RaisingDad

Merry Christmas to me!      Ho, ho, ho, and all that jolly old elf stuff.      An empty house is not a happy place, in and of itself. No, it takes a family to make that house a home, to fill all the nooks and crannies with Christmas joy. For me, my family is what makes my house the happiest place on earth. Even happier than Disneyland.      And they're all here. At home. At least for one night.      Everyone is talking and laughing. The grandkids are running around, laughing, and eating, with the dogs eating what the kids drop on the floor. All of this is what makes life worth living.      As some of us get older, some of us get smarter. Don't sweat the small stuff, because it's all small stuff. And, while you're at it, don't sweat the big stuff either.      When I ask some people how they're doing, n...

Ah, Christmas.      I remember when it would cost me under $100. It would be enough to buy enough gifts for everyone, and I'm talking about nice gifts. Not like the kind my brother gives. He once gave me a shirt that was from a very expensive store, and when I went to return it, the sales person hemmed and hawed and then told me that the shirt was from last season, and they could only give me the sale price, which ended up with ME owing THEM money. But I don't hold grudges.      Anyway...      Then the cost of Christmas warp-speeded into the hundreds. It seems like it was just a few years ago that I could still keep everything under a thousand... now it runs over a thousand. Why? Don't ask me, I just earn the cash and sign the checks.       Well, now that I have taken my parent's place within my family, the cost of Christmas continues to make t...

     Watch out, folks, Christmas is just a day or two away.      Myself, I enjoy the holidays. The days are short and cold, and the nights are long and even colder. People are friendly, and, if they can't accomplish that, they  try to be friendly, and, if they can't accomplish that, they try to appear to be friendly. I'll settle for that. I've always said that I'd rather have someone who hates me, but treats me good, than someone who loves me, but treats me bad. The  pretense of gentility is just as good as the real thing, as far as I'm concerned.      As usual, my wife and I are having the family Christmas dinner at our home. My wife likes to have it at our house because, as she says, we can cook whatever we want and invite whomever we want... it's our house. Our family has grown to the point that we have a lot of grandkids and non-family guests. ...

I get home today. All the lights are on.      In the great room. In the kitchen. The hallway. I can see the path whoever it was took just by looking at their trail of lights. It's so bright, I put on my sunglasses before I burn out my corneas.      I hear talking, but that's just the TV. It's on with no one watching it.       I know my wife is out having her hair done, so who could it have been?      I then look at my Dad's little father-in-law apartment in the front of my property. It's a separate unit, and its front door faces the entrance to our kitchen. I can see all the lights are on there as well. It's the middle of the day, and yet the outside light over his front door is even on. The lights are on in his room, his closet, his bathroom. Of course, his TV is on, too. Why wouldn't it be?      What is up with this?...

Last night, as I walked by my Dad's private bedroom in his private little father-in-law house at the front of the main house, I noticed that all of his lights were on. The light on the ceiling. The light on the nightstand. And the light in his closet. The TV was on. The bathroom light was on. And the heater was working overtime.      Has my Dad, in his old age, become afraid of the dark?      In fact, now that I think about it, where was my Dad?      He was in the great room, sitting in his-- my --favorite chair.      (In case you've always wondered why I always refer to his favorite chair as my favorite chair, it's because before my wife and I decided to invite him to live with us, that used to be my chair. He had his chair, back in the house he used to live in when my Mom was still alive, and it went with him to the very nice apartment he moved into after she died. Wh...

as submitted to the AARP Bulletin        At 18, you could say I was feeling my oats.      It was the 70’s, and various states—in their wisdom—had just lowered the drinking age, so my buddies and I thought we’d do our patriotic duty and throw back a few.      My father only had 2 rules for me: 1) don’t miss my curfew, and 2) don’t drink. Unfortunately, he didn’t add another rule to that short list: 3) don’t be stupid. If he had, I might not have broken the first 2.      To his credit, my father—whose belt not only held up his pants, but was also in charge of administering justice—didn’t overreact. In fact, he even let me sleep it off.      When I woke up the next afternoon, hung over didn’t even begin to describe how bad I felt. I didn’t think I was hung over, I thought I was dying. I felt so bad, my teeth even hurt.      “Hung over?” my Dad asked. He w...

Today I went to Costco to gas up.      With the gas pumps, there's only one way in and one way out. There are HUGE white arrows painted on the black pavement indicating which way you're supposed to travel. There are numerous signs that read "DO NOT ENTER!" "EXIT!" "EXIT ONLY!" and they're all painted in a bright red. Not even Ray Charles could miss them. And, if I haven't made my point clearly enough already, there are the white signs: "Enter" "Enter For Gas." Again, you could put a blindfold on Stevie Wonder, and he  would have had no problems finding the entrance and exit to the gas pumps.        Costco being where you can get cheap gas, the lines are all long  Except for one. I can do the math, that pump must be broken. But, as I drive closer to the pumps, I notice there's a car there... and it's pointed the WR0NG WAY!      This driver--a female--had...