Where's My Breakfast? (Part Four)

On the last day of our short--too short--four day vacation, while we were returning home, I got a call from my daughter. She is laughing and telling me that Grandpa must have had a tough night.

     On this particular morning my daughter had to leave early for work--she has a life, after all. She didn't have the time to wait for him to go on his walk (at his convenience) and return in enough time for her to get ready. She only told him that the day before about half a dozen times. As she is leaving for work she goes to the kitchen to make sure he is all right and to let him know that she is leaving.

     "Grandpa," she tells him, "I'm leaving for work. I'll be back later. Is there anything you need?"

     "Well..." her grandpa says, looking as if he doesn't know what's just happened. Some people watch what happens, some people make things happen, and some people wonder what happens. My Dad is at the wondering-what-happens stage of his life. I'm in no hurry. I'll get there soon enough.
     "...huh?" grandpa continued. "I went on my walk and when I returned there was no breakfast. I had to make my own breakfast.  I HAD to make my own breakfast."
     There was a touch of irritation there. She could tell because of the way his eyes were bulging out. They bulge out the same way looking for landmarks when I'm driving him somewhere and he thinks I don't know where I'm going.

     Oooh-kay! "Well," my daughter says, "I have to go. I'll be back this afternoon."
     "Hey? Where are you going?" my Dad says as she heads out the door, not making the connection that she only leaves for work every day of her life--excluding weekends.
     "To work, grandpa."
     She waves at him on her way out.

     "Well," he says. Smack, smack, smack! She sees him looking around the kitchen for a breakfast that refuses to materialize. Click, click, click! "I can hardly wait until your mother gets back so she can help me."

     Help him? Help him do what? He does nothing all day. He goes on his walks--at his convenience--and when he returns he expects my wife to hand him a cold orange juice. And then he waits to be served his breakfast feast. And then he sits in his-my-favorite chair and watches baseball on TV. Somewhere along the line a dessert will appear. He must think it's by magic, because he doesn't bother to thank whoever it is--my wife--who places it in front of him. 

      I wish I had it half that good. Just half.

     The next morning after we get back I run into Dad in the kitchen.

     I greet him but keep my head down. I'm drinking a nice hot cup of gourmet coffee (don't hate me because I'm beautiful) and reading a Winchester Weapon catalog. I tell my three-year-old grandson that I'm going to buy one like the one Jimmy Stewart kept chasing after in the movie Winchester 73, and I'll take him hunting dinosaurs with it, but, man, these rifles are EXPENSIVE. Those dinosaurs will have to wait. Anyway...

     My Dad looks at me, and then he looks discreetly over my shoulder to see if my wife is on her way to fix him something to eat. She isn't. I'm letting her sleep in.
     "You sure were gone a long time," he tells me. "A long time."

     We were gone four days.
     He doesn't ask me how our trip was, if we had fun, if I got lucky. No, all he asks is...
     "Are you making breakfast?"
     Too short, indeed.
 
 

Raising My Father

RaisingMyFather.blogspot.com

jimduchene.blogspot.com  Fifty Shades of Funny

@JimDuchene

  

Which Reminds Me... (Part Three)

The nonsense my Dad was putting my daughter through for something as simple as deciding what he wanted her to bring him for dinner reminds me of a time--long, long ago--when my Mom was still alive.
     For one reason or another, the whole family was there visiting, and instead of looking to our Mom to cook dinner for all of us, we thought it would be nice to take our parents out for a nice dinner at a nice restaurant. I suggested a world-famous restaurant--McDonald's--but for some reason I was voted down.
     My Dad wasn't as old then (if that's not stating the obvious), but he was every bit as cantankerous.
     "Dad," I told him. "Get ready. We're taking you and Mom out to eat."
     We had already passed the idea by Mom, and she was all for it. She's spent her whole life cooking three meals a day plus snacks, so any opportunity to get out of the kitchen and have somebody cater to her was her idea of a good time. My Dad, however...
     "Out to eat?" he asked.
     "Yeah, Dad." I answered. "Out to eat."
     "But your mother is going to cook."
     "For ALL of us?"
     "Yeah."
     That was easy for him to say.
     "We thought it would be nice to take the two of you out," I told him.
     "Who's we?"
     "All of us."
     "But your mother likes to cook."
     Like I said, it was easy for my Dad to say that, especially since his part in the equation consisted of waiting for the food to be cooked.
     "We already told her," I said, "and she thinks it's a great idea."
     "She does, eh?"
     "Yeah, she does."
     "So she's not going to cook?"
     "No."
     My Dad pondered that a bit. And stayed where he sat. Watching TV. Not that he had any getting ready to do. He was dressed. His shoes were on. All he really had to do was stand up and turn off the television set. I only told him to get ready to get him used to the idea of eventually having to get up and turning off the television set. Half the battle of getting my Dad to do anything is putting the idea in his head first.
     Mom was a master at this. She would mention something to Dad, and then when the time came to do it, she would tell him, "You've already said you would!"
     "I did?"
     "Yes, you did," was my Mom's final answer.
     What was my Dad going to do? Call her a liar?
     So my Dad would go along, because he was a man of his word. Even the ones that he never spoke. But back to our dinner...
     "You ready to go, Dad?" I asked him, as everybody made their way into the den.
     "Where are we going to eat?" he wanted to know.
     "Cappeto's. That Italian restaurant you like."
     "I'm not in the mood for Italian. It's too heavy."
     "But everybody wants Cappeto's."
     "I had a big breakfast," he told a starving room full of his children and grandchildren. "I'm not that hungry."
     It didn't matter to him that the rest of us were practically passing out from hunger. He just didn't want Italian.
     "Well, how about La Malinche? You like Mexican food."
     "I told you, nothing too heavy. I'm still full from breakfast. You don't know how much your Mom feeds me. Sometimes I think she's trying to kill me, she feeds me so much."
     I guess it never occurred or occurs to him when my Mom or my wife puts a feast in front of him that he doesn't have to eat everything, or that he can just ask for less.
     "How about Chinese food? There's a good Chinese buffet by the Barnes & Noble."
     "I don't like buffets."
     "You don't?" That came as a surprise to all of us. Whenever he and our Mom went out to eat on their own, Dad always made his way to his favorite buffets. Hometown. Golden Corral. My wife's kitchen. "What do you mean, you don't?"
     "I told you, I don't like buffets. I always eat too much."
     "Well, how about just a regular Chinese restaurant."
     "I don't like Chinese, either."
     That was really limiting the places we could eat.
     Burgers?
     No.
     Barbecue?
     No.
     Seafood?
     No.
     Moe's?
     N... Moe's?
     Apparently, we had hit on something.
     "I like Moe's," Dad told us. Which was funny, because Moe's was a great barbecue place on the northeast side of town, and he had already said no to barbecue. It was owned and run by a husband and wife team out of Carolina. North Carolina? South? I forget, but it doesn't really matter, because their barbecue sauce is all you have to remember. It's delicious, and they just slather it on their ribs. That's what I like about Moe's. They're not stingy with the sauce. 
     "They have good sauce," my Dad added.
     Everybody looked at everybody else, and it was decided.
     Moe's, it was.
     As we all started heading out the door, my Dad sat back down.
     "Honey!" my wife called out to him. "What are you doing?"
     My Dad turned the TV back on.
     "Just bring me back some Moe's," he instructed.
 
 

Raising My Father

RaisingMyFather.blogspot.com

jimduchene.blogspot.com  Fifty Shades of Funny

@JimDuchene

   

I Interrupt My Regularly Scheduled Programming...

I was looking through one of my wife's women magazines, because, if there's one thing I learned from Clint Eastwood in the movie Heartbreak Ridge, it's that I should know my--for lack of a better word--enemy.
     Sun Tzu, a Chinese general for the King of Wu, put it this way over two and a half thousand years ago:
 

If you know your enemy and know yourself, you need not fear the result of a hundred battles.

 

     I know myself like I know the back of my hand (What The Heck Is THAT?), but women (in general) and my wife (in particular) continue to be a mystery to me, and that's why (when nobody's looking) I'll occasionally open up one of my wife's magazines and see what the competition is up to.
     Except for Cosmopolitan.
     I find that magazine especially worthless when it comes to supplying its readership with accurate and helpful information, but--for any lawyers who are reading this--that's just my opinion. Let me give you an example...
     It seems that every other article in Cosmo are about tips on how a woman can drive her man wild in bed. They offer tricks and techniques and tactics, but, truthfully--between me and you--a man doesn't need all those tricks and techniques and tactics. Ladies, all you need to do to drive your man wild in bed is...
     ...say yes.
     As comedian Ron White humorously pointed out, she doesn't need to flick her man's frenulum. All she needs to do is...
     ...show up.
     But I digress...
     I was looking through one of my wife's women magazines, and I found an advertisement for a Vaginal Cream.
     Hmmm, I thought to myself. Vaginas.
     The tag line for the product was:
 

After menopause, intercourse can be painful.

But it doesn't have to be.
 

And underneath, a picture of a pretty flower. It (the advertisement, not the flower) said:
 

Discover a prescription that can help:

P------- (conjugated estrogens) Vaginal Cream.
 

     While "painful intercourse" might be a problem for some women after menopause, I found it amusing (in a scary way) that the cure is WAY worse than the, for lack of a better word, disease.
     Here are some of the warnings and safety information the advertisement offered:
     If a woman uses estrogen alone, she may increase her chances of getting cancer of the uterus.
     If a woman uses this particular Vaginal Cream and her vagina starts to bleed unusually, as opposed to bleeding usually, then she should report it.
     Report it? To whom? The FBI? The NSA? The TMZ? The advertisement doesn't say.
     A woman should not use estrogens, with or without progestins (whatever they are), to prevent heart disease, heart attacks, strokes or dementia. However, if a woman does use estrogens. with or without progestins, it might increase her risk of getting dementia. In other words, she's damned if she does and she's damned if she doesn't.
     If a woman uses estrogen alone, it might increase her chances of having a stroke or getting single or multiple blood clots, but if she uses estrogen with progestins, that might just cause her to have a heart attack, a stroke, get breast cancer, blood clots, maybe none of the above, maybe all of the above, or maybe only some of the above.
     The advertisement also warns that a woman shouldn't use their product if she has unusual vaginal bleeding, has or has had cancer, has had a stroke or a heart attack, has a bleeding disorder, is allergic to any or all of its ingredients, or even if she just thinks she's pregnant. So let me understand this, if you have any or all of these problems you shouldn't use this product, but if you don't have any or all of these problems... you STILL shouldn't use it, because this product might just give them to you.
     Wow.
     And we haven't even gotten to this product's common side effects, which are: headaches, pelvic pains, breast pains, vaginal bleeding, and vaginitis.
     Vaginitis.
     I don't even know what vaginitis is.
     I assume it has something to do with the vagina.
     But I do know this, the purpose of this cream--this Vaginal Cream--is to make sex for the woman more pleasurable. Can someone please tell me how headaches, pelvic and breast pains, vaginal bleeding, and vaginitis put a woman in the mood for sex? Sometimes all that has to happen to break the mood for my wife is for the air conditioner to come on.
     A doctor once told me that you don't want to have a woman's reproduction system before the age of fifty, and you don't want to have a man's reproductive system after the age of fifty.
     I don't think I'd want to have a woman's reproductive system, for lack of a better word...
     ...EVER.
 
 

Raising My Father

RaisingMyFather.blogspot.com

jimduchene.blogspot.com  Fifty Shades of Funny

@JimDuchene

   

Blah, Blah, Blah (Part Two)

     Dad can pretty much do anything on his own.
     That is, when he wants to. However, when my wife is around, he never wants to. Yeah, my wife has my father spoiled. Very spoiled. She treats him a lot better than the way she treats me. Not that I'm jealous. Not even a little.
     Okay, maybe a little.
     Anyway, I had set it up so my wife could have a nice trip, some peace of mind, and maybe even get in a little shopping. Two of our daughters were very happy to help us and give their mom a chance to relax. Our oldest daughter agreed to stay at our house while we were gone. She had set up her work schedule so that she could be at our house to keep an eye on her grandfather most of the time and she was even spending her nights there as well.

     Every morning while we were gone she got up and made her grandfather breakfast, which was nice to hear about, because when she lived with us she, like my Dad, enjoyed having her mother prepare her meals. Like most kids, I guess.
     She didn't make my Dad the feasts he's used to my wife cooking for him, but she fixed him a good breakfast none the less. Any breakfast you don't have to make yourself, I say, is a good breakfast.
     She was gone during the day, so she couldn't make him lunch, but for dinner she would always cook or bring him something.
     "Grandpa," she'd call. "I'm on my way home. Do you want anything?"
     "What?" See? I bet you thought it was just me.
     "Do you want anything?"
     "Do I want anything?"
     "Yes. Do you want anything?"
     "Do I want anything of what?"
     "To eat, grandpa?"
     "To eat?"
     "Yes. To eat."
     "Aren't you going to cook dinner?"
     "I don't have time. I'm running late."
     "Well..." Click, click, click! "Ah..." Smack, smack, smack! "Something to eat?"
     "Do you want some tacos?"
     "I don't like tacos."
     "You like tacos, grandpa."
     "No, I don't."
     "Every time I bring you tacos you eat them."
     "Just 'cause I eat them doesn't mean I like them."
     "You want a burger?"
     "Well... ah... I don't know."
     "I could bring you some Chinese food."
     "I really don't know."
     "Well, tell me what you want."
     "What I want?."
     "Yes, grandpa. What you want."
     "Well... ah..."
     "Mexican food?"
     "Too spicy."
     "Italian?"
     "Too heavy."
     "Chinese?"
     "Too light."
     "I'll bring you whatever you want, grandpa."
     "You sure you can't cook?"
     "Grandpa, I'm getting home too late to cook. What can I bring you?"
     "I guess tacos would be okay."
     After dinner, she served him snacks. Ice cream, fruit, or anything else a king might want served to him by a loyal subject on a golden tray. She'd set the TV on his favorite channel, where he could watch whichever baseball game happened to be on.

     Now, let's remember that our daughter is doing him (and us) a favor. She has her own family to care for, but for a week her family are on their own. Dad has other kids who can help out, but they're always MIA when it comes to taking care of Dad.
     "Hey," I'd tell one, "we're going out of town. Can you take care of Dad for four days?"
     "Aw," this one would answer, "Our kids..." Blah, blah, blah.
     "Hey," I'd tell the other, "we're going out of town. Can you take care of Dad for four days?"
     "Gee," that one would answer, "there's this virus going 'round, and..." Blah, blah, blah.
     Blah, blah, blah, indeed.
   

  

Raising My Father

RaisingMyFather.blogspot.com

jimduchene.blogspot.com  Fifty Shades of Funny

@JimDuchene

  

There's No "U" In "We" (Part One)

     I took my wife on a mini-vacation.
     Did we stay with the Trumps in New York? Visit the  Middletons in England? Go to Paris with the Obamas on the taxpayer's dime? No, our mini-vacation was more of a four day road trip.
     It's the first vacation that she and I have gone on (alone) for almost four years. My Dad is always my wife's foremost concern, and, for the last four years, if we went on vacation, he went on vacation.
     At my expense.
     Not that I'm complaining about the cost. I'm not even complaining about my Dad's lack of desire to produce anything resembling George Washington when the time comes to pay for anything. My main complaint would be the absence of any gratitude at the end of any transaction.
     No "thank you."
     No "but I was going to pay for it."
     No "of all my kids, you're my favorite."
     To be fair, however, I was probably the same way when I was a kid, and I probably offered him the same sense of entitlement and lack of gratitude he offers me now. And, to be truthful, there's probably no probably about it.
     "We're going to go out of town for a few days, Dad," I said, when I first broke the news to him.
     His eyes lit up. He's always up for a trip, even though he spends most of it complaining and telling us to pull over because he needs to go to the bathroom.
     "Really?" he asked. "Your wife didn't say anything to me about it. Where are we going?"
     "Well, it's just me and the wife this time, Dad. Alone."
     "What?"
     "It's just me and the wife."
     "Just you and the wife?"
     "Yes."
     "Going on vacation?"
     "Yes."
     "Alone?"
     "Yes. We need a break."
     "A break?"
     "Yes."
     "What kind of break?"
     "Just a break, Dad."
     "From what?"
     "What?" Now he's got me doing it.
     "A break from what?"
     "Dad, you know how it is. You were married."
     "What does that have to do with anything?"
     "Sometimes it's just nice to be alone, you know. With your wife."
     "You want to be alone with your wife?"
     "Yeah."
     "Yeah?"
     "Yeah."
     "If you want to alone with your wife, all you have to do is tell me. I can take a hint."
     "And what?"
     "What?"
     "And what?"
     "Well, I'll let you be alone."
     "You will?"
     "Of course I will. You can go upstairs and be alone with your wife, and I'll just stay down here and watch TV."
     Hmmm, that's not exactly what I had in mind when I told him I'd like to spend some time alone with my wife.

 

Raising My Father

RaisingMyFather.blogspot.com

jimduchene.blogspot.com  Fifty Shades of Funny

@JimDuchene