Baby, It's You!

I got a chance to meet a friend’s family members for the first time the other day. They had their baby with them. I pride myself in being able to determine a baby’s age and have become pretty good at it over the years. I have three kids of my own so I guess I have some experience. So yeah, I guessed that he was 5 or 6 months old, and sure enough, the baby was 5 1/2 months old. Pretty good, eh? Well, it backfired on me, ‘cause the baby was not a he – she was a girl. I got that part wrong. That part’s tough. In my defense, the child was wearing a dark blue outfit.

I have a friend whose dad was one of those guys at the amusement parks who guessed your weight or your age. The guy was good. I would never want to be the guy guessing your weight (awkward!) but I could do that age thing pretty well I think. But with the way the world’s going, maybe it would be fun to have a “Guess Your Orientation” guy at the carnival. People would line up for that.  

  

This Bun's for You

I got to go to one of those antique/throwback candy stores a while back. This is where they have the candy that either was unpopular or had some kind of flaw so it was discontinued. Mallo Cups. Wax teeth, Beemon’s Gum. That kind of stuff. You never know at these stores if someone somehow started making that candy again, or if it’s just really old candy. When my kids would get discontinued candy at Halloween I’d always say “Why don’t you give bite of that Clark Bar to the dog to see how she handles it before you bite off a piece?"

One of my favorites of these old candies was the Bun. They were these huge chocolate peanut clusters. I’m pretty sure I know why they were discontinued. Kids probably got sent to the store by their moms to buy buns for hot dogs or hamburgers but they spent the money on the candy bun instead. “But Mom, you told me to get buns!”  That’s probably why they got rid of candy cigarettes as well.   

Toll House Cookie

One time my friend was following me through the toll booth getting off the turnpike. As a nice gesture, I told the tollgate dude that I was paying for the car behind me. He took my money for both cars and we kept driving. Well, my friend never said anything to me about not having to pay so I finally asked him about it and he didn’t know anything about it. He had paid his toll like he always did. The toll dude just kept the extra money I guess. Well, that didn’t work so well, so now I take it out on the other toll dudes. For instance, at the rare toll both where you’re getting on the toll road and the toll dude hands you a ticket, I always ask him how much I owe. That’s always fun. Also, sometimes I pull up to the booth the toll dude is facing my car’s back window. This accomplishes two things, it freaks out the toll dude (he deserves it), and it forces the guy in the back seat to wake up and pay. This is only fair ‘cause, after all, I drove.

I’ve never just tossed a handful of change into the booth but I’d love to hear from a reader who has done that.

Tree Removal

Now that everybody has their Christmas trees taken down, let’s talk about getting rid of that other tree, the one we’re not as found of – the call tree. The call tree is that thing at work where, if there’s an emergency, you call certain colleagues, and then they call other certain colleagues, until everybody has been called. Has anyone ever seen the call tree process work, where maybe it saves a life or something? I have not. Like that old game “Telephone” you played when you were a kid, you do practice runs or rehearsals of the call tree and more times than not the message gets pretty mangled toward the end of the process. I think there’s usually like one guy somewhere in the process who changes the message intentionally and messes it up. These rehearsals are tough to endure. Who has the desire to call their co-workers on the weekend? We see enough of each other during the week. Can’t this type of message be done with a mass text of some sort?

JObama Memories

With their terms coming to a close, I think it’s time to share some Obama-Biden memories. Whether you agreed or not with Obama and Biden politically, they did some cool stuff sometimes.  

I have this friend from Delaware, Joe Biden’s home state. One Saturday when they were both back in Delaware my friend got to participate in a bowling fundraiser that Biden also attended.  He got to talk to Joe. They hit it off well and Joe invited him to split a cheeseburger. How cool is that? I admire the idea of splitting the cheeseburger. Who needs a whole cheeseburger?

Obama has proven to be the opposite. One time he came to our city and the mayor took him to a Coney Island restaurant. The dude ate 2 hot dogs (no ketchup-cool), fries, chili, and a shake. He followed that up with a jumbo dog.  I admire that all his responsibilities as president did not affect his appetite. 

A final Obama thought: The Cubs gave the Obamas 4 lifetime passes to Wrigley Field yesterday. Are you kidding me? Lifetime? He’s only 55 – he’s gonna be around a while. Does this mean he can walk into Wrigley in like the third inning and just point at some seats and the people in those seats have to leave? And do the Cubs know how much this guy can eat? Will he insist on throwing out the “first” ball every game he attends? “Hey, I used to be president. Give me the %&@# ball! I don’t care if it’s the third inning.”  

Doctor Nose Best

What’s with having the “N” in ENT? Plenty of things can go wrong with the ear and the throat, but does anybody ever go to the ENT for their nose? Have I missed out on nose cleanings? Strep nose? Swimmer’s nose? Are there smelling aids? To me, the nose seems like a pretty healthy organ. “How you feeling, Phil?” “My nose hurts again.” No. You just never hear that. When I was young kids would occasionally shove things up their nose. Do they still do that? I don’t think so. Kids have so much stuff to do now with video games and the internet. When I was a kid, you’d get bored and shove something up your nose maybe to see if you could get it to come out the other nostril. But today, the ENT’s don’t have to deal with that, I don’t think.

And yet, the “N” stays in their name. I blame Spielberg. Nobody wants to be associated with that weird E.T. dude.