The Ben Matlock Legal Degree

There are people who scoff at how much Matlock I watch. Hah! They scoff. Well, I now have the last, er, scoff.

I just received my official Matlock legal aid degree. Hah! I scoff back. Granted it has absolutely no courtroom standing, but requires only 50 Captain Crunch box tops, and looks real impressive mounted on the wall of my office in the provided frame with the look of real wood. People who used to ignore me now seek my "professional" legal advice.

You are taught how to claim never having lost a case (one of the key Matlock tenets), especially seeing as how you never really take up what might be called a "case." The course also instructs you on how to acquire a good ole boy southern accent AND how best to dye your hair silver. You make sure the TV in the waiting room runs a loop of Matlocks and the money just pours in. 

Beautiful.

Shopping? Let's Go - Chop Chop

The other day I heard those words dreaded by men of all ages:  "Dear, would you like to go shopping with me?"

Who does this? When a guy needs a few more #8 flat head Phillips screws, he doesn't call a close friend to ask if they want to go shopping. First off, guys don't go "shopping;" they go buying. They know the store they need, the area where such parts are and poof poof, the necessary things are bought and promptly brought home.

Women? It is "shopping." It is a social occasion since you're about to wander about a store (virtually any store will do) checking everything out.

This disparity has produced that sad, emasculated class of "men" who sit in malls holding on to their wife's purses while she and her dearest friends "shop."

You will NEVER catch a curmudgeon doing anything of the sort. We prefer turning it all into a useful sport.

Loose Ends....Literally

As you can see here, I have been obsessing over people who should be able to easily comment on any given post for the past 3 years. Turns out, my late December research paid off as I got more comments on the last week of the Repor than any other issue ever.

And as the New Yorker points out, I'm not alone.




But wait, there's more. The New Yorker illuminates the  curmudgeon philosophy quite often.  Frankly, as seen here, we think ALL vegetarians are idiots. It takes the New Yorker, however, to perfectly capture the sentiments of idiot vegetarians all around us. People who make ordering lunch a cringeworthy experience.




Finally, not part of the Curmudgeon Societé Generale Handbook, but admirably illustrating our métier:

It's Alive...

All of a week ago, a bunch of us youthful type curmudgeons (recently retired, new to Medicare, etc.) declared the Curmudgeon Societé Generale dead.

To seal the deal, we mounted a ceremonial Curmudgeon Handbook book burning party. I even let them burn my own humble chapter - Trash is the Last Resort.  We were on a youth-related tear, the youngest of us, at 55, reminding us what pre-retirement desk sitting resilience used to be.

Oddly, the following morning I got a visit from two esteemed former Curmudgeon Societé Generale representatives.  As I seem to recall, they had convenient single syllable names that could be suitably approximated by the odd grunt. They also had a certain economy of movement, seeing as how they were unencumbered by necks.

The message was simple: publish the final few articles "in the can" and I would be permitted continued use of my extremities.  And thus, "the Repor That Wouldn't Die" series has been born. Happily, Hanz and Franz can't read, so I may wander from strict Societé Generale regulations now and again.

Hey, we're young and we're passionate (mostly about our next meal, but it's a start).

Sad News

Today, the Curmudgeon Societé Generale disbanded.

We sort of ran out of old coots. They have the nasty habit of K'ing the B, and a few too many did so.

Sadly, I'm not going to pick up the reigns of those crusty old overly opinionated types. I was merely recording secretary. I took it upon myself to soften their antiquated views, but that ends today.

I've toiled for the past 3 years on over 1300 entries, some 16,000 page views by loyal readers, and support from a dozen countries.

But there comes a time to move on - to where, we shall see.

I want to thank all my loyal readers for their support, without which I wouldn't have made it this far.

Technology Officer - Official Idiot

As the Technology officer of the Curmudgeon Societé Generale, I am bereft. I have misplaced my iPhone.

I know, I know, I have an iPhone finder in my computer and all (technology officer) but it would only say it was here.

As a retired curmudgeon I am "here" a whole, whole lot. It is not telling me what room, what coat pocket, what floor. It is merely telling me what an idiot I am.

As if I didn't already know. ,  

Blue

As the technology officer of the Curmudgeon Societé Generale, I rush (as fast as any curmudgeon can) to embrace new technology.

Bluetooth. What a pile of crap. Leave the room and it disappears. Wander about your house and it resets to its favorite condition: ignoring you and your fancy dancy phone.

I suffer for technology.

There Will Always be a Mr. Tudball

We shall call him Mr. Tudball. As this candid picture shows, not everyone is cut out for a smartphone. Hell, adding a camera to a flip phone was clearly a trial for Mr. Tudball.

We all know one or two close friends who, like Mr. Tudball here, haven't taken a shine to plain old cell phones, let alone smartphones. Hell, here in the Curmudgeon fraternity, there are a LOT of such Luddites. They completely miss how quickly one gets to appreciate rapid communications with people, and as a corollary, how much they miss by not being able to stay in the loop with family and friends.

There will always be the Tudballs of the world...and thus, chortles for the rest of us.

Closed Captions

My Sainted wife and I have taken to using closed captioning when watching TV, and not for the reason you're probably thinking:  "they're old, they're going deaf." No, as suggested by an alert reader, we use it so we can understand the dialog in British shows.

Yes, yes, I know they too are speaking English, but let's face it - when the British get to talking fast it can be a struggle to keep up. Plus they have this habit of pronouncing everything differently if they don't have an entirely different word handy (e.g., chemist is pharmacist) which really puts a spanner in the gubbins.

Which brings up a troubling observation: closed captioning is always there when you need it. That means it is there on even the absolute WORST movies imaginable (Plan 9 From Outer Space and its ilk). I assume that means someone actually had to sit through these awful things typing up the, for want of a better word, dialog.

I hope the dialog typing union is good enough to get them some kind of combat pay for being exposed to these horrid things.

Kids Today (Slight Return)

My fellow curmudgeons are forever whining about "kids today" being on their phones all the time. Followed, generally, by some creative mangling of the names 'Facebook' or 'Twitter'. I touched upon this last April.

Kids spending too much time on their smartphones is really a tired trope these days. When I think of what I spent too much time on when I was that age, I cringe. So kids walking around with a computer in their pocket and commu-
nicating with each other excessively doesn't even appear on my radar.

And, according to this picture, we old farts are just as guilty.

Curmudgeons Abroad

Let's face it, foreign travel is not for curmudgeons. Even if we could tolerate the actual getting there bit, we would probably starve once there.

There is no safe haven abroad - England? They boil EVERYTHING. Scandinavia? Do you KNOW what gravlax or finnan haddie are? Greece? Yeah, we're going to eat yogurt and figs. Pressing on, un-Americanized Italian or Mexican would no doubt be deadly, and let's just cross India (how spoiled IS this curried meat?) and Japan (you didn't COOK this fish?) and China (why is my dinner moving?) right off the list.

Aah, give us good old American cooking. Like Denny's...or Taco Bell. Beautiful!

Start the New Year Right - Comment!

For my devoted readers who are just as confused as me about how to send comments on this blog, I have, mostly, good news.

The good news - IT CAN BE DONE!

- Tap "No Comments" (for bizarre reasons that have yet to be explained).
- Enter your comment in the cute box provided.
- Selecting "anonymous" in "Comment as" is fine.
- Tap "Publish"
- Tap "I'm not a robot" to get one of those (damned) CAPTCHAs. Solve it, hit "verify" and it checks off that you're not a robot - that's a good thing, isn't it?
- Tap "publish" because you've been verified as human by the Blogspot computer (a tad meta, no?).
- You're back to your comment - but with "Your comment was published" proudly displayed!

Easy, no? I agree - no. But don't let that stop you! Comment away!