Yesterday, when I was young...

Do you remember that song that goes "Yesterday, when I was young, and the taste of life was sweet, like rain upon my tongue."?  I can hear it playing in my head, but the words do not jell any more.  This is like so many other things in my life that have gone awry. 

I remember when beer bottles had screw on caps and sometimes they were a little hard to grasp and that is why God gave us teeth; to open bottle caps!  Alas, those days are over and gone.  Well, actually, so are the teeth.  I think I used to have 32, but that number is slowly dwindling.  Granted, four of them were wisdom teeth which never fit anyway, but nonetheless, they were there.  Unfortunately the caps that were so easily removed with my super powerful jaws have now been replaced by caps devised by a mad scientist.  The first thing I need to do is read the "how to remove cap" instructions printed on the miniscule cap.  Well, the very first thing I have to do is find the magnifying glass so I can SEE the instructions.  Ok, here we go!

To remove cap grasp bottle firmly.  Push down on cap while twisting counterclockwise.  You may need to exert extra pressure.  Now, we are dealing with a prescription bottle with a cap that is maybe an inch across.  My fingers quit bending that far many years back, but I am game to try.  So I grasp the bottle firmly in my left hand.  I press my right hand onto the cap.  Everything is plastic and of course my hands are sweaty in anticipation of this chore.  Ok, push down and twist counterclockwise.  I am assuming the cap goes counterclockwise; not the bottle.  And in a perfect world, something would turn and something would open.  Hell, maybe I was supposed to turn myself counterclockwise.  So, I try again.  Once more with feeling!  So this time I grasp the bottle in my right hand with the cap in my left.  Counterclockwise should still be the same direction.  I recall life lessons that say "Lefty loosey, righty tighty."  Sounds great in theory.

By this time I have worked up a sweat and wonder if I really need these blood pressure pills open at all.  Surely some one will stop by later today and they will open them for me.  This leads me to remember all the things I need open, like the jar of pickles, the bottle of lavendar cleaner, and that bottle of aphid killer that I threw across the fence in total frustration.  What has my life become?  I can not even try to catch the rain on my tongue anymore, because I might catch pneumonia instead. 

And all this brings me to the crux of the matter.  I am getting old.  Not only are my fingers stiff and my teeth gone, even words take on new meaning.  Like colon is no longer a punctuation mark, it is now something inside me to be babied and cleansed on a regular basis.   Will no longer means determination, it is something I have to make and file with the court or when I go toes up the state of Colorado will be my beneficiary!  Friends and family are no longer just people to be cherished, they are to be feared and revered and do not tick them off or they will not come to my funeral.  (I do not want to be the only one there!)  Walker is no longer someone I meet on the path, it is what holds me up.  Depends is not an act you perform when counting on someone to do something, it is now a noun to replace "string bikini or thong."

And I could go on all day, but I can't because I want to make a cake and I have got to get that new bottle of vanilla open.  Think I will take it down to the Senior Center and make that our challenge for the day!  Please do not laugh at this because one of these days you are going to be wanting to taste the rain only to find that it is now acid rain and you want no part of that!

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Pick ME! Pick ME!

I would dearly love to blame this on some one else,  but I feel that in all honesty I must take full credit for this.  Granted I do have a lot on my mind here the past few days, but I would be remiss if I let this one go by unnoticed.  You will need all the facts.

I went to the doctor and had blood work done.  When it got back nursie dear (and you know who you are, don't you, Deb?) called to give me the  news that every thing is through the roof except my bank account.  Now granted, I was about to get around to starting to exercise pretty soon, but she informed me that I was way to late for that.  And she was most firm about it and now I know why they call her "Sarge".    So I commiserated with my buddy Tim and he gave me a tongue lashing.  "You have the treadmill all set up down stairs for crying out loud!  Just get on it and quit saying you do not have time!  Just do it!"

Well, the man is right.  So after he left I got to thinking.  I am good at multi tasking and this might work.  I had 3 seed catchers that just needed elastic in them and they would be ready to go.  So I clipped a bodkin on each end of the elastic and started it through the little opening.  That was going well and so I reached up and turned on the tread mill.  You know that safety device that hooks on your belt and if you fall it will turn the machine off?  Yeah, that inconveniently place little do hickey.  The seed catcher kept getting wrapped around that and shutting the tread mill down.  So I unhooked it from my waist and wrapped it around itself.  Then we started again, 

Well all was going real well at the slowest speed so I kicked it up a notch.  And I finished both sides of the first seed catcher.  Things were going so good I actually thought about calling Tim's wife and telling her how good I was doing at this multi tasking thing, but I decided to just finish the seed catchers first.  So I started number 2.  Then I kicked it up another notch.  I had been at this little job about 9 minutes when I dropped the bodkin.  Now what do we do when we drop something?  We pick it up.  Natural instinct dictates that.  Well, let me just tell you when I realized that was the wrong thing to do. 

It occured to me about the time my right leg hit the Oleandar tree and my left leg was sticking out of the Fig tree and my whole backside was being sanded by the sure grip coating on the treadmill which was now spinning freely at about 30 miles per hour.  That was also about the time I noticed my safety cord dangling harmlessly behind the speedometer.  As I drug my poor broken little body across the floor to jerk that loose I thanked my God in heaven and all his angels that I was alone and not being videotaped.

So here I am the next day.  I am not real sure that right leg isn't broken and it is a very funny color.  The left one is sore, but still intact.  My backside resembles chicken skin after it has been barbequed.  Some where in the melee I whacked my head on something and I am not sure I don't have a severe concussion, but for sure there is something loose up there.

So, the words of wisdom for today are this:  Leave that damn safety thing on your belt, do not try to multi task and for crying out loud if you drop something, just leave it alone.  I must confess that I could not get to sleep last night and I am not sure whether it was because of the bone poking through my skin or because I was laughing so hard at the sight that must have been!


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Oh, hell! I am falling to pieces before my very eyes!

I have always prided myself on how well preserved I am.  Hard to convince people that I am actually 70 years old.  Well, now it may be catching up with me.  My foot has been hurting since last September, so I decided to go have it checked out.  Now before you get all excited thinking why did I put it off, I will tell you. 
See I was setting a new stock tank for the geese.  That entailed digging.  I thought I had probably bruised my foot.  So I kind of took it easy for a few days.  Then it was October and I began to think maybe I had sort of did the hairline fracture thing so I started doubling up on the Calcium.  By then we were just past Thanksgiving, and then there was Christmas to contend with and then New Years.  So this was actually the first chance I had to see Doctor. That and the fact that I seemed to recall a woman who had stepped on a needle and years later it showed up on an x-ray.  This sure felt like a needle.
So I called and of course, Deb got me right in. 
Doctor was very surprised to see me and after exchanging pleasantry's he checked my chart.  Now bear in mind that my blood pressure is always right there on the normal number and never fluctuates.  Well, except today when it found it necessary to jump up 12 points.  So here I sat with a needle in my foot ready to break loose and head for my heart and the elevated blood pressure.  I tried to explain to him that when she took my blood pressure, we were talking.  This really tickled him. 
"So when you talk your blood pressure jumps up?"
"Well, no, but I am under a lot of stress."
"Stress from what?"
"Well, that needle in my foot that is probably moving steadily to my heart while we are talking for one thing!"
"X-ray will pick up a needle like that!"  Course he snapped his fingers, because that is what they do. "Now what else?"
So I explained about how busy I have been selling on ebay.
"Oh, dear, making money stresses you?"
I told him about the big ice glacier in my front yard.
"Oh, dear, ice stresses you?"
I told him about all the things I do in my "spare time".
"Oh, you would rather vegetate?"
To make a long story short, the man knows me very well and he puts up with no crap and excuses.  I love him and have since the first day I met him.  That day when he walked into the exam room the first time and said, "Why are you here?"
And I said, "Since you are my new doctor, I wanted to meet you."
And he said, "So do you want a Colonostomy?"
And I said, "Do I look like I want a Colonostomy?"
And he said, "So then, why are you here?"
And I said, "Because if I have a major coronary and wind up in the emergency room I would at least want to know that you recognized me as one of your patients.  I do not take pills for my Cholesterol, and I will let you know if I have any needs.  Blood test once a year so you can tell me it is high and adjust my thyroid.  That is about it."
But now he is making Doctor noises and since I do love the man dearly and have gotten used to living on this planet I guess I will keep an eye on the old blood pressure and seems like the x-ray came back and there is not a needle in the old foot after all.  It is a spur and if it continues to bother me, "we" will do something about it which will entail a knife and a needle which strikes fear in my heart.  So the wiccan brought me some stuff to try and I will kind of try to stay off the silly thing a little more.  Oh, and I'm going to mix me up a concoction of cider vinegar, honey and garlic.  Garlic cures everything, including spurs and blood pressure!  Oh, yeah, vampires, too!
And being single and uninvolved, I can pack away the garlic!  Yes!  Life is good even if I am falling to pieces a bit at a time.

Laughter is the best medicine!

Oh, it is now official!  I always thought that laughing was good for you.  At least unless you laughed at the wrong time or place, but now I know for sure.  My copy of http://www.realage.com/ came over the Internet today with tips to keep me younger than I think I am.  Had something to say about how good Butternut Squash was for me, but I promptly blew that one away and glombed on to the one about laughter.

It is a fact that laughter will lower your blood pressure 10 points in 20 minutes.  I have perfect blood pressure and take nada for anything.  Oh, one little thyroid pill which without, I am very tired.  That is to be expected at my age.  Lord, I have kids that are on all kinds of stuff for all kinds of things.  I have friends who look like a walking pharmacy.  But here I am, the happiest little thing you will ever come across and now I find it is good for me.  I know if I do not interact and laugh with my friends I just get a little blah.

Life in my little corner of the world is usually rather pleasant.  I keep the bills paid and the wolf away from the door so it is mostly a day to day thing, but if I keep an open mind and do not dwell on the mundane I can get a chuckle out of about anything.  Icarus the cat jumped on Elvira the dog and got a free ride one morning.  Goose tripped over a duck and landed in the pond.  Bret seen a spider in his room.  Now granted, I probably have a sick sense of humor, but it is humor none the less.

I think I am getting ready to make a point here.  Life is short.  Life is simple if you let it be.  When it gets complicated, you loose control.  So there is much to be learned from the KISS theory, which you all know means Keep It Simple, Stupid!  My biggest problem is trying to think for someone else.  I basically want to please every body, but it does not work like that.  I learned in seventh grade that "You can please all of the people some of the time, some of the people all of the time, but you can not please all of the people all of the time."

I also learned that you never really know anybody, you only know OF them.  I can not be inside their brain so I can not know what they think.  Know what I do sometimes?  I should not tell you this, but I will.  Pretty sure I will live to regret it, but I am banking that most people who read my writing, chuckle and forget what I say.  Sometimes if I am listening intently to something you are saying that is boring me to tears, I have a little smile on my face and nod and interject my one word comments.  My mind is a million miles away at that point.  Know how to tell if I am really with you?  If I laugh.

If I laugh, I am listening, because sooner or later everyone I know will say something that my twisted mind can get a laugh from.  If I laugh a gut wrenching belly laugh, you truly have my attention.  If I touch you, you are home free.  I rarely meet anyone I can not laugh with, and if I do, I only see them once cause next time I will make an effort to get out of their way.

So your assignment for today is to lighten up!  Shake loose and get down!  Life is short!  Life is wonderful!  What does not kill you will make you strong!  So get out there and carpe diem!  And whatever you do, find the humor in the situation!