They dwell among us.

The undead.

They’re evil, wicked, mean and nasty.

KIDS!!!! AAAAAAGGGHHHH!!!!

All the little monsters are getting ready for the Great Sugar Rush to fill their headbones with sucrose and chocolaty mish mash moosh until they vow never to eat any more Mary Janes, Neccos, or Snickers. You can already catch the scent of candy in the plastic pumpkins. Wonderful sugar pushers are already bringing in the deadly stuff to the workplace. Horrible things like candy corn, miniature chocolate bars, malt balls, and even Neapolitan cookies!! Yeah, you know, those wafer things that come in vanilla, chocolate and strawberry flavors.

Well, those people are all conspiring against me. They share a common goal: to cause me to binge on sweets so my britches will pop, my eyes will roll to the back of my head, and I’ll fall down in a nice pile of leaves with a big sugar-eating grin on my face. I have only one thing to say to all you sugar monkeys: I LOVE YOU VERY MUCH. COME LIVE WITH ME.

Ooops!! I said two things. That’s ok, I don’t mind. Two things are better than one. May I have another malt ball please?? Thank you. Now my teeth are brown with delight, and I shall never pressure wash them again.

Hallowe’en is a most magical time of the year, darn it. Young monsters roaming the streets, and gathering all those yummy remarkables. These days we take the grandkids trick or treating. Our own kids of course are older now, and I confess I miss the very important chore we had to bear as parents each Hallowe’en: to check the loot when they get home. Conversation during such safety checks went much like this:

“This Mr. Goodbar looks like it’s been tampered with. Guess I better taste it to make sure.”

“DAAaad!! How come it’s only the Mr. Goodbars that are defective?? That’s the thirteenth one you ‘tested’ so far.”

“Well, ok, they’re probably alright. Oooo!! Snickers! That one looks a little… yep! There’s a tiny hole right here! Gotta open it up…”

“Gimme that back!! MOM! Dad’s eating all my candy!!”

“SSSsshhh!! OK, OK!! Here!!”

Of course, as monster kids grow up, Hallowe’en activities change. One thing has remained the same though: we’re privileged to have them over to carve pumpkins. Nowadays that includes the grandkids, which of course is way cool. The traditional photo session at the end of all the carving artistry involves one picture with the lights on, and one with the lights off; while the flickering candle light of the jack o’ lanterns lights up our faces.

Before the kids were grown, past Hallowe’ens came with the traditional parental warnings: don’t harm anything. No eggs. No mayonnaise. Nasty stains with that stuff. No breaking things. Soap, shaving cream, now there’s some party favors! Our son once mentioned maybe plastic wrap might be nice.

“What, no toilet paper?? Anyhow, what the heck do you do with the plastic wrap?”

“Wrap up someone’s mailbox! Hee hee!!”

“Ummm, yeah, ok man, whatever you say.”

Sounded like fun to be honest…

After digging into my own childhood memory box I recalled when some friends of mine wrapped this guy’s motorcycle in MANY layers of hiney wipe. Poor dude parked his bike inside a gas station, where one of the pranksters worked. Right across the street from the grocery store. Talk about your supply and demand! So I was kinda keen on Nate doing a big TP job, because I never had the guts to do that when I was a kid. I was scared to death of my dad in those days; and I didn’t want the skin removed from my posterior.

At our house, we pretty much allowed harmless pranks. A well done toilet paper job is pretty cool, actually. Until it rains. Got a bit concerned once when our daughter informed us about some interesting plans, though.

“Where you goin’ tonight, Punkin?”

“We’re goin’ go to Ryan’s house and fork them!”

“SAY WHAT??!!”

“You know, you buy a few boxes of plastic forks and stick them all in the lawn!”

OK so that sounded like fun to me too! Can you imagine the parents waking up in the morning??

“Wake up, dear!!”

“Why, what’s wrong??”

“We’ve been forked!”

“O God, NO!!”

Hey, there’s lots worse these monsters can get into. We tried not to suppress their creativity, so long as it was harmless fun. In other words, we stayed involved enough in their lives to know what they were doing.

Anyhow, since they’re older now, trick-or-treating is slowly setting sail on the ship to Memory Island. But you know what? Sometimes I miss all those free “possibly defective” chocolate bars the kids used to bring home by the bushel. However, we have been known to mooch a little from the grandkids. We don’t do “safety checks” anymore, that’s Mom and Dad’s job.

I know, maybe I’ll dress up like a coffee table or something and go myself!! On the other hand, maybe I could go shopping!! Let’s see there’s all this candy; but wait… plastic forks, shaving cream, toilet paper, plastic wrap… Plastic wrap?? Yeah, why not??!!

Happy Hallowe’en, all you Flavorheads!! By the way, that Mr. Goodbar looks like it’s been tampered with a bit…

Well if you’ve ever visited this silly site before, you know I love old cartoons.  In keeping with the spirit of the season, here are a couple of my favorites.

So there I was, minding my own business, wondering what I should write about for this week’s Happy Friday!!! thing, when a Facebook Friend posted a funny: “Friday the 13th – remember – it’s bad luck to be superstitious!” so I said “thank you” because I was wondering what to write about tonight and now I know so there!

Just for the halibut, I used The Google Thing (TGT) to find out how often Friday the 13th happens. Well that took me to The Wikipedia Thing (TWT), which says “On average, there is a Friday the 13th once every 212.35 days, whereas Thursday the 13th occurs only once every 213.59 days.” We get one at least once a year, but it can happen as many as 3 times in a year.

Isn’t that special?

There was a period of my life when I was convinced Friday the 13th came much more often. You know that old saying: “if it wasn’t for bad luck I wouldn’t have any luck at all.” I’m hoping that doesn’t apply to me. Back in “The Before Times” I was certain my luck really stunk; but I gradually discovered that all the “bad luck” was really a set of consequences that I inflicted upon myself due to some rather poor choices.

Nowadays I consider myself extremely fortunate. Of course, I’m trying to make better decisions. It has been especially helpful to shed my youthful follies that involved too many intoxicants; my affinity for which helped me rationalize all too many actions that were very unacceptable and too often very unkind. I don’t think I really left adolescence until I was 35 years old. After much pain and suffering (again, self inflicted) I actually got to a point where I wanted to grow up. I’m still trying to learn better behaviors… to stay teachable. I try to be kind to everyone I meet, and I’m getting better at being kind to myself.

Although I didn’t really expect it, I guess this Friday the 13th got me thinking about all this stuff. As I said, I really am very fortunate. I can very much agree with what a friend of mine often says: “90 percent of the world would love to have the problems I have.”

Well my friends, it’s very late outside so I’m gonna make this one short and sweet. The grandkids are here, and as I’m plunking on the keyboard they are zonked out after watching very old (and very cool) cartoons until a very late hour. Therefore, I’m gonna plop some videos of a couple songs that have helped me “get better luck” over the years. They help me remember that it’s never too late to start all over again.

Even if I have to do it multiple times a day.

Not sure if I’ve ever mentioned this, but I married the Most Beautiful Woman In The Universe. She can’t help being lovely, it just comes natural to her. I really am truly grateful every day that not only is she beautiful, but she’s my best friend, and also I get to kiss her and snuggle and stuff like that there. That being said, even her Amazing Loveliness sometimes cannot prepare us for a horrific reality of life: BIG CHORES. We really don’t like big chores, especially when neither of us have had any experience with said chore. One case in particular began today after much anticipation and weather watching.

Earlier this year we decided we should stain our deck. A good idea, it’s made of wood and is 11 years old already. Until today it has never been stained. My Beautiful Girlfriend (the lovely lady who let me marry her 44 years ago) hired a nice man to come blast the deck clean with pressure washers and bleachy chemicals. He did a great job and made the wood look very clean indeed.

I bought the stain a few months ago, and after some delay with the deck cleaning job (the nice man had a scheduling whoopsie and showed up a couple months late); it was time to plan for deck staining time. This of course was completely dependent on the weather: in the event of rain you have to allow the wood to dry for a few days. Needless to say, it rained just often enough to annoy us greatly.

Here we are now on Labor Day weekend. I normally take a couple days vacation in conjunction with a long weekend so I can get lots of time off. And I figured if push came to shove I could spend my vacation staining the deck with the help of my Very Attractive Wife Lady. That fun began today.

Remember how I said earlier that neither of us really like BIG CHORES, especially ones with which we’ve had no experience? Well, not sure about anyone else, but we both got a little grouchy. She started off very grouchy, then apologized. Then it was my turn to be a stinker-butt, and I apologized. Then both of us decided that the stinker-grouchy-butt routine was not very helpful, and we managed to just get things done without trying to remove each others’ vital organs.

A friend of ours told my Sweet And Amazing Honey Pie that this deck staining job thing would only take 3 hours. Apparently our friend forgot to use the time multiplier during her ciphering… 3 hours was chewed up in nothing flat and we have several more hours to go.

Upon seeing the result, we were pretty pleased with ourselves; in spite of the mess we made. Some decorative rocks now have speckles. In the flower bed that trails around the outside of the deck is a little concrete kitty that is “sleeping.” It’s beginning to look more like a calico. We’re taking a break because the sun went ni-night; and besides, every joint and muscle in our bodies is crying for mercy. More fun tomorrow when we hope to finish it all off.

Both of us groaned that we woulda-shoulda-coulda hired all this out; but reality quickly slapped us in the nostrils because that would be rather expensive. Call us selfish, but we’re getting closer to retirement and are trying to make decisions that save us some cash. After all, as my Voluptuous Va-Va-Va-Voom Best Friend Person said, this deck staining business “is not rocket science.” Good thing it isn’t; not sure our home would survive the explosions. Hey, we made pretty on the deck, and our marriage actually survived!! Truly miraculous.

Please, no more BIG CHORES for this year.

Please.

Could have been worse, we could have chosen to build a boat…

So there I was, minding my own business, harvesting the ripe tomatoes before the rain came. And we actually got a REAL rain for a change!! Almost an inch at our house. While other parts of Michigan have been getting some pretty good moisture over the summer, here in our little corner of Beautiful West Michigan it’s been pretty doggone dry. Because of that, if you don’t pick your ripe or nearly ripe tomatoes before it rains, the extra water makes them split open.

So there I was, minding my own business (oh wait, I said that…), and as I was picking the corn, I mean the TOMATOES, I noticed that two of the corn stalks were bent over in a most unnatural way. It only took a few milliseconds for me to know exactly what this was all about… the partially chewed ear of popcorn lying there, crying silently with little chompy marks all over its outer skin places… oh yes, I’ve seen this before, it makes me crazy and sad inside because I don’t plant very much popcorn and now this (or these?) stinkin’ THIEVES are making me so arooo and bipple-dee-bip that I can’t even snibble my fardaklob without flortening even more bold italic words to show how COMPLETELY ANNOYED I AM AT THOSE MASKED MONKEES GETTING INTO MY POPCORN WITHOUT ANY INVITATION OR EVEN A SLIGHT HINT THAT THEY MAY BE WELCOME and that’s quite enough superfluous emphasis for one run-on sentence; thank you very much.

Raccoons. Just like last year. Unlike last year, I may have some reprieve. I put out a live trap last night and this morning there was a corn thief, trapped in Corn Thief Jail. Ha ha on you, you stinkin’ cute little monkey headed brinklebork!! The cat food was excellent bait for your corn thievin’ nostrils!! I really hope you were the “Lone Ranger” in this popcorn raid. Just in case though, I put the trap out again with the hopes of catching other members of your family; if they are near.

A friend of mine has chickens… and he has trapped some thieving raccoons and a couple possums I guess. They are all in heaven now; he accelerated each of their journeys with a .22 calibre shell. Sorry, but I don’t have it in me to kill these thieves. I guess you’re supposed to get a permit to either kill or otherwise remove vermin from your property; but from what I’ve heard not many folks worry about such things. No, I think what happens at my house is they crawl into some kind of wire box and somehow mysteriously disappear. During this magical event, they venture off to an unknown raccoon friendly environment that’s about 10 miles and 2 rivers away from my yard. I’ve never actually trapped one you see. It was a dream. Don’t read the previous paragraph. Oh, you read it already?? Well fine. I’ll deny every word of it.  Besides, you have to catch me…

The most effective method to stop the garden raids is of course prevention. I’ve talked about an electric fence for a couple years now. This was the year it was supposed to happen… but as is often the case I forgot to quit procrastinating. Now the corn is well on its way to maturity. Although I dashed off to the Farm and Home store last night and went nuts buying electric fence surprise supplies, I’m embarking on a learn-as-I-go journey to put a row of ouchy-wawa wire (that’s technical talk for HOLY MACKEREL THAT’S A BIG SHOCKEROONY) on top of my existing 5 foot high wire fence. I think I have a nice design; so wish me luck.

My grandiose plan for all things like this is to quit procrastinating either tomorrow or the day after that. No need to rush into things you know. Everything falls into place, especially change out of your pockets when you sit on the couch. Did you ever look under the driver’s seat in your car?? There’s treasure under there I tell you!! This is all from things falling into place. OK, maybe I’ll actually have to work to finish the electric fence surprise. That will take some effort.

Maybe tomorrow…

Today’s video has nothing to do with corn theft; rather it is a rendition of one of my favorite Beatle songs. Not sure if my little corn thief’s name was Rocky… might have been a girl. But then a friend of ours named Richelle actually is known to us as Rocky.

I’m guessing many of you have heard The Beatles version of Rocky Raccoon.  If not, you can find it on the YouTubeThing.  I knew there would be no Beatles video of it; but I rather like Richie Havens’ version of Rocky Raccoon.

Once upon a time, in a brand new16 year old car, the air conditioning died and the Spoiled Americans who owned the car were very dismayed (especially the American Wife). Because the Spoiled American Husband really enjoyed staying happily married, after many hot summer days (and an upcoming family reunion on the east side of the state) he finally got off his hiney and got the brand new, 2001 Chrysler Town and Country to the Air Conditioning Fixing Guy.

The day of Air Conditioning Fixing came, and the Air Conditioning Fixing Guy called and spoke in very technical jargon: “I can’t fix your air conditioning unless your cooling fan works. Your cooling fan doesn’t work.” Well this sounded a bit fishy to the Spoiled American Husband. But being the (relatively) obedient person he is, he took the brand new 16 year old car to the Normal Car Fixing Guys (who don’t do air conditioning) and said, “the Air Conditioning Fixing Guy says he can’t fix the air conditioning because the cooling fan doesn’t work. Seems to me it’s OK, but would you please check for me?”

The Normal Car Fixing Guy called back: “there’s nothing wrong with your cooling fan. I kinda got into an argument with the Air Conditioning Fixing Guy when I called him, but I’m sure your cooling fan is OK.” So by now you all have probably guessed maybe that I am the Spoiled American Husband Guy so I will save my word count and herewith refer to myself in the first person. That is, of course, unless a second or third person comes to visit and claims to be me, in which case I’ll probably not be able to finish the story for many more minutes.

Anyway.

So I call the ACFG (Air Conditioning Fixing Guy) and say, “well I had my cooling fan checked, it’s OK. But you know, you serviced the air conditioning and replaced the compressor about a year ago, and now it is already broken. For why this is so quickly dead? Is there no warranty on the compressor?” There was some silence on the other end, and the ACFG basically gave the telephone equivalent of a shoulder shrug: “uhh… no… it’s been a year… ummm… no; no warranty.” I paused, and said, “well OK, when can you take another look?” “I’m booked till Monday,” he said. So I told him I would consult with my Beautiful American Wife Person regarding scheduling and get back with him.

Now I am knowing it’s time to do the Google search for a nice, shiny, New Air Conditioning Fixing Guy. I am also getting weary to the point of not with good grammar typing or word usage correct. And also even not caring about it really too!! So I look at the reviews and found that a neighbor of mine was indeed pleased with the service at the New Air Conditioning Fixing Place I found. Atsa nice. OK. So I go there and they check and find a bad compressor. I am now tell them “yes I know, the other Air Conditioning Fixing Guy replaced it about a year ago.” “Didn’t he give you a warranty??” “No,” I said with some harrumphing. “Well,” the Nice Office Lady says, “we give a warranty on all our repairs: 3 years or 36,000 miles.” “I like that warranty a lot,” I retorted. I schedule the repair, we drop the car off Sunday night for the Monday working time, and wonder how, oh HOW CAN WE SURVIVE WITH JUST ONE CAR??? OH GOD OH GOD!!!

Monday comes. More waiting. No call. Here comes the late afternoon. Oy yoy yoy…

Finally the New Air Conditioning Fixing Guy calls me and says, “your compressor is bad. Do you know you need to replace the expansion valve and the dryer unit? Ya, if you don’t do that the compressor won’t last very long.” “Pretty sure the other ACFG didn’t do that,” I replied with a sigh. “No worries, we’ll get you fixed up!!” said the NACFG (New ACFG). “When can you do that?” I asked. “Looks like Wednesday is open.” “OK thanks,” I said obediently. We drop off the car again. Again we are cry of our now having only one car, Oh God OH GOD.

Wednesday is almost gone now. Oh God. They call again… “there’s a part we can’t get till tomorrow morning.” I try hard to conceal my sadness. “OK… will it for sure be done tomorrow?” “Yes, no problem,” the Nice Office Lady replied.

Thursday. Tick tock, tick tock… afternoon arrives. Late afternoon.

Yay, I cheer with Great Impatience Now!!  (I cheer with sadness and worrisome sarcasm.)

The Nice Office Lady finally calls and tells me that the bill will be about $818. Well by now I am rolling in gooey, sticky happy sauce, because the first “fix it” job cost a bit over $600 about a year ago. No warranty. Now I get to enjoy a Brand New Bill from the NACFG for $818. Is that cool or what?? And this amount was prefaced with the following, when the Nice Office Lady at the NACFG place told me, “well, your air conditioning works great on the passenger side; but not so good on the driver’s side.” “I can live with that I think, my Beautiful Wife Person is the one who really needs the air conditioning to work.  But wait,” I hesitated, “can you fix the driver’s side? How much would that run?” She commenced to ciphering, and the new bill was looking like it was gonna exceed $1000.

For air conditioning.

In a 16 year old car.

No.

Uh uh.

Stop.

Please.

“OK,” they said. And when I came in to get the car, the Nice Office Lady went over the details of the VERY NICE WARRANTY (seriously, it was very nice) with me. I thanked them all with great exultation, and on the way home I fiddled intently with the temperature controls and I think… maybe… PERHAPS I may have noticed an improvement of air conditioning on the driver’s side.

Maybe.

I dunno.

So, the moral of the story is: we are spoiled rotten. The brand new, 2001 Chrysler Town And Country will now be cooler inside than it is outside when the summer heat returns. Otherwise, it’s in pretty good shape; comfortable to ride in; and runs great. Nice radio… it even gets AM!! I really love AM radio (but that’s another story). And it’s paid for… no car payments at our house.

Spoiled Americans. That’s what we are.

I think next time I go for the deliciously expensive car repair, I will help them to cipher the bill like Mr. Lou Costello did with his landlord…

Once upon a time, like this evening, I thought it would be really cool to replace the belts on the mower deck of our brand new 2002 Cub Cadet lawn tractor. Seemed simple enough… “Oh and while I’m at it I might as well change the oil,” I said to myself. Another seemingly simple task.

Well, a mechanic I’m not; and in the realm of garden tractors I’m thinking I have the know-how of a choo choo truck with no interior antibodies. Huh?? Let’s put it this way: I seem to have an affinity for learning things the hard way when it comes to anything with an internal combustion engine.

OK, I’m shaming myself. As you may have guessed by now, things didn’t turn out quite like I planned. I got the mower belts changed without too much difficulty; although it was a whole lot easier getting the deck off the tractor than it was to put it back on. Then for the oil. I looked here and there, and found no evidence of where the oil drain might be. “Oh wait,” I thought, “there’s a thingy with a cap off of it that might be a drainer doodad. Looks like the cap’s been off for a loooong time…

So being the thoroughly modern ignoramus I am, I got on the interwebs and found that the thingy with the cap off was indeed the drainer doodad (please forgive my technical jargon). I tried to follow the instructions: push in slightly and turn counterclockwise to drain the oil.

Well because the drainer doodad was totally gunkified, I couldn’t push in, so I turned counterclockwise and the whole darn thing came off. Now the oil is draining into the tub I have waiting below. Cool, so far. I thought. Then… OH PEEGLESNURGE!! IT’S RUNNING ALL OVER THE POWER TAKE OFF!! I made quick with the rags, but to no avail. Big mess. I did get the gunk out of the drainer doodad so I can use the thingy with the cap next time. But this was this time, and I tried to clean up everything the best I could.

OK… after much weeping and gnashing of teeth, but without throwing any tools or biting my wife’s head off, although I did ask her to quit asking me questions, like “will it start now? Did you get it? Is it going to run?” because after she asked me several of these I would run around the house screaming and crying because of the mess I made and I’m feeling pretty dumb and I didn’t want to make my Beautiful Honey Pie sad by barking at her when she was just wondering how things were coming but holy gazzamoopa I was getting really frustrated and I finally, FINALLY after much finger ouch and crawly grunty times I got it all back together and now it’s time to try the mower and wow by golly it works great but something’s wrong besides this run-on sentence you see because the tractor ain’t cruising so good so WHAT THE HECK IS THE DEAL NOW??

“Oh poop,” I recalled, “I must have oiled the pulleys.”

So now the belt thingy that runs the hydrostatic transmission whatchamahinger is oiled nicely; which of course means it ain’t gonna have much power because it be a-slippin’ all the stinkin’ time. Is that cool or what?? NO!! THAT IS NOT COOL!! So what did I do? I did what any almost-a-mechanic-guy would do: I got out my floor jack and jacked up the hiney of the tractor so I could see what the deal was and A) yes there was oil where it shouldn’t be and 34) the belt should probably have been replaced many moons ago which I think needs to happen at the dealer. Otherwise, I’m a gonna need me a tractor tutor.

I could have avoided all this cockamamie flerping around by not trying to do stuff for which I’m not really well trained. The folks at the Cub Cadet service house would have made some grocery money from me and my tractor would actually do what it’s supposed to do. As it stands now, we should be able to mow… works OK on a flat surface. Gets a little wimpy trying to go up hill though… The old Cub Cadet needs to go to the doctor soon. A real doctor that is… And of course, you probably know what I told my Most Wonderfully Attractive Wife person after all this, right??

“I want ice cream.”

Guess I could take it to these guys…

I’ve come to a terribly harsh conclusion: my Beautiful Girlfriend and I are getting older. This of course may seem like a no brainer… I mean I’ve already enjoyed 63 trips around the sun; and next week my Lovely Bride will be able to boast the same thing. So yeah, we’re getting older.

Remember how Grandma and Grandpa used to gross you out when you were a kid? No, not them personally (I hope), I mean some of their conversations. Many of you have probably endured the dubious privilege of overhearing them discussing all the really neat things that come with an aging body: wrinkles, hair loss (men especially), false teeth, and the worst conversation topic of all: bodily functions.

Well, I never thought I’d hear myself say it, but my wife and I have stepped up to the plate with this old people stereotype and discussed poop and pee today. And it didn’t even gross us out! In fact, we were laughing through much of it. Some of the discourse involved “anomalies…” you know, cool things like constipation. Next was the need to pee 145 times a day… or maybe thinking you need to but can’t.

The intrigue shifted gears a bit when something came to mind. I told my Sweet Honey Pie, “you know I haven’t gotten a bill for my Cologuard yet.” For those who are unaware, Cologuard is a test for colon cancer. You see (I’m talking to youse kids now…) when you turn 50, your doctor will recommend you get a colonoscopy to make sure you don’t have colon cancer. It’s a very enjoyable procedure where they knock you on your hiney (so to speak) with a big dose of demerol and then they shove a gigantic garden hose with a TV camera on the end into your nether regions. Actually, the most enjoyable part of the procedure is the prep you have to do before you go to the Garden Hose Hiney House. Oh yes, it’s great fun. You drink a special tonic that makes you wish you never had intestines. Have some, then be very close to the toilet because you’re gonna need it!! All this so the medical folks can look at your colon without any crappy obstructions.

Oh wait… Cologuard… right, we didn’t get a bill. Well you see, it’s like this: I was 52 when I got my colonoscopy, and I was really glad my Lovely Lady was with me. That’s because after the procedure was done; I wouldn’t wake up. In fact, I decided not to breathe very much. Seven times a minute is not enough for good health really. She yelled to the nurses, “um… he’s not breathing.” They shrugged it off at first, saying the demerol would wear off soon. At that point my Baby Cakes (who also happens to be a nurse) spoke a bit more assertively. “He’s not breathing!! His lips are turning blue!!” “Oh,” they said, and gave me some narcan; which has been in the news a bit lately. Narcan reverses the effects of narcotics, and its role in news reports has been the use of it to help junkies survive an overdose. So, it turns out I’m allergic to demerol; or at least the amount they gave me. My Dear Darling had some other complications that resulted in her colonoscopy being stopped before they could determine anything. Then, unfortunately, she had to undergo a barium enema; which is even MORE fun that the colonoscopy. Neither of us wanted to enjoy those happy crappy times ever again.

So yeah, OK, Cologuard!! Time to talk more about poop!! Yay!! Both of us had negative results for colon cancer, which was a very good thing. Another very good thing is Cologuard, which is a test that involves sending a stool sample to a lab for testing. Just to be clear, in case youse kids (youngsters) aren’t aware, a stool sample is not a hunk lopped off of a chair with no back. No no, you get to poop in a bucket and ship it via UPS to the lab. Is that crappy or what?? It’s very effective, and much less invasive than a colonoscopy or barium enema. Way cheaper too. But our insurance company, to which we affectionately refer as the Blue (I Don’t) Care Network, is too stinkin’ cheap to pay more than a pittance for the test; which leaves us holding the bag for the rest. Even though Medicare and lots of other private insurance companies pay, BCN does not. Is that awesome or what? Doesn’t’ matter, we’re blessed with the ability to pay our share. We’d much rather pay than have those crappy barium garden hose TV enema cameras shoved up our poopenheimers. Cologuard is recommended every 3 years; by which time Medicare will be our insurance provider.

I know this all sounds like a pretty crappy conversation, but if you’re near the same age as us, you’ve probably had a similar discussion at one time or other. If you’re near my age and try to tell me you haven’t; well, I’m not sure I’d believe you. And if you are younger than us and are absolutely sure you won’t talk about such things when you get old, I laugh to you.

You’ll find out.

In the meantime, Betty Boop will sell you some tonic that will cure all ills…

Happy Friday!!! to all you readers out there. And Happy Anniversary to my Beautiful Girlfriend and me. You may notice that I’m posting this earlier in the day than normal. Well, you can’t see me, but I’m here on a Thursday night, smacking keys on this keyboard thing to write a Happy Friday!!! a day early so I can celebrate a special day with my Soulmate.

It’s like this, OK: way back on May 19, 1972, we officially became a couple. That’s like 45 years ago!! How can this be possible??? I mean, I know it’s been awhile, but 45 years?? Sheesh!! As a friend of mine once said, “you know what the frogs say, ‘time’s fun when you’re having flies!!’ “

Boy ain’t that the truth ( I think…).

Somebody Upstairs had to be stirring some sort of Cosmic Cauldron to put us together. We were “introduced” to each other during the last half of our senior year in high school. God Bless Mr. Patana… he was the Spanish teacher who was saddled with overseeing the study hall to which my Future Honey Pie and I were assigned. He was adamant that we should enjoy assigned seats: boy / girl, boy / girl in alphabetical order (probably for his ease of taking attendance). I am a Hansen, she was a Hilliard, so we got “stuck” sitting next to each other.

Why is this so “Cosmic?” I thought you’d never ask… even if you didn’t. Here I was, a transplant from Long Island, Noo Yawk, getting seated next to a truly lovely female person transplanted from Ferndale, Michigan. Both of us were uprooted from our perfectly comfortable lives in the suburbs and blasted waaaay up north to Rhinelander High School in Rhinelander, Wisconsin.

Wisconsin!! WisCONsin???!!!

Oh yeah.

My transplanting preceded hers by almost 6 years; so by the time this lovely young woman came to Podunk (my cousin’s nickname for a small town), I was fortunate enough to have been converted into a country boy. However, I certainly understood the pain of being uprooted with little or no notice; and that’s exactly what she endured.

Fortunately (for me), we became very good friends pretty much instantly. Study hall became my favorite part of the school day; even though I already had a “girlfriend.” I put “girlfriend” in quotes because she lived near Chicago and only came up north with her family for vacations. We wrote gooshy letters to each other and stuff but this awesomely attractive young lady from Ferndale really captured my heart. She also mentioned she had a “boyfriend;” he was in the Navy (also good… for me). Neither of us spoke much about these long distance relationships much though. Our friendship was blooming into something much more amazing.

I was really enjoying what seemed like a strictly platonic (albeit powerful) bond when she pulled a dirty trick: she abandoned her normal attire of bell bottom blue jeans and smock tops for dresses and sparkly makeup. It was very effective… similar to how effective it would be if she clunked me on the noggin with a large 2 X 4. Needless to say, my relationship priorities shifted drastically from that point. I found my soulmate!!

Along came May 19, 1972; when my long distance “sweetie” was due to arrive at the resort where her family loved to spend the beautiful Northwoods summers. I rode my 1970 Honda CB175 (which we still own) over there and broke the news.  Although she wasn’t very happy about it, this really wasn’t a complete surprise; because I had mentioned my “new friend’s” name in several letters. My new Beautiful Girlfriend did her part with a “Dear John” letter to her beau in the Navy.

So here we are now. I’m still head over heels in love with this woman. Actually, it’s much stronger and deeper than ever. We are still best friends, and she still causes my blood to flow very warmly. And I do mean VERY warmly. And that’s all the detail youse kids are gonna get on that stuff!! So I’m writing on a Thursday night because I have a date tomorrow with the Most Beautiful Woman in the Universe. That’s not meant to be anything derogatory against other women, mind you. My professional opinion is that ALL other women in the world are the 2^nd Most Beautiful.

Hope all of you have a Happy Friday!!! I know I will, because it’s Friday, and I’m In Love. All the while I’ve been writing this, that song by The Cure has been banging around in my head (along with others), so here we go…

Can you believe this Sunday is Mothers Day already?? Sheesh!! Seems like just a few weeks ago it was 17 degrees outside. Well, as frogs say, “time’s fun when you’re having flies!!” Those of you who read my silly rants are aware that I took a little break. Wasn’t sure when to get “back in the saddle” with the Happy Friday!!! thing; but I figured a tribute to all the Mothers of the World could be a nice idea.

When writing about something as important as Mother’s Day, the task pretty much mandates a little research. Alright, maybe it’s not a mandate. But as I sat staring at the title that jumped out of my keyboard and onto the page, I couldn’t help being curious about where all this Mother’s Day stuff originated. Turns out there have been several holidays over the eons devoted to mothers; dating back perhaps thousands of years.

Here in the US, the holiday as we now know it was created by Anna Jarvis in 1908. Her efforts resulted in President Woodrow Wilson proclaiming it a national holiday in 1914. Unfortunately, the occasion quickly became commercially “interesting” to merchandisers; to the chagrin of Ms. Jarvis. Even she reportedly began to refer to Mother’s Day as a “Hallmark Holiday.”

Even so, God knows there is no more deserving soul to be honored than Mom. Your Mom, my Mom, Mother Nature, and so on. In the case of me and my siblings; I’m amazed that our mother made it through the ordeal of raising the four of us without completely going bonkers. Our parents started our family with me in 1954; and raised us through the 60s, and into the 70s. Early on, social norms meant that Dad was “king of the castle” and Mom was the keeper of the household. In other words, Dad earned the money and Mom did the best she could to keep us fed and clothed. Considering some of the “challenges” my Dad introduced into that equation she did a remarkable job.

Mom was the cook, bottle washer, laundry attendant and mending master. She knew how to comfort us when we were sad; and she knew how to put us in our place when we acted up. We were raised on Long Island, New York during a time when shows like “The Honeymooners” were still on TV. Even if you didn’t live in Brooklyn, people were not afraid to yell to get their point across. I once had a fond remembrance of when the four of us were driving her nuts; and Mom shouted, “YOUSE GODDAMN KIDS!!” Needless to say, she got our attention. When I mentioned it to my mother many years later, she quickly replied, “I never said that!!”

Of course not.

Anyway, she raised us the best she knew how. Did a darn good job of it too. Although her generation was not really the touchy-feely type; we knew that she loved us and would do anything in her power to make life better for us.

She must have been heart broken when I ran off with “that girl.” At the time, that was how Dad referred to my beautiful girlfriend. Relations between Dad and me were usually tense (to put it mildly), so leaving home at the ripe old age of 18 seemed like the natural next step for me. I joined the Air Force and was married to my sweetie all in the course of a year after graduation from high school. Things between Dad and me never really improved so we settled about 500 miles away and would visit maybe once or twice a year. It would be many years before I would really understand how difficult that must have been for my parents. My lovely wife and I raised a daughter and son; and now that they are grown and out of the house we get restless if we don’t see them for a week, much less a year or more.

Mom did the best she knew how. She was the product of a generation where the woman bowed to the husband, regardless of how deep the BS puddle became. Under Dad and Mom’s roof, we didn’t tell each other “I love you.” There was very little hugging, and if Dad was around, whatever you do, don’t cry “or I’ll give you something to cry about.” Deep down, however, we knew we were loved, albeit some of the the methods were a bit harsh.

Just like any new parents, my beautiful wife and I were determined to “do a better job than our parents did.” We raised our kids in a home where the words “I love you” were uttered every day, often multiple times. We had plenty of hugs to go around, plenty of time spent. And when I would get up on my high horse, my lovely wife would get a stick and knock me down from there. Well OK not literally, but you get the idea. I probably presented the same “challenges” into our new family that my Dad interjected into family life when we were being raised. One thing for sure, if you are interested in growing up, try having kids! I’m sure we made our mistakes, but we did some things right, also.

My Mom and Dad have both been gone for several years. Dad and I managed to patch things up before he left this life, thank God. And Mom did her best to cope with losing the love of her life until she finally left also. Funny how things evolve… as of this writing I can honestly say that I’ve flushed the bad memories and I’m cherishing the good ones.

So to my Mom, and to my lovely Wife Mom, and now to our daughter who’s also a Mom, and to all the Mothers in the Universe:

THANK YOU. GOD BLESS YOU. I LOVE YOU.

So there.

Well Mom, wherever you are, I hope you and Dad are having a Perfect Day.