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Rants December 14, 2008

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1. You might have heard that when President Bush visited Iraq, an Iraqi man threw a shoe at him. Is that any way to treat a world leader who, for seven long years, has done everything in his power to promote world peace?

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2. The other day Marsha cried out from the kitchen. The can opener had stalled half way through a can of chicken noodle soup. I ended up bending the can enough to dump out the soup into a pan. Later, I washed off the can and the can opener and filmed myself trying to get the can opener off by following the directions printed on the back of the thing. I ended up cutting the can apart with tin snips and putting two new batteries in it which enabled me to get it going and eject the tin. I put the film of myself fumbling with this operation up on Blip. The point of all this is that a woman wrote a review of the Blip piece and said that it had a “Zen like quality” to it. I Googled Zen like quality, but couldn’t find out what Zen like quality meant. I found dozens of sentences in which people had used the phrase Zen like quality, but not one page that would define Zen like quality. So, here is another common but undefined phrase cluttering up our language. I’m going to file Zen-like quality along side of another one: meaningful relationship. Doesn’t the entire situation have a Zen-like quality to it?

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3. You know that I only repeat the good news and the bad news that I read in the newspaper. First the good news. The number of Mom and Pop businesses --- that’s two people making a go of it by working alone and constantly seven days a week for 18 hours a day – has increased over the past year. Now the bad news. Mom and Pop are working alone because the economy in this country is so bad that they had to fire all their employees.

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4. There is an organization in Maine called Moose. Moose. Just like the animal. Moose might stand for Maine organization of storytelling enthusiasts. I can’t remember. The other day all Moose members got an email from Michael inviting us to a pizza party. Because it was in Portland which is too far away for me to attend I didn’t pay much attention to the details as to time and street address. But this morning all Moose members got another email, this one from Jo who asked, “Michael. What day is the party?” You have heard that the cobbler’s children go without shoes. Isn’t it just like a storyteller to leave the punchline off the end of a story?

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5. You know how you only half read some things that you look at quickly. While posting a comment on etienne’s Facebook page my eye inadvertently scanned an ad on the side of the page that I thought said, “Explore your paternity.” When I looked closer I saw it said “Explore your Personality.” But in the milliseconds that it takes the brain to process such data my brain rationalized Explore your paternity, assuming it was a slanderous commentary on our rural lifestyle.

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6. You’ve been to see your doctor recently and can clearly see in your mind the elevated table you sit on when you are poked and prodded. You sit up on the end of the table and sometimes you are asked to lie back down on the table. You sit on a huge sheet of wrapping paper that unrolls from the top of the table. When you are gone, they tear off the wrinkled paper you were sitting on and unroll some more for the next customer. But --- here’s something new. At my last visit I was greeted by a huge photograph of a sad looking young man that was printed on the paper. At the top it said, “Male Low Testosterone Medical Research Study” Beneath that next to the man’s picture it said, “Lack of Energy. Low Sex Drive. “It’s hard to admit, but that’s me.” I laughed when I saw it --- I was staggered --- and even brought a square yard of it home with me to show to my television friends. You know that the doctor didn’t pay for that paper. But can you believe that pill salesmen have got two foot square ads printed --- in color --- on the very paper that you sit on when you visit your physician for a physical? With creative genius like this unleashed, you know that advertising printed on some other paper can’t be far behind.

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7. My friend Winky was fishing off the end of the dock in Tenants Harbor when a big sailboat came alongside and tied up. While chatting with the young fellow who owned it, Winky said, “I’ll bet you never did a day’s work in your life.” The fellow said it was true. And Winky said, “Well, you ain’t missed a thing.”

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8. Winky was talking with a rich man who just tied up his boat by a dock in Tenants Harbor. And in the course of the conversation the rich man allowed that he was born into the world without a penny. And Winky said, “When I was born I owed $8000.”

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9. When my friend Winky saved a small child who had fallen into a pond, the child’s mother asked if she could kiss the hand that saved her child. Winky said, “No it’s done a lot of other things, too.”

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10. Have you ever been invited over to a friend’s house where they walk the food right to you? Have another piece of pie. Have another piece of cake. Have some more coffee. My friend Winky has an answer for these people. He gives them a wistful look and says, “If it’s all right with you, I’ll take the rest in money.”

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11. My friend Winky is a packrat. He has every receipt anyone has ever given him for the past 40 years. You have to turn sideways to walk into his office. He finally told his wife it would be ok to throw out every paper over 12 years old --- as long as she kept copies.

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12. I never thought he’d do it, but my friend Winky started to visit a psychiatrist. Of course the first thing I wanted to know the first time I saw him was whether or not it had helped his constipation. Winky said, “No, but now I know why I have it.”

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13. Not many women do it, but Winky told me that on the day before their marriage his bride-to-be told him about all of her previous affairs. I said, “That took a lot of courage.” Winky said, “It took a lot of memory.”

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14. I don’t know if you ever go to the farm trade show in Augusta every January, but it’s a good show and if the roads are clear you should try to make it up there this year. Winky had a booth there last year like he always does but last winter was special because the governor stopped by Winky’s booth. He looked at a machine Winky had made and it was obvious to one and all that the machine didn’t seem to do much of anything. The governor didn’t want to say anything bad to a voter so he only scratched his head and asked Winky what good anybody could find in this machine that was on display. And Winky said, “You can tax it.”

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15. If there is a better way to help out in your community than coaching pee-wee baseball I don’t know what it is. But when my friend, Coach Winky, replaced the best pitcher with another boy, some of the parents wanted to know why. “Well, that boy who was striking out all the batters was throwing a curve ball. A curve ball is thrown with the deliberate attempt to deceive, and I don’t think that is an ability we should encourage in young people.”

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16. When my friend Winky was very young, he went to the senior class prom with a girl who was wearing a low, low-cut off the shoulder dress. And after a while curiosity got the best of him and Winky said, “What is keeping that dress on you?” She said, “Only the onions on your breath.”

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