The Chicken or the Egg?

As far as I know the question of which came first has never been decided, but I’ll vote for the chicken who laid the first egg. Imagine her shock when, exhausted, she rested upon the mysterious result of her labor. Perhaps she waited, curious as to what would happen next.

Warmth, a mysterious movement. The thing beneath her cracked! The chicken rose to see a tiny being emerge. Cheep Cheep! And she was never the same after that. She paraded around the barnyard, the tiny thing wobbling after her. They passed the rooster, who crowed. The chicken ignored the arrogant fellow. And then briefly wondered why he was passing out cigars.

The End

Sorry, but I couldn’t resist posting this. I ran across it in some of my old writings and it made me laugh so I thought maybe it would make you laugh too.

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WHO Are YOU?

“And WHO are YOU?” the older man in the black tux and argyle socks said as he shook my hand. I was being greeted by the father of the groom after the wedding ceremony.
“My name is….” I said, not feeling quite as ridiculous as I might’ve if he hadn’t been wearing the purple and pink socks.

He raised his eyebrows at me, Groucho Marx style, and I moved on. I figured he wanted to disconcert people with the socks because he was a psychiatrist, and liked to do unexpected things to see how people would react, but I was disconcerted because I had no ready answer to his unexpected question.

The thing was I was nobody. I’d been invited to the wedding through a friend of the bride, whom I didn’t even know. My friend had arranged the invitation for me, including my pre-school daughters, believing they should get their first look at a true-to-life fairy-tale bride. I’d set aside my discomfort to appease her but had felt completely foreign in such exalted company. My friend had been disappointed when Terry and Tammy, instead of being excited, watched the elaborate ceremony with a detached air.

So – who was I? Should I have said “I’m a friend of a friend of the bride?” or “I have an invitation but actually I’m a party crasher because I don’t even know your son or new daughter-in-law?” It’s bewildering to be asked “WHO are YOU?” and trying to think of an answer.

Perhaps, I thought later, I should make an appointment with him. Tell him he got me to thinking “WHO am I” as if I’d never thought to ask it before, and that I’d been searching for an answer ever since. I was lost. I didn’t know who I was. Wasn’t that what psychiatrists were for, to help us discover who we are? But psychiatrists cost money, and besides I kept seeing those wild argyle socks with the expensive black tux. How could I trust him?

So I decided to find myself, myself. Still looking.

Well Blow Me Down and Call Me Flossie

When I was fifteen I worked one summer in Don’s Restaurant in Hazard, Kentucky. My name was Flossie. Don had such a turnover in waitresses he couldn’t remember our names so he used a few favorites remembered from ages past. Assuming there’d been a Flossie, that is. So I said “Blow me down and call me Flossie!” After all, he was paying me fifty cents an hour.

We had a tip box to put our gratuities in (I’m more sophisticated now) to be divided up weekly. Like a good little Flossie I put all my tips, excuse me, gratuities, in the box during the first week but when it came time to receive my cut, I only received four dollars.

I complained to the other girls that my tips, excuse me, gratuities, had been more than that for half-a-day. They laughed at me. “We don’t put it all in,” they said, “just a dollar here and there.” In other words I had shared all my own tips, excuse me, gratuities, with them, but they had shared only a smidgeon of theirs with me. The scale had been weighted to their side. I wondered why they hadn’t told me ahead of time. That’s how green I was. I’m more sophisticated now.

Okay, I said, and the next week I only put in a couple of dollars. But I felt dishonest. “Oh, he knows,” one girl said, “he don’t care.” And, since we were all in cahoots, I figured it was okay. But my conscience still bothered me, just a smidgeon. I’d been taught that rules were rules and were meant to be followed.

Although I never became a corrupt politician, nor even an honest one for that matter, I wonder if that’s how it begins? If we all do it, then it’s okay. Let’s vote ourselves some special benefits, set up different rules, just for us.

Of course none of this is actually vocalized. Most likely they just breathe in that rarefied stink in the air that wafts off the old farts who’ve been corrupting Washington for years, and they know without vocalizing that this is how things are done in Washington, DC.

Bless Her Heart

While walking Winston in the park today I realized I owe you an apology for my recent rants. Time was I never ranted but swallowed my ire and pretended the world was always a happy place. For this reluctance to express anger I blame my mom (God Bless Her Heart, as we say in the hills when speaking ill of someone – to show we really love the ornery person). My mom was, of course, a wonderful woman (God Bless Her Heart) but she was of the “turn the other cheek” variety.

Well, of course I could say the other cheek I was thinking of was lower down on the body and I forgot which one she meant. I tend to get things mixed up that way. You aren’t buying it? Mom wouldn’t either. She raised us to not “Act the Fool” (Bless Her Heart) and to Mom facetiousness was never funny.

But this isn’t about Mom. It’s about me apologizing for sending out negative vibes instead of positive uplifting ones, about me trying to make amends for my angry rants. The best way to do that, I think, is to give you a list of a few of the things that I’m truly grateful for:

1) That my eldest daughter just bought six baby chicks but can’t have a rooster, which is okay as she’s only going to have them lay eggs (in the garage until she can get a chicken shed built). They are already counting on 42 eggs a week after the chickens become hens. This is part of her answer to the coming food shortage she keeps hearing about. (Bless Her Heart)

2) That my youngest daughter has given up feeding her family grain, anything made from wheat, oats, soy, or even corn. That’s right. She now makes pizza crust from coconut meal, brownies from black beans, etc. They really do taste good, Bless Her Heart. I just hope Michelle doesn’t hear about it!

3) Which brings me to the last item for today. We still live in the good old USA where my grandson can buy a green wig with his birthday money, have me make him a strange-looking cape and go to an anime convention where everyone looks like they just stepped off an intergalactic vehicle traveling through unknown worlds to visit planet Earth, and nobody thinks it’s odd. My Mom would be appalled. Bless Their Hearts, she’d say. Ain’t it wonderful!

Bless Your Heart!

Obesity Epidemic?

According to a report from the Trust for America’s Health (TFAH) and the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation (RWJF), more than two-thirds of states have adult obesity rates above 25 percent.  In 1991, no state had an obesity rate above 20 percent.

News Flash!  America finally admits it has an obesity epidemic.   The government has gotten fatter and fatter.   Oh – you mean they’re talking about the people?   Oh. So who got fat first?   Dah-dah-dah-dah-dah  (finger pointing). 

They even admit now that the obesity rate has gone up since 1991.  We knew that already.  However, they’re talking about the rest of us, we who cling to our guns and religion while sitting in front of our television sets eating cheap junk food and listening to their lies.  

The question is:  Does the government represent its citizenry or does its citizenry reflect the ills of its government?  And how did the government get so fat in the first place?   Because it was taken over by the Fat Cats Club, most of whom also belong to the Lucky Sperm Club.  They scratch each other’s backs (or other parts) while dividing the spoils and using our tax money to reward their outside back-scratching cronies.   

The rest of us:  The obesity that began in Washington has spread throughout the country.  It’s contagious.   Oddly, the fattest people make the least amount of money.  What?  Do they spend all their money on food, with no activity, sitting and gorging all day?   No, but they buy the cheapest food, which is not nutritious, so they’re still hungry and eat more of it to try to get full, which they never do.   Healthy foods cost too much.

That’s not all, of course.   Society’s ills are never so simple.  For instance, most people on a steady diet of processed foods develop a taste for it (probably all those tasty additives, some deliberately used by food manufacturers because they’re so addictive).  

The government needs to cut its obesity rate by at least fifty percent (they didn’t count themselves but it must be close to 100.)   Do you suppose Newt could work up a contract between our obese citizens and our obese government?