Happy New Year, Death To My Enemies

“May old acquaintance be forgot and never brought to mind...” We sang it last night at the local ball, a gala affair. I shouted at the top of my lungs for a "Happy New Year!" to my old community, town, and burg. Even though, let’s be honest, what've they done for me? But it’s the holidays! And if Christmas this year taught me anything, thanks to a rare movie I saw, it's good to live right, God bless us everyone.

That said, I frankly wouldn’t mind if a few of my acquaintances could be forgot, with the extra bonus of being never brought to mind. Yeah, that’s the ticket, I could use that for a New Year's gift! Perfect for the bastards ... and a few beyoches thrown in the mix. That's women’s progress, right? Having them right in there with the bastards, making my life miserable to the best of their ability. They may be ham-handed morons at everything else life throws their way, but they're experts at being bastards, real pros! No one's gotta lend a hand, they got it!

But it’s tough to open the New Year on a down note, although, frankly, this morning I’m high as a kite. I had a few good dances last night. There was this one young chick, wow, young, must have been 19-20 — I didn’t card her, that’s the doorman's job. And here I am, nearly 67 (but I could pass for 64), dancing with this little filly. Ha ha! Like dying and going to a particularly decent section of heaven, where everything’s blue and the Lord hasn’t gotten around to censoring it. Slow Lord there.

Anyway, she’d had a little too much to drink, thankfully, and I was stone sober like always. And I’m not saying she exactly went overboard with the close dancing — I’d never make that complaint — I'm just glad her dad wasn’t there to take her home. Nothing much happened, I hope you understand, I’m just hoping she doesn’t name it after me! No, no, of course I kid, although, you know, as much drinking as everyone else was doing, and me with my ginger ale, I probably could’ve skipped the country and no one would’ve been the wiser. Also, I always show up blurry on video evidence, don’t know why.

Getting back to the old acquaintances, the bastards, my enemies. There were a few bullies bullying me when I came in, “Hey, old man, past your bedtime!” “Does 'The Home' have a bus outside? We’ll have some blue-haired chicks next!” And one guy bumped into me in the hat room and I dropped my keys. But a helpful angel to my right picked them up and gave them to me. I thought, God, the abuse here is atrocious!

Closer to the serving table, it was more of the same. Friendly jostling for the most part, but there’s always a few in the crowd that look at me like I’m dirt. This one drunk bastard singled me out and was calling me Seabiscuit. I guess the same as saying I’m a horse. And if I’m a horse, perhaps a horse’s ass. I’m not completely sure, but it sounded like a slur.” Make way for Seabiscuit!” He bellowed louder than he had to. The chandeliers, which my mother would’ve loved, were shaking. I thought, I’d love to squash you under my hoof, you blankety blank bastard!”

Then the next thing, one of these evil SOBs suddenly had my car keys again! It was a pickpocket job, just to get my goat. As luck would have it — HIS — he was about two foot taller than me. And his equally asinine friends were nearly the same height. And they were throwing my keys back and forth, with me looking like a complete dweeb jumping in the middle. This went on for a couple minutes, very humiliating. Finally, one guy wasn’t expecting the keys to come to him. He raised a glass to sip another alcoholic beverage, when the keys were flung. He missed and they went by his feet. I grabbed them and crawled through the legs of several other people, bit the actual thief hard on the kneecap, then didn’t come up till I'd crawled to the chips and dip table.

I brushed off my knees and had a few chips. The dip was delicious, sort of like the way one of my aunts used to make it, very good. If only she’d been there. Kids used to say she wore army boots. And even though I never saw them, if she’d been there, she could’ve kicked these guys to the next county.

Happy New Year to everyone else who is good. But Death — temporal and eternal — to the various mofos there are in the world that hate me, Exhibit A being those guys and some of the other troublemakers, as well as the usual everyday people who hate my guts.

This Is Thanksgiving, Not Mother's Day

Friends, it's Thanksgiving! Raise a glass with me, and let us propose a toast ... to Mama, the Dearest on Earth to Us. You may be a perfect stranger to me every other day of the year. But please join in, for on Thanksgiving we're all family. Eh? Are you raising your glass? Raise it! And let us toast Dear Mama, just like we did way back when, on the very day they told us, "This is Thanksgiving, not Mother's Day."

It was actually a revelation -- however unwelcome it seemed at the time -- since we were admittedly a bit carried away honoring Mama. And ignoring the bird spread naked and golden brown on the ritzy dining table of that deservedly expensive hotel. They had a spread loaded with thighs, breasts, and drumsticks, and they charged an arm and a leg for it. What money? Money means nothing on Thanksgiving!

The real problem started with toasts. Most of us don't make toasts on a regular basis. Everything we know about toasts we learned from movies and TV. Which so often specialize in fictional happenings, goings-on, stories with a plot, a conflict, working through the conflict, and resolving itself in a happy ending. Meaning, if a toast doesn't sound like it sounds on TV, there's something wrong.

We went out for Thanksgiving, the whole family. Daughter, sons, their kids, Papa and of course Mama. Mama's the center of the family in most families, especially if your family is anything like ours. She makes our heart melt. We have memories of her tenderness when Papa was gruff, or whatever. We nursed off her, literally, giving us the step-up in life we needed when other kids were bottle-feeding or seeking nutritional refuge in the arms of a goat or something worse.

So when we went out for Thanksgiving at the best place in town -- Expensive! So expensive it's like throwing money down the drain -- it really meant something. We were very sensitive about the experience. Usually we pinched pennies, now we were living it up, like the Rockefellers or the Gettys. Papa had his money withdrawn, it was big-bucks time at Thanksgiving! Every plate was expensive, crazy expensive. So much you could've eaten five times somewhere else and had money leftovers.

It's the same feeling you get at other holidays when the expectation is to go beyond your ordinary means. Christmas is the biggest example, but each person's individual birthday is a mini version of the same thing. Or New Year's, when Papa came home with eggnog and salami and chocolates and candles. You're wondering if it's the same guy who's always so tight. Papa's family went through the Depression. They had to scrape for everything they could scrape together.

OK, so there we were at this hugely expensive place. And naturally, with the money buying us the biggest, best Thanksgiving meal, our tender thoughts turned to Mama. Who was spared cooking the big meal for a change. But would've gladly done it if we hadn't gone out. She would've come up with a turkey, cooked it, carved it, made dressing, made pies, all the fixins, bread by the bushel, and drinks.

I took my drink and lifted it by way of a toast, and the rest of the family immediately joined in. "To Mama, the center of our family, our life, our common love, our heart, our soul." "Here, here," the others said. Then my next brother, not to be outdone, lifted a glass and cleared his throat: "To Mama, who binds us together as one, not just our life but our everything, the best Mama we could've ever hoped for." Then my next brother (3), who of all the siblings saw Mama over the years more than those of us who'd moved away, had a tear in his eye. He lifted a glass and toasted her: "We should probably be toasting Papa," he started to chuckles, "because Papa is the one who found Mama. She was a natural beauty, although, as we've all heard, she was 'a diamond in the rough.' But she had the upbringing in her own family and saw the example of her own parents, and now has exceeded them, which I say not to question the merits of Grandma... Family, raise a glass to Mama!" The fourth brother had a decent toast, and the daughter (5) and the last son, last but not least. His toast was a tearjerker, because when you're Number 6 you're just happy to be alive. Statistically, Number 6s are rare, and reflection on that gives you a keen ability to make good toasts.

When all was said and done, I led the way for everyone, including Papa -- barely able to walk even with a cane -- to get up and go over to pat Mama on the back and give her his own personal plaudits. She was trying to wave us off -- her wonderful modesty and self-effacing nature, further reasons to love her so much. But we went on anyway, patting her, giving her kisses, hugging her. True, the food was getting cold, but that's OK. Thanksgiving comes but once a year, whether or not you have a Mama, and we knew someday we'd lose her. But it wasn't that day! That day she felt the fullness of our love. Even though she tried to wave us off, that was her day!

We were laughing, praising Mama, and outdoing one another something fierce. "This turkey is probably the most expensive turkey in the world, since the meal is so outrageously expensive at this fancy-schmancy place, but it's nothing compared to the turkey Mama could've made!" Similar sentiments were shared. Praising the different aspects of the meal, but discounting it compared to what Mama could've done. When the waiter, obviously at the beck and call of the head cook -- who probably should've been demoted to assistant chief bottle-washer for the remark -- came out and scolded us, saying, "Folks, we'd like to remind you, This is Thanksgiving, not Mother's Day," our table became stone quiet. I looked at my brother like, "What the fu-?"

We might've rioted -- I was personally that close to gutting that particular waiter, and Brother 3, with his greater familiarity with Mama and the over-protective nature he'd nurtured, looked like he was daydreaming of a noose for the head cook. We would've hung him high right there over that very table had Mama not stepped in, saying, "The waiter is only doing his job, beloved family. And he's right. You started in praising me, your Mama, and of course I appreciate and love each one of you always, but in the sentiment of the moment we were all carried away. So let us get back to our meal, dear ones, because as he said, and he was right, "This is Thanksgiving, not Mother's Day."

We Join Ourselves in Holy Matrimony

We have the world's greatest treat for you, as we near the end of this story. Which, as a story, now actually promises to go on and on, however many years of life we are granted, not just for The Pink Professor and me, but for our second happy couple, bubbling over for having finally discovered one another, the billionaire and Garrett Al (aka Geritol and Jor-el).

Old Maude, our kitchen help at the Roadhog Roadhouse was pure gold and true to her word, "With you guys' billions and my brains, we'll have the greatest double wedding this happy burg's ever seen!" Which was really saying something, because she's been around a long time. The historical society/museum has her out for special events, to share firsthand memories of the settlers who stole this land fair and square and proceeded to civilize it. (We made her the figurehead in charge, while the billionaire's people actually handled the massive arrangements.)

Festivities started at the courthouse, with Pink and I, and the billionaire and Geritol, holding up our marriage licenses for photographers and well-wishers. Next, we took our places in matching gold limousine convertibles, and with 100 motorcycles flanking us, biker friends from the bar, made our way slowly through town to the Roadhog Roadhouse. Workers, of course under Old Maude's supervision (wink wink), had the place so decked in flowers and ribbons, the breeze coming through made it like an optical illusion, the entire place in beautiful motion.

The official wedding ceremonies were quiet, traditional, and dignified. The billionaire and Jor-el took traditional vows. Garrett Al and I go way back, and as I watched him, I thought back to the early days, when he essentially molested me in my own yard. I was freaked out, but Geritol proved himself the truest friend in the years since, especially after he took on an extra-cosmic consciousness and began channeling (and identifying) with Jor-el, Superman's father on Krypton. The stories he can tell! And now here he is, a brand new wonderful chapter in his life, becoming the billionaire's husband. I'm very emotional -- this is true -- I had a lump in my throat the size of a grapefruit and of course "something in my eye."

For Pink and myself, some of our extended biker family have various kids here and there around the county and neighboring areas, so a bunch of them were with us, walking slowly and dropping pink rose petals. The bikers were extremely proud. Then Pink, accompanied by his mother, and I, carrying my dog Roughage, my other best friend, proceeded down the aisle. We veered off, his mom standing proudly to the side, and Roughage was well-behaved while working over a bowl of beef jerky, and the minister reappeared.

We're two guys who wear our sensitivity on our sleeve, so naturally we wrote our own vows. They're kind of mushy, so I won't give them in full. But remember, Pink went to San Francisco and nurtured a group of street people underground for four years, inspiring them by his presence and only 7% of my soul, so his vows centered on the theme of 100% and completion. For my vows, I remembered back to the time a guy showed up at the Roadhog with a 14-piece pool cue, and how we avoided huge trouble thanks to The Pink Professor. My point got a little mixed up -- I couldn't remember if the guy started with the tip and worked down or the handle and worked up. But I worked it out in the end when I looked Pink in the eyes and said, "Life's like that 14-piece pool cue, sometimes the pieces come together just right. And that's our life together."

The schmaltz over, the rings, the kissing, and the rice, we all retired to the courtyard, where there were beer nuts and bar pickles in vast quantities. The billionaire had also spent a cool $6 million to bring in the professional roadshow of "Grease." When the troupe did an encore of "You're the One That I Want" and "We Go Together," the wedding party and all the guests were up, everyone shaking their respective booties, totally working it out.

Old Maude and I also got down for a while. She can dance! I congratulated her on a job well done.

The 25 Days Of Christmas

Today, as I get into the spirit of the season, I'm going to start celebrating "The 25 Days of Christmas."

This is a personal celebration. I won't be checking in to keep everyone updated on it. I just feel that it's worth noting at the onset, with the additional hope that others might join me, also in their own silent way. We won't be communicating with each other regarding our joy.

The thought occurred to me this morning, that Christmas Day is the 25th. And what better way to lead up to it than with a thought, some token of recognition in advance of the great day? It could be anything, really, a holiday cookie, a special Christmas song, or perhaps a little eggnog, certainly a tasty treat if taken in moderation, because it always feels like I'm going to have convulsions if I drink too much.

But I have one little qualm. Today is already the 6th, meaning Christmas is around 20 days away. If you count the 6th as the first day, it's 19 days going through the 24th. That means I have a bunch of days to make up and no days to do it. So either I forget it till next year, or truncate it to "The 19/20 Days of Christmas," or just double up on Christmas moments to account for the first five days. I like to do things right, but in this case I simply can't. But to make something good out of a bad situation, like making lemonade out of lemons, I'm going to just do that, double up five times.

Obviously, I'm going to do this apart from blogging. If I put on a song right now, while I'm straining my brain to write, I wouldn't be able to enjoy as fully as I'd like. In fact I've always found that if I listen to music while writing the music goes incredibly fast. It might be a three minute song, but it feels like it's over in one minute, a testimony to how great my concentration is. I'm like a laser beam at the keyboard.

My thought, though, for today, celebrating the 1st and the 6th days of Christmas, would be much as I hinted at above, a holiday cookie and a great song. It might be "Rudolph" or "The Herald Angels." And of course I need to go to the store and get some cookies. I have plenty of Christmas music already. I'll try to get something chewy. Those are my favorite cookies.

This is going to be a great holiday for me ... and you. Christmas. 25 days for each of us to make the most of!

Chest-Thumping Jesus Asks, "What About Me?"

"Hey, who's stinking birthday is it, anyway? I'm sick you guys overlooking me! It rolls around like clockwork every December 25, you've gotta be used to it by now! So get it straight, OK? It's my birthday and I don't want you messing it up, wasting your time with a bunch of other stuff!"

I saw this revelation on a church sign, the Word become angry words on the curb, trying to shake some sense into our sorry selves, that Christmas is a time for a laser-like staying on task, keeping first things first. Of course that's a common complaint we've heard every year from people speaking of the Lord. They're always deathly afraid, like the original Puritans, that somebody somewhere might be having a good time.

But this is the first time I've seen it right from the Lord Himself, signed by Him and everything, how sick and tired He is of His birthday being crowded out by gifts, trees, and food.

Unfortunately, like the biblical writings themselves in the original language, we don't have punctuation, and the all-caps display doesn't necessarily convey tone, so that's something also to guess at. It doesn't seem to actually matter very much for the first three lines of the revelation. We can clearly see we have three distinct activities related to the holiday season. Having punctuation would be nice, since I don't like having to rely on guesswork for divine messages, but we are able to make out the basic meaning.

What we don't get, and it's more than just the all-caps, is His tone. Is he saying it in a resigned way, like He's defeated? Or is he saying it in more of a threatening tone? Like, "I'm keeping track of all your vain deeds, and you're gonna be sorry!" Maybe it's something else, but the last question shows He's not happy. He wants to bring it back around to what's important -- dammit -- ME, ME, ME!

In addition to the resigned or threatening tone, the way I first took it was with a lot of dumb bluster, that kind of attitude. Like a football player, not the quarterback but one of the lesser celebrated players, thumping his chest and blustering, "What about ME?! How come everybody's overlooking ME?!" Exasperated at the lack of recognition, and He did make a great contribution, dying for the whole team.
 
OK, let's allow for the old truth that everyone's "Jesus" is always simply a reflection of themselves. This apparently being a church of some strictness, lamenting that everyone else's shorts aren't also sufficiently tied in knots, naturally their "Jesus" is going to be a killjoy, jealous when anyone's having a good time with gifts, trees, and food, and aren't off suffering in a hair shirt. Any turning away to have fun, even for a second, is to deny "Jesus" His birthday due. Feeling guilty yet?

There are better "Jesuses" out there. Like the gracious one who might say, "Hey, enjoy your gifts! Decorate your tree and have a great time! Are you sure you've had enough food? Get some more! Wait, I'll get it for you!" But what about your birthday, Jesus? "Ha ha, when you're 2000 years old, what's another birthday?!"

400 Posts!

Tooting a party horn and throwing broken glass as confetti ... they said it couldn't be done ... someone must've said that.

But here I am ... proudly thrusting a fist toward one of my broken down doors ... four centuries ... if posts were years, I'd be older than the King James Bible, just by a hair.

So what's that put me at, something like the time of Shakespeare? And Shakespeare, for all this great qualities, never wrote 400 books! In fact, I've got everything he ever wrote and it's only one book.

The last 400 years have been all mine. To make the most of. To party hardy!

I've still got a freezer. They didn't take that away from me. And it could've happened. 400 posts in cold storage, each one dated and time stamped by the Blogger people. And I did it without anyone's help. I've only quoted people a few times and always with attribution.

This is my day! It's like fulfilled prophecy, or something. The sun came up for me today ... being very happy ... it arose on all four horizons ... a most wonderful day!

The Hiatus of Hiatuses

Today, with all the free time I have, I plan to celebrate, to whoop it up big with a celebration of my hiatus. With the end of another month (June) and the beginning of another month (July), it seems a fitting time to get excited.

All through June [Cheers] I insisted on maintaining my hiatus, despite some temptations [Boos] to terminate it early. But thankfully, as month after month drags by, the temptations have become lessened and my resolve has been steeled and reinforced. [Cheers].

(From here on I will leave out the cheers, boos, and other expressions of my favor or disfavor. But you may imagine them along the way. Anything that is pro-hiatus will be something to cheer. Any enemy of the site, attitude, or factor opposing my hiatus will be something to boo. But for the most part, I'm going to keep it positive, not allowing those sad voices of the past drown out the joy I feel over what really could be called The Hiatus of Hiatuses. [Cheers].)

I like that ... The Hiatus of Hiatuses. But it's such a great descriptor and such a great title, maybe I ought to save it for a more auspicious day, like July 4 or Christmas. No, I'll step out today. This will be the auspicious day to celebrate my hiatus as The Hiatus of Hiatuses.

Look, who's got a better one? No one that I've seen. I think it's official by now, that my blog has the most consecutive posts on the author's hiatus. And certainly, by far, the most thoughtful, heartfelt, and varied. For I not only took a hiatus -- anyone can do that -- but I put my heart on the line for it, I've worn it on my sleeve, and now I'm staking a claim. I heard there's another site that's done the same thing. But I heard that all their posts are robot-generated. Such worthless things as "Day 36 of My Hiatus," with a robot-generated paragraph of gibberish following. I would put my heartfelt thoughts up against an ignorant robot any day! [Cheers].

So how did I get this far? That's a great question. When I started the hiatus, back in April I think it was, I had it projected out as essentially a 15-day thing, two weeks tops. Someday if I ever get back to work, I'll find the original file and set it forth as a part of the archives that the general public can access. I saw it one day and was thinking, My Lord, I had no idea. I was a little naive. Because little did I know, I would shoot past two weeks and leave my original plans well in the dust.

I don't entirely know how I did it, to be honest, except Grandma always gave me during my upbringing an attitude of sticktoittiveness. (My spell check says that's not a word. Isn't it a zigziglarism?, which my spell check also says isn't a word. But hey, I can't be bogged down by the spellchecker. The spellchecker is the equivalent of a robot, an automated device just like the guy uses on the other hiatus site, and, who knows, maybe he's up to "Day 37 of My Hiatus" by now! [Guffaws]. Yeah, when you've got a robot, it's no problem; you program it, it spits out your gibberish, and you're lounging on a beach somewhere.)

My time is up. I post to one of those egg timers, and when the sands run out, that's it.

Just let me sneak this in. Celebrate with me. Wherever you are, lift a glass or coffee cup to my achievement, and stay with me to celebrate -- who knows how many more days -- The One And Only Hiatus Of Hiatuses.

[Cheers drowning me out, then trailing off, as a lone figure pulls a mantle over his face and leaves the crowded hall, looking back on the lights of the building, then ahead to the rippling sea. Hat tip to Sinclair Lewis.]