The Pink Professor -- How Much More?

Whatever happened to The Pink Professor? That's the Number One question I get, and on a daily basis. At the grocery store, swimming pool, Tupperware parties, garage sales, talking with homeless friends under the bridge in the Big City, and really everywhere. And if someone asks me in daily life, I just tell them. But on the blog it has to be different. Because he told me he’d rather I wasn't spreading his personal business online. Of course, him being him, he said it in a nice way, but me being me, I find the nasty edge of every “friendly request.” You don’t call something a “friendly request” unless you know damn-well there’s nasty ways I can take it. But I can never stay mad at him...

Anyway, I told him the problem I face -- insatiable public curiosity -- and he gave me leeway to say a few things about what he’s up to. Even though he doesn’t want anything down and dirty, anything resembling the full scoop, any relationship dishing, which probably includes pillow talk. (He's into tickling me till I about pee my jammas to make me tell him everything on my mind.) So are you game for something boring, his favorite party recipes, and aspirations as a child?

He probably always had his sights on being a professor. Smart kids like him, they know what they want to be. I'm still flailing about in that area. Now 65, I retired from odd jobs, all boring. He recently retired from the university, but kept his nighttime gig as the Pink Professor figure at the Roadhouse; his great virtue is he's a softening influence in such tough environs. His favorite party recipe: nachos and salsa, heated 23 seconds in the microwave.

As far as our relationship, we're OK. And I want to keep it that way, going out of my way to keep his personal business personal. But again, I can say a few things without being too invasive, like the fact that he wears baby-soft PJs to bed, but prefers me au naturel.

But let me bring this back to his work: it's no secret that he's a great reconciler, like when two morons are fighting over scoring a game of pool. Pink always soothes the troubled waters; he's a bridge over them. When I'm around, I serve as a complement to him, with my ability to cast insults with reckless abandon and eschew the bitter consequences of my actions. Then he does his soft-shoe thing again and everyone can see how mellow he truly is. In our personal time, though, once I've had my fill of the Eskimo-nose cuteness, I bust.

One of the things that pushes me over the edge is him allowing himself to be used by these Roadhouse creatures. I get that he has a mission, but everyone needs their space. And if it takes a person — a do-gooder without an off button — till the middle of the night to reconcile the divvying up of a bushel of bar peanuts in the shell, who am I to bitch and moan? I’ve heard (and don’t hold me to this) that other people keep more regular hours, with the wee hours of the morning pretty much to themselves. They’re not on the hook for calls to negotiate the terms of a flagrant motorcycle absconder making restitution or other legal arrangements to get out of eight months in jail when it’d probably be to their ultimate benefit to actually do a little time; it'd teach them a lesson, that you do the crime, you also have to do ... whatever-it-is...

Because the rest of us have a life, too. Most of us grew up respecting the generous boundaries of the law. And if you don’t feel like doing that, then don’t expect the rest of us to be there round-the-clock to bail your sorry ass out, thereby curtailing our lives together — when maybe we had other plans, ever heard of that? And what if we simply don’t want to be wasting our time with the dregs of so-called humanity that wouldn’t have two brain cells to rub together were Einstein himself their nursemaid. Spare me, folks, the pleas of "Humanity!" That went down with the Hindenburg, and the less I hear of it in these modern times -- possibly the end of days -- the better.

Yes, I reached the boiling point a long time ago! And now I say, How Much More?! Leave the Pink Professor alone! In fact -- let me put this out there! -- if I hear of just one more motorcycle loser cracking peanuts in the crook of his arm, then stealing someone’s woman because of this great bar trick, then having his own noggin cracked open in the ensuing melee, then needing a 24-7 nursemaid for his precious care lest he bleed to death or find himself in unremitting convulsions — Call Pink Professor Hand-Holding Unlimited day or night — I will scream, then find myself on an interminable stampede, stomping heads in a certain all night bar and grill! You don’t think I know how to knock heads, do you? Well, you try me -- you heard me, just try me! I start stomping, I don't quit! Because I've had it. I’m up to here with it, and according to sources, I’m liable to snap. That's right, you heard me, losers: I'm this close -- you see this? -- you see what I am? Just that close! This old ME! ME! ME! shit's gotta cease...

Frankly, friends, I believe the Pink Professor is overworked. But I’m sure it'll all work out in some way for the best. 

Long Live Trucking

The last few days I’ve been looking at the interstate and wishing I’d been a truck driver. You have the open road everyday and you’re alone with your thoughts. The boss you have, he’s not breathing down your neck like some the ones I’ve known. You pick up a load, you take it somewhere, then move on.

I’ve been thinking about it since last weekend, when I went to a retirement party for three brothers, three truckers who recently retired, all the same time. They started out young, put their time in, and now someone else gets to haul the shipments, while they sit at home and tend the garden or whatever.

It was cute the way their kids had the place decorated, strictly a truck motif, with gas signs, rest stops, etc. I asked one of the guys, Frank, what he was going to miss the most about trucking. At first he said “Nothing!”, which got a good laugh, then he was serious for a moment about missing the open road everyday and being alone with his thoughts.

Ted also got some laughs when he said you don’t have the boss breathing down your neck all the time, with his boss sitting there at the retirement party, wagging a finger and laughing.

And Pete, basically zen, said, “You get your load, you move on, you arrive.” The way he put it really stuck with me.

We gathered around the cake and the daughters were slicing it and putting it on plates for the well-wishers. There were three sons of these guys, too, but only two of them were in town, with Frank Jr. himself being on the road, trucking. The two sons stuck close to their dads, like they were extra happy to have them home permanently. Probably because you can never be sure you’re going to see your dad again when he goes on a trip; our lives are always at risk; you could be driving along, suddenly come upon a stalled car over the next hill, and end up buying the farm. There’s always that, but you have to make a living, so on you go...

Before we dug into the cake, each of them took his turn to thank their families for putting up with them. Most of us had a hard time holding back tears. Frank brought us back to the fun when he told some of the blessings of trucking: “They had trucks when I started trucking, and there’s still trucks when I ended. Not every job can say that. Long live the truck!”

Ted had a few more things to say, then echoed Frank somewhat. “If I was starting out today, I wouldn’t do it any different. Not much has changed. We had trucks then, we have trucks now. Long live the truck.”

And Pete, a rough cut guy with tattoos, and that whole zen thing going, also echoed his beloved brothers, “Trucking is its own magic. Trucking is all-inclusive, with no opposite. It is filled with life and power and the ability to get goods where they need to be. Trucking will live a really, really long time.”

Amen! He ended on an optimistic note. And here's to all you guys on the open road today. As Aunt Alice used to say, "Cheers, dears!"

From Hiatus To Eternity

Oh, I can't tell you how great the temptation is to simply pack it in. Brother, I'm this close to just saying the heck with it and making my hiatus a permanent retirement.

What do I need this for? My so called "friends" and "followers" are nowhere to be found. They're long gone. And frankly I don't even care. If they couldn't bear with me through a little thick -- as in thick and thin -- this brief hiatus, then I don't need or want them around when things get thin again.

But maybe things will never get thin again. Not if I give in to this aching, nagging, persisting, insisting temptation to, as I said, pack it in permanently. I'm this close, very very close, right on the edge, the verge, the precipice of saying That's it, that's all she wrote, bye bye, don't write and, especially, don't visit.

And the day I say Bye bye for good, you shouldn't expect to see me again. When I ride off in the sunset, I don't come back. At that time, at that point I have nothing left to give. Either because I've given all I can give or because I refuse to give any more. I can be very stubborn like that. You don't want to know. You don't want to push me.

Retirement looks great to me, I have to say. Nothing to do all day but sit around. Maybe grill a slab of meat, shoot some clay pigeons, take a walk down by the old millstream and watch fishermen cuss out their snags and fart on their bait for good luck. Plus, retirees get a special license plate and, I'm not sure but I think they get a handicap sticker for their car. That doesn't really make any sense though. I'll check that. I don't know where I got that idea ... I'll nix it.

Everyday for a retiree is blue skies as far as the eye can see. On a clear day, a retiree rises and looks around. And what he sees astounds him. Because he can literally see forever and ever. If you know anything about the infinity of space that poets tell us about, you know that you don't suddenly reach the end. That's what these precious ones can behold all day, all because they've quit their job, packed it in, reached the end of the road, and now have nothing more important to do than to be looking up at the endless skies. And occasionally having a root beer float.

That sounds great right about now! Just great. And I'm this close to going for it. Can't get any closer without going over the edge. If anything happens to push me over the edge, this is the absolute last word you'll hear from me. I'm sorry but that's just how it has to be. I said "If." Because if not, I'll be back tomorrow.

My Bemused, Gracious Wave

First, a tirade: Rotten, stinking thing! Couldn't get this blogger to come up! So I'm sitting here like a bubble about to bust and can't get on.

Second, back to the show: I was just in the center of my living room, working on a bemused, gracious wave. When everyone comes to see the Old Faithful geyser spouting off, soon to be located at the south of my half acre property, they will want to see their host. I will occasionally wander out, in bathrobe and pipe, to visit with some of my geyser's well wishers, sign autographs, and tell where I got my big start.

It was right here, in fact, where I learned the values that I live by. Hard work, honesty the best policy, family, friends, service to one's country. And of course the rock solid conviction that wishing can make it happen, if you're young at heart. I make a wish and the forces align to bring it to pass. It is written, it is done.

Fate has conspired to make me a success. I tried to shrug it off. You've heard the story of the king who walked in rags, trying to avoid his destiny. Been there. And there's the story of the king who was slated to be killed, but he put a servant in his royal robes. Yet the arrow, shot askew, hit the right king and he died. That can happen. The first one, I mean. How do I know? Hey! [making self referential gestures and smiling].

ONE THING FURTHER -- That's the end of this particular post. I just wanted to note here, for posterity, that my favorite appliance dealer is retiring. So if you bought his appliances in the last couple years because you thought service followed the sale, you're out of luck. But that's a downer. What I want to do is actually pay tribute to him. He's out there, one of my regular readers. I'll just call him "P," because I didn't clear this with him. P, baby, you always did a great job working on my appliances. You were there when I called and I won't forget that. I always chuckled at something you did, the way you acted put out or incredulous that people didn't know more about appliances (1) or their place in life, working, not taking welfare. You had a couple things to say about immigrants. And I didn't completely agree but you're welcome to your radical views as an American. The whole appliance thing was funny, though, laughing with you. Like if someone didn't know how a dryer worked, etc. At first I didn't know either, to be truthful, but I watched you a few times. And now I believe I grasp some of the concepts. Have a great retirement!