Some recent events have inspired me to write this little ditty with regards to hygiene. Unfortunately, the male species is a little more guilty of a lot of this, and I'm writing to hopefully inspire a little more attention to certain details to one's personal cleanliness. Now, don't get me wrong, I have encountered several a female with some of the same lack of attention to things like body odor, dirty hands and breath that if it was bottled and pressurized into a capsule, then launched to the Middle East, would probably clear up this oil crisis once and for all. So with this said I won't generalize one way or the other, this is to men and women and how you are affecting those around you with your bad choices and laziness.
Let's start with one of the world's cheapest and most abundant resources.....WATER. Sometimes, you have to stand under it, splash a little on your face, get friendly with it. Its OK. You won't melt. Hey I get it, if times are tough, wait for the next fall of rain and go bask in its glory without an umbrella. Save on the water bill. But honestly, this needs to be done daily. Some people will say, "Oh but my skin, if I showered everyday, it would dry up." Well, news flash....when you don't shower everyday, my nose wants to fall right off my face. This is unacceptable. Use lotion then, I don't know what to tell you. The only time not showering everyday applies is when you are camping....because you are living and sleeping outside.....like an ANIMAL. Everyday life requires us to be human beings.
The next of the necessities is soap. This one is very important and another one not to be feared. Get intimate with it, it's fine. Your significant other will appreciate you cheating on him or her with the soap. Believe me, this is one affair you are allowed to have. And if you don't have a significant other....well..... then.....maybe you should really pay attention to what I'm describing in this post. Rub it around your entire body. Spend some time with it. Make it worth it. And just for fun.....use deodorant afterwards as well. Go on! It'll be fun! Even if its a couple swipes. This one I understand people have allergies and such, but CVS has options. We've discussed in previous blogs the number of options that are available to us today. Go search. Find one that suits you albeit odor free, organic, or composed of tree bark and lemons.....I don't care. But when you enter public domain, try to think of others around you. The other day I was shooting pool, and the guy I was playing had 4 teeth, two on top and two on the bottom (hey symmetry is always nice), they were a shade of gray I don't think Crayola even has a name for, and the odor that came off of this man.....was so reprehensible.....how do I describe it? OK, it was as if (and use your imagination), it was as if a french fry, had an asshole.....and I felt like I had my head shoved up it! How's that?! Trust me, we are going to come full circle back to the teeth, but I want to spend a little more time on odor. Does one NOT smell themselves. I shower daily and if I sweat and get a little ripe, I can tell....within minutes, and I fix it! And how do you nicely approach someone and let them know? "Um excuse me.....do you work in raw sewage? No? Really? Well how DO you get that smell?" In my own words, the nicest way I think to say it is to pull someone aside and say, "Cleanliness is next to Godliness.....and you my friend have a long trip ahead of you before you see the light."
This final segment I am going to group a few items together: teeth, breath and personal space. I was out the other night and was having a conversation with a husband and wife that apparently used the same blend of rotten meat and vinegar as mouth wash, and due to their drunkenness lost all consciousness of personal space. I mean, they should have just sat on my lap and told Santa what they wanted for Christmas. (Let's just say Santa suggests a dental starter kit.) What is with people that feel the need to be inches from your face to tell you a story. I can hear you, there is no reason I can think of that your mouth needs to be inches from my nose....if anything....aim for the ear. I don't hear with my nose. I smell with it, and right now I smell rotten egg salad and road kill. And what's worse than the smell? The little flecks of acid rain that are flying from their mouth as they continue to make you part of a conversation that can't end quick enough. And I have found subtle hints don't work. Like sliding away slowly like a casual low tide at the beach.....or turning your head to the side to expose only your ear and bring your nose to safety (this is when they will walk around you like a street post until they are face to face with you again. This one can cause dizziness if you keep spinning around for too long.)...or finally excusing yourself to the rest room and never coming back....sometimes does the trick but chances are they will find you, and appear out of nowhere and shout right in your face..."WHERE DID YOU GO?! Were you hiding?!" (Ugh! I was.....but you found me! Wooohoooo! OK let's play again....give me a count to 25 and I'll hide again. Ready?! Go? Olly Olly Oxen Free!......)
Honestly, I'm not even sure how to end this. Maybe with a shower, or a few sharp spritz's of cologne? Or maybe one last piece of advice.....Lather, Rinse and Repeat are not just three words that someone forced together to sound pretty. They are ACTUAL instructions to making and keeping friends. I'm all about shortcuts and avoiding long processes. But this is one area that needs a little extra attention and avoidance of laziness. No witty pun to end this one on, no double entendre, just simply to those that do not take others into consideration the nest time they forget to suds up, rinse, swipe or brush.....well.....You Stink!
About Me
- Just Joshin' Ya'
- Continuing with the notion that laughter is always the best medicine for any situation. In good times and in the worst of times, who doesn't appreciate a good laugh?!
.....Have Viewed Just Joshin Ya'
Saturday, March 31, 2012
Wednesday, March 21, 2012
If You're One of Those People.....Stop It!
I'm sure we have all been there, in a situation mouth open in awe at the sight or sound of things people say or do, maybe up-hauled, disgusted, annoyed or some other various emotion that makes us stop and say to ourself...."Really?! Come on!" I've been making mental notes of these encounters and now I am going to share a few of them with you. Lately I have found myself coming to a complete stop and looking at the gene pool with nothing but shock and dismay.
As I've mentioned in previous blogs, technology is mainly responsible for making our society living zombies. How about the self check out lanes? Where now, we are forced to do someone else's job. Last I checked I came to the store to buy food....I'm hungry. I didn't know I was coming to work. Now I may as well slap on an apron and ring out my own groceries. OK fine. Seems simple enough. Well it is. I seem to have no trouble finding the bar code and ringing the product through the laser pad and sending myself off, usually quicker than if I waited in line and had someone else do it. But what about the people you see standing in front of the self checker in utter silence not understanding how this "new machine" works. It's not new people! You have been watching grocers ring you out for years. It's the same method. Nothing has changed. Bar code to laser and in the bag! Nope! You'll get that person waving a box of oatmeal frantically wondering why it won't scan. Produce? Forget it. People have lost all touch with reality when they have to enter a produce code in. That really sends people through a loop. The other day I was in the self checkout line (and lately I've been making a lot of ground turkey stuffed peppers, so I became familiar with the 4-digit code)....and this old lady was purchasing green peppers and didn't know the code. So naturally she had her head in the air looking straight up at the ceiling as if the 4-digit code would be in the light fixtures. I noticed her turmoil so I figured I would help. (Bad idea!) I said, "Ma'am, the code is 6315." She smiled and thanked me....then in an instant I had two different people on two other self checkouts simultaneously ask me the code for Fuji Apples and Plums. "I don't know," I said, "I haven't bought apples or plums in a while." All of a sudden I became the grocer. So if you're one of those people that doesn't understand the technology and needs the helping hand of a person who is employed as a checker, but you still feel the need to hold up everyone else who DOES understand how these things work....Stop It! Seek live help.
While we are on the topics of grocery stores. If you are one of those people who is still paying with checks.....Stop it! Get a debit card! (Mom this includes you too....I've seen you pay with check and I've also noticed the eye rolls from people behind us.) Because checks aren't quick. It always involves...."Now what's today's date?" "Who do I make the check out too?" (Who do you think you make the check out to? Maybe the name of the place your shopping at....do you even remember where you are?) Then the check gets stuck in the check reader, approval is needed, Congress is on the phone, and here I am with a pack of gum wondering why I picked the shortest line. I should have known. Another thing, if you are one of those people who thinks you're cute paying with perfect change.....Stop it! "That will be 11.97." Now you get the man or woman digging in their purse or pocket....."Here's 10.....11.....11.50...11.75.....76.....hold on....I got that penny in here somewhere.....Oh! Nope....another dime....I don't wanna break my dime.....damn another dollar...I certainly don't want to break that.....does anyone have a penny? Sir do you have a penny?......) Oh for God sake, here's a dollar just move this along. Give them the dollar and put the 3 cents into a slush fund, you're killing me!
Moving out of the stores and into the streets where it's filled with people doing the most God awful things imaginable. If you are one of those people who thinks they are invisible and people don't see you .....Stop it! We can see you. Its a glass window you are sitting behind. It's glass! It's clear! I can see you, and so can everyone else! Why is it when we are on the road going 30 miles an hour or more, we regress back to children. I was looking in my rear view mirror to see if it was safe to change lanes and there it was....I saw it....a man take his finger (and not even hiding it) jammed it right up his nose and started digging. Then retracts the finger and stares at it.....Nope....didn't get it.....back in for another dig. Ahhhhhhh Eureka! I changed lanes....almost through up in my lap and shouted aloud in my car "Noooooooo! Stop it! Stop it! Why?! What the hell?!" Is a tissue not an option? Does a booger in the nose make it harder to drive to the point that people can't wait until they are pulled over safely and can get a tissue? Disgusting!
Cell phones and phone conversations. If you are one of those people that needs to recount everything that happened in the past week detail by detail...that's fine, but lets make dinner plans and we can discuss it without a phone attached to our ears. Otherwise, hit the key points and carry on. If we do find ourselves at dinner catching up and you are one of those people that is hooked to your phone like a life support system.....Stop it! It's not the time to Tweet or answer phone calls from people that you weren't previously engaged in important conversation with. You asked ME to dinner. You had important things to tell me so let's talk. (OK we are ALL guilty of this one.....but none the less.....Stop it!) If you are one of those people that is wrapping up the call, or I initiate a clue that I need to get going and say something like....."Well, I really need to get going, I'm at dinner catching up with with an old friend." That's not code for "Sooooooo what happened after the ice cream melted?....."
Now, I haven't gotten involved in Twitter. I downloaded it and got overwhelmed. I get it, I will probably start doing it, it's a matter of time but be selective. If you are one of those people that Tweets things like...."I'm in McDonald's and it smells like fries".....Stop it! It's McDonald's, it should smell like fries! This isn't news or something that needs to be shared.
If you are one of those people that goes to the beach in a Speedo, and you are not a female.....(do I really need to say this?).....Stop it! Unless you are French, and even then it's uncalled for, just stop it! I'm glad you have a great body, but I don't need to see anything above the knee caps. It's always the old man with the long gray curly hair and saggy man boobs sporting the banana hammock anyways. Gross! Stop it!
I will stop here. Trust me, there will be a Part 2 to this blog in a matter of time. I will continue to take notes on what I encounter but I believe this is enough to get you started. Oh.....one more! If you are one of those people, who read this and are now thinking to yourself....."Oh this is DEFINITELY not me".....STOP IT! We are ALL guilty of one, if not all of these at some point in our lives. This is just a friendly reminder to take pride in yourself as a classy member of the gene pool. Just trying to initiate a little sanity back. So if you have taken offense to anything I said.....JUST STOP IT!
As I've mentioned in previous blogs, technology is mainly responsible for making our society living zombies. How about the self check out lanes? Where now, we are forced to do someone else's job. Last I checked I came to the store to buy food....I'm hungry. I didn't know I was coming to work. Now I may as well slap on an apron and ring out my own groceries. OK fine. Seems simple enough. Well it is. I seem to have no trouble finding the bar code and ringing the product through the laser pad and sending myself off, usually quicker than if I waited in line and had someone else do it. But what about the people you see standing in front of the self checker in utter silence not understanding how this "new machine" works. It's not new people! You have been watching grocers ring you out for years. It's the same method. Nothing has changed. Bar code to laser and in the bag! Nope! You'll get that person waving a box of oatmeal frantically wondering why it won't scan. Produce? Forget it. People have lost all touch with reality when they have to enter a produce code in. That really sends people through a loop. The other day I was in the self checkout line (and lately I've been making a lot of ground turkey stuffed peppers, so I became familiar with the 4-digit code)....and this old lady was purchasing green peppers and didn't know the code. So naturally she had her head in the air looking straight up at the ceiling as if the 4-digit code would be in the light fixtures. I noticed her turmoil so I figured I would help. (Bad idea!) I said, "Ma'am, the code is 6315." She smiled and thanked me....then in an instant I had two different people on two other self checkouts simultaneously ask me the code for Fuji Apples and Plums. "I don't know," I said, "I haven't bought apples or plums in a while." All of a sudden I became the grocer. So if you're one of those people that doesn't understand the technology and needs the helping hand of a person who is employed as a checker, but you still feel the need to hold up everyone else who DOES understand how these things work....Stop It! Seek live help.
While we are on the topics of grocery stores. If you are one of those people who is still paying with checks.....Stop it! Get a debit card! (Mom this includes you too....I've seen you pay with check and I've also noticed the eye rolls from people behind us.) Because checks aren't quick. It always involves...."Now what's today's date?" "Who do I make the check out too?" (Who do you think you make the check out to? Maybe the name of the place your shopping at....do you even remember where you are?) Then the check gets stuck in the check reader, approval is needed, Congress is on the phone, and here I am with a pack of gum wondering why I picked the shortest line. I should have known. Another thing, if you are one of those people who thinks you're cute paying with perfect change.....Stop it! "That will be 11.97." Now you get the man or woman digging in their purse or pocket....."Here's 10.....11.....11.50...11.75.....76.....hold on....I got that penny in here somewhere.....Oh! Nope....another dime....I don't wanna break my dime.....damn another dollar...I certainly don't want to break that.....does anyone have a penny? Sir do you have a penny?......) Oh for God sake, here's a dollar just move this along. Give them the dollar and put the 3 cents into a slush fund, you're killing me!
Moving out of the stores and into the streets where it's filled with people doing the most God awful things imaginable. If you are one of those people who thinks they are invisible and people don't see you .....Stop it! We can see you. Its a glass window you are sitting behind. It's glass! It's clear! I can see you, and so can everyone else! Why is it when we are on the road going 30 miles an hour or more, we regress back to children. I was looking in my rear view mirror to see if it was safe to change lanes and there it was....I saw it....a man take his finger (and not even hiding it) jammed it right up his nose and started digging. Then retracts the finger and stares at it.....Nope....didn't get it.....back in for another dig. Ahhhhhhh Eureka! I changed lanes....almost through up in my lap and shouted aloud in my car "Noooooooo! Stop it! Stop it! Why?! What the hell?!" Is a tissue not an option? Does a booger in the nose make it harder to drive to the point that people can't wait until they are pulled over safely and can get a tissue? Disgusting!
Cell phones and phone conversations. If you are one of those people that needs to recount everything that happened in the past week detail by detail...that's fine, but lets make dinner plans and we can discuss it without a phone attached to our ears. Otherwise, hit the key points and carry on. If we do find ourselves at dinner catching up and you are one of those people that is hooked to your phone like a life support system.....Stop it! It's not the time to Tweet or answer phone calls from people that you weren't previously engaged in important conversation with. You asked ME to dinner. You had important things to tell me so let's talk. (OK we are ALL guilty of this one.....but none the less.....Stop it!) If you are one of those people that is wrapping up the call, or I initiate a clue that I need to get going and say something like....."Well, I really need to get going, I'm at dinner catching up with with an old friend." That's not code for "Sooooooo what happened after the ice cream melted?....."
Now, I haven't gotten involved in Twitter. I downloaded it and got overwhelmed. I get it, I will probably start doing it, it's a matter of time but be selective. If you are one of those people that Tweets things like...."I'm in McDonald's and it smells like fries".....Stop it! It's McDonald's, it should smell like fries! This isn't news or something that needs to be shared.
If you are one of those people that goes to the beach in a Speedo, and you are not a female.....(do I really need to say this?).....Stop it! Unless you are French, and even then it's uncalled for, just stop it! I'm glad you have a great body, but I don't need to see anything above the knee caps. It's always the old man with the long gray curly hair and saggy man boobs sporting the banana hammock anyways. Gross! Stop it!
I will stop here. Trust me, there will be a Part 2 to this blog in a matter of time. I will continue to take notes on what I encounter but I believe this is enough to get you started. Oh.....one more! If you are one of those people, who read this and are now thinking to yourself....."Oh this is DEFINITELY not me".....STOP IT! We are ALL guilty of one, if not all of these at some point in our lives. This is just a friendly reminder to take pride in yourself as a classy member of the gene pool. Just trying to initiate a little sanity back. So if you have taken offense to anything I said.....JUST STOP IT!
Wednesday, March 14, 2012
"Just Call Uncle Lee....."
Happy Wednesday Everyone! I am sitting on my patio enjoying the weather in Sunny California, sipping a nice hot cup of coffee and have been contemplating which direction to steer my blog today. There are a lot of national and world affairs taking place, a lot of which could use a good jab of comical anecdote. I promise that we will get to those eventually. Today, however, I am pulling a treasure out of the memory bank. I feel it's only fair, as I continue to poke the finger of fun at various members of my family, to indulge my readers in a bit of self deprecation to level the playing field a bit. To begin, I need everyone to keep in mind, at the time this took place.....I was 4, and yes I remember it like it was yesterday. I have no reservation in sharing this story with you, I am not embarrassed by it at all, but rather kind of proud at the milestone I accomplished one fine Spring day. Let's begin.
There is a bit of prefacing that needs to be done before we get to the meat of the story, so bare with me. I hail from a large family, that is no secret. My mom is one of seven, and as kids most of my aunts and uncles lived in Endicott and the surrounding areas. Since then, they have moved to various parts of the country but at one point we were all one big happy family in Endicott, NY. We did our share of visiting the different relatives and I being who I am took note of EVERYTHING. Each of my relatives will have their time in the limelight so for sake of keeping this story somewhat short, the visits to my Uncle Lee and Aunt Joanne's house will be of pertinent information to the remainder of THIS story. At the time, they had a beautiful dog, a Collie, named Bub. Bub was a fun dog. I remember camping at the lake with my family and Bub was my personal water taxi. All I had to do was grab his tail and hold on and he would swim me around the lake endlessly. He never got tired. When we would visit their house, Bub was my companion before my aunt and uncle had the army of children they have currently. So upon our visit, my uncle knew that I would primarily be in the yard playing with Bub, so he felt the need to tidy up a bit. When we would arrive, like clockwork, there was Uncle Lee with a shovel cleaning up the many land mines Bub would leave behind. Not to get graphic, but this dog could "scatter the matter" in a yard like nobody's business. So this was a chore and not a very easy or fun one I would imagine. So my thanks to Uncle Lee for taking on the duty (pun intended) of making a clean yard for me to enjoy an afternoon of fetch and fun with my childhood canine pal, Bub.
I think that should cover the necessary background information you need to understand why I saw no harm in what I did that warm Spring day. The flowers were in bloom, the sun was out and we were keeping busy in the yard enjoying the sunshine......Hey much like Im doing today! (Trust me, I wouldn't think of doing today what I am about to do in this story 28 years ago.) Our first house we lived in, well that I lived in, was on the corner of Watson Blvd. For those of you that don't know, Watson Blvd. is one of the main thoroughfares through our town. There are always cars whizzing by and people walking up and down the street. Essentially, NEVER a quiet and unoccupied road. So as playtime outside progressed, let's just say breakfast, brunch and lunch.....(Yes, I always had an appetite, even at the age of 4).....breakfast, brunch and lunch were moving through me and ready to be released to the world.....you have no idea how accurate that analogy is about to become. I'm not sure what came over me, or where the thought in my head came from but being a young boy, let's all just be real for a moment. Is it not the most gratifying thing as a young boy (Sorry girls, you may not be able to level on this one) to be able to shine skin to the wind and pee in the woods? Or whip it out at any given moment to pee wherever you are....within reason that is. Sure there is a bathroom within walking distance, but when the choice between an unappealing, static wall-papered bathroom or the option to feel the wind roam free over your extremities presents itself.....can I get a show of hands from all the guys.....whose gonna go with what's behind door number 2? Ahhhhhhhhhh Number 2.....which leads me to the next part of my story. So, Im feeling the urge and I decide right then and there, the bathroom is not an option.....it's too far away for the urgency that is upon me. I needed to take care of this right then and there. So I decide to drop the bomb.....right outside. Not behind a bush....or a tree.....or even kill two birds with one chocolate stone and fertilize my mother's flower bed. Nope! As I ran past our house, right past the back door (Hello innuendo) that practically led to the bathroom, I headed straight for the corner of North Arthur and Watson Blvd., proudly dropped my Scooby Doo drawers, and if I only had a newspaper at the time (or was able to read one at that age) it would have made things a lot more comfortable. Now picture this.....me, a 4 year old, in full squat, dropping missiles right on the sidewalk, cars are literally honking as they pass by. So....naturally I thought they were cheering me on. I just waved. Smiled and waved. Cue the old lady (no lie, I can tell you what she had on) walking directly on the other side of the street in awe. Just staring at me. Well for God sake I thought....give a boy some privacy....stop staring......didn't your mother ever teach you it's not polite to stare? Sheesh! So I gave her the one hand salute and wished her well on her walk through the neighborhood. I'm sure it was off to a good start!
So I finish taking care of business, I even was able to sneak back into the house without anyone seeing me waddle half nude to the bathroom, where I should have been in the first place.....I know this now.....to wipe naturally (I'm not an animal) and get my clothes back to their original order. Then, taking a deep breath I march right back outside to play. I was so proud. Now....as a child and even still, I am not a good liar. I was proud in the moment, but when I got back outside and my father greeted me in the yard with "Hey, there you are.....where were you?" (Ummmmmm pooping on the street Dad, where do you think?).....No, I didn't say that. But I don't know if it was that look he had or the way he asked me where I was, I felt like he knew I was up to no good. So it was hard for me to hide it. I tried, but I failed. "I didn't do anything." I said. Well that's a death sentence as a kid. Saying you didn't do anything means.....I just shit on the sidewalk. So my dad asks me, "Where did you NOT do anything?" to which I replied....."In the front of the house! Gosh!" (Damn! Foiled! Devil!) So now comes the trip to the front of the house. (Well.....my second trip to the front of the house.) And plain as day my dad could see what I had done. "Josh! Did you do this?!" My goose was cooked, so I simply looked back directly into his eyes and I said, "Well......" Which as a kid means, (Yes! and I have no alibi or lie ready. I hadn't thought that far ahead.) So then he asks me, "Well who is gonna clean this up? I'm not cleaning it up! You better figure out how to get this mess off the sidewalk!" Now, I may not have had a lie ready as to why the mess was there, but I certainly had a plan on waste removal. I turned right back to my father, stared directly into his eyes and said, "Just call Uncle Lee....."
There is a bit of prefacing that needs to be done before we get to the meat of the story, so bare with me. I hail from a large family, that is no secret. My mom is one of seven, and as kids most of my aunts and uncles lived in Endicott and the surrounding areas. Since then, they have moved to various parts of the country but at one point we were all one big happy family in Endicott, NY. We did our share of visiting the different relatives and I being who I am took note of EVERYTHING. Each of my relatives will have their time in the limelight so for sake of keeping this story somewhat short, the visits to my Uncle Lee and Aunt Joanne's house will be of pertinent information to the remainder of THIS story. At the time, they had a beautiful dog, a Collie, named Bub. Bub was a fun dog. I remember camping at the lake with my family and Bub was my personal water taxi. All I had to do was grab his tail and hold on and he would swim me around the lake endlessly. He never got tired. When we would visit their house, Bub was my companion before my aunt and uncle had the army of children they have currently. So upon our visit, my uncle knew that I would primarily be in the yard playing with Bub, so he felt the need to tidy up a bit. When we would arrive, like clockwork, there was Uncle Lee with a shovel cleaning up the many land mines Bub would leave behind. Not to get graphic, but this dog could "scatter the matter" in a yard like nobody's business. So this was a chore and not a very easy or fun one I would imagine. So my thanks to Uncle Lee for taking on the duty (pun intended) of making a clean yard for me to enjoy an afternoon of fetch and fun with my childhood canine pal, Bub.
I think that should cover the necessary background information you need to understand why I saw no harm in what I did that warm Spring day. The flowers were in bloom, the sun was out and we were keeping busy in the yard enjoying the sunshine......Hey much like Im doing today! (Trust me, I wouldn't think of doing today what I am about to do in this story 28 years ago.) Our first house we lived in, well that I lived in, was on the corner of Watson Blvd. For those of you that don't know, Watson Blvd. is one of the main thoroughfares through our town. There are always cars whizzing by and people walking up and down the street. Essentially, NEVER a quiet and unoccupied road. So as playtime outside progressed, let's just say breakfast, brunch and lunch.....(Yes, I always had an appetite, even at the age of 4).....breakfast, brunch and lunch were moving through me and ready to be released to the world.....you have no idea how accurate that analogy is about to become. I'm not sure what came over me, or where the thought in my head came from but being a young boy, let's all just be real for a moment. Is it not the most gratifying thing as a young boy (Sorry girls, you may not be able to level on this one) to be able to shine skin to the wind and pee in the woods? Or whip it out at any given moment to pee wherever you are....within reason that is. Sure there is a bathroom within walking distance, but when the choice between an unappealing, static wall-papered bathroom or the option to feel the wind roam free over your extremities presents itself.....can I get a show of hands from all the guys.....whose gonna go with what's behind door number 2? Ahhhhhhhhhh Number 2.....which leads me to the next part of my story. So, Im feeling the urge and I decide right then and there, the bathroom is not an option.....it's too far away for the urgency that is upon me. I needed to take care of this right then and there. So I decide to drop the bomb.....right outside. Not behind a bush....or a tree.....or even kill two birds with one chocolate stone and fertilize my mother's flower bed. Nope! As I ran past our house, right past the back door (Hello innuendo) that practically led to the bathroom, I headed straight for the corner of North Arthur and Watson Blvd., proudly dropped my Scooby Doo drawers, and if I only had a newspaper at the time (or was able to read one at that age) it would have made things a lot more comfortable. Now picture this.....me, a 4 year old, in full squat, dropping missiles right on the sidewalk, cars are literally honking as they pass by. So....naturally I thought they were cheering me on. I just waved. Smiled and waved. Cue the old lady (no lie, I can tell you what she had on) walking directly on the other side of the street in awe. Just staring at me. Well for God sake I thought....give a boy some privacy....stop staring......didn't your mother ever teach you it's not polite to stare? Sheesh! So I gave her the one hand salute and wished her well on her walk through the neighborhood. I'm sure it was off to a good start!
So I finish taking care of business, I even was able to sneak back into the house without anyone seeing me waddle half nude to the bathroom, where I should have been in the first place.....I know this now.....to wipe naturally (I'm not an animal) and get my clothes back to their original order. Then, taking a deep breath I march right back outside to play. I was so proud. Now....as a child and even still, I am not a good liar. I was proud in the moment, but when I got back outside and my father greeted me in the yard with "Hey, there you are.....where were you?" (Ummmmmm pooping on the street Dad, where do you think?).....No, I didn't say that. But I don't know if it was that look he had or the way he asked me where I was, I felt like he knew I was up to no good. So it was hard for me to hide it. I tried, but I failed. "I didn't do anything." I said. Well that's a death sentence as a kid. Saying you didn't do anything means.....I just shit on the sidewalk. So my dad asks me, "Where did you NOT do anything?" to which I replied....."In the front of the house! Gosh!" (Damn! Foiled! Devil!) So now comes the trip to the front of the house. (Well.....my second trip to the front of the house.) And plain as day my dad could see what I had done. "Josh! Did you do this?!" My goose was cooked, so I simply looked back directly into his eyes and I said, "Well......" Which as a kid means, (Yes! and I have no alibi or lie ready. I hadn't thought that far ahead.) So then he asks me, "Well who is gonna clean this up? I'm not cleaning it up! You better figure out how to get this mess off the sidewalk!" Now, I may not have had a lie ready as to why the mess was there, but I certainly had a plan on waste removal. I turned right back to my father, stared directly into his eyes and said, "Just call Uncle Lee....."
Monday, March 12, 2012
"The General Takes the Cake....."
The title of this post may have people's imaginations wondering what extraordinary situation my mother got herself into this time. Was it a cake heist? Does she end up covered in cake by the end of this story? Well not exactly. Today's blog is dedicated to 55 years ago today, the world was blessed with the best mother....my mother Kathy. As we know her now, The General. She has, and always will be, the best in her own right, for her unconditional love and support, for worrying about us even when it seemed to be annoying and uncalled for; Mom was just protecting her pack. Obviously, the normal "mom duties" were never lacking, Carting us around, cooking amazing food and feeding us (which as you can guess was a full time job itself), tending to us when we were sick, going to bat for us when we needed help, being the loudest mother on the sidelines at our sporting events (Hey, she is the general), she's loving, caring, nurturing, sweet, kind.....and....uhhhhh.....CRAZY! This blog will not focus on one story in particular, but rather it will be a quick glimpse at some vignettes of insanity associated with my mother and why we love her so much. As a matter of fact....just now....in the midst of me writing today's blog, I just got off the phone wishing my mother a Happy Birthday. The phone call took the normal twists and turns I've grown used to over the years, but here is how the call ended. We were discussing my school loans and how I NEED to pay them back, and there's no getting out of them etc. I said to her "I realize this, I just need to find something steady before I can feel comfortable on a payment schedule again." And her response,..... "Well....or just hope the rapture happens before they come knocking on your door." I dropped the phone.While we are on the topic of phone calls, I have gotten used to the phone calls that are so non-sequitur it hurts. It will normally start with me, "Hey mom! How are things?" (In a cheery mood at this point, ready to catch up and find out the latest happenings) "Well," she says, "Your father is scrap metaling and Im in the garden weeding. (seems pretty normal)....Have you talked to your sister lately? She's been so stressed, her acid reflux is kicking up again and she's been in and out of the doctors (ironically.....still normal).....Hey do you remember (Here it comes.....who died?).....do you remember a Debbie Clark? (And normally I don't remember the name so I say "No") Debbie Clark....she went to school....(Mom a lot of people go to school, I don't recall a Debbie Clark).....Debbie Clark.....(Mom saying it over and over doesn't make me remember it....I remember her from 5 seconds ago when you first said her name....Im starting to feel an acquaintance but I think it's just power of suggestion, I could be wrong...) Oh Josh, well her grandfather came into The Olive Garden today.....she's in intensive care....kidney stones, and not the good kind.....(Great! First of all....are there a GOOD kind of kidney stone. Secondly, now I feel like I need to pay Debbie a visit in the hospital and I don't even remember her, and third (thricely?), Im worried about kidney stones! (Yes my mother's worrying when we were younger gave us all a little case of being hypochondriacs.....some worse than others.) So I will generally try and steer the conversation back to normalcy before I get read the obituary section and ask a regular question like, "So how did Dad's team do in the playoffs?".....Her reply, "Oh Josh, he's been a basket case....you know how much stress the league is adding to your father? I told him, he needs to relax and take more time for himself. As a matter of fact I was sitting next to.....do you remember (here we go again...) Beth Allen? (No mom, the name doesn't ring a bell.) Oh speaking of bell....there's my timer on the stove, I need to get going to work....(But mom what were you gonna tell me?) Oh....well Beth's dog had to have his colon removed because of something in the dog food she's been feeding him...(Mom...did Dad win or lose? Is this going to tie in somehow? Im not.....following.....is dad's colon health OK?!.....) The phone call usually ends with me frazzled and then worrying I have an ailment or Im eating the wrong food.
The crazy goes far beyond phone calls. My mother once stopped the car in the middle of the street in a panic, my sister and I in the car, seat-belted in the back not sure what was happening, so our eyes just watched in amazement as Kathy leapt from the car, nervous and panic stricken as she pounded hysterically on a stranger's front door. The woman answered the door with her hand over her heart, (probably because my mother launched her into a frenzy). My mom relayed her concern to this woman and informed her that she had better come right away....because her cat was stuck to the brick wall on the front part of her house. The woman's hand came off her heart and thats when I saw the look in her eye. The look that we've all given on several occasions....the look that says (Lady, how long ago did the train actually jump off the track?) The woman replies back to my mother, "Honey, that's fine. That's where the cat lives. It's drilled into that wall.....it's a ceramic cat." *Sigh*
There's the time we will NEVER let her live down. As a family we decided to gather around the TV and watch a movie and that night's selection was "Home Alone". (Yes.....Christmas time again.) Now my mother swears she stays awake for movies. But unarguably her head is nodding with the opening credits. The second time she watched "Home Alone", and made it past the first scene, she was beside herself that Joe Pesci was in the movie. (Yeah.....she was awake for it.) OK, so the first time we watched it, she was sawin' logs before the kid was left on his own while the family took off to Paris. Snoring.....through the entire thing. It wasn't until the classic scene when the mother returns to find him by the Christmas tree at the end and there is this glorious reunion between mother and son......(cue my mother's wake up call). None of us knew my mom had woken up. We were looking at the TV watching joyfully when off behind us came this garbled raspy voice from beyond....."Ohhhhhh sure.....leave your kid home for Christmas and then you come back and hug him.....Ya' BITCH!"....and as soon as the last word left her mouth, her head fell back on the sofa and she passed right back out. "Well mom seems to like the movie," I said.
My mother's love, care and nurturing has never ceased. Although it was a lot different as a child being tended to than it is as an adult. A few years ago I was hit with a nasty flu through Christmas, (WHAT IS IT WITH CHRISTMAS AND OUR INSANITY?!) my favorite time of year and I was bed ridden. But there was mom, by my side making sure I had plenty of fluids and the necessities I needed to get back to recovery. Mind you, my aunt, (my mother's sister, we will discuss the thread of insanity that the two share in a later blog), well she is the medical brain of the family, and upon consulting her she instructed my mother that I needed plenty of fluid, vitamin C, Pedialyte pops and plenty of sleep. I was severely focused on the sleep part of the diagnosis. My mother on the other hand, made sure that every 10 minutes I had a clementine in my hand. She would hover above my head just as I was about to drift off into sleep and when I opened my eyes I'd jump because I thought someone was there to smother me with a pillow. It was just her, thermometer in her hand...."Let's take your temperature", she said. (Mom, it was 103 fifteen minutes ago when I took it last time.....it's probably the same.) "Here's some water and a Pedialyte pop. Aunt Rosemary says you need your fluids." (Aunt ROSEMARY also said I needed SLEEP!) I honestly couldn't stand the thought of another Pedialyte pop. They tasted like sweat and Provolone cheese.....oh and grape. Yuck! But no matter how much I tried to sleep, Mom was there with a cold press on my head, Pedialyte pop in my face and a thermometer practically shoved up my ass for the best reading possible. She means well.
The list can and will continue to grow and I look forward to sharing the insanity with anyone willing to read. But for the time being, and through all of the insanity, it goes without saying that we are truly blessed with such a wonderful mother. And today....the day of her birth is a moment to celebrate just how much we love HER unconditionally. You will always mean the world to me mom. We will always have our ups and our downs, see eye to eye and probably disagree as well. But one thing will never ever change, and that is how much you mean to me and how much I love you. I wish you the happiest of birthdays and if the world is ready for it, at LEAST another good 55 years of crazy. Now go and have yourself a wonderful birthday and a fun time out to dinner with Dad. But just remember if you pass that bull on the top of the Vestal Steakhouse.....stay in the car.....he's suppose to be there. He's drilled into the roof. Happy Birthday Mom! Muah! Hug! ;-)
Sunday, March 11, 2012
"The General.....An Introduction"
This blog, as Im sure many others will be, is dedicated to yet another fine apple on the tree that I fell from. My mother, Kathy. My parents (and various other family members) will show up a lot in my blogs so I find it important that you get to know each of them with the same love and understanding that I have over the years. They are all gems and are primarily responsible for who I turned out to be. I wouldn't trade any one of them for anybody. We are going to take a little journey back to my childhood. I was probably about 11 or 12 at the time so......Wow! 20 years ago.....OK then,.....20 years ago my mother inherited a nickname given to her by my father. "The General". As the story progresses you will find this name fitting and understand why this name has stuck right through to present day.
It was Christmas time and we were all out on a family shopping trip. (I am starting to realize Christmas time seems to be a mecca for crazy situations in my family.....I will make it a point to find a comical Easter story in the near future.....) The three of us kids, my older sister Michele, my younger brother Anthony and I were belted in the back seat of our 4-door family sedan, a black "Chevrolet Celebrity". I know....we're fancy. We had just finished an outing to "Service Merchandise"for some holiday shopping deals, fun times and family stress. (One wouldn't think the fun would wear off for two middle aged parents with three restless kids that want to sit on every piece of lawn furniture, hide in racks of clothing and engage in rounds of "MOM! Tell Josh to stop looking at me" to which the reply was something like this, "Josh.....close your eyes.....you're looking at your sister again." But trust me, the fun wears off. So Mom and Dad get familiar with their wits ends and we are secured in the back of our luxury sedan for what is soon to become and endless trip home.
With the plethora of malls and shopping centers in my hometown (and I say this in jest), everyone and their brother.....and sister....are usually all out at the same place like some big town reunion. This year it had happened to be "Service Merchandise. We had no idea what was in store for us or that it would be THIS difficult to exit the shopping center and be on our way home. We are in a line of cars, backed up from the road, through the parking lot and along side the store. Backed up to the point that we can barely make out the red light that we are waiting in line at. So to ease the chaotic antics of three siblings sitting within hair pulling and "dirty look" range, conversation about "who wants what from Santa", and "we had better be on our best behavior if we wanted Santa to bring us these things" ensued. It worked for all of about 7 minutes until someone's elbow jabbed someone's rib cage "accidentally" and all hell continued to break loose. With all of the conversation and childhood drama going on in the car we were failing to notice that we hadn't moved an inch in about 20 minutes. I mean.....we didn't even ROLL. There was absolutely no advance forward and it started seeming a little suspicious. Were people cutting line? Were we behind parked cars? (Trust me.....it happens) So now, in the next several minutes to follow, all our differences were put aside and we became a team again, simultaneously we all had the same idea to watch the red light and see how long it was staying red and how quickly cars were making it through the green light to get to their next destination. We watched and watched.....3 minutes.....5 minutes.....OK 10 minutes?!!! No Green light?! Something is wrong. Combined, it had been about a half hour since we had been in line until realization that the light was not changing from red to green. It was at this time that it seemed to be noticed by EVERYONE in line. People got out of their cars, arms waving, yelling, a few fingers up in the air.....
"Dad....why is that man pointing to the sky with his finger?"
"Josh.....not now....he's probably telling that guy the quickest escape route out of this line, now just be quiet and nevermind." (Seemed fair enough)
Now.....being as far back as we were, with 3 children as a distraction, this is maybe 5-10 minutes past when it should have sank in that we weren't moving....but no big deal, understandable. But.....WHO IN THE HELL.....was in the front of this line? Who was that IDIOT at the red light that was just sitting there? Staring at the light going....."Well this is the longest red light I've ever encountered. I should probably get the Guinness Book on the phone. Guess I'll just wait it out." In the next few minutes, which are still a blur and happened all too quickly for children our age to have registered what our mother was about to do, I must indulge you in some background information.....
.....My mother, being somewhat over protective and wanting to keep an eagle eye on us children, she made it her duty to become involved in the school system. Her and my Dad were active members in the PTA. Raised money for a lot of school activities and never missed a parent teacher conference from K-6. If that wasn't bad enough, my mother took it above and beyond and donated her time as a lunch monitor at the school. Fully equipped with her trench coat and whistle, it was next to impossible for any of us kids to EVER get away with anything at school. We had no choice but to do as we were told and obey every school rule because if we by chance stepped out of line.....Mom was watching. If our name was announced over the PA system to go to the principal's office....guess who was standing outside his door with arms folded and a disapproving scowl?.....Mom! I guess now I am thankful for her over protective tendencies but at that point in time.....it was next to nerve wracking.
.....OK back to the car. Chaos is at full tilt with people everywhere. Yelling at one another, doors slamming and mass hysteria over a continuous red light. My mother....in the passenger seat starts getting fidgety. The three of us in the back could hear her deep breaths and panicky contemplations taking place. Bundled in our winter jackets and strapped in the back there was nothing we could do to stop what was about to happen. So our eyes just continued to widen as we watched in disbelief. She reaches for her purse and starts fumbling through papers, checkbook, lipstick, coins....Aha! There it is....she grabs her whistle and before my dad's reflexes had time to latch onto her arm to keep her in the car, she bolted. I mean a mad dash to the front of the traffic line to take matters into her own hands. Mind you, my mother is NOT a cop. She has never even volunteered as a cop (surprisingly enough her donated time went no further than keeping an eye on us at school). But by some act of God she stood in the middle of traffic....under the broken red light....and just started blowing her whistle. One hand extended to hold oncoming cars and the other making full circular motions to move the cars forward through the light. Like these motions came to her in a dream! At first people looked on as if this woman was crazy....(they have no idea) At this point in our life, it didn't really shock us, we were just concerned that our friends might be in nearby cars witnessing our family's craziness. But I got to give it to my motehr....people started moving. The three of us in the back slouched down in our seats so we weren't seen by any friends in a 2 mile radius and suddenly we felt the car moving. As the sounds of sharp whistle blasts got closer and closer to our vehicle I knew we were approaching the light. I could hear my mother's voice above the honking and traffic sounds commanding, "Move! MOVE! Come on! Let's move it sir! You have a line of cars behind you!" I couldn't believe.....my mother was directing traffic! We continued to roll forward and finally made it to the light. My dad flung open the passenger door and like a scene from a bank heist my mother gave one last sharp blow to the whistle and did one of those flying trapeze jumps into the car as my father peeled out from the red light.
"The General" was born. It was moments like this day that will forever burn into your brain. Many people may look at some of my "life's happenings" and think....Wow! his family is crazy. Trust me, everyday I reflect the same affirmation....my family IS crazy. But I love them. They have made life worth living and the stories worth telling. So I continue to be proud of the seeds I sprouted from and have learned to take pride in the crazy. So let the introduction conclude to the "fountain of material" and someone you WILL get to know,.....my mother.....The General.
It was Christmas time and we were all out on a family shopping trip. (I am starting to realize Christmas time seems to be a mecca for crazy situations in my family.....I will make it a point to find a comical Easter story in the near future.....) The three of us kids, my older sister Michele, my younger brother Anthony and I were belted in the back seat of our 4-door family sedan, a black "Chevrolet Celebrity". I know....we're fancy. We had just finished an outing to "Service Merchandise"for some holiday shopping deals, fun times and family stress. (One wouldn't think the fun would wear off for two middle aged parents with three restless kids that want to sit on every piece of lawn furniture, hide in racks of clothing and engage in rounds of "MOM! Tell Josh to stop looking at me" to which the reply was something like this, "Josh.....close your eyes.....you're looking at your sister again." But trust me, the fun wears off. So Mom and Dad get familiar with their wits ends and we are secured in the back of our luxury sedan for what is soon to become and endless trip home.
With the plethora of malls and shopping centers in my hometown (and I say this in jest), everyone and their brother.....and sister....are usually all out at the same place like some big town reunion. This year it had happened to be "Service Merchandise. We had no idea what was in store for us or that it would be THIS difficult to exit the shopping center and be on our way home. We are in a line of cars, backed up from the road, through the parking lot and along side the store. Backed up to the point that we can barely make out the red light that we are waiting in line at. So to ease the chaotic antics of three siblings sitting within hair pulling and "dirty look" range, conversation about "who wants what from Santa", and "we had better be on our best behavior if we wanted Santa to bring us these things" ensued. It worked for all of about 7 minutes until someone's elbow jabbed someone's rib cage "accidentally" and all hell continued to break loose. With all of the conversation and childhood drama going on in the car we were failing to notice that we hadn't moved an inch in about 20 minutes. I mean.....we didn't even ROLL. There was absolutely no advance forward and it started seeming a little suspicious. Were people cutting line? Were we behind parked cars? (Trust me.....it happens) So now, in the next several minutes to follow, all our differences were put aside and we became a team again, simultaneously we all had the same idea to watch the red light and see how long it was staying red and how quickly cars were making it through the green light to get to their next destination. We watched and watched.....3 minutes.....5 minutes.....OK 10 minutes?!!! No Green light?! Something is wrong. Combined, it had been about a half hour since we had been in line until realization that the light was not changing from red to green. It was at this time that it seemed to be noticed by EVERYONE in line. People got out of their cars, arms waving, yelling, a few fingers up in the air.....
"Dad....why is that man pointing to the sky with his finger?"
"Josh.....not now....he's probably telling that guy the quickest escape route out of this line, now just be quiet and nevermind." (Seemed fair enough)
Now.....being as far back as we were, with 3 children as a distraction, this is maybe 5-10 minutes past when it should have sank in that we weren't moving....but no big deal, understandable. But.....WHO IN THE HELL.....was in the front of this line? Who was that IDIOT at the red light that was just sitting there? Staring at the light going....."Well this is the longest red light I've ever encountered. I should probably get the Guinness Book on the phone. Guess I'll just wait it out." In the next few minutes, which are still a blur and happened all too quickly for children our age to have registered what our mother was about to do, I must indulge you in some background information.....
.....My mother, being somewhat over protective and wanting to keep an eagle eye on us children, she made it her duty to become involved in the school system. Her and my Dad were active members in the PTA. Raised money for a lot of school activities and never missed a parent teacher conference from K-6. If that wasn't bad enough, my mother took it above and beyond and donated her time as a lunch monitor at the school. Fully equipped with her trench coat and whistle, it was next to impossible for any of us kids to EVER get away with anything at school. We had no choice but to do as we were told and obey every school rule because if we by chance stepped out of line.....Mom was watching. If our name was announced over the PA system to go to the principal's office....guess who was standing outside his door with arms folded and a disapproving scowl?.....Mom! I guess now I am thankful for her over protective tendencies but at that point in time.....it was next to nerve wracking.
.....OK back to the car. Chaos is at full tilt with people everywhere. Yelling at one another, doors slamming and mass hysteria over a continuous red light. My mother....in the passenger seat starts getting fidgety. The three of us in the back could hear her deep breaths and panicky contemplations taking place. Bundled in our winter jackets and strapped in the back there was nothing we could do to stop what was about to happen. So our eyes just continued to widen as we watched in disbelief. She reaches for her purse and starts fumbling through papers, checkbook, lipstick, coins....Aha! There it is....she grabs her whistle and before my dad's reflexes had time to latch onto her arm to keep her in the car, she bolted. I mean a mad dash to the front of the traffic line to take matters into her own hands. Mind you, my mother is NOT a cop. She has never even volunteered as a cop (surprisingly enough her donated time went no further than keeping an eye on us at school). But by some act of God she stood in the middle of traffic....under the broken red light....and just started blowing her whistle. One hand extended to hold oncoming cars and the other making full circular motions to move the cars forward through the light. Like these motions came to her in a dream! At first people looked on as if this woman was crazy....(they have no idea) At this point in our life, it didn't really shock us, we were just concerned that our friends might be in nearby cars witnessing our family's craziness. But I got to give it to my motehr....people started moving. The three of us in the back slouched down in our seats so we weren't seen by any friends in a 2 mile radius and suddenly we felt the car moving. As the sounds of sharp whistle blasts got closer and closer to our vehicle I knew we were approaching the light. I could hear my mother's voice above the honking and traffic sounds commanding, "Move! MOVE! Come on! Let's move it sir! You have a line of cars behind you!" I couldn't believe.....my mother was directing traffic! We continued to roll forward and finally made it to the light. My dad flung open the passenger door and like a scene from a bank heist my mother gave one last sharp blow to the whistle and did one of those flying trapeze jumps into the car as my father peeled out from the red light.
"The General" was born. It was moments like this day that will forever burn into your brain. Many people may look at some of my "life's happenings" and think....Wow! his family is crazy. Trust me, everyday I reflect the same affirmation....my family IS crazy. But I love them. They have made life worth living and the stories worth telling. So I continue to be proud of the seeds I sprouted from and have learned to take pride in the crazy. So let the introduction conclude to the "fountain of material" and someone you WILL get to know,.....my mother.....The General.
Wednesday, March 7, 2012
"Leon.......Look What You've Done to My Tree"
OK Everybody, for those of you that don't know my family, you get to meet an exciting new character. One that I am sure you will be introduced to again, but this story popped into my head last night and I figured I had to share it. Ladies and Gentlemen, meet my Grandpa Leon.
Now, before continuing with this story, I posted this picture for a couple of reasons. 1.) So you can put face with name and really get the derelict picture I am going to paint for you. 2.) Don't just gloss over the picture.....look carefully.....and this should set the tone for the tree I fell from. He is in his pajamas people. This was Christmas Eve. Look carefully under his pajama top.....Ahhhhh you see it?! Yup! He is STILL in his clothes. Pajamas right over the top. I asked him if he had an important business conference on Christmas morning that he needed to do a "quick peel" and roll out of bed for. So quick that he couldn't possibly take the time to CHANGE clothing.....nope.....just layer everything right over one another. Maybe this is how Cher does her costume changes so quickly. OK, we can continue with the story, but I feel the need to share this stuff with you.....I can't make this shit up. I love writing.....but truth be told....a lot of this ends up writing itself.
Let's begin. Its about a week before Christmas and the hustle and bustle is at its best. My grandparents were visiting at the house, Christmas music playing softly in the back, my mother baking all of our seasonal favorite Christmas cookies.....how could anyone not be filled with the Christmas Spirit.....well, if you're my father and your Christmas tree has taken a turn for the worse, it's very easy to mope around the house at such a joyful time. Yes, we used to get a live Christmas tree that we would cut down ourselves and display in the front window with pride. Well this year in particular, our tree just wasn't getting the water it needed, and needle by needle our Tannenbaum turned into a Tannen-Bomb! My father's tragic behavior carried on for a couple days and we had all about had enough. These next events took place quickly and out of the blue.
My mother had just taken off to work, my brother and I were probably enrapt in some Nintendo game, my sister.....probably trying to think of something constructive for my brother and I to do, Grandma on the couch nodding in and out of consciousness slowly to everything going on around her (who could blame her, Grandma Betty is so smart), Grandpa walking around, Coors Light in hand, milling about the house aimlessly looking for something to comment on. "Carmen (my dad)," he says, "This tree is looking awful sparse. Like it's withering away to nothing." Yeah that is exactly what my dad needed to hear. If there's one way to make someone feel better about something, point it out to them....throw it right in their face. So my dad replied back, "I know Dad, just don't touch it, the needles are very....." It was at this point that you could hear every last little needle that USED to be left on the tree, tinkling down to the carpet below, followed by some grumbled Italian phrase coming out of my father's mouth. You see, Grandpa Leon, God love him, he's like a kid. Tell him not to touch..... and before the sentence even finishes crossing your lips a bony beer chilled finger is in full extension toward the lifeless branch of the tree sending a needle clearing shock wave through the course of it's being. Well this was that straw.....you know the one that snaps the camels back.
So my pops continues to pout and be pissed and the three kids get to deal with the aftermath. Grandpa Leon starts feeling guilty and in a flash is peeling back 20s for my sister and my Dad to go get a new tree.....2 days before Christmas.....With an exchange of glances and realization, that as insane as this sounded, we knew this ultimately would give my father the satisfaction he needed to make it through the holiday and quit his moping...because honestly...it was bringing us down. So my sis and my Dad are off to pick out a new tree. How my brother and I survived the next 45 min, is still unclear to the both of us. We were no sooner ripped from our Nintendo Nirvana and given the joy of helping to dismantle the tree. The lights needed to come off, the estimated 2000 Christmas ornaments needed to be taken off (this is a fact....people can attest to the number of ornaments on our tree) and what seemed to be my main concern and nobody else's was the 75 year old holly berry decorations that had been in the family and passed down to my Dad from his Mom. I knew how important these were and wanted to make sure they made their way off the tree. Well nobody heard me the first time I said it, and that was because Grandpa Leon was behind the tree, with the tail end of a string of Christmas lights, and in the same fashion you use to start a lawn mower.....he pulls the string of lights causing the tree to spin like a friggin' top. Well if there HAD been a needle or two left on the tree there wasn't anymore. But Hey.....the lights were off the tree. Grandma Betty and I were taking down ornaments and I mentioned once again, "Guys, the holly berries need to come off the tree. Dad has had these in his family for years." As I feel the tree being tugged away and maneuvered toward the door, Grandpa Leon replies back, "Never mind the friggin' holly berries....there's no time...." So I start frantically grabbing the berries I can find. I had a good handful of them and continued to grab more as my brother and I had no choice but to help get the tree onto our front porch, where we would launch it off the deck and into the yard below. Try to picture, my grandfather at the trunk of the tree and my brother and I at the top guiding it out the door, all the while I am grabbing berries like it's my job. My poor brother, gets to where his back is up against the railing of the deck and he can't go any further so he instructs my grandpa to stop pushing the tree. "OK Grandpa, stop. Give me a minute to maneuver," he said. (Grandpa Leon doesn't hear well.) So he keeps pushing. "Grandpa Stop! .....STOP!" My brother almost did a header onto our front lawn as my grandfather continued to push the tree over the porch. My brother and I exchanged looks of wide opened eyes and disbelief. It was at that point that my brother was able to somehow work his way out from behind the tree, he looked at my face and as if he was reading my mind he must have heard me telepathically say to him....."Anthony.....there's two more holly berries on your side of the tree that I wasn't able to get....." because as the tree got its final thrust over the porch he put out his hand and got the last two antique berries from the tree. "Whew!", I sighed, "The holly berries are safe." Meanwhile, Grandpa Leon couldn't see or hear any of this. He had no idea my brother almost took a swan dive with our tree. So naturally he looks at us, "Why the hell are you just standing there....there's work to do. And what's with the damn berries. Fling those things and let's get a move on."
So now my father and sister return with the new tree, and no one even had time to notice the traumatic looks of disbelief and shock on our faces. Within 20 minutes, the tree was up.....the lights were on.....ornaments were back in place....and YES!!! The holly berries made it back to their rightful branches thanks to me!!! My sister had picked out a fancy new Burgundy tree skirt to go underneath and altogether it was such a remarkable difference. Life had been breathed back into our tree.....and my father, and so had the Christmas joy as his tree had been noticeably resurrected. There was no mistaking the new tree. Even from the front door you could tell from the fresh pine scent that was in the air. Aside from that, there were needles on the branches.....fresh full needles.....you would need to be down to your last brain cell to NOT notice that the tree was bigger, fuller and fresher.......(enter...my mother.) "Hey guys....what's going on." she said, as she enters the living room. "Not too much," we chimed back, figuring she would surely notice at this point as she was staring right at the new tree, with that innocent yet clueless smile she has. She continued in conversation about her night at work, and who came into the restaurant, etc. as the rest of us just sat there in disbelief, eyes like saucers wondering how she could NOT notice. A few minutes pass and my mother finally looks back at the tree......"Heyyyyyyyyy...." she said, "You guyyyyys....somethings different" (There it is....it's sinking in), "You guys bought a new tree skirt!".....The story of my life just writes itself.......
Let's begin. Its about a week before Christmas and the hustle and bustle is at its best. My grandparents were visiting at the house, Christmas music playing softly in the back, my mother baking all of our seasonal favorite Christmas cookies.....how could anyone not be filled with the Christmas Spirit.....well, if you're my father and your Christmas tree has taken a turn for the worse, it's very easy to mope around the house at such a joyful time. Yes, we used to get a live Christmas tree that we would cut down ourselves and display in the front window with pride. Well this year in particular, our tree just wasn't getting the water it needed, and needle by needle our Tannenbaum turned into a Tannen-Bomb! My father's tragic behavior carried on for a couple days and we had all about had enough. These next events took place quickly and out of the blue.
My mother had just taken off to work, my brother and I were probably enrapt in some Nintendo game, my sister.....probably trying to think of something constructive for my brother and I to do, Grandma on the couch nodding in and out of consciousness slowly to everything going on around her (who could blame her, Grandma Betty is so smart), Grandpa walking around, Coors Light in hand, milling about the house aimlessly looking for something to comment on. "Carmen (my dad)," he says, "This tree is looking awful sparse. Like it's withering away to nothing." Yeah that is exactly what my dad needed to hear. If there's one way to make someone feel better about something, point it out to them....throw it right in their face. So my dad replied back, "I know Dad, just don't touch it, the needles are very....." It was at this point that you could hear every last little needle that USED to be left on the tree, tinkling down to the carpet below, followed by some grumbled Italian phrase coming out of my father's mouth. You see, Grandpa Leon, God love him, he's like a kid. Tell him not to touch..... and before the sentence even finishes crossing your lips a bony beer chilled finger is in full extension toward the lifeless branch of the tree sending a needle clearing shock wave through the course of it's being. Well this was that straw.....you know the one that snaps the camels back.
So my pops continues to pout and be pissed and the three kids get to deal with the aftermath. Grandpa Leon starts feeling guilty and in a flash is peeling back 20s for my sister and my Dad to go get a new tree.....2 days before Christmas.....With an exchange of glances and realization, that as insane as this sounded, we knew this ultimately would give my father the satisfaction he needed to make it through the holiday and quit his moping...because honestly...it was bringing us down. So my sis and my Dad are off to pick out a new tree. How my brother and I survived the next 45 min, is still unclear to the both of us. We were no sooner ripped from our Nintendo Nirvana and given the joy of helping to dismantle the tree. The lights needed to come off, the estimated 2000 Christmas ornaments needed to be taken off (this is a fact....people can attest to the number of ornaments on our tree) and what seemed to be my main concern and nobody else's was the 75 year old holly berry decorations that had been in the family and passed down to my Dad from his Mom. I knew how important these were and wanted to make sure they made their way off the tree. Well nobody heard me the first time I said it, and that was because Grandpa Leon was behind the tree, with the tail end of a string of Christmas lights, and in the same fashion you use to start a lawn mower.....he pulls the string of lights causing the tree to spin like a friggin' top. Well if there HAD been a needle or two left on the tree there wasn't anymore. But Hey.....the lights were off the tree. Grandma Betty and I were taking down ornaments and I mentioned once again, "Guys, the holly berries need to come off the tree. Dad has had these in his family for years." As I feel the tree being tugged away and maneuvered toward the door, Grandpa Leon replies back, "Never mind the friggin' holly berries....there's no time...." So I start frantically grabbing the berries I can find. I had a good handful of them and continued to grab more as my brother and I had no choice but to help get the tree onto our front porch, where we would launch it off the deck and into the yard below. Try to picture, my grandfather at the trunk of the tree and my brother and I at the top guiding it out the door, all the while I am grabbing berries like it's my job. My poor brother, gets to where his back is up against the railing of the deck and he can't go any further so he instructs my grandpa to stop pushing the tree. "OK Grandpa, stop. Give me a minute to maneuver," he said. (Grandpa Leon doesn't hear well.) So he keeps pushing. "Grandpa Stop! .....STOP!" My brother almost did a header onto our front lawn as my grandfather continued to push the tree over the porch. My brother and I exchanged looks of wide opened eyes and disbelief. It was at that point that my brother was able to somehow work his way out from behind the tree, he looked at my face and as if he was reading my mind he must have heard me telepathically say to him....."Anthony.....there's two more holly berries on your side of the tree that I wasn't able to get....." because as the tree got its final thrust over the porch he put out his hand and got the last two antique berries from the tree. "Whew!", I sighed, "The holly berries are safe." Meanwhile, Grandpa Leon couldn't see or hear any of this. He had no idea my brother almost took a swan dive with our tree. So naturally he looks at us, "Why the hell are you just standing there....there's work to do. And what's with the damn berries. Fling those things and let's get a move on."
So now my father and sister return with the new tree, and no one even had time to notice the traumatic looks of disbelief and shock on our faces. Within 20 minutes, the tree was up.....the lights were on.....ornaments were back in place....and YES!!! The holly berries made it back to their rightful branches thanks to me!!! My sister had picked out a fancy new Burgundy tree skirt to go underneath and altogether it was such a remarkable difference. Life had been breathed back into our tree.....and my father, and so had the Christmas joy as his tree had been noticeably resurrected. There was no mistaking the new tree. Even from the front door you could tell from the fresh pine scent that was in the air. Aside from that, there were needles on the branches.....fresh full needles.....you would need to be down to your last brain cell to NOT notice that the tree was bigger, fuller and fresher.......(enter...my mother.) "Hey guys....what's going on." she said, as she enters the living room. "Not too much," we chimed back, figuring she would surely notice at this point as she was staring right at the new tree, with that innocent yet clueless smile she has. She continued in conversation about her night at work, and who came into the restaurant, etc. as the rest of us just sat there in disbelief, eyes like saucers wondering how she could NOT notice. A few minutes pass and my mother finally looks back at the tree......"Heyyyyyyyyy...." she said, "You guyyyyys....somethings different" (There it is....it's sinking in), "You guys bought a new tree skirt!".....The story of my life just writes itself.......
Monday, March 5, 2012
"Your Mother is a Pillsbury Impostor"
Upon request, I was told I had to blog about this story. I am going to attempt to do this with no names, so in a court of law we are free and clean, and also to protect a secret that my friend and I agreed that night to take to our graves. If the woman in this story ever reads this blog, we sincerely apologize. Let me begin.
At the time this story takes place, I was still working at the restaurant. (Sorry, no names.) 4th of July was approaching and one of the women who used to work at the restaurant was having a huge 4th of July party and needed about 20 of her mother's homemade pies. 10 apple and 10 cherry. She asked my friend who I worked at the restaurant with if she would be in charge of the pies for her party and I soon after got asked by my friend to help make them. Keep in mind, the woman we were about to bake pies for married rich, lives in a beautiful home and over time has become very picky and her values have gotten slightly skewed. The last two people who attempted to make her mother's pies were fired in a fit of disgust, so this is what we were up against. But my friend and I knew that regardless of the outcome, we were going to have the industrial kitchen, 3 bottles of wine and a night full of fun all to ourselves. A little background to the story to keep in mind. My friend was leaving town the next morning at 7:30AM on a flight out of Los Angeles.
The restaurant was slowly emptying out that infamous night that we were going to make the pies. We figured we were going to start around 10:30/11:00.....well.....the owner decided he wanted to kick back with a couple bottles of wine and by the time we got everyone out of there we didn't get started until about 12:30AM. So my friend and I hit the kitchen, thought it would be fun to put on the chef coats.....chef pants....and really make it official. We even made chef hats out of napkins. This was followed by a brief flour fight to really sell the idea that we were professional chefs. We toasted with some wine, the night was still young.....we had PLENTY of time. Another woman who will remain nameless was in charge of getting the ingredients from the mother's world famous pie recipe. The ingredients were laid out on the counter for us and it was time to start dividing up the tasks to keep this running smoothly. I took note very quickly that the recipe had called for Crisco.....plain lard.....for the crust. The woman had bought BUTTERED Crisco instead and I started wondering if this was going to be a problem. Thinking back to baking with my mother, I knew there was a difference but wasn't sure if it would pose a problem. This is when the first sign of urgency set in. Upon looking at the watch we realized it was already 1:30AM. My friend went into a slight panic as she had to be on her way to the airport in about 4 hours and we didn't even have a ball of dough yet, so time started to become "of the essence". (Slight panic for my friend is normal and over the years I've learned how to see her through it.) So we threw caution to the wind and started cranking out the batch of pie dough.
I was in charge of the dough and my friend was in charge of cooking the fillings. Cherries were bubbling in a sweet mix on the stove top and the apples right beside simmering in cinnamon, sugar and butter. I got the dough mixed and started stretching it over our first pie tin, noticing that the dough was not very pliable I started to get nervous. "Come on" I told myself, "this recipe is famous. Maybe this is how its suppose to be." So I kept working the dough and after about 10 minutes.....it KIND OF looked like a pie. We ran a test run with a single pie, put it in the oven, let it bake and when the timer buzzed my friend and I looked at each other, took a deep breath and opened the oven door. The pie.....looked horrendous. The dough shrank and shriveled, the lattice work on top was broken and crumbled..... much like our hopes for a quick successful night of pie making. Now its about 2:30AM and hysteria set in. There may or may not have been tears, there was definitely concern for a 7:30AM flight and obviously some decisions had to be made. My friend looked at me and said, "JOSH! What are we going to do? We can't give her 20 pies if they are going to look like this! We are screwed! SCREWED! I'm gonna lose it! She is going to be so pissed! We are gonna get FIRED!" Knowing that I had to stop Churnobyle from melting down again I thought quick and calculated all of our options in about 5 seconds. I grabbed my friend and said, "Outback! Now! Pull it together! I have a plan!"
Realizing that if we didn't do what we were about to do we risked a few things. 1.) My friend would NOT make her flight. 2.) We turn in pies that would make us and everyone involved look really bad and unprofessional. So it was decided.....we were going to the 24 hour grocery store to buy pre-made pie crust. Picture this: It's 3:15AM (still no pies....still no dough.....) my friend and I in our chef coats, chef pants and napkin hats.....flour on our face in a brisk walk around the store in search of the baking aisle. The dough was hard to find at first so my friend contemplated using tortillas as pie crust. I knew she was losing it....and quickly too. Something had to be done. So quickly I found a store supervisor and inquired where we could find the pre-made pie crusts. He looked at us and said, "Aren't you guys professional chefs?" To which I said, "Really? I have a napkin on my head....we were ROLE PLAYING! WHERE'S THE DOUGH?!" We completely wiped the store out of pie crusts and headed back to our very own Kitchen Nightmare.
We got back, cranked the heat on high to reheat the fillings on the stove and ripped package after package of dough. Stretching, slicing and weaving the dough to make her mother's raved about lattice pattern on top, we were making great progress. "Do you smell something?"....."The CHERRIES!" As if we didn't feel like Lucy and Ethel enough at this point, we now had to sift through burnt cherries and hope to God we had enough to fill 10 pies. They weren't as filled as we wanted them to be but at this point we didn't have time to haggle over minutia. 5:00AM, pies are in the oven and my pride as a chef is completely in the shitter. We cleaned from top to bottom while the pies baked. Left no remnants of pre-made ANYTHING. Nobody could find out the truth behind our Impostor Pies. We even went so far as to take all of the Pillsbury boxes and wrappers in a trash bag and use an off site dumpster and bury the evidence far at the bottom. We were going to make it through this.....hopefully.
The pies were done and looked beautiful and we started regaining a dash of hope that this might actually work. Then reality set in. This woman FIRED someone from doing her a favor because the pies didn't taste like her mother's. We really started to worry that she was gonna call our bluff and we were gonna be in for it. Now....I didn't really know this woman....so I didn't care what she thought. I told my friend, "Listen, this is the best we could do. At least she will HAVE pies and we hope for the best. If we get found out, we come clean, apologize and tell her we wanted to at LEAST have something to pass at her party. We really had no other choice."
Concluding this saga, I will wrap this up as quick as I can. My friend made it to her flight, I literally dropped her off at the airport as they were boarding. Her and I were in touch via phone over the course of the next few days wondering what the outcome of our Pie Debacle was going to be. Well let me tell you.....that woman Rrrrrrrrraved about our pies. " You got my mother's recipe to a T," she said, "No one BUT my mother has ever gotten the pies to taste just like her homemade recipe. You guys did such a great job!" (Your mother.......is a LIAR! Secret recipe my ASS!) You can't tell me she was slaving away in a kitchen making dough. We figured her out. She was passing Pillsbury off and sipping Margaritas in the back while everyone thought she was slaving away over pie crust. Do you know to this day...my friend and I get hired every year to make this woman pies? But now....things run smooth. Of course the question crossed our minds...."Do we.....ya know....follow her recipe or do we......" Oh we follow her recipe alright. We high tail it to the store, wipe them clean of Pillsbury and crank out pies like Marie Callender. Then we toast with a Margarita while the lies bake in the oven.....I'm sorry....the pies.
At the time this story takes place, I was still working at the restaurant. (Sorry, no names.) 4th of July was approaching and one of the women who used to work at the restaurant was having a huge 4th of July party and needed about 20 of her mother's homemade pies. 10 apple and 10 cherry. She asked my friend who I worked at the restaurant with if she would be in charge of the pies for her party and I soon after got asked by my friend to help make them. Keep in mind, the woman we were about to bake pies for married rich, lives in a beautiful home and over time has become very picky and her values have gotten slightly skewed. The last two people who attempted to make her mother's pies were fired in a fit of disgust, so this is what we were up against. But my friend and I knew that regardless of the outcome, we were going to have the industrial kitchen, 3 bottles of wine and a night full of fun all to ourselves. A little background to the story to keep in mind. My friend was leaving town the next morning at 7:30AM on a flight out of Los Angeles.
The restaurant was slowly emptying out that infamous night that we were going to make the pies. We figured we were going to start around 10:30/11:00.....well.....the owner decided he wanted to kick back with a couple bottles of wine and by the time we got everyone out of there we didn't get started until about 12:30AM. So my friend and I hit the kitchen, thought it would be fun to put on the chef coats.....chef pants....and really make it official. We even made chef hats out of napkins. This was followed by a brief flour fight to really sell the idea that we were professional chefs. We toasted with some wine, the night was still young.....we had PLENTY of time. Another woman who will remain nameless was in charge of getting the ingredients from the mother's world famous pie recipe. The ingredients were laid out on the counter for us and it was time to start dividing up the tasks to keep this running smoothly. I took note very quickly that the recipe had called for Crisco.....plain lard.....for the crust. The woman had bought BUTTERED Crisco instead and I started wondering if this was going to be a problem. Thinking back to baking with my mother, I knew there was a difference but wasn't sure if it would pose a problem. This is when the first sign of urgency set in. Upon looking at the watch we realized it was already 1:30AM. My friend went into a slight panic as she had to be on her way to the airport in about 4 hours and we didn't even have a ball of dough yet, so time started to become "of the essence". (Slight panic for my friend is normal and over the years I've learned how to see her through it.) So we threw caution to the wind and started cranking out the batch of pie dough.
I was in charge of the dough and my friend was in charge of cooking the fillings. Cherries were bubbling in a sweet mix on the stove top and the apples right beside simmering in cinnamon, sugar and butter. I got the dough mixed and started stretching it over our first pie tin, noticing that the dough was not very pliable I started to get nervous. "Come on" I told myself, "this recipe is famous. Maybe this is how its suppose to be." So I kept working the dough and after about 10 minutes.....it KIND OF looked like a pie. We ran a test run with a single pie, put it in the oven, let it bake and when the timer buzzed my friend and I looked at each other, took a deep breath and opened the oven door. The pie.....looked horrendous. The dough shrank and shriveled, the lattice work on top was broken and crumbled..... much like our hopes for a quick successful night of pie making. Now its about 2:30AM and hysteria set in. There may or may not have been tears, there was definitely concern for a 7:30AM flight and obviously some decisions had to be made. My friend looked at me and said, "JOSH! What are we going to do? We can't give her 20 pies if they are going to look like this! We are screwed! SCREWED! I'm gonna lose it! She is going to be so pissed! We are gonna get FIRED!" Knowing that I had to stop Churnobyle from melting down again I thought quick and calculated all of our options in about 5 seconds. I grabbed my friend and said, "Outback! Now! Pull it together! I have a plan!"
Realizing that if we didn't do what we were about to do we risked a few things. 1.) My friend would NOT make her flight. 2.) We turn in pies that would make us and everyone involved look really bad and unprofessional. So it was decided.....we were going to the 24 hour grocery store to buy pre-made pie crust. Picture this: It's 3:15AM (still no pies....still no dough.....) my friend and I in our chef coats, chef pants and napkin hats.....flour on our face in a brisk walk around the store in search of the baking aisle. The dough was hard to find at first so my friend contemplated using tortillas as pie crust. I knew she was losing it....and quickly too. Something had to be done. So quickly I found a store supervisor and inquired where we could find the pre-made pie crusts. He looked at us and said, "Aren't you guys professional chefs?" To which I said, "Really? I have a napkin on my head....we were ROLE PLAYING! WHERE'S THE DOUGH?!" We completely wiped the store out of pie crusts and headed back to our very own Kitchen Nightmare.
We got back, cranked the heat on high to reheat the fillings on the stove and ripped package after package of dough. Stretching, slicing and weaving the dough to make her mother's raved about lattice pattern on top, we were making great progress. "Do you smell something?"....."The CHERRIES!" As if we didn't feel like Lucy and Ethel enough at this point, we now had to sift through burnt cherries and hope to God we had enough to fill 10 pies. They weren't as filled as we wanted them to be but at this point we didn't have time to haggle over minutia. 5:00AM, pies are in the oven and my pride as a chef is completely in the shitter. We cleaned from top to bottom while the pies baked. Left no remnants of pre-made ANYTHING. Nobody could find out the truth behind our Impostor Pies. We even went so far as to take all of the Pillsbury boxes and wrappers in a trash bag and use an off site dumpster and bury the evidence far at the bottom. We were going to make it through this.....hopefully.
The pies were done and looked beautiful and we started regaining a dash of hope that this might actually work. Then reality set in. This woman FIRED someone from doing her a favor because the pies didn't taste like her mother's. We really started to worry that she was gonna call our bluff and we were gonna be in for it. Now....I didn't really know this woman....so I didn't care what she thought. I told my friend, "Listen, this is the best we could do. At least she will HAVE pies and we hope for the best. If we get found out, we come clean, apologize and tell her we wanted to at LEAST have something to pass at her party. We really had no other choice."
Concluding this saga, I will wrap this up as quick as I can. My friend made it to her flight, I literally dropped her off at the airport as they were boarding. Her and I were in touch via phone over the course of the next few days wondering what the outcome of our Pie Debacle was going to be. Well let me tell you.....that woman Rrrrrrrrraved about our pies. " You got my mother's recipe to a T," she said, "No one BUT my mother has ever gotten the pies to taste just like her homemade recipe. You guys did such a great job!" (Your mother.......is a LIAR! Secret recipe my ASS!) You can't tell me she was slaving away in a kitchen making dough. We figured her out. She was passing Pillsbury off and sipping Margaritas in the back while everyone thought she was slaving away over pie crust. Do you know to this day...my friend and I get hired every year to make this woman pies? But now....things run smooth. Of course the question crossed our minds...."Do we.....ya know....follow her recipe or do we......" Oh we follow her recipe alright. We high tail it to the store, wipe them clean of Pillsbury and crank out pies like Marie Callender. Then we toast with a Margarita while the lies bake in the oven.....I'm sorry....the pies.
Sunday, March 4, 2012
"Unlock the Magic.....The Art of the Oreo Cookie....."
A whole blog post dedicated to America's favorite sandwich cookie? Seems a little over the top does it? Well sit down, relax and pray to God you have enough milk in the house. When you are done reading this you just might be dipping your way to happiness. I don't care how healthy I choose to eat, how many days a week I go to the gym, there is nothing.....absolutely nothing that could make me cut the Oreo cookie from my diet. They were my favorite when I was a kid and they will continue to be my favorite throughout my life. There is NO comparison in my book, and like any other food or consumable...there are rules. There's a system. You don't just rip the package open and start haphazardly dunking in a half assed manner. You have to approach the situation as though you are wooing the cookie into submission. It is indeed an art form.
When I am "in the mood", if you will, for an Oreo binge, the process does not begin at the cupboard and the refrigerator. It's like picking a fine wine. (I've always said, if I make it big some day and I have the money to have an entourage of help, there is no way I could send someone to do my grocery shopping.....for a lot of reasons, but mainly because I don't trust some random stranger with the delicate task of picking out my Oreo's.) Join me in aisle 7 at the grocery store, will you? The selection is about 3 feet wide by two shelves high and I'm feeling slightly overwhelmed. (Breathe Josh....breathe....) The selection process starts as I eliminate which type of Oreo I am NOT going to buy. To start, no single stuff! Over the years, as much as I love Nabisco and their interracial cookie combination (chocolate and cream), they have really started skimping on the single stuff, so I don't even bother any more. It's a mere suggestion of what the creamy middle should be. So my selection has narrowed. Regular double stuff is always a staple and it's usually where my mind is set. It's a glorious day when Ralph's has the 2 packages for $7.00 deal and its just enough to push me over the edge to buy two packages as I will save 18 cents from their original price of $3.59 a pack. (Obsessive much? Keep reading.) So double stuff for sure. I pull out the first wall of packages....the ones people have pawed over, dropped and drooled on..... and as I've learned working retail....freshest are in the back. I usually like the back of the shelf 2nd package down. Reason being, most people are lazy and the laws of instant gratification will consume them into grabbing the first pack they see. Secondly, if there is someone as crazy as I am, the very top package may be slightly handled and some of the cookies risk being crushed. With the second package down rule.....chances are, no one has even seen this package let alone fondled and mangled the cookies. Why not go further down people ask? Well because too far down, you have the weight of the other Oreo's on top and you chance crushed cookie syndrome. (Hey.....I told you it was a process.) Following the same procedure, I pick out a flavor that I think will accompany the plain double stuff and 90% of the time the mint Oreo's take the cake.......Mmmmmmmmmm cake......don't get me started. Thinking slightly health conscious I grab a jug of 2% milk (from the back of the refrigerated section), head to the cashier with excitement and trek on back home.
Now comes the decision of how I will eat the Oreo's. It was an act of Congress picking the damn things out, you can imagine the thought process that goes into this. While I decide, I put the milk in the freezer to give it a quick chill and I contemplate my approach for the next 15 minutes. There are 3 main eating styles to choose from:
1.) "The Classic Dip" - (And unbelievable as it may be, I do NOT unlock and eat the middle first like you see in the misleading commercials. The two components are meant to be eaten together and only a true connoisseur would know this and not follow suit on what the media instructs them to do.) The classic dip goes like this. One cookie.....dunk half of the cookie into the well chilled milk, THREE times. No more, no less. This will saturate the cookie just enough to melt in your mouth. Then flip the cookie and follow the same procedure always dunking half of the cookie so you have something to grasp on to and you don't get what I refer to as "Titanic Oreo", where it falls from your grasp and sinks to the bottom, (like Jack fell from Rose's grasp in the movie). If this happens, don't fret, you can enjoy the Oreo sludge on your last sip of milk with aid of a spoon and life will go on.
2.) "The Oreo Tube" - This is a style I coined on my own and I am pretty proud of. It's one of my favorite eating styles and there is much enjoyment to be had. You need a narrow glass. (I've found the glasses you can get from drinking POM Iced Tea work perfectly. They are the perfect circumference of an Oreo leaving about an 1/8" around the cookie for the milk.) Do you see where I'm going with this? Stack the Oreos one by one in the narrow glass leaving about an inch of space at the top of the glass. You can also do what's called "striping your stack", by placing a regular double stuff then a mint Oreo, then a double stuff....then a mint Oreo....and so on and so forth. Poor milk over the top of the stack and watch as your cookies bask in an embrace of chilled milk. Now get a spoon and start digging your way to the bottom. It's heaven in a glass.
3.) "The Oreo Bowl" - This style is for the health fanatic. I developed this while working production where consciousness to health seemed to be "a thing." Our company and many craft service tables on set would buy the 100 calorie mini Oreo sandwiches so as not to over indulge, and celebrities and crew could keep their waist line in tact......Yeah......grab about 3 or 4 of these fun little 100 calorie packs and empty them into a cereal bowl.....cover with milk and eat with a spoon in classic cereal fashion. Fruity Pebbles and Cocoa Puffs got nothing on this!
So, in closing, food is meant to be enjoyed. Take your time and develop an art for eating. Im currently working on a fourth Oreo style where you unlock two doubles stuff and make a quadruple stuff.....but it just seems like gluttony, and I don't know what to do with the two uncreamed cookie halves.....but in the meantime, I'll leave nothing to the imagination as to where I am headed right now.....Aisle 7 Here I Come!!!!!
When I am "in the mood", if you will, for an Oreo binge, the process does not begin at the cupboard and the refrigerator. It's like picking a fine wine. (I've always said, if I make it big some day and I have the money to have an entourage of help, there is no way I could send someone to do my grocery shopping.....for a lot of reasons, but mainly because I don't trust some random stranger with the delicate task of picking out my Oreo's.) Join me in aisle 7 at the grocery store, will you? The selection is about 3 feet wide by two shelves high and I'm feeling slightly overwhelmed. (Breathe Josh....breathe....) The selection process starts as I eliminate which type of Oreo I am NOT going to buy. To start, no single stuff! Over the years, as much as I love Nabisco and their interracial cookie combination (chocolate and cream), they have really started skimping on the single stuff, so I don't even bother any more. It's a mere suggestion of what the creamy middle should be. So my selection has narrowed. Regular double stuff is always a staple and it's usually where my mind is set. It's a glorious day when Ralph's has the 2 packages for $7.00 deal and its just enough to push me over the edge to buy two packages as I will save 18 cents from their original price of $3.59 a pack. (Obsessive much? Keep reading.) So double stuff for sure. I pull out the first wall of packages....the ones people have pawed over, dropped and drooled on..... and as I've learned working retail....freshest are in the back. I usually like the back of the shelf 2nd package down. Reason being, most people are lazy and the laws of instant gratification will consume them into grabbing the first pack they see. Secondly, if there is someone as crazy as I am, the very top package may be slightly handled and some of the cookies risk being crushed. With the second package down rule.....chances are, no one has even seen this package let alone fondled and mangled the cookies. Why not go further down people ask? Well because too far down, you have the weight of the other Oreo's on top and you chance crushed cookie syndrome. (Hey.....I told you it was a process.) Following the same procedure, I pick out a flavor that I think will accompany the plain double stuff and 90% of the time the mint Oreo's take the cake.......Mmmmmmmmmm cake......don't get me started. Thinking slightly health conscious I grab a jug of 2% milk (from the back of the refrigerated section), head to the cashier with excitement and trek on back home.
Now comes the decision of how I will eat the Oreo's. It was an act of Congress picking the damn things out, you can imagine the thought process that goes into this. While I decide, I put the milk in the freezer to give it a quick chill and I contemplate my approach for the next 15 minutes. There are 3 main eating styles to choose from:
1.) "The Classic Dip" - (And unbelievable as it may be, I do NOT unlock and eat the middle first like you see in the misleading commercials. The two components are meant to be eaten together and only a true connoisseur would know this and not follow suit on what the media instructs them to do.) The classic dip goes like this. One cookie.....dunk half of the cookie into the well chilled milk, THREE times. No more, no less. This will saturate the cookie just enough to melt in your mouth. Then flip the cookie and follow the same procedure always dunking half of the cookie so you have something to grasp on to and you don't get what I refer to as "Titanic Oreo", where it falls from your grasp and sinks to the bottom, (like Jack fell from Rose's grasp in the movie). If this happens, don't fret, you can enjoy the Oreo sludge on your last sip of milk with aid of a spoon and life will go on.
2.) "The Oreo Tube" - This is a style I coined on my own and I am pretty proud of. It's one of my favorite eating styles and there is much enjoyment to be had. You need a narrow glass. (I've found the glasses you can get from drinking POM Iced Tea work perfectly. They are the perfect circumference of an Oreo leaving about an 1/8" around the cookie for the milk.) Do you see where I'm going with this? Stack the Oreos one by one in the narrow glass leaving about an inch of space at the top of the glass. You can also do what's called "striping your stack", by placing a regular double stuff then a mint Oreo, then a double stuff....then a mint Oreo....and so on and so forth. Poor milk over the top of the stack and watch as your cookies bask in an embrace of chilled milk. Now get a spoon and start digging your way to the bottom. It's heaven in a glass.
3.) "The Oreo Bowl" - This style is for the health fanatic. I developed this while working production where consciousness to health seemed to be "a thing." Our company and many craft service tables on set would buy the 100 calorie mini Oreo sandwiches so as not to over indulge, and celebrities and crew could keep their waist line in tact......Yeah......grab about 3 or 4 of these fun little 100 calorie packs and empty them into a cereal bowl.....cover with milk and eat with a spoon in classic cereal fashion. Fruity Pebbles and Cocoa Puffs got nothing on this!
So, in closing, food is meant to be enjoyed. Take your time and develop an art for eating. Im currently working on a fourth Oreo style where you unlock two doubles stuff and make a quadruple stuff.....but it just seems like gluttony, and I don't know what to do with the two uncreamed cookie halves.....but in the meantime, I'll leave nothing to the imagination as to where I am headed right now.....Aisle 7 Here I Come!!!!!
Saturday, March 3, 2012
"Razors, Lasers and Speed Dial....."
Please pardon me for the rant I'm about to go on, but are we, as consumers, not getting a little carried away with things? We as a people have become so driven to having "the best of the best". It started off with cars, then electronics and now it's just spreading like wild fire to everyday consumer products. Next time you are out shopping for.....oh I don't know.....ANYTHING.....take a look around at how many options there are. It's overwhelming. It's ridiculous. There are not enough hours in the day to contemplate every little detail, color or added feature of the product you are about to buy. Take a look at razors. What used to be a single blade plastic razor has now turned into an entire half aisle at CVS of multiple options. What are we up to now? 7 blades? Every year, right around the Super Bowl, Gillette throws on another blade and a fancy new commercial. "For the closest shave ever.....the new Gillete OctoBlade.....8 Razors for the closest shave humanly possible." (Until next year when they add yet another blade.) Pretty soon we are just going to be running our bodies up against a wall of machetes. I think 3 blades was plenty. What do the 4th and 5th and various blades after that REALLY accomplish? Are we not just removing skin at this point. When they say closest shave possible, they really mean right down to the bone. Insanity at its best and we feed these marketing schemes on a daily basis.
Uncrustables?! Here's a good one. You actually pay more for a peanut butter and jelly sandwich that.....I'm gonna stop right there. WHY ARE WE BUYING PRE-MADE peanut butter and jelly sandwiches?! This is the height of laziness. Not only that, you are paying twice the price and HALF the sandwich has been CUT OFF!!!!! They've removed the CRUST! Have we become that ignorant?! Paper Towels.....Lord Almighty!.....Its a friggin' paper rag! An AISLE! Dedicated to wiping up messes! Sure, they will tell you all about the absorbent pockets that lock water in and hold strong so you can clean mess after mess after mess with the same towel. First of all.....BULLSHIT! I've tried the wet towel and marble trick and I still have marbles ALL OVER my kitchen floor. (Now I truly have lost my marbles). Secondly, GROSS! Are you really going to save that paper towel for the next mess?
"Honey I spilled again!....."
"Don't worry, I saved the paper towel I used to clean up the dog piss on the kitchen floor. Make sure you put it back when you're done.....according to the commercial we got a good 6 or 7 more messes we can clean with that paper towel. It's on the counter beside the microwave.....right next to the Uncrustables!"
The auto industry. Single handedly, they are making us the laziest people ever. I remember taking my driving exam and whether you passed or failed depended mainly on the ability to parallel park. Now.....they have cars that do it for you? Pull up along side another car, hit a button and kick back while your car maneuvers itself right into place. Let me ask.....What happens when that technology...ehhhhhhhh for lack of a better phrase....TAKES A CRAP! You're left in the middle of the street, holding up traffic, calling On-star from your Blu-Tooth to air lift your car into place because you NEVER HAD TO PARALLEL PARK!!! Laser sensors....on the back of our car to tell us (and this one just makes my head spin) if we are about to back into anything. Now, me as a pedestrian, would appreciate at least a courtesy head turn to check behind you and make sure YOU'RE NOT GONNA RUN ME OVER!!!!! I don't want my life dependent on a laser beam because you're too lazy TO USE YOUR REAR VIEW MIRROR!!! Do we really need this feature? "Hey IDIOT! You're about to hit a BRICK WALL! STOP REVERSING!!!" (That is what I imagine 5 years from now when they add voice to the sensory device.) I know people that don't know how to get home from work because they have GPS'd there way everywhere. EVERYWHERE! I get it. I do. I use it. I love it. I have it for back up. But for God sake, at least know where the hell you are. Because the last thing you want when you are stuck in Compton at sundown, is to wait for the system to process updates, while you dodge bullets and drug deals, while your car figures out HOW YOU GET TO YOUR HOUSE!!!
If cars aren't making us lazy enough, our phones are now sucking any last bit of desire to think, from our very brains. Im not gonna lie, I am a HUGE IPhone proponent. Couldn't live without it. It does everything for you. Everything. There are applications that do anything you want. Balance your finances? There's an app. Count your calories? There's an app. It does everything but wipe your ass for you and I'm sure someone in Silicon Valley is hard at work to make that a reality. Voice activated toilet paper. The thing of the future. Slogan: "Now we don't even need to wipe our own ass." Short on friends? You got Siri. A built in robotic friend that will feed your ego and call you The Master of the Universe if you want her too. This one is truly disturbing to me. It's ripping our sense of interacting with people and our surroundings to actually learn something for a change. Tell me....how many people's phone numbers from your list of contacts can you actually dial? And without this coming off as a foreign concept, actually plugging the number in your phone using the dial pad. (The dial pad is that fancy arrangement of numbers that's buried in your array of applications on your phone. Because lest we not forget.....it's a phone.) "Speed Dial.....one step closer to Alzheimer's."
Where is our wake up call? When is enough really enough? I'm not innocent in this. I'm guilty as charged. Dependency on technology is becoming a scary thing. It's not going to be an issue until there is so much bandwidth overload that our phones, computers, oversized TV's and wireless devices just explode right before our very eyes. Then where will we be? Right where we were before all these devices were even being thought up. We will be left with the brains of a 7 year old. Could you parallel park when you were 7?
Uncrustables?! Here's a good one. You actually pay more for a peanut butter and jelly sandwich that.....I'm gonna stop right there. WHY ARE WE BUYING PRE-MADE peanut butter and jelly sandwiches?! This is the height of laziness. Not only that, you are paying twice the price and HALF the sandwich has been CUT OFF!!!!! They've removed the CRUST! Have we become that ignorant?! Paper Towels.....Lord Almighty!.....Its a friggin' paper rag! An AISLE! Dedicated to wiping up messes! Sure, they will tell you all about the absorbent pockets that lock water in and hold strong so you can clean mess after mess after mess with the same towel. First of all.....BULLSHIT! I've tried the wet towel and marble trick and I still have marbles ALL OVER my kitchen floor. (Now I truly have lost my marbles). Secondly, GROSS! Are you really going to save that paper towel for the next mess?
"Honey I spilled again!....."
"Don't worry, I saved the paper towel I used to clean up the dog piss on the kitchen floor. Make sure you put it back when you're done.....according to the commercial we got a good 6 or 7 more messes we can clean with that paper towel. It's on the counter beside the microwave.....right next to the Uncrustables!"
The auto industry. Single handedly, they are making us the laziest people ever. I remember taking my driving exam and whether you passed or failed depended mainly on the ability to parallel park. Now.....they have cars that do it for you? Pull up along side another car, hit a button and kick back while your car maneuvers itself right into place. Let me ask.....What happens when that technology...ehhhhhhhh for lack of a better phrase....TAKES A CRAP! You're left in the middle of the street, holding up traffic, calling On-star from your Blu-Tooth to air lift your car into place because you NEVER HAD TO PARALLEL PARK!!! Laser sensors....on the back of our car to tell us (and this one just makes my head spin) if we are about to back into anything. Now, me as a pedestrian, would appreciate at least a courtesy head turn to check behind you and make sure YOU'RE NOT GONNA RUN ME OVER!!!!! I don't want my life dependent on a laser beam because you're too lazy TO USE YOUR REAR VIEW MIRROR!!! Do we really need this feature? "Hey IDIOT! You're about to hit a BRICK WALL! STOP REVERSING!!!" (That is what I imagine 5 years from now when they add voice to the sensory device.) I know people that don't know how to get home from work because they have GPS'd there way everywhere. EVERYWHERE! I get it. I do. I use it. I love it. I have it for back up. But for God sake, at least know where the hell you are. Because the last thing you want when you are stuck in Compton at sundown, is to wait for the system to process updates, while you dodge bullets and drug deals, while your car figures out HOW YOU GET TO YOUR HOUSE!!!
If cars aren't making us lazy enough, our phones are now sucking any last bit of desire to think, from our very brains. Im not gonna lie, I am a HUGE IPhone proponent. Couldn't live without it. It does everything for you. Everything. There are applications that do anything you want. Balance your finances? There's an app. Count your calories? There's an app. It does everything but wipe your ass for you and I'm sure someone in Silicon Valley is hard at work to make that a reality. Voice activated toilet paper. The thing of the future. Slogan: "Now we don't even need to wipe our own ass." Short on friends? You got Siri. A built in robotic friend that will feed your ego and call you The Master of the Universe if you want her too. This one is truly disturbing to me. It's ripping our sense of interacting with people and our surroundings to actually learn something for a change. Tell me....how many people's phone numbers from your list of contacts can you actually dial? And without this coming off as a foreign concept, actually plugging the number in your phone using the dial pad. (The dial pad is that fancy arrangement of numbers that's buried in your array of applications on your phone. Because lest we not forget.....it's a phone.) "Speed Dial.....one step closer to Alzheimer's."
Where is our wake up call? When is enough really enough? I'm not innocent in this. I'm guilty as charged. Dependency on technology is becoming a scary thing. It's not going to be an issue until there is so much bandwidth overload that our phones, computers, oversized TV's and wireless devices just explode right before our very eyes. Then where will we be? Right where we were before all these devices were even being thought up. We will be left with the brains of a 7 year old. Could you parallel park when you were 7?
Thursday, March 1, 2012
He Works Hard for the Money.....
Have you ever heard the expression, "Give 110%."? As it has, and always will be, one of my mantras with any job I've had, or pretty much anything I choose to take on, sometimes it doesn't always pay off. Don't let me steer you wrong....work hard, give it your all...there's light at the end of the tunnel. But in some cases, this one in particular, it didn't reap the benefits I was hoping for.
I was working part-time at a 5-star fine dining restaurant in Pasadena as a server. Let's just say my personality and jovial sense of humor was far more fit for TGIFridays or Applebees. I think it's partly because I like to smile at the customers and maybe toss in some light sense of humor to the patrons. I had no idea that in some of these hoity-toitty restaurants.....they don't really like that. Sometimes we were instructed before approaching a table with the following: "Now, when you serve this table, don't be too gushy, don't smile too much and keep things short and concise." Short and Concise?! I have 5 long winded specials I need to read off. And how do I not be TOO gushy, or smile TOO much?! What the hell does that even mean? So I find my self walking up to the table with half of my face in a frown and the other half a crooked smile, I must have looked like I had a stroke AND sounded like it when I was trying to keep things short and concise when I read the specials....."Steak,.....carrot soup,.....salad....it has cheese.....tastes good.....Wellington......my favorite......care for some drinks?" This was ridiculous!
My roommate and I both used to work here so we would occasionally carpool into work. On the way in one day, I asked what the reservations were for that night. He told me the only things on the list were a pharmaceutical party in the back, a few groups coming in mid evening and a party coming in to celebrate the anniversary of her husbands death. (Morbid, but I've heard worse.) So that was all I knew going in that evening. When it came time to split up our serving areas that night, I was told I would take the 8-top in one of our private rooms and any walk ins, and the other two would handle the party in the back and the few others that had reservations that night. So putting my best foot forward, I was bound and determined to do a good job. I was going to be quick yet thorough, be present when I was needed and put on my best half-smile I had. So all is going well.....nothing is told to me about the party I was taking care of, but damned if they weren't going to have a good time with my hands on the reigns. Their orders were in and Im pouring wine like the Trevi Fountain and I hear one of the guys say to the other....."Did you enjoy your birthday?" So being the fantastic server I am this is my opportunity to be jovial, celebratory maybe even some sharp wit to stir up some laughter. So I ask, "Ohhhhhhhhh, so what are we celebrating tonight? What's the happy occasion? Who are we toasting to?!" To which the woman at the head of the table replies......ready for this?....."My dead husband....." At this point I realized I wanted to join her husband. Just my luck! I had the DEATH TABLE.....Party of 8!
These examples of "trying your hardest" don't stop here. I'll share one more with you. There was a table of 3 that had come in to eat and they were one of the owner's friends and I was in charge of making sure they had the 5-star experience that Zagat raves about. It was two older women that were two sheets to the wind before sitting at the table, and an old guy in a wheel chair. So you can imagine how this is gonna go. They started off with some cocktails.....go figure.....the two women got Cosmopolitans and the man in the wheel chair ordered a martini with what appeared to be his dying breath. I made the Cosmos and my friend Heather made the man his last will and testament. I frequently checked in to make sure everything was going well. "Do you need more drinks? Water maybe?..... A defibrulator?" I was cleaning up behind the bar and glanced over at the table and saw the two women just lost in conversation and the man in the wheel chair was either getting a really close look at his food or had passed out with his face in his spaghetti. Heather said to me, "Do you think I made his martini too strong?" I replied back, "We may want to check for a pulse." Luckily enough he was not dead. Truthfully I was worried we were going to need to call the coroner, but come to find out when you are 90 chocked full of martinis and booze, sometimes you take a little nappy nap at the dinner table. I now tried to steer the table away from drinking as things were on an express elevator to hell. Dinners were finished, dessert was had and by God the martini glasses I cleared from that table were beyond plentiful. They were getting ready to leave and the owner came out to mingle with his friends and asked me if I would help them out to the car. They needed help getting her husband's gin soaked ass out of his chair and into the car. (Above and Beyond people....above and beyond.) Figuring I'm working on quite a hefty tip, I agree to help and I asked Heather to cover my tables. As I'm walking out the door, the owner, in his eccentric voice says to me, "Josh.....don't forget to bend at the knees.....cripples are dead weight." (I'd like to say I was shocked, but I think you are beginning to understand why I wasn't.) What happened next was just comical. Even Ripley wouldn't believe this. I get to the car and one of the drunkards took off and I was left with the other woman and her husband. I was given explicit instructions as to how this was going to go down. Ladies and gentlemen.....there was a SLIDING BOARD involved. She instructed me to lift her husband by his belt loops, drag him across the sliding board into the front seat and she would yank him in from the driver's side. (Verbatim) So here I go.....I get my fingers into his belt loops and lift with all my might...(the owner was right.....dead weight)...this guys pants came up to his chest and not to get graphic, but his poor balls.....they were where his nipples should have been. So now Im coaching him, looking him in the eye and attempting to ease his pain by leveling with him saying, "Sir I know this hurts.....just work with me....WORK WITH ME..... As his legs were getting slammed into the dash board all he could do was let out grunts and moans and I was honestly feeling really bad. I had a 90 year old fragile drunk tossed over my shoulder like a dish rag, arms flailing, legs flailing, and his wife who was about as worthless as his belt loops trying to YANK his arm from the other side of the car. I don't know how it happened, or when he finally fell into place, but he was in the passenger seat. I honestly don't even know if his legs were still attached or if they were still in the wheel chair. But he was in, the look on his face resembled someone who just slipped into catatonic state....no words, no more moaning, just pure and utter shock. His wife took the driver's seat and as the keys went into the ignition I thought to myself.....this is a disaster waiting to happen. She was probably better off letting her husband drive with his, what were now, legs rendered useless. But there is only so much help and remedial services I was willing to offer. I said, "Drive safe and have a good night."
Not even an extra dollar! Unfortunately the tip had already been given and this was before it was asked and agreed upon that I would play paramedic for the next 45 minutes. But silver lining....silver lining. If there's one thing I can do with the worst of situations, it's to find something to walk away with. Whether its a lesson learned, a new piece of comedy gold or a new skill set, I can now say and confidently add to my resume "Avid Sliding Board Skills". But you don't just stumble upon this wisdom. It's not just handed to you. You clearly have to work for it, and not just half assed work, you have to be willing to always give 110%.
I was working part-time at a 5-star fine dining restaurant in Pasadena as a server. Let's just say my personality and jovial sense of humor was far more fit for TGIFridays or Applebees. I think it's partly because I like to smile at the customers and maybe toss in some light sense of humor to the patrons. I had no idea that in some of these hoity-toitty restaurants.....they don't really like that. Sometimes we were instructed before approaching a table with the following: "Now, when you serve this table, don't be too gushy, don't smile too much and keep things short and concise." Short and Concise?! I have 5 long winded specials I need to read off. And how do I not be TOO gushy, or smile TOO much?! What the hell does that even mean? So I find my self walking up to the table with half of my face in a frown and the other half a crooked smile, I must have looked like I had a stroke AND sounded like it when I was trying to keep things short and concise when I read the specials....."Steak,.....carrot soup,.....salad....it has cheese.....tastes good.....Wellington......my favorite......care for some drinks?" This was ridiculous!
My roommate and I both used to work here so we would occasionally carpool into work. On the way in one day, I asked what the reservations were for that night. He told me the only things on the list were a pharmaceutical party in the back, a few groups coming in mid evening and a party coming in to celebrate the anniversary of her husbands death. (Morbid, but I've heard worse.) So that was all I knew going in that evening. When it came time to split up our serving areas that night, I was told I would take the 8-top in one of our private rooms and any walk ins, and the other two would handle the party in the back and the few others that had reservations that night. So putting my best foot forward, I was bound and determined to do a good job. I was going to be quick yet thorough, be present when I was needed and put on my best half-smile I had. So all is going well.....nothing is told to me about the party I was taking care of, but damned if they weren't going to have a good time with my hands on the reigns. Their orders were in and Im pouring wine like the Trevi Fountain and I hear one of the guys say to the other....."Did you enjoy your birthday?" So being the fantastic server I am this is my opportunity to be jovial, celebratory maybe even some sharp wit to stir up some laughter. So I ask, "Ohhhhhhhhh, so what are we celebrating tonight? What's the happy occasion? Who are we toasting to?!" To which the woman at the head of the table replies......ready for this?....."My dead husband....." At this point I realized I wanted to join her husband. Just my luck! I had the DEATH TABLE.....Party of 8!
These examples of "trying your hardest" don't stop here. I'll share one more with you. There was a table of 3 that had come in to eat and they were one of the owner's friends and I was in charge of making sure they had the 5-star experience that Zagat raves about. It was two older women that were two sheets to the wind before sitting at the table, and an old guy in a wheel chair. So you can imagine how this is gonna go. They started off with some cocktails.....go figure.....the two women got Cosmopolitans and the man in the wheel chair ordered a martini with what appeared to be his dying breath. I made the Cosmos and my friend Heather made the man his last will and testament. I frequently checked in to make sure everything was going well. "Do you need more drinks? Water maybe?..... A defibrulator?" I was cleaning up behind the bar and glanced over at the table and saw the two women just lost in conversation and the man in the wheel chair was either getting a really close look at his food or had passed out with his face in his spaghetti. Heather said to me, "Do you think I made his martini too strong?" I replied back, "We may want to check for a pulse." Luckily enough he was not dead. Truthfully I was worried we were going to need to call the coroner, but come to find out when you are 90 chocked full of martinis and booze, sometimes you take a little nappy nap at the dinner table. I now tried to steer the table away from drinking as things were on an express elevator to hell. Dinners were finished, dessert was had and by God the martini glasses I cleared from that table were beyond plentiful. They were getting ready to leave and the owner came out to mingle with his friends and asked me if I would help them out to the car. They needed help getting her husband's gin soaked ass out of his chair and into the car. (Above and Beyond people....above and beyond.) Figuring I'm working on quite a hefty tip, I agree to help and I asked Heather to cover my tables. As I'm walking out the door, the owner, in his eccentric voice says to me, "Josh.....don't forget to bend at the knees.....cripples are dead weight." (I'd like to say I was shocked, but I think you are beginning to understand why I wasn't.) What happened next was just comical. Even Ripley wouldn't believe this. I get to the car and one of the drunkards took off and I was left with the other woman and her husband. I was given explicit instructions as to how this was going to go down. Ladies and gentlemen.....there was a SLIDING BOARD involved. She instructed me to lift her husband by his belt loops, drag him across the sliding board into the front seat and she would yank him in from the driver's side. (Verbatim) So here I go.....I get my fingers into his belt loops and lift with all my might...(the owner was right.....dead weight)...this guys pants came up to his chest and not to get graphic, but his poor balls.....they were where his nipples should have been. So now Im coaching him, looking him in the eye and attempting to ease his pain by leveling with him saying, "Sir I know this hurts.....just work with me....WORK WITH ME..... As his legs were getting slammed into the dash board all he could do was let out grunts and moans and I was honestly feeling really bad. I had a 90 year old fragile drunk tossed over my shoulder like a dish rag, arms flailing, legs flailing, and his wife who was about as worthless as his belt loops trying to YANK his arm from the other side of the car. I don't know how it happened, or when he finally fell into place, but he was in the passenger seat. I honestly don't even know if his legs were still attached or if they were still in the wheel chair. But he was in, the look on his face resembled someone who just slipped into catatonic state....no words, no more moaning, just pure and utter shock. His wife took the driver's seat and as the keys went into the ignition I thought to myself.....this is a disaster waiting to happen. She was probably better off letting her husband drive with his, what were now, legs rendered useless. But there is only so much help and remedial services I was willing to offer. I said, "Drive safe and have a good night."
Not even an extra dollar! Unfortunately the tip had already been given and this was before it was asked and agreed upon that I would play paramedic for the next 45 minutes. But silver lining....silver lining. If there's one thing I can do with the worst of situations, it's to find something to walk away with. Whether its a lesson learned, a new piece of comedy gold or a new skill set, I can now say and confidently add to my resume "Avid Sliding Board Skills". But you don't just stumble upon this wisdom. It's not just handed to you. You clearly have to work for it, and not just half assed work, you have to be willing to always give 110%.
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