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Copyright (c)1996 by Tim Bedore First Printing 1997 Printed in the United States of America
Dedication- To Karen and Claire, with Love
CHAPTER 1 -----WHAT YOU'RE ABOUT TO READ IS TRUE
CHAPTER 2 -----SOME OF YOU ARE CRAZY
CHAPTER 3-----POLITICS
CHAPTER 4 -----ANIMALS
CHAPTER 5 -----SURE, IT'S TRUE
CHAPTER 6 -----THE MEDIA
CHAPTER 7 -----AIN'T WE PRETTY
CHAPTER 8 -----SPORTS
WHAT YOU'RE ABOUT TO READ IS TRUE - WHY MAKE STUFF UP WHEN THINGS LIKE THIS HAPPEN?
Women with Beards on My Paper Route
When I was nine years old, I had a Sunday morning paper route and one of my customers was a woman with a beard. I m not talking about a spotty goatee, wispy sideburns and no connecting parts. This woman, Mrs. Berman, had a full Z.Z. Top, Jerry Garcia, Sebastian Cabot-style beard.
If you re thinking she must have been a hairy transvestite, you re wrong because she and her husband had hairy kids that looked just like her. Apparently Mrs. Berman never left the house because we never saw her around the neighborhood, so when I delivered their paper for the first time I was blown away. I knocked and a woman with a beard opened the door. Like in a cartoon, my eyes bugged way out of my head and my jaw dropped. I just stood there agog, holding out a Milwaukee Journal. Instead of being insulted or angry, Mrs. Berman did the most generous thing - she smiled warmly and said Hello, which made me feel my bug-eyed reaction to her beard was O.K.
A few months later we moved to another town and I got another paper route, and on it was another woman with a beard. What are the odds of that? Her s was not as full and attractive a beard as Mrs. Berman s but a beard nonetheless. Two paper routes, two women with beards. The only reason boys get paper routes is in the hope of seeing a housewife naked so imagine my frustration, considering, the only out-of-the- ordinary things I ever saw was three drunk guys, two women with beards and a bald cocker spaniel. This is the kind of luck I ve had all my life.
The moral of the story is this if you re a paper boy (or in any of the various delivery industries) and you meet up with a woman with a beard, it s been my experience you ll get a decent tip if you learn to smile back when they smile at you.
I Was the Victim of a Drive-By Garbage Pelting
Someone threw a can of creme corn at me the other day. I was walking down the street, a car passed by and something came flying out the window right at my head. As it whizzed past me, I noticed it was a can of creme corn and my first thought was- who still eats creme corn?
Then I realized, I was the victim of a drive-by garbage pelting. It was either that or a very aggressive recycling program ("Hey, we're in a hurry, get this to a recycling center and I mean now").
I walked over just to be sure I was seeing straight and sure enough, there it was- a full can of creme corn. Why would anyone throw a loaded can of creme corn at a total stranger? It doesn't seem plausible they were just trying to get it out of the house before their mom made it for dinner. I hated creme corn when I was a kid but not enough to take someone's head off with a can of the stuff. If a car is going 40 m.p.h. and launches a pound of vegetables at your skull, anyone has to understand it would cause a lot of damage.
Don't today's high school civics classes teach kids when individual behavior breaks down societies break down, that if for no reason whatsoever you hit someone in the head with a can of creme corn, one day for no reason whatsoever you'll get hit in the face with a can of fruit cocktail? Aren't they still covering that in our schools?
As I walked on I wondered what I would do to the kids who threw the creme corn if I caught them. Making them eat the creme corn cold seemed like a good first step. Use a can, eat a can. But if I ever find them, I want this case to go to trial. I want justice. I want an attorney to point at a can of creme corn and say, "Your Honor, I would like to submit this as exhibit A."
What's my point? Please spend more money on parks and schools and recreation centers and whatever else it is that teaches kids to respect others or wears them out so they don't have the energy to attack strangers with canned goods.
My girlfriend and I are shopping for wedding rings and here's the rub: the ring she wants costs $5000. My ring costs $60. How's that fair? Where is the feminist logic in that? Right there in the jewelry store I said, "I want Gloria Steinem herself to come down here and explain this deal." My girlfriend, who is very independent and fairminded, said "Well Tim, the woman's ring costing 83.3 times more than the man's ring is an inequitable, antiquated tradition but it's just one old tradition I want to uphold." So I said, "The wife doing all the cooking and cleaning is an antiquated tradition, too. Is that the one antiquated tradition I get to choose we uphold?" Apparently, not.
Even discussing jewelry is unpleasant for me. When I was nine my grandfather presented me with a family heirloom ring he kept for 50 years. I lost it within three minutes. I went to the bathroom and before I washed my hands, I put the heirloom ring on top of the toilet- a second later it was gone. I felt like a big dumb idiot. The adults concluded it must have fallen into the toilet and gotten flushed but I suspect one of my brothers stole it to make me look bad. Since then I have never liked jewelry. So I said, "Honey, you get a nice ring and I'll go without one. We'll save 60 bucks."
I would think a diamond ring would make a woman nervous as hell because they're so expensive you become a target for muggers. Would you walk around with $5000 in cash in your hand? No. So I said, "Honey, I know you've got your heart set on a nice diamond ring but I've heard they're doing some very interesting things with copper."
What's my point? Gentlemen, don't joke about the ring. If you are getting married, just say "Yes dear, whatever ring you want" - get the best credit terms available and move on from there.
When I Decided I Wanted to Be in Show Business
When does it occur to someone that they want to be in showbusiness ? For me it happened in first grade during reading group. I don t know if they still do this in but the nuns used to separate kids into groups according to their reading ability and then give the groups the names of birds. The smartest group was called the Blue Jays and the middle group the Robins and the slow group was the Pigeons or Sparrows or something equally unflattering. I m sure the nuns thought putting someone in the Sparrows or Common Twits, or whatever the slow-group was called, was a form of tough-love that would motivate them to raise themselves up to Robin level.
Anyway, ten other Blue Jays and I were in front of the class taking turns reading aloud from the Run Spot Run series of novels. As Billy Ellis stood in front of me and read I got the brilliant idea that if I quietly pulled his chair out from under him, he would comically fall to the floor when he tried to sit back down. The resulting pratfall would produce gales of laughter and I would be a big hero for providing this moment of levity for the Blue Jays, the Robins and especially the Pigeons who were quite fond of simple, physical humor. But instead of harmlessly falling to the floor when he sat, Billy went crashing to the linoleum and clutched his back, writhing in pain.
Then something happened that changed my life forever. Everyone, furious for what I had done to poor innocent Billy, turned and glared at me. Sister Rosalais locked her terrifying gaze on me, her eyes popping out of her head in a Holy Rage. The whole class just riveted their attention on me. And that s when I knew that I wanted to be in show business. I felt bad about what happened to Billy. But right then I decided to find a way to make people focus their attention on me without having to physically hurt someone.
This moment was not just a turning point for me but I think Billy Ellis got the show business bug, as well. He is an executive producer of a big time T.V. show. Maybe my pulling his chair out from under him in first grade introduced us both to the warmth of the spotlight s glow. It s also probably fitting, today I m the one with the bad back.
The Real Story of Thanksgiving
Long, long ago, hopeful young families left Europe and bravely crossed the sea to their new home in America. Upon reaching the New World the Pilgrims cleared the forest and raised bountiful crops, and their joy was hard to contain for this was the life that they had dreamed of. And then the Indians came out of what was left of the forest and slaughtered the young white families because they had made the mistake of building log cabins and planting zucchini on sacred Indian burial grounds. But the Indians couldn t swing their tomahawks fast enough as wave after wave of wretched refuse invaded their land. The Indians swung their arms mightily but eventually they grew tired and finally dropped to the ground, exhausted and beaten, as hordes of white men become landlord of the land of plenty.
Resigned to their fate of sharing the land with their new Euro Trash neighbors, the Indians and the white man sat down to a roasted turkey dinner one November day (on the white man s calendar) and gave thanks for their new-found friendship. The Pilgrims were understandably a bit more thankful for this friendship than the Indians, because the Indians had agreed to stop making lodge-pole decorations out of the skulls of the strange pale-face families that lived in houses and wore shoes.
This Thanksgiving celebration become a yearly event and evolved into a day that Americans cook stuffed turkeys and then stuff themselves after watching the Detroit Lions get stuffed by some other football team on national television. Ain t history funny that way? Easter started as a Christian celebration of the resurrection of Christ but now it s fooling children into thinking a bunny comes to their house and hides candy. Christmas, of course, was a celebration of the birth of the Christ child.
What other big days in the life of Christ might we turn into a holiday? What about the first day toddler Christ learned to walk? We could call it Stepping Day and celebrate by eating a standing rib roast. I like holidays. Most people don t have to work, everybody acts nice, you eat real well and they put good movies on T.V. Let s figure out an excuse to have more holidays. And I hope you re enjoying yours.
The Night Tony Orlando Almost Made Me Sing
The other night a few of us were talking about our all-time scariest moment. Without a doubt mine is the night that Tony Orlando almost made me sing. I was in Las Vegas to perform at the Hilton for a group of auto parts wholesalers. Up until then I did not realize that people who sold scented pine trees and "My other car is a piece of junk too" license plate holders needed conventions. But there they were, 2500 of them seated for dinner in the world's largest convention center. This space was so big there were three Jumbotron screens on stage so the people in back could see what was happening on stage. After their doughy prime rib dinner, I was to go up and do my little comedy routine. Disaster was the only result I could see coming out of this situation but amazingly, I killed. They loved me. I have never felt so alive.
That evening Bill Cosby and Tony Orlando were performing in the Hilton's main showroom so I asked the hotel people if I could get in to see Cosby. I offered to stand in the back of the room while Cosby was on but instead the maitre d' took me down to a stage center/ringside seat. It was very generous but now I'd have to sit through Tony Orlando before seeing Bill Cosby. If you love Tony's music I'm sorry but for me his songs are a crime against culture. I am not saying that you are wrong to enjoy the Orlando style. I'm just saying it irritates me in the same way that mouthing words while you read would irritate Evelyn Wood. Cats tortured by dental drills would fall more softly on my ears.
But much to my pleasant surprise Cosby himself opened the show. I couldn't figure out why the most popular entertainer in the world was opening for Tony Orlando but I thought "Great. I'll watch Cosby and leave during the intermission." So Cosby does his 45 minutes and the audience response was surprisingly mild but I really enjoyed watching the master at work.
All was well with my world until Cosby ended his set, not by leaving the stage but by bringing Tony Orlando right out to begin his act. And that's when the place went nuts. I couldn't believe it. These people were actually there to see Tony Orlando. Everyone was standing, cheering, screaming... for Tony Orlando... without Dawn. They were going nuts! I didn't know what to think.
Tony charged the microphone and shouted (and he spits when he speaks by the way), "Lock the doors. I can tell this crowd is going to be the best crowd of the week. We're going to go all night long." The crowd went berserk. They were enraptured by the thought of being locked in a room with Tony Orlando. I was getting nervous. Was this an alien sub-culture? Who were these people? I was glued to my seat looking up at them in bewilderment as Tony spat out, "I had a hit once, I had a hit once." And the devoted shouted in unison, "Yes you did and we want to hear it right now."
When Tony broke into "Tie a Yellow Ribbon Around the Old Oak Tree," that crowd blasted off the launch pad. They were singing along, arm and arm, strangers hugging each other. The song mercifully finishes and Tony says, "I don't know why they do it but they always put people up front who don't want to sing or clap along." I was scared out of my mind. Was Tony Orlando going to ridicule me in front of 500 Orlando fanatics? Then he says, "Let's bring this guy up here and teach him to sing."
A lightning bolt of terror shot through my body. What if Tony asked me why I wasn't singing or dancing? I would have to be honest. "I don't mean to hurt your feelings Tony but your music sucks." Then I would compound the problem by saying, "It's all a matter of taste but I like good music, not this Vegas crap." That crowd would have lynched me. I would have given both testicles and either arm for the ability to evaporate. Tony moved to the front of the stage and reached down for... a guy who was sitting across from me and pulled him out of his chair, up onto the stage. Apparently, he too was sane and refused to sing along with this horrid drivel. Visions of Tony forcing the two of us do a duet of "Knock Three Times on the Ceiling" sent me into a blind panic. I bolted from the room, knocking people over as I made my escape. As I left the showroom I heard the poor guy Tony brought on-stage, with total sincerity, say as he was dragged to the microphone, "Please don't do this". Years later this memory still makes me shudder.
She Likes to Feed the Elephant
How should you react when your mother-in-law tells you a dirty story? She’s a surgical nurse and recently told me one of the weirdest things she ever witnessed was a man who came to see a urologist because he had trouble urinating. The doctor inserted a scope up into the man’s urinary tract and saw a peanut. My mother-in-law didn’t say what type of peanut but I assume it wasn’t a walnut, filbert or pecan because of the size or a cashew because of the shape. I am sure the legume in question was the standard, round, small peanut. I also assume it was unsalted and de-shelled.
Anyway, according to my mother-in-law, the doctor looked into the scope and said, “Sir, unless I’m crazy, you have a peanut in your urinary tract.” And the man said, “Ummmm..., yes..., well, my wife likes to play a game called ‘feed the elephant.’”
As my mother-in-law finished the story, for a split second I thought, “If I laugh, she will think I approve of and perhaps even desire bizarre sex acts with her daughter. Maybe, under the guise of telling me a funny story, she is actually trying to see if her daughter married a pervert.” For a moment I didn’t know what to do or think but everybody else was laughing so I relaxed and said, “I don’t know how you win the ‘feed the elephant’ game but it looks like his wife scored at least one point.”
What’s my point? We Catholics are way too uptight. I haven’t been to church in over 20 years and I still had to think whether or not to laugh at that story. And so I’d like to thank Ken Starr for bringing the previously un-spoken topics of... well, you know... into the public arena. It makes it a lot easier for me to respond to my Mother-in-law’s jokes and stories knowing I am not the first person to mention... all that stuff... in their house.
SOME OF YOU ARE CRAZY I DON'T WANT TO POINT FINGERS BUT...
Syringes in Pepsi Cans and David Kavatek
What kind of people put syringes in Pepsi cans or cyanide in Tylenol capsules? The psychotic? The megalomaniacal? Nasty diabetics out for revenge? One thing we can probably assume about them is that they have access to syringes and cans of Pepsi that haven't been sealed. But other than that, who are these people? Did you sit next to them in grade school? Was it something that you said or did that turned them to the dark side?
If I had to guess which one of my grade school classmates could have turned out to be a social menace, I would say David Kavatek. He had an awkward, gangly body with a head that looked more like a cartoon head than a real head- big top, teeny chin. Highlighting his head's peculiar shape was an already receding hairline at the age of nine. All the boys were trying to look like the Beatles but David's forehead was beating out his hair in the fight for space on his noggin.
In addition to his odd physical appearance, his farmer parents dressed him like an Amish Cowboy. Then there was David's very unique odor, a combination of thrift-store mustiness and manure. All of this of course was beyond his control and had nothing to do with his worth as an individual but try to tell that to a class full of nine year olds. So a horrible game called "Kavatek's germs/no returns" evolved. For some reason my classmates believed David's appearance was caused by germs and you could contract Kavatek's germs by just brushing up against him. The only way to rid yourself of Kavatekitis was by touching someone else within five seconds and saying "Kavatek's germs, no returns." Thus that individual passed the germs on before being infected, and adding the words "no returns" meant they had immunity against being re-infected this round of the game.
For some reason this all made perfect sense to a lot of my fellow classmates. Some of us didn't play along with Kavatek's germs/no returns but nearly every girl in class would run in a blind, screaming panic if a boy even tried to pass the germs to them. Catholic girls are very germ adverse. When threatened with Kavatek's germs they would squawk like a gaggle of geese, screaming in hysteria, scattering throughout the playground.
Imagine how this made Kavatek feel. How much psychic damage was done and what happens to the person that had this childhood? I hope the fates have been kind to him and the world turned his way and every road that he took was the high road but somehow I suspect that the guy putting syringes in the Pepsi cans is a Kavatek. What's the moral of the story? Be nice. Teach your kids to be nice. Drink Pepsi out of a glass instead of the can. And air out your clothes and be tolerant of those that don't.
Discussing circumcision the other day I said "When, when, when will it end. My god when will the horror end?" Some friends who just had a baby told me what actually happens during this barbaric operation. They strap the innocent, helpless babe into a little "hold him steady while we whittle on his penis" chair, and the screaming and the terror is beyond belief.
Most doctors now admit circumcision has no real beneficial effect on hygiene yet they still strongly recommend that it be done because you don't want the son's penis to look different than his father's penis. Wait a minute. How many families have father/son penis comparison day? I never saw my father's penis. And you know what? I didn't want to. If a little boy does see his father's penis and asks why his looks a little different all you have to say is... "Daddy's wiener was brutalized by a sadistic, money-grubbing health-care system propagating archaic beliefs and rituals to suck more wealth out of a people helpless to defend themselves against the monolith."
Well, that may be a little heavy for a toddler and I'm not even sure that monolith is the word I needed there, but maybe you just say "Daddy... was water skiing one day and..." I don't know what you say. You just say that people are different and that sometimes their "thing" looks different. Of course you should probably use the word penis instead of "thing." In my family it was called dingus, which is fine for awhile but then you have to make that difficult dingus to penis transition somewhere in your life. Otherwise as an adult, women would be weirded out if you referred to it as your dingus.
Anyway, how did this whole idea of clipping the foreskin get started? That's not something anybody tried one day just for the hell of it. Circumcision started as a religious ritual in the Old Testament. God told Abraham to circumcise himself with a sharp rock (a sharp rock making the job a lot easier than a dull one). Maybe there was a good hygiene reason for it back then but now circumcision is just like a Perry Como Christmas special- it costs money, it's torturous and it has no real purpose.
POLITICS SOME THOUGHTS, COMPLAINTS AND SOLUTIONS FROM AN OPTIMISTIC CYNIC
I have the answers to our current political problems, a way to end the gridlock, the partisanship, the special interest influence. The solution is this make me your King. I m serious. No joke. I want to be the King of America. Just for a month. I will return the United States to a democratic, representative form of government, after I ve fixed things.
The Democrats and Republicans are so at odds with one another a King, with omnipotent power, is the only way to fix America overnight. So all of you now, Hail King Tim. I m serious. As your King, I wouldn t have to worry about the NRA or the AMA or the PTA or the CIA or the NBA. I would just give the royal command to fix things. If those that opposed the crown resisted I would send in the King s men and My will would be done.
And why King Tim? Why not King you? Well, I thought of it first. And secondly, I trust me. I don t know you.
The first royal command I would give is no more astro -turf. Take it out. Find a way to grow grass indoors or take the roof off the dome because astro - turf is gone. I know astro -turf is not a big problem but getting rid of it is just so righteous. Then, no more Star Wars space-based weapons system, no more subsidies for tobacco farms or Lawrence Welk museums, no more $640 toilet seats, no more tax breaks for the rich, no more free rides for the poor. The only gun you can take out of the house is a shotgun or a hunting rifle, and if that gun is out of the case and there isn t a duck or a deer real close by, you ll never see the outside of the King s prison. There will be more schools, more teachers and more time spent in school. Beef and ice cream will once again be healthy. I m not sure how we ll do that, but I ll put the full force of the government behind it. And if they don t do it on their own, I will put the Chicago Cubs in the World Series. I won t fix the Series, but I will put the Cubs in the Fall Classic. Seriously, I want to be your King.
Gun Control and the Wizard of Oz
Those opposed to gun control claim restrictions violate their constitutional rights and represent further encroachment by a federal government that is out of control. But we’ve had gun control for most of this century without any such problems. For example, we’ve never been able to hunt squirrels with a bazooka. (Nor would you want to if your intention was to eat the squirrel.) Yet there are vicious squirrel killers who, to satisfy their blood lust, would blow apart the fuzzy little nut gatherers with field artillery if it were legal.
Obviously, allowing a handful of lunatics to launch rocket grenades at quick, tiny, moving targets would be dangerous to society at large— thus it’s against the law. The government has always denied individuals the right to have a tank or a Gatling gun or a howitzer for that reason. The kind of gun control we so desperately need now is the kind that keeps automatic weapons out of the hands of grade, junior and senior high school kids, drop outs, disgruntled post office employees, religious fanatics and all the generic nut-jobs who mean to harm the innocent. Is there any reason a 6th grader needs an Uzi? Wouldn’t a single shot .22 be enough for that angry youngster?
Because this is the reality— without restrictions on automatic weapons, every kid that got turned down for a date to the prom, every underachieving civil servant who got passed over for a promotion, every psycho you ever pissed off can get a street-sweeper death- spewing fountain of lead/hell weapon if they want one. Recently, a spokesman for the National Rifle Association insisted that, “If we allow the government to control what type of guns we can have they will then be able to tell us that you can’t build a house with ten bedrooms, if that’s what you want to do.”
I don’t know if the NRA is aware of this or not but the government does tell people what size house they can build. They are called zoning laws you gaggle of goofs.
And what kind of analogy is that anyway? Houses don’t kill people. Unless you’re the Wicked Witch of the East, then they do. When Dorothy and Toto and the house they flew in on, landed on the Wicked Witch of the East, it killed her. This in turn pissed off the Wicked Witch of the West, who thankfully could not buy an automatic weapon due to the strict gun control laws in that movie. Can you imagine how many Munchkins the Wicked Witch of the West could have wasted had she had an Uzi instead of a broom? There wouldn’t have been the journey to Oz or the Cowardly Lion or those evil flying monkeys. Were it not for strict gun control laws, instead of being a great feature film the Wizard of Oz would have been just an interesting short subject.
The government doesn’t allow us to do all kinds of things and one of the most important things the government shouldn’t allow anybody to do is kills lots of people at one time.
I had a dream the other night where I killed an abortion protestor. It was OK, because I was just doing the Lord’s work. If I didn’t kill the abortion protestors, they would eventually kill abortion doctors. Thus, I saved lives by stopping murderers from murdering... by being a murderer.
Oh sure, I was dragged into dream court, but it didn’t matter to me. I told the Judge that the only verdict that mattered to me was God’s verdict. He had spoken to me and I did his bidding. Nonetheless, the jury found me guilty and sent me to dream prison. There, I was immediately killed by my fellow inmates because my shrill proselytizing annoyed them.
Then, with great anticipation, I arrived at Heaven’s Gate and was met by the Lord Himself. Imagine my shock when the Almighty Father read me the riot act for killing people. Here I was expecting to be rewarded and praised but it turns out that whole, “Thou shalt not kill, violence begets violence, vengeance is mine and mine alone” stuff, applied to me, too. God looked me in the face and said I was a raging moron for even thinking He had spoken to me, let alone hired me as a hit man. When God said He wished people would quit thinking they were getting messages from Him, I felt really, really, stupid.
Then God, who looked a lot like Wilfred Brimley, personally escorted me to the gates of Hell. Taking me inside, the Devil laughed as he showed me where the rest of the religious kook-killers sat. And that’s when I woke up.
What the Hell has happened to American Politics? Why are our politicians so out of touch? Did you know we’re still spending money on Star Wars? To protect us from who? The Russians? They’ve retired. Iraq? It’s much more likely they’d sneak a bomb in here on a speedboat than put it up in the air where we could watch it for 20 minutes. We don’t need Star Wars. Star Wars would cost trillions of dollars and be obsolete tomorrow.
That’s exactly what happens to weapons systems. It’s why the Indians lost to the cowboys. The Indians invested heavily in bow and arrow technology and when the cowboys came along with guns, forget about it, it’s over. Bullets are flying all around and the Indians are firing back but as soon as they run out of arrows they’re done. You can’t just dive into the bushes, grab some wood and start shooting it. Arrows take hours and hours to make. That’s why the cowboys won.
But anyway, I’m sick of campaigns and the power elite and spin doctors and promises. I think we need leaders who understand the real people and you know who understands the real people? The real people, that’s who.
So here’s my plan. We cancel all elections. No more voting. We pick our leaders just like jury duty. You start calling people on the phone and take what you get. Unless you have a good excuse, you have to be a senator for a month. Now you say, Tim, the average citizen isn’t qualified to lead the country. Oh yeah? Can the average citizen balance their checkbook? Would the average citizen pay $640 for a toilet seat or subsidize tobacco farmers while trying to convince people not to smoke?
We’re smarter and our politicians are a lot dumber than we think. Sure, with my system you might end up with some perverts, schnooks, deadbeats, dodo’s, nincompoops, Bozo’s, and neer-do-wells. But that’s what we’ve got in Washington now and we can’t get rid of them. With my plan if you get an idiot, he’s done in a month and you call someone else.ANIMALS CAN WE LEARN SOMETHING FROM OUR FRIENDS OF LESSER INTELLECT?
"Honey, the Eagle Ate Your Chihuahua"
Did you see this in the paper? A Georgia couple on vacation in Alaska pulled their Winnebago into the town of Valdez to get gas and walk their Chihuahua. Unbeknownst to them, an eagle lived in a perch above this gas station and when it saw the Chihuahua it thought, "Oh boy, Mexican food." The eagle swooped down and grabbed the Chihuahua, which managed a half-yelp before our national symbol took the tiny pooch flying for the first and probably last time.
Seeing the eagle and six pounds of what was now Raptor-Chow soar out over the bay reduced the woman to a sobbing wreck. Her husband came to her aid and after much consoling, helped his wife get back into the Winnebago. According to the gas station attendant that saw the whole thing, as soon as the husband was out of his wife's sight, a big smile broke out on his face. He clenched his fists and did a victory dance around the Winnebago, whisper-shouting, "Yes! Yes!" Quickly changing his smiling face back to somber, the husband climbed into the driver's seat and the couple drove off.
Can you imagine what was going through that poor woman's mind as she watched her Chihuahua fly away? She must have known that in moments a nest of hungry baby eaglets would be tearing away at her beloved pet, the little bell on the dog's collar ringing with every tug, "Ding, ding, ding."
And can you imagine the husband's thoughts? He'd been praying to God for years and years to please do something, anything, that would get this obnoxious Chihuahua out of his life. Then all of a sudden Old Baldy swoops down and snatches the hairless hound at a downtown gas station. His prayers had been answered in the form of an eagle. Imagine his esctasy.
But as difficult as it must have been, he changed his demeanor from a victory dance to appropriate remorse before he got back into the Winnebago. That, to me, speaks volumes about how much he loves his wife. He never liked that dog, but because it made his wife happy he truly felt her pain and kept his own joyous response hidden from her. Love is a many splendored and sometimes secretive thing.
What's my point? I'm not suggesting if your wife has a Chihuahua and you don't know how to get rid of it, Alaska is the place to go. And I'm not laughing at her pain. We're celebrating his joy and the resurgence of an endangered species.
It's spring and once again time for the renewal of life. Every year, miraculously and beautifully the cycle begins anew as nature seeks to recreate itself. Have you ever seen ducks mate? It's not a pretty thing. In fact it's down right disturbing.
Three times in the last couple of weeks I have been out golfing and witnessed duck sex. From what I've seen, male ducks work in pairs to force themselves on one unfortunate female duck. I watched in horror as the guy ducks chased the gal duck all over the place, and once they cornered her the one guy duck grabbed her by the throat and held her down while the other guy duck mounted her. She's screaming, quacking, wings flapping, going crazy, trying to get away, but they kept after her and eventually did it. It was a gang duck bang.
Then the next time I was out golfing there were two more guy ducks and they chased this gal duck all over and they were quacking and carrying on, and I knew it was another gang duck bang and I felt horrible about it... first because I was trying to make a birdie putt and couldn't concentrate. But mainly I couldn't concentrate because I felt so bad for the gal duck. I wanted to turn around and say, "Would you stop it. Stop it. That's no way to treat anyone. That's not how... decent... ducks behave." And then, of course, I realized, that is how decent ducks behave. That's nature way.
And they did stop it. This time the two guy ducks got tired and gave up chasing the gal duck, but after they stopped paying attention to her she started following them around. It looked like a singles bar.
Then I saw two geese in the pond and the guy goose was on top of the gal goose and not only was he doing it but he was trying to keep her head underwater while he was doing it. Animal love is rough and hard to watch.
So what can we learn from observing sex in nature? Guys like sex lots more than gals (at least for waterfowl that's true). I guess some human guys could look at all this and use it as a rationalization for their own aggressive sexual behavior, claiming it's just nature's way, but if you do . . . you're just acting like a duck.
I Beat up a Squirrel with a Vanity Fair Magazine
I beat up a squirrel with a Vanity Fair Magazine the other day. It fell down the chimney into our fireplace and immediately jumped onto the protective screen trying to get out of there. The poor squirrel was just going nuts trying to get through the screen and I wanted to help it get away from the fire but he was scratching and clawing and biting and... we don’t allow that in the house. So I hit the screen with a rolled up Vanity Fair in the hopes it would realize escape was impossible and it should calm down and then I could guide it out of the house. Well, let me tell you this— squirrels fear fire much more than they fear a skinny guy with a magazine. So the squirrel keeps chewing and tearing and tearing at the screen. Finally, it busts through the fireplace screen and then tries to bite me, like, all of a sudden, I’m the bad guy.
The gray terror went bounding through the house like it knew the place (very disconcerting), into the back bedroom and started climbing up the blinds, like a hyper-active child going up the down escalator. So I closed the bedroom door and thought I’d just let the poor thing settle down while I thought about what to do.
While I waited I started looking through the phone book thinking maybe they had something on squirrels in the house in that “Handy Hints” section in the front. Well, they didn’t but I looked in the Yellow pages and found a company called Critter Control.
They said the squirrel removal fee was $135 and I thought, my God, this is serious. They must have traps and knockout gas or tiny squirrel stun guns so they can capture the little thing and take it outside and rehabilitate it (“Squirrels stay outside... look, this is where the nuts are”). So I asked the guy, “Why does it cost so much?” He said, “Rabies and all that stuff.” I said, “Come on out Critter Control.”
So for $135 I’m expecting guys in Critter Control jump suits to invade like a SWAT team, but instead two guys drive up in their own car wearing T-shirts from the bar that they hang out at (the “Shiny Object Tavern”). The only equipment they had was a fishing net and appeared to be drunk. My $135 bought two beer-soaked guys with a fishing net.
So the one guy walks into the bedroom while the other guy just stood in the dining room and laughed at me. About twenty seconds later the first guy comes out of the bedroom with the squirrel in the net and says to me “Is this the one?” I said, “Yes, that’s the gray terror that was much more... threatening... earlier, yes. Good job gentlemen.”
What’s my point? You may think squirrels are cute and adorable in the park. But once they’re in the house they’re nothing more than acrobatic, vicious, outdoor rats. Don’t go through what I’ve gone through!! Get yourself a net and be prepared to face the Gray Terror!!!
The Bear That Broke into Volkswagen Microbuses
The other animals are out to get us. I’m convinced there is a multi-species conspiracy whose goal is to harass, embarrass and attack humans. In the past I have reported on the eagle that stole a woman’s beloved pet Chihuahua at a downtown gas station, and about the woman who beat up a moose after being attacked while cross-country skiing. I, myself, had a violent confrontation with a squirrel in my own home. Now there are reports from northern California of bears that are making concerted efforts to humiliate and starve vacationers.
Apparently the bears have learned to stake out trails in backpacking areas. When a group of campers come by, the bears burst out of the woods sending the terrified humans scurrying down the trail in a panic. Then the bears tear into the abandoned backpacks and camping gear and eat the tuna sandwiches, cheetoes and slim jims the campers brought to the great outdoors. According to my sources the bears break into cars and campers only when they see a cooler inside because they know that’s where they’ll find the food. Other ingenious bears have learned to walk out on the road, stop cars and then pose for pictures with the unwitting tourists, who are more than happy to feed them. The tourists end up with some interesting video while the bears end up with their lunch.
What is my point? The other animals hate us. Lions and tigers and bears are out to finish off the human race. I foresee a time when herds of vicious, marauding squirrels turn every picnic into a bloodbath. Of course, it’s impossible to get all the involved species together to discuss ways to end this wild vs. human animal strife because the other animals conveniently haven’t yet learned to talk. At least that’s what we think. Who knows what they say when we’re not around?
So this summer be careful out there in the forests and parks of America. Don’t do anything to rile up the wildlife. Don’t litter or start a forest fire or play loud music. Remember, you are being watched.
SURE, IT'S TRUE THINGS I'VE READ OR BEEN TOLD BY VERY HONEST PEOPLE
The Pregnant Cheerleaders of Hempstead, Texas
Did you see this in the paper? The school Board of Hempstead, Texas reluctantly reversed its ban on pregnant cheerleaders because they feared legal challenges (the pregnant cheerleaders union?). Earlier in the year the board had kicked four pregnant cheerleaders off the 16-member squad. That's right, four of the 16 Hempstead cheerleaders, a full 25%, were pregnant.
I assumed the ban on pregnant cheerleaders was a moral decision on the school board's part but maybe they just wanted to avoid this situation: the cheerleaders are on the court doing their routine, "Give me an H. 'H'. Give me an E. 'E'. Give me an M... Hey my water broke, my water broke, get the biology teacher . . . my water broke." It would be a disaster. That kind of embarrassing experience could scar a pregnant cheerleader for life. Imagine her unsuspecting parents are in the stands screaming, "Thelma-Louise, you said you were just putting on weight. You lied to us girly-girl." Several of the basketball players would lose focus worrying if they are the father and a big game could be lost. It was a wise school principal that made this decision.
The same week the story about the pregnant cheerleaders of Hempstead came out, a woman from Wichita, Kansas was in court for shooting an abortion doctor in the arm. She claimed she's happy she did it but that in the future she would leave things like "guns and bombs to men because it's not women's work."
Well finally these anti-abortion people are displaying some common sense. Bombing and shooting are not very lady-like indeed and thus reflects poorly on their organization. In fact these right-to-lifers should get to the core of the problem and go to Hempstead, Texas and shoot the pregnant cheerleaders. Killing off the supply of customers is the surest way to put abortion doctors out of business. After all, there's only nine letters in the word Hempstead. Therefore, they really only need nine cheerleaders. Solutions are only a moment of logical thought away.
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