Pigskin Pork Rinds

I get this newsletter that I, at best, skim. I speed read it; then I chuck it. So, there was a timely article in there Friday about what to eat during football season. I assumed it was aimed at us parents, helping us plan our kids’ diets if they play football. Drink plenty of water, lots of fruit. Don’t eat just to eat. Eat when you’re hungry. That type of thing. (Strangely, nothing about spitting. That may be mainly baseball. It’s gross when they spit in the dugout, isn’t it?) So I’m speed reading this article, learning what to eat during football season. (Keep yourself hydrated. Yada, yada, yada.) Suddenly I realized, with a jolt, that the article is not about what to eat when you’re playing football. It’s about what to eat when you’re watching football on TV! Wait. What? There’re guys out there banging heads, getting speared, tearing ACL’s and stuff, and this writer feels the need to tell TV viewers to stay hydrated? 

Let’s dedicate a whole magazine to this vital topic of what to eat while watching football. They can sell it at the checkouts. Call it TV Dinner Guide. Yeah.

Soaring at the Box Office

So the Sully movie is out, starring Tom Hanks. I haven’t seen it yet, but it’s getting good reviews. The movie of course is about the 2009 emergency landing of the commercial jet in the Hudson River after it collided with a flock of geese. The flight lasted 3 minutes. The movie lasts ninety minutes. So yeah, I’m trying to figure out what fills the other 87 minutes. Here are some guesses at what may fill some of the time in the movie:

•      Some background on the geese who died.Where they had been, where they were headed...
•          Have Hanks explain the difference between flying the plane and flying the Apollo 13 spacecraft.
•          Do the river landing in slow motion. (Yeah, like that’s not gonna happen.)
•          Have some snakes on the plane. That worked a few years ago in a Samuel Jackson movie.
•          Have New Jersey Governor Chris Christie block traffic on a bridge over the Hudson during the landing
•          Have the geese survive and focus on their lives after the encounter
•          Have John Glenn play the co-pilot. He’s still alive and likes to talk.
•          Let Hanks talk about his next movie where he plays the president: “Forrest Trump”.

My only request here is that this film not be shown on future commercial flights.

Talkin' Trash

I hope all you American readers had a nice Labor Day. Monday holidays mess with garbage pickup day here in the states. My garbage is normally picked up on Thursday but some weeks when there’s a Monday holiday the schedule gets delayed a day and the trash gets picked up on Friday. I find it challenging trying to remember which of the holidays delay trash pickup and which don’t. There’s always at least one guy on the block who takes his trash out a day early on those weeks when there’s the one day delay, and he gets up before I do and takes his garbage out when it’s still dark outside. So I take mine out too. (Maybe if he didn’t get up so early he’d remember the right day to take out his trash.) So, yeah, I come home after work on those weeks and go out to the curb and start wheeling the trash can back to the house only to realize it’s still full. So then I look around, and make sure no one’s looking, and slink back into the house. It’s humbling.

Here’s a question! If your mailbox is on the other side of the street, can you wheel your garbage over there too? Should I not be doing that?

Parking Lot Fight

One time I was leaving downtown during a free outdoor concert. Parking was scarce, and two different cars followed me as I walked to my car, hoping to get my parking spot. As I was getting into my car, both drivers got out of their cars and started arguing over which one of them was going to get my spot. I did not stick around to see who won the argument. I just left. I don’t know which one got my spot. Perhaps I should have taught them a lesson and told them “If you’re going to fight, I just won’t leave”.

Many years later I was reminded of that scene when I was leaving the YMCA one day. There was a car that, once again, followed me all the way to my car. Fortunately there was only the one car this time, so there was no fight. The driver waited for me to back out, and took my spot. The thing that made this situation different is that it was the YMCA. The Y is all about exercise, and the guy could have easily parked a little further out. So yeah, it seems hypocritical to me that people feel the need to park close at the Y…

Speaking of the Y, what’s with the big window that’s at the end of the pool? Yeah, yeah. I know it’s so you can sit out there and watch your child learn to swim. But how many parents have had to throw themselves through that window to save their drowning kids? No, I don’t know the answer to this, but if somebody could find that out and report back that would be great. I’m pretty busy with this blog…     

Don't Push My Buttons!

Have you ever entered a building, headed for the elevator and hit the up button on the wall next to the elevator door, and, as the elevator nears the first floor to pick you up, the light goes out on the button you pushed ‘cause the elevator’s almost there? And then someone comes up behind you and reaches around you and pushes the up button? It doesn’t light up ‘cause yeah, the elevator’s almost there. So, like, what’s this guy thinking who runs in and pushes the up button? Does he think you’re standing there just to hang out? Does he think you’re maybe just using the elevator door as a mirror to fix your hair?

Well, the pain does not end there because now you’ve got to ride the elevator with the dude. And yeah, you’ve gotta say something at this point. A proper comment from you at that point could be, “You DO realize I had pressed the button and that the light on the button goes out as the elevator nears, right?” Another option could be a simple “Hey. Ever ride one of these before?”

Another option, depending on how your day’s gone, would be to mace him in the lobby. You would have a good defense – assuming this was to go to trial. That button had already been pushed. Period.

Early Bird

We just got invited to a suite at a football game. The game is the week before Thanksgiving. That is great, ‘cause it gets pretty cold to sit outside for a game that late in the season. And I always enjoy singing the national anthem really loud in the suite. So I was very appreciative of the invitation. But I was disappointed when I saw what was on the menu for that game. Apparently, since it is the week before Thanksgiving, they are serving turkey and sweet potatoes. C’mon! This type of thing irritates me. And it happens all the time. Why do people do it? I want my turkey on Thanksgiving to be special, not a rehash of what I had the prior week. I’ve never understood the serving of turkey at luncheons and dinners the week before Thanksgiving. Hey, while we’re at it, let’s have an egg hunt on Palm Sunday, or serve corned beef hash a week before our Jiggs Dinner on St Patrick’s Day.

  

Well, it could be worse. Would they ever dare serve mushroom casserole at a football game?