I Heard You Coming

The other day I popped by to see my Dad. Always a treat - even for a curmudgeon.

What I wasn't expecting when he greeted me at the door was "I heard you coming." Apparently Jimi Hendrix, playing dutifully at volume through a 400-watt sound system that makes the rear-view mirror useless (way too shaky from the bass) could be heard INSIDE HIS HOUSE.

We are talking a beautiful, relaxed suburban setting here - my humble car was broadcasting Jimi some 100 feet away with the windows closed. Zounds!

I know my Sainted wife always claims I don't hear her when she's talking to me, but maybe she's on to something. So I tested this "theory" by playing Jimi on my home stereo at appropriate Hendrix volumes (you, dear readers, no doubt recall the damage Who volume can do to wall-mounted plates) and walked outside.

Uh oh. I could hear it out front on the street...with all the windows closed.

Cool.

Brakemen

Have you ever thought about these guys? In the early days of railroading, these were the crucial guys who helped to stop trains. They were pretty brave dudes in their day: old trains didn't have the automatic braking system they do today. So the brakemen would clamber up atop each car and manually apply brakes when needed.

Tossing and turning on a top of a moving train car, trying to turn a mechanical wheel to grip the brake drums on each car. Crazy stuff. They deserved a union to call attention to the risks of the job.

Then, as with auto workers, things got out of hand. Train air brakes were invented - brakemen were no longer needed. But, the union negotiated to keep them on - doing nothing of value but getting paid handsomely.

Curmudgeonly diabolical.

Multitasking

Have you encountered one of these yahoos who brag that they can "multitask?" You don't have to be a curmudgeon to know they are full of it.

Spend 5 minutes with one of these sorts and it becomes clear they can no more "multitask" than your average dog can. The best can switch between tasks with admirable alacrity, but most sort of zone out when the going gets tough. It becomes great fun to throw a question at them while they are "multitasking" and watch them grind to a halt.

Curmudgeons? ANY task is to be avoided, let alone multiples.

Shopping for Paint

If you are a married man, you have been dragged to the paint store to look at "colors." You rarely, if ever, go there voluntarily. As a matter of record, our local paint store has a sign proclaiming "no custom colors mixed without permission slip from wife."

Fine by me.

So here you are, in the paint store with your Sainted wife. You smile benignly, you make like the coral is indeed different from the pink, that there are key differences between the zillion "whites," that that shade is no doubt "so last year:" you basically whore yourself out for peace on the home front.

I'm a curmudgeon. This adventure is the definitive test of marital harmony. Who knew? Not any guy I ever met. It wasn't anywhere in the marriage vows I took.

And don't even start me on wallpaper shopping.

More Breakfasts With Tom

I have mentioned these before (way, way back in December 2012). These are periodic breakfasts with my good friend Tom where we engage in an active discussion of current affairs from an economic point of view.

I trust I have not already put you to sleep.

The "active" part is where I actively eat and Tom expounds (seemingly endlessly) on various economic theories as if they were a) interesting, and b) factual. And everything that is going on economically these days apparently spells doom and gloom for us all. By the time I get back home, my Sainted wife has to quarantine me until I have fully, as she phrases it, "detoxed from Tom."

This is why I engage in this "entertainment" periodically - any more frequently and I would be suicidal.

Hunks

Oh yeah, I'm a hunk. Sadly, not in the way you, dear readers, are probably hoping.

Coming out of high school I was a lean, mean, fighting ma...well, lean machine. Finely toned at 6' and 150 pounds, I was...well, lean. Being a curmudgeon and therefore abjectly averse to exercise in any way, shape or form, I slowly lost the "lean" bit.

Pinch an inch? I can do that on an arm. Love handles? I'm way beyond that, unless your hands are like André the Giant's. I sure am glad they invented "comfort fit" waists and "relaxed fit" shirts. My fear is that I will soon be old enough to appear in public in sweat pants and get away with it.

It's a damned good thing Skittles hadn't been invented back when I was in high school.

Repairing Steps

I was recently telling my Dad how I had spent two days repairing the back garage door step. I was quite proud of myself. He sort of yawned. "Just one step?" Well, yes, but it was a very special step.

Normal back door steps are simple planks; replace a couple and you're done in, oh, half an hour or so.

But this was not any ordinary step. Our garden architect (these people, I learned way too late, exist) built us a step no carpenter ever would. It was topped with 3x1 cedar that was angled to match the patio brickwork. And all the edges were artfully routed. I had dreaded this project from the start.

Apparently, he had felt 4" nails would be a good choice for the 1" thick planks. I had to use a hammer ON the pry bar just to remove them. One lousy step. I had my hammer, the pry bar, a saw, a drill, the router, and special screws out before I was done.

That sucker better last. You don't mess with a curmudgeon.

Italian Cooking

I live in a town with a high proportion of Italians whose ancestors were recruited by rich Americans (Rockefellers, etc.) to build their "country" estates out here at the turn of the 20th century, conveniently accessible from NYC by their private railcar.

And so, extraordinary stone mansions were built by extraordinary Italian stone craftsmen. Of course, "old country" cooking followed. It's primarily "we have a bunch of these tomatoes, our herders brought us some cheese, whatever are we to do?" And pizza and a myriad of pasta-tomato sauce-cheese dishes came to America. Each virtually identical in makeup, but in true cultural pride, given different names. There are somewhere around a zillion shapes of pasta, each with its own name and "gravy" that has to be simmered for hours.

Curmudgeons don't play that game. We buy Spatini powder for "gravy" and any convenient spaghetti. Surprise! Tastes great.

Distracted Drizzle Driving

An alert reader recently mentioned a scourge in Southern California: driving a car. Out there in lala land, distracted drizzle driving is a thing. Known as DDD locally, it appears to be a combination of discovering moisture on the roadway while one is driving and texting.

Apparently, a recently wetted road surface is a driving hazard that continues to escape them (I mentioned this phenomenon some time ago). Moving about in the rain in a motorized vehicle still confounds them - so apparently, the faster, the better (or, in So Cal terms, perhaps inch ahead).

So off they go, zipping about on wet roads they refuse to accept are slippery, texting away. Big surprise. Another DDD-related incident occurs.

That SoCal - what a fun place.

Stink Bugs

Have you encountered these things? Apparently another bizarre import from Japan, they are called stink bugs because they emit a real foul smell if you smash them as you would any other annoying bug.

They are bizarre also because they just sort of appear in our house around this time of year - one here, one there. And to add to the overall weirdness of these things, they show up fully grown - I've never seen a mini version.

But they are real slow and clumsy, so they are easy enough to scoop up, but since you can't crush them, they have to be flushed.

If I'm in a real foul mood, I toss them in a neighbor's Japanese car.

Button Flies

What fashion nitwit brought these things back? I can understand that they were a good idea - BEFORE THE ZIPPER WAS INVENTED. The last thing I need is a delay between me and my important business.

If you're stupid enough to go "commando" and catch your willie in a zipper, you're an idiot. But fumbling with buttons (and modern designers' fondness for turning them sideways in odd places) is no way to approach essential functions you engage in a few times a day.

I agree with Seinfeld's assessment that "down there" is no place for sharp metal teeth that mesh together, but for normal guys wearing underwear, screwing around with buttons is beyond stupid.

Malaysia

The curmudgeon Societé Generale expects me to keep a keen eye on how well I'm getting our message out. I recently discovered that curmudgeonry has been happily discovered in Malaysia. This was big.

First, I had to find out where this "Malaysia" was. I'm a U.S. waspy curmudgeon - I'm not even sure where Cleveland is. Malaysia was a whole other story. My first reaction was to draw on what I had learned in grade school geography: it's in Spain...or maybe India.

As an adult now, I apparently have better resources at hand. Malaysia is big. And has lots of people. Lots of people ON THE OTHER SIDE OF THE EARTH.

Curmudgeonry rules.

Mr. Wong

It was the 30s - the 1930s, that is. You are Monogram Movie Studios and Fox Studios is eating your lunch with their wildly successful Charlie Chan mysteries starring that well-known Chinese actor Sidney Toler. (Note to non-fans: Sidney was Missouri born and bred.)

So you decide to cash in on their success by creating your own series of Chinese detective movies starring another well-known Chinese actor, Boris Karloff. Yes, they were hoping to cash in on the fact that he was already a household name given his turn as Frankenstein's monster.

So a Chinese detective he became. Hollywood at its finest.

SPAM

I have made no secret of liking SPAM. Heck, as I noted back in January of 2012, I named my beautiful dark blue sailboat the SPAM.

The popularity of SPAM seems to follow U.S. Military presence - it's popularity surged in Britain during the post-war years when it was tough going there; it is apparently quite popular in Hawaii to this day.

However, the front page of the January 27 New York Times proclaims it is not only popular in Korea now, it is a highly respected gift. You know, a housewarming gift, a hostess gift. They even have special gift packages of a few cans neatly wrapped together for the holidays.

Now THAT'S liking SPAM.

Couch Shopping

Shopping for couches isn't what it used to be. They do things these days, they don't just sit there and look pretty like in the old days.

My Sainted wife and I set out on a shopping mission - it seems that I have made quite the impression (literally) on the couch here in Command Central. It was time to up our game.

Then we discovered what could be had in today's couches - a recliner (and not only any old recliner, but a power one with separately controlled headrest or massage), A/C power in the armrest, storage in the armrest, USB ports to charge phones, little courtesy lights for the fold-down center work surface. You know, FEATURES. In a couch.

It's being delivered this Thursday. The future of couchery begins, oddly enough, with a curmudgeon.

Chick Flicks

As a card-carrying Curmudgeon Societé Generale member, I don't do "chick flicks." However, as a husband, I am confronted with a real dilemma. My Sainted wife doesn't do action flicks.

Curmudgeons therefore fall to the ground on our knees thanking the inventor of the multiplex. They permit us to go to the movies we love...somewhat together.

Here in Command Central, emotion-filled crapola is not permitted.

If they can do parental controls, why can't they do guy controls? Or some alarm system when a chick flick is coming on?

We need some warning so we can prepare our excuses.

Remote Buttons

It was inevitable. Watching TV in this high-tech age has turned on me.

Here I am, watching a pleasant Detective Murdoch on Netflix and there is a hiccup on the internet, interrupting the show. My Apple TV returns to the start menu and I then have to push a button 7 TIMES to return to my show.

1. Select Netflix from main menu
2. Select user (is it me or Sainted wife)
3. Select "recently watched" from Netflix menu
4. Select the show
5. Select the interrupted episode
6. Select "play"
7. Select "resume" (vs. "restart from beginning")

I'm telling you, I'm exhausted. In the old days, you just got up and gave the side of the TV a good wallop.

Choir

My Sainted wife is in the choir at her church. She has a beautiful voice, and loves being part of making uplifting music. She apparently derives as much pleasure from this as I do from flinging plates off the wall with the Who or Jimi Hendrix, so that's really saying something.

Her choir, on the other hand, has members who have taken to resenting that the choir director has singled her out for extra singing duty.

A church choir. With jealousies. You can't make this stuff up.

These are women stuck in junior high school. You wouldn't catch curmudgeons talking behind each other's backs. We're too obstreperous, in-your-face types.

And we aren't engaged in anything anywhere near as noble.

Lanes

OK, I've about had it. I've often mentioned that driving in New Jersey takes guts and special skills. Old, winding, narrow roads and such.

However, as with driving anywhere, one general rule of driving is staying in your lane. Rather basic. Sort of your rule #1 of avoiding accidents.

Apparently this basic driving technique is escaping newer drivers here. If there is a parked construction vehicle, say, in their lane, you would expect them to wait until there is no oncoming traffic and proceed around the obstruction. Hah! Not any more. People just wander around the obstruction into your lane as if they expect you to divine their stupidity and squeeze into the gutter so that they don't have to practice expected driving norms.

After all, stopping to wait for oncoming traffic to clear would disrupt their precious rush for that venti latte at Starbucks.

The Big Game

What a game! The defense! The passes! The goals and stuff.

Seriously, I didn't watch a minute of it.

My favorite Super Bowl parties were held at a good friend's house for years. We all were completely disinterested in the game - it was just an excuse for a party. We would joke around, hold loud conversations through no doubt the most exciting parts of the game, pausing only for the ads.

One year, some unfortunate guy came thinking it was a real Super Bowl party. He really got upset when he couldn't hear the game over us goofing around.

Beautiful.