RaisingDad

My Dad and I are sitting in the great room.      I have my back to him. I'm drinking coffee and writing on this blog, which is what I do when I'm not buffing the oak floors or being driven nuts by my father.      My Dad is drinking his tea. My wife makes it special for him every morning and every day.      "What do you do to make it so special?" I asked her once. I was teasing her, so I didn't really expect an answer.      "I make it with love," she tells me, putting me in my place.      And she does. Makes it with love, I mean.        I look up from my computer. I think I hear my Dad, um,  gargling?      Hmm... I sit, listen, and wait.      A few seconds later I hear him gargling again.      Slowly, like my imaginary days as a SEAL Team Six soldier, I get u...

It's Sunday morning.      I'm sitting outside drinking my second cup of coffee. I've already read the Sunday newspaper. Twice. Well, not really. I've already read the Sunday newspaper twice, except for the front page section.      My Dad is inside sitting at the kitchen table finishing his breakfast. He's got a healthy appetite, but he eats slowly. Very slowly. It's not that he's some kind of half-human/half-turtle hybrid. He'll move fast enough if I drop a twenty on the floor. He'll pick it up and say it's his with a speed The Flash would envy.      No, I think he's eats slow because he has the whole day ahead of him with nothing to do, so he figures, "What's the rush?"      He's already read the front page, and it sits to his right. Next to his plate. He's got his elbow on the paper. Just enough of his elbow to let the world know that it's his.      Like my twenty ...

I wrote the following after reading a profile about Bruce Dern in Rolling Stone magazine. After sending it to him, I got the usual Hollywood reply: "Don't call us, we'll call you." If anybody can send me the zip code to his PO Box in Santa Monica, California, I would appreciate it.    Night.      It's dark and it's beautiful.      Somewhere in the blackness, a door opens and closes.      Now there's just a sliver of light on the horizon, but just a sliver. No more than a razor slice of light, really.      And now someone running toward it.        It's morning now. A pretty blonde lady, Laura, is busy. She's preparing breakfast in her kitchen. Her husband, Henry, walks in, and, after a kiss good morning, sits at the kitchen counter where the newspaper waits for him.      "Would you look at this?" Henry tells his wife, acting...

I bought a ginger ale the other day and it had no ginger in it.      It was made with carbonated water, pure cane sugar (which is just processed sugar... the healthiest kind), and artificial & natural extracts and flavors. It also had citric acid and caramel color. Not caramel , but caramel color. And, by the way, how do you even pronounce caramel? With two syllables or three?      I've been corrected both ways.      Is it "car -a- mel" or "car- mel "? I always thought Carmel was the town where Clint Eastwood was mayor. At any rate, before this turns into a story about me complaining about to -may -toes or to -mah -toes , let me get to my main point...      I was at Sam's yesterday. My wife I were getting away with only a few items this time around, since my Dad wasn't with us to toss additional unwanted items into the basket. Unfortunately, however, it wasn't few enough.    ...