Thinking The LionsThinking The LionsA humorous look at life with a wife, three teenagers, twin babies, three cats, and a fish. Plus, occasional pictures of Herman The Wonder Kitten and The Hatbaby. Articles
Hey, it's Enrico Palazzo! And Disco Pirate Bunnies!
2008-02-11 16:06:00 I think that commercials should be required to be a little less catchy.I'm one of those people who thinks that commercials don't affect him, only I'm kidding myself-- we all are-- because they do. They affect me directly and do so a lot of times. No matter how much I tell myself that I'm not affected to advertising, there will always be the memory of the night that Sweetie and I were watching TV and saw an ad for a fast food restaurant that will go unnamed but which looked really really good and the next day we got up early and went there for breakfast. And I dreamed about it that night, too.And commercials affect me indirectly, like this morning when I'm driving to work and find myself, for 30 minutes, singing the "credit union song" from the commercial that was playing when I started the car. Again, I won't name the company, but the song has a strumming acoustic guitar and a sort of Jack-Johnson-y singer. A guy who's not quite as likeable or funny seeming as the "Credit-Rep... More About: Pirate , Disco , Irate
TV Shows I'll Write Someday (#1)
2008-02-08 18:20:00 Celebrity Court: Be a contestant on "Celebrity Court," the show where average people represent Celebrities in their legal battles!Each contestant gets assigned a celebrity to represent. The contestants have to appear with the celebrity and have the celebrity tell their side of the story to a judge and a jury. The contestant then argues -- in front of a live studio audience -- why their celebrity should win their case. The celebrities will also meet with an expert celebrity witness and taped portions of those meetings will be shown during breaks.The show will on two nights. The first night is the presentation of the celebrities' case, and the second is the results night. Overnight, viewers can call to vote which celebrity should win. On Results night, there will be three possible outcomes: The judge, the jury, and the viewer call-ins. Each contestant picks a result they want: they can choose judge, jury, or call-ins, and then the results are revealed. A contestant who loses 'his' ... More About: Write
And with the iPHone I could have looked up and found out who Bert Kaempfert
2008-02-06 15:54:00 Here's what I think: I think that we -- at least I, and probably you if you're being honest -- don't need to be able to buy and sell stocks from our phone while sitting in traffic. I'm just going to go right out there and say that's a bad idea.I saw another one of the iPhone commercials this morning, and there's a lot that I don't really like about the iPhone but the thing that I most really don't like about it is that stock thing.And the way it promotes class envy. Maybe I most really don't like that about the iPhone. Who is living the iPhone life? The guy that owns the iPhone is sitting and watching a movie he downloaded when he on the spur of the moment decides to go out for calamari (which I had once, in Mexico, and which is gross) and so he goes? Or the guy who apparently is sitting in traffic and then begins to think about Hawaii and so he looks up hotels, books one, and then checks his investments to make sure he can just, on the spur of the moment, go off to Paradis... More About: Iphone
Bringing The Heat
2008-02-05 15:23:00 I've completely lost the ability to regulate my body temperature. I'd always heard that the knees were the first thing to go, but it looks like it's actually the thermostat.I'm reduced to trying to jump start my temperature in the morning by taking a near-scalding hot shower to raise the temperature up. I don't know how I get so cold by the time I shower when I spend the night sweating, which I do almost every night unless Sweetie has the ceiling fan on, in which case I spend the night both sweating and freezing, somehow, and dreaming that I'm one of those cars that gets tested in a wind tunnel.But I do get cold by the time I get to the shower, so I have to try to raise my temperature quickly -- quickly because I'm cold and sluggish and coffee takes some time, and quickly because we have two showers in the house but a hot water heater that really struggles just providing hot water for the dishwasher and isn't quite up to the task of giving two people warm showers, let alone ... More About: Heat
If You Strike Me Down, I Shall Only Become More Powerful-- Powerful Enough
2008-02-01 17:14:00 I know my life is going very well because of the things that frustrate me and make me mad.Here are the top three things that make me mad right now:1. I had to get out of bed to get the remote control for the TV this morning, so I couldn't just lay there for 15 minutes without getting up first and then going back to "snooze."2. The snowbanks on my driveway make it hard for me to back out my car without having to turn the steering wheel to avoid the garbage cans once a week.3. Saving food.See? If your life is going so well that those kinds of things are what you have to get mad or frustrated about, then overall, you're doing well.People with real problems get mad at stuff like "My company fired me after reassuring everyone that they would not close the plant." Or "I can't believe my health insurance won't cover that."People with problems like me get mad at stuff like "Oh, man, I have to turn the steering wheel slightly to get out of my driveway."I can only imagine what the truly w... More About: Strike
And now a word from the rest of me
2008-01-31 15:30:00 Hey, everyone! Did you know that in addition to Thinking The Lions, I write four other blogs? If you didn't, here's a sample of what you've been missing:BABIES! BABIES! PETS! PETS! This is another picture from the weekend of all the kids; we took them all to the local zoo, too. The younger ones were not very impressed by the zoo at all. My theory is that to Babies!, everything is all new. We grown-ups are used to seeing trucks and houses and things, so to get us excited, you've got to put a giraffe in front of us. But to Babies!, a giraffe is no more or less exciting than a Volvo. Mr F, shown here, did like the little turtle that was swimming around, and tried to touch it.The title of this post refers to the brief argument/bet Sweetie and I made this morning. . . . read more Babies! Babies! Pets! Pets!____________________________________ _________________________Nonsportsmanlike Conduct: Tired of the failed MVPs? I know, like me, you never get tired of making fun of people who ha... More About: Word , Rest
Announcing the First Ever Thinking The Lions Contest!
2008-01-30 15:19:00 Yesterday, I put up the third in what will no doubt be a long-running series of posts, "Unraveling The Mysteries of the Universe." My favorite reader -- Mark, who I'd link to but he's all anonymous -- said in a comment that he's going to try to get a video of his two cars synching their blinkers.And as I read that, I had a lightning-bolt inspiration. With a clarity of thought that I rarely achieve, I thought this: I'm kind of hungry.I thought that because all I had for breakfast today was toast, and I missed it when it popped up, so I was late getting the butter on it and the butter didn't really melt in, so the bread was crispy and the butter was sort of paste-like. It was unsatisfying and I'm at least 2 1/2 hours from when I could reasonably eat my lunch. You just can't eat lunch before 11:00.But I also thought: Mark, you're on to something. So here's the contest: Take a video of two cars' blinkers working together in unison and send it to me for posting here. The person... More About: Contest , Lions , Thinking
Unraveling the Mysteries of the Universe #3
2008-01-29 17:00:00 When I find myself sitting at a stoplight behind another car, and we're both turning in the same direction, I like to watch to see if our blinkers synch up. I try to see if they will synch up. And they never do. The blinkers are always just slightly off, so they cycle through a rotation, matching up, then exactly opposite, and so on.Which makes me then think that maybe the car manufacturers do it on purpose, in turn causing me to wonder why they would do that. Would there be some safety reason to not allow any blinker, anywhere, to operate on the exact same time scale as some other blinker? Is that true, in fact? Are car blinkers like snowflakes? And is that true about snowflakes? (That they are all different, I mean. I don't think snowflakes operate on any time scale.)And lastly, I wonder what I would do if the blinkers ever did match up. Go out and introduce myself to the person? It seems like I should do something, if that ever happens. More About: Universe , The Universe
The Crocodile Sitter
2008-01-25 15:32:00 ?I had a dream,? Sweetie told me the other day ?That you had a crocodile babysit the boys.??Was it a friendly crocodile?? I asked.What else is there to say to her comment than that? Sweetie has these deep-seated fears that permeate her conscious and subconscious mind, fears that unravel her all the time, that I am in some way unsafe for Mr Bunches and Mr F, fears that developed entirely unhelped by any action of mine, and fears that existed long before she left me babysitting them for an hour this past week, an hour in which I found out that Mr Bunches had the ability to climb up on things and jump, and that he could do that on things he really should not be climbing up on and jumping on.When I saw that Mr Bunches had progressed to the point where he could put himself in physical danger, I did what any loving, concerned, cautious, non-crocodile-hiring parent would do: I ran to get my camera.?Be careful,? I warned Mr Bunches as I left him up on the hassock and ran upstairs and got m... More About: Sitter
Unraveling The Mysteries of the Universe, #2:
2008-01-23 17:06:00 The babies are at the age where they're starting to like movies, and they have their favorites already. Number one on the list is "Toy Story." They watch it over and over and over. So I watch it over and over and over. And I listen to it, over the baby monitor at night, while they fall asleep watching it. I like that a little -- it's kind of like listening to an old fashioned radio show. "NBC Radio brings you... Toy Story. Sponsored by Smith Brand Cod Liver Oil."But having watched it roughly 100 billion times, something occurred to me. The toys can move when people are around if they want to -- they do it when they scare Sid at the end of the movie. But they don't move, because they're toys, when people are around. Buzz Lightyear, though, doesn't think he's a toy for most of the movie. He thinks he's a space ranger. So why doesn't he move when people are around? More About: Universe , The Universe
Movies I'll Write Someday, #1:
2008-01-19 15:47:00 "4 Ever" Brady is dead, but can't move onto the afterlife until he finds someone to look after his widow, Jane. Lola has died, too, and won't rest in peace until she locates the perfect spouse for her former fiance, Toby. Can these two "high-spirited" ghosts help the living and maybe find a way to live happily ever afterlife? Brady and Jane, Lola and Toby: 2Be + 2Gether = 4 Ever! More About: Movies , Write
Also Broke Zarathustra
2008-01-17 04:02:00 I like to picture, as I open my garage door in the morning to embark on my day, this scene:The sun glints over the frozen lake to my right, golden-orange rays speckling through the bare tree branches and glinting off the snow, scattered into the window of my garage door. The door, white and gleaming, rises slowly, revealing my black shoes, then my pants cuffs, moving on up my trench coat. As the door continues rising, someone outside would see me, with the sunlight illuminating the right side of my body, my left still in shadow, holding my coffee mug and staring into the distance, a sense of noble purpose visible on my face. In the background, the drumbeats and trumpets of ?Also Sprach Zarathustra ? grow louder and louder until the door is open all the way and I am cast into the light of a crisp new morning.That?s how I like to picture it, every day. Here is what really happens:The sun glints over the frozen lake to my right, golden-orange rays speckling through the bare tree branche...
Is This Any Way To Treat The Hero of The Forgotten Princes of An Inflatable
2008-01-09 05:26:00 People think that I don?t have an exciting life. Those people are mostly Sweetie and the kids. But maybe you think that, too. Maybe you?re sitting there reading this and saying ?Sweetie and the kids are right. You?re life is a boring m�lange of Peanut Butter Cap?n Crunch and reminiscing about old comic strips.?Maybe you have a point. But at least I know what ?m�lange? means. Any life that includes being able to use ?m�lange? in a sentence can?t be all bad.And speaking of words that are hard to use in a sentence and reminiscing about comic strips, here?s some insight into my soul. I loved ?Peanuts? when I was a kid, and I also took piano lessons. I know what you?re thinking ? I was on an early path to coolness. I agree. But that?s not my point. My point is this: Because I loved both ?Peanuts? and piano, I recognized what Schroeder was always talking about when he made references to Beethoven. But until I got far enough in my piano lessons, until I got beyond the part where your lesso... More About: Inflatable , Treat , Hero , Forgotten
Baking Soda and Hope Can Cure the Post-Christmas Blues
2007-12-27 18:13:00 Ordinarily, I feel a little bit of a letdown after Christmas ? no more cheesecake for breakfast, no presents to look forward to, no reason to listen to Billy Squier?s Christmas song. But this year, I felt, instead, a slightly strange sense of satisfaction. I think it?s because so many of my questions were answered ? all of them, in fact, except two.Those questions were, in no particular order (well, okay, in the order in which they were answered):How many Apple Jacks will stack on the head of a stuffed bear?Which fuse turns off the power to the kitchen wall?Will I convincingly be able to act as though whatever is in the deep fryer box is as good as the deep fryer would have been?What kind of licorice do cats like, anyway?How did Michael Myers know it was his sister?AndWhat was the point of the second Bourne movie, then?AndAm I the kind of husband who will vacuum the rug even though you can?t see the pee?I think, just looking at that list, you will know all you ever need to know abou... More About: Baking , Blues , Post , Hope
My Christmas Tree Rules!
2007-12-13 05:11:00 I have a beginning anecdote that I can?t resist even though it really goes nowhere and does not seem to relate to anything else I?m going to write about this time. Here it goes: Tonight, I inadvertently cracked the secret of what flavor, exactly, is ?Juicy Fruit.?Juicy Fruit, the gum, is no-exact-flavor. If you go to their website, like I did just now (well, not just now when you read this, but just now when I wrote that, only it was actually just before I wrote that, and as I write this, it?s been about a minute, but you get the point) you?ll see that they describe it as ?one-of-a-kind? flavor. They don?t tell you what the flavor is, just that it?s ?one-of-a-kind.? They also, I see, are promoting some new flavors ? ?strappleberry? and ?grapermelon,? that are also ?one-of-a-kind.? I hope that they?re just mixing two kinds of actual fruit. I?d hate to think that the Juicy Fruit people have actually genetically engineered new fruit. Although a ?strappleberry? would be kind of neat. I ... More About: Christmas , Rules , Tree , Christmas tree
The Pot Roast Generation
2007-11-19 17:00:00 The way I see it, Grandma?s first mistake was bringing up the subject while we were still digesting dinner. Everyone was just lolling around after Alternate Thanksgiving dinner trying to surreptitiously unbutton their pants, while also surreptitiously wondering if anyone else had paid attention to how much they had eaten, and if so, whether anyone else would think less of them for going up to get a fourth cookie?or maybe that was just me, because they were really good cookies, sugar cookies with frosting and M&Ms and candy corns ? and Grandma brought up what we should have for Christmas dinner.?Alternate Thanksgiving? may not be a holiday you celebrate, but it?s one I?ve grown to embrace. I am moving, as rapidly as I can, away from ?traditional? holiday celebrations. ?Traditional? as used in that sentence means: starting too early, running too late, requiring that I wear nice pants and a sweater and sometimes a tie, and involving people that I am related to but who do not live u... More About: Roast , Generation
Maybe I can finally get that cold Coca-Cola there...
2007-11-01 20:00:00 How excited do you get when you go to a new mall? On a scale of 1 to 10, I hit about an 8. (For comparisons? sake, here are some other measurements: Birth of my kids: 9.5. Wedding day: 10. Getting up to go to work in the morning: 2. Finding out that there?s still Peanut Butter Cap?n Crunch left in the box: 9.1.)I don?t know why I get so excited. I just do. There?s something, I guess, about an entirely new arrangement of Gaps and Hallmark stores and Williams Sonoma that I find thrilling.I first realized this on a trip to Oshkosh:That is, I first gave this conscious thought on the trip to Oshkosh; I?d realized it a long time ago. But on the trip to Oshkosh, I began formulating it as a theory: New Mall = Really Interesting.Oshkosh, Wisconsin, does not have a mall. We had gone to Oshkosh, Sweetie and I, on a small trip to celebrate our anniversary. We had begun going to cities in Wisconsin for the weekend on the theory that even the small towns have something interesting about them. (Th... More About: Cold , Coca-Cola , Coca Cola , Coca , Cola
It Would Probably Be Easier, In The Long Run, For Me Just To Order A New On
2007-10-25 00:31:00 When did it become some important for the batteries not to fall out?We have tens, maybe hundreds, of things in our house that require batteries, ranging from the many, many battery-powered toys the babies have to the talking alarm clock I got for sending in Pop Tart box tops.I actually have 2 talking alarm clocks, which I had intended to split up by taking one to the office and having one at home, but Sweetie made me give one to the babies by pointing out that they would need a clock in their room. She said that around the time that the babies were born and I wasn?t sleeping much at the time, so it made sense to me that they would need a clock, only now I look back at it and think Why? Why do babies need to tell time? And I?ve been proven right, because the talking alarm clock I gave the babies is on their dresser but they don?t use it, and I know they don?t use it because the batteries in it died so it won?t keep time or talk. (It has three things it says when it goes off: ?Somebod... More About: Long , Order , Probably
Action Roy!
2007-10-05 04:38:00 It?s hard to say which I spent more time thinking about yesterday, exclamation points or action figures. I?m going to go with action figures. But I did put in some effort on the exclamation points.I spent some time thinking about exclamation points because I read an article about how the exclamation point should be used more, or maybe the point of the article was that people are using the exclamation point just exactly enough but grammarians, or punctuarians ? is a punctuarian a job? I?d like it to be ? think that people, including me, are using the exclamation point too much.And this is, of course, a subject close to my heart because I not only use exclamation points (but sparingly!)(There?s one!)(and another!)(Okay, that?s enough.) I also put an exclamation point on a shirt I made, in the ?You?ve Been Punctuated? line of clothing. (I'd show you the shirt, but for some reason it does not show up in the gallery the way it actually shows up in real life, so here's a different one):... More About: Action
I Am The Snoopy
2007-09-21 05:53:00 Of all the positions that I hold in my life ? lawyer, father, Polar Bear Swimmer 1994, Unbeaten Competitor in Madden 2008 on the Playstation 3, inventor of the deep-fried meatball, perhaps the most exalted station I have is that I am The Snoopy .I became The Snoopy late last week when Sweetie and I finally decided that something had to be done about the twins, A and B, not sleeping. They are one year old, we decided, and they have to start sleeping through the night. They have not slept through the night at all yet, not even once, unless you count the night that Grandma and Grandpa came and babysat them to give us a night off, and said that A and B slept entirely through the night and didn?t wake up, but I do not count that night because Grandma and Grandpa, I don?t think, turned on the baby monitor and so they could not have known what A and B were doing in their rooms. The twins might have been crying. They might have been jumping. They might have been arguing in Tagalog about who ...
Stevens Point, Twinkies, and Squid Chili: A Recipe For Romance
2007-09-05 07:05:00 ?I have made a decision,? I told Sweetie. And I looked at her as we pulled out of the driveway to go grocery shopping, which I had somehow gotten roped into doing even though it was no longer my job, since my job is my job and groceries are Sweetie?s job, ever since we got to the point where she could stay at home with the boys.Groceries used to be my job. I had groceries down to a science, once. We?ve been going to the same grocery store since we moved here back in 1999, and I always follow the same order of grocery shopping?begin with bread and produce, go to meat, frozens, and then work your way back through the aisles until you get to candy, at the end, which was also the point where you could take a quarter out of your pocket and get three sample candies by putting 25 cents in the box on the end of the candy display, three pieces of candy to tide you over while you waited in line and read the tabloids they keep at the grocery stores for people to read while they wait.Even bette... More About: Recipe , Romance , Chili , Point , Squid
A Victory For The Ages
2007-08-17 05:57:00 There was a time when I thought I was going to take on huge challenges in the world, really change things. There was a time when I was convinced that I was one of those people destined to leave his mark on mankind in a way that would have his name be common knowledge centuries later.My life did not, though, head in that direction. I am not a household name, even in my household, where I am usually relegated to the background and generally outvoted except on the rare times that I put my foot down and announce that we are not going to Dairy Queen, we are going to get some real ice cream, not that soft serve junk that is one of the signs of societal collapse. And even on those occasions I usually cave in and end up eating a "Blizzard" that is rapidly melting into a shake with chunks of Oreos in it.But all is not lost. I still have ample opportunity for conquering new horizons and imposing my will on life. Take, for example, the Battle of The Garbage Can, in which I took on the Herculea... More About: Victory , The A , Tory , Ages
Sundaes In The Park With Sweetie
2007-07-21 14:39:00 We went out, Sweetie and I did yesterday, for some alone time. This was a sacrifice for me in more ways than one.Don?t get me wrong. It was not a sacrifice to spend time with Sweetie. I love spending ?alone time? with her, which we do periodically because we have two teenagers, 10-month old twins, and a 20-year old Oldest Daughter who has moved out in name only. We see Oldest so often now that we assign her chores. They don?t get done, which itself is just like when she was living here. With all those kids, and three cats, and I still in theory work when I go to the office although the Internet?s really starting to interfere with that, Sweetie and I every now and then want to have some time with just us. Time where there are no babies with diaper-ish needs, The Boy is not asking if he can go ?walking around? with his friends, and Middle Daughter doesn?t pose brain teasers like ?What?s the opposite of R?? causing me to just stare at her until she explains and then she says ?S??She wa... More About: Park , Sundae
We Can't All Be Second Worst
2007-07-19 02:26:00 There was a time in my life when I tried my hardest to excel, to be the best I possibly could, to be the kind of person who would not, in a pinch, listen to sports talk radio on his way to an emergency. But at this stage of my life, I?m resigned to not being that person anymore. I now set my sights a little lower. I figure if I do enough, make enough of an effort to not be the absolute worst, to make sure that there?s someone who is a little lower than me, that?s good enough because then everyone will hate that person and leave me alone.The emergency that I was on my way to was that Twin B was stuck in the car. Sweetie had taken the boys to the park for a walk, and in the process of putting them back into the massive SUV we have to drive to carry all the kids and a giant double stroller and a diaper bag the size of a tent, she set her keys on the front seat, loaded Twin B into his car seat, turned around to get Twin A, and shut Twin B?s door. With all the doors locked. And her... More About: Econ
You'd Think All That Singing Would Help Burn Some Calories, But You'd Be Wr
2007-07-01 04:21:00 When I was younger, Thursday nights were for going out. In college, and in the years when I should have been in college because I was college age but was not because (I told myself) I was taking some time off but really (others likely said about me) I was just screwing around, Thursday nights were for going out. There was a good reason for that. Thursdays you went out because Fridays, everyone went home for the weekend to wash the stale beer/cigarette smell out of their clothes and convince their parents that mid-term grades would be good.My mid-term grades, when I got mid-term grades in those terms where I was actually in college, started off not so good, but not because of Thursday nights. Most of my good Thursday nights were in the years when I was not in school, because then at least I had a little free time on Thursday nights. When I was in school, between school and the jobs I worked and the hours I worked, I did not have the money to go out or the time. When I was not in scho... More About: Calor , Calories , Would , Calorie , Some
Now That's A Reason
2007-05-19 02:57:00 There are reasons, and then there are reasons. Some are good, and some are not so good. Some are, when you come right down to it? well, stupid.Take, for example, my reason for running. I go running in an absolutely fabulous location. The picture at the beginning of this post was taken from the path I run on.That path, the location, the beauty of that spot is not the reason why I run. It would be a great reason to visit that area, but if you?re going to go visit a pretty nature preserve you want to do it in a leisurely manner, with a water bottle and a sunhat and time to stroll. You do not, if you visit that park, want to do it while feeling your kneecaps creak and grind, with sweat pouring down your forehead in such profusion that you wonder, over and over, whether you would really look as lame as your kids say you would if you just wore a sweatband, and whether you should even care if you look that lame when sweat keeps getting into your stupid eyes, and getting in there so much th... More About: Reason
The Egg Salad Incident
2007-03-28 15:54:00 Lots of people have been asking me about the raccoon but I can’t worry about that now because I’m a terrible parent.I came to this conclusion, that I’m an awful parent, because of the egg salad.If you’re a parent, or a kid, then you know that parents are never supposed to talk about the sacrifices they make or made. They can talk about the hardships they faced before the children were born – explaining why it was so difficult to grow up with only an Atari 2600 instead of both a Playstation 3 and a Playstation Portable – or they can talk about how great their life was long, long before the kids were around – like explaining to people who won’t believe you anyway why those Atari 2600 games were so much better than “God of War II.”One reason, by the way, that the old games were better was that they had one joystick and one, maybe two, buttons. The Boy’s Playstation 3 controller has a directional pad with four buttons, four buttons on the right side, two joysticks,... More About: Salad , Sala , Incident , Cide
But The Hardest Thing To Do Is To Sing It The Way They Wrote It
2007-03-07 15:54:00 There are things I do not understand and don’t think that I ever will.I don’t, for example, understand why MY lyrics to “Train in Vain,” by The Clash are not the actual lyrics. I sang these lyrics last night to A and B while feeding them orange mush (chicken and noodles?) and yellow mush (tutti frutti dessert?)(They liked the yellow mush better, as measured not so much by how much they ate as how much they rubbed into their ears and/or the cats. The orange mush was far more likely to be pulled out of their mouths and flung.)Here are the lyrics I sing:You say you stand by your manTell me something I don’t understandYou said you love meAnd that’s a factAnd then you left meFor a different trackWell some things you can explain awayBut the hardest thing to do is stay.You didn’t stand by meNo not at allYou didn’t stand by me,No wayAll the times when we were closeI remember these things the mostI seen all my dreams come tumbling downI can’t be happy without you ‘round.S... More About: Hard , The Way , Sing , Wrote
Supersized Dreams
2007-01-31 01:40:00 There are probably better ways to write than with a baby sitting on your lap, and better places to do it than a hospital coffee shop. But that’s my life these days and we make the best of what we have, right? Besides, sitting in this coffee shop is far, far better than sitting in Vuey and hoping that my feet don’t freeze off because it's a stick-shift car so it's harder to let it run in the winter and I live in Wisconsin where this time of year it feels like it's always winter.I suppose I should explain that entire paragraph, maybe beginning with the obvious question running through the minds of anyone who’s not related to me: Who or what is a Vuey? Okay, so I name my cars. I name most of my cars, that is. I’ve named them going all the way back to Zippy, my Ford Festiva that I bought while in law school (the name came from the salesman telling me the car was “zippy,” and it was. I loved that car. I moved my entire apartment in it. Ford Festivas are surprisingly roomy ... More About: Dreams , Super , Dream , Size
For some people, the realization that they are old, or out-o
More articles from this author:2007-01-16 16:55:05 For some people, the realization that they are old, or out-of-it, or not hip, comes from things like hearing their favorite music on an oldies? station. Or seeing that sports heroes or rock stars are now younger than they are (or, conversely, older than their? parents ? like the Stones).Admit it, if your grandpa put on thatheadband, you'd put him in a home. For me, it was putting on a stocking hat that made me finally come to terms with the fact that I?m a grown-up. Also, bald. But mostly, a grown up.I?ve been resistant to hats, other than baseball caps, for a long time. My resistance probably came from the fact that the hats when I was a kid looked like stocking caps but for some reason had inexplicably large puffballs on top. Like this: My own hat was a Packer cap, so it had a farless garish color scheme.Only larger. You could feel it catching in the wind when you ran, or walked, and older kids would come up to you and pat you?me ? violently on the head while hitting your puffba... More About: People , Hat , They , Real , That 1, 2, 3, 4, 5 |
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