It was a big problem. What to get the Captain, my son-in –law, for his birthday? A stocking cap perhaps, to keep his Telly Savalas-like head warm in the blisteringly cold San Diego weather? No, the only time he wears a hat is on the boat, and that one’s covered in little red and white flecks of fish goo and squid guts. Yuck. How about a new fishing pole? No, he already has an entire garage wall and most of …Read the Rest
The Nordic Warrior Queen has asked for a retraction. She’s failed to see the humor of my recent post, The Middle Age Tramp Stamp, and wants me to set the record straight. Okay, here goes. As it turns out, there’s something about menopause that the women who are enduring it don’t find the least bit funny: the mood swings, the hot flashes, the tender breasts and annoying need for supplemental estrogen—I understand now that these are difficult subjects for a …Read the Rest
I came in from the garage the other day to hear the Nordic Warrior Queen talking on the phone. I didn’t mean to eavesdrop, but I could tell it was our daughter, and something big was going down. Jimmy (she hates it when I call her that) had brought her cat in to the vet. No, don’t panic, they told her. Smelly Cat is fine. A little gas is a perfectly normal thing. Yes, even if the smell makes the …Read the Rest
The Nordic Warrior Queen was the first to notice the ghost writing on the window. It looked something like “Smooshie’s Room,” and we laughed about it. We thought it was just some simple, “schoolgirl decorating her room” sort of thing. After all, Smoosh seems like a cute nickname for a girl, and if she chose to write it on her bedroom window in a broad, cursive, love-sick teenage stroke, where’s the harm, even if she did it with nail-polish? Irritating, …Read the Rest
Sometimes at work I have to wear a tie. I’d rather wear a T-shirt, but they won’t let me. Okay, fine. But here’s the problem: I’m 5’ 8” tall and have a 19” neck, a size normally reserved for very short football players and the morbidly obese. Good luck finding a shirt that fits. I know: I’m shaped like a troll. But I don’t need some Chinese woman telling me that. I tried using collar extenders – two of them, …Read the Rest
I have to take all these classes for my new job. It’s called “virtual” training, which means day after endless day of connecting to a web-site to watch as some faceless stranger runs through all the important stuff I’m supposed to know about the software sell. Then I’m supposed to do all the same steps they just showed me, on my own computer, while the instructor watches over my virtual shoulder. And at the end of each day, I have …Read the Rest
The Nordic Warrior Queen was hollering at me the other day. “Why can’t you men ever turn off the light when you leave the room?” I was a bit offended at being lumped in with the rest of the male species. After all…it’s me she’s talking about, but I kept my opinion to myself; you don’t survive thirty years of marriage without knowing when to pick your battles. I finished my turn in Chess with Friends and looked up, so …Read the Rest
Bark, bark, bark, all day long. I asked the Nordic Warrior Queen, “Whose fucking mutt is that? I’m going to kill it.” That’s when she told me there’s a dog park a few hundred away; just next to the baseball field, on the other side of the trees. A dog park? You mean, a park, just for dogs? What the hell? You’d think they pay taxes or something. So I Googled “dog parks,” and it turns out there are over …Read the Rest
I could be dying, but does the Nordic Warrior Queen take it seriously? Of course she doesn’t. Instead she insults me. I guess that’s what thirty years of marriage does to a relationship. It’s like this. A few months ago, right about the time my employer gave up all pretense of trying to keep me busy, I started to get this…well, this rough patch of skin. On my stomach. It doesn’t hurt, but it might be a tumor, or some …Read the Rest
It’s that time of year again, so that means risking life and limb climbing a wobbly stepladder to the uppermost reaches of the bedroom closet to retrieve the several dozen boxes which contain the Nordic Warrior Queen’s Department 56 North Pole Collection. You know what I’m talking about, right? Those little overpriced replica houses, factories, and buildings, with names like The Gumdrop Shop, The Elf Bunkhouse, The North Pole Post Office, and The Reindeer Stables, complete with miniature Donner and …Read the Rest