The Porch

There he is again--swat--bzzzzz. “Ah shucks!! He got away again.” ( You’ll notice that I have emphasized ah shucks which is entirely foreign to my vocabulary, but in that this is Sunday I thought it best to incorporate a degree of respect into this article. If the full truth were known, I said #$%& to myself.)

There are two events that my wife and I look forward to being a part of our every Sunday.

One would be our attendance at our Church, and the other would be sitting out on our screen-less but, newly constructed back porch with a cup of coffee in my right hand and a soft drink in my wife’s left hand.

The reason we both have a free hand, is that the other hand is generally occupied with a fly swatter which is generally attempting to swat that one aggravating fly who in turn is displaying his dire affection for either our bodies or our drinks.

“There he is on the window ledge,” is the general announcement, before I take another swat at him and miss, uttering under my breath the same words of disappointment.

--I immediately have discouraging visions in which I can clearly picture the fact that I’d never make it as a major league baseball player--

My wife then drops her fly swatter, as well as her drink on the floor when the door from the kitchen to the porch opens and there is a cheerful emission of the word “Hello.” ( I didn’t want to divulge this fact, but my wife suffers from un-co-ordination and is very startled by surprise. This has garnered our attention, and with psychiatric assistance ( which is mainly covered by Medicare ) we are trying our best to correct these two unfortunate conditions.

Nevertheless, that bright and cheerful “Hello” emanated from the mouth of our daughter in law.

We had completely forgotten that we had committed ourselves to watch our 6 year old grandson for this afternoon.

As a reciprocal gesture, she had baked us a chocolate cake with vanilla icing.

She showed us the cake, which for some reason she placed between my wife and I, on a small table.

Before our daughter in law had found enough time to leave, I was proudly instructing my grandson in the art of fly swatting.

Before she had found the necessary time to back out of the driveway, I had issued my grandson a fly-swatter.

Apparently, my grandson has a waning concentration, as he began to play with our dog, temporarily forgetting about my instructions, into which I had placed great effort.

This apparent total lack of respect was like “a slap in the face” to me, so I attempted to correct this void in my grandson, by calling for a squadron formation. I can not overemphasize the seriousness nor the importance of fly-swatting. ( Particularly, on our back porch. )

That annoying fly made his appearance once again, only this time on the lamp shade.

The swatting privileges were passed to both my wife and grandson.

They swung and missed at which time both had the same vision as I had of never being allowed to play in major league baseball.

That fly had to be very aggressive, as his next location was in the outer periphery of the cake.

I gave specific instructions, that upon my count, all three of us would swat the periphery of the cake where the fly appeared to be eating away. ( in that I am not an entomologist I really don’t know what he was doing. But, whatever the function was, it appeared to make him very complacent. )

Unfortunately, we missed the periphery of the cake. and all three of us hit the cake dead center. This total lack of alignment may be attributed to:

1) My grandson’s lack of concentration.

2) my wife’s lack of co-ordination.

3) my lack of good fortune.

Somehow the complacent fly had once again eluded his eternal destiny.

So, we heard those old familiar sounds--swat-- bzzzzz!!

However, the effect the hapless fly swatters had on the vanilla icing was similar to a very large elephant stepping into a jar of Vasoline.

In other words--there was a really big squish, which in turn caused the icing to become dislodged from the cake.

There was vanilla icing everywhere, except of course on the cake.

The icing was dangling from the right ear lobe of my grandson, in my wife’s hair and on my nose and in my left eye. A few pieces even made it as far as the drink spilled by my wife.

The icing also went up the right nostril of our dog, which I had to extract, after I was able to breathe and see once more.

It was not fun cleaning ourselves up to a presentable state and removing the liquid from the deck, but when we had, we all felt much better.

When this had been accomplished we resumed our Sunday siesta on the back porch.

A day filled with limited frustration and relaxation.

Relaxation, until we heard that fateful --bzzzzz!

THE FLIGHT

What would be your reaction be if you had planned to take a business flight to a major city. At the last moment you had chosen to upgrade your accommodations from coach to first class.

You settled into a much more comfortable chair with considerably more “leg room” and found that the person sitting beside you was a famous singer whose name you couldn’t recall?

So far, I bet your reaction would be one of ecstasy, especially if you liked his singing.

There was only one minor problem, he was dead!!

I’ll bet now that reaction just headed south.

You now have the choice between running to the restroom and “tossing your cookies,”  or you could be the first to call for immediate assistance and administer CPR.

You might find that by choosing the latter path you would save the life of a very talented individual.

You also would eliminate the possibility of getting your foot caught in the commode, which is quite easy to do in an airplane restroom, especially if you are performing two functions.

The airline company places in the commode a disinfectant, which is understandable.

This disinfectant acts as a dye.

Many a time after using the airplane restroom I have returned to my seat with a blue pants leg and my suit is gray.

Returning to the guy who appeared dead, he appeared moribund, but he was really just fast asleep.

Needless to say, he was most unappreciative of my administration of CPR.

After I had explained to him my mistake and that I thought he was the greatest singing talent in the world, he seemed to calm down a little.

He also exhibited another new-borne trait. For the rest of the flight he would no longer sit beside me.

And that’s a shame in a way, because I have a daughter who wants to be a singer, and I consequently had several questions to ask him.

Oh well, that’s life.

Now there is an empty seat in first class, because of his transferring to the coach section.

The stewardess offered it to anyone in that section at no extra cost, but for some reason everyone exhibits an apprehension to sit in the seat next to me.

So I am now seated next to an empty seat.

As I have embarked on this flight for business purposes, it is imperative that I appear busy because you never know who’s looking.

I remove my lap top from its case only to discover a mouse ( a real one!) inside.

The mouse jumps into the aisle and scampers toward the rear of the plane bringing fear to those females sitting toward the rear of the plane, then it reverses direction toward the cockpit.

On this flight we have a female pilot.

Somehow the little mouse works its way under the cabin door. I shortly hear a scream from the female pilot and witness a an airplane that has veered tremendously from its course.

The little mouse reverses direction again, and heads for the rear of the plane.

In this process that mouse frightens all of the female attendants and passengers ( some of whom are already “scared half out of their wits” from his previous scamper).

Now I am the subject of scorn of both genders.

Immediately, I remember the exploits of D. B. Cooper. Maybe I’ll be lucky and be found when I parachute into the wilderness.