Sick Stick Dip

Despite the abundance of bad habits and odd odors which emanate spontaneously from my body, surprisingly I have never smoked. I know the term ‘smoking hot’ is supposed to be a good thing unless of course you are Nascar disc brake or the inside of an overtaxed machine gun barrel. Oh sure I HAVE been ‘smoked’ a few times by smarmy salespeople or from an occasional invite FOR dinner by cannibals, but fortunately I have had few run-ins with classless cigarettes or a gust-fuss from their ruinous fumes.

As a teen I was no stranger to purchasing tobacco though since my first boss often put fire to a Briar while checking my work. So for holiday gifts I would buy the old dude some delightfully fragrant berry blends of the rough-cut stuff for his packing n’ puffing pleasure. Admittedly even I smoked a pipe or two in my life, though I was never proud of it while hidden up in the rafters trying to torch a  poor plumbing job soldering the water lines properly.

Hey just because I admired MacArthur’s stoic prow doesn't  mean I want anything to do with that nasty corncob sprouting out of it – who knows where that thing’s been? Unless somebody’s ribs are on fire and covered in Sweet Baby Ray’s then you can keep your peace-pipe smoke to yourself. Occasionally I will take a drag on a Pretzel Rod since they have all the benefits of fine Cuban cigars except for a few salt bump lesions and the fact that they fracture unpredictably when I cut off the cap.

Yes there’s nothing like taking a satisfying suck on a stick of hard tack in the back of a big car with dark tinted windows, to make you feel really important.  When I gum that wet-ended salty log it quickly inflates my ego without risk of any second-hand hot air escaping into the environment and making my clothes stink a lot more than usual. Hmmm, maybe that’s why I have an insatiable urge to play poker with dogs or call for a ‘hit’ on a mafia rival – I've clearly become addicted and a two-pack per day chain pretzel DIP! 

Stud Free Zone

Given my potato-truck style, even when wearing a tux I have never been mistaken for a suave James Bond with his rumple-free charms and oh so cool sweat-less n’ wet-less dry demeanor. Heck, even if I fake a British accent and don a dashing green ‘ensemb’ you can be INsured I still won’t strut enough stuff to make the swimsuit edition of Gecko’s Quarterly. Nope you’ll never catch me with a  “Pierced Brosnan” or any other body part since obviously studs and I don’t mix and I already have enough holes in my head.

I know closet space around here is at a premium to hang stuff up, but even with my oversized Dumbo ears as prime real-estate who needs more air vents adding to the wind noise and voices already beating on my brain? Clearly this new trend of unnecessarily perforating ones flesh-sack flaps is some kind of dental healthcare conspiracy. Call me provincial and CRESTfallen, but honestly I think these days it is ‘un-holey’ to encourage our youth to have more cavities and make them even larger.

I thought greasy teens in acne commercials are always complaining about having poor pock-marked complexions so why now are they so eager to add even more pores to it? I guess all that pent-up angst and Redbull-headed energy needs a few extra blowholes to ease societal pressures huh?  Forget cratering faces, today’s youth should VENT their passions and plaints like the rest of us do, by sticking pins in voodoo dolls, not using a Bedazzler to bang bling to their beans.

Sadly I’ll never be ‘cool’ by today’s standards since those drafty windows into my soul searching and self-realization are willingly painted shut. Yes by design the only ‘pokers’ and ’studs’ to cross my future path will  be confined to stoking a fire, building a wall, or an occasional game of cards. You see, unlike the young and dumb of today, thin-skinned old coots like myself know better than to abruptly punch pinholes in our hides without care – lest an ill-timed ‘whoopie’ leak might embarrass the air.

Green Scene Legacy

Given that the world has glommed on to the green scene now, surprisingly even I am trying to pass-on a legacy of recycling and re-purposing resources before I become the main course at the worm buffet. Like my mentor Kermit, whenever I can I enjoy being green, or at least sharing a shade a smidge south of a drunk monk’s shot of Chartreuse. If saving our precious planet means double-dripping through my underwear coffee filters before a good power washing at a public fountain then count me in because I’m always game-Y!

Even a blow-hole like me wants to protect the environment, so after a trash-bath I never let folks at the bus-stop preen downstream even if I’m seen shaking off with gleeful GUSTo. Those windy restroom dryers have a bad habit of flapping my fat and shooting my scent towards innocent bystanders. Anyway the bums who beat the drums in my ears can’t take the high pressure in confined spaces, especially if by an un-thinking tool that expels hot air faster than I do after a Taco Bell burrito. 

Since I am a bit of a pack-rat by nature anyway, recycling my leavings is more of a luxury for me than a chore though my wife perspective might not agree. Where most folks simply throw away their clothes with holes, I knows those ‘olds’ have a lot of life still left in them as dirt shirts, paint pants, rags, or in a pinch - drapes for the guest room. Though I’m always proud that I have a better plan than the ‘can’ for my ‘DUDS-ly long-gones’, I do admit, in the light of day (particularly strong sunlight) I’m not a fan of my inadvertent spotted n’ tanned ‘gams’.

From toilets to toasters, until my digits have stripped every switch, nut, or gasket no tired ol’ technology will find itself crossed off and tossed toward a meaningless end in a cold cloistered casket. No that hot, fiery, and very final R.I.P. parking space up front is reserved just for an old vulture like me since I’m too toxic for trash and too dried up for glue. But alas my lasting legacy can slouch tall since good fortune befalls all the recycled riches and ‘green’ goods I have diligently scavenged and ‘saved’. You see, regardless of my own final dark fate, the scraps and stuff I leave behind will forever serve as a shining light of hope, values, and a renewed productive life as a ‘plastic bin full of junk’.

Family Friendly Plots

Despite the curmudgeon creases in my cranium cover and sour glower from my furrowed brow, I like family fun-time eateries I really do. However even as a much younger ‘Up-chuck Cheese’ buck, my tolerance for the noise and finger goo generated in such joviality-joints has always been fairly low. Even the older-oriented arcades, alleys, or skating stink rinks have always been a challenge to my senses with their chaotic clunks, bumps, and funk gunk at every turn.

Hey I was lucky enough to raise a kid too so believe me I know that big noises and stains of all shades can come in very small packages. But my wife and I did our time in combat and have earned discharges as a ‘childless R’ Us’ civilians now. My old statue of limitations ran out long ago on food fights, the blowing up of animals – balloon or otherwise, and assaults upon unchartered depths of my face holes with anything other than a self-administered cotton-topped giggin’ pole.

The true problem is that the strife in my loony bin life’s already akin to being water-boarded with sound and slime but the whine-line crossed is usually MINE. That’s usually due to the pain of knuckles dragging, heavy breathing, and incessant grunting - and  that’s just whenever I move between the couch and the kitchen. Understandably by the time my wife unchains me at night so we can tether together to take in a hot caloric injection out on the town,  I’m already exhausted over Eustachian tube ringing rancor and shrill shrieks from both soda jerks and their sprouting squirts.

I guess that means in the future I should start shunning those delightful diners which feature a free sundae scoop of ‘FAT gras’ or collections of colorful tot toys to swallow with any meal purchase? Who knew places like those would attract legions of little people with large larynxes and icky sticky digits? You see, brainless, froth-mouthed zombies like myself hunger for family friendly places in which to comfortably congregate as well. Too bad there isn't a place where my wrinkled brethren could find a little more open space that is easy on  the ears so the Monks, mutes, lutes, and ME could comfortably feed in eternal and everlasting peace!

Scrambled Egghead

Even though my family members have successfully proven to the world that they are considerably smarter than I am, given enough time I’m planning eventually to be an egg-head too. No I’ll probably never know complicated math or be able to do crossword puzzles without adding in a few extra black squares to fit MY solutions. But fortunately, time is on my side since every day nature takes my soft n’ boiled noodle one step closer to naked noggin nirvana. 

Overall I’ve had a good relationship with my follicle fur and we usually have remained friends through thick and THIN (though recently our times together have tended toward the latter). When I was younger my fuzzy filaments did not always do my bidding or act the way I preferred, but what teenager ever listens to its guardian so it was understandable that whenever we parted ways, grease was ultimately involved. I guess I have been lucky overall since most of my life I’ve had ample hair raising’ close calls even though they usually concerned curly cowlicks and bed-head lasting impressions rather than any actual downy danger.  

As I age though, I have begun to notice that I am spending less and less quality time with my old and gray shock of locks, and it’s clear we are heading for ‘splits-ville’. Even my hats don’t want much to do with me any longer and seem to use any excuse to abandon my shiny dimpled dome, though that may be just the sweaty ski-slope n’ sunblock up top talking.  The good news is that with every hair that I share and shed in my travels helps me lose weight and better yet conveniently distributes confusing DNA evidence in case I’m ever accused of a CAPital crime.

Clearly my scrambled ‘Mount Baldy’ with all that new found fresh air circulating when bare, will finally give my soft spot a sure shot at inviting  true EGGHEAD envy from my bookish friends and family whiz-wits. Yes, respect surely will be mine as I continue to exhibit evidence of my advancing age by putting my wisdom-laden exposed lobes prominently on display for all to buff for luck like the belly of a laughing Buddah. No on second thought probably not, since sadly I already tingle way too much there since I admit, the only legal briefs I have ever opened, cinch too snugly under my slacks and when I sit, cut-off far too much blood to the brain!