Old Buzzard Devours Sweet Bird of Youth

My friends, go mark your calendars: My farewell tour starts tomorrow.

I’m not going anywhere. That's obvious by the fact that after all the years and all the awards won writing this junk that I’m now making less money than I was when I started this venture. (I have a degree in journalism, people, not personal finance.) Instead, I am embarking on a year-long goodbye to my youth because, about this time next year, I turn 50.

Ralph Kiner Never Met My Dog

Ralph Kiner never met the dog I named after him. It probably wasn’t a loss for either of them but it saddens me.

Twice in my life, I crossed paths with the baseball Hall of Famer, who died yesterday at the age of 91.

Philip Seymour Hoffman – R.I.P.

Philip Seymour Hoffman didn’t write this scene in the movie Almost Famous but this blog may never have been without him saying the words he spoke just to me:

If only Philip Seymour Hoffman, as brilliant of an actor and man as he was, had heeded the advice of Frances McDormand’s character in the same movie:

Good night forever, sad man who played Lester Bangs. Don’t let those swill merchants rewrite you.

(GIF source: http://fockingchick.tumblr.com/.../im-always-home-im-uncool)

Signs of the Mayan Apocalypse

It saddens me to announce that this will most likely be my last post.

It saddens me further to know that my long-awaited GoogleAds check will never arrive. I’d love to blow all three-digits of that baby on one last CornNuts and malt liquor bender while the hellfire and brimstone rain down.

Those of you grappling with strangers at Target for the last Furby may have forgotten that come tomorrow, Friday, Dec. 21, all life ceases. This doom and gloom arrives courtesy of the Mayan civilization, which is legendary for its contributions to language, math and culture, specifically Southern Culture on the Skids' instrumental, "Make Mayan a Hawaiian."

I usually ignore Judgment Day predictions, but the signs of the Mayan Apocalypse have become increasingly apparent.

The Trouble with Normal

My kids came home Friday afternoon as always.

Excitable hopped into the minivan at parent pickup, greeting me with his typical “Hey, Pops” as he squeezed his backpack in between the captain’s chairs in the middle row.

“Did they say anything to you at school about what happened?” I asked.

“About what?”

I told him there had been a shooting earlier in the day at an elementary school in another part of the state.

I didn’t tell him that the school was only about 45 minutes north of us.I didn’t tell him about the 20 children only a few years younger than him that died.

“Running Over the Same Old Ground”

Last night’s 12.12.12 Mega-Concert of AARP-eligible Rockers raising money for Superstorm Sandy victims had slipped my mind. Instead, I voluntarily bore witness to middle school students performing holiday classics.

The string ensemble killed. Not in the showbiz sense of wowing the audience into a dropped-jaw state of awe but in the Biblical sense of “… and Yahtzblob slew Kincadia with jawbone of an ass then danced the tarantella through the bloody entrails.” Why more parents of public school violin players aren’t throwing themselves in front of commuter buses remains a testament to the high quality of our nation’s antidepressant supply.

Then there was the chorus of which Li’l Diva. The girl loves to sing. Just not what teachers want her to sing. If it’s not One Direction or Ke$ha or the Beibster, it ain’t worth expelling the breath. She faked her way through most of her four songs. She’s more than ready for next year’s scheduled bout of teenage angst.

Scribbles Around My Heart

In an uncontrollable fit of neatness to avoid actual work this past weekend, I cleaned my drawers.

Not those drawers, which are done on Monday with the rest of the family unmentionables, but the filing cabinet drawers in my home office. That reminds me, we’re out of Shout.

After sorting through a desk full of paper that means nothing at all, I found a thick packet filled with colors and textures in paints and crayons and markers and pencils and stickers. It was the kids’ artwork from the days when I was still the center of their world instead of that guy who knows all the parental control codes to the household electronics.

I went through all the papers. The homemade Father’s Day cards, the school art projects, the five-minute masterpieces made on long summer days between snack and cartoon breaks.

I pitched a few things that held no special significance, such as a sheet with randomly placed shark stickers Excitable obviously created and a coloring book butterfly outline polka-dotted with splattered water color from the Li’l Diva.

Then there was this:

The Invisible Scars of War

Memorial Day is a week past yet I still find myself thinking of those who sacrificed their lives to protect our freedom.

In particular, I think of Sgt. Matthew A. Proulx of the New York State Army National Guard.

Love; Pass It On

Because the monsoon sweeping down as I type is carrying away the grass seed I put down for the 12th time in a month.

Because when the sun rises, and with it -- me, much of autumn’s bursting brilliance will have become soggy blanket of Crayola puke upon my muddy yard.

Speaking of expulsing bodily fluids, because no sooner did I step out of a New York City parking garage this week then did I step smack into a steaming pile.

Because that last bit compelled me, friend to all things canine – even those with the squirts, to give the stink eye to every dog and dog owner I passed in the next hour.

Because when I finally found a public bathroom, they were out of toilet paper.

Because while waiting to learn this, the thick-accented South American woman queued in front of me answered her cell then burst into tears because her sister really did have cancer, and I couldn’t do anything except hope my reeking shoe didn’t make this even worse for her.

Because my blog reader and Twitter feed has been filled with death, divorce, disease, despair and destruction of late. This may have drove my favorite escape, our TiVo, to finally off itself permanently Wednesday at the tender age of 6, taking with it my favorite two episodes of Ed.

Because Thing 1 is again struggling with her reading and resisting all my efforts to help her.

Because the doctor told me my total cholesterol and bad cholesterol are both over the limit. Dearest cheese, I’ll shall always think back fondly on the many tasty moments of crumbly delight we shared.

But finally because the keyboardist in this band did me a real solid last week (more on that later) and this is just the kind of infectious hook those of you bruised and battered by the past week could use right about now.

So, crank it!

And yes, you may interpret that as need be.

Video: Love; Pass It On by The Middle Eight

* * *

Finally, a special thanks to Elise of Everyday Goddess for making me a “Post of the Week” earlier this month.

Why I Won't Sleep Much Halloween Night

"Hey, Dad! Wanna see my pictures from art class?"

"That's an scary looking jack-o-lantern, Thing 2. But, uh, what's with the red under the eyes and mouth?"

"That's blood! Oozing out!"

"Uh, awesome, buddy. What else ya got there? That's a big one."

"Yeah. I was the only one to do two pictures. Everyone else only did one. But I did TWO."

 

"Cool looking witch silhouette in front of the moon, dude."

"Yeah. Look down there ...

 

"... That's a tombstone by the house!"

"Nice touch, son... but, um, what's that over there? ...

 

"... Is that a scarecrow? With a chainsaw?"

"Yeah! He came to the life! He cut up the man in the house. That's who's under the tombstone!"

(blink)

(blink)

"So, uh ... wanna tear into the bag of AirHeads I bought for the trick-or-treaters?"

"YESSSSSSS!"

*

Happy Halloween. Be good to your trick-or-treaters. And your kids. Please.

Can't Spell 'Diet' Without It

A co-worker and I were once returning from a meeting when, overwhelmed by the munchies, he asked me to pull over at a 7-Eleven. He needed a hot dog, he said, because he had gone to a nutritionist who drew some blood, analyzed it and determined that his body chemistry made him "hot dog tolerant."

After I stopped the Slurpee from shooting out of my nose, he explained that it was something about his body reacting extremely well to the "protein" and burning it at a highly efficient rate so he didn't gain weight. Eating a wiener, for him, would be like pumping the highest grade octane gas into your car.

Considering the hot dogs looked like they had been on that roller grill since Madonna really was a virgin, I think he had another kind of gas coming.

I forgot about this until sometime ago a friend, in an effort to improve her health and drop a few pounds, consulted a nutritionist who drew some blood, ran some tests and gave her a thick binder full of test results along with a list of foods. Try one food for a few days, record how your body reacted to it (heartburn, pus-filled boils, speaking in tongues, etc.) and how much you weighed the next day. Bad reaction and/or weight gain -- never eat that food again! Your body is having a type of allergic reaction to it, causing water retention, battles within the autoimmune system and justification of the nutritionist's exorbitant fee.

I'm no scientist, and I certainly don't pretend to be one on this blog, but I think you'll agree with me when I say "What the flock?"

(Literary alert: "Flock" is foreshadowing.)

This seems like a good way to test for food allergies and conditions like celiac disease, but is it the most cost-effective way for someone who is otherwise healthy and happy to get into some skinny jeans?

My doubts grew when my friend ate nothing but lamb for lunch and dinner. For about three months straight.

OK, lamb may not top your list of diet foods but I give the nutritionist credit here. When your dog has skin or stomach issues, one of the first things many vets recommend is a switch to a lamb-and-rice based food. It's either that lamb is a kinder, gentler meat or just that most dogs -- and humans except for gyro fanatics -- don't normally eat much lamb so it's a good control to test if their normal food is making them sick. So from me -- two paws up!

Then there were the martinis. Apparently all kinds of wines made my pal gain weight, but a good stiff Bombay Sapphire martini (hold the olive -- please) did not add to the scales. I was glad to hear that because I feel gin is highly under-appreciated by today's Grey Goose swilling masses (apologies to Vodka Mom and Aunt Becky -- you know I'd hit the potato juice with you two any time). Other than that, I was a tad concerned about the pile of empties I noticed in her recycling bin.

This went on for months, by which time my friend should have gone through the list and determined a wide variety of good and bad eats for her. Unfortunately, every few days, tired of baby-sheep breath and juniper-scented hangovers, she snuck in a pizza or helping of nachos and had to start from the top of that list again.

Then, one day, it stopped. No more obscure ancient grains to try or eating Food A only after digesting Food B before taking an intravenous hit of Food C in puree form. She was back to normal, but with a simple commitment to more fruits and veggies, less processed foods and regular exercise.

I was proud of her because, while I too often stray from the good food path, deep down I know those are all right things to do to maintain a healthy life.

What turned her around, you ask?

Publicly, she'll say it was the long-term restrictions and the boredom of the diet and the price of the program.

Privately, though, it might have had something to do with her nutritionist suddenly dropping dead.

When Blood is Not Enough

On the privacy screen are colored slips of numbered paper: blue for those with appointments, white for walk-ins. They are up to No. 5 of the blues while No. 1 of the whites has just been posted.

I'm White "3."

It shouldn't be long before my number is up.

"I'm going to be late coming home from tennis Sunday," I told My Love the day before. "I'm going to give blood."

She looked up from her laptop. "Are you going to help that boy who was in the newspaper?"

"Yeah," I said. "I haven't given blood in a while, and he has the same thing that killed David."

The church gym is a sea of portable cots, chairs and medical tubing. A few people are lying down, already squeezing crimson into dangling bags, and a dozen more are seated with me in the waiting area. A classic rock station echoes around the high rafters from a boom box, making the place feel more vacant than it is.

The binder of laminated papers in my lap tells me what sex acts and world travel could make me ineligible for donation. I return it. Now I wait to be called on so a Red Cross employee can bring me behind a gray-green screen and ask me about my sex acts and world travel. She shall be bored.

I open the paperback I brought and read a passage about drunkenness in Minnesota. Then, the boom box starts to play "Casey Jones."

David was my best friend in high school. He was my gateway, as best friends are, to most of the typical "evil" firsts of the underage -- buying alcohol, consuming alcohol, smoking cigarettes, smoking things that aren't cigarettes, the Grateful Dead, etc. (Ugh -- The Dead, man. I need a miracle! Jerry moved!)

During morning announcements, one late fall day during sophomore year, the principal announced we were all supposed to be praying for David. He had just been diagnosed with leukemia.

*

A woman slides up to me and enthusiastically says hello.

"Oh, I'm sorry!" she says and backs up. "From the side, you look just like my friend Frank."

And I'm sorry, Frank.

A man is walking around explaining the option of donating platelets instead of blood. I did this once at a post-9/11 blood drive. My Love -- who was a regular donor for a while -- was pregnant with Thing 2 at the time, so I went to the sports arena across from my office in uptown Dallas and donated on her behalf as part of a birthday present for her. I gave her my free T-shirt, but I ate the Nutter Butters. They always gave out Nutter Butters after giving blood in the DFW area.

"Uncool," the man says, reading my name off the sticker on my chest, "do you know what your blood type is?"

It's O or B. One was what the Carter Blood Center of Dallas/Fort Worth told me. The other was the result of a finger-prick test I did during an eighth-grade biology class. I honestly don't remember which gave me which answer.

"No, sorry," I answer. "I don't."

A overweight teen with a goatee who has just donated is shuffling around through the tables and chairs. He's talking to people and singing along with the boom box. It's "More Than a Feeling."

I turn back to my book.

*

Most, but not all, of the portable cots having people lying in them. There's about two dozen people waiting with me now. The blues are up to the low 20s. White "2" still has a seat with me. It's been 40 minutes.

A local TV station is interviewing a couple of girls in T-shirts with large blue ribbons printed on them. The ribbons bear the name "Peter." A few minutes later, the reporter is combing through the donors-to-be, looking for a good interview.

He convinces the less-than-excited kid in front of me who said he "kinda knows" the boy with leukemia we're all here for today.

David's leukemia went into remission in high school. He eventually graduated from Boston College, even got married. The cancer didn't care, though. It came back even harder this time, and he went off to Sloan-Kettering to have a bone marrow transplant.

"They're the best," a nurse I met on a TWA flight from St. Louis told me at the time. "He's in good hands."

A few weeks later David called me. I don't remember the conservation other than he was stoned out of his chemo-bald gourd from the pain meds and it made me laugh a lot.

A few days after, his immune-suppressed body he got in the oncoming path of the wrong germ at the wrong time.

*

The blues are now in the low 30s. I contemplate pretending to go to the bathroom and sneaking out the side exit. There's at least three dozen people waiting with me now and almost all the tables are filled with people lying prone, letting life siphon from them.

I put the unopened Band-Aid I had been using as a bookmarker in place. I head for the front door.

"Thank you so much for giving!" says the girl at the reception table.

"I'm sorry, I didn’t donate." I hand her back my white slip with the big, black "3" on it. "I've been waiting an hour and no one's even called No. 2 to get screened yet. I'll see if I can come back later."

I know I won't. I've got a hoard of soccer players to coach, a dog in need of a long walk and more than a few chores waiting for me.

I peel the green nametag off my chest, folding it in half. For the first time, I notice what it says along with my name: "I Make A Difference."

I slip it into my paperback, next to the Band-Aid, and start the car.

When I get home, I tell My Love about my latest failure. From the other room, the stereo is playing. It's a different radio station than the one I heard in the gym.

However, the song is still "Casey Jones."

*

I remember David reviewing the Pete Townshend album this song came from for the high school paper, which I was editor of at the time. He hated that album. He was so wrong. One day, we'll pick up the argument.


Video: "Give Blood," Pete Townshend w/ David Gilmour

Death of a Web Site; Birth of a Thing

Back in the days of yore, when American Bison freely roamed the Great Plains and Internet access was dial-up only, we had a family Web page on America Online. Nothing fancy, but it served as a way to keep our friends updated on our adventures following our move to a strange land called Texas.

I maintained it fairly regularly for about three years until the nearly simultaneous arrival of Thing 2 and the onset of Thing 1's autoimmune disease overwhelmed my free time and patience. For six years after, it sat idle and abandoned like a zillion similar sites other people set up back in a time when the closest thing to iTunes was the squawking ping of the modem mating call.

This past Halloween, AOL killed that site along with its entire free "Hometown AOL" Web hosting service. I'm sure the ironic timing was lost on them but it was an understandable death.

People move on. Priorities change. Technology improves (or, in the case of Word 2007, it grows more annoying). Blogger's days will also eventually be numbered, I'm certain.

But before the site went black, I downloaded all its content. I hadn't seen much of it in years and I was surprised that it wasn't nearly as embarrassing as I thought would be. Nor was it as good. Eh, life is one continuous re-write, is it not?

Therefore, to mark this weekend's anniversary of My Love's squeezing Thing 1 out from between her marathoner's thighs, I bring you -- from the archives -- my blow-by-blow account of that blessed birth -- as written by myself nine years ago with some slight clarification and enhancement for today's sophisticated tastes:

Feb. 5, 2000 - Baby due. Baby no show. An entire bag of Reduced Fat Oreos disappears from the cupboard.

Feb. 8, 2000 - My Love's doctor says not to worry. If no baby by Feb. 15, they will induce that day. After the appointment, we go for Mexican food. Much salsa is consumed.

Feb. 14, 2000 - Valentine's Day. Still no baby. Inducement scheduled for 8 a.m. tomorrow. Our Whitman Sampler is low on vanilla creams.

Feb. 15, 2000
Approx. 1:15 a.m. - My Love's water breaks. Hey, no one tells her when she's going to have a baby!

1:30 a.m. - My Love's wakes me and tells me the news. After asking her if she's sure for the 20th time, we decide to go to the hospital.

2:30 a.m. - On the road to the hospital, My Love predicts a six- to eight-hour labor. "I'm going to make this mind over matter," she says.

3 a.m. - We arrive at hospital and check in. My Love asks for, and receives, Labor Room 1 because it has a jacuzzi. (Ed. note: Not sure why. Water birth wasn't part of the plan. I didn't bring my trunks either.) My Love starts having contractions.

8 a.m. - The epidural is administered. My Love's language again becomes printable in a family newspaper.

10 a.m. - I go for breakfast at the hospital cafe. Western omelet, toast and coffee. Mmmmmm.

Good signs appear while reading the newspaper: Horoscope for today's birthday, according to Joyce Jillson in The Dallas Morning News: "It's a year of self-expression. Your need for expansion takes over, and you may move into a bigger place ... Your best signs for romance are a Taurus or Libra."

I am a Taurus. My Love is a Libra. Oooh, veeeeeery scaaaaaary stuff kids!

The News' "People in the News" column notes that also born on this day was Mick Avory, original drummer for The Kinks.

Video: "Tired of Waiting for You," The Kinks

11:30 a.m. - We settle in for a viewing of the Jimmy Stewart classic "Harvey," which includes this dialogue:

Doctor -- Uh, trauma. Spelled t-r-a-u-m-a. It means shock. There's nothing unusual about it. There's the "birth trauma" - the shock of being born...

Elwood P. Dowd -- That's the one we never get over.

1:15 p.m. - I go for lunch: chicken salad, pretzels and cranberry juice. Mmmm. (Ed. note: Around this time My Love had her 10th cup of ice chips. Sometimes, it's good to be me.)

4 p.m. - Now that we've finished watching "Oprah," time for My Love to start pushing. My role is to hold up one of her legs and count 10 aloud during the pushes, which is a good thing because the nurse keeps forgetting the count.

4:58 p.m. - Out pops baby Thing 1.