with a build-up like that, you’ll all surely have guessed by now).  My novel is about to be published.  Yeah, for real.  Say it with me…..OMG!  There’s a little more to it than I actually realized.  There’s submission of the manuscript, (don’t you love it?  I get to say manuscript.)  Then there’s the photo art for the cover, and author’s biography, and acknowledgements, and author’s picture for the back cover, and publicity stuff, and press releases etc.  I kindof knew all this, but it knocked me for a loop when they laid it out.  (Not to mention upcoming appearances on Ellen, Oprah (on her stupid channel, OWN…..damn, nobody watches that!), and of course Katie Couric, on her new show in September.)  Ok, I made up that entire last part about the appearances.  We’ll just have to wait and see about that.  Also, I’m hoping for Steven Colbert’s show.  He’s always so kind to his guests.)

The process of getting it out there takes upwards of four weeks until Amazon and Barnes and Noble have it available.

So I just wanted to let you know, that if you don’t see a new post for a week or two, it’s not because I’ve lost interest the in the little people.  Or that I’ve moved on to fame, glory and stardom;  you know, shopping for new digs in Beverly Hills or lunching with Amy Tan,  or discussing movie rights with Tate Taylor (he directed The Help, you know).  No, it just that I’m busy as all get-out.  So I promise I’ll be back soon with tales of life in the fast-(publishing)-lane.

Oh, and when it actually is ready to go public, I’ll give you the details.  Just in case you  might want to give it a look-see.

Now I really must run.  John Stewart is on line one and I really must take his call.  He gets puffy if you keep him waiting…..

I’ve written many times about the dog;  my girl, my first born, my baby, Savannah.  
She’s a love, you know.  She’s going on 16.  In dog years, that’s….I don’t know…..do the math.  (Something like 112 years old).  And I’m not going to try to convince you that come next week she’s going to win the 100 meter sprint in London, even if there actually were doggie Olympics.  She’s a good ol’ girl and I know, deep down, at 16, it’s almost over.  But I’m not going to get all maudlin tonight.  No, no.  I’d rather tell of a funny thing that happened today when I ran out of her heart worm pills.  I give her one on the first of every month and as of September 1st, I’m out.  Order more, right?  Sounds easy, no?  Not so fast, kemosabe.  Meandering through the canine health system is no easier than the people one.  It’s a challenge.

Sit.  Let’s discuss.

She had her last checkup about 18 months ago.  All’s well for an old gal.  She’s up-to-date on her shots and good to go.  So I went online and ordered the six-pack of heart worm pills.  (I don’t mean to be negative here, but I’m not convinced she’ll be around long enough for the twelve-pack).  So I ordered, gave the credit card, clicked, and got the confirmation.

All good so far.

A minute later I got an email stating that my veterinarian  needs to fax a prescription for the pills in order to fill the order.  Puzzled, I called the online pharmacy (I guess I’ll call it that, but it seemed like a funny request, considering you can buy Viagra, Cialis, Valium, Oxycontin etc, online without a prescription.)  So after a brief discussion I ascertained that indeed, they would not release the pills without a prescription and the only way to get the scrip is if she visits the vet and has a heart worm test.  If she tests negative, she can have the pills.

(Now I can’t speak for you, but my bullshit detector was screaming! )

It went something like this:

So I called the vet and they told me the same thing.  She’s old now, so it’s even more important to check her for it.  Ok, class, say it with me.

WTF?

Epiphany.  Times are tough and I can’t get the pills without lining the pocket of the vet.   Maybe he needs a new car or something?  The dog doesn’t even need to see the good doctor, just pay for the test.  (It all smacks of greed and mendacity to me.)  So here’s my quandary;  do I take her to the vet, pay the freight and buy more pills, even though they are apparently useless?  Do I say, she’s 16, and even if she does get heart worm does it matter? I mean the simple truth is that when an 80-year old man gets prostate cancer, they don’t do anything about it.  He’ll most likely die of something else before the cancer does anything to him.

I’m thinking it always comes back to the referral.  The part I can’t believe is that the dog doesn’t even have Medicare and I’m STILL having to do this.  Oh, the indignity.

I guess she and I will work it out.  

While I’m on the subject, I heard this story the other day as well.

Friends of mine also have an old dog.  The difference is theirs is diabetic, and as such, needs special prescription dog food as well as insulin shots on a daily basis.  (I should add here that I can’t even imagine giving myself a shot every day, much less the dog).  But they’re devoted to the pooch and administer the daily shot and buy the food at Wal-mart, with prescription in hand, because it’s astronomically expensive everywhere…..except for Wal-mart.

So, recently they went to get dog food, not realizing that the prescription had no refills.  As a result, Wal-mart needed to fax the vet to get a new scrip to fill the order.  And I swear to you, my friends stood and waited in Wal-mart for a fax from the vet, to buy freakin’ dog food, as customer after customer got their Oxycontin, Cialis and Ambien scrips filled, (so that they could get high, get hard, or drive while asleep).….all while Wal-Mart is keeping the world safe from old, rogue, diabetic dogs eating and abusing prescription kibble, without a prescription, roaming the countryside, terrorizing what?  Squirrels?  Mice?  Is the Wal-Mart pharmacy motto something like:  We will dole out quaaludes to the masses while we  dutifully keep those pesky dogs from abusing their kibbles and bits?    I don’t know about you, but I definitely feel like we’ve fallen off the beam somewhere along the way.

As my southern friends are wont to say:  You can’t fix stupid.

So my girl and I are going to grow old gracefully together, and I will not allow bureaucracy, stupidity, red-tape or inefficiency to mar her very golden years.  She’s been way too good a girl, for way to long,  to suffer such indignities.

Just sayin’.

One week later.

P.S.  Since I wrote the above, I found a very accommodating pharmacy online (in Australia, if you must know), that will dispense the same pills she’s been taking for 15 years…..without a prescription.  So I ordered some and, stupidity notwithstanding, I’ll continue to administer them.  And I guess the veterinarian will have to find someone else to chip in for his Mercedes.

Are you watching?  The Olympics, I mean.  Aren’t they exciting?  And from London, England;  a country that we actually like!  Sort of.

A note here.

I’ve mentioned many times that I am not a sports person.  I couldn’t make a fist until I was thirty.  I throw like a girl.  (And I don’t mean a butch lesbian, I mean a 12-year-old girl).  Even other gay man sniggle when I throw.   And years roll by without my ever tuning in to a sporting event…..except for the Olympics.  There are a few categories of which I am truly fond, and I follow, and hoot and root for the home team every 4 years.  I love the gymnastics, the swimming and the diving.  The rest?  Not so much.  There are sports I simply do not understand.  Like those women with the batons and the ribbons?  WTF?  How does that compete with track and field or even archery?  And how about synchronized swimming?  Lovely girls in the pool, smiling with a mouthful of water?  Not for me, thanks.  Let the games begin!

So I watched the opening ceremonies and I noticed some seriously strange things.  I mean really odd.

Sit.  Let’s discuss.

The opening ceremonies began wonderfully enough with the whole historical British concept, directed by Danny Boyle, and it was, I must say, lovely.  (Although it wasn’t quite up to four years ago in Beijing, IMHO.)   I won’t opine on the actual show.  It was entertaining enough, especially that whole James Bond/Queen Elizabeth segment.  I enjoyed it immensely.

Then came the parade of nations, which I like, although we can all admit, it’s a tad LOOOOOOOOOONG.

So, here are a few observasions about that same parade:

1)  Did anyone else notice that the athletes from American Samoa were wearing these polyester sarongs?  I’m guessing it was supposed to look like silk, but any gay man worth his beads could see the shimmering of that godforsaken fabric on a plasma TV.  We own that country, no?  Can’t we do better than that?  (It turns out our own team was dressed in Ralph Lauren, manufactured in China.  Oh the indignity).

2)  Nauru had a total Olympic presence of two competing athletes while Australia has 410.  Hmmmm.  (Nauru?  Nauru is a small, oval-shaped island in the western Pacific Ocean, 42 kilometres south of the Equator.)  In case you didn’t know.   See photo:

3)  I did not know that the country I learned in grammar school, known as British Honduras is now Belize.  (And I’ve been there!)  Duh!!!  Did you all now that already?  Is this yet one more example of the cheese stands alone?

4)  There is a country named Comoros?  Really?  I mean, really?  Hold on…..I have to google that.

Comoros is a sovereign, archipelago island nation in the Indian Ocean, located off the eastern coast of Africa, on the northern end of the Mozambique Channel, between northeastern Mozambiqueand northwestern Madagascar. Other countries near to the Comoros are Tanzania to the northwest and the Seychelles to the northeast. The capital is Moroni on Grande Comore.   Take a look.

Don’t you love the internet.  God bless Al Gore.  (BTW, it looks lovely there.)

Anyway, it’s the third smallest African nation, by area.   So now we know.

I could go on.  As you can see, I’m only in the C’s.  I watched a long time but fell asleep right after Kazakhstan.. (There were a lot of countries and I’m old, ok?)

The next day I caught video of Paul McCartney crooning Hey Jude and I was as verklempt as Sir Paul.  It was a lovely moment, with the entire world chanting, na, na na na-na-na-na, hey Jude. ( They don’t write lyrics like that anymore.)

Today is day two already, and there’s been a lot of swimming, diving and some lesbian women shooting guns at something called a skeet.  (Hey, I said I only liked a few events).

So the women’s gymnastics and women’s synchronized diving are on at this very minute, and I need to go watch.  I love those beautiful, fresh-faced, young women and their athletic prowess.  I actually kvell.  They make me proud of our Olympic programs and they win honor for themselves and their country.

I’ll be back with part 2 in a couple of days.

I can’t wait to see whose country has the best ribbon twirlers.  WTF?

I was born in a trunk in the Princess Theater in Pocatella Idaho.  No, I’m sorry.  That’s A Star is Born.  Let me begin again.

I’ve spoken several times about my bartending career;  twenty-two years behind the bar, mixing, shaking, counseling patrons and generally solving the world’s problems.  I’ve also mentioned that I loved that life, but gave it up, some twenty-five years ago for the life of a businessman.  But I’ve always had an area in each of my residences over the years, for guests, friends and of course me, to sit and have a libation.  Like most folks, it was usually the living room.  But since I’ve been in the big house, with husband, it’s been at the breakfast bar in the kitchen.  Our friends gather with us at our dinner parties, seated upon stools, and visit while husband and I stand in the kitchen, prepping dinner.  There aren’t enough chairs but if you’ve been invited to our home to feast, you’re among loved ones, so you understand.  You’re kindof in the kitchen but it’s ok.

But deep down, I never really wanted this.

What I wanted was what you see when you enter the lobby of the Biltmore Hotel.  (Something like this:   A room-dominating bar, with elegant barstools and a well-dressed bartender serving cocktails to the gentry.  Concoctions like a very dry Rob Roy, or a Grey Goose Dirty Martini, or a perfectly chilled Absolut Cosmo straight up.  I would imagine that Lady Gaga or Jake Gyllenhaal, or Michelle Obama might drop by, (I know, I have a very vivid imagination…..humor me), or even Gwyneth Paltrow wearing a $90 tee-shirt, (see her clothing line.  Her poor mother, Blythe Danner  is suffering from post-menopausal osteoporosis, doing promo spots for Prolia while her daughter’s clothing line has $90 tee-shirts.  Oh, the humanity).

Anyway…..one day, very recently, fortune smiled upon us.  It sounds crazy but the gods delivered unto me, a bar.  Sit, let’s discuss.

I have a friend.  You’ve met him in previous blogs.  A loved one with eating issues.  (Doesn’t narrow it down much, does it?)  Anyway, he bought a new condo, fabulously furnished, and is in the process of making it his own, putting his stamp on it, so to speak, by re-doing certain things.  There was a bar (in the middle of his Great room), which was quite lovely, (and included a fridge and an icemaker), and since he doesn’t entertain much, and doesn’t drink much, and in truth, it was blocking his amazing wraparound view of the intracoastal waterway, he wanted it out.  So he offered it up, and husband and I thought it might look kind of spiffy in our home, (and perhaps my fantasy could be fed), so when he had it dismantled, he also had it delivered to our front steps.  See photos:  

I know.  It doesn’t look like much.

The price of the bar was…..how you say…..right, so I ventured to find a contractor that could reassemble it, run a water line, an electrical line, and fabricate the stone so when we shrunk it down to fit in our living room it would be made beautiful again.

Digress.

Have you ever hired a contractor?  Those of you that are poor, have not.  I know this, because I’m poor and I have not.  Poor people get Uncle Joe to put in cabinets, or bilk their bowling buddy to run a water line or ask your gay son’s lesbian friend to help put in the built-in microwave.  Rich people  have contractors.  They say things like I’d love to have you over for dinner, as soon as the contractor is finished with the kitchen.  Then they shop at Whole Foods and don’t really cook dinner, but rather bring in prepared food and pretend they cooked in their new kitchen.   (Have I mentioned that I hate those people?)

Back.

So it turns out that husband’s cousin has a very talented guy that could spruce up the Taj Mahal if it ever needed it.  He works cheap and he’s a fun guy.  Need I go on?  I like him WAY better than the $4000 guy.  (Yeah, that’s just contractor talk:  $4000……$6000…..you get it.)  My guy?  Well, let’s just say he’s my KIND of guy.  We feed him while he works.  We play the country music station because it keeps him in good spirits, and I have an endless supply of Cape Cod Potato Chips and M&M Dark Chocolate Covered Peanuts.  He seems inspired.

And lo and behold, (I love that expression.  They use it in fairy tales and perhaps Scheherazade, but not in common parlance.  I love it anyway, and I need to use it now and again, so please indulge me), but lo and behold a bar is born;  for hundreds of dollars, not thousands.  And here is the star of the show:  

Which brings me to:

You are cordially invited to a Cocktail Reception to be held in the Grand Hall at Chez DeLeo/Krongelb.  We’ll gather at the Lobby Bar for cocktails and take it from there.

Cosmo, anyone?

Every so often I confess that I’m about to try something I’ve never done before.  Like that night we went to our favorite bbq joint and I discovered the various joys and horrors of karaoke.  Or the night we discovered HD broadcasts in movie theaters, Live From The Metropolitan Opera.

Well I have a new one for you tonight.

It occurred to me that I’ve never participated in the government of my own country, but rather have left the running of it to others.  In the pursuit of my so-called bucket list items, I’ve decided to become a poll worker in the next election and make my mark on the way the country is run.  So I called the SOE office, (that’s tech-talk for the Supervisor Of Elections), and inquired.  My, my, it’s a tale to be told.  Sit.  Let’s discuss.

I’d like to give you backstory, but you already know it.  It’s the government!  As in, government workers!  And I am to join their ranks, however briefly.

With that in mind, hear the tale.

I called on a Tuesday morning, just to inquire, really, not even sure I was serious.  I spoke to what seemed like a lovely woman and we chatted for a few minutes.  I asked questions,  she answered.  She asked, I answered.  And so it went.

About ten minutes in, she informs me that, yes, you’ll do, and yes, the job is yours if you want it, and by the way, you’re not to be a poll worker but rather a Clerk, in charge of the entire precinct for the day of the election, with all other poll workers under your employ, and there’s a class for four hours and when can you start?

My natural response:   WTF?????

(It was a phone call, people.  And suddenly I feel as if I’m stumping for public office.)

My mama raised no fools, so I was left suddenly with the thought that there’s something else going on here.  Why, after a five minute phone call did i get placed at the head of the class?   This woman didn’t know me at all.  Why?,  I kept asking myself.

And then the epiphany.  It’s not me that she loved, but rather the others that she didn’t love.  I won by default.  (I immediately thought of my Homeowners Association, of which I am the President.  Why am I?  Because I’m loved by the masses?  Perhaps.  Because I’m the smartest in the land?  Maybe.  Because my wisdom and judgement would rival King Solomon’s?  Could be.  Because there isn’t another warm body in sight to begin to think about doing it and I’m the only idiot that volunteered?  Yeah, that could be it.  Pretty much.)

I should add here that this is not a volunteer position.  They pay for a long days work (election day).  It’s not a lot of money, but it’s a gesture of gratitude for your participation in your own government.  Still, if one wasn’t working at all, it would constitute a very temporary gig, and some folks might show up.

So here I am, the Clerk.  The Big Mammoo.  The Head Honcho.  .  As I’m so fond of saying…..big woo!!

I should add here, that I decided that if I can do it, so can husband, so I volunteered him as well.  And on that same phone call, without even so much as speaking to husband, she made him a supervisor as well.  High praise, I thought.  (Or are the pickins’ really that slim?  Alas.)  Let the training begin!

The Class

I arrived bright and early, clutching pad and my sharpened #2 pencils, as in days or yore, eager for knowlege, as I’ve not taken a class in anything, really, in decades.  (One of the advantages of being old is that you can toss around the phrase,  in decades, easily.)  Husband’s class was the following day, so I was flying solo.  There were about 30 of us, of varying ages and I immediately noticed a couple of things:  (I’m going to try to be delicate here because nobody really likes a smart-ass.)

1)  There were no Lexus or Mercedes or even Infinity vehicles in the parking lot, which led me to believe this would not be a rich crowd.

2)  There were no young people, college-age or otherwise.  I guess, not really being taxpayers yet, they have no interest in their government,

3)  There were only three men.  (including me.)

4)  There were a  LOT of middle aged, very heavy, African-American women, with gold teeth and big knockers.

5)  There were several who spoke marginal English at best.  (Haitian being their native tongue).

6)  There was a huge amount of attitude emanating from the masses toward the civil servants teaching the class.  (As if to say, I’m here to be a poll worker but you’re not the boss of me.)  Which, quite frankly was not true.  They were in fact, the boss of us.

And these people, in my class, are in charge of our democracy.  (Maybe we do need more prayer)…..

And so it went.  It was a lot to learn, and the sad, oh-so-sad truth is that the majority were chatting, checking their phones, their devices, not paying attention, talking amongst themselves and generally being huge pains-in-the-ass, to those of us geeks who were there to learn.  And I had to learn all of the stations, being the clerk.

There are several positions:  greeters, id checkers, ballot issuers, aides, the assistant clerk, the main clerk (me) and the voting technician specialists  (husband).  That’s actually the most important job.  His job is to keep the ballot counting machines running smoothly and troubleshoot if there are issues.  That’s why his class was separate.

It occurred to me that I didn’t see any part of the so-called top one-percent, about which we hear so much, eager to work for civil service wages for a long day to help run the government which affords them the luxury of living the American dream and cheating on their taxes.  No time, I guess.  Might cut in on their golf game.  Clutch the pearls.  We wouldn’t want to do that.

Anyway, by the end of the four hour class, I’d learned a lot, but was still terrified I didn’t know enough.  I’m going to have to study my book some more.  There’s a lot riding on my performance that day.  After all, this is not an election for high school hall monitor, it’s for the POTUS.

Side note:

I just found out that I actually signed us up, accidentally, for the August Primary, and not for the general election in November.  Oops.  I thought I was a good citizen but even I have NO idea what that election is for.  And we all know that probably six dozen people will show up, all day, for a mid-summer, August Primary with no issues at all.  There will be another class for the November elections.  I guess this primary will just be good practice for my entree` into running the government of the United States.

After all, with my  new phone, it’s just possible that someday I might.

You’ll not believe this.  Honestly, you won’t.

The dream phone…..the very Motorola Razr 4G  LTE.….(I’m not even sure what all of those initials stand for) arrived.  If you know anything about smartphones you know they take apps and photos and addresses, and emails and calendars and all that.  So I loaded the puppy to the max in the first three days and it was straight out of Star Wars…..The Death Star.….This device could actually call up the Armed Forces and win a war.  (I seriously hope POTUS has one).

Digress.

I just learned that POTUS stands for President of the United States.  Did you know that?  Or is it yet another case of The Cheese Stands Alone, in that I’m the only one who didn’t?  And of course, now, there’s FLOTUS, as in First Lady of, etc…..  Kindof cool?  Not sure.  Anyway, I hope he has one because goodness knows you could rule the world with this thing.

Back.

But on day three…..Houston, we have a problem.  Sit.  Let’s discuss.

So my baby beauty was all loaded up, and I’m the happiest camper on earth, and suddenly it began to malfunction.  It kept shutting down, for no reason.  An hour-and-a-half call to Tech Support, a Factory Reset later, with all of my programming of three days wiped out, and my Droid, (yes, I call it that now, kindof like R2D2 or C3PO,)  seemed to be OK.  I re-loaded everything over the next three days and all was right in my world, and suddenly, again….the shutting down.

Another Tech call and I wind up with:  We’re going to need to swap your phone for a new one.  Yours obviously has some issues.

Oy.

So there’s a new one on the way.  Should be here tomw.  In the meantime, I bought an app that backs up everything I’ve done, with the hopes that I don’t have to spend another three days programming.

Lordy, Lordy Miss Scarlett, when did life get so complicated.  Let’s not lose sight of the reality.  I bought a phone!  Not a car, not a house, a phone!!!  One would think, a phone, big woo.  But the whole experience comes with just a touch of drama.

I should add here, that there are apps for this device that defy description.  (Funny, I remember from my bartending days when Apps was short for Appetizers which you’d order with cocktails. like chicken wings or spring rolls.  Now it’s short for Applications.  Go figure.)

So among my Apps, I have Sam, who is the Motorola equivalent of Suri.  You know, the Apple Iphone bitch.)  She’s the Assistant who does my bidding.  You can change her name to any name you like, so mine is now officially called Blanche.   As in DuBois.  (I’m gay, ok?  She’s a character in Streetcar Named Desire, if you don’t know.  Just a wee bit demented.)  I might change her name though.  To Consuelo.  (Now before some of you get all politically correct and shout that I shouldn’t have a maid named Consuelo, and ask if she is legal and all that?, please remember that:

1) I mentioned that I’m gay, and that’s the name of Suzanne Sugarbaker’s maid on Designing Women, my favorite tv show of all time.  It’s an  homage, people), and

2) She’s not a real person.  She’s a droid app.  (God, I hope I don’t get hate mail for calling her that.  I mean it with all due respect.)

Anyway, she’s great.  I say find me a recipe for guacamole and she says, take one large ripe avocado, one large tomato…..you get the idea.  I think I love her.

Anyway, the replacement comes tomw.  I am certain, or at the very least hopeful, that the backup app will do its job and restore all to my new device.

If not, you won’t hear from me for at least three days.  I’ll be in programming mode.

Blanche, bring me a cocktail, please.

This is kind of a continuation of the zombie blog, face-eaters.  I mentioned in that piece that here in Florida there is the peculiar stand-your-ground law, that enables an ordinary citizen to kill anyone he chooses and then claim I felt threatened.  Honest to God.  I am not making this up.  The Treyvon Martin case was just such a situation and it took the authorities six weeks to even ask questions of the murderer.  Only in Florida.

Which brings me to tonight’s topic.  Here in the Sunshine State, (as in your home state as well, I’m sure), there are some laws on the books that need to be pointed out, and perhaps re-examined.  Sit.  Let’s discuss.

First up is a recently passed law, just a few years ago:  the one about the pregnant pigs.  Just take a look at mama.

THE LAW:  To prevent cruelty to animals and as recommended by The Humane Society of the United States, no person shall confine a pig during pregnancy in a cage, crate or other enclosure, or tether a pregnant pig, on a farm so that the pig is prevented from turning around freely,

Now, truth be told, I’m as big a tree-hugger, or in this case a pig-hugger, as ever there was, but I’m just not sure that in today’s society, with all of the craziness that goes on, that Tallahassee lawmakers really needed to stop the presses and pass this compelling legislation.  I don’t know.  Could be just me.

Moving on.

THE LAW:  Any parent, legal guardian, or other person having custody or control of a minor who sells or otherwise transfers custody or control of such minor, or offers to sell or otherwise transfer custody of such minor, shall be guilty of a felony.    In other words, it’s illegal to sell your children.  

Good one, no?   We needed a law for that?  Was that a big issue before the law?  Was there a whole lot of:

Ya think?  Big problem?  Needed legislation?  Maybe instead we should have a law that says it’s illegal to kill your children.  That way Casey Anthony might actually have gone to jail, instead of her waltzing to freedom and a book deal.  Just sayin’.

Here’s another:  Unmarried women parachuting on Sunday shall risk arrest, fine or jail.  So what can we take from this one?  It’s ok for married ladies?  It’s ok for single ladies Mon-Sat, but never on Sunday?  What were they afraid of?  That the parachuting single gal would be late for church?  The very idea.  Makes you wonder about the people making our laws.

Here’s a good one:  Men may not be seen in public in any kind of strapless gown.  (I swear, this is a real law on the Florida books).Again, what to glean?  Gowns with sleeves are ok?  Strapless gown on  your beau is ok at the Senior Prom, just don’t step out into the street?  Might be just  me, but in a redneck state like Florida, I just cannot imagine that this was ever a problem that needed legislative action.  Were there gangs of marauding men in the olden days, pillaging local villages dressed like contestants in the Miss America Pageant?  This law can’t be aimed at the Ku Klux Klan.  Their gowns had sleeves.  I’m just baffled.  Although judging by the above picture, maybe this is a good law.  Not sure.

Here are a couple of quickies:

1) Women may be fined for falling asleep under a hair dryer, as can the salon owner.  
(What can I say?  Off with their heads!)

2)  It is illegal to sing in a public place while attired in a swimsuit.  Oh well, there goes the entertainment at the Tiki bar at the Fountainbleau hotel.  Wait.  Tell me again why he shouldn’t sing?  I can see him as Tony in West Side Story.   (Also poolside Karaoke is out.  Hmmm.  Maybe that’s why they passed it.  The karaoke thing).

3)  Having sexual relations with a porcupine is illegal.  (On the books, people.  Not kidding).   The very thought of that…..ewwww, or rather, ouch!!!!)   Actually this one makes a little sense.  After all, the offspring would look like this:  

And my personal favorite, because some things really need to be clear:

4)  If an elephant is left tied to a parking meter, the parking fee has to be paid just as it would for a vehicle.  This one was really important.  Don’t you agree?  Those elephant scoff-law people need to be punished.  Here’s a quarter.  Pump the meter for me, would ya, babe?  And for cryin’ out loud, don’t step on his trunk!

There are dozens more of these, but I think you get the idea.  I’d love to hear from you about strange laws on the books in your home state.  Heaven forbid that our legislators should ever get down to doing the real business of the people.

Just sayin’.

I have a tale to tell tonight.  It’s a cautionary tale.  (For the uninitiated, that means Beware!!!!!)  It’s about T-Mobile Cellular.  I’m not afraid to name names, as they’ve more than proven their total inadequacy in their chosen field of endeavor.  This was a true retail horror story, and I’m taking no prisoners.  Totally unacceptable.  Sit.  Let’s discuss.

It began innocently enough with my wanting a new cell phone.  A star-spangled 4-G beauty.  It was time, and if you know me at all, you know I love a good toy, and I’ve waited long enough with the cheap phone and the cheap plan.  (Not to be confused with my wonderful Ipod touch, which I love, probably  more than the dog,  but don’t tell her).

The last thing I wanted was a huge phone bill each month, so I considered T-Mobile with their $50. plan.  Turns out, to get that rate you have to buy the phone for that plan, and the spiffy model I wanted was, ahem, clutch the pearls, $600.  So clearly, that was off the table.  Next choice was a contract (I know you’re all familiar with this routine so I’ll fast forward).  I found a plan I could live with, and found out that for Father’s Day, they were running a special:  Any phone in the house, folks, free.  Oh, you put money up front, big bucks etc, but rebates galore and at the end of the day, the $600 beauty (HTC 1S, by the way), was to be free.  Way cool.

Sign me up.

Then a wrinkle. I had shopped and researched online and found the deal I wanted and I found out that the business plan (if you own a business, which I do, as does husband as well, was cheaper monthly.    All you need is your Business License,  your Tax ID and off you go. But you can’t do it online or on the phone.   (Don’t ask me why.  Should have been the first clue as to what was coming).  So off I went to the store and presented same and was told that a Social Security number on a d/b/a Sole Proprietorship, (stay with me, folks), didn’t count.  They needed a real Tax ID.  This was after a half-hour of in-store time while the clerk was on hold, due to the fact that the free phone sale was on and T-Mobile hadn’t planned on the enormity of it and the staff answering in the home office was overwhelmed, as husband and I cooled our heels.  (Not enough people answering phones…..in a phone establishment.  Second clue, right over my head).

Ok.  Half an hour later, we were stumped when refused.

Idea.  Let’s do this in husband’s business’ name.  After all, we have  his Tax ID.

Presenting our credentials, and another half-hour of hold-time later, we’re informed that they need to see his actual business license. ( WTF?  Look it up, you morons.)  Your freakin’ specialty is 4G internet access!!!  But I held my tongue and said, if you need to see it, it’s available online, and gave him the website.  Another 20 minutes later, he claims they need to see checking account statements.  (And queue the explosion.)  I lost it.

I should fill in a little about what was going on in the store for the hour-and-a-half that we were there, thus far.

A bedraggled (is that a word?), seemingly homeless guy walked in.  He reeked.   So much so, in fact, that one of the salesgirls who wasn’t with a customer walked around spraying Febreze into the air, as if it were Chanel No. 5.   His clothes were tattered.  His beard….what can I say?….he looked like Mandy Patinkin in Yentl.   He whips out a credit card, and ten minutes later he’s walking out the door with his new phone.  WTF???

Next up were two girls about 16 years old.  Clearly BFFs.  And they came into the store without looking up, each with face into cell phone, texting, (probably each other, rather than speak), and one had Daddy’s credit card, and not ten minutes later she walked out with MY PHONE!  The one I’ve been trying to buy.  No questions asked!!!

And here we are; two guys, who happen to own:

And from us they want a blood sample?

As they say on Broadway, No, No, Nanette.  We stormed out.

Alas.

But it’s still free-phone-day.  So now I call T-Mobile on the phone to just forget the whole business plan thing, pay a little extra and get my dream phone.  Not so fast, Kemosabe.

I was on hold for a half-hour.  Sound familiar?  T-Mobile is just so clueless.  After about thirty minutes, I got cut off.  Hung up upon.  But even with the steam emanating from mine own ears, I redialed to try again.  (Hey, it’s a $600 phone and it’s free for Father’s Day.  I know, I’m just a cheap whore at heart, but bear with me.)

So I called back, and while on hold it dawns on me, sitting in my office, at my computer, to take a look to see if maybe Verizon has any Father’s Day deals.  (I’m close to the brink of insanity at this point).  So for the next half-hour of hold time, I studied Verizon’s phones, read reviews, examined their calling plans, didn’t find any free phones, but some good prices, and in a moment of exultation, I hung up and dialed them.  There’s actually more, but I’m thinking I’ve made my point.

An hour later, (and I should add, a very nice hour, with a lovely young woman named Stephanie, who is now my new BFF and who is  pursuing her Doctorate in Education, all the while working her nine-to-five,) I was sold on a Motorola Razr  top-of-the-line phone, and get this:  It was $600, but with specials, rebates, incentives, etc, it was $99.  And the coupe de ville, I mean coup de grace was a $100 internet credit, so the dream phone was indeed, free.  She waived the activation fee and signed me up for the old peoples’ plan (hey you only had to be 62) and didn’t even take a credit card.  (And it’s $20 per month cheaper than T-Mobile.)  The phone is on its way to me, I’m happy, husband is happy and T-Mobile should rot in hell and be forced to go to Community College and take a goddam business course!!

I tried to call T-Mobile Corporate offices to tell them SOMETHING.  ANYTHING, about their stores, their policies, their employees, their inability to staff, etc, but it turns out they have no phone number.  Let me repeat that.  T-Mobile Corporate Headquarters has no phone for customer issues.  I got a secretary at Corporate and she told me just that.  She advised me to write to them.  I asked for an email address and her reply was, they don’t have that either.  Write a snail letter.  (As if anybody on God’s green earth is going to sit down and do that, and as if they’d read it.  I’m thinking if they wanted to hear from consumers, they’d make it a little easier.)  Maybe I’ll just print this story and mail it to Corporate.   I doubt they’ll ever read or consider anything I’ve said, but It’ll make me feel better.

______________________________________

3 days later……update…..

The Verizon phone arrived.  And as they say in Star Wars…..the Death Star is now complete!………I rule………..

So this has been my homage to T-Mobile.  My advice?  Avoid them like poison.

Anybody else have a similar horror story?  I’d love to hear it.

Oh, and expect a call from me any day now, on my new spiffy phone.  Behold……

I won!!!

You’ll never believe this, but I won!  I got a postcard in the mail that says I’ve won an eight-day cruise on a major cruise line, all expenses paid.  Well, not all.  I’m responsible for port charges and taxes.  But still…..  (Suddenly my mind wanders back to prior cruises and my standing appointment on the first formal night with the baby lamb chops.  Ah, good times.)  And get this;  all I have to do is attend a brief hour-and-a-half seminar, with no-purchase-necessary, and the cruise is mine.  (and of course, husband’s).  Sounds lucky, no?

Relax, kemosabe.  I was born at night.  Just not last night.  Sit.  Let’s discuss.

So, of course I’m skeptical.  Nay, cynical.  Nothing is free.  (Air is, but it’s filthy).  But being the Curious George that I am, I phone the 800 number and glean the following:

1)  You must be a citizen.  (Naturally.  Who gives away stuff to illegals?)

2)  You must be married.  (Ok, I told them I was partnered and had as my significant other, husband.  That seemed to do it.)

3)  You must have a major credit card.  (Duh!  They’re definitely going to try to sell me something.)

4)  You must sit through the seminar where this travel-related business is going to try to hook you up to some serious stuff.  But…..

5)  You are obligated to buy nothing.  NADA.  El Zippo.  Just sit through it.

After the show, er, seminar, they give you the cruise certificate.  Easy?  Probably not, but I’m nothing if not adventurous.  So I made an appointment for this Friday for the workshop.  I’ll know more after that.  (Now I know they’re betting that they can sell ice to Eskimos living on a glacier, but what they don’t realize is that even if I weaken, and really want whatever it is they’re selling…….we’re poor, and can’t afford it.  So there is NO danger of our purchasing anything, anytime soon.  I can tell you that, but please…..shhhh….. don’t tell them).  I am, however, wide open to using them for my travel needs if indeed they are a travel agency.  I don’t have a personal travel agent and could actually use a good one.   My gut tells me this all might be a colossal waste of time, not to mention a scam.  A con.  And it’s an hour’s drive to West Palm Beach and and hour back, plus ten bucks in gas, and if it’s bullsh*t, then it’s all for naught.  Well, not exactly for naught.  I am, after all, your ever-attentive blogger, and at the very least there will be a tale to tell upon my return.

If this is actually legit, I’ll have NO problem using them for my travel needs in the future, but that’s yet to be determined.

So let’s stop now and I’ll continue after the scam.  I mean, the presentation.  (I’m thinking that if this is a huge hoax, it’s my job to disseminate that information).  If they’re messing with me, I will exact my revenge.  Stay tuned…..

See you tomorrow.

_________________________________________________________

Ok.  I’m back.

So it was pretty much what they claimed.  We arrived, filled out some paperwork, ate a free and extremely delicious cookie and had a cup of coffee, sat through a rather interesting presentation, actually, all about travel and discounts and wonderful vacation spots and then broke up into couples, alone with a high-end salesman, all to ourselves.

The deal was that it costs lots of money to join this travel club.  I mean a LOT of money.  It’s eight-thousand dollars.  I know, I know.  I said it too.  Are you freakin’ kidding me?  But as I thought about it, sitting there with other couples during the presentation, who travel for months-at-a-time to places like Machuu Picchu and Bora Bora and a week in Cabo San Lucas here, and a week in Quito, Ecuador there, and a week in Vegas, or San Diego or Provincetown, I began to realize that to the right demographic, this was a great deal.  For an average week’s stay at a fancy resort, they could save you a couple grand.  Do it a few times a year and you’re paid up.  Now add to that, the membership is lifetime and transferable to your kids and grand-kids and it makes sense for a lot of people.  Seriously.  And people did indeed sign up.

Just not us.

They tried to make deals, lowering the price, spacing out the payments, altering the package for less money, but I held firm.  The truth is, husband and I just don’t travel enough to make up the initial cost.  But don’t blow it off.  It really would work for a lot of people.

Just not us.

Now for the free stuff.

So, most impressively, even though we declined to purchase, they gave us our certificate for our free cruise, with no attitude at all.  (Remember the beginning…..nothing is free). We are to pay port charges and taxes, and there are hoops through which we must jump to get this cruise.

1)  We must fill out the certificate and mail it, certified, registered mail within 14 days.

2)  We must notify them 90 days in advance of any selected dates we might want to go.

3)  You can’t travel in a month with an “R” in it.  They want 60 days on either side on Lent.  If you have more than one child then you can’t go in the summer…..(no, I’m kidding.  I made up all of #3).  Gotcha!  Moving along…..

4)  There are extensive blackout dates, such as:   we can’t book any date within one week of a national holiday, and the deal is on Carnival (not our favorite), unless we’d like to upgrade for a small fee to Royal Caribbean.  (They didn’t tell me HOW small).  But husband says, fuggeddaboudit, we’ll sail Carnival.  And as the young people today say, we’re down with that.

So that pretty much sums up the adventure.  I’ll jump through the hoops and let you now how it all turns out.  After all, it’s worth the effort just for the baby lamb chops alone.

I’m in a mood.

Sometimes it really gets to me that I left the greater New York metropolitan area, all those years ago, with its opera houses, and Broadway theater district and clubs and museums and art galleries, and traded it all for some sunshine, and mostly no winters.  I lie to myself a lot and say that people are people, and savvy New Yorkers have nothing on us upscale Floridians, and that politicians are politicians, and laws are laws, and no matter where you live, there’s always some strange shit that goes on.  (If you’ll pardon the expression.)

But, lately, in the news down here, we’ve had a couple of stories that just defy logic.  File them under news of the strange.  Kind of like a skit on Saturday Night Live…..gone bad.  Certainly the most notorious these days is the attack on a homeless man, by a “flesh eating zombie” who was shot to death by police, on the MacArthur Causeway in Miami.  No kidding.  Sit.  Let’s discuss.

The reporting was a tad sketchy.  It seems that when police arrived on the scene, there was a man, Rudy Eugene, who was eating the face off of a homeless man.  (Of course, my warped mind wonders if homeless people taste better than the rest of us.  I’m thinking those plump Cuban women might have a hint of ropa vieja about them and be pretty delicioso.  Or even those artery-clogged New York tourists might have a kind of pastrami essence as you devour them.)   But Vibe Magazine, (is that really a publication?  not sure), reports that, and I quote:  the attacker’s girlfriend kissed Rudy Eugene goodbye as he left their home, and heard nothing until she got a call at 11am Monday morning from a member of Eugene’s family telling her the bad news. She believes Eugene was drugged unknowingly, or the victim of supernatural doings and that maybe someone put a curse on him. She claims she never believed in Voodoo until now.  

Really?  Supernatural doings?  Voodoo?  (Oh I can hear Roy Black’s defense team murmuring behind the scenes.  And Gloria Allred is here already.  What’s with her anyway?  She’s like a Kardashian, for cryin’ out loud.  Always in the news).  But I hear her already…..It’s Miami.  There are Haitians.  Haitians practice Voodoo.  He’s just a victim, and he’s a vegan.   He would never normally eat face.  And so it goes).

So I”m thinking that maybe I ought to be worried.  Seriously.  I’ve never lived in a place where people eat people.  I live in a land where, according to Mitt Romney, Corporations are people, and that’s strange enough.  I love Streisand, and she sings People who need people are the luckiest people in the world.  But I’m thinking, people who get eaten by people…..not so lucky.

So, what to do?

I could arm myself whenever I go outside.  Sounds crazy, I know, but I do live in the STAND YOUR GROUND state;  where you’re allowed to pack heat (carry a gun, for the uninitiated), and walk into a library, a school, a park or a government building and it’s perfectly legal.  In fact, the NRA encourages it.   And if, while you’re strolling in neighborhoods, as a self-appointed guardian of the people, patrolling where you ought not to be in the first place, perhaps spoiling for a fight, and you feel threatened by a passerby who looks like he might be, oh, I don’t know…..Black perhaps?, as he’s walking home from a convenience store with a soda and a bag of Skittles, and you blow his brains out, you get to claim, I was defending myself and am perfectly within the law.  And sometimes it takes six weeks for authorities to question it.  Yeah, that state.  Florida.  Home of the zombie flesh-eaters and Billy The Kid’s descendants.

But I don’t want to walk around armed and dangerous.  It’s just not me.  I’m already a little broad in the hips so a holster with a gun would just accentuate my belly and my muffin-top sides.  No, no, no.  I’m not ruining the line of my black muu muu just because one guy is running around with an appetite for face.  (And homeless face, at that).

No, I’ll just carry a sock full of garlic and a big silver crucifix (oy, what would Kosher Grandma say about that?  What did she know?  There were no zombies in her shtetl in Lithuania.   Cossacks, yes.  Zombies, no).   And of course whenever I go out, I’ll wear my running shoes at all times.

I’m old, but I’m pretty sure I can still outrun a flesh-eating zombie.  

Have you ever opened a piece of mail, say, from a doctor’s office, expecting that your insurance has picked up the tab, and for which, perhaps, you owe a couple of co-pay bucks?  And upon further reading you realize that the number in the I owe the doctor column is huge?  Seriously, have you?  Well guess what?  (I know, I know, after the intro, you all guessed.)  Duh.

I got a bill today for husband’s last visit to the urologist;  a very brief visit.  Mostly for a prescription.  Sure he made him pee in the cup, he’s a urologist, for cryin’ out loud, but other than that, it was for a scripp.  The bill we received was for $958.  
I barely flinched.  I know he has Medicare and I know they cover everything.  (Well, so far).  Those of you without Medicare, I’m sorry.   Your day will come.  It’s wonderful.  Those of you who are of the Repugnizant , I’m sorry, I meant Republican persuasion who believe that Medicare should be privatized or abolished you can stop reading right now.  (Although truth be told, I am an avowed card-carrying Liberal, so I suspect you are not now, nor have you been, reading anyway).  Medicare covers you.  Your only job is to find a doctor that is at least marginally good, doesn’t hang around the lake making duck noises, (as in quack quack) and didn’t pass his medical boards on the curve, as the saying goes.  Husband and I happen to like this urologist.  It’s his staff we abhor.  Sit.  Let’s discuss.

So I opened the envelope and $958 later, I’m on the phone and it’s ringing.   It is answered and I hear:   Dr. Gonif’s office, how may I direct your call?

(Now, bear in mind, I’m a pro at this sort of thing.  Been doing it for years.  With my medical history?  Fuggeddaboutit.   I could have had a seat at King Arthur’s Round Table, such a valiant Knight am I.  I am ready for battle).  You should also know that the staff member who answered the phone is NOT my favorite person.  Let’s call her Nurse Ratched.  The conversation went something like this:

me: May I have the billing department, please.

her:  I can probably  help you.

me:  Ok. Hi.  I’m calling about a bill for $958.  My name is davidk and I’m calling on behalf of husband.  Why the bill?  It was a half-glass of pee and a prescription.  Doesn’t Medicare usually cover this?

her:  Let me look it up.  (long pause).  Yes, here it is.   It seems husband didn’t have a referral for his last visit and Medicare refuses to pay, as does his supplementary insurance.

me:  I’m sorry, he had a referral.

her:  No, I’m sorry, he did not.

me:   No, I’m sorry.  I don’t mean to tell you your job, but I too, am a patient of Dr. Gonif, and I arrived at his office one day, a while back, without a referral, and you put my ass out on the sidewalk, like yesterday’s garbage, and told me not to come back without one, all the while smiling like Cruella de Ville.   And so a week later, referral in hand, I did.  So I am certain, beyond any reasonable doubt, that without a referral, husband would never have gotten past the pit bull behind the lovely sliding frosted glass window in the reception area.   Which tells me that he had one, and you either misplaced it, or lost it.

her:  Well we have no record of it.  Either you pay the bill, or contact your primary to get us a copy of the original.

me:  Really?  Do you have ANY idea how busy my doctor is?  And now you want me to ask his staff to stop what they’re doing and look through the records to find a piece of paper that your staff either lost or misplaced,  rather than your asking your staff to try to find it?  That which they lost?  Or perhaps misfiled?  Really?

her:  Well sir, we’re very busy too.

me:  Yes, apparently so busy that you don’t have time to file a patient’s referral, and as a result you reign terror down on the unsuspecting.

her:  There’s no need for that kind of talk, sir.  We’re doing our best to accomodate you.

me:  No, my dear woman.  No you’re not.  If you were doing your best, we wouldn’t be having this conversation.  Furthermore, if this is your best, I’m glad it’s the doctor and not you, who examines my rectum.  With him it’s just a finger.  I’m thinking if it were you, it would be a full fledged f*ck.  

her:   click.

Members of the jury, i ask you;   Was that too much?  Was I out of line?

Ok, i waited a while and called back and apologized for the profanity (but nothing else).

She and I went another couple of rounds and the upshot was that yes, I have to bother my doctor’s office to try to resurrect the referral (that’s my compromise), and they finally agreed to fill husband’s prescription again without his paying the bill first, until it all gets sorted out.  (See, I told you I was good at this).

(Can you believe they were going to hold him hostage with no Vesicare until he settled the bill?  How in the name of Holy Water, is an old man supposed to take a piss?)  She’s mean.  Just plain ole mean.

With that settled, all I need now is a prescription for valium from my primary,  so I can take one before my next visit to Dr. Gonif’s office, before I have to see that bitch.

The good news is Medicare covers that.

You know how I often start my pieces with the phrase “Sit.  Set’s discuss?”  Well, not tonight.  For this episode I need to use a new phrase.

I’m sure that at least most, if not all of you, have, or are aware of Facebook.  (Personally, I’m in Betty White’s camp and think it’s a HUGE waste of time.  But then, I’m not a young person jockeying for a position of popularity in a high school, nor am I a grandparent needing to keep in touch with the wee ones, nor am I hawking any kind of product (unless you count this very blog, which from time to time I might mention, in passing), nor am I political, show business inclined or even bored).  So even though I have a Facebook account, I’m not logged on a whole lot.  I venture there when I get a “friend” request, or an email instructing me to do so.

But today, I got an email from a child.

Well, truth be told, she’s not a child anymore.  The last time I saw her she was, approximately ten years old.  Now she’s most likely 40ish.  I worked for, and was very good friends with, her parents.   She introduced herself online and my mind flooded and we’re instantly back in contact.  I’m suddenly taking a trip down memory lane.

Ok, ready?  For the new phrase?  Stand.  Let’s stroll.

This is powerful stuff.

The last time I saw most of this family was 1983, give or take.  It’s coming up on 30 years ago.  (I worked briefly with the mom in 1989, but that’s a tale for another time).  But the daughter has contacted me and the memories are flooding the corners of my mind. (to paraphrase Barbra).  I don’t want to go into the personal stuff, since we’ve just re-connected and I wouldn’t want her, or her parents, to think I’m an opportunist, but I can give you a vague sense.  Here’s a taste.

Her parents were this wild and tempestuous couple.  He, Austrian, as I recall, perhaps Viennese, and she, a down home southern girl with more horse-sense than any city folk I ever did  have the pleasure to know.   They were a great couple, although the husband was a character.

Digress a sec.

You remember those old 60′s sci-fi/horror movies with a laboratory and experiments and such, and eventually, one of the characters in the black and white farce gets to utter the immortal words, about the scientist?  He’s quite mad, you know!  Well, I’ve lived my entire life, mostly, without ever meeting those kinds of people.  But every so often it happens, and in this case, the husband was really quite mad, you know.  

Back.

OK.  Not mad in the sense of re-animating corpses, but in the sense that he had his own little world.   Did I mention he was very bright?  Too bright for his own good, probably.  (It’s a familiar theme).   And he cooked.  Food.  I’m talking, a chef of the highest magnitude.  World Class.  Five star little bugger.  

The wife, on the other hand, was logical, sensible , organized, had a great sense of business and could run a tight ship.   So they had the idea to open a restaurant, with him as chef, running the back of the house, (kitchen), and her running the front, (dining room), and I came to them as a waiter looking for employment, we found each other, it was Kismet,  and I stayed a good while.

no, this is not actually me, but a lot like me......back when i was young. ahem.

It really was a love affair.  I loved them both and they loved me, and restaurant-wise,  we ran a pretty smooth operation.

Except for the crazy part.  The husband.

He was such a great chef that immediately upon opening and being reviewed by the Miami Herald, we were mobbed with hungry diners.  And the wife would take reservations, and greet guests, and do PR in the dining room, while the husband cooked this great food (which I might add came out of the kitchen very slowly;  he was meticulous and fastidious as well as great).   And all would be well as we chugged along magnificently as a team, wowing the crowds, basking in the applause….. until something went wrong…..it didn’t have to be anything tricky, just something like a guest sending something back because it wasn’t to his liking.  And when the waiter, (often me), would bring it into the kitchen, the lunacy began.  Chef would rant and rave, curse up a blue streak that would embarrass a sailor, and often throw a knife.   (He was actually very good with the knives;  he could have hit me any time he chose, but he always missed.  I’m grateful for that.)

So in the middle of the dinner rush, the wife would have to go into the kitchen and calm the maestro down, to the point where he could function again.  This delay backed up the dining room even further, so the pressure on the kitchen increased, as did the frequency of the knife-throwing.

Just one of the many stories, about this family whom I loved.

And believe it or not, insanity included, they were some of the best times of my restaurant career.  I’ve spent a fair amount of time, over the years, thinking back on those wonderful days.  There was a lot of love there.  (And a whole lot of good food).

As I mentioned, the daughter is now grown, with her own life.  I don’t know how much she remembers about those crazy days in the restaurant, having been only ten years old, but I”ll be more than happy to fill her in on our collective high times and adventures, as this new re-acquaintance progresses.

It’s nice.  At least Facebook is good for something.

I’m a very liberal guy.  If you’ve been following at all, you know I’m a live and let live kind of person.  I mean, really, when you’ve lived my life, and are as bizarre as I am, how could you begin to judge others and expect any credibility at all?  So I say, get on with your life, damn the torpedoes and get out of the way.

However.

I think you’re all aware that I shop a lot, especially online, and that leads to a lot of email and the occasional brochure.  Today, I got one such piece in the mail and I must admit, it shook me to my very core.  It was a bathing suit catalog, and it was just a tad strange.   I’d like to share it with you.  Sit.  Let’s discuss.

To be truthful, I love a hot man in a speedo or a trunk as much as, if not more, than the average gay man.  You ladies know about which I speak; you love it too.  For example:  

Yummy-licious, no?  Or how about this one?

<Sigh>.  I know.  Don’t you want to be the wall behind him for just a minute?  Me too.  But back to the catalog.

You’ve all seen these types of advertising.  Handsome men, winsome women, scantily clad in garb designed to look good on a beach or poolside, to dry quickly after a plunge into a body of water, and to hold their shape.  Some are quite beautiful, especially on the models demonstrating them in these brochures.  After all, isn’t the expression, “if you’ve got it, flaunt it”,  a motto by which to live?

But the ultimate question is:  how much is too much?  or more to the point, how little is too little?

Now, as I’ve said, I love a hot man in a speedo.  Or a tight trunk.  Or maybe even a thong, but that’s stretching it.  Take a look at my first example of an idea gone a tad off course:  

I know, I know.  Stop sniggling.  I told you it was going to be strange.

So my first (of many) questions is:  where exactly does one wear this?  The beach?  The pool?  Dunno.  (Btw, it’s a foregone conclusion that the target audience is gay.  there’s not a straight man alive that would be caught dead in this thing/thong/thing.)

Or, how about this one?

Didn’t his mother ever teach him it’s not polite to point?  The very idea!  This guy has an utterly amazing body, but I can’t take my eyes off of the blue pointy thing.   It couldn’t possibly be any more revealing!

Ok, I take that back.  Are you freakin’ kidding me?  Who wears this stuff?  I mean, I’m as gay as…..ok, just say it,…..anyone on the planet, and even if I had the body, I don’t think I’d wear this particular suit.  What happens when it gets wet?  I’d like to say it becomes see-through, but it starts out that way.  I’m thinking as he exits the pool, the entire crowd will know his religion.

Can you do one more?  I mean, of the guys? (Ladies, you’re up next).

How’s this?

Really?  To the beach?  Really?  To the country club?  The cabana club?  I can hear it now:

It boggles the mind.

Now, as disturbed as I was by these pictures, I have to admit, the guys are hot, so I’m mildly interested in their general sexiness, notwithstanding the bizarre attire.  But imagine my shock and awe when I turned the last page of the men’s section and on the first page of the ladies’, found this:

For me, there is no redeeming feature about this picture.  It’s just tits on a beach.  or rather, tits in the ocean.  I imagine some of my less gay readers might find this interesting, but to me, the word show-off comes to mind.  (So does beach-whore, but I’d better not say that).    And just when i thought I’d seen it all, (and she’s actually showing it all), there’s this:  hang onto your hats…..

I know, right?  I have so many questions, but these are my top six:

It just boggles my mind.

In that very same catalog there is a line of apres beach attire that caught my eye, (and made me wish it had poked out my eye instead of just catching it.)  Ladies, imagine it’s evening now and it’s time to hit the beach bar for a cocktail or two with the gang.  You step into the cabana for a quick change out of your bathing suit and voila`, you’re ready to party.  Take a look:

Yep, I’m thinking she’s ready to rumble.  how she’ll make it from the cabana to the bar, walking on the sand in those shoes is yet another mystery.   And how she’ll go tinkle is a whole other matter.   Ok, one more.  it comes in other styles.

Again, where exactly would one wear this outfit?  I can see her now, coming down the stairs of the bungalow, down the shore, with mom and dad and younger sister watching Wheel of Fortune, and she speaks:

And so it goes.

As Fanny Brice once sang, “well, I’m miffed”.

I had no idea that people dressed like this.  I guess i’m not going to the right beaches.  Or pool parties.  I’ve learned a lot from this catalog, but I’m going to write to them and ask them, politely, to send my next one in a plain manila envelope.  I shudder to imagine what my mailman thinks.

Meanwhile, back at the doctor’s office…..

I haven’t written about medical things for a while.  Lord knows, I have my share of issues, health-wise, but lately there have been no doctors, no nurses, no hospitalizations and no crises.  (Well, not since that four month bout with the sciatica).  But, ahem, we’ve more than covered that.  I know I’m bored with it, and I’m sure you are as well.  (Although i might add, at this point, it’s gone.  It went as it came.  One day I felt better.  The next day even more so.  And over a period of about a week, it ceased.  It was almost scary when it stopped, like the final moments of La Traviata, where Violetta sings “the pain has stopped, I’m well, I’m renewed”.….and then drops dead.  Except I’m still here, and I’m delighted to say that the ordeal is over.  Praise the Lord and pass the ammunition).

So I’m well, thank you very much, but it was indeed time for a checkup and first up was the cardiologist.  You all know my heart stories.  Alas.  Sit.  Let’s discuss.

It was the usual routine;  labs first (drawn blood, for the uninitiated), and then wait a week, followed by the results show at the doctor’s office;  kindof like Dancing With The Stars, (which is neither dancing nor stars), but you show up to see if you’ve been eliminated.

Sometimes you go to the doctor because you’re sick;  vomiting, fever, strep throat, food poisoning, or boils, (actually that last one almost never happens).  He prescribes stuff and off you go.  But sometimes it’s just a maintenance thing.

It’s funny, but doctor’s visits have become a numbers game.  After your blood work-up, you sit with him/her for your allotted 15 minutes and you discuss how you are (on paper).  You think that you feel pretty good, other than the crap that comes with aging, (but there’s no cure for that), but your numbers might say otherwise.  Your PSA is high;  your blood pressure is high;  your cholesterol is high;  your blood sugar is high.  Apparently, high is not so good.  (Well, not since they outlawed Qaaludes.  High was very good back then).  Over the years I’ve had all kinds of reports, (my blood counts betraying me on all fronts).  Lately, I’ve had some cholesterol issues, (high) and some triglyceride scares  (very high).  BTW, you all know what triglycerides are, don’t you?  I mean the actual definition?  Gaze upon this and tell me how we are supposed to go forward:

tri·glyc·er·ide

[trahy-glis-uh-rahyd, -er-id]      noun, Biochemistry, Chemistry .  

Anyway, the bottom line is that my new cardiologist, who, upon seeing my old numbers, with skyrocketing aforementioned triglycerides, and high LDL (not good) and mediocre HDL (also not good),  prescribed this concentrated fish oil called Lovaza.  (It’s prescription strength, big time.  The pills are the size of actual fish! ).  And lo, and behold, (which is a very fairy tale phrase, I might add), my cholesterol is 110.  He’s aghast.  My triglyceride count is 125.  (I actually caught him gloating), and my LDLs are so low that he cut my Crestor in half (again).   He actually said, your LDL is amost too low.  I promised him that from now on, I’d eat the skin on the chicken.  He was sort of ok with that.  (No, I’m kidding.  Lest you think my good doctor is a quack).  So the moral of the story is, there is neither rhyme nor reason in the universe.  If you’ll remember earlier blogs, replete with doctor visits, emergency rooms, ablations, catheterizations, holter monitors, echocardiograms,  and other various and sundry procedures, it’s just amazing that I’m here at all, never mind with those numbers.  So all is well in my world, at least for now.

Now if you’ll excuse me, I have a date with a pastrami sandwich on rye.  My LDL is dangerously low.  Alas.

I discovered a wonderful old film and I want to share it with you.  It’s not an old film like Fritz Lang’s Metropolis, from 1927, or even Gone with the Wind from 1939, but rather from 1992;  a mere twenty years ago.  But before I tell the tale, you  need a little background.  Sit, let’s discuss.

There’s a new Broadway musical on the block.  (Those of us that currently watch Smash understand that process.)   You find a story, some composers, lyricists, a cast, and off you go.  Normally, when producers attempt this process, it’s because they have a property that they think will fly.  It’s a gamble, at best, (usually with other people’s money), but when the material is right you end up with the likes of Evita, or A Chorus Line or Phantom of the Opera.  Sometimes they seek to produce a musical based on a proven hit movie by adding songs and often dance.  Examples would be La Cage au Folles,
The Lion King,

or Billy Elliot.  They turned out to be great musicals even though the original movies were not true musicals, but rather movies with a song or two or three.  A lot of stuff gets added to make a show.  But sometimes it gets tricky, and the material you start with is not so hot for a musical, but for some reason producers proceed anyway.  Sound strange?  Let me explain.

In a word, this season’s biggest flop on Broadway was Carrie, the musical.  Now, the Brian de Palma film was excellent, but it’s really not musical material;  a psychokinetic teenager covered in pig’s blood,  along with her telekinetic, religious zealot of a mom, all committing murder on prom night.  Really?  Fun stuff, no?  Well, it BOMBED.  I think it ran for all of twenty minutes and closed on page 6.  Back in 1966 there was Breakfast at Tiffany’s with Mary Tyler Moore, (in her heyday), which closed after 9 performances.  (Great movie, shitty musical).  Alas.

Lately we’ve had The Adams Family, Catch Me If You Can, Footloose, Sister Act, etc., all from movies.  None are in the category of Fiddler or Man of La Mancha, but they’re making a buck.  Producers will set anything to music if they think they can sell it.

Which finally brings me ’round to my discovery.

There was a movie called Newsies, loosely based on a turn-of-the-century story about kids in New York that sold newspapers on the street, (for Pulitzer and Hearst), were down-trodden and started a union to fight the bosses.  A feel-good musical glorifying the little guy and the triumph of the human spirit, with the moral of the story being something like, make your voice heard and you can change the world (not untimely even for today).  It got the full Hollywood treatment, by Disney Studios, no less.  Huge production numbers, sets, costumes, hundreds of young actors in giant chorus numbers complete with dancing.  Allen Menken did the score.  As it turns out, it was a huge box office flop.  In a  year when Unforgiven, The Crying Game, and Scent of a Woman were hot, I’m thinking the world couldn’t give a rat’s ass about orphans kicking up their heels, selling newspapers.  (Although in that same year, Disney Studios had a huge hit with Aladdin, which won best score and best song, by the very same composer, Allen Menken).  But the public stayed away from Newsies like poison.  Even I, who am a musical nut, and a movie nut as well, didn’t see it.  Critics refer to it as the movie that killed movie musicals.  Big expense, no return, and there were no more for many years.

OK.  So here comes the kicker.

Because they’ve mounted a Broadway production, husband and I watched the old movie tonight.  Can you guess?  It’s outstanding!  (Perhaps now, we’re in a different moment in time, or a different set of eyes;  not sure), but it was fantastic.  Here come the fun facts.  The leading man, (the head Newsie kid), is a 17-year old Christian Bale, singing and dancing his heart out, and he’s excellent.

Couldn't you just plotz?

I’m thinking this is going to be an amazing show, if they cast it right and produce it properly.  

Of course, if they muck it up, it might close on page 20.

Update:  the Tony Awards were announced today and Newsies is nominated for Best Musical.  (I knew I was on to something).

Here are two minutes worth, from the internet.  See if this doesn’t get you in the mood…..(there are 2 small clips in a row.  Be sure to watch both.)

http://newsiesthemusical.com/about

I want all of my New York readers to get tickets.  See you in the theater.

You know how your life has cycles, and you have events that come ’round every few years that need attention?  Stuff like;  either renew your gym membership or pick another workout joint?  Or, should you sign another 2-year lease on your apartment or think about moving?  Well, i’m at that juncture with my ride.  I lease my car, and it’s time for a big decision.  I need to find my next vehicle.  As they say, the jig is up!  Or in my case, the lease.

This is not the simplest of tasks, unless of course, money is no object, in which case you might say I’ll take that black Bentley please.  The one with the chauffeur.    (Which, if you’ve been following, you know is NOT the case in my world.  So with an eye on my budget, and an eye on style, I have begun the perplexing task of choosing my next chariot of fire.  I know you’ve all bought cars in your life, with the exception, perhaps, of you New Yorkers, so I think you’ll feel my pain as we go.  Sit.  Let’s discuss.

My choices range from the ridiculous to the sublime.  Observe ridiculous:

I know, I know.  It’s lovely and all that, and it’s actually within my budget, and I love the color, but I don’t think I can get my fat ass into it.  And even if I could, how would this sciatic, crippled old man ever get out?  So moving on…..

Husband and I are going at it fast and furious, shopping.  We began with the search for a Hybrid.  (green planet and all, save the trees, don’t eat the tuna, gas at 4 bucks a gallon, etc.)

Turns out, it doesn’t pay for us.  We don’t drive enough.  So I looked in the newspaper for specials and found out one amazing thing.  CAR DEALERS ARE LIARS!!   Did you know that?  You see ads like:

$99/month lease, zero down, sign and drive, (fine print…..price good for first 6 months, remaining 30 at $299/month.)  WTF?  or,

$99/month lease, 36 months.  (fine print…..$4,999 due at inception).  or my favorite,

$99/month lease, no security deposit, no payment for 6 months. (Fine print…..must have 780 credit score, must be a recent college graduate, must be a veteran, must have lost a limb in a recent war, must be married with at least 1 child, and must be employed for twice what you’re worth.)  Or something like that, which NOBODY is.  But damn, it’s a great deal if you can get it.

So, hybrids being out, we moved on to good mileage vehicles in our price range.  Here’s the Veloster by Hyundai.  We liked the look:  

Not a Consumer Reports best choice.  Crappy reviews.  Also, it doesn’t lease well.  Alas.

Moving on we found this:  

I know.  Isn’t this just spiffy?  A little over our range, but hey, I’m 62.  How many more cars will I buy before the grim reaper comes to get me?  (Or before my loved ones take away the keys and say things like, ok old-timer, it’s time for you to stop driving.  Come have some warm milk.)  So I’m thinking, let’s have some gusto.  Did i mention that this is a little sporty?  And that it rides low?  And that Mr. Bum Hip doesn’t have a hot dog’s chance at a baseball game of surviving the getting in and getting out process?

Back to the drawing board.

How about, we wondered, a truck?   No, not a Ford F-150  (Honestly, can you picture me in such a butch vehicle?  My friends would giggle).  Rather, an SUV.  I’ve never had one.  The nice part is you don’t get in by lowering yourself, but more by sliding your ass onto a cheek-level seat, thereby easing back and ass issues.    This might work.  

I can definitely picture me in this beauty.  Not the best mileage, but hey, we don’t drive that much.  Or this one:  

Yep, we’re definitely closing in.

A word about the salesmen….

When you pull up to the dealership, they’re standing outside, in the driving rain, with no umbrella, circling like buzzards, waiting for your car door to open, so they can approach you with a wet shirt and a phony smile and say, Welcome to Abbruzzo Toyota, how’s your day going?  (At which point  you’d like to answer, fine, until just this minute.)

Confession:  At the third dealership, husband and I sat in the car a few minutes discussing strategy while the buzzards got really soaked.  I took a bit of schadenfreude watching them wilt.  It’s not really my fault.  What were they doing in the rain waiting to accost me?  They could have waited inside.  I was just trying to make them better salespeople.

The haggling game is the really ugly part, but I have a bit of an advantage.

1)  I’m poor, so they can’t make me go over our budget.  (I know, that sounds like a weakness.  Depends on how you play it.)

2)  I’m 62, and closing in my 10th car.  The expression, that offer is only good for today, doesn’t work with me.   Somehow, I know they’ll need to sell cars tomorrow too.  Also, the phrase, take it home with you and see if you like it has no effect on me.

3)  I have learned the art of negotiating and then saying thank you, and leaving, despite wet salespeople throwing themselves in front of my car.  I know they’ll call me with a better offer in two hours.

It goes on, but you get the idea.

So we wheeled and dealed, (or is it wheeled and dealt?), and came up with a great lease on a beauty.  The truck won out.   It’s a Toyota Rav 4 and getting in and out is a breeze.
Isn’t it cute?  Although now we have become those people that I used to hate because when you’re parked next to them, you can’t see past their huge vehicle to back out.   Oh well, I say, just deal with it people.  And suddenly I feel so southern:  

Daddy’s got a new truck!

the world has changed.  and i don’t mean, since i was a wee one, (although it has).  i mean since i was a pot-smokin’ hippie.  in my day, (ah, that fateful expression, designating someone who is certainly no longer young…..young people don’t ever say, in my day).  but, in my day, back in the late 60′s through the early 80′s, when you needed to get stoned, you fired up a doobie.   when you ran out, you called your dealer and scored.  (you know this is authentic, because i’m displaying a complete mastery of the stoner’s lingo.)   while i was in college, my dealer was a nice clean cut jewish kid from the suburbs, say…..scarsdale or forest hills, and  he looked something like this,  he lived on campus and was pre-med.  (kind of ironic that someday he’d be prescribing drugs, legally).  and you met, you copped a lid and all was right with the world.  flash forward many years, and the entire experience has changed.  sit.  let’s discuss.

in the later years, when the masses realized that there’s huge money to be made, the nice boys were pushed out of the business and the riff-raff moved in, and the dealers took on a whole new look, like this guy:

or this guy:  

starting to get scary right?  these are not nice jewish boys studying medicine any more.

needless to say, hollywood capitalized on the whole new movement and gave us caricatures of real-life thugs:  say hello to my little friend…..

anyway, back to the story.

there was an article on the news the other night about a pot dealer in the rural south, named darlene mayes.  she was busted for dealing in four states.  turns out, she’s the godmother of the entire marijuana industry in oklahoma, kansas, missouri and arkansas.  they found $276,000 in her house in small bills.  bundles of $15,000 all over the house.  not really so bizarre, you might think.  all drug dealers have wads of cash around.  oh.  did i mention she’s 73?  (clutch the pearls).  she’s somebody’s grandmother.  can you imagine?  here she is.  it’s a mug shot.  she might be better looking than this, but really, at 73?  how hot could she be?  take a look:

the story went on to say that it’s not that uncommon anymore for senior citizens to be involved in the drug business.  they’re quiet, they keep to themselves, don’t talk to many people and are not flashy with the money.  the guy from the DEA said it’s an epidemic.  there’s the case of francis cook,  a pot dealer in england, who was busted with 200 plants and hauled off to the tower of london, (i’m guessing here).  he is england’s oldest drug dealer.  he is 83.  wtf?

or the case of frances torres, 67, peddling drugs to minors in cleveland,

and using her grandson as the in-school contact:

boy, talk about a stoner.  (it’s nice though, that the authorities dressed them in matching jumpsuits.  that way, the others in the slammer know they’re kin).

all of this makes me think about my grandmother.  my nice bubbe.  you know, the kosher one, from the shtetl in lithuania?  i’m trying to imagine her doing high finance with thugs, weighing out bags of pot, or little nickels of cocaine and passing them gingerly,

in a school yard.  or even worse, having people come to the house while she was making chicken soup and matzoh balls.  my grandma?  think about it:  she finishes making the chopped liver for friday night shabbos dinner, opens the fridge to put it in, and pulls out a kilo of pot because mr. z and the crips are waiting on the porch.  and i can just hear her saying:  checks?  i should take a check?  from a drug dealer?  what are you, meshuga?  cash, mister, or no deal!  

you see, my bubbe was a tough bird.  she was a no-nonsense woman, from the old country, who spent a lot of time getting kicked around by cossacks.  by the time she got to this country, i’m thinking she could have gone ten rounds with jake lamotta.  she took no shit from anyone, which is a good thing, but mostly doesn’t make for a loving grandma/grandson experience.  just sayin’.  (truth be told, i never saw her with a dirty harry weapon in her hand, but i wasn’t with her all time, if you know what i mean.  but i can picture it. ) 

i don’t know.  what has the world come to?   gam-gam is a drug dealer.  (personally, i’ve never called my grandmother gam-gam, but i know people who did.  mostly goyim).   what can i say?  it’s a cold world out there.  although i must admit, that if i needed to cop a lid, (for the uninitiated, that’s drug parlance for purchase an ounce of pot,)  i’d rather deal with gammy, than with vinnie “the knuckles”  zambino.

at least gammy’s ounce comes with a knish and a dr. brown’s cel-ray tonic.

has it really been 15 years since james cameron’s titanic was released?  really?  you know it was nominated for 14 academy awards and won 11, tying ben hur for the most?  you did know that, right?  truth is, it didn’t win a lot of important ones, other than best picture and director.  but no actor/actress/supporting anything.  it won lots of music and special effects and sound engineering (what the hell is that, anyway?) and editing (good visual on a sinking ship?) and costumes.    and now, it turns out, honoring the 15th anniversary of the second highest grossing film of all time, (avatar being the highest, by the same director, i might add), and the 100th anniversary of the sinking of same ship, it has been released in a 3-d version in theaters, and also in giant blind–your-eyes 3-d at the imax theater, for those of you that really want to go down with the ship.

now, i have a confession to make.  i’d never seen it.  (clutch the pearls).

how, you might ask, have i not?  well, to be honest, when it was released, i thought to myself, (and i imagine you did too), i know how it ends, so i really don’t need to see it.  i know, not the best answer, but believe it or not, i, and from what i understand, three other people on earth, missed it.  (i’m guessing everyone else has seen it, based on $1.8 billion dollars at the box office.)  and then the years passed, and the furor died down, (the song, however did not), and people kindof forgot about it, and so did i.

flash forward fifteen years.

so now they’re re-releasing it and i decided that i really ought to see it once, at least to relieve the feeling of the cheese stands alone, to which i am prone.  so a queue-up on netflix and voila, the film is mine.

did you know that this film is over three-and-a-half hours?  mon dieu!  that’s really a commitment, so i serialized it and watched it in sections.  part one, the love story begins, up to, but not including the iceberg, (pause for a day) and then, part two, the action story, the sinking ship. (there are some who will decry this practice as killing the pace of the movie, by stopping, but, (remember the premise), i’m old, so every now and then i need to make water, as the saying goes, so it’s better for me as a miniseries, if you take my meaning.   so now i’ve seen it.  not in 3-d mind you, (completely unnecessary) as actually, the only moving part of the whole movie was the water, and big woo.  it’s water.  it’s not pandorans swooping off cliffs, taming their direhorses performing immense roller-coaster thrills, or the giant tree of life, the hometree, eywa, falling on an alien civilization.  it’s just water flooding corridors.  personally i didn’t think i needed to spend $28 for husband and i, for that.

so blu-ray at home was fine for me, thank you very much.

you might ask, how did one of the four remaining people on planet earth, that hadn’t seen it, like it?  i can answer that truthfully now.

it was good.  no, let me amend that.  it was fucking amazing.  what a beautiful movie.  (i know you’ve seen it so bear with me).  here we go:

the beauty, the scope of it and the visual splendor boggled the mind.  the acting, however, was a little wooden.  leonardo dicaprio as jack, was enthusiastic and young and did ok.  kate winslet as rose, carried a quality that was perfect and lovely.  see earlier note about winning prizes for costumes.  take a look:

(you know i have this same outfit, but i can’t wear it anymore as i’ve put on a few pounds).

rose is  from the aristocracy.  she has lines like put the degas in the bedroom.  jack is a poor vagabond artist.  he has lines like, is that a degas?  is that a picasso?   (name-dropper) can i paint you naked?  he also has the following line:  i didn’t do this, rose.  you know i didn’t.  i didn’t do it.  (sad, but true.  who writes this stuff?)  but they meet and fall in love while aboard.  i might add, not before he teaches her to spit.  apparently, this is a skill that is overlooked and not taught at miss muff’s academy for girls, where rose took her education.  she not only learns to spit over the side of the ship like a drunken sailor, but masters the art of hocking a ginder in the back of her throat, forming the subsequent phlegm into a projectile. (too much information?)  she actually gets to use this new-learned skill in her final scene with her fiance, where she completely wets his face and tux with a huge clam from deep in her throat.  well, i found that part utterly charming.  (but then i’m from jersey city, …..we used to have contests in the schoolyard…..but that’s a story for another day.)

i only wish they’d had some dialogue that was not cornball crap.  seriously, the spoken word might have ruined the film in the hands of a lesser director.  if i heard jack…..rose…..jack…..rose…..jack…..rose…..one more time i think i might have jumped ship.   but because of the pace, the sets, the costumes, the story, the music, the cinematography, and the magnitude of the actual ship,the movie was magic.  not even billy zane, as rose’s fiance`, with his hystrionics and flailing nostrils (from the ali mcgraw school of acting) could sink this movie.  nice hairpiece no?  don’t believe me?  google him.  bald as a baby.  a bald baby, that is.the action was truly breathtaking.  i found myself holding my breath at times, when they were underwater trying to escape certain doom.   (i understand there’s an online cult that holds contests to see if you can hold your breath as long as jack and rose in that one swim sequence.  i’m not sure what the winner gets.)

(and of course, spoiler alert, the ship, indeed, does sink and most of the passengers die.)  

the final scenes where rose is afloat and jack dies while holding her in the freezing north atlantic, i must say, brought a tear to  mine own cynical eyes as i watched true love freeze to death.  (kindof as it does in most marriages).  but then gloria stuart, you know, rose, but like a million years later, the old lady, throws the blue diamond into the sea, and croaks instantly (and who wouldn’t, having cast a gem that cost millions to a watery grave?)  she was nominated for an award but i thought they made too big a deal out of her performance.  she was ok, but i think the hoopla was about the fact that she was 87 more than anything else.  she was a real glamour puss in the 20′s (yes, almost 100 years ago), and worked with james whale (the director of the original frankenstein) in early horror.  the fact that she endured for 70 years in show business made people nuts.  but for me, she was just ok.  give me jessica tandy or ruth gordon on a good day, anytime.  anyway, in the film, moments later, her soul is transformed and is back on the ship, climbing the stairs in the dining room, 
 with all of that glorious white linen and her handsome love at the top of the stairs.  (cue the tears).

well, to be honest, i was a tad verklempt.  there was indeed moisture descending down my cheeks.  folks, this is an amazing movie.  sorry it took me fifteen years to see it, but now that i have, it’s another classic love story to embrace, right up there with casablanca and gone with the wind.  and my heart will go on and on.  (if only i didn’t ever have to hear that song again.)

tonight’s feature is about a practice which has been troubling me for a long time.  perhaps since i was a wee one.  it’s about nicknames.

as you all know, my name is david.  i’ve always been david.  never dave.  not sure why.   over the years brother has called me dave, but not parents or sister or other relatives.  not sure why about that either.  he calls me dave but refers to me as david.  he’ll say, hey dave, pass the lasagna, but then follow with, geez i simply asked david for the lasagna and i got attitude.  strange.  but this is  not about me, but rather the bizarre habit of the world-at-large changing one’s given name to something either close, or entirely different.  sit.  let’s discuss.

at first, i thought the concept of nicknames was the same as initials for certain words.  like WMD is short for weapons of mass destruction.  if you say WMD, which is five syllables,  as opposed to the long version, it saves you two entire syllables of speech.  how economical.  practically cuts  your talking time in half. (where’s the sarcasm font?)   now i can see writing WMD instead of the other because it’s a huge difference, but speaking it?  not so much.  same with PTSD.  four letters.  easier to type than post-traumatic-stress disorder.  i get that concept.  so i always figured nicknames were a shorter version of your real name.  until i gave it some thought.

let’s start with a couple of simple ones:

michael becomes mike.  two syllables versus one.  ok.  i’ll buy it.  but when michael becomes mikey, WTF?  what does that get you?  you’ve simply changed the man’s name.  not only that, you’ve infant-isized him.  (i needed a word, ok?).  i just don’t get it.

does this look like a "mike" to you?

how about john?  why, in the wide-wide-world-of-sports does john become jack?  WTF?  same amount of letters, syllables, breath.  why would people change it?  and how about johnny?  that’s longer, you dolts.  i’m thinking if his mother wanted him to be jack, then by god she would have named him so.  don’t get it.

jack lennon? i think not.

why is margaret changed to peggy?  or maggie.  not even close in nature or scope.  although sometimes there really is a maggie.

no margaret here. just maggie smith.

scott becomes scotty.  scotty is longer.  why change it?   (i wonder if that happened before or after the whole scottish terrier issue, which is also a puzzlement.  people buy that breed and refer to it as a scotty.   suppose a guy had a scottish terrier and he named it scott.  would the dog then be scotty the scotty?).

scotty the scotty.

hey, listen up.  i warned you a couple of years back i was a sick fuck.

penelope?  ooh, can’t handle that.  way too long.  let’s change her name to a coin.

call her penny, i dare you.

robert.  oy.  among the worst offenders.  why can’t you just be named robert anymore?  no, you have to be rob, or bob, or bobby, or robbie.  the very idea.

bob? bob pattinson? i don't think so.

then there’s any girl on earth whose first name begins with a d.  diana, darla, denise, dora, etc.  many of them are reduced to dee or even worse, dee dee.  

there’s another whole subset of people that insist on changing your name if your hair is a certain color.  have  you ever noticed that a lot of redheads are often called red?  like red buttons?  or red barber?  (red barber’s first name was walter, for cryin’ out loud).  or worse, they’re nicknamed rusty?  i think tin man’s (wizard of oz) nickname should be rusty.  when dorothy first meets him, he is actually rusty!  and especially because he doesn’t t have a first name to begin with?   and he wasn’t even a redhead.  i swear, i think people are just not paying attention.

she will not answer to "rusty", i assure you.

what about poor elizabeth.  a lovely given name.  no, let’s make it liz.  or beth.  or lizbeth.  or lizzy.  (did you know that elizabeth taylor hated being called liz?)

forever "elizabeth"

a couple more egregious ones:

alexander.  let’s just call him, al.  or alex.  or alec.  or xander.

albert:  mmm, al, bert, bertie ( that last one was from the king’s speech).

archibald.  let’s go with arch.  or archie.

you do realize i’m still in the letter a?   i could go on but i think you get it by now.

i don’t know.  i’m not in favor of it.   i think people should be left with the names they’ve been given.  if they don’ t like their own moniker then they should change it themselves.

husband just yelled from the next room:  dave, what are you doing?

oy.  gotta go.

interesting day today.

as you all know all too well by now, (what?  you all know all?  might as well have said “as all y’all know”.  that southern thang.   sorry about that.)   but as you do all know, the sciatica is a part of me now, like a bad tooth.  (difference being i’d have pulled the tooth three months ago, whereas i can’t do much about this “hip thing”).  so i’m limited in some of my activity.  as previously mentioned, i can’t stand still for more than a minute without the sensation of a hot knife in my thigh.  i can walk short distances but it helps if i sit for a minute every hundred yards or so.  and i can lie down without pain.  (woohoo).  and i can sit…..in a comfortable chair, with no discomfort.

however, this past week, a road trip was upon us.  husband and his cousins wanted to drive to punta gorda to visit some other cousins in town for the winter. (you remember punta gorda don’t you?  slammed by hurricane charlie in 2004?)  i suspect they’ve  rebuilt and i’d love to see it, and loving husband as i do, and totally grateful that he accepts my extended family, with their various and sundry levels of insanity and issues, (hey, i never said i was exempt…..we’re cut from the same cloth.  i’m nuts as well),  i said,  count me in.  i’d love to meet your cousins.  but with this sciatica thing, the prospect of two-and-a-half hours getting there and ditto to get home, i feared the worst for my hip, being confined that long.  so i took a pass and opted to stay home.  husband was saddened but understood.  and it seems i missed quite the party.  sit.  let’s discuss.

he left at around 8:30am in the suv with his local cousins, arrived 3 hours later and spent a lovely afternoon with his cousin.  upon returning home, he said that i’d really have liked her.  she’s 70ish, bright, and charming.  i’m certain that i would have, indeed.

however.

as we sat and chatted over cocktails tonight, he informed me that he was actually glad i didn’t go with.  puzzled, i asked why?  the conversation went something like this:

him:  babe, i’m glad you didn’t come today.

me:  why?

him:  well, it turns out that rosie is as great as i remember her from our childhood.

me:  so?

him:  well…..she has this husband.  he’s older than we are.  like 76.

me:  so?  we’ll be that age someday, with any luck.  i like old people.

him:  um…..as it turns out, he’s not a big lover of gay men.  so i felt a little uneasy.

me:  hey, we’re savvy adults.  we can handle that.

him:  well…..not just that.

me:  what?  what aren’t you telling me?

him:  he uses the expression “fucking jews” a lot.

me:  WHAT?  (clutch the pearls).

him:  yeah.  turns out, he hates jews.  he’s a huge anti-semite.  something about “banking, horns, drinking baby’s blood, killing christ and cheap miserly bastards, damned for all time by the almighty jesus.”  

me:  you’ve got to be kidding.

him:  no.  have i mentioned he also hates blacks?   i can’t repeat it but the n-word came up a lot, especially in relation to the President.

me:  jesus h. tap-dancing christ.

him:  no, actually he kind of likes jesus.

me:  well, i’m guessing that the jesus i know would not like him very much.

him:  probably not.

me:  so what did you do?  did you react?  give him a severe tongue-lashing?  flash the bird?  bitch-slap?

him:  well, it must have been a divine intervention, because about twenty minutes after we arrived, i had an allergic reaction of some kind and my throat closed up and i got a bit of laryngitis and mostly just listened and whispered with rosie, while he expounded about how “obama and his jew cabinet were all communists and way too tolerant of all them queers, and needed to be taught a lesson.”

me:  well, i can only say it’s a very good thing i didn’t go.  this jew homey don’t git laryngitis.  elderly or not, i would have whooped that old racist, bigoted man’s butt.  

him:  yeah, had i been in my own car, i would have decked him and stormed out.  could have given him a reason to hate “italian cousins” as well.

me:  you’re my hero.  

him:  poor rosie.  married to that.  well,  i haven’t seen her for 22 years, and i suspect 22 years from now, one or both of us will be dead,  having hopefully outlived the anti-semitic , racist asshole.

me:  want me to drive to punta gorda and push him in the pool?   i will.    i could fix it so he’d end up on unsolved mysteries.  no-one need ever know what  happened to him.  i’m not from jersey city for nuthin’, ya know.

him:  naw, i wouldn’t.  

me:  so he has NO idea that jesus was a jew?

him:  guess nobody’s ever told him. 

me:  well, do you have  his email?  i’d like to fill him in.

him:  LOL.  let it go. 

me:  ok.  sorry/glad i missed it.  

have i mentioned how wonderful the sciatica can be?

where was i?  oh yeah, sciatica.

i know…..boring.  aren’t you tired of it?  i know i am.  next week will be four months of hopeless, helpless cripple with no relief in sight.  alas.  after rounds of pain medication, stretching, chiropractic, exercise, physical therapy and finally cortisone injections in my ass i am out of options.  the only thought left to me is that maybe it’s not sciatica but something else.  so i finally succumbed, and  at the tender age of 61, (well, actually, 62 this week…..happy birthday to me)…..i went for an MRI.  have you had one?  oh my, this is a story to be told.  sit.  let’s discuss.

after jumping through the hoops, (you know, doctor’s prescription, referral, insurance company clearance, pick a place, make an appointment and show up) it went something like this:

it begins with a few quick questions;  any metal in your pockets?  any jewelry made of metal?  piercings i can’t see?  shrapnel in your body?   (i’m thinking if i had shrapnel in my body, it’s no wonder i hurt) and after clearance, they give you earplugs and you lie on a gurney-like  stretcher and they slide you into this cocoon-like machine.  they tell me that if you’re claustrophobic, that you’d have difficult time of it, but i’m not, so i wouldn’t know.

it’s an imposing piece of equipment.  take a look :

so my tech guy puts a squeeze-toy in my hand and instructs me to indicate if i’m in trouble of any kind as he slides me in.  now, it’s tight in there, but i’m guessing that a coffin is probably tighter.  (i could be wrong, never having actually been in a coffin), but it’s really not so bad that one needs to freak out.  

this looks way  more comfy than the machine.   btw, i had NO pillow.  harrumph!

and then it begins:

there’s a kind of creaking noise you hear like an old water pump priming itself, which is no big deal.  then suddenly, rather loudly it sounds like a cruise ship leaving the harbor…..WAH….WAH….WAH…WAH…WAH…etc for a minute or so.  it’s kind of loud.  then a minute later the jackhammer starts:  rat..tat..tat..tat..tat..tat..tat..tat..tat..tat..tat..tat….etc.  oy.  some very serious noise. but certainly bearable.  no motion,  just a lot of noise.  no pain, no touching, nada.  noise.

for me, what was unbearable was that in that position, my leg was killing me, and you’re not supposed to move.  i thought if i could shift a little i could relieve the pain, but i tried not to. then my nose itched.  which is funny, because even if you wanted to, you couldn’t raise your hand to your face to scratch it.  it’s tight in there.  i thought if i closed my eyes i might actually nod off, with the rhythmic pounding serving as my white noise.  but the leg…..the goddamn leg…..

so i opened my eyes and tried to distract myself for the twenty minutes by looking around the tube.  right off, i saw a black speck just above my eyes.  at first i though it might be a bug.  you know, a tiny insect.  and of course my mind went wild.

i began to think that they’d slide me out of that teleportation pod,…..i mean, tube….. and the bug and i would become one, the brundle fly.  (from that movie?  the fly?)  and that we’d swap body parts and i’d get his head and he’s get my hands and i might be stuck with a really tiny fly penis and that would be depressing.  imagine me trying to kiss husband goodnight like this:

or that soon i’d sprout thick hair on my back and have a craving for refined sugar?  and then i realized i already have thick hair on my back and my middle name is krispy kreme, so what am i worried about?  no, none of that happened.  just a lovely twenty minutes in a noisy tube.  (god i’m such a psycho sometimes.)

i should add here that they found nothing.  at least nothing they could blame for my pain.  alas.  oh well, all  things considered, it was not really a bad experience at all.  i can readily endorse having one, should you need it.  but a word to the wise:  be sure to tell the techie the truth, because there was that one story about the woman with the big knockers and the nipple ring, and the electro-magnetic force grabbed it and it took them a week to get her out.  but don’t let that scare you.

just sayin’…..

i’ve discussed in earlier pieces that i don’t exactly wear the jock-strap of the family.   it’s true.  i throw like a girl.  and i don’t mean a softball-playing lesbian either.  i mean a 10-year old girl.  and my least favorite sport in high school had to be basketball, being all of a 5’6″ budding homo, as a freshman.  so it’s  no surprise to learn that we don’t attend a lot of sporting events.  well, truth be told i watch the olympic mens’ gymnastics every four years or so, but that’s pretty much about the beautiful bodies on those boys and not so much about parallel bars or rings.     no big surprise there either.  (seriously the biceps and asses on those young men make me puddle…..right on the spot.)   so it was a tad unusual tonight when husband and i found ourselves at a miami heat game.  i know, clutch the pearls.  how?  why?, you might ask.  sit.  let’s discuss.

i have a new neighbor living next door and he’s a really nice guy.  he’s obviously successful and happy to be in this neighborhood with such fine upstanding neighbors such as husband and me.  (ok, i’m surmising a bit here).  but a couple of weeks ago, he stopped me outside and we had a conversation:

tom:  hi dave,  how’s it goin’?

me:  great tom, yourself?

tom:  can’t complain.  tell me dave, do you like basketball?

me:  not really.  it’s too much like sports for my taste.

tom:  very funny.  ever been to a game?

me:  naw.  if there aren’t fat ladies singing, count me out.  why?

tom:  i have these tickets a friend gave me for march 6th.  take them, please.  as my guest.

now, i’ve never been, but with free tickets, i might be game for a game.  (to turn a phrase) free is good.

so tonight, husband and i had an adventure.

we arrived early, because i don’t generally do stadium stuff, and anywhere there is the possibility of 30,000 fans, i anticipate traffic that could cause you chest pains, and i was right.  

we arrived and made our way inside and were directed to our seats, which just happened to be courtside tickets.  see below:

we were right behind these guys.  pretty awesome seats, no?

the pre-game free throw began and there were a lot of tall men on the court tossing around what seemed like 100 basketballs;  bank shots, lay-ups, 3-pointers, blind shots, dunks, (boy, for a non-sports type sissy, i’m pretty good with the lingo, no?).    and we were literally in the middle of it.  the opposing coach and his staff were right in front of us.  at one point, a player got knocked down on the court and the posse ran out to help;  a towel guy, a heat-pack guy, a broom guy mopping up sweat puddles (yeah, i know, real attractive  job.  i wonder how much it pays?).  by the way, while he was down, the heat girl dancers came out to entertain.  they were a bunch of fabulous women who mostly looked like this:  (i wonder what you have to do to get this  job).  see below.

when we first arrived the crowd was minimal and i wondered aloud to husband, why do they need such a big arena if nobody comes?  just before kickoff, tip-off, knock-off, whatever, the crowd swelled and looked something like this.  and remember, we’re sitting on the floor:  it was deafening!  did i mention that i love the smell of testosterone in the evening?

another thing that puzzled me is that the heat was playing the new jersey nets, and yet their tanktop uniforms sported a big NY.  i asked a few people but nobody seemed to know the answer.  the scoreboard said nj nets, but the shirts said ny.  hmmm.  it’s a puzzlement.  feel free to enlighten me in the comment section.

it occurred to me that i really don’t belong at sporting events.  each time the heat scored, the crowd roared at 20 decibels with horns and sirens and pandemonium.  each time the nets scored it was like a library in that cavernous arena.  not a sound!  i felt bad for the other team, which of course is completely unacceptable in sports.  you have a team, you root and scream for them and hate the other team like poison.  (i’m pretty sure that if you look in the dictionary, that’s the official definition of sport).

the other thing i noticed is that it’s expensive.  the tickets (which were a gift) were $150/ea.  parking nearby ranges from $15-$50.  (i know,  how crazy is that?  i mean, even with free tickets!)  then there are souvenir programs, sports junk, (sorry, licensed sports items), etc.  and then there’s food.

the high rollers (or is that a gambling term?), in the seats which cost hundreds, are apparently instant members of the Dewar’s Club.  what that gets you is entree to the box level for dinner, for which you pay $80/pp, which i think is a lot, but hey, i’m neither high nor a roller.  (there it is again, that pesky top 1%), but the food looks something like this:

for the regular folk, there are  hot dogs, clocking in at $9/ea,

a 12-oz draft beer for another $9,  a styrofoam bowl of chili
for a whopping $14, and cocktails beginning at $12 per single, $18 per double.  whew.  tickets, parking, a snack and a drink or two, and it’s $300 per couple per game.  a tad pricey for me.  i’ll stick to the cheap entertainment like a subscription to the opera.  (well, it’s cheap compared to that!!!)

i should mention that there is a downside to those privileged seats.  every time the heat did something exciting, the entire staff on the bench in front of us stood up to cheer/curse/whistle, and our view of the court was entirely blocked.  oh well.

we left early, as it was a rout for the heat, we were really  not that into it, and all i could think of was the traffic getting out.   husband hated the entire affair, but as ever, he was a good egg about the whole thing.  i enjoyed the grand look-see experience.   and yet, as amazing and entertaining  as it was, i don’t see us lining up for season tickets any time soon

although i am considering buying a jockstrap.  i mean, just as a fashion accessory.

i have a confession to make.  i’ve lied to you.

you know how i constantly tell you that i refuse to watch television that doesn’t have a script?  a/k/a reality tv?  the bachelor, and of course, the bachelorette?  survivor?  (survivor samoa, survivor australia, thailand, africa, borneo, ad nauseum), american idol?  top chef?  dancing with the stars?  (which is neither dancing nor stars…..see chaz bono).  well, there is one guilty pleasure.  and i’m here to confess in front of god and man and baby jesus.  i watch judge judy.

ok.  not every day, or all of the time, but i occasionally drop in on the good judge’s program and i must admit, i get a kick out of the proceedings.  sit.  let’s discuss.

i suppose that the first question one might be inclined to ask is why would anybody take their legal issues to a court of public opinion which is actually public?  as in, on tv?  wtf?  have you completely lost your mind?   the world is not only watching, but laughing at your sorry ass.  let me give an example:

the case of the suing sisters.

sister number 1, let’s call her showanda, (not her real name, but extraordinarily close).  you know the type.

is suing sister number 2, loquisha (no, they’re not twins.  perhaps the mother was in vaudeville.  not sure).

so showanda claims that while she was serving time in prison, (crime undisclosed, apparently irrelevant, your honor), loquisha went to her sister’s self-storage cubicle and borrowed her television, broke it, and now refuses to pay for a new one.  so showanda is suing her.   loquisha, in her countersuit, claims that she paid rent to live with her sister, and was not notified that said sister was not paying the rent until 12  hours before she and her sister were evicted, so she wants compensation for rent paid.  these girls are sisters!!   (i swear people, i couldn’t make this stuff up.  except of course, for the names.)

judge judy takes the countersuit first, and, in  her infinite wisdom, ascertains that loquisha lived for 2 months in her sister’s house and paid 2 months rent.  case closed.  she paid, she lived.  showanda owes loquisha nada.  el zippo.  needless to say she’s pissed off.

now for the original claim.

the good judge ruled that loquisha has to give the television back, and ordered a marshal of the court (not to be confused with a court-martial….i know, this legal crap gets tricky), to accompany loquisha to her domicile to see that she returns it.   now showanda is screaming, “but it’s broken, your honor”, but judge judy, quite frankly, dealing with literally the detritus of humanity, has had enough, and utters, i don’t care.   judgement for the plaintiff, counter-suit dismissed.   good-bye.  (gotta love her.  she knows when it’s over).

ok, deride me for watching, but this stuff is delicious.  it makes my life seem so much  nicer than it actually is.  i can’t even begin to think of anyone i need to sue, much less for a broken television.

the show goes on and on with such cases, each one better than the last, and when they break for a commercial, what do you suppose it’s for?  hemorrhoid cream?  deodorant?  the new chevy cruze?  no, my friends.  it’s for slip and fall attorneys.  the law offices of schwartz and catalano.  (not their real names.  are you crazy?  they’ll sue me!)   so it’s  dial 1-800 get-money.    i swear!   i guess they figure if you’re watching  judge judy, at 4pm in the afternoon, that:

a) you’re out of work.

b) there is a remote possibility that you need money.  (being out of work)

c) yet another remote possibility that you’re out of work because of an injury.  hence:

1-800 get-money.  (to tell the truth, while watching, i got caught up in the moment and gave serious consideration to suing someone.  they make it look so easy.  just call the attorneys and they claim that i might be entitled to $10,000 for lost wages, and they give you money.   but then i think,  hmmm…..if i run up against judge judy in my lawsuit, i’m likely to piss her off.   and that’s never a pretty option.  case dismissed.

you know how i tend to go on about injustice?  well, not in the political sense, like how mitt romney can spend his way to the nomination for president because  he can afford it?  i care, but i don’t write about it.  or when police personnel commit the same traffic crime as a hairdresser, but somehow go unpunished?  i care about that too, but don’t opine.   but there are certain situations that i think are just not right and need to be exposed to the populace-at-large (or at least all six of my readers).  the first is about weight restrictions on luggage on airplanes.  sit.  let’s discuss.

these days, i happen to think that the airline industry is out of control with their rules and hidden fees.  the whole system is skewed, and not in a good way.  for instance:

i weigh 170 pounds.  (there, i said it.  out loud.  i used to be 155, but that’s a story for another day).    when i fly, and check a bag, i believe the weight limit on my luggage is 50 pounds.  if it’s 51 pounds i get charged extra.  do the math.  my luggage and i, ideally weigh 220 pounds before i get charged extra.  (stay with me people, i think this is going to piss you off as well).   this first picture is not me, but represents my travel style:

now, along comes mr. lard, (you all know him,)  take a look:

really?

he’s the guy that, before take-off, when you’re sitting in your aisle seat,  and the hot guy with the amazing biceps two seats over is in his window seat (and you’re anticipating enjoying that view for the duration, and flirting a little, across that glorious empty seat between you,),

squeezes his way down the narrow aisle and you suddenly get really religious and begin to pray, dear baby jesus, please don’t let this man sit in the middle seat and loathe my space.)  yeah, that guy.  and when jesus doesn’t come through, you’re stuck next to this guy, and the first thing he wants to do is put up the armrest so that he can spill his girth sideways.  and most of the time, we’re polite because we don’t really want to insult people to their faces.  he can’t even put down his tray table without it being tilted, because it’s resting on his belly.   so he sits with his arms folded for three hours, thinking he’s doing you a favor, because he knows he’s big, and he knows he’s sitting on half of your seat, (which is half-again too small for humanity) and we endure.

not right.  but i’ll come back to this part.

the real injustice comes when he checks his bag.

let’s say, for the sake of apples to apples, that his bag, like mine, is exactly 50 pounds.  so, technically he’s within the weight restriction and doesn’t get charged extra.  but if he weighs in at 325 pounds, and his bag is 50 pounds, that’s a whopping (from the english word whopper-with cheese, would you like fries with that?) total of 375 pounds, compared to my 220.  and he doesn’t get charged extra!  wtf?    but if i go one pound over in the luggage, i do.  fair?  i think not.

as bill maher is so fond of saying, there should be a new rule.

there should be a weight limit, say 300 pounds (and a scale at check-in) for you (holding your bag) and if you go over the limit then you’re penalized.    that way, the thinner people can take more stuff

and the t-rex of the species has to take the cheese wheels and cookies out of his luggage and put them in his carry-on

i think that’s fair.  this is really a pet peeve of mine, and i hope the airlines public relations people read this and change the rules.

now, back to mr. lard whose fat rolls are touching your thigh.

i’m thinking, (and i could be wrong…..or just new york style rude), that when he plants his big-ness in the seat next to me, and moves that armrest up, that i should be allowed to say:

not so fast, kemosabe.  that armrest defines my space and i’d like my little tiny area to remain mine, to squander as i please.  if i choose to regale myself in splendor and tilt that seatback to the full, luxurious 5 degree angle to which i’m entitled, so be it.   it ain’t much, but it’s all i’ve got.  you have your space as well.  please confine yourself to it.  so you will put that armrest down or there will be no peanuts for you, babar!

after all, he wasn’t embarrassed about eating utah, why should i be subjected to sitting next to the mormon tabernacle choir?  and if i hurt his feelings, he’ll have to content himself with eating his cheese wheel and cookies without setting them down on his tray table.

i’ve written about various hoaxes over time, so tonight i thought we might revisit last year’s post about that most romantic of days.   it’s a very odd tradition called st. valentine’s day. you all know the story of the origins, so i won’t bore you with the details.   (briefly, a man named  valentinius, (see photo),

(ok, a very fey man), lived back in ancient rome, when young men, possibly soldier material, were forbidden to marry, because single guys were more willing to fight and die for mother rome, than were men with loved ones.  as a kind of chaplain he performed the marriages anyway, against the will of the emperor, and was found out and murdered and became a christian martyr.   you did know all that, right? should i have said spoiler alert?)   anyway, it was such a romantic gesture that it is suspected of being the origin.     but all of that aside, today, in modern times, valentine’s day is a big deal on several levels.

1) single people of the world, who think it’s a load of crap.  i can just hear them seething. let’s just pick a day to make us single guys and gals feel miserable. i’m a happy person all year long, and single by choice, because i want to be, but somehow on valentine’s day i can’t venture out into a restaurant because i’m alone, single, and loving life, but there’s no significant other on my arm and couples will gaze upon my independence and pity me. ME??? spare me your pity.  do i look like i need it?  (see photo)

think about it, people, it’s one day, out of the whole year.   i mean what’s the point? you either love and have someone all year or you don’t. why the fuss over one day? (see, there’s a groundhog thing going on here. one insane day perpetuated by…..if we only knew….).

then there are the couples. they fall into categories as well.

a) new couples. oh geez, everything is romantic to them. (again, photo)

the moon, the stars, a walk on the beach, cupcakes for two, crying together watching lady and the tramp, (ok, the guy’s a dork, but she loves him with his tears.)   for them, valentine’s day is an excuse to do cutesy things, that actually make the rest of us a little nauseous, but if you say that out loud, you’re a curmudgeon, so we smile and kvell a little for young love and all its glory. (i actually do.  deep down, part of me is a sentimental old fluff. and hey, i was young once, a long time ago, in a galaxy far, far,away.)

b) old couples they’ve been together awhile. i’ll get to the gay couples in a minute. let’s talk about straight couples. (wow, could i do a chapter or two about what straight men don’t understand about valentine’s day.  the women will be cheering in a minute.).  women are more romantic than straight men. period.  straight men love manly things; sports, beer, golf, fraternizing with other men, (but not for sex), but including bragging, boasting, talking trash, exaggerating, and general camaraderie.   kind of like grown up college boys.   women are more sensitive, loving, caring, better human beings all round. (i know i betray my own sex, but of course i’m talking here about straight men), and it’s all too true.   so this one day rolls around, and the female half of the equation generally buys into it, that her man ought to show a little emotion or affection by way of a gift. a card. a box of chocolates. a surprise dinner out.  some acknowledgement that he has access to her vagina.  something.   and a lot of guys get it, and they do it. some out of love, some out of fear, some out of  i just don’t want to hear i fucked up, but they do, god love ‘em.  some don’t. no punani for them on the 14th.

c) the gays.   my people.  we get it.   we know romantic love better than ennis del mar and jack twist (brokeback mountain, for you beginners). and it’s the same with us. some guys go all out.  we  have one couple that we love and the two of them are so romantic. they do the nice restaurant thing, and sometimes jewelry.  ah romance.   it’s nice.   and i love them for that.  they told me today, that rather than go out to a crazy overpriced restaurant with poor service because the staff is overworked on a day like today, they bring in chinese food, set it up on the coffee table and sit on the floor in the living room, by the fireplace and have a romantic dinner.  (well, they don’t have a fireplace, it’s florida, ok?)  but they put the dvd of the fireplace on the tv and cozy up and feed each other with chopsticks.  kindof chinese lady and the tramp. (i might have made that last part up.)  but they’re true role models for romance in the gay world.

d) the non-romantic gays.  to them, it’s a night where, as a couple, there are specials and deals at happy hour on drinks, or they cash in on valentine’s day special dinners around town, because they are a couple.  but it’s a little like a free meal at denny’s on your birthday.  just not packed with a lot of emotion or love.  (see photo below).

as for me, husband and i are good.  we have love every day. don’t need a dinner out or jewelry. (thank god, because quite frankly, i can’t afford diamonds).  we know we’re in for the long run, and that’s enough.  i love him, he loves me, and that’s the way it’s supposed to be.  (catchy song lyric, no?)   so, in conclusion, who’s perpetuating the st. valentine’s event these days?  hallmark?  godiva?  ftd?  madison avenue?  best buy?  (i actually saw a commercial that said,  buy your honey a kindle.  talk about romance!)   i’m not sure who’s behind it, but i do know, as sure as  punxatawnie phil is going to poke his little head out next year, and the huddled masses will pay heed to that tomfoolery, that there will be some cards, roses and candy circling the globe on the 14th.  so the truth is, this one’s as big a hoax as any of them. the difference is, that by the end of the day, there will be a lot of couples smooching, happy, getting laid, and renewed in their love and relationships, all for the price of a box of chocolates.   not a bad deal, when you think about it.

something a little different tonight.

let me begin with,  i like brad pitt.  a river runs through it, legends of the fall, se7en, thelma and louise.   i like him a lot.

husband and i just watched a movie.  it was an older movie, circa 1989.  (i know what you’re thinking;  gone with the wind is an older movie, or wuthering heights), but this was relatively older and i’ll tell you what i mean.  it was an early brad pitt movie, from the very beginning of his career.  unlike say, jake gyllenhaal, who started as a kid in city slickers when he was like 10, brad was 24 in his first film in 1987.  he made a dozen or so appearances between 1987  and 1989.  his early credits include man with drink on beach, preppie guy in fight, and 4 episodes of dallas.  he was twenty-six when he made this film, and was essentially, the lead.  he plays a high school senior, and his boyish cuteness carried the look of an eighteen-year-old.   have i mentioned that the film was a huge slice of dreck?  (that’s yiddish for stuff that comes out of your butthole).  sit, let’s discuss.

husband and i watch a lot of movies and i have seen my fair share of crap in my movie-going career.  this movie was a dung-heap.  brad wasn’t alone.    roddy mcdowell was in it as well.  (he must have needed a mortgage payment or something.)  geez, to go from lassie come home with elizabeth taylor in the 40s and the iconic planet of the apes series, to playing a very fey high school principal with a penchant for staring at young girls panties, alternating with dressing in drag on the school stage while alone.   so sad.  martin mull was also in it as comic relief.  he spent the entire movie with an arrow in his chest traipsing across california trying to get help.  have i mentioned it was dreck?  i believe i did.

so it’s this slasher movie, a la halloween, friday the 13th, et al, but with no budget.  it was pitiful.  there was one car in the whole movie (about seniors in high school).  one freakin’ car!   and i’m pretty sure they used a can of dutch-boy red vermillion paint for the blood.  there was also a deranged janitor chasing co-eds with a string mop, through the hallowed halls of what looked like bakersfield high school, a vice-principal who resembled the wicked witch of the west, and an overweight gym teacher who meets his demise on a trampoline.  dreck.

i know what you’re thinking;  why didn’t we turn it off after twenty minutes?  dunno.  it was like an accident on the  highway;  you can’t look at it, but you can’t look away.  i sat for the first forty minutes in utter shock that brad pitt would do this until it finally dawned on me.  he wasn’t brad pitt yet.

here he was, this young good looking guy, trying to make a career of it, and he needed face-time.  he needed producers, directors, (especially casting directors) to see him work.  he also needed to learn his craft, how movies are made, how actors behave on the set, to hone his professionalism, and in general how the business works.  (he’d take away a lot more, later, when he worked with the likes of robert redford, anthony hopkins, frances mcdormand, julia roberts and others.  but when you’re young and aspriring, it’s about the exposure.  take a look.  what a cutie…..

 at the end, husband said, i’m amazed he hasn’t bought up every copy on earth and burned them.   but i say he needn’t.  he was just an aspiring player learning a trade.  nothing for which to be ashamed.  (except that it was dreck.)    the imdb database and netflix archives are filled with early outings from some of today’s major stars.  and a lot of that includes appearances in sitcoms, soaps, kojaks, etc.

i might add here, that the other night we watched a national lampoon film called van wilder, starring a very young (college age) ryan reynolds, before he was ryan reynolds.

that one was actually very good (as national lampoon almost always is), and ryan showed hints of what he’d later become.  so in a sense, we like our faves’ early stuff and watch films of this ilk, often.   (it’s just usually not dreck of this magnitude.)

so even though poor brad was straddled with no screenplay, no budget, no director and no respectable co-stars (other that the two aforementioned bit players, i think he did ok.   and remember that his current wife, angelina, did 14 films before gia, her breakout performance.   if i ever get to meet him, i probably won’t bring up any of this.   i’ll just talk about tree of life.  (between you and me, also dreck).

that’s a funny title, i know, but you’ll understand why, shortly.   i’ve mentioned before, many times, that by professional standards, i’m no athlete.  (actually, by fifth grade schoolgirl standards i’m not an athlete either), so you won’t often find me either engaged in sporting activities or watching them.  but upon occasion, i do frequent a local sports bar/restaurant with over 100 tv screens and more sports happening than you can imagine.  (what’s that line from the movie apocalypse now?  i love the smell of testosterone in the morning.  or is it napalm?  i forget.)  either way, there are a lot of guys in there each time we go.   i have a bone to pick with the decor of this place.  not the multitudinous abundance of television sets, but rather the men’s room.  sit.  let’s discuss.

in this restaurant, the ribs are sublime, the beer is ice-cold and there are usually a lot of hot guys making manly, grunting sounds (especially when their team scores).  personally, i like that more than the actual sport itself.

eventually, it comes time to use the facilities, and here’s how it goes:

i’ll enter the men’s room, step up to a urinal, unzip my pants and proceed to do my business.  as i stand there, glancing up, my eyes espy (in addition to yet another television), a series of pictures on the wall.  here is the first one:

now, i’m as red-blooded as the next guy, and i can certainly appreciate that this girl has a certain quality about her.  i can’t quite put my finger on it, (not that she’d let me put my finger on it), but she certainly deserves to be on that cover.  glancing about i see this one as well:

and yet another, and i see a pattern emerging here.  lots of healthy women:

and one more:

ok, this last one is a little slutty.  i don’t think she’s a sports illustrated gal.  seriously, who dresses like that to drive a cab?

so here’s what i’m thinking.  a straight guy walks into a men’s room to do what the beer is calling him to do.  he is standing with his pants open and his manhood in his hand and is glancing around the room looking at these fine-looking, scantily-clad women.  there is at least a remote possibility that he might get, shall we say, aroused, especially after a couple of brewskies.  how is he supposed to tuck it back into his jeans?   i’m hoping he’s wearing his dolphins or jets jersey NOT tucked in, but rather hanging over his general frontal area.  and what happens if a dad comes in with his little boy to make pee-pees, while mr. el bono is standing there in a state of excitement.  there could be trouble.  just sayin’, is all.

now, here comes the pet peeve and my big question:

what makes the owners of the establishment think that only straight men go in there?  what about me, pokey?

those ladies’ pictures don’t do too much for this gay caballero, and i insist on equal time.  i want to stand in front of that urinal, with my dick in my hand, so to speak, and see this:

see?  i’m an open-minded guy.  i don’t even care what the bathing suit looks like.

or what about this one?

don’t you think that’s the least they can do?  i mean, i’m eating, i’m drinking, i’m tipping just like the hets.  i say give a ‘mo his due.   abercrombie gets it.  the above picture is hanging in the men’s dept of their store.   ok, one more:

ok.  you caught me.  if this one were in there i’d probably piss on my shoes.  it’s a little slutty as well.  but aren’t we entitled to equal time?  at least he’s not pretending he’s a cab driver.

so the next time i’m in the restaurant munching ribs, swilling beer and watching a tight end do, whatever it is a tight end does, i think management owes me.  just sayin’, is all.

yeah, you know the song.  sing it with me.  when the moon hits your eye like a big pizza pie, that’s amore.  when the……go ahead, i’m listening…..so you don’t know the second line?  really?  ok, it goes, when the world seems to shine like you’ve had too much wine….that’s ……well you get it.  why bring this up?  husband and i went for pizza tonight.  now, as you know, i’ve mentioned before that i live on a perpetual diet in mortal fear that someday i’ll end up like mother, who, at her peak, standing 5’2″, weighed in at about  250 lbs.  not pretty.  but every so often, i need to cut loose and be really bad.  and when i do, it’s often pizza that is my nemesis.  sit.  let’s discuss.

you know how there are all kinds of pizza?  and seriously folks, i’m a jersey city boy here, so bullshit pizza doesn’t count.  (or should i say bullshit pizza don’t count, and be true to my roots?)  this domino’s or pizza hut or little caesar‘s crap is not pizza, not matter how many commercials you see, or what it looks like in those very commercials.  it ain’t pizza.  it’s cardboard with cheap cheese product atop, and pepperoni sliced so thin, that you couldn’t give a 14 year-old boy acne.    i tried some store-bought bake-it-at-home-yourself stuff.   that doesn’t cut it either.  it’s tough enough to find great pizza in south florida, but the first thing you have to do is eliminate the pretenders.

so that leaves us with actual  pizza joints, as we used to call them.  back in jersey city, the polite term was pizza parlor, but they were mostly dimly-lit, family style restaurants, with booths whose seats were plastic, and the entire place smelled of oregano. when in search of great pizza, that’s a start.  (also, there were usually gentlemen with slightly bent noses sitting around, here and there, with a glass of beer, speaking in hushed tones.   i’m not sure what they talked about, but i am sure it was better not to know.  there are programs like the sopranos for a reason).  and back then, they were called pizza pies.  not just pizza.  it was a different world, pizza-wise.  there was regular crust or sicilian, which is a thick crust with very light sauce.  mostly a bread-like affair.  there were no thin crispy crust or flatbread types.  there were no coal-fired ovens back then, just regular pizza ovens which, at the time, worked just beautifully.  these days, pizza, like a lot of things, has branched out.  i should also add, back then, most pizza was plain cheese and tomato sauce.  oh, the occasional pepperoni or sausage and mushroom or even onions, but nothing really too tricky.  pineapple and ham?  back then?  in jersey city?  you’d get the shit kicked out of you if  you even tried to order it.   there were mob hits for less.   just saying, is all.

anyway, i digressed.

so, in a mood, we went to our favorite pizza haunt of south florida.  it happens that it’s a coal-fired-oven type pizza with actual flames licking at the pie.  (the cool thing about that style, is that the crust comes out a little singed on the edges which adds a crispiness that’s hard to beat.)  the place is called anthony’s.  we go to the original location, although there are  a dozen of them now.  (he branched out).

and here’s the ritual:

we arrive and put our name on a list because it’s standing room only.  we would really like to circle the room and hover over people that are finishing their pies, and kindof urge them to hurry the fuck up,  but that would be rude, even for south florida.  (in new york, i understand you can still get away with that.)  when they finally call us we don’t need menus.   we always start with the chicken wings, (ok, the large order), which are also cooked in the oven with the coals, as opposed to deep-fried, so they’re only half as deadly to the waistline.  they arrive on a plate smothered with sauteed onions and bread toast triangles (which are really just pizza dough rolled very flat and cut thus), but i can’t begin to describe the wonder of these wings.  next up is the house salad.  it’s a lovely mixture of greens, tomatoes, onions, peppers, pepperoncini and olives.  we, of course, order the cup of bleu cheese topping.  (it’s 2 bucks extra but hey, in for a penny…..).

now, you can actually make a meal of those two items and walk away happy, sated and stuffed.  but then you would have missed the point.  the pie.

husband’s half is always the same;  sausage and mushrooms.  to him, if that ain’t it, it ain’t right.  so be it.  i’m a little more creative. sometimes some pepperoni, sometimes some green peppers and olives, and sometimes, (bear with me now), some arugula.  hey, nouveau pizza.  what can i say, i’m an adventurous guy.  (i wonder if you’d get the crap kicked out of you these days in jersey city if you ordered arugula on your pie?  something to think about next time i go visit).

let me say that the pizza is fantastic.  different from jersey city mob pizza, because of the black crispy parts on the oh-so-thin-crust, but it is, for me, the best of south florida.  and of course, after the wings and salad, i can’t eat but two pieces, at most, so there’s lunch to go for the next day.  (actually, i hate that part.  i’m bad two days in a row that way, when i only meant to be bad once.)  oh well.

so if you’re reading this, and you don’t live in south florida, sorry.  you’ll just have to imagine it.  but the rest of you, get your ass over to anthony’s.  (the one by state road 84 near the airport in fort lauderdale), and run the drill. you won’t be sorry.

and it will bring back memories of jersey city, even if you’re not from there.

four weeks later…..

you remember where we left off?  me?  sciatica?  suffering like a horse that needs to be put down?  scarfing down the pain pills so fast as to relegate rush limbaugh to amateur status?  yeah, welcome back to my world.  believe it or not, i’m still suffering.  i’d like to say it’s better, but it’s mostly just different.  before, i couldn’t bend.  now i can bend but my right thigh feels like there’s a knife in it.  oy.   but i actually took out the garbage tonight without crying.   i’m in physical therapy now and we’re making progress.   sit.  let’s discuss.

have you ever been?  i mean, in physical therapy?  i’ve described it somewhat for my neck treatment, (see earlier blog), but this is entirely new.  the neck guy, in the previous blog, who “whispered” what he might do, if he were allowed,  is now my therapist.  big time.  (i might add here, that i love him.….with a deep and abiding love that will withstand the test of time, global warming, and republican presidents.)  i’m here to say, he’s the MAN.

each session of therapy begins with people putting their hands down my pants, in my general ass area, and attaching tens pads to my butt cheeks.  (alas, the sad part is that nobody gets a remote thrill from this, as my ass is, how shall i say this?…….61 years old and less than exciting.)  but they truck on, and attach the electrodes, and wire me up and lay me down and raise my legs upon a high stool and zap me, while i’m reclining on a heating pad for 15 minutes, set to a timer.  what can i say?   it feels good, people.  they generally have to wake me at the “ding”.  after that, there are many exercises, that i wouldn’t normally do, (too much work), but i’m hurt here, so i oblige.  there are leg lifts, forward bends, hunched kick motions, ball crunches, (not what you think), pulls, stretches, and general piss me off stuff.  i suffer through it all to get to the good stuff.  my therapist, (the one who, upon occasion, has hands on loan from GOD, rubs my affected area, causing me to wince, groan, moan, smile, yelp, groan some more, and occasionally threaten to rip out his eyes, from the pain.   when he’s done with that, i feel pretty good.  until the magic words…..ok, time for traction.  oy.

now traction is a funny thing.  (not funny, ha ha….. funny, odd).  remember all of those jews during the inquisition movies that you’ve seen over the years?  the rack?  where they kind of rent you asunder?  or the drawn-and-quarter sequence from braveheart?  well, picture that.  they tear you limb from limb on a table that separates as you lie there.  it doesn’t feel so bad while it’s happening, but sometimes the aftermath is not pretty.  well, wtf?  i am, after all a jewish guy, so i feel like i’m picking up the modern day slack, and taking one for the team, as it were.  oy.

after traction, i’m instructed to walk around the gym, feeling the love.  or the pain.  or the shift in my personality from nice to beast.  not sure.  and then i am dismissed.  hugs all ’round, have a nice weekend, see you monday, yada yada.  oy.

so i limped badly for all of yesterday and most of today and then suddenly, this evening i had a breakthrough.  (might have been the wine), but i think not.

it’s definitely helping.  and i sure hope so, because i’m almost out the pain pills.

are we done?  has the fat lady sung?  (more about her later).  is the season finally winding down to the point where we can get back to sanity, regarding our daily schedules?  i don’t know about you, but my holiday, christmas, kwanza, festivus season’s cup ranneth over this year.  my girlish figure is shot.  (well, truth be told, it was shot in the 90s, but it’s just an expression).  i’d like to tell you that the madness is over but it’s not quite yet.  sit.  let’s discuss.

eating-wise, it was the best of times, it was the worst of times….. (i know, don’t you love dickens?)

so here’s a brief summary of my sins.

it began, of course, as it did for all of you, with thanksgiving.  we came, we ate, we bloated.  (hail caesar).  this was followed by the previously reported post-thanksgiving cruise, (a/k/a the sciatica journey…see earlier blog) which included several meals already discussed.  upon arrival home, on december 3rd, the feastivities began.  (ooh, i think i just made up a word.  i like it.  combination feast and….well, you get it.  call merriam webster).  it went something like this.

1)  best friend’s party.  it’s an annual event, a boy party, as he likes to say.  he’s a great cook, invites a  lovely crowd, pretty men in scanty clothes working it (and if they’re cute enough, (and these guys were), i don’t mind that they’re not wearing much clothes and touching my food.  i’m funny that way.  if they had been trolls, it would have skeeved me.  but they were handsome and hot so….. god, i’m so shallow).   it was pretty much a food orgy replete with a running chocolate fountain.

moving on.

2)  the following night was my big client’s annual shindig.  a fabulous affair at our favorite italian pizza place.  (there will be a blog about pizza coming up very soon.)  some old friends and some new faces.  (wait.  i didn’t mean my old friends had new faces put on them, as in “work done”.  no, no.   i meant there were new people as well as people i knew. whew.  wouldn’t want to blow anyone’s cover, if you know what i mean).    it was an appetizer, salad, chicken wings, pizza, dessert affair.  divine.

digress…..

chicken wings were invented by the devil himself, to tempt us all into perdition so that we wouldn’t mind having heart attacks, dying and living in hell for eternity.  at least that’s how i see it.  i LOVE chicken wings, but i know they’re so bad for me, so i rarely partake.  however, this place doesn’t fry them. the little buggers go into a coal-fired oven, so i indulge, and they’re actually better than the deep fried ones, taste-wise.  just my thoughts.

back…..

3)  the very next night we attended an opera concert for which i won free tickets.  it was a famous metropolitan opera soprano, and no, she’s not the fat lady in question.  she was actually svelte, lovely and fabulous.  we preceded it by dining at a well known cuban restaurant on calle ocho in miami called versailles.  ropa vieja, frijoles negros, arroz, platanos, etc.  (see, i know some espanol).  i figured i’m fat anyway, so…..  anyway, it was way good.

4)  two nights later found us at the hard rock cafe and casino, sampling the legendary burger menu, with friends.  if you’re a burger guy, it doesn’t get much better than that.  and we had a coupon!

5)  then the dinners with family kicked in for the final week.  husband’s cousins, friends’ bashes,  and the big finale, christmas dinner at the home of our loved ones, brisket guy and his husband, (who is far less finicky these days…..a christmas miracle, perhaps), and twenty friends.  a sublime array of culinary delights replete with home baked bread.  it was a pot-luck event with the guests filling in with side dishes around divine lamb-shank and coq au vin main courses provided by the hosts.   a truly joyous day.  (i was wearing pants with an elastic waistband at this point.  i call them my fat-boy pants.  you have to play your strengths).

6)  a relatively calm week ensued until new year’s eve, when husband and i had two, count them, two parties to attend.  the first was in a swanky aventura high-rise and was a 6:00-9:00 cocktail event with tenderloin of beef, cooked just-right-rare, with two horseradish condiments, and a gorgeous spiral-sliced ham, and chicken nuggets done up in a sweet sauce (divine), and on and on.  a lovely crowd (another boy party).  i drank gingerly as it was meant to be a long time til midnight.  we dallied until the end and wended our way back north where there was a late-night new year’s eve bash next door to our house.  (talk about convenient). this one included dick clark and ryan seacrest.  and of course, lady gaga, who was amazing, as always.  around 1:00am, i hit the hay, very tired indeed.

i awoke to a new year.  (as did we all, no?)

now, realize that through all of this, i’ve still got an eye on my waistline, and i don’t make resolutions because that’s just nuts.  why would i promise to do something in january that i wouldn’t do in july?  silly.  but i’m ever mindful of my weight, so i’m thinking it’s over.  it’s finally over.

not so fast kemosabe.

it just so happens i have two sets of friends, count them, two, who celebrate both little christmas, (12 days after big christmas…..who knew that song actually meant something?), and greek christmas (no, it wasn’t invented by the manufacturers of feta cheese.  it’s a real holiday in greece).  and to kick my teeth in, we have a friend turning 65 who’s having a birthday party.  and all three events are this weekend!

so the answers to the questions at the top of the page are:  no.  we ain’t done yet.  i have five more pounds to gain.  and yes, at the end of this weekend the fat lady will have sung.  and i finally understand why she’s fat!  but…..to paraphrase scarlet o’hara:

as god is my witness, i’ll never be hungry again.  that is until january 9th, when i buy back my soul from the devil and sell it to weight watchers.  

i have a bone to pick.

i’m normally very kind and genteel  (wow, i almost wrote gentile) during the holiday season, filled with tidings of great joy, and with the spirit of the day.  but i’ve been hearing about the complaints people have about holiday greetings.     i, however, am old now, and so i don’t give a rat’s ass about political correctness, so i walk around and say merry christmas to my gentile friends, and happy hanukkah to my jewish friends, and happy kwanza to my non-white friends, and…..(wait.  is that ok?  non-white? or should i say african american?)  see, it comes right back, that political correctness stuff.   and to my pagan friends, (of which i happen to have a few), i say, happy saturnia day.  (don’t ask.  long story.)  oy.  what’s a jewish boy to do at this time of year?  sit.  let’s discuss.

contrary to what some people in the media would have you believe, it really is okay to say merry christmas at this time of year.   i’m a new jersey jew, and when someone says it to me, i know they’re wishing me good things, so how could i possibly take offense?   i will indeed have a merry christmas , even though i don’t celebrate the birth of the baby jesus.  but it’s still a fun time of year, when houses are decorated, as are stores and malls, and carols play from loudspeakers in public places, and for the most part, people are in a festive mood (except for the chronics;  they’re always unhappy.  this time of  year they’re called scrooges or grinches).   do we really think that every time someone regales me with that greeting i should stop and explain?

see what i mean.  my appropriate response should be:

me:  and a very merry christmas to you too.

that way, even though i’m jewish, nobody gets called an asshole, there are no hard feelings, and no pox.  (didn’t we have enough of that with the santeria curse on husband a few months ago?

likewise, if i walk into a store, and the worker-bee speaks to me in spanish, instead of the mother tongue, i don’t get all bent out of shape and decry the death or loss of our beloved country.  but rather, it goes something like this:

see?  no asshole.  no pox.  genteel with the gentiles.  (ooh, i like that).

i guess my question is:  why can’t we all just live and let live.  nobody’s right all of the time, so if people misspeak slightly, upon occasion, why can’t we just smile and go with the feeling of the moment and just stop talking about what’s correct in today’s parlance?  it gets a little tedious for me.

so i’m saying that if this curmudgeon can deal with it, i’m thinking the populace at large should take a lesson.

and with that, i wish you all a merry christmas, happy hanukkah, festive kwanza, joyous feast of the pagans, happy agnostic day, thoughtful atheist day, and of course, a happy healthy new year.  (unless of course you’re jewish, in which case new year’s is in september and it’s completely inappropriate for me to say it now and ……here we go again.

i’ve told you about the whole neck thing.  my arthritic, stenotic, stiff, unbearable neck?  for which i ended up with million dollar cream, and nine sessions of physical therapy?  it’s considerably better now.   it’s no longer high on my list of things about which to kvetch, since, (are you ready?),  my back went out, the morning of the cruise.  (we get one goddam vacation a year and i wake up, the morning of, with excruciating pain.  go figure.)  so i limped though the voyage, pumped up on a vicodin/soma cocktail (talk about “out to sea”) and didn’t let it spoil my fun.  but when i got home, i needed to take serious action, lest i end up a rush limbaugh clone and find myself doctor shopping in boca raton, wondering why there’s a ringing in my ears.   sit.  let’s discuss.

i had an appointment scheduled with the good doctor, my sports m.d. (god, i feel like dwayne wade.  i have my very own sports doctor, although i will say, dwayne is a lot taller than i.  i’m not much for sports but i’m feeling pretty butch these days.  broken, but butch ).  the appointment was for the tuesday after the cruise, kindof a follow up on my neck.  of course the doc didn’t know about the whole “back” thing, so when i got there he was curious why a guy with a stiff neck was limping so badly.  i told him about the radiating pain originating at my right hip and running down my leg, numbing my thigh all the way to my foot.

him:  it’s probably sciatica, but we can’t talk about it because you’re not here for that.  you’re here for follow-up on the neck.

me:  but i am here, nonetheless, and the neck is pretty good.  not all better, but much better, and i’m a crippled old fuck that can’t walk, so help me.

him:  without a specific referral for that ailment the insurance company won’t allow it.  but if they did i’d tell you that i’d eliminate most of what i’m pretty sure it isn’t, and decide it was inflammation of your sciatic nerve.  then i’d give you this pamphlet with exercises that look something like this: 

to help you ease it, until you can see your primary, get a referral and come back.  but i can’t until you do that.  how’s the neck?

me:  it’s better.  the physical therapy helped.

him:  it would help the back too.  but i can’t prescribe…..well, you get it.   so, go to it.

me: thanks.

i left his office, called my primary, pled my case, and minutes later a referral was faxed to the sports guy.  they called me, we made an appointment for the next day, to discuss my back.

later that same day, i was back in rehab for the neck, told my tale of limping and cruising to the therapist and asked him for some help.

therapist:  i can’t do anything about your hip and back without a referral and permission from the insurance company.

me:  well, they approved this visit, and i’m here, and we have an hour-and-a-half, can’t we begin. everything is in progress.

therapist:  (loudly) nope, not allowed.  you’ll have to come back.  (whispering),  but if i could, i’d put this heat pad under your coccyx as you were lying with the tens unit on your neck, like this.  and after, i’d show you some exercises and stretches as you were lying on the decompression bolster doing your neck work. (loud again), but i can’t, so i won’t.

me:  (loudly) ah, quel domage. i guess i’ll just suffer.  (whispering), i love  you.

all of the above was tuesday.

the next day, i’m back at old sporty,to discuss my hip.  not so fast, kemosable.  (i love that expression.  i use it a lot.  it’s probably racist, and i’ll probably get letters from the indians…..i mean, the native americans, to knock it off, but…..) first the physician’s assistant does the workup, takes enough x-rays to make me glow in the dark, (which is actually not a bad thing when you’re out late at night in a questionable neighborhood) and gets me ready for the meeting.

i should add here, x-rays these days are so amazingly cool.  it’s all digital, so as the doc looks, it’s not film on a lighted area of the wall anymore, it’s on his computer screen.  and he can lighten or darken and enlarge and zoom in and really see your bones.  i’m thinking it takes a lot of the guesswork out.  no more blurry x-rays.

so he came in, and discussed by aching back:

him:  well, in the pictures, your hips are beautiful

me:  (coyly), well thank you doctor.

him:  no, i don’t mean it that way.  i mean they’re in very good shape, medically speaking.

me:  no replacement in my near future?

him:  nope.  you’re good for at least ten years.

me:  i should live so long with these aches and pains.  (suddenly i sounded remarkably like my jewish grandmother).

him:  the spine is good.  a tad osteoporotic, but you’re well within the five percent acceptable range, so you’re good.

me:  well, that’s at least a relief.

him:  uh-oh.

me: uh-oh?  what kind of language is that for a doctor?  what’s uh-oh?

him:  no, i just noticed a little plaque in your arteries.  not a lot, but i can see it.  you should watch your cholesterol and triglycerides.  (this from the sports guy).

me:  i will.  my numbers are good, but i’ll watch them.  so, what about the current back pain?

him:   it’s definitely sciatica.  i think we can ease the pain with some pills, if necessary, and some physical therapy is called for.    they’ll make you right as rain.  (btw, what’s up with that expression?  i’m thinking rain is only right if you’re having a drought.  rain is not right on a beach day, or a golf day, or a disney world day. they need to delete that phrase from the lexicon.  just sayin’).  so here’s a prescription for the pills, and one for the therapy.  i’ll see you in four weeks.

me:  sounds like a plan.  thanks doc.

so, scrips in hand, i headed out.  i still have three neck sessions left.  i’m wondering, if i have two referrals, two scrips and two permission slips from the insurance company, if they’re allowed to work on both of my malaises at the same time in the same session.  maybe i’ll ask whisper that question and see what happens.

day 5 st. marten or st. martaan (depending on your persuasion).

never left the ship.  we’ve been to these ports a lot, so they hold no interest, whereas an empty cruise ship is my kind of town.   it was essentially a lovely day, taking meals, strolls on the deck, a little stretching in the gym, reading, blogging, watching a movie and of course the ever popular napping (as a result of the overdose of vicodin that seems to be a part of my life now).   not helping the sciatica a whole lot but my attitude is just spiffy.

i mentioned earlier that husband was singled out upon embarkation and asked if he’d like to model in a fashion show.  he graciously acquiesced and waited anxiously for his debut performance.  it turns out that one of the pied piper’s excursions was to orient beach for a bash, replete with food, drinks, and debauchery, (and apparently a fashion show thrown in for good measure).  well, since husband and i weren’t going to participate in that trek to the beach, his debut was cancelled.  (or rather he’d like to think, postponed until another time).  alas, fleeting fame.

the pre-dinner show was a gal who was a female impressionist.  she made it very clear to her audience that her particular job is very different from that of a female impersonator (of which there were several in our crowd).   no, rather, she did song stylings (with wigs evoking certain characters), like cher, celine, beyonce, tina turner and others.  she sang a few songs in her own voice and style and was actually excellent, and the impressions were fun.  of course, doing all of those gay icons, our crowd really loved her.

dinner was good but not as remarkable as some nights so i’ll spare you the details.

the post-dinner festivities included our yearly theme party; this year it was called a decades event and we were encouraged to dress in the garb of the decade in which we were born.  well, having been born in 1950, (don’t bother to do the math, i’ve confessed many times that i’m 61), i was still a wee one by the end of the decade, so if i were going to dress up, i would have opted for a 60s hippie kind of thing, but husband and i took a pass.  he headed back to the cabin after dinner,  to read, and i wandered the deck (in yet another tropical wind event) marveling at the sheer lack of creativity of most of the players.  there were a lot of pretty good hippies, (glad i didn’t do it),

and a few other assorted types.  extra points for the tape on the glasses.  (these guys are actually friends with whom i’m traveling. )

for me, the most creative was a guy born in the 60s, who opted for 1969.  that’s 69 if you take my meaning.  see illustration:

yes, that’s leslie jordan to his left.  more about him later.

so having been tossed and blown, (and just a tad bored), i walked on, and headed for the o.k. corral for a little vicodin-induced shut-eye.  i was slightly depressed as i pondered that there were only two remaining days.

day 6  a sea day.

the days at sea are far and away my favorite days.  the ocean, the sky, the sun, the clouds, the occasional stray shower, eating, lounging and relaxing with no place special to go.  or lying by the pool listening to a calypso band, or watching the fashion show, or taking a crafts class or a napkin folding lesson (not kidding) or in this case, on this particular ship, the glass blowing exhibition.  corning, (yes, that corning) has a show on the top deck lawn, several times each cruise.  (i shouldn’t just toss that off.)  there is a lawn on the top deck.  guests play bocce ball, (you know, your italian grandfather’s version of golf but with no sticks?), or just lie on the grass as if you’re in the park, or perhaps a game of croquet.  it’s really impressive).

so corning has this two hour show complete with ovens, kilns, molten glass, and all the tools of the trade and artisans (including, of course a handsome young man named ross.  i mean, how not?) creating these magnificent pieces right before your very eyes.  see below:

then they raffle off some of them at the end, and the lucky people get to take one home.  it’s really gorgeous stuff and you see pieces that were created on board as you peruse the ship.  see below:

i enjoyed the heck out of the entire experience.

this being the penultimate night, it was the second formal night for dining.   the dining room held the traditional filet mignon and lobster as a main course.  i don’t know about you, but for me, it’s worth the swollen knuckles and the touch of gout the next day.  i have a thing for lobster.  afterward, there was the special entertainment brought on board just for us, and you were not allowed to attend if you were not a pied piper guest.  it was the wonderful comedian, leslie jordan.

for those who don’t know, he played (and won an emmy) on will and grace.  he also has created the character of brother-boy, in del shores amazing play/movie, sordid lives.  he’s a gifted, talented performer and he did 90 minutes of standup to a sold-out gay crowd.  if you  haven’t seen sordid lives, both the movie and the series, you ought to.  just sayin’.   after laughing that hard for that long, it was time for bed.  lordy i love the way the ship rocks you to sleep.  final day is tomorrow.  see you then.

day 7…..finale

i’m still on vacation but i’m a little hateful today.  it’s almost over.  and then i have to go back to my regular life.  you know, you may not realize this but living on this ship is a lot nicer than my real life.  seriously, at home, when i leave my bedroom every morning, nobody goes in behind me and makes the bed, straightens up, wipes my sink, changes my towels, checks the toilet paper, leaves me a bucket of ice and the morning newspaper. ( i’d like that, but no.  husband loves me, but, apparently not as much as my cabin boy.)  that’s not my life.  that’s oprah winfrey’s life.  also, i like picking up a plate and walking through the stations of the buffet and piling food on, without having to prep it, cook it, and clean up after.  i mean, how not?

the reality of it is we have to go tomorrow.  but before that, one more sea day, and as previously mentioned, those are my favorites.  this was a restful day, as the back thing was (literally) a pain-in-the-ass, so i kind of laid low.  typical lazy day, the exception being that after dinner we had to pack.  it was a little easier than getting ready to board, in that:

a)   most of the clothes were dirty so we didn’t have to be so careful about packing them, and

b)  the massive quantity of wine was gone, rendering the luggage about 50 pounds lighter.

so after dinner the bags go into the hallway where sometime during the night, as we sleep, the elves come and deliver them portside waiting to be picked up.

i finally remembered to take a couple of pictures in the dining room.  the first is of the extensive wine “cellar” right in the middle of the room, behind the captain’s table.  take a look:

the second is the amazing chandelier over us as we dined.  truly a work of art:

for the record i think i should add a picture of husband and me having the amazing vacation you’ve now shared with me.  (you’ll notice i’m in coco chanel black.  it hides my fat rolls underneath).

ok, so we’re a little gay too. <g>

before i close, here’s a peek at what the ship looks like to give you a sense of our week.  there’s a lot of amazing artwork abounding.  the first is a “curtain” effect sculpture (made of stone, i swear), take a look:

the next piece is about 6 feet in diameter.  carved wood.

after that is a sculpture that was simply divine:

and then a couple of paintings, wall pieces and mosaic glass.  just astonishing:

day 3  san juan

it’s odd, but we arrived in san juan late in the day, about 4pm.  take a look.  it’s getting dark already:

so much for the fabulous beaches and rain forest (el yunque).  btw, if you’ve not been to loquillo beach in your life, put it on your bucket list.  white sands, palm trees on the beach, azure blue sea…..just paradise.

the rain forest too, is an event.  gives you an even greater sense of the wonder of the universe. (spoiler alert.  if you’re a died-in-the-wool creationist, and don’t believe in darwin and his evolutionary theories, then you’ll most likely not appreciate the way rain forests have evolved over the millennia.  just saying, is all).

so, san juan at night.  hmmm.  i suppose seeing puerto ricans in their native habitat is fun for some, but i’m from jersey city.  we had puerto ricans up the ass growing up, so it’s not all that big an attraction for me, if you know what i mean.  but many passengers went ashore and ate palomillo steak and arroz con pollo.  some went to the gay tea dance which the pied piper crew arranged, for mucho bailando, which left the ship beautifully quiet for the rest of us.  i napped by the pool, lying in the shade on one of the coveted canopy chairs that are so difficult to come by, (unless of course, the ship is empty…..<g>).

one of the wonderful amenities of the ship is that every afternoon at 5:30 sharp, there is an all-yu-can-eat sushi buffet on the top deck.  i don’t eat much of the rice, (because i don’t want to spoil my dinner), but i do kindof pig-out on the fish.  take a look at all of this:

if you’re a sushi lover this is a nice plus.

there is a bar on the ship where we gathered nightly.  the bartop, where one would normally lean, is chilled, kindof a refrigerated countertop with ice on it to keep your drinks cold and frosty.  i swear.  your cocktail sits on a counter of ice.  you have to be really careful not to soak your ball gown before dinner.  i saw one queen who’d had one appletini too many, lean on it and his dinner jacket sleeve, yes, the white one, landed on a snow pile.  not pretty.  i stayed away from it.  i’m a sloucher from way back so i knew i’d eventually lay an elbow and get wet.  you know the saying, an ounce of prevention…..

dinner was once again marvelous.  there was a liver pate` that was the consistency of a dense mousse.  not a lump or bump in it.  just the intense flavors of goose liver, cognac, and peppercorns.  schmeared on the french bread i found myself moaning.  (and next to the captain’s table, one really needs to watch one’s decorum).  the pate` was followed by an iceberg lettuce salad.  (ok, tell me again.  what’s up with that salad?  it was so out of fashion for so many years, when did iceberg lettuce come back in?  it’s the same boring watery crunch it always  was, and yet now, fine restaurants get ten bucks for a wedge of it with bleu cheese.  wtf?  remind me in the future to take a pass on that salad.)

the main event was a new york strip steak, rare, as i requested, nestled atop a small pile of rigatoni smothered in a gorgonzola cheese cream sauce.  (someone in the kitchen knows what he’s doing.  gorgonzola cheese and red meat.  need i say more?  just heavenly.

finally, the dessert was a triangle of dark, dense chocolate, with actually the same consistency as the liver mousse.  so creamy, so dreamy, so insanely over the top.  i, however was a good boy.  i only ate a couple of bites, with an eye forever on my waistline, and left the rest on my plate!  oh be still my heart.  there are still many meals to go.

next up, the show.  it was a guy named garth oliver, who was a runner-up on britain’s got talent.  he’s a ventriloquist.  i know, big woo.  or so we thought.  but this guy was a true phenom.  talked a mile a minute, bantered insanely with the audience, giving lessons in ventriloquism.   his first “partner” was a monkey with a squeaky voice that was hilarious.  the thing i love most about ventriloquists is that as the banter gets more and more furious and funny and frantic, approaching “screwball” intensity, one must remember that it’s all coming from one guy.  all of the insanity, the voices, the inflections, the back-and-forth, is one crazy guy.  a good one will have you convinced that there are several characters on the stage performing the routine, but it always comes back to one guy.  very impressive.

i don’t have ship video, but take a look at the guy.  just insane.  and fun.  short clip.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3ydzolgvi_u

it was truly a side-splitting act and the audience went wild.

finally, for me, a trip up to the sky lounge, where the eclipse gang (the singers and dancers from the big production shows) all gathered to salsa the night away.  some of the audience got into it with them, but they mostly just did their mucho bailando, with hips swirling and girls twirling and high kicks.  they have so much energy it pisses me off that i’m so freakin’ old.  i’d love to throw a high kick, but with the sciatica and all, well…..you know.  Here’s a link to youtube.  After you look, just close the youtube window and com back.  I’ll wait…..take a look:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SMhXk_m_Nxw&feature=youtu.be

they never tired, of course, but i did.  so i finished off my wine and headed back to the cabin for some shut-eye.   all in all, a pretty terrific monday.

day 4  st. thomas

still on vacation.  i know, it sounds redundant but the days flow one after another with eating, naps, entertainment, eating, conversation, swims, eating, dancing, fashion shows, eating and drinking.  (i know.  i said eating a lot.  i like eating).

at breakfast today, i got a tad adventurous.  i ordered eggs italian, which is a variation on eggs benedict, the difference being two poached eggs on a slice of crusty italian bread with prosciutto topped with a basil pesto sauce vs. the usual hollandaise.  can you spell yum?  really different and a new gastronomic taste.

following breakfast we forayed into town, (bad hip in tow), to buy some additional wine and some club soda.  i brought some with me, but am going through it faster than expected using it as medicine for sciatica.  (don’t tell the a.m.a.  not sure they’d approve.)  twenty minutes into st. thomas, the hip screamed take me home so back we came.  we’d been there before.  classic case of been there, done that, bought the t-shirt. 

lunch is a bit of a blur as the vicodin kicked in, and shortly thereafter i wrote about day 2 and then napped.  a shower, and a shave later, we found ourselves in the theater watching a cirque du soleil type show, with amazing acrobatics, high wire antics and handsome strong men balancing anorexic women on their heads.  there was a guy with a giant yo-yo on a string  (i swear), doing insane things.   (is it racist to mention that of course he was asian?  the yo-yo guy is always asian.  i think they teach yo-yo in beijing at university.)  there were also some contortionists.  they were very talented and all that, but quite frankly it’s not my favorite kind of show.  picture it:  a guy hanging by one hand from a trapeze swing, with a woman’s thighs wrapped around his ankle and she’s planking (i think that’s the term for the new craze, kindof parallel to the stage), while dangling.  what holds her up and keeps her from falling is, how can i put this delicately?  it’s how tight her…..ok, just say it…..how tight her twat is.  i mean she’s crushing the poor guy’s ankle with her crotch.  after the dismount i’m pretty sure he was limping.  so what it comes down to is a woman hanging by her labia.  all in all, as a gay man, not my cup of bouillon, entertainment-wise.  but i can tell you that the straight guys hooted and hollered a lot.  not sure why.

on to dinner.

vitello in tonnato (for you plebes, that’s paper-thin slices of chilled veal in tuna sauce), one of the world’s delicacies.

uneventful salad.  (seems unless i make it myself on the buffet, the  salads are a tad lacking, for me).

vichyssoise (chilled potato-leek soup).  and they really got it right.  if you’re not a fan, this might have converted you.

there was no entrée that tempted me, so i opted for the standard “every-night” side of the menu, and ordered broiled salmon hollandaise.  delish.  the hollandaise gave me buyer’s remorse about the morning’s eggs.  i should have had the standard benedict.  well, there’s always tomorrow.

so having had the twat show before dinner, we had some spare time after, so we wandered into comedy central for a so-so comedian.  (after the insane ventriloquist the night before, the guy would had to have been seinfeld to get a chuckle, so we left in the middle for one of the pied piper activities at 11:00pm.  are you ready?  this is what gay men do on a cruise.  we all piled into the big theater for a movie:  a mamma mia sing-along!  now, as i’ve said in earlier blogs, every gay man that’s ever sucked a dick thinks he’s judy garland, so this crowd was determined to show meryl streep how it’s done.  (not to mention  poor pierce brosnan.  i’m thinking when they made this movie, harry connick  jr was busy, or something.  would have been a much better choice.)  so, sing along we did, and the characters were transformed from donna and the dynamos to meryl and the ‘mos.  i made it to the act 1 finale, (voulez vous) singing my little gay heart out, and my bed called out to me.  long freakin’ day.  i finished my wine and headed for the big lie-down.  all in all, a pretty good day 4.  to be continued…..

day 2

i don’t mean to complain, as this is supposed to be a fun piece, but the sciatica gave me a miserable night’s sleep.  i finally gave in and began to take a cocktail of soma and vicodin.  (yeah, i know.  sounds delicious, but i really wanted my full wits on vacation.)  it still hurts, but now, who gives a shit?  but i’m not going to let it ruin my time.

did i mention that we’re on the celebrity eclipse?  gorgeous ship.  take a look:  (by the way, if you click on the pictures, they get huge!

sister ship to last year’s solstice.  actually, in case you didn’t know, they name sister ships with like names.  for instance, the giant royal caribbean ships are the freedom and the liberty.  the holland america group (the dam ships), are the nordam, (north), westerdam, (west), zuiderdam, (south) and oesterdam (east).  see how it works?  then of course there are the big sisters…..the humongous ships…..the oasis and the allure.  (yeah, i don’t quite get that relationship either).  but for this cruise, the five sisters are solstice, equinox (get it?  the seasons)  and then the eclipse, reflection and the silhouette.  (actually, i don’t quite get all of those either.  seems like they’re all sun/moon related,  i think. but that’s how it works).

the day began with breakfast at the stations of the buffet.  remember them from last year?  well, being the sister ship it’s the same fabulous drill.  great food, beautifully presented.  i’m trying to be good, so i stuck to an omelet, juice, and coffee.  (okay, a few strips of bacon on the side.  i mean, how not?  oh, and i had to taste the corned beef hash.  damn, it was good.  i was hoping it wouldn’t be).

after breakfast was pool time.  lying on a chaise lounge, ship gently rocking me, ipod on my head, maria callas singing norma, and a big iced tea by my side.  can you spell heaven?  people, i’m on vacation.  even my hip eased up.  it was really nice.

next up, lunch.  again, man the stations, full speed ahead.  i kept it to salad with a scoop of tuna.  (and trust me, there’s pasta, and indian food, and chinese food, and thai and deli, and cheese, and desserts and ice cream).  but i abstained.  i’m determined to be good for a least a couple of days, to make sure my pants fit until toward the end.  then, of course, fuck it.

after lunch, the pills kicked in big time and i needed to nap, which technically is not a bad thing.  i’m thinking that’s a popular vacation option on a sea day.  later a sauna, (the hot wooden wall on my damaged hip felt pretty good), cocktails and the first formal night dinner.  and of course, as on the sister ship, my old friends showed up; the baby lamb chops. 

digress.

it’s been a year since the last cruise, and i’ve actually talked about, dreamed about and described to friends, the remarkable baby lamb chops.  i don’t care if the lambs are screaming, clarice, i’m having them!  and they did not disappoint.

back.

funny note.  in addition to friend, there is another couple in our group and the first night the maitre d’ sat our party of five at a table for twelve with some other pied pipers.   it started off amicably enough, but as the  dinner wore on, this little microcosm of humanity  turned out to be….well….ok, just say it,  horrible.  they complained about everything.  the service is too slow, the food is not hot, his portion is bigger than mine, there’s not enough butter, it’s cold in here, bring more breadsticks, last year was better, and on and on until  i wanted to stab them with my butter knife!   i kind of told the one next to me, to shut the fuck up, nicely of course.  i thought about consulting the maitre d’ after dinner to change our table, but i figured, i’d just talk to my group and ignore them.  well, next morning, the concierge desk called and said you  originally requested a private table for your party, so we decided to move you and we’re giving you your own five-top.  now, i’m not sure, but it’s possible that they ousted us from their table, or maybe the house needed a 12 top for a request party.  either way, we were moved and we’re next to the captain’s table now.  husband is in the corner and the empty table is where the captain sits with his party on formal nights.  see picture:

and here he is, that handsome devil…..the captain.

pretty cool, if you ask me.  all the big-wigs are at his table, and the servers buzz like busy little bees in a hive, so our service is now amazing.  see, sometimes the high road really is the way to go.  those evil queens are probably stuck near the kitchen or the toilets or somewhere.  serves them right.

we don’t dress in monkey suits for formal night, but many do.  and sometimes…..just  sometimes…..queens will get carried away.  take a look:

did they actually think that if they’d not worn those outfits that nobody would know they were gay?  bust a gut, people.

after dinner was the captain’s welcome cocktail in the theater, followed by the ship’s singers and dancers in a broadway revue which was really wonderful.  all those fresh-faced kids, with their twirls and high kicks and lifts (on a rocking boat).  quite fantastic.  their salute to les miz and jersey boys was a delight.  more shows to come.

well, by now it’s midnight and we have to push the clocks ahead an hour, having entered a new time zone.  (damn.  i just got finished pushing the clock in fort lauderdale, like, 2 weeks ago.)  so we’re losing an hour of sleep which means i must go to bed.  see you tomorrow.

day 1

here we go again.

we’re on the annual cruise.  husband and i.  a little different this year, as i kind of know what to expect.  and i’m struggling to write about a different aspect than last year’s cruise.  that one was primarily about food.  (hey, i’m the son of a food addict so i have issues.)  and i promise that there will be food items abounding, but i’m going to try to focus on the fabulous fun, frolicking and frivolity (i’m nothing if not alliterative).  and so it begins.  sit.  let’s discuss.,

it’s now 11.30 on saturday night.  sailing day.    we are, as they say, out to sea.

digress.

you know it’s a funny thing.  it’s a seven day cruise, but what they don’t emphasize is that the day you board the ship is day 1.  i mean they let you board around noon, and your  room is not ready until about 1:00 and the ship doesn’t leave the harbor until 5pm, but  it counts as a day.  we’ll come home next saturday and be off by 9am, so that certainly isn’t a day.  so today counts. that’s why i like to come aboard early.  if this is day 1 of my vacation, then by god, i’m taking it.  and here’s how it went.

back.

we awoke at dawn.  (you know, the excitement and all), and surprise, surprise, it seems my hip went out as i slept;  it was either from loading suitcases into the trunk of the car friday night, or from standing at the “before party” at a local gay bar the night before sailing.  (a bunch of the out-of-towners wanted a “meet-and-greet” to get a jump on the festivities, so we went.)  but god help me, as if there isn’t enough wrong, my sciatic nerve decided to rear its ugly head for a “hey, how are ya?  how’s this feel?”  so the two of us, husband and i, in a frenzy to get ready to leave by 10am, are hindered, to say the least, by old brokeback dave.

there’s a lot to do before we go away.  we have to setup the children; peeps, (the angelic cat), savannah (the old dog, a/k/a grandma, with a bladder problem.  can anyone explain to me why they don’t they make depends for dogs?) and of course, piss boy (if you remember last year).  this year we psyched him out and bought a plastic painter’s tarp and as we loaded the dining room table with items to pack, each night we covered it, so if, like last year, he decided to “gift us” as a departing gesture, our stuff would be safe.  but he was good, so we didn’t have to beat him.  (no, i’m kidding.  we hardly ever beat him).

so we prep the children’s food, change and leave a new kitty litter, portion out the treats for the dog, (for the sitter) including peanut butter covered garlic tabs to ward off a prevailing tick problem.  did you  know that?  if your animal has a tick problem, feed it garlic tablets and it wards off the insects.  (and vampires as well, i imagine) i know what you’re thinking.  you’re thinking the 14 year old dog will have bad breath from the garlic.  news flash…..  have you had a fourteen year old dog give you kisses lately?  trust me, the garlic doesn’t make a goddam bit of difference.  it’s dog’s breath, people, stay with me on this.

having set them up, we pick up friend who’s also cruising, and head to the port.  i drop husband and friend on the pier with the luggage, park the car, join them, mill through the mob and finally board the paradise express.

need i tell you that it’s the gay group again?  those pied pipers? they’re a fun bunch.  not exactly the hottest men on the planet, the average age being over 55, but with the seasoned traveler comes great conversation, camaraderie, and of course, endless sexual innuendo reminiscent of the things they used to do but no longer do. they don’t actually do much of what they’re implying, but they (we) certainly talk a good game.  don’t get me wrong.  there are many hot, sexy men aboard.  it’s just that when you’re my age, we have a tendency to obtain a superpower known as invisibility.  the young hot men look right through us and move on.  but i’m not bitter.  i was young and hot once, and had my day.  someday if they’re lucky, they’ll be old invisible queens crippled with sciatica and i’ll look down from the heavens and chuckle in a very snarky i told you so, kind of way.  i don’t believe in much, but i certainly do believe in divine justice.

i think i’ve told you that husband lost 35 pounds.  his secret?  you promise not to tell?  diet and exercise.  who knew?  (duh, everyone, it’s just that nobody actually does it.)  so, interesting note:  at check-in with the group, the lead travel agent asked husband if he’d like to be a model in the fashion show later in the week.  (bitch didn’t ask me.  but then i’m a paunchy old queen), and husband was simply delighted, and of course said yes.  they didn’t say exactly what he’d model, but count him in.  more about that as it unfolds.

once aboard there was registration (purell), check in and receive hotel paperwork (purell), find your cabin and wait for luggage, unpack when it arrives, muster safety drill (purell),  lunch (purell), tour ship (purell), sailaway, theater show, free cocktail party with name tags so the 700 of us can get to know one-another, dinner (purell), skip dessert, dancers in the lobby, windswept walk  on the pool deck and now i’m talking to you when i should really be lying down.  (they’re really purell happy here.  norovirus-phobia, or something.  i think they probably spend more money on purell than on the actual food we touch with clean hands.  wacky world.

a word about the cocktail party.  it was on the top deck by the pool.  the ship was moving at 20 knots (exactly how fast is a knot?), and the prevailing headwinds were 25 knots.  so together, there were 45 mile an hour winds while you’re standing on the topmost deck of a rocking ship with a drink in your hand.  where i live, (fort lauderdale) that’s called a tropical storm during which: yes, we have cocktails, but no, we don’t go outside.  are you nuts?    i mean, it’s a gay group and all, but that’s not what i had in mind when i thought blow-job.  it was fierce.

so after all of that, quite frankly, i’m bushed.  (and i almost never use the word bush.  you know, too much painful history and all).  so i must rest.   i’ll continue this tomorrow.

my neck still hurts.  no no.  no sympathy.  shit happens.

i’m in therapy now.  (wow, that makes me sound like a really sick mental case.)   no. not that kind of therapy.  (although god knows a few sessions on a couch certainly couldn’t hurt, at this point in my twisted development, but no.)  we’re talking the big PT.  physical therapy.  simon says, hands on neck.  sit.  let’s discuss.

question:  did you know that there are people in the world who go to school or college or tech classes, and set out to become workers that dedicate themselves to the healing of others?  did you know that?  (well yeah, doctors and nurses and shit, and of course dentists), but others who are not the really high salary types.  just dedicated people who decide to become caregivers?  wtf?  (i’m thinking those people’s souls are so much  nicer than mine.  i have a tendency to sit and sneer, in my way, while they actually take an interest in  my well-being……let’s say for an example…….i see a comedy vein and want to make snarky comments, and they see a collapsed vein and want to help.  see what i mean?  different outlook.)

so i finally got the call from dolora, (remember her?  pat, can i buy a consonant?  a goddamn “s”?  so that my name is not completely ridiculous?) and she informed me that i could come to get my stenotic, arthritic neck treated.  of course i delighted and rejoiced with that call.

off i go, and i’m met with an officious amount of paperwork at intake.  (have i mentioned in previous blogs that the very first question, i mean, the goddamn primary interest of the parties involved is not how are we today?, (the royal we being implied, since it’s just me and my damaged neck),  but rather, the very first question is…..say it with me now…..can i see your insurance card?  

madre di dio.  (ooh, i’ll bet i never told you i speak fluent italian. well i do.)

so after those particular pleasantries, i got to meet my australian therapist, fiona.    (isn’t that a beautiful name?  i mean, if west side story had been set down under, instead of sharks vs. jets it might have been dingoes vs. wallabies and you could actually sing fiona instead of the usual maria.  try singing it.  it works.  just a a thought, mr. sondheim. )  and she’s thin and gorgeous, and so in shape i want to bitch-slap her into my reality, but hey, she’s there for me, so i go with it.  a bunch of intake questions and getting to know you stuff  later, and we’re into it.

stretch this, turn that, point your nose here, stand up straight, does this hurt?, how far can you turn your head?,  how long have you had it?, push my hand, pull my arm, reach behind you, pull my finger, oh, i’m sorry, squeeze my finger, what kind of pillow do you sleep on?, does it hurt in the morning?, and on and on.  ok, i think to myself.  she needs to know.  and so it goes…..

massage was first.

digress…..

for those of you that have never had massage, wft is wrong with you?  the concept of lying on a table with a devoted, trained person with magic hands manipulating your (fill-in-the-blank) is beyond the pale.  you really need to do it.  even if NOTHING hurts.  just do it.

back…..

so ten minutes later i feel somewhat better.  how not?  after that we do some tens unit electric shock stuff (like at the chiropractor, and if you haven’t done that either, wtf are you waiting for?), coupled with some heat therapy, while i lay on my back on a table.   can you spell nap?  i nodded in a  heartbeat.

upon awakening, i felt better.  not ALL better, but better.  and fiona scheduled me for several more.  i, for one, can’t wait.  she was extraordinarily nice, except every two minutes or so, she’d say stand up straight, dahling. (she’s australian not a drag queen.  that’s how they say it.   it reminded me of my hateful mother, always nagging me.  but fiona’s  right.  i’m a slug type sloth that slouches.  (say that three times fast.  i dare you.)

so fiona is from northern australia and speaks a LOT like olivia newton john.  even so, as good as she is, i don’t think she’s hopelessly devoted to me.  she’s just my therapist.  but i think i’m in love.  oh well.  although she did mention traction for next time.  oy.

so, going forward from here, i’ll keep you posted.  the neck is getting there.  (don’t forget i have the million dollar cream to schmear as well.)

stay tuned.

you know how i often say, “sometimes the universe conspires?”  like how the  guy from husband’s high school, whom he didn’t know 50 years ago, moved into the house behind us?  or my own college roommate, who was on on our cruise last november for a week, but we hadn’t seen each other since the 60s and neither of us knew the other was there and didn’t recognize each other? and then after, we reconnected after four decades?  stuff like that?  and you know i was born jewish, but am now the last surviving pagan on the eastern seaboard, with all semblance of  the original religion of my childhood relegated not only to the back seat, but more like the rumble seat?  well something’s happened and i’m thinking, that pesky universe.  there it goes again.  sit.  let’s discuss.

that selfsame college roommate, with whom i am now close, and who was single for a very long time, finally met a guy.  a male friend.  a boy friend.  a boyfriend.  yeah, that’s it.  and the two of them are having quite a time of it.  i won’t go into details because:

a)  this blog is rated “g”

b) the details are, actually, none of our business

c) they’re having way too much fun and i don’t want to make you all jealous.

so the new guy, let’s call him boyfriend, is a handsome, amiable fellow, and very sweet.  (it’s tough to come into a group of friends that are close, and fit in, but he’s doing just beautifully.)  and of course, it helps that husband and i are not bitchy queens, which makes it just a tad easier, but i take no credit.  he’s welcome because he’s genuinely nice.

now, he happens to be a jewish chap, born in israel.  i mean, the actual middle-east, in that little country surrounded by pugnacious, imperialistic, antagonistic,  neighbors.  i’ve never even been able to imagine what it’s like to grow up in a place where the threat of your very existence is a way of life, but he has, and he’s still a swell guy.

he’s a businessman, and he sells…..how shall i phrase this?…..mystical accessories related to judaism and specifically, kabbalah.  (now, pardon me, but at this stage of my life, the closest i’ve been to kabbalah is reading about that nice gentile italian girl, you know the one, madonna, who went to israel, studied a bit and came home with not only a string of publicity, but an actual red string on her wrist.  i know, i know.  madonna has a string!   big woo.  or so i thought.

anyway, husband and i had lunch with the happy couple today, and we got into a discussion about all of that.  (now bear in mind, i think i’ve told you i was raised full orthodox jew, and i know the rules, and the prayers and the rituals and i just choose not to participate anymore.  i’m not ignorant, just disinterested.)

but this charming fellow went into an elaborate explanation about this red string that is woven in israel, and is often wound in large quantities around the tomb of rachel, the matriarch of judaism.  (he also brought up a good point when he said that if the ancient jewish men weren’t such chauvinists, relegating their women to obscurity, that she would have been as important and well-known as say, abraham or moses.  come to think of it, in orthodoxy today, there’s still a lot of that going on.  but i digress).

now this string is purported to have some mystical powers.  the practitioners of kabbalah cut strands and ritualistically tie it around the left wrist of the recipient, with seven ceremonial knots with corresponding words and prayers, and the wearing of it is supposed to bring good fortune, and more importantly, ward off evil spirits and grant divine protection.  well, i say, pagan or not, sounds like a plan to me.  i mean, who couldn’t use a little good fortune?  and of course, being president of my homeowners association, i can certainly use a little protection from evil spirits, if you know what i mean.

so this genteel gentleman, (is that redundant?  i don’t think so), bestowed the gift of the thread upon both me and husband, recited the prayers, tied the knots, and now we’re good to go.  turns out you don’t have to be really religious to appreciate the mystical  aspects of our being.  i think just honoring and remembering what went before us, is enough.  there are thousands of years of the history of my people before oh-so-important me was born, and i’m thinking we shouldn’t lose sight of that.  ever.  religion or not, at the very least, we all stand on the shoulders of those who came before us and we are indebted to those that have brought us along this far.  and this red string on my wrist makes me think about that, and perhaps climb out of my own self, in order to look inward.  (or i could just be becoming a sentimental old fluff).  not sure.

either way, i’m glad i made a new friend, and i truly sense that this little piece of red string has bound us somehow.  it’s a pretty good feeling.

now don’t run out and buy a spool of red thread and start making knots.  it doesn’t work that way.  (first of all, i’m pretty sure the thread will have been made in china, and i’m thinking 5,000 years ago, air travel being what it was, that rachel never made it to china, so in all likelihood, chinese kaballah thread is a scam.  although the jews do love chinese food, so there’s a chance that maybe back then they had take-out).

could be, if you believe.

big saga tonight.  it was a rough week.  have you ever had a toilet go bad?  well, not really bad but not quite right?  it’s not like it overflowed and flooded the premises, but over the past couple of weeks the flush wasn’t what it once was.  not as stong.  not as vibrant.  not as decisive.  (wait, you realize, of course, that i’m still talking about the toilet and not about me?)  it became an issue that needed attention.  sit.  let’s discuss.

i have a management company whom i pay to fix things in our house.  i pay yearly (and dearly), and whatever goes wrong, (pretty much), i call them and they fix.  so this week my toilet in my master bath took on the demeanor of a lazy flush and i called them.  the repair man came, rootered a bit, plunged (past tense of “to plunge“?) and it was still kind of slow.  his diagnosis?  you need a new toilet.  the counterclockwise water motion isn’t enough to push the water down, due to calcified crud in the holes in the rim of the bowl.  my being an expert on a bunch of shit, but not especially about toilets, it all sounded like a considered opinion to me.  he left, i went to home depot, bought and carried home a new toilet, ordered the installation, and all was going to be right in the world again, come the following morning.

not so fast, kemosabe.

when the installer arrived, he removed the old toilet and gazed into the hole in my porcelain tile floor and announced, you have roots in your pipes.  (come to think of it, i saw a gay porn movie once where there was a scene between a lumberjack and a camper and one of them used that very same line.  but i digress.)  ok, i reply.  can we remove them?  no, says he, you need a professional rooter guy.  i’m not putting the new toilet on because when he roots your drain, it’s easier from here without the bowl and this way he won’t scratch it.  when he’s finished, i’ll come back and install your new toilet.  ok, says me, sounds like a plan.  and off he goes.

next stop, internet, phone calls, rooter appointments and finally a very nice man with a very big tool arrives, (a drain tool people,  minds out of the gutter), and he inserts a cable into my pipe (gosh, that does sound a tad dirty, no?)  and pulls out…..and i don’t think i’m exaggerating here…..what came out was a sequoia tree.  a five foot long root system that looked like the bottom of the tree from avatar (you remember, in the battle for the planet scene, when eywa, the tree of life, tips over and the people of pandora weep?)   well, picture me weeping.  that beast came out of my toilet!!!!    i’m amazed it didn’t grab my ass and shove a branch up, as i sat!  this thing was fierce!  so he cleans out my drain, $200 later, and packs up and leaves.  now, for sure, all things will be ok in the morning after the install.

did i mention i bought a kindof fancy job?  it’s a double flush deal.  sitter’s choice.  there’s the 1 gallon flush for liquids, and the 1.6 gallon for solids.  of course my first question is, and i’m sure it’s yours as well, how do it know?  is there like a little tiny speaker there, so that while you sit it asks, are we done here or do you need to drop a solid?  come on, i haven’t got all day.  i mean seriously, how do it know?  well, it  turns out that there are two buttons on the top.  one for number one and one for number two.  (how grammar school is this?  i mean, maybe the toilet wants to know if you have to go poopies.  oh the indignity!)  anyway, it is really, all things considered, pretty cool.   there’s no handle.  nothing to jiggle down the road.   take a look.:

i know, it’s a freakin’ toilet.  oh, big woo.  but check out the buttons for number 1 or number 2.

if you click on this second picture, i don’t know if you can see it, but the buttons have braille on them.  (i’m thinking if the blind guy found the toilet that’s a miracle in itself.  but to have him be able to select his flush….well, talk about equal rights for the handi-capapble.)

so the installer returns, and upon trying to do his job, announces that my tile floor is very uneven and that the throne will not sit squarely, and might, perhaps, rock a bit.  what to do, what to do?  so he uses shims, to prop it, and pre-mixed grout to various thin and thick applications to level it off, and announces, ok, it’s in, but don’t touch it for a week.  wtf?  through  my tears i ask, a week?  he answers, well don’t even put a hand on it for 24 hours.  after that you can stand and deliver liquids, but do not sit upon it for at the very least, three days to let the grout cure.  (and he thinks it’s the grout that needed curing?  what about me pokey?)

so the ordeal is over.  the toilet is in and it’s a beauty, and barely uses any water.  at the risk of being even further indelicate, since i’m still not allowed to sit, we have yet to see a solid go down but i have high hopes.  i’ll keep you posted.

so this past week has yielded a victory in battle with the bees, (see earlier blog), and now a happy ending to my porcelain crisis.  i am still king of my castle.  unfortunately, i am currently without a throne.