Archive for July, 2008

The Apple and the Tree

July 28, 2008

My poor children – three beautiful apples which didn’t fall too far from the neurotic tree that is their Father.

They’re grown now, our youngest having turned 19 a few weeks ago.  Soon, no more teenagers. 

They each have their own distince personalities, one is serious, one is so NOT serious she can’t even define the word serious, and one is funny as hell.

All my kids have great senses of humor, but my poor son, Cliff Jr., picked up my genetic clown code.  (Check out the human genome.  Seriously.  There’s a gene called BOZO-84225, and it’s either dominant or recessive.  Okay, I’m talking out my a**… back to business).

This morning, my son discovered this blog and we text messaged a bit about it.  Texting with Cliff Jr. is odd – it’s usually 5:00 AM and I’m sitting on the MARC train waiting to depart to Washington, DC.  My day is one hour going already.  But 5:00 AM for Cliff is when his “evening” is coming to an end and he’s about to go to bed.  But I digress…

In the course of discussion about my blog, Cliff wrote:

“You need to make this into a book.  It would be a good book to read on the toilet.  Short, funny stories.  It’s making me want to poop.  Take that as nice as you can.”

I didn’t know whether to laugh, cry, or rewrite my will.  Okay, truth is, I laughed.  Out loud.  To the dismay of my fellow MARC-ers settling into their sleep modes.  But screw ’em, this was funny!

Poo seems to be a common theme with Cliff Jr. (I wonder why).  When he and his sisters would play Mad-Libs, his would read like:

“Ladies and gentlemen, on this poopy occasion, it is a privilege to address such a poopish-looking group of stools.  I can tell from your smiling turds that you will support my crappy program in the coming election.  I promise that, if elected, there will be feces in every toilet and two floaters in every garage.  I want to warn you against my smelly opponent, Mr. Hanky.  This man is nothing but a slimy drop.  He has a stoolish character and is working bm in with the criminal element.  If elected, I promise to eliminate vice.  I will keep the poops in the public till.  I promise you squeezy government, foul taxes, and crappy schools.”

When the children were very young, I would sing lines from Christmas carols and see how they’d finish them:

Oh the weather outside is _____:  frightful (Amy), snowing (Liz), poop (Cliff)
And the fire is so _____: delightful (Amy), hot (Liz), poop (Cliff)
And since there’s no place to _____: go (Amy), go (Liz), poop (Cliff)
Let it _____: snow (Amy), snow (Liz), poop (Cliff)
Let it _____: snow (Amy), snow (Liz), poop (Cliff)
Let it _____: snow (Amy), snow (Liz), poop (Cliff)

Maybe it’s because he’s a boy.  Maybe us boys – grown and ungrown – have a fascination with shock value.  Or maybe he needs to be evaluated.  I’ll let his some-day wife and his health insurance provider make that decision.  For now, it’s all good.  He’s not smearing things on the walls (that I know of) or pooping in his sister’s lemonade (that she knows of).  If this really were a problem, his Mom wouldn’t have to yell at him to clean up the dog’s mess in the front yard.

So for now, we’ll indulge his healthy poo fascination and chalk it up to a case of Cliffs will be Cliffs.  And for you, good reader, I pledge this blog shall be poo-reference-free for the next six weeks.

To learn more about poo, visit your local library.  Or screen the film The Road to Wellville.  Fascinating!

Author’s note: While the subject of today’s blog might seem distasteful, inapporpriate, crass or otherwise base –  it is – it’s better than what I was preparing to blog prior to receiving Cliff’s text messages.  I was going to comment on an excerpt I read in the Toledo Blade, my hometown’s daily newspaper.  This, taken word-for-word, from today’s edition:

“The late Laurel Blair was a collector – stamps, orchids, cuff links, books, and bourdalou (women’s urinals used in carriages, also known as ‘coach pots’).  When he was 52, he discovered his greatest love: lithopanes.” 

So imagine, had they had Viagra back then, Mr. Blair would still be occupied with women’s urinals, and we wouldn’t have the wonderful lithopane museum in Toledo today. 

But we might have had a bourdalou museum.  Our loss.

Tags:, , , , , , , , ,
Posted in Daily Thoughts | 3 Comments »

To Digress Or Not To Digress

July 26, 2008

Live from Martinsburg, W. Va., it’s Saturday Morning Writer’s Block!  Starring:
   Overflowing Laundry Hamper
   Corn Flakes on the Floor
   Papers Needing Filing
   CDs Scattered Everywhere
and Featuring
   Unmade Bed with Sheets Needing Washing
With Musical Guest Squeaky Ceiling Fan. 
And starring: 4:00 Writer’s Group Demanding Productivity. 

So, I look away from the laundry, the dirty floor, the pile of papers and CD’s, the unmade bed and the fan begging for WD-40.  I stare at this soul-less computer screen, wanting to write.  Not for the pleasure or the artistic pursuit, or even the profit (God knows THAT will never happen – I’ll sooner get cancer of the lip).  No, I want to write because I have a 4:00 writer’s group, and I want to share something.

I decided to seek inspiration at the Drudge Report.  What a guy, what a name.  How can anyone doubt the existence of God, or even the reality of God’s sense of humor, when, knowing where Matt would end up,  God gave him the last name of Drudge.  Aah, with my writer’s block melting off, I’m so happy to digress…

We consumers are a gullible lot.   Drudge carries regular stories of the rise and fall of the price of a barrel of oil.  Reading the latest this morning, I wished for the speculators to die soon so they can commence their unholy, fiery well-deserved eternal torment.  And I thought how last night, I was happy – HAPPY – to see gas at $3.74/gallon. 

Just a few years ago, we were angry when gas rose to $1.50.  Now we’re ready to wash our feet in gas that’s “cheap” at $3.75.

But I’m not going to fall for it.  I’m not going to be pleased with this still-too-high cost of gas.  I have principles.  Marketplace principles.

For example, a couple of years ago, I decided to boycott Breyer’s Ice Cream.  (Pause while my writer’s group, who will read this essay later today, laugh uncontrollably at the idea of Cliff Kurt boycotting ice cream.)  Yes, Breyer’s Ice Cream.  This manufacturer chose to engage in what I consider one of the most unconscionable gimmicks – package shrinking.  Breyer’s reduced its package size from one-half gallon to 1.75 quarts.  A drop of 12.5%  This represents a hidden price increase of over 14%.  If Breyer’s kept the half-gallon container and raised prices from $4 to $4.56, consumers would KNOW.  But by shrinking the package and relying on many (most?) consumers to not notice, consumers do NOT KNOW.  Shame.

And Breyer’s isn’t the only manufacturer.  Watch the size of the bag of potato chips.  The canned juices.  Even the weight of the breakfast bars.  It’s nearly universal.  But my principles kick began with Breyer’s.

I suppose I should ask myself, “Principles, yes, but at what cost?”  I’m sure my writer’s group colleagues are asking the same question as they covertly scoot their chairs further and further away from the clearly insane man over there.

My girlfriend – she’s smart.  She knows principles are important, but she also knows a thing or two about smart money management (which is why SHE’s going to buy dinner this evening.  Sorry, hon, I forgot to tell you – I’m broke).  But again I digress.

I know my girlfriend is smart because she finishes the crossword puzzles I can’t complete, she runs a Jeopardy board like Rainman in a sundress, and she insures her car with Geico Insurance.

I do not insure with Geico.  Over a matter of principle. 

Several years ago, my insurance costs rose due to a relocation from a state with normal drivers (Virginia) to a state with idiot drivers (West Virginia).  In quick order, two of my children came of driving age, causing further rate hikes.  It was a monthly exercise in rage control when I would have to pay the Gecio bill.

Then one month, as I was on the web paying the bill, I saw a Geico TV commercial featuring Pete Frampton or Little Richard or Tiny Tim.  Some celebrity, can’t remember who.  But as I was paying what I felt were ridiculously high insurance rates, Geico was wasting money paying celebrities to appear in ads – unnecessarily.   I snapped.  I switched to Nationwide, which had higher rates, but which rescued me from the monthly anger-fests and the blood pressure hikes whenever I would see that freakin’ dancing animated gecko prance around on TV – which I had been paying for!

But Shelley knows, as I knew of course, that despite the costs of those ads, they work.  They bring in huge numbers of insured, thus enlarging the pool (hopefully with good risks if Geico’s underwriters are worth their salt), thereby reducing rates for everyone.  But still, I just couldn’t shake the feeling – the principle of it.  I do have a solution – when Shelley and I marry (how’s THAT for positive thinking – visualize and it will become real), I’ll just ask her to select and manage our auto insurance.  Sweet!!

Well, if there’s ONE good thing to come from all of these high gas prices and marketplace gimmicks and dancing geckos and hidden marriage proposals, it’s that they gave me fodder for today’s blog and cured my writer’s block.  And saved my writer’s group from having to read my thoughts on how looking at one’s stools causes emotional disturbances.  Aren’t ya glad I’m not digressing here?

Tags:, , , , , , ,
Posted in Daily Thoughts | Leave a Comment »

Death Becomes Me

July 18, 2008

I like death.  I’m not sure why, but I’m fascinated with mortality, morbidity, rigor mortisity, et. al.

I guess I’ve always allowed my fascination to lie in the wet underbelly of my subconscious, but today as I enjoyed my daily ritual of perusing the obituarties in my hometown newspaper, I gave conscious thought to this dark interest.

It may have begun in my childhood.  My grandfather was a prominent mortician in Akron, Ohio, a couple of hours away from my boyhood home.  My family would visit him often, and he and Grandma would come visit us equally as often.  But I especially enjoyed our visits to them as we would drive the Ohio Turnpike to his home in Akron.  On our arrival, we would be greeted with a $1 bill (in the late 1960’s, that would buy enough candy to make one vomit, but I digress…) and all the butterballs we could eat.

Then, over the next days, I’d spend my time mostly with my cousin Danny.  Danny’s family, like Grandpa and Grandma, lived in a neighborhood behind the funeral home, within walking distance of the place.

I always wanted to be like Danny.  He was a real cool kid.  He had the cool move of proudly displaying a bottle of red formaldehyde as a decoration on his dresser.  (How bout THAT!?! Knew how to spell formaldehyde without even looking it up in the dictionary.)

Danny had the run of the funeral home, as long as he didn’t get in the way of any customers.  Any living customers.  Nobody really cared what he might have done with the dead customers (especially the dead ones themselves, probably), but still he respected them.

I got some really bomb-ass behind-the-scenes tours of the Kucko-Hecker Funeral Home.  We played hide-and-seek in the casket storage room.  He showed me the embalming room and at no extra charge, he threw in an explanation of all the really cool tools used to prep a dead body (oh so gross but oh so cool!).  He even offered to let me spy on an embalming, but I wasn’t yet ready for that.

I haven’t heard from Danny in years and years.  I suppose it’s because I have about 70 cousins on both sides of my family.  I think Danny’s an attorney these days.  I bet he specializes in probate law.

Such wonderful childhood memories!

The funeral home is still there.  It’s now run by Danny’s brother Peter.  The lobby displays a prominent oil painting of my Grandpa, who now looks a lot like my older, balder brother.  THAT is scarier than three corpses in a two-chapel funeral home!

Grandpa’s been dead for about thirty years, but I still remember the two pieces of advice he gave me:  1) You don’t need to fear dead people. They can’t harm you.  It’s the living people you should fear.  2)  You shouldn’t just eat drumsticks.  You should learn to eat all the pieces of the chicken.  You might go to a wedding some day and have to eat something other than a drumstick.  Yep, good advice on BOTH counts.

To celebrate the posting of today’s blog, I’m eating a Brach’s butterball.  I’m reminded of beautiful caskets made of rich, deep wood. And organ music and people crying.  And driving in a procession, immune to the stoplights.  And post-funeral gatherings with kielbasa and fried chicken and cole slaw.  For some reason, this brings me comfort. 

Maybe my death fascination would have been a fear of death – certainly that would be more heatlhy, I supose.  But ignorance is bliss.  Hand me another butterball, please.  Anybody know a good funeral this weekend?

Tags:, , , , , ,
Posted in Daily Thoughts | 1 Comment »

The Incontinental Divide, or How I Came to be a Suspected Bedwetter

July 15, 2008

I’m NOT a bedwetter.  In fact, I haven’t wet the bed since I was 41 years old.  Why, I change my bed sheets every six months, whether they need it or not.

But today, my co-workers must think I’m the poster boy for all those middle-aged, white-male incontinents.  This through no fault of my own except my fierce dedication to good hygiene.  (We can file this essay under, “Today, it sucks to be Cliff Kurt.”)

It all began with a seemingly ordinary, definitely innocent trip to the men’s room.  As usual, I carried my iPod (carrying a newspaper is an embarssing admission of one’s gastratory motives) so I could occupy my mind playing solitaire while – well, I don’t want to digress HERE.  Suffice it to say I was making a trip to the men’s room.

Everything was fine, ordinary, almost pleasant in a proctologist son’s curiosity sort of way.  I did my duty (winning the solitaire game in the process), and proceeded to the sink to wash my hands.  And here’s where the trouble began.  Or the hilarity ensues.  Take your pick.

I pressed down on the hand-soap pump, giving it a good couple of squirts.  But I didn’t feel any soap on my hands.  I’d heard the soap squirt out of the dispenser, but it was nowhere to be seen.  My search for the soap was becoming reminiscent of the famous hair gel scene in “Something About Mary.” 

And then I found it.  Two large, dark spots on and next to my fly.  Not good, friends. 

I assessed the situation.  It was about 10:00 AM.  I had six hours of work ahead of me (could I restrict all my work duties to my desk?  Maybe.)  Followed by a looong commute home where I would encounter hundreds of subway and MARC train riders, none of which, I’m sure, wants to stand or sit next to an incontinent.  Well, there is that ONE guy on the MARC train who everyone thinks is pretty strange.  Maybe he wouldn’t mind.  But I digress…

Clearly, there was no way I could allow these dark stains to remain. 

So I grabbed some paper towels, soaked ’em up with hot water and scrubbed away at the soap stains. 

I’ve oft heard the phrase, “This was where things went from bad to worse,” but really, this was where things went from bad to worse.

The soap didn’t simply wash away from my pants.  The stains became all sudsy and frothy, a white, bubbly mess on the front of my pants.  Dear reader, I will now pause while you insert your own obscene, digusting, at-my-expense joke here.   (pausing – long)  Are you done?  That was easy, wasn’t it?  Too easy.

So now, I had two rather large patches of white sudsy soap sitting on and next to my fly.  I had an office full of co-workers to pass through, followed by a google of commuters.  Oh, what was a hygenic boy to do?

I feared further scrubbing would make the stains larger, wetter and frothier.  I thought about putting a sign on my neck reading:

“It’s not what you think.  They’re soap stains.   You’re sick for thinking what you thought.” 

But like any good Republican, I understand it’s best not to call further attention to our flaws, so I nixed the sign idea.

I ran reconnaisance through the bathroom and, luckily, I found a newspaper.  This would allow me to escape to my office, hiding my unintentional mis-deeds behind the sports section, which I did. Successfully.  How ’bout them Bears?  Helluva game!  But again, I digress.

So now it’s about 1:30.  I’ve had the wet, white, frothy stains on my pants for about three and a half hours.  They’ve gone from wet and frothy to simply white and crusty.  I can’t freakin’ win.   I truly don’t know how I’m going to navigate the Metro/MARC stations tonight. 

Well, I suppose it could be worse.  I could have re-created any of a number of great scenes from Something About Mary.  I guess a couple of stains on my pants are better than hearing my girlfriend’s brother yelling about my “frank and beans” to the EMT’s.

Tags:, , , , , , , ,
Posted in Daily Thoughts | Leave a Comment »