Revolving Resolutions

Though New Years already has enough alcoholic baggage with it to make it my least favorite holiday, the expectation of realistic resolutions always makes it feel like it comes with homework too! You mean I have to wish for world peace, bacon flavored Pop Tarts, and robot servants and really mean it? I thought they taught us in school that clichés will take care of all ills simply by ‘dreaming big’ or ‘standing strong’ to achieve anything right?

Clearly that’s why there is little motivation to be the first one out of the gate in a confetti-driven stupor to resolve to do much of anything other than get out of bed and scratch - which I am rather good at by the way. If only the world would truly revolve around football, food, and parades, then all of life’s toughest problems could be figured out and dealt with on every January 1^st.. That would leave the rest of the year left just to goof off and make / re-break the non-essential goals and impossible dreams that relentlessly recur and face us all in daily life.

Generally my resolutions fall into two categories – ideas that I am cursorily interested in but for only 5 minutes or less, and goals that I want to do for a lifetime but sadly will also do for less than 5 minutes as well. Oh sure every year I commit to ‘getting into shape’ but that’s NOT the type of resolution I should be making. The real mystery is whether my skin-sack's shape should resemble something akin to a tall n’ tan steak fry rather than the UH-oh-so familiar soft, ashen couch potato.

Honestly though, I don’t get melancholy over the relentless passage of time and the unfulfilled dreams of the previous year, since tomorrow’s literally a new day and change always happens. That is the one revolving constant that makes not just New Years, but ANY day just as good as any other for taking chances, making goals, and even missing marks. So for as many days as you keep on breathing, raise a glass, smile, and keep reaching for stars no matter how far away they may appear. Because I resolve one thing is certain – just like me, you’ll be making the same toast and jelly all over again - in just 364 and a quarter days!

E-Bowl-Of

Given my graying growing girth I have to watch what I eat, or more accurately WATCH what other people eat. Don’t worry I have plenty of flaccid fatty flesh reserves and cisterns of black coffee to tide me over until the Dairy Queen and Burger King get together to make a fat-free baby burger I can nurture without guilt. In the meantime though, I think it would be nice if I could find a guaranteed, calorie shredding, diet idea that will help me slim down just by sitting in my easy-geezer chair!

You see that lumpy yawn of a divan is where I do my best calorie cutting (into bite sized chunks). Yes in the presence of those crushed plush n’ crumby tufted buttons is where I write and stress EAT most often, especially after the TV news drones ceaselessly on about curb lurking dangers and societal discomforts. Who can blame both my mouth and my stomach for growling when these days every time I turn on the tele some floosy newsie starts spewing doozies about E-bowl-of this and E-bowl-of that.

So naturally my musty dusty brain filled with a murky milky mush calls to the claws to grab my anchor of a laptop, and the computer that sits atop it, to seek out this ‘E-bowl of’ cereal site that everyone is abuzz about.  I am intrigued since what personage of a portly persuasion doesn’t want to stare at lusty, glossy and saucy pictures of wet n’ grainy, fiber-rich cereals all from the comfort of their own couch? I would think even skinny, ice shelved penguins on egg-watch too might get a little hot and bothered and see their feather temps rise under such extreme conditions.

Maybe I have misspelled it for I find no mention of a bland pablum diet and an e-fitness program that is web-based without the mess of real spiders and their unfortunate encounters with heavy free weights. Too bad since who knows If I had really shed a sled-full of my sugarloaf I might have been able to reach out and preach the benefits of ‘E-bowl-of’ to the world beyond my Lazy-Boy. Yep, If I were lucky, I might have even gone to the SOURCE where this trend all started – then as the official spokesperson, I could fly back home and REALLY spread the word in person to those TV news-pukes who always make me hungry!

Mars and Venus

Fortunately when I was a young pup, my parents taught me the value of reading along with eating so with every Pop Tart consumed, also too was a paragraph on high fructose syrup and preservatives. I soon developed a rather extensive vocabulary in all the ingredients crammed into Lucky Charms beyond the oats to make them ‘magically delicious’.  This early education came in handy later when I finally ventured out on my own in the world by 50 years of age looking for things to read, eat, and eliminate all at the same time.

Naturally at least part of this skill has proven helpful in navigating the ways of the world especially when I travel. No it is not often I find a full place setting in restrooms or an edible morsel that has not already been passed over by vermin, but frequently in foreign lands it is important to read and enter the correct gender door to the toilet. With this in mind, why then is it so difficult to mark doors properly and legibly so that anyone - blind, dumb, or confused (or all three like me), can determine their gender and choose an appropriate loo to lounge in?

While I have accepted the dull lanky stick figure form of the male, and equally uncreative female stick icon in a dress as the representative placard for restrooms in America, it is not necessarily so overseas. Other countries prefer to reflect the fact that people often have tiny heads in comparison to their bloated bodies, and depending on how much spicy curry slurry they’ve consumed they might be in a blurry hurry to find the right water closet fast. So if this is true, why are their icons so confusing to my uncreative mind. Is the restroom for males the ‘fat running blob in a hat’ or is it the ‘jumping blob with a sack’ – and who knows which room is outfitted for babies since by definition all babies look like blobs?

Forget this Mars and Venus stuff since nobody really knows the gender of any planet. I don’t really care what the RIGHT symbols look like as long as if we can just agree on choosing ONE universal standard to read that applies to the appropriate gender in question. I’m not really worried though if I wander into the wrong toilet as I reach advanced age as long as I only travel in Spanish speaking countries. Because at least there nobody’s offended if we geezers misread the signs between the Senor or Senores, because when you gotta’ go any port in a storm is OK, when you have a ‘SENIOR movement' !

Closet Talk

Like most of my non-nudist moth-y friends, I too feel compelled to greet every morning with a trip to a suspended bare bulb inside my coop’s cloth lined crypt known as the bedroom closet. I am not lucky enough to have a hangar big enough to store both my ego and tent-sized tighty whities, or even make a good impression in a gym locker room. So sadly, I must thrust my duff daily into a tiny textile tomb of trappings, wrappings and togs in a zesty quest to dress my best instead of a mess.

Due to my oversized Kong body and undersized donkey dome that simple goal for most souls, of seeking apropos furbelow, is a challenging chore for me. To make matters worse, I admit coming out of the closet in the Winter can be difficult since along with my nose at night, I tend to keep the igloo blue and crispy cool too.  Even if the dawn doesn’t mind breaking daily I DO, so I lament stubborn buttons and fleecy duds that stick or won’t clip zippy-quick to prevent my pipe from freezing stiff.

Not only in the closet but obviously my wife and I frequent many of the same places, so it seems every organization to which we belong we receive a pair of matching logo polo shirts - one in her size and one in mine. Of course in the full light of day any ‘knit’-wit should be able to see the difference between a blouse and a rumpled blimp-skin. But then again can I help it if  my aging ‘ojos’ and bleary before-breakfast brain, only have enough sense left to interpret shivering and some kind of shapeless shirt?

Hey given my evolving age and devolving fashion sense, is it any real surprise that I truly am facing a dim outlook as to my closeted life and inadvertent foray as a fatter yet slightly less wild-haired version of RuPaul? Remember in some ancient cultures of the Caribbean and South Pacific, a big gut straining at the seams of a stretchy hide shows a rich life of abundance - and a mouth watering crew BBQ for a whole week! No matter how well I fill-out my wife’s closet frocks into ‘Eww’ too–tight muscle shirts, I know I’ll never be a stylish fashion PLATE … I’m better served upon a greasy dinner ONE with fava beans on the side.

My read on REEDS

Who decided that bagpipes should become associated with classy ‘American’ pomp, processionals, and memorable occasions? When I was young, I don’t recall legions of long legged and skirted men parading around their instruments except if I frequented West Hollywood Halloween parties. Now if I lived in Scotland or some other European culture that shuns pants I might understand, but didn’t my family forerunners sprint for the sea long ago to cover-up their bell-bottoms and avoid the blare of these bloody bleating bags o’ pipes?

After all who can listen to an instrument where its fundamental parts consist of a ‘Bag’, ‘Drone’, and a ‘Chanter’? In practice, any ONE of these words swirling around your dome for a short time will give you a headache, but together in concert they will always lead to serious migraines and ultimately formal funerals. Hasn’t America already suffered enough HARMonium at the hands (or slobbery chops) of obnoxious accordion and harmonica ‘windbags’, with their wheezing reeds and congested nasal nuisances?

Amazingly, not all REEDS rub me the wrong way unless they have to do with swamps, Hobbits, or irritatingly inane teenage Vampires. Musically, English horns and clarinets played well can be curiously captivating and who isn’t a fan of good SAX whenever they can get it?  Also remember to make it a double when it comes to my orchestral fave-flavs, the swoon of a bassoon expertly blown, or its baby bro, the oboe - even if played just ‘so so’. 

A few of you critical canines  might now howl in protest when I croon a tune at Karaoke or have the brass to‘bag’ on your beloved pipes n’ reeds without heed. Hey relax, I was hatched into a hill family of pro musicians and played trumpet too, so blowing-off fellow belIowers is just a form of tooting my own horn - right! Anyway I must admit, I’ve never looked very sophisticated while pants-less with my bagpipes showing. So I had better stick with the CLASSY instruments that I know and love - the hobo-band ‘chug jug’, slide whistle, and ubiquitous saliva-soaked jaw-harp!