RaisingDad

My Dad drives me nuts.      Today I'm buffing the oak floor. (This is why I retired from my job, so I could spend all my free time buffing the floors.      "Tell me about it," my wife says as she washes what clothes need washing or makes what beds need making or cooks what foods need cooking. Anyway...)      The buffer is kind of loud (okay, it's a LOT of loud), and it makes a high pitched sound. A little TOO high-pitched for these old ears, so I wear ear protectors to muffle the sound. You've seen them used in gun ranges, if you're the kind of person who goes to gun ranges. If not, you've probably seen them in movies or TV. If you haven't seen them there, then you need to watch something else besides the Kardashians.       As I'm buffing the floor, my Dad walks in and sits in his-- my --favorite chair. My wife, out of habit, tur...

I'm in the great room by myself, sitting in my favorite chair, and watching something other than baseball for a change.      How did I get so lucky? I don't know. My Dad must be taking a nap or something. He's 96-years-old. Maybe I should check on him. But-- dang it! --I'm really enjoying myself, because my hitting the trifecta of television-watching is so rare.      My wife walks in. She gives me a big smile, walks over, and picks up the remote. As she changes the channel, she asks, me "Were you watching this?"       My answer?      "Not anymore."      That's the price I pay for hot coffee in the morning, hot meals three times a day, and the occasional something hot at night. (And I'm not talking about cocoa.)      I look at my wife. She looks happy watching her reruns of NCIS. I think she has a crush on Mark Harmon.   ...

The night before last, it was  the usual story. I go downstairs and find all the lights on. The kitchen lights are on, the lights under the kitchen cabinets are on, and the lights in the great room are on. Even the TV is on, but there's no one there. My Dad is MIA.      I could ask him, "Dad, why do you always turn on all the lights and then leave?" But he'll just deny doing that. It's like with the microwave. We tell him, "Dad, be sure to cover you food when you heat something up."      "Why?" he'll want to know.      "Because it splatters all over the inside of the microwave," we'll tell him. That's a pretty reasonable answer. One that anyone would respect.      When we find the interior of the microwave splattered with food soon after, we know who the culprit is.      "Dad," I'll ask him while my wife is cleaning up the splat...

My father continues to complain about his dentist.      He was telling my wife that he wants a new dentist. He's only been going to this one for decades, but, besides feeling that this one takes his money when he's not looking, he is positive that he has also screwed up one of his teeth. Once my father gets something in his brain, that's all he thinks about.      The problem is this, my father has one tooth that he fiddless with all the time. I'm talking about ALL the time. He pokes at it with tooth picks, flosses it, pokes at it with his fingers, and then complains to us that it hurts.      My father is closer to being 100-years-old than 90. I don't know how many times I've felt like telling him, "Dad, your teeth are about to celebrate their centennial. Be happy you still have them." I should also tell him to quit gargling with his tea before drinking it, but my w...

I used to enjoy watching Diane Sawyer report the nightly news on ABC because I found the way one of her eyes was smaller than the other mesmerizing. She looked as if she was skeptical of the news she was reporting while she was reporting it, and her hunched, leaning-toward-you posture added to the illusion. But, sadly, now she's gone. Like her youth.      Meanwhile, I can't believe that the biggest story on TV or in the newspapers is that it's winter and we're having winter weather. Winter only comes EVERY year. And with winter we get cold weather, snow, and icy roads.      The most interesting story about winter that I've read concerned a man in Fargo, North Dakota. He went into the walk-in freezer where he works to warm up. While the temperature outside was a chilly -40 degrees, inside the freezer it was a scalding -10.      In case you missed it, there was a Velveta Cheese shortage awhil...