Funny Messy Life: Recent Episodes

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The past few weeks have been extra hard on me, and as I sit here and write this out, I really don’t feel like it. See, on top of everything else that’s going on in my life, my son is graduating high school, and I never thought about the idea that we would be experiencing so many “lasts”. I’m definitely a proud dad, but there is pain that tags along with it. So I think it’s time to vent a little as my oldest child becomes a man. I’m Michael Blackston, and as much as I don’t want to have to admit it, these are necessary events along the path of my Funny Messy Life.

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Pomp and Circumstance rings loud and quite obnoxiously in the distance. I used to like that song. It’s regal. It tells a story of celebration and accomplishment. And lately it rudely smacks me upside the head with the sour flavor of truth. Now the song doesn’t ring as jolly as before, because my son Noah is graduating.

Don’t get me wrong, I’m happy for him. Any parent with a strong-willed child who doesn’t like to be told what to do can relate to the sigh of relief that comes with the aspect of never again having to make sure projects are done on time and homework is turned in. We’ve had some epic battles over the years, but that relief is bittersweet. It means we also lose the anticipation and excitement of football season and sitting right next to the band so we can glance to our left for most of the game and watch that handsome boy play his saxophone in his snazzy uniform.

So let’s start earlier. Way earlier.

When I was in sixth grade, the band teacher at the middle school came around to test the students and see which ones were suitable to start band the next year. To my recollection, they gave us some sort of ear test and graded us based on how we understood tones, beats, and the essential elements of music. I think the grades were something like, Superior (obviously the best grade), Good, Okay, Good Enough To Play The Triangle, and Just Give Up And Join The Chess Club.

I believe I was the only one in my class to be graded a Superior. I might be wrong, but I’ve worn that badge this long, and I don’t intend on taking it off until someone tells me differently. I do know I actually scored a Superior, and I remember the band director begging me to join the band. I didn’t though, because I was already going to be in chorus, and I was terrified of learning an instrument.

My wife’s story is similar. I don’t know how they were tested, or what she scored, but I know she never joined the band, even though she has always had a gift for music, and eventually earned a degree in Vocal Performance. She tells me to this day how much she regrets never joining the band, and I feel the same way about my decision.

Our son Noah, did join the band, and began as a trombonist. He liked the instrument, and had a knack for it, but it wasn’t long before we found he was better suited for something else, and he took up the saxophone. He would sit in his room at night and wail away on that horn, actually making the right note once in a while, and we loved every second of it. Once a friend made the statement that he bet I couldn’t wait to find a reason to get out of the house when that started, and I surprised him. I told him it was just the opposite. I often sat in the recliner just outside of Noah’s door and soaked in the notes - every single one, good or bad - that came from the lungs of my son, and out of his sax.

And I wasn’t lying. Kayla and I both found immense joy in those moments, and soon enough, more and more notes found their marks until songs and rhythms began to fill our house.

In eighth grade, he was asked to join the high school marching band a year early, an honor not everyone gets. Next thing we know, the concerts and recitals, of which there have been so glorious many, were replaced by the grueling business of band camp, practice every day after school, and Friday nights under the lights of one of Georgia’s finest, and most notable stadiums, The Granite Bowl.

Year after year, we sat in first sweltering heat, then rain as the season changed, then crisp cold as we watched him play. We sat just to the right of the band and the pride we felt is something I hope I can hold onto until I take my final breath. He would look over in our direction every once in a while, between playing and having the time of his life with his friends, and he would catch us staring at him. I’d give him a goofy smile and look away, letting him know it was okay to be making those memories on his own.

I took so many pictures when he didn’t know the camera was on him, and looking back over them, I see him change and grow from a little boy who struggled to carry the weight of the instrument after a long day of rehearsal, to a young, vibrant man full of confidence to take on whatever the world could throw at him. Before our eyes, he has become a person those around him look up to - a leader. He only just missed getting appointed to be Drum Major his senior year. He was upset at first, but seems to have learned from it.

The band experience has developed a deep love for music of all kinds. He has a wide range of appreciation and you never know what’s going to come up next on his playlist, but specifically, he has picked up the guitar. That’s normal, I know, but my son thinks big, and he showed it in one of the coolest ways just the other night at one of his last concerts with the band. I wasn’t surprised to see him step up there and thrill the audience with his sax as he and three others played in an impressive saxophone quartet, but it was the finale that felt liken a scene right out of a movie.

The band teacher introduced EC Pop - the first ever rock band comprised of students from the band who got together and decided it was time to ratchet things up a bit. They performed Daft Punk’s Get Lucky, and my boy, shiny red electric guitar in hand, walked to center stage as the lead singer and frontman of the group. It was a dream come true for him, and by the time the song was over, they had the crowd eating out of the palms of their hands. One of the students watching from the band section pulled out their phone, lit the flashlight, and started to wave it back and forth as the band onstage rocked out. Before long, people all over the audience were doing the same thing, and my heart was about to burst. What a night! What an experience! What a boy!

There’s only one of those “lasts” that rivals that one, or maybe even beats it, at least in the hearts of the band kids and their parents.

With every marching band, there is, of course, the school fight song. Of all the music that is played, it’s the fight song they know the best because they’ve played it so much. A thousand times, it seems, they blasted out their melodic battle cry to spur on the Blue Devils, and it never occurred to me that there would come a time when they would play it for the final time.

I’ll never forget the way my heart felt broken, and at the same time somehow jubilant for them. At the end of the final home game, the underclassmen stepped aside and allowed the seniors a gift. They would play the fight song one last time in that place. I watched with tears in my own eyes as those kids who would soon have to leave childhood behind, proudly proclaimed with horns, and woodwinds, and percussion, their allegiance to not only a school that gave them so many great memories, but also to each other. Because no matter where they went from there, or how far apart they were, there would always be one thing that held them together. Elbert County High School band, Class of 2022.

We’re going to his final concert tonight, and I’m already in an emotional place, so I’m not sure how well I’m going to take it, but I’ll have to take it. And on May 20, he’ll walk across in front of his class in that same football stadium that echoes with music and memory, accepting his diploma, and resolving a melody that it took years to play.

For Noah, he looks to the future, although he’ll peek fondly back on those times, all too soon remembering them as “The good old days”, but for me, it’ll be a little hard to swallow. I’ll always look back to the boy who didn’t like to turn in his homework, but never, ever failed to make me proud.

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There’s a snarky saying about how women change their minds. It goes something like, A woman’s mind is cleaner than a man’s because she changes it more often.

In my experience, women won’t mind you saying that when you’re with a group of people and everyone is smiling, laughing, and generally having a by-golly swell time. Experience has also taught me that there is a time and a place for everything. Saying that when it’s only you and your wife in the car after you’ve been arguing about where to eat because at first she wanted a burrito, but now she’s decided she’s in the mood for baked ravioli, and she’s already giving you the stank eye because you said something like, “Make up your mind”, … you probably ought to think about not whipping that nugget out of your grabbag. She ain’t in the mood for your shenanigans.

I don’t really think it’s that fair of a quip anyway, because I am A Man, By Thunder, and men can be just as wishy-washy. From Atomic Red Studios, which is being moved again because I keep changing my mind about where to put it, I’m Michael Blackston, and I’m about to highlight some decision making issues from my Funny Messy Life.

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Ladies, don’t let your man get away with it. I’m on your beautiful indecisive sides all the way. He’s likely to one day say something about how you can never make up your mind, and if I’m right, you’ll immediately be able to bring up some of the things he’s guilty of in that same arena. For me and a lot of other guys I know, it’ll show up in the category of our toys. We’ll tidy it up and call it collecting, or upgrading, but in reality, it often comes down to indecision.

I know musicians - especially guitarists (Good LORD, guitarists are bad about it) - who are never satisfied with the last instrument they bought. They saw it in the guitar store, played the most impressive riff in their personal catalog, while pretending not to care who’s listening, loved how it felt, and just had to have it. Then when they get it home, they decide it doesn’t play right. The action isn’t as good now as it was in the store when they were hammering out Eddie Van Halen’s Eruption as everyone else around them secretly rolled their eyes. There’s a funky twang in the pickups they suddenly don’t like. And Is it me, or does that sunburst look different in this light? They have changed their minds.

Case in point, Atomic Red Studios, and my setup for recording these podcast episodes and other audio. I’m not going to try and remember exactly how many different versions of my studio there have been, or in how many different places I’ve tried to put it. It doesn’t matter, because here’s the problem: I keep going to great lengths to make a new, better version, then changing my mind about it. This last place seemed to be perfect. I was allowed to convert a small room at my church, free of charge, into the perfect studio space. My house is small, and there’s just no room for a sound studio, so I went to great lengths to set one up at the church. The plan was to record Funny Messy Life, as well as audio books, and do voiceover work. Okay, I counted, and if I’m not leaving anything out, there have been approximately 562 versions of my studio, none of which gave me the great audio I was looking for. The problem with the church site is, any time I want to record, I have to get stuff together and go there. A home studio is more convenient for me because none of the stuff I do so far earns me one red cent..

I have, at last count, ten different microphones. I started with one - a SURE SM58. Old Reliable. The trustworthiest of trustworthy microphones. It’s so durable you can glue a hook to it and use it as a fishing lure, and it’ll still work when you plug it in. It’s been a standard in the professional vocal world since the beginning of time. The SURE SM58 is the microphone God used when He said, “Let there be light.” But I heard about another microphone that would be better for my podcast. It would give me the rawest, most natural sound for my voice, and I could always do adjustments in editing. The guy at Sweetwater swore by it, so I bought it. The new mic cost me $250, and I loved the way it sounded. At least I did for a minute. When I decided my voice sounded richer with the SM58, I said to my wife, “Wife, I hereby change my mind! I shall returneth to my SM58. And henceforth, I shall call it my favorite. So sayeth me.”

She didn’t believe me, of course. She’d been down that road before, and she was right. It wasn’t long before I realized I needed something of good quality that I could take on the road and use to record podcasts in my hotel rooms. It needed to connect directly to my laptop via USB port, and before I knew it, Dave Jackson of The School of Podcasting fame was recommending a dandy little microphone by Audio-Technica.

“I must have it!” I decreed.

Luckily my wife was nowhere in sight, and I was near Birmingham, Alabama. There’s a music store there that had it in stock.

“I shall journey forth to the store, and there avail myself of the equipment I require. Then, and only then, shall I find contentment.”

I bought it, and I loved it. I still do. But I also continue to find myself drawn to my SM58.

Then I heard through my research on successful voice overing, that the RODE NT1 was a fantastic microphone for serious voice actors getting started. Michael was moved within his spirit to act, and thus, he sent a message to the owner of the ad.

“Is this microphone still available?”

The owner replied, “Yes. Yes it is.”

”I must have it!” Michael bade and light shone upon his face. The angels rejoiced, and glory shone upon the face of the earth.

In reality, God was probably shaking His head. “He never learns.”

I bought it and used it quite a lot, but …. I’ve recently gone back to using the SM58 mostly.

I feel like this is boring. It probably is, but it serves to show just a hint of my own indecision. Like I said, there are ten microphones altogether, as well as other equipment, each supposedly better than the next.

I mentioned the restaurant thing earlier, but I’m worse than my wife about it. I have days when I wasn’t something, I’m starving, but for the life of me, I can’t figure out what it is I really want. It’s not that there’s an epic battle going on in my mind between pancakes and pita bread. I don’t want any of it. Nothing! I’m about to die to eat something, but I don’t want anything. It doesn’t make sense. It’s like a culinary glitch in The Matrix. It happens to me all the time, and I’m helpless to do anything, but flop around on the ground like a tantruming child, flailing my arms and legs hither and yon, and whining about life worse than an overly woke socialist.

By the way, if that last statement offended you, we likely aren’t a good match.

So where was I? Ah yes, arms thrashing, and legs akimbo.

“I wanna eat, but I don’t want nuthin’, but I’m hungry, but nuthin’s good, but I wanna eat!”

It should not surprise you that in these moments, my wife has perfected the art of the side-eye. She’s never gone as far as to say, Idiot, out loud, but it’s there on her face. She doesn’t appreciate the highly evolved man-cision system I have in place, and how because I have such a developed and complicated process to navigate regarding the intricacies between one thing and another, there is sometimes a disruption that causes a failure of calculation, resulting in said flailing arms and legs akimbo.

When she reads this, she’s going to give me the side-eye. I know it.

I still don’t know whether or not to use this piece for the podcast/blog/swim in Lake Me at all. I’m having a hard time making that decision. It’s difficult finding the time to record these episodes lately anyway, but I guess I could get some pvc pipes and blankets and carry a sort of portable studio with me on trips. Seems like a lot of trouble, though. I’m not sure. I could cut the pipes in half and connect them with joiners. That way I could throw the whole thing in a duffle. But what kind of duffle should I get? Plain? Black? Georgia Bulldog red? Something with a logo? Maybe I could make an Atomic Red Studios logo and print it on a plain, Georgia Bulldog red duffel. That would be neat. The Atomic Red Studios duffel could actually carry the Atomic Red Studios. Is that over thinking it? I don’t know.

I can’t decide.

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Let’s see … how should I describe my back issues? Um …. If there was a further sublevel of hell past anything Dante came up with where the devil himself would say, “Nope, nope, nope!”, then you pushed into a dank corner of the sewer system of that hell where stagnant, rotting remnants of the bowels of the worst demons that have ever existed have gotten caught in a gooey, churning cesspool, it might - and I say might - come close. Because, my friend, your humble host recently slipped a disc in my back, and the subsequent agony was the worst thing I’ve ever endured. It’s part of the reason for another lengthy delay in episodes of this podcast, and I’m about to tell you alllll about it, including the lessons I’ve learned, both spiritually, and in the area of my own stupidity.

From Atomic Red studios, I’m Michael Blackston, and if you thought a whiny man with a cold can be bad, wait till you hear about this latest test of my endurance straight out of my Funny Messy Life.

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I sit and prepare this episode of the show feeling rather comfortable and relatively pain-free. The name of the restaurant I chose rhymes with Hizza Put, and I’m enjoying a simple order of breadsticks with extra seasoning, and a cup of alfredo sauce, instead of marinara to dip them in. (Yes, you can ask for that.) I’ve sort of gotten addicted to the breadsticks from Hizza Putt because when this whole thing started, it’s all I could think of when people insisted I eat something to stay alive. And once I decided it was an sensible enough request, it was just easier, when my wife annoyed me by asking me to make decisions in my state of pain, to scream, “Breadsticks!”

Now, let me be clear. My wife was not actually being annoying. What she was doing was trying her best to take care of a man in his late forties who was floating in a pool of hell’s poop water. In reality, my wife, God bless her, was an absolute saint, along with several others who helped me, or prayed fervently for me, or both. In fact, I found out just how amazing my support system really is.

So here’s what happened. I’m going to go back to before Christmas, because I believe it’s the start of the whole thing.

I’ve known for years that I have a weak back, and there are a couple of reasons for that. Since I was a teenager, I’ve dealt with back trouble because:

1. I have always hated to exercise, so I have a weak core, and …
2. I gots Gamp Back.

“Hey, Mike … what in the name of all sewer stankwater pain is Gamp Back?”

I’m glad you asked. If you listened a few episodes ago when I talked about my perfect Christmas, you’ll hear me emote lovingly about my grandpa and how he would sit quietly watching his family as we lived our lives around him. He called himself The Gamps, obviously a babytalkish way to say Gramps, and it stuck. So while he was watching us, there were likely times he was doing so in agony from a back that gave him trouble, and because genes have this cute way of repeating themselves down a family line, a whole bunch of us ended up with torsos that easily make the decision to test the boundaries of our pain tolerance by taking a spinal version of Rumspringa. That’s the period of time where young Amish people are allowed to break from tradition and do shameful things, like chewing gum and moving their feet slightly to a beat.

During Spinal Rumspringa, members of our family will develop the aforementioned Gamp Back. Knowing this was a possibility, I should have insisted that my son, who is a young, strapping 17-year-old, change his own tire. It was that last stupid lug that did the trick. Whoever put it on must have summoned the power of Thor, and like the God of Thunder’s hammer, the lug did not want to budge. I was apparently not worthy. Yet, I insisted I was still man enough to do it, and I did, but not before I felt a slight twinge in the lower left side of my back.

“Haha. That’s gonna smart for a few days,” I laughed like a character from Father Knows Best, and finished the job.

But it bothered me a little from then on. I mean, it wasn’t bad enough that I paid it much attention, but it was constantly there, putting a damper on all of my tide yuling, shelf elfing, and Christmas tree oh-ing. Then right after Christmas, I started noticing some pretty severe sciatic nerve pain that didn’t want to go away. I wanted it to, just like you want those shiny strands tinsel to stop showing up on your clothes when you get them out of the dryer, all the way into August.The only thing worse than that is the flake green plastic Easter basket grass. Regardless of how I describe it, the pain was relentless.

My wife got tired of hearing me complain about it. It’s not that she wasn’t sympathetic with my injury, but after a while, it was clear I needed to see a doctor and and get on some kind of medicine that made me loopy to see if I could get some relief. Me being me, though, I thought that was just silly.

“You need to go to the doctor about that, and get on some medication that makes you loopy to see if you can get some relief.”

“Nah. It’ll go away. I’ve had it before, and it just has to work itself out.”

“It’s more serious than that. You really need to make an appointment. You need something for the pain.”

“Silly woman, I know my body.”

“Why would you refuse if they can help you? You’re not a young, strapping 17-year-old boy anymore. You’re not even strapping.”

“The waiting room would be crawling with COVID. I ain’t goin’. OW! My Leg!”

“WE NEED SOME RELIEF!”

I also needed to see my doctor about getting back on a serious plan for my diabetes, so she threw that at me and said, “Oh, and by the way ... You’ll be mentioning your leg and back.”

Fine. I made the appointment and he gave me some steroids for the pain, along with a good talking to about Cadbury Creme Eggs and the role I’ve allowed them to play in my life. Spoiler alert: They are not the hero.

To my surprise, the steroids made me feel a LOT better, and pretty fast. So fast, in fact, that just before going on a trip to Alabama, I moved a block of granite in my backyard without help because I STILL would not believe that I was neither young, nor strapping. Then I worked a weekend where I set my posture badly and didn’t move for about six hours, then turned around and drove home five hours. I think I also found an early stock of Cadbury Creme Eggs and crammed them into my face like a honey badger.

I soaked in a bath once I got home, and it felt great after the drive. It was hot, and it was soothing … for a couple of minutes. Then I noticed something. The muscles in the lower left part of my back and my left leg began to tighten in a painful way.

I removed the pretend pipe from between my teeth, and stated, “Gee, that doesn’t just smart. That’s a sure enough, gosh-golly bite from the jaws of a hell hound. And is that sewer water I smell?”

At first it was uncomfortable, then worse, then unbearable. Now, as you know from earlier, I’m not one for doctors, but I quickly decided to calmly, make another statement to my wife. I said, “OH GOD! YOU GOTTA TAKE ME TO THE EMERGENCY ROOM! I’M DYING, KAYLA! THIS IS IT! I AIN’T GONNA MAKE IT OUTTA HERE, BUT WE HAVE TO TRY. WE HAVE TO TRY!!!”

She rushed to my aid, and we rushed to the hospital. That, itself, is its own story, but not for right now. Actually, the hour ride to the hospital that’s NOT run by drunk llamas wasn’t bad. Something about the way I could place my legs gave me a decent amount of relief. I was seen by the ER, given drugs that made me loopy, and sent home. The next few days went as follows:

MY WIFE - “How are you feeling?”

ME - “AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!

MY WIFE - “Still that bad? Is there anything I can do to help the pain?”

ME - “You can … GAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!! I’M DYING! BRING ME A PEN AND PAPER! I NEED TO WRITE OUT A WILL!!!!!!!!!!

MY wife - “Let me at least get some food in you. What would you like?”

ME - “AHHHHHHHHHHH …. BREADSTICKS! HIZZA PUTT!!!!!”

During the night, I writhed and moaned like a baby because I could get no relief, no matter what positions I tried. Sitting up, lying down, legs in the air, legs off the side of the bed, Bound Lotus, Congress of a Spider Monkey … all of them. Kayla couldn’t sleep, but she did everything she could to care for me. Again, she’s been a saint. That was pretty much the long and short of our lives for most of two weeks until we could get in to see a chiropractor. I’d never been to a chiropractor before, and I was skeptical. I hobbled in like Quasimodo, and answered their questions as best as I could.

“Where does it hurt?”

“GAHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!”

“How long has it been hurting?”

“AAAAAARRRRRRRRRGGGGHHHHH!!!!!”

“Are you able to eat?”

“BREADSTICKS! HIZZA PUTT!!!!”

And then, a man entered the room. There was a heavenly glow surrounding his head. At first I thought he was holding a lamb in his arms, but it turned out to be a white towel to put under my head. He gently took my leg into his hands and taught me a motion that moved in concert with him to loosen the nerve. He bent my body in a couple of ways I never would have thought possible, much like I used to twist and contort my sister’s dolls when I wanted to practice ancient torture methods, but somehow, this felt amazing. He then leaned in, pressing his body weight into me with the skill of a medical Samurai (please don’t come at me with something like, Chiropractice, Chiropracticality? Chiropractation? Chiropractation! … isn’t technically medicine, fah fah fah!) I don’t care. It was to me. Actually, it felt like a miracle because when I left, I could actually walk. And that night, I could sleep. And the next day, I considered moving around some of the blocks of granite in my backyard.

Actually, I took his advice, and have been doing everything exactly as he instructed. I saw him the next day for another adjustment, and saw him twice a week for the next six weeks. And after that, there will be at least a monthly visit for the rest of my life because I am a staunch believer now.

It wasn’t just him, though. There was a ton of prayer and promises to act right, pray more, read my bible, and never ever again attempt the congress of anything with the name of an animal in it. In addition, my family doctor advises that I steer clear of as many burgers and creme eggs, and make more of a habit of visiting something that rhymes with Balad Sar.

So it’s a good news/bad news sort of thing.

The good news is that I’m nearly completely recovered now from my back injury, and relatively pain free.

The bad news is that to stay that way, I need to engage in a healthy lifestyle. But these breadsticks with extra seasoning are SO GOOD!

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Part of a conversation with my friend, Toni King from a previous podcast called, "Cue One Go - The Theatre Show". We're talking about things that happened onstage.

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Due to my busy schedule, I'm going to be giving you a look back into the history of my podcasting. In this episode, I'll introduce you to my friend, Toni King, who co-hosted a podcast with me called, Cue One Go - The Theatre show. I really miss C1G and I hope listening to this episode brings you as much joy as it did for me.

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The Uncanny Consequences Of Being Me

The title of this piece reads like a fancy-pants movie they’d show at a film festival where the people in the audience all eat their popcorn with a fork so they won’t get their fingers greasy and spot up their turtle necks and skinny jeans. I’m sorry about that. I don’t mean to make you feel like you’re one of those people. You might prefer your popcorn the way I do … floating in a bucket of butter oil that resembles a gigantic vat of cereal that’ll stuff your arteries like a Thanksgiving turkey. I mention my arteries because they’ve been on my mind lately. My doctor told me they’re as clogged as a man’s who eats movie theatre popcorn the way I do. Which got me thinking … I’d love a bag of that Lance Movie Theater Extra butter popcorn I talked about in episode 71, titled Diary of a Rage Monster. Which got me to thinking … I’d probably not be able to find it anyway because that’s how things go for me. Which brought to mind … Hey, I wanted to write about that!

Well, now that you’re supremely confused, let me bring it back around to the title of this piece and tell you about my bad luck. From Atomic Red studios, I’m Michael Blackston and I’m calling this The Uncanny Consequeces Of Being Me because sometimes that’s what it feels like to live my Funny Messy Life.

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Have you ever heard of The Screwtape Letters by C.S. Lewis? It’s composed as a series of correspondence between two demonic forces - Screwtape, and his nephew Wormwood. The nephew is a rookie demon assigned to a poor, unsuspecting human and his job is to bother the man enough that he never comes to know God, or worse, curses Him altogether. Screwtape is a crusty old veteran and is trying to help his nephew in learning the ways of evil and messing with humans. It’s a classic book that has helped many understand the powers at play in the realm we can’t see, and I have come to believe I have a Wormwood of my own.

I understand that not every inconvenient thing that happens to me is the work of evil minions. Just because I crank the side of my finger in the ratchet thingy that tightens the straps when I secure granite to my trailer doesn’t mean the devil did it. Just because I drop a piano on my two big toes like I told you about in episode 16 - I think - the part titled, I Can Do It All By Myself, doesn’t mean Satan waved his hand and caused the piano to fall. Just because I look like an idiot when I try to bust a move doesn’t mean the forces of evil are actively trying to stop the beat. No. Those things simply mean I’m clumsy, stupid, and a terrible dancer.

But alas, there is uncanniness afoot, and it happens when I find something I adore. I’ll become enamored with the item and start to desire it with the desire an obsessed man will desire a thing and suddenly, even though I’ve seen it everywhere, it’s gone. Nowhere to be found. Vanished into thin air and as unseen as the whisps of a flatulent butterfly.

Okay, most of the time it has to do with food I shouldn’t ought to be eating in the first place, so I suppose one could argue that it’s actually the forces of good that are directing my path. However, since I get so turned upside down about it, I feel better laying the blame on my own moron of a demon, or maybe he’s a genius.

In light of that, I believe I’ll borrow from C.S. Lewis and present my own version of correspondence between the teacher and the newbie imp. I’ll call him, Sugar Poot. (I’m sorry, Mama - it’s the first random nickname that popped into my head and it made me laugh out loud in the restaurant. I spit out my tea and got it all over my shirt. Sigh. Thanks a lot, Sugar Poot.) The master bad guy will be Vernon McDirtbag.

Here go the conversations I think might take place between them:

Dear Uncle Vern,

I reckon mama’nem told ya I got my first assignment this week, and I been tryin’ real good to git him to fly off’n the handle. It ain’t workin’, though. I was plannin’ to hurt him right off by makin’ him git a splinter when he was loadin’ up some granite, but the idgit beat me to it when he pinched his finger in the ratchet thangy what tightens up the straps. Can ya give me some pointers? I don’t know what I’m doin’.

Yourn truly,

Sugar Poot

Dear ….

I won’t call you Sugar Poot. What was your mother thinking? I shall refer to you as S.P. Also, my name is Vernon, not Vern.

Anyway, I will attempt to give you a few suggestions as to how to keep your man off of the straight and narrow, but you must realize that from what I understand, you have quite the task ahead of you. He is already a child of God, even if he does sometimes erroneously write things that make his family shake their heads. Being previously saved, your only recourse will be to lay spots upon his testimony. Our Adversary has him in His hand, but that doesn’t mean your man is perfect, or unshakeable. He is only human, after all. Think of things that will cause him to stumble. Things that will invite him to sin and to do so publicly. I wish you devil speed in your endeavors, nephew.

Yours,

Vernon

Dear Uncle Vee,

A-Ight, I tried whatcha said. I give him a real bad time last week when I heard him sayin’ he wanted some of that Lance Movie Theater Butter popcorn. He was goin’ out of town, and it was late, and he was feelin’ snacky. He just figured out he likes that stuff and he’s got a real addiction to it, so y’know what I did? I made sure every bag of it between his house and Carbon Hill, Alabama was plum out. That’s five hours of drivin’ without his precious popcorn bag, Uncle Vee! You orta seen him. He was madder’n a Crimson Tide fan the day Nick Saban announces his retirement. I got him good! Only thang is, he didn’t do nothin’ bad about it. He jest stewed the whole way, fussin’ to hisself about how that’s always how it goes. The second he finds somethin’ he likes, it’s gone. I’m gon’ try it again, though. Soon as I find somethin’ else he’s a-cravin’.

Yer dedicated ‘prennice,

Sugar Poot

Dear Nephew Sugar …. S.P.,

While I’m impressed with your fervor, I must say that your error is obvious. The answer is in the description you give of your man’s reaction to not being able to get his teeth around the scrumptious, buttery kernels of popping perfection. He said it always happens. Nephew, if you are to move him with temptation, you must seize upon the things that catch him off guard. It sounds to me that he is used to this sort of disappointment, and therefore harder to push in a negative direction. Yes he, as you called it, stewed, but in the end he survived, and I dare suspect called upon his Lord to help him with his state of mind. Do not worry, nephew. These are rookie mistakes and to be expected. Think outside the box to get him so frustrated that he makes a scene in front of others. And to add insult to injury, perhaps you may entice him to do so on a day when he is wearing his Jesus shirt like he talked about in episode 67 of his podcast, Funny Messy Life. Here’s hoping for a better report next go ‘round.

P.S., My name is VERNON, not Uncle VEE!

Yours in evil,

VERNON!

Dear Daddy McDee,

Oh boy, did I git him this time! He was on the road again. I been noticin’ that he kept eyeballin’ them white chocolate Reecie Cups, but he never bought one. I mean, he likes Reecie Cups, but the rag’lar ones. He’ll eat them thangs, and anythang else chocolate fer that matter, like he never knew he was a diabetic. Hard as I tempted him, I couldn’t git him to partake in the white chocolate ones. But then he did it. He tried one. You oughtta seen the look what come over him when he took his first taste. I mean, them thangs was everywhere, so I let him git one more pack of ‘em on the way home, then I waited. Next trip he headed out, I put it in his head. MMMMM, BOY! Wouldn’ a white chocolate Reecie Cup sit good on yer tongue? Put it on ya head, ya tongue‘ll slap ya face to death tryin’ ta git to it! Well, he took the bait and I made every one of them packs of candy between his house and Brookhaven, Mississippi disappear. That’s ten stinkin’ hours of travel without gettin’ the kind of Reecie Cup he wanted and I thought I had him ready to cuss, but he didn’t. He took a deep breath, pulled over at an exit that had a theater, and went to a movie. Daddy McDee, my man bought a gigantic tub of popcorn and had ‘em give it five layers of butter oil. It sloshed when he walked to his seat, uncle. It sloshed! I can’t compete with that! I don’t know how I’m gon’ earn my medals of evil if’n I can’t even git a man to cuss about a piece of candy. I’m forlornded.

I give up,

Sugar Poot

Dear S.P.,

This is our final correspondence. I can’t deal with you, so I’ll let my sister - your mother - be your mentor. After all, she is the one that named you Sugar Poot. However, I will urge you not to give up entirely. My promise is that your man is currently in the flesh. That means he has weaknesses in the armor he wears, that is if it’s armor of his own making. Whenever you notice he has taken up the Armor of God, you have no chance. But stay firm and resolute. He doesn’t always put on the Armor of God. He knows our Adversary leads him to, but he doesn’t always follow. In those times lay your best shot. You’ll be able to spot them. He will whisper something hateful about his fellow man, or look twice in a direction he should not. Perhaps he will drop a piano on his big toes and curse like a sailor. He wears his own armor then, and it is full of vulnerable, open spaces. In the meantime, don’t call me Vern, Uncle Vee, or Daddy McDee. As a matter of fact, just don’t call me.

Lose my address,

Vernon

So there you have it. I fully expect that when I find something I really enjoy, in due time, it will become utterly, and uncannily, unavailable.

P.S. Eventually I was able to find the popcorn and the Reece’s Cups. Swamp Guinea stew is a whole other story, like I mentioned in the last episode. It’s just uncanny.

Yours in comedy and messy life,

Michael

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A Christmas interview with my 8 year old daughter, Merida.

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My Perfect Christmas

I told you so. I suspect a few of my regular listeners didn’t believe me when I said I’d be back to Funny Messy Life after a brief hiatus, but here I am. I’ve been gone for a few weeks because it’s hard to find the time to write out full episodes of this podcast when there are other things that I have to do in place of it, like editing the final draft of a novel, which is what has been going on with this last break. But every break has to come to an end at some point, and while I’m not done with editing Mr. Long Said Nothing because my life is too full with obligations, I’ve been thinking it’s time to get back in the podcast saddle. The question was this: Should I jump on back in now, or give myself the rest of the year and jump back in at the beginning of 2022? I mean, it’s only about a week now, right? Then something happened. I received a Christmas card from my friends, the ________, in Minnesota and my heart soared. By the way, _________, I wanted to send you an email to thank you, but I got a fancy pants new iPhone and in the data transfer, I lost your info, so drop me your email address if you don’t mind. Anyway, I decided that if someone who knows me through this podcast feels strongly enough to send me a card, then maybe others of you do too … just maybe not as much as the __________’s because they put that they were my biggest fans right there on the envelope, so ……

SO! - without further ado, I’m Michael Blackston and Merry Christmas! Here is the first episode back after my hiatus, and now I present to you, for your holiday pleasure, a few words that describe what I think would be the perfect Christmas in my Funny Messy Life.

_________________________

Let us start by jingling all the way back to my childhood in the 1970’s and 80’s to get the family Christmas tree. In. my extended family, we had a tradition. We always met at my grandma’s house on Sunday afternoons for lunch and a few hours of fellowship. The grownups gathered around the kitchen table after the meal, while the kids were expected to go outside and frolick merrily around the property, regardless of whether or not it was 20 degrees, or 150. If it was 150, we came back in at the end of the day with sweaty, gritty dirt lines circling the perimeters of our necks. I may have mentioned before that we called these rings of grime and funk, Granny Beads. If it was twenty degrees outside, we’d still have them, but they’d be frozen into magical frozen filth beads. Either way, the adults would inevitably tell us at the end of the day, after being the very ones to banish us to the hours long whimsy of nature, Y’all smell like the outside!

But every year a couple of weeks before Christmas, it was the entire family who got to smell like the outside. Why? Because it was our tradition for everybody to march into the woods together and pick out our Christmas trees from the wild cedars that grew behind Grandma’s house. The men took up their saws, we kids ran untethered through the forest like we didn’t have no good raisin’, and the women kept a keen eye out for the perfect tree when they weren’t yelling at us kids.

“Quit runnin’ around like y’all ain’t got no good raisin’!”

Every once in a while, one of the young ones would find a tree we wanted to take home.

“Let’s git thissun, Deddie!”

But it was never the right one. It usually had a huge bare spot in the middle, or the top looked like the Jolly Green Giant had used it to scrape the granny beads out of the creases on his jolly green neck.

Eventually, the angels would descent, shining a holy light on the perfect tree, and the man who claimed it would begin the arduous task of cussing it down. Did I say cussing it down? Ha ha, no. Of course not. I meant cutting it down with interesting, and quite colorful words as a way to encourage the saw to stop getting stuck in the sap midway through.

Once we got the tree home and decorated, the house smelled delightfully of cedar and burning cedar needles as back in those days we thought nothing of stringing a dead tree with huge glass bulbs that got hotter than Satan’s armpit. In effect, our house smelt like th’outside!

And that’s number one on my list of things that would make a perfect Christmas - going outback of Grandma’s house with the family just one more time to pick out the Christmas tree.

Next, I think I would want the family to gather again a couple of weeks before Christmas at an old southern restaurant that no longer exists, except in our fond memories. I’m not sure who first came up with the idea of everybody going to Swamp Guinea (prounounced SWOMP’ - ginny), but they are responsible for some wonderful memories. It became another extended family tradition, and I suspect maybe my Grandpa started it all. Swamp Guinea was an wood cabin sort of place that smelled of fried everything and sweet tea. It was an all-you-can-eat family style gorge-fest where our family met to tear into chicken, shrimp, catfish, hush puppies, cole slaw, and stew like we didn’t have no good raisin’. The place is closed now, and this year we tried to re-imagine the tradition with a trip to another similar place called Booty’s. I didn’t care for it, but we were all together and that’s what was important. Well, Grandma wasn’t with us for the first time, so I guess that might have had something to do with it not being the same.

The thing is, the stew I just mentioned would also always make an appearance at our Christmas Eve gathering. Someone would order a pot of Swamp Guinea stew and bring a loaf of bread to the table. Lately the stew was from a different place, and it’s good, but it’s not Swamp Guinea. At least we were all together at Grandma’s.

So for number two, I think just one more meal with the family at Swamp Guinea would help make the perfect Christmas.

Stepping back to the tree situation, one of my favorite memories of Christmas was always the family decorating the tree in the middle of Grandma and Grandpa’s living room. The box with all the ornaments would be brought in and everyone would be invited to find the ball with their name on it. I think my sister might have started this event years ago because she’d seen them doing on Days Of Our Lives, but it stuck and it became ours as well. The kids hung theirs as high up as they could go, while the teens fought for position at the topmost point of the tree. One of my cousins would never be outdone and to this day, the tree’s topmost ornament bears the name, Chuck. It’s there again this year, except the tree was brought to my aunt’s house because the house we’ve always known as Grandma’s has been sold. New places, new traditions. Never quite the same.

Grandma and Grandpa would sit back and watch the crowd laughing and being jolly as we decorated the tree, sometimes so loud it seemed we didn’t have no good raisin’, and they said few words. They just took it all in.

And that’s number three for me in my ideal description of the perfect Christmas.

Then there’s Christmas Eve. After the meal that included all the trimmings, including the stew, we would all retire to the living room to open presents. The kids would have been begging to get to this part for a while now, and having digested, the adults would relent. At that point, a couple of people would be appointed to pass them out from the enormous pile under the tree and the fun would start with everyone ripping up paper and throwing bows into the air with reckless abandon, as if they didn’t have no good raisin’. Someone always ended up with a bow on their head, showing it off to everyone like it was the first time anyone had ever thought of it. A lot of time that person has been me. There are a couple of gag gifts that have made their rounds over the years: an old coat that no one wants, and two plastic guitar-shaped popcorn … things with Elvis on the label. These gifts must be kept and regifted the next year. Every year, someone dares someone else to eat the popcorn and we laugh. Once again, the Grandparents, ,and for several years, only Grandma, sat and watched and got showered with gifts, but said little. This was their gift - to see the family they created share a wonderful time. I suspect this description matches a lot of others around the world in cultures that celebrate Christmas, but each one will have their special little things that make it unique to that family.

Ours will be different this year. Grandma passed this year and like I said, the house was sold. It’s funny, I always call it Grandma’s house, but there was Grandpa, too, until he passed. That was his way, though. To quietly sit in the background and enjoy watching the rest of us. When I think back on it, I can still see the look on his face, the slightest upward curl the edges of his mouth, and the twinkle in his eye as his family lived their lives in front of him. That’s what he always worked toward. It was his greatest mission - to provide those moments for the rest of us.

In the end, it became Grandma’s mantle to sit back and watch. The older she got, the less she would say as she sat at the side table in Sundays in the kitchen while the rest of us talked and laughed, and on a rare occasions, argued. I felt bad for her sometimes and didn’t want her to feel left out, so I’d ask her …

“You okay over there, Grandma?”

She would smile and say, “I’m just listening to y’all.”

Coming in at number four, one more Christmas with Grandma and Grandpa at their house on the Washington Highway. I want to pull in one more time and see the lone tree out front lit with bright, multicolored lights. I want my headlights to shine just one more time on a sign out front by the road that read, Joseph Mills Photograghy. I want to walk inside and immediately hear gales of laughter and smell the stew. And I want my hug. God, I miss my hug.

It’s all different now, and I’m settled that the only choice we have is to continue to love, laugh, and live. In those moments, we will usher in new traditions and the world will, as it always has, move on.

There are a bunch of other things that would help put the perfect season pin to the season, but this year, these feel like they rank at the top for me. Maybe I’ll revisit this list and add to it another time, but for now, it’s where it ought to be. As for my Christian brothers and sisters who might ask, Where was Christ in all of this? You never mentioned Christ.

I didn’t have to. He was always there. He was there when Grandpa and Grandma eloped to be married at 16. He was there at the birth of each of their three daughters, and subsequently every grandchild as the family grew. And Christ was at the very center of every celebration, every tradition, and every memory we made. And now, I guess he’s with them in Heaven, three of them holding hands together and smiling, watching with maybe few words, as we continue to live our lives in front of them.

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Well, I felt really stupid this morning. And then I felt even more stupid around lunch time. And then I felt supremely stupid at the end of the day. Why? Because I was having a bad day.

Actually, check that. There was nothing particularly bad about the day. I was having one of those days when it seemed like everything - and I mean EVERYTHING - was out to irritate me.

From Atomic Red Studios, located in a secret bunker somewhere in Northeast Georgia, I’m Michael Blackston and sometimes I have days when waking up on the wrong side of the bed is an understatement. The problem is, the stuff that gets under my skin, really shouldn’t. By the end of the day, I can find myself in a ridiculous headspace, and I’m not alone. I’ve seen footage of people just like me. One young man at a gas pump got so angry with a door compartment on his motorcycle that when he’d had enough, he reared back to kick it. Luckily for the bike, his friend intervened and wrestled him back from his maniacal discourse before anything bad could happen. So, with a heart of transparency, let’s peek inside the pages of a diary. The diary of a rage monster.

_________________________

First, I had gotten up at 4:30 am to get started on a trip to Sumter, SC for work. I’ve been traveling less recently, and I’ve been leaving out the evening before when I do travel, so I can get a good night’s sleep in my hotel room before getting up to etch my fingers to the bone. It’s a nice routine, but Sumter is close enough to where I live that the drive isn’t so bad and I often just get up little before the roosters.

I like Sumter. There’s plenty to eat, a movie theater should I decide to drop 80 bucks for a single ticket and concessions, an Air Force base that’s cool to pass by because I can pretend I’m Maverick from Top Gun, except I’m not in my twenties, driving a cool motorcycle, and about to go make out with Kelly McGillis. Other than that, it’s almost identical. And they actually have a Swan Lake in Sumter. They have an actual lake with swans.

All that to say there was no reason for me to already be having a bad day not an hour into my commute.

Dearest Diary,

This morning broke my slumber finding me well in temper. My good wife and the firstborn of my loins, the male child, had been away at concert the previous eve, in the communeship of Buckhead, near the capitol of our fair state of Georgia. I was aware of the late hour they should return and had dressed our second born, a girl child, in her night clothes and bade her pleasant dreams. She went amicably, allowing me the advantage of an early turn-in myself, being that I must wake prior to the crow of the cock.

I feared the tally of hours might not be enough for my sleep, but upon waking, I felt refreshed and eager to turn a key to the day and all the promise that lay waiting beyond that mysterious door.

The initial hour of my drive was without event, and I dare say the next ones might have followed suit, had my hunger not played the beast and my bladder cried out also.

I shall stop, then, I uttered to no one in particular, and led my iron carriage into the next store of convenience. There I found the necessary venue for silencing the cries of my bladder, and though my intent was not to gather food here, for I had seen the golden sign ahead that told me the time was Bo and my mouth lathered at the thought of a buttery biscuit stuffed with Cajun filet, I did, indeed, endeavor to procure a vat of cola from the fountain.

The fountain brought forth a delicious brown syrup and water mixture in a cascade over a mountain of crushed ice inside my cup, and did so at the mere touch of my finger. My spirits were on high with the aspect of such cold refreshment and soon, I should feel my taste buds seizing, then giving in to the salivatory seduction that is the Cajun filet biscuit with two slices of cheese. Could such rapture be met with foe, and at so early an hour? Surely I would have thought Nay! But alas, fine diary, rock would soon strike flint in the form of a thin, plastic lid. A cluster of them to be exact.

The discs that were to be the barrier between the contents of my cup and the possible soaking of my lap had been stacked anew and tucked tightly into a space by what I can only assume were the minuscule hands of a baby midget. I was scarcely able to insert my own fingers well enough into the stack, for they are fattish and resemble the stubby links of sausage one might request at the House of Huddle. My ire became piqued as I contemplated my course, wondering why on God’s green earth the attendant would be loathe to leave room for the selection of a singular lid. I settled upon the idea of using a fingernail to lift the corner of the topmost lid, and while I was successful in my endeavor of sliding a nail underneath, the lid would not come forth. Once I tried to lift it, then a second time, now thrice, but to no avail. It was stuck to its brothers like a glue of the most voracious variety, making impossible the prospect of retrieving just one, or any for that matter, for the entirety of the cluster of discs was too large to be withdrawn from its keep. I roasted with enmity toward the lids, marking inwardly how silly I must seem to God, Who created all and gave the discs no soul, nor reasoning. It did not matter.

BLAST THESE CURSED LIDS OF PLASTIC!, I shouted and an employee the size of a thimble next to me became startled.

You! I said indignantly and squeezed mine eyes to slits toward him. You, sir, have brought shame upon this place by so carelessly packing these discs. And now, lest I prevail, I shall risk the appearance of incontinence with a large wet stain upon the front of my pantaloons. A pall upon you sir, and may shadows of woe consume thy house!

Dude, I’m just doing my job, he bade haughtily and I stormed away.

I am sorry, dear diary. I have acted the fool.

Yours,

Michael

Most Honorable Diary,

I am a man unhinged of late. While I was eventually able to rescue a single plastic lid from its dungeon of a hole, thereby keeping my clothes dry during my commute, my day, I fear, has become more hateful still. It would seem I have been visited by an illness that knocks at my door oftener than I care for. I cannot seem to hold anything in my hands today, causing all manner of embarrassment and irritation. Mother calls this condition The Dropsies. I call it hell!

Diary, I am unable to efficiently produce the etchings for which I am called to do if every time I pick up my hand piece, I knock over my glass of tea, or my iPhone, or accidentally poke a customer in the eye. How then, shall I seed my wallet? Surely an artist with clumsy hands does not curry the favor of those seek a master. Therefore what shall I do if this new development persists? I will tell you. To quote a lyric from OLIVER, I shall scream. I shall scream, I shall scream, I shall scream.

The final straw with this fresh bane was when I dipped my hand into the bag of popped corn I have punched earlier, and, intending to grasp a quantity of several at once and shovel them into my mouth, my plan was thwarted once again by my painfully sausage-like fingers. They clasped a goodly amount of the kernels and had no failure removing them from the bag, but alas, the task was too much for such a poor excuse for extremities and the very moment before I was able to cram them into my mouth, the pressure holding them together loosed and the entire lot exploded from my hand like so much buttery shrapnel from war’s tastiest grenade. The popped corn flew in every direction except for whence it was meant, and I flew into a rage, cursing their very existence of the snack.

AAAARRRRGGGGHHHH!

I clutched another handful from the bag and vaulted it against the wall bedside me, somehow hoping to cause pain to something inanimate, fluffy, and light. I called it names and I rebuked the evil emitting from the bag that lay before me.

Foul treat, I despise you! Whisps of Satan! Your stench both draws and repulses me! Be gone, for thy taste is a billowing siren song where dwells sadness and despair!

Workmen stared in the direction of my outburst, knowing not how to react, until I one of them approached and offered to rid me of this thorn in my side.

You gon’ eat that?

I fear for my sanity, diary. Pray for me.

In your debt,

Michael

DIARY!

Why do I even bother placing quill to your parchment?! This is the very problem, is it not? Here am I spilling the worst of my personal flaws to a book, as if there were a living, breathing entity within the binding that would benefit me by council. Ha! Perhaps it was the fatalist part of this entire matter that I made the first stroke, lending the idea of consciousness to any object wherein its molecular structure, there be no hint of blood. I have jumped off the cliff. Now, by the end of this day, I see that wayward cup lids and an episode of the dropsies were mere trivialities compared to the fit I have now pitched at yet another item that could not possibly bear a soul, nor ill intent.

‘Twas merely a water bottle, and nothing more. It made no malevolence against me, spoke no threat, yet by the end of the matter, I had beaten the poor bottle against the pavement of the sidewalk.

I only wished for it remain inside of the plastic bag I had earlier designated as a trash receptacle. I meant good by it, that I should be the good steward and stow my garbage away from the rest of decent society, to contain it properly. I needed it no more, for it promised not another drop of refreshment. But the bottle would not stay in the bag. I placed it there, gently, and having satisfied that I was ready to start my truck, bucked the belt around my waist and ignited the engine. Alas, before I was able to pull the lever into drive, I hear the bag in the passenger seat floorboard settle awkwardly and the bottle rolled out.

This would not do.

I retrieved the bottle and reapplied it to the bag, yet it rolled out again, immediately upon my sitting back.

Once more, I retrieved the bottle and placed it, nay, slammed it violently back into the bag, daring in my heart that it should have the audacity to further escape. There seemed to be a peace by then, that the bottle would relent. I was able to re-buckle, pull the lever into drive and spring the vehicle forward toward home at last. Home, where there awaited a shower and the prospect of an early retirement to my bed.

As soon as I was dedicated to my course, out into the street where stopping to re-trash a delinquent bottle is more difficult, I hear the bag settle again and the bottle roll out, this time completely beneath the passenger seat, as if it would hide from me.

Now, in my head, I knew the right thing to do. It would certainly be folly to give in to the rage I felt at the moment for a plastic bottle. Folly though, appeared to be the order of the day. I felt to be at the mercy of my heart and not my head in any case, I screamed the truck to a halt by the side of the street and charge out, around to the passenger side door. The bottle was nowhere to be seen, but I knew. I knew exactly where it was hiding inside its cave under the seat. I could almost hear it laughing at me. Had I not capped it from the start, I feared I might hear it audible, which angered me more.

I thrust my hand beneath the seat, ignoring the sticky remnants and grainy residue of things that had fallen there before unbeknownst to me, and tried to get my fingers around the bottle. I could feel it inches, even centimeters from my grasp, but budging back ever so slightly and out of my reach any time my flesh felt its cold plastic skin.

This game of cat and mouse pushed me to a new mental state. It turned me into something primal and without any sense of reason whatever.

The yell that this induced from my lungs resembled nothing of the man I saw in the mirror. It was the scream of a madman or a monster. When I finally got my hand around the bottle, I squeezed, with intention, harder than was necessary. I imagined I could hear shrieks of pain, and this brought me joy.

Immediately, I brought the bottle outside the truck and raised it before my eyes, still gripping it with terrible fervor.

Disobey me, will you?! I’ll see to it you stay put from now on. You have brought this upon thyself!

I struck that bottle on the pavement over and over and over again, screaming fresh with every insane blow. Traffic slowed to watch the spectacle. It was only after a passerby, who apparently had been in my position before, hollered his approval - Woo HOO! Git ‘er done! - that I came to my senses and realized what a buffoon I was being.

After all, diary, it was just a plastic bottle. How could I blame a plastic bottle?

It was the bag. The bag was to blame.

And I’m sorry, dearest diary, for writing to you so harshly before.

Currently seeking treatment,

Michael

Ok, so obviously, I’m trying to be funny, but just in case anybody thinks I was being serious anywhere in this piece, please observe the following disclaimer:

The previous enactment is a work of fiction. None of the insanity of the story you just heard is real. Michael does not write in a diary, nor is he from civil war times as indicated by the style the prose indicates. While Michael did actually become enraged while attempting to retrieve a plastic lid one morning, he did not yell at a little person. There was no bag of popcorn …. wait, okay, there WAS a bag of popcorn because there’s usually a bag of popcorn, but never was it thrown against a wall. That would waste good popcorn. No plastic bottles were harmed in actuality and Michael usually chuckles like a good-natured gentleman when they roll out of the trash bag. Have a nice day and quit taking yourself so seriously.

We’ve all had those little moments though, haven’t we? I’d love to hear about yours.

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I make my home in the Deep South. Northeast Georgia to be exact. I was born and raised here, I love our traditions, I love and respect my mama, I’m proud that there’s a church on every corner, and my rear end is plopped on the couch every Saturday in the fall because behind God and family, college football is king. Go Dawgs.

BUT …..

I’m not your typical southern boy. In fact, I spend my days expecting any minute to hear a knock at the door because I’m finally getting the visit from the South-Land Authentication Authority Works, otherwise known as S.L.A.A.W. They’ll be asking me to hand over my southern card.

“Ye’uns ain’t from around these parts, ere ya?”

“Yes, sir. I was born and raised right here in the Peach State. I like grits!”

“Oh yeah? Cooked or instant?”

“Instant.”

“Hand over that cahhhhhhd!”

It’s true. I prefer instant grits to cooked every single time. It’s what I grew up with and I like the taste. I particularly favor the brand with the Quaker guy on the front. That alone isn’t enough to have my southern card revoked, though. I know others - others who prefer to remain nameless - who like instant grits over cooked. One little hiccup in a person’s heritage does not a traitor make. Unfortunately for me, there is a long list of things that traditionally give a southerner their stamp of approval, and I don’t match up with a lot of them. For instance …

1. I don’t like country music. Many of us around here don’t but I get physically ill when I hear most of the stuff coming out of Nashville today. There was a time when I was quite engaged with the country music scene. I worked for two different country music radio stations and during that time in the mid-nineties, I enjoyed it. Now though, my snobbery which emerges from my distaste for poorly written lyrics and cliched creativity has me plugging my ears with closest thing to me, even if that thing is an ice pick, or a chunk of broken glass.

2. I don’t like cornbread. (What?! Say it ain’t so!) It is very much so. I like a corn dog and I can eat my weight in hushpuppies, but don’t ask me to take a bite of an actually by golly piece of cornbread. I’ve tried. Believe me. I just can’t make myself like the texture of it alone. There’s something different about a greasy hush puppy dipped in an ungodly slop of tartar sauce. I tried dipping cornbread into tartar sauce and it’s not the same.

3. While we’re on food, don’t offer me fish of any kind, including fried catfish, bream, or bass. (MMMM, boy! You don’t know what you’re missing out on. Them’s good eatin’.”) I know, but I’m the guy that makes it necessary to have the alternative chicken strips at every fish fry. You might be thinking, Well I don’t have chicken at MY fish fries. And that’s fine. Just don’t invite me, because I ain’t coming. Neither me, nor my wife will eat anything that comes from the water. Again, we’ve both tried. It all tastes like fish and we hate the taste of fish.

But Tilapia doesn’t have that fishy taste.

Yes it does. We’ve tried it.

But Mahi Mahi tastes more like chicken than fish.

YOU SIT ON A THRONE OF LIES!!!

1. And while we’re still on the topic of food, I eat my fried chicken with a fork. (Fried chicken, suh, is to be eaten with your hands.) Well, good for you. I don’t like the smell chicken flesh leaves on my fingers and it’s super hard to get that smell off.

2. Collard greens? No thank you.

3. Eggs. (Boy- I say BOY! Is there gon’ be anything on this list what don’t belong in the food pyramid?!) I’m starting to see your point. Other than country music so far, it’s all been about my finicky palette. Still, eggs are a staple of breakfast and I can’t stand to even smell them being cooked. I’ll eat them on occasion as long as they’re really well scrambled and have a whole block of cheese mixed into them. Otherwise, keep them away from me. Even my sister, who loves eggs, will go to the trouble to get the “wiggie” out of every egg she cracks before doing anything to it. I shouldn’t have to explain what the wiggie is, but I will, since it’s a word she made up years ago. It’s the little white stringy thing that’s always attached to the yolk. Now you know. And you’re better for it.

4. I don’t write “Thank You” notes, or at least I haven’t in the past. I’m changing on that as I get older, but not because I think it’s the right thing to do. If you receive a gift or service from someone you won’t see face to face, sure. Of course, you should send a note of thanks. BUT, it’s just my personal opinion that if you give me a gift and I personally, to your face, with a big ol’ hug and a tear in my eye, thank you, from my mouth to your ears, then I have thanked you. I have learned the hard way that this is a hot button topic for some people. I know folks who get red hot under the collar because it’s their opinion that you should send a thank you note every time someone says bless you after you sneeze. Those people are the reason I have a stack of 20,000 of the same thank you card I bought at the bin store for a dollar. (Well, I NEVER!) I guess not, but now you have. We have our own opinions and mine is just as valuable as yours. I don’t think I need to remind you what they say about opinions anyway.

5. I think keeping a dog on a chain is animal cruelty and if you’re caught doing it, you should be chained and left in the heat of the day, yourself. This isn’t a particularly southern thing, but I grew up seeing my share of people treat their animals this way. When I hear some redneck that just crawled out from under a rock say, It’s just a dang dog, I have to stop and ask God to help me see that person through His eyes. Why? Because my eyes in that moment, want to see that person strung upside down by their toenails and skinned like a catfish. Pets outside are fine as long as they’re taken care of and have room to run around. I’m talking about the people who think it’s okay to attach a huge, heavy chain around a dog’s neck and leave them a filthy bowl of water.

6. I hate trucks with irrationally large tires and no muffler. I look at stuff like this from a psychological perspective. When a dude blares past me in a pickup so loud it could wake the dead and sitting jacked up so high on its tires that you just about need a ladder to get into it, my first thought is, Somebody has insecurity issues. Somebody doesn’t feel seen nor heard. Yet, for so many young boys in the south, that sort of ride is a dream. I think the same thing when a car has the radio booming so loud it rattles the windows. Give me a quiet, sensible, comfortable automobile. I have absolutely zero need to go “Mud Ridin’.”

7. I have no use for hunting. (Them’s fighting words, boy!) Don’t get me wrong. I actually don’t have a problem with hunters who do it the right way. It’s just not for me at all. I tried it years ago when I was young. I got into it for a while and I shot a couple of deer, but since that time, I’ve changed my ideals. I don’t personally have a need to kill something with a face to be happy. Hunters who kill for food and utilize as much of the animal as possible have my respect. I believe animals were placed on earth for various reasons, and some of those reasons include supplying humans with food, shelter, clothing, and tools. But for me, while I really enjoyed the thrill of the hunt when I was into it, i would engage in that activity now with a camera instead of a gun. Not because I’m opposed to guns, but because I don’t need to help thin out the whitetail deer population. There are plenty of others around here willing to do that.

So take my card, if they must. I’m more interested in being a country united. I’m southern for the most part, and I’m proud as punch about my heritage. There are just a few kinks in the chain that hangs between the posts at the Mason/Dixon line.

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You want to know what having ten teeth extracted at once will do for you? It will make you long for your happy place, that’s what it’ll do for you. I’ve made no secret that I’ve had some pretty major dental issues and I’ve been transparent about it. Why hide it? It’s part of who I am. And now, my dental issues have come to a head in a way that required drastic action. I had to get a denture plate for my top teeth. In the long run, it’ll be a good thing. As a matter of fact, I’m already reaping the benefits because I now have an attractive smile, but the hours leading up to E-day were stressful.

What, exactly, is E-day? That’s what I’m going to tell you about. I’m Michael Blackston. Strap yourself in if teeth-related stuff bothers you, because that’s the town we’re going to visit from my Funny Messy Life.

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E-day for me was August 16, 2021. The “E” stands for “extraction”, so Extraction Day! … not a day in your calendar where you would expect to plan a cookout, or exchange gifts, or sing happy songs about the joys of getting cavities. Oh the rot in your mouth is frightfuuuullllll!

Oddly enough, I trust my dentist in the area of comfort to the point that I didn’t feel a ton of trepidation about it. Maybe I just pushed the thought to the back of my mind with other topics like paying overdue taxes and asking forgiveness for buying another microphone without running it by my wife. Whatever the reason, I didn’t think about it until it started getting closer to the day.

For one thing, I had already had to reschedule it once. I had made a plan with another dentist. I was still going to get the teeth extracted, but instead of a denture plate, I was going to go for the more expensive snap-in implant prosthetic plate. I told myself I was too young to have dentures, and I have a friend who got the snap-ins and loves them. Being a performer, I was concerned that I might be in the middle of an awesome rendition of Music of the Night from Phantom of the Opera and my teeth would fly out of my mouth unexpectedly, poking Christine Daae in the eye, and sliding down her face cartoon-like in a trail of spit and Cheezit crumbs from the snack I’d had right before the show.

Unfortunately for me, but fortunately for my wallet, when I went to the dentist the Friday before my first scheduled E-day to pay for everything early so I didn’t have to worry about that with a numb mouth dripping spit, and blood, and Cheezit crumbs from the snack I’d had just before the appointment, I found out that particular dental office was being run by drunk monkeys. They didn’t have anything together, so I told them to forget it. I’d go somewhere else.

After talking to several people who wore regular dentures, and being assured of the quality of suction available nowadays, not to mention the expense if half that of the snap-ins, I became convinced that a regular denture plate was the way to go. So I made an appointment with a former dentist I trusted.

I mention all of that to say that I was just ready to get it done, and that might have contributed to my peace before going in.

As the days drew nigh, though, the reality of what I was about to have done began to hit me. Snap-ins or not, it didn’t matter. Either way, those teeth had to come out.

People asked me a lot of questions the closer I got to E-day ...

They gon’ put you to sleep?

No. They said they’d give me gas, but to put me to sleep would be more expensive and was something I’d have to have done elsewhere. It was too many steps.

Won’t insurance cover that?

I don’t know. I don’t have insurance because a self-employed man with dental insurance is rare. Dental insurance for a self-employed person requires $30,000 a month and selling your soul to Satan.

So they ain’t gon’ put you to sleep for that?

See my answer to the first time you asked me that. And by the way, this line of questioning isn’t making me feel any better about it.

Can I have one of them Cheezits?

As it turned out, I didn’t even get gas. They didn’t offer it, and by the time they got through sticking me eighty times in the gums with a needle, I was numb enough that I didn’t figure I needed it.

As the days wound toward August 16th, I started to think more about it.

On the Sunday before it, had I not been singing on the Praise Team at church, I would have knelt down at the front and bathed in a little of that sweet altar juju. I spent the rest of that Sunday afternoon getting the requisite well wishes and folks telling mew they’d be praying for me. One theatre friend told me to Break a leg!

Then it was night. The sun went behind the horizon and things began to take on that eerie feeling. It’s like watching a scary movie at noon and thinking, there’s nothing to it, then trying to go to bed later that night and hearing every crack and shift of the old wood that holds up the house.

I started to realize what having ten extractions actually meant. Having ten tooth extractions at once means that someone is about to extract ten teeth out of your face at once, but it’s more than that. They’re going to then send you home with a hundred pounds of gauze because that’s how much it’s going to take to soak up everything that tends to ooze from ten gum holes where teeth used to be.

What’s wrong, honey?

Kayla realized I was crying.

I can’t do it. I can’t go through with it.

Yes you can. It’ll be over before you know it and I’ll be there with you.

It’s all gonna ooze … I don’t wanna ooze!

Go to your happy place.

That was a good idea. I should go to my happy place in my mind where I could at least fall asleep among the things that I love.

And I did. I love Christmas. Christmas is my happy place. Disney World is also my happy place, but there are too many characters walking around there sporting big, perfect teeth. I didn’t want anything to send my mind back in that direction any sooner than necessary. So, I chose Christmas as I drifted off to sleep and dreamed ……

Silver bells … manger scenes … lights, and laughter, and family, and …..

Twas The Night Before Dentist

Twas the night before dentist and all through my mouth

Not a tooth understood what my nerves were about

Preparations were made at the surgeon’s with care

And tomorrow, first light, I’d lay back in the chair

The children were wrestled and sent to their beds

While visions of toothless me rent through their heads

And mama with her phone out and me in a mask

Had just settled in before morning’s bleak task

When into my slumber, my mind took control

And sprang into fantastic story time mode

At once, I was partying, quite happy to go

To the dentist and loose my teeth, row after row

The celebrants danced and they played in the sun

As a farewell - a send off - to the unfortunate one

“It’s me!” I proclaimed with a face full of cake

Why this hullabaloo? It feels more like a wake

When what to my curious eyes should be brought

But a fistful of strings, their attachments aloft

“It’s your ride to the dentist!” said my Mother with cheer

Offering me the large present of helium gear

I took them suspiciously, and questioned as why

I should not go by car, but instead I should fly

“‘Cause BALLOONS!” She responded, then bounded away

With agility not in her wheel house today

She left me there standing with strings in my hand

And bright rubber orbs floating high o’er the land

The party continued as I took my flight

Hovering just a few feet, for my weight is not light

As I drifted off townward, they waved their goodbyes

And I set my eyes downward for my journey was nigh

First I sailed out of course and got stuck in a tree

While the guests from my party stood pointing at me

Away to adventure, I corrected my course

For awaiting were dentures and a pie hole of sores

Now needle, now mouthwash, now suction, now spit

On face mask for gas, so I’ll not give one … care

Through the town toward my destiny as onward I flew

When suddenly a carnival appeared out of the blue

Now the tree I’d encountered had popped some balloons

So my flight was more labored than first I’d assumed

Yet alas, what came bumbling amid all the sass

Of the carnival atmosphere now come to pass

But a filthy, drunk clown, stumbling toward me and he

Held a crop of balloons, which then filled me with glee

“I say, my good clown, might I buy them from you

At a dollar apiece?” But he said, “That won’t do.

You may not! They are mine!”, quoth the clown with a heave

And my dream jumped ahead once he’d taken his leave

What to do? What to do? I shall linger all day

And be late to the dentist. “Oh, I hate clowns!”, I say

But just as this freak show appeared from nowhere

In an instant it disappeared into thin air

What was left was the sound of a siren ablast

But no sign of confusion my mind had amassed

It was time to wake up, and the sound? My alarm

For the hour had come to, in truth, face the storm

I was oddly at peace as my wife drove me there

With no hint of balloons, or drunk clowns, or the fair

So I now have no teeth at the top of my mouth

Only sore, bloody holes and some pain meds to tout

And oh yes, there’s the denture I’m getting used to

You can probably tell by the "esh" shounds I do

But you’ll hear me exclaim, ere I end this tonight

There just isn’t much pain, and I’m speaking alright

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It’s refreshing to be able to find a place to rest from a road trip and ease my mind from the perpetual gray asphalt desert that the interstate can be. There was a time in my career when I could hit the road at 3 am and keep moving till I got where I was going, no matter how far the destination, with the exception of bathroom and food stops. But I’m getting older by the minute, and I can’t make my trips as easily without taking a break. No duh, right? Every minute that passes, you’re another minute older, Captain obvious! It’s just that I used to be able to ignore it. I can’t ignore it anymore. I seem to be falling apart - something my younger self was warned about, but I pushed away from my mind because that was in The Future …

Well now I’m coming to terms with the reality that my body has its own agenda. It wants to call it quits. It’s my body’s grand scheme to rot like that bag of salad you said you were going to eat, but then threw to the back of the refrigerator and forgot about. That salad got soft. Things turned colors they weren’t intended to turn. There is a smell coming off it that causes you to make a certain kind of stink face and when you finally take it out to throw it away, you exclaim, “That’s OLD!”

From Atomic Red Studios in the heart of Granite Country, I’m Michael Blackston, and while some of you might still call me a youngun at the age of 48, I‘m not feeling it anymore. Let’s get acquainted with some of the things that are flashing bright red as a great big warning sign in my Funny Messy Life.

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The first thing a doctor would tell me is that my biggest issue is my diet and exercise habits, or lack thereof. Dear old doc would explain that of course I wake up feeling like Mr. Magoo after he’s been run over by a dump truck hauling a ton of broken wheelchairs and walkers. When a person goes to bed at night after eating a family sized frozen lasagna and three Little Debbie Fudge Rounds, that person will naturally wake up with the sensation that they got too close to the cars of a Tilt-A-Whirl and all of the passengers were contestants on The Biggest Loser.

Add to the fact that the last time I engaged in any sort of real, regular exercise, I was unable to grow facial hair, and there’s the answer.

I know I haven’t helped my cause over the years, but my body still hates me. And I think that even if I ran five miles a day and ate only tofu and broccoli, the things I’m about to mention would still be going on.

Let’s start with my teeth.

I’ve mentioned before what a nightmare my smile is. I could be the grinning poster boy for horror movies, but theatres would never allow it because people would be too disgusted after looking at it to buy popcorn. My teeth started crumbling in my twenties and never looked back. For a while, I was able to fix my smile with veneers. Very expensive veneers, I might add. Thanks to my dad, I was able to put off the inevitable for a while, but because my teeth have always been weak, even that decayed after a while, and now the inevitable is at the door.

At this writing, I’m eight days from getting dentures. I’m still having trouble with the thought of it. It’s not the extractions of the bad teeth that are left. I can handle that. It’s the fact that I’m having to get DENTURES! At least for right now, it’s only the upper teeth that have let me down. The bottoms are getting crowns. Again, an expensive endeavor.

I’ve always been a singer, and that’s what I’m most worried about. I haven’t know anything but singing since I was four or five years old. I recently had an … episode … while I was traveling and had too much time to think while the gray desert loomed ahead of me. I began to think about what life would be like if my new upper plate restricted me from singing or speaking. I love my visual art, but if you asked me which activities mean the most to me, it wil be first leading worship at church, followed by performing on stage. And guess what? DING DING DING! You guessed it! Both of those things involve me using my big ol’ loud mouth. And that’s not to mention the fact that I hope to start a speaking ministry when I get my teeth situated, or that I’d like to continue voice work like this podcast, recording audio books, and doing voice overs. I won’t be able to do any of that as effectively if I sound like I have an enormous, unwieldy, apparatus in my mouth because I have an enormous, unwieldy apparatus in my mouth.

So I freely admit that I had … an episode … while driving alone in my truck.

As I noodled it through, and imagined myself in front of the congregation at church, sounding like Sylvester the cat, I started to lose it. It sounded something like this:

“Noooo, God! No, God, Please no, no! No! NOOOOOOO!!!!”

After that I cried a little and pled … pleaded? Pledded? I pledded with God not to make my speech and singing a huge, mushy mess of spit and incoherent babbling.

Here’s the good news, and I swear this isn’t a joke. This happened. Immediately after that, I realized I needed to pee, so I pulled onto the next exit and while I sat idle in my car, I felt led to do a search on YouTube for Singing with dentures. And after I fixed the autocorrect, which wanted to help me search for videos about Stinking Wig Dennis, I found a video that lifted my spirits. I think I was pointed there by God. It was by a beautiful young woman who was a singer who wears a full set of dentures, both top and bottom. And they’re not implants. They’re actual dentures. First, I noticed that she’s beautiful and the teeth look great. But then she said so many people who are aware of her dental issues have asked her if it affects her singing, so the whole video was made to set their minds at ease. She sang a few verses from a Christian song I happen to love, and she sounded amazing! She said she had not been affected at all.

Now, I realize that’s not the case for everyone, and I fully expect a period of getting used to speaking around mine and during that time, I may very well sound to t he congregation like there’s a Pharisee hiding out in my mouth, purposefully trying to make me unintelligible. But now I have hope. If I’m meant to lead worship, God will make a way for it and I’m content with that.

Teeth aren’t my only bane. I have a back that used to be stronger. I could do a hundred sit-ups at one time in my life. However, a few months ago, I decided that I needed to tighten my abs, but I was in a hotel room and had only the floor to aid me. I laid a towel on the floor to act as a barrier between my body and all manner of filth that lives and thrives in the carpet of a hotel room. Not creating a barrier between you and them is asking for trouble. You want a Pharisee in your mouth? Because that’s how you get a Pharisee in your mouth.

I prepared myself that since it had been quite a while between now and the last time i did a real sit-up, there might be a hint of resistance. But there wasn’t a hint of resistance. When I tried to perform the sit-up, there was all out maniacal laughter from my back region. Exercise hoity-toities call that your Core.

My Core was mean to me.

HAHAHAHAHAHA! You thought you were going to get up from this position without being creative, much less perform even one measly sit-up? What were you thinking, my naive friend? How old are we now? Eighty? Feels like we’re eighty if I’m being honest. Dude, you might even have to call for help to get up at all. OOPS! You left your cell phone WAAAAY up over there on the counter at the sink and you got to know that hotel phone is CRAWLING with Pharisees! HAHAHAHA! You’re stuck! HAHAHAHAAAAAA!!!

Yeah, I couldn’t do a single sit-up. Since then, I’ve slowly remedied that and my core is a tad stronger, enough that I can do a few sit-ups, but starting a finicky pups mower is a whole different story.

I woke up one morning a few weeks ago barely able to walk and I couldn’t figure out what I’d done to my stupid “CORE”. It got better after a few agonizing days, but I did it again a couple of weeks later, and I recognized the pattern. On both occasions, I’d insisted that the push mower would start if I just yanked on the string long and hard enough. Neither time worked, but both times saw me waking up the next morning feeling like the victim of a Grizzly Bear in rut with bad eyesight. I realized where I had made the Faux Pas.

And the sight in my right eye is still bad from the attack of the Shingles I endured back in March of 2020. It got into that eye and blurred everything out. I hoped it would clear up after a while, but not so. It’s not as bad by the end of the day, but again, first thing in the morning, I can’t see much at all and that’s not great for someone who makes their living as a visual artist. I’m already nearsighted in the other eye, but for now I can see clearly enough from my one good eye to do my work. Someone asked me to describe the effect from the Shingle Eye. I said it’s like a Grizzly Bear with bad eyesight is in rut and is having an epic battle with a Pharisee in the middle of a snowy field. They kick up all that snow and that’s what I see in the morning.

The maladies tally like the list of food items at the world’s largest buffet.

• Shoulder pain that flares up when thar’s a storm a-comin’.
• Pale, pigmentless skin that combusts when exposed to the sun and the scars that remain come in the form of cancers.
• My hearing has been leaving me for some time. You generally have to say everything to me twice.
• I had a fungus once that left my big toe permanently yellow.
• I mentioned the teeth, there’s, and the back.
• Type 2 Diabetus.
• Tinnitus. Which occurs as occasional ringing in my ears and I’m frequently able to hear my pulse in my head when I’m laying just right.
• I have a few skin tags. I call them my Love Dangles.
• My fingers hurt from time to time and I fully expect that will be getting worse. A friend called it a visit from Uncle Arthur.
• I randomly itch when I’m trying to go to sleep, especially when I start thinking, I hope I don’t randomly itch while I’m trying to go to sleep.
• There’s a hair that grows from the side of my nose and I have to pluck it.
• And lately I’ve started using certain words like, Hooligan and Whippersnapper.

I’m growing old, and getting old is getting old. It comes with the territory, I know. Lots of people are worse off than me, I know. One day I’ll be in heaven and everything will be perfect, I know. I can’t wait for that. Until then, I’ll try to bite my tongue if the Pharisee in my mouth tries to start any monkey business, and I’ll work hard at being content with where I am in life.

As a matter of fact, let’s embrace a better term. Mature. Ha! I’ve never been accused of being mature.

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The older I get, the more I realize Mama was right … Your mouth can get you in trouble. Actually, the older I get, the more I realize Mama was right about a whole lot of things, and I try to implement the lessons I’ve learned as much as I possibly can. Take my chickens, for example. They’re always hatched before I count them. Well, they’re mostly hatched. My chickens are sometimes hatched before I count them. On occasion. Occasionally, I will wait to count only the hatched chickens. Once in a blue moon.

Maybe it’s obvious I’m hard headed. And I have a mind that doesn’t always run my words through a filter, so I have to be careful about what comes out of my mouth. That’s why I have a shirt that I bought at the World of Wally to help me remember who I am. I’m a Christian and I should behave like one. My shirt says Team Jesus across the chest. When I’m wearing it, I feel like I’m getting a little extra mental discernment before I speak because people can see before I open my pie hole, what they ought to expect from me. But it can have its disadvantages too, and that’s the subject of this episode.

From Atomic Red Studios in Northeast Georgia, I’m Michael Blackston and this is Funny Messy Life.

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"So if you’re a Christian, what are the disadvantages of wearing a Jesus shirt?"

It’s just what I said … People have immediate expectations based on what they know about Jesus. The word “Christian” actually means, Little Christ. We’re supposed make our best efforts to represent that name and His teaching. We are to try to be as much like Jesus as we can. I believe a person’s best witness is how they are seen in the eyes of other people. So, if you’re mouthy, like I am, and if you have a hard time filtering your thoughts before you spit them out MO-ron style, like I do, it can set a bad example if you’re misbehaving while wearing a shirt with Jesus brandished across the chest. Yes, it does help me to think more deeply about how I behave, but when I DO mess up, there I am with the name of the Son of God emblazoned for all to see. It’s a good thing, but it can be dangerous if you’re not careful. I know what I should and shouldn’t do or should and shouldn’t say according to my belief system, but I’m not perfect. There’s going to be something that I stumble over and somebody else might see that and start thinking, Not only is he a MO-ron, but he’s a hypocritical MO-ron.

That doesn’t mean I’m going to play it safe though, and not wear my Team Jesus shirt. I have faith and it’s a discipline I need in my life anyway.

It doesn’t escape me, however, that this would be a really boring piece if I left it there sitting in a puddle of psychological self-awareness and potential piety. Instead, if you’re anything like me, you’ll be thinking, Michael, please give me an example. There MUST be some situations you can think of - some mental packet of mayonnaise you could squeeze onto the meat of this sweet, sweet literary burger.

And you’d be right. In fact, that’s a good place to start. With condiments.

Imagine I walk into a dingy diner where the walls are covered with people’s names written in Sharpie. This place has been a staple of this tiny town in the middle of Alabama since Columbus sailed the ocean blue.

I deem this land the property of England and I shall endeavor to befriend the natives, teaching them the proper way to live and also the way to die if they don’t agree to the way I teach them to to live. And also, if I want what they have, but they refuse to give me it. I shall teach them how to die then as well. But first, we shall build dingy diners so fellow sojourners might scribe their names onto the walls with their quills whilst dipping fried potatoes into a paste deriven from the tomato plant!

There’s no such word as “deriven”, sir.

I claim it for England!

What if I would like to dip MY fried potatoes into a paste made from the tomato plant, but when I go to tear a small corner of the packet, it catches a seam and rips all the way down the side?

Don’t you even try to tell me that’s never happened to you and you know how aggravating it is.

I’m wearing my Team Jesus shirt though, and while my initial reaction is to become angry because everything I’ve touched today has either fallen, broken, or rolled under the most impossible crevice, and now THIS, I can’t scream at the top of my lungs.

CURSE YOU, UNWIELDY KETCHUP PACKET! THINE STRAW BE THE LAST!

I have to think about Who I represent and act calmly. My rage must be contained in that moment. If I’m to say anything at all, it will have to be along the lines of, I forgive thee, imperfect packet. I shall try another.

Or in the event that I have to text something important to someone, but due to the fact that I have short, stubby, sausage fingers, I keep misspelling everything. I’ll immediately want to throw my phone at the wall and declare, VILE DEVICE! HOW SMALL IS THY KEYBOARD! SUCH THAT MINE DIGITS DENY THEIR RIGHTLY POSITIONS! A PALL UPON THY MAKER AND SHALL THEE SUFFER ETERNALLY HENCEFORTH!

But nay. That’s not nice. Anger is sometimes warranted, but it’s my own pudgy fingers that are to blame. I think about my shirt and I’m moved to adjust my thinking before I speak. How I wish my fingers and your keyboard were fairly met, dear phone. Verily, I say that it is not your fault. I shall pick up the pieces of you that have shattered to the floor from your contact with the wall, and I shall weep over you. We shall meet again on the other side in the new contract I’ll have to sign now because I have behaved poorly.

Obviously in this example, I didn’t catch the initial rage in time and I would have to repent if it were real. I would have to look down at my shirt in shame.

Michael, I think you’re being little over-the-top. No one is going to expect you to walk on water just because your shirt says “Jesus”.

True. No one will expect that, nor would I want them too. Still, we live in an age where you can’t blow a gasket and expect it to be forgotten as soon as it happens. There is the potential that your poor decision to flip off the guy who cut in front of you will find its way to the internet, and if you have a Jesus bumper sticker on your car and it’s the guy behind you filming, you’ve just made all of us look bad. People judge with big blankets, so if we claim to represent a certain way of thinking, then act in a manner counter to that, most people will cast a stinky eye toward the whole lot. I didn’t say it was right, but it’s the way people are.

In light of that, it wouldn’t do for me to walk into a pot shop in Colorado wearing my Team Jesus shirt and holler, Gimme the FATTEST doobie ya got!

I don’t smoke anything, of course, and especially not pot. I’ve never had occasion to request a fat doobie. In fact, other than this piece, you’re likely never to witness me use the term again, unless it’s squashed between the bookends of the words Scooby and Doo. But if I did do something like that and you were there, purchasing your own fat doobie (there I go again, saying the word, doobie), which is legal to do in the state of Colorado, wouldn’t you cast a tiny bit of judgement in my direction?

I think you would, if we’re all being as honest as Abe here.

I understand what my weaknesses are. I’ve let my mouth get me in trouble since I started talking. It’s nice to have something extra on me every once in a while to sit there in the back of my mind, saying, I know you want to want to avoid that person in the store that won’t stop talking once you let them get started, but you’re supposed to be a representative of Christ. It says so right there on your chest. Certainly you didn’t put on that shirt and expect you could act any silly old way, did you? Now get over there. She might want to tell you all of the gory details of her bunion problems, but she also might NEED to tell someone about it. Lend her your ear, Christian. There’s even a blessing in it for you.

I know listeners might think I take my belief in Jesus lightly, but I promise that’s not the case at all. I simply have a solid inclination that God has a great sense of humor and appreciates a good laugh. Seriously though, I do pay a little closer attention to the way I behave and treat people when I’m wearing that shirt. It’s not that it gives me more power, but it’s sort of the same thing as people touching a cross they have around their neck in a difficult situation. It’s not a talisman, but a reminder of who I proudly am. I’m a child of The King, that’s who I am. I don’t need T-shirt to tell me that.

But it doesn’t hurt.

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Today, I’ll tell you that I wouldn’t change a thing. I’m blessed to get to do what I do for a living, and although the road getting here was long and winding, frequently taking turns onto dark and unfamiliar lanes, I can definitely track God’s plan. Some of those lanes got bumpy though, and those were never long. I’m going to tell you about a road along my career path that only lasted a couple weeks, and one that only lasted a few months, but both share a single common fact … I was not cut out for them.

I’m Michael Blackston and at the time of this writing, the country is going through a new pandemic called an employee shortage, which is what prompted me to tell you a few new stories about my own work history during my Funny Messy Life.

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Like I said, at this writing, the United States has a huge problem. Nobody wants to work because they’re getting free unemployment money from the government. There are two types of people in this scenario …

1. Those who are willing to work because they can and have enough integrity, self-worth, and, by glory, intelligence to know that a society needs its people to pull their weight.
2. Those who COULD work, but instead will ride this wave of political stupidity, with their lips suckled firmly around the government teat, as long as their fat, lazy, sorry, no-good, trashy selves can ……… not that I’m judging.

I do understand that there are those who legitimately require government assistance to survive for whatever reason. I’m not talking about those people. I’m talking about the mush-brained, crawled out from under a rock, scum of the earth, pond scum that have no excuse, and have brought the country to a halt because they refuse to go back to work until they have to. They know who they are, and they don’t care.

But that’s not even what I wanted to talk about here. And now that my rant is over, I can get back to the stories that are adorable little islands in the middle of Lake Me.

The problem with my work history is that I have always been an entrepreneur at heart, I’ve always wanted to work for myself, largely because I get a lot more done when I’m the boss of me than when someone else is the boss of me. That’s why until I found etching, I never stayed at one place for more than 2 years.

I can’t remember for sure, but that might be the amount of time I worked for the Walmart portrait studio in the mid 1990s. It wasn’t the worst job I ever had, but I didn’t really enjoy it, especially when it came to the selling part. I was working there when I got married and I began to think that I needed to make more of an income than the weekly block of cheap, moldy cheese and half bag of oats it felt like that job paid me.

My stepdad was working for a motorcycle place in town and there was an opening, so he put in a good word for me. It was all commission sales, but the potential to make a better income was there, so I took the opportunity and quit blowing bubbles to make babies smile. It was also nice to not have to take the same photos every month for a woman that kept coming in to try and get headshots, but always made this wide-eyed extreme face like Dracula if you open his coffin in the daylight and he’s naked.

There was an inherent problem with me selling motorcycles, though. For one to adequately and effectively sell motorcycles, it helps to actually know something about motorcycles. I mean even one thing would be nice. I knew then, and pretty much still do now, exactly zero things about motorcycles. I think they’re cool and all, but I’m afraid of them. Moreover, I’m afraid of the lack of respect a lot of other drivers have for them.

When a potential customer came in and I had to try to sell them this metal horse with the potential of untold power they could wield under them, I had nothing to give. Actually, the power was very much told. I just didn’t know the details. And the customer could tell it immediately. That job was horrible for me because I realized at that moment in my life that in order for somebody to be the best salesperson they can be, there must be at least the slightest interest and belief in the thing they’re trying to sell.

On top of the skyscraper of cards stacked against me the very second I first walked through the doors, was the personality of the owner. He was from New York, or New Jersey. I can’t recall which, but he had the accent to go with it, and the countenance. I love my northern brethren. I think we can learn a lot from each other, but just as there is a difference between a Good ol’ boy, a Redneck, and Inbred Mouth Breathers, there are levels of culture above the Mason-Dixon Line. There are Those Who Hail From The North, there are Yankees, and there are DANG Yankees. If you’re in the category of Those Who Hail From The North, You’ll typically visit the southern states with some respect. If your ways are of interest to one of us, you’ll gladly explain it in a mutual dance of culturally enlightening gooeyness. The plain old Yankee has good intentions, but from to time, will forget that they’ve entered a realm where the southern drawl is as thick and syrupy as the sugar in our tea. They have a difficult time getting their heads around the fact that Grit isn’t just a sandy kind of substance that gets between your toes when you’re walking barefoot, but also a term for a starch that can be served on a plate in a myriad of delicious ways. Still, they get that it’s an “us” thing and they can leave it off their order. The Dang Yankee doesn’t care that you have your own culture in a particular region. They think you should be throwing parties because they finally deemed you worthy of coming to your area to teach you savages the ways of the intelligent man. He scoffs at your attempts to say hello, even if you don’t know him. He sneers at your grits on the menu and makes snide comments about them to the serving staff. He calls you names like, Yokel, Idiot, and In-bred Mouth Breather. He’s not always wrong, but he also doesn’t keep it to himself. He wants to bring his culture down here and burn yours to the ground like Sherman marching to the sea. The word “Dang” might be replaced with a variety of more colorful words depending on the culture level of the person saying it. This guy was a caricature in every sense of the word. He was a Dang Yankee. When somebody who doesn’t spend a lot of time in the breadbasket of New York culture, they send to go with the loud, neurotic Italian persona, and this guy hit that mark to the hilt.

Remember when I said I don’t like to be “bossed”? I don’t like to be bossed. This guy was the owner, so he had the right and obligation to boss me, but he took it to a whole different level, or at least different from what we’re used to here in the south. He took it to Dang Yankee level. Allow me to dramatize a particular scene that really happened. And this will be nearly word for word.

(The scene opens with Michael bent low beside a motorcycle, polishing the chrome. He is alone in the store, except for a couple of other employees. There are no customers either inside, or outside. I repeat, there are NO customers. The boss enters the showroom and, without slowing pace as he heads toward the door to leave, shouts to Michael.)

BOSS. Hey, Mike! How’s about you sell somethin’?

MIKE. There are no customers either inside, or outside. I repeat, there are NO customers!

BOSS. I don’t wanna hear excuses. Sell somethin’!

(End scene)

That happened and that was his mentality. It was something to that effect every day, so after a few months of working for a man who thought he was The Godfather, and making little to no money, I left for the golden promise of fortune in the loan business. I tell all about that in episode 23, titled The Loan Man.

I just don’t do well with management that refuses to be logical. I can handle a competent boss. I worked for a little under a year as a locksmith under a boss who loved his employees and treated us like family. He died recently, and I didn’t know it until well after the funeral. It’s a shame. I liked to go back into the shop every once in a while just to say hello.

I did have one bad experience that turned into a tasty bite of You Get What You Deserve sandwich.

There was a tiny independent fast food restaurant where I lived called, Katherine’s Kitchen. Back in the day, it was famous for its fresh, made from scratch biscuits. There were a couple of ladies in the back that cooked them, and there was some kind of special southern ju-ju they put into the dough. They were amazing biscuits, and people lined up to order. A normal morning was busy, and it always took someone on the outside walking from car to car taking orders so they didn’t get backed up. But I on Saturday mornings during college football season when the Clemson Tigers were the home team, the line was all the way out of the drive way and into the road, and it stayed that way for hours. Saturday mornings at Katherine’s Kitchen would have given a Chick-fil-A crew a run for its money.

I had worked there for a week, so I was still a rookie, when I met a certain manager for the first time. He’d been on vacation when I started, and I had already worked one Saturday morning shift. My first day meeting him was on a Friday. We did not hit it off. He was a sloppy, ignorant, loudmouth of a guy, who must have been extremely insecure around me, because he wasted no time throwing his considerable weight around. Nothing he said to me was in a kind way. He didn’t even behave like a drill sergeant who runs you hard because he’s honing you like steel on steel. No, this guy was a belligerent blowhard who had someone under his authority and he liked to be a bully.

I took it for the first day, but dreaded going in to work the next morning. Clemson was playing a home game and it would be insane. I didn’t know if I could take his bullying as silently as I had the day before.

He wasn’t that bad before the doors opened. He was gruff and I could tell he was waiting for the perfect time to pounce, but he apparently meant to do his work in front of an audience. The second the doors opened and the line formed, he began his game. He would insult me in front of customers, berate me for things I had no part in, and smile to the customers the whole time, as if to say, Hey, look at how big a boy I am. I can bully dudes.

I took it for about an hour before I’d had enough. What this guy didn’t understand was that because one of our other workers had called in sick, the last thing he wanted would be for me to leave an entire Saturday morning Clemson football crowd to be handled by himself.

As I took an order from a man decked head to toe in orange and purple, yet distinguished, like he might be watching the game from a private box, my manager stood behind me and began to make fun of the way I was taking the order, for no reason. The orange and purple man didn’t appreciate it any more than I did, and he told me so.

“I wouldn’t take that from that moron,” he told me.

“I need the work,” I probably said back.

“It ain’t worth all that. I’d leave him with it if her does it again.”

A few seconds later, the manager returned with a fresh set of insults. Each successive one worse than the last. His grin widened more each time as well. The orange and purple man gave me a look that required I do something about it. I got the sense that the orange and purple man knew something about power and standing up for one’s self. It gave me wings and I turned around to face my manager.

“One more insult, and I’m walking out. I’ll leave you with this to handle on your own.”

He laughed at me. He needed to show the crowd, who was watching intently now, to see how this pre-game entertainment might play out, that he wasn’t scared of little old Michael.

I turned back around to face the customers and continue with their orders, when I heard something from behind me. He’d tested me and mocked me again. The orange and purple man stared through me. Time to put up, or shut up, boy. I silently took my name tag off my Katherine’s Kitchen shirt and laid it down on the counter.

“I’m sorry folks, but your orders will take a while longer now.” I turned around to the manager, who was still wearing a smile for the moment. I’m gone,” I said. “It’s all yours.”

“What?! You can’t do that? I can’t handle all these orders!”

“Good luck,” I answered, heading for the front door. The orange and purple man grinned and gave me a wink and nod.

“You came back here. You can’t just leave me here. They’ll fire you!”

I pointed to the counter where I had laid my name tag and his eyes widened as he realized this was actually happening.

“You can’t fire somebody who’s already quit,” I explained and walked out.

I’m not certain, but i think I might have heard a spattering of applause, ever so light, from beyond the door. I didn’t look back. I didn’t think that’s how the orange and purple man would have handled things.

Years later, I ordered at a chain restaurant drive thru. I didn’t recognize the voice on the intercom, nor the guy at the window. He was that forgettable. But he recognized me just as he handed me the bag of food. If he’d recognized me while it was being made, I might not have taken it for fear of what he might have done to it. As he handed over, his eyes widened, just as they had when I pointed to my name tag.

“It’s you!”

I still didn’t know who he was. Better people had passed before my memory than him. “Do I know you?”

“You left me at Katherine’s Kitchen to run it alone, you S.O.B.!”

I laughed. Now I remembered him. “Oh yeah. About that, you know what? … I’d do it again in a heartbeat.” And I drove away. Smiling from ear to ear.

I hope that guy has grown up and changed the way he treats people. And I wish I could have gotten to know the orange and purple man. Something tells m e he had a lot to give in the way of doing life. I thank him though, for that one lesson. I don’t let people run all over me anymore.

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I’ve been toying with some ideas about new kinds of stories to tell you. Originally, I thought I could get listeners to send in tales about their own funny, messy, lives because, let’s face it, I’m getting older, but I haven’t lived forever. I’m gonna eventually hit a wall and there won’t be much left to tell about my life. I’m starting to see that wall in the distance and I’m not ready to stop running my mouth. Pair that with the fact that nobody seems to want me to tell their stories and I have to start figuring out where my content is gonna come from in the long run. Then it hit me … every town in the world, from the biggest to the smallest, has interesting stories. I don’t want to dive into folklore too much - the podcast LORE by Aaron Menke does that just fine already. I don’t want to give an interesting history in the lives of famous people - the podcast The Way I Heard It by Mike Rowe accomplishes that extremely well, thank you very much, and Mike’s got one of those amazing, deep voices that’s so buttery, Paula Deen would toss it in one of her recipes if she could. I recommend both of those podcasts highly, by the way, and I never miss an episode. But I realize that I could tell interesting stories whenever I come across them that seem to be at the heart of a place, and I came to that realization when I found myself reading a pamphlet from my own hometown, Elberton Georgia. It’s a story rich with history, brotherhood, southern pride, and some drunken shenanigans peppered in.

This is the story of Dutchy. I’m Michael Blackston and while it might not be my own tale, it is a good one to tell about my own hometown’s Funny, Messy, Life.

If you know anyone who works in the granite monument business, ask them if they’ve heard about a small town in Northeast Georgia who claims to be The Granite Capital of the World. They’ll say you’re talking about Elberton, Ga, named after Samuel Elbert, whose grave you can find in one of the famous old cemeteries in Savannah. We believe ourselves to be the number one supplier of granite in the world and if you argue about it, well … them’s fightin’ words.

Sometimes people will ask how our little town got involved in the monument industry in the first place, and the story might surprise you. It starts, oddly enough, with an ugly, squat statue that everybody hated from the moment they laid eyes on it.

It was 1908. His name is Dutchy.

That wasn’t his name, originally. He didn’t have a name, originally. He got his name the way a lot of us have - meanness and the need people feel to put words to an emotion. Some kids get tagged with nicknames like, Stinky, Booger, Slim, or Back Seat Bertha … Dutchy got his name because of the way he looked. Those details are on their way.

The American Civil War had ended 30 years earlier and the Daughters of the Confederacy wanted to erect a monument to the Confederate dead. I’m not really sure what Elberton did before then, but I’m pretty sure a lot of folks plowed the land, farmed the land, and made babies on the land. The monument industry wasn’t even a blip on the radar, which hadn’t been invented yet, so maybe I should change that to The monument industry wasn’t even a footnote in the Farmer’s Almanac.

Anyway, when the Daughters of the Confederacy moved on getting the monument made, the first granite finishing plant in Elberton was created for that purpose alone. Later, that finishing plant would stay in business and become the first in a succession of granite sheds that dot Elberton’s landscape like God was holding a bunch of sheds in His hands because He wanted to carry them all into the house without having to make two trips, but there were too many, and He dropped a few in North east Georgia.

A sculptor was commissioned to carve a statue out of the gray granite that runs forever under our feet. If you’ve ever heard of Stone Mountain just outside of Atlanta, it might interest you that what that huge piece of rock amounts to is an obnoxiously large boulder poking through the earth. It’s a piece of granite. The vein that it rises from runs all the way under our town a couple of hours away. We happen to sit right on top of probably the richest section of it. Apparently, the sculptor they hired, being Italian and unable to google American Civil War, didn’t know much about how a confederate soldier was supposed to look and did what my teenage son would call a ratchet job. I understand “ratchet” means bad nowadays, and not necessarily a tool I can never find the right bit for.

The citizens didn’t like it one dang bit and they named him “Dutchy” because they said he was squat, ugly, and wore the uniform of the heathen north. They claimed he looked more like a Dutchman than a God-fearing’ Confederate soldier. In those days, it wouldn’t do to dress your statue like a soldier that wasn’t God-fearin’, and worse to make him look like he ain’t from around heeyah!

That’s why it didn’t take long before the local children were calling him names and pointing at him as they pushed their wheels with sticks through the town square. It’s said that people would throw rotten vegetables at him and that old men would give him Whut Fer with their eyes as they passed.

Poor Dutchy. He didn’t ask to look the way he did. The world was still as politically incorrect as it could possibly be. There was definitely no one who had yet “woken” so they could tell us all how we have a right to our own opinions as long as our opinions jive with theirs. He was the victim of the ultimate bullying situation. The whole town was against him. And it was about to get worse.

One night, when some of the young men had been drinking heavily, once of them started up some meanness about Dutchy.

I feel like what I should do here is develop a scene for you. It’s what could have possibly been the conversation that led up to the disaster that happened to Dutchy later that night. I’ll take my best stab at what that might have sounded like.

(Scene: A dingy side bar right off the town square. The tables are made of wood. The chairs are wooden. The spoons and forks … wood. The teeth of the waitress … also wood. A group of men sit at two tables next to each other. They all smell of dirt, granite dust, watered down beer, and barn animals. Man 1 stands up.)

MAN 1. Yankees! I hate me a Yankee!

CROWD. YEAH!

MAN 1. We’d have won the war if’n that yella belly, Lilly-livered so and so had’na signed that paper at Appomattox!

CROWD. YEAH!!

MAN 2. I shore wish they’s sump’n we could do about it.

CROWD. YEAH!!!

MAN 1. Whut if’n I told ya thar IS sump’n we can do about it.

CROWD. Yeah?

MAN 1. Yeah. Thar’s one of ‘em standin’ on a pedestal right over yonder. He’s an ugly cuss, boys! Looks like a dang Dutchman what don’t fear the Lord and I thank it’s high time he got whut’s comin’ to him.

CROWD. YEAH!!!!

MAN 1. Whaddya say, boys? Wanna pull him down and bury him?

CROWD. YEAH!!!!!

MAN 1. Wanna drink some more beer before we do?!

CROWD. YEAH!!!!!!!!! (BUURRRPPP!)

In the dark of night, a group of severely drunk townsmen got some rope and lassoed the statue around the neck. A few of them hollered, Yee-HAWWWW! A few more threw up in the bushes. Before pulling the statue down, they dug a pit at the base of the pedestal where Dutchy stood and when it was ready, they all grabbed a part of the ropes. There was laughter and merriment by the ones who pulled, and triumphant shouts of victory.

The south will rise again! Long live the Confederacy! Thar IS a God, ya heathen Dutchman!

The ones over at the bushes had now passed out, so they wouldn’t remember a thing come morning.

Dutchy came toppling down into the grave that had been dug for him, his legs breaking apart from his torso as he hit the ground. The drunk men replaced the dirt into the grave and went their ways, becoming a unique part of Elberton history.

I remember my mom driving me and my sister to the square one afternoon in April of 1982. The memory is foggy and broken, a memories become over a span of forty years, but the right pieces are there.

“What are they doing, mama?”

There was big equipment at the base of the memorial that had replaced Dutchy after he was brought down. A crowd had gathered, but to the best of my knowledge, nobody was drunk.

“They’re digging up an old statue. It was there before the one you see now.”

We watched for a while and then moved on, recoding this piece of history into our “Where were you on the day …” memory banks.

The town officials hired the proper people to dig him up and give him a bath. The once pristine gray granite was caked with a century’s worth of red Georgia clay. And now he resides in his own room at the Granite Museum about a mile away from where he was buried. He gets the respect he deserves now, and if you’d like to get a look at him yourself, there’s plenty about him if you search online for “Dutchy Elberton”. You can even find a photo of the square when he was unveiled in 1908. But if you’re close by, take a side trip into Elberton and visit the museum. We’re awful proud of Dutchy now. He’s sort of an unsung hero around here. I’m sure he’d be happy to make your acquaintance and have a little company. He might not look like much, but you can’t keep a good man down forever.

Live on, Dutchy.

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As a whole, I’m happy about how my life has turned out so far. Hopefully, there is plenty more left of my story, but you never can tell. We live second by second, and minute by minute. I first learned about life in that context through Rick Springfield’s epic eighties ditty, Love Is Alright Tonight from his Working Class Dog album. That album is one of the things in my life I do not regret. My sister and I sang that song at the tops of our lungs while the LP played on her stereo before karaoke was a thing, and those are happy memories. The pattern on life’s wallpaper is not always pleasing, though. Sometimes you sit back in your chair, staring at the stains and faded designs that mark the walls of your life and you think, “That part wasn’t pretty. Or smart. Or made any sense at all, you complete moron.”

It’s the complete moron marks of my history that I want to talk about now. The ones that were made in permanent marker. You can’t erase them because if you could, there wouldn’t be anything there to remind you not to be that stupid ever again.

From Atomic Red studios in the heart of the Deep South where God would have placed Eden to begin with if it hadn’t been so stinkin’ hot in the summer, I’m Michael Blackston and these are things NOT to do that I’ve learned during my Funny Messy Life.

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Starting from earliest to most recent, I will tell you a couple of things I’ve learned never to do, ever, for the love of all that is pure and holy, ever.

Maybe you have the stomach of a goat. Perhaps your bowels are able to tolerate things like the Carolina Ghost Pepper, the mayonnaise at a county fair, and dudes over 30 singing emo music, without it putting your body in a state of incapacity. If that’s you, then congratulations. Enjoy the fair and grab yourself a turkey leg right before getting on The Scrambler. In fact,,,,,,, that reminds me of a disgusting thing that happened to my while riding The Tilt-A-Whirl with my cousin who did stupidly stupid things with me. And now I’ve made a note in my Stories-To-Tell app for this podcast/Blog/thingy.

I don’t have that kind of intestinal fortitude, though. I can hold my own under normal circumstances, but when you introduce conflicting delicacies from the culinary world, as delicious as they may be separately, or in concert with their kind, my body will protest. It will say, “Nay! Thou shalt not combine these two things, you complete moron!” I found this out the hard way when I was somewhere around 18 or 19 years old. Part of the issue i have, being mildly Obessive Compulsive, is that everything has to balance. I’m uncomfortable with odd numbers, so as a younger man, it never occurred to me that I could eat just one of anything and make it out of the day alive.

Enter my mom’s burgers, fried on the stove, greasy and perfect. I always ate two of them covered in two slices of cheese each, and lousy with mayonnaise.

On this evening, I remained true to my ritual, but it was also the Christmas season and my mom had bought some eggnog at the grocery store.

I love eggnog. I don’t much care for eggs prepared by themselves in any way, except for scrambled, and even then there better be a 2 to 1 cheese to egg ration. I’m cool with them as an ingredient, though. If I can’t taste the edginess of it all, it’s fine. I especially like it as a nog. And being that I wanted to enjoy some nog as a postlude to my cheeseburger feeding frenzy, and being mildly Obsessive Compulsive, I down two large glasses of the stuff immediately following supper.

It didn’t happen for a while. It would have been nice if my stomach had given me some notice so I could mentally prepare myself for what was to come …

Hey, buddy! I don’t want to alarm you ‘er nothin’, but later, you’re gonna regret what you just did there. I’m just giving you a heads up because this isn’t going to be a minor inconvenience. Nossir, this here is gonna be something you’ll tell your grandkids about. It’s going to be so bad that you will beg God to take you home to sweet ol’ Beulah Land because my friend, you’re gonna feel like you’re absolute hell. Alrighty then. We good? Great!

That’s not how it went down, though. I went to sleep happy. I fell asleep quickly, and dreamt of frolicking with beautiful teenage Sugarplum fairy girls. We kissed and fawned all over each other while eating the biggest, greasiest cheeseburgers to be found in Sugarplum Land. And between our soft smooches, we sipped eggnog from the blossoms of candy roses.

But you what it’s like when you dream. Things can turn fast. My beautiful fairy glided her delicate hand along my cheek, but didn’t stop there. It made its way past my neck to my chest, moving downward, and stopped on my stomach. In a flash, the delicate hand transformed into a cheeseburger fist, only the cheese pour from between the buns was made of broken glass and rusty nails. She sank her burger fist deep into my belly and the pain was terrible, like having the Super Bowl firmly in your grasp, then the coaching staff deciding NOT to run the clock out and letting the other team come back from a 28-3 deficit in the fourth quarter to beat you. Actually, no. When that happened to my Falcons, I think that was worse than the fairy with the cheeseburger fist full of glass and nails.

When I felt the pain, I looked into the eyes of my beloved teenage fairy. (It’s okay to write this because I hadn’t met my wife yet, and if I had, it would have probably been her in the dream and we never would have gotten married because, well … cheeseburger fist.)

Her whole face had changed from the fantasy of my good dreams, into an evil, grotesque creature of my nightmares. She grinned from ear to ear in a smile that stretched impossibly the full width of her face. Her teeth were wedges of rotten pickle and she drooled rancid county fair mayonnaise from the corners of her lips. Her wild eyes had grown enormous with insanity and the delight of what she was doing to me, and she began to cry happy tears that looked curiously like thick tendrils of eggnog.

I woke from the dream enduring the worst pain in my gut I’d ever experienced. It felt like I was a man having a baby. I thought maybe I was. Somehow I’d been impregnated by my dream fairy/ogre and I was about to deliver a demon child with cheeseburgers for hands. I made my way slowly into the hall towards the bathroom, propping against the wall with my hand to keep myself upright. I looked down at the floor at one point to make sure my eggnog hadn’t broken, and finally made it to the bathroom, shutting the door behind me.

I sat on the toilet just as the worst surge of pain so far erupted in my bowels. I tried not to scream and wake up my parents, and that’s the last thing I remember before waking up on the floor between the toilet and the sink. My mom was pounding on the door, calling my name.

“Michael, are you alright? Answer me! I heard a huge crash in there.”

I came to my senses just enough to answer her.

“Don’t worry. It’s just gas.”

Since that night, I’ve learned that it doesn’t matter what the volume of the food comes to, if I eat even one greasy cheeseburger and chase it with any sort of dairy product, I’m going to get the same result. My fairy demon will return to me in my sleep and stab me with her meat hands.

Five or six years later, I found myself working an overnight shift at a large market, 100,000 watt powerhouse radio station in Greenville, SC. I’d been there for a few months, so I knew where they kept all the goodies, like CDs to give away, T-shirts, coozies with the station logo, and products that had been given to the station by sponsors. It was good thing that I knew where to look when I found myself trying to take phone calls from drunk listeners and at the same time, nursing the worst headache I’d ever had.

“WESC this is Mike.”

“Hey, buddy! How about playin’ that Achin’ Breakin’ Heart song by Rilly Bay Sarce?”

I’ve noticed that nothing good usually follows a guy starting his sentence with, “Hey, buddy!”

“I don’t think I recognize that one. Who am I talking to? What’s your name?”

“Puddin’ Tame! PBBBBTHHHHH HA HA HA! Hey, buddy … hey! My old lady loves that song and I’m tryin’ to get her goin’. You know what I mean?”

“Oh, you mean the one by the guy whose little girl is going to win everybody’s heart on the Disney Channel one day, then lose everybody’s lunch for them a few years later by acting a fool. I tell ya what … I’ll try to get that on for ya.”

That’s what we always told people who insisted on us playing requests when we weren’t allowed to play requests. I’ll try to get that on for ya!

Anyway, that’s the kind of thing I was dealing with while my head felt like it was being beaten senseless by Miley Cyrus’s microphone.

Luckily for me, I remembered the goodie supply. Actually I remembered the GOODYS supply. We played spots fort he popular headache powder, and they had sent us a thousand year supply of the stuff. There was a case of it in the cabinets above the coffee pot. I’d taken GOODYS before, so I knew it was fast acting, and would hopefully take the edge off of my headache. I went and got me a pack.

I sat back down in front of the control board. The song that was playing was about to end … something by Toby Keith, or Reba McEntire maybe, and I went live to introduce the next song and tease the weather before I took my medicine.

Oh God, let me live long enough to get through this so I can take the GOODYS as soon as the next song starts.

“92.5 WESC - Good Times and Great Country. It’s gonna be wet for the remainder of the weekend, but don’t worry. I’ll give you the forecast and everything you need to know about how to still have a great time with all the happenings around the Piedmont. That’s coming up right after Reba McEntire tells us all about how awesome it is to send our daughters away to be hookers. Here’s Reba … and Fancy … on your station for Good Times and Great Country … 92.5 WESC!

I killed the mic and looked longingly at the tiny, rectangular packet of headache powder. Back then, it was just folded paper. You unfolded it, worked it between your fingers, and chucked it to the back of your throat. Then you chased it with anything that was liquid and wouldn’t kill you to avoid as much of the bitter horror that is the taste of headache powder.

The only thing was, my headache was worse than anything I ever remembered having. I also remembered once hearing that it got to where it needed to go more quickly if you snorted it like a cokehead. I mean, it was already powdered, and it came handy with a paper packet that I could easily roll into one of those straws like the junkies do. Win/win, right? What was there to lose? It was just medicine, not hard drugs.

First, I emptied the packet of powder onto the counter in front of the control board. Then I rolled the paper in a tight little straw, just like I saw them do once on Miami Vice. But then I noticed something. The powder was too ill formed on the counter to make this efficient. According to the movies, the powder needed to be cut into a couple of thin lines with a razor blade. Bonus! There was a razor blade to my left because back in those days, there was still a reel to tell machine and some things had to be manually spliced.

I picked up the blade and made my lines. The Obsessive Compulsive in me insisted that there be two, and that they should be perfect. By then, Reba had already advised Fancy to be nice to the gentlemen and they’d be nice to her. I didn’t have much time left before I needed to break in with that info I’d teased about.

I stilled myself because I didn’t know what to expect as far as sensation, and I stuck the rolled up paper into my right nostril, bending over the lines of GOODYS powder.

It’s at this moment that at this time, it would have been nice if my nose had broken in to give me a word of warning …

Hey, buddy … I know what you’re thinking. You’re thinking ‘I saw a dude with a sweet mullet do this on TV in the mid eighties and I think I’m tougher than him’. You’re not tougher than him, buddy. You know why? Because he’s a character and that actor didn’t really snort that stuff. Sure, people do snort coke. They take a snow ride. They sniff the nose candy. But they’re stupid. Are you stupid? Let’s find out. Because if you snort that, it’s gonna light you up like a firecracker. You know how that feels … your sister lit one in your hand. Is that what you want, buddy? For your face to feel like your sister lit a firecracker inside it?

That didn’t happen though. The only thing I heard just before I took a big old snort of GOODYS headache powder was the sound of innocence lost streaming over the room from speakers booming the voice of country music’s favorite redhead.

I was desperate and I snorted it.

Let me explain now, the sensation that goes hand in hand with snorting a GOODYS headache powder.

It’s nothing like having your sister light a firecracker in your nose. In fact, the nose part of your face is the least of your worries. Sure, it stings, but what happens all up in your sinus cavity is the real thrill ride.

Immediately upon the snorting action, your face is invaded deep within by white fire. White is the hottest visible color when it comes to a flame. If there were a hotter color of fire, say … chartreuse, then I would describe it as fire in your face the color of chartreuse. Chartreuse face fire. It knocked me off my chair onto the floor. There was screaming involved. I’m glad I was alone, or someone would have called 911. Maybe somebody need to call 911.

“AHHHHHHH! OH GOD!!! MY FACE! MY FACE IS ON FIRE! MY FACE IS ON FIRRRREEEEEE!!! THERE’S CHARTREUSE LAVA INSIDE MY HEAD IN THE AREA OF MY FAAAAACCCCCEEEE!”

I’m not proud of myself. I’m not certain how long it took me to realize that Reba had stopped singing and there was nothing but dead air and the sounds of my sobbing, but the good news is, I’d forgotten all about the headache.

Needless to say, I DO NOT recommend snorting headache powder, or anything for that matter, without being in the presence of a doctor. My wife and son do some kind of thing where they shoot something up their noses for their allergies. I won’t. Nope. I refuse. Because I know good and well that just when I need that voice of reason, there won’t be anybody in my head saying, “Hey, buddy …. this is gonna hurt!”

We have to learn lessons as we grow, I guess. Those are two that I’ll never forget. I’m always up for hearing about your bad decisions. Send me an email if you’d like ...

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I don’t want to be one of those old men that constantly gripe about stuff because I’m just generally mad. I like to think I have a positive outlook most of the time, but I’m no different from anybody else in that I have my days. Even when I’m putting together a piece for the podcast, I at least give it an honest shot at putting a light, humorous spin on things if I’m complaining. There are some things though, that no matter how happy I’m feeling at the moment, no matter how full of flavor my crunch berries were that morning, no matter how much Ram I currently have in my Rama Lama Ding Dong, I will always hate them with every tiny, sinuous fiber of my being. I’m going to tell you what those things are and why, even though I respect and fear God to the uttermost, I’ll have a few questions for Him when I get to Heaven.

From Atomic Red Studios in the Granite Capitol of the World, I’m Michael Blackston, and this is a thought provoking episode of Funny Messy Life

_________________________

(The following is a pre-enactment. It’s how I think things are gonna go down once I’m comfortably in my heavenly mansion, which is inside a 24 hour Krispy Kreme, and God drops by to see how I’m settling in.) (Cue the music.)

(There’s a knock at the door.)

ME: Who is it?

GOD: It’s God. (Pause) I’ve been trying to reach you about your car’s extended warranty. (God howls with laughter.) Not really. (Longer pause.) It IS really God, though. I saw that the light was on.

ME: OH! Sorry! Come in.

GOD: This is niiiiice. You know, I’ve always remembered fondly on the day I created the doughnut, but all anybody ever appreciates is that chicken place. And they don’t even know how to spell “chicken”, ha!

ME: I for one, am a fan of the doughnut. I’m glad You made that happen.

GOD: Well, I saw that it was good.

ME: God, can I ask You a question?

GOD: Sure.

ME: Promise you won’t get mad. Because I don’t mean any disrespect; I’m just curious.

GOD: I’m not mad now, Am I? I already know what you want to ask Me anyway.

ME: You do? How … ? Oh, yeah.

The conversation will continue over fresh glazed doughnuts and coffee … (sorry Mormons, but God drinks coffee), and he answers my questions satisfactorily. Because He has His reason for everything; I just won’t understand them entirely until I get up there. With that in mind, I’m going to post the questions and answer them with the explanation that I believe, in my imperfect flesh, might be God’s reasoning. And because God has a cameo in this episode, and He already knows what my questions are, I’ll let Him ask them for me.

Question #1.

GOD: Mosquitoes are food for bats, but fire ants? What’s that about?

Fire ants are a direct punishment for God for the fall of man when Adam and Eve bit that fruit. The Bible is extremely detailed - astonishingly so, but it doesn’t contain everything that was ever said by every character in it. I won’t add to the words of The Bible, but I’m certain that among the things God was explaining would be a punishment for going ahead and eating the apple He specifically told them not to nosh, He included that curse. “Survey says, ….. Fire Ants! How do you like THEM apples?!”

Do we even have Aardvarks in the American south? I’m sure they’re a delicacy for some animal. Armadillos maybe? They kinda look like an Aardvark wearing sheet metal. It’s the only thing I can think of as a decent reason for fire ants. Food for Armadillos and a curse on the face of mankind to be endured through the ages by barefoot picnickers and anyone who dares walk anywhere in any grass anytime in the Deep South. Hate is a strong word - a terrible word. We don’t use it nonchalantly in our home, but I hate fire ants. Kayla won’t let me set the mounds on fire, but I often fantasize about what it sounds like as they die their tiny little devil deaths when they take the ant bait back to the queen. I imagine the squeals of agony and cries in the dark as they leave this earth to spend forever in hell and I find joy in it. Revelation tells of the end times when Satan and his demons will be thrown into the fiery pit to be tortured for all eternity. I’m kind of hoping that pit will be full of fire ant hills.

Question #2.

GOD: People need electricity, but the Power Company? What’s that about?

Just a notch below Fire Ants is the Power company. I hated them when I lived in a different state, then I hated the new power company when I moved to Georgia, then I hated my current power company when I moved to another county. I used to think that as I got older, my pure, unadulterated loathing for the power company would subside. I would understand them. I thought I would learn to appreciate their culture of cold, unloving greed and megalomania.

But no.

As I’ve grown, I’ve learned to think of them in the same category as fire ants. Of course, I don’t fantasize about people who work for power companies dying horrible deaths, but I do enjoy it when I see another house with solar panels on the roof. I imagine that for every solar panel that’s added to a roof, a power company executive loses another golf ball.

I think God will tell me that He created them to test our capacity to love. Humans are easily disgruntled and carry grudges for extended periods of time, so maybe the power company is a way to teach us to see others through God’s eyes. Sometimes, because we are told we should love everyone, we must learn to let God love them for us because we are weak. Even the wretched among us deserve love.

However, I fully believe that if power companies could find a way to operate off of pain, they would harness the evil of fire ants and feed on the tears of small children.

Question #3.

GOD: Jorts. What’s that about?

There are jeans and there are shorts. Another curse on mankind, I’d wager. God was so upset with Adam and Eve that He felt the need to create the existence of a knee-length jeans/shorts hybrid. Fortunately for the world’s first couple, God couldn’t bring Himself to make them wear them, so He gave them the option to choose leaves and animal pelts to cover themselves. Later, He would still show mercy and allowed us the more fashionable toga, but eventually, our crimes would become so fierce that he flooded the whole earth, only to find that we would repopulate and create Florida Gator fans. That’s when the curse of the jort hit us full throttle. Extra pockets couldn’t even save us from the horror. God sent us a rainbow after the Great Flood as a promise to never render His judgement in that way again. We’ve gotten no such promise about the jorts, and so we must endure it until the end of time.

Question #4.

GOD: The Funny Bone. What’s that about?

We all have one and we’ve all konked it on something. I’ve always wondered what was so dang funny about it. It’s pain. I don’t tend to laugh at pain. I handle pain about as well as any normal person, but that has never included slapping my knee, other than to bring the feeling back into my pinky finger. Because that’s what happens when I bang my funny bone on a door jam. The feeling goes out of my pinky finger. I might slap my knee then, followed by shaking my arm all about like I’m playing some weird solo version of the Hokey Pokey, but laughter never, ever happens.

My suspicion on this is that God enjoys humor. Every other point on our body that is encountered rudely will behave in a similar fashion. It will hurt to varying degrees, but it is clearly pain. With the funny bone, it’s still pain, but it’s different. Our reaction to it is different, and, I suspect comical for Him to observe from up there on high. When we hit our funny bone, we stop for a second as the realization consumes us. Our eyes cross, and it usually feels to me like it happens in slow motion. Our mouths gape open for a silent moment, then the sounds come.

“uuuuuuuuuuuUUUUUUUUAAAAAHHHHHHHHHH!”

When you’re around company and you hit your toe on the bottom of a bedpost, you scream immediately, sharply, and try to compose yourself. Someone will have to ask if you’re okay or what happened.

When you hit your funny bone, you have to announce it to everybody within earshot, and everybody within earshot will make the same face at once. It’s that cringy, teeth bared grimace that might be followed by hissing sounds. It goes something like this:

You’re in Dollar General and you’re mad because they don’t carry the cases of Propel flavored water and now you’ll have to go to Walmart after all when you specifically came to DG to avoid having to do that. It’s July, and in your irritation, you barrel down the aisle without paying attention to how close you are to the shelf full of Christmas decorations. You konk your funny bone a good one on the corner of the shelf and the hilarity ensues.

“uuuuuuuuuuuUUUUUUUUAAAAAHHHHHHHHHH!” Your eyes cross in slow motion. “Funny bone! I hit my funny bone! Everybody, I just hit my funny bone!”

Everybody within earshot makes this sound … “HISSSSSSSS!”

“I hit my funny bone, everybody, and I can’t feel my pinky now! OH GOD!”

And God, well He’s up there holding a glazed doughnut and all of heaven hears … “HAHAHAHAHAHHAHAHAHAHA! Funny bone!”

I think I ought to make a disclaimer here for anybody hearing or reading this who is thinking, “Did Michael just punch his ticket to hell with this one?”

The answer is no. I’m a staunch believer that if God made us in His image as we’re taught, then He has a sense of humor, but I also prayed over this one before I started it. And while I never actually heard, “Go ahead and write it, My child,” I didn’t feel Him telling me not to in my heart. I love The Lord with everything I have and I can’t wait to really see Him face to face. I’ll not have any actual questions for Him, because I believe either I’ll know the answers, or they’ll be inconsequential compared to His glory. And if He’s a fan of the doughnut, I’ll happily always keep the light on for Him.

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I have a laundry list of insecurities that keep me in a perpetual state of uncertainty. Uncertainty about whether or not the last thing I sang was on key, uncertainty about whether or not the last thing I wrote was up to par, uncertainty about whether or not the last thing I painted or etched would cause the viewer to retch and look for the closest bush. I even worry about the sound of my own voice because it never fails that I’m addressed as “Ma’am” at a drive-thru, no matter how deep I try to make my voice to avoid it. Just as I sat down to write this, my son sent me a text. And I quote: “Well, McDonalds just ‘yes ma’am’d me. So this is how that feels?” The two of us sound a lot alike when we talk, so I’m afraid he has a life full of annoying drive-thru lanes ahead of him.

One of the ways I’ve always combatted being insecure around people has been to mirror their personalities. There’s a word for this that crossword filler-outers everywhere will recognize. It’s called “Aping”. For the most part, the ability to mimic a person’s personality has been a good thing for me, because the result is that I’m able to get along with almost anybody, but it’s never on purpose. It just happens, and I’m always afraid someone’s gonna notice it and call me out.

“So there I was, minding my own business, when all of a sudden that hag comes out her front door and hollers for me to get off her lawn, like I’m the only one that digs up the neighbor’s flowers!”

I reply with, “Giiiiirrrrrl, no she DIT-INT!”

I’m not thinking about it. It’s just a knee-jerk reaction. But now, my neighbor thinks I’m on her side, and I really can’t say anything to her as she walks away from my bare rose bushes with three dozen long stems in her basket.

That’s an exaggeration; I don’t have rose bushes, but you get it!

I’ve decided that to make my point even stronger, I should dramatize a day in the life of an ape like me. Maybe it’ll help you get to know me a little better and to understand that the struggle is real.

From Atomic Red Studios, I’m Michael Blackston, and this is a reflection, so to speak, of my Funny Messy Life.

_________________________

The alarm rings to signify the beginning of a new day. I don’t feel like I got enough sleep last night, but I have a schedule to keep, so I go to the bathroom, then take a look at myself in the mirror and sigh in disgust. “Dang. Just dang.”

I try to cheer myself up with a joke because I think I’m clever.

“Time to scratch my rocks.”

I laugh at myself. I’m not clever, but that joke never gets old.

Once I’m out the door, headed to pick up whatever rock I’m actually gonna scratch, I know that I have to detour in the direction of coffee. Unfortunately for the drive-thru attendant, the last thing I watched before going to bed last night was MasterChef, and one of the hosts of that show is Gordon Ramsay.

Can I take your order?

Yes, I want you to make me the most amazing medium cup of coffee.

Cream and sugar?

Ah … cream, my darling. 6 to be precise, but no sugar. You can toss one phenomenal packet of Splenda in the bag, along with a stirring straw.

$1.75. Pull around.

This had better be a delicious cup of coffee, my darling, otherwise, what am I even doing here?

Ordering coffee.

Ordering coffee. You just don’t get it, do you? Wow. Wow wow wow!

The coffee is fine, giving me no excuse to shove it back through the window, shouting, “LOOK AT IT!”

I need to put gas in the tank before moving on, so I pull into a station. At the pump adjacent to me, there’s a teenager who helped me with a theatre set at some point or another.

How are you, Julie? (We’re just gonna call her Julie, because I don’t want to use the actual names of any of the other young ladies who’ve helped me with sets over the years.)

OMG, I’m totally doing awesome! How are you?

(Here it comes) I’m totes awesome, too! Hecka busy, though.

Right?! It’s like somebody turned on a busy faucet and totally forgot to turn it off!

Right?!

Right?!

Totes right!

Of course, I live in the Deep South, where not only does everybody know everybody, but they sincerely want details. I get to the office of a granite manufacturer to pick up my stone, and Reba greets me with a smile.

Well, hey! How’s ya mama’nem? I saw ya daddy day before yestiddy at the Walmart. He was lookin’ good, but said his knees was bothering him.

I don’t doubt it, little lady. Paw’s knees’re bound ta give him the devil’s time as much as he’s on ‘em. Cain’t do nuthin’ with that man.

Well, tell yer people I said ‘hey.’

AH-ight. Y’all come go with us.

I reckon we better stay where we’re at.

It’s probably good that I’m pretty much left to myself while I work, because it gives me an opportunity to reset. I can put on my headphones and wrap up into a world of sound that I’m in complete control of. Maybe I’ll listen to some podcasts, some audiobooks, or that new 80s station I found. Maybe I’ll dial up The Office and let that play in the background. Whatever path I stroll down in my audio journey, it’ll be like wrapping my head in a sound burrito. It won’t matter what ingredients are inside it, except for cheese. I promise there will always be plenty of cheese. That’s the kind of place my mind can go when I have nothing coming into my head from the outside, and more than likely, it will also influence my lunch preference.

Mexican it is! A burrito sounds like a winner, and so when that hunger bell strikes, I’ll head off to … well, the Bell. But then again, nah. I think I want to be served. There’s a great Mexican restaurant where I live. I still wonder how close the food in those places comes to real, honest-to-God Hispanic cuisine like you’d get at one of those side street places in Mexico with no ceiling and dirt floors, and there’s a mariachi band playing. No, I don’t mean one hired to entertain you, but a mariachi band made up of old dudes wearing actual sombreros they built out of straw, and playing instruments they also made out of straw and adobe, but sound awesome. That’s real Mexican cuisine. I don’t think their food comes out of the oven to your table in those places within two minutes of ordering it. But that’s okay. I’m hungry, and they’ll keep refilling my tea while I write yet another amazing podcast episode.

There’s just one problem. The authenticity of the food might be suspect, but the authenticity of their ethnicity is not. Those are real Mexicans running the place, and as my son will attest, that’s a recipe for disaster due to my subconscious aping. Allow me to explain. I’ll keep it short, as I can’t remember if I’ve told this story before.

My son travelled with me a couple of years ago to Alabama for a job. It was the summer, and he had not yet decided there were better things to do with his summer than to go on work trips with dear old dad - things like sleeping, sleeping, and sleeping.

There’s a great Mexican restaurant in Jasper, Alabama, too, called Pepito’s, and I introduced Noah to them. The server was quite chatty that day, with his thick Hispanic accent, and although I didn’t intend to insult him or humiliate my son, I think I might have managed to do both. He was talkative enough that his accent got into my head, so that when he asked if I wanted beef or chicken in my quesadilla, I answered with a resounding, “Cheeeekin!”

I know that teenagers overdramatize how badly their parents embarrass them sometimes, but it’s safe to say Noah’s basically crawling under the table was justified. Once the server was gone, he decided it was the funniest thing he’d ever heard, and he still won’t let me live that down.

The good news is, I’m able to walk away from lunch without coming across as a great big racist, and I can continue my day.

I’m not ready to go back to the etching yet, but I remember that the bin store sometimes gets a new shipment on this day of the week, and off I go to find some treasure. Maybe I should have picked a different day.

When I get there, just as my concentration settles on finding more audio equipment I’ll never use, the guy next to me decides that I look like just the person to talk to about this wonderful place he’s found. He’s from out of town, and this store is magical. Problem is … he’s from WAAAYYY out of town.

What’ll you be tryin’ t’foind? The parrfect thing to tek home to ye’ woyf, mehbeh?

(It’s on) Tha parrfect thing fer me’woyf don’t exist, let meh tell ya!

Well bless yer little Irish heart, and every other Irish part!

Now I’m in trouble. He thinks I’m one of his people, which isn’t hard to believe. I have the skin of an Irishman, the hair of an Irishman, the blue eyes, and now, apparently the dialect. Why do I do this stuff to myself? I have to come up with something.

Ya think we’d be lucky enough to find us a pint? I understand you can always sound like the real deal if you mention a pint to these guys, and why not engage in a little unfounded, romanticized stereotyping?

If ya, do, let me know, and we’ll drain it together. But I wager around these parts, the tongues’ll be awaggin’ at that.

He has no idea how right he is. I lead worship in a Baptist church. That’s why I keep a light conscience. There’s no need to fear th’ wind if yer haystacks’re tied down, I say!

Aye. No sport actin’ the maggot when there ain’t a need, me boyo.

We go our separate ways at that point, but dang it, now I want some Lucky Charms, so I take a side trip to Ingles before getting back at it with my rock.

(Sigh). There’s an angry man from up north ahead of me in the line. He can’t stand how slow it’s going, and he thinks I’m just the man to whom he should express his stress.

He says, Can you believe how slow this line is goin’? I got places to go, things to do, am I right?

I say, FUHGGEDDABOWDIT!

He replies, Right?! Fuhggeddabowdit!

Then we just go back and forth.

Me: FUHGGEDDABOWDIT!

Him: FUHGGEDDABOWDIT!

Me: FUHGGEDDABOWDIT!

Him: FUHGGEDDABOWDIT!

Both of us together: FUGGEDDABOUUUUDIIIIT!

I realize it’s safer for me to head home. So after jumping out of line because I was suddenly in the mood for ravioli, I make it to my truck without insulting anybody else. The day is getting long in the tooth anyway, and I have one more stop to make. I need to pay $200,000 to the vet for my English Bulldog’s latest weekly visit. Her name is Barbara and she’s my precious baby, but let me assure you that if you’re thinking about giving a bulldog a home, they tend to smell, and you’ll buy veterinarians large houses and sports cars.

I walk into the vet’s office and a bell on the door rings, alerting everyone, including all the dogs in the back wearing their cones of courage, that I have arrived. They all greet me at once. The vet tech at the counter pulls up my records and tells me the total I owe.

That’ll be $200,000 for the blood work, a vial of your own blood for the teeth cleaning, and we will accept your first born as payment for figuring out that smell around the anus area.

I reply in the only way I know how. BARK! and then I offer a vein.

I know I’m not really a dog, though.

I’m an ape.

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I’m a Type 2 diabetic, which means that I should stay a safe distance from sugary delights, such as ice cream, milk chocolate, cakes and pies, spoons full of sugar to make the medicine go down, and soft drinks. I thought I was being a good boy when I started ordering diet drinks, but then people seemed to take a wicked pleasure in bursting my healthy eating bubble by happily admonishing me with the news that …

Those are just as bad for you as the regular drinks because your body thinks its really sugar and the blah blah blah blah blah!

They’ll tell me that, and in my mind, they’re throwing their heads back in maniacal laughter as they take a ridiculously long drag from a straw jammed down into a ridiculously enormous, full-on, jacked up with sugar, absolutely real Pepsi.

When that happened to me recently, it naturally sent me into a tailspin of memory of playing in the woods with my cousin who joined me in the doing of stupidly stupid things. And that’s the stuff this episode is actually about. From Atomic Red studios, and frankly, the Huddle House in Hartwell, Georgia, where this was written and I used really sugar in my coffee (yeah, but that orange juice is horrible for you. Just HORRIBLE!), I’m Michael Blackston and this is a rustic, woodsy look into my Funny Messy Life.

_________________________

How do the diet drinks tie in already?

My cousin and I spent a lot of time in the woods. Back in our day, the woods were the Play Stations. Our XBoxes were actual boxes that we painted an “X” across because X marks the spot, and we needed to remember where we’d buried the broken glass, poisonous mushroom spore bombs, and sticks we’d whittled to sharp points for when the vampires finally attacked. We were prepared, son! And if you go back there now and look close enough, beneath the briars, and pine needles the earth uses to record the passage of time, you’ll likely come across a number of aluminum cans from the mid to late 1980s - Diet Coke cans, to be precise. They’ll be faded, even completely robbed of their former red and silver glory, but they’ll tell you a story.

First, I guess it’s the story about what litterbugs we were. Young boys don’t generally think about the environment, and we were no exception. But the real story is one of adventure, one of intrigue, and no small amount of Tomfoolery. It’s because we needed those drinks if we were to survive the Georgia summer heat as we made our huts and blazed the intricate trails that wound throughout the property we called, Our Land. But the drinks were off limits. Oh, yes! The Diet Cokes belonged to my grandpa, who was a Type 2 diabetic, and had been told not to ever let anything with sugar in it pass his lips again. Our instructions were to stay out of the refrigerator, and especially, stay out of J.C.’s Diet Cokes. They watched us like a hawk because they knew that we knew that they knew that we knew that they were watching us, and if we were to get our hands on them, it would take a special forces unit to successfully acquire the target. Luckily for me and my cousin, we thought we WERE a special forces unit, and were, therefore, the right men for the job.

The Big M’s! That was the name of our secret club, but it wasn’t just any normal club like the ones other boys created. There was no scrap plank of wood hanging over the entrance of our main hut with our name scrawled in the clumsy handwriting of a twelve year old with a bucket of old paint and a gnarled, worn out brush. Our club was a secret. Shhh! No one could know about the Big M’s, except for those in the organization. We were as invisible as the C.I.A - our existence as sacrosanct as the Illuminati. We had plans and drawings of our future underground lair - a bunker to beat all bunkers, complete with armored war trucks, an ice cream bar, and entire room dedicated to playing with our action figures. And the one thing that was an absolute, chiseled in stone must, in order to be a member of the Big M’s was that your first name had to start with the letter “M”. My best friend at the time, also named Michael, was officially a member, but as I recall, it was a thing akin to the first drummer for the Beatles. My cousin’s name starts with an “M”, and we were together all the time, so really, it was about the two of us. We had the skills, the stealth, the know-how, and the guts to execute Operation: Grandpa’s Cokes and get away with it. We performed this covert action time and time again, but we couldn’t throw the empty Diet Coke cans in the trash back at the house. Therefore, the ground in the woods seemed to be the next best option.

We did a lot of preparation for battle in those woods. At that time, Sylvester Stallone had roused our tiny pre-teen hunger to fight anything and everything with an M16 in one hand and an Uzi in the other. Arnold Schwarzenegger also did his due diligence when it came to that, so we saw ourselves as the next wave of ninja killing, terrorist destroying, death machines. We submerged ourselves in the Chuck Norris of it all to the degree that one of the places we always went when we landed at the local department store was the toy department, because at that time, toy companies not only sold realistic looking plastic assault rifles with some rattling contraception inside them that made a sound like playing cards on bicycle spokes when you pulled the trigger, but they weren’t yet required to put the silly orange tips on the end of the barrels. Not that I don’t understand the need for those orange tips. I’m just saying that a black Sharpie marker fixes that little problem right quick for a kid with even a thimble full of creativity.

Our first exercises to prepare us for war happened with our fists gripping the stocks of guns that were really sticks that happened to bend the right way. If you look hard enough and squint your eyes just right, most branches will do, shape wise, as some form of firearm. Imagination is a wonderful thing. But even more wonderful was the wielding a replica of the real thing, even if the ratta tat tat sound was closer to that of the giant wheel on The Price Is Right than to actual automatic gunfire.

“I got you! You’re dead. You have to count to twenty!”

Those were the rules of combat in the woods behind Grandma’s house. If you got shot, you had to stop and count to twenty before returning to the game, fresh and unharmed, as if you’d never been riddled by a hundred invisible bullets from a gun that had the power and audio equivalent of someone blowing you a raspberry. Most of the time, you toed the line. If you heard the sound, and the immediate cry from your opponent, “I got you!”, it was over with no argument. That was, at least, until the count of twenty had been made - basically the same thing as “respawning” in video games today, and assuming that you agreed.

Sometimes you didn’t agree. Sometimes, you were sure that the bullets had hit the trees between you, or that you were running so fast, that your enemy hadn’t been able to accurately aim their weapon. It was in time like those that a sort of debate took place between the shooter and the supposed dead soldier.

“I got you!”

“No you didn’t!”

“Yes I did! You have to count to twenty!”

“You missed!”

“No I didn’t! You have to count to twenty!

“No I don’t! You missed!”

There’s a dance that takes place between the two parties. It sounds eerily like a political debate, only more sophisticated.

During the counting of twenty, of course, the shooter gets to disappear into the woods and re-establish covert sweetness.

We either played war or made trails and huts in the woods. There was also a good bit of exploration, but never too far. In the end, we stuck to what we knew. In the winter, it was easier because the thicker layers of clothes kept us from being lacerated head to shoulder by briars. In the summer months, it was a sweat fest and we were constantly on the lookout for snakes. We only saw one during our childhood. Later, as adults, the two of use took a nostalgic stroll through those woods and saw a big, beautiful black rat snake coiled up under a tree. I’m certain that as much time as we spent out there as kids, we must have been inches from the strike of a copperhead or two, but the only snake we encountered was harmless. Since then, I’ve grown to love snakes and have educated myself on them. I squeal like a kid on Christmas morning when I see one in the wild now, but back then, a snake was a snake, and I held the irrational fear of them that probably 90 percent of the population does.

We were walking along one of the many trails we’d beaten down with the sticks we called our babies, and suddenly from the trees to the right, a bright green noodle stretched across our vision, right in front of our heads. It might startle me for that to happen today, but only for a second. After that, I’d likely reach out and take it in my hands, name it something silly - Mr. Snookeypants - and take it back to the house for my family to play with before releasing it, frightened and confused, back into the woods.

As it turned out, twelve year old me, along with my twelve year old cousin, who did stupidly stupid things with me, squealed, not like kids on Christmas morning, but like terrified children at a gory Halloween carnival, and ran back the way we came. I remember we made it to the house and burst through the door to tell the others of the monster we’d just encountered, looking death straight in the red, glowing eyes. Oh yes, by the time we made it back to the safety of the house, the snake would have had red, glowing eyes full of fire. It would have curled it’s head back in that classic “S” shape, ready to strike. Before doing so, it would have opened its great maw of a mouth, revealing fangs as sharp as surgical scalpels, the flesh from its last victim hanging bloody and rotting from them like shredded, rancid curtains.

They’d told us to watch out for snakes and we’d found one.

I’ve noticed two things about this latest offering. 1. I long to revisit the places of my childhood, and 2. When I read something by Stephen King, it influences my writing.

The woods have been the backdrop for so much of the best scene in my life’s play. The woods behind Grandma and Grandpa’s house rank at the top, but there are other places. It pains me that my own children have grown up unable to relate to that kind of fun. The woods just haven’t been a part of their lives very often. When I was a kid, I didn’t realize how important that part of my life would be. It was just the woods. Nothing magical about them. There’s trees, and fallen leaves. There are old, weathered logs to step over sounds in the distance that might be danger, but probably isn’t. And now, when I give them a reason to follow me there for some small adventure, their eyes light up with excitement. Because they haven’t gotten numb to it. And they know there really is magic in there.

All it takes is a little imagination.

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I will never understand why fast food chains use anything other than the Chick-fil-a model for customer service. Until Chic-fil-a came on the scene with their We’ll-Do-Whatever-It-Takes-To-Make-You-Feel-Like-King-Special-Britches philosophy, we were all fine with, “Welcome to the Altar of the Arches. What can I get ya today?” But now, we can see a new world of possibility when it comes to customer service, if only every other chain would buy into it.

It’s a super-duper morning here at your Chick-fil-a.

It’s our pleasure to serve you todaaaaaayyy!!

For some reason, even though these other companies have trouble keeping employees, and their lines aren’t looped around the building twice, they don’t seem to care nearly as much about how their customers are treated.

This episode is about a couple of times when customer service wasn’t just below the standards of your typical Chick-fil-a, but it dove into ridiculously bad. And it’s about a better world we may all experience if we’ll just embrace the pure, unadulterated power, of two little words … My pleasure.

From Atomic Red Studios, I’m Michael Blackston, and this is my Funny Messy Life.

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I’m not proud of my actions - the ones that resulted at the climax of the situation I’m about to tell you. I am a Christian, who strongly believes that how we respond to negativity can set the tone for not just those around us, but those who happen to be downstream to those around us later in the day. In other words, there’s a butterfly effect that starts with us, and can brighten or ruin the day for a bunch of people. It’s up to us to decide who we want to be. The bad news is that on this particular day, I wanted to be a stressed out director of a stage show that was opening the curtain to an audience sooner than later, and in the car with me was my stressed out Co-Director and wife, as well as my Assistant Director, and Set director, who happened to be my stressed out sister. We were running late, but we had to stop to pick up food because otherwise, we would all die before the show was over.

We decided a popular fast food chain that serves Mexican fare would be the best choice, because it was on the way, supposedly fast, and cheap. Simple burritos are hard to screw up, right?

No. Not right.

Mistakes are common among those who consider themselves a human person, and I’m no exception. In my profession, I will occasionally make a mistake, and there are much larger consequences for those mistakes than if you screw up a burrito. And yet, I manage to own those mistakes in a humble, customer friendly way. I would think that with hundreds, sometimes thousands, of dollars on the line, I might have at least some reason to be in a less than happy mood if I make a mistake. But it wasd MY mistake, not theirs, and as long as they treat me with civility, I will try everything in my power to fix it with both parties happy in the end.

Enter this burrito that will soon take a prominent role in this story, not to mention a short flight.

You will recall that I said we were already in a hurry, and supremely stressed. There was a show to put on, and inevitably, cast members would be late, somebody would be feuding with somebody else. I don’t think this was opening night of Joseph and The Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat, when a massive storm raged up right as everyone was supposed to get there, the wind literally blowing my wife to the ground in the middle of the street, and the rain flooding the entirety of stage right only an hour before curtain, but we expected something to happen to cause us panic. That’s why it was important that the order taker listen carefully as we drove up to the intercom. None of us in the car like lettuce or tomato on our food, so we all three made a simple order of beef burritos with no lettuce or tomato.

First, the person on the intercom was rude. Unlike Chi-fil-a, their salutation did not come over the speaker riding a rainbow.

“Whatchoo want?”

I’m thinking Really?

I ordered the burritos. No lettuce, no tomato.

We pulled forward and paid, received our bag of burritos, which was basically tossed into the car, unceremoniously by a worker who wanted to be anywhere but there, and pulled over to check it. We thought that would be a smart move, using the service we’d gotten up till then as an example.

Every burrito had both lettuce, and tomato.

I took the bag inside and got the attention of a worker. She walked up to me with an irritated look on her face, and said, “There a problem?”

I could have handled the situation in a couple of ways. I could have matched her body language and responded as if her very presence evoked the temptation to throw up. IO could have mirrored her obvious distaste for anything that resembled a customer, thereby verifying the age-old I’m rubber and you’re glue philosophy. But I didn’t do that. I understand that appearances can be deceiving, and sometimes people are just having a bad day. I would not mirror her, but instead, I would smile and calmly explain the issue.

“I’m sorry to bother you, ma’am. These burritos were supposed to be beef and cheese only. No lettuce, no tomato. I truly do not mean to be trouble, nor, in fact, rubber.”

The young lady sneered and snatched the bag violently from the counter like I had insulted her mother, her pet bunny, and her priest.

I watched the person remake the order. I could not see their hands, but I was focused on their lips to make sure nothing got spit on. The young lady shoved three new burritos into the bag hard enough that I’m surprised they didn’t break through the bottom. It reminded me of those superhero movies when the hero has just realized their powers, and everything they touch ids destroyed by their newly found strength. Except that this woman knew exactly what she was doing, and looked up me as she handed me the bag, as if to say, That’s what I do to burritos in paper bags! She didn’t say a word - just thrust the bag toward me, and turned around in a huff when I took it.

I should have looked at them again, but I thought at least they probably got the order right this time, and I was in that much more of a hurry now.

We sat in the car, hurriedly grabbed our burritos so that we could get to the theatre, where certainly, we would find out somebody had used up all the eyeliner pencils and foam makeup wedges. This was a show about Egypt, after all, and nobody in the cast naturally looked anything like an Egyptian.

We each opened the wrappers, and of course, there was lettuce AND tomato on each one. I sighed, and calmly took the burritos back into the restaurant.

The young lady was not as happy to see me this time, as she was before.

“What’s wrong now?!”

I was pleased with my demeanor. Mr. Rogers, himself, would have been very proud. But as it goes, pride cometh before the fall.

“These still have lettuce and tomato on them. They’re supposed to be beef and cheese only.”

Here is what she said … “Just eat the D*#@ burritos!”

I, being much more euphoric than I had a need to be, asked for the manager, who came up to the counter. He was a large, sloppy looking, Neanderthal of a man, wearing a scowl reminiscent of Tommy Lee Jones on a bad day. Have you seen Tommy Lee Jones on a good day? It’s still a scowl.

“What’s the problem?” he asked me, not as would a manager at Chic-fil-a, smiling from ear to ear, and simply delighted to be able to solve a problem for his valued customer. This guy yelled the question at me like he was daring me to say anything negative.

I took a deep breath.

“Good sir, these three burritos were ordered to be beef and cheese only. No lettuce, no tomato. They came to me with lettuce and tomato, so I brought them back. They were returned to me wrong again. Now, I understand mistakes are made. I believe when I get to the theatre later, I will find a drunk hobo has peed all over the set. However, while I have been pleasant and patient all the way through, your employee has been rude, disrespectful, and the opposite of customer friendly from the moment we gave her the order.”

Here’s the manager’s reply … wait for it …

“So?”

I was dumbfounded. “What do you mean, so?” I asked.

He smirked and said, “Whatchoo want me to do about it?”

I had come to the end of my euphoria. Now, the stressed, late, irritable director of a show was about to rear his ugly head. A show, by the way, that would no doubt meet me at the door with news that a pack of rabid possums had taken residence in the sound booth.

What did I want him to do about it?

I looked at the burrito I had taken out of the bag to show them, then I looked back at the smirking manager.

I looked back at the burrito in my hand, then back at him.

Then I decided what I wanted him to do.

This is a true story.

I told him he could eat them, shoved the bag on the counter, and threw the burrito, like a major league pitcher, hitting him dead center of the chest.

It takes a lot to make me angry enough to do something like that, but I’m not stupid. He was a large man, so I decided not to ask for a refund. Instead, I turned heel and made my way to the car in the quickest fashion I could manage without looking like a scaredy-cat.

“GO GO GO GO GO!!! I’ll tell you in a minute, just GO!” I screamed when I got in the car and slammed the door behind me.

I don’t remember if we had time to stop anywhere else for food, or if we ran into anything like zombies taking over the stage and doing their own performance of Our Town when we got to the theatre, but the show went over well, all told.

I’m not proud of myself. I should have reacted differently. As a matter of fact, I hold to the thought that, when dealing with any situation, the outcome is far better if you respond instead of react.

My mom and step-dad responded to a similar situation recently, where the drive-thru attendant definitely made it clear it was not her pleasure to serve them. Believe it or not, the restaurant in question belonged to the same chain. It was a Sunday afternoon a few weeks ago, and they decided that instead of the usual after church tradition of fried chicken, they would stop for Mexican fare. My daughter was with them, and probably had some influence in that decision.

The details are fuzzier here, because I got the story from three separate sources, so I’ll only report the commonalities.

They drove up to the intercom at the drive-thru and the attendant asked for their order. There were several people in the car, so the order was large and somewhere in all of the details, the attendant must have gotten frustrated. She became extremely rude, and my step-dad tried to help her out. She must have taken it as aggressive, because what was the attendant's reply? Wait for it ….

She said, “Watch yourself!”

Watch yourself. Let that sink in. An employee in the service industry, regardless of how rude the customer is being, and especially when you can’t be sure one way or the other like this moment with my step-dad, should never, under any circumstances, say, Watch yourself. If I had been the owner of the place and that happened, she'd be gone. Period.

After driving away, my step-dad decided the manager should be spoken to, so he found the number to that franchise and called them.

Who answered? Rudely McRuderson, that’s who.

My step-dad asked to speak to the manager, and she told him he was speaking to her. Then he asked if she was the one who was so rude to him just now, and she told him “yes,” with apparently zero remorse.

This same company, at yet a third different location, this one in my hometown, recently had reports of employees at the window, asking customers if they could keep the change as a tip, and getting verbally abusive with the customers that said “no.”

My point is, there’s a resounding difference between Chic-fil-a and almost all of the other fast food brands I’ve encountered. And this is not a Chick-fil-a endorsement piece at all. I can hear some of you now … Sure it’s not an endorsement. Michael’s a Christian and everyone knows Christians think there will be a Chick-fil-a in Heaven.

That’s not the case at all. I don’t even care that much for the food at Chick-fil-a, but they still get my business. Why? It’s not because of anything spiritual, or political. It’s because they make me feel like when they saw me coming, everyone’s day got brighter just knowing I chose them. I don’t require anyone in the service industry to treat me like a God. There’s only one God, and I’m pretty sure He doesn’t dress like I do. (I stole that line. Ask a nerd to explain it if you need to.)

What I do require is human decency. That’s all. I understand that there are days when people feel bad, but give me a smile anyway. Or at least, fix your mistakes with courtesy so that I don’t have to throw my food at you, and then run away like a frightened chinchilla.

And business owners, adopt the Chick-fil-a model. You don’t even have to say My pleasure. You could say, …

The pleasure is all mine, or

We’re happy to be of service, or

Nut’n but love fo ya!, or

OH MY GOSH, YOU ACTUALLY CAME TO SEE US! THIS IS AMAZING!

Be creative. And be nice.

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Having a radio show used to mean drinking a lot of old, stale coffee, coddling drunk callers on the overnight shift, and eating things left over from remote broadcasts that no one really knew whether or not would kill you. Having not been behind a live radio board for years, I can only assume some of that still happens, but there are some things that never change.

This episode isn’t about radio stories. I’ll save those for my interview with my dear friend, Joe, when he comes in studio to remember back to the radio days of good ol’. No, this is about the things that keep your local station on the air, and what about them that drives me insane enough to scream like a B-movie horror woman, and turn down the volume to keep my ears from bleeding.

I’m talking about radio commercials … the bad ones.

From Atomic Red Studios, I’m Michael Blackston, and this is not a test. It’s a deep dive into the snobby side of my Funny Messy Life.

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Let’s get one thing straight, right off the bat. Everything is not right for everybody. You might want to be a surgeon, but if you were born without sight, that’s not going to be a favorable career for you. I don’t want you handling a scalpel in or around my very delicate person. If you don’t have a love for animals, I’d advise you not to be a veterinarian.

“I’m sorry, Mrs. Wernkle, but Fifi passed away during the procedure.”

“You were just clipping her claws!”

“Eh. Stuff happens, know what I mean? Next victim!”

The same is true for radio. It’s not that I think you ought to have to pay your dues before your voice is heard all over the place. Lord knows, that would be a losing battle anyway. Have you heard some of the podcasts out there? Quiet, haters!

It’s just that some people need experience before voicing a commercial, because most of us weren’t automatically born with the “it” factor necessary to come across in a way that’s pleasing enough to sell something. This seems to be rampant in the car dealership world. Is it really effective for the announcer to scream at me?

*“COME ON OUT TO BLACKSTON AUTOMOTIVE THIS FRIDAY FOR THE DEALS YOU JUST WON’T GET ANYWHERE ELSE! WE’VE GOT AWESOME DEALS ON USED CARS OUT THE REAR END! SPEAKING OF REAR ENDS, HAVE YOU BEEN IN AN ACCIDENT LATELY? SOMEBODY TEXTING ONE OF THOSE OTHER DEALERS, TRYING TO FIND BETTER PRICES THAN YOU CAN GET AT BLACKSTON AUTOMOTIVE, AND THEY DIDN’T SEE YOU COME TO A STOP?! BRING IT IN TO US AND WE’LL FIX THAT CABOOSE BETTER THAN IT WAS THE DAY BEFORE YOU BOUGHT IT - AND WE’LL SEND THE BILL RIGHT UP THEIR INSURANCE COMPANY’S TAILPIPE! BLACKSTON AUTOMOTIVE WILL TAKE CARE OF YOU BECAUSE AT BLACKSTON AUTOMOTIVE, WE TREAT YOU LIKE FAM’BLY! THAT’S NORTHEAST GEORGIA’S NUMBER ONE AUTO DEALER, BLACKSTON AUTOMOTIVE. BLACKSTON AUTOMOTIVE!”

That doesn’t get annoying, does it? Yet, you hear it every day. If you’re going to feed me slop, at least put it on a fancy plate. What if that same commercial were presented a different way? What if a smoothe talking bassy voice sold it to you under a bed of sultry jazz? Still not great, but at least you got to hear some jazz.

But they don’t think that way. They think the owner of the company, who may be a fantastic car salesman, should do the spot. He usually has no clue how bad he sounds, and to make matters worse, they’ll often add one of the guy’s kids to sweeten the sell. That’s usually not a good idea. It’s like a carcass in the middle of the road that’s been there for three days in August. In the south. You think we won’t notice the stench if you put a cute hat on it?

*“AT BLACKSTON AUTOS, WE’VE GOT THE BEST USED CARS AT THE BEST PRICES AROUND. EACH VEE-HICKLE GOES THROUGH A 1.25 POINT INSPECTION, SO YOU KNOW YOU’RE GETTING A QUALITY AUTOMOBILE. BUT DON’T TAKE MY WORD FOR IT. HERE’S MY SON, PEA-POT TO BACK ME UP. TELL, ‘EM, PEA-POT.”

PEA-POT: “THAT’S RIGHT, DEDDIE. HERE AT BLACKSTON AUTO, WE ‘SPECT ‘EM REAL GOOD. IF’N WE FIND A VARMINT IN ONE’NIM VEE-HICKLES, WE TELL IT TA GIT! GO ON, GIT!”

WE DON’T PLAY GAMES AT BLACKSTON AUTO. YOU GIT A GOOD’N WHEN YA COME OUT HERE.

COME OUT TO BLACKSTON AUTO, WHERE WE TELL VARMINTS TA GIT!

THAT’S BLACKSTON AUTO!

BLACKSTON AUTO!”

There’s a commercial that plays on one of the large market stations out of Atlanta and it gets under my skin so badly that I have almost sent a nasty letter. It sounds like the owner of the place, not a car lot, but a retail establishment, and no one told the guy to take the historically large chaw of tobacco out of his mouth before stepping up to the microphone. To make matters worse, his dialect is nearly as redneckish as the character I just did in the last fake commercial. Allow me to take a jab at an impersonation, but first, I’ll cram an enormous wad of paper into my mouth to complete the effect.

*“BLACKSTON ART SUPPLY IS OPEN NOW TO OFFER ALL TYPES OF ART SUPPLIES TO ALL TYPES OF ARTISTS. IT DOESN’T MATTER IF YOU’RE A AMA-TOOR, OR A ‘SPYURENSED ARTEEST, WE’VE GOT WHATEVER YOU NEED TO TAKE YORE LATEST DOODLE, AND TURN INTO YORE LATEST MYSTERPIECE. YOU WANT PENCILS, WE GOT ‘EM AT BLACKSTON ART SUPPLY! YOU WANT BRUSHES? WE GOT ‘EM AT BLACKSTON ART SUPPLY! YOU WANT SENSATIONAL SWATCHES TO SATISFY ALL YOR QUILTIN’ NEEDS, WE GOT ‘EM AT BLACKSTON ART SUPPLY! COME ON OUT TO BLACKSTON ART SUPPLY, AND WE’LL MAKE YOU FEEL LIKE VINCENT VAN GOFF.

BLACKSTON ART SUPPLY.

BLACKSTON ART SUPPLY.

BLACKSTON ART SUPPLY!”

I have misophonia, which means that this stuff triggers the Mr. Hyde in me. I can’t help it. And now there’s another trend. It’s the good ol’ boy commercial where one of them is the straight guy, and the other one is the goofy dude you just can’t do anything with, hyuck hyuck! The goofy guy always ends the ad by singing a country song as badly as he possibly can and they all have a good laugh, as if they didn’t just cause an entire listening area to throw up their last meal. I shall demonstrate.

“CLEVIS: HEY EARL, I GOT AN IDEA FOR A NEW INDEPENDENCE DAY SPECIAL HERE AT BLACKSTON TIRES AND VASECTOMIES.

EARL: OH NO, CLEVIS, YOUR IDEAS ALWAYS INVOLVE ME SPENDING MORE MONEY? WHATCHA GOT UP YOUR SLEEVE NOW?

CLEVIS: NAW, EARL, THISUN’S GOOD. LOOK HERE … WHAT IF FOR EVERY BRAND NEW SET OF TIRES WE SELL BY THE FOURTH OF JULY, WE GIVE A FREE VASECTOMY?

EARL: GOOD GRIEF, YOU’RE GONE RUN US OUT OF BUSINESS! HOW ARE WE SUPPOSED TO MAKE A PROFIT IF THE BILL SKIPS THE SNIPS?

CLEVIS: IT’S A GREAT IDEA EARL. THANK ABOUT IT … IT’S THE ULTIMATE GIFT OF INDEPENDENCE WHILE WE CELEBRATE INDEPENDENCE!

(SINGING) INDEPENDENCE DAY! IT’S INDEPENDENCE DAY!

EARL: (LAUGHING) I NEED MY INDEPENDENCE FROM YOU, CLEVIS. COME ON OUT TO BLACKSTON TIRES AND VASECTOMIES AND GET A BRAND NEW SET OF TIRES SO YOU CAN SKIP THE SNIP ON YOUR BILL!

CLEVIS: (SINGING) IT’S INDEPENDENCE DAY!

I know. I’m just griping. I can’t help it. I’m a hard sell, and if it seems like you’re giving me the old razzle-dazzle, I’ll kick against it with every ounce of energy I have in me. That’s why I wouldn’t make a great salesman, unless I really believe in the product.

Although, if I ever think about having a vasectomy, it couldn’t hurt to get a nice set of new tires, could it?

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When you live with someone for a long time, the stories pile up. That’s especially true when the people who live together are siblings, because not only are you with each other all the time, but you’re also going about the business of growing up, and learning to handle the things that life throws at you. Case in point, me and my sister. Early on, I saw the need to tell some stories about how we’ve tackled projects together as adults, but I haven’t gone into great detail about our childhood, with the exception of the time she dotted me in my eye. So now, as I think I promised, it’s time to go a little further back into our childhood, mainly the early eighties, and tell you about some of the things that we got into. Parents, you may cringe, because there is a bit of blood, as well as something that would have probably gotten us labelled as terrorists in today’s culture of jumping to conclusions, and cancelling anybody that breathes in a way some people disagree with.

Today, we tend to cover our kids in bubble wrap, but back then, it was a different time. I’m Michael Blackston. Why don’t you slip on your favorite Underoos, grab a bowl of cereal, and settle in for the Saturday morning cartoon that is my Funny Messy Life.

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When we were kids, my sister spent a lot of her time looking after me, and a lot of her time being annoyed by me. The rest of time, were were in what more cultured Americans refer to as, “Kahoots”. I don’t know if that’s the right way to spell it, and I don’t care. Doesn’t matter. Me and Stephanie engaged in them because it was the eighties - a time just before the dawn of all the technology that keeps kids inside, punching keypads and video controllers with their thumbs. I would say it was safer for kids to play outside unsupervised back then, but by the time I’m done with this episode, that won’t hold water.

Steph is my big sister, so there were times in our childhood when it was up to her to save the day. One of those times came on an afternoon when we were very young, and found ourselves playing in the yard with the boy that lived next door. I won’t give his name, but if you’d like to hear about some of the other trouble he got me into, go back and listen to the episode called, My First Love, when he introduced me to the famous, fabulous, four-letter F-word. You can’t read about it - I used bullet points to tell that story. Sorry.

Anyway, he was mean. He was my sister’s age, or maybe a little older, and he liked to pick on me because I had not yet trained to be a ninja assassin, although I had aspirations.

Behind the house, tucked a little way into the trees, was an old dog pen my dad had built. It had been years since there had been a dog back there, and nature had grown up all around it, so that you had to go down a short path to get to it. The path was bracketed on both sides by poison oak, stinging nettles, rabbit tobacco, and Devil’s Snare. Oh yeah, and Kudzu. It’s Georgia. There’s always gonna be Kudzu. The fence surrounding the thing was probably eight feet high, with rusty points of chicken wire sticking straight into the air like the evil fingers of a robot Satan, stuck in a perpetual freeze as they curse God. And I feel like I need to stop for a few seconds and make a note in my topics list about a future episode. Let’s see … chewing wild rabbit tobacco with my cousin who did stupidly stupid things with me … because we were stupid. I know there are people out there who don’t care for the word, “stupid”, but it’s okay because I’m calling myself and cousin it, and also … we were.

Back to Steph crucifying herself.

Wait … What?! Is this going to be graphic? Yeah. A little bit..

I don’t know how or why the neighbor boy got his hands on the banana seat from my bicycle, but he did. I think the equation in his mind probably looked a little something like this (Mathematicians, don’t laugh at me. I’m an artist. Just an artist.)

Fun + Laughs∞ = (Banana seat + high fence)(Devil’s Snare) x (Michael crying)

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(Butt whoopin’/meanness) ¶ ÷ quota of evil doin’

However it went down in his mind, the fact remains that he got his hand on the banana seat from my bicycle and chucked it over the fence, into the forbidden dog pen, and the door to the pen had a chain on it. If you’ll refer back to my equation, the objective was to create fun and laughter, by virtue of my tears. Mission accomplished.

Stephanie didn’t want to be the one to have to climb over the fence, but somebody was going to have to if I was going to shut up. I understand the compulsion of some people to be repulsed by the term, “Shut up”, but we were kids, and I needed to.

The neighbor boy certainly wasn’t going to suddenly find a spark of mercy and climb to rescue my bicycle seat, so that left Steph. I was too little and overcome with grief anyway.

Steph found a purchase for her feet and began the climb, fussing at the neighbor boy the whole time. Devil’s Snare reached out for her, awakened by my screams, her anger, and the stench of the neighbor boy’s untethered glee. She managed to find her way safely over the fence, into the pen, and tossed my banana seat back over, triumphantly. But the journey was far from over. The chain kept the door locked from the inside and out. Steph would have to make her way over the fence one more time to get out.

She found a purchase once again for her feet, and began the arduous task of pulling her body toward the top. And she did it. Swinging her leg over the top of the fence, she tried to find a foothold again, to let herself down. And she found that foot hold. She swung her other leg over, and that’s when everything went wrong.

Stephanie and I have always been fantastic climbers. We had Sweetgum trees all over the place in our yard, and because technology had not yet advanced to the stage of letting us send a digital version of ourselves up into the trees, carrying swords and machine guns, we had to go up into the real trees. It doesn’t escape me that there are some people out there who don’t care at all for the very mention of machine guns, but we were kids, and our dad taught us at an early age how to handle a firearm, so if we’d been allowed to, we surely would have strapped M-16s to our backs as we climbed. Dad would’ve frowned on that, though. The point is, that we climbed the trees all the way to the top, as far as we could go without them bending over, so Steph losing her footing on the fence was not an expected occurrence.

Lose her footing she did, though, and she fell.

She didn’t fall far. Those rusty fingers of metal at the top of the fence got into the game by stopping her fall. One of them tore deep into her wrist and held her, dangling and screaming. Now we were both screaming. She was screaming in pain and terror, I was screaming in grief and terror for Steph, and the neighbor boy, seeing what had happened, started screaming too, in terror for the butt whoopin’ he was likely to take, both from his dad when he got home, and Steph, if she made it down from there alive.

I don’t recall how she ended up getting down, but she did, bloody wrist and all. I’m sure I remember it worse that it really was, and I probably got some of the details fuzzy. I was small, after all, and saw the whole thing through a blurry glaze of tears at the thought of not having my banana bicycle seat.

I’ve always respected Stephanie’s chivalry in that moment, and I think she still has a scar on her wrist to show for it, but that’s the least of what could have happened to us.

Later in years, when I was a preteen, and she was a teen, we found ourselves in possession of some firecrackers. I think they were called Black Cats. They were the kind you light, then throw to hear a loud bang, and that’s pretty much it. We stuck a few up the butts of actions figure and lit them just to watch how many arms and legs would go flying. Unfortunately for me, they were also the fast fuse kind. Why unfortunately for me? Well, Steph handed me a Black Cat one afternoon with the following plan.

“You hold it, I’ll light it, and you throw it real fast.”

I, being a MO-ron, agreed. Now, I get it that some of you out there might not want to hear the word Mo-ron. You consider it rude and insulting, but agreeing to this was not one of my finest moments and carries, I believe, the proper information to categorize me as such.

I held the firecracker, and she struck a flame to the lighter. The fuse was long enough, but I suppose that in her excitement, she lost some control of her motor skills, because instead of lighting the fast fuse at the end, she opted for the lighting-the-firecracker-right-at-the-base-of-the-explosice maneuver.

I barely managed to get it out of my hand before it went off. Had it actually exploded in my hand, I could have been seriously injured. As it was, I got enough distance from it - a few inches - that it only FELT like somebody chopped off my hand. I was numb for a couple of days.

So, did that experience serve to teach us a valuable lesson? Yes it did. It taught us that it’s possible to live another day, and we came up with the most sinister plan yet.

There were a lot of those firecrackers left, but we didn’t care for throwing them any more. They were powerful, and they hurt. We needed a way to harness their full potential, and better yet, all at once.

We knew three things:

1. A glass jar would hold all the powder if we meticulously cut through the paper of each firecracker and dumped the powder into it.
2. If we drilled a tiny hole into the bottom of the jar and inserted a very long wick, we could place the jar, and all of its powder, at the center of Brady Bottoms - an area down the road from our house, and hide behind a tree to witness our glory.
3. If we first doused the wick in gasoline, it would surely light and find its way to the jar.

And we did exactly that. Well, almost. It took us days to secretly sit in dad’s metal building with Exacto knives, cutting the firecrackers and dumping their powder into a jar, but we did it, and hid the jar away until we could figure out a way to drill a hole in the bottom of it without breaking it.

Luckily for us, mom found out about our master plan, and intercepted the jar, scolding us to no end, and thanking Jesus that we’d not gone through with it. Mama was wise because she knew three things:

1. Exploding jars break into tiny pieces of glass projectiles that fly faster than Steph or I could have dodged. We would have wanted to see the explosion, so even though we had planned to hide our bodies behind a tree, our stupid idiot MO-ron faces would have been right in the line of fire.
2. We had constructed a bomb, and even in the eighties, that’s illegal.
3. We could have died.

We tried to argue, but mama told us to shut up, and that she’d rather see us playing with machine guns in the tops of the Sweetgum trees, than have us become pasty little terrorists.

So the first Sister Sister episode involved happy things like birthday cakes, the theatre, and parade floats, while this one involved grisly scenes, blood, and weaponry - some legal, others not so much. Needless to say, my sister and I have lived interesting lives, and there’s still a lot to tell. I’ll get to that on down the road. Until then, parents, watch your kids closely, and kids - don’t be stupid.

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As I begin to write out this piece, I’m sitting in a tiny, square sandwich shop called, Bob’s Sandwiches. It’s located on a side street in Brookhaven, Mississippi, and I have never eaten here. I’ve passed by it a time or two, and there used to be a geocache on the property that I wasn’t able to find, but I’m told it’s a piece of Brookhaven history that needs to be experienced. We’ll see. I travel to Brookhaven every six to eight weeks for work, and I was recently told I’m pronouncing it wrong. I say, BROOK’- haven, but apparently, the locals pronounce it, br’k-HAY’-ven. Being corrected sent my mind into a dive as I thought of other words that are pronounced differently, based on your region, which then set me to thinking about phraseology, and I came up with some doozies that separate we southerners from the rest of creation. So sit back a spell and enjoy it, because I’m Michael Blackston, and this is lesson in the dialect that some say amounts to butter rolling off the tongue in my Funny Messy Life ... or as some folks around here say, LYFE.

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The English language is said to be one of the hardest to master because there are so many variations of meaning that can come from the same spelling of a word. That’s called a HOMOGRAPH. Then you’ve got HETERONYMS, which are a type of homograph that are also spelled the same and have different meanings, but sound different. Some words can be both homographs and heteronyms if they sound the same, and are spelled the same, but have different meanings. And then there are WHATTHECRAPHS, which are all of the above, but you say them like a southerner.

Okay, Bob’s Sandwiches just served me my burger and DADGUM! (Which is a southern way of saying, “Well, slap ya grandmama, that’s good!”)

That’s a fine place to start - the word dadgum. Dadgum is distinctly southern, but it can serve to express emotion in a myriad of ways. If you find unexpected joy in something such as a beautiful lady passing by, or the first bite of a delicious large burger with ketchup, mayo, and extra cheese, you can get your delight across to anyone in earshot by exclaiming, DADGUM!

On the contrary, you can use the same word to express disappointment. If you’re waiting at a red light and the last car you need to go by so you can make a left turn has nothing better to do than let their vehicle glide down the road at the default speed in drive without putting their foot on the pedal, you might have to let your emotions be known. Daaaaad-gum it! Because they caused you to miss your chance to turn.

Of course, there are the classics. You say To-MAY’-toe, or To-MAH’-toe ... we say MAY’-ter.

All my life, I’ve spent time around fishermen. I usually went for largemouth bass when I tried, unsuccessfully, to angle, but some folks like to sit on the bank of a river and try for a smaller pan fish called, Bream. We pronounce it BRIM in my circles, but I could throw a rock blindfolded and hit somebody who will pronounce it, BREE’-yum. That’s just our southern accent, though. There’s another popular fish - a hybrid between a largemouth bass and a bream - that I’ve always called a Crappie, pronounced the same way you pronounce a typical critique of Star Wars, episodes 1-3. But the other day, I was in a conversation with a customer in Alabama, and when we started talking about fishing, I mentioned Crappie. She said, “You mean, CRAH’-ppie.”

“No, I meant crappie.”

She shook her head, “No, it’s pronounced, CRAH’-ppie. Not crappy, like you’d say it if you were describing Auburn’s football program”.

I told her where I’m from, we say CRAP’-pie.

She screamed, “Roll Tide!” and stormed out.

Dialects have been responsible for changing the pronunciation of words for years, though. The thing that makes a southerner’s words roll off the tongue like melted butter off a biscuit is the use of particular phraseology that is unique to areas below the Mason/Dixon line. There are a ton of them. I’ll list some of my personal favorites, and try to give the best explanation I can as to how they originated.

I’m not the first person to point these out either, so I’m going to try to visit some of the less cliche’ phrases, like Bless your heart, and Y’all come back, now. Instead, let’s tackle some of the more colorful turns of phrase in the catalogue of the Deep South.

1. If the Good Lord’s willin’ and the creek don’t rise.

When I started the research for this, I realized right away that this whole process might be a rabbit hole I didn’t want to go down. You say this to somebody when you’ve been invited to a family reunion that’s three months down the road, or a gospel singing at your neighbor’s church tomorrow night, when your neighbor is a Methodist, and you’re a Baptist. It basically tells someone, I’ll try to make time, but I got a lot to do. It doesn’t always mean you’ll find a way for the Good Lord not to be willin’, or that you’ll go tear up the beaver dam in the creek behind your house, just so you’ll have an excuse, but sometimes it does. I’ve always seen it as a put off that’s less obvious than if you said, “If the wife don’t mind me leavin’ my underwear on the floor, and basement don’t need cleanin’ out.”

1. Madder’n a old wet hen.

To my understanding, this originates from egg farmers who used to dunk their hens in cold water if they got aggressive about people messing with their eggs. Apparently, being dunked in cold water makes a hen super mad, hence the phrase. Someone gets linked to this phrase when they’ve just had it and they ain’t having no more of it! A more current version of this kind of recognition might be along the lines of, Settle down, Karen!

1. The pot calling the kettle black

If you think about them for a minute, most of this terminology will make sense. This one means, You done gone and accused me of the same thing you’re doin’! You’re a hypocrite, .... preacher! On the stove, a pot gets the same char the kettle does, so why in tarnation would the pot have the sheer audacity to point out the blackness on the kettle’s butt, when it’s got some wiping to do of its own?

1. In tarnation!

My wife and I have spent several car rides discussing the origins of this gem. We believe it likely derives from the southern ability butcher multiple words in a sentence, then squish them together into one phrase. In other words, What’ntarnation?! could have originally been, “What in the entire nation?”

1. Well, ain’t you precious?

Sorry. It’s not a compliment. That reply comes right after you just told me the way something ought to be done because it’s the way you did it back home. Then you came here and thought, I’ll teach Billy Bob the right way to do things. Or maybe you told your grandmother her peach cobbler was a little too sweet. Nine times out of ten, hearing this means you’re one breath away from somebody jerking a knot in your head.

1. I’m about to jerk a knot in your head!

You just said the wrong thing after being told you were precious, and through some sweet, southern grace and mercy, you’ve been given once last chance. Think very carefully about what you do, or say, next. It could mean the difference between living a full and happy life, or finding yourself ...

1. Deader’n a door nail.

This means dead. Not just a little dead, but really, seriously, dead. Scholars think the use of the word “door nail” could be referring to the large nails on medieval doors. Versions of this term have been used as far back as the 1300s, and some semblance of it was mentioned in the writings of Shakespeare. I doubt your granny will care where it came from though. Poor mouth her cobbler one more time, and you’ll become acquainted with it fast.

I just love the south. We pride ourselves on the way we talk, though I’m not crazy about listening to someone who speaks inarticulately because they think it makes them sound tough. My wife and I have worked hard to raise our children to speak clearly, but to also take pride in their heritage. We don’t use double-negatives, but we do embrace a few unconventional contractions, and we ain’t never gonna stop.

And if that bothers, you, well … bless your heart.

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Death is something everyone handles differently. Even when mourning looks relatively the same among people from the outside, the emotional details can be a lot different. For me, death has always been another part of life, and due to my strong Christian beliefs, I tend to mourn more when there’s ambiguity about where my loved one has gone in the afterlife. In other words, if I’m sure you are in heaven, I’m not as likely to cry much for you because I’m happy for you, even if I’m gonna miss you terribly during the time I have left here on earth. That’s the way it’s been for me after recently losing my grandma. Sure, I cried a little, but I’m happy that she’s not in pain anymore, and might be telling Jesus right now about the time she hit a neighbor kid in the head with a sack of potatoes when he tried to take her shoes. Yes, Jesus knows about that already, but maybe He enjoys hearing the story again from her, just like I did every time she told it. With all of that in mind, I surprised myself with what happened when I found myself alone in an empty house that was the backdrop for almost all of my memories of my grandparents.

You might want to grab a tissue, just in case. I have a napkin holder at the ready in the restaurant where I’m writing this, and I can already feel the water want to spill from my own eyes as I prepare to be really transparent about how I’ve handled moving everything out of my grandparents’ house on Washington Highway.

I’m Michael Blackston and I hope you’re spared ever having to deal with anything similar to this chapter of my Funny Messy Life.

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If I’m going to share parts of my life with you, it’s only fair you get to peek in on the messy, as well as the funny.

For reasons more personal than I have a right to divulge here, it was decided to sell my grandparents’ house. After Grandma’s passing, it became necessary to move everything out, and prepare it to make way for the new owners. After a couple weeks of hardcore moving by my mom and stepdad, my mom’s two sisters, and my own sister, there were a few things I was asked to help with. I drive a pickup truck, so I knew my services would probably be needed. For the most part, there was just a lot of stuff that needed to be thrown out from decades and decades of living.

The house was built in the sixties, think, by my grandparents. That makes it even tougher. A young J.C. Mills wanted to provide a good home for his expanding family. In Elberton, Georgia, our industry is granite. Everything is granite. Even our high school football stadium - The Granite Bowl - is dug out of the ground and terraced, using the very stone that supports our community. The only place I remember my grandpa working was a granite company and a small photography business he had for the weekends. A large portion of the wedding pictures that hang on walls around the county were taken in the living room of that house on Washington Highway.

I’m not sure what grandpa did before granite, but whatever it was, financed the house. They had it built, and started a chain of memories for a family that became, to some, unusually close.

It was love that made us that close. Once the daughters started moving out and having children, they formed traditions that would forever shape the way we all lived our lives.

I dropped by a couple of times during the moving out phase. Moving is never easy, and this one was under-painted with a palpable sadness, but we all seemed to be holding it together okay. We laughed like we always do, took verbal shots at each other in a fun way, like we always do, and pretended this was just another turning of the page. I never cried during that.

They cleared the house and cleaned it as best they could. There are stains there, and faded places on the walls - testimonies, I believe, to good family structure and solidarity. We’ve been blessed in that regard. Those things will eventually be painted over, and ripped up and made new for someone else to make memories. Until I went back in there, alone, I didn’t realize how much power those things can have.

My task was to take any remaining junk off the property and haul it off. No problem. I can do that. But there was also one last thing inside that I needed to get. It was a cable box and its components that I was to take back to the utilities office. My sister had left them on a single, old, wooden chair in the living room. It was all the business that was left for me inside the house after 47 years, and I nearly didn’t make it out in one mental piece.

I described it to my mom this way:

Remember in movies when a person walks through an empty house and suddenly, as if like a dream, everything reappears around them, taking shape, as the memories flood back? I did it on purpose. I picked up the cable equipment and started toward the door, with no intention of allowing my emotions to have their way with me. After all, this was another page to turn in a story that isn’t finished for any of us, …….. Right? Instead, I put the stuff back down and found myself being tugged deeper into the house, almost unwillingly, but not really. I needed this, and later found out I wasn’t the only one to make the same final journey. I think my sister might have gone through the whole place, before they changed anything, and took pictures. I’m glad she did that, but I won’t need them to remember.

The front bedroom. Grandma and Grandpa’s bedroom. When you walked in, there would have been a photograph of a military ship on the sea. We think it was the ship grandpa was stationed on during the Korean War. How odd not to see it there anymore! I stood in the middle of the room as visions of the way it was returned in full detail. Not much to remember here, other than it was pretty much off limits, unless necessary. We knew not to mess up the covers because Grandma liked a made bed. There was a time when there were a couple of rifles on a gun rack on the wall, but those had been gone for a while, since grandpa died. Under the rack was Grandpa’s desk, left just as if he was still using it. There were pens and things older than me in the drawers, and that always intrigued me. I wondered what the pens had written, and long ago they had written them.

Next to that was the back bedroom. The daughters all shared that room as the years passed in some form or another. Again, not many memories for me there, except that’s where I took my kids and shut the door when they were misbehaving and needed a “talking to.” One thing did occur to me all of a sudden while the walls were bare. I'll say nothing more than that I looked for the bullet hole. There wasn’t one, but I’ll ask somebody about it at a later time.

From there, the hall leads to the bathroom, and then the main part of the house. There is a small closet to the left and that, my friends, in a tiny space, is overflowing with memories. What didn’t that little closet do? That’s where the toys were kept, and the coloring books, and the zip-lock bag of crayons that was started sometime in the eighties and kept magically refilling itself over the years. That closet held the baseball and football stuff - the essentials for our summertime Sunday afternoon, epic sports battles. That tiny closet held the gloves, balls, and bats that led me to realize I actually did have at least some semblance of an athlete in me. The same stuff would also help me to realize on my thirtieth birthday, as I chased down a fly ball in the field next to the house, that my twenties were definitely over, and something was definitely wrong with my body. That closet was a place for hide-and-seek. It was a clubhouse, where we wrote childish things on the walls that are still there to this day. And it was the place where Grandma kept the blankets that comforted us on so many days when sickness kept us out of school, but mama still had to go to work.

The living room is to the right, and it’s here that I understood the depth of ugly crying that I was about to have to endure. I mentioned the traditions we made. The living room was big enough, but only just so, to hold the whole family if something big was about to happen on the tv with the Braves, or the Falcons. The room would fill up in the eighties when number 3 stepped to the plate, and somebody would inevitably scream, “Dale’s up to bat!”

Around me, standing center, the room filled with the smell of ham, and peppermint, and wrapping paper. The floor filled to my ankles with crinkled up gift wrap and the sounds of Christmas cheer. I turned behind me, and there was the tree with my cousin Chuck’s personalized Christmas ball - we all had them - holding its place at the top. Grandma and Grandpa were there, sitting toward the back, surrounded by gifts, and watching it all with pride because they had made that, and it was good.

The first real tear fell, and my face twisted. I was alone, so I didn’t put up a fight. What was the use? The dining room was next, and I would be powerless now.

The large table was gone, but not really. I could see it, and we were all around it. First it was Christmas and we were stuffing food in our faces, because the last memory was Christmas and the storyteller in me insists on a smooth transition. But then it was every Sunday afternoon that ever happened there. I was small enough that the table was enormous. Then I was a teenager and cared about two things - fried chicken and football. Then I was a young man, and my future wife was next to me, holding my hand under the table so no one else could see. Then there was Noah, then Merida. And all the while, the rest of the family enjoyed the company, talking, and laughing, and the echoes of kit all bounced from the corners of the room in the way I think heaven might sound like. Grandma and Grandpa were there for most of it, too, sitting back and watching, listening. Because it was good.

The tears finally fell free, and fast.

The kitchen area is small, and hard to navigate when more than a couple of people are in there, but it keeps its share of memories, too. Those mornings when Mama brought us to grandma’s because we were sick and she had to work … those mornings would start at the little table to the side. We’d sit there and talk to Grandma while she made us breakfast and little instant coffee with loads of cream and sugar. I still take mine that way. Later, when I sold insurance, I would come over for lunch and sit at that table with Grandpa. Grandma always made me two delicious grilled cheese sandwiches. I kept telling her I only needed one, and every afternoon there would be two.

And last, I walked into the small utility room off the kitchen. There were the washer and dryer in there, and also a large freezer, and ancient bureau with twin mirrors on the doors. My cousin and I - the one who did stupidly stupid things with me - spent a lot of time in front of those two mirror. That was easy before we did the stupid things. In those days, we did the things children do. We grabbed the binoculars from the bureau and tried to look through the trees toward the red dirt. To us, at five years old, the big stack of what I believe was asbestos, was actually Dracula’s castle. We hoped we’d finally get a glimpse of him, but alas, he slept in his coffin during the day.

We learned to stand up for ourselves in front of those mirrors. We pretended the boys reflecting back to us were not only two different boys, but our sworn enemies. We scoffed at the boys in the mirror and we threatened harm to them if they ever got brave enough to come through. We knew they were us, of course, but what a telling tribute that was to the truth of the duality we all struggle with. We didn’t know anything about that then, but I found myself looking into my side of the mirror for the last time. I had to bend a little lower to get all of myself in frame, and that’s when the finality of it hit me with everything it had. The boy was gone, or at least he wasn't alone. The years had flown by, and I’d been so busy, I missed a lot of it. Still, there he was. The other boy. The memory. And behind him, stood a man who wanted to hold on to the boy as tightly as he could, but knowing he had to let go.

I said goodbye because I had to. And in doing so, I've noticed since then, that every time I see my reflection, I’m not alone. The boy in the mirror will always be there as a reminder of that house.

Because some pages refuse to turn.

I’ll always cherish the letters on those pages between the boy and the man in the mirror.

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Human kind is a veritable cornucopia of diverse personalities. To observe the Homo Sapien in its natural habitat, is to be immersed into an environment unlike any other, where subculture, after subculture, is represented with pride, and more often than not, stupidity. There is no better environment to witness the state of the human condition than a Walmart, and today the natives are restless.

I’m Michael Attenborough, and this is a special presentation from Atomic Red Studios of Funny Messy Life.

This is The World of Wally - A Mockumentary

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As we arrive into the parking lot of a local Walmart, we are met immediately with what seems to be a representation of every kind of human, many of them beaming from ear to ear, as they carry large purchases back along the trails toward home. There are televisions and hoverboards, and video gaming systems, and more televisions. I approach one of the humans cautiously. It appears to be a male, and he’s stepping proudly as he pushes a trolley overflowing with boxes of alcoholic beverages, and a miniature refrigerator.

“Pardon me, but might I ask the meaning of such a purchase on a Monday afternoon?”

“BEER COOLER! AND BEER FER M’NEW BEER COOLER!”

“I see. And why today?”

“Guv’ment sent me a check fer me an all six of m’younguns. Tomorrow, I’ma buy my old lady them fancy curlers she’s been nagging me about.”

As we set our course toward the entryway of the store, it occurs to me that due to the arrival of stimulus checks, the American human is mimicking holiday behavior, acting out fiscally, in a way that is normally seen in November, the day after Thanksgiving. However, it is well documented that upon the occupancy of any sudden windfall, the human person is known to exhibit this sort of behavior, regardless of the season. Now that the tax season is upon us, coupled with the influx of checks that bear stimuli, I suspect that we may encounter more of the same, once inside.

The door opens automatically and as we enter, I remark that there is a large sign overhead, declaring that this avenue is the correct one for entry. Curiously, there is a human to my right, completely ignoring the sign above a second set of doors that clearly reads, Exit Only - Do Not Enter. Still, the doors open, and the human is allowed in without obstruction. What a delightfully carefree and rebellious species!

To my left, just inside is a desk with humans both in front, and behind. The specimen behind the desk appears bored, or rather irritable, as they attend to another, more provoked human. Let’s listen in.

“I’m sorry. I asked the manager already. Your signature has to match the name on the check.”

“It’s in my old man’s name!”

“Then he’ll have to be the one to sign and cash it.”

“I want one of them beer coolers before they git gone. And some beer for my beer cooler!”

“I’m sorry.”

“Hold one fer me ‘til I git back.”

“We’re not allowed do that.”

“BEER COOLER!”

I think it best we leave the area before violence erupts, and so we journey further into the jungle of departments, and try to observe a different subculture of humanity.

Ah! The area known as The Market. Here we shall discover our humans in preparation for mealtime, foraging for the nourishment they will take home to their dens to feed the tribe.

Here is a rather large male, scouring with his eyes, an assortment of confections in boxes marked with the image of one of their idols. The idol’s name is Debbie. She is found to be diminutive in stature, but gigantic in flavor, and one of the male’s cubs has taken a particular liking to one of the boxes.

“Git me some Star Crunch, deddeh! I want me sum’nim Star Crunch.”

“Them thangs’ll ruin yer dinner! Ya mama’s fixin’ tater chips later.”

“Can I have’em fer dessert, deddeh? I won’t eat them Star Crunches till after my tater chips. I promise, Deddeh!

“We still got Devil Sqars from last week. Boy, git-chyer hands offa them Star Crunches ‘fer I take hick’ry to yeh!”

More activity diverts our attention behind us where two carnivores are engaged in an astounding display, attempting to decide which of them should walk victoriously away with the last rotisserie chicken. The two stand facing one another, each displaying her own plumage. The closest to us is tall and thin, and flaunts an enormous blue hat with one large feather rising in astonishing glory to the sky. The other, a rounder specimen, pokes her chest forward in an attempt to intimidate the other with the words written on her sleeveless t-shirt that read, If It Ain’t Duke’s, It Ain’t Real Mayonnaise.

Their hands linger a breath away from the chicken now. Which one will make the grab, leaving the other without the protein she so badly desired?

We wait. The tension is palpable. There’s movement to the left and the day is saved. Both of them shall have their meal, as a deli worker has brought over a trolley full of fresh chickens. Unfortunately, only one of them is flavored with lemon pepper, and both desire it. Once more, the eyes narrow and the hands hold position to strike.

Moving on, we travel to our final area. The land here is vast, and it would be impossible to observe every segment of the topography.

We’ve made our way now to the land of hardware. Two older humans - one male, one female - have perched in front of a display of floor tiles. They, too, are not agreeable.

“I don’t like none of these. I told ya I like the linoleum. This ain’t as easy to clean as the linoleum.”

“These is easier fer me to lay. I can’t lay a sheet of linoleum like I used-to-could. It’s ter’ble on m’knees.”

“You got to git on your knees to lay floor tiles. What’s the dif’fernce?”

“Ain’t the same. I like these because ya can peel the back off and it’s sticky. Ya just stick it down. Peel and stick. Peel and stick.”

“You’re just bein’ contrary to git me all riled up!”

“You’re just bein’ contrary ‘cause ya can’t stand change! I say stick ‘em. Stick! Stick!”

“Vinyl!”

“Sticky!”

“Vinyl!”

“Sticky!”

The natives are quite restless. We’ve come to the end of our journey among the Homo Sapiens that frequent the World of Wally. Their behavior is extraordinary, and at times, disturbing.

Join me next time as we explore more culture. We’ll be hiking through a desert of humanity as they navigate the exhilarating experience of the Department of Motor Vehicles. Tempers will be high, patience, will be short, lines will be long, and the clerks will be slow. I’m Michael Attenborough. Thank you for your company as we made our way through the World of Wally. Until next time. Goodbye.

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I like to mess with the phone scammers that call me eighty times a day. I’ve visited this past time before in Funny Messy Life, every so often, you bump into a topic of content that warrants a second dip in the pool. I was sitting in the parking lot of a restaurant, waiting for them to open for lunch, and trying to decide what to write because I was running close to the deadline for releasing the podcast. I had barely opened the app on my phone where I keep my list of topics, when low and behold, I get a call from a number that seems local, but with a name I didn’t recognize. The planets aligned perfectly, after weeks of trying to be in the right environment to record my playtime, and I got the audio.

I’m Michael Blackston, and if you hate getting the “Car Warranty” call, stick around for the whole episode. Because I’ve got more to say about the annoying world of telemarketers, and how they affect my Funny Messy Life.

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They used to at least be from legit businesses. When telemarketing first began to be considered the smelly armpit of telecommunications society, they were much more limited. They seemed to focus their efforts around the time families were sitting down to dinner, because they knew people were home from work, settling in for the evening, relatively happy. We were eating, which makes us happy. The work day was newly over, which made us happy. Vanna White wasn’t getting letters from AARP yet, and that made us happy. The people who ran the marketing companies knew that “happy” is an emotion conducive to selling garage doors, new carpet, and exciting time share oppportunities. There were also a bazillion surveys they wanted you to take, and calls asking for donations to the campaigns of political candidates you probably wouldn’t vote for, even if they promised to give you your very own Chick-fil-A.

Then we wised up. Technology gifted us with a glorious thing - Caller I.D. Suddenly, you could look at a display and tell who was calling, and if you didn’t recognize the number, or if it was Aunt Mabel, who always wanted to tell you about her toe fungus, you could ignore the call.

But alas, technology, as a friend, has two faces. The combination of the internet and phones people carrying in their pockets, on their person, at all times, even to the bathroom, brought out the worst of humanity. The scammer.

I was never one of those who fell for the early emails from princes in Uganda, but strangely enough, there are plenty who did. There were long lost cousins overseas who just wanted get the millions of inheritance dollars owed to you into your hands, and they’ve been trying to reach you, and now you’re risking losing it all, unless you act immediately, and all you have to do for them to put those millions in your bank is to give them your checking account number.

People fell for it, and it evolved from there. Now we all get the calls every day. For a while, it was a real person when you answered the phone, but they eventually realized they could cover more ground by having a recorded voice deliver the original bait, then you get a real person, overwhelmingly with an Indian accent, when you press “1” to speak to a representative.

So in playing with them, I’ve tried several approaches. The first time I talked about this in the podcast, I had some fun recreating fictional situations, but soon, I’ll play the audio from a real one, so stick around. It’s coming up.

I tried being a super-redneck, but that never gets me very far, and my goal is to waste as much of their time as I possibly can so they’ll have less time to bother others. I know it’s really a drop in the bucket, but if they’re going to be relentless, I might as well get my licks in too. I started watching YouTube videos of hackers royally disrupting these scammers and actually getting into their computer systems, while posing as victims. Those have been fun to have going in the background while I work, and they’ve given name a bit of insight into the way these chunks of sewer filth think. They’re not after a redneck. A redneck may have a distinct way of speaking, but many of them are quite intelligent. The scammer recognizes that. No, they want someone who they can intimidate, and who they think will be uneducated enough with technology that they can scare them into giving them all of their information. I found that older ladies hit the bullseye for how long I could keep one of these Jack Wagons on the phone.

I usually get one of three main scams.

1. The Car Warranty. - They tell you they’ve been trying to reach you about your car’s warranty. I’m not sure how it works, but it’s one of the most commonly used. Facebook is lousy with memes that portray outlandish ways this scam could be done.
2. The IRS Is Coming To Take Your Butt DOWN! - They’ve never been able to tell exactly why, but they swear if you’ll give them the last four digits of your social security number, they’ll make it all go away.
3. The Social Security Administration Is Coming To Take Your Butt DOWN! - Same deal. Someone has used your number to steal your identity and perform all sorts of lewd and unseemly acts that would embarrass your grandmother, even if she’s already gone to heaven. They can’t tell you WHAT these identity thieves have done, but they want you to take their word for it - the details would straighten the curls on your grandpa’s bald head.
4. You Amazon Account Has Been Hacked And Someone Bought An IPhone For $100,000. - I haven’t gotten far with these guys yet, but my new persona might finally break down that wall.

So what is this new persona? I think I’ll name her Aunt Mabel. She’s feisty, and loads of fun. She’s cheerful, and happy to talk. She’s exactly who they’re targeting. I have to admit that what you’re about not hear is largely inspired by the likes of Jack Vale, and others, because it’s what seems to work.

So without further ado, we lean into the audio of my latest attempt to waste a scammer’s time. Enjoy.

(Insert Audio)

There will be more to come. I hope I can remember to always have a way to record these close by. I’ll try out different characters and personas, and maybe, with enough of us fighting back, we can educate people, put a dent in the predatory activity of scammers, and have some fun at the same time.

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As I tucked my daughter into bed later the same night after I had interviewed her for this podcast, I could tell she was upset about something, so I asked her what was wrong.

I want you to erase what we recorded earlier, she told me.

I didn’t understand why, but she told me she didn’t think it was funny and she wanted to do it again. Something funnier, she said.

I promised her it was fine and plenty funny - that we would do another episode where she could be funny the way she wanted to, but honestly, that scares me a little. Why? Because I was once a young child and the things that I thought were funny were, in fact, not funny at all, when adult me looks back on them in horror and once more realizes how much more … oh, what’s the term my grandpa would have used? BUTT WHOOPIN’! How much more butt whoopin’ I should have had coming my way. And if you wonder why I was such a deviant child, don’t forget that most of my badness had a partner. If you’ve listened to all of these episodes, you ought to know by now that right beside me stood my cousin, who did stupidly stupid things with me. Yes, it’s more evidence that I should have been locked in a padded room for a lot of my Funny Messy Life.

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There’s a large Ingles grocery store there now, but in the eighties, it was a strip mall. It was before Sam Walton had staked his flag firmly in the We-Sell-Everything retail market and and there were several different chains of bargain department stores. Sky City was the only one in Elberton, Ga, so if you wanted to buy blue jeans, a new spatula (spatchler, if you have the right amount of Georgia clay running through your veins), and a box of Marlboros, all from the same place, you made a trip to Sky City. They still sold music on vinyl back then, unless you were fancy enough to have a tape player, and live tank fish, which were right next to the fishing tackle. I always thought was a tad cruel. It was like telling the goldfish, Hey … we might be selling you to entertain us if there’s nothing to watch on the three tv channels, but you see that big hook right there? That’s about to stab your uncle Carl through the lip part of the face and drag him out of Lake Russell flipping and screaming.

My cousin and I used to get to go to Sky City together sometimes when our mothers took a fancy to trying on clothes. Small town living had not yet realized the dangers of allowing nine or ten year old children run around a store unsupervised and we were set free to do as we pleased as long as we promised to behave. So we promised.

Our first trip would be to the toy department so we could see what new items hung deliciously in blister packs. They were items our moms would say no to just a little bit later, and then it was off to the music racks. We took particular interest in the album covers of Ozzie Ozborne because he somehow knew that fake blood and deranged images would sell albums. That grew tiresome quickly, though, because my cousin and I had developed a ritual we thought was hilarious and as long as it was the dead of summer, so that the fans they sold were all going full blast to battle the heat due to the lack of air conditioning. I guess the initial blame might belong to poor design of the departments and displays. Because had the fans not been only one aisle over from the fishing tackle and supplies, my cousin and I might not have realized how comical it would be to do a stupidly stupid thing.

I fished because my cousin did. Otherwise, I didn’t care too much for it. But he was just getting into it and the day we came up with our scheme, which we repeated over and over again, to the dismay of store management, we were looking over the equipment and baits they had to offer. At one point, we came upon a type of bait used to catch catfish. It came in a small plastic container and on the lid were printed the words, Blood and Cheese.

Interesting.

It couldn’t really be blood and cheese, could it? I mean, why would any normal thinking person do that, right?

We opened the container to see what was really inside and found out that it was, indeed, very much filled with a mixture of blood and cheese. I pray you have never had the priviedge of smelling that combination. I think it’s what they shove up into your nostrils as a welcome gift the second you get to hell.

We both reacted the way you would expect anyone to react when the odor hit our noses. We quickly put the top back on it and backed away, making crosses with our fingers like you’re supposed to do when you want a midnight snack, only to find there’s a vampire between you and the leftover taco salad.

But then, adolescence gripped us around the frontal lobes, and suddenly we had a sneaky, evil, disgusting plan.

It was hot in that Sky City. They didn’t always air condition the stores back then and the fans on the next aisle over were all blasting away, and rotations back and forth at maximum velocity. How funny would it be to open a container or two of the blood and cheese catfish bait and place them strategically behind a couple of fans on such a steamy, sweltering, Georgia summer day? Our answer to that question? Hilarious. And so we did.

And then we ran. This became a tradition every time we were together in that store, until one day, magically, the fans had been moved and the establishment no longer seemed to carry the blood and cheese catfish bait. Do you realize the amount of tearing up our behinds that would have happened if we’d ever been caught?

Eventually, my cousin and I got old enough that our parents would let us ride our bikes around town unsupervised.

There have been many,many times recently, when my own son has made the statement, You don’t trust me, dad. To which I reply, No, son. I do not. He’s asked me why once or twice, too, and I always say the same thing … Because I was a boy once. I know what boys do. Then I promptly go into a closet and fall to my knees, asking for salvation again. Just in case.

It was easy to get bored in the small place where we grew up, so it didn’t take much for a young boy to become what my Grandpa used to call a Baddun In The Town. He used to call us that when we were mere babies because he could probably see the rottenness in our eyes. Double that and give two boys bicycles, and no good was gonna come of it.

Our favorite thing to do for a while was to ride over to the same strip mall where we’d thoroughly sickened the customers of Sky City, and park ourselves on a bench outside of another store called, Otasco. I can still smell Otasco. They sold a lot of tires and the smell of the rubber and whatever else was in there was distinct.

The goal, as we sat on the bench, was to engage in a hearty game of Truth or Dare. Of course, neither of us ever chose truth. We knew everything about each other anyway, and what would be the fun in that? We intended to compete to see who would break first and refuse the dare, resulting in a punch to the shoulder as hard as we could. My cousin was a lot stronger than I was and I didn’t like him punching me in the shoulder, so I doubt I lost the game very much. And knowing him, he probably didn’t either. I imagine he probably refused the last dare and then told me he wouldn’t be taking any punches to the shoulder, and if I did, he’d punch me in the shoulder. So the game would end in a tie because, you’ll recall, I didn’t like him punching me in the shoulder.

The dares usually took the form of something embarrassing we would say to the next customer coming into the store. Bark like dog, or call the next old lady Mister. I only remember the specifics of one of the dares I have to complete and I wish I could take it back. I also hope they didn’t know who my mama was, or she would have been the conversation over their dinner table - she and her lack of good parenting.

My cousin asked the question … Truth or dare?

I thought over it for a second. You had to do that just to make it seem like you were playing the game right. Dare! I said.

Okay. The next old person who comes by, you have to pretend they look familiar to you. You have to ask them if they’re any kin to … (snicker) … The Janittles.

I was a little confused. Why would that be a dare? What was embarrassing about asking somebody if they were kin to the Janittles? Who were the Janittles, anyway?

Then it hit me. It wasn’t spelled J-A-N-I-T-T-L-E-S … it was spelled … G-E-N-I-T-A-L-S.

I shook my head crazily from side to side. I ain’t doing that!

Then you’ll have to take a punch to the shoulder, he told me.

I’ll punch you back in the shoulder! I threatened.

Then I’ll punch YOU back in the shoulder two more times!

Check mate. I had to do it, and lo and behold here came a blue haired lady, parking her enormous 1980s vehicle right in front of us.

I swallowed hard and waited for the lady to exit the car and walk up. In my mind’s eye, I think she had the look of the world’s stodgiest librarian, who had her funny bone extracted by aliens. Either that, or she didn’t like hooligans, and, having taken one look at us, recognized us to be exactly that. Which we were.

Ma’am, I stopped her as she was heading in, hoping to ignore us. My cousin was already having to cover his mouth to stifle the gales of laughter that would be coming shortly thereafter. You look familiar. Are you kin to the Janittles?

What did you say, young man?

Are you kin to the Janittles?

No. Why?

We hadn’t anticipated a question in rebuttle and my cousin, who did stupidly stupid things with me, wasn’t prepared for it.

Because you favor one, I replied.

BWAAAAAA HA HA HA HA HA! My cousin erupted and the poor lady went inside without another word. I can’t believe you said that … I CAN’T BELIEVE YOU SAID THAT!

I didn’t get a bruise on my shoulder that day, but there was always a bit of a scar. Even at my young age, I realized how words could hurt. That lady probably shrugged it off without a thought and maybe poor-mouthed a mother she didn’t know over meatloaf later that night. Old birds like that are usually real tough and the shenanigans of two adolescent morons on a bench outside of Otasco probably didn’t come close to piercing her skin. And then again, you never know how deeply your words might dig into a person. If they've had a particularly bad day, or perhaps they battle a bunch of insecurities, something like that could actually make matters worse for them.

Nowadays, I try my hardest to make those I meet to feel better after they leave me and I’m not lying when I tell you that over the years, I’ve revisited those games of Truth or Dare and people we might have affected by our actions in Sky City. I’ve spent a lot of my adulthood feeling regret over the childish things I did when I was young, but I also realize that the past is the past. We can only move forward from today. If there’s an opportunity to make amends, we should do so. Otherwise, I think our best move is to learn from our past and try to do right by people.

Hmph. Janittles. You gotta be kidding me.

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The recent weeks have been hard on my mom’s side of the family because my grandmother, the incomparable and amazing Sue, which is somehow short for Geneva (I’ll explain that in a different story because Sue needs a piece dedicated only to her), had been suffering. She fell and broke her hip a couple of years ago and was taken to a nursing home for recovery, which, because she was the ripe old age of 93, never happened. We knew it wouldn’t. The lady was already weak, so we knew she would never walk again. And after fighting to bring her home and the saint-like diligence of her three daughters and my sister, accompanied by an angelic team of home-health care workers, at the end of February, 2021, my Mema - Ah-Mama to the great grandkids, went home to be with the Lord. I have a lot more to say about how her passing will affect our family and some of the stories she told of her childhood are classic, but that’s for later. Right now, I want to dive into some culture and theology that seems to flare up like the burners on Mema’s ancient gas stove whenever someone dies. I’m talking about the concept of Heaven, and more specifically, what we’ll be doing up there.

I’m Michael Blackston and this is an otherworldly dive into my Funny Messy Life.

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You might be saying, I didn’t come here to be preached at!

And I’m here to tell you not to worry. I don’t do that here ... much (listen to the story called, The Trendy Curmudgeon for a slight departure from that rule). There may be a Christian themed podcast sooner or later where I bring hell-fire and brimstone, but here at Funny Messy Life, I like to keep it light. That’s why I beg of you … if you have trouble telling the difference between seriousness and satire, listen (or read) carefully ... I’M JUST HAVING A LITTLE FUN!

Now that we’ve gotten that out of the way, I can begin my commentary.

I’ve been to my share of viewings and funerals and graveside services over the course of my lifetime. I know my duties as a Pallbearer and I understand what to say and what not to say to the family of the deceased. For example, NEVER ... and I mean NEVER, no matter how similar an experience you’ve had ... NEVER EVER tell a member of the grieving party that you understand what they’re going through. Because you don’t. You might think you do, but ya don’t.

What you do say to them, depending on the region, is how sorry you are for their loss, and that if they need anything at all, it would be an honor to help.

There are some alternate words you might consider, again, depending on the region. If you’re in:

Georgia - I’m so sorry for your loss. She made the best sweet tea.

South Carolina - I’ll be praying for your family. Your daddy could swat mosquitos better than anybody I knew.

Florida - Bless your heart. Will your grandma be buried here or back home in New York?

Alabama - ROLL TIDE!

Of course, I’m from the south, so that’s all I can offer, but if you call your local funeral home and request a list of regional condolence alternatives, I’m sure they’ll be happy to send that right out to you. Unless you’re in California. They’ll probably just label you “insensitive”, call for a boycott on everything “You”, and tear down a random statue to make a point.

Anyway, I’ve made a left turn into, What the heck does this have to do with heaven?

Here’s the connection. More than a few times, because she was bedridden for so long, I heard people say things about my grandmother like, Well, she’s up there now, just a-dancin’ away, or She’s singin’ In The Garden with a heavenly choir as we speak! There are several of these little nuggets of ointment for the heart, but I started to think about what I want people to say about me when I go on to the Great Beyond. I started thinking about it during a trip to the grocery store when I was insanely hungry, but only had enough cash on me to buy the bare essentials. This is what I told my wife ...

When I die, if anybody says I’m up there dancing or singing, I want you to tell them what I’m really doing.

What’s that?

I’ll be eating. I’ll be at a big table with everything I ever wanted to eat in front of me because it’s heaven and I can have whatever I want and as much of it as I want because it’s heaven.

Seriously? Your idea of heaven is sitting at an enormous table, cramming your pie hole with macaroni and fried chicken?

Of course not! I will be cramming my pie hole with pie. I’ll get to the macaroni after I tire of anything that’s loaded with sugar because it’s heaven and Wilford Brimley can’t tell me what to do. And if anybody dies and comes looking for me, tell them to just follow the trail of movie theater popcorn butter and it’ll lead ‘em right to me. Because heaven.

You’re pathetic.

IT’S HEAVEN!

I started to think about all the other things that will be available to me, but nothing, other than Jesus, interested me. I think I mostly look forward to chewing delicious morsels of heavenly goodness, followed by swallowing said morsels and having them disappear into space without being bad for me.

Because heaven.

And then, because my mind won’t let a thing go very easily, I started thinking about the one thing other people might be looking forward to when the Roll Is Called Up Yonder.

Again, don’t write me with your opinions about whether any of the people I’m about to mention will go to heaven. This is a comedy piece, not theological, as you can already tell. So quiet, you!

I imagine The Crocodile Hunter, Steve Irwin, is snuggling up to the biggest crocodile you ever laid eyes on, giving it a noogie, and flossing it’s teeth, while wearing a necklace made from live baby cobras.

Perhaps Lady Gaga (she’s still with us - don’t panic) will have a bathtub full of never ending feathers and eyeliner pencils and all the Elmer’s glue in the world to put together her next outfit.

My literary muse, the late Lewis Grizzard, may well be watching reruns of the Run Lyndsay, Run play from the 1980 Georgia/Florida game. He will have a typewriter close by and, because it’s heaven, everybody up there will agree with everything he said in his latest article.

Comedic actor, John Candy, will .... well, I guess he’ll be cramming food into his pie hole with me at the huge food table.

Funerals are a weird experience. This was my daughter’s first time. Luckily, she didn’t have to endure watching too many people cry because we were all happy Grandma had moved on to what we believe is a place where she’s young again and perfect and eternally happy. And we believe we’ll get to see her again.

At one point, during her last days, dementia had set in pretty aggressively and she began to think she was once again cooking biscuits from scratch. I told my mom they had missed a golden opportunity. They should have brought the ingredients over a;long with a big bowl and let her go to town. It’s been years since any of us have tasted Grandma’s homemade biscuits. She got too old to bother messing with them, but there was a time when she made them at every meal. I never knew one way or the other whether or not she enjoyed making them all those years or if it was a chore she was glad to be rid of. Something tells me she didn’t mind not having to make them, but there at the end, they must have been a reminder of a happy time for her to go back to them like that. She was surrounded by loved ones that had passed on during those last hours, too. She talked to her sister and brothers and my Grandpa. While we gathered around her and tried to keep her comfortable, she was in a different place in her mind - a different time. Back then there were few shows to choose from on the tv and very little, if any color in them. There were children and grandchildren and great grandchildren still to be raised and nosey outside cats to shoo away from the laundry basket while she hung clothes on the line in her bare feet. There were several of those mouse catchers over the years, but they all went by the same name … Kitty Tom.

In the last days before she passed, I reckon she might have visited a Christmas or two when the family was all together and none of the dramas that filled our lives later on had happened yet. The tree in the corner would have been a real one, a bushy cedar, cut down by Grandpa’s own hand from the woods behind the house, and it would have been draped in stringy tinsel, and those huge colored lights that used to get so hot, it’s a miracle there weren’t more Christmas house burnings back then. There would have been Gene Autry playing a lonely cowboy tune on the cabinet stereo, or maybe a laugh track behind a black and white screen featuring Red Skelton on a television way smaller than a lot of people nowadays can remember.

And I’m sure she could smell the biscuits cooking in the oven. That glorious aroma of fresh, golden brown bread.

Yeah, that’s where I think I’ll be. Sitting at that table in front of a plate piled high with Grandma’s biscuits, sharing a meal with her one more time. One more of an eternity of times to come, and listening to her tell me her stories again.

That’s where I’m gonna be.

Because heaven.

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I like to think I’m charming and kind. My mama raised me to respect others and to think twice before I spit out the first thought that pops into my head. Unfortunately, that doesn’t always happen. This episode is about putting your foot in your mouth, or more specifically, some of the times I have put my foot in my mouth. I’m Michael Blackston and this is a helping of embarrassing moments from my Funny Messy Life.

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Maybe you always look both ways before crossing a verbal highway, but just take a look at social media and you’ll quickly see that most people don’t bother to do that. In fact, on Twitter or Facebook, it seems like people do the equivalent of jumping right out into the middle of traffic on a busy verbal highway, wearing a blindfold, music blaring at top volume in their earpods, and screaming something political at the top of their lungs they know absolutely zero about, other than something snarky they saw from a friend who thinks the way they do screaming in a meme that featured Kermit The Frog or Willy Wonka. Sorry for the run-on sentence, but it had to be done. I’ve done my share of blind posting, too, but that was before I came to the realization that I do a jam-up job on my own of saying things I immediately regret, without attaching it to an adorable photo of Betty White.

And sometimes it’s completely innocent.

Let’s take this very podcast as an example. I call it Funny Messy Life. I like that name. I think it’s swell. I think it’s catchy. And I think I almost peed myself when, after several episodes in and shortening the title in some posts to FML, my son says to me …

Dad, you know what FML actually means, don’t you?

No, son. Is there another meaning?

Yes, there is. And you’re not gonna like it.

What does it mean?

It means (Blank) My Life. It’s what people text when they’re upset.

Ha ha ha! You’re such a cute, silly, boy child. Of course not. “Blank” doesn’t start with a “B”. It starts with and “F” ….. Oh.

Yeah. Oh.

Well, what was I supposed to do? I’d already done everything to build Funny Messy Life. I wasn’t going to go through the work of changing it, so I stopped using the acronym whenever possible. I felt a little stupid, too. It seemed like I should have mentioned it to somebody beforehand, but how was I to know? Things change so rapidly that as you get older, the more you find yourself treading the deepening waters of language. Or at least, dodging the scooters and mopeds of the verbal highway.

I may have told this story before, but it bears repeating, if for nothing else than to educate you about the perils of assumption.

The scene is a chain restaurant - Red Lobster, to be exact - and my family had eaten there enough to know the staff on a first name basis. Our usual waitress was a large young woman with a beautiful smile and a bubbly personality to boot. We liked her and, of course, her size was of no importance to us, other than the obvious concerns about her health, which, we concluded, could not be helped any by her being so closely engaged with all those garlic cheese biscuits they serve with reckless abandon. Her girth was hew business, though, and we loved her no matter what.

On one evening, she approached our table with the requisite eight baskets of Cheddar Bay Biscuits, and she appeared extra bubbly. She was, in fact, glowing. One family member asked why she was in such a good temper.

I say, what puts you in such a good temper, good woman?

Oh my, she replied. I am on top of the world, sir. I have delivered a girl child and she is a doll, you see. Simply a DOLL!

My family was genuinely happy for her and told her so as she topped off our drinks. Bully for you, my dear. May your days be filled with the joy and merriment brought about by the delightful sounds of your precious princess. Hazah!

That should have sufficed, but I’m not one to leave a thing unspoken …. Sadly.

I said, THIS WHOLE TIME, I NEVER KNEW YOU WUZ PREGNANT!

If you’re reading this, you’ll realize that I typed that in all caps. It’s because that’s exactly how it felt the second it came out of my mouth. It felt like I was yelling, because while every part of that statement was completely innocent, NO PART of it should have been spoken.

Yes Virginia, there IS and idiot.

I hadn’t meant to insult her weight, but in one glorious sentence, I managed to dump a whole shaker full of awkward onto our table and if I recall right, we didn’t see our waitress as much as usual that night. I borrowed a couple hundred dollars to leave as a tip, but the damage was already done and the rest of the dinner was spent with the men laughing too hard at jokes that weren’t funny, my mom, my sister, and my wife glaring at me like I’d just beheaded a puppy in front of everybody, and the occasional sounds of consolation coming from the direction of the kitchen. There, there. You’re not fat. He’s just a very stupid man. Now, put down that biscuit.

And then sometimes I haven’t been innocent. There have been times that I was a total jerk-wad dork-face and deserved the consequences of my actions.

And much as I hate to admit it, I used to have a really bad habit of making fun of people behind their backs. I know the psychological reasons behind it, but there was never any justification for it and there came a time when I was caught in the act and the guy confronted me. It may have been the very moment I did some growing up and realized I was being, essentially, a bully.

It was the first radio station I ever worked for and I was a young man in my late teens or early twenties. Back then, I could still chase down a fly ball without pulling a muscle or breaking my hip, and I thought I was made of Kevlar. Nothing could hurt me. In my mind, I was so clever, I could poke fun at anyone I wanted to and as long as I never did it in front of them, I was the life of the party. When I think about how cruel I could be sometimes, I want to go back and force young man me to walk barefoot across a field of Sweetgum tree balls.

I had a co-worker at the station - a fellow DJ with more experience than me - who had a very distinctive voice. It wasn’t the typical radio guy booming voice that resonates in your socks, but instead, it was more to the tenor side. It was a voice a person would recognize immediately as him the second they heard it, and that’s a valuable thing when it comes to radio.

Unfortunately, the guy had a super quick temper and it had gotten him in trouble at other places, which made him a journeyman in the local radio circuit. This got under my skin and instead of being a friend about it and seeing what I could do to help, I decided it would be better to be a fourth grader and make fun of his voice.

One evening, another jock and I were working late in the recording studio, hammering out some commercial spots, and got carried away making fun of the DJ with the distinctive voice. And the meaner we got, the funnier we thought were. We started to recorded our private roast once we began mocking him by doing impressions of his voice.

Any ex radio person who remembers working with an old reel-to-reel recorder will tell you that unless you pass the film over a magnet, the audio stays there. Well, we forgot to erase the tape and guess who was slated to record ads first thing the next morning.

The next evening, he was there as I came in for my shift and when we were alone, he came in and shut the door behind him. He was red in the face, but I could tell he was trying to keep his composure. He’d never said an unkind word to me and I had been a friend to his face, but that night would be different.

I had forgotten about our making fun of him the night before and in those recordings, I had attributed his voice to that of a beloved muppet, so you can imagine how my heart sank when he started by asking …

Do you really think I sound like a popular muppet?

Beloved muppet, I answered weakly.

At that moment, I thought I was about to have to fight for my life, but he held his cool and explained how he’d found the audio this morning. He told me he was deeply hurt and that if I had any problems with him, I should have come to him personally.

There was no way of explaining my way out of a thing like that and I was hurt too, because suddenly, a light was shined on what a cruel person I was. It wasn’t because I’d gotten caught, either. I really felt bad and I can’t remember attacking anyone in that way since.

There was nothing funny about that, but these last two are hilarious now that they’re over. One was a near miss and the other was … a really unfortunate bulls eye.

The near miss:

I know good and well I’m not the only person to accidentally send a text message to the wrong person from time to time. But on this occasion, I had been texting to my wife all afternoon while I was out of town and because we still like to get frisky every once in a while, the texts got further and further down the road to FOR-YOUR-EYES-ONLY town. I’d been working on a stone for a family who wanted to come in later to see it when I finished, so they could give their approval, and since I finished it right at closing time, I left and went to my hotel. Along the way, I thought of something to text to my wife - something you’d find right in the middle of the town square of FOR-YOUR-EYES-ONLY, but I was driving and couldn’t immediately deliver my steamy little message, which involved a detailed description of one of my body parts and some activities thereof. Again, it would have fit best in a schoolyard commentary between immature boys. These are the same boys who would later giggle uncontrollably in geometry class when the teacher uttered the words, Grand Tetons.

The owner of the monument company, who is to this day a dear friend, a beautiful woman, a wife, mother of two wonderful children, and a child of God, sent me a text as soon as I walked into the hotel room. The customer had just been by and loved the etching. I replied to her that I was glad. Then my mind went immediately back to the dirty thing I wanted to send to my wife because while I do inhabit the body of a man, I still have that fourth grader in my head that thinks passing gas in church is funny. You can tell where this is going, can’t you?

I composed in my head, the perfect filthy comment concerning my body parts, without hesitation. I typed the lurid statement into my smart phone without thinking. I also did those things without changing who the message would be delivered to and so we find my finger hovered perilously above the send button.

I yelled like a girl and dropped my phone like it was molten lava, just in time to save the monument company owner an eye opening surprise. That was close. A near miss. I did tell her about it in the office the next day, saving her the actual details of the text, and we both had a good laugh. But it happened again just the other day and this time, I wasn’t so lucky. Neither I, nor every member of the praise team at church.

Bulls eye:

Several months ago, we had a slight flooding in our basement and several boxes of stored books were damaged. I was going through them to throw them away and I took one of them, a book of nursery rhymes by Mother Goose, to use as kindling for a bonfire I was trying to start to burn some old pallets. As I tore through the pages, my eye caught on an old poem from days of yore that had to do with a kitten. A baby kitten, in fact, but it didn’t use the term kitten, nor was the word it did use, followed by the word cat. It was titled, My Little … I’ll let your imagination run wild. It was an adorable poem, full of lighthearted, childish prose, and nothing at all perverted. Unless, of course, you have a fourth grader living in your head and a wife you could text.

So I took a picture of the poem.

I posted the picture in a text with a laughing emoji, as if to say, Hey, I know this isn’t perverted and all, but if you imagine yourself on a playground and take it out of context, it’s pretty funny, right?

And

I

Pressed

Send.

Unfortunately, my mind had been on a lot of other things, including some important music information that I’d been going back and forth about with the praise team.

Via text.

Guess who, once again, didn’t think to check who my new text would be going to and to make matters worse, I partner with my wife at the church as the Worship Leaders. We’re on staff.

Again, my heart sank and my skin went cold. I sent an immediate apology to the group and explained that it was supposed to be a private message to my wife only and please forgive and I’m sorry and embarrassed and please forgive me and forget you ever saw that. In fact, go right now and wash out your eyes with soap. This is your Worship Leader speaking!

Later that night at rehearsal, we all had a big laugh about it, but I think I’ve finally learned my lesson about putting anything out there where satellites can get a hold of it if it’s meant for private eyes.

And while I won’t do that anymore, I know my days are not over for sticking my foot way up into my mouth, because in my head, there’s still a little boy who wonders if you can really create a blow torch by passing gas in front of a lit match.

So just be patient. Eventually this topic will have a part two.

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Every now and then I sit down to prepare an episode of this amazing podcast and go through all the trappings that encapsulate the perfect writing scenario. I decide on the restaurant, I locate the desirable seat, which has is preferably a comfy booth with plenty of room to spread out my stuff, order the food, then get to writing. On most occasions, I’ve already decided what I’m going to write about and have become sufficiently submerged in the goo of mental hype so that when I break out the blue tooth keyboard and see that it will turn on despite my constantly forgetting to change the battery that was put in it five years ago, I’m able to immediately go to town on the story.

Sometimes, though, it doesn’t work out so easily. Sometimes I can’t decide where I want to eat and drive around aimlessly, looking at restaurant signs, going, Nope. Nope. Nope. Ungh uh. Never. Nyet. Nine. Maybe ... ehhhh ... Nope. And that just puts me in a foul temper, which usually makes the mental hype goo stinky. And then there are times like this one, when I see that a dining room is BACK OPEN since the pandemic started and I shout to the rooftops, THERE! ORDER ALL THE THINGS AND EAT THEM INSIDE LIKE A STARVED CARNIVORE!

Unfortunately, I got so overwhelmed with the thought of eleven herbs and spices being devoured in their own confines that I left my bottle of fresh mental hype goo on the kitchen table with the laundry that needs to be folded and hung.

Lucky for me, I keep a running list of topics on my phone for just such a scenario and I started to skim over them while my mashed potatoes cooled. Nope. Nope. Nope. Ungh uh. Never. Nyet. Nine. Maybe ... ehhhhh ... nope. But the I saw it ... there at the bottom of the list. The Bin Store!

I’m Michael Blackston and I’m about to fill your in on one of the latest obsessions that fills at least an hour of week of my Funny Messy Life.

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It started with a man in my church - a man my daddy worked with, before he retired, at the Georgia National Guard. It was before the pandemic started and nobody thought anything about rummaging after strangers through big, wooden bins full of items that were returned to retailers and had now been loaded into a truck and dumped out for sale at enormous discounts. The man from my church caught me on the way out after the service and said, “Tell your daddy to quit going to the bin store. He don’t need no more crap.” He was joking around, of course. It was his way of telling me to say “hey” to my daddy’nem.

But I was intrigued and I asked him what he was talking about. He went on to explain to me that the bin store was a new place that had opened up[ in the building where Family Dollar used to be. He told me how it worked and that he saw my daddy in there all the time.

The next time I saw my dad, I asked him about it ... after I told him Bill said “hey”.

Dad’s eyes grew large and filled with what you might describe as unbridled whimsy as he dug around in his own head, like a child recalling the first time they saw the castle at the center of Magic Kingdom. My dad’s head is quite the realm filled with glass and clay and plaster and arrowheads. And lately a lot of God, which is a good thing.

“It’s a place like no other, my son. At the bin store, your wildest dreams can come true on any given day. It’s a place of miracles and pain. A place of lovely, fragrant aromas and sometimes, the unmistakable stench of unwashed body parts. At the bin store, treasures be found and fer certain, monsters be thar too!”

That was all I needed to hear, I mean, come on! Treasures and monsters ... miracles and pain ... lovely fragrances. I wasn’t crazy about the aspect of unwashed hind parts, but hey ... sometimes you have to make sacrifices.

Here’s how it works, if you’re not familiar with the ins and outs of a bin store. And I’m sure they each have their individual nuances that make them special in their own way.

You enter through the doors and immediately get the sense of both chaos and possibility. The central feature, of course, is the bins, which should be filled to the brim with stuff you might want. Yes, it’s stuff somebody else didn’t want, but one man’s trash is another man’s treasure and all that. But it’s not a yard sale. There are items I’ve run across that were obviously pre-owned, but for the most part, it’s new ... just maybe damaged a hair or missing a small part. Some of it, though ... WHOO BOY, SOME OF IT ... is pristine, high quality stuff you’d pay a pretty penny for.

But wait, you don’t have to pay a pretty penny for it. Why? Because it’s the bin store and they dumped a truckload of junk in the bins that people are just trying to get rid of. Wherever it came from was a place where it had no value for whatever reason. Maybe the demographic was wrong or when Amazon shipped it - there’s a bunch of Amazon returns - it wasn’t exactly what they thought they wanted. Maybe that’s part of the allure. Maybe knowing I might be able to save something from the Bin of Misfit Crapola is what’s drawing me there, on top of the thrill of the hunt. After all, I don’t hunt things that can run away, except the mouse that’s in my pantry - his name is Jerry - and I can’t catch him because I refuse to kill him and he ignores the humane trap ... a trap I bought at the bin store.

The next reason to check out your local retailer of bin sweetness is the prices. Now, at this time, I have a bone to pick with my local store. As I’ve said before, I’m not a huge fan of changing things up, especially when I’ve just gotten used to the system. When the store first opened, They had a tiered format. The day they dumped a fresh truck, all items were six dollars. That’s awesome to start with, because I’ve found some amazing things on what most of the regulars creatively called, Six Dollar Day. But the next day was ... wait for it ... FIVE DOLLAR DAY! Everything that wasn’t bought the day before was even a dollar cheaper. Then it was Four Dollar Day, Three Dollar Day, and finally, Two Dollar Day. Those of us who weren’t worn out from thinking up clever names for the different days could get anything in the bins for two bucks! It’s a gambler’s paradise because what you aren’t willing to buy for $6, you can try to wait out and get cheaper. Maybe it’ll still be there and maybe it won’t. That electric tea kettle you had your eye on - you know, the one with the tiny dent you decided you could turn toward the back side of the kitchen counter - yeah, it might get buried beneath layers of torn boxes of dental floss and packs of male grooming kits called, MANSCAPED, or it might catch the eye of someone who loved it for what it was and didn’t care if the dent faced the wall or not. Then again, it might be there on Two Dollar Day, victoriously shining like a beacon in all its chrome-plated glory. But now, they’ve changed their structure. Every day is Six Dollar Day and the bins are filling up to obnoxious levels because people come get the new truck stuff that’s worth $6 and ignore the lesser merchandise. Then they dump another truck and the unwanted stuff just stays. The initial structure cleared the bins better as people were willing to spend a couple of bucks on the discarded trash left after most of the good stuff is gone.

It’s not always a successful trip, either way. Sometimes the bin store yields treasures beyond my wallet’s capacity, even at the low prices, and sometimes the pickings are as desolate as the brains of the average politician. I have a kind of niche product I’m typically on the lookout for. Musical or recording equipment are especially irresistible. Take the microphone that I’m using to record this podcast. It’s made by Amazon. Amazon Basics is written right on the side, but it’s nice and heavy. It’s sturdy and it’s directional, which is great for podcasts and vocal recording because directional means that you have to be directly in front of it with it pointing directly at the face part of your face for it to pick up like it’s designed. Normally, I’ll be using my RODE NT1 fancy-pants professional condenser mic to record the podcast, and condensers pick up from everywhere around you. It’s one of the things that make it so important to sound treat your studio well if you’re gonna use a mic like the NT1 and now I’ve run off on a tangent, so let’s get back to the bin store.

Anyway, I’m using the Amazon mic this time to prove a point. The sound is nice from a microphone I dislodged from underneath a pile of bed sheets and off-brand sanitary napkins. When you order it from Amazon, it comes with a nice XLR cable and has a 4.5 our of 5 star average rating as a product. Amazon charges $20 for it. And guess what? I’ve bought three of them from the bin store! For me, it’s fantastic because people are ALWAYS asking to borrow my microphones for things like weddings and such. They don’t always make their way back to me, so these bin store finds are a real steal! It’s something to consider as well, if you’re thinking about doing some recording of your own. One of the first problems new podcasters discover is getting their hands on halfway decent equipment. This episode experiment goes to show that you don’t have to have a RODE NT1 or better to achieve good sound.

I also love other equipment such as the accessories that go with microphones and recording gear. I’ve bought three different boom arms with shock mounts - - items that can get quite expensive - and outfitted my studio with more professional style equipment. I won’t go into the details about boom arms and shock mounts. Look them up on Uncle Google if you’re curious.

I just wanted to give some praise to the humble bin store. I didn’t even mention $20 bag day, which is the best day of all - the day when you’re invited to fill a garbage bag with whatever is in the bins and the entire bag is only $20. It’s another way to clear out the smalls that clutter up the bins. There hasn’t been one of those days, either, in a while and I’m jonesing for it.

So if you have one, check out your local bin store. It takes a minute to get into the groove, to get over the feeling that you’re dumpster diving. But I promise, once you find that thing, and you’ll know it when you see it, you’ll be hooked. Like me and daddy.

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I got a chance to talk my cousin the other day - the one who was always right there beside me as we did stupidly stupid things. We don’t get the chance to talk much anymore, so it never fails that, upon hearing his voice, I’m struck with memories of our childhood. Those memories usually involve something we did that would have made our mothers cringe. I know most young boys, when they get together, are apt to find themselves in situations a grown person would call, Up To No Good, but the issue was heightened with me and my cousin because we’re both primarily creative people. And other times, we were just rotten and ought to have had our hides tanned with a hickory if we’d have been caught. Hickory is southern for: An implement of discipline, typically a small branch harvested from a tree grown in the fires of hell. Also reference, “I’Mone take a hick’ry to yeh!” or “Go on git me a switch!”

I recall a couple of interesting stories where fate took the preverbal hickory to us after a bout of rottenness and we had to learn lessons the hard way.

I’m Michael Blackston and we’re about to hit 88 miles an hour in the Delorean of my Funny Messy Life.

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The mid to late eighties saw me and my cousin, who did stupidly stupid things with me, getting bolder in our delinquency. We had reached 16 years old and my cousin had a car - an enormous Dodge Magnum that probably got 1.5 miles per gallon and took up the curbside in front of three houses. It was black and all metal and you could drive that thing through a brick wall without scratching it. We tested out the durability of the Magnum at one point, but that’s another story for another time. Right now, just know it was simply the method we used to get from Point A to Point B, Point A being the small convenience store where we acquired our fishing tackle and Point B being a pond out in the country, where lived a mystical largemouth bass we affectionately called, Granddaddy Long Balls. That’s the only time I’ll say the full name of the fish because it’s crude and this is a family show. I’m also a deacon and may yet have to answer for that. From here on out, he shall be called, GLB.

My cousin was the best fisherman of the two of us. Wait, let me take that back and be more specific. My cousin could whistle and fish’s would jump on his hook. I could be equipped with the latest and greatest of angling technology and the fish would pop their heads out of the water and blow me a raspberry. There was only ever one fish that I knew my cousin to have trouble catching. GLB. He was obsessed with catching the fish if he had to throw hooks into that pond till he was eighty years old. My cousin would say things like, I’ll catch the fish if I have to throw hooks into that pond till I’m eighty years old!

Perhaps finally seeing him hooking GLB was the catalyst behind the life of crime we turned to in order to get the very best tackle.

The convenience store was tiny and back in the mid eighties, there were no video cameras. Top notch security surveillance meant a round, bubble shaped mirror perched high on the back wall behind the counter. It was supposed to give the 267 year old man, who seemed to be the only person who ever worked there, the advantage of seeing everything that happened in the store in real time. Unfortunately, because of where it was placed behind him and the fact that the only movement we ever saw from him was the occasional shallow breath or creaky turn of his head, as if he’d have a look around the old store if only they made WD-40 for necks, it felt like we could have gotten away with just about anything.

And we did.

The store had a pretty massive collection of fishing tackle. That was a staple in a lot of stores back then because the world had yet to be brought to its curricular knees by cell phones and video games. You actually had to bait real hooks and hold real poles and a lot of us did.

The store, though, had the good stuff. I’m talking the latest precision lures and fishing line. There were plastic worms galore in all kinds of colors and shapes. Rubber minnows and lures with skinny things on the end of them. Top water lures and divers, something called plugs, and even styrofoam cups with holes poked in the top of the lids with soil and wriggly, squiggly, live earthworms inside.

Somewhere, my cousin had gotten his hands on a gigantic tackle box that had what seemed like hundreds of compartments. Every time you thought you’d opened it up as far as it could go, you found another clasp that allowed entry to yet another compartment. You could have rented it out as an apartment complex. It was too big to have been purloined from the convenience store. We weren’t that brave, but the things that we put into it ... well, we never paid a cent for it. As a parent and business owner, I’m making myself mad just talking about it. Mom would have been so ashamed of me and if I had even the slightest inkling of who had owned the store back then, I’d make a donation in their name to some charity or just pay them back outright. Sadly, the days have passed for that store and there’s nothing I can do but say, I am truly, deeply sorry for our behavior and saddened to the point that I’m considering going to find a hickory to use on myself.

We went back over and over again and filled our pockets with booty from the fishing aisle, laughing because the old man behind the counter never noticed. We weren’t sure he was even alive, and we outfitted the palace of tackle boxes with the newest and best fishing gear of probably any in the county. We were proud of ourselves because while our parents had taught is better, we were at the age when we thought we were smarter than anybody else in the world and the idea of moral behavior wasn’t interesting. We were in it for what we could get and what we could get was the best shot at landing GLB.

We thought we were smart, but watching over us, laughing, and planning to teach us a lesson we’d never forget was God Almighty. Remember in the Bible when He made the donkey talk? Well, this was no donkey. It was the biggest bull we’d ever seen in our lives and while didn’t make it talk, it had no problem communicating how angry we’d made it by ducking under the rusty barbed wire fence that surrounded the country pond and daring to set foot on its turf.

My cousin pulled his big Dodge Magnum to a stop in tall grass right next to the fence. We could almost hear GLB taunting us in his little fish voice, Come and get me, ya lily livered, cotton pickin’, lure stealin’ varmints! I always imagined GLB sounded a lot like Yosemite Sam, but with more bubbles. I think I thought of it that way because what else kind of fish would inhabit a body of water we called The Civil War Pond? And we called it the Civil War pond for no better reason than because it was said it had been around since the days of the Civil War, as if it were the only pond in the south that had been around that long. Imagine looking at a big oak tree and someone tells you it’s over 200 years old, then you say, That’s the Civil War Tree! Anyway, I digress ...

We got our gear from the back of the Magnum, my cousin handling the ridiculously large tackle box, and proceeded to carefully negotiate the barbed wire fence. Once on the other side, we could make out the essentially 8 million lily pads that covered the pond.

Now wait a second ... that wasn’t the Civil War Pond, it was a different pond. The Civil War pond was where he and I used the property owner’s flat bottom boat, without their permission, to go out and cast our lines toward the bank. THat’s the day I finally hooked what I though was my legendary monster catch because the way it fought, it felt nearly impossible to reel in. When i got it to the boat, I saw that it was a tiny bream that I’d hooked in the side as it swam by, minding its own business. But I digress ...

Now that I’m remembering right, the point GLB lived in had a different name because of all the lily pads that covered the top of the water like a blanket. I told you that my cousin and I were creative types, and so we named this one ... you guessed it ... The Lily Pad Pond.

So now that we’re back on track, my cousin and I outfitted our lines with rubber worms, threading the hooks just barely back into the lure so they wouldn’t snag on the undergrowth beneath the surface. I think fisherman call that something like making your worm weedless. And we began to fish - casting and reeling, casting and reeling, making the worms do their little jiggle under the water and probably passing gas and blaming it on each other. I imagine we talked about the things sixteen year old boys talk about as all the while, a bull the size of my cousin’s Dodge Magnum was slowly making his way to the top of the hill to our right.

My cousin said, Ya hear that?

I said, Naw.

He said, There it went again. It sounded like a snort.

I said, I didn’t hear nothin’. Did you fart?

Then we both heard the same thing, but it wasn’t any snort. Sometimes cows and bulls will throw you an adorable Moo - the kind you expect in nursery rhymes. With a Moo-Moo here and a Moo-Moo there. Here a Moo, There a Moo, Everywhere a Moo-Moo.

But here was no moo and there was no moo. My cousin and I realized at the same time that we had done yet another stupidly stupid thing because charging right for us, blaring the most hellish bull-honk that’s every been blared, was Satan’s prize bull. He was pitch black, with red eyes that burned with fire and smoke billowing from the cadaver s of his nostrils like the gray aftermath of an atomic explosion. His voice was a siren of death and his horns were like great, curved columns hewn from the Temple of Hades. He charged us faster than anything we could have expected, his massive hooves, beating the ground hard enough to make a sound like rolling thunder.

My cousin’s eyes because the size of tractor tires and he said the only thing a person can say in a moment like that.

“BULL!!!”

We dropped everything and ran back toward the car, praying the bull wouldn’t catch us. In an act of blessing, it stopped where we had been at the edge of the pond and sniffed our gear. Then, in one last meaningful expression of the mission it had really been sent to accomplish, the bull lowered his head toward the gigantic tackle box that was full of everything we had stolen, and hooked it with the point of one of his horns. With an effortless flick, he tossed the tackle box into the pond, thus showing my cousin and I - the one who did stupidly stupid things with me - what really comes of treasures that are ill-gained.

I don’t know if my cousin and i ever went back there and I certainly can’t remember if he ever managed to snag GLB, but I would wager he’d tell you he did. Isn’t that how you’re supposed to tell fishing stories?

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No transcript again. We're in the middle of a series of interviews with my family, soooo......

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This is an interview I did with my daughter, Merida. (Yes, named after the Disney princess). There is no transcript of the conversation, so please listen to the episode to hear the sweetest little girl in the world. (When she wants to be.)

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If you grew up in the south or even have been a fan of comedy journalism, mainly during the eighties, you may recognize the name of the man I want to pay tribute to in this episode.

The writing style from which I draw my inspiration, at least the style you’re used to hearing and reading, was a constant companion of mine during my teen years. And it came from none other than a small town Georgia boy who grew up to make a name for himself as a journalist and best selling author. I’m talking about one Mr. Lewis Grizzard.

A review of this podcast recently compared me to him and while I would never plunge my torchlight in the same ground next to his, I have to say it was an honor to even be mentioned in the same sentence with a writer and comedian that held so much sway over my formative years.

I’ve recently decided to read back through his enormous and rich catalogue of work and thought I might start here with what I can only hope will be seen as a fitting memorial to, in my humble opinion, a southern literary genius.

I’m Michael Blackston and this is a special tribute episode of Funny Messy Life.

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He’s been gone for a while now - since 1994 to be exact, but it still seems like yesterday that I anxiously awaited every publication of the newspaper out of Atlanta on the day that the new article was due from the man who hailed from Moreland, Georgia ... Lewis Grizzard.

He was an opinionated cuss and left no stone unturned when it came to the culture of the day.

I remember seeing his name on books in the school library and my uncle had a few of them on his bookshelf, but they didn’t mean much to me until I realized at fourteen that the world of literature was a magical place - a real one - a safe one where I could go amid the turmoil of my angst and difficulty understanding what was happening to me mentally and physically. I would find some solace in fiction, primarily Stephen King, and also a little Dean Koontz here and there, but my greatest discovery came when I first checked out a book titled, Don’t Sit Under The Grits Tree With Anyone Else But Me. It might a sound corny or cliche’, but his stories took me back to my own childhood, even then when I was still in it, to a simpler time. They were places I recognized because although I was still young, there were things I realized were gone for good and Lewis Grizzard had given me a tangible way to relive them, or something like it, as often as I wanted. Bike rides down old, forgotten roads in the woods, playing in creeks with my buddies and planning all of the awesome stuff we were going to do when we grew up. I was starting to have to make the real plans by the time I discovered Lewis Grizzard and there was a bit of a gut check for me that those innocent days had melted into a time when mistakes could be way more costly.

Mr. Grizzard was known for his outlandish titles, a lot of times compiled from past articles in The Constitution. That’s what we Georgians called the aforementioned newspaper. The full name of the paper is the Atlanta Journal-Constitution. Some of the more hoity-toity folks who were already getting pedicures instead of cutting their toenails with a pocket knife called it, The AJC, and now that’s pretty much the go-to. Some of his other books, though, were biopic, such as If I Ever Get Back To Georgia, I’m Gonna Nail My Feet To The Ground. Mr. Grizzard unashamedly laid out his childhood and early adulthood for the world to see and he did it in a way that brought both laughter and tears. I’ll never forget the day one of his new books was announced. I remember it like it was yesterday. It was a book dedicated to things of a sexual nature called, Don’t Bend Over In The Garden, Granny, You Know Them Taters Got Eyes and my grandmother was appalled. She was never one of his fans, but she didn’t miss an article and our conversations about what he’d most recently written gave us a tie to bind our generations together.

I think that’s what drew me to him from the start. He was real. He told you what he thought and didn’t care if you disagreed. In those days, political correctness was a thing of fantasy. Unicorns and fuzzy-headed trolls sliding down rainbows were the only companions of the politically correct because back then, you could be you. It didn’t make you right all the time, but by heavens, you were entitled to your own opinion and if somebody didn’t like it, then they could just keep on walking, preferably north or west, to be with your kind. Around here, I believe he would have argued, we cherish our mamas, respect our daddies, love women the way Christ loves the church, and allow people to think for themselves. There ain’t no dang room for forcing our beliefs on people, so we don’t. An if’n ya don’t like it, then BYE! I relish those days and I won’t give any more commentary on the disintegration of common sense or the concept of Live and let live. All I will say is that Lewis Grizzard would have had plenty of opinions on the matter and while I’m not happy he’s gone from us, I’m glad he didn’t have to see our world come to what it has.

He got plenty of pushback from his writings at the time, though, even without the cancel culture of today.

He had his share of detractors, especially his ex-wives, of which there were more than one. One of them even wrote a book of her own about him and their time together, chronicling many of his bad qualities, and I guess he had it coming. I don’t remember exactly to what degree, but he gave the women in his life reason to seek literary revenge, I think. But there were other Grizzard non-fans as well. I don’t think my grandmother particularly liked his sense of humor. Females tended to find him quite chauvinistic and I could always see their point. But reading him, I think I understood where he was coming from most of the time. He was just trying to be funny, but he was hard-headed and the more he got called out for his views that sometimes seemed backward or too far behind the times, the more he reveled getting the reader’s dander up. I always looked at it as a game of tug of war between Lewis and those who didn’t understand him.

Ok, so if you’re one of those who are familiar with Lewis Grizzard and would have tugged the rope on the side of Team I-Don’t-Understand-Him, let me remind you that there are a ton of women who enjoyed his work. My wife is one of them and I was surprised when once she started reading his books, she chewed through one after the other until there was nothing left. She’s even showed interest in reading through all again with me.

My wife is not very surface-minded. She looks deeper into the meaning behind a thing to try and find the heart of it and in the writing of Lewis Grizzard, she found the same things I did.

He was a great appreciator of southern culture and tradition. He talked a comical game against the likes of Yankees and Florida Gators, but I believe that if given the opportunity, he would have invited them into the front porch into a big, old, wooden rocker that might have a fresh coat of white paint or might just as well have been weathered by wind and time, and shared stories with them over a tall, perfect glass of sweet tea. When the Bible mentions nectar, that’s what it’s talking about. Southern sweet tea.

Lewis Grizzard loved his family. He wrote about his mama with dignity and respect and a devotion to her that knew no bounds. He wrote an entire book about his father, titled, My Daddy Was A Pistol And I’m A Son Of A Gun. That book had a profound effect on me and helped me to realize the power jerking tears violently from the eyes of readers with stories that relate and require an emotional response. That book made me cry over and over again because of the love and respect he held for his father. The way he opened up to his audience was pure trust.

There were characters he called back to from his childhood again and again. Names I’ll never forget, like Cordie Mae Poovey and Waymon C. Wanamaker, Jr. a great American, and the voluptuous Kathy Sue Loudermilk. The tales of their antics buried deep in my memory and I found myself right alongside them as I read on, never thinking about the fact that some day I would try to retell my own childhood stories in a way that maybe - just maybe - took my readers and listeners into that same magical space where they could be there right beside us as the old rope swing broke or we conned my cousin’s neighbors out of their change to buy cigarettes. Each one of them just another member of the gang, breathing dust kicked up from the red Georgia clay and sweating granny beads onto our necks in the summer heat.

We had other things in common that made a connection for me; a love and loyalty to our sports teams, for one. We both eagerly awaited the first kickoff of the college football season when the mighty Dawgs of UGA take the field and hunker down to lay a stompin’ on whoever dares to step cleat ‘Tween The Hedges. He was a devoted Dawg fan who, if I’m remembering rightly, never missed being in the stadium during the home games. He didn’t live long enough to see the Braves take the World Series, but I feel like he was there anyway. I thought of him when the play was made to win it all in ‘95. I cried like a baby in my wife’s arms. Silly, I know. A grown man acting that way over a game, but it had been such a long, hard-fought road to get there, and I think maybe some of those tears were on his behalf. I doubt I’m the only one who thought of Lewis Grizzard on that day.

Lastly, he was an American. Agree with him politically and philosophically or not, there was no denying he loved his country. His daddy fought for it and he believed in the principles of life, liberty, and freedom that were the foundations of that fight. If you wanted to get him riled up, speak poorly about the United States of America. He’d fight you tooth and nail because he knew he owed that - I think we all do - to the men and women who, like his father, gave blood and so many, their lives to make sure our great nation thrived and held strong to the ideals it was founded upon.

I strongly urge you to seek out his writing or even his standup comedy. I had the privilege of seeing him do his routine live once. I was a teenager and I went to the concert alone. I wanted to be, just once, in the same mom room with the man who had such a profound impact on my life - a man who had a heart valve replaced with the valve from a pig’s heart, then wrote a book about it. They Tore Out My Heart And Stomped That Sucker Flat, it was called.

In case you’re interested, here are just a few of the other titles I haven’t mentioned in this piece, but this list is by no means, all of them. If you’re a binge reader and like to devour everything an author has produced, you’re in for a treat.

*Kathy Sue Loudermilk, I Love You

*Won’t You Come Home Billy Bob Bailey?

*If Love Were Oil, I’d Be About A Quart Low

*Shoot Low Boys, They’re Riding Shetland Ponies

Like I said, there are many more, but I’ll let you be the one to discover them. That’s part of the allure of the man.

The reviewer of this podcast I mentioned earlier, called me the Lewis Grizzard of our time. It’s such an an honor that they recognized him in my writing to be sure, and it was an unsolicited response, but I have to respectfully disagree. I know the person who made that review and he will understand why. The reason is simply this:

There has never been and never will be another Lewis Grizzard.

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I can never seem to make people understand that keeping busy is the way I rest. People see me staying busy and because they, themselves, are happy to spend time in front of Netflix, they think that’s the way everybody out to chill. “You need to take time to rest, Michael.” You’re going to kill yourself working so hard. You don’t always have to be doing something.”

And that’s where they err. I DO always have to be doing something because if I’m not, chances are my heart rate is up, I’m filled with anxiety, and I’m about to explode. My blood sugar raises to DEFCON 80 if I spend too much time idly watching TV that’s not something that teaches me “How-To” do a thing. My blood sugar goes up because I’m an emotional eater. And also, I have the palette of a four-year-old, so I go looking for Oreos or anything with milk chocolate in it. My hands HAVE to be doing something, so if I’m lying in the bed watching The Mentalist, I’ll unconsciously occupy them by frequently dipping my fingers in a jar filled from one of the four million bags of Cadbury Mini Eggs I bought for .89 cents at the local bin store. It’s just one of the aspects of being a Type A personality and I’m the poster boy. I’m Michael Blackston and this is a rather tedious look into my Funny, Messy, Life.

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I think it’s pretty important that people understand that there are different personality types and what’s good for the goose is not always good for the gander.

My wife needs to rest in the middle of the day. For the longest time, I considered her a little lazy because she’s always wanted to take a nap. It was well into our marriage before I realized that it wasn’t that she was lazy. Studies show that women require more down time, but being an introvert, her body also requires mental recharge time in order to function. Have you ever seen a person melt into unrecognizable goo after about 20 minutes in a crowd? Introverts do that. Kayla has friends who are also introverts that she can relate to. They make sure the other one is going to be at the same parties so they can huddle in a corner and not talk to anyone but each other. I figure the conversation probably goes something like:

“Hey. Glad you’re here so I don’t have to talk to anybody else.”

“Yeah, me too. But I still don’t want to be here, even though we’re friends. I love you and all, but ... you know ... there are people here. I want to be alone in the dark with my cats.”

“I agree. I think I’m gonna go.”

I understand that about her now, so when she’s taking a mid-day nap, it’s okay. I can go right on teaching myself to paint with watercolors and simultaneously learn the basics of arranging orchestral music for the hurdy-gurdy and the didgeridoo, and everybody’s happy.

Take this episode of the podcast for example.

When I left work to go to lunch, the folks in the office told me to take a load off for a while and not think about anything. I’d been tediously etching a triple portrait using a photo reference that was about as clear as that video of Big Foot walking through the woods.

When I said I’d be writing a blog post for a podcast episode, the lady behind the desk said, “Heavens no! You sit back and let your hands rest.”

I was patient with her. I don’t visit that company very often and they don’t quite know my quirks yet, so I told her that writing was the way I relax and that I was looking forward to it. She didn’t believe me.

“You work too hard. You’re going to kill yourself.”

It’s constant because people who have a personality different from mine can’t get their heads around it, especially those who know what I do for a living and don’t understand how I can use my hands nonstop all day and rest by typing or playing my piano in my down time. It’s because I’m used to it and I don’t like down time. The last down time - I’ll call it an incident - that I tried to take, I ended up flying off the handle and going outside to completely rearrange the back yard, including the trees.

You might ask, What about vacations?

Well, I love a good vacation. Who doesn’t? But don’t expect me to sit around a pool all day or lay out on the beach. First, I’ll be the guy wearing a full body radiation suit because my skin bursts into flames when it comes into direct contact with the sun. Second, if I am at the beach, I’m probably body surfing or taking my daughter out in the waves or fighting off people who think I’m some kind of alien in my radiation suit. And you can ask my wife if you don’t believe me when I tell you that I will also have a pen or pencil and a notebook or sketch pad with me and I will bury myself in some sort of artistic endeavor.

We love us some Disney World, but if you’ve been there, you know it’s anything but relaxing. I may not be creating anything at the moment, but I promise I’m doing something constructive. I’m taking in the experience and trying to figure out ways to implement what I see around me into my daily life.

But you have to stand in lines forever. There’s not much you can create in the line for Pooh’s Happy Grand Adventure Time Experience Land.

I beg to differ the heck out of that, my friend.

I’m not looking at my phone like every other schmuck in line who’s trying to pass the time. I always bring a mechanical pencil and a pocket sized sketchbook. I sketch the scene around me. I’ve been known to draw architecture, characters, the people in line ahead of me, and once I drew a dude’s feet because he was wearing sandals and he had funky feet. It really should have been against the law for him to be wearing sandals. I also think I once rendered some big dude’s plumber’s crack in graphite.

But I still get grief from the people who have known me forever and should be aware that nothing they say is ever going to stop me from keeping busy.

When I direct a theatre show, I have my hands in almost every aspect of it.

My last show was Nunsense, I co-directed it, built the set, painted the set, planned the lighting scheme, built some of the props, cleaned parts of the theatre ... all because I wanted to and would’ve FREAKED OUT if I hadn’t.

My cast, entirely made up of ladies, told me I did too much and was going to give myself a heart attack, then they all laid down and took a nap.

They may have been right, though. Scientists have found that Type A’s are the greatest risk for heart disease.

But I’ll tell you this - try and stop me from constantly being on the go and I WILL DEFINITELY have a heart attack.

This isn’t a choice I’m making - it’s how I’m wired. I have to create, I’ve got to achieve. I MUST be productive. I don’t believe in the phrase, “I can’t” and I refuse to do “good enough.”

I have to try and master everything I put my mind to and if I fail, that’s okay because I gave it my best effort. I’ll also try, try, try, try, try, try again.

It can get annoying. My wife tells me to just sit down for a minute and for the love of all that’s pure and holy because I’m driving her crazy and she can’t sleep with all that moving around the house as I scrub the floor boards with a magic eraser. And sometimes I’ll give it a shot, but it usually ends up with me darting forth like a person who darts forth, yelling, “DO ALL THE THINGS!”

I guess you’d call it a blessing and a curse, but it’s one I have learned to cope with. And I’m thankful for it, too. It’s because I have a Type A personality that I’ve been able to write the Great American Novel ... two of them so far, actually, although I can’t be the one to call them great. That’ll be up to my readers, but at least I finished them, by thunder! I’ve written two stage plays and a musical, too, thanks to being a guy that never stops. So I won’t apologize.

Type A’s are go-getters. We get things done. We may have ulcers, but we get things done. Yay for Type A! And now the thing I need to go get done is to wake up my wife. She needed a nap.

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The nineteen-eighties are a cornucopia of fond memories for me. That’s when my childhood was in full bloom - the days between the times that have gotten spotty in my mind and the teen years when I got spotty on my face. Back then, I had a few girlfriends and I wanted to be liked just like any young boy, but I hadn’t yet begun to look into every mirror I passed by, making sure each follicle of hair was in place. It was right before the almighty mullet took the world by storm with it’s front/back two-party system and I still enjoyed getting fun things from Santa on Christmas morning, rather than cool things. It was the golden years of my adolescence - when my cousin and I (the one I did stupidly stupid things with) ruled a thick patch of woods behind our grandma’s house and all we needed to cultivate our “Land” were big sticks we somehow ended up assigning too much importance to. Back then, the words “Covid”, “Corona” and, God help us, “Politics” were planted firmly and safely in an apocalyptic future, doing nobody no harm.

I’m Michael Blackston and this is Funny Messy Life.

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There were other days sprinkled about this history when my cousin and I tromped around the woods behind my grandparents’ house with dirty faces and scratched up knees, but the vast majority of our jaunts happened on Sunday afternoons.

In the eighties, kids still had the opportunity to do stuff kids really can’t today. Words like “Abduction” and “distancing” weren’t as much on the radar. We knew those words, but as pre-teens, my cousin and I didn’t pay much attention to them in the relative safety of my Grandma’s house. Strangers never ventured onto the property that we knew about and distancing was just what our parents wanted us to do as a rule - to distance ourselves from them. All I know is that as long as it wasn’t raining, the children were expected to go outside immediately after lunch while the grownups sat around the dining room table and said things we didn’t understand, usually as commentary about whatever person was at the center of their gossip. I recall hearing a few interesting things spoken around the “adult” table that I’d come to know later in life - phrases like, “She orta be ashamed-a-herself!” and words like, “tramp” and hussy”.

For context, you should know that my mom has two sisters and everybody and their children met at my grandparent’s house every single Sunday at lunch time, unless there was a family reunion we had to go to. And until recently that tradition has remained.

My cousin and I knew our cue when the adults decided lunch time was over … one of them would holler, “OUT!”

And we were happy to go. It was time for the adults to be rid of children hanging all over them for a few precious hours. There were no video games to play, no cartoons to watch, and football wasn’t as important to us as the trails and huts we were about to build. I always found it funny that they were so ready for us to spend an august afternoon among the bugs and the grass and trees and dirt, getting soaked to the bone with sweat and developing fine chains of grit in the creases of our necks we southerners call “Granny beads”. And yet, when it was time to come in for the day, they, without fail, would turn up their noses and exclaim, “YOU SMELL LIKE THE OUTSIDE!” Of course we smelled like the outside! What do you expect?! We’d been one with the outside all day long. If we needed water, they’d give it - reluctantly - and then point back toward the door … “OUT!”

So off we’d trot into the woods behind the house with only two nuggets of parental wisdom to guide us: “Watch out for snakes” and “Come on when I call ya, now”. Other than that, the adventures of the day could begin or continue.

So what did my cousin and I do exactly?

I told you already. We built trails and we built huts. Not just any trails and huts, though. While strangers didn’t normally show up unannounced, that didn’t mean they wouldn’t. In our minds, there might one day be an evil plot - a coup, if you will - wherein terrorists or worse - insurance salesmen - would overtake our grandparents’ home, presumably on a Sunday afternoon, so I guess they didn’t get any Jesus earlier in the day, and we would need to flee to the cover of the maze we’d created in the woods and make our stand from there.

The implementation of our vision was nothing short of spectacular. Every trail we beat down with sticks, every clearing, every hut we constructed, every bush we peed on had a name. I even remember some of the names we gave them.

There was the “Briar Trail” because when we made it, we had to beat down an excessive amount of briars and went home that afternoon with countless points of blood loss on our tiny little southern redneck baby-child bodies.

There was the “50/50”, which was a clearing in the middle of it all that had once been someone’s garden and if you dared cross it during one of our games of war, you only had about a 50/50 chance of making it through without getting drilled by a hailstorm of bullet noises we made with our mouths.

There was another clearing beyond the perfectly mowed boundary of my grandparents’ yard and it was a mystical place. We didn’t make it, but we claimed it. It had always been called by our parents, “The Red Dirt.” It was an area of land that was a barren desert of a place where nothing but a few small, scrawny pines and grayish yellow weeds grew. Everything else there, in an area a tad smaller than the size of a football field, was deep red Georgia clay. Many years before, something had been deposited there in the middle of the expanse of red dirt. It was a large stack of some sort of crumbly building material that I’m starting to think might have been asbestos or the lining of a nuclear bomb silo, hence the reason nothing could grow around it. We climbed all over the stuff, chewed on it, probably licked it a little - so now that I think of it, maybe the skin cancers I constantly battle have a better explanation than my being in the sun too much as a kid. Our parents wandered out there as kids. The youngest of three sisters, the tom-boy, used to ride her motorcycle out there and jump the hills. I’m starting to think I know what’s wrong with the whole family and I should either report it to the authorities or call the writers of Stranger Things.

We beat down all of those trails with sticks, but we didn’t simply find any old dead branch lying around like uncivilized caveboys. Our sticks were carefully chosen and given names. They were used every week and carefully hidden at the end of the day so we would know exactly where to find them. I don’t remember what we named them. My cousin probably named his something like “Hulk” and I would have named mine something a little less aggressive - something that fit my personality more closely - “Little Orphan Annie” perhaps. We called them our “babies” and when one of them would finally get smashed against something one too many times and shatter, we would hold a funeral for it. Yes, an ever-lovin’ funeral. For a stick.

We dug holes here and there and hid stuff down in them as weapons caches for the inevitable ninja attack, but we only had the natural resources around us to work with. Then we’d cover them with a layer of sticks and leaves and mark them so that we could come back later if we needed to protect the family from rabid, flesh-eating gila monsters. Remember the mushroom things that had spores all in them and would make a big dusty - and poisonous, according to our parents - cloud? Yeah, we hid a bunch of those in the cache holes. I said CACHE holes! There were pointy rocks, sharp sticks, and pieces of glass we found and some chunks of the radioactive alien asbestos that had broken off of the pile at the Red Dirt.

We were ready for the fight and all we had to do if the crazed army of savage zombie Cabbage Patch Kids attacked was to find the nearest hut and batten down the hatches with a bunch of poisonous spore bombs, the Hulk, and Little Orphan Annie.

Speaking of huts, we were master builders of those. Old logs and fallen branches were prime construction material and low hanging branches from healthy trees never stood a chance. I guess there might have been five complex structures hidden in those woods and we would protect them like fire ants protect their evil little mounds. Well, we would have if the Boby-building Wizard Women tried to take over.

We worked tirelessly to cultivate our private little military compound and we considered that patch of woods to be our property. We talked on the phone during the week planning what we would do on Sunday and we even spent the time to come up with a clever title for it. Now brace yourself for the torrent of impressiveness you’re about to experience because of our creativity. We called it ... “Our Land”.

Then one day, it was gone.

We pulled into the driveway of my grandparents’ house and I could see the construction machinery in the distance. We were told we couldn’t go out there anymore. Most of the patch of woods had been cleared away. With the trees and trails all gone, there was no way to know what was where. We couldn’t even save our babies. Hulk and Annie were just two more pieces of collateral damage, unrecognizable from any of the other rubble, from a bomb that had been dropped on us by something we never anticipated - culture. Our land was gone. Until that moment, neither I nor my cousin who did stupidly stupid things with me had any concept that somebody else owned the property and that they could sell it out from under us. That they could clear it and build a home right on top of it. On our land.

Oh well, nothing lasts forever. It’s a lesson I keep having to learn over and over because I’m a positive thinker and whenever things are going good, I can’t stand to look in the direction of reality - out over beyond the yard where life’s bulldozers and backhoes grin with their stupid metal teeth as they tower over my dang happiness.

It’s funny that I actually just teared up a little bit thinking back on that memory. Reality is so much more foreboding when you’ve blown through years and seemed to by-pass forty without so much as a double-take. That was a sad day for us. I’m sure our parents talked about progress or even gossiped about the sellers or the buyers … “Orta be a-shamed of tharselves!” But to us, something major had changed. We’d experienced a passion being ripped away from us. Something had destroyed what had taken so many countless hours to build. And while it’s a small thing in comparison to real battles and the actual monsters I’ve had to face over the years since then, it might just have been my first real taste of working hard to do a lot of something for a whole lot of nothing. Then again, we made memories and those are something no bulldozer can destroy.

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One president is famous for saying, “Change is good.” He’s also famous for such gems as, “I did not have sexual relations with that woman,” and “It depends on what the definition is of is is or isn’t is.” And I don’t agree with that former president. I’m not a fan of change. It also turned out that he did have relations with that woman, by the way, and the definition of “is” happens to be “is.” Unfortunately, just because I don’t like change, doesn’t mean I’m exempt from it in desperate times and that’s exactly where the world now finds itself - in desperate times. Even the stretch of time between this episode and the last one is a testimony to how hard I fight against change, but I’ll get into the details of that later. For now, strap yourself in because thanks to Covid-19, I’ve gathered a list of changes we’ve had to make and how I feel about them, but also a few changes I think are due to come by the time all of this is behind us.
I’m Michael Blackston and this is an infectious episode of Funny Messy Life.
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In a history of my own creation, a wise man once said, “Pandemic, Shmamdemic. Just get out of my way in the buffet line.”
Well, let’s start there in our discussion of what I’ve been dealing with as a writer. Because the fact that restaurants closed their lobbies wasn’t as big a deal to me for the same reason it was to most people. I don’t mind eating at the house or outside the restaurant where I just picked up my order. I don’t mind trying to balance a hot bowl of Chicken and Gnoci soup from Olive Garden on my knee while driving 75 miles an hour through Atlanta traffic. While most people I know were over eating at home after the first two meals and moaning incessantly about having to cook or get delivery, “The pizza guy’s taking too loooooong. Life is so haaaaarrrrd.”, I was brought to a screeching halt when it came to my literary creativity. In other words, I couldn’t write unless I could go into a restaurant and sit down.
Apparently, I’ve conditioned myself that way over time and when I tried to settle into a cozy nook of my living room with my laptop, I couldn’t conjure up a single cohesive sentence. I’ve complained before about trying to write in a restaurant and having people come up to talk to me, which I don’t mind, but I want the conversation to be short so I can get back to writing while I have the creative juju. And since in my own home I’m supposed to be the master of my domain, I should be able to make the juju flow like sweet, buttery, buttered butter. But I’m not the master of my domain at my house. I’m the guy that hears my name called every ten seconds, whether it’s the “Dad” moniker or the “Honey” one so that my juju turns into some gummed up, old gummy gum that all the good was chewed out of and then stuck under the seat of a subway car in 1972, one year before I was born. That ain’t writing juju!
I didn’t intend to set myself up to only be able to write in a restaurant, but I did and this is only getting written as I sit alone at lunch in a diner for the first time in a few months.
So thanks to Covid-19, we have been forced to forage for our own food like neanderthals who can’t write because they’ve got old, dry, gummed up caveman juju.
Another thing that has affected me big time is the movie theaters being closed. Even at this writing, they’re still closed. I realize that movie theaters are cesspools of filth and if you took a black light and shined it on the seats and floors, you’d find disgusting stains and stuff that resembles my writing juju. But a man has needs and one of those needs for me is a bucket - no - an enormous vat - of movie theater popcorn that’s been buttered on the bottom, the mid bottom, the middle, the upper middle, all over the top, and every dry spot that’s left.
But Michael - you, sir, are a diabetic. Do you not know that what you just described would kill a healthy buffalo?
The answer is yes. I do know. And I’ll die with high viscosity and a thick layer of oily butter all over my mouth and chin. A mouth that will be smiling because of all the oily butter.
Let me tell a quick nugget about that so you might get a proper visual. I don’t think I’ve mentioned it before.
Once while enjoying a movie with my bride and scarfing down huge handfuls of dripping, buttery popcorn like an ogre, I realized I needed to go to the restroom. I eased my face over to my wife’s ear and whispered the usual line.
“I gotta pee.”
She nodded and off I skipped to the restroom quickly so that I could get back before I missed anything good and also because there was more sloppy popcorn to devour like a starved dog.
As I came back into the theatre, I caught my wife’s eye and the light from the screen must have hit my face just right so to cast a glorious beam on me, filling out every detail. My wife started to laugh hysterically, although there was nothing funny happening in the film.
When I got to my seat, she was still guffawing and couldn’t seem to stop. So I asked her the usual line I do when she’s laughing at me uncontrollably.
“WHAT?!”
She leaned in and through great yucks and the tears that were in her eyes, said, “Your chin is completely covered with butter. It’s so greasy from all the popcorn you’ve been shoveling into your pie hole, that it shines like a diner sign. You look ridiculous.”
I had walked out into the lobby like that. I’d probably said hello to someone while sporting a chin dripping with popcorn butter.
So that’s a change I’ve had to get used to thanks to COVID-19. No movie theater popcorn.
I could go on and on and on about the first world struggles we’re having to endure, but you know them. You lived them yourself and a bunch of them have been discussed ad nauseam on Facebook and Twitter. Things like the worldwide toilet paper shortage and the fact that people seem to believe that the cans of soup that were on the shelves would be the last cans of soup ever made. Except for Cream of Mushroom. Nobody wants the Cream of Mushroom.
So instead of boring you with any more problems you already know about, I’ve searched deep into my creative mind where, because I’m able to write in a restaurant again (by the way, I had to stop a while back and this is being written a couple of days later while sitting in an Olive Garden where I have Chicken and Gnocci soup dripping all over my chin {Squeee!}), I’m now feeling my juju getting pliable, like somebody pulled it out from under a table and started chewing it anew. I can foresee some things we might be having to deal with in the near future, thanks to COVID-19.
1. People will pass out in streets, on sidewalks, and in Walmart aisles at the sight of so many mouths. By the time we, as a nation, feel like this pandemic is safely behind us, we will have become used to seeing so many face masks covering up people’s mouths and chins, it will be utter shock at the sight of so many lips - beautiful lips and chins, ugly lips and chins, lips and chins smothered in oily movie theater butter because the cinema is back open. It’ll be like that episode of The Twilight Zone where the woman’s face is unwrapped and to the viewer appears beautiful, but she’s horrified at the sight because in her world, normal people look like that sculpture of a face you tried to make with clay in art class.
2. Speaking of the movie theaters opening back up, you’ll be able to finally go see Fast and Furious part 68 - Hobbs and Shaw Open A Deli, but it’s gonna cost you $82 for a single ticket because Hollywood’s been shut down this whole time like the rest of us and they have to recoup their money somehow. And because concessions is where the theaters make the money to keep the lights on, your popcorn, which was already highway robbery, will now cost you an additional $80 for a small. The good news is that you will have the option of getting the large bucket for a $20 upgrade and if you want the combo, which includes the bucket, two large soft drinks, and the candy of your choice, you only have to pay three easy monthly installments of $99.99.
3. But wait - there’s more! Toilet paper! TP-ing somebody’s yard will become a federal crime. Why? Because of the Great Toilet Paper Shortage of 2020. I guess I have to mention it because this will be devastating to teenagers. According to my source, Principal Schmelton of Tallyho High, Old Man Schmelly to his students, kids all over the country will receive marks on their permanent records after the first offense. This will not apply to first year students, who will only be given demerits, due to their being, as he puts it, Fresh Meat.
And there’s more to come. There’s a lot more that we’ll have to stomach and accept as the - dare I even say it? - New Norm. And the sooner we prepare ourselves for that, the better off we’ll be. Welcome to the world after 2020.
Thanks, COVID-19.

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I guess everybody has something they’d call a guilty pleasure. Even the best of us sometimes give in to temptation and it depends on the offense as to whether or not you ought to just be careful or be taken into custody. I’d say the guiltiest of my guilty pleasures would be my addiction to the NBC super hit, The Office. I’ve watched the entire series ten times now, which is in itself something that should be cause for concern, and I used to think I was only one of a few who were so obsessed, but apparently, I’m not. There are a bunch of us the world over. But this episode isn’t about the obsession, it’s about why I should probably never meet anybody from the cast. I don’t know that I’d behave myself appropriately.

I’m Michael Blackston and this is probably the closest I’ll get to being called a fanboy when it comes to my Funny Messy Life.

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I think the reality of my ever getting to meet an actual member of the cast of The Office is pretty slim. I guess if any of my books get sold or any of my plays get picked up, there’s a possibility, but the likelihood of that happening is not good. I suppose if I composed a musical about a beet farmer named Dwight who gets beamed up into a real life Battlestar Galactica scenario and defeats an alien attack with a laser gun made from a nutcracker machine he has to fish out of a big old mound of Jello, I might hear from NBC’s legal department, but otherwise, let’s be real.

What’s got me thinking about this is the recent arrival of two podcasts created by cast members from the show: An Oral History of The Office, hosted by Brian Baumgardner, who played Kevin, and Office Ladies, hosted by Jenna Fischer and Angela Kinsey, who played Pam and Angela. The Office has enjoyed a resurgence in popularity lately as people are discovering what I’ve known for years … it’s possibly the best show that ever graced the screen of anything. I know it is for me. And one thing I’ve learned by listening to these two podcasts is that the cast of the show seems to love it as much as the fans. That’s a revelation to me because you would think after so many seasons and new opportunities and the constant obsessive fans bringing up the same old phrases and jokes, the actors would be saying, “Enough already!”

So as I sat listening to an episode of Office Ladies, a podcast where Jenna and Angela break down every single episode, walking down memory lane with cast and crew and offering behind the scenes nuggets of Office goodness dipped in awesome sauce that’s been lovingly created with the voices of the hosts and adding ever more flavor to my world which I once believed to be devoid of further tastes of The Office, I noticed they often mention the names of fans who write in with questions. And I thought to myself, “Self, what would it be like to hear my name spoken aloud by Pam or Angela or Jim or Kevin, or the holy grail of it all, Michael Scott?” And that’s when I decided it probably wouldn’t be a great idea to meet them in person. Because my heart started to beat wildly. My nose started to run. My eyes watered and I began to sweat in places I can’t mention in a family podcast.

I’d actually heard my name spoken a lot during the run of the show. Like I said, the lead character, until he left after season seven. Was Michael Scott. So I’d heard them all say “Michael”, but it’s not the same as if they actually said something along the lines of, “Strangely attractive fanboy Michael Blackston sent in a question about Steve Carell. He asks: Jenna and Angela … Do you think Steve might have had an inappropriate crush on the two of you, seeing that he was married at the time and if so, did his wife Nancy mind, knowing it was just a fantasy kind of a thing? Asking for a friend. Signed, Michael Blackston.” or even, “Wildly talented writer, composer, singer, and actor Michael Blackston, who would totally accept an offer to work on a reboot, writes in with a question: Dearest Jenna and Angela or Jennjela - (do you mind me calling you Jennjela?) … Do you think Steve might have had a man-crush on John Krazinski and if so, did Pam mind, knowing Steve was married? Asking for a friend. - Michael Blackston (professional artist who would have definitely attended Pam’s art show and friend of cats, who would have never put Sprinkles in the freezer.)

Something like that would set my soul aflame. But meeting them? Actually MEETING them? I don’t think I could handle that, at least not well. Not in a way where they would come away from it NOT uncomfortable. Let me sprinkle some thought over this … Sprinkles …

Let me share with you why it might be a bad idea.

I’ve never been the type to go nuts over celebrities in the first place. I know they’re real people just like you and me, they put their pants on one leg at a time just like you and me, and they probably hate putting on stage makeup just like you and me. But it’s different with The Office. I think I’ve watched it so many times and made those characters such an integral part of my life that they’ve taken on the feel of real people, not actors playing roles. I knew this would be a problem for me after listening to the first episode of Office Ladies. I understood it was Jenna Fischer and Angela Kinsey on their mics, but I found myself wanting to hear them take on their characters. It was easier when Jenna referenced Angela because Angela played Angela in the show, but when Angela mentions Jenna, I think, No. She’s Pam. I want you to call her Pam because she’s Pam and she loves Jim and she likes to draw illustrations. I start feeling Like Stephen King’s character Annie Wilkes in Misery (Played by Kathy Bates, who, by the way, played Jo on The Office for a while), except that I don’t intend to kidnap Greg Daniels and break his leg so he can’t go anywhere until he vows to bring back the show, including Michael Scott. In that book, Annie couldn’t make a distinction between real life and the world of her favorite book character. I know the difference and I respect the actors, but I don’t want to let go of my favorite show.

If I actually met Jenna or Angela, I would be completely respectful, but I don’t think I could get through the meeting without starting to cry. And that would be embarrassing because it wouldn’t be a charming cry like you might get from a normal person meeting someone they admire. “How sweet, Ange … he’s got a tear in his eye. What a charming and normal man-fan.”

No, I’m afraid it’d be far worse than that. “Lady, he’s sobbing like a baby child. It’s embarrassing to watch and sad.”

“But he’s happy, Jenna. I think that’s joyful sobbing.”

“It gives me no joy, Ange. No joy at all.”

It could also go the other way. I could become so insecure that I was incapable of saying a single word. I’d try not to be that fan that blats out stuff from the show as if they’re the first person who thought of that. I don’t know that fans ought to look for reasons to shout That’s what she said to Steve Carell, but I’ll bet it happens all the time. The rest of the cast has earned the right to go there at any time, but me … I don’t think so. Still, I doubt I’d be able to help myself and I’d also bet money that I’d be so eager to do it that it wouldn’t even make sense.

Imagine this scenario.

I’m in Atlanta, the closest large city to where I live, and I’ve felt the need to pick up a bag of Oreos and some milk for my ride home because that’s what diabetics do. Actually, it’s not what we should do, but in my case, it’s part of what I do that made me a diabetic, but anyway … behind me in line is Steve Carell, who has come to town because they’re filming another Avenger’s movie and Marvel has decided the SHIELD agents could do with a Scarn-like quality. He notices my items and because I understand that Steve is a real down-to-earth kind of guy, he comments to be neighborly. “Sometimes ya just gotta go with milk and cookies, am I right?”

I turn, realize who’s behind me and can’t stop my stupid mouth before screaming, “THAT’S WHAT SHE SAID!” right into his face. Not the best impression, to be sure. In my soul, I would have wanted to say the perfect line, something so brilliant that Steve grins wide and asks for my number so we can be best friends forever and ever, but I suspect I would more than likely make myself look like a dufus.

Brian Baumgardner is from Atlanta, so I guess there’s a small possibility of our meeting and me shouting, “Do Kevin … DO KEVIN!”

Rainn Wilson would have to endure me throwing out a random reference to Bears, Beets, Battlestar Galactica .. in that order. Or saying something like, “Whar’s Mose? Ya talk to Mose lately?””

I could go on and on with every actor who has become a part of my mental family and that’s the way I think of them. And that’s why I have so much love for them all. There is no other television show that has affected me so completely as The Office. And it makes me happy when I hear the likes of Jenna and Angela and Brian and Steve discuss in interviews and podcasts how much it touches their hearts to know they’ve been welcomed so fully into homes and families all around the world.

So I guess this did turn out to be more of a love fest for The Office, but that’s how I feel. Those characters and stories continue to make me laugh and cry every time I watch it, no matter HOW MANY times I watch it. And in all honesty, if I ever get the opportunity to meet any of them, I will be a total gentleman and not get all awkward. I mean after all, it was just a show about an ordinary paper company, although in Pam’s words, there’s a lot of beauty in ordinary things. Isn’t that kind of the point?

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2021 promises to be a great year for me. Of course, I think I said the same thing at the beginning of 2020 and look what a dumpster fire that turned out to be. But 2021 is starting out with a bunch of stuff in place that I’ve been wanting to implement for a while and so I’ve hit the ground running. That’s what this episode will about. It’s gonna be a kind of update/story time/apology that should get us back on speaking terms after my extremely obnoxious lack of posting episodes of this podcast. I’m Michael Blackston and it feels like I’m finally back in the saddle of my Funny Messy Life.
____________

It’s not like I haven’t been thinking about you because I have. It’s just that, like everybody else, 2020 kicked me in the life-junk over and over again and it got hard to find the time to create episodes. I was busy and some things kept happening that directly affected the way I record these things. I got really busy while not going to restaurants or movies or to see my grandma in the nursing home because COVID-19 is a jerk. I thought my business would suffer during the pandemic with people being out of work or quarantined, but it didn’t. I thrived and I got busier than I’ve ever been.
I know, I know. That’s what I say every time I huge span of time between episodes and it sounds like an excuse. To be honest with you, I have considered cancelling this podcast several times because I don’t like promising something I can’t make good on. It’s like breaking up with someone and saying, It’s not you, it’s me.
My wife and I have been married for nearly 26 years and these situations I keep finding myself in with you, the listener, sort of reminds me of the time I broke up with her for five minutes. I won’t go into too much detail about it because I plan to have her on with me soon to tell our story - it’s a cool one - and we’ll probably touch on the break up, but let me just say that when I did it, I really thought that’s what I wanted. Then I kept thinking about her and I kept calling her and before I had blinked, I was buying her a stuffed animal and taking her to a concert.
In the same way, I keep taking time away from you, but I can’t stop thinking about your long hair and the way I feel when we’re together, so here we are. Together again with promises that I’ll treat you right this time.
At least there’s nothing wrong with us having an open relationship, so hopefully there are other podcasts you listen to for company. I guess it’s similar to the early Mormons, who had multiple wives. It’s what you might call acceptable POD-lygamy ... I’m sorry. I should be ashamed of myself. But that’s what you do to me. When we’re together, I feel like I’ve got the freedom to be myself and say the first thing that comes to mind, whether it’s a good joke, or something that ought to send me to pun-hell. But lets put our past behind us and move on, shall we?
It might sound like an excuse, but 2020 was busier than I ever believed it would be, despite the limitations of the pandemic.
I finished my second novel, Shoeshine Drop, began to get my music ready for the stage, decided to create a production company for my plays, accepted the position of Minister of Music at the largest Baptist church in my town, became a deacon at said church, and in the biggest change to my routine, moved my business home so I don’t have to travel very much at all anymore.
You can see why it might be hard to find time to write, and then record, podcast episodes in the middle of all that. The biggest thing that stopped the recoding process was my frustration with my studio. In the past three years, I have recorded this podcast in hotel rooms, the cabs of two different vehicles, and in various places I called a studio in my home. My goal has been to have a dedicated space to record professional sounding audio, but nothing I’ve tried in my house has worked for one reason or another. During those three years, I’ve built, taken down, and rebuilt my studio nine times. Until recently, something has kept me from getting right every time, whether it was outside noise bleeding into the recording, inside noise bleeding in, electronic interference, echoes and audio bounce back, etc. It was something every time and unless you’ve ever tried to do something that should be pretty simple, only to meet obstacle after obstacle, you won’t understand how it can suck the life and desire to do that thing right out of you the same way political runoff campaigns will suck the life out of you and make you want to fly screaming off a cliff like the pigs in the New Testament that had the demons driven into them. As a matter of fact, I don’t know what’s worse, politicians and their campaigns or having demons driven into you. It’s pretty much the same thing. Anyway, that problem has been solved now. This episode comes to you from my brand new studio in one of the second floor rooms of my church. It’s a little room tucked deep into the center of the church at the end of a maze of rooms nobody ever uses anymore. I was able to build a frame along the walls of the interior of the room and hang sound treatment to allow me to control the sound. There is no outside noise to deal with and no inside noise, either. It’s a beautiful thing and not only will it allow me to consistently have a professional environment to produce this podcast and another one I’m planning based on Christian Apologetics, but it finally opens the door to my being able to seriously step my foot into the waters of commercial voiceover work.
The last thing it allows me to do is record audio books. I have my two novels to record, but also some classics. The first one I plan to record is The Picture of Dorian Gray.
So what I’m saying is that I’m back in the saddle and things are looking bright.
For a while one of my biggest concerns about this podcast was whether not I had much left to say. I felt like I was getting close to all I had in me, but then I realized that the world gets more and more stupid every day. All I really need to do is check in on Facebook and Instagram to see something that inspires me to write. It might spark a memory from my life or it might cause me to spit out some of my opinions about the today’s culture. A culture, by the way, where a politician seriously ends a public prayer with A-Woman because he thinks he’s showing equal respect for the females of our species.
Yeah.
I know.
And I share the ideal that men and women are equal in worth, I’m saddened that a person calling themselves a pastor doesn’t know that ending a prayer with Amen isn’t referencing men. It’s Hebrew for something like, So be it. Some good has come out of it, though, and that’s the hundreds of new memes to enjoy, making fun of it. My problem is that while 2020 has given me plenty to talk about, you come here to get away from the stuff you get bombarded with on a daily basis, and especially the things that made 2020 what it turned out to be. Now that we’re into a fresh year, if you’re like me, you want to forget about a lot of last year, so i need to keep things fresh.
I decided that since I was going to ramps things up again with the podcast, it might be a great idea to go back and re-listen to all of the past episodes, mainly because the older I get, the more things I can’t remember like where I put my glasses, why I walked into a room in the first place, and what I’ve already talked about in the podcast. And while i was listening through them, and cringing again at my delivery because I’m never happy with it, I came upon a short update I inserted between episodes when I had, like now, neglected to post anything for several weeks. In that update, I mentioned having guests on to share their stories in the future to make things more interesting, but I never did that. I also told you that I would be delivering my episodes via bullet point instead of writing them out verbatim, so that my delivery was more natural. I did that for a couple of episodes, then went back to writing them out because I noticed that I’m more concise when I write it out. And it’s still genuine when I put in the time to write it out, plus it’s way easier later on when I decide to try and make a little cheddar by putting the episodes into book form, which I have decided to do and will tell you about at a later time. As far as guests go, I realized that it was hard to go very far that way without a great deal of extra work that I don’t have time to do. I still plan to have some guests. My wife will be on soon to tell our love story. My son will be on soon to talk about some stuff and partly as test of our chemistry for another podcast the two of us have been wanting to do for a couple of years and now have a good place to do it. I’ll have my dear friend, Joe Trusty - hi Joe ... he’s an avid listener - to reminisce about our radio days, and there are a few other interesting people I’d like to share with you. But as a rule, it’ll likely be me most of the time, doing what I’ve been doing for the first forty episodes.
But I do want to extend an offer to you. In the past, I opened the show up to the possibility of sharing stories from listeners. All you had to do was email me, tell your story, and if it passed the mustard, I’d share it in an episode. Well, nobody sent in their stories and that’s okay. I understand. One thing I’ve learned from several years of on and off podcasting is that begging listeners to talk to you doesn’t do anything to help you communicate with them. Unless you’re one of the huge shows like Joe Rogan or the Office Ladies, you won’t get huge amounts of reviews and hearing feedback from listeners is as rare as the planets aligning to make the Star of Bethlehem like Saturn and Jupiter did in 2020. It used to bother me, too, because I really did beg for feedback.
Is anybody there? Hello? Anybody? TALK TO ME!
And them I realized something. You pull up a podcast to be entertained, not get into conversation with the host. You need someone to talk to you and engage your mind on you commute or during your workout or when your cousin Melvin won’t shut up and doesn’t realize you’ve shoved your AirPods in you ears as far as you possibly can. And you’re choosing me. You’re choosing me over Melvin and I thank you for that. I guess it goes back to my radio days when I had actual fans who couldn’t wait to call me when my shift started. My friend Joe will attest to that, so it feels weird not to hear from you.
So if you don’t want to tell your story, I understand and don’t hold it against you. The podcasters I listen to never get feedback from me, either. But if you do think of a story that’s really interesting and that you wouldn’t mind having accessible to the world, then send me the details. I might even be willing to record a phone call with you so you can tell it yourself. Who knows? Maybe another segment for the show might be born. But if not, I’m content if you simply sit back and let me do the talking. Because even though it probably seems like I’ve forgotten about Funny Messy Life, the numbers keep growing and a few folks here and there keep subscribing. So that tells me there are people who enjoy what I’m doing.
And by the way, I’m not saying I’ve NEVER gotten any feedback. I have a couple of listeners who have reached out and to you, I say thank you. As one of f my favorite podcasters says when he gets encouragement from listeners, it puts gas in my tank.
If your name is Melvin, I hope you understand that I wasn’t necessarily talking about you earlier, unless you’re one of those people who never take a breath and let other people talk into the conversation. If you are, then maybe try listening some. The communication is a whole lot better when you do that.
And if I go a minute without posting a new episode, just know that I haven’t forgotten you. I’ve just gotten busy or something happened to make my studio unusable and I’m in the middle of moving and rebuilding it ... again.
If you do have something you’d like to share with me, let’s start out by having you email me at funnymessylife@gmail.com. Keep it PG and we’ll probably be fine.
Lastly, do me a favor and share the podcast with your friends and loved ones who you think might enjoy it. My best weapon in the battle to be found is you, so do me a favor and be a tank in my arsenal. I’d really appreciate it.

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My pastor recently delivered a sermon that I needed to pay extra attention to. It’s not that I don’t always pay close attention to the sermons, but anybody who’s spent much time in the congregation of a church will tell you that on occasion a person’s mind can wander. When I was an early teen, I was in love with the preacher’s daughter and so my mind was on the two of us skipping gaily, hand-in-hand through meadows of dandelions while the theme song from The Neverending Story played on the wind in the background. In fact, thinking about her now brings back an embarrassing memory involving her from those days and I’ll tell you about it at the conclusion of this episode. I’m Michael Blackston and this is my Funny, Messy, Life.

Nowadays, I’m more apt to stay engaged with the sermon and only mentally stray when he mentions food, or football, or food. But this recent sermon was different because he was going into detail about deaconship in the church - what it really means and what’s expected of someone who’s called into it. It was important to me because I was, that very day, being ordained as a deacon and I’m here to admit that I was terrified. Why? Because all of my life I’ve had this idea that being a deacon was something that was for better men than me. I know that’s not true - that men are men and we all have our flaws, but there’s a standard that comes with the position. Not that we’ll always meet it because of said flaws, but that we’re at least expected to honestly strive for it. The pastor joked that he thought of the word deacon as less of a noun and more of a verb, so he would be preaching on what it means for a deacon to deac. We all had a laugh and I paid close attention to what he said, but sometimes a spark lights in my head and I just can’t douse the flame. It has to do with how wrong I was when I was a kid about what I would have to face if I ever became the deacon of a church and I feel the urge to remind any of my fellow church members who might read or hear this that I think I’m funny and you need to keep that in mind if you’re gonna go any further in this piece. Also, I take my deaconship seriously and have seen the error of my ways when you compare the truth to what’s next.

So, without further ado, the following is a list of things I thought were possible issues I might have to face if I were to become a deacon.

Incompetence In Finger Pointing.

When you’re a kid, you think every adult in church knows better than you and feels like an authoritarian. Double that when it comes to deacons. I always thought of the deacons as the church deputies, Barney Fife-ing their way into God’s good graces in the hopes of getting a pocket FULL of bullets when they got to heaven. I’ve since learned that’s not the case. Our relationship to God is not Barney’s relationship to Andy, but Opie’s. Unfortunately, kids have active imaginations and I always thought it would be a daunting task to be one of the ones who pointed their fingers at the rest of the congregation when they were getting out of line, like not putting anything in the plate when it came by and singing the wrong words to Just As I Am. “Just as I aaaam, without one flea …”

Forgetting All Of My Deacony Blocking.

Speaking of passing the plate, this one was always a big deal for me. How do they do it, bookending the pews as one passes the plate down, the other intercepts it, then moving another row back in a complicated volley of plate passery that even Joe Montana would be envious of? I can’t concentrate on anything for more than 30 seconds, so how would I, little Michael be able to learn such mastery if I ever became a deac … oh look, Alaina just played with her hair. See, that’s what I’m talking about. Even the “memory me” is incapable. Heaven forbid I considered the whole Communion dance, what with the trays of broken up saltines and Smurf sized cups of grape juice. In that scenario, I always saw myself dropping the juice tray or forgetting I’d already passed the tray down an aisle and those people would have to explain why they’d had seconds at the Lord’s Supper.

Being Called On To Pray.

I would say this is probably still a concern for most people today if yours is a church where random people in the congregation are called on like tributes in The Hunger Games to pray during the service. They say the fear of speaking in public is number one on the phobia list for most people, but it doesn’t really bother me too much today. As a kid it terrified me because I saw that a lot of times, it was one of the deacons who got called on. I never once saw someone jump up from their pew and volunteer as Tribute for the one called upon. If you were chosen, you either obediently prayed aloud or suffered eternal hell. The choice was yours. On top of that misguided outlook, I heard eloquence in those prayers. Old men went on for hours praying over everything they could think of, using impressive words like, Thee and Thy, or adding “eth” at the end of everything because they only prayed in King James. Since then, I’ve learned that God actually prefers less eloquence when it comes to prayer and favors words that come from the heart, which is a good thing for me. You’d think a writer could pray it up nice with the best of them, and I could if given an entire lunch time and a glass of tea to come up with just the right way to say it. That’s not the way I pray off the cuff, though. I pray like a cave man who has just discovered fire and wants to thank the bright, shiny, ball creature that comes out in the sky during the day.

Being The Next Man Up.

I know it’s not like politics where if something happens to the preacher, it’s the next guy in line that gets the job, but as a kid, I didn’t know that. I thought that the higher up the deacon ladder somebody got, the closer to the pulpit they got. That meant I would have to be the one who gives the sermons if tragedy suddenly struck and everybody ahead of me was killed by a rogue baptismal pool electrocution and the pastoralship landed in my lap. This also makes me wonder just what I thought went on in those deacon meetings. Today, I could do it. I enjoy studying the Word, but back then my expectations were that I would have to know every name in Chronicles by heart. Let me re-pronounce that for my super-southern friends … Ca-RON-icles.

It’s not as daunting a task as I thought it might be, becoming a deacon. Don’t get me wrong, - it’s a serious appointment. I’ll have weeks that I’m the “deacon-on-call”, I have widows that are assigned to me and it’s my responsibility to see to it they have everything they need. I don’t have to worry about being called on to pray because I’m the worship leader and I’ll be doing my share of that anyway. There are other things that’ll be expected of me as well, but now I know I’m up to it. It just took a little growing up and getting my head on straight. I still have a hard time not looking at a couple of girls during the service, though. One’s my wife and the other one is my daughter, but they're never more than an arm’s reach away and I’m the one who periodically runs a finger through their hair.

So one more thing before I bring this one to a close. I promised you I’d tell you about the preacher’s daughter I was so in love with. I’ve already told you her name. It’s Alaina. She’s the reason I think I’ll always have a soft spot for Italian girls. I contacted her to get her blessing before mentioning the following story because I initially intended to keep her name out of it. I didn’t know if she’d want me calling her by her real name and I won’t give you her last name, although my peers who grew up with us will know her well. I looked her up on Facebook and messaged her. It’s the first time we’ve communicated since my days of pining for her and she was a great sport about it. In fact, I revealed a secret I’d been hiding since I was 13 years old and she told me she was honored to be such a sweet part of my memories. So let me get into it because it’s pretty cheesy in my opinion and cowardly of me to boot. Here’s a bit of backstory …

I hadn’t thought of Alaina as any more than a friend that I rarely talked to as a preteen until a dream I had one night. In the dream, Alaina and I were riding in the backseat of my mom’s car and she pulled into a parking space in front of Sky City. That’s a long forgotten chain of stores that disappeared sometime in the late eighties, I think. In the dream, I looked to my left and there was Alaina looking back at me with those big brown eyes and smiling. That’s all there was to the dream, but it was enough. To this day, I don’t have a clue as to what caused it, but I remember it like it was yesterday. Always have. From that moment on, my Sunday mornings at Grace Baptist Church in Elberton, Georgia were changed forever. I thought I was in love, but I never told her. I just pined away for several years from a distance. Well, I take that back … I told her once, but I didn’t sign my name. This is the part that I said was cheesy and more than a tiny bit embarrassing on my part.

Apparently, as is so often the case with someone who admires another from afar, eventually the tension mounted to something that could no longer be contained. That’s why one afternoon, I couldn’t take it any more and wrote a letter to Alaina, expressing my love, but I was still too shy and insecure to tell her who I was. I was living in a house about a mile from her in town and I would ride my bike past where she lived constantly, hoping to get a glimpse of her and her long, dark hair. I planned on waiting until everybody in my house was asleep and sneaking out to leave the note in her mailbox. And I did just that.

Okay, okay, you want to know what silly old thing a 13 year old boy writes in a note as a secret admirer. I guess since I’ve gotten this far, I should probably tell you.

Here’s what it said … wait for it ……..

Someone out there loves you.

That’s it. No name, no anything. Just that simple sentence, loaded with extra cheese. I slipped it into the small mailbox that was on her front porch in the middle of the night and it’s taken me 34 years to come clean about it. That’s right, I came clean. I had to if I was going to tell the story to the tens of people who listen to my podcast.

Alaina has been great about all this, Again, she said she was honored and thanked me for taking her on a trip down memory lane. She also assured me that my message asking permission to talk about this was in no way creepy because I mentioned a couple of times that I wasn’t trying to seem like Creepy McCreepers from Creepytown, USA. As for the note I left in the mailbox, she hasn’t mentioned it in our correspondence and that’s okay. She either doesn’t remember it, never got it, or doesn’t want to talk about it. And there’s no reason to. Whatever the reality, she now knows she had a secret admirer and she knows who it was. And I think that’s pretty cool. I, myself, wouldn’t change anything about how my life turned out. I’m completely head-over-hills for my bride and the sweet, musical stage babies we made together. Still, this lane of memory is one that I think will always make me smile because as cheesy as it might have been, it was innocent, honest and true. And I believe that’s the way childhood ought to be.

I’m giving you permission to share this if you liked it, even if some of my classmates get wind of it and point fingers at me for being such a dork. It’s okay … I embraced the dorkness of it all a long time ago. And if you’re ever passing through Elberton, Georgia on a Sunday morning, we’d love to have you over at First Baptist. I’m the worship leader there and now that’s also where I deac … I’m deac-ing? Deaconing … That’s where I’m a deacon! I’m Michael Blackston and after a looooong hiatus I’ll regale you all about soon, it’s good to be back in the saddle, telling you stories from my Funny, Messy, Life.

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The state of Georgia got its orders like every other state did. Our official decree was something along the lines of, “Stay in your homes for the love of all that is pure and holy. Keep yourselves barricaded behind a toilet paper fort if you’re among those who hoarded it and kept good, sane, decent folk from being able to get any. If you’re among the good, sane, decent folk who did not find it necessary to be a greedy, inconsiderate imbecile (I used the word moron at first, but changed it because it sounded mean and now you know how I really feel about it) and so find yourself without toilet paper, just do the best you can and you will have your reward in heaven. Either way, do not leave your house until the end of eternity.”

Now, you might think that this episode will be about COVID-19 and the quarantine, but nay. I only mention it because at least you probably didn’t have to be quarantined, safely hidden away from The Rona, only to be rudely attacked by another virus - one that lies in wait. One that infiltrates early in life and sits waiting for the perfect time to strike, making you an irritating, whinebag of a ninnyboy. Unlike me, you probably didn’t develop a case of the shingles.

I’m Michael Blackston and this is an excruciating episode of Funny Messy Life.

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It’s April 8th, 2020 and I didn’t feel like sitting down to write out this episode at all. The only reason I finally started was because I felt obligated to and to be honest, while you’ll not be able to tell, it’ll probably get done over time, in whatever little squirts of inspiration I can muster. It’s not because I don’t like you or don’t want to talk to you. It’s because I’m still dealing with an outbreak of shingles and not just any outbreak, oh no. Mine appeared on my face and head.

It’s now April 11th, 2020. The intro and that first little paragraph is all I was able to manage before I had to stop and do whatever it was I did. I think I laid in my hotel bed and watched a movie. That would have been the Angelina Jolie vehicle, SALT, which was okay at first, but turned into something I didn’t care for. Anyway, where was I? Oh yeah, Shingles Face.

I’m one of the lucky ones that aren’t considered essential and yet I’m still able to work as long as monument companies still have stones for me to draw pretty pictures on. At this point, I still travel, although I’m trying to remedy that, and I’m alone. I’m alone at work and I’m alone in my hotel room, especially now that nothing’s open and there’s nowhere to go. In fact, the hotel is a very safe place and seemed to have an endless supply of toilet paper. So there I was, feeling blessed not to have to lose work - at least for the moment - and while it was boring in the hotel room, I still had a comfortable place to sleep. My one issue was a nagging little stinging place on my eyelid that I thought might be a spot of poison oak. I’d had poison oak there before when I was a boy and it ended up pretty bad, but I knew not to scratch now and it wasn’t really bothering me. I had a topical cream to put on it and I was good to go. I figured I got a spore or two there from the area behind the dumpster at the monument company I’d worked for the week before. They have no bathroom and I have to pee out back when I’m there, but poison oak and snakes are the only things I really have to watch for.

I went to bed that night, blissfully unaware of what was happening in my body and feeling very proud that I’d been so diligent about applying my topical cream, but I was awoken around 3 am by the distinct sensation that my right eyelid had made a decision to inflate like a giant red balloon. When I got up to look at my face in the mirror, I was shocked. Aghast might be a good word. I was dismayed at what I saw and a tad frightened that maybe Pennywise the Dancing Clown might suddenly appear from behind my ballooned up eye socket, asking me if I wanted to float. There was another problem, though. There was now a rash on my face, spidering out from the area of my eye and crawling like raw tentacles up my forehead and to the side, heading toward my ear.

I remember thinking, “That’s unfortunate and somewhat alarming.”

I decided my poison oak was being a serious douche and I should probably go home immediately. I figured if it got any worse, I’d be glad I went ahead and drove the five hours back while I still could.

I stopped in at the monument company on my way out to leave a note on the desk in the office and didn’t even bother to load up my equipment. I knew that when I went back to work, it would be there anyway. The note read something like this:

This is Mike. I had to leave in the middle of the night because my face is being a serious douche. I’ll explain when I come back. Who knows when that will be. I’m leaving my equipment. Please don’t sell it because I don’t think I’m going to die. I don’t think. This was Mike.

I was sure it was poison oak. I couldn’t really think of any other option that didn’t include an alien laying an egg in my eye socket, even though I did look like that might have happened and now the alien was trying to crawl out. The weird thing was that it didn’t really itch or hurt. Yet.

The next day I walked up to the medical center where I live and a nurse was waiting outside the door to take my temperature. COVID-19 procedures stated that if I was running a fever, I would have had a whole lot of complicated things to do to get seen and I was afraid with the way I looked, I might just be a little hot. Luckily, I wasn’t.

She asked me what I needed to be seen for and I pointed to my head.

“Poison oak being a jerkwad to m’face.”

She nodded, wrote down my perfectly normal temperature on a slip of paper and told me to hand it to the nurse when they called me back. In this season of our world’s history, I expected the lobby to be full, but there was only me and a couple of other people, one of which was loudly telling everyone who came in how bad a bunch of doctors they had there and we ought to be worried for our lives. Discretion and wisdom kept me from asking, “Well why are you here, then, Einstein?!”

Once I was taken back, a nurse took my temperature and glanced at me, asking the normal questions. What have you eaten recently? Are you allergic to anything? Is that some kind of weird bug crawling up your face?

Then she asked something unexpected. “Have you ever had shingles?”

That one surprised me.

“Shingles? That thing old people get that make you tell yourself I hope I never get old enough that I have to tell people ‘I got the shingles.’ Those shingles? No.”

Soon I found myself sitting in a room and before long, the doctor came in. I know this doctor very well. He’s a general practitioner, but also delivers babies. He’s delivered probably 95 percent of the population of my county and he’s been doing it since 1843. He’s an old Chinese man who speaks with broken English, but whatever he says, you can believe it. He’s seen it all.

“You have shingle,” he said when he walked in and took one look at me.

I thought he was asking me if I had shingles and I said I didn’t know.

“I know. You have shingle,” he said again and I thought to myself, OH CRAP!

He said he’d be right back and left the room, so while he was gone, I googled what to expect when battling a bout of shingles. Everything I found pretty much said the same thing, which is:

You have shingles? Oh crap. You’re in for a fun ride. You can expect in the next few days to be in some of the most unbearable pain you’ve ever experienced. Depending on where the breakout is located on your body, you will feel like that area is manifesting the darkest, most torturous bowels of hell that were originally reserved at the beginning of time for the vilest of evil.

Mine was on my face. The interweb went on to explain the situation from there.

Congratulations! You’ve broken out with shingles on your face. Shingles on your face is a real douche. Shingles attacks the nerves under your skin, usually starting around and spidering out from your eye like some jerkwad alien creature that secretes acid. Your face and head and neck and even your shoulder will feel something akin to the devil constantly scraping every tendon with the harshest grade of sandpaper and then defecating on your raw flesh with his hellish demon feces of fire. This will go on for days until the skin over the rash area has been deadened. You might think, “Oh boy! What a relief!” Ha ha ha, but that’s no relief. The rash will occasionally itch deep under the skin and the only way to really satisfy it will be to dig deep beyond the deadened nerves until you reach the place where there’s still feeling. But be careful. That’s also the place where shingles dragon babies are suckling the teats of your tender nerve endings and you’ll go shooting upward into the ceiling with agonizing screams. But don’t worry. You’re not contagious to most people, so this is something you can experience all by your lonesome. Let’s raise a glass to shingles! Here’s hoping you have a caring loved one to wait on you hand and foot because if you don’t you’re going to be in a special kind of hell. SHINGLLLLEEES!

And that’s exactly what I experienced for two or three days immediately after getting home. It’s like once I knew what it was, it had been given the green light to do its worst.

Two things happened next. First, I woke up the next morning, having hardly slept at all because of the pain, with my face swollen twice as much as before. I looked like a prize fighter who’d just gone twenty rounds. Second, I was extremely nauseated. While I was at the doctor, he had decided to give me a supplement for my diabetes meds while he was prescribing pills for the shingles. The side effects of this new supplement, I found out later, include nausea and for the next couple of days, until I figured it out and on top of the pain from the shingles, I couldn’t stand up or eat without feeling like I was gonna be sick. I had to go back to the doctor because of the nausea and the fact that now my face looked and felt like I was prepping for the role of The Elephant Man.

“Ish thsh shponshna hernpnern?” I asked the doctor, which translated from my swollen face language means, “Is this supposed to happen?”

“Swelling, yes. Nausea, no. I change the medicine.”

Once I finally got a handle on everything and the swelling started to go down, I saw a light at the end of the tunnel. I’m told some of the effects of the shingles can stay with me for quite a while, but that normally it only happens once. Unfortunately, there are cases of multiple outbreaks in people, so just understand that if that happens, I’ll know what I’m looking at early and you can bet that I’ll be self-quarantined until it’s over so you don’t have to listen to the unearthly screams.

I hope you don’t get shingles. There’s apparently a vaccine you can take and I would highly advise talking to your doctor to see if it’s right for you. I survived it, but knowing what I know now, I definitely would have considered looking into it. I also hope you liked this episode and if you did, next time you’re on whatever platform you get your podcasts, how about giving me a quick rating and review. If nothing else, it’s a great way to let me know how I’m doing and that you’re out there. If you’d like to communicate with me, there are several ways to do that at the website, funnymessy.com or you can email me at funnymessylife@gmail.com. So until next time, I’m Michael Blackston. Thanks for letting me vent a little and joining me on another journey into my Funny Messy Life.

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The world has changed overnight. Things that only happen in the movies are playing out right before our eyes and it’s pretty surreal knowing we’re going through a major historical event. As COVID-19 continues to be a big, giant butt hole, humanity has had to learn a lot of new techniques to cope, especially when it comes to quarantine. Looking on the bright side is one of them. For instance, this pandemic may be horrible, but at least we’ve got something of our own now that we can throw in the faces of future generations like our forefathers have in the past.

“Boy, you don’t know how good you got it. Back in my day, they forced us to stay indoors … in the air conditionin’ … told us we couldn’t work for weeks and all we had to occupy us was eatin’ tater chips and layin’ around in our pajamas all day watchin’ Netflix and postin’ self-righteous memes on the Facebook!”

But for me, and maybe for you as well, I’ve found that finding stuff to keep myself entertained has brought me back to some things in my life I’ve neglected, namely my absolute passion for Sir Andrew Lloyd Webber’s adaptation of The Phantom Of The Opera. And that’s what this episode is about - My life with The Phantom.

I’m Michael Blackston. Join me as we open an enormous theatrical curtain on my Funny Messy Life.

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I grew up singing for audiences, and not just normal kid songs, either - songs like I’ve Been Working On The Railroad, Twinkle Twinkle Little Star, or I Like Big Butts And I Cannot Lie. No, while my first official solo at age five was called, Dead Eye Dick, I quickly graduated to fancier numbers like, The Rainbow Connection and Tomorrow from ANNIE. Then I pulled out the big guns. I think I was eight when I performed Memory from CATS in a competition and I would have won first place if the judges hadn’t been such push overs and gave the win to a little girl who turned a bunch of schoolyard flips to music and called herself a “tumbler”, Halfway through her act, she did something wrong, got scared and ran off the stage, and was eventually coaxed back on. I sang flawlessly, but got second place behind tumble girl. I deserved first place and I know it because my mom and my grandmother told me so. But I’m not bitter.

Anyway, singing Memory was the first time I was exposed to the magic of Sir Andrew Lloyd Webber. He composed CATS and would eventually become my hero as I started writing plays and musicals.

Jump forward into my teens. Fifteen to be exact. My step-father took my mother and I to New York City for the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade. During the trip, my mother thought she’d surprise me with a night on Broadway - the Winter Garden Theatre, which was home to CATS. She thought I’d be elated, but alas, I was not. I was fifteen and my interests had temporarily changed from singing and performing to hunting and fishing and being the most obnoxious redneck I could possibly be. I told her I didn’t want to go see a bunch of dudes wearing tights dancing around like a bunch of sissies. I wanted to stay at the hotel while they went to the show.

Mama calmly told me that the tickets had already been purchased and I would love it and I was going and if I argued about it again, she would throw me right into the Hudson river. So I went and it was magical. It changed my mind about theatre right then and my world went from wanting to fish in the rain to wanting to sing in the rain.

Not long after that trip, my step-father surprised us again with a package of tickets at the Fabulous Fox Theatre in Atlanta. The shows included: The Buddy Holly Story, Annie, CATS again, and The Phantom Of The Opera. This time I WAS excited, but I didn’t know just how affected I would be after seeing Phantom. I think the finale scene where The Phantom is holding Christine’s dress and she rides away in a boat with Raoul and The Phantom wails in despair, “It’s over now - the music of the night” … that moment might have been the first time I cried at a show. It still gets me every time I hear it. It’s my favorite moment in the play because when the actor playing Erik - that’s The Phantom’s name - gets it right, it’ll tear out your heart and leaving you bleeding in the mezzanine … or the orchestra seats if you spent the big bucks.

From that moment on, everything was POTO, which is what cool Phans sometimes call it and is easier to keep typing out instead of Phantom Of The Opera. Phans, by the way and in this case, is correctly spelled with a PH.

First, I went out and bought the original London cast soundtrack with Michael Crawford and Sarah Brightman. I learned it note for note and walked around everywhere singing it. There was a used bookstore in town and one afternoon I found a large paperback that not only went into detail about the creation of the show, but had a step by step photo diagram of The Phantom’s makeup application and in the back was the full libretto. When that book caught my eye, I probably screamed like a fan girl, maybe cried a little, and held the book to my chest like it was an original manuscript of the Bible. You couldn’t have plucked it away from me if the entire female portion of the cast of CATS was just outside the window in their skin tight leotards, grinding away to Mr. Mistopholes.

I read that book cover to cover several times before lending it to a friend who never gave it back. I should have known better. In fact, let me jot ordering it again right onto my to-do list while I’m thinking about it.

For most of my adulthood, you could count on three loves in my life behind God and family. Those were Theatre in general, University of Georgia Football, and POTO. I needed nothing else. I had my Phantom picture frame, I had my official mask I bought from The Really Useful Group that wasn’t exact;y right had too much shine, but I didn’t care. I had my two revues that I performed Phantom numbers in wearing said mask … I was happy.

I dressed as The Phantom every single Halloween until I overheard someone say, “Here comes Michael dressed as The Phantom - again.” After that I gave it a year off, then dressed as The Phantom the next Halloween. There’s something about becoming that character for lovers of the musical that inspires passion and intensity. I never felt that way dressed as Dracula or Batman or a Hooters girl.

But there was a time that I lost my way. I had one kid, then another. I started writing plays and novels and became all consumed with those endeavors until Phantom slowly faded into the rest of the craziness around me.Instead of being a beacon lighting the path to a happy place, it was just another boat lost in the rocky sea of my life.

Then the pandemic hit and suddenly I was finding extra hours that needed filling. Actually, two things happened. The pandemic, yeah, but I also finished my second novel and began my current project, which is finishing my own musical. I started composing and needed something special in the way of inspiration.

One night, right at the beginning of when everyone was being told to stay home and only poke your head out the door to see how cold it is or if we’re going to have six more weeks of COVID, I saw my hero - Sir Andrew Lloyd Webber - videoing himself from quarantine, playing All I Ask Of You from Phantom. I couldn’t believe it. I was getting to see the man perform his own work from his home on his piano. It was one of the dearest things I’d ever experienced and suddenly the light was back, beckoning me to my own piano. Since this reawakening, I’ve made more progress on my show than I ever have. I joined a group on Facebook for Phantom lovers and everyone there has been amazing and helps to keep my creative juices flowing.

I don’t know, I guess everyone has that one specific thing. I have other loves in my life. I can’t seem to stop watching The Office from end to end, then starting right back over again. And there are plenty of other things too, but there’s something special about The Phantom. His deep, consuming love for Christine. His secret lair on the lake beneath the Paris Opera House - a lake that really does exist. The gothic, hauntingly beautiful melodies that pierce you to the marrow from the moment the main theme erupts at the beginning of the show when the mountain of a chandelier begins to rise from the stage and hovers ominously and foreboding above the audience. The knowledge that the time will come when that chandelier will come crashing down, making good on the deadly promises of The Phantom. It’s all a perfect experience that takes you in and makes you want to be there … to really be there.

So while this episode wasn’t necessarily very funny or messy, it does represent an integral part of my life. I plan to hold tightly to The Phantom from now on, because I never want it to be over - the music of the night.

If you enjoyed this episode, there’s a lot more you can listen to and hopefully a lot more to come. All you have to do is subscribe. Most folks do that via Apple podcasts, but it’s available wherever you listen to your podcasts and you can even subscribe at the website, funnymessy.com. Maybe you have a Phantom or theatre story of your own … I’d truly love to hear it and we can be pals. You can get in touch with me at the website in the comments sections of the blog, from the contact page, or if you’d prefer to email me, it’s funnymessylife@gmail.com.

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I’ve mentioned several times over the span of this podcast that I make my living as an artist. Mostly, I etch on black granite gravestones, but I haven’t talked much about the fact that I dabble in several other artistic mediums. My entire life - as far back as I can remember - has revolved around some form of creativity and for the most part, it’s a wonderful thing. Unfortunately, nothing’s all pros and no cons. When people make the comment, I wish I was creative, I want to ask, “Really? Because it ain’t all pretty landscapes, standing ovations, and sipping from your tea glass with one pinkie out.” So while I won’t lie and tell you I’d change a thing, because I love being the creative type, I have to admit that there are plenty of drawbacks to being an artist as well and those are what I want tell you about in this episode.

I’m Michael Blackston and this is what covers the canvas of my Funny Messy Life.

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Most artists I know realized they had the skill to create early in life. It was the same way with me and I was one of about four or five kids in my grade who everybody knew could draw. It didn’t take long after the first instances of public artistry that some of the frustrations started to rear their ugly heads. First, a kid who is just learning to find their artistic groove wants to draw or paint what he or she wants to draw or paint. The concept of selling my work hadn’t crossed my mind in fifth grade. All I knew was that I had a deep, intense desire to draw The Incredible Hulk over and over again. And it was alright when Kenny Parker started watching over my should and asked what I was drawing. It was kind of cool to have an audience who admired my work. It was not alright when Kenny Parker started making suggestions.

“You know what you oughta do?”

I didn’t answer him because I did know what I oughta do - exactly what I wanted to do. But Kenny Parker answered his own question.

“You oughta give him machine guns.”

I think that this might have been the first time in my artistic life that I realized people are stupid. The Hulk didn’t use machine guns because he had muscles and he destroyed everything with his fists. I knew it, Kenny Parker knew it, and everybody else in fifth grade knew it. Bruce Banner never warned his enemies by showing them a couple of M-16s. He told them not to overly irk him and that if they did, indeed, spark his ire, the enemy in question would find no fun sport in his resulting aggression. I guessed I’d have to remind Kenny Parker of that.

“Hulk don’t need guns.”

“Yeah, but it’d be cool. Draw him some guns.”

“No, Kenny. Leave me alone.”

“What’s that on his chest?”

“It’s pectoral muscles, Kenny.”

“It looks like he’s got boobs.”

“It’s not boobs. It’s muscles.”

“Hey Mike, you know what you should do? Draw him a Hulkmobile.”

“No. It’s my drawing.”

“Fine. Mrs. Ayers, Michael’s drawing boobs!”

I had to explain to my teacher that I wasn’t drawing naked people. I hadn’t learned how to draw pectoral muscles well yet, so yes - Hulk’s chest looked a bit like the naked chest of an 80 year old woman and I was asked not to draw anybody - Hulks or old women alike - with their shirts off. Incidentally, later on Kenny Parker was caught drawing naked people on the bathroom stall and they looked suspiciously like the Hulk. So that experience was also the first time I encountered censorship and plagiarism.

I’ve never met an artist who hasn’t had to deal with someone telling them what they ought to do, but that’s not the only common thing.

I frequently have to do layouts in pencil for customers to approve before rendering their final piece and since that happens a lot while I’m on the road, I have to find a cozy booth in a restaurant so I can work over a glass of ice tea or a cup of coffee. Without fail, I’ll get the obligatory compliment about the work from a stranger who has built up the courage to ask if they can see what I’m doing, immediately followed by something along the lines of, My granddaughter can draw like that. The need for people to tell me all about their lives without you having asked them is uncanny, which is why I thought, when I asked listeners of this podcast to contact me and tell me their own stories so I could put them in an episode, people would jump at the chance. Crickets. Crickets is what I got. Anyway, the stranger is never done. They’ve opened a door and I’m too polite to ask them to leave me alone. I get to smile and nod and encourage their granddaughter, or nephew, or cousin Bertha who makes macaroni art, to keep up the good work. My granddaughter draws the cutest little naked superheroes. You know at first, the men looked like they had boobs, but now she can draw muscles. I try to giove her advice, but she doesn’t seem to like it very much.

Go figure. At least from my experience, she’s on the right track.

I find it interesting that there is a universal comment non-artists will make to explain just how far the distance is in the gap between you and them when it comes to creating an image on the surface of something. They always watch me for a little bit and before long, they can’t help themselves. Maybe you’ve said it, too.

I can’t even draw a stick man.

It happens every time.

Sometimes they tell me they can’t even draw a stick man, BUT their aunt Hilda’s gardener’s stepson can draw anything he sees.

On occasion, someone will actually seek advice to tell their loved one who aspires to be an artist.

I’ll usually tell them to learn how to draw pectoral muscles because otherwise, people will just think you’re drawing boobs.

You learn a lot about people and realistic expectations if you’re an artist and let others see your work. I used to get excited when random onlookers would ask questions like, Do you do private commissions? or How much do you charge for something like that?

The learning curve was a quick one because I’ve come to realize that when most people ask you stuff like that, they’re usually doing one of three things:

1. Just trying to make conversation
2. Genuinely think for approximately 2.63 seconds that they might be interested in buying art from you, but they also like buying stuff from other people, like As Seen On TV stuff off the shelf at Walmart, Stuff they actually see on TV and can’t live without, beer, cigarettes, and chia pets. All stuff that will seem more important later in the day than a piece of your artwork.
3. Or they’re a fellow artist who can’t figure out what to charge for their own work and want you to tell them.

That’s what business cards are for. I simply tell them that every piece ids different and I charge according to what’s needed to be done. I then hand them a card with my number on it and tell them that when the timer comes to call me and we’ll discuss it. But they’ll never call. They’ll lay the card in the junk catcher compartment of their car and won’t see it again until they need to fetch something with a stiff edge to pick out the piece of meat that got stuck in their teeth. Come to think of it, that’s a waste of my good business cards, so from now on, I’ll print out the ones I hand to those people at home on an old roll of paper towels that fell in the dish water, then dried out, but I never had the guts to use.

Of course if you hang around the art community long, you’ll run into a varied array of artist personalities. There’s the insecure artist who could hold gallery shows, but thinks their art is crap. There’s the artist whose art is crap, but thinks it’s great and holds gallery shows, the artist who flits from style to style and medium to medium depending on what’s selling best at the moment at the craft shows, the snooty artist who uses words like passe and kitsch about other people’s art. And there are plenty of artists who create because it’s what drives the beat of their heart. I like to think that’s who I am, although I suspect I’ve been a touch of all the others at some point. I try to respect any style of art that’s rendered as long as it’s done to create something that moves either the artist themselves or the viewer.

I’ve camped out in the area of the visual arts this whole time, but I’m one of those people who uses the artsy side of my brain completely and apparently never developed the other side. I can do basic math and figure out some things based on formulas I memorized, but throw a letter in with numbers and I’ll run screaming from the room and go find a pretty picture to paint. I sing, I act, I write, I paint, I draw, I direct (which is an art all by itself), and I’m a good public speaker. That’s enough to occupy my time with something for the rest of my life and I’ll be happy if it earns me a dollar or a smile. Either way, I’m happy.

And by the way, if you see one of my business cards floating around in a gas station toilet, how about boiling it and handing to the next person who asks if you know a good artist. Maybe they have something stuck in their teeth.

Until next time, I’m Michael Blackston. Thanks for joining me for an artsy fartsy look into my Funny Messy Life.

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As I sit in a fast food restaurant creating this episode, my son is 15 years old and wants to drive everywhere. In a few months, he’ll be going for his driver’s license and I’ll begin the era of parenting when my heart thumps a million beats per second every time he’s out on the road by himself. And he’s doing really well. He takes Driver’s Ed right now as well, so he’s getting plenty of practice, but he prefers me to go out with him to his mother, who apparently goes into a screaming panic whenever he makes the tiniest mistake, like crossing into the oncoming lane when there’s oncoming traffic and that oncoming traffic is a tractor trailer. I’m cooler in those situations and give constructive criticism like, Should probably get back in your lane, instead of doing like Kayla, who would grab the handle above the door and scream, WE’RE ALL GONNA DIE! I understand it, but I’m the one who taught my wife to drive and there are a couple of quips from those days I thought you might find interesting. And there’s one from her mother’s driving days that was funny enough to make it into my first novel. I’m Michael Blackston and this is a fast and furious episode of my Funny Messy Life.

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I just remembered I’ve never told you how my wife and I met, so that’s coming soon It’s a cool story that makes women-folk go “AWWWW!”, but for now, we’re going to jump a little further beyond that about 30 minutes into our first date. We’d been talking for a while, but we’d never been in the same car together. I picked her up for that date and headed into town for dinner and a movie. I was driving an AMC Spirit. It was tan and looked a lot liker a Pinto, but probably didn’t drive as well. It had about 800,000 miles on it. My dad had given it to my sister as a gift when her car died, but she couldn’t steer it because the wheel was like trying to turn an anchor that had been planted in a block of cement. It was hard for me, but Steph is a small woman and she preferred to drive something that didn’t require her to only drive in a straight line. So I took the car and that’s what I picked up Kayla in for our first date.

We were nervous heading into town. We only knew each other from the telephone - a sneaky tidbit I’ll tell you more about in the How We Met episode - so I don’t think there was that much being said during the drive. My mind’s eye remembers a lot of sticky sweet giggling and me trying to look as macho as I could. The one thing I’ll never forget is being suddenly berated by my would-be bride.

I could show you the piece of road because it scared me and honestly, she still fusses at me for the same thing to this day.

I had found a voice and was telling her something - probably trying to solidify myself in her eyes as Mr. Macho Big Shot Impressive Hunk Of A Man - when she suddenly yelled at me. I had gotten a little animated with my story and when I do that, my hands fly around like they’ve got an infestation of bats inside them and those bats have been disturbed.

“KEEP BOTH HANDS ON THE WHEEL!” she yelled at me. “Never take your hands off the wheel when I’m in the car!”

“Sorry.”

I put both hands at 10 and 2 from then on and had to work up the courage to carry on a conversation.

So I know how Noah feels when he says she’s a nervous passenger. In fat, she drives 99% of the time that we’re in the car together and only gives up the wheel when she has to. Which is hardly ever. She claims it’s because she gets sick, but I wonder if there’s a little bit of her being in the car with me for so many years now … me and my bat hands. But she’s had her moments too.

I taught her to drive and not only that, but I taught her in a manual transmission. My wife drives a stick as well as anybody, but that wasn’t the scariest part of teaching her to drive. Her problem was that she loves animals so dang much, especially a kitty.

By the way, I had to stop after that last part and leave the fast food restaurant because I needed to get back to work. Now I’m continuing the story after work in a table service restaurant and yes - I know I have a problem. At least at the fast food restaurant, which will remain nameless because I don’t advertise for free, but it rhymes with Nubway, I had a salad. My diabetes dictates that I should incorporate some leafy greens into my diet and also a crap-ton of Caesar dressing and croutons. The report I read didn’t exactly have those last two things in it, but I believe that to be an omission typo. At this restaurant, who’s name rhymes with Larfield’s, I am not having a salad. Let’s just leave it at that, except to say that I ordered extra sour cream.

Anyway … driving lessons and kitties.

I started my wife out with a few easy, non-threatening jaunts around my neighborhood. It’s a peaceful neighborhood where my parents still live to this day and you can walk around all safe without fearing for your life. It’s even a place where kitty cats and puppy dogs gallivant about, just happily licking their paws and smelling butts with reckless abandon.

It was one of these paw licking kitties that caught the attention of my wife as she was learning to drive. The cat was paying us no attention because it was all the way across the yard from the road, up next to its house. But Kayla noticed it and suddenly we were no longer on the asphalt. There was grass in front of us and a cat that suddenly did notice us as we barreled toward it.

Okay that’s a little bit of an exaggeration. She did point the car toward the cat and veer off the road, but me grabbing the handle above the window and screaming, WE’RE GONNA DIE! brought her quickly back to the reality that she could not at that moment and from behind the wheel of a metal death machine, pet the kitty.

Why would I even make such an exaggeration? Because of this last nugget from when Kayla’s mom was a presence on our roads.

Hazel. I need to dedicate an entire episode to stories about Hazel, but I’ll let Kayla and her sister provide me with the content because … well, you could make a movie about Hazel. She’s gone to be with the Lord now and I can only hope she has a way to listen to this from one end of her kitchen table in Heaven, probably nursing a cup of strong coffee.

As the story goes, she was driving somewhere and something caught her eye. She was passing a local cemetery and there were three or four workers filling in a grave by hand. As most good southerners would have, Hazel thought to herself, I wonder who died.

Now, after I heard this story from Hazel herself, who told it and every other story like nobody ever could or ever will be able to again, I started to understand where Kayla got the tendency to point the car in whatever direction her head was turned. I think you can probably see where this is going.

When a person sees other persons digging a grave by hand, I would think it’s logical that they would find it more interesting than the other stuff around them like the speed limit and the road in front of them. And that seems to be consistent with how Hazel felt about the situation. According to her, out of nowhere, she started to see through her windshield, shovels flying in the air and she heard lots of yelling. She barely realized she had turned off the road and was heading through the cemetery, straight for the grave workers, in time to stop before she drove the car right into the fresh hole. It’s a good thing she did stop because into the fresh hole is where the workers had jumped to avoid getting run over.

Whenever Hazel told that story, she’d get beside herself and tag it with her signature cackle. The grave workers that day hadn’t found it so funny, but Hazel sure did and I can see her now, sitting behind the wheel, cackling like she did while they climbed cussing out of the hole and picked up their shovels.

Like I said, that one made its way into my first novel, Mr. Long Said Nothing, with the difference being that the character influenced by Hazel wasn’t alone and it was a horse and buggy she almost plunged into the grave.

I’ve had close calls of my own and maybe one day I’ll tell you those. I already told you about totaling my Hyundai in a rainstorm, but there are others, like the close one that fixed my little red wagon when it comes to driving sleepy.

For now, I’ll leave it there. I just pray safe travels for you, always and tell you to remember to keep both hands on the wheel … at least when my wife is in the car.

I’m Michael Blackston. Until next time, thanks for taking a drive down memory lane with me and my Funny Messy Life.

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I love to tell stories, especially in writing, and if I can use the responses from the stuff I’ve created as a gauge, I’d say I’m pretty darn good at it. I’m not tooting my own horn here. All a writer has to go by is audience response, but there might not have been a response to give if it hadn’t been for one woman - my eighth grade English teacher, Mrs. Thornton. I’d like to thank her for the way she encouraged me, but I can’t. She’s not with us anymore and I waited too late to tell her just how much her hard-nosed approach made a difference in my life.

I’m Michael Blackston and this is an important part of my Funny Messy Life.

I wasn’t a great student. I wasn’t even a good student, but I had something most prepubescent boys care nothing about. Potential.

My mother was an elementary school teacher for most of her working life and so in the small, southern town I grew up in, all the other teachers knew me. I was Brenda’s son - the one whose summer breaks were cut short because I was made to go a week early and help mom at the beginning of the year to get her room ready during pre-planning and at the end of the year to clean up during post-planning. I was always made to help the other teachers too, by doing things like pushing loads of textbooks back to their storage places on those carts that had two levels and always had one wheel that just spun around like your messed up buddy sometimes randomly did when he was on a sugar high, and all the time the other wheels did their jobs.

By the time I got to the eighth grade, most of the teachers in the school system knew Brenda’s boy and I got used to that. I had a deeper relationship with them because I helped them and I think they had a little sympathy for me because while the other kids were starting their summer breaks or getting in their last week of it, I was pushing that stupid cart around the empty halls of the elementary school, weaving that huge thing around with my tiny seven year old body like I’d had too much to drink the night before, and all because of that one rogue wheel.

I used the fact that they all liked me to my advantage and because mom was a single mother with stacks of papers to grade every night and couldn’t stay on top of me and my homework, I got into the habit of being what we in America call, A Dang Slacker. And I got away with it for a while. I sort of feel like I got a little extra consideration at times for being Brenda’s Boy. That was, until eighth grade, when I was assigned to Mrs. Thornton’s English class. She wasn’t mean; she wasn’t unreasonable. She just expected the best out of her students and would accept nothing less. She was a strong black woman who commanded the room. When she spoke, it was with confidence and articulation. She intimidated me.

Mrs. Thornton knew that if you allow children to function at their lowest level, they’ll grow up to function at their lowest level. If my mind wandered in class, she’d call me out. If I was bored and just stopped paying attention, she’d call me out. I couldn’t stand the woman.

I’m sure I had hurtful names for her and said things behind her back to my friends that made me feel good at the time, while she stood by, fully aware that I was doing it, and she wouldn’t give one, as we say here in the good ol’ U.S. or A., Tee-Total Rip.

Why?

Because she cared a lot about us. She wanted the best for her students, no matter what it took and no matter what we thought about her. We were children and in the long run, there might be one or two of us who realized how much she did care and would appreciate it. I wish I could tell her that I’m one of those kids, but I can’t. I waited too late.

Despite Mrs. Thornton’s and my mom’s best efforts, my eighth grade year was mostly an exercise in me being what we red blooded, southern Americans call, a Jim-Flammin’ Iggit. By the end of the year, I had nearly failing scores in all of my classes except for Chorus. My Math and English scores were failing, but I had one last hope of bringing my grade up enough to pass in Mrs. Thornton’s class. She was waiting on a term paper she said I hadn’t turned in. I actually thought I had turned it in, but it was nowhere to be found and she informed me that if she didn’t get it by the deadline, my English grade would be posted below 70. We could fail one class and still advance to the next grade, but failing two would hold me back to repeat the eighth grade.

There was no way I was going to get my math grade up. They might still be showing that grade to curious gawkers for a quarter apiece at fairs. But I dug in my heels about the term paper. I told her I had turned it in and she told me I had not. If you’re familiar with the attitude of what we Yankee Doodles Dandies call, The Male Eighth Grader, you know they’re stubborn and I wasn’t an exception.

I didn’t do the paper and I had three reasons: #1. I was a male eighth grader and I knew everything, #2. I was a male eighth grader and I was lazy, and #3. I fully expected to get that Brenda’s Boy credit.

When the report cards came out, I opened mine up, already planning my crazy escapades of the summer, and I started to cry. There were all of my scores - Chorus was a bold, high A, Math was failing and I knew it would be, all the others but one were passing. Barely, but passing. All but one. English. It was a failing grade, just as I had been told it would be, and I was figuratively hit in the face with what we around my grandma’s house call, A Big Ol’ Heapin’ of I Told Ya So!

Mama asked me what was wrong, but she already knew. She’d had a conversation with Mrs. Thornton before I got my report card and she was fully aware of everything, including what was to come next.

“I faaaaaiillled! Mama, I have to repeat eighth grade! WAHHHHHH!”

Mama waited for me to calm down and asked if I turned in my term paper like I was supposed to. I told her I had, but Mrs. Thornton lost it. Mama asked if I had rewritten it to make sure Mrs. Thornton got a copy on time and I screamed something to the effect of …

“She hates me and she lost it the first time - probably on purpose - and I turned it in and it’s not fair to make me write a new one because it was her fault and she lost it and she hates me and she’s always been mean to me since the first day of school and I didn’t know why and I’m telling the principle and she’s gonna get fired and … WAAAAAHHHHH!”

Mama calmly explained that Mrs. Thornton wasn’t to blame for any of this. I hadn’t kept up my homework, I hadn’t studied like I was supposed to, so I failed a lot of my tests. I didn’t pay attention in class and if I had done right, I probably would have passed even without turning in the term paper. She reminded me that I’d been warned this would happen and that Mrs. Thornton had been more than fair by even giving me the chance to rewrite it.

After a while, she also told me the plan going forward and I couldn’t believe my ears.

Mrs. Thornton had called mama and told her she’d give me one last chance. I was to come to her classroom during post-planning the next week and rewrite my term paper. She would read it and if I followed the guidelines for the paper, she would give me a grade one point above failing so that I could go to the ninth grade.

I rode my bike from the house to the school the next Monday morning and went to Mrs. Thornton’s class. She was bent over a stack of paperwork she had to complete to start her own summer break and she looked up from that when I walked in.

“Have a seat at your desk, Michael,” she told me and pointed to the spot where I’d slacked off all year long. She brought some paper and a pencil with her, along with a printout of the expected guidelines for the work. “If you’ll focus, it shouldn’t take you long,” she said, clearly disappointed that it had come to this for one of her students. She also knew that I blamed her for losing the paper and to this day, I still think I turned it in.

I started to write, but I couldn’t think. All I could do was dwell on the fact that there were woods to be explored, bikes to be ridden, and games of pretend Rambo to be played. I got madder and madder, until finally I found the courage to just ask Mrs. Thornton right out.

“Why don’t you like me?”

I think it surprised her and she got back up from her desk again to come sit in one of the smaller ones close to mine.

“Why do you think I don’t like you?”

I hadn’t planned the conversation past the initial question, so I stalled for a minute, but eventually came up with something. “You’ve been mean to me all year. Embarrassed me in front of the class, you’re making me do this paper again when I promise I turned it in.”

“Where did you put the first one?”

“I laid it on your desk.”

“Where on my desk?”

“Right in the middle.”

“Mmm hmm,” she mumbled and walked back over to her desk, taking something off it. She brought the thing to me and presented it atop of the paper I was trying to write. “Do you remember when I showed this to the whole class?”

What she had brought over was a tray, labelled boldly on the front. Term Papers. I shook my head that I did not remember.it.

“I showed this tray to the whole class and asked you each to place your papers in it. I said it was very important and that if you didn’t, I might not see it. It may have gotten mixed up with other things on my desk and I may even run across it one day, but you didn’t follow instructions and that’s not my fault, is it?”

“No ma’am.”

I’ve always had a problem paying attention. I was never diagnosed with ADHD, but I imagine if I had ever been tested for it, the results would have been posted right next to my math grade at the carnival. The doctors probably would have said something to my mother like, “Ms. Blackston, we think your son would benefit from medication.” If she asked which medication, they’d reply, “All of them.”

Mrs.Thornton had learned that about me and I think because of it - and a little bit of the Brenda’s Boy thing - she knew I struggled. But the biggest thing was that she believed in me. I realized early in life that I liked to write and some of that made its way out of me over the course of the year. And that’s what she told me.

“Michael, you’re here today getting another chance because I’m impressed by you. You’ve got a real talent for writing and I don’t want to see it go to waste. I’m not going to pass you without you rewriting this paper because I’ve seen what you’re capable of and I want you to see it too. I want you to understand the value of hard work and to reap the rewards only when you’ve completed the task. You’re a good writer and I’ve not been mean to you this year, I’ve been tough because I see something in you. If I didn’t, I wouldn’t have bothered to call you out. I wanted you to get it. I don’t hate you. In fact, I like you very much.”

Now, I don’t care who you are or what kind of attitude you throw out there, if someone says that to you, it’s gonna leave an imprint on your life. Nobody had ever told me they actually liked my writing before then and something Mrs. Thornton knew was inside me erupted forth and from that moment, I gave everything I had to my writing.

I finished the paper and she passed me into the ninth grade. I wish I could tell you that my talk with Mrs. Thornton moved me to become a superior student overall, but it didn’t. All through high school, I was what we writers call, Stubborn As A Mule. But I did take it seriously every time I was given a writing assignment and I excelled in those classes. I was on a mission because suddenly I loved Mrs. Thornton. It’s hard not to love someone who inspires you and ignites a fire of passion within you for something.

This podcast comes to you courtesy of that passion. I tried to record a few of these by just writing down a few bullet points and even flying by the seat of my pants without much of a plan, but it never felt right. I always came back to writing the episode all the way out because it’s what I do and I love it. I went through a time of not writing much, but I came back to it and at this recording, I’ve finished two novels and two plays, with more on the horizon and I’m just getting started. I owe that to one teacher who, in her wisdom and love for her students, refused to accept anything but the best from us. I wish I could tell her that, but I waited too late.

You know what? I’ll tell her anyway.

Thank you, Mrs. Thornton.

I love you.

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I work in the death industry. That’s the way I put it when I don’t feel like going into detail about what I do for a living and would rather you left me alone about it. It’s not very often that I have to give that as an answer because I usually like to talk to people about my job. But sometimes it’s been a tough day and all I want to think about are cuddly puppies and cheese steak sandwiches, so if you ask me what I do, I’ll reply, “I work in the death industry,” and that’ll probably end the conversation. But not always. In this episode, we won’t talk too much about what I do for a living, but because of my vocation, I hear some strange stories and I also frequently think about how my own passing will be handled. I’m Michael Blackston and this is my Funny, Messy, Life.

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Because I etch pretty pictures on gravestones for a living, and by the way, that seems like a decently short answer to give as well and isn’t as creepy, people will sometimes ask what my own tombstone will look like, whether I’ll be buried or cremated, etc. We’ll get to that in a minute. Right now, I want to discuss something that seems to be a growing trend in the funeral game and that is something called, Extreme Embalming.

I remember first hearing about it on the radio and checking it out, then saying to myself, “Self, that would make a funny topic for the podcast,” so I wrote it down in a note app on my phone and promptly forgot about it. There was probably a cuddly puppy or a cheese steak sandwich nearby or a cuddly puppy WITH a cheese steak sandwich nearby, which brings to question what I would do to get the sandwich away from a puppy who would be very eager to eat a cheese steak and how far I would go to wrench it from the little thing’s jaws. Would I hurt the puppy because I’m bigger? Would I coax it to let go of the sandwich with old fries from under the seat of my car? Would I just gnaw on the other end until me and the puppy met in the middle like the spaghetti scene from Lady And The Tramp? You can see how my mind works and why I might forget about the Extreme Embalming topic for a while.

But I’m back to it and if you’re wondering what it is and don’t feel like googling it yourself, then stay with me. My initial reaction was, “That’s gross and stupid and dumb and gross!” My second reaction was, “That’s not entirely different from something they used to do in the old days.” My third reaction was, “I’d probably try the cold fries from under the seat first.”

Extreme embalming is the practice of normally embalming a body, but instead of placing the body in a coffin with hands folded and eyes closed so they look peaceful and at rest like decent people, the family chooses to create a scenario for the viewing and sets up the body of the deceased in an interesting and whimsical pose as if they were still alive and having one hum-dinger of a time. This is a real thing!

Did you hear me? This is a real thing!

Here’s an example of what I’m talking about:

Uncle Walt has passed. He was old and he went peacefully, but he was also a maverick and Danger was his middle name. Uncle Walt had been a rodeo cowboy in his heyday. Perhaps the family feels like this is an occasion for an Extreme Embalming and so when you walk into the funeral home, you aren’t met with the fragrance of flowers, old lady’s perfume, and a casket at the end of the room with people somberly giving their condolences. No, it’s a rodeo with hay bales and ropes and barrels with goofy clowns hiding in them. And over in the corner, because Uncle Walt was a bull rider, there’s a mechanical bull like you see in honky tonk cowboy bars, going wide open. Hollers of “YEEEEE HAAAWWW!” and “RIDE ‘EM, COWBOY!” or maybe even “GITTALONG, LITTLE DOGGIE!” pierce through the crowd full of mourners. But you don’t get a chance to ride the bull. Oh no, that’s a privilege reserved for just one man. Uncle Walt. He’s been strapped to the mechanical bull so he don’t go flying off and his right arm is stuck high up in the air holding his hat. Uncle Walt is flopping around on that mechanical bull the whole time - just as stiff as a board, but holding on to that thing for dear … well, I would say life, but … you know, and flailing around to and fro like a champion because the bolts they used to screw him on are bigguns. In my sick mind, I hear the mortician in my head stepping back after tightening the bolts and saying, “That ain’t goin’ nowhere.”

You can find pictures of some of these scenes online if you’ve got the stomach for it and I guess I can understand the sentiment. Like I said, there was a time that something akin to this was a normal practice. In the Victorian era, when photography was brand new, people realized that if they took a photo of their deceased loved ones before they were buried, they could have one last thing to remember them by. Before cameras, if you wanted a picture of somebody after they died, you had to get an artist to draw them.

“Call the doctor! And while y’uns is at it, fetch cousin Ruby. She draws good!”

In my line of work, I’ve seen several modern day photos of bodies in caskets taken at the funeral home. But back in the day, they didn’t just take a pic right before the lid was closed on the coffin. They posed Granny in her favorite rocking chair and put the photo in an album filled with other photos just like it. They even had a name for albums like that - The Book of the Dead - and once again, if you have the nerve, Google will happily show you some photos. Just search Victorian Book of the Dead. Don’t say I didn’t warn you when you can’t sleep tonight. And you can’t blame the cheese steak.

I don’t see the need of having my body Embalmed Extremely. I won’t be doing that to any of my loved ones, either. But don’t think for a second that I haven’t thought out what my scene might look like. After all, I’m also a playwright and creating scenes is something I do. So if it becomes a law that Extreme Embalming MUST be done at every funeral, here is what I’m asking my family to do at my viewing …

I want there to be a living room setting with a big, comfy couch. On the wall is the largest flat screen TV you can get at the time and on that TV is a Georgia Bulldog football game. We better be playing a good team and we better be winning. I want to be sitting in the middle of the couch, dressed from head to toe in UGA gear. I want people to be tossing a football around the room and at least every two and a half minutes, whoever is holding the ball has to strike the Heisman pose. If they don’t a safety will be awarded to somebody the person holding the ball will have to punt.

On my right hand, which is raised like Uncle Walt’s because I’m cheering for my team, is an enormous, red, foam #1 finger. In my left hand is a cheese steak. Sitting next to me is the bulldog puppy I just took the cheese steak from. There is to be a bowl of Cadbury Creme Eggs on the coffee table in front of me and several other bowls of assorted chips and dips. The game should be one from before November 20, 2011 because I want the sound on the TV turned all the way down and a radio in the room blaring the call of the game by Larry Munson. Now that I think of it, I want it to be the Buck Belue to Lindsay Scott RUN LINDSAY, RUN! win over Florida. At halftime, I want Bulldawg Bite played by the Redcoat Marching Band.

Seriously, though, I do have a plan. I want to be cremated and I want to build and etch my own urn. It’ll be black granite and I’ll etch things pertaining to my life and loves on all four sides. But it won’t hold all of my ashes - only one third of them. I want the other two thirds handled in a special way

I want one third of my ashes mixed into paints and a painting created by an artist. I want the last third mixed into ink and a hardcover copy of my first book, Mr. Long Said Nothing, printed and encased in glass to be handed down to future generations of Blackstons.

Yep, I recognize that’s kind of morbid and probably stupid expensive, but in my line of work, you get a little numb when it comes to these things. I guess if it’s too expensive to to that stuff, my next of kin could go to the Dollar Tree and pick up a cheap glass to throw my funky dust in - it won’t matter to me anyway. I know where I’m going and you wouldn’t be able to drag me back if you wanted to.

Just … please, don’t bolt me to a mechanical bull.

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I’m a guy and guys have lots of different things about them that make them unique. There is one universal thing most guys have in common, though, and that is a deep love and appreciation for the comic form known as Bathroom Humor. There are occasionally women I’ll run into who understand the genius of this art form and my wife is not one of them. I will mention a lady a little later on who would go toe to toe with any man or boy when it comes to the intricacies of the humble fart, but for now, I have a story to tell that I teased several episodes back. You see, there is no better bathroom humor than humor that actually begins in a bathroom, so now I shall regale you with the time I peed on my leg. I’m Michael Blackston and this is Funny Messy Life.

____________________

It starts with The Statler Brothers. Growing up in the 1980s with parents and family who favored country music, my wife fell in love with the tight harmonies of The Statlers. She didn’t force their music on me when we started dating because she thought most people who liked them were already taking Metamucil everyday and getting letters from the likes of AARP and Back In The Day Weekly. She didn’t realize that I also like sweet, sweet harmonies, super high tenors, and basses so deep you can feel it in your pants. After a while, she found this out and we spent many hours in the car listening to them.

You can imagine the glee on Kayla’s face when I told her I’d gotten us box seats to see the Statlers at the Georgia Theatre in Athens - you guessed it … Georgia - for something we were celebrating, Probably her birthday, our anniversary, or maybe in those days, the fact that we hadn’t gotten a collection call about a late bill that week, which would make it seem frivolous to buy concert tickets if that were the case. Nevertheless, she was overjoyed at the prospect of hearing those pants punching bass lines live.

The night of the concert arrived and my bride and I put on our nice clothes - we call them our Go To Church clothes in the south - because we had box seats and we didn’t want the hoity-toity people around us to be able to tell we were driving a car the finance company was chasing us to repossess.

Oh look, Rupert. It appears we have the dregs of humanity in our amidst. Shall I fan their stink in the other direction?

Oh, do, Bedilia. I simply can’t fathom the thought of breathing the same air. Fa Fa Fa Fa!

Church clothes it was with a touch of haughtiness to boot - xomething my grandma would have called Puttin’ on airs. Kayla wore a dress and I wore a button down shirt - freshly pressed - and light tan slacks. My hair was parted perfectly and since Kayla had long locks back then, I assume they blew beautifully in the breeze around her face like the golden halo of an angel. (Actually, her hair is more reddish brown than golden, but I’m painting a mentsal picture here.)

We got to our seats and tried our best to look like we belonged in the same room with Rupert and Bedilia. We even secretly sniffed our armpits to make sure we didn’t stink. Then we sniffed each other’s armpits to make sure we were right the first time and before long the concert started.

I don’t remember who the opening act was, but I do recall she was fantastic. Her show lasted about thirty minutes before the Statlers came out and between the sets, the crew had to switch the stage for the main event. They gave us a fifteen minute intermission while they did that, so every person in the building decided at once to take the opportunity to go to the restroom.

Bedilia my dear, I believe we should retire to the loo, don’t you think?

Oh I do, Rupert I simply doooooooo!

Kayla and I went too and normally, as you probably already know, Kayla takes longer getting back because the line to the ladies restroom is backed up like a Soviet cold war era line for … well … toilet paper. But that night, she made it back first because I had myself a delay.

The men’s facility was packed and all the urinals were taken. Thank God because I got into a stall and what happened next wouldn’t have been fun in a crowd.

I assumed the position over the bowl - yes, I lifted the lid - and unzipped my pants. I had to go pretty bad and I was closed off from the public, so there were no bladder freeze issues, and I let ‘er rip. It was all good for a few seconds until I realized that I could feel a distinct pressure on the front of my left pant leg, like the caress of a gentle spring rain. I casually looked down and saw what was happening.

It wasn’t a gently spring rain.

Somehow, the stream of my pee was divided into two. One stream found its rightful place in the direct center of the porcelain bowl, while the other stream seemed to hit some invisible wall and bounce back onto my pants leg, creating a track about two and a half inches wide from mid-thigh all the way down to my ankle. I mentioned I was wearing light tan slacks. Do you know what happens to light tan slacks when they meet a two and a half inch wide stream of pee? They make a dark patch from mid-thigh all the way down to your ankle.

I didn’t know what to do. I performed some sort of emergency jiggle and reincorporated the two streams into the toilet, but the damage had already been done. I had to make a plan.

First, I would wait until I was sure everyone was out of the bathroom. I’d probably have to miss the first part of the concert, but that was okay because they’d turn down the lights and I’d be less conspicuous.

Second, I would frantically soak paper towels in water and try to scrub as much of the pee out of my pants as possible. This would make the track on my pants infinitely worse, but at least I wouldn’t stink and be the butt of Rupert and Bedilia’s jokes.

Last, I would hold my leg up to the blow dryer on the wall and hopefully no one would be the wiser.

That was the plan.

Here’s what actually happened.

It took forever for the bathroom to empty out. There was a dude in the other stall who must’ve had rotten tacos right before the show. After he finally left, I leaned down to peek under the bottom of the stall and make sure I was alone. By then, the pee track had gone cold and I had that wet clothes feeling down my leg, which made me walk, when I left the stall, like all the blood had gone out of my leg as I tried to minimize the contact with my skin.

When I got to the sink, I found that there were no paper towels. I considered soaking some toilet paper with water to scrub out the pee, but we’ve all seen what happens to TP when it gets wet, so that was a no go. I had no choice but to try and use the dryer on the wall and hope I didn’t smell.

It seems an easy thing to do to lift your leg up to those dryers when you plan it in your head, but in reality, you’d have to be either extremely tall, extremely agile, or fast enough jumping up and down so that more hot air than not gets to the spot on your pants.

My only option was the jumping and I’m not that fast. I tried it and I knew right away that it was an exercise in futility. It was over. I had to make my way back to the seat as cleverly as I could so as few people as possible saw the art running down my leg.

I left the bathroom, still doing that floppy leg walk because I hate the feeling of wet clothes on my skin, but I added the spectacle of trying to keep as much of my thighs together as I could to hide the spot.

I hobbled like Egor all the way back to my seat and Kayla looked at me concerned.

“What took you so long?”

I told her the story and ended it with a final declaration. “I’m pissed off.”

Of course, my adoring wife couldn’t pass up the opportunity to reply. She said, “Sounds to me like you’re pissed ON.”

I could have sworn over behind me I heard, “FA FA FA FA FA FA!”

It wasn’t funny when it happened, but now I look back on it as one of my favorite stories to tell when I want people to give me that face that asks, What’s wrong with you?

Which brings me to the lady I know who appreciates that kind of humor. Her name’s Kelley and she’s a dear friend. I’ve done several theatre shows with her and even mentioned this once before in a story called, The Stuff Wings Are Made Of, but it’s worth mentioned again.

Just before were were to go on stage - I mean right before we were about to go on - I whispered into Kelley’s ear, “Hey … did I ever tell you about the time I peed on my leg?”

She died laughing and it’s been a running joke between us ever since.

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I’m always the last one to the party when it comes to whatever whippors the younger generation is snapping. Just when I felt comfortable using words like “Bad” to describe something as good, I was told that I’m behind the times. Suddenly “Dope” was the term used for something good; no longer the term we used for drugs. Add to that the fact that being in possession of a particularly powerful drug meant that you had gotten your hands on “The Good Stuff”, and life could get confusing. This was all years ago while I was still a kid. I was the fogey among my friends, I suppose.
But as I get older, I find the trend of lagging culturally behind has remained in place while the new slang gets more and more weird.
At one point in time, the phrase, “Sup Yo” was an admonition for a dude named Yo to partake in a meal or a glass of tea. Now it’s a question you ask in passing to your buddy or your ex gym teacher if he was the sort of educator who liked to “hang” with you or considered you his “homey”. Even recently, I was informed via a radio morning show (so you know it’s accurate)
that it is no longer acceptable to "LOL" anything. That’s apparently old school texting. I remember metal turn dial desk telephones that weighed the equivalent of a busload full of The Biggest Loser losers and now there’s an area of texting that is considered old school. I had just achieved the confidence of typing LOL without feeling stupid. Now we are to reply to something funny by typing out the actual sound. “HA HA” is the new cool. I’m okay with that. I actually feel better typing HA HA than I do LOL.
But I began thinking about what could possibly be the future of our language in terms of slang and texting procedures. And after mulling it over, I believe I have come to some pretty accurate predictions. Here now, is a list I have compiled through no small amount of mathematical and scientific hypothesis awesomeness.
HA HA.
These are common phrases and words we may fully expect to see make a complete 180 in their descriptions. I think this list is pretty sick (meaning fantastic).

FLAPJACKS – You might expect this to mean something related to breakfast or
devices people with floppy skin might use to hike up their arm wings. But you’d be wrong. This will be the new alarm sounded when your team scores a touchdown in American football and likewise for something people call futbol. Now, when our team is
successful, we shall jump up and scream, “Thass right! FLAPJACKS boyeeeee!” My sources tell me this new form of expression will be considered quite “Sweet” (meaning “sick”, meaning “dope”, meaning “bad”, meaning “good”).

PEBBLES – The charming nuggets used for skipping over a pond or a popular Hanna
Barbara cartoon child who turned into a Hanna Barbara cartoon hottie in later years?
Absolutely not. It will be the new curse word favored by trash mouthed high schoolers all
over the good ol’ U.S. of A. It will be splattered willy-nilly across your social media
pages. “Did you see that pebbles jacket Heather was wearing? She looked like a pebbles
hobo. If I were Heather, I’d say pebbles that jacket. PEBBLES IT!” Parents will cringe
every time they hear the “P” word in movies and eventually on late night cable.
GRANNY - Sorry, guys. It’s the new hair-do for men. It will be all the rage to shave a
wide, bald strip right down the middle of your head from front to back. The hair left on
either side is then braided and glued into crazy shapes like lightning bolts and saw blades.
Why is it called the GRANNY? Who the heck knows?! The consensus is that this style,
much akin to the upside down afro men are sporting on their chins now that makes them
all look like they’re about to go minin’ fer gold up in them thar hills, will be accepted as
“killer” (meaning “sweet”, meaning “sick”, meaning “dope”, meaning “bad”, meaning
“good”).

SQTASTJIME (Text Initials) – I know what you’re thinking. You’re thinking that can
only stand for, See? Q Tips Are Safe To Jam In My Ear. I can’t tell you how many times
that particular acronym would have come in handy before. But you are wrong, my friend.
Soon the world will text SQTASTJIME to convey the message, Sitting Quietly Taking A
Simple Test; Java Is My Electricity. Some Christian texters will replace the word Java for
Jesus. Jesus will be our electricity.

GOO – No longer a word for a sticky substance in the back of your refrigerator or that
stuff you wake up with in the corner of your eye. Believe it or not, it will be associated in
a familiar fashion as a nonsense word uttered by a toddler. However, the connotation will
be accusatory as if the recipient of the word in a text or comment is dumber than a small
drooling human. To pour salt on the wound, the word will eventually be replaced by a freakishly ugly baby doodle emoticon. How Adorable! – Speaking of ugly babies … This phrase will come to mean just the
opposite of how it sounds. A remark of this kind will tell the parents of a child, “THAT
IS AN UGLY BABY! PLEASE LEAVE AND GOOD DAY!”
GOOD DAY – Interestingly enough, “Good day” will come to mean, “I hope you
have to build an igloo out of bottle caps and newspapers to live in. And then I hope it
rains on your newspaper bottle cap igloo.”
As you can clearly see, our world is becoming increasingly hostile and it doesn’t look
to get any better. I hope, for humankind’s sake, that we get back to letting “yes” mean
“yes” and “no” mean “no”.
Stop changing our words on us and maybe communication will be easier, humanity
will get along, and we won’t be afraid to say what we feel.
So with that, I say God bless and good day.
Good day in the bad way.
Not the bad way as in “bad”, but as in sick.
Not sick as in nauseated, but, you know … dope. Oh, never mind. I’ll just go build my igloo.

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Feets Don't Fail Me Now
For years it went something like this …
“KICK! And TURN! And BACK! And BEND! And … Arms loose, ladies; Guys,
keep those shoulders back. Posture, people. POSTURE! We open in two weeks! Okay,
keep it goin’ annnnd … KICK! And TURN! And BACK! And SP- … No, no, Michael.
It’s BACK and SPIN, not SPIN, KICK, BACK. No, no, no, NO! There’s no LUNGE in
this routine, Michael. Stick to the choreography. Here we go … KICK! And BACK! And
… Michael … Michael … MICHAEL! WHY ARE YOU THRUSTING LIKE THAT?
GET OUT MICHAEL. GEEEETTTTT OOOUUUUTTTTTT!”
To put it mildly, my dancing has always resembled something like a kindergartner’s
recital if all the kindergartners were blindfolded and on roller skates. I Can’t help it,
though. I was born a singer and an actor, not a dancer. I have spent my entire life
avoiding anything that had the remotest indication of movement in rhythm and because
of this behavior, it’s with no surprise that my reaction to the suggestion of a dance in any
form has always been, “… (blink) … You, um … (blink) … You want me to do what?”
I go numb. My brain reminds me of the scene above where I thrusted and lunged when
I should have kicked and spun and the teacher threw me out. I’d never been thrown out of
church before. I never will again. Because …
I.
Don’t.
Dance.
But wait! What’s this happening to my feet? Why are my hips twisting, my toes
tapping, and my hands assuming the splay-fingered form known as Jazz?
It’s because I have found my groove, at least I hope.
The curtain opening on The Addams Family – The Musical will not only find me
adopting an entirely different look, but there will also be another aspect of the Gomez
role that many who know me will absolutely not expect – dancing.
The opening number is heavily choreographed already, but there’s a tango at the end
that is pushing the limits of my “able to”. I'm managing it though, and frankly, I’m
starting to get a little cocky about how well I feel I’m doing. Forget how many times I hear the encouraging words of my choreographer (“Don’t worry. You’ll get it.”). The
plain fact is, I think I got it! And I can’t wait to put my new dancing shoes into play with
my everyday life.
No longer shall I hear, “Michael? Dance? Hahaha … hahahahahaha …
HAHAHAHAHAHA! No offense, but … BWAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!”
From now on, it’s move over Kevin Bacon, ... hold on to your jacket, John Travolta, ...
not so fast, Carlton. It’s "Michael Time" and you absolutely cannot touch this! I’m so
excited that I'm ready to burst a move at this very moment. I’m feeling sort of hot and
beginning to think perhaps I should drop it like such. I still don’t know what that last one
means exactly, but I’m sure it has nothing to do with an unsavory move involving one’s
rear end. Twerking? NO. I draw the line there, dirtbag.
I can say that you may very well see me in the potato chip aisle at the local grocer,
however, shaking my groove thang. In my next business meeting, it’s possible I could
actually stop, collaborate, and listen. My life has opened to a world of possibilities now
and I can’t wait to move to the beat of it all. Can you even stop the beat? No. No you
can’t stop the beat. I found that out the awesome way. I’m having a Jellicle ball thanks to
learning that I have what it takes to boogaloo and even slide electrically.
Whew. I had to wipe my brow a little after that. Are you tired? I’m tired … tired of
standing still! I know all my references are old school. I have intentionally been away
from the current music scene and I don’t plan to change that. I have so much to catch up
on that I probably won’t get to today’s moves until I’m ninety – a fit, in shape, ninety
year old man who still thinks he could play The Rum Tum Tugger if need be, by thunder!
So now that I’m armed with this new found ability in my theatrical arsenal, I’m
thinking of dancerly shows I’d like to tackle. I mentioned CATS earlier, but I still have
quite a road to travel before I'll be able to fit my buttocks into a leotard. Singing In The
Rain might be a possibility as well as Chicago … wait, no. The dancers in that one are
mostly ladies and I won’t be doing any cross dressing. Also … leotard. That leaves A
Chorus Line, maybe.
I know what you’re saying to yourself. You’re saying, “Slow your role, buddy. That
kind of dancing takes a lot more work and effort than you think. Years go into perfecting
the craft.” And I know you’re right. So I suppose if I must, I’ll take it a bit slower just tomake you happy. (And not make you jealous of my sweet new moves)
To start, I’ll just try to get through the current production without breaking an ankle or
throwing out my back. It is a comedy, so maybe I can play it big, yet on the lighter side
so that I don’t show up the rest of the cast. That’s what I’ll do. If you come to The
Addams Family and see me up there pretending to give it my best, but looking a little like
I have two left feet, please understand that it’s just for the sake of the show. We’re all a
team on that stage, so there's no need to show off.
Yes, that’s the thing to do. Don’t expect greatness on my part, just the appearance of a
guy in his forties who doesn’t put the word dancer in his resume.
But know this – I may be holding back as far as you can tell, but in my chest beats the
heart of a Fred Astaire, a Michael Jackson, a Gregory Hines, or a Ted Koppel. And now
that my feet are learning to be free, there’s no caging them.
And yes, I did have A LOT of coffee tonight while editing my podcast. How did you
know?
Oh, who am I kidding? You’ll never see me on a dance floor in a freestyle tornado of
shimmying; body parts flailing willy-nilly with reckless abandon. That’s not me. But I
can say I’ll not be shying away from shows that feature dancing any longer. It’s great for
the mind, body, and spirit as long as you don’t care how you look. I’ll just have fun and
give it my best.
And if A Chorus Line ever comes around, I’ll audition.
God, I hope I get it.

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I’m changing into someone I never thought I’d be. When I look into the mirror, it’s beginning to be hard to recognize the man staring back at me. This new me is becoming exotic; a word I don’t think would have ever been used to describe any of my attributes. And to others, it probably still wouldn’t. But I see it coming. It’s right there in my mindand I like it. This new me will be debonair and dark and, well … Hispanic.
I am slowly turning myself into Gomez Addams for my role in The Addams Family – The Musical, and I must say I think it’s gonna be pretty dang awesome!
I have to admit that when I first heard that this show was going to be the musical for our local theatre’s 2016 season, I was quite bummed out about it. I had never heard the soundtrack and knew nothing of the story. All I knew was that I had tired of Broadway’s
leaning toward making musicals from TV shows and movies. None of it really impressed me and most felt forced; like an attempt to capitalize on something that had already been
mostly created by somebody else. After all, it hasn’t been that long since Spiderman danced his way across my television screen during the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade, effectively ruining the holiday season for me. Like a nightmare clown zombie that haunts your sleep, I was unable to banish the sight from my mind for quite a while. At night, I would attempt to wipe the imagery of a man dressed as one of my favorite super heroes doing a box step. Super heroes and box steps are both wonderful things
separately. Put them together, however, and you get something you threaten children with if they won’t eat their broccoli. So you might imagine my astonishment upon falling head over heels in love with the show once I did a little investigation. I was thrilled that the storyline was interesting, that the characters were treated with depth and charisma, that Fester was still Fester, even though he sings now and is involved in an impossible love
dilemma.
My thoughts on the show turned completely around and I was one of the first at the auditions. Now I have been cast as Gomez and my beautiful wife has been cast alongside me as Morticia. Here’s the kicker … Neither of us look anything even close to Gomez or Morticia. As I said before, Gomez is Hispanic. I know that in the old TV show, he wasn’t as Hispanic as the later adaptations of the character, but the dialogue in the script is written true to the original idea, which is VERY Hispanic. I am about as albino as you can get. Kayla is too, but Morticia is known for having that pale look. I have blue eyes, alarmingly white skin, and hair so light that you can’t tell I have eyebrows unless you
look closely.

It can be intensely awkward when people you are talking to start leaning in close like they're making their move for a little sugar. (Unfortunately for those who are confused easily, “sugar” is also a southern term of endearment, a description for Diabetes, a popular name for a dog, and a way of cursing that replaces the other word that starts with the “SH” sound.)
“What in the world?! Step off, Uncle Mort!” I might say with a fist tight and ready to tangle.
“I’s jist lookin’ t’see iff’n you had eyebrows er not.” (That’s how everybody’s Uncle Mort talks below the Mason-Dixon line.)
“Well, stay outta my face. I can smell your snuff!”
But I digress.
Once I was cast as the charming Gomez Addams, I realized that changes had to be made to my appearance if I were to pull this role off properly. I had the accent down. I can handle that with no problem as I have been perfecting accents since I was a small
child. I had the singing down too. But I’m not happy unless I’m going full out Rambo into a role. I’m no method actor, but I want to be as convincing as I possibly can.
I decided that I would not use “Theatre hair color” to darken my mane. I would actually dye it in stages so that the transition would be gradual, yet by the time the curtain opened, I would have the hair of a matador. I hope to obtain dark brown contacts for my eyes. And I will grow a thin mustache and soul patch that will be colored for the show to match my head.
As I look into the mirror now, I see a man who has gone through stage one. The mid-tone brown my wife applied for me made my hair a nice deep auburn. We also did my eyebrows with the same color.
“STOP IT, COUSIN JO-NELL!” (Cousin Jo-Nell doesn’t care if I have eyebrows or not. She just always wants some sugar. I tell her she’s doing nothing to help our southern stereotype.)
The problem is that now that the process has officially begun, I don’t know if I’ll be able to stop. Surely there is a line I need to draw and refuse to cross. Right now I have the head of a highlands stud who gallantly travels the land in his kilt while skillfully bleating out Celtic love songs on his bagpipes. I’m totally at ease with that visual, even if you are not.
But I see a future closing in where I’m sporting a head of jet black hair, brown eyes, and leathery tanned skin. Yes, my tan will have to come from a spray, but nonetheless, I don’t think being a runner up for a George Hamilton contest ought to be in my plans.
Well GREAT! Now I want a face mole.
I need to be stopped. I need an intervention. I’m thinking of buying a red cape and changing from “Go Dawgs” to “Arriba!”
Question: Would it be distasteful to address people as “Meester” and “Meesis”?
I think it would, but that’s exactly what I want to do.
I know I go too far in these things. I played the killer in an Agatha Christie mystery and felt like I had to twist everything around for a while. “Hey, honey, I love this chicken parmesan you made for dinner … OR DO I?!”
All I know is that I will play the part with passion and when I kiss Morticia, I can give it all I’ve got because my wife won’t mind.
And when I’ve finally gotten back to my normal look and she moves in close to see if I still have my eyebrows, I’ll surprise her with a little sugar. Then it’s on to the next character.
Hmmm. I’ve always wanted to play Sweeney Todd, the Demon Barber of Fleet Street!

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If you have a phone in your pocket, you know the frustration that comes with what I’m getting ready to talk about. Telemarketers and the annoying trends most of us have to deal with on a daily basis. There’s something to be said about the days of good old when you made a call by picking up an enormous receiver that weighed approximately fifty pounds and asked a woman on the other end whose job it was to physically switch around wires on a big board in front of her - her name was always Marge - and you asked her to patch you in to Big Al at the market so you could have some eggs, butter, and bread delivered because you wanted a buttery egg sandwich. Back then, a telemarketer would have to get through Marge and her nosey wall of defense in order to bother you, but today, well … that’s what this episode covers. I’m Michael Blackston and you’re patched into a party line called my Funny Messy Life.

Today’s technology is great for a lot of things, but it also makes us vulnerable and gives easy access to predators. I want to talk about phone predators. There was a time when the word Telemarketer was pretty much a blanket statement. It brought to mind a peaceful, easy feelin’, interrupted suddenly by an energetic voice on the other end of the phone wanting to sell you a prescription to Egg Sandwiches Weekly or asking for a donation to the local volunteer fireman’s fund so they can feed the homeless egg sandwiches.

But now, there’s a division within the word. Telemarketers still emerge from their dungeons at suppertime to offer a great deal you just can’t miss, but lately it’s more likely the other kind - some recorded voice selling insurance or a credit card, or you’re being informed that you’re the subject of an IRS investigation and all you have to do is give some guy with an Indian accent your Social Security number and they’ll fix everything for you.

What’s happened is that now we’re almost happy to get a real person on the other end trying to sell us something. At least we can actually tell someone we’re not interested and if we ask to be taken off their list, they might - I say might - comply. With the scams, they’ll usually give you the option of pressing nine to be taken off their calling list, then they call again from a different number the next day.

That’s another thing. They hijack local numbers so you think it’s a legitimate call. This isn’t new to anybody, but it’s stupid annoying and so I’ve started trying to play around with them to waste their time since they seem to have no problem wasting mine. Unfortuantely, they must’ve have gotten wise to my shenanigans and put a note on my number to hang up on me when I press one to speak to a representative who would be delighted to show me how I can make $20,000 a month right from my toilet seat.

It’s usually the insurance calls that hand up on me, but I got to have some fun before they decided to block me. Yeah. THEY blocked ME! Here’s a sample of how one of these conversations went …

The phone rings and I don’t recognize the number. Caller I.D. tells me it’s from Beaver Snout, Montana. I know it’s a telemarketer, but I’ve got a couple of minutes while the paint’s drying on the tombstone I’m etching, so I think, why not see how far I can take this?

I answer the phone - “Hello.” - and low and behold a recorded voice starts the pitch.

“This is A-Plus Ultimate New-Fangled Hum-DInger Insurance and Associates with an amazing offer - Don’t hang up the phone! …”

I think to myself, “Oh, buddy, I don’t plan to.”

“We want to give you some exciting news about how you can now get super-duper sweet insurance for you business at a fraction of the price you’d pay for regular business insurance. Press 1 to speak to a representative who’s waiting now to show you how we can change your life, or press 9 to be taken off of our call list.”

Now I’m at a juncture. I know that if I press 9, not only will I not be taken off the list, but there probably won’t even be a recorded Thank You and the call will be ended with a cold, rude click. On the other hand, I can speak with the representative who’s waiting now with baited breath, and probably in an accent I’ll barely be able to understand, to tell me how they are going to change my life! I’m feeling spicy, so I press 1.

A voice comes on the line that sounds anything but happy to be working for A-Plus Ultimate New-Fangled Hum-DInger Insurance and Associates, but at least he has an accent I can understand. “This is Carl. Are you looking for insurance for personal use or business?”

“Business. I’m self employed, but I don’t have any insurance.”

“We can certainly help you,” Carl sighs, then asks, “Can I get your name?”

“Oddly enough, Carl, my name is Carl also.”

He starts to input my information. “Carlton … may I have your last name?”

“No, it’s not Carlton. My name is Carlotte. If I’d have been a girl, mom was gonna name me Charlotte, but when I scooted out of there and she saw I was a boy, she settled on Carlotte. Also, my dad sold Hondas.”

He sighed again. “Is that really your name?”

Now I know he’s on to me, but his job is to try and sell me something, so as long as he has me on the line, he thinks there might be a chance. “Yes, it is.”

“May I have your last name, Carlotte?”

“Driver.”

“How many employees would you need to ensure?”

“That depends on how many are left at the Home Depot when I drive up.”

“Is there anyone who works for you on a regular basis?”

“Of course.”

“How many are there?”

“Hey Carl - his name’s Carl too - how many people are you today?”

“I don’t understand, Mr. Driver.”

“You ever see that movie, SPLIT?”

“Yes …”

“It’s like that, only Carl don’t turn into no monster. Yes, I do. No, you don’t. Yes, I do! Shut up, Carl! Sometimes he’s the only one that comes to work, but sometimes he’s a whole crew. I guess you would call him a beast.”

I hear him tapping something into a computer and at this point, I’m impressed at his tenacity. Salesman Carl either really wants his commission for some really bad insurance or he desperately hopes he can get me to tell him my Social Security number.

I guess he regroups and decides to play along because the next thing I hear is, “Let’s do it this way, Mr. Driver …”

“You can call us Carlotte.”

“Certainly, Carlotte. I’d like to see if you come up in any of our databases as having previously been insured with us. It’s something we have to do by law. May I have your Social Security number?”

DING DING DING!

“We have several.”

“Alright. What’s the first one?”

“1”

Carl taps, I wait.

“Yes … next number.”

“2”

Tap, then, “Go ahead.”

“3, I think. Then 4.”

“Mr. Driver, are you messing with me?”

“YES WE ARE, YES WE ARE, YES WE REEEA-LLY REALLY ARE … SHUT UP, CARL! GO BACK TO YOUR HOLE!”

Annnnnd CLICK.

Sweet satisfaction. I’m the reason Carl the salesman will probably look for a different job two weeks after being hired by A-Plus Ultimate New-Fangled Hum-DInger Insurance and Associates.

It’s not always sweet satisfaction, though. Sometimes I get ahead of myself and end up feeling bad for the guy.

The other day, my wife and I were Christmas shopping for a couple of underprivileged kids and my phone rang, interrupting my Christmas spirit and the I.D. said the call was coming from Australia. I don’t know anybody from Australia, but I DO know how to do what I consider a decent Australian accent, so in order to keep a smile on my face, it was, as they say, on.

“Ello, mate.” I intended to use every single Americanized Australian cliche I could think of.

“Hello, Mr. Blackston. This is James. How are you today?”

Uh oh. This guy knows my name.

“Fine, mate. I was just about to throw some shrimp on the barbie and then hit the bush to hunt me a few Dingos.”

“That sounds like fun. I won’t keep you - I know you’re probably busy, but I notice you have your domain through GoDaddy and I wondered if you might need any help with your website.”

I’ve gotten these calls before, usually from somebody with the aforementioned hard to understand accent, and when I say I’m not interested, they persist until I have to hang up on them with a hearty, “I said good DAY, sir!” But this guy seemed like he genuinely wanted to help me and sounded like he was working hard to support his family. He didn’t sound like he was from Australia, but it didn’t matter at that moment in time. There could be any number of reasons my phone identified the call as having come from the land down under. James sounded like a red blooded American, but he could’ve been on vacation with his family. Maybe they were taking a nap from the red blooded American touristy things they were doing over there and James couldn’t sleep, so he thought he’d squeeze in a little work, trying to offer aid to those in need of web design assistance. Perhaps he was a big wig at the company and was on a business trip, but had a bit of free time to get his hands dirty with the honest work that made him the man he is today. I don’t know why I knew from the start that I could trust him - I just did. It was something in his voice. And now here I was, using a fake Australian accent, stuck in this insincere conversation with a man who just wanted to put food on his table. Shame on me, I thought to myself, then interrupted that thought to point out to my wife, a cute stuffed crocodile that struck my notice for some reason.

“Hey, Kayla - ow ‘bout wranglin’ that croc into the buggy. Crikey, she’s a beaut!”

Then it was back to James.

“Listen, mate. I appreciate your concern, but I’ve got all the help I need with my website. Howevah, if I decide I need a touch of assistance, you’ll be the first one I reach out to.”

And that’s where the call ended. I picture James softly hanging up the phone, wiping a tear from his eye just before it has a chance to roll down his cheek, and beginning to dial the next number of the person he has a strong yearning to change the life of with his sweet, sweet web designing skills.

I told my wife I had to be more careful with the way I answer my calls and then we finished shopping for the children. I think we ended up adding a framed photo of the big, weird looking auditorium in Sydney and an Outback gift card.

I guess I really should step aside for a second and explain that I have no problem with callers who have accents. I’ve made a bunch of mentions about people I have a hard time understanding and I need to explain a little further.

1. I’m hard of hearing, so I prefer someone who speaks clear english because if they don’t, it’s like the old game of telephone you used to play as a kid, except it doesn’t go through eight people before it gets distorted.

“Mister Blackston, I’m calling from across the street to tell you your house is on fire.”

“Of course I know Fred Flintstone used his feet to spin the car’s tires! What’re you calling me for?”

1. I don’t mind an occasional telemarketer, but the constant barrage and refusing to stop calling once I’ve asked to quit it for the love, drives me insane. So if they DO have an accent that sounds like it comes from a place where there’s a lot of sand, don’t insult my intelligence by telling me this is “Bubba.” I know what a Bubba sounds like and you ain’t no Bubba! If you want me to believe you are who you say you are, try being yourself.

Of course, I realize they may have a name that’s hard for a red blooded American to pronounce, but it won’t matter if we get far into the conversation anyway. If I’m having trouble, I’ll just call you Bubba.

Well, I’m glad I got that off my chest. Don’t be a stranger - if you enjoyed this or want to communicate with me, go to the website at funnymessy.com and use the contact page or email me directly at funnymessylife@gmail.com. Yeah, I did that so it’d be even easier for you. The website has all the stuff you need to subscribe, too, so you get notified immediately when I submit a new episode. See, I want to be your friend and I promise - I won’t call you Bubba.

I’m Michael Blackston and thanks for sitting in on another aspect of my Funny Messy Life.

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It hasn’t been a very fun year for me as a college football fan. It’s weird that I should say that, but it’s been a weird season. My team won all of their except for one and I’m pretty sure if we played that one over again, we’d take the win. It was one of those fluke games we were supposed to dominate, but stuff just kept happening. Then we went to the conference championship game to face the LSU Tigers and it went exactly the way I expected it to.

So you might be asking me why it wasn’t fun? My team did really well for the most part and things look promising for the future.

The reason it hasn’t been fun is that most Georgia Bulldog fans will tell you that the majority of the wins weren’t pretty and the entire season was spent with a lump in our throats, waiting for the shoe to drop. And through the wins, we knew what we were going to face in the postseason, - that being one of the most amazing quarterbacks I’ve ever watched, who played for LSU. We’re talking about a dude who ran his offense like he’d been playing in the NFL for ten years.

But, that’s not what I want to focus on in this story.

This is the story of how I handled this last game, even though I was prepared for the way it was going to turn out.

This is the story of why I’ve had to step away from several of the games I’d been excited to watch because of the monster I was becoming and some of the things I did, thought, or said that made me have to say, “Hey! Idiot … that’s not very Christ like.”

I won’t bore you with anymore game details. You can get that from sports talk radio till you’re blue in the jock strap. No, I think you’d probably be more interested in me - mild mannered Michael, father of two, and happy husband who puts up Christmas lights with my son in the very visual of a Norman Rockwell painting - becoming a total dip-wad jerk-face about college football.

I said “DIP” … with a “P”.

I get my sports watching from my grandpa, mostly, except for the losing my ever-lovin’ mind part. I remember him sitting there in his chair on Sunday afternoon, watching the Braves or the Falcons in steely silence, only speaking up when we kids got too loud or between him and the TV. He’d speak up then and say something like, “Can’t hear the TV!” or “Can’t see the TV!” Then it was back to silence as he took in whatever was happening, whether it was bad or good. When it comes to Atlanta sports, the balance has been toward the bad, except for the 15 year run the Braves had of straight NL East Division championships. But you don’t want those stats. You want to hear about how, when watching sports and my team doesn’t do well, I can summon the deepest, darkest, thoughts from hell’s whimsy.

That’s where any similarity ends with my Grandpa as far as sports watching habits go - the silence. I really don’t care for people talking around me when the game’s on. I don’t like going to watch parties because the word “Party” tends to mean people will be communicating and I like to focus completely on the game. How else am I going to understand exactly how stupid the play calling is or how transparent the play calling is or how moronic the play calling is? I could go on.

It starts with the usual stuff … outbursts like, “OH COME ON!” and “WHERE’S THE FLAG, Helen Keller?!”

I usually have a good, well thought out reason for being in disagreement with the coaching, or the on-field play, or the referee’s judgement, or the smug look on the opposing running back’s mother’s face. But when things don’t go my way on a large scale, I can ramp up my negativity to 11. I start thinking things I shouldn’t when things start happening like the play calling is vanilla, which it was most of the season, or the receivers play as if the were just taken off an assembly line that day and had never seen a football before - an assembly line where their sole job was to smear butter with their bare hands.

I’m not violent in my thinking. I never wish for a player to suffer a physical injury, but I’d be lying if I don’t go to dark places in my mind where there’s public embarrassment for the opposing coach or the opposing running back’s smug mother. I think about things like how sweet it’d be if my team could make a miraculous comeback and I might get to see the other team’s player’s and fan’s gaping, arrogant mouths hanging open in disbelief and inconsolable grief like big ol’ open mouths! Maybe I’d be offered the extra sprinkles on top of a victory cupcake of witnessing real, cascading tears of emotional torment on the faces of the other players and the running back’s mama.

But I’m a Christian. I believe every word of the bible, including Love thy neighbor as you love yourself and Do unto others as you would have them do unto you. I don’t think, Don’t be a dip-wad jerk face, is from the bible, but it is good wisdom, and by the time my emotions get that far, I feel the Holy Spirit start knocking on the door of my heart, saying something to the effect of, Um, Mike ol’ buddy ol’ pal, That’s not exactly the way I want you thinking. In fact, it’s exactly the opposite of how I want you thinking.

Of course, until I come to my senses, my flesh will argue.

"Are you watching this? That was obviously pass interferance! The refs are being paid - I know it!"

I doesn’t matter. You’re supposed to be the salt of the earth and you know THAT. Right now, you’re more like sour sauce on a four day old burrito.

"Cheating is wrong! And also, our offensive coordinator only knows one play! UP THE MIDDLE! UP THE STINKIN’ MIDDLE!"

Watch your temper, Michael. Be the salt.

"I want to pour salt in the ref’s eyes!"

GET THEE BEHIND ME, SATAN!

But like a true believer, when the Holy Spirit corrects me, it sticks, and even though I don’t want to listen, I can’t help but to. That’s why during the 2019 Southeastern Conference championship game, when I started to scream at everything in eyesight like a person who had completely lost every bit of his mind, beginning with the television, ending with the Christmas tree, and everything in between, I had to remove myself from the situation.

It was clear that my team was outmatched and there would be no miraculous comeback. So when I let out a final, “#$^(I@&#Y&%#^!#&(@#&(*@#^Y(&!@^#&@ IT!”, I heard more sternly from the Holy Spirit.

First of all, Mister, we don’t talk like that and you know better! Second, you’re done.

"Fine, I’ll go to my room."

No, sir. I want you to leave this house. Go somewhere and cool down. You think about what you’ve done and how you are to behave, young man, and I don’t want you coming back in this house until you can do so with a Christian attitude. AND DON’T EVEN THINK ABOUT GETTING CHOCOLATE TO MAKE YOURSELF FEEL BETTER! In fact, I’m coming with you to make sure you do as you’re told.

I went to my bedroom where my wife was comfortably settling in to watch her team play in their conference championship game, which we all knew they would win without a problem, and told her that I was not acting or thinking very Jesus-like and that I had to step out for a while. We had a lot of dirty laundry to catch up on and I had decided to go to the laundromat and do it all at once. Besides, the washer we had at the house was not being very righteous either and had that night started re-enacting Noah’s flood all over the laundry room floor.

She said okay and at first, I thought she said it rather smugly. I don’t like smug, but the Holy Spirit spoke up and stopped me in my tracks …

Stopppppp iiiiiiitttt! There was nothing smug about her reply and if you start being a dip-wad jerk face to her, you’ll regret it.

I’m glad the next day was Sunday, because I needed to be in God’s house for some spiritual recharge in a bad way. I went to the laundromat, got everything washed and dried, and even got the opportunity to pray silently for a family of people who came in just before I left, who let’s just say needed …. You know what? No. We all need prayer and I’m starting to sound like a dip-wad jerk face.

Here’s to being a good neighbor and listening to the Holy Spirit. Thank God He guides me, because if He didn’t, I’d might be mentally wishing the fleas of a thousand camels upon you for something.

Love ya, though.

Mean it.

I have a feeling you might relate to this in some way. It might not be sports, but it might be something. Maybe heavy traffic, maybe telemarketers. That’s another one of mine and it’s the theme of the next episode. Hey, guess what … I made a gmail account for Funny Messy Life so you can email me if you want to. It’s funnymessylife@gmail.com so now it’s even easier for you to shoot over your thoughts and comments. I really want to hear from you. The website has all kinds of access to me too, including a contact page and all the ways you need to subscribe and share at the push of a button.

So until next time, I’m Michael Blackston and I thank you for lending an ear to a little bit of my Funny, Messy, Life.

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If I told you I had the best dog in the world growing up, you’d probably disagree with me. You’d tell me about your dog, how it was the best dog in the world and if anybody else was listening nearby, they’d interrupt our kingly canine conversation with a story of their own. I understand that and I’m not here to argue, but when I was trying to decide what this episode would be about, I came to a stop when I thought about Butch. It’s been a while since I thought about him, but while it might be just my opinion that he was the best dog a boy could have, I believe his memory deserves a little attention. There won’t be much funny in this episode, or even too much that’s messy, but there will be plenty of life. Butch’s life. It’s the story of one truly amazing dog.

I don’t remember how old I was when we got Butch or the circumstances. Actually, I don’t even remember getting him - just that he was there for the best parts of my childhood. Butch was a black lab, mostly. I think he had a little bit of other stuff mixed in, but he was mostly lab - just a tad shorter, but not by much. Anyone who’s had a Labrador knows the loyalty inherent in that breed. I know there are lots of loyal dog breeds, but Labs have a special kind of loyalty specific to them.

I was a young boy when my first memories of Butch wander out of the haze and I’m able to make something out of them. We lived in a rural area of Georgia where the traffic wasn’t bad enough for moms to worry too much about us riding our bikes in the road and some of that is also credited to less people in the world. It was the early to mid eighties. I know every generation looks back fondly on the years of their childhood and considers them the days of good old, but it’s what I knew and there are parts of it I don’t miss and parts I long for deeply. Like my days with Butch.

My memories don’t go back to when he was a puppy, but I clearly remember him as a healthy boy with a stout, strong frame and thick, shiny black fur. He also wore a smile. Always. His tongue would fall from his mouth while he grinned in that irresistible please tell me how I can make you happy way all good dogs have. But he wasn’t a good dog. He was a truly amazing dog.

Butch followed us kids wherever we went in the neighborhood - through the deepest areas of the woods, down dirt roads, and into creeks. Wherever we were, there was Butch right beside me, grinning that goofy grin because that dog thought I called out the sun in the morning and put it to bed each night and all he wanted to do to show me how much he appreciated it.

Even those memories, thought, are foggy. I remember a summer night spent in the backyard of a friend. while we slept, Butch sat guard outside the tent, letting any creature that dared to come too near that if they wanted to get to us, they’d have to come through him first. Earlier that evening, before we got too tired to stay awake, we snuck into my friend’s neighbor’s shed and stole a bunch of fireworks. Butch was there too, grinning and wagging his tree limb of a tail, as if to say, What’re we gonna do next, huh? What’re we gonna do?

But then we come to my first clear memory. Butch didn’t come when I called him and that wasn’t right so I went looking for him. And I found him laying under one of my parent’s parked cars in the drive way.

I called him out from under the car.

Here, Butch. Here boy.

But he didn’t come. He looked at me with sad brown eyes. His tail weakly beat the ground, happy he’d been found, but he didn’t come.

Here, boy ... Come on, Butch. I called again, but he just looked at me and whined.

So I went to him and getting closer, saw the gaping bloody hole in his thigh. It was too neat to have been made by anther animal and when my dad looked at it, he recognized it for what it was - a bullet hole.

We knew who had shot him. A crotchety old man up the road had recently threatened to shoot him if he’d ever found Butch in his yard again and here he was with a bullet hole in his leg.

Dad wasn’t one to rush off to the vet every time a pet had a problem, but this was something a barrel of homemade mange dip wouldn’t cure. The news wasn’t good. The bone was shattered and wouldn’t heal, so we had two options. We could put him out of his misery so he wouldn’t have to try and keep up with the other dogs, or we could have the leg amputated and take our chances with a gimpy dog.

Yo can imagine my vote and my parents agreed. We had it removed and after a few weeks of special treatment, Butch - one truly amazing dog - quickly learned to get around on three legs.

He came to be known as Tri-pod by the adults who thought they were cute, but that nickname never grew on me. He was Butch and he was awesome.

For the next several years, life went along fine for Butch. Our family went through some terrible times, but Butch kept me going with his constantly eager, wagging tail and that relentless grin.

Eventually, I grew into my teen years and we moved to another state. Butch came along, but he didn’t get to roam free like he had before. He was relegated to a large back yard with a chain link fence and I, learning about new pursuits and interests, slowly forgot Butch was there. Well, I never really forgot. He met me at the fence every single time I went outside or came home from school, always wagging, always grinning, always delighted to see me again. But what was once a fierce friendship became an occasional pat on the head or a Hey, boy from the drive way on my way in the house. As I was growing up, I didn’t notice Butch growing old.

He had another dog to bond with - a female - and they did what dogs do, creating a litter that has its own story, but Butch was showing signs of age, with plenty of white around his muzzle. The only things that didn’t change was that wagging tail and that toothy grin.

Then one day, we realized he was sick and the vet gave us the news that he had heart worms so bad that, due to his age, treatment would only prolong his suffering. I wouldn’t hear of putting him down. He was my Butch and we’d been through a lot together and although I hadn’t spent much time with him lately, I couldn’t do that to him.

Fortunately for him, but unfortunate for me, my mom and stepdad made the decision and a date was set. I spent some time with him during that last week because I needed the memories to last and Butch was just happy to have me there like the good old days. I was in high school by then and the morning came that while I was in school, Butch would be taken to the vet and laid to rest. I was told to go out and say my goodbyes before we left and I did that, but I couldn’t make myself stay with him too long, It was too painful and I wanted to keep a brave face.

As we started to back out of the driveway, I looked one last time at Butch, standing there at the fence, watching us go, expecting to greet me on the way back in with his tail wagging and his smile brilliant. And that’s when I lost it. I started screaming for him and tried to get out of the car. I knew this was the end game and once we pulled out of sight, it would be the last time I ever saw him. He saw me upset and started to jump up and down on those three legs, and barking, wanting desperately to get to me - his boy - to protect me from whatever it was that had me so upset. I wailed and cried, calling his name over and over again as my mom drove away. I don’t remember anything she said, but I imagine she tried to console me. As a parent, now I think she probably had a moment herself one she was alone. The heart of a mother breaks for her children when they’re in pain and there’s nothing they can do. I imagine it’s a feeling only rivaled by that of a dog who needs to get to his boy, but there’s a fence and eternity between them.

Maybe there’s nothing that stands out to you as all that special about the story of Butch, but that’s what makes it special to me. He was mine and I was his and we had a bond. So to me, that makes him one truly amazing dog.

Sorry about that. I have this insatiable need to stir people’s emotions, but also to tell stories. I hope one day when I step out of this life, there will be a bridge there and all of our beloved pets that went before us will be waiting on the other side. It’s a comforting thought.

I’ll be back soon with another episode, but until then, how about sharing Funny Messy Life with your friends? You can do that by using the social media buttons at FunnyMessy.com and you can subscribe there too. Lastly, I’d love a rating and even an honest review at Apple podcasts the next time you’re there. It helps me know how I’m doing. So until next time, thanks for going into the past with me for a glimpse into my funny, messy, life.

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Are you old enough to have had one of those moments when you try to do something you, as we say in the south, used-ta-could, but suddenly realize y’ain’t-never-no-more?

Now, I’ll get back to that question in a few seconds and let you ponder it while I make an aside about the two weird southern phrases you just read/heard.

Used-ta-could. Jeff Foxworthy has touched on this one in his standup routine and I usually try not to use other people’s material, but I absolutely refuse to allow him to take sole ownership of that one. Used-ta-could has been in our Deep South vocabulary since Spot was a pup. What I mean by that is I was already using the term naturally, without being taught it, when I was still knee-high to a grasshopper. It’s in our DNA. And if you need a quick explanation about what it means so you can use this gem to add some color to your own conversation, it simply means this: Used - ta (Once upon a time) Could (I was able).

And then there’s Y’ain’t-never-no-more. Pretty self explanatory, if you ask me. Y‘Ain’t (You are not) Never (never, ever) No-More (ever again.)

Okay. I can move on now.

When I was about as big as a June Bug on a jet plane, I thought I wanted to be a Hollywood stunt man. Those were the days when a group of friends could get together on a summer morning, hop on their bikes, and not show back up until mama called you for lunch. Mamas back then had the power to throw their voices over the whole neighborhood and you could magically pick out your mama’s voice amongst the rest of them. Then you were back out of sight until just before dark when the voices of the mamas began their final call. It was a daily routine that I remember with a smile on my face because I got to experience it, but also with a tear in my eye because the way the world’s gotten, it’s not something my children will ever get to enjoy.

We got into all kinds of mischief, but mostly we jumped ramps and climbed trees. One friend would show up at the door and ask if you could come out and play. The two of you would build a ramp in a back yard with bricks and boards and you’d see who was brave enough to jump the highest. I figure the ramp jumping might have been a thing of the eighties and I blame Bo and Luke Duke for that. I think it was Friday nights that The Dukes of Hazzard came on, but the Duke boys proved that if it was jumpable, you could do it without ever getting hurt or damaging your vehicle. They also proved that evading the police and being an outlaw was cool and if you entered your car by jumping through the side windows, everyone would cheer and hang up posters of you. I found out that the people who owned the cars and were responsible for my safety didn’t cheer after all. They also didn’t like me taking off in a run and sliding across the front of the car to get to the other side. I found out I didn’t like it when I tried to do that once wearing shorts and it was hot as satan’s rectum.

I remember getting a brand new bicycle for Christmas one year and my dad had decorated it with the colors and decals of the General Lee. The General Lee was the Dodge Charger the Duke boys drove and jumped over everything while they were being cool and evading the law. Sometimes their cousin who wore a tiny shirt tied together in the middle so it looked like a bikini top and basically a piece of string for shorts, rode with them.

Dad smiled as I rode off on that bike. He said nothing other than to have fun because he knew that the stuff I’d get into probably paled in comparison to the fun and games he got into as a kid.

Mom, on the other hand, had to give me the warnings you’d expect.
That’s a new bike, Michael. Don’t ruin it by jumping ramps and ditches.

I calmly tried to explain to her that bikes were made for jumping ramps.

No, they’re made for riding with both wheels on the road.
I calmly explained that Evel Knievel never touched the ground.
You’re not Evel Knievel and I don’t want you jumping ramps or lines of cars. Or ditches.

I calmly explained that I intended to be a Hollywood stunt man like John Schneider, or Tom Wopat, or Catherine Bach’s shorts and that I had to jump ramps and ditches if I wanted to be the best.
Then I promised I wouldn’t jump stuff because she went to get a belt and I knew what that meant.

I also knew I’d be out of sight and out of mind until lunch, so when the coast was clear we found the biggest pile of brinks we could and stacked them on one side of a giant ditch. We laid a board on top of them and I dared my sister, who was just as much a Duke Boys fan as I was and could climb a tree higher than I could, to go first. She got on her bike and starting from all the way across the yard, going downhill, cut through the crisp winter air and hit the ramp dead center. She flew through the air like an eagle and let out the signature Duke Boys yell. YEEEEEEE HAAAAWWWW!

She cleared the ditch, landed in the road, and skidded her bike around to a stop like a pro. I couldn’t wait to try out my new Dukes of Hazzard bike.

I rode it up to the house at the top of the hill, kicked the pedals forward and suddenly, I, too, was heading downhill toward the ramp and the ditch beyond it. I felt the cold wind sting my cheeks and Jack Frost nipping at my nose. There were tall pines all around us and I could smell those mixed in with the scent of victory and glory and the mountaintop that was becoming equal with the Duke Boys. The air was sol cold, in fact, that it started to make my eyes water just as I got to the ramp and I couldn’t see. I hit the ramp and an odd angle my brand new Dukes-of-Hazzard-General-Lee-Now-I’m-A-Duke-Boy bicycle went airborne in a way that didn’t excite me. There was emotion, all right, but it wasn’t what I’d hoped for and my yell wasn’t exactly the triumphant YEE HAW my sister had made. It was more like, YEEE-AHHHHHHH!

I think I landed wheels down, but sideways, which sent me tumbling, but not far, into the road. It wasn’t far because when I landed, somehow my right ankle had jammed into the spokes of the front wheel with the impact and got caught there.

As I lay there in the middle of the road, my sister rushed up and helped me get my foot out of the wheel while I howled like a banshee, then she helped me to the house. I’m pretty sure she dismantled the ramp and we told mama that I’d fallen over while we were riding with both wheels on the ground.

Years later, I see my mama’s wisdom in her warning and have seen that it doesn’t matter when it comes to your children thinking they know better than you. It’ll never matter.

My mom gave my son a pair of those shoes with wheels in the heels of them a couple of years ago and he went skating everywhere. We were getting in the car at the local theater after a rehearsal and Noah went skating across a rather steep downgrade in the pavement, so of course, I made him stop.

Don’t do that, son. If you stop quick, you’ll shoot forward and land on your face.

But all the other kids have these and they’re great at it. I need to practice so I can be the best.

The next day, can you guess what happened? Yeah. Face first in the pavement and as soon as I made sure he’d be okay, I said I told you so, proving that even the Duke Boys ain’t smarter than their parents.

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I’m a man of extremes, apparently. My wife has mentioned more than one time, in the midst of an argument, that it’s either all or nothing with me and that makes her want to crawl up the wall. Of course, then I tell her if she’s gonna go up the wall, I think she might as well go ALL THE WAY up it because I’m a man of extremes and it’s all or nothing with me.
When it comes to this podcast, it’s more of the same. I pounded out the text of the last episode and then promptly waited maybe six weeks to record it. In my defense, I had a lot of stuff that happened and slowed down the process, like studio woes, equipment woes, procrastination woes, and a cat that got into a cabinet full of catnip. If you’d have seen that, you’d have said, “Whoa!”
Now, I want to get the show out in a reasonable amount of time, but I had nothing written or planned, so I’m picking out some pretty random thoughts and stories to tell.
I think I’ll start in Satan’s anus because that's what it feels like outside and it's OCTOBER, people! (By the way, in this episode, I’ll be using terms like Anus and Butt crack, so … just letting you know ahead of time. Possibly Rectum if it goes that far, but anyway.)
So.....
____________ Satan’s anus.
It’s a crude term, but desperate times call for desperate measures and right now, times are desperate. I’m not sure whether or not the rest of the country is going through anything similar to what we are here in the Deep South, but let me tell you - that hospitality people love so much is in short supply. Why? Because it’s as hot as the devil’s butt crack, that’s why.
But we’re in the south and that’s what happens in the south. It gets hot. It gets sticky. It’s miserable to be outside for ten seconds. But it not supposed to be that way in October! The last report I heard was that the heat was breaking records last set in 1911. Let me tell you a little bit about 1911.
In 1911, Indiana Jones had not yet found and redid the Ark of the Covenent. I’m not talking about the movie. I’m talking about the real Indiana Jones the historical documentary with the cool music was made about.
America was still so new in 1911 that whenever you said anything to anybody, you still had to end the phrase with, GOVNAH!
In 1911, Democrats were conservative and Republicans were liberals. Now it’s all turned around, thanks to this heatwave. (Insert ghostbusters audio.)
In 1911, people still got outside for entertainment. That was way back before science brought us the brain strengthening blessing of television and the internet.
A lot of other stuff that seems ancient happened since the last time we had heat this bad in October:
The Hindenburg disaster - you remember … “Oh, the Humanity!”
The sinking of the Titanic - you remember … “Jack, there’s just not enough room on this door.”
What I’m asking is what did we do wrong? Why do we deserve this? Who royally ticked off the weather and gave it this insane vendetta against the south land? There’s got to be somebody toward whom I can point my finger and say, “Dang you! Dang you to HECK!”
You’ll tell me it’s global warming and I’ll say to you, “PSHAW!” I might even go as far as using one of the scientific phrases I like to turn and say, “Global Warming - Shmobal Warming.”
Maybe you’ll counter with Climate Change. Well, duh! It’s a change that Santa might be coming down the chimney wearing a speedo this year, ain’t it? Of course, if you want my more scientific reply, I still might go with “Climate Change - Shmimate Change!”
I know something’s going on and it’s got everybody around here acting weird. My church’s youth pastor and the children’s ministry leader each came to church recently dressed in Florida Gator and Alabama Crimson Tide getup. In my town. At MY church! (Alright, it’s the Lord’s house and I doubt He has a particular allegiance, but still, and I hollered that at them as they stepped up onto the pulpit for an announcement. “What are y’all wearing?! This is the Lord’s house!) Because where I live is Bulldawg country and it seemed like standing up in front of the congregation, a decent human person ought to wear something pleasing to the Lord. Or something with UGA embroidered on it, but I digress.
That’s what I’m talking about, though. This heat’s got everybody messed up in the head. I think Bill Murray described our situation best in the Columbia Pictures epic, GHOSTBUSTERS.
“Fire and brimstone coming down from the skies, rivers and seas boiling ... human sacrifice, dogs and cats living together - mass hysteria!”
I guess you probably think I’m overreacting and maybe you’re right. I’m sure it’ll get better. I’m writing this while it’s still hot. I just saw a butterfly land on the hood of my van and immediately shrivel up into ash. By the time I actually record the audio version, I’m sure it will have broken and the glorious chill of fall will have soothed the burning like a great big dollop of hemorrhoid creme. So let me jump ahead in real time to me recording this episode ...
Ah, that’s better. It actually feels like fall outside. The fair’s in town and we’re taking our little girl tonight. My son is taking his girlfriend and his best friend, too, and Kayla and I both have warned him he should pay the most attention to the girl so she doesn’t feel left out. He’s fifteen - what can ya do? All he says in reply is, “DAAAAAD, I KNOW!”
I went for a walk this morning because I diabetes specialist told me it’d help me not to die and you know what? Half way through, I started to wish I’d brought a coat. Or at least maybe a light jacket or a nice fleece sweater.
My point is that it happened exactly the way I thought it would and so far, it seems like the community around me has gotten back some of their sanity.
Of course that may change by tomorrow. There’s a football game. We play the Gamecocks of South Carolina and if we were to lose, there might be fire and brimstone yet.
Gamecocks - Smamecocks.
And of course, GO DAWGS - SIC ‘EM! WOOF! WOOF!

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In the last episode, I talked all about my two years spent as a prisoner in the small loans industry. And while I was building the back story, I mentioned my stint as a Walmart portrait photographer, which brought back memories I thought I’d like to tell you about those days. But then I started calling back to my entire work career and I realized I’ve got a whole barrel of stories to tell you about things that happened in a variety of jobs I worked before settling in as a professional artist. So in the heart of staying in the same lane, this episode will be me telling you those things - things that range from falling babies and football catches, smelling like a French hooker for two reasons at the same time, neither of which actually involves hookers, and an uncomfortable situation that included insurance, a woman in a leg cast, and hard core porn. It won’t be an explicit episode, but it will revolve around some adult themes, so if you don’t want to have to answer any questions you hoped you wouldn’t have to answer until much later, you might not want to have young kiddos within earshot while listening. Otherwise, by the time we’re done, you’ll probably agree that I’ve had some odd jobs. I’m Michael Blackston and this is my Funny Messy Life.

I’ve always wanted to be my own boss. I could tell early on in my working life because I never stayed in the same job for more than a couple of years before I got bored and moved on. I was constantly looking for that career that I could learn and then create a version of all my own. I’m naturally a hard worker, but I’ve never cared for anybody telling me what to do. Hence, I have a long history of flitting from job to job.

Now, let me just start off this first story by making the statement that as far as my research has shown me, babies can’t fly. Not even bird babies. They have to develop and then mama pushes them out of the nest on purpose to nudge them toward what they’re meant to be. The only two exceptions I can think of might be Superman and Jesus. But then again, Superman is an alien and Jesus is the Son of God and there’s no evidence that either one of them ever went cruising through the air as an infant.

Why, then, do human moms sometimes lose their sense of logic when it comes to babies and flight the very moment their little bundle of joy is stuck in front of a camera?

I did the Walmart portrait thing before cell phones had cameras and every bowel movement of some children was posted on Instagram. In the late nineties, we were still in the If I want a photo of my child’s number two to post on the church bulletin board, I better get myself a roll of 35 millimeter film and fish the camera out of the kitchen drawer days. That was also before everybody didn’t have a cousin who figured out how to use the portrait mode on their iPhone and suddenly considered themselves a professional photographer. If you wanted a professional photo shoot of your child, you made an appointment at Sears or Walmart or with that Mills dude.

That’s where I came in. I’d been extensively trained in the art of posing children, focusing an enormous dinosaur of a camera, and blowing bubbles or making silly mouth noises until the little thing made some sort of a face that half way resembled a smile.

One of the more interesting things they told us to watch out for in our training was the fact that when you pose a small child on the three foot high table behind the camera, you should stress to the parent - nine times out of ten it was mom - how important it is she stay seated next to the table with her hand holding the baby from the hole in the back of the baby-sitter-upper-pedestal-thingy so that the baby didn't fall over and crack its head on the cold, sue-able Walmart floor. They were adamant that we explain we would not take the shot unless mom had a good hold on the child and was on the seat beside them. They were also adamant that there would be plenty of moms that couldn’t seem to get that through their heads and would continuously get up from the table, leaving their wobbly-headed baby, to try and see what the photo would look like before I clicked the shot-taking-clicker-thingy.

Fast forward a few months and this fact was solidly tattooed into my reality because it was an issue every single day. There were a ton of close calls and it was eventually ruled that if we had to remind a mom three times to protect her baby, that we were to completely stop the shoot and ask them to leave for the child’s safety.

It was one of these close calls that was the last straw for me and I quit that day to head on over to the motorcycle dealership and try to sell motorcycles I didn’t know how to ride.

A mom came into the studio with a very small baby, really too small to be having its picture made while propped up on a three foot high table. When we sat it in the baby-sitter-upper-pedestal-thingy, it just sort of doubled over in a heap like a ball of squishy dough because it didn’t have the strength to sit up on its own. I positioned the baby as well as I could and showed mom how to hold it through the hole in the back of the thingy, then stepped back to the camera to focus and crop the shot.

Mom came right along with me.

No, mom! See how the baby is about to flop over onto the the table like that? That’s not good. I need you to stay with your baby, please.

She said she was sorry and sat down next to the table. I repositioned them so that everybody was safe, then I walked over to the camera to focus and crop the shot.

And so did mom.

No, no, no, mom! You HAVE to stay with your baby. I can’t take the shot if you’re not sitting there with your hand on your child. Please … it’s the rules.

I repositioned mom and she apologized again. I thought we finally had an understanding. I walked back to the camera to focus and crop the shot.

(Sigh) … and so did mom. Except this time when I looked at the table, I saw the baby in the middle of toppling head first over the side. Without thinking, I dove like a ball player laying out to catch a pass and caught the baby inches before he hit the floor, one handed.

I was shaking like a leaf as I handed the baby back to the crying mother and asked her to reschedule for another time. As I recall, she also complained to management that our studio was an unsafe environment.

There was a report that had to be written and as my manager tried to console me because I was still a nervous wreck, I explained that this was my swan song. I wouldn’t be blowing any more bubbles for the Walmart portrait studio. Instead, I told her I thought I had the makings of a fantastic, profitable career as a motorcycle salesman. I just needed to figure out what a motorcycle was and I’d be good to go.

____________

I’m not sure if where you’re from there’s the saying, “You smell like a French hooker”, but we have that one here in the Deep South, among lots of other color phrases. I never knew exactly what that meant - I mean, I got the picture for the most part, but it didn’t become real to me until I tried to become a perfume salesman.

I answered an ad in the paper for an amazing opportunity to get into the exciting world of Pedo Bouquet. I just made that term up and if you say it with a hoity-toity French accent, it sounds impressive. If you say it with a redneck hillbilly accent - Peddo Bow-Kay - it sounds like you’re using flowers to lure children into an alley.

I created the term to make it sound classier than it was. Pedo - meaning “of the foot” and Bouquet - meaning “of the stinky perfume.” In other words, I was a door-to-door perfume salesman.

This wasn’t long after Liz Taylor released her awful smelling White Diamonds fragrance that would run you about eighty buck a spritz if you’re the kind of person who likes to throw cash out of your car window while you drive.

Because I’ve always been a simpleton, I’ve never felt the need to be knowledgeable about colognes and perfumes. I’m good with Old Spice and a quick sniff around the crack of my jeans before a big nought out. So when the ad told me all about how much money I could make with their products, I was happy to give something new a try.

By the way, be aware of some of the tricks people use to hook you when you’re looking for a job. When the ad uses the words “up to” when describing what kind of income you might make, as in You could make UP TO $600 a week!, it also means you might get paid in green stamps and old batteries they cleaned out of their grandma’s house during the estate sale. The “Up To” amount is probably the number they came up with when they first crunched the numbers over beer at the karaoke bar. One too many and some guys says, “You know what we should do? We should sell knock off perfume to businesses door-to-door. I did some cla-koo-tashuns and I bet we could make $600 a week each, easy! You know what else we should do? We should go TP the sheriff’s house ‘cuz he arrested me last month for public incoksitation.”

The good news is, I tend to learn my lessons. The bad news was I had not had that lesson yet, and I be-bopped my self right into the interview. In the last episode, I made you familiar with a similar process, except this time, the office wasn’t impressive. It looked like they had hastily put up some cubicle walls and went to a thrift store for some cheap decor. They didn’t need glitz and glamour anyway. They knew all they had to do was sell me on the notion that women like to spend money and they like perfumes and colognes. Pair that with the lie that their product was the same stuff the brand names sell, only in a different package so it could be sold cheap, and I just KNEW I had what it takes to sell $600 worth of that crap a week.

Now, I do have to be fair … the products we were selling were good knockoffs and from what comparisons I could make, there wasn’t much - if any - difference between it and the expensive stuff. The problem was not the product, but something I didn’t see coming and something they conveniently never told the new recruits.

The businesses we were targeting had been targeted by the recruits before us approximately 15,297 times before … and that was just the previous week. They’d see us coming down the sidewalk with a duffel bag full of cheap Pedo Bouquet and they’d meet us at the door, saying something like, “Nope,” or “Uh uh,” or maybe something less short and to the point, like, “I will beat you down and leave you for dead. And then I will point and laugh at your smelly, bloody carcass until the police arrive. And then I will lie and tell them some thug attacked you in the street and left you for dead and that I’ll take care of you. And then when the police leave you to me, I will beat you again to make sure there’s no life left in you at all - just a stinky, rotting corpse that smells like a French hooker!”

So, yeah. I smelled like a French hooker … I guess. I can’t say that I’ve ever been in the presence of a real hooker, French or otherwise, so I’m not sure if that’s really an accurate description, but it’s probably pretty close. It was because when we did make it through the doors of a business, part of the sales pitch was to spritz the stuff on ourselves and let the ladies smell it on us instead of stinking them up with it. After a day of spraying yourself with twenty different perfumes and colognes, you basically smelled like a walking, flowery chemical plant.

I didn’t last more than two weeks in that job before I realized the scam it was, which today I figure was exactly two weeks longer than it should have taken me to realize it, but it’s history and a lesson learned.

There was one other time I smelled like a hooker, though, and I had some ‘splaining to do.

One of the most rewarding jobs I ever had was being the overnight DJ on the weekends at a large market radio station. Being the overnight weekend “Personality” has its drawbacks and its perks. The perks were things like getting to eat whatever was left over in the break room after the Saturday afternoon remotes, having the station all to yourself all night long, and having a few adoring fans. The drawbacks were things like the aftermath of eating the leftovers from the remotes, like the time I tried to see how many of the remaining 56 Taco Bell soft tacos I could eat at 3 am - tacos that had been sitting there since noon the previous day, the loneliness and, frankly, spookiness of having a radio station to yourself all night long, and the fact that a bunch of those adoring fans were either drunk, crazy, or thought they were in love with you because you were the one voice they could count on being there for them no matter what and although you didn’t feel the connection yet, it had to be there … yes, it was there, they just knew it and one day - ONE DAY - you’d feel it too. They’d see to it … whatever it takes.

Those kinds of drawbacks.

Well, one of my adoring fans called every shift. Actually, I had several of those and some of them were dear to me, but this one was desperate and she took a liking to not only me, but also the guy that followed me on Saturday and Sunday mornings.

There were a few weeks when she called and I couldn’t seen to get her off the phone. I didn’t want to hang up on her because that would have been rude and I had the sinking sensation that doing something like hanging up on her might trigger the thought that I was rejecting her and that might be bad. I’m talking boiling live rabbits in big pots bad. So I talked to her and the more I was nice, the more she fell in love with me. I don’t remember her name and wouldn’t give her actual one anyway, so I’ll just call her Vanilla Fields. You’ll understand why in a minute. Here’s an example of the kind of conversations we had that led her to thinking she was in love with me:

“WESC, who’s this?”

“Hey, Mike, it’s me - Vanilla.”

“Hey, Vanilla. Can’t talk long tonight - I’ve got a ton of radio guy stuff to do.”

“Like what?”

“Well, I gotta play the songs and then I gotta give the weather forecast. There’s the commercials and all, you know, and the Public service announcements.”

“Ooooooh. Sounds like fun. Can I come over and help?”

“No, we’re not supposed to let anybody in the building after hours. And I might have to run a test of the emergency broadcast system and whatnot …”

“I won’t tell anybody you let me in.”

“Um, I’m married.”

“I’m DRUUUUNNNKK!”

She also thought she was in love with the guy who relieved me and she did the same thing with him. One night he came in early and we were shooting the breeze when Vanilla called. She was head over heels when she realized the had us both in the same room on the same call at the same time. She eventually convinced us to let her in and she promised to sit across the control board like a nice groupie while we worked. She claimed she just wanted to see how it all worked and thought it would be neat to be in the room while her favorite jocks played her favorite songs.

Joe and I looked at each other and thought it couldn’t hurt since we were together and could probably fend off any advances she might have in mind. We agreed she could come over for half an hour if she promised to behave and soon, we were face to face with her, letting her in the building.

To her credit, she was perfectly well behaved. The only problem was, she had decided that filling her bathtub with undiluted gallons of Vanilla Fields perfume was what it would take to impress us with how awesome she smelled. And she insisted on a hug.

I really like the smell of Vanilla Fields perfume when it’s applied with common sense and sobriety. I don’t think she was drunk when she came into the radio station, but the common sense factor was not in play. You could smell her from the other side of the locked door. Joe got excited at first because he thought she’d brought ice cream.

Unfortunately, she insisted on a hug from each of us.

After she left, our noses had adjusted and we forgot about the smell until we each got home and our wives had questions. Try to imagine explaining this to a woman who knows you have a radio station all to yourself and have a few adoring fans who would happily make you their baby daddy. Luckily, we were together with Vanilla and could verify each other's story. I also suggested my wife go back to the station with me right then and she’d see how the foam sound treatment on the walls of the studio had curled up and disintegrated as soon as Vanilla walked in.

I plan on an entire episode dedicated to tales from behind the walls of radios stations I’ve worked for, but I still talk with my dear friend Joe about that night.

____________

And then there was the time I had to immediately call my manager and file a report upon leaving a customer’s house.

I was an insurance agent who sold and collected premiums door-to-door. We cold called for customers and once we sold a whole life insurance policy, it was up to us to collect the premiums each month. It’s called Running A Debit and while it’s a stressful living, it did teach me a lot about running my own business.

I had a client who lived in a filthy trailer out in the middle of absolute nowhere and she’d taken a liking to me. She flirted big time every month as I marked up the booklet that was her record of having paid her premium. I’d been told by the management that she didn’t like to pay her premiums and that the guy before me used to have to go out to her trailer several times a month before she would. I was worried that she might try that with me once I realized she liked the fries that came with my shake, if you know what I mean, so that she’d get lots of chances to see me. So I told her that I would come out once a month and if she didn’t pay her premium the first time, I’d have to set her up on a mailing system. She wanted to see me at least once a month, and the bacon that comes with my eggs, if you know what I mean, so she ended up being one of my easiest customers to collect.

One afternoon I knocked on the door of her trailer and the door popped open a little because the lock was broken and doing stuff like fixing broken locks on her trailer door wasn’t a priority, I guess. And there she was … sitting on the couch in a dingy tee shirt with food stains on it and shorts WAAYYY to tight and high, with her left leg hiked up in front of her in a cast from the top of her thigh all the way down to her ankle.

“Hey, baby! I thought you’d be comin’ by today!”

I can’t remember her name and I wouldn’t give it anyway, so I’ll just call her Indecent Exposure.

“Hey, Indecent. Is your premium in the folder like normal?”

“You know it is. You see my leg?”

“Yeah, I see your leg. What happened?”

“I was bein’ bad. I was DRUUUNNNK and fell off the back deck. Can’t hardly get around and don’t got nobody to help me. You want to help me change out of these dirty clothes?”

“Gonna have to throw you a no on that one. I’m not allowed to do that.”

I went to take the record booklet off the wall and started to fill it out. I was standing between her and an enormous big screen tv, which she turned on, but my back was to it and the sound was apparently down at first.

Behind me, I started to hear the sounds of - how can I put this mildly - male/female engagement - getting louder and louder while she turned up the volume. Porn.

It was porn on the enormous big screen tv behind me. She was hoping the porn and the leg cast would be enough to entice me into, um - how can I put this mildly - helping her change those nasty clothes.

I looked at the tv, then I looked back at her. My eyes were wide and I didn’t know what to say at first.

I looked back at the tv.

I looked back at her.

I looked back at the tv.

I looked back at her.

“You ever watch nekkid movies?” She asked me.

“I’m gonna go now.”

When I got to the car, I pulled out my flip phone and started dialing my manager before I left the driveway and explained that I didn’t exactly know what just happened, but I think I just offered dessert, if you know what … never mind.

I’ve done a lot of things for work over the years and every one of them has given me good stories to tell. Eventually, I hope to get to them all, but I hope this was a good start. Let me know how you felt about it by leaving a comment at funnymessy.com. There, you can also share this podcast with a friend, a loved one, a stranger, or that flirt that randomly shows you porn. If you like it a bunch, do me a favor and leave a rating and review of the show on on your podcast player. It helps others see what they can expect from the show and your good rating helps convince folks it’s something worth checking out.

So thanks for listening (or om this case, reading). I’m Michael Blackston and if you have a funny or even messy work story you’d like to share, then contact me and we’ll talk about it. And until next time, keep your your legs in their casts and your clothes on your body, at least when you’re listing to stories about my Funny Messy Life.

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Previously, I mentioned a part of my life that I still have nightmares about and I hesitate to even go into it now, but I promised I would tell you some of the stories and I figure it’s best to just get it out of the way. To give it a nice name, I was a bill collector. Some called me The Loan Man and others called me things I can’t say in decent company. So, in episode 23, I’m gonna take you from day one, through some stuff in the middle, and all the way to my take this job and shove it moment - a situation you won’t blame me for, I promise. In fact, you’re gonna wish I’d punched the guy. I’m Michael Blackston and you should know that I’ve tried to forget the days I’m getting ready to tell you about, but I guess I owe you some transparency when it comes to my Funny Messy Life.

Sometimes when you hear someone say hindsight is twenty-twenty, it’s a cute little lesson you might have learned, like:

I shouldn’t have financed that living room set at 85 percent interest, or;

What happens in Vegas doesn’t actually stay there, or:

Turn off your body mic when you go number one during a live show.

But sometimes it’s a much more serious lesson, like:

Turn off your body mic when you go number two during a live show and you ate at Taco Bell earlier, or:

Never trust the man in the suit with big teeth who tells you going to work as an “Assistant Manager” at a small loans company is basically the same thing as starting a career as a professional banker and before long, you’ll be a bossy pants, bossing people around in your boss pants and driving the classic 1960s Mustang convertible you’ve always wanted. Because he’s lying.

A lot’s changed in the collections industry since the time I was imprisoned there, and from what I hear, it’s all good things. I’m not a fan of political correctness, but like a blind squirrel, sometimes political correctness finds a nut and it being against the law to harass people is one of them. A friend who still works for a company like that recently told me some of the things they used to be able to do that have now been outlawed for the good of humanity, like:

• Chasing (which is going out to the home or job of somebody -that owes money and demanding payment),

• Being anything other than professional on the phone,

• Making repossession threats without going through the proper legal channels,

• Calling your friends, neighbors, and loved ones when you refuse to communicate and telling them what a scumbag you are and that you probably kick puppies, punch kittens, and voted for Hillary.

These are all good things to make illegal, but they weren’t always. Actually, there was always a rule against telling other people your business - it’s called Third Party Disclosure - but we didn’t adhere to it very much. That was when everybody still had a land line and didn’t have a device in their pocket that had the power to crash the energy grid of a small country and record phone calls at the same time. I feel like the advancements in that kind of technology is probably what’s behind a lot of the rule changes.

We’ll go back in time, now to the late nineties, not long after I got married and was looking for any job that would keep the bills paid. When we got married, I was working as a Walmart portrait photographer, blowing bubbles and making mouth noises at toddlers and crazy people. This was still when normal people held actual cameras and if they wanted a professional looking photo, they went to a professional photographer. Everyone didn’t have a device in their pockets that had the power to search and immediately play the national anthem of the small country whose energy grid it just crashed and at the same time take an awesome digital pic of you and your dessert in Portrait Mode. I still loaded film into the Walmart cameras with my hands in a portable darkroom bag.

I didn’t exactly hate that job, but I hated that job and when my step-dad got me a position at the motorcycle dealership where he worked, I jumped at the chance to quit taking pictures of snotty children and crazy people to sell motorcycles to snotty bikers and crazy people.

Unfortunately, I didn’t so much hate that job as I absolutely despised it and the money I barely made because I don’t know anything at all about motorcycles, nor do I care to learn. Customers would ask, “Do you even know how to ride a motorcycle?” And I’d say, “Nope. Nor do I care to learn.”

You can imagine how thrilled I was when I opened the classifieds and saw an ad that said ASST. MANAGER NEEDED! EXCITING NEW CAREER OPPORTUNITY IN BANKING! Have you ever wanted to be a BOSSY PANTS, but have never made it past being a LAZY BRITCHES? Call for an appointment and we’ll make ALL your pants bossing dreams come true!

Oh, I called the number and I made that appointment.

I put on a tie and the pants I thought would scream BOSSY best and I sat in front of a man I trusted immediately. He seemed sincere as the day is long. His office was nice and plush and I thought to myself, This … THIS is the beginning of a solid future. I have to nail this interview.

Um, … no I didn’t. It turns out I could have probably walked in there wearing a grimy tee shirt, overalls, and muddy boots. I could have looked the man right in his eyes and said, "I’ll be a dang good’n fer ya, if’n y’all’ll hire me!" I could have then spit on the floor from a mouth chawing down on a world record wad of tobacco and he would have hired me.

Why? Because I was breathing and it was the small loans industry in the late nineties. At that time, small loan companies turned over employees faster than a Baptist heads for the banana pudding. If they lost someone, all they had to do was put an ad in the paper promising the opportunity for high-falutin’ bossiness of pants and people like me would come running. The nice office was a facade, just like free Disney World tickets in return for a short presentation turns into some salesman holding you hostage for hours while trying to convince you that the maintenance fees and your first born are a small price to pay for a time share.

In other words, it’s a load of hockey. Thaaaat’s right, HOCKEY!

He hired me on the spot and when I walked into the branch office I’d be working in for the first time, I had this feeling. It was kind of like that sensation you get when you thought it was gonna be gas, but then realize your body has bigger plans, mixed with the way I imagine state troopers feel when they get assigned to the DMV.

The people behind the desks looked like they’d given up on life years ago and simply existed under the florescent lighting. I’d been told that the branch manager had been there for thirty years and would be the best at training me. And she was. She was a no-nonsense old lady who struck fear into the hearts of customers so that they wouldn’t dare be late or suffer the consequences. Consequences doled out by the hand of an old southern lady can be brutal. If you need to identify one, just look for the woman with her hair up in a bun, saying stuff like, I was workin’ here before Spot was a pup, or when you was still knee-high to a grass hoppah!

I remember coming in one morning the first week I was there and having her tell me about killing a massive cockroach the night before. Biggest Palmetto bug you evah seen. I squarshed him flat as a flittah!

You don’t mess with a woman like that. I think that’s why one customer’s husband tried to come over the counter at me at the end of my very first day.

Here’s what happened:

My job was to call delinquent customers. An account was considered delinquent after one day being past due. So if your payment was due on the 15th and you didn’t pay it, your account was delinquent on the 16th. I always hated that word … DELINQUENT. It’s the word that comes after Juvenile when you describe some brat who sets the woods on fire messing with fireworks unsupervised - twice, - or goes around collecting money for the functionally illiterate so he and his cousin, who did stupidly stupid things with him, could buy cigarettes. Yet, there you were, only one day past due and considered DELINQUENT. The problem was, there was no grace period. You pay on or before your due date, you’re awwwwwlright. You’re the best - the bee’s knees. But, you dare to be even one day late, you, sir, are DELINQUENT and we’ll call your home, your Nearby (which is a friend, family member, or neighbor you used as a reference when you got the loan), AND your place of work. And I ain’t jokin’! That was the policy and the old southern lady told me I would be expected to do that with every delinquent customer, twice a day, until I communicated with them and set a date that they would come in and pay.

I didn’t want to do it, but I was afraid of the old southern lady and I needed the work, so I did it. And the husband of a woman with a very unique name I remember to this day (although, I won’t say it because of the third party disclosure thing and I’m not sure how long the statute of limitations on something like that lasts) cmae into the office just before we closed and said in a slightly perturbed manner, “WHO THE BLEEP IS MICHAEL?!”

I don’t know why I didn’t say something like, He’s gone for the day or Michael? What Michael? Who know not this Michael of whom you speak. But I didn’t. I said, “I, good sir, am he. How may I be of assistance?”

Mr. Angry Pants then tried to jump over the counter in my direction and would have squarshed my pants that weren’t feeling so bassy as flat as a flittah. That is, if the old southern lady hadn’t been a lot faster than she looked and made it to the counter before he could get over it. She stuck a bony finger in Mr. Angry Pants’s face and gave him down the country - another very southern phrase. By the time she was done with him, he had apologized and paid the loan payment.

That was the beginning of a time in my life I refer to as the firey road to actual hell and I can’t blame Mr. Angry Pants. I might have marched into the office too, if it’d been me. I wouldn’t try to start a fight, but my pants would have totally been angry.

The old southern lady had a stroke about three months into my working there and never came back. That’s when I really learned the finer points of being a jerk when it came to collecting. The next manager was a spitfire.

There hadn’t been any warning about a new manager when I walked into the office on Monday morning and met the young southern man. He was two or three years older than me and wore a huge smile when he came to shake my hand and introduce himself. He nearly crushed my hand. He was wiry, strong and I could tell right away that things were about to get interesting. He’d been ushered into the managerial spot over the weekend almost immediately after the old southern woman had her stroke. In fact, I didn’t even know about the stroke until he told me and then explained to the office that things would be different from now on. Fast paced. We were gonna take butts and kick names, by glory!
And things did change. Calling cards, which was what we did first thing every morning and before we closed every afternoon, was the first change I noticed. Calling cards is the harassment I told you about. If your account went delinquent, your information was kept on a yellow card and we had to call all of your numbers to try and contact you and mark down the results of every call.

Calling cards with the old southern lady was like listening to somebody’s grandma give ‘em whut fer after they’d done something wrong.

Calling cards with the young southern boy was like listening in on a college football tailgate conversation between two rival fans.

He loved to tell people he was gonna come take their TV while they were watching it. I even heard him say to an old lady on the other end of the phone that he was gonna come take that box she watches her stories on. It was just plain meanness and I never liked it. I guess that’s why I didn’t make a good assistant manager. I refused to treat people that way and I think it probably drove the young southern man crazy that I wouldn’t do as he asked and use some of the same tactics he did.

The crazy part of it was that with the exception of a few people, it seemed to work and most of our customers loved him. He’d get them riled up enough to come barging into the office, madder than hornet and by the time it was over, they were eating out of the palm of his hand. He just had a likable way about him once you got to know him.

There was one time he didn’t get a customer to like him after he made her come in to sit in a booth and discuss why her account stayed constantly behind. She came in, sat down, listened to him run her over the coals, then left. But just before she walked out, right as she pulled open the door, she said something that made me laugh and summed up the young southern man.

She said, “Mean ass loan man.”

After the young southern man left for greener pastures, there were a couple of others that came through. One was a young man fresh out of the military who had more interest in booze than running an office. The other was a whole different cat than the alcoholic or the young southern man. He had a soft voice and a kind heart, except for one time he got into it with a woman on the phone and called her a B-word. He never did stuff like that and it had been a one-time thing. Unfortunately, the woman had been recording the call and there was a price he had to pay.

Then it was my turn. Corporate felt like I had been groomed long enough and it was time I took over as manager of the branch. By then, I had been with the company for almost two years and wanted out, but the money was good and the promotion came with a raise and incentives. But like I said, I can’t treat people that way and it showed in the numbers.

After a couple of months, there was a surprise visit from the district manager to see about fixing my issue of being a nice person. I couldn’t stand the man. He was arrogant and he shifted from side to side on his feet if he was standing when he talked to you.

Earlier, I mentioned the process of sitting in a booth to discuss your account. That’s what we tried to get you to do if you were having trouble paying - come in and sit in a booth across from you. We would try to make you feel bad about it, scold you about how we were good enough to make the loan when you needed it, and try to lock you into a promise to pay on time from now on. And oh yeah, we were also to try and make you pay a payment right then, no matter what.

On the day my district manager came for a visit, so did an old lady who had been under the same loan with us for - no joke - 50 YEARS! I’d tried on numerous occasions to convince her to stop renewing the loan and just pay it out so she didn’t owe us any more. She renewed every three months because she got a little back, then payed on it religiously on the third.

She came in that day and asked me to sit with her in the booth. She had a problem. She had no idea my district manager was just on the other side of the partition from her in the next booth over, listening to how I would handle it.

My check didn’t come in on time this month. There was a mix up at the social security office, she told me, then asked if she could renew it and skip the payment. I told her it wasn’t up for renewal yet.

Then she said, I have the money, but if I give it to you today, I won’t have enough for my medicine.

This woman had paid us who knows how much in interest over the past few years and she never missed a payment. She was never once … DILENQUENT. She asked if she could skip this month and double up on her payment next month.

I told her that would be fine and for her not to worry about it. She’d been a loyal, perfect customer for that long, I didn’t see why we couldn’t trust her to catch it up the next month. The little old lady was as happy and relieved as she could be.

My district manager was not as happy and relieved as he could be. He was the exact opposite of happy and relieved. You might say he was quite the Mr. Grumpy Pants about it because as soon as the old lady was out the door, he slid over into the booth and sat across from me where she’d been. And his pants were grumpy.

Now there are only a few things in this world that set me off without fail, some of which include pointing your finger at me in a mean way, pinching me for any reason at all, and having no mercy on the elderly, just to name a few. Mr. Grumpy Pants managed to hit on two of those. Had he pinched me, I might be telling you about this from a prison cell.

Red faced, he pointed his finger at me and sounding a lot like Foghorn Leghorn, he said something to the effect of, “Now boy - I say, Boy - that’s the problem we’re havin’ with this heyuh braynch! That woman told you she had the money in her pocket.”

I explained that she was the perfect customer, that I’d never had to call her once for her payment, and that I was confident she would do as she said.

“You should have told her she has a contract and she had to pay that payment right now!”

“But she has medicine to buy.”

“NOT OUR - I say - NOT OUR PROBLEM!”

It gives me such sweet satisfaction to think back on what happened next.

I looked him square in his red pie face, locked eyes with him, reached in my pocket for my keys to the branch, and smiled as I slowly slid them across the table to his side. He looked confused and asked me what I was doing.

I told him I refused to treat people that way any longer and I quit. Then I told him not to forget to lock up.

He told me I couldn’t do that. “You can’t do that, son, I can’t stay all day. I’ve got somewhere to be.”

“Not my - I say - not my problem. And yes I can do that.”

I packed up my stuff while he huffed over the telephone, desperately trying to find someone who could relieve him for the rest of the day. I was a grinning Mr. Smarty Pants all the way out the door.

I savor that memory every time. I guess I should let it go, but I have to try and keep something positive about my experience being a Loan Man. Over twenty years later, I still have nightmares about walking to work and sitting behind an old desk in a dingy office to call cards. I’ve had a couple of small loans since then out of necessity, and after sharing war stories with the people who still work in the industry, I think I could probably do that again if I had to. Things have changed. You have to treat people with respect now, or they’ll hire a Mr. Lawyer Pants to sue your Criminal Pants.

I did eventually achieve Bossy Pants status, but it took starting my own business and I’m glad I did. Of course, now I’m about to take my company in a scary new direction and I might need your prayers.

Or a loan.

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They call them Fur Babies.
I consider myself to be a strong, manly, straight-to-the-point kind of guy … usually. But I have to admit that I’ve embraced the term Fur Babies. It fits. They’re furry, for one and also, they’re my babies. I have four of them right now, three of which live in my house and I consider them a part of the family, not just pets. They’re the reason I’ve settled on pet memorials as my new line of business that I’ll be focusing on heavily over the next few months.
But I’m not going to tell you about the Fur Babies my family currently cares for. I’m going to talk about some of my hairy children from over the past 25 years of mine and my wife’s marriage. Because if you call me crazy about animals, you’d be right to call her completely off her rocker for them. I’m Michael Blackston and this is episode 22 of Funny Messy Life.
I feel like I need to make a disclaimer first. When I started writing out the blog for this episode, I wanted to go a little funny, but also a little warm and fuzzy. I didn’t expect what I ended up with, which is, to me, a tear jerker. So maybe you should think about having some tissues handy, or a sleeve, or a napkin from that pile you keep beside you in the car from all the fast food stops. Because if you’re an animal lover like me, you might need it.
Over the lifespan of our marriage, my wife and I have cared for a whole lot of animals. We’ve had to draw a line because there was a time our hearts were so soft that we’d take in a homeless possum if we thought it needed help. They could have made one of those disgusting Hoarders shows about us at one point, or at least that’s what it felt like.
And to be completely honest here, I have to admit that I was usually the culprit bringing home mangy, flea-ridden, skinny, stinky critters I found on the side of the road. After a while, my wife finally said, Michael, enough with the hippies. If I see one more flower crown or or have to hear yellow submarine one more time, I’m gonna hurt someone. Peace and love, my …… you get the picture. We decided to rescue animals instead. They bathe more.
I was responsible for them, top, though. I have had jobs over the years that put me right in the line of fire when it comes to big ol’ puppy dog eyes or adorable kittens and I’ve brought a bunch of the home.
So let me go to the old mind kennel and pick out a couple or three of our Fur Babies to tell you about. The problem is, I love them all so much, it’s hard to choose.
I’ll start off with one of the most beautiful cats you’ve ever laid eyes on. The Rum Tum Tugger. We just called him Tugger, but if you know anything about Broadway musicals, you’ll recognize the name as the cool cat from the Andrew Lloyd Webber musical, CATS. In fact, we’ve had several animals that we named after characters from Broadway shows. There was Bustopher Jones, Erik, spelled with a K after the first name of the Phantom of the Opera, Old Deuteronomy, which is biblical, I guess, but actually she was an enormous Green Iguana we raised from a baby, who lived for eleven years and was named after - you guessed it - a character from CATS.
Anyway, back to Tugger. I was working as a bill collector. You might remember me talking about how much I hated that job in the last episode - episode 21, but there were a few things I took from that experience that were positives and Tugger was one of them. I literally took him from his home while doing time as an Assistant Manager for World Finance Corporation.
I was doing what we called Chasing. I’m told they’ve made laws against it now, but it was basically going out to someone’s house who was avoiding our nagging, incessant phone calls trying to get them to pay us. I’d knock on their door and confront with something along the lines of, Hey … how’s about you pay me? But when I got to Tugger’s home, I understood why they hadn’t been answering their phone. They’d skipped town and I’d be having to do what we called Skip Tracing. Skip Tracing involves putting on your detective suit - mine comes with a cool plastic badge and writing mit - and tracking them down any way you can so that when you finally catch up to them, you surprise them by showing up at their nephew’s wedding reception and saying, Hey … How’s about you pay me?
They had taken everything not nailed down to the trailer. Well, everything accept one. They left the cat. Not only had they left the cat behind without any food or water, but it had been an inside cat that wasn’t used to hunting for food. How do I know this? Because the poor thing had been declawed.
I was about to leave and give my manager the stinky news that our customer had flown the coop when I heard a sound behind me. I turned and saw this amazing, long haired Himalayan with the biggest, brightest blue eyes coming toward me, crying for help. He was gaunt. He hadn’t eaten for days and he didn’t understand what was going on. All he knew was that the people he thought loved him had left and he wasn’t being fed and he was scared to death. After I made sure that he wouldn’t eat my face if I tried to touch him, I picked him up and I could feel every rib he had. He looked at me with those eyes, cried with that voice, and started to purr because finally, someone was showing him some love.
It was over for me after that. I put him in the car and called my manager to tell him that I was taking the rest of the day off.
The Rum Tum Tugger seemed to fit his look and so we became the proud parents of one of the sweetest, most appreciative felines to ever grace the face of this here earth. Of course there were a few issues that went along with resuming a cat who had been declawed and then set out in the wild to fens for himself, namely the issue that he hated every other animal he came into contact with and would try to eat their face. we had a couple of other cats and no matter what we tried, he would not get along with them. He wanted one thing - to eat their face. Imagine you’re another cat and your caretakers surprise you one day by bringing home a beautiful, show quality zombie bent on your destruction. It’s a love-hate relationship. You want to be friends because the new guy is so beautiful and majestic; so perfect. Unfortunately, the new guy is out for your blood and if you get anywhere near him, he will absolutely try to devour your soul.
Obviously, Tugger got sequestered from the other cats. He really couldn’t do much because he was declawed, but he didn't know that and neither did the other cats? We hated having to close him in, but we couldn’t find a home for him and it was better than leaving him to die. He became our bedroom cat and he seemed just fine that way. He only had one other problem. He would sit inside his letter pan and crap over the side onto the floor. But we loved our Tugger and he lived a happy life for a long while until we came home one night and found he had crossed the rainbow bridge.

My rescue efforts didn’t stop there. On another excursion of trying to find my customers so they would pay their bill, I ran into a tumultuous situation in the middle of the road and made the decision to put my life in danger. Right in the middle of the road was a tiny puppy, only a three or four weeks old, staring down the teeth of a large pit bull. Had I not gotten there when I did, this puppy, also a pit bull, would have become lunch. I didn’t even think about it. I ground my car to a stop in front of them, got out and barreled toward the big, angry pit bull … hungry pit bull? HANGRY pit bull, and yelled the magic sounds my father, and his father, and his father before him used to vanquished unwanted beasts from our midst. The magic words sound like this: Kyanh heyunh. GAWN GIT!
The monster dog ran away because he’d heard the magic words before and knew they sometimes preceded a heavy object flying in his direction. I didn’t have a heavy object, so I was glad my bluff worked. Then I looked down at the cowering, shaking little puppy and realized what must have happened. He was covered from head to foot in mange. He was a sick puppy and I think the mama dog must have booted him from the litter, leaving him pray to whatever got there first. I couldn’t leave him there.
I picked him up and took him home where my wife and I nursed him as well as we could, then took him to the vet.
Demadectic mange was the diagnosis and it could be cured. The littles guy’s skin was so broken, cracked, and bleeding from the infection, than we couldn’t tell what his coloration would be for a while.
We couldn’t keep him inside for long; the landlord wouldn’t have that. Besides, we already had two cats in one part of the house and another one in our bedroom that would certainly have a go at eating his face. So we kept him in until the mange was gone and built him a nice area outside. His fur grew in and he was a stunning, pastel gray and tan color. He wasn’t full pit and he was smaller than I thought he’d be, but he was a prince of a boy. I’ll never forget that face. We named him Gimli, after the dwarf from the Tolkien books because he was shorter, but stocky -powerful, but loveable.
We didn’t see Gimli’s passing. There came a time in our marriage, not long after my son was born, that our lives took a bad turn and we had to move in with my mother for about six months. It was during the financial crash of the early 2000s and we had no choice but to take our babies to a no-kill shelter in hopes of finding better homes. It nearly killed us; my wife especially, and to this day, she can’t talk about it. We tried everything we knew to do in order to place them, but in t he end it was out of our hands and while we hoped to go back and readout them, we were not allowed to do so. I can’t think about it long myself. That was almost fifteen years ago and it still cuts to my heart and twists in there with an overwhelming pain I just can’t describe.
There was only one of our fur babies that came back to us because she was the only one we were able to find a home for.

My dearest Gracie.
I didn’t realize this episode was going to be so hard.
Yep, I was working for the loan company and on my way home from work one afternoon during the five o’clock rush. There were bustling, aggravated drivers all around me and I just wanted to get to the apartment and rest. As I roared down one of the busier sections of my commute on a four lane highway, I noticed a minuscule black dot up ahead. It looked like it had fur, so I figured it was just another victim of the road that would feed the buzzards later. But as I closed in on the furry black dot, I looked down and and its eyes - open, terrified, and definitely alive - met mine and watched me pass. Once again, I didn’t think, but whipped my car around in an illegal U-turn, which nearly caused a pile up, and pulled over to where the tiny black cat was huddled directly on the white line that separated the lanes. She ran when I come near to her and made it across the street to a parking lot before she couldn’t go any further. I noticed the awkward way she sort of flopped when she ran and once I caught up to her, I realized she’d already been hit.
She was just a kitten, all black with bright, yellow-green eyes. She cried and I held her and took her to my car, not sure what to do. She was so small. She fit fully in just one of my hands. When I got home, my wife saw her and decided we were going to take her to the emergency vet in Greenville, SC an hour away. Kayla drove while I held the kitten and I cried my eyes out the whole way there because I knew what they were going to say. They were going to tell us it had been a valiant effort, but she was too far gone. We could already tell that she had no use of her front left leg. That’s what caused the awkward flop when she ran from me.
But it was a miracle. The vet looked her over and came to the conclusion that the leg was all that was wrong with her. On top of that, he said there wasn’t any reason to amputate it because there was clean blood flow and she’d learn to use it to balance, even though she’d never be able to put weight on it. The vet asked if we were going to be responsible for her and we unanimously agreed we would. There was no need to talk about it.
On the way home, we gave her the name that seemed to best fit her. Grace. God had given her grace in that He sent me to her at just the right time and saved her life.
During the financial crisis I mentioned, we were able to place her temporarily with a friend of ours who had a particular love for her and she him. Whenever he would come over for a visit, she would come to him and shower him with affection. He was glad to take her and when we were back on our feet, she came home.
We ended up calling her Gracie, instead of Grace over the years. That kitten I was sure would have to be put down the day I found her, the kitten who eventually reigned as queen of our household, blessed our family for 18 long years. She did so atop three strong legs and one comically stiff one that atrophied and flopped behind her as she ran right along with the rest of them.
My dearest Gracie.
I can’t do this any longer. I could tell you wonderful heart warming stories that Gracie placed herself right in the center of, but my heart wouldn’t be able to take it. She succumbed to feline diabetes in 2018 after a long battle. In the end, she was blind, deaf, and there are days I hate myself for selfishly keeping her with me for so long at the end. I just couldn’t stand the thought of being without her and I still can’t. She was my child. She was my beautiful Gracie.
We honor all of our babies, furry, feathered, or scaly, with their own special ornament on the Christmas tree. We put them up individually as a family and cherish their memories. We don’t have pets around here. We don’t throw them out or put them down just because they get sick. They’re not human, we know that, but they are every bit a part of the family. They’re our children.
I hope you enjoyed this episode of Funny Messy Life. As painful as it can be for me to talk about these things, it’s also nice to remember them. And if you heeded the warning at the start of this about getting your tissues ready, you’ll be just fine in a minute or two. If it didn’t affect you, then you probably have no heart and deserve to have your face eaten by a drop-dead gorgeous Himalayan zombie cat.

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I’m not sure if anybody’s ever done research on why Americans become rabid, buggy-eyed butt hornets when we get behind the wheel, but if they ever do figure it out, I want to be among the first ones to know. I know it’s easy to want to point a finger at the other guy - usually the middle one - when there’s one road, but more than one driver. But whenever something goes wrong, I’m finding that nine times out of ten, I’m the one with the problem. So I’ll call myself a butt hornet when it fits, but there’ve been occasions when I did nothing wrong and still got the raw end of the deal.
I enjoy driving, for the most part, except when other people do things that get all up under my skin. I’ll list a few examples so you’ll get a solid picture of the kinds of things I’m talking about:
Going too slow in front of me.
Going too slow beside me.
Going too slow when you’re pulling out in front of me.
Going too slow when you’re making your turn in front of me.
Pulling out in front of me.
Making a turn in front of me.
BEING in front of me, etc.
There are too many more to list and I know full well that the issue is with me and my impatience. And I'm trying to learn to be a more gracious driver. I really am. But it's hard, especially when people ignore the rules. Take, for instance, the four-way stop sign. To the best of my knowledge, the driver's manual states that the right of way belongs to the driver who came to a complete stop first and in successive order, until all vehicular operators have made it safely through and on their merry way. That doesn't happen a lot of the time in the south where hospitality tends to be thrown around all helter-skelter whether it's needed or not. At least in my neck of the woods, people with the right of way, have an annoying habit of urging you to go first. Because they're nice and they're courteous and they won't have it mentioned to their grandma that they (gasp) went first! Nobody likes to be slapped in the back of the head and told, You's raised better'nat!
I like me some southern hospitality, but not in traffic.
You go first.
No, you go. You have the right of way.
Naw, naw. I insist - you go ahead of me, good suh!
I will not do such. I'z raised better'nat.
I've sat behind vehicles that were involved in an eternal volley of politeness that made me want to do something drastic like rolling down my window and screaming to them at the top of my lungs. "Somebody GO ALREADY! Hearses have gas pedals, ya know! School busses too, Mrs. Crenshaw!"
And I'm sure all of the people in the funeral procession would feel the same way, even the dead guy. Hurry it up, Director, before somebody else gets my dang grave!
It's probably just me that gets irritated by that kind of thing, really. I just feel like we should all know the rules and if we'll follow them to the letter, traffic will move a lot more efficiently.
Follow the rules to the letter, you say? Are you telling us you've never gone a mile over the speed limit then?
I have to be honest ... that's not what I'm saying. Truth is, I have a lead foot and I've had to curb that in the interest of my health and also the health of my wallet. But I'm not the only person who misbehaves on the road. You should be in the car with my wife some morning if she hasn't gotten the chance to pet an animal. But we're not talking about her Mr. Hyde personality when she's yet to yell, "KITTEH!" and nuzzle the belly of a feline. No, I'm the one on the couch here.
In my early twenties, I worked in a profession I loathed from day one. Stories from the world of small loans is a whole other episode and I've definitely got some interesting stuff to tell you about that part of my life, but for now, just know that a husband trying to jump over the counter to fight me on my very first day put a bad taste in my mouth for the collections industry.
Needless to say that because of hating that job from the start, I dreaded going in every morning and my commute was an irritation, too. It took me about thirty minutes one way and I had to drive around South Carolina backroads to get there as quickly as possible.
One morning was particularly bad and to this day, I point to what I'm about to tell you as one of the reasons I get so completely out of sorts with bad drivers in front of me sometimes. Let me paint a picture for you. I was already running late, which meant I had a certain criteria I expected drivers in front of me to follow and it was very simple: At least go the speed limit. Is that hard? I didn't think so. I never think so. In fact, it's still one of the top criteria I expect from you if I happen to get behind you on the road. And for the record, I won't ride your tailpipe unless you're just being ridiculous about it.
Anyhoo, it turns out that halfway through the commute, just as my coffee had started to get cool enough to drink and I'd actually come to terms with the fact that I'd be late and calling people to tell them they had to pay on their loan would be blissfully delayed for a little longer, I got behind a young woman in an old hatchback, going about 15 miles under the speed limit.
Imagine my joy at being behind her on an old country back road where you don't get many chances to pass and if you do, there's probably going to be 57 cars coming the other direction. I didn't want to call people and ruin their mornings any more than those people wanted to be called, but I also didn't like getting fussed at for being late. So you might be able to come up with some of the words I probably let slip out while I was behind her - words I can't use here, but went colorfully beyond the initial commentaries of, "Can you not see the speed limit?!" or "The gas pedal is ON THE RIGHT!" or maybe even "I WILL CUT YOU!"
Of course, she couldn't hear me. I know it was a she because of what happened next. After a couple of missed opportunities to pass because there was a parade going on in the opposite lane when the center line was broken and it was legal to, I finally saw it, bright and glowing with a choir of angels singing and pointing the way ahead ... AHHHH ... Come thou labored and weary vehicular operator ... pass and be weary no moooooorrrre!
So I did. I pressed my foot to the accelerator and felt the heavenly vibration of a motor picking up speed and chewing up the asphalt as God intended.
But something was wrong. As I moved into the oncoming lane to pass, the car ahead of me sped up and I had to press the gas harder. But the woman in the old hatchback also pressed harder so that I had to go way faster than I wanted to in order to get around her and the line was about to go double up ahead due to a looming sharp curve.
As I made it even to her car, I looked over and the woman ... hold on while I take a deep breath because this part still gets me madder'n a yella jacketr at a picnic ... (deep breath aaaannnnndddd relax) ... She looked at me, shook her head as if to say, NO. YOU SHALL NOT PASS! and sped up more.
I panicked and looked behind me, but the line of cars that had moved up to fill in where I'd been was too long and my only option was to channel my inner Earnhart and go NASCAR fast to get around her, which would have been fine, but ...
I got back over into my lane just after the legality of my passing ran out before the curve. Which would have been fine, but ...
I hadn't had a chance to slow down to the speed limit from the insane amount of speed I had to get to in order to pass the witch in the old hatchback. Which would have been fine, but ...
The first car in the line coming around the corning in the opposing lane was a State Trooper.
Yeah.
He licked his chops and threw on the lights immediately and my goose was cooked. He didn't want to hear my excuse. He didn't care about my story titled, The Ho In The Hatchback. All he was concerned with was the fact that I was going lightspeed and passing on a double yellow line. And he was rude about it. With how our noble law enforcers are paid way too little for their sacrifice, I assumed maybe he'd gotten a call that morning from a bill collector or something, because he seemed to be in a really bad mood.
I don't know what the woman's problem was. Maybe she saw me railing at her about her slowness in her rearview mirror before I passed and that set her off. If so, that ought to be a lesson to me.
It's funny, I've gotten insulted when it was the other way around before. I was once driving at exactly the speed limit and a redneck in a pickup truck was riding my tail so close that I could smell his breath. Boon's Farm, anyone?
He didn't like me going the speed limit, but I wasn't going to speed just to make him and the tooth he had left happy. He eventually got the opportunity to pass me and did. He needed a muffler, by the way. Not sure if he knew it or not. I shook my head when he went by and as he was moving back over into the lane, I assume he had to put down his bottle of Boon's Farm before sticking his arm out the window and flipping me the bird. That actually made me laugh.
Once again, I was on my way to work one morning when a carload of rednecks got behind me. I assume everybody who acts like an idiot is a redneck because so often ... they are. And once again, they rode my butt so close I could smell their cologne. High Karate anyone? I like to drive the speed limit or just over it, maybe by five miles an hour or so. I've had too many speeding tickets over the years and I don't care for them. But five miles over wasn't good enough and the crazy thing was, they had plenty of opportunities to pass. I still don't understand why these people stayed behind my car to harass me, but they did. Later, they turned off, but not before apparently thinking it would just be hilarious to call the cops and give them my license plate number and vehicle description, telling them I was driving drunk.
So I'm minding my own business, coming into town and sipping my coffee because it had just gotten cool enough to drink, and a city policeman slips in behind me without my noticing. The scenario went a little something like this.
"Know why I pulled you over?"
"No, officer. I don't think I was speeding. If I was, it wouldn't have been more than four or five miles an hour over because I'm a good driver, even if I sometimes get frustrated with women of ill repute who cause me to have to speed and pass on a double yellow line, but that didn't happen, so no. I can't say that I do."
"Well somebody called us saying you were driving all over the road and it looked like you were drunk. Have you had anything to drink today, Mr. ..... Blackston?" (I'd handed him my license and registration without him having to ask. I know the drill.)
"Yes, sir. Orange juice and this coffee." (He laughed, which was a good sign.)
"I didn't think you'd had any alcohol. I've been following you for a while and you've done nothing to make me have to pull you over, but when we get these calls, we have to check it out, you understand? I'm going to have to give you a breath-a-lizer, which you can refuse, but if you do, I have to make you get out of the car and do some physical tests."
"I'll take a breath-a-lizer." (Which I did and the results made him laugh again.)
He apologized for the inconvenience and I told him there was no apology needed and I hoped he didn't get any calls from bill collectors. I told him who I suspected made the call and why and he said it wasn't unusual for people to waste time and resources like that.
That was uncomfortable and unnecessary. I was the one not breaking the law, well ... not by much. And it wasn't like they young hooligans playing a prank. They were not nice people who tried to ruin my day. The jokes on them. I got a funny story out of it. It did bother me until I realized nobody I knew drove by while I was getting a breath-a-lizer done. If it had happened on the main drag through town, there would have probably been a blurb about it on page three of the paper right next to an article about how Blackberries don't grow like they used to and a piece describing a local marketer's pitch to Boone's Farm about rolling out a High Karate flavored brew.
My temper and my mouth are a constant process of improvement, though and as much as I still say things I shouldn't and then wish I hadn't, especially when I'm behind the wheel, there was a time when I was a lot worse about it. I make no secret or apologies that I'm a follower of Christ. But for a while back in my twenties, I lost my way and became somebody I'm not proud of - somebody my wife eventually had to tell me she was at times embarrassed to be around. For reasons I won't go into in this episode - maybe in a different one - I went through a phase of using extremely foul language and not just around my peers. It got to where I relished the idera of saying something that made other people uncomfortable. I thought they'd look up to me as a renegade - maybe somebody they secretly wished they had the guts to be like. I was absolutely not behaving in a way Jesus Christ would approve of and whether or not you see things the way I do spiritually, is beside the point. I knew what I sincerely believed, but had strayed from it.
What does this have to do with road rage, Michael?
Nothing so far, but wait. It's about learning to control myself and an amazing thing that happened which you're welcome to consider a coincidence, but I truly and totally do not. It was a miracle - a gift directly from God and an immediate answer to prayer.
I used to work at a large market radio station on the weekends in Greenville, SC. Overnights. It didn't pay much, but I hadn't been married long and we needed the money from a second job. The overnight weekend shift made it easy to get away with things on-air that should've gotten me fired.
There was a Friday night at the end of a week long revival at my church and the preacher had made a point that stuck with me. He said you don't have to act like a Christian. Nobody does - it's your choice. But don't say you're a follower of Christ in one breath and act like the devil in the next. Be what you are and own it, basically. That night it hit me that I was living two lives and I needed to decided which one it was gonna be that defined me. I believed in Jesus Christ and that He is who He says He is. I decided that if I was going to be a man of integrity, I had a choice to make, but I couldn't have it both ways and so I re-dedicated my life.
There was an issue, though. I could put an end to being a jerk and trying to behave in ways that weren't becoming of a Christian. Unfortunately, the language and temper thing was a bigger hurdle and on my way to work at the station that night, I asked God to take that from me. I told Him I couldn't do it on my own and that this was one of those things I'd need the Holy Spirit to intervene on. And it worked. I'd tried to tame my tongue before, but suddenly it felt true and I actually cried all the rest of the way to the station.
Jump ahead a couple of weeks and I'm on the way there again. I'd made the decision to quit the station because I could find extra work elsewhere in a place that wasn't so tempting to slide back into my old ways and somewhere else would probably pay better anyway. But I'd given them a few week's notice and this was one of my final weekends.
The road is dark and desolate for a stretch just before you get to the interstate and it was there that my back left tire decided to blow. This was before cell phones were in everybody's hand and I didn't have one. It was also before I made enough money to have anything fancier for a jack than one of the cheapie kind that comes with the car and starts to buckle about two inches into the lift. And I had no flash light.
Perfect.
I pulled to the side of the road, got out, and could see in the moonlight that my tire was completely flat. I wanted to cuss. No, that's not right - I wanted to fly into a profanity laced tyrade that would include, but not be limited to, screaming it at the top of my lungs and throwing something through the window of my car.
I started to do that. I started to cuss - we call it cuss in the south, get used to it - and I think I might have actually kicked the side of the car. But then there was a voice in my head. not audible, but that soft, comforting voice and it reminded me of my new dedication and that while nobody else was around and it was late at night, I needed to exercise control in reverence to my promise, because it will be honorable to God. So I calmed down and prayed. I said I was sorry and that although I didn't know what I was going to do because the jack I had wasn't going to be enough and I had no light, I would obey and trust in Him.
I calmly took the spare out of the back, still praying, and the moment I set it against the car, there were headlights that appeared over the hill.
I hoped they would stop and I hoped they would be nice to me. I could be robbed, murdered, tortured there and nobody would know it.
The driver topped the hill and came to my position, pulling their car in behind me in a manner that suggested they expected to find me in need of some help. The driver left on his lights so that my car was illuminated and because of that, I couldn't tell much about them, other than it was a man. A very, very, incredibly large man. He was both tall and wide and could have had whatever way he wanted with puny little me.
He didn't say anything when he got out, but went directly around to his trunk and took out one of those impressive hydraulic jacks, the metal bar that went with it, and a lug wrench.
I already considered him a miracle. God had taken no time in answering my prayers and I wanted to thank him for stopping.
"You don't know what an answer to prayer you are."
He didn't reply. I thought it was odd, but he might be in a hurry - maybe even not really happy to have to help someone, but obligated, so he just wanted to get it over with. He bent and started working on my tire.
"I can do the work. I hate to make you do it," I told him.
Nothing, not even a nod.
"My names Mike. What's yours?"
He looked up at me sternly and put up a hand to shush me, but still, he refused to say a word.
I started to get a little bit irritated. I mean, if you didn't want to help, fine. I'd figure something out. But if you're gonna stop and lend a hand, at least you don't have to be rude about it. I kept all of that to myself, though, and shut up until finished.
When he was done, he took his tools back to his car and put them in the trunk, then walked back to where I was standing.
"Thanks again. Can I give you anything for your trouble?"
He put up a massive paw again and reached into his back pocket for his wallet. From there, he pulled a worn, feathered at the edges business card and handed it to me. I don't remember what it said his name was, but here's what it said his title was:
Pastor for the church of the deaf, mute, and blind.
He left me the card and shook my hand, then turned back toward his car. I thought about calling out my thanks again, but didn't. I don't think he would have heard me and he wouldn't have been able to tell me, you're welcome.
I'm a lot older and wiser now and it stabs me every time I think about the fact that I misplaced the card and never got a better chance to show my appreciation. Maybe that was the way it was supposed to be. But now, if I'm about to totally lose it, that miracle is brought to mind and the lesson in it that might have been overwhelmingly silent, but that I heard loud and clear. And it calms me.
Rage is natural and anger is justified at times. Just don't let it define you.

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All I wanted to do was sit down somewhere and write. I’m back to writing the podcast episodes out blog style because although I thought it would sound more natural just telling stories and saying what was on my mind using bullet points and otherwise flying by the seat of my pants, it still didn’t sound right to me. I’ll get to that later at the end, but for now, just realize that while I intended to make the theme of this one a journey into the back of my mind, through the land of my personal pet peeves, where I keep all the things I want to say, but usually don’t, I didn’t expect to deal with the kind of stress I’m going to talk about in order to get to actually write about it. I hope that makes some kind of sense. So, if you’re saying to yourself, “Dang it, self! I wish he’d find a format and stick with it!”, I promise you’re not alone and like I said, stick around till the end and I’ll explain myself to yourself.

For now, I’m gonna vent for a little bit about Pet Peeves and other things that stress me out. I’ll bet you can relate to a bunch of these things, especially if you suffer from creative diarrhea like I do and need to flush the toilet of your mind from time to time. Maybe that wasn’t such a great way to put it, but you get my meaning. Distractions can stop it up and then you have yourself a big ol’ mess all over your mental floor.

So I’ve listed a few of my worst pet peeves - the ones that can cause a major back up - and as my wife will readily complain ... I don’t handle them well. I'm Michael Blackston and this is Funny Messy Life.

I’ll start with what I consider the worst one. It’s the one that sends me into fits of rage and turns me into a person who thinks things. Scary, violent, un-Christian things. Things that send me to the altar on Sunday morning (as long as somebody else goes first) to repent of my wicked thoughts and send them to HELL! ... Amen. And this particular pet peeve has a fancy scientific name that I will absolutely throw around like an elf with candy in a Christmas parade when I’m explaining why I just said something that made a sailor cry.
MISOPHONIA.

MI - Pertaining to Me
SO - Pertaining to the degree it causes anger ... and
PHONIA - Pertaining to telephones somehow, but I don’t know why.
Misophonia as described a little less accurately by the internet’s Your Dictionary is:
A neurological disorder in which negative experiences, such as anger or disgust, are triggered by specific sounds.

In other words, if you smack your gum or chew with your mouth open so that smacking ensues, I’ll want to forcefully close your mouth by putting you in a headlock and make you swallow it. If you continue, I’ll have thoughts. Bad thoughts. Thoughts that make me feel the need to write pretty songs to the Lord later in apology for the pure evil that passed through my head. Maybe I heard you smacking your food like some idiot cow out in a field whose mama never taught it good manners and suddenly wanted to snap my fingers at you like shorter, fatter version of Thanos.

My problems with people chewing with their mouths open and smacking started a long time ago around the breakfast table with my sister. She’d smack her cereal and I yell at her.
“Stop smackin’!”
“I’m NOT smackin!’”
“Yes you are, you’re SMACKIN’!”
“I am NOT SMACKIN’!”
“MOOOOOOMMMM! Stephanie won’t quit smackin’!”
“MOOOOOOMMMM, tell him I’m not smackin’!”
I could keep going, but I think you get the point.

Since I’ve become an adult, I’ve been able to train my kids to close their mouths when they eat, but it hasn’t been without trial and error. Also, my wife might just be a worse misophoniac than me. She can’t stand the sound of crunching. My poor son has been through a lot over the years.

“Noah, stop crunching those Doritos or I swear, I’m gonna take ‘em from you.”
“Mama, I can’t help it - they’re crunchy!
“Well chew with your mouth closed so I can’t hear it!”
“I’m trying!”
Then here comes me: “NOAH, QUIT SMACKIN’!”

I think the latest problem I’ve had with it is when I’m listening to podcasts and radio shows. I can hear it when people need to wet their mouths and loosen up the gunk in there. When they don’t they make all these little annoying dry mouth sounds that send me through the roof, thinking ... bad things. Luckily for them, all I have to do is not subscribe or turn the channel. But what do I do when I’ve finished a podcast episode of my own and realize when I’m editing that I’m making those sounds? Depends on my mood, but for the most part I understand there are other misophoniacs out there who’d appreciate I edit those verbal hell hounds out so they don’t have to ... well ... think things.

Next on my list is talking during a movie. Any movie, whether I’m at home or at the theater, but mostly in the theater when I’ve paid $437 for a family of four to see and hour and a half of digital animation. That amount of money ought to allow me silence. I have a hard time focusing when there are other things going on around me and especially when there’s a story to try and follow. I don’t want to miss a single line and so when you’re whispering behind me or laughing at un-funny times, I’ll start a volley of unhappy looks in your direction. First, I’ll give you the old quick quarter turn. That’s the one most people use as their out-of-the-gate warning. You snap your head just a quarter of the way around in the direction of the person talking as if to say, “Hey - movie’s started.” If you keep it up, you’ll be subjected to the look I like to call the Are You serious right now?! That’s a good half-turn of the head, except that instead of a quick snap to make sure you see how irritating you are, you get the half turn slow and with a cut of my judgmental eyes in your direction. I’m basically warning you not to make me call you out in front of everybody.
Some people, though, can’t control themselves and have to endure phase three. I’ll turn completely around and address you. You might think you’ll get the “SHHH!”, but no. That’s too easy for you to get over. For me, it’s more effective to use words of my own.
“Good sir (or madam, depending on the situation) ... do you MIND?”
That’ll usually do it, but not always. Sometimes I have to engage phase four and nobody wins.

It’s simple. I’ve lost it and I have to yell at you.
“MOVIE! PEOPLE TRYING TO WATCH! ... MOVIE!”
There are two recent incidents that come to mind when I had evoke the phases. I was just outside of Birmingham, Alabama at the Patton Creek theater at the Galleria. Sounds fancy, I know, but I had to all four phases. I don’t remember what the movie was - probably something that included gunfire because when I see movies alone I tend to see guy movies with gratuitous violence - and for the first few minutes, I was alone. I like it when I get the whole theater to myself. It’s not like I take off my pants and get super comfortable or anything, but just like you, I think about it. After a a couple of previews, though, in walks two teenage boys in ROTC uniforms, giggling loudly about teenage boy stuff as they made their way to the very back.
I allowed that, even though I consider the previews to be part of the movie. They were just teenage boys, after all, enjoying the talk of teenage boy stuff. And then the movie started. But they kept giggling five rows behind me and not trying to be silent about it.
So I gave them phase one. The Quarter Turn. It didn’t phase them. A few minutes later, they found something else funny that had nothing to do with the blood and gun play on the screen and I could hear their unabashed rudeness over the ratta tatta tat of several AK-47s.
I had no choice but to remit their way the fury that burns from phase two - The Half Turn.

I think they understood and for a few more sweet moments of peace, my curmudgeon-in-training ears heard only the soothing sounds of bad action hero dialogue and Glocks aplenty. We had an understanding, these young future leaders and I, but it didn’t last and when I heard them laughing again so loud over the sound effects of the film that it was clear they intended to see what I would do, I’d had more than I could handle.

It was only me and them in the theater, so it bothered no one else that I stood, turned, looked them in the eyes, and became my father, skipping phase three altogether.

I said, “Boys. ENOUGH!”

I’ve never seen young men straighten up and quiet down as quickly and totally as these two did. At the end of the “movie I stood up and told them to have a nice day.

They both said, “Yes, sir.”

Then there I was again at the Patton Creek Fancy Pants Galleria Cinema just outside Birmingham, watching another movie I’d been waiting to see. DUMBO. I wasn’t completely alone when I walked in - there were a few other people who’d gotten there before me, but not many. I found my seat where I normally like it - half way up, dead center - and settled in with the largest size popcorn they had, the bucket, which had been gloriously layered all the way through with oily, butter flavored grease product.

Just as the movie started, a mile long line of 30-something women, each with their own large bucket of popcorn and vat of cola, filed in and thought that the two full rows behind me would be their perfect spot. It wouldn’t have been a problem, except that the woman who sat directly behind my head where my ears tend to be, had a little ritual she performed every time she stuck her fingers in the bucket. She wasn’t content to pick out a few pieces and eat them like a normal person. No. She had to stir the bucket. Every. Single. Time. It probably didn’t bother anybody else, but to me, it was the sound of a tornado bearing down on a trailer park.

I gave her ... Phase One.

I gave her ... Phase Two.

I started to give her Phase Three, but when I turned to address her, I noticed that every one of the thirty-something year old women could have picked me up with one hand, stuffed me in their popcorn buckets and stirred me like just another a greasy little kernel.

The final Pet Peeve happens from time to time and gets under my skin in a personal way. Mouth noises are uncouth. Talking in the movie is rude. But this one takes what I consider a complete disregard for tact and it happened today while I was trying to find a place to write out this piece.

If I’m reading or writing, leave me alone.
I guess that makes me sound like a jerk, but I don’t mean it that way. It seems like I might have talked about this before on the podcast, and if I did, forgive me. The thing is, I think I might have also changed my tune after today because I felt bad later.

I wanted to write out the episode for the first time in a few weeks. I made this big deal about not wanting to sound fake and trying to record by natural, unscripted storytelling. The thing is, I’m not necessarily a natural at that. I am and natural writer, though, and I’ve since realized that I stumble a lot less when I write my thoughts out. They’re still my thoughts, but I can control them better and not go off on tangents or repeat myself so much when I write them down first. So I was all geeked up about getting a new episode out after a several week stumble, but I can’t write at my house. There’s too much going on and I’m not out of town at the moment. So I decided to go to our local diner. It was packed with no seats. Even if I’d waited for one, they wouldn’t have wanted me to take up a booth for a couple of hours only drinking coffee.

So I decided to go to McDonalds and put in earbuds with soothing piano music in the background to drown out the noises around me.
As I ordered my coffee, I noticed a very old man sitting nearby, staring at me. It was unnerving how he stared at me and I also noticed the only seat available in the whole place was the booth next to him. I could see what was coming.
I got my coffee and laid my computer bag, coffee, and iPhone on the table, using big motions like a peacock or something, hoping the old man would take the hint.

I see that this young man obviously has work to do. I’ll not bother the lad with my curiosity and staring. I will, instead, focus my attention on the pretty young girls taking up the rest of the tables as they rest from their travels to some sports competition or other.

I sat down, opened my computer, brought up the writing app I use, and he said nothing. He allowed me the privacy, at least so far, that I wanted. I put my earbuds in my ears, picked up my phone, and selected something called, Easy Listening Piano. I took a delicious sip of my perfectly crafted coffee, sighed for a life giving breath of air, and lifted my fingers to the keyboard to start tapping out this piece. That’s when I heard a voice from my right.

“That a computer?”

It was the old man. He slid over closer to me and I smelled pee.
Now, hang with me here, because I’m about to sound like a total jerk, but I’m trying to be honest and like I said, lessons have been learned.
I didn’t show any outward irritation with him, but inside I was thinking he should be able to see I’m trying to work. Could I, for the love of all that’s holy, not be allowed to work? But I didn’t say any of that. Instead, I smiled at the old man who propped up with an old, hand carved stick for a cane, and said, “Yes it is. Got some work to finish, so I thought I’d have some coffee and while I do.” I smiled a big, toothy grin to let him know he was dealing with a nice guy, but then I turned back to the computer and put in my earbuds. I took another breath and went to type the first words of this piece.

“My son’s got one of them computers. Graduated college to work on ‘em. I don’t nothin’ about ‘em though. I’m eighty-seven years old.”
I took out my earbuds and asked him to repeat himself - it was garbled at first over the Easy Listening Piano. Then I did something I knew would be the end of my working on this piece. I asked, “That so?”

In the south, most of us are taught to be kind and polite, especially to our elders. And while I was kind and polite, I wasn’t feeling having a conversation with this man. I wanted to write, dang it. I wanted to do my thing.

I listened to him tell me things about his life - tiny, bite-sized snippets he was probably used to dolling out in conversation with strangers. He’d graduated from high school sometime in the early 1940’s. He’d served in the Navy. His wife was in a nursing home and it’s cost him everything to take care of her.
I listened and nodded and replied the way I was supposed to, even thanking him for his service, but as soon as I got the chance, I lied and told him I’d only needed to upload something using the free wi-fi and it was already done. Then I loaded up my stuff, told him it was nice to meet him, and walked away to find somewhere I could write this piece.

I sat in my car for a minute, thinking of a place. I wanted quiet and for no one to bother me with their stories because I had my stories to tell. There was the park. Yeah, that’s a good idea. It’s raining pretty good, but no one will be out there, it’ll be cool enough, and I can park myself under one of the covered picnic spots and write at a table where the only interruption might be the patter of rain around me and a critter or two that had taken shelter there. On the way there, I kept thinking about the old man and how sad he looked, but happy when I gave him the time of day. I also thought of how he’d smiled at me when I left and nodded, like he understood that people had better things to do. There was a party going on when I got to the park and all the parking spaces were taken. There was a free table under the shelter, but it was a birthday party for a kid and there would be things that broke my concentration.

The library. Perfect. You’re not allowed to be annoying in the library and they have dedicated work spaces for just this sort of thing. But when I walked in, laid down my stuff, and asked the librarian if it was okay that I’d brought in my coffee, she told me they closed in ten minutes.

I was getting more and more stressed out. My listeners had waited way too long for the next episode and there were those who had told me they liked reading the article and were sad when i stopped. They’d be so happy to get this fresh new one to read. Getting back into the car at the library, I thought about the old man again. He seemed to be content to sit there a while, propped on a cane he probably made himself because men like that have no need for trifles made by others. They can still do it themselves, by thunder! I thought about how he told me he’d been in the navy and had graduated high school in the early 1940’s. He would have probably been in the Navy during D-Day. We’d just recognized the 75th anniversary of that battle and I passed over his service with a cursory thank you when I might have been in the very presence of a real hero.

I was rocked by that thought and turned my car back toward McDonalds. If he’d left, I’d write my article. But if he was there, I’d go to where he was sitting, shake his hand, and ask him his name. Then I’d lay my computer bag at my feet and ask if I could get him some lunch or at least a cup of coffee and I’d honor a man who just wanted a little company. I’d listen to him and I’d nod my head, this time in deep respect and interest. And I’d cherish each word of history he thought valuable enough to tell.

When I walked in, he was gone and I was disappointed. He did tell me he lived in town now and so I’ll look for him when I’m around . I’ll remember his face and he’ll be getting along on that hand made cane of his. I’ll talk to him then and I can assure you, his stories will rise like a titan over anything I could tell. I look forward to that.

Okay, heavy stuff, but it’s how I’m feeling. I’ll be spending some time with my grandmother tomorrow and I’ll try to get her to talk about the things that make her happy. She’s a wellspring of history, that 92 year old woman, and I’ve taken her for granted. She’s in a nursing home and looks forward to every visitor that comes by. I’m gonna make more time from now on for a lot of things. I put a lot of effort into things that can wait and neglect too many of them that can’t. I hope you’ll consider the important things in your life. The elderly who deserve your time, the kids who do too. The people around you who don’t mean to be a bother, but just want to get a chance to talk to somebody. Don’t be like me - too focused on my own stories to see the richness of narrative all around - until it’s maybe too late.

By now, you might have guessed that this is how I think the show will be running. It’s sort of a hybrid between the first several and the last few. I still plan on eventually having some guests come on to talk candidly about their life experiences, but I’ve found it’s hard to get people to find the time.

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I'm a professional artist. I travel all over the southeastern part of the United States etching detailed images onto black granite. In my over ten years of working for myself, I've gathered a few stories that I hope you'll find interesting.

In this episode, I break them up into three sections:

A Tale Of Two Portraits

The Impossible Etching

A Tale Of Two More Portraits

As promised, here is an example of my etching work:

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Her name was Linda. Actually, that's a lie, but I've changed her name to protect her privacy because, well ... we were in love and we were way ahead of our time. We were also small children. In episode 18, we're going to explore a time in my life - very early on - when I first began to experience the mental and physical pains of a relationship.

But here's a disclaimer: You might consider whether you want your children to listen to this one because while I won't be dirty, the middle story is about a 5 and 6 year old playing You show me yours and I'll show you mine, except we went a tiny bit further.

If that got your attention, give it a listen. I'm Michael Blackston and this is the story of the first love of my Funny Messy Life.

Did you get into any embarrassing situations with the neighbors when you were a kid? How about since you've grown up? Tell us in the comments and let Funny Messy Nation know about it so we can all laugh or cry with you. 

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Monsters under the bed? Nah. Monsters in the closet? Nope. I was never that kid, but I did have some scary encounters. In episode 17, I’ll give you the inside scoop on a few things that went bump in the night and other places too. From the creature in the woods to the Green Man in my room and even a ghost in an old church. I’m Michael Blackston and these are some of the things that haunted the early childhood of my Funny Messy Life.

Did you battle any monsters? I’d really like to hear about it. Tell us your story in the comments!

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When it comes to interesting stuff in the world, little compares to the intricate workings of the human mind. From kids to the elderly and entire lives in between, we can make simple things hard, difficult things easy and sometimes we let the mundane stay mundane. It doesn’t matter how you choose to ride the wave in the ocean of your own existence, I can promise you’ll pick up a few barnacles in the form of stories along the way, like I have.

I’m going to break a few of them off the bottom of my own surf board and tell you about my struggle with loosing weight, my daughter’s sense of independence, and what you might call my flirting with kleptomania. I’m Michael Blackston and while I have no idea why I used a nautical theme to get us into it, because there’s nothing nautical about any of the stories, you’re about to enter my world. Something I like to call my Funny Messy Life.

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I’ve talked about my diabetes at least a couple of times now and while I make light of it because this is a comedy thing i’m dong here, I want you to know I do take it seriously. It’s just that I have an addiction to certain kinds of foods and an aversion to exercise and those things combined join forces and create this enormous disease Voltron-like robot that shoots chocolate candies and buttermilk biscuits at my sedentary body in a non-stop barrage of delicious cannon fire. That’s why I’m currently engaged in ...

The Battle For The Last 20 lbs

I have twenty more pounds I need to lose and everybody seems to be against me. Don’t get me wrong; I don’t believe it’s anybody else’s duty to make it happen, but I’m starting to believe there was some sort of summit among the people I call “friends”, the people I call “family”, and the people I call “strangers” to put an end to my weight loss goals.

It’s everywhere I turn and the evidence is overwhelming. As I sat in a popular retail store, I saw from my vantage at a booth in a popular sub shop that is attached to the popular retail store, that just past the Don’t-Accidentally-Bring-Something-Through-That-Wasn’t-Properly-Scanned-Or-We’ll-Embarrass-You-With-An-Alarm-That-Makes-Everyone-Think-You’re-Stealing-From-Us-And-Because-This-Is-A-Small-Town,-Your-Grandmother,-Pastor,-And-That-Dude-That’s-Just-Sitting-There-Waiting-For-His-Wife-To-Hurry-Up-For-The-Love-Of-All-That-Is-Holy-Will-Know electronic wall, was a series of shopping carts with the has-beens of another by-gone holiday; the Carts Of Misfit Candies, if you will.

We’d just finished Valentine’s Day, so the display was unashamedly tempting with its sign that read 50% off all items. There were eye catching red cardboard containers shaped like hearts and enormous aluminum foil wrapped chunks of milk chocolate goodness shaped like hearts; - everything was shaped like hearts - and it beckoned me with the love and satisfaction that the shape offers. I sent a thought toward the carts; Be GONE, heart shaped candies! Back to your foul and evil hidings where lie delicious calories and tooth rotting decadence! But they stayed right where they were.. I tried to keep my attention focused on the task at hand, which was writing an award winning blog article, but my eyes kept returning to the carts (we call them buggies in the American deep south), filled to their tops with what my pastor calls the pleasures of the flesh. The chocolate kind, you pervert!

So far, I’ve resisted; I’m resolute and steadfast in my goal of losing the final twenty pounds. But it’s not just this store that’s waged war on my health. It’s my family, too.

We get together at my grandmother’s house most Sundays and enjoy a meal. There’s always fried chicken, usually mac and cheese, potatoes, and it never fails that there’s either biscuits or rolls. There are normally a couple of different desserts and my grandmother always has candy in jars and ice cream in the freezer. Iced tea, anyone? There will inevitably be two gallons of it and several soft drinks. Yes, I brought a five-gallon drum of cheese balls, but I swear it was peer pressure. I walk around the table that has been set out with all of the stuff I just mentioned, fully intending to eat like a reasonable human being, but I end up forced to follow the pack, or in this case, the herd because we never stop grazing the entire day. I’m not happy until I pile my plate high with everything that would scare the stripes off Richard Simmons’ shorts. I’d mention the vegetables that are always there on the table and plenty of them, but because I’m mesmerized by the beast of gluttony and its wiles of tasty crap I’m urged to eat, I find myself blinded to the vegetables and the healthier alternatives. Yes, I AM blinded and not just by science. It’s this jones I’ve got for stuff that tastes good that blinds me. And diabetes. I’m told that soon diabetes will blind me if I don’t get a handle on it.

It’s everybody else’s fault. If they would bring only healthy food, I wouldn’t feel obligated to wheelbarrow in a container of cheese balls that are not only a source of poor health, but as you might remember from earlier episodes, are also the source of a terrible Saturday morning a few years ago.

But suppose my family didn’t mind my losing weight and suppose they didn’t make attempts (and succeed) in knocking down my dietary convictions, there’d still be the outside influences.

All the towns of this nation have joined in the Let’s Make Michael’s Heart Valves Resemble A Clogged Drain Full Of Hair And Fingernail Clippings Except With Grease war. I can’t take a leisurely stroll without passing what the enemy has termed a “Fast Food Restaurant”. These are major weapons disguised as convenience. They’re stationed strategically at every corner, and everywhere in between those corners, touting their fast, delectable ease. I must keep an open eye to all incoming MOVs (Menus Of Value), and the task isn’t easy. And speaking of convenience, another piece of artillery the enemy employs against me has the word directly in its name. Convenience Store. Where there’s not a fast food restaurant, the mortar rounds of this war, there’s a convenience store. I liken it to a 50 caliber machine gun. Even the auto parts stores have a candy display!

And then there are the agents who call themselves “Friends”. These are the covert ops human people who dash to and fro inside the confines of my trust, watching for every opportunity to trip me up. They might bring an enormous chocolate chip cookie to the theatre on my birthday for “all the cast to share”, except they insist I take the leftovers home. They listen intently as I say I have twenty more pounds to lose and then reply in a wickedly sincere voice, “You’ll be WAAAYYY too thin if you lose that much. You look great now.”

Savages!

It’s hard to know who you can trust.

I’m asked what I’d like for Christmas, knowing they’re only setting me up for failure. They know I’ll say a movie gift card and my mind will go directly to the large bucket of popcorn I’ll drown in so much butter that my face will glisten around my mouth by the time I walk out because I cram the popcorn into my pie hole by the handfuls. (Go ahead and laugh … that actually happened.)

So I ask you; where is my army? I have my wife’s support and that’s wonderful; we support each other. But the rest of everybody remains my enemy in a conflict to loose the last twenty pounds. I blame the people around me; I refuse to blame myself. If I weren't bombarded with temptation at every turn and if there were no demon imps marking every mile of my existence, just waiting for me so they can hold up an apple fritter and a gallon of chocolate milk, I wouldn’t be in this fix.

I resolve, however, to win the war. There may be battles that deliver blows in the form of individually wrapped, bite size candy bars, but I’ll keep fighting on.

Unfortunately, behind each buggy filled with the last holiday’s candy, there’s another holiday approaching fast.

Best to keep my armor on.

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I’ve come to believe that people are hardheaded from birth. We don’t have to be taught that feature - we want things our way from the moment we breathe our first taste of oxygen. We come out, we start to cry and scream. Why? Because you woke us up and turned on the lights. And it never stops from that moment. We like it the way we like it and we’ll tell you about it. It even shows up in our every day activities. Take men for example. We’re never lost, we just sometimes don’t know where we are and we don’t need to stop and ask for directions. Or take my children for another example. My daughter is five and a couple of years ago, I wrote this piece. Let’s go back in the past when we had to endure a lot of ...

I Can Do It All By Myself

The phrase, I can do it all by myself, is a lot cuter when uttered from the tiny mouth of a two and a half year old. My daughter is growing way too fast and she’s at that stage now where she wants to do many of the things that we used to help her with all by herself.

I love that when they’re young, partly because of the cuteness factor, but also because of the hilarity that can ensue as the show progresses. It might sound mean to laugh at her misfortune, but she can get into some messes that, let’s just face it, are hilarious.

Unfortunately for mankind, but fortunately for the medical field, the adorableness of it all doesn’t last. Eventually the, “Aww – how sweet” replies from the masses turn into, “You’re an idiot.”

It’s because while we grow up physically, we don’t necessarily grow up mentally. Men tend to be some of the biggest offenders when it comes to this. I know – I’m living proof. To be quite honest, I probably ought to thank God that I’m not just “proof”, leaving out the “living” part.

Kids are innocent. They want to be like the adults that are taking care of them. That’s why it might not be such a great idea to practice your vices where they can see and emulate you. For instance, what if you smoke around a child and one day while you aren’t looking, he takes a cigarette from the pack an aunt left on the arm of the chair and puts it down the front of his pants between skin and underwear, hoping to get a chance to try smoking it later? What if it’s mid-July and that child is very forgetful? And what if, because the cigarette has been down there all day and the child has begun to sweat, it breaks apart and the tobacco disperses all about his parts and crevices? Do you have any idea how sweat and skin mixed with the chemicals in cigarette tobacco react and create a burning sensation like you decided to do your business sitting on a fire ant hill?

Well, I do. Because I was that child. And as my mother noticed, upon helping me out of my pants to see why I was jumping up and down, attempting to beat out invisible flames in and around my crotch area, that I had attempted a smuggling operation down there, she decided a burning on my backside might balance out the pain.

It didn’t. It added to my pain.

You might think I’d learn, but again, I didn’t.

The I Can Do It All By Myself mentality somehow became firmly tattooed into my subconscious mind so that I hate getting help with just about anything.

Forget going to the doctor. I’ll suffer through something with prescriptions of my own making way more often than I’ll darken the doors of a doctor’s office. Soup and Nyquil are my go-to methods for fixing anything from Bronchitis to a stab wound. And whiskey.

But it doesn’t stop there and I’m not the only one who behaves this way. Something tells me a good portion of society refuses to admit they need assistance. Here’s a story that’ll make you scream, “Are you the most idiotic person in all of mankind?!”

I was building the set for a local live production I was directing with my wife. The show was Bye Bye Birdie, the wonderful 50s era musical. The first scene calls for a piano in the office of a music producer and I wanted an old classic upright. We happened to have one that was unable to be used, sitting in the orchestra pit. The theatre had decided to scrap it when I had a bright idea. I would gut it so that the shell could be lifted easily from the pit and onto the stage. I would create a prop piano that looked like a working one, but was very light and maneuverable. After all, there’s been need of a prop like that in other shows and it would be nice to have something that wasn’t as heavy as a working piano.

To gut the piano, I’d have to remove the soundboard from inside it, which required that it be laid down on its back. Remember, this is an old, classic upright; the kind with the tall top. Those are out-of-this-world heavy and it takes several men to move one any distance.

I had my men scheduled on a Saturday to help with laying it down, but for reasons that could not be helped, both were unable to make it.

What to do?

I didn’t want to delay getting this prop ready. We were in a time crunch, but more importantly, I was excited about doing it and I didn’t want to wait. So there I was in the orchestra pit, alone on a Saturday, with no one to hear my screams and I decided, “You know what? I Can Do It All By Myself!”

I shifted the piano forward and backward to get a feel for its balance and thought it could be done if I let it down slowly. And it was working, too, until I got it about a foot from the ground and felt my back make the familiar revelation, “If you don’t let go, I’m about to FREAK OUT!” I’d tangled with my back enough to know that it was not joking and I let the piano drop the rest of the way. It made a loud sound, but didn’t break. That would have been okay if only I had thought to pull my feet out from under its path.

The piano landed on my two big toes.

At first, you know the half-second before the pain hits and you realize you’ve maybe changed your world forever with your stupidity, it wasn’t that bad. My mind went to a place of, “Hmm. Something feels funny.”

But then I felt the shock and pain of an old, classic upright Steinway with the tall top crushing my toes and my mind took a new course of thought. “AHHHHHHHHEEEEEEEEEE!!!”

I was forced to tug my toes out from under the piano, which was applying so much pressure that my feet came completely out of my shoes and left them there. I stood there for a while, afraid to bend down and look at my toes and totally convinced that they were crushed and I might have to be assisted out of the pit. But when I finally managed the courage to have a look, I was surprised to find they were only bruised and I could move them. It was painful, but they could move and I was able to walk to some extent.

My suggestion is that we realistically look at the task ahead of us and make an intelligent decision in regard to how much help we need. After the piano incident, the most common advice I heard was, “I told you to stop trying to do everything by yourself!” The second most common phrase was, “You almost just changed your world forever with your stupidity!”

I would ultimately lose both of the nails from those toes and the one on the right decided to go all rebel and grow weird so that I’d later suffer the in-grown toenail I told you about in episode four.

By the way, that’s an episode that will regale you with how I decided I could perform my very own toe surgery …

All By Myself.

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The human condition is an interesting thing. We put stuff into our bodies that we know will kill in the long run, just to get an immediate - albeit temporary - satisfaction. We try to do things without the help of more knowledgeable or capable help because we want to think more highly of ourselves. And now, I’m going to tell you about a little compulsion I have when I travel. I can help but wonder about everything that’s not nailed down ...

Is That Free?

As I walked into the kitchen this morning, I performed my usual habit of laying out all of my supplies for the day, java-wise. I’d already brewed the pot and the smell of ground coffee beans permeated the room so that every individual fiber of hair in my nostrils awakened and said hello to the promises of a brand new day - all except that one long nose hair that was being stubborn and refused to be plucked. Having long nose hairs that need to be plucked is a subject for another day, but it’s coming. Oh yes, it’s coming.

Anyway, after getting the coffee brewed, my next step is always to lay out a stir stick for my cream and sugar and a small napkin to lay the stir stick on so that it doesn’t touch the surface of the counter. Yes, I’m a little OCD, but it also looks pretty and makes me feel all fancy pants.

I accomplish this task by opening one of the plastic packets of coffee supplies that hotels keep in the rooms for their guests. The packet comes with one sugar, one creamer, one pink packet of sugar substitute, one stirring straw, and a small napkin. I use milk and liquid sugar. I hate the pink packet stuff, so I carefully store those for emergencies. I never know; I could be lost at sea and need to whip out my cell phone to call and ask my wife to have my emergency coffee supplies shipped to my life raft. Even the pink packets could be handy in that situation to scare away the sharks.

That leaves the stir straw and the napkin for me to primly place and arrange perfectly on a corner of the counter in front of the coffee pot. I may then step back and observe my work and the probability of lots of cups of coffee. I have a problem when it comes to coffee and I admit it, but that’s an article for another day.

The whole coffee thing isn’t the subject of this story anyway. It’s that little plastic packet of goodies offered for free by the hotel. I have hordes of them because I travel a lot and before I leave my hotel room, I steal everything that I feel could possibly in some way be spun into the round about area of semi-probable okayness to take with me.

In an effort to make you understand the gravity of my problem, allow me to put it into story form as we stroll through my exit strategy from whatever hotel I’ve stayed in. I’ve decided to tell it a narrative as if I were recording an audiobook. Why? Because I plan to start recording audiobooks and I need the practice.

Michael stretched and a gave a long yawn as his mind wrapped around the sound of the alarm going off across the room. For a brief moment, he considered staying in the bed. After getting to sleep so late due to staying up writing on a play destined for Broadway, or at least an after-school function in a small town in Idaho, he felt like a couple more hours might just be the ticket. After all, he was the boss of him. He could make that call if he felt so inclined.

But the day beckoned and after the stretch, his blood began to flow a little faster so that he thought more clearly. He was, in fact, the boss of him, but his clients were the bosses of the checks he needed them to write. That thought poked him awake the final bit and Michael jumped out of bed toward the alarm to shut it off and pack up. He’d be leaving for home after work today and there was lots to do before he left the posh lodgings that had kept him for the last two nights.

He showered and groomed to satisfaction, all except for one long, rogue nose hair that refused to be plucked.

“Curse you, long nose hair! You taunt me,” he growled into the mirror at the curled line of string that grew from his nostril and would torture him all day as it made him feel constantly like he had a booger there for everyone to see.

But there were more important things to consider now. There were things not nailed down. And there were some nailed down he thought the staff probably wouldn’t miss.

After packing his essentials, Michael surveyed the room to itemize the bounty so he would forget nothing. There were little soaps and shampoos and conditioners. This room even had a tiny hand lotion. There were disposable coffee cups and plastic packets with supplies.

He packed them all into his suitcase and noticed there was room there for more.

Michael felt his adrenaline begin to rush through him as he contemplated the haul that might possibly be loaded into his bag.

There was an unopened single roll of toilet paper in the bathroom. Michael often needed toilet paper. He snagged it and noticed the towels laying on the floor. He considered those damp rags for a second, but decided against it because he knew how badly he had smelled going into that shower the night before.

The television in the room was too large to fit into his bag, but not the pen and pad of scratch paper that lay on the nightstand beside the bed. There were pillowcases on the pillows that would definitely fit, but again, Michael remembered rubbing his nose on them during the night in a senseless attempt to wipe away a phantom booger. The thought of packing the pillowcases did not appeal to him, so he moved on and out of the room, closing the door behind him.

In the hall, to Michael’s delight, was an unattended maid’s cart overflowing with provisions intended to replace the stuff the other guests had used. Michael opened his bag and crammed as much as he could into it.

He looked up and down the hall to make certain he had not been spotted and pressed the button for the elevator. As he entered, he heard a cry from the vicinity of the cart, “Oh no they dit-in!”

Hearing this, Michael pressed the "Close Door" button rapidly eighty times.

In the lobby, the smell of breakfast lofted throughout the place. There were freshly baked frozen biscuits. Michael didn’t care for frozen biscuits. He was a master of the scratch-made kind and preferred them to the ones from a bag. Most everyone he knew now pulled them frozen from a bag and it saddened him that there were only he and a few ladies with blue hair that still practiced the craft of making biscuits by hand. But that’s a story for another day, he said to himself and stuffed five frozen biscuits into his coat pocket.

Before turning away, Michael noticed peanut butter and jelly packets aplenty in dishes directly in front of him. He scooped a large portion of each into the pockets of his jeans, adding a few pouches of oatmeal and instant grits for good measure.

Turning from the food bar, he made his way to the checkout desk for his receipt.

The attendant met him with a smile that seemed to say underneath it, I’m supposed to smile because I’m paid to, but I’m hung over and if you complain about any little thing, I will choke you with one of those biscuits you have in your pocket. And I know you have them because there’s a trail of bread crumbs leading from the bar to exactly where you’re standing.

“How was your stay?” he beamed.

“It was fine,” Michael replied in a voice that wasn’t so much complaint ridden, but was intended to convey that the amenities of this place are a bit lacking. “Just checking out and need my receipt.”

As the attendant bent toward his computer to view the screen, Michael palmed a grouping of pens from the counter, jar and all, and placed them quickly underneath his baseball cap.

Upon offering the receipt, the attendant also offered to Michael that there suddenly seemed to be something strange about the way his cap fit on his head. Michael snorted and something in his nostril tickled him there. He wiped his nose and thanked the attendant for everything, bidding him a good day.

As Michael made the approach to his car, he heard a voice behind him calling out and he feared the worst. He’d be relieved now of his stashes and informed he was no longer welcome at the Super Duper Motel 4.

But the attendant from the counter was holding up a set of keys as he came running and said, “You left these.”

Michael thanked him again and took them from his hand. As the attendant was quipping something original about how he wouldn’t get very far without those, Michael also took the master key from the attendant’s belt.

As he drove away, he thought, "They could have at least had mints on the pillows."

The End.

Okay, so that’s an exaggeration. I’m no thief, but I do take everything that is supposedly “Complementary” every time. That's why it's there, right?

And now my coffee cup needs refilling and I have to go to the bathroom to blow my nose.

Feels like I might have a booger.

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If you ask me, human beings are the most interesting things on the planet, followed closely by baby goats videos on the internet. I hope these three stories intrigued you at least a little bit and if they did, let me know.

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Sometimes I think my problem is just that I’m messed up in the head and I have a circle of family and friends who’ll nod in agreement when I say that. Yes. Yes, that man is messed up in the head big time.

But sometimes parenting takes a little insanity to make something positive happen. Even if it makes you look like you lost all your marbles and might turn you into the person children point at when you walk down the street with your shopping cart full of your prized parenting possessions ... badly done coloring pages because what if they’re the next Rembrandt?, random rocks they found in the yard and gave you as presents because what if they’re the next Indiana Jones?, and that thing you can’t identify that they found in a dump somewhere, because what if they’re the next American Picker? Even if it makes you look like that, who cares? You’re a parent and you don’t have to apologize because it made you a spectacle. So go right ahead and dance down that street, pushing your shopping cart with its wobbly wheel and singing songs only you know the words to in your mumu and combat boots combo. I won’t say a word to you because my friend, you have a story to tell.

I’m Michael Blackston and I’m about to tell you a few of my own stories and about the parenting in my Funny Messy Life.

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My wife, and I are currently in a time-honored struggle with our daughter that has been waged since man first started raising children … getting a young’n to sleep in his/her own bed. I didn’t start this to hear all about how easy you had it - your children were perfect angels and you never had the first problem making them sleep in their own room. First of all, I don’t believe you and secondly, if you are telling the truth, I hate you. So, good day, Sir or Madam. I SAID GOOD DAY, SIR OR MADAM! No, I’m talking to you - the normal parent - who can identify with the struggle, have tried and failed and tried again ... (sigh) ... and failed again ... to get your sweet one to go “night night” in their own bed - in their own room - so you and your adult other can do the things you and your adult other want to finally get to do. Things you can’t do with a kid in the room .... REST! Here’s how I’ve been ...

Fighting The Good Fight

I tried the most basic approach at the beginning. But things escalated from there to dangerous, then to outright stupid.

Day 1 “You’re sleeping in your room tonight, Pumpkin, like a big girl.”

“No, I’m not.”

“Awwww. Yes you are, because daddy needs his side of the bed.”

“No, I’m nooooot.” It would seem to be a respect problem right from the start if it weren’t so cute that she said it a sing-song delivery while scooping potatoes onto the top of her latest Barbie’s head.

“Yes you aaarrrrreeee,” I sing-song back and rustle her adorable hair.

“Noooo I’m nooooooot.”

This played out into the wee hours of the night until my voice was so exhausted from arguing and my hands were so tired from washing potatoes out of the hair of a naked Barbie, that I placed her softly into the bed between me and my wife and fell asleep, though not before trying to get in one last volley. “You’re sleeping in your own bed tomorrow night.”

I thought I’d won. There was no reply, at least not until I had just drifted off into a land where the cure for diabetes was fresh doughnuts and all the regular Coke I could drink, then out of the darkness, a tiny voice trickled like a gentle mountain brook over the noise of the fan.

“Noooo I’m noooooooooot.”

Day 2 A different approach. Mr. Nice guy didn’t work, but I understand that she is a child, so I decided to take it from nice to funny. After all, when you want to get someone on your side, you make them laugh. It’s the oldest trick in the book for speakers who want a crowd of people to buy their new product. You get them to like you. If they like you, they’ll trust you. If they trust you, they’ll agree with you by nodding vehemently in agreement with you because they want to please you in the future by purchasing your widget or sharing your latest blog post. (By the way, I’m really hoping you trust me. Just sayin’.)

I saw a benefit in trying this out on my four year old because if I can get adults to want to do what I say, then a small child ought to be, at least in theory, a breeze.

“Hey Merida … why did the chicken cross the road?”

“I don’t know.”

“To get to the other side of her own bed. Funny, right?”

“Is the chicken a rooster or a hen? Because at school they said that roosters are big and strong.”

“Well, it’s not really the point, but I guess it’s a rooster.”

“Are you saying I’m actually a boy, daddy?”

“What? No!”

“You said a joke to make me sleep in my bed.”

“Yes, but …”

“Roosters are boys.”

“It’s a HEN! The chicken crossing the road is always a hen.” I started to sweat. This wasn’t going as planned. “You’re sleeping in your own bed tonight.”

“No, I’m not.”

Time for the backup plan. I would tickle her to get her laughing so hard she didn’t realize I had put her into her bed. The plan worked at first. She pitched a cackle so hard that she threw herself backward onto her pillow, but overshot it by a few inches and clocked the back of her head on the wooden book shelving that made up the headboard. She was screaming in pain and I had to convince her to let me check her skull for fractures and wood chips.

Day 3 With the protective bumpers in place on the shelves behind her - I made them out of pool noodles that were retrofitted to cover the dangerous parts - I implemented another phase of Operation: Sleep, Dangit!

I’d seen movies where the good guy lured the villain into a place by distraction and guile. I don’t see my daughter as a villain by any means, but I definitely see myself as the hero in my own movie, so it should work, right?

“Hey darlin’, what’s that? Is that a new baby doll?”

“Where?”

“In your room. Now that we have you in your night night clothes, teeth brushed, and potty trip done, I think we should check out the new baby doll I see in your room.”

Of course, I know this might seem more like bribery and probably not a good precedent to be setting, but stay with me. I needed to create an incentive to get the villai … um … my child interested in following me into her bedroom and I had no gold, nor suitcases full of money and drugs.

Thinking there was a baby doll in there, she ran into her bedroom.

“I don’t see it,” she gushed, excited.

“See that lump under the covers at the foot of your bed? I think that must be it! You’ll have to burrow down under your covers to get to it.”

The plan was for her to get under there and I would cuddle up next to her and read a book while she hugged her new doll, forgetting completely about mommy and daddy’s bed.

What actually happened was that she surprised me and whether what she did next was innocence, cunning, or just a slap in my face with a smile, I’ll never know.

“It’s easier this way, daddy!”

She ran around to the foot of the bed, lifted the covers from that end and pulled out her new, too expensive doll. She hugged it tightly, just as I new she would, then ran down the hall to our bedroom screaming, “Thank you daddy, I love it! You’re the BEST daddy in the world!”

(Sigh.)

Day 4

I probably should have given up right then. I’m a pretty staunch believer in the three strikes, you’re out concept, but I wanted to give it one last try before letting the dust settle while coming up with a new set of plans.

Natural remedies. I looked on the internet because all the great ideas are there and everybody is an expert. I found what I hoped would be a helpful blog by a woman named S. Marty McPants. Her bio said she was an expert and her credentials listed being on the internet to prove it.

Here are a few of the things I tried that night.

Start early - I could handle that. We hit the sack at 3 pm. For some reason, she just laid there making annoying mouth noises and fidgeting her legs. Then she told me she was hungry.

“Daddy, I’m hungry. I didn’t have supper yet.”

“Shhhhh. Go to sleep. Daddy needs you to go to sleep.”

More mouth noises and fidgeting.

“Daddy I’m not sleepy yet..”

“Just lay there and you’ll get sleepy. Now stop making those noises and wiggling.”

She started doing hand puppets - the same boredom activity my son used to call Talkin' Hands.

“Look, daddy. This hand is a kitty and this hand is bunny. Watch ‘em fight!” She then engaged in a violent cage match to the death between her two puppet hands.

“Stop that! Go to sleep!”

“Daddy, I’m hungry.”

Soothing Fragrances

I decided we’d get up and try again later. When that time came, I was armed with an arsenal of fragrances and essential oils I was told might help initiate a sleep response. I had roses, oranges, lavender, coconut, cinnamon spice, honey suckle, pumpkin spice, essence of baked chocolate chip cookie, scent of breast milk, and something called The Smell of God’s Endearing Love.

Nobody told me not to put all the oils in the steamer thing at once and the result was anything but calming.

A Noise Maker

I don’t know why I didn’t think of that before. I use a noise maker app when I’m on the road in hotel rooms - heavy rain - and I can’t sleep without it now. In our bedroom, my wife and I need to have a fan going at all times and part of that is for the noise, so it made sense that my darling angel might benefit from the same thing.

Unfortunately, I hadn’t paid attention to the box when I bought it, just after Halloween. It was orange with cute black bats all over it. I assumed the bats represented night time and they were happy and cute and happy. I didn’t read the writing on the box because my eyes were glazed over from the lack of sleep the previous night when two tiny feet dug into my back for the entire eight hours. So, when I set up the machine next to the bed and pressed play on the remote control, my precious daughter, who was nervous already about being in the dark, was treated to the screams of murder victims, chains rattling, and evil laughter.

She’ll be sleeping with us for a while yet.

What can you do? I only have so much in me and I think I’ll need a recharge before I try this again. Until then, I’ll get as much sleep as I can in the six inches I’ve been allotted for my side of our king size bed.

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Not long ago, I cycled through pictures in a blog of a young lady who wants to look like a Barbie Doll so badly that she’s had a bunch of surgery to alter her body. I won’t go into my opinion about that because she’s free to do that to herself if she chooses and wouldn’t care what a dude like me with good sense thinks about it in the first place. So you might be thinking to yourself, Here he goes. This redneck soundin’, biscuit eatin’, minivan drivin’, butter churnin’, opinionated, Disney lovin’, (gasp for breath ...) art makin’, podcast havin’, bible readin’, politics hatin’, superhero movie watchin’, showtune singin’ son of a so and so is about to tell us what we should and shouldn’t do. And you’d be wrong. I’m about to tell you about a problem I have in my own household. I call it ...

The Barbie Doll Conundrum

I’m about to enter into a fracas that’s been raging for years. There’s an all out hullabaloo about the harmful affects Barbie dolls have on our society and I, for one, would like to add my two cents as a father and husband now that I have a daughter who embraces them with every fiber of her five going on 25 little being.

First, let me make it clear that I won’t be tossing around any of the regular notions that are typically at the forefront of this brouhaha, such as the emotional effects Barbie might have on young girls in regard to their appearance. I mean, I played with He-Man figures my entire childhood and my wife will tell you I’ve never felt like I needed to look like them, with their perfect bulked up bodies that could destroy a submarine with one flex. And that was just Teela. I’ll leave the brainy stuff to the psychologists and their bow ties.

I’m talking about finally shedding some light on the real problems associated with having approximately 8,324,749 Barbie dolls lying around the house.

Problem 1. There are approximately 8,324,749 Barbie dolls lying around my house. My daughter has opened box after box during birthdays, Christmas, Hannukah (and we’re not even Jewish), full moons, Mardi Gras, Cinco De Mayo, and post thrift store adventures my mom has been on. Homeless people on the street come up to us, not asking for money or food, but to give my child a Barbie doll.

“Can I get you a hot meal, though?”

“Oh no, thank you, but that angel looks like she’d like a doll.”

Yes. She would like a doll. That’s the problem. She’ll always like a doll. I’m trying to teach her what actual floors look like in a house, but I’m not being allowed to do that because of the Barbie doll thing. I want her to understand the beauty of natural hard wood or even a well installed linoleum, but that can’t happen because there’s a perpetual layer of naked dolls on the flooring surface of my entire house.

Problem 2. Everything is naked. Yep, I get it. They’re just plastic dolls, but there are two males living in the house and even the idea of 8,324,749 naked females can create issues. My son is a teen and I’m trying to teach him the value of a chaste woman; to appreciate the kind of girl who wears an adequate amount of clothing and leaves something to the imagination for the man she will eventually marry and that he should see nothing beyond that until his wedding night, praise the Lord and can I get an “Amen”?!

Unfortunately, taking off all of their clothes is the very first thing a girl does when getting a new doll. At least that’s how mine plays with them. She disrobes them, then tries on different clothes. The problem is, sometimes she finds it hard to put the clothes back on them. Before long, I’ll hear, “Help, daddy!” and suddenly I’m fondling a tiny naked calendar model. Then later that night …

“Hey, honey. Um, you wanna …”

“We have church tomorrow and it’s late.”

“Oh, okay.” (Turns over in a pronounced huff)

“What’s wrong?”

“NOTHING!”

These problems could be avoided if they’d just make the dolls with clothing that could not be taken off and to give a little credit, some of that has started to happen. My daughter got a couple of Disney princess dolls that had painted “skin suits” on under their dresses. It gave me a start when from the back seat of the car, I had Elsa thrown toward me without her dress on. “Help, daddy!”

Kayla looked over at me in the passenger seat as I was holding the doll in one hand and her dress in the other, wearing a noticeable look of disappointment.

“Why are you frowning like that?”
”NOTHING!”

Problem 3. There are only so many Barbie dolls that’ll fit in a single bathtub. Also, they all have long hair that doesn’t dry immediately. The beauty of that finely groomed hair while in the box is undone once the post-tub drying experience has happened. One seasoned mom told me to just comb it out and just let it dry naturally.

Nope. I’ve got to shake out each individual doll so it doesn’t get moldy and once I beat the hair savagely against the side of the tub like Bob Ross beating the devil out of his paint brush, Barbie’s hair looks like Phyllis Diller’s and who - I ask in all honesty - wants to look at a naked Phyllis Diller?

I try to explain that we only need to put a few in the tub at a time, but a four year thinks that the only way to play in the tub is to have every single toy she owns in there with her. So not only am I rounding up 8,324,749 Barbies, but also each Minnie Mouse and every McDonald's toy she ever got in a happy meal. Once I bathed a Cabbage Patch Kid for five minutes before I realized it wasn’t my daughter. I only figured out my mistake after a hand shot out from under the toys holding a naked Ken doll. “Here, daddy!” Now, that’s where I draw the line. I ain’t fondling no naked Ken doll.

Problem 4. Sooner or later, my angel will be too old for the dolls and I’ll face the day when I have to pick them up off of the floor for the last time. That day will be bittersweet because while I’ll enjoy the sight of a clean walking surface, I’ll also understand that this marks a turning point in our lives.

I’ll also have to figure out what to do with all of those dolls. I won’t give them to a thrift store. I couldn’t do that to my fellow man. I might go out under bridges and distribute them back to the homeless.

“You got any change, sir?”

“I just gave you a DOLL!”

However it turns out, I do know that there’s a light at the end of the Barbie Fashion Accessory Tunnel by Mattel that somebody bought for my daughter’s last birthday. But there’s also a light at the end of the philosophical tunnel and that is that one day, despite the too-much-growing-up that my little girl will have done, I shall shower unencumbered by any tiny naked women lying on the floor just on the other side of the curtain, making me feel like I need some deep, intrusive therapy from a dude in a bow tie.

Until then, I can enjoy the simple things, like being in bed beside my wife later in the evening after she had to be the one to put Ken’s clothes back on him, and feeling a little nudge on my shoulder.

“Honey, … um …”

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Have you ever tried to raise a child “in the way he or she should go”? I think that’s how the bible puts it. Of course it’s making reference to spiritual things in that context, but it can be applied to the following story as well, especially since spiritual phrases are often yelled out in the form of, “Oh good Lord!” or “For the love of all that is pure and HOLY!”

I’m talking about the thankless art of ...

Raising Children

We want them to be valuable members of society; independent, strong, cunning, and efficient – to make a difference for the world and to be a betterment for the human race. I want them to salute the flag and help old ladies across the street. I want them to know I support their right to protest, but would ask them kindly not to do it while wearing a hat that looks like a hoo-ha.

I have two projects at the moment for which I, along with my wife, are responsible. One is five and the other is fourteen. That’s why I plead to our Creator: God help us!

The five year old isn’t necessarily easier in that she’s a five year old and they need a detailed daily strategy to handle them without losing your sanity, a strategy which will inevitably be amended with magic marker, crumpled, torn, and destroyed by 9 am so that the rest of the day is a flying by the seat of your pants kind of thing. At least with a child that young, there’s plenty of time ahead of her to figure it out. Maybe I’ll be the first parent ever to get into a groove and raise her into adolescence, through the teen years, and right into adulthood with nary a tear, nor raised voice. Perhaps we can accomplish the holy grail of parenthood and our daughter will understand early on that wearing clothes that actually cover her body is for her own good and if daddy has to say, “Darling, sweet, cherub dear … would you mind terribly going back to your room to change into something that doesn’t look as if you will soon be performing on a stage where the central set piece is a pole?”, she’ll smile like the angel that she is and say to me, “Father, whom I love and admire to the apex of my respect, I shall indeed change into the proper attire with the understanding that just because the world says tramp is the new nun, doesn’t mean I must abandon my upbringing and submerge into such a presentation. And should I approach a bridge with my peers and they bid me jump, I shall say nay. NAY, I SHALL TELL THEM!”

Maybe that’s the daughter that’ll brighten our house, but I doubt it.

At the moment, I spend a lot of time trying to be a good example for a fourteen year old boy who wants desperately for me to realize that he has figured out the world in all its intricacies and knows the ways of it much better than I do. He tries to make this clear by rolling his eyes and offering an exasperated sigh after even the tiniest instruction, i.e. “Go feed the dog”, “Stop peeing on the toilet seat”, “Don’t bite the gift horse that feeds you before it hatches.”

I will say he tries - in the way only an early teen knows how - to finish a task that was asked of him once the moment of angst has passed.

He likes to sleep on the couch. He insists it’s more comfortable. And since it’s pretty much been ruined with grease from crumbs and greasy things and something we can’t identify, but is so gross the dog cried out when she licked it, we’ve allowed him to move it into his bedroom.

One bright morning not long ago, he woke … well, let’s rephrase that. One hot AFTERNOON not long ago, he woke and left the comforter he’d been sleeping under in a pile on the floor beside the couch, so I told him that he needed to fold it the way he’d been shown and put it in the designated spot. After all, what if mom showed up unexpectedly and the living room looked lived in?

I left him to it and when I came back, I found the comforter in the very spot I’d told him to put it - rolled up in a big wad like some monster-sized squirrel was making a nest and stuffed it into a tree hole.

I just said, “Oh good Lord!” and shook my head while I bent to pick up a naked Barbie doll that had been bound from head to toe in rubber bands. I had no idea where the rubber bands came from and I hoped in the name of my sanity that she’d not gotten her hands on some version of Fifty Shades Of Grey for toddlers. After all, you never know when mom and the preacher are going to show up unexpectedly.

I guess the verdict at this point is that my kids are progressing in the normal fashion for their ages and I’m aging quickly because of it.

Just keep us in your prayers, would you? I’m told there’s only more of that to come.

God help us.

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I know, I know - cry me a river. Most of us go through the parenting thing, so be such a big baby. I get it. And I’m not saying i’d ever change a thing. I love my kids and I hope they know I’d die for them without a second thought. I tell them I love them every day. I think it’s one of the most important things a dad can do for their children - to say I love you. A lot.

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I’ve got problems just like everybody else. I know it’s sort of a sham hiding them all behind a barricade of laughter and merriment the likes rarely seen beyond newborn babies who think a dirty diaper is funny and really old people who think a dirty diaper is funny, but it’s the way I cope. My aunt Janet likes to call me Chandler Bing - the guy from FRIENDS - because no matter what’s going on and even when things get serious, I’ll sometimes break the monotony with a sarcastic or off-the-wall (often not well though out) comment. That’s why I feel like I have license to discuss and laugh about the next three topics. Why I hate the sun (I get skin cancers). I have type 2 diabetes, and I used to be a terribly insecure child. With that, I’m Michael Blackston. Let’s huddle up together - Eskimo style - because where I’m from, it’s getting colder outside, and let’s roast marshmallows over some stories from my funny, messy, life.

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There was one year that I got a tan. One. My mom used to have a picture of it somewhere, but I’m thinking the sun sent an agent to destroy it so there would be no record because I haven’t seen it in years. Otherwise, I burn and peel, burn and peel, burn and peel, and then see a skin specialist. Why? Because ...

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The hot, steamy, stupid sun is hot.

My sister is sad because it’s fall and we’re finally getting some relief from the heat.

I know some people like her prefer it – people who enjoy the feeling of the skin melting right off their bones like there was an atomic explosion in their back yard and they neither ducked nor covered. And if that’s you, fine. Don’t worry about my opinion. You go enjoy being a cupcake in God’s Easy Bake Oven.

The misery of stepping outside during summer is hard to put into words that will help you to understand just how big a deal this is for me as one of the true white people of the world. I’m not caucasian - that’s too tan. I’m a snow man. Camera men stand me in front of their lenses to balance the light.

And as to what the sun does to me when I creep from my shadowy depths into the sting of its shine? Well, have you seen the end of the first Indiana Jones movie? It’s like that, except not as delightful. The way I’m built, it’s as if I’m opening the Ark of the Covenant while wearing an Ozzy Ozborne mask made by Marilyn Manson, and signed by Richard Dawkins. It burns.

Not to mention that the sun and I don’t get along for other reasons. You might tolerate the heat to enjoy the beautiful bronze color that your skin inherits from the cancerous rays of the sun, but not me. The sun has a different gift in store if I bask more than approximately 10.62 seconds. I get to unwrap a big ol’ box of Basal Cell Carcinoma – the sort of skin cancers my doctor commented, “They’re the kind you WANT to get if you’re gonna get skin cancers. Hahahaha.”

Well it ain’t funny.

I don’t WANT to get ANY skin cancers, but nature has resolved that they pair nicely with the skin tags under my arms and so I’m with them. I know it could be worse. My family has dealt with the scare of Melanoma first hand, but even the carcinomas can be bad if you let them go. So my skin doctor tells me to never fear. All I have to do is grease myself down with sunscreen from head to toe every day for the rest of my life and make sure the SPF protection is no lower than 7,948.

“And wear long sleeves if you can, unless you get wet. Once your clothing is wet, it offers little protection from the sun,” he says. “In that case, Mr. Blackston, you should make sure your sunscreen is in place and also carry a spare suit of armor with you at all times. In fact, just to be safe and to ensure that you enjoy a happy life under the sun, you just go ahead and put on that suit of armor first thing every morning and wear it all day no matter how much it chafes your nipples and makes your skin tags sore.”

No big deal, right?

Forget it. Next year, I’m dressing as cool as I can, which may or may not include full public nudity when the temperature rises above 70. You won’t be able to recognize me anyway – my face will be in a puddle around my feet.

Because the stupid hot, steamy sun is stupid.

And hot.

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My wife sent me a photo from Facebook the other day that showed a billboard stating that “This year thousands of men will die from stubbornness.” Under the printed message was a spray painted note. “No we won’t.” It’s a solid statement about men all around the world and the fact that we hate to be told what to do. It also reminded me of how ...

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Diabetes Ruined My Day

I have a hard time dealing with nagging. Actually, hard time is putting it mildly. I should probably be honest with you and say that if I feel like I’m being harped on, I turn into an incoherent caveman, one nag away from peeing on stuff to mark my territory. And from stories I’ve heard over the dinner table on Sundays, I think I might get it honest.

I guess that’s why Kayla was surprised when, after several mentions of going to the doctor and getting my medications in order, I said, “Yeah - you’re probably right,” instead of “OG NO GO TO DOCTOR - OG FEEL FINE!” and I didn’t even pee on anything. I did try to argue that maybe I should be a good Christian and let The Great Physician sort it out, but that went over about as well as I expected it to.

I didn’t make an appointment - that would have made too much sense. No, I opted for the walk-in maneuver at the Medical Center, which meant that I wouldn’t see my family doctor, who had a full slate of appointments to examine people who had better planning skills than me or probably the specialist I’d seen in the first place about my diabetes. She wouldn’t be happy at all that I’d not followed her instructions. It also meant I would be waiting in the room of waiting longer than I wanted to. We all know that when you make an appointment, you have to wait anyway, so now that I was being “squeezed in”, I expected to exceed the daily recommended dosage of waiting room while I was in there with sick people and reading magazines that crawled with sick people funk.

The wait was long enough, but not as long as I’d thought it’s be. The only problem was the lady sitting next to me who ...

Never.

Shut.

Up.

She talked about her brother who was in jail because he’d been falsly blamed for a crime he didn’t commit - RAWNG ACCUSED, she called it, and just because he had outstanding warrants and was driving a car with no license plates and no insurance. “They’s jest lookin’ fer sumbody t’harr-ICE. Ain ‘t got nuthin’ better to do!”

Of course, that bled into how his no good girlfriend was pregnant with a baby that wasn’t his, but he was still gonna stay with her when he got out because she got a good check every month and everybody else was tired of buying his cigarettes and booze. And Preacher Billy said he couldn’t wait to take him out witnessin’ again once’d he done his time.

It might have been the first time you could actually SEE the IQ level of people dropping. Thankfully, my name was called just in time to keep me from looking up sexy pictures of my cousin Lulabell on Facebook.

I’d been on medication for Type 2 diabetes for a year already, but it only took giving out of my prescriptions and not renewing them once before I was on a downward spiral that mixed it all up. Blood pressure meds out? No problem. I’ll get around to filling that right after I finish this salt lick. Diabetes meds are all gone? Whatever. They gave me an upset stomach and so does Ex-Lax. At least Ex-Lax tastes like chocolate and I ... like ... chocolate.

Then there was the diet plan ... and the cheating on the diet plan. What started out as a random hiccup every once in a while turned into an all out frat party in my refrigerator, except that I was chugging Yoo-Hoos and Mountain Dew.

So there I was face to face with my doctor - the irritated, steaming specialist who I’d promised I’d take my diabetes seriously. She started in like a mother who you’d promised to take cleaning your room seriously, but has found eight dirty plates with silverware, four half-eaten bags of Funyuns and the block of cheese that went missing three weeks ago.

“What did I tell about taking your meds?”

“You said to take my meds as prescribed.”

“Why haven’t you done that?”

I just shrugged and counted the counted the long Q-Tips in one of the jars on the counter. There were ten.

“Look at me when I’m talking to you!”

I thought about telling her she wasn’t the boss of me, but then I remembered she is the boss of my diabetes.

“Have you been keeping a check on your blood sugar twice a day and logging the numbers?”

“Define logging.”

“Writing them down. Have you been checking your blood sugar or not?”

“Define checking.”

“Obviously not.”

“I have been using the little needle lancer thingies, if that what you’re asking.”

“Alright. How so?”

“Blow darts.”

“Do you think this is funny, Mr. Blackston? Diabetes is nothing to laugh at!”

“Well, if you give it giant shoes and a rubber chicken, it might be funny.”

She threw her hands in the air, yelled, “I give up!” and stormed out of the examination room. A few minutes later, my family doctor came in and sat down in front of me. He has a much nicer bedside manner.

“Your specialist has thrown her hands in the air and screamed, “I give up.”

“I know. I think it was the Funyuns that upset her. Or the block of cheese.”

“What?”

“Nothing.”

“We’re going to start from scratch, Mr. Blackston, and this time you’re going to do this the right way. You got it?”

“Yessir.”

I ended up getting three gallons of blood sucked out of me to see where I was at, diabetically and cholestoralicallty, and was given so many prescriptions that the doctor had to put on a hand brace.

“Can I still have bread?”

“Some, but small amounts of it.”

“Can I have Coke?”

“Not with sugar. Diet Coke or Coke Zero, although I’d prefer you cut out colas altogether.”

“What about a little candy?”

“How much is a little?”

“A party bag of peanut butter M&M’s.”

“No.”

“I’m also going to insist you check you blood sugar regularly and not use the needles as darts. Can you promise me you’ll do that?”

“My ninja training is gonna suffer, but I guess so.”

In other words, I can eat grass and drink water. That’s how I took it. Diabetes had turned me into a cow. My wife tried to talk some sense into me and tell me that all they’re saying is to put on my big boy pants and be smart. If I have candy, eat a couple of pieces and be done. Watch my carbs and learn to enjoy more cleansing beverages. she told me. .

It would be an adventure alright - the Temple of Doom - because they’d ripped my heart right out of my chest.

I wonder if I could dip green beans in a chocolate fondue?

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I lived a pretty charmed life as a kid. My complaints were about things that would get me slapped by children less privileged than me, so I didn’t say a lot. My problems were more of the mental kind. I was small and weak and bad at sports. I could use my imagination, though. There was just one problem. I spent a lot of time with my cousin and he was strong and great at sports, so I defaulted to him in almost everything. It’s time I came forward about ...

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The Acceptable Mulk And Other Semi-Heroes

There’s a reason behind my hard-headedness and insistence on being in control of my own life, which, by the way, I refuse to apologize for and you can’t make me. Until adulthood, I never felt like I had control of anything. And that didn’t last long because I got married when I was 21, so by law, all control of my life was ceded to my wife. Growing up, I was always a pushover and I wouldn’t stand up for myself. I went along with whatever I was told to do by whoever told me to do it. Part of that was being a scaredy cat and part of it was hating any kind of confrontation.

Enter the relationship between me and my first cousin - the one you’ll probably hear plenty about throughout the life of this podcast - the one that did the stupidly stupid things with me I mentioned in episode 2.

He had no trouble taking the lead. He was a lot tougher than me and seemed to enjoy a little confrontation because he knew he’d usually win. He’s also five months older than me, so in our childhood minds, his nearly half a year of extra life experience gave him the power by default. We were inseparable as kids, so there was a whole bunch of playing to be done, and I let him dictate what shape that would take. We might create elaborate booby traps in grandma’s back yard to foil trespassers, then laugh at ourselves for making something that started with the word "booby". Or, as in some of my earliest memories, we might defend the city as superheroes.

It was the mid to late 70’s and Batman and Robin came on every afternoon. I remember wanting to get into the tv with the dynamic duo so bad that I seriously considered putting a chair through the screen to get to them. Back in those days, grandma let us stay inside the house while she was keeping us for exactly three reasons: Sesame Street, lunch, and Batman. Other than that it was, “Go play outside!”

Looking back, I think I understand the logic that us being outside was better than her having to keep us from trying to get to grandpa’s .22 rifle or putting chairs through the tv.

We didn’t mind, though. A couple of towels for capes and we were good to go! It didn’t matter that we didn’t have masks, either. We made up for that by starting every new mission with the theme music.

My cousin got to be Batman. Every. Single. Time.

I always had to be Robin and there would not be any sharing the roles. Whenever I asked to be Batman, he told me I couldn’t because he was stronger and he was the one who had the Batmobile Big Wheel. That made sense and I didn’t argue. Plus he had to admit that I did a better Robin than he did.

or

Then there were opportunities to save the world as other superheroes, like when we’d ride 865 miles out in the country to go to the private pool my mom was a member of. It was called the Fish and Game Club. The bathrooms at the place crawled with spiders and mosquitoes and smelled like fish. And game.

Obviously, I never got to be Aquaman because I wasn’t as strong as my cousin and besides, he was the one who slept in Aquaman Underoos. We didn’t know enough about comic books to realize there was such a thing as The Sub-Mariner and even if we had, my cousin would’ve, being so much older and wiser than me, proclaimed him not as good as Aquaman. So I got to be the sidekicks, like Robin again or Float Boy or a dolphin. Maybe if we’d grown up in a later decade I would’ve gotten to be Spongebob, but I doubt it. If we were pretending to be in Bikini Bottom, I’m sure I’d have been relegated to Patrick or the Pirate face that sings the theme song with the funky lips. Even as we got a little older, he got to be He-Man and I had to be Orko - the little bumbling ghost guy that provided comic relief and always had to be saved.

He did throw me one tiny bone in the early eighties when we discovered what would become his all-time favorite superhero, The Incredible Hulk.

Our world changed immediately once we got our first glimpse of David Banner going all “OH NO YOU DIT-INT!” on some bad guys and flashing those bright green rage eyes. Suddenly, Lou Ferrigno is ripping out of Bill Bixby’s clothes and it was ON like Donkey Kong (Another childhood thing he was better at than me)! My cousin got in trouble because he kept cutting up his good shirts so it’d look like he’d turned into the Hulk and burst out of them.

The problem was, there was only one Hulk and he was a loner. Banner walked sadly from town to town under haunting piano music and nobody followed except for teams of rednecks and oil tycoons bent on terrorizing the neighborhood. The Hulk didn’t have any sidekick. He didn’t need one. That meant there wasn’t much for me to do other than play and cheer on The Hulk as he brought havoc upon unsuspecting back yard hooligans.

We had an idea. We’d make one up for me. I sure wasn’t going to get to be the Hulk, but what if there was another hero that worked with him.

Thank goodness, my cousin came up with a character and our playtime was saved.

I would be the Hulk’s less impressive cousin who turned purple and caused the bad guys unbridled pestering when he got mad. I would be ... The Mulk.

That’s right, !

The sad thing is, I embraced it. Just to be considered at least somewhat useful, I was elated and I owned the role of the Mulk. I even cut up a couple of shirts for myself, so you can imagine my surprise recently when I googled images of the Hulk and found a still from The Simpsons showing a comic book of The Formidable Mulk.

There were plenty of other times I took second fiddle, too.

He got to be Dracula, I got to be Count Spatula - Dracula’s cousin from New Jersey who worked in an Italian restaurant and drank red Cool-Aid.

He was The Wolf Man - I was his cousin, The Labrador Man - a mild mannered, but still doglike being that was frightening with my fierce loyalty and skill at fetching anything my cousin threw in the yard.

Since then I’ve learned to stand up for myself and be who I want to be, without asking permission. Well, I do try to let God tell me who He wants me to be and I’m okay with that, but nobody else is the boss of me. Well, my mom has some pull. But other than God and mom, nobody tells me what to do except when my daughter flashes her eyes and begs for something.

So God, mama, and my daughter are the only ones who can tug at my reigns.

And my wife, of course.

“Mulk coming, honey!”

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Society has a lot of rules, but being that I live in the Land Of The Free, society around me likes to bend them, and there’s nothing I can do about it. Laws are different, so don’t get the two confused. It’s a RULE of society that you shouldn’t play the music in your car so loud at 3 am that you wake everybody in the neighborhood as you pass through. But it’s a LAW that I can’t install a tire spike system in the road in front of my house that I can access at the push of a button the next time some thug does that.

We’re going to have a look at some of the rules society likes to scoff at and I’ll put in my two cents about what I think you should think society should think about doing differently. We’ll tackle the Pants Hanging Down and Shorts Too Short issues, I’ll remind guys about the proper behavior in a public restroom, and I’ll give you a play-by-play of my frustration about people being too slow.

I’m Michael Blackston and that’s all ahead as we take an opinionated look into my Funny Messy Life.

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I never wanted to be THAT GUY - you know, the geezer who puts up a sign in the yard that screams, “STAY OFF THE GRASS!” or that fella who hates any new music for no better reason than because it’s not the same as his, (although don’t even get me started about the stuff kids listen to these days that bears no resemblance to music.) I wanted to stay hip and NOT sound like every older generation that ever cringed at the younger one. What I’ve learned is that there are some things that aren’t trends, but ought to be lasting rules we follow as decent people. That’s why I’ve adopted the self-description of ...

The Trendy Curmudgeon

If I were asked to describe myself in terms of my outlook on world culture, I’d have to say I’m a complicated mess of trendy-slash-curmudgeon. I’m the forty-something man in McDonalds sitting at a table typing away at a laptop and drinking a steaming cup of java while surrounded by other, much younger, people typing away at their laptops and drinking steaming cups of java.

Yay me. I’m with it, man. I’m hip.

But I’m also the guy who looks up from his laptop with a scowl decorating his otherwise merry face every time a thug walks in with his trousers around his ankles or a girl that can’t be more than twelve is at the counter with shorts on so tight around her bottom that she’ll need a window scraper or possibly some sort of paint thinner to get them off. In both cases, I feel ashamed to even be in the same room.

It’s a tightrope walk being the kind of guy that believes in a strict system of morals but also enjoys watching the world progress in positive ways. I just have old-fashioned (and, I believe, correct) views about a lot of things that the younger generation either pays no attention to or would make a Facebook meme about, nicknaming me, “F. Duddy.”.

You’d probably call me pretty darn progressive for the most part. I love change when it brings the positive. I like the variety that human imagination is capable of and the invention that science has gives us. But some things should be sacred, don’t you think? And I’d have thought they’d be common sense.

For instance, men, if your pants could hold an entire army of Zulu warriors, including the spears, and you’re not wearing a belt, then your britches are going to fall down. Now, I would say that common sense and decency should win out every time. No one wants to drag their pants around like they’re on the chain gang while the cheeks of their butt are segregated from the almighty real world by only a very thin covering of under-fabric. NO SANE PERSON WANTS THAT! But just take a look at the current climate and you’ll see that sanity doesn’t have a place in the world any more. Some young men would have it no other way but to do deep knee bends to get to their pockets. I’d hoped that the fad would go away like most do, but it hasn’t.

It wasn’t long ago that I walked into a local retail store and witnessed an older teen sitting on a community stool at the customer service area with his pants so low around his thighs that only his underwear made contact with the padding. It got my dander up because here was a young man who had crossed a line. This was no longer a matter of my being an old fogy with my old fashioned ideas. The man’s BUTT was pretty much at liberty to do no telling what all ungodly manner of offenses to that stool. The fabric separating cheek and orifice from the same surface somebody else would soon unknowingly sit on is no match for a mighty wind or an unwashed … I can’t even say it.

It rhymes with Hut Bowl.

It amazes me that no laws seem to have been broken here. There ought to be a fine that goes along with the first offense; a hefty one. People caught walking around like that in public ought to be made to pay a lot of money and they should have to lick the seats where others have committed the same offense.

The ladies wearing painted on shorts need to think before they step out as well. While there is a difference in the reasoning for this look and the one mentioned above - one is meant to look sexy and the other is meant to make you look like you’re asking to be the victim of a drive-by shooting - there’s still cause to mention the dangers of it.

First, to speak on the sanity issue, there’s usually not much more material between your cheeks and the public seats you’re sitting on than the thug. A thong is NOT proper enough under girding to be considered any sort of a barricade against the craftiness of a determined crack germ.

So if I can see your chutt beeks hanging below the bottom of your shorts, you’re showing too much and they’re too tight, young lady. And you’re probably too young to be showing that kind of skin anyway. If I ever see my daughter walk into a room wearing something that revealing, I’m shooting her with a tranquilizer dart and telling her grandmother, who will then swoop in with a new outfit and a guilt trip she’ll spend weeks digging out from under.

The problem with the stuff that’s too revealing isn’t only that it leaves nothing to the imagination, but that there are people walking around in that sort of get up who have no business wearing it.

Don’t argue that it’s comfortable. It’s cutting off your circulation. So take that and stick it in your pocket that’s hanging below the hem of your shorts. If, that is, you can manage to squeeze anything thicker than a strand of fishing line into those pockets.

I know I sound like your dad, your granddad, or an old man on a park bench feeding the pigeons and using phrases like, “Back in MY dayyyyyy ……”, and I’m sorry. I do like a lot of the stuff that teens and twenty-somethings are into and I tend to get along well with that age group. I can play a first person shooter with the best of them. Actually, my son Noah kills me at HALO, so never mind that.

Looking back at the beginning of this, I suppose maybe I’m not that trendy after all. I’ve just reached the age where I can say curmudgeonly things and mean them. I don’t yet have to trim my ear hairs, even though I do have that one that grows rebelliously in an impossible curl straight out of my ear. At least I can grab it with my fingers and yank that puppy out like a boss. I don’t currently use the word Whipper-Snapper in any way other than comical, and nothing is, to me, new-fangled.

I just have a sense of decency that’s always been there, thanks to my raising, even in my teen years.

Ladies, you are beautiful and special, so please treat your body that way. A God-made pearl is rare and valuable. It’s kept chaste inside the shell where it’s being created until it is ready to be found and presented in its true glory. A man-made pearl is fashioned by hands too eager to be handled and sold and is thus, not nearly as valuable.

You’re the God-made pearl. Don’t allow the world to convince you to show too much of yourself too early.

I’m not saying to close yourself off and be a fashion hermit. Just see the value of who you really are – who you were wonderfully made to be – and don’t just give it away.

And guys, pull up your stupid pants. You look like idiots.

Remember … Thugs just take whatever they can get for free. A real gentleman prefers a real pearl.

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I don’t claim to have all the answers, but I know I’m too opinionated to open my mouth on a lot of issues in the public forum. That’s why I rarely engage in political discussions. I’ve been told my tongue is wicked and has a habit of being hurtful when I’m opposed, so in order to be a kinder, gentler Michael, I stay away from that sort of thing. There are some things, though, that almost every person inside of a specific group will agree on. The following is one example of what I’m talking about. They are ...

The 8 Commandments Of How To Behave In The Men's Room

An interesting conversation took place last Sunday at my grandmother’s house over the fried chicken and mashed potatoes. By the way, I’m not a concerned about etiquette at Grandma’s. I eat with my elbows on the table because it never hurt a thing to do so. I also drink from tiny glasses without stretching my pinkie finger way out because I feel no need to prove how quaint I am and whatnot.

However, as rough around the edges as I can be, I do recognize scenarios which require the practice of preordained etiquetty stuff and one of these is where the conversation went around the dinner table over the butter beans and corn bread. Specifically, my cousin Chuck, my uncle Greg, and I discussed the rules of engagement in regard to the expected behavior in a public men’s restroom.

They are rules that have stood the test of time and have served as canon for all men. Call it whatever you want to, but breaking the commandments of the men’s room is dangerous territory. Personally, I identify exactly as God made me, man parts and all, and so I can’t speak on the rules of the women’s restroom, especially about special machines that offer special products for special things. But I’ve visited my share of men’s facilities for a long time now and I can tell you horror stories. So now I shall list these commandments, which were chiseled in a tablet somewhere after the first awkward encounter between two dudes relieving themselves in the same vicinity.

The commandments are as follows:

The First Commandment: Thou shalt not SPEAK to another human person or yourself while standing at a urinal or sitting in a stall.

The original text would have used the terms “bush” and “tree”, respectively, but has been changed to reflect modern times. Some scholars suggest that medieval texts may have replaced the original words with “hay bale” and “on a peasant”. Whatever words are used, the understanding is clear that no spoken word is to be uttered from one man to the next whilst amid relievement activities. The introduction of the smart phone and blue tooth has placed an uncomfortable wrench in the cogs as now it’s possible to hear one side of a conversation from the man in the next stall or urinal. For the first little bit, it was hard to figure out whether or not you were being spoken to and the sturdiest portion of this commandment was being broken. Now it’s usually easy to know that you’re just being made privy to a private conversation in the privy.

The famous Can You Spare A Square episode of Seinfeld still gives me nightmares. While I don’t know if that sort of things actually goes on in a ladies room, I can say with fiery-eyed certainty that it should never happen in the men’s room. What would I do if I forgot to check the state of the toilet paper inventory in my particular stall and found out there was none? I would sit quietly and wait until the place shut down for the night, then I could freely get up and find something to finish the job with. What if it was one of those 24 hour places that never closes? I’d sit in silence, lamenting my stupidity, and wait to die.

The Second Commandment: Thou shalt look neither left nor right whilst standing upright at the urinal while others are about.

Staring only straight ahead is permitted. If you’re alone at the urinal bank, looking left or right to be aware of all who may enter is permitted, but once you‘ve been joined by others, the only area of interest is directly in front of you. Looking around means you’re interested in something else and probably scoping out the goods. You automatically become the creepy guy in the trench coat waiting in the alley. At least that’s what you think it looks like. Staring straight up at the ceiling is also acceptable. Larger convenience store chains that offer long banks of urinals understand this and have taken it to higher levels by marketing to men who’re in the trap. They post posters of all the cool guy stuff you can get in the store like CB radios and remote control helicopters. Some pages show the junk food options available. With such a captive audience, it’s a smart move because I have to admit that the last power inverter I bought was due to the sale I noticed they had on satellite antennas. Don’t ask me why, but it made sense at the time.

The Third Commandment: If thou accidentally looketh in the direction of another man at the urinals, thou must quickly look away and clear thy throat all manly-like.

We’re human and sometimes we don’t think. In these cases we might absentmindedly look around. If that happens, you are to bow out your chest to seem as large as you can and grunt. Cocking one eye up as if you think you’re All That can help too, and you might also take on a bit of a strut like a cowboy as you zip up and walk to the sink to wash your hands. If you have a lazy eye or happen to resemble a Chinese Pug, you might consider wearing a patch over the eye that is the loose cannon. This will enable you to only have to deal with controlling one eye and should that get slippery on you, at least you can “Yar!” like a pirate as you do your overtly cowboy style walk. Nobody messes with a bow-legged pirate.

The Fourth Commandment: Thou shalt ALWAYS leave at least one empty urinal between you and whomever goteth there before thee.

My cousin added that if it’s filling up and there isn’t that option and all the stalls are taken and someone would notice you peeing in the corner, then, and only then, do you fill in at an empty urinal between two other dudes. And even then, you make sure one of the dudes is shorter than you. I have to admit that it’s easy for him to say because he’s tall. I’m not that tall, so it becomes a harder task for me. Tall, dark, and handsome will never apply to me because not only am I not tall (I’m average height) but I don’t tan. I break out in skin cancers or simply burst into flames when exposed to sunlight.

The Fifth Commandment: Thou shalt wash thy hands after touching thyself.

And you better be touching yourself, dude, because if you ain’t holding it, you ain’t aiming.

I saw a man at a QT leave the bathroom without washing his hands recently and the only thing that stopped me from saying anything to him was that I was afraid he might smack me with his unwashed having-recently-touched-his-junk hands. He was also wearing an eye patch and walked like he thought thar wan room enough in the bathroom far th’ both of us. The plain fact of the matter is that if you don’t wash afterward, you’re telling your fellow man that no matter what kind of funky goo you have on your hands, you don’t care about their well being and are willing and ready to spread your filth hither and yon. Don’t doeth it. Thou art swine if thou doeth it.

The Sixth Commandment: Talking at the sink is permitted only if the “Man Nod” shall not sufficeth.

Personally, I don’t need your thoughts about the weather or gas prices. I don’t want your opinion on the Braves or the Yankees. If you need acknowledgement, I will nod at you. In that nod I will convey all that needs to be conveyed, which is, I acknowledge that you exist and that is all. Now wash that stank hand of yours and allow me to leave this place. Ask me “How’s it goin’?” when we’ve broken the plain of the exit door.

The Seventh Commandment: Getteth out quickly.

Don’t stand in anyone’s way. Everything should be accomplished with quickness and precision. Lingering only makes you seem like a weirdo and let’s face it, if you’ve executed your directive in full and still feel the need to stay in there, you’re a weirdo.

The Eighth Commandment: Thou shalt not buyeth a condom or a spritz of cologne from the dispenser on the wall unless thou art the only one in the room.

Doing so in the presence of others will only let everyone around you know that you’re creepy and you’ll start to notice fathers holding their daughters closer to them as you pass outside. Both purchases also insinuate an urgent need and it will be assumed that you have recently made or are about to make another purchase from a person in the parking lot.

Now that these protocols are out there, maybe you’ll understand why men usually get in and get out of a public restroom. I say usually because there are always exceptions. And if a man you’re with comes out of the restroom with a sudden need to buy a mag light the size of a telephone pole or an antenna that can pick up sounds from the dark side of the moon, you’ll know why. Lastly, if he comes out suddenly smelling like Stetson, keep a close eye on him.

I’d imagine there are other rules I’ve forgotten and so if I left anything out, please feel free to chisel them in stone and add them to the list.

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Aaaaaand sometimes it’s just me being me. Like Banner turns into Lou Ferigno painted green when he gets angry, I too, have a rage monster that shows its ugly face in certain situations. Only my man-boobs are flabby, not sweet pectoral muscles like Lou Ferigno’s. No, I get right beside myself when I get behind someone going slower than me. That’s because ...

My Slow Is Faster Than Your Slow

Blackston’s Log …

October 2015 – Universal Studios – Orlando, FL

Day 1

We arrived at our destination early and made our way into the World Of Harry Potter where alien childlike creatures with plastic wands and round glasses flit to and fro like Cornish Pixies. There are plenty of little Rons and Hermiones too, shouting Wingardium Leviosa in my face. Right away, I notice the flow of movement is very different from that of my own realm. The beings that surround us seem to be utterly baffled by the two protrusions they are being expected to use to propel themselves; protrusions we humans have come to call “legs”. They apparently don’t know how to use them. Some of these organisms, from appearances, could possibly be weighed down by gravity as their bodies have need to consume large amounts of unreasonably priced fuel, yet this observation does not account for the slow progress of those whose bodies have not taken in as much of the caloric fare as their wider counterparts.

It is a puzzle. My wish was to glide swiftly along between the “attractions”, but I and my party cannot. We are constantly delayed by beings who would ease on down, ease on down the road and we are forced to tippy-toe ever so slightly among the crowd.

They gawk at the displays around them, often stopping completely to engage their own party in a group photo-documentation via their communication devices. It would seem they find this behavior, and possibly my annoyance at having to be delayed, quite humorous. I know this by way of their constant smiling and laughing as the devices are pointed their direction. I also gather that most of these creatures are very fond of cheese, as they often tend to be invited to say the word by their leaders and the group obeys. Perhaps cheese is a code word for “Here comes that guy that wants to get around us. Let’s annoy him by our slow progress and merry disregard for everyone else in the vicinity.” If Day 2 is as difficult to traverse as Day 1, I may have to buy one of those $20 bags of candy I keep seeing on the side of the walkway as an incentive for patience.

Blackston’s Log - Day 2

We re-entered the realm this morning, hoping for less of a crowd and easier foot travel. I was encouraged when employing the use of the moving sidewalk near the ticket booth and I found it curious that I had missed this wonderful feature the day before. As we stepped onto the surface of this conveyance, we were met with a slight disruption in our stride, but were quickly able to adjust our stance to accommodate the fact that the ground was now managing for us, our progress forward. Other beings around us feel the satisfaction of allowing this mode of carriage to be the whole of their propulsion while my party and I have discovered that if we walk at a goodly clip upon this surface, we are able to achieve a sort of super-speed and shorten our travel time by quite a bit. An unfortunate calculation on my part has led to the scientific discovery that a body in sustained motion will continue that motion after the flooring has discontinued its aid in travel. In other words, when the moving sidewalk stops, I do not. As a result of my not paying heed to the change in pace beneath my feet, I nearly flew face first onto the ground. A child-beast behind me holding a lollipop and with a snot bubble blowing dangerously large out of one nostril pointed and remarked, “HAHAHAHAHAHA!” I have found this world’s young to be rather aggressive and have steered as far from them as possible; a feat I do not find easy, yet worth the effort.

As the day progresses, we notice the crowd is bigger than the day before and the mosey factor is at an all-time high. Elderly versions of these beings are employing the use of battery propelled vehicular units called "scooters" to get around and upon seeing this, I at first delighted that they should move with swift, mechanical aid and not impede our progress. But this is not the case. The scooters must be governed to only allow the pace of a three-toed sloth with a gimpy leg. These scooters seem to be made to drive best when pointed headlong into oncoming foot traffic and must be charged on the energy created when the riders say, “Excuse me,” or “Sorry,” or “Coming through!” These scooters apparently alter the mind of the operator so that they begin to think they are a part of a race. One such operator, an elder female, drove one that boasted an emblem on the back that read NASCAR. She complained to the people around her that she felt that everything looked the same no matter where she went, as if she were going in circles. After watching her for a while, I suggested perhaps making a right turn every now and again might help change her view of things. But in reply, the lady creature spat at me what I could only describe as a tribal grunt. "VROOM VROOM!", followed by, “YEE HAW!” and puttered off to the left.

The day seems to be coming to a close and I’d like to not walk now.

Blackston’s Log …

Late December 2015 - The Mall

It was difficult to park our craft as we once again find ourselves at the mercy of those surrounding us and their slow-stepping ways. Inside the mall, we are greeted by beings with large bags draped about their entire bodies. Crowds squeeze into the stores on either side and the travel lanes outside are bottle-necked with people not caring that I am behind them and cannot get around to reclaim the speed I wish. Entire families walk side by side at the clip of a drunken turtle, taking up the whole path. When I communicate my desire to get by, they snarl and offer a hurtful look as if the phrase, “Move it, Grandma!” is somehow offensive.

Blackston’s Log …

January 2016 - Gatlinburg, TN

Our thought was that a weekend getaway to a small town in the Smokey Mountains of Tennessee would see our small party of two able to do touristy stuff without a bunch of hustle and bustle and people walking too slow in front of us.

This territory is, as well, a hub of movement - all slow. We have found that the passage of the Christmas season has not halted the visitation of this place and the creatures who gather here are varied with the exception of the commonality of being in front of me too often. I had hoped the memo would have been received by those in charge that I was coming and would not wish to be delayed by beings around me “looking” at things.

This destination is popular with groups of people, all of them crowding at once into the walking path and stopping there to engage in something called, “Fellowship”, so that I am frequently found at an idle between points A and B. I understand the allure toward this activity, however I detest the placement of it. I assume there are places with tables and seats where groups may assemble and partake instead of being in what I have come to know affectionately as “my way”.

The only things that have served to soothe my savagery thus far due to the constant delay are the candy shops in abundance. Just as I feel my teeth clench, I am able to smell the aroma of chocolate covered everything and I am sated for at least a moment.

At this entry, my navigator is asleep in the queen bed next to me enjoying what creatures with no children call, “a nap.” In a while, we will again embark during suppertime into the foray of the masses and attempt to be at peace with a leisurely pace.

But my slow is faster than their slow. And because I’m hungry, I’m afraid harm may soon befall them. Godspeed to us.

As a note of update, since the logging of these things in later 2015 and early 2016, my wife had surgery on her achilles tendon and was in recovery when we made a trip to Disney World. She ended up in one of the scooters and I have to say, it was awesome. People jumped out of our way when they saw her coming. It might have had something to do with the train horn I installed on the thing.

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I wish I could say I wasn’t so open with my opinions - that I have a filter that works all the time, but I can’t. My filter is pretty good most of the time, but if you catch me at the wrong time, the lava flow of nasty that comes out of me can burn. That’s why I try to contain it in places like this podcast and blog.

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As I think about the direction this podcast is going, I realize I want it to be more story driven and less Op/Ed. Sure, I like to put my thoughts out there as a little cud to chew for the readers and listeners, but I’m finding I get plenty of that on social media already and maybe this show ought to veer toward interesting stories. I’ll finish giving you the articles that are already written, even if they’re my opinions, but after that, it’s going to be all great stories. And that’s why I’m asking you up front to help me out a little by sending in your own stories - stuff you think would be interesting to tell to the whole world. So stick around at the end of the episode and I’ll tell you how to get those to me. Right now, though, I’m Michael Blackston and I’ve got a few things to tell you about my own Funny Messy Life.

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You’ll be able to tell right away that this first one was written a while back, but I thought it was an interesting piece, since it mentions an element of my life that happened at the same time my sister and I were building that dang float I told you about in episode 10 called, Sister Sister. It’s a peek into how crazy my life was at that time and why there was ...

No Sleep For Me

Here we are only a couple of weeks away from curtain and I can’t sleep one stupid wink. The little clock in the bottom right corner of my laptop says 2:50 am and just above it a tiny, bug-eyed paperclip stares back at me inside of his pink square. We, the paper clip and I, are the only people in the world not asleep right now.

Sleepless nights are nothing new to me. I go through a few days of mild insomnia about three or four times a year and I can usually deal with those. A little late night house cleaning and a few crosswords on the iPad while I wait for the Nyquil to kick in and I’m good. But there’s a unique thing that happens every now and then when sleep becomes a stranger and there’s only one good explanation for it - Showtime is approaching.

It’s called “Thespio-Insomnia”. Thespio – as in having to do with the dramatic arts, and Insomnia – as in you’d be willing to use those little black metal clips to clamp your eyelids closed while listening to a speech by Al Gore on the history of tax documentation if it’d promise just a little bit of sleep.

It’s a phenomenon I just made up that presents whenever I’m directing a live show and get to around two weeks from curtain. I’m sure it happens to others, too - actors preparing for their roles, Prop Masters who are in charge of making sure nobody touches the props in a show full of kids, - but as the Director of the program, it’s an all out war waged on the mind, body, and spirit in the middle of the night. It’s a cruel demon that pushes a crazy cart with a wobbly, squeaky wheel in my head all night long. That cart is spilling over with set designs, staging issues, cast problems, deadlines, and any number of other considerations that seemed to be simple on paper, but have become the stuff of nightmares as opening night gets closer.

A typical night in the worst of it goes like this:

I come home from a rehearsal, placing one exhausted foot in front of the other, zombie-like, toward the bathtub where lies the sweet promise of water hot enough to soothe my back and make my fingers look all wrinkly and gross.. My back wants it, my feet yearn for it, and my heart needs it. While I’m in the bath, the residue of the issues from the latest production might - I said Might - fade into the back of my mind and I’ll start to relax. For some insane reason, I’m fooled into a state of euphoria that tells me that upon my next move to the bedroom, I’ll find the sweet restoration of a good night’s sleep. I slide into the bed under blissfully crisp tubbins (Tubbins are my family’s word for covers and the explaination for that deserves its own piece) and I actually do fall asleep. Let’s say this happens around 11 pm.

At 11:15 pm my eyes fly open and every nuance of every problem with the show seems like a mountain that’ll be impossible to climb. I’m suddenly inundated with the madness of the cold, hard, truth. The lighting is nowhere near ready, the sound is anything but complete, the set is way behind schedule, the cast is waaaaayyyyyy behind schedule.

And we’re supposed to be off book by now … HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!

Crap, I forgot to mention that costume issue to them tonight! We don’t have all the props we need! I mean, where in the world am I supposed to get an 18th century bamboo pigmy lantern shaped like a monkey head?! (I knew I should have snagged that one I saw last year at that thrift store!)

So and so refuses to project. Such and such projects too much! AND WE OPEN IN TWO WEEKS!

Such is the life of the director of a show.

Every time I do one, I get to this point and I have to ask myself why I continue to be involved with such nonsense. I already know the answer because the answer never changes. It’s in the blood that courses through my veins. All the issues that need to be dealt with are nothing compared to the thrill of a stage awash in lights and an audience just barely able to be seen beyond them. It’s the craft as a whole thing - it can’t be sectioned off in pros and cons, you savage! And it’s the end game. It’s a performance that pleases the crowd.

But this particular show is a bit different from the stuff I normally direct. Months ago I mentioned the inclination to put together a Christmas production as a thank you to the theatre and the city for all the hard work and expenditures that had gone into a major remodel and renovation that broadened our local theatrical capabilities. The idea for the show was accepted and scheduled and I’ve been excited to bring it together.

In my mind, it should’ve hardly been stressful at all. It was to be a concert style affair. That meant that no real staging or blocking needed to be done. The set would be quaint, but minimal, using the brand new fancy pants lighting they just installed to set the mood and three simple microphone stands placed across the stage. The cast was hand-selected - not auditioned - and rehearsals would be a cinch.

I thought I’d be spared the interruptions in my sleep patterns, but I was wrong, Jack! I've got to face some things about the show and they ain’t pretty. There’s stuff to be done and I mean quick.

A couple of nights ago, the same old drunk demon got behind the wheel of the crazy cart in my head and started screeching down the nightmare road. Sleep became unsettled and tonight is worse. I’m wide awake. The actual times were: To bed and finally asleep at 1 am. Jolted awake at 2:30.

And it always starts the same way.

“Be GONE, demon,” I command.

The nasty little imp just laughs and wheezes and weaves his cart with the funky wheel over the center line. He’s singing a really bad version of For He’s A Jolly Good Fellow. So not only is he drunk and singing way off-key, but he’s also WRONG!

“Be gone in the name of JESUS!” I mentally shout and in reality just angrily flop over in the bed, my jaw set in defiance, or more accurately, a pouty face. But since this isn’t really a demon, just my mind being an idiot, it laughs even harder and starts singing an off-key version of How Are Things In Glocca Morra from Finian’s Rainbow with a bad Irish accent. At least now it’s a showtune.

Next I resort to pleading.

“Plu-huh-huh-heeeze let me sleep and stop thinking about all the theatre-y stuff. Give me rest and dreams about chocolate cookies and the white kitty from CATS!” (I think her name’s Victoria. Yes, my wife knows she’s my favorite kitty.)

Now the inebriated incubus stops the cart and has gone quiet, but only just long enough to make me think he’s giving up at last, only to suddenly sing louder and more off-key in an even worse caricature of an Irishman. Same show, different song.

“Look, look, look to th’rainbow!”

Come to think of it, this just might all be the details from a dream I had after eating too much taco pie right before bed one night. Seems like a too-much-taco-pie dream. And I’m also starting to think the demon is really just the little guy from the Lucky Charms commercials.

Anyway, it ought to be an interesting day. I have a CD of the performance music to finalize, a large sign to paint for the parade float that’ll help promote the show, a script to write for what little narration we’ll have, a lighting plan to put into place, emails with update info to send to the cast, an audio recording project to work on, and several other things I can’t remember now but that will, I’m sure, pop happily into my head around 2 am tomorrow morning with the distinctive voice of a leprechaun. In other words, plenty of wine to keep that evil demon drunk while he kicks his heels and pushes the crazy cart down the windy road of my brain.

The good news is that I can usually function okay on days like the coming one will be. And I do have the option of a nap this afternoon if I need one.

But odds are that I’ll start going down the list, feverishly trying to get as much done as I can before I’m off on a business trip that’ll be the cause of me missing an entire week of rehearsal.

I can do this as surely as I’ve done it so many times before on a much larger scale. And I wonder how much fun it would really be if we got to the end and I thought to myself, “Well, that wasn’t a difficult process at all.” I think I’d probably feel like something was missing because there’s nothing like a job well done when the work’s been hard.

I have the coffee pot ready to brew, but I won’t push the button just yet. I think there’s something in the bible about not brewing the morning’s coffee before 6 am.

I hear my daughter in the other room calling for her juice, so I think I’ll check in and see if I can be of any assistance to my wife, you know, since I’m up and all.

Why do I do this to myself?

Because I love it, that’s why.

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We’ve all had those days when we really want to get going, but stuff - call it lack of focus, not awake enough, being a moron, whatever - keeps making us spin our wheels in the mud. My wife will tell you how angry I get when that happens, so I thought I’d try to put a comical spin on one of those times when ...

I Just Wanted To Leave

I’ve been so busy lately that I nearly forgot to put this episode together. For a plan-your-work / work-your-plan type of person like me, that can be stressful. It had to be done, though, because there were other things that took priority over the podcast - things that revolve around the care of my family and things that create income for said family. Mama raised me right; God and family come first, then income, then peripheral stuff like blogging, podcasting, or the Punkin Chunkin’ World Championships.

What are the Punkin Chunkin’ World Championships? I don’t have time to tell you. There are other things that take priority over that, but the name ought to be enough to get you close anyway.

I will say that some things are negotiable in the priority chain of command based on their monetary values, but no price can be placed on the family portion – no price.

You can make me an offer and we’ll see, but it’s probably not gonna happen.

Make me an offer.

JUST KIDDIN’! Calm down, you! Save your anger for a post called maybe, Is It Possible To Sell Out Your Family And NOT Go To Hell?. The answer, by the way, is a resounding “no.”

My hobbies aren’t the only things that have suffered due to my mind being occupied by other stuff and I think that adult readers will relate to the morning I’ve had. First, for the past few days, I’ve been hosting an abnoxiously angry tooth. It’s one of the molars in the back. I mean, I wouldn’t say it’s exactly PO’d. I’ve dealt with angrier teeth. But this one has definitely got its dander up.

Aside from the tooth, there’s also been a ceremony or a concert or a party of some sort my son has had to be a part of on several nights for the last two weeks. We're also preparing a trip to Disney World. I have a very young daughter – enough said, and a teenage son.

Due to all of this on my mind and more that I won’t mention because getting to the point is a priority, I had a hard time getting out of the house this morning.

It started in a fashion common to adults, especially those stepping out into their Monday morning commute, but I was trying to keep from waking everybody in the house. I’ll try to give an accurate account while leaving out a few of the details that aren’t a priority.

My wife woke me in the middle of the night by asking a simple question.

“What time did you set your alarm for?”

She knew that I had to be in Clinton, NC to meet a client at 9:30 am and the drive is 5 hours, not counting the necessary stops to pee, fill up the gas tank, and, depending upon whether or not the light was on, hit the drive thru at the Krispy Kreme. The problem was not as much her question as it was the way I, in a dream state, interpreted it. In reality, it was a simple question born of a much more tolerable situation I was yet to understand. In my mind, however, I assumed I must have slept right through the alarm into Thursday and would have some “splainin’ to do.”

My heart leapt from my chest and I told her my alarm was set for 3:45 am. Then I added, “What time is it?!” in a tone that suggested it might be opening day of college football season and I had missed a kickoff.

“Calm down,” she said. “It’s only midnight, but the power is off. I’ll set my phone alarm for you.”

Whew.

Now I could go back to sleep, only with a tinge of anxiety playing a bad rendition of, If I could Turn Back Time, on an out of tune accordion in my head.

When the alarm woke me at precisely 3:45, I hopped out of bed like I normally do the morning of a commute and into the bathroom. One flushing of the toilet and a few sounds I made previous to that, and I was ready to get dressed, but I couldn’t find my shoes. Where were my shoes? I’d put them right there! I could explain where right there was, but … priorities.

I found my shoes under three baby dolls and a magna doodle and, after putting them on, kissed my wife and my daughter, who was sleeping beside her, on the cheeks. The face cheeks.

I typically give myself about 15 minutes before the time I actually need to leave to get everything together and get out of the house, but today I needed more than that.

I started to grab the stuff I put in my pockets on a daily basis, but realized everything was fuzzy. I’d forgotten to put in my contacts. I tiptoed back through the bedroom to the bathroom, opened the case, and began wrenching my right eyelid open wide enough to jam a plastic disc on it. I closed the lens case and trotted myself back out of the bedroom, stopping for one more kiss on each of the ladies in the room’s cheeks. The face cheeks.

Now I could leave. I packed up my computer, which I had almost walked out without, and went outside.

Stuff was still blurry. I had only put in one contact and that just wouldn't cut it. I had to unlock the front door and go back into the house to remedy that. Once I could see, it was back out the front door.

My phone. I forgot my phone.

Unlocking the door, I went back inside and slipped into the bedroom to retrieve it from the nightstand beside my bed. I took that moment to wonder why I didn’t just set my own phone alarm, but whatever. I kissed the ladies on the cheeks once more for good measure. Face cheek … at least on one of them. My daughter had turned onto her stomach and twisted upside down in the bed and I got the wrong set of cheeks. It was dark.

I went through the door at the front of the house and exited toward the car, noticing it was quite chillier than it should have been in mid-May. That’s when it occurred to me that I had not grabbed my pocket stuff from the top of the microwave. I unlocked the front door and entered the house again, found myself greeted by two cats who I could swear were calling me an idiot with their eyes, and went to grab my pocket stuff.

Problem. No pockets.

I’d forgotten pants.

I needed to be wearing pants and I was not wearing pants.

Pants are a priority.

I performed a pantsless prance back into the bedroom and put on some jeans, almost got another set of kisses but thought better of it, and left the house for the final time.

Ten miles down the road, I couldn’t find my phone, even though I knew I had put it right there, and decided I had to turn around. It only took a mile heading back in the direction of the house before I found it in the little cup under the door handle.

It’s important to keep your priorities in order and try not to get so overwhelmed with everything you’ve got to do that you forget to wear pants.

And now that I think of it, I hope Walmart’s having a sale on underwear.

*Some of the details in this narrative are true and some have been exaggerated for comic effect. I would tell you which are which, but … y’know … priorities.

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Life is fleeting and can be interrupted at any time without the courtesy of checking with you first to see if it’s alright. I found out the hard way that a car is hard to control once it starts doing things that aren’t covered in the driver’s manual and all you can do is hang on for the ride. That’s the theme of this last story. I’m going to give you a behind-the-scenes look into ...

My Wreck

A vehicle accident will make you do some thinking. There was me on the interstate, a car that wasn’t built for water sports, and as luck would have it, enough rain falling all of a sudden that when it was all over and the trooper was done taking notes, My Hyundai Elantra was presented with a bronze medal for the backstroke.

Once the rain got bad enough, I decided that pulling over to wait it out would be the best course of action. I was unaware that my car was also a competitive figure skater, complete with those sweet spins and whatnot, and had made a decision without consulting me to try one out at that precise moment. One will not usually win an argument of wills with an automobile unless they are a demigod with an awesome hammer or were created from clay by Zeus. In that light, anyone with a basic working knowledge of physics will understand that I was to be on a carnival ride for a few seconds and completely at the mercy of the mighty Elantra.

She fishtailed left to start the routine, then balanced the act by switching direction and going into a full Dorothy Hamill spin toward the embankment.

Unfortunately, she was not a professional and needed a lot more practice because she pitched backward down that steep embankment and came to rest with a crash at the direct center of the trunk into a tree. I was not amused.

“Don’t do that again,” I told my Elantra with the same voice I use when I tell my son to quit smacking his food, but there was no reply. She was dead.

It occurred to me that I’ve taken some things for granted while I driving in the past and I’ve re-evaluated my commitment when it comes to some of them.

For instance, from now on, I will:

Wait to stop before completely changing clothes. Ever put on pants at 60 miles an hour?

Not apply eye liner or any other makeup while actively driving. Yes, I am a manly man (no comment from those who would comment) and yet, I have done that. I do stage shows and sometimes I run late for dress rehearsal. Speaking of shows, I will …

Only sing YouTube showtunes with songs I know the lyrics to. Googling the lyrics and reading them as you sing and drive is just as bad as texting while driving. Maybe worse.

Keep my eyes open while driving and singing YouTube showtunes. But them passionate “in-character” ballads, though.

No longer completely organize the interior of my automobile at a high rate of speed. (Okay, ANY rate of speed) I realize now that the trunk can wait.

Not play “Peep-Eye” with babies, cute dogs, or old people in the cars next to me. Peep-Eye requires both hands to be effective. Driving requires at least one hand on the wheel or at least a knee.

Not extend any individual fingers to anyone for more than three seconds. While it may seem necessary to emote in such fashion for an extended period of time to insure that communication is properly received by your intended, more than three seconds may incite loss of motor control. And also, Jesus is watching.

Forego counting and rolling coins above 50 miles an hour. A five dollar roll of dimes just ain’t worth crashing over. Probably.

I’m sure I’ll uncover more dangerous activity on my part while I drive that I never realized I was practicing. Until then, I’ll be making sure this new vehicle is better rehearsed with that camel spin.

It’s definitely a female. I’m calling her LaFawnda after the woman in Napoleon Dynamite. She’s a Mazda 5 minivan, buster and you better respect! She may be unassuming, but like LaFawnda, she’s got sass.

She’s also got junk in the trunk, but that’s just me being a slob.

Actually, I can’t call her LaFawnda. That character was a lady. My van stays dirty and sees the parking lot of a whole bunch of motels.

My van is a harlot, so I need to think of a harlot’s name.

Trixie? No. Too cliche. Dottie McGladbags? No.

I’ll think of it sooner or later, but for now, I need to focus on staying in between the lines while I drive and being super conscious of what’s going on around me.

Thank goodness Georgia recently passed the hands free act that makes it not only illegal to text and drive, but also to have anything in your hand while operating a motor vehicle, so I guess I ought to stop writing these scripts while I’m behind the wheel. I’m kidding. I joke - I’m a joker.

Joker ....

HARLEY QUINN! I’ll call my van Harley!

Nailed it.

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I’m looking forward to writing some fresh, new stories to add to the show and I can’t wait for you to hear them. They’ll be true, too - well - mostly. So until next episode, I’m Michael Blackston and you may now exit the ride. Watch your step and we’ll catch you next time for my Funny Messy Life.

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Today we have a lot of discussions about how people “identify”. Some dude with a beard identifies as a little girl in pig tails, some little girl in pig tails has decided she identifies as a middle aged oil rig worker from Texas and her parents support that. Which is weird because nine times out of ten, a parent who would be okay with that would fall way to the left on the political rainbow and hate anything to do with oil. Even a few people in government leadership positions - over the whole spectrum, I might add - identify as decent people. Which is weird because nine times out of ten government leaders fall way to the scumbag side of the political rainbow. I know! But you won’t have to worry about me ruffling any feathers in these three stories. They’re about how I identify and unless you’re one of those people who needs a safe space from anybody that disagrees with you, we should be good.

I’m Michael Blackston and this right here is a virtual canon ball into the very chlorinated pool of my Funny, Messy Life.

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As I compile these stories from an earlier blog into something that resembles entertainment, I’m sitting in a restaurant again. It’s a little unassuming place in Carbon Hill, Alabama called, Lacy’s Pizza Bar and it’s been around since Spot was a pup. (Since Spot was a pup is a charming southern phrase I either learned from my Grandma or the old people that gather every morning in McDonalds.) Lacy’s, God love ‘em, has served me one of the most delicious burgers I’ve ever eaten. It’s a mainstay for me when I visit Carbon Hill in my travels and they don’t need to worry about me giving them a bad review - not when they serve a burger that tastes just like mama used to make. Never frozen and not fast, Lacy’s gets both of my funky shaped thumbs up, which matters because ...

Apparently, I look Like A Critic

This was written in a restaurant that has not been around since Spot was a pup.. Come to think of it, I was sitting in a restaurant the last three or four times I banged out something on my keyboard, so either I’ve developed a pattern or an eating problem that needs to be addressed.

Actually, a restaurant is an ideal place for me to write. Lots of authors need something going on in the background while they create. Some writers keep a radio or TV blaring while they work, while some stay-at-home bloggers write to the soothing sounds of screaming children and if that works for them, fantastic!

I like the ambiance of the world around me, even if I resort to plugging my ears with those little spongy do-dads - earplugs, I think they’re called - to keep from being bothered by the sounds of the old man behind me who keeps sucking something out of his teeth. You might think that sounds silly, but when I’m alone, I have to get up and walk somewhere to fill my tea glass. So being in the unfortunate situation known to some as, "Around people", is a must if I don't want to see to my own drink refillery.

There’s something I’ve noticed when I go to certain restaurants and whip out my laptop to write … sometimes they think I’m a food critic and I get exceptional service. They do things like making sure I don't worry about my drink refillery and periodically asking how I'm doing or if they can get me anything. It doesn’t happen everywhere, as some places don’t consider themselves the type that a critic would bother to review, or they think the same way about critics that I do. I have a strong distaste for professional critics and I have a saying I believe with all my heart … “Those who can, do. Those who can’t, teach. Those who can’t do or teach are professional critics!” I also tend to make a face that looks like somebody just walked by who ate bad tacos when I hear the word critic.

I do feel the need to tear away the blanket of that statement by admitting that I know plenty of teachers who can do. Some of them are great friends of mine, but as far as critics go - creatures who fell into evil along with the thirty-three percent of angels that followed Satan into hell and thrive in the negative, I’ve never met one I didn’t want to point at and laugh just to embarrass them or shoot in the back of the head with spit balls.

I also have to admit that it’s nice to get the kind of service that comes with people desperately wanting to please you so that you won’t say something nasty about them and hurt their business. After a few times of noticing this, I think I’ve figured out how to recognize the ones that think I’m a critic and what it is about me that leads them to that conclusion.

For one, I’ve noticed that the nicer the establishment, the more they want your positive feedback if they think you’ve got a little clout stuck between your teeth. A local dive that serves your beverage in a foam cup doesn’t care what you think. They don’t care that someone in California is condemning them to eco-hell (not as bad as the real hell where critics live, but still ...) even as they pull the tap on the fountain that dispenses your drink. So why would they care that somebody might write that their onion rings don’t have the proper “chew”?

A reputable restaurant that might entertain a critic will quench your thirst in a receptacle made of glass, or at least a red, rippled plastic container with the vendor’s logo printed on it. They would also savor the thought that I should use a fancy-pants word like receptacle in conjuction with their beverages ... or a fancy-pants word like conjunction.

They won’t worry that you could be a Negative Nancy if their food delivery system is a trough in the middle of the restaurant with plates piled up at one end and the cutlery at the other. If slices of cake have been sitting out for more than two hours, you can bet they probably won’t worry about you. Their skin is as tough as the skin on top of the cheesecake.

I’m treated differently depending on the way I’m dressed, too. Most of the time I’m wearing blue jeans in one of various stages of decay. At those times, I don’t bother to try and fool them into thinking I’ll have an opinion on the quality of their mashed potatoes. It’s when I’m sporting emo hair and wearing a black turtle neck and round glasses that people approach me with caution. This ensemble doesn’t necessarily promote phenomenal service, but it gets me weird looks. Upon further thought, I can see how that look along with the skin cancer scar I sport on my temple could also make them think I might be Harry Potter.

Then there’s the entrance. If I’m tired and just want to be left alone, I’ll probably order a #3 meal and type quietly at my table in the corner next to the indoor playground with the ear pluggy do-dad thingies crammed way up in my hear-holes. But if I need that special pampering, I’ll sometimes enter and declare, “Serve meh!”

A good trick to remember if you have your computer out on the table and want the staff to wonder if you’re judging them is to sit back from time to time and make it obvious that you’re observing someone from the staff. It helps to cock an eyebrow and curl a finger around your chin as well, nodding your head every now and again in approval or shaking it scoldingly from side to side. Then when you’ve been noticed, raise your eyebrows and begin to type furiously as if you’ve discovered something interesting during your observation.

You can further the ruse by making faces when you take bites of your food. The more your face distorts into a pinch that says, “That bite of your fare was detestable! I should hope the next bite will offer a fonder air of grace to my palette,” the harder they’ll work to make you happy. Take a bite of fettuccini ... make a face that looks like you’re traveling down a Georgia back road during planting season. Don’t know what I’m talking about? Drive down a Georgia back road during planting season and see if you don’t make a face that looks like you’re traveling down a South Carolina back road during planting season.

There are other things you can do to lend credence to your portrayal, such as carefully investigating your silverware and making sure to wipe it down, even if it’s so clean it could be used in some crack-head kind of surgery that involves forks.

Adding the accent of a British dignitary helps too, but beginning all of your correspondence between you and your server with, “I SAY,” is also a plus.

As I started writing this piece, it was lunchtime and I was in Walterboro, SC at my favorite restaurant there, Olde House Cafe. Now as I finish it, I’m in a Myrtle Beach Denny’s. Neither of these places would expect a hoity-toity snob of a food critic to darken their doors, although maybe one should hit up Olde House. I’ve never had anything from their menu because as soon as I walk in, angels from heaven begin to sing and golden light hits me from the direction of the buffet bar. And it delivers. But while I’m not dressed in my dusty work britches at the moment, … THAAAAT’S RIGHT, BRITCHES! … I am dressed in a nice, casual shorts and t-shirt combo, complete with sandals. (No socks! You’ll never catch me committing the heresy of wearing sandals with socks.) So it’s possible my waitress could think I’m a food critic in town for a little holiday and dropping a literary elbow on one of the nation’s top tier 24-hour-breakfast-or-dinner-the-choice-is-yours-it’s-all-gonna-clog-your-arteries-anyway diners to boot.

I wonder how you critique nachos in the first place. Ehh, I’ll figure it out.

“Oh, waitress … I say! These fried chips of pressed corn flour covered in greasy meat and processed cheese spread are simply delightful. Would you be so kind as to compliment the chef when he returns from his smoke break?”

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I get tons of curious looks from people when I break out the old laptop and start pounding away at some genius piece of literary broo-haha. They’re even more curious when it’s a composition notebook I’m attacking with my sweet handwriting skills only an elementary school teacher could read. Rarely does anybody actually say anything, though. They probably understand this simple truth ...

Writers Write. It’s What We Do.

NOTE: Once again, the following was originally a blog post, so it will mention writing type stuff several times. Ignore that. Now it’s a blog post AAAANNND part of this podcast episode.

I don’t feel good today and I don’t want to write. My daughter woke up with a cheerful exuberance that seemed to scream, “Hello world! Let’s make this a day to remember!” In actuality, it was a lot of screaming, but more along the lines of, “Daddy where’s mommy I want cheese balls no I don’t want those cheese balls I want pancakes no take those pancakes away I want peanut butter on a spoon and Mickey and Elsa no I don’t want Elsa I want Tyrone no that dragon scares me turn it off I want cheese balls WAAAAAAHHHHH!”

Days like today are the norm for people to whom God gave the gift of child rearing, so I do hear the playing of the tiny violin in your sarcastic minds and I accept it as I salute and take my hat off to you. But as much as I adore my little precious, pink bundle of fireworks, she can make it difficult to find the energy to write an article at the end of the day, especially if I haven’t felt well to begin with. It’s hard to be constructive when all of your senses have been numbed and you’ve been reduced to a shivering mass of flesh whose only translatable words turn out to be the lyrics to that dang Clubhouse theme song.

But I’ve got to write when I have the opportunity, so I’ve committed to it. Because that’s what you do when you’re a writer. You write when you don’t feel like it. You write when others are doing other stuff in other places with other people. When I decided to begin seriously writing on a consistent basis, the first thing I did was sit down at a table in a restaurant whose name is also the title to a catchy song about a man who tap-danced in worn out shoes. I pulled out my computer and started a document, listing as many topics as I could that I thought might be interesting.

I was going for 50. I got 46.

Close enough.

I wanted to always have something handy to write about if I needed to, but had no inspiration. I could add to that list as the ideas came and I’d have a solid foundation for topics. One of the topics was When I Don’t Feel Like Writing, I Write Anyway.

Via my well-sculpted writer’s mind-muscles, I can nearly hear your audible retort:

How could a word-slinger like yourself ever not be ready to write?

Well pardner, even the finest of us can end up stepping into a puddle of squishy prose-poor quicksand only to sink there surrounded by some sour stench, never to be heard from again if we don’t tie some rope to a tree nearby so we can pull our dang selves out. That tree is my laptop, the rope is my list of topics, and the quicksand is my current funk. And the sour stench? Well pardner, that’s the milk in the sippy cup next to me that I forgot to put in the fridge.

Yep. It’s a wasteland, writing. There are lots of us walkin’ round totin’ keyboard revolvers on our hips, always challengin’ the cowboy or cowgirl next to us to a duel out in the middle of the information super highway in front of a bunch of gawkers. The shots fired can be heard ‘round the world, but there are only a few true Word Slingers left.

Do you believe yourself to be one of those few, you ask?

I think to stay ready, a man oughta believe the best in hisself, so I reckon I do. It ain’t like I believe thar’s only room in this digital town fer a few of us. Thar’s lotsa room. It’s jest that most folks who wave around a blog fer ev’rybody to take a gander at are showin’ pitchers instead of writin’ words. The art of the article is gittin’ lost and thar ain’t that many what writes words anymore.

It occurs to me that in my exhausted state, my own words have become less the charming John Wayne stereotype and closer to the hillbillies from Deliverance, so maybe the western themed allegory has run its course.

As you can see, there’s always something rattling around in my head, it just doesn’t always make sense.

So why force it if you’re uninspired?

It’s the same reason you still go to the gym once you’ve dedicated to a workout even if you’re too tired. The muscle needs to be stretched and toned. It’s about learning to push through. Every article can’t be the best thing I’ve ever written, but each one can be written with the best of my ability. My current ability happens to be nonsense, but that’s okay. I’m still writing!

Where would we be if Alexander Graham Bell had been too tired to talk to anyone? What if Michael Jordan had said "Basketball, Shmasketball" and decided that baseball was good enough for him? What if God had said, “Y’know, I don’t really feel like making people today,” or just “People Schmeeple!”? (I just giggled at People Schmeeple. It needs to be a tee-shirt.)

The world continues to turn because people push on and do things they don’t necessarily feel like doing right then and there.

Am I equating myself to Bell, Jordan, and God? Nooooooooooooooooo. And now that I think about it, I might say my prayers tonight a little extra sweetly.

I’m just saying that to do things right, sometimes we have to do them even when it doesn’t feel right. And we should prepare ahead of time for bumps in the road, like I did with my topic list. I’ve gotten up out of the quicksand. Sure, I’m dirty. I’m even more tired than I was when I started. Fine. I still smell sour milk, … okay that’s got to go in the trash. There’s no saving that sippy cup.

Writers write. It doesn’t have to be a Nobel Prize winning piece - just ideas brought to life.

It’s after midnight and I’m still up. I’m over-tired and just rambling. That’s what people say when their child is screaming bloody murder, trying out that new word they hoped she didn’t hear, and embarrassing them in front of the whole church.

She’s just over-tired.

Thanks, Mrs. Helpful. Is that why your child is kicking the old man next to him in the groin? How about you take care of that? I’ll take my banshee to the restroom while you go get the preacher and some holy water.

Looking toward the weeks ahead, I can see that I’m going to get very busy at my day job and I want to make sure I keep the flow of ideas and writing going. I don’t want to get so crazy with the world around me that I totally lose focus and forget about writing these blog/podcast things.

So I’m writing anyway and that’s my advice to anyone else who doesn’t feel the groove settin’ down on they bad self.

If you’re a writer, write. You don’t want to? Do it any way.

You’ll find, like I have, that once you get going, it’s easy for the words to flow. They might not make much sense to anyone other than you, but they’re still your words and what a wonderful way to look back after years have gone by and say, “What was I smoking?”

__________________________

I don’t take addiction lightly. The ugly head of addiction has poked through the protective bubble I created around me more than once, so I know all too well the effects a dern-tootin’, real hum-dinger of a dependancy can have on not just the addicted person, but everybody that cares for them. I also know that the first step to recovery is admitting you have a problem. That’s why this final inclusion is an attempt to clear the air, to make my admittance, and seek wisdom the best way I know how.

My Name Is Michael And I'm A Socks Addict

There are socks and then there are SOCKS.

Imagine my day has been difficult because I’ve been on my feet for most of it and I’ve worked hard to keep my composure though a lot of stuff I didn’t want to have to deal with. If you’ve been a person who slogs through the daily grind for very long, you’ve had those days too. So you’ll know what I mean when I say that the bath or the shower at the end is a Utopian experience that can serve to make everything at least a little better as you settle in for the night.

For me, part of that freshening up experience is putting on clean socks. It’s a bliss that’s, in my mind, akin to that feeling you get when you dip in a cool swimming pool on a scorching summer afternoon or bite into a Cadbury Creme egg when it's not the Easter season. It’s a sense of immediate, ahhh-inspiring relief.

I know that for some of you, that satisfaction comes from kicking off your shoes and your socks and running around barefoot like some Neanderthal or a redneck’s child at Walmart, but not for me. As far back as I can remember, I’ve insisted on keeping socks on my feet at all times with the exceptions of swimming, bathing or showering, walking on the beach, and dressing as a hippie for Halloween. Okay, there’s one other time. I didn’t want to bring it up, but you gutter-minded people are thinking it anyway, so ...

Anyway, I absolutely detest the feeling of my feet touching anything else other than in the situations I just mentioned. There was no trigger moment from my childhood that I can remember; I’ve just always had to have my feet covered and if I don’t, I look like a cat when you put Scotch tape on its paws.

Until recently, I’ve considered socks to have only two categories:

New, Untainted Socks that have never known man intimately, worthy of Mary, the mother of Jesus, and ...

Used Socks that have been defiled by having embraced the naked skin of a body part that I believe only came into being after Adam and Eve took a bite of that dang apple and brought all manner of hell to the human person, namely something we now call the foot.

Thank goodness, now another type of sock has come into the picture – the Sweet Mercy They’re Comfortable Sock - and it’s a game changer. Let’s just call them SMTCs.

Let me give you a little back story to bring us to my first experience with SMTCs.

It’s been a long observed tradition, starting when I first met my wife and spent a Christmas with her family, that we receive a new pack of socks as a present under the tree.

Let me give you a little bit of backstory to bring us to the tradition that’ll bring us to the back story of how I came to learn of the existence of SMTCs.

My wife had an aunt that lived with her who always, every year without fail, supplied the family with fresh socks during the gift giving/meal eating/trying to kill each other with balled up wrapping paper war celebration. The aunt tended to plead that it was all she could afford and that was probably so, however, she was fully aware that because it was such an integral part of their family tradition, anyone who did not receive the gift of socks may consider their holiday utterly ruined and a curse might actually be placed upon the face of the family.

So everybody got socks.

Now, over 20 years later, the aunt having passed, my mother has made sure that the tradition lives on and usually gives socks of some sort.

But last Christmas, it was my sister providing them in the form of a little something extra. She was trying to gift me with items she knew I could use when I work because she knows that I work in environments that often have me extremely cold, extremely hot, slightly cold, slightly hot, a little chilly, a tad toasty, or suitably temperaturated. That’s a new word and I claim it - all rights reserved property of Michael Blackston for the love of all that’s holy so now you have to fight God to take it from me.

Not only did she provide a very much appreciated electric blanket and some wool gloves, but also a couple of pairs of socks that were woven by the hands of baby angel babies while humming soft lullabies and then skewering the fluffy music notes out of the air with their golden knitting needles. Hence, my feet are enfolded by a heavenly, melodious cloud of love and baby angel baby kisses.

I think Walmart calls them work socks or something and I’m surprised they don’t push them more with all them barefoot redneck chillun runnin’ ‘round.

On the outside, you might think they were any old thick socks. The fabric is deceptively normal. But on the inside, Sweet Mercy, They’re Comfortable! The material is the same as those really soft blankets that are usually too small to cover your entire body, but you scruntch up into a ball and pretend you’re swaddled in the arms of your mother anyway.

The first night I wore them to bed, I didn’t take immediate notice of the hidden luxury of the socks. It was only once I’d gotten under the covers and settled in that I began what I can only describe as making the music of ecstasy.

“What’s going on over there?!” My wife was concerned that I might be looking at something naked on my iPad.

“It’s these SOCKS!”

“What?”

“These new socks my sister gave me. They’re like nothing I’ve ever felt before.”

“From the sound of things, I don’t know that I want you to ever feel it again.”

“It’s okay, it’s just ... it’s just socks. It means nothing.”

“It better not.”

“Do we have any cigarettes?”

I’ve determined that I’ll systematically replace all of my used, slutty socks for this more sophisticated, more appealing sock. They’re not cheap. The good ones never are. As they say in Vegas where I’m told you can have any kind of socks you want, ya get what ya pay for.

It’s hard, though, to get used to the fact that after 20 plus years of marriage and never having to pay for socks, I’ll be handing out cash now and not only that, but only to the high-class providers.

And before you judge me and tell me the grass isn’t always greener on the other side of the drawer, you need to know that I believe people were created with needs and I believe I ought to have the best. Yes, I’ll still have regular socks when they’re given and probably even provide socks for myself when I can’t get them anywhere else.

I know I can’t be the only one. There have to be more like me all over the place and should they find themselves enticed and pulled into the world of obsessive and unabashed socks, embrace it. Don’t try to climb out. Stay away from meetings that see you introducing yourself with, “Hello. My name is (insert your name) and I'm a socks addict.”

Some desires are natural and there’s nothing in the bible that warns even the saltiest Christian against having socks. Darnication is not even mentioned, I can promise you. Another new word and I claim that one too.

So I’ll continue to enjoy the pleasures of good socks. I don’t need the approval of anyone but my wife. She may not understand why, being one of the barefoot hippie, flip-flop wearing sort, but she allows it because she loves me.

No, we don’t have one of those crazy “open” relationships,k especially not “open-toed”.

_________________________

All that’s left is me thanking audionautix.com for the great underscore music (in the podcast, obviously - duh) and thanking you again for giving a few moments of your time and diving into the secret realm of my Funny, Messy Life.

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If you asked people to tell you one of the most important things in life, it wouldn’t take long for them to say family. For me, family is a main ingredient in the stew of a happy life and I think you’ll be able to tell by the following three stories that little else comes before it. My sister and I have always been close, even when it came to fisticuffs, as you’ll see, so I think it’s a good idea to tell you some stuff about her. She’s been warned, but I can’t promise she won’t come for me after I finish with the following three stories.

My name is Michael - Mr. Blackston if you’re nasty - and this is what I’ve come to know as my Funny, Messy Life.

___________________________

If you’ve listened long enough to this podcast or read the blog, you probably think you have a pretty good bead on me. One thing you may not know about me though, is that I love to cook. Like almost everything I’m interested in, I consider it an art. Baking is no exception, but I don’t dabble in it too much. I tend more toward stuff that can be fried, grilled and fried, or fried and refried to make sure it’s fried enough. My sister, however, is a different story. She’s got skills and that’s why I just ...

Let Her Bake Cake

I like to give credit where credit is due, especially in the world of the arts. I believe that efforts ought to be lauded, in the good way most of the time. The good way is when you congratulate the artist for a job well done, even if the outcome is ugly but a strong effort was made. The bad way is when something is so ugly, all you can say is, “Oh my Laud!”

Unfortunately, for all the praise an artist might receive, the final product is rarely acceptable in their own eyes.

I recently lived out this scenario with my sister. As I said, she’s a good cake baker, creating most of the ones that are the centerpieces of our family birthday get-togethers and she never disappoints. Well, that is she never disappoints us. She doesn’t own a cake makery bakery, but everything is created with love. She could run a cake makery bakery and would probably do a booming business, but I think she enjoys the art too much to taint the fun of it with annoying things like agendas and deadlines. Instead, she’d rather bless her family and friends with delicious, moist cakes baked at three in the morning because she put it off till the last minute.

And I’m fine with that.

What I’m not fine with is her being a complete artist about it. What I’m talking about is the insecurity that comes with being a creative person. I know the feeling. I still have a canvas that’s been sitting on an easel for ten years that only needs my signature to be considered a completed painting. There’s just something I’m not happy with and I’m convinced that if Jesus himself said to me, “Sign it Already, my son”, I would probably ask if he was sure because I’m just not happy with it. Then I would say, "Just kiddin'', and I’d sign it. Then I would try to fist bump with Jesus and he would solemnly shake his head because you don't fist bump with Jesus. Anyway, I know all about insecurity when it comes to artwork.

My daughter’s birthday was in mid-April and she wanted a frozen cake. Not a cake that had spent several hours in a freezer; that would have been much easier. No, she wanted a FROZEN-ANNA-ELSA-OLAF-FOR-THE-LOVE-LET-IT-GO cake. My sister was on the case and had something dreamed up all ready to go. She had an idea, researched some stuff for reference, and planned a grandiose spectacle of a cake for my little Ice Princess. As an aside, my daughter was named Merida after the character from Brave and I can’t wait to teach her how to shoot a bow and arrow. Ay’ll beh shootin’ far me oon haahnd, duntcha knoo?!

I didn’t think much about the cake as we got ready to trek across the state line to my mom’s house where we were having the party. Imagine my surprise when right before we were about to leave, I get a text message from Steph that says, “CAKE FAIL!” It came with a photo of the early stages of the frosting process, which had apparently gone wrong. It wasn’t anything like the icy flow of fun that was supposed to cascade like a frozen lake over the top and drip like perfect, beautiful ice cycles down the side. Instead it had an Elsa has a very bad cold and has sneezed all over some round, blue object kind of a thing happening.

In all honesty, when I looked at the photo she texted me, I had a bad feeling about it. I showed the photo to my wife, she just said, “Oh Laud.” We shared a chuckle and carried on with the business of trying to make a little girl out of the hurricane ball that was terrorizing one of the cats in the corner.

We weren’t worried about the cake. Merida wouldn’t care one way or the other as long as she had something sugary she could spread all over her face and hands and store in her diaper for us to discover later. We just wanted it to taste good.

Stephanie couldn’t deal with it, however, and we learned this as soon as we walked through the door of my mom’s house.

“LOOK AT IT”, she screamed and pointed toward what we considered a fine work of baking and decoration. She’d done well. It looked good and deserved the nice kind of lauding. Yes, I’d seen more magazine worthy work from Steph, but considering what she’d sent a photo of earlier, we thought she’d pulled it off.

“What’s wrong with it?”

“Did you look at it?!” She hissed.

“Yes. Just now and it’s fine. It really looks good.”

She’d worked herself up into what we classy southerners call a Tizzy over this cake and was close to pitching what we refined folk call a Hissy Fit. She had in mind something that could be featured in a bridal magazine or Cakes That Really Look Like They Are From The Set Of FROZEN Weekly.

“NO! LOOK. AT. IIIITTTT! You’re not looking at it!” she screamed and used a full nelson move to force my face to within centimeters of the cake. All I could think of in that moment was that it’s a good thing Jesus wasn’t standing there saying, “It’s beautiful, my child.” I don’t think she could have handled it.

“There’s nothing wrong with the stupid cake!” I screamed back and then told mom on her. “Moooooom, Stephanie’s pickin’ on me about her caaaaake!”

I thought it was over, but nay. She smoldered a while and before long the subject was brought up again.

One of my aunts was asked her opinion and the reply of, “Oh that turned out nice!” wasn’t what Stephanie wanted to hear. You’ve heard the sayin, “Hell hath no fury like a woman’s corn”, well I say Hell hath no fury like an artist who doesn’t believe you like what they’ve created.

Steph drew in a deep breath and the room fell silent, expecting the worst.

“WOULD YOU LOOK AT IT?!”

No matter how hard we tried to convince my sister that, in all sincerity, it was a nicely decorated cake, she wouldn’t have it. Her mind was made up that the cake authorities would soon be breaking down the door and taking her to answer a few questions in a dim room with only a single light and a metal chair. And because it was a Disney themed cake and she loves The Mouse with all her heart, the interrogator would probably be wearing an ear hat, whether it’s the mouse ears or the Goofy headgear, we have no way of knowing.

I can say that I didn’t do myself any favors later by having a little fun at her expense right after we‘d finished shoving grilled meats down our throats and watching my princess tear into her mountain of gifts like a honey badger. I couldn’t help myself and I dare say a bit of little brother justice came out as a form of revenge for the rasslin’ move she'd put on me earlier.

“What’s for dessert?” I will neither confirm nor deny whether there was a smart-alecky look on my face when I asked it.

“The cake,” mom answered.

“I meant what’s for REAL dessert?” I couldn’t help myself.

I’d hoped to catch the look on my sister’s face, but she vaulted herself at me from the top of the deck railing and I was rendered unconscious by a karate chop to the back of the neck Ricky Steamboat style.

I do vaguely remember hearing, “LOOOOOK AAAAAT IIIIIT!” just before I blacked out.

It really was a fine cake.

And yes, I know it's "woman scorned.”

__________________________

From what I can tell, especially raising a couple of children of my own, siblings tend to be different from one another. My sister and I have plenty of differences between us, but maybe the tie that binds us the closest is that we’re both artists. Steph doesn’t dabble heavily, but she could. When she takes a notion, she can turn out beautiful artwork. In fact there’s a part of me that harkens back to the child I once was - the little brother that always hoped to be as good an artist as his big sister. I guess that’s why she and I still work well together after all these years on certain projects. There’s just one problem ...

We Think Too Big

The Christmas parade float was finished. Stick a fork in that bad boy, he’s done.

My sister and I worked on it for two and a half days and it was a winner in our eyes, especially being the first parade float we’d ever been in charge of creating. I won’t say we were as proud of it as we wanted to be, though. Don’t get me wrong, it’s everything it could have been with the budget we had. But the problem we have with the Christmas parade float for the local theatre was the same problem I have when I build sets for shows I direct at the same local theatre. I want my sets to rival shows on Broadway and I wanted our float to compare to something you’d see cross your television screen Thanksgiving morning.

Simply put, I see things in my head bigger than I can make them and my Stephanie’s the same way. Put us together on a project and we dream up things it would take a six figure budget and an enormous crew of helper minions to achieve.

This has been an ongoing issue ever since my first fully produced show. It was Sir Andrew Lloyd Webber’s Joseph And The Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat. My wife and I fell in love with the show early on in our marriage and found ourselves involved with a production. We were cast in smaller roles, but we had big dreams for our own production and were soon approved to stage it in Hartwell, Ga.

The cast count was nearly forty and the set, in my over-imaginative brain, was to be one of the most, if not the most, elaborate one ever built there. The problem is that the stage is the size of a postage stamp. And not the big ones either. It was the size of those stamps nobody ever wanted and always got shoved into the junk drawer. Not only would it be a challenge to build what I had in mind because of the limited room, but placing forty people on it would be nearly impossible. Did that stop me?

No it did not.

I have way too much imagination for anything like logic to have a say in what can be done. That’s why I enlisted the help of my set partner and sister, Stephanie. Did this mean that I would be pairing myself with someone who would be the voice of reason to my Mad Hatter of the Stage mentality?

No it did not.

What fun would that be? Steph was as insane as I was about trying to fit every little squirt of imagination we could into it. I needed no silly voice of reason; I needed a partner in crime.

What we managed on that stage with the amount of people in the cast may have been crowded and the very small wing space may have been ripe with sweat and actor funk, but it was awesome sweat and faaaaabulous actor funk and the audience loved it. There were concessions we had to make though, notably a golden chariot that appears center stage at the end of the show with tall wings that raise and lower to each side majestically at the whim of the stage manager. It was in the plans and we built it. The Broadway show has the chariot intricately layered in gold scales, so of course I designed our chariot in the same fashion and bought the materials which ended up being a crap ton of cardboard, gold spray paint, chicken wire, zip ties, and PVC pipe. I set my sister to work on it and she was excited. She meticulously cut individual scales out of the cardboard, sprayed each one of them gold, hole punched each one of them in the top, then fixed every single one into place in perfect harmony with the others. It. Took. Her. DAYS. And it was FAAAAABULOUS!. So when the time came to set it in place at center stage, we were riddled with anxiety and glee - rich, thick, mind numbing theatre glee. You know what I mean if you’ve ever built set pieces you were proud of. We’d made it light and portable so the crew could get it on and offstage quickly. That’s why we used PVC pipe. And let me interrupt myself to suggest to any future set builders that you can build a sturdy version of almost anything out of PVC pipe.

We raised it up and began to lower it into place. And VOILA!

It didn’t fit.

Oops. My bad. I’d measured wrong somewhere, so in quick decision pro-like director form, I stated the following:

“It don’t fit. Scrap the chariot.”

Stephanie blinked her eyes at me as if she were trying to clear her vision because obviously she was in some sort of dream where chariots she made don’t fit in their place.

“What did you just say?”

“Chariot’s too big. We’re losing the chariot,” I crossed to stage left with my nose in the air. If I’d been wearing sunglasses, a turtleneck, and a scarf, I’d have flipped the scarf from one side to the other nonchalantly with directorial swagger.

“That chariot. Took. Me. Days.”

“We can’t use it.”

“We can fix it. I’ll make it work.”

“Nope. There’s no time and I need you painting intricate hieroglyphs with mother.” Mom was over at a side stage up on a ladder with a paint brush where I’d erected tall flats (thin walls of canvas with wood frames, for you poor non-theatrey folk) and recreated the entire plot of the play from start to finish in actual Egyptian hieroglyphs. Mom was tasked with painting them. Another side note - Those walls were necessary to create dressing rooms on the side stages because of the small space we had to work with and the sheer number of cast members. There were times during the performances when there was literally five feet separating the front row and a bunch of naked people.

Anyhoo, Steph wasn’t happy.

She jumped at me screaming, “LOOK AT IT!!” And she hasn’t let it go to this day.

Unfortunately, the lessons we’ve learned have only served to enhance our insatiable need to try bigger and bigger things. It broadened our belief that It CAN be done!

That made its way to our future productions. While Steph didn’t help with Into The Woods, I still solicited the assistance of another artistic lunatic. While most who put together the set for that particular show are happy with stylized versions of the woods, even opting at times for the charming cardboard cut out trees, I could not see anything but being honest to the title. A woods effect that can be done simply? Not I! The actors must be IN the woods!

I knew a business owner nearby who had recently cleared a lot for parking, so I asked for the trees.

I then, after obtaining permission from theatre management, bolted actual tree trunks that rose out of sight into the fly space (that’s the rafters for you poor non-theatrey folk). There have been plenty of other sets that went the Michael’s Gone Mad route and I have other artists who help out on occasion. I recall a second production of Joseph at a different theatre when I almost came to my senses and permanently fixed a very heavy set piece to the wall, but opted for my original idea whereas I intended it to raise and lower with a pulley system. My associate, the insane David, said, “It can be done.” He then spent hours crawling dangerously among the support beams in the fly space rigging it up and the piece worked as I’d hoped, although it took half the crew to hoist it.

You see, when I begin to develop a plan for a set that I intend to build, I can’t make myself see it on the stage I’ll be working with. Yes, you pious theatre set builders who may read this, I do measure the stage first. But that’s just numbers and I math not so good. My mind has its own stage inside it and that stage will handle anything I can think to throw at it. That’s the stage I do my planning on. And because of that, I’m inevitably disappointed when the final screw is in place and stand back to look at my creation.

This float was like that too.

Steph and I built it together and we were proud. We stood back and looked at it, complementing each other on a job well done.

“Job well done, my sister. I dare say thine skill and determination hath won the day. Victory be in our grasp.” (There were prizes for the top three floats. We didn’t win.)

“Abandon not, brother, thine own applause. For thou didst indeed pour forth also upon this mobile creation thy vintage of art’s wine. Thy job, too, is well met.”

But I had to admit that it didn’t live up to the float that paraded valiantly past my mind’s eye - with its jubilant spray of color and sound; the one I saw causing children to shout, other floats to cower under a shadow of unworthiness, and parents to point and tell their kids, “There be the example for living up to live up to, me child.”

I see that my inner voice has quickly changed from Olde English, reminiscient of Shakespeare, to that of a crusty, sweaty pirate.

And Steph agreed with my assessment of the float.

We both wondered if we could‘ve done something more. I didn’t mention scrapping it to Steph because I was pretty sure that even though she’s as crazy as me when it comes to this stuff, she’d be tempted to … oh, how does she put it … dot me in the eye. I’ll eventually tell you the story of how she dotted me in the eye in a piece titled, My Sister Dotted Me In The Eye.

Now I ponder how to take the Christmas parade float to a higher level next time - a level beyond what’s appropriate to one that is, frankly, ridiculous:

A giant helium balloon shaped like the comedy/tragedy masks – It would follow behind the float and would be tethered to twenty children dressed as elves gaily dancing and singing show tunes that mention Christmas. Also, I would insist on hand-stitching the elves’ costumes from reindeer skins. And not reindeer that had been hunted, but reindeer that had died natural deaths from an overdose of Christmas cheer.

A dancing kick line - Comprised of local cheerleaders dressed as Mrs. Claus. I figure the cheerleaders are probably already in the parade, so let’s give them a reason to be there. Unfortunately, I can imagine a domino effect if we came to a sudden stop and all the ladies tumbled one by one off the back of the trailer, bowling style, into the group of elves holding the balloon. That’s a reason to think longer on that one.

Thought about it.

Still wanna do it.

A celebrity representative – I know it might seem a bit “pie in the sky” to think I might get a big name like Robert Downey, Jr. or Pat Sajak to star on our float. But Tony Danza might be available.

Circus freaks – Who wouldn’t want to see that? The 800 lb belly dancer, the tiny lady covered completely in tattoos, the pygmy prince who jump ropes through the enormous holes in his earlobes. That’s what I call entertainment! And I’m still playing the soundtrack to The Greatest Showman endlessly on my commutes. Then again, if you want to see that stuff on any given day, all you have to do is walk into a Walmart.

In the end, it makes sense to come down to earth and be happy with what we accomplished with our little float. You can’t have it all, even if you believe there’s room for one more slice of spectacle pie. You just have to settle yourself down and allow reality to be your guide.

I’ll have to be content to let my imagination run wild and pretend I’m surrounded by tall buildings, large balloons, and choruses of singers from Broadway shows.

And waiting there at the end of the line might be someone famous to interview me. Perhaps Pat Sajak.

I know, I know. I think too big.

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My son is nine years older than my daughter. We had hoped that the age difference might diffuse some of the obligatory fighting that goes on between siblings, but our hopes were dashed in quick fashion. As soon as she could walk and talk, which now feels like only a couple of days after we brought her home from the hospital, the sparring began. My sister and I are closer in age by four years, so there was PLENTY of fighting between us. Steph wasn’t content with pulling hair and tattle-telling. She was a fan of pro wresting at an early age and you better stay out of arms reach of her if she’s just finished watching a Rocky movie. That’s why this last story exists. It’s why ...

My Sister Dotted Me In The Eye

You know those things that come to be early in life and somehow find a way to have staying power? Silly things like pet names your granddaddy called you or being an idiot. In some cases, those things can last so long that they become a an endearing side note the parties involved can share on occasion and enjoy a good laugh.

I used to call you Butt Face. Remember that?

I sure do, Grandpa. I sure do.

Hahaha. Good times!

It’s not always a fun volley of hurtful name calling, though. Sometimes an event gets a title. Let’s use the time my sister dotted me in the eye for example. While you can probably grasp the idea of what physically happened to me from that phrase, you need to know the story behind it.

It was a dark and stormy night. A Saturday if I recall correctly. My mother had taken the family somewhere and we were parked outside of my aunt’s house to either put her out or pick her up, if I remember it correctly. If memory serves me right, I was in the ballpark of seven years old and my sister was in the ballpark of twelve. We fought a lot, but if I’m accurate in my recollection, my sister and I had been at each other’s throats more than usual and tensions in the car were heightened, when she said something smark-alecky and I didn’t take it well.

Mama wouldn’t have been happy about it and would have warned us multiple times, in that nurturing way mother’s do when they’ve had enough.

“Sit down and shut and shut up. I’ve had enough!”

It’s important to mention that we probably were standing because in the 1980’s I don’t think seat belts had been invented yet and kids just tumbled to and fro with reckless abandon all about the back seat.

You’re a stupid head!

You’re a poopy mouth!

You’re a butt face!

Then mom would have to chime in.

Hey! Just because your grandpa calls him that, doesn’t mean you get to.

That’s the way it sort of went down, except for the butt face part. My grandpa never called anybody that as far as I can recall.

The point is that whatever we were saying got serious and when I’d said one thing too many, my sister, whom I love with all my heart and have built many wonderful and beautiful masterpieces of artistic glory with, hauled off and punched me - not slapped - but full knuckle PUNCHED me right in the eye. I recall that correctly.

It didn’t even hurt at first. As anyone who’s ever been punched will probably attest, getting hit isn’t that painful. It’s healing that hurts. The funny thing is that I didn’t realize how hard she’d hit me until I looked in the rear view mirror and saw an enormous bump rising just below my eye socket.

She’d made her mark. She’d dotted me in the eye.

I don’t know where it came from or when it started that we began calling getting punched in the eye getting DOTTED in the eye, but it seemed to fit, so it stayed.

From that moment on, any time there was a mention of a fight or the threat of one, someone would be described as having been dotted in the eye.

Over the years, it’s gotten to be a joke between us. I’ll say something joking, but maybe a tad mean, the way brothers do, and she’ll respond with “Ima dotchoo in tha eye.”

So I give that to my readers/listeners as a little gift. Don’t make threats of knocking out teeth or laying someone out. Take the road my sister and I have paved for you. Offer to dot them in the eye. That way you can both have a good laugh all the way to the hospital.

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I have stories for days about my sister and me and the stuff we got up to. There was the time she crucified herself - in a manner of speaking, the time we snuck and made a bomb that would have killed us had we set it off in a field like we intended, the time we snuck into the woods and found a monster, the time we snuck into the woods for a game of blind rock chunking with the neighbors ... a million stories and I’m certain they’ll come forth sooner or later. So sis, if you’re getting this, I love you and I can’t wait to create more stories in the years to come.

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Note: The following content is created tongue-in-cheek style and is intended for the comedic entertainment and enjoyment of people who are not easily offended. If you’re easily insulted and get all mouthy and whatnot, understand that you may one day be mooned. By the host. While he’s driving. That’s just his way of saying, “Hi friend! You have no sense of humor!” Otherwise, proceed.

This world is a dangerous place full of lazy people who’d rather take your money by force rather than work for it and teens who think every other day is a good time to create a new social media challenge like eating detergent pods or snorting condoms. That’s just to name a couple. While the world will never be truly fixed, I hope I can do my part to help by offering my own opinions and maybe - just maybe - we’ll take a step closer. I have three pieces of commentary that I think might lead us in a better direction.

I’m Michael Blackston and this wasteland you’re about to enter ... it’s a little thing I like to call my Funny, Messy, Life.

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It all starts with a mindset. We’ve got to take control of our thoughts before we can take control of our actions. Baby steps and crap. I try and take control at the beginning of every new year, but it might not be what you think. Recently a friend I just made up to segue into the story asked me how I was doing keeping up with the resolutions I’d made at the first of the year. I’ll tell you like I told my friend ...

I Resolve NOT To Make Resolutions

The Christmas season was a hard one due to all the stuff I had to do. I finally got it all done, but afterward I felt like I‘d been run over by the entire kick line of The Rockettes Magical Yule Tide Gala Christmas Under The Lights Holiday Bonanza Gala. Under normal circumstances, that might not have been such a bad thing. But in this analogy, these are the ladies that didn’t quite make the cut; the third string Rockettes who aren’t as good with their feet and definitely wouldn’t make the calendar. In that case, I’d rather not be trampled, yet that’s exactly how I felt. Follow that by the unseasonably warm weather and constant rain and you’ve got a good helping of the blahs.

It just didn’t feel like Christmas to me. So I resolved to make the next year different. Because it’s up to us to choose our own attitudes.

But I hate resolutions. People make them every year and rarely follow through. Gyms get an influx of new members who’ve resolved to get in shape. People buy brand new workout clothes and all sorts of exercise equipment as a result of their resolve. It doesn’t take long before those same clothes become bedtime wear and those pieces of exercise equipment become racks to hang the laundry you’ve not gotten around to putting in the closet..

Artists like me decide it’s finally time to start working on that masterpiece they’ve been meaning to get to and writers like me decide to compose that novel they’ve been talking about. The masterpiece sits, after the initial hesitant few strokes of the brush, unfinished for weeks, months, or years, all the while giving the artist an excuse we like to call a “work in progress”. The novel gets maybe ten to twenty pages old before it’s forgotten for something newer until the author can shake the “writer’s block”.

Not to mention these common resolutions (Not To):

Smoke

Drink

Cuss

Fight

Cheat

Look at somebody else naked on the internet

Look at yourself naked on the internet

Have road rage

Pick boogers

Origami

I decided to NOT make resolutions ever again. I know what I need to do and I don’t need some kind of a eureka moment or statement of dedication to make a thing happen. What I did decide to do is officially announce my anti-resolutions. These are things in my life I’m happy with and that I intend to keep in my routine.

I will not be changing my intense need to create. I write, paint, draw, act, sing, compose, dance in the shower, and make puppets from socks I find on the side of the road.

I don’t send thank you cards unless I didn’t get to thank you verbally and in person. I’m familiar with the “etiquette” argument, but I meant it the first time when I told you to your face. I don’t like to repeat myself. Did you get that? I don’t like to repeat myself. I touched on this in the last episode so why is it coming up again? Oh. I guess I brought it up. Just know that if you get the sense someone is avoiding you in Walmart, it’s me putting into practice my sweet ninja skills of invisibility so I don’t have to look you in the eye if I think you wanted a thank you note.

I’ll always hate being continually spoken to after the initial “hello” if I’m sitting at a table and obviously engaged in my writing or if I’m reading a book. I appreciate the hospitality, I do. But if I’ve replied kindly and then redirected my attention to my task, that’s an indication that I wish for the conversation to be over. It doesn’t mean that I don’t like you. It just means that at that particular moment, I don’t like you as much as I like my story or my book. I’m sorry if that’s rude. We’ll have to debate it another day; a day when I like you better than what I’m writing right now.

I will never change my stance on coffee. That stance is thus: Coffee is the nectar of God and my heavenly mansion will come equipped with an ever flowing river of java with just the right amount of cream and sugar. I will call the river, The Ever Flowing River Of Java With Just The Right Amount Of Cream And Sugar. I realize that there’re Snooty-Britches people who may be reading, listening to, or watching this and you might believe that coffee should only be swallowed if it’s black. You have the right to that opinion and I won’t harbor any ill will toward you for that conviction. However, should you be stranded on the side of the road in a thunderstorm with a temperature just above freezing with no cell service and I drive by in my working automobile while completely dry from head to toe with the heater on and drinking a hot cup of Joe touched by the angel of caffeine, don’t feel sad if I don’t stop. Me raising my steaming, creamy, sugery cup to you and pointing as I pass is just my way of saying, “HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!”

I’ll remain staunchly against the summer. I’m a man of the fall and winter. I’m Mr. White Christmas. I’m Mr. Snow. I want to scrape my window every morning with a credit card because I keep forgetting to buy a proper window scraper. I know several of you people who will wholeheartedly take up the gauntlet for the cause of Summer. We’ll just have to respect each other from opposing sides of the street. And if you feel the chill of my gaze as I wish for Old Man Winter to blow his nose in your hair, that’s just my jolly way of saying, “STOP IT! HEAT IS HOT!”

I think I’ve made my point about resolutions. They’re not for me.

Another note: I warned you that I’d be satirically taking on a mean spirit in this article and that you might consider whether or not you could handle it. So I’m sorry if you’re angry now. Don’t worry, I didn’t mean to make you mad and I hope you’ll forgive me. If not, I ask the comedy muses to find really funny ways to make your life interesting when the new year comes. It’s just my kindly way of saying, “Nanny Nanny Boo Boo.”

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So we understand now that it starts in our head and the action is to follow. Unfortunately one of the world’s biggest problems is that there tends to be this big wall made of TVs, video games, couches, and comfy blankets between us and the action. Well friends, fear not. I believe I have ...

The Solution To Procrastination

My son forgot all about a project for school until just hours till bedtime the night before it was due.

Scratch that.

It was overdue and he told us he’d be deducted 20 points from his final score for that, but at least he’d been given one more chance to present his 3-D scale model of the Great Pyramids of Egypt.

When I asked why he’d waited so long to do it, especially when his mom and I have been on him about not turning in his work, I got the old, “I’m sorry! I forgot” routine. If you’ve ever been the parent of a teen, you’ll hear those words in your head with the tone the teen union insists its members use - the tone that suggests it’s all your fault.

The truth was, he’d procrastinated. So there I was helping him to get it together and harping like dads do when teens act teenagery, while the past-his-bedtime clock ticked away.

We still have issues to deal with when it comes to my son and his school responsibilities, but I have to admit that as a student, he gets it honest. It’s only been recently that I’ve learned to poke the devil of procrastination in the eye with a sharp stick. I recognize it’s a problem that haunts a lot of people. I didn’t get around to checking the actual numbers, but I’m sure there are a few.

As a student, I put off doing my homework and projects too, but now I’ve discovered some keys to getting things done.

Although I’d rather give you this lesson tomorrow, I’ll go ahead and do it while we’re here.

These are some things I’ve put into practice in my own life in order to be able to write “The End” on the story of any particular task. They’re systems, if you will, that’ll help you find completion and be able to say, “I’m done!” These are tactical positions you can take in the war with your own personal devil and will serve as your own personal stick to poke in its own personal eye, shouting, “Take that, devil! That’s my sweet, sweet, efficiency in your eye socket!” These ideas are manna to the righteous ones who would follow the religion of the Go Getter. They’re suggestions that …. I suppose I should just get to it ….

First, don’t hatch all your eggs in one horse’s mouth. We tend to be people who have too many irons in the fire. I know I’m one of them, so shut up if you know me and have told me so. I know I’m preaching to the choir. But as much as I love having a full plate in front of me at life’s supper table, I can’t eat it all in one bite. I have to take it by the mouthfuls and chew on it, then swallow it, then savor the awesomeness that was that bite. And I have to keep it separated because everybody knows that if your food touches, everything on the plate is ruined. Your tasks are the same way. If they’re all mixed up together, you got problems. The mashed potatoes of work are dirty dancing with the corn on the cob of your hobbies, which just rolled over from a sordid affair with the peas of your honey-do list. You can’t have that. You have to segregate them and tackle them one by one and in the order of your priorities.

Second, give a name to each day of the week. This means assigning a task to each day, even if it’s just one a day, that MUST be completed before you can go to bed or sit up all night binge watching Andy Griffith on Netflix. Give each day a name; something like:

Bills-Are-Duesday

Mendsday, the day you mend stuff.

Write-A-Few-Wordsday or ...

Fred.

You can think of any crazy name and make it fun. Do you think Barney would go to sleep with a job undone? I don’t think so. Well, on second thought, I think there was an episode where Andy caught Barney asleep in the back when he was supposed to be watching the Courthouse/Sheriff’s Office/Detox/Rehab facility of Mayberry. And now I want to watch that episode. I’ll get to that one day. When I feel like it.

Third, get yourself an Accountability Partner. They’re all the rage and for good reason. They’re awesome. With an accountability partner, you have a partner to keep you accountable. Give them a list of things you need to have done every day before the sun sets and then get together with them to see if you made it happen or not. If you succeed, you get a nice pat on the back and maybe a gift certificate to a fancy day spa. And if you fail, you might have some sort of punishment in place to make you think about what you’ve done. For instance, you might have to buy your accountability partner coffee or a milkshake or a massage at one of those totally legit parlors with the dark windows and flashing neon. My wife is my accountability partner, but it’s a little different. She gives me the list of what I need to get done before the end of the day and then we discuss my success and failure over a tall glass of guilt. It’s a good motivator. Our prizes for success leave a lot to be desired, though. She put the brakes on the idea of getting me a massage at one of those parlors with dark windows. It’s a good thing too because a couple days later, the one I was thinking about got busted for somehting or other. As far as punishment for not doing the things she asked during the day, she did say it would be technically similar to the denial I was getting by being told I couldn’t go to a massage parlor, but that didn’t make a lot of sense to me.

The main thing is: Keep the main thing the main thing the main thing thing. When you have too much stuff on your plate, making sure nothing touches and eating one bite at a time is definitely a difficult proposition. But if you want to succeed, you have to chew on one thing at a time and swallow it before you put another bite in your mouth. We’re back to the food analogy, but it fits. If you stuff bite after bite in without following through with the chew/swallow technique, you’re bound to choke. Make each task your priority and focus on that alone until you’ve finished it. You’ll choke trying to do everything at once. The thing is, if you do it all together, nothing gets done and you get frustrated about it and you don’t sleep because you feel like you’re just spinning your wheels and nothing is going right. If you leave the rest alone until the one you’re working on is finished, then you get to erase it from your mental chalkboard and forget about it. There’s nothing sweeter, except maybe baby chicken babies pecking at a ground covered in sugar cubes and Froot Loops.

In the grand scheme of things, nobody but you and your accountability partner will probably ever know you’re a procrastinator. Okay, unless you’re a project manager who never manages their projects or a student who “forgets” to do his assignments. But you’ll definitely know and that’s what’s important. Having the confidence that you’re a doer, not a didn’t do yet’er, is a power that nobody but the devil can take from you. And since I poked a stick in his eye, I think he’ll be gone for a while. I mean, I’ll check to make sure he’s gone ...

But it can wait till tomorrow.

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Now we’re getting down to the nitty-gritty. I’ve fixed the procrastination issue and we come to what I think is one of the biggest problems we have in our society - Politics. People lean too heavily on them and while I respect that everyone has an opinion, how about we all keep them to ourselves unless we’re asked. In other words ...

No Politics For You

I like having lunch with my wife during the week. It doesn’t happen very often due to our schedules, but every now and then, we get the opportunity to break bread over an afternoon meal and share how our day is going. It’s cherished time. It’s a wonderful way to be spend a few moments together and remind ourselves why we fell in love with each other.

We had the fortune to find an hour available at the same time recently, so we met and drove a few blocks over to a new café in town. We placed our orders, found our table while we waited for our food, and began the small talk that only a couple that’s been married for over two decades can appreciate. Our cell phones even took a backseat to the conversation. Everything was nice … until a dude walked in who thought it would be just the perfect place to begin a loud political rant.

So now, I’m gonna step up on my own soapbox and do a little ranting myself.

To that guy and everyone like him:

I’m glad you have an opinion. But as they say, often very crudely, so I’ll tread lightly because there might be children listening - oh, and God … God is listening - Opinions are like a certain body part. Everybody has one. You’re entitled to yours, of course. It’s a free country. I think it even says something about speech in the constitution. But the middle of a restaurant while I’m trying to enjoy time with my wife and a greasy cheese steak is not the appropriate place to loudly proclaim it.

To be honest, much of what the man was saying happened to be things I agreed with. But he said it in that way people do when they’re way too proud of themselves. He would make a boisterous political statement that included his recognition of what’s wrong with the country, then quickly glance around at the tables to make sure everybody could hear him; a little smirk riding on his face.

My wife had to shush me after I said something loudly of my own about my feelings on being interrupted by Marty McPolitics.

It didn’t help that the man looked like he was on his way to an audition for a Grizzly Adams reboot. And that would have been fine, but his L.A. hipster accent didn’t match his exterior and my OCD sensibilities didn’t care for the combo. He was one of those guys who had the long beard of a mountain man and camouflage apparel, yet you wouldn’t trust him to build your shelter if the two of you were lost in the woods together. Then again, I probably don’t look like the type you’d trust as your walking survival kit either, but I know my share about it. Thanks, dad! (And also every episode of Man Vs. Wild)

Once he and his friend got their food, they took their conversation to private mode at a table across the room, but I kept noticing the loudmouth’s friend cutting his eyes at me and I wondered if he’d heard what I said earlier or maybe he favored my jeans and t-shirt ensemble to his friend’s get up that assumed an attitude more along the lines of, “I ain’t payin’ no dang prop’ty taxes. I’ll jess live in th’ woods down by th’ crick.”

I know that in today’s climate political tensions are high. I realize that everyone stands on one side of the road or the other and they have their reasons for it. I encourage political discussion as long as I’m nowhere within five miles of it with earplugs firmly squished into my head via a Q-Tip so they can’t fall out, while loud CDs of the Trans-Siberian Orchestra or the soundtrack to Phantom Of The Opera blare away in the background. And if I could also order a herd of those screaming goats surrounding me at the time, that’d be great.

Yes, politics are important. And yes, they should be discussed. I’ll do the research and I’ll know how to vote come time to step into the ballot booth. And if you’re the type who loves to debate, feel free to find some folks who are like-minded and go to your happy place of arguing to no avail and getting all hopped up on anger and adrenaline when someone says something you don’t like. Usually, that’s Twitter or Facebook. It’s all good. Just leave me and my meal out of it. I don’t want to be subjected to your thoughts when my only recourse is to either say something to you (which, as I said before, was immediately met with a “shut up or I’ll kill you” look by my wife), to get up and leave, or to try my best to ignore you while you infringe on my right not to listen to your yapping.

Again, should I have found myself behind a podium or mixed up in a round of, “Why our country is on a B-Line for hell” with the men at church, this is a guy I would have chosen to stand beside me. He and I actually see eye to eye, politically.

But SHUT YER PIE HOLE! I’M EATIN' PIE! I doubt the lady taking your order had the answer you provided in mind when she asked how you were doing today. The answer to that question should always be something along the lines of, “Great, and you?” not, “Well if (insert the politician you hate) had anything to do with it, we’d all be feeling like prisoners while they and the Big Money in Washington do everything they can to keep all of us under their thumbs and giving away all our rights and there are too many deer out there right now because they want to keep us from shooting too many and it’s all because of the government bureaus and their bureaucratic bureaucracy and what about cats and you know it’s the White House and who’s occupying it right now that released all the cats – and drones are coming up your toilet pipes while you’re sitting there and taking pictures of your hoo-hoo parts without you knowing it because Big Brother has to know every little detail about you.” (Since I said earlier that I agreed with the man’s ideals, I do feel it necessary to mention that the former tirade is a fictional and exaggerated account of what was actually said. I like cats.)

It’s okay if you have your opinions, just don’t pepper my tomatoes with it.

Facebook has a wonderful feature that I’ve come to be blissfully familiar with when it comes to people who can’t stop blasting out their politically laced commentaries. It’s called an “Unfollow” option. It’s absolutely your page and social media is a place for you to create all the content your little heart desires in whatever fashion you desire and however often you desire it. But I have the opportunity to step away if I so choose. I can live my life without having to be inundated with politics while you drone on and on and on without interrupting my meal.

All I’m trying to stress is that while you have a right to your political thoughts and opinions and while there are certainly plenty of forums for your runaway trains of thought, I don’t have an “Unfollow” button I can click out there in the real world, so not everything and everywhere is that forum. Just because you can do something doesn’t mean you should do something.

I’m certain that young man who desperately needs to have a conversation with as razor is passionate and brings a lot to the table; I know he brought more than we ordered to our table. And we need to have dialogues about these things. You need to have done your homework before you place your vote. Otherwise stay home. We don’t need to be voting due to popularity or because your family has always voted a certain way. Know the issues and attempt to elect the person who fits the most closely with your ideals and who you think will be the absolute best choice.

But while we’re learning and making our well-informed decisions, let’s keep it on the down low unless the conversation naturally leads there. Don’t walk into a restaurant all jacked up on emotion and beef jerky and start blurting out how the government is planning a hostile seizure of your cat hoard. That may be so, but I’m trying to eat.

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Whew. I’m glad that’s done. The world can thank me. I’ve fixed it - at least a little.

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People are sensitive animals and it doesn’t take much to bring a knee-jerk, often irrational, response when things happen that we consider out-of-the-norm. Newton’s Law states that for every action, there is an equal and opposite thing that happens to stuff. The measure of control we have over our reactions will separate us into three categories, which I’ll rank from best to worst:

1. Wise Souls - Slow to react and willing to think things through so as to get the best, most righteous outcome from a situation.

2. Average People - The category most of us fall into. Quick to spit the first thought out of our mouths, regardless of how hurtful and inaccurate it is.

3. Liquored Up Howler Monkeys

No one wants to be number three, but I’m seen them. It’s always been that way, but the internet has changed things. It’s given everybody a platform and that’s not necessarily a good thing. The first two stories in this episode deal with the new age of communication, while the last one will tackle a touchy one that calls back to the Days of Good Ol’. So settle in for the next twenty minutes or so because I’m Michael Blackston and you’re about to get my thoughts on some things that have crossed the path of my Funny, Messy Life.

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Like most people I know, I’ve become a slave to something that didn’t exist when I was growing up, but is now arguably the biggest influence in the lives of anybody who has access to a computer or smartphone. I’m talking about Social Media. I’m talking about the need to “check my alerts” and see how many “likes” I got for posting the hairball my cat coughed up. Social media has penetrated not just into what we see, but how we react to almost everything. Now, don’t get me wrong - I LOVE social media. I just think we need to be careful with it and to make my point, I’d like to tell you all about how ...

Facebook Killed Toilet Paper

I know people who blame social media, and especially Facebook, for everything that’s wrong with the world. It’s as if they believe the universe was morally perfect until the internet swept in and “tweeting” became something people did more than birds. But social media allows people like me to practice a craft that wasn’t available before. I get to write stuff and send it out to as many people as will read it. I get to record my thoughts and send my voice around the world in a podcast to as many as will listen. And I think both of those people appreciate my insights.

I do have to concede, however, that the influence of Facebook hasn’t been without its problems for me. No, I don’t blame it for break ups and divorces. People will use any tool that’s handy to do stupid stuff that gets them in trouble. It’s not the fault of a soul-lacking computer application that some folks frantically re-post articles from The Onion or the Babylon Bee because they didn’t bother to check and make sure it wasn’t a spoof. And don’t shake your finger at Facebook just because you’re going to hell for not sharing a meme that’s proof of your love for Jesus.

Unfortunately, even I’m not immune to letting things I see on social get to me needlessly. There’s something right now that haunts me and I believe it directly points to Facebook as the source.

I’m afraid of toilet paper.

Whoa, there, now! I didn’t say I wouldn’t use it, but still. Laugh if you want to, but consider this the next time you’re sitting there with your pants down.

There just might be spiders in that roll of cushiony softness you intend to use during the closing ceremonies.

I happened to have come to that part of the festivities and was ready to take the final measures, if you will, complete with fireworks where the Mexican team had gotten the best of me, if you know what I mean. The toilet roll at this place was not fixed to the holder, but free standing on a shelf beside me. As I went to take it up and put it to its rightful duty, (ha ha ... duty), I realized that if I was gonna pick it up, I’d be putting my fingers into the dark cardboard tube without caution. I remembered a photo I’d seen on my news feed and pulled my hand back as if I were playing that slappy-hands game we used to play with our friends.

The photo I’d seen on Facebook? A Black Widow spider hiding under the top fold of a roll of toilet paper.

I cautiously picked up the loose roll from the shelf and examined the hollow tube, then carefully unrolled the amount I needed like I was about to trip a mine.

I was perfectly in my right mind to be so careful. Had I not, I could have wound up on an emergency room table with a big, swollen spider bite on … my … you get the picture.

Unfortunately, I don’t think I’ll ever be able to perform that delicate procedure, or any procedure involving unrolling a tube of paper without expecting a jump-scare from some angry killer beast. In fact, Merry Christmas to my peeps. You can expect your gifts wrapped in a plastic Walmart bag. I’m normally not the excitable sort when it comes to this type of thing, opting for logic over fantasy. But I see this as a reasonable threat along with several other possible situations a person could find themselves in when the horror becomes very, very real. Try these on for size and see if you don’t end up checking things out a little more carefully.

Scorpions in your pillowcase – I figured I’d start with my number one phobia to get it out of the way. Once I thought there might be spiders in my toilet paper, the next step seemed to be to consider that there might be scorpions in my pillowcase. I like to fold my arm and rest my hand under my head at night, placing said hand inside the pillowcase. Now I’ll imagine that as soon as I do there will be a series of stings that’ll send me through the roof and little cries of laughter from the evil little things.

Chiggers in your underwear drawer – If you’ve ever had the unfortunate experience of dealing with an infestation of chiggers, then you know the misery the invisible little demons can bring. If you’ve ever had them in the vicinity if your unmentionables, you know it’s itchy and excruciating. People think you’ve been places and done things you couldn’t tell your preacher about. You feel like a human lottery scratch off ticket. Every time I’ve gotten them, it seems like they've gone straight for that area of my body and so I have to figure they’re attracted to my underpants somehow. What would be stopping them from finding their own Eden in my underwear drawer? Who’s to say they haven’t found it already?

Jehovah’s Witnesses hiding in your car – That feeling you get when you hear the bell and open the front door without checking to see if it might be Jehovah’s Witnesses, then finding out that it is, in fact, Jehovah’s Witnesses, is made ten times more horrible when you think they might have found a way into your car in the middle of the night. I’ve recently heard reports of them upping their game and approaching people at gas pumps. It’s only natural to assume that the next evolution in their strategy is to infiltrate your car. You’ll get in tomorrow morning, start your engine, put on your seatbelt, adjust your mirror, and SMACK! You’re staring down the latest issue of The Watchtower before you can say, “Go away, my unmentionable parts are itching and I can't scratch them because of the scorpion stings on my fingers!”

Miley Cyrus under your bed – If you think you hear something strange going on under there, something that sounds like a wrecking ball accompanied by, strangely enough, a decent singing voice, it could be Miley Cyrus. She’s probably naked and sticking her tongue out like some even more deranged version of Gene Simmons. If you look, you’ll never be able to un-see it, so don’t say I didn’t warn you. There haven’t been any certified sightings of naked Miley Cyrus riding a wrecking ball under beds, but I wouldn’t take any chances. I’ll add that she seems to have toned down, so the chances of finding her under your bed are at best, minimal. But still ...

Soccer on your TV – This would do me in. I’ve changed the channel from time to time and seen glimpses of it, but thank The Lord, I was able to pass by quickly enough for it to do no harm. It’s okay if you like soccer. I respect that. I live close to Atlanta and the United have set the town ablaze with excitement. But I like snakes. If I found a snake in my toilet paper roll, I’d likely name it "Slippy" and put it on my head. For me, soccer is one of those things I simply cannot abide. Forgive me if you disagree. It’s just that I would rather sit in my car wearing chigger infested underwear with scorpions coming out of the seat covers, wearing a snake hat and unrolling a tube of spider filled toilet paper while listening to Jehovah’s Witnesses as naked Miley Cyrus riding a wrecking ball came barreling toward me, than to watch soccer.

I’m paranoid, thanks to Facebook and that dang spider. Whoever posted that photo, hear this … I’m sufficiently perturbed.

I hope when you go to the bathroom tonight, you hear something go bump. And I hope you think of that spider as you unroll what should have been soft, cottony bliss. I can’t tell you how much I wish to know you put on socks that slugs have made squishy little homes in and how I would cheer to know that every time you see a rerun of Hannah Montana, your eyes involuntarily cut to the darkness under your bed.

I’m not vindictive, naturally, and I don’t blame social media for everything that’s wrong with the world. People’s choices are the problem. So I suppose that in the end, I’ve got no choice but to blame mankind for killing toilet paper.

I wonder what's next. Maybe someone will post a photo of a kitten and everything will get back to normal.

____________________

While I don’t agree that social media is at the root of all the world’s problems, that doesn’t mean I don’t think it has some blame to take for the negative way we behave. There was a time when, if I had a beef with someone, - say a restaurant that served me bad beef - I would have charged to the front desk and asked to see the manager. But now it’s easier to just blast them in a quick tweet. We hide behind our screens and that anonymity has given us false bravery. It used to be “liquid courage” that provoked people to publicly act like what my good friend Melvin from Alabama calls, MOW-RONS. Now it’s “Screen Guts” that make us say whatever comes to mind without either a filter, nor any sense of what consequences are gonna bite us in the butts for it. That’s why I urge us all - please for the love of all that is pure and holy -

Think Before You Post

The “Post” or “Send” feature is a dangerous thing that should be handled with caution. We ought to fear it the way we used to fear THE BUTTON they told us the president had his finger on. We thought we were always one “Ahh-CHOO!” away from World War Three. We should be that concerned about the post and send options. The decision to send out our every thought to the world, is something that ought to be thunk and re-thunk, then placed on the back burner for a couple of days, prayed over, reviewed by an “accountability partner”, then re-thunk again. Yes, grammar Nazis, I meant “thunk”, although it’s not a real word in your world. In my world there are unicorns that lay sparkly magic eggs and people have often “thunk” things. President Donald Trump and his Twitter account are a really good example. In fact, stick around to the end of the episode because I think I’ll compose him a letter about it.

I'm not without blame, either. The decision to post without using some sort of filter between my head and fingers has happened a few times and especially late at night when there aren’t that many people online and it’s safe and I’m jitter-emotional because I forgot to ask for those five cups of coffee I just drank in decaf form. And I’ve seen a few posts from other people that seem to scream from between the lines, “I didn’t think this through before I hit send!”

Part of me is saddened by this element of our culture and part of me dances a little leprechaun jig in the middle of the kitchen table, complete with a green top hat and black shoes with big ol’ buckles, at the notion that I’m not the only one. I feel self-righteous when I’m in the saddened-by-it zone, often shaking my head under my top hat, which makes the four leaf clover sticking out from the band wave somberly from side to side, and doing that “tsk, tsk” sound with my mouth. It’s in those times that I feel sorry for friends and relatives I see who obviously need prayer and intercession from the Lord after such a post.

But then someone mentions something I don’t particularly agree with and because there’s been a perfect storm of irritants - an athlete from my favorite team has been benched because he stole a moped and then got a DUI on said moped on his way to a dog fight while in possession of illegal imported Tupperware ... or maybe we’ve just run out of Lucky Charms - I lose all control and erupt in a rant my mother could not possibly be proud of. After all, half a game is waaaay too harsh a punishment for the moped thing, in my opinion.

An example of an un-thunk post might be something along the lines of:

“How stupid is the NCAA? Footballer McAwesomesauce stole that moped to get to the dogfight because he was trying to win money to send home to his mom. He wouldn’t be having to provide illegal Tupperware for her if they’d give her something to hold the crack pipe she carved out of soap at the prison she’s in for burning those orphans’ plush toys. Idiots! A player from Southern Cal got caught trying to sell origami shaped like private parts to a cop and he only had to sit out the National Anthem. Stupid NCAA! May the fleas of a thousand camels infest their toilet seats!”

Now, I could avoid an embarrassing post like that if I made sure to always have a fresh box of delicious toasted cereal with marshmallows shaped like stuff in the cupboard. But I can also make sure I don’t speak those innermost areas of my mind in a public forum by thinking it through first. There’re times when I do wish a flea infestation on the NCAA. I can’t stand a lot of the nonsense that comes out of the NCAA. But it’s not their fault players often get involved in the sordid and dark world of illegal Tupperware and pornigami. And they have rules in place to punish those law breakers that have to be followed.

Unfortunately, unfiltered posts aren’t the only cesspools of smelly goo that fill the noses of our social media. There are trends that show up as well, causing no end to the agony.

At the risk of being the post police, I have to say I get tired of things that show up over and over again. I’m not talking about something going viral; the posts people share so that others can enjoy a piece about a cause that needs support or a new recipe for making cheese cake out of old shipping pallets. What I’m talking about are cutesy-pootsy things that get real old real fast. There was once a stick figure named Bob and everybody made their own “Be like Bob” post. I had nothing against “Bob”. It was cutesy-pootsy and I see why people thought it was adorable and wanted to get in on the action. But when something like that becomes popular, all of a sudden there’s one every other feed that comes across your timeline. It’s not to insult anyone that this particular post fad is in my cross hairs. A bunch of my friends participated and I know why. It gives their voice a little something different. And as I mentioned, I liked the first couple of them ... the first couple.

“Look. It’s a stick man with something clever written beside it. Hahahaha. What a neat little meme. His name is Bob and he is a clever stick man.”

I scroll down to the next post.

“Ah, I see there’s a need to remember to bring in our pets tonight as it will be quite cold.”

I click “like” on the cold pets post because I don’t want pets to be cold either and scroll down to the next one.

“Oh! It’s another Bob the stick man post. Wow, Bob’s popular. This one’s from my cousin. Bob is a funny, funny stick man and apparently has much to say.”

I keep scrolling.

“Hey now! My aunt has posted that I’ll be turning my back on Jesus and thus dooming my soul to hell if I don’t type “Amen” and share this delightful picture of what could either be a hooded figure in the clouds or a funky shaped cloud.” (I do not type “Amen” nor do I share it because I know that a Facebook post doesn’t carry the power of salvation and eternity and I have so very much I could say from a certain soapbox about that kind of thing, but I scroll again.)

“Holy underpants, it’s Bob the stick man again! Okay, Bob. That’s enough now. I need kindling and your little stick body is starting to look like firewood.”

Scroll

“GAAAAHHHH - BOB! I WILL NOT BE LIKE YOU! I WILL KILL YOU, BOB! I WILL KILL YOU!”

It’s not Bob’s fault and it’s not the fault of the people who give him a voice. Everyone wants to be seen and heard and there’s nothing wrong with that.

My only plea is that we, as a culture, make good decisions when it comes times to post. Many, MANY times, things that we’d like to be seen should not be seen and things that we’d like to be heard should not be heard. All it takes is thinking it through first and maybe asking your grandma or someone that looks like they might have some sense if they approve before you hit the send option. That way people who also have no filter function from their mind to their reflexes might not throw bowls of cereal against the wall when Bob has gone too far.

I do hope those yellow moons and purple horseshoes will come unstuck from the sheet rock.

_________________

Not only do people want to have their voices heard, they want affirmation that they’ve done a good job. Remember when you were a child and you got praised for something you did well? That never goes away. Maybe it’s because I’m used to audience applause and therefore prefer a face-to-face encounter that the following story about one of our gift giving traditions rubbed a couple of people the wrong way when I first posted it. Let’s see how you handle it when I tell you ...

Why I Hate Thank You Notes

The following is intended to make you laugh and possibly to help you see my point, but mostly to make you laugh, so let's be adults about this. If you disagree and want to give me what fer*, send your correspondence to: MJ Blackston - 987 Your Upper Lip Lane - Fannywave, USA

You may proceed ...

When my wife and I got married, we did a lot of things right with the wedding and all the normal accompanying ceremonies that surrounded it, i.e., showers, inclusion of both families in the planning and preparation, barn raising, Total Eclipse Of The Heart flashmob, etc. We also apparently did some things wrong. Looking back, I wouldn’t change a thing about the way we did it because we thought it was beautiful and after 20-plus years, somehow I think it stuck.

One of the things we did wrong was in the area of “Thank you” notes. Both of us, while raised knowing good manners and basic etiquette, lack education as what’s “proper” when it comes to things that are expected from high society folk like queens and presidents and hoity-toity great aunts you never talk to.

As it happened, we forgot to send out “Thank you” notes after the wedding and bridal shower. It had escaped both of us that we were supposed to. What now seems to be something even new-born babies and poo-throwing primates know, somehow slipped our notice. Our thinking was that our verbal, eye-to-eye, lips-to-ears, sincere “Thank you” to each and every person while actually attending these events should have been enough to satisfy the understanding that we were, in reality, thankful for the thoughts and gifts. It was news to us that the universal rule regarding appreciation plunged beyond the little white baby’s breath flowers that smell like someone peed themselves and the lace doilies, into the realm of righteous and un-moving ritual.

It wasn’t until several weeks later that we found out we had awakened the - (gasp) disdain - of a distant family member over not having sent a 3 x 5 printed card bought from a retail store, that said something to the effect of, “I know we said thank you before - at the shower - face to face - with a physical hug and tears in our eyes - but, because we have nothing better to do than figure out where to put eight toasters, three non-matching dish sets, and a velvet Elvis painting, we’ll send you this piece of paper to say, THANK YA AGAIN!”. We found out we were expected to send “Thank you” notes. And we were informed that it had come to the attention of some people that we had failed at this basic duty and would undoubtedly end up in divorce and/or with ugly children.

Since that incident, we’ve taken a solid stance on the issue, feeling that change is in order. I believe a special note of thanks sent to document your appreciation is truly warranted at times. And the more I think on it, I do see the beauty in it and have no problem if anyone wants to do it. It’s nice and it gives the gifter a memento. But to be expected to do so just because it’s always been that way and to be angry with me if I don’t, even after my thanks have personally been delivered from the mountaintop of my presence with you, makes you a bit of a bossy-pants.

And I don’t care for bossy. That’s why I started my own business; I’m the boss of me and sometimes I even get tired of hearing me boss myself.

As I’ve taken an introspective tour of this subject while looking at photos of my two gorgeous children and spitting mental raspberries at anyone who said our marriage wouldn’t last, I’ve realized what a terrible world we would live in if we were expected to send “Thank you” notes to punctuate our appreciation after every technical reason to. I know the world is terrible now, but think about it.

What if you had to send a “Thank you” note after every hair cut? It might read:

“Here’s a little note of thanks to let you know I feel … like in respect to cutting bangs, you have the sweetest ninja skills.” That might be from the perspective of a woman. From a man’s perspective to his barber, “Thanks again for shaving me; that wasn’t in the plan. But since you didn’t slice a vein, I’m quite the happy man!”

Maybe you should make nice by sending the trash guy a note every single week after he dumps your garbage into the big truck that comes by at 3 in the morning.

“Congratulations! Once again, you’ve cleared my household rank. I thank you, sir, for without thee, my kitchen sho would stank.”

Don’t ask why I’m making them rhyme.

This would be an annoying one to have to send:

“How lovely and serene I felt as I sat for three days in your office waiting to change the address on my driver’s license. Please be sure to relay my gratitude to the State for insisting that aside from my current license and proof of new address, I also bring along my marriage license, birth certificate, a photo of the doctor who delivered me, the tooth of a dragon, the peg leg of an old pirate, and one eye. Without you, I never would have remembered where I’d put those things.”

Whew! So, it doesn't have to rhyme.

It could get very difficult to put into practice if “Thank you” notes were expected to spew forth at every single pleasant interaction. Should we keep them in our cars and at the ready, folded into paper airplanes, so we can glide them out the window toward people who are merciful enough to let us merge into traffic in front of them? Does my head nod in your direction and the throwing up of a short hand wave not say enough about how thankful I am of your graciousness?

“Dear Doctor, This is just a little note of thanks to tell you how much I appreciate you cleaning up the bloody stump that was my foot before I accidentally put it in a running wood chipper. It reminds me of how grateful I was the time you dressed my eye socket when I accidentally poked it with a stick I was about to put in a wood chipper. You are the beez kneez. I look forward to my upcoming appointment when you’ll put that little glove on one of your fingers and root around up there.”

There are so many scenarios that I could go on all day and never make a dent. What irritated me so about the distant aunt that got upset about us not sending a “Thank you” note was that it was family. And not only that, but she gossiped about it instead of coming it to me personally. Strangers are one thing, but if family expected it every time they did something nice, it would be relentless. Those are the people you see most often.

“Dear Grandma, thanks for the chicken pot pie. You should know that although we love your cooking, we don’t expect you to go to so much trouble. After all, you’re in your 90’s. Let us help out with the cooking and you rest. By the way, do you think there’s a chance we might see a chocolate pie or peach cobbler in the near future?”

Or …

“Hey, Uncle Bernard! Thanks for asking me to pull your finger the other day. I was COMPLETELY caught off guard. You really got some volume happening down there. You should be proud. You should also probably check your pants.”

I know it’s all about etiquette. I know that back in the day, people were taught the “finer” things like how to walk with books on your head, that elbows somehow make a table dirty, and that a person’s actual verbal “Thank you” is just not good enough, by thunder in tarnation dad-gummit. But recently, as we all sat around the dinner table at my grandma’s house, my family made the decision to put an end to feeling obligated to buy birthday cards for the adults. So, if a simple “happy birthday” is enough to state my appreciation for the day you popped out and said, Howdy-doo, why is it necessary to send a small card after the fact that says precisely the same message I gave you to your face at the time the gesture on your part was made?

I guess I’m just not sophisticated enough to understand these things. I suppose logic has no place in reality. Just know that if I look you in the eye, shake your hand or offer a hug, and say the words, “Thank you so much for the gift, the thought, your company, the advice I didn’t ask for, etc.,” then I actually mean it.

If that offends you, I’m sorry. Let me know and if you give me your address, maybe I’ll consider sending you an “I’m sorry” note to back it up.

Nah, I’ll just throw one of my eight toasters at your house.

__________________

There’s a part of me that feels like I’m gonna get some negative feedback over that last one. Probably because when I posted this article in a previous blog, I got some negative feedback from a few people who either didn’t read the disclaimer at the beginning or had no funny bone. If you’re insulted, I’ll remind you to note the disclaimer at the beginning of the story and initiate the button in your head marked “Sense Of Humor”. That’s a button it’s always okay to push. And I actually do send Thank You notes now, just so I don’t offend anyone.

I invite you to stick around for the following special letter to our POTUS.

Bonus:

A letter to President Donald Trump

Dear Sir POTUS,

I feel the need to write this letter in the hopes that perhaps we as a country can take strides toward a better tomorrow; to Make America Great Again, as you say.

I’m not sure if you’re aware of this, but there’s not much you do or say that doesn’t get scrutinized by the entire country - nay - the entire WORLD, and that makes it very important that you carefully craft every tiny thing that comes out of that combed-over head of yours.

I believe that as a country and a united front, we as citizens, should support the office of the President and do our parts to help maintian the awesome sweetness of #Merica.

In that light, I shall endeavor to make a few suggestions that you might put into action in order to get the support of those who would normally chastise you for having the audacity to take a breath. I’m talking about Hollywood, the news media, and hipsters who wear skinny jeans and say filthy words like “Organic”.

1. Stay off the Twitters. For that matter, social media is not your friend in any form. The responsibilities of the President of the United States are such that you have to make important, often unpopular decisions and say unpopular things. When you offer those things for every single humanoid with eyes and opposable thumbs to see and hear, you’re setting yourself up for disaster. And lets face it, you ain’t the best at figuring out the right stuff to say out loud. There are places for diplomacy and social media, sir, is one of those places.

2. If you MUST Tweet or Gram Instantly or Chat in a Snap, you should employ an Accountability Partner. The government pays extravagant amounts for the smallest items anyway. According to the guy from Taxi in the first Independence Day movie, hammers and toilet seats come at a premium in your world. So why not have a wise sage tag along at your every move? Someone like Franklin Graham, Dr. Phil or Nicholas Cage. You need to hand over the Book of Secrets to him anyway, so they can make the third National Treasure.

3. Make a bill that relieves Americans from being expected to write Thank You notes.

I feel like these three items would help your approval ratings, especially the Thank You notes thing. I appreciate your consideration of these suggestions and look forward to their emplementation. And I invite you to subscribe to the Funny Messy Life podcast. In fact, a bill making it a law that everyone subscribe at www.funnymessy.com would make just as much sense as a law that fines people who can’t afford health insurance, wouldn’t it? Anyhoo ... thanks again.

Sincerely,

Michael Blackston

#Merica

#MakeMerica Great Again

#DontForgetAboutThatSubscribeToMyPodcastLaw

#DoIt

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I’ve never been confused about my gender or even curious what it would be like to wear a dress. So to be crystal clear, I’m all dude. But I spent a lot of my formative years with women and I think that’s done a couple of things for me. I don’t always come across as the burliest, manliest fella in the cave because I’ve learned to appreciate some things over the years that might be considered more along the feminine side of the dividing line, and I find it’s just much easier for me to talk and relate to women than men. While I’ve never battled any confusion when it comes to my gender, it may not be that easy for other other people, at first notice, to decide exactly what I am. I’m Michael Blackston and you’re entering one of the weirder areas of my Funny, Messy Life.

_______________

I spent most of my time with my mom and my sister growing up and that caused me to adopt similar interests - my mom’s love for music and the theatre, my sister’s affinity for the figure skating portion of the winter Olympics, and my grandma’s skill at making fresh baked biscuits from scratch. But despite all of the things about me that might seem more “girly” than the average guy, I’m serious about my masculinity and can hold my own in any, well ... most ... okay, plenty of bro-hood scenarios. I’m here to proudly say ...

I Am Man - Hear Me Sing Sweetly In Falsetto

I thought it’d be a good idea to make it clear exactly who I think I am. I do this because the odds are phenomenally good that if I don't, you'll eventually think to yourself, "Just who does this guy think he is?"

I shall save us some time.

I’m an artist with a bunch of interests. I'm a husband and a father (In that order), and a devout Christian. If you keep those things in mind, you'll get most of where I'm coming from.

However, a new description recently came into play as to the condition of my character that had me a tad confused. I was described by a well-meaning friend as being not so much a woman trapped in a man’s body, but also not exactly the cover model for Man’s Man weekly. He said I was more of a “Metrosexual”. It took me a minute to process that as I looked up the definition of the word before I punched him in the face with my man knuckles. I wasn’t completely positive there wouldn’t be some face punching to come, but I’m a reasonable person. I forgot to add "reasonable" to my list of traits you might find handy to know. I could at least perform my due diligence before the fists began to fly and here’s what I found to be the correct use of the term as defined by Webster’s dictionary online:

noun met·ro·sex·u·al ˌme-trə-ˈsek-sh(ə-)wəl:
A usually urban heterosexual male given to enhancing his personal appearance by fastidious grooming, beauty treatments, and fashionable clothes.

HAHAHAHAHAHA! I decided my friend had not really checked his description for accuracy whilst pertaining it to moi.

I asked him why he thought of me that way and he replied, “Because you’re a straight dude who likes a lot of girly stuff.”

Okay, I thought, he has a point. He’s obviously referring to my obsessive love for live theatre (especially the musical variety), my fierce desire to keep a tidy home (although that never seems to become a reality), my embrace of all the arts - including crafts - and the fact that I can do a pretty good Julie Andrews when I’ve had a little too much coffee. But I didn’t feel that was enough to categorize me as a metrosexual when compared against the definition as given by Merriam Webster. So I adjusted my man-girdle (it was getting hot and you sweat under those things) and prepared to give my rebuttal.

“You, my friend – O he of camouflaged grandeur -, have me all wrong. True, I hold fast to a few things that may be considered feminine by some standards. And yes, I enjoy cooking, show tunes, and sappy movies where people fall in love, have a fight, then one of them chases after the other just as they're about to drive off or fly away, only to make up and kiss in the rain. I absolutely asked my mother the other day to borrow her sewing machine so that I could learn how to use it to make my costume creations go faster. So what?! I might fit the description as you see it, but I am not the best groomed of any room. I hate to shop for clothes, and have never had a beauty treatment. Therefore, I would say that I definitely do not fit the description of a metrosexual.

“Further,” I told him, “you may be surprised to find that I'm a crack shot with a rifle and although I’m sickened at the thought of killing for sport, I’ve spent more than a few hours in a deer stand in my youth and even bagged a couple. I fully respect those who hunt for food and wish you Godspeed in your future woodland endeavors, my scruffy friend with a bird nesting in your beard. Speaking of woodlands, my good sir, you should know that I, too, can track game and have a fair knowledge of survival skills as taught to me by my father, a great hunter and gatherer. Among other manly things I learned and adore that were taught to me all or in part by my father are the following: carpentry, gun safety, persistence in learning a skill, how to field dress a deer ("gut it", for those who aren’t manly), how to properly hold a hammer and how to string colorful combinations of curse words together when hitting your thumb with said hammer, how to fish, how to camp, the fact that gifts that were made by hand are more precious and last longer than anything you could ever buy with money, and the list goes on.”

“Sorry ‘bout'at,” he offered and spit something brown into a cup.

I like to think of myself as well rounded and cultured in lots of different ways, not just the ones that scream TESTOSTERONE, and I’ve put together a list of things that I believe truly make a real man.

A REAL Man includes the following traits:

· He is capable of laughing even when it hurts, unless there’s a lot of blood coming out of something important.
· Given some wood, nails or screws, and a drill, he can build something useful – like a shelf for his Broadway show tunes collection or a drawer he can put his stage makeup in.
· He can do simple self-surgeries (I dug out my own in-grown toenail and regaled you with that story in Episode 4.)
· He is not only capable of love, but doesn't mind saying it out loud to anybody he really feels it towards.
· He believes in something and is willing to fight for it. Like which is better - store bought fondant or homemade? Or who drew first - Han Solo or Greedo? (Let the debate begin.)
· He feels strongly that he is actually a mightier man than Old Dan Tucker because not only could he wash his face with a frying pan, but would have never died of a toothache in his heel. (He would have dug it out like I did. Like a man.)
· He never abuses women, children, or animals either physically or mentally.
· He cherishes his chosen mate as a precious jewel.
· He can build a fire. He might have to use those easy light logs they sell at Walmart, but he can light ‘em, by thunder!
· He will put that fire out when he’s done with it.

• He observes the oxford comma.
  · He takes his punishment without placing blame on others.
  · He sits calmly in the bleachers, keeps his mouth shut unless he’s cheering or otherwise being a positive influence, and lets the coaches coach.
  · He spends time with his children and shows his sons how to be real men and his daughters how to be real women.

These are just a few and I’m sure there are plenty more I didn’t include. Let me know if you think of something I left out.

As far as my friend and our encounter over my alleged "metrosexuality", I didn’t hit him because he didn’t know any better and a real man has more sense than that. Plus, I didn’t want to get tobacco juice on my knuckles. After our conversation, I agreed to buy some deer meat from him, shook his hand (which smelled suspiciously of doe urine - or at least I assume it was doe urine. It was some kind of urine and now I’m thinking, dear God let it be doe urine), and offered to throw away his spit cup. Instead, he dumped it in the bushes.

I gave him the old man nod and we walked our separate ways.

Metrosexual, my girdle.

___________________

I’m not sure if my natural speaking voice being a little high is due to all the time I’ve spent around women or not. I recognize a bit of a lilt to it a lot of guys don’t have that might make someone listening to, but not seeing me, think they’re hearing a middle aged southern woman straight off the plantation. I get that, but it doesn’t change the fact that it irritates the buttermilk out of me when it happens. I want to shout ...

Dude! Don’t Call Me Ma’am

I’ve lived with a phenomenon in my life that has plagued me at drive-thru intercoms and on telemarketing calls for, oh, maybe twenty years. And now, after so long and so many awkward moments when I come face to face with the clerk at the window, I’ve given up and come to terms with the fact that I’ll have to live with it for the rest of my life.

In a choir, I’m always placed in the tenor section. And because I’m a tenor, I don’t lay claim to a very low tonality of voice. I’ll never be heard over speakers, softly setting the mood for some couple’s “special” time. In other words, I’m no Barry White. My voice whispering, “Yeah, baby, you know you’re awwwwl-riiiight”, would come out sounding something like a chipmunk talking to a beautiful acorn.

So it shouldn’t surprise you that on most occasions when I’m talking to a faceless voice over an intercom or on the phone, to someone who doesn’t know me from Adam, nine times out of ten, I’ll eventually hear, “that’s a double cheeseburger meal with no pickle, add mayo, onion rings instead of fries, two apple pies for the price of one, a cup of gravy with extra gravy, some mayonnaise packets, a bucket of lard, and a Diet Coke. Large size it … Will that be all, ma’am?"

I know my voice can sound higher than the average dude and I’ve had to answer for that time and time again. I think it might have been some of the spark behind the “metrosexual” incident I just told you about.

But I’m still amazed that there are times my voice comes across as girly. And it’s not that anybody’s calling me a sissy, either. THEY REALLY THINK I’M A WOMAN! And it happens all the time.

But I have a theory that just might explain things and even if it’s not the reason, I’m sticking to it because it’s the best I have and I came up with it all by myself. I think that most people - not just me - tend to raise their voices at the drive-thru speaker, causing it to go up a few steps in the scale.

Imagine that I’m a man, because I AM a man. Now imagine that my gruff, burly self has decided he’s thirsty and desires a brew worthy of my power. Those who know me, stop laughing and follow me into the fantasy. I drive up to the Altar of the Arches and roll down my window. No, I cock a sinister eye at the window and it cowers in fear due to my manliness.

The person on the other end of the speaker chimes without much excitement, “Welcome to Altar of the Arches. Would you like to try our new bacon wrapped bacon today?”

I clear my throat and prepare to order with the authority of a god, and reply.

“No, thank you. I’d like a medium coffee with six creams and one Splenda.” I say it in a voice lifted several octaves so I can be heard over the sounds of the outside world. And because I always feel like I have to yell in these situations. I end up sounding like some freak hybrid of Richard Simmons and Dame Judi Dench. And by the way, that is exactly how I take my coffee at the Altar of the Arches.

“Yes, ma’am. Pull around.”

It’s become a point of paranoia now. I listen back to my voice over work and think to myself, “I might have sounded a little girly there, but I don’t think anyone would get the idea I was wearing a dress.”

Maybe it’s because I get along better with women than men. When I find myself at a gathering, it’s more often than not that I’m hanging out with the ladies instead of the guys. I’ve mentioned before that I tend to favor the more tender side of things. I know how to hunt, but prefer not to. I’d rather be painting a deer than killing it. I can fish, but I’d rather be writing or singing a song about the sea than standing by it with a rod and reel in my hand. And I guess that tendency adds a delicate quality to my conversation. Give me a discussion about poetry and art over hunting, fishing, or politics any day. After all, ladies never get involved in tasteless banter, right?

WRONG! That’s exactly where the juicy conversation is found. And as long as I can handle words like “uterus”, “nipples”, and God help me, “Oprah”, without becoming red in the face, I’ll usually be accepted into the group. Come to think of it, “nipples” can often be heard around the fire with the men as well, just not in a decent frame of reference.

Spending most of my childhood in the presence of my mother and sister has a lot to do with it, I’m sure. But when I ask others, “Do I sound like a woman to you,” they always assure me, “Oh, noooooooo. Of course not. Why would you ever think such a thing?” And I know they’re sincere because they usually fix each other with a knowing look and a bit of a smile on their faces as if to say, “How charming is this manly specimen?! I think Michael is THE most manly man in the history of manhood”. I’m positive that’s how I ought to take it.

So why do I have the same problem whenever I’m on the phone with some telemarketer I don’t know?

“Blackston residence …”

“Hello, ma’am. Is your husband home?”

UUUGGGHHHH! Don’t they train you not to be sexist and ask for the “Man of the House” over at the University of Interrupting People To Sell Stuff They Don’t Want Or Need?

If it’s a woman on the other end, I might get sassy and try to start a cat fight, seeing how long I can keep them going thinking I’m a female myself. It doesn’t take long to end the call, but normally not the way I would have it. They’ll just call me a B-word or hiss and hang up.

If it’s a guy, I might flirt to see if he’ll flirt back before lowering my voice so that he can tell I’m definitely NOT a woman. You can’t put a price on that awkward moment. Unless the lower voice lets him know I’m teeming with dude-ship and he does flirt back. Then the awkward moment belongs to me and all I can say is, “Well played, intrusive salesman, well played.”

I know this all sounds kind of mean, but it gets old being mistaken for a girl, even if it is an honest mistake every single time.

So I guess next time I might try to be nicer and just lower my voice, hoping to get them to see the error of their ways and apologize. It’ll probably go something like …

CALLER: Hello, ma’am. Is your husband at home?

ME: (Lowering my voice) I’m the only one here.

CALLER: Oh, I’m so sorry … Do you have a cold, ma’am?

And then I’ll just finally give up.

_________________

Gender issues aren’t just my burden to bear, though. I felt for my wife during both of her pregnancies as she dealt with - and handled like a boss, I might add - different obstacles that I’ve since learned come as part of the whole child birthing package. I knew about the sore back, the morning sickness, and all the stuff that swells up, but I had no idea about one amazing side effect women frequently endure while the bun bakes in the oven.

Pregnant Brain - The Struggle Is Real

*This is another one that contains too much mention of writing for me to edit it out for a podcast without recreating the whole thing and I’m too lazy for that, so just ignore the writing stuff and the fact that this is a run-on sentence and enjoy the story.

I can’t remember what I was going to write about.

It’s 11:14 pm and I’m in a Myrtle Beach Waffle House because I’m not tired and I have a blog post due. I’m probably not feeling tired because I can’t turn off my mind because I have a blog post due. I have a blog post due because I haven’t written a few ahead of time and stored them away like I promised myself I would and now I’m behind the eight ball so I’m obsessing over the fact that I have a blog post due and I can’t sleep. And now I’m wide awake and about to eat a greasy cheeseburger plate at a Waffle House in Myrtle Beach.

In addition to my short-term memory, I also tend to lose the capacity not to write run-on sentences when I’m in this state; not the state of South Carolina, but the state of Tired And Eating A Cheeseburger Way Too Late At Night.

Maybe age has something to do with my forgetting what I was going to write about. They say that the more you age, the more stuff you forget, like where you put the remote, where you put your car keys, and where you put your smart phone that contains the app you downloaded to help you locate the remote and your car keys. But I’m sad to say that I’m old enough now that age has started taking that sort of toll on me. I can’t be a day over thirty. That’s what somebody wearing coke bottle glasses said to me once, “You can’t be a day over 30, sonny!”, and I want to believe them.

My wife has an out, though, and she’s not afraid to use it: Pregnant Brain.

According to her, Pregnant Brain is a condition that happens to many, if not all, women in the event of many, if not all, pregnancies. It can occur during the gestational period, which might manifest in her forgetting to add pickles to her 3 am peanut butter taco craving, for example. Or it can be something that happens weeks or even months after the baby has shot out waving jazz hands. For instance, my wife forgetting that I informed her of my distaste for diaper duty. It can even spring forth during labor and delivery by her forgetting that you can’t survive without your spine; the one she’s punched through your abdomen to clench in her fist.

At first I thought it was something she made up so I wouldn’t be upset when she failed to do stuff she didn’t want to do, but then it kept happening. She’d forget to bring home household necessities I asked for, like candy bars and booze.

“Pregnant Brain!” she shouted and threw her hands into the air as if care were a thing she didn’t possess.

At first I figured she just didn’t want me, a Christian, to chase a Whatchamacallit with Rock and Rye, but she sincerely promised that she forgot. After all, Whatchamacallits are sinful. Okay, … I really only wanted the Rock and Rye because, although I hate the taste of liquor, nothing puts a stop to bronchitis better than a shot of whiskey before bed and I was having a nasty bout of “The Crud”. And I still think maybe she just didn’t want to be seen going into the ABC store by the preacher or somebody in the community who would be on the horn to my grandma before she could pull out of the parking lot. In a small town, you have to check the church bulletin for your name in prayer list every Sunday morning, in case some mouthy gossip saw you renting that R-rated movie from Redbox.

As we ordered a meal at a fancy restaurant that rhymes with Rexas Toadhouse the other night, the waitress, who looked like any minute she might deliver more to our table than the food, apologized for forgetting a part of our order by implementing “Pregnant Brain!” I will say I was pleased that she didn’t throw her hands into the air as if caring were not on the menu as my wife tends to do. Of course, had she done that, steak, mashed potatoes, and broccoli would have flown hither and yon among the patrons.

I nearly summoned the courage to ask her about the Pregnant Brain issue, but decided not to when I remembered the last time I mentioned a baby to a waitress I thought was expecting. It turns out she was expecting - to have cheesecake after work - and my face went beet red, so I opted out of asking further questions of this waitress, just to be on the safe side.

I figured there had to be something to this Pregnant Brain thing after all and suddenly lots of stuff began making sense. I felt like maybe I needed to apologize to my wife for accusing her of being slack that time she ...

Forgot to pick up my underwear that finally fell off the ceiling fan. I’d been showing off my sweet ninja skills by kicking it into the air and trying to catch it before it hit the ground. Don’t shake your heads, guys … you know you’ve done it. Only this time I got a little too much lift and got it caught on one of the fan blades.

Or that time she forgot to unclog the drain after I emptied a bowl of hamburger grease down it then followed that with cold water.

She also had a case of Pregnant Brain once when she forgot to put the milk back in the fridge after I made a glass of Rich, Chocolate Ovaltine and left a nearly full gallon on the counter.

“Pshaw!” I used to say about Pregnant Brain, but now, I consider the time it caused my wife to nearly burn down the house due to preheating the oven without removing the pizza box I’d secretly put in there to keep from the cats or the time she almost burned down the house due to preheating the oven without removing the cat I’d secretly hidden in there to keep out of the pizza box.

So to all of you ladies who’ve ever carried and delivered children with the effect that things tend to slip your minds a little more often, please accept my humble apologies. I realize that I’m a man who will never know what it’s like to bear a child inside my own body and as a result, suffer brain damage. I can’t speak for all men, but I can speak for myself – a person who, according to a blind woman, doesn’t look a day over thirty – and I say don’t worry about it.

To be honest, I know that it IS a real thing and it's something that real women have to deal with. So while I joke, I also appreciate that we men need to understand that the physical nature of bearing children has lasting effects well beyond the delivery room and the nine months prior to it. And because you endure, you are to be cherished and appreciated almost as much as opening day of college football.

If the blessing of being the vessel of creation requires that your short-term memory take a hit then so be it. It’s worth it, right? At least you have a reason beyond age that you can point to with pride and sincerity.

We men can claim one of two things: being old or being stupid. Most of the time it’s the latter, I’m sorry to say. Well, I refuse to believe I’m old because that blind woman said so and that leaves me with stupid.

Fine then. I can’t remember what I was going to write about because I’m stupid. I’ll eventually figure out something to write about, even if being stupid or this cheeseburger kills me. Or these hashbrowns. Or the pie I think I’m gonna order.

That is if my waitress will come over here.

I think she may have forgotten about me.

And now I see her throwing her hands in the air sans care.

Maybe I ought to ask her when she’s due.

_________________

I feel like I ought to mention something about that last story. You know, the section around the middle where I talk about all the stuff my wife forgot to do to clean up after me when a man with any worth at all would have cleaned his own mess. Yeah, that was a joke. I included it to be funny, so please don’t send me mean comments. I love you, ladies. But if that sounded a lot like your man, let me know and I’ll create a scathing story in one of my future episodes that’ll shame him into doing better.

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There are plenty of ways to describe my personality and most of the good ones rank pretty low on a political correctness scale of one to ten. A few screws loose is popular. Kind of a wackadoo is a cute one. Then there's one of my favorites, That boys is nutballs! It's okay. I've gotten used to it over the years and I really kind of wear it as a badge of honor. Sane people are boring and droll about their days NOT talking to themselves in funky cartoon voices or breaking out in Broadway showtunes if someone repeats, in normal conversation, even the hint of something in common with a show.

For example:

“I say, good man. I'm nearly finished reading Victor Hugo's The Hunchback of Notre Dame.”

“There is nothing like a daaaaaame … nothing … in tha … WOOOOOOOORRRRLLLLD!!”

In this scenario, it would also be acceptable to also sing lyrics from the Hunchback Disney movie or even go way out there and sing something from Les Miserables, which is also by Victor Hugo.

The point is that if you ask anyone about me, they'll probably include something like, Yeah, he's a couple bricks short of a load. However you slice it, the truth is …

You may be right, I may be crazy. I'm Michael Blackston and these are a few pieces of insanity from my Funny, Messy Life.

I’m trying to learn good marketing techniques so that I can reach the widest audience possible. One of the most important things I have to keep in mind is that the content I provide needs to be delivered on a consistent basis and it’s got to be something that’ll catch people’s attention. Another handy idea is to throw in a topic every once in a while that’ll get someone's dander up in a way that makes others take notice of their excitement and/or outrage. So in the spirit of stirring things up, I’ll go ahead and set our sights on the yuletide and proudly shout from the mountain top …

Let There Be Christmas 365 Days A Year!

I can hear you right now screaming at your phone or computer screen. From the sound of things, you’re as jubilant as I am about the prospect of carols on the radio 24/7.

I'll admit with sing-song merriment that I'd absolutely cast my ballot, arriving at my local voting center with, yes, bells on, for such a festive turn of culture. Would that our halls be decked ever more with tinsel and candy canes and tiny white lights! I take joy in the thought of banisters wrapped year-round in bows and shelves lousy with elves.

“But Michael, such conditions brush past the other holidays. Thanksgiving won't even be here, yet the stores will fill their inventories with December stock and I don’t like it.”

I reply, “COAL FOR YOU!”

Not really. I wouldn’t be so cruel as to further your rampant Grinchivity with such non-jolly treatment.

Instead, “FRUITCAKE FOR YOU!”

But in fairness, I do understand your point. It’s just that I'm thankful every day and while I do see the need to celebrate other excuses to get together and eat, I don’t see why we can’t do those things wearing hats with reindeer antlers and blinking lights. Wouldn’t that just be fantastic? I’m not suggesting we forget our homage to the Veterans or not remember the fallen who fought for our country. To be honest, I’d be more than happy to lay aside my Golden Scepter of Sugarplum Dreams on those days, (I have one, by the way, made of old Gummi Bears, used candy foils, a birdbath pole I stole from the neighbor’s yard, and some gorilla glue) but I want to Trick or Carol on Holly-ween!

Again, I can almost hear you protest.

“Michael, I get enough of that stuff in the several weeks leading up to Christmas. I’m ready for Spring after that, you imbecile.”

But I CAN’T hear you. I've stuffed my ears full of red and white striped marshmallows.

Come on, go along with me on this. There’s room in our everyday for Christmas, isn’t there? Or is your heart as cold as Mr. Forty Below's? Get your inner Scrooge out of that VW Hum-Bug and grip your hands around the steering wheel of a One Horse Open Mer-sleigh-des! I apologize for the blizzard of bad puns, but you made me do it. Just sayin’.

So if you’re not with me, where do we go from here?

We’ve obviously come to an impasse. You want “variety” in your year. I want Christmas every day. I suppose we’ll just have to - as the bumper stickers say - Co-Exist. I’m okay with that as long as you don’t say anything negative to me when I sneak up to you, softly, quietly, like Santa on July 4th, and whisper as sweetly as a snowflake, “OH THE WEATHER OUTSIDE IS FRIGHTFUL!”

“Okay, Mr. Christian, what about Easter?”

Ya got me there. We don’t need to mess with Easter, unless you want to slap a red, floppy hat on that stupid bunny. Otherwise …

CHRISTMAS! CHRISTMAS! CHRISTMAS! CHRISTMAS!

At least I have those of you who are in my camp - Team Christmas - to lean on. I know those people exist because I see them even now on social media posting their wondrous glee at the coming season and causing no end of stress to the heartburn of society, also known as Team Seasick Crocodile. (Don’t get the reference? You would if you were a member of Team Christmas. We’re still taking applications, by the way. Although, looking at your Christmas Cheer credit history, I can’t promise you’ll be approved.)

Of course, this entire thing has been aimed at the secular essence of Christmas, which I do adore. But I would be remiss if I didn’t close out with the precious real reason we celebrate. You could take away all the lights and all the glitter. You could erase the fat man and the presents. As long as you give me the baby Jesus and songs of salvation come to earth, that’s truly Christmas for me.

I celebrate that Every. Single. Day. (Whether you like it or not.)

And by the way, I’m told by the head office that we WILL be able to approve your Team Christmas application.

We’re just going to need the title to that VW Humbug.

__________________

I feel like I should remind new listeners that most of these stories originated as blog articles before I came up with the idea of turning them a podcast. Most of the time, I edit out the parts that mention anything being written or my readership, However, I like the line near the beginning of this one about writing in a Huddle House, so I'm keeping it in. Just pretend it was your imagination if it bothers you when you hear it - like you were drunk or high or something. After all, there are others to think about, even if it's just you and me. Why? Because it's about me and ...

Me's A Crowd

I’ve done a lot of live stage performance over the years and have learned to really get into my part and transform for an audience. Character roles that challenge me have become my favorite way to express myself on stage and I feel like I’ve been training for them my whole life. The reality is that my acting career will more than likely be corralled to amateur stages and that’s just fine for me, but it doesn’t stop me from doing the things now that I've always done in order to continue the journey to perfect my craft.

What are those things, Michael? Huh? Give us your golden wisdom!

Wait a second. I’m sitting in Huddle House trying to write this while a version of the barber shop scene from Coming To America plays out at the next table, except instead of an argument over history’s best boxer, it’s whether or not one of our past Sheriffs is a racist because there aren’t enough black deputies. It’s hard to concentrate and the discussion is getting heated. I don’t want to put in the earplugs I keep in my computer bag for fear of insulting them and becoming a subject of their very loud and angry conversation. Anyway, the truth is I talk to myself. A lot. That’s what I do when I’m alone to hone my stage skills.

Now before you look at me sideways and cock an eyebrow while chewing on a toothpick like one of the old dudes at the next table is doing, let me explain to you that any actor who is worth his or her salt will tell you they’ve been guilty of doing the same thing.

Let me to explain further.

Actors have a base need to be part of a scene. We need to be “ON” at all times, including, for instance, when we’re driving alone in our cars. I can’t tell you how many times I’ve engaged in conversations with “characters” of my own design, only to turn and see an old lady, a cute young woman, maybe a burley construction worker, or even a mime pretending to drive an invisible car, looking at me like I’m a nut. The worst was getting caught having a debate with myself at a traffic light by a cute, burley, old lady mime wearing a hard hat. She wasn’t in the lane next to me. She was crossing the street pretending to use an invisible walker.

That’s just a way I practice improv. And it’s one of the reasons I’ve become obsessed with getting to do great character roles.

I’ve played a British murderer, an old British crook, a British play director, …. are you starting to sense a pattern? …. a singing Hebrew with family issues, an eccentric tango-ing Hispanic with a wife who has a death fetish, a New York gambler, and …. oh yeah …. a redneck version of Jesus. And that’s just the tip of the iceberg. Not to mention that at the time of this recording, I’m about to open curtain as a 90 year old man.

Part of the reason I love these roles is their tendency to require the use of a foreign accent, or at least a different one than my native southern that comes out the way I imagine cornbread would sound if it could talk, and accents are something I’ve been working on since I was a child. Now my son has discovered a talent for it. In fact, most of my conversations with myself have one or both of us speaking with a different accent and it’s rarely the same one between the two of me.

You still think I’m crazy, don’t you?

Doesn’t matter to us. We enjoy our discussions between ourselves and we know plenty of us we can call on at any given moment to tag into the ring with me and me. It gets hard sometimes to even remember who I really am when one of me gets going with several others of me, but I’m never lonely when I’m around to talk to and play out scenes in our head of mine.

So I understand if you have trouble figuring out the complicated maze I understand me to be as us. Understand?

It doesn’t matter. Just believe me when I say that all of me are not the only ones who frequently engage in this practice.

But that’s not all. We have to have our props when we play out these works of performance art and that can be a pain to handle while the me of us is trying to drive. (I know I’m driving the grammar police batty and that makes me …. or us …. a tad giddy.)

Have you ever tried to smoke a prop cigarette with one hand and swing a foam battle ax all wacky like with the other while driving with one knee? I can only do it with one knee because the third Me is using the other one to kneel on for a crying scene. I’m proud to say that I’ve proven over and over again that I can do just that type of thing while merging into six lanes of downtown Atlanta traffic where rush hour is a nightmare. Have you seen how many idiots text while they drive?

I can say that I’ve never once been stupid enough to try and put on stage makeup while I’m commuting, so don’t worry. Of course that would be hard to do with a sewing needle in my other hand. I have to prioritize and stitching a costume is more important than makeup. It’s the easier thing to do while keeping my eyes on the road, so long as I thread the needle at a red light and keep the sewing to a simple half-back stitch when I’m rolling.

It’s not that in depth every single time I practice my art, though. I don’t always need to wear chain mail and jousting armor for the plays in my head. Not always.

Then there’s the death scene. You should know that it’s a difficult thing to pull off with others around you. There’s no way to be inconspicuous because people think you’re dead or at least unconscious for a few moments until your mind audience erupts into thunderous applause and the scene changes. It’s the throes of death that seem to bother people. If you’re doing Romeo & Juliet you might be okay with Romeo’s demise. He poisons himself - spoiler alert. Your coffee cup would probably be a fine substitute for the poison bottle. But Juliet stabs herself with a dagger and I find it difficult to accomplish the illusion with a stale french fry or a renegade straw from under my seat.

However we choose to chisel away the rough edges of our craft, we actors will be ready when that curtain opens. I can count on any of me to face the charge and bully forth in our thespianic responsibilities. So if you're somewhere near me, we fully expect to see you out there in the gallery giving us a bravo to me.

For now, the conversation at the other table has turned to national politics and it’s starting to get rowdy. There may be fisticuffs, which is my cue to exit stage right.

__________________

One of the benchmarks of getting people to assert that you are, indeed, Not playing with a full deck, is to publicly engage in a little foretelling. Whether you have a real ball of crystal or you supplement your devining tool with old coffee grounds and the chicken bones from your last embrace of Bo Time, it doesn't matter. You don't even have to use a tool to sound like an idiot. That's why I instruct you to believe blindly as I give you my ...

Product Predictions of The Future

I’m in the mood to look forward to what lies ahead, especially in the world of technology, and it excites me to the core to think of all the things we Americans will be able to spend way too much time with instead of our families. Hey, I’m not preaching just to you; I’m one of the worst offenders. It’s only recently that our little clan has adopted a no cell phones at the table rule and it's not going so great. It was hard at first watching everyone playing air phone because they didn’t remember how to join in a discussion.

But cell phones could just be a thing of the past. The possibilities for new stuff are endless.

So I’ve created a list of things we might see that will make you say, “Ooooooo, SCIENCE!” Keep in mind that I am something of a prophet as I make these up.

The future will bring:

The Cannibaby. As the father of a Barbie-lovin five-year-old, I’m excitied about this one. This toy will be all the rage as ol’ St. Nick is making his list and checking it twice. Why? I’m glad you asked. Are the dolls in your child’s toy basket overrunning the house? Well no more! The Cannibaby is a brand new doll that is an angel in the arms of your beloved bundle of joy and a demon at night for all the other dolls in the house. Once it knows your child is asleep by way of a sensor, the Cannibaby springs into action and fills its little belly with every morsel from anything that looks remotely like a doll. But don’t worry if there’s a real baby in the house. The Cannibaby is designed to shut down when near a life source. And before you go and shout, “Foul! That was introduced in the 1980’s and his name was Chucky!” remember that Chucky went after real people. And also, Cannibaby would eat Chucky.

The “That’s My President” App. We’re inundated with politics these days and nobody seems to be able to agree on anything. Everyone has their opinion, but it’s irrelevant now that we’ll have the "That’s My President” app for all of our devices. Just plug in the face of anyone you want to be president, touch the “GO” button on your screen, and voila! Whoever is elected will have the face of whomever you voted for any time they’re in front of a camera. They all intend to say the right things during the campaigns and then be an idiot once they’re elected anyway. So who cares whose head is on the body behind the podium. There is one exception, of course. Me. In the next election, I'll be running for POTUS on the “Lotty Dotty I Hate The Parties Party” ticket.

Rap Shoes. You’re literally a walking beat box when you’re wearing your Rap Shoes. With the slogan, “Kick it with your kicks!” you can expect to pay a pretty penny for these sneakers, but it will be well worth it because you can finally have a steady beat everywhere you go. These shoes have powerful speakers mounted in the sides so that your soundtrack is projected to the whole world as you walk. The beat matches your speed, so if you want to groove to a slow funk and impress the ladies, you can walk slow, Jive Master. Aww yeauuhh! If you want to jam with a hot, fast freestyle, pick up your speed. It’s all up to you. This product is not recommended for anyone who can’t walk in rhythm or is too square to rap. The concert is yours to command with Rap Shoes. Only $562 a pair.

Shaving Elves. You may not know this, but all elves don’t make the cut for Santa’s workshop. They have to find work somewhere. After an ill-thought out prank and Santa not appreciating his reindeer being bald on Christmas Eve, an enterprising young elf named Eugene will be introducing a brand new service to the world. He and his partner Bob, who does the books mainly because he’s not that good with a razor, will front a team of elves who didn’t work out for the big guy in red and need employment. Using the skills they learned during their training at the North Pole, they’ll break into your home at night and give you a shave while you sleep. You go to bed looking like something that might be photographed blurrily in the woods and wake in the morning clean-shaven with skin as soft as the Cannibaby’s bottom. Careful when ordering the service, though. The staff is still small and sometimes Bob does the shaving, unless you specifically ask not to be shaved by him. Do not get shaved by Bob.

Fat Sucking Leeches. I’m personally looking forward to this one. They'll train leeches to no longer crave blood, but to only eat fat. You’ll purchase a "Box-O-Leeches" and let the fun begin. Empty them out in the bath as you take a nice soak, close your eyes, and the leeches begin to work. Ladies go ahead, look at yourself in the mirror before you get in. You might want to take a picture to remember yourself by because when you look in that same mirror after the leeches are done with you, the phone may start to ring and it’ll be Victoria’s Secret wanting you for a photo shoot. Don’t worry, they’ll Photoshop those suction marks right out before they slap up enormous posters of you in your underwear all over the windows in malls across America. And guys, that six-pack you’re dying for is no longer chilling in the fridge. Feel free to eat all the crap you want because thanks to Fat Sucking Leeches, you’ll always have abs of steel no matter how much you pack away. Oh, never mind. I forgot you’ll need to actually work out the muscles to make your stomach flat. And on that note ...

Workout Elves. They don’t like to shave people. They think it’s gross. But they'll come to your bedside at night and physically work your muscle groups so that you don’t have to. It can get pricey if you buy the Gluts Package, so choose your program carefully. If you start to wake up, an elf named Sven will slam your skull against the headboard of your bed until you’re unconscious. You’ll never know they were there except for the sore muscles when you wake, the candy cane flavored protein shake they’ve prepared, and the knot on the back of your noggin.

And finally ...

Books. No longer will you need to worry about the stories you like to read being unavailable if you loose your charge! Forget worrying about losing your entire library when you drop your phone in the toilet! This new product will revolutionize the way you take in information. At about the same face size as your Kindle or iPad and in an endless variety of exciting thicknesses, Books allow you to focus on one thing at a time. You’ll delight at the variety of actionable options afforded you.

Things like: Turning pages, folding corners, using REAL bookmarks, and highlighting important parts for future reference! And not only does holding a book make you look smarter when others are around, they can be DECORATIONS! You can create shelves and shelves and shelves and shelves and shelves and shelves of BOOKS! And if you drop one in the bathtub, no problem. The worst thing that will happen is you have to let it dry out and now your book is 80 times thicker than it originally was!

I hope you'll consider purchasing one or all of these future products once they're available and if you like the results, let me know.

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To say I'm a little eccentric is being kind, but I know I'm not the only one who has a case of the funky-brain, so I feel like I'm in good company. And if at any time you feel as though people around you are a little scared to be in your vicinity, just know ... they are and there's nothing you can do about it. Embrace the insanity and have a conversation with yourself. Maybe the you of all of you can calm one of you down.

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Ah, relationships. They're what make the world go round. From Adam and Eve to your crazy aunt and uncle who wear tinfoil hats in case the aliens finally come, relationships have defined our lives. Even if you think there's only you and a make believe woman you created out of an old string mop, Twizzlers, and a couple of coconuts, you're in for an awakening. You and that string mop woman are in a relationship - a weird one to be sure, and you probably need to see a professional – but a relationship none the less. And eventually, you're not going to see eye to eye.

I'm Michael Blackston and these are a few stories from my own relationship bucket - the one that pours out all over my Funny, Messy Life.

Some people have made the claim that marriage is hard, but I disagree. It's always been my opinion that marriage is not hard - and I've been married for over 20 years – but it's life that can be difficult. “Being married”, at least for me, has never been tough. In fact, having each other to lean on has been a blessing. But that doesn't mean the road we've traveled never got rocky and most of the time over stupid stuff. There was a time earlier on when we refused to make disagreements easy, but we learned over the years how to handle those moments amicably. Although ...

Once Upon A Time, We Fought.

My wife and I rarely fight anymore. Oh, we argue, like all couples do, over small things that are inconsequential in the long run.

“PLEASE put your empty clothes hangers on the empty clothes hanger rack like I’ve asked a million times. When I do the laundry, I feel like I hear the theme from Sanford & Sons in the background if I have to go to your closet!”

“I don’t have time in the morning.”

“It takes five seconds!”

“Don’t yell at me!”

“I’m not YELLING!”

“Here it comes ... this is the big one!”

I’ll let you decide for yourself who’s who in that conversation. You might be surprised if I told you.

But recently, we had an argument. That’s all it was – an argument. It in no way resembled a fight between my bride of over twenty years and me. As you’ll see, when we used to have real fights, they were epic! I say “were” because we've learned it's much better to argue than to fight. So in this recent argument, we raised our voices a tad louder than normal and clipped our sentences to make our points in a way that might be described as snippy, snide, or You-Don’t-Have-To-Bite-My-Head-Off.

I was on the road somewhere around Atlanta on my way home from a business trip and she was on her way to get our little girl from my mom’s, where she’d been staying for a few days. Our son was in the car with my wife and he later described our argument as a fight. My better half had to explain it to him. She told him that wasn’t a fight. “You’ve never seen us really fight.”

Let me tell you the story of one of those fights. And before you wave me off with a dismissive hand because what I’m about to tell you pales in comparison to the redneck fisticuffs you and your partner come to, understand that each pair is different from the next. I’m sure if we watched you and yours go at it, we’d whisper to each other, “Glad we ain’t THAT nutballs.”

The reason I’ll give you for this fight won’t necessarily be accurate because it was a long time ago and I can’t exactly remember why it happened; only that it did.

It had been a long day at the office and life had gotten on my last nerve. It was also a summer day in the deep south, so the heat was unbearable. Heat in the deep south knocks on your door first thing in the morning with brass knuckles and when you open that door, it grabs you by the head and sticks your face right into its armpit. You stay buried in the armpit of the sun all day, whether you're in air-conditioning or not. At night there's at least a little relief, depending on the humidity, when Southern Heat removes your nearly lifeless body from its armpit and places you roughly in its damp, stinky gym shoe, wrapped in the wet sock it’s been wearing all afternoon.

After the day I’d had, the night had come and I found myself struggling in Heat’s left Puma (because it doesn’t even have the decency to wear cool shoes) where it was dark and dank and smelled like old tacos.

My wife’s day hadn’t been any better, so our tempers were on a hair-trigger and since it was fairly early on in our marriage, the wisdom to think before we acted wasn’t in our wheelhouse yet.

The fight started at the grocery store. Money was tight because we liked to eat out too much and went to too many movies, so the plan was to only get the essentials we needed and food for the lizard. You heard me right – the lizard. Our green iguana, Old Deuteronomy, had gotten large and had to have special food. Okay, I’ll explain the lizard’s name real quick: We love the musical, CATS.

There. Understand now?

Anyway, her special diet consisted of fresh vegetables and leafy greens. She was partial to zucchini, yellow squash, and kale greens.

Once in the store, Deut’s food already found, we started trying to figure out what our “essentials” would be. An ideal selection might be a few fruits and vegetables, some canned stuff, and maybe a couple of box dinners – mostly items that could be refrigerated for a while or placed in a cabinet and forgotten until we needed to clean it out and “donate” to the church food pantry. (Isn’t that what everybody does? You donate the out of date canned food and boxes of stuff you were going to start fixing but forgot about because you still end up picking up fast food on your way home from work?)

Unfortunately, I was in no mood for “essentials”. The sweaty sock of Southern Heat was sticking to my cheeks and I’d had enough. I’d had all the day I could handle and decided I wanted Oreos and a pizza.

I told my new wife of this decision.

“No.” She said vehemently.

“Yes.” I stated it back even more vehemently and thought to myself, I do enjoy being vehement.

“No, we agreed that we were going to stop spending foolishly and live by only the essentials until we get caught up on bills.”

I made that “PLLBTTSHT!” sound that would be translated into proper English as, Oh posh, my dear. Clearly you’re not aware of my inability to retain a verbal contract.

“I want pizza and Oreos. I have had a bad day and I refuse to have anything else,” I continued with aplomb. Or maybe it was a plum. I might have eaten a plum.

“Oreos are expensive, Michael! We’re not getting Oreos.”

“We ARE TOO getting Oreos. I love them so much that in roughly twenty-ish years, I’ll start an extremely funny and charming comedy blog / podcast where I’ll frequently mention my love for the crème filled cookie!”

The argument went on throughout our time in the grocery store and we walked out without the Oreos. We also drove away without ordering a pizza.

During the ride home, very little was said and my wife could tell I was hot under the collar, not to mention under my clothes, and especially those special spots on my body where Summer Heat likes to burrow in deep. Let’s call them crevices. She could also tell because I have an acute ability to pout.

I reckon I was at DefCon 5 over that pizza and those Oreos. When we parked in the driveway, she asked me to stay in the car so we could talk it out. She didn’t want to go into the house angry and let the iguana see us not getting along. But I was in no mood for talking. The irrational butt-face of a southern summer had been having its way with me for too long and I’d gotten a tad out of sorts.

“I don’t feel like talking.”

“We need to. I won’t have Deuteronomy seeing us not getting along. She’s a tender lizard and it might upset her.”

“She’s a lizard.”

My wife gasped and put a hand to her mouth; unable to believe my cold-blooded comment about our cold-blooded reptile. “She’s our baby!”

I got out of the car silently, the bag of fresh vegetables for the lizard in my hand, only wanting to go inside and try to get over my craving. My wife was not ready to give up, though.

“You know we agreed on being frugal. You said you agreed and now you’re trying to turn it around on me.” Her statement might appear to be sad and sweet at first, but her voice and her eyes told a different story. There was anger and sharpness to her tone. Fire was in her eyes and even the Southern Heat cowered in fear.

I wasn’t phased and became angrier than before. My nerves had reached their end and I exploded. “ALL I WANTED WAS SOME &*%$$ PIZZA AND SOME #$%^ OREOS BUT NOOOOO! YOU HAD TO PUT THE OLD KYBASH ON THAT, DIDN’T YOU?! WHO CARES WHAT THE @#$%! MICHAEL WANTS?! LET’S BE FRUUUUUGGGGAAAAAALLLLLLL!!!!” (Yes, I spoke like that earlier in our marriage. No, I do not now, as I reconnected with Jesus shortly afterward.)

Dogs in the neighborhood started barking and lights in windows switched on as gawkers wondered what was going on. That might have been normal enough for the bad neighborhood we lived in and on a redneck Friday night. But unfortunately for our beloved lizard, I had flailed my arms like a madman and sent the vegetables flying out of the plastic bag and onto the neighbor’s roof.

Okay, so I actually made it a point to throw the bag of vegetables as high and as hard as I could.

We stood in silence for a few seconds, then looked at each other and started to laugh. That’s one of the things I love about us. Even if we get out of sorts, we can end the ordeal with a laugh. We went back to the store and re-purchased the food for the lizard. No mention of pizza or Oreos was made on the second trip, by the way.

The next morning, there were bits of yellow squash, zucchini, and kale greens all over the yard; leftovers the squirrels didn’t want.

We talk about the “Vegetable” fight to this day - it’s our own little Veggie Tale - and we’re thankful that after twenty years, we’re past acting like that.

And now my wife has texted me to request that I pick her up a sausage biscuit before I come home. I will do that because I can afford to now.

But not before I run by a place that sells Oreos.

_______________

Sometimes it helps to have side skills when it comes to working out the kinks in a relationship. I learned early on that my wife is a sucker for certain accents from other areas of the world. When we first met, I could talk to her like an Australian and she’d melt. She also gets weak in the knees when a Scottish man speaks. I think, though, that most guys have a universal tool at their disposal if they'll just learn to use it. I believe it's entirely possible to …

Get Out Of Jams With A British Accent

WIFE. “Don’t give me that look!”

ME. “What look?”

WIFE. “That look you just gave me. I don’t appreciate it.”

ME. “I didn’t give you a look. I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

WIFE. (Getting hostile) “Yes you do. You looked at me like I’m stupid. That was embarrassing.”

ME. (Raising my own voice) “I don’t know what look you thought you saw, but I’m tired of you accusing me of a look when I didn’t give you a look!”

WIFE. (Really angry now - nostrils flaring) “THAT ONE! THE ONE YOU’RE GIVING ME RIGHT NOW! THAT’S THE LOOK!”

ME. (Standing my ground) “I LOOK LIKE THIS! I CAN’T HELP THE WAY MY FACE IS SHAPED! YOU KNOW MY FACE NATURALLY LOOKS LIKE SOMEBODY JUST CUT THE CHEESE. I’M VERY, VERY HAPPY!”

WIFE. “Forget it. You’ll never admit you gave me a look.”

ME. (In a British accent) “I would never look upon you in such a way as to raise your ire, my dear. What you mistook for disdain, love, was, in fact, only the face of one with the deepest of desire for you. Let us not fight.”

WIFE. (With sincere delight) “I’m sorry. I love you.”

BOOM!

I believe I’ve found the holy grail of argument enders. Men, learn to deliver a decent British accent. Women love it.

It doesn’t matter who you are or what you’ve done, you can douse the fire by speaking with the voice of a debonair English gent. What you heard before is just the tip of the iceberg when it comes to weaseling out from under your screw-ups, but I’m warning you. This is a power that has to be handled with care. A wise man once said, “With great power comes great skills that enable you to wear spandex and get away with it.”

You’ve got to be careful not to over-use this new knowledge and understand that it’s not enough to be kind of sort of okay and sound a little like a guy who might have visited London once.

You need to study the dialects and know what to use and when to use it. If you’re trying to get out of a situation where you have, under a moment of intense stupidity, asked a woman who is not pregnant when she’s due and would like to get back into her good graces, it might be a smart idea to break out your 007 voice. It might come out something like, “I beg your pardon. I was mistaking the glow your presence has given this room as that of the bearer of miracles. I stand corrected. Your beauty is simply a radiance you emit everywhere you go. Forgive me.”

What you might NOT want to do is dial up your drunken Cockney accent.

“OY! I wan’t meanin’ t’cull ye fat, dearie. It’s clear t’me yer sufferin’ from sump’n glandular!”

As you can see, that wouldn’t be your best option. It’s important to know when to be an Aristocrat and when to be the British version of Larry the Cable Guy.

Years ago, I found myself in a similar situation at a restaurant. Our waitress, who we’d gotten to know over the months was once again serving our table. We’d never known her to be what you’d call “small” and because I’m a man and an unobservant idiot, I didn’t catch on to her clues. One night while laying down a delicious basket of garlic cheese biscuits, she announced she’d recently delivered her baby. Being Captain Tactful, I replied, “Congratulations! This whole time, I hadn’t realized you were pregnant.” Innocent enough on my part; I was telling the truth. But in my innocence, - or idiocy - I didn’t realize that by my comment I was letting her know that I hadn’t been able to tell the difference between regular her or pregnant her. It would have been nice to be able come back with something in a british accent, but how? I wasn’t ready, so I knew I needed to come up with something to keep me prepared at all times in case my mouth starts dripping with stupid.

Gentlemen, in order to help you to be ready - not if, but when - the time arrives to transform your persona into that of a rugged, yet charming Englishman, I’ve created the following four-question test. You have two choices in each scenario, so think it through. If you fail, the only way for you to learn your lesson fully will be to punish you by forcing you to listen to an endless loop of Pat Boone’s cover of Crazy Train. Good luck. The correct answers will be given at the end of the quiz.

Situation 1:

The flight attendant on your plane traveling from Atlanta to New York is UUUUUU-GLY! You can’t help but stare at the way her unibrow doesn’t just connect points A and B, but does a funky little high-five number in the middle. Her personality is spot on and she doesn’t even mind you constantly asking her to bring you ginger ale to settle your stomach. After her twelfth trip to pacify you with a smile so your whining doesn’t upset the other passengers, you make an innocent comment.

“I like the way your eyebrows meet in the middle and flip up to do a little celebration like somebody just scored a touchdown.”

Which of the following positions should you take after you realize you’re a moron and she replies, “You’re no prize, yourself. At least you can see my eyebrows, you albino!”

Do you say:

A: (With the voice of Dr. Strange actor, Beandip Curlicue) I’ve upset you. My words were certainly meant as a compliment. My auntie Grace had the same beautiful unibrow - a singular stretch of nurturing fur that reminded me of a puppet - and I was simply remembering her face as she sang me to sleep on a summer evening.”

or ...

B: (With the voice of Mssr. Thenardier from the London cast of Les Miserables) I’m sorry, Madam. I’s just tryin’ t’save yer fore-edd from what oy thot was wunna them great big poison cattuh-pilluhs, oy was!”

Situation 2:

The lady sitting next to you in the movie theatre – a complete stranger - absent-mindedly forgets who is sitting where and plunges her hand into your popcorn bucket. You've noticed earlier that under her fingernails, there appears to reside the remnants of thirty years of digging through garbage. Obviously, you can no longer eat any popcorn from the bucket and you scream at her like a mad man. “What’s wrong with you?! At least have a Haz-Mat team look at your fingernails before you go all Rambo into a dude’s popcorn bucket!”

Which of the following replies should you make once she turns your direction and you realize she’s blind and is wearing an I Plant Flowers For The Poor pin on her shirt?

Do you say:

A: “Ello? Wat’re doin’ in this ‘ere movie anyway? Ye can’t see nuffin’!”

or ...

B: “Alas, I drive the nail into a coffin of my own making. Would that I have thought before behaving so poorly, good woman. Here, allow me to straighten your pin and wipe that smudge from the face of it.”

Situation 3:

You’re at a family reunion you didn’t want to go to in the first place. Your old aunt Grace makes a B-line the moment she sees you and you only make sense of it all after she’s planted a sloppy kiss right on your cheek.

Which of the following reactions ought you to adopt?

A: (Like the disagreeable Filch from the Harry Potter series) I nevuh loyked kisses, mum. Not from the likes of a woman wat raises poison Catuh-pilluhs on ‘er face.”

or ...

B: (In the style of the loveable, Mr. Bean, you say nothing, but look alarmed whereas you cock one eyebrow, lick your lips, then turn around and walk face first into the door, knocking yourself blissfully out so you don’t have to look at that eyebrow anymore.) Who knew aunt grace was a flight attendant?

Situation 4:

You've been invited to the White House for dinner with the President and the First Lady. You are asked to remain standing until they’ve arrived and have been seated first. Once they come in and are sitting at the table, you’re shown to your seat and the dinner begins. You say, “So where’s the REAL president?”

Realizing you’ve just insulted him, how should you recover?

A: (In your best Winston Churchill) “Oh dear, I’ve spoken ill. Oh well, they say there’s a kernel of truth in everything, do they not?”

or ...

B: (In your best Capt. Jack Sparrow) “Oh dear, I’ve spoken ill. Oh well, they say there’s a kernel of truth in everything, do they not?”

For your scoring, the correct answers were:

A, B, B, A

You’ll notice they spell ABBA, a wonderful musical group from the 70s who have nothing to do with this story, yet here they are.

The point is that while not all of the situations above present an argument, they do offer an uncomfortable situation where you might, in applying the proper British accent, escape by the skin of your tooth.

(In an English accent) I do hope this has helped to further the cause of idiot men who have no filter between their heads and their mouths. By applying these techniques, you can be a winner in the long run. And as we all know, the winner takes it all.

Dangit, ABBA!

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One thing I've learned from a couple of decades of chewing on the matrimonial croutons of my life salad is that once a couple has spent enough time with each other, they tend to break from the mold of the world's traditions and create their own. Even anniversaries have specific precious items that mark the years spent together. 25 years is the “Silver Anniversary”. 50 years is the “Gold Anniversary”. I think 70th is “Comfy Coffin.” For my wife and I, the traditions don't mean much and that tends to confuse people. Take Valentine's Day …

The Fakest Day Of The Year

My wife doesn’t care a bit for Valentine's Day and I love the crap out of her for it. I know that sounds like such a man thing to say, but it's true and you're not the first person to think that I'm kidding myself. The reason is because my wife has the keen ability to spot bull hockey. (If you need to dive further into the definition of the word “hockey”, listen again to the last story from episode 3 called, I Can't Work In These Conditions. It means what you think it means, by the way.)

This ability was sparked in my wife at a young age and it made her a skeptic that doesn't believe you. That's not an incomplete sentence. She doesn't believe anybody about anything without having every fact available and I think she's better for it. We have no Ginsu Knives or anything else bought off late night TV for three easy installments of $19.95. She knows what she knows and once she knows it, she knows to know that she knows it and that's all that matters. In other words, my wife is a No-Nonsense kind of gal.

On top of that, she's not mysterious. She tells me exactly what she wants and she doesn’t veil it in riddles no normal man can figure out.

Early on in our marriage, we came to a mutual decision that gifts were to be things given due to a truly emotional desire to make the other one happy and in a manner and time that it's clear the gift isn't being given because we're “supposed to.” That agreement has made things incredibly easy throughout the years. As long as I'm thinking about her and showing my love for her in both tangible ways - flowers just because, her favorite candy if I pass it in the grocery store, or “I love you” written in the soap scum and mildew on the shower wall, she’s fine. Also the intangibles – like holding down a job, walking on the sidewalk between her and the road so I’m the one that gets sprayed by passing cars or splattered by a texting driver, or lighting a candle if my bathroom visit is longer than it takes to read the sports section. Just don't tell us when we “have” to give gifts or show our affection. The world isn't the boss of us and with that idea in mind, we're perfect for each other.

Enter Valentine's Day. We appreciate that it’s a day set aside for making that extra effort to show the one you love that you care. We just don't buy into it, nor do we need to. I verbally tell my wife “I love you” at least five times a day, sometimes more, and she does the same thing for me. Add to that the fact that we do things for each other to show it throughout the day, and there's no need for cardboard hearts full of chocolate.

We don't buy it because we see it for what it’s become – a day for dudes to cram into a department store because they waited until the last minute to buy the flowers, candy, cards, jewelry, perfume, bath salts, spa sessions, etc. Thanks, but no thanks. We've decided to actively protest Valentine's Day. We schedule a dinner on the weekend before or after and if I need to be out of town on the fourteenth of February, I go. People don't believe me when they ask what I'm doing for my wife for Valentine's Day and I reply with a haughty I'm-Better-Than-You look on my face, “I'm providing a dang home.”

“What are you REALLY doing?”

“I’m working.”

“Yeah, but what at you getting for Kayla for Valentine's Day.”

“Bacon.”

“Bacon?”

“You heard me, Bacon. I'm bringin' it home, buddy.”

And the beautiful things is, she's good with that. Together, we thrust our middle fingers upward at the world's expectations and shout, “Take that and drive all the way to Valentown!” If we get those little heart shaped sugar candies with words on them, we try to spell out “Kiss it, V-Day!”

Every day is Valentine's Day for me and my wife and if you don't believe us? We don't care. If you think we're missing something in our marriage, we might listen - and I emphasize the word “might” - if you've got more years of happy wedded squishiness under your belt than we do. But, if you don't, we'll just tell you to shove it up yer Valentush before we plant a big ol' kiss on each other and connect our fingers in a tangle that's as natural and real as the love that no holiday could ever dictate.

_________________

Relationships are a part of life and it's up to each individual to decide how strong one will become.

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You know what's funny? Watching somebody try to drink right after a trip to the dentist's office while their mouth is still numb and everything spills down the front of their shirt like a tiny baby. You know what's NOT funny? After the numbing stuff wears off and every single nerve ending is zapping you face with electric hell. I've had some conditions I've had to heal from that have been quite embarrassing, gross, or both, and I wouldn't normally even consider mentioning them, but hey – we throw ourselves out there for the sake of comedy, right?

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A Tooth Extraction Is A Major Head Wound The following was written in a pain-induced state on a hot and humid night in July of 2015.
And NO, I DO NOT WHINE!

It’s a hot and humid night in July of 2015.

I hesitate to write about the poor condition of my teeth because I’m from the south and there is a long observed stereotype about southerners and their dental habits, or lack thereof, and I don't enjoy the idea of progressing it. However, I'm moved to do just that in order to tell a complete story.

This narrative officially begins as follows: My teeth are crap.

I don’t mean that I have a few cavities in need of looking into; I’m telling you that what I have are laboratory curiosities. They're brittle enough that I fear being in the proximity of even a mildly talented soprano. The word “cavity” is a misnomer for me, as the plight of my teeth should more readily favor a new word, “cavern-ty”.

So it should come as no surprise when I tell you that I recently had to have an extraction performed. The tooth in question had worn – allow me to rephrase that - it had rotted to the point that it had become merely two broken wedges sticking out from the gum at the back of my mouth. Upon inspection, I found it to resemble the black, volcanic peaks of Tolkien’s Mordor, but it didn’t hurt, so I let it go. The absence of dental insurance will cause one to do stupid things like that. Also, as I said, it was at the back of my mouth and thus hidden, so I was able to smile when I saw my reflection and note that no one would be the wiser.

There's a word in the medical field when something such as a rotten tooth becomes infected. That word is “Abscessed”. In more practical layman terms it means, “HOLY MOLAR, THAT HURTS!” And oh by the way, if unattended, it can kill you.

That happened to the tooth right before a trip to the beach, of course. I’d looked forward to it for weeks while my gums and broken tooth happily played well with each other. Then BAM! “You think you’re going to enjoy the beach trip?” my mouth said to me because it’s a mouth and mouths say things, “How about we amp up the dang it factor and throw a little infection party?!” It’s akin to planning a trip to Universal Studios and getting an ingrown toenail right before you go. (Oooooh, a little foreshadowing.)

You might imagine my festive demeanor among the waves over the next few days and I made an appointment to get it extracted as soon as I got back. For the layman, the word “extracted” means, “Someone just shoved a needle into my gums over and over and then wrenched bone out of my skull in the similar fashion a dog employs when playing tug of war with a rope.”

You may even be interested to note that while the aforementioned round of tug of war was being enacted, I could hear the sound of bone fragments cracking and popping inside my head and I started to laugh about it. I solemnly swear that I was not on any medication that would have induced silliness. It was just that I realized how loud it sounded as the intrusion happened in and around my skull and it made me chuckle. I couldn’t feel much at the time other than the tugging. It did occur to me that it would be my luck to get a dentist that would, much like the dentist in the Little Shop Of Horrors, take my laughter as a challenge. But she remained undaunted and eventually blighted Mordor from the face of Middle Earth. In the course of it all, though, she destroyed my gums.

While the numbing agent was still at work, all was well and once I had my pain meds, it was easy enough to manage then too. But as I traveled to work on a bright Tuesday morning, I had a six-hour commute to think about how two ulcers that had developed over the last couple of days had made the healing process more painful than it needed to be. At first I pushed the idea aside and told myself to be a man! It’s only a couple of sores in your mouth alongside a deep hole where your tooth used to be. It’s no more than three open lesions seriously restricting any profitable use of the left side of my mouth. Then I remembered it was more than that. She'd torn my gums asunder back there.

I HAVE A MAJOR HEAD WOUND! An extracted tooth hole is a head wound; a gaping maw of tender and vulnerable flesh.

Why hasn’t the great jury of society come to this verdict yet? Have we been systematically brainwashed to believe there’s really nothing to it by the ADA? Did three out of four dentists agree that we should keep this information under wraps; great big spit-filled gauze wraps? I want to feel some sort of victory at this discovery, but coming to terms with the fact that I have a major head wound has made me question everything I once believed to be true.

Is there really a silver lining to every cloud? What if the little engine actually couldn’t? Did Joanie truly love Chachi? And what if it’s all about something other than the Hokey Pokey?

I’ve been led to believe that the pit in my gum where a tooth used to be – formerly the deadly destination on the itinerary of hobbits with evil rings - is only a minor inconvenience, but googly-MOOGLY, my mouth hurts right now!

Perhaps a good night’s sleep will help me to make some sense of all of this once I take some of the meds.

Something tells me this rant owes a wee bit to needing the meds.

And now my big toe is beginning to hurt. What’s that about?

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I believe that at least once in every man's life, there comes a time when he must do something stupid to make the pain go away. For some men, it may take going through torment to get to that point. For me, it only took realizing that …

An In-Grown Toenail Is A Major Foot Wound

An in-grown toenail is painful. Think about it - there is a hard, sharp item (the toenail) growing inside (in-grown) your toe. One might say that it’s not much to complain about. After all, it’s only a small inconvenience in and around the area of a toe; a tiny body part when compared to say, your chest (another body part that can be problematic if you have pain there – you should probably get that seen about).

But an in-grown toenail is much more than a minor inconvenience. When there is toe pain, you feel it with every step. It’s sort of like a hobnail boot you can’t take off.

What made mine all the more irritating is the knowledge that I could have avoided the whole ordeal had I paid better attention to my grooming.

I don’t like to admit it, but sometimes I forget that there are duties I must attend regarding my feet, i.e., cutting my toenails. It doesn’t happen often, but on occasion I find it would be quite possible to journey up the trees in the park alongside the savviest of squirrels. And because I have the feet of a caveman, with the nails on the two big toes being the consistency of barnacles, I have to take care to make sure I get all but the necessary nail off when I cut them.

That didn’t happen on one of the last sessions and I've paid a mighty price.

I cut the nail on the big toe of my right foot to completion, or so I thought. What I didn’t realize was that I had left a jagged, pointy shard – a toenail spear if you will – that would eventually grow into the flesh at the front of my toe. I suppose the growth was so gradual and I was so completely irresponsible as to the needs of my feet for a while that I just didn’t notice until a fateful day when I rammed my big toe - and the spear growing inside it - into a chair in my motel room.

Words cannot relate the delight I felt and the words of praise I expressed at the discovery of my new condition. Actually, there are words available and I tried my best to use them all, but this is not the place for such pleasantries. EUREKA, by the way, was not one of them.

I am a man. And a man comes up with solutions to such circumstances. My solution was this: Wait for it to grow through the front of my toe, then pull it out.

Hindsight has educated me in the ways of the human body and I've learned it has certain procedures it employs, unwavering from its course. And although I didn't want cutting to occur, eventually it would have to.

I began to try and broker deals with my body on behalf of the big toe, which I came to know by the endearing name of “Ow”. I would have pedicures on a regular basis. I promised to massage my feet every night after a soak in epsom salt. I would never, ever, ever, for-the-love-of-all-that-is-pure-and-holy, let my toenails go without proper maintenance again if Ow would only regurgitate the spear without my having to go to the doctor.

But my body is a jerk. It either didn’t hear me or simply refused because it never relieved me of the pain. I decided to take matters into my own hands and I’m glad I did.

Before I venture into further detail, here is my official disclaimer:

The actions I took which I am about to relate in no way constitute any promotion of self-surgery and any medical procedures for which one is not qualified, including but not limited to: Toenail surgery, Fingernail surgery, Liposuction, General Dentistry, Captain Dentistry, Paleontology, Astrology, Faith Healing, etc. should always be conducted by a professional. (A medical professional, not just like a plumber or prostitute. Either one of those operating upon your person could set you up with much bigger issues.)

After several weeks of getting to know Ow and having to clean and dress the toe daily, I realized that it was not going to heal on its own and measures had to be taken. With a $425 price tag attached to a procedure that would be performed by a person of the Doctor persuasion in mind and having noticed that holding it under a running faucet of hot water caused the pain to subside, numbing it a bit, I decided the time had come to add “Surgeon” to my already impressive, if not stupid, list of things I can do all by myself.

I procured the following instruments in preparation:

A razor blade

Large toenail clippers with the little knife/toe-jam-digger-outer in the middle.

A second set of large toenail clippers from the bathroom drawer with only the handle part rusty. The clipper area, though dull, was shiny.

Paper towels to apply pressure to the wound

My favorite bible (for obvious reasons)

Very hot running water

Good old-fashioned man-courage

An imaginary monkey (Monkeys make me smile)

My wife was out of the house, but my son was in the next room and I informed him that he should contact his mother and tell her what I was doing on only two conditions. 1. If he heard a scream that lasted more than 10 seconds, and 2. If a pool of blood began to seep into his room from under the door of the bathroom. He said okay.

Two minutes later, being the loyalist that he is, he entered the bathroom just as I was about to make the first slice with the razor blade and handed me the phone.

My wife calmly asked me one simple question. “Why are you such an idiot?”

“I know what I’m doing, don’t worry.”

“You need to let a doctor do that!”

I did not let a doctor do that, hence the disclaimer presented above.

After about ten minutes of painful slicing and digging into my flesh and periodically spooning blood spray off the sides of the bathtub with my hand, the spear was removed. After it was over, the relief was amazing and all was right with the world. I felt not only like a new, hardcore, bull of a man, but also a little bit like a smarty pants. As a matter of fact, I may submit this article to the Journal of Medicine for their consideration. I imagined all the pats on the back I would be getting from impressed friends and neighbors. I was, for all intents and purposes, a Doctor. I couldn’t wait to call my mom and tell her the good news, in no small part for the fact that she’d been terribly worried about Ow. I dialed her number and told her everything.

She calmly asked me one simple question. “Why are you such an idiot?

“That’s Doctor Idiot.”

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The bible can be scary if you read some of the passages, especially the ones about issues that people have had to endure due to either being unlucky or enslaving the people of Israel and refusing to let them go. One of the things that always struck fear in me was any mention of boils. I always associated that condition with uncleanliness and the Days of Good Ol', but now I know it's common and not always because of unsanitary practices. I found out the hard way that ...

It Boils Down To Pain

It never fails to be a humbling experience when something happens to me that I always thought was reserved for tales of olden times or people who refuse to type “Amen” and share a Jesus loves you meme on Facebook. But once last year and now recently I have had the tumultuous experience of living with a skin boil.

That’s right, a skin boil.

And I think I can deliver my message without it having an effect on your lunch. It’s just that this is information that might be valuable if you're to avoid having to deal with a boil of your own. I won’t go into gory detail about what exactly a skin boil is, but instead I'll allow you the opportunity to Google it for yourself, saving everyone but the sick and curious from a grotesque experience. Just know that a boil is painful and depending on where it surfaces, you might wish that someone would crack you over the head with a croquet mallet to put you out of commission for good.

Counting this last one, I have now suffered through three of them; the first was in my crotchety area and that was bad enough. I didn’t know what it was, only that something had seemed to burrow under the skin, way too close to sensitive stuff for my comfort. It became hard to walk and eventually, it had to be “taken care of”. I’ll just say that I have a wonderful wife who must love me more than I could ever know to willingly be the one who “took care of it”.

After the first episode, I did a little research and found that I had been the lucky host of a boil, so I knew what to look for in the future in order to stop it before it could get bad. Unfortunately, the second one apparently knew that I was wise to the ways of the boil and it crept up silently before pouncing onto my back just to the right of my spine. Upon first glances, I took the spot to be nothing more than one of those big ol’ zits one will get sometimes on their back. You know what I’m talking about. It’s like Mount St. Helens has attached there and it feels like there’s lava flowing directly beneath it till it comes to a head and either you or someone who can reach it is able to “take care of it.” It’s those little numbers that always seem to be right at the spot where your back touches everything when you sit back in a chair.

I waited for the slightly uncomfortable, yet tolerable, pimple to head up and go away, but it had other plans. It was only the tip of the iceberg and when I got home from play rehearsal two days later, I noticed that it had become hardened, painful, and very large. It had become a boil. The third one happened to be on my elbow. And while it was equally as gross as the other two, it didn't hurt at all. It mainly just caused children to cower and dogs to bark at me when I passed.

Why, you may ask, am I even telling people about it? Wouldn’t I want to keep something like this private? Do I want to be a disgusting medical oddity on a TV show about medical oddities called Disgusting Medical Oddities?

The answer is simple and, I believe, honorable. I want to be that messenger that lives on in history books and lore, galloping through the internet on my data horse shouting, “The boils are coming! The boils are coming!” I want to be remembered as the one who saw through the fog that our bodies glaze us over with when they’re about to infect us with infectious infection. And now that I have witnessed the heights my body is willing to go to in order that it could fool me and sneak this abomination onto my back, elbow, and crotchy groinous area, I think it’s only fair that I pass along any hypotheses I may have developed as to other devices your body might use on you.

So here’s a list of conditions you'll want to watch out for.

The Susan Boyle Boil – So you’ve settled in for the night and started a lovely flame in the fireplace. All you want to do is sit by the fire under a nice warm blanket and jam to the soothing voice of the one and only Susan Boyle. And why not? She was an over night sensation who would soon find her CDs in thrift stores everywhere. But there is danger here. Because when Susan sings, you become carefree and at ease with everything around you. You loosen your grip on caution and that’s when boils are at their stealthiest. You’ll never see it coming. One minute you’re belting I Dreamed A Dream with one of Britain’s finest voices, the next you have a boil on your neck the size of Big Ben. You may as well draw a clock on there and hang a bell because you’re gonna be a very painful spectacle for several days.

The Sir Arthur Ignatius Conan Doyle Boil – Similar to the one above, you may think you have your best, most attentive eye on things as you, via delving headlong into your reading, become the greatest detective the world has ever known. You are living vicariously through Sherlock Holmes and nothing will get past you. The tiniest detail will be scrutinized and thus, always before you. Yet you are deceived, my friend. You are the victim of diversion. Before you know it, there might well be a hound the size of a St. Bernard in the area of your Baskervilles and there’s nothing to do but let it bark at you with every step. It can be tamed, but it ain’t fun. Trust me.

The Mohel Boil – No one is safe from the danger, even those who do Yahweh’s work. If you think you’re a mentsh and performing a spiritual duty will keep you from having to do a little suffering, you’re wrong. Look at Job. I think he may have been covered in boils before it was all over with. You feel good about the circumcision you’re about to do, but you realize that this is a super sensitive task. You’re dedicated to having all your concentration focused on the foreskin at hand … so to speak, and that’s when it happens. The surgery goes okay, but when you get home you realize you’ve got tsuris, or serious troubles, on your tuchis. Don’t be a putz. Get it seen about before the pain makes you destroy some poor kid’s svantz.

The "To The Victor Goes The Spoils" Boils – It would seem that being a winner is ideal. Who doesn’t want to come out on top? But I doubt you’ve ever been hoisting a huge trophy with the number one glued to it and thought, “You know, I’m not really defending myself against boils right now.” Welcome to intense sorrow. You should have been on alert. You should have blown the race or fumbled at the goal line because now you’ll be dealing with an avid fan that goes everywhere you go for a while and it’s a pain in the pigskin. Did you ever hear that the winner takes it all? My friend, you’re gonna take it ALL.

Now if after looking at this list, which is nowhere near exhaustive, you've decided that life is too short to go about your day unaware of the potential threat of getting a boil somewhere on your body, then you've taken one step closer to a happy existence and I applaud you.

But if you think it would never happen to you, I can truly say that I’m sorry and I hope that you’ll remember me when you realize you’ve been intruded upon by a ninja boil you never saw coming.

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I'm glad I brought all of this to light. Everyone has things that have happened to us and some of them are embarrassing, but confession is good for the soul, I guess. I just hope you can enjoy a good meal after this trip down medical lane.

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If you stare too long at a person and they notice, you could find yourself in an awkward situation that requires, “Lucy, you got some ‘splaining to do”. This happened to me once when I saw the most beautiful little girl – she was maybe 4 years old – in a diner. I was eating alone and noticed her and her mother at an adjacent table. As a portrait artist, the human face is a wonderland for me and this little girl looked like a true angel. I didn't know I was staring like a creepy stalker creep, until I realized the mother was watching me carefully with a look that told me she would not hesitate to stick a fork into my eye socket if it came to it. In my mind, I was sneaking glances for future reference because I do a lot of angel images in my day job as a tombstone artist and it was less creepy than pulling out my phone and asking like some buck toothed hillbilly, “C'n I take yer li'l girl's pitcher?” What I did do is apologize and explain why I kept staring at her daughter, which seemed to help mama to relax a tad. All that being said, I'm a big fan of people watching and in my travels, I get the opportunity to do a lot of it. So here are a few stories about the interesting results from that activity.

I'm Michael Blackston and we're taking a deep dive into my Funny, Messy Life.

Canadians R Nuts

Because my travels take me along the coast of South Carolina, I find myself pretty frequently in the vicinity of Myrtle Beach. The actual business I do work for is in Conway, SC just outside of Myrtle Beach and to be honest, during the tourist season, I usually stay well inland away from the traffic and the crazy people who really believe they look like models in their way too tiny bikinis and shorts/sandals with socks combos. While it’s true that there are plenty of young people to look at whom, (I’m told) fill out their attire nicely, I'm a married man and thus, wouldn’t know for sure. What I can positively tell you is that for every cutie in dental floss, there are five others who picture themselves on the cover of the Sports Illustrated Swimsuit Addition (not that I would know what that cover looks like – I'm just taking a friend's word for it), when in reality, they would do well to grace the front of Ugly Tree Weekly. I can say that because I’m no Art Garfunkle either, but at least I know it.

However that message isn’t the focus of this article.

Canadians are nuts. There’s the central storyline.

Now before you get all angry and throw pieces of ham that for some weird reason you’ve decided to call bacon at me, allow me to explain.

Somebody informed the Canadians that we don’t have much of a winter in the deep south and by storming the beaches down here, they can take advantage of all the off-season golf and ocean wading at which they can shake a hockey stick. That’s fine for the most part. Our winters are mild compared to the Great White North and the golf in Myrtle Beach is second to none.

But the ocean in March is colder than Chilly Willy’s butt crack. And guess what? They’re out in it! Lean in closer … they aren’t just walking in cool sand at the edge of the water or even wading in to their knees. They’re splashing around in the waves like it’s July 4th and someone placed lit firecrackers under their fanny packs.

During the off season, I stay in one of the luxurious hotels along the oceanfront because during the winter, they’re hungry for visitors and you can usually negotiate a nice room for a stick of gum or a few cartoon impressions. So when I decided it was time to take a leisurely stroll on the beach after a long day of etching, you can imagine my shock when, after enjoying the sight of Canadians prancing gaily in the tide, I allowed the slightest morsel of foam to touch my toes and subsequently went into instant hypothermia.

I suppose I could have been more polite with my vocal reaction so that my northern brethren might experience the hospitality that was foretold concerning we southern gentlemen. But alas, I elicited a cry of, “SWEET MOTHER OF MERCY YOU PEOPLE ARE CRAZY NUTJOBS FROM THE COLDEST REACHES OF CHILLY WILLY'S BUTTCRACK!”

They appeared undaunted by my scathing remark and simply returned to their wave swells of frolic and merriment. Meanwhile, sea life jumped out of the surf and grabbed onto me trying to get a taste of my body heat.

I figure it would be about the same if I went up there next summer and turned on the heat. But have you ever felt cold like the ocean at the end of winter? Maybe you have.

Polar bear jumps.

Those are popular around here because you can get a group of people together and make t-shirts and everybody jumps in cold water to show some disease a thing or two. I’m not making fun; it really does help create awareness and serves well to poke people in their action bits. I’ve never done it myself, choosing instead to write or speak in a temperature controlled environment about the need to kick something bad in the junk. But I have close friends who have put on the trunks of our neighbors to the north and jumped into water fit only to refrigerate sides of beef.

I’m told the experience is something akin to this:

You arrive at the edge of a designated lake to meet with your fellow brave jumpers, all of whom are standing by the waterside breaking up the solid layer of ice so that no one gets caught under it, therefore creating the need to organize a follow up polar bear jump for awareness to not jump into water covered in a solid layer of ice.

Everyone comes equipped with a strategy. They see themselves running like warriors into the depths all the way up to their necks and treading the water in a happy aqua-dance of victory and good vibrations. Their tears of achievement will flow down their bodies and warm them because the cold discomfort is no match for their awesomeness. They'll then emerge from the lake in slow motion while somewhere in the distance the theme from Chariots Of Fire is played through a sky filled with bald eagles. While they were in the water, someone replaced all of their towels with American flags and they are draped in them as they are met by adoring supporters. As the music comes to a dramatic close, they gather the flags in their fists and raise them high above their heads, screaming “ADRIAN!”

At least that’s the plan.

What really happens is they get out of their vehicles, run to the edge of the water with their arms wrapped tightly around their bodies and jump up and down while nervously giggling with their fellow jumpers about how nuts this is. Someone says, “GO!” and they all run screaming into the water; some to their necks and some to about the topmost skin layer of one toe. They continue to scream as if they’re being torn asunder until they can take it no more and turn running back to the shore to roll and writhe on the ground wrapped in a towel. It can be considered a religious experience because God’s name is frequently mentioned.

In some cases, the ruckus may disturb a group of Canadians who have been silently resting completely submerged in the middle of the lake and they’ll pop their heads up out of the water like glacier moles and begin to point and laugh.

Differences in culture interest me and I know that’s all this is.

I was raised in an area of the world where some people will wear earmuffs when the temperature is in the high sixties. Canadians were reared under holes in ice ponds and are brought to the surface by grabbing onto a passing fishing line and yanked up by a burly fellow in walrus skins. If they see their shadow, they dive back beneath the ice and stay there for six more weeks playing Marco Polo with leopard seals.

That, or they drive down to Myrtle Beach and get a great price on a hotel room.

Either way, it’s just nuts!

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Some places that are good for people watching are also good places to get a disease that will eat your flesh from the inside out. You have to weigh your options – get some good material or get leprosy. I'll take what's behind curtain number two, Bob! That's the game you play while making ...

Observations From The Waiting Room

Sitting in a doctor’s office is interesting, educational, and scary all rolled into one germ laden bacterial infection of an experience.

I know, I know – if I’m there, I’m not helping the situation and no one wants to suck up my funk any more than I want to suck up theirs. That doesn’t stop me from being a little judgmental as I sit and stare into the faces of misery that surround me on all sides.

If you’re a people watcher, this is a fantastic place to get your fix, but beware. Making eye contact is usually a bad idea. Sooner or later you’ll meet the gaze of someone who will take it as an opportunity to annoy you until the blessing of either you or them being called back into the land of alcohol swabs, tongue depressors, and needles that will "only sting for a second".

One recent visit has wielded a haul of personalities to observe, so let’s just jump right into the cesspool. This room was host to any number of these …

The “Shout It From The Rooftops” Loud Talker – I list them first because they command the attention of the room. They can’t be ignored, no matter how many squares of gauze you jam in your ears and cover with that medical tape that will peel the skin right off your flesh when you remove it. There’s no need to try and read a little from one the magazines that must be crawling with the "ick" of everyone who picked it up before you; you’ll not be able to concentrate. Instead you and all your waiting room buddies will be regaled with whatever happens to be on their mind at the time. It might be politics, it might be the details of the rot they have all over their foot, or it could even be tales of yore. The guy I was listening to wanted us to know how bad an idea it was to eat sardines and chase them with beer from a cup that's been sitting out for a couple of days. He thinks it's funny now. From the look on her face, the lady sitting beside him doesn't think it was so funny. However it manifests, you can bet that everyone in the building will be able to hear it.

The “How’s Ya Mama ‘Nim?” Church Saint – You haven’t seen them in a long time and you don’t feel like talking at the moment. Your head feels like it’s carrying about twenty tons of gravel and the pressure is causing all manner of liquid to leak from your nose. You wouldn’t have sat there if you’d realized it would be in the proximity of anyone you know, but because they always sit in the back pew at church, you failed to recognize them. Now you’re stuck smiling like a crazed hyena so as not to be insulting as you let them know the latest buzz about the exciting life of your extended family. You may try to throw subtle hints like being short and choppy with your delivery, burying yourself in a book, or screaming uncontrollably in fake pain. But they'll not be deterred in their quest for any glimmer of gossip they can sink their teeth into.

The “Hey, Buddy - Let’s Be Buddies Forever And Ever” Close Sitter – I usually find this to be a guy. I don’t know why, but I rarely see a female being a space invader in this way. He may be someone you’ve met before or he may be a total stranger. Whichever he is, rest assured that you’ll know ALLLLLL about him before the nurse comes to the door and gloriously shouts one of your names. Not only does he think you need to know every single sick detail about his condition; he also wants to show you. Go on …. Tell him you'd rather not because you honor his privacy and he …. really …. doesn’t need to. Wish as you like, but that conversation is moving by that time on the wheels of a statement something along the lines of, “Ain’t she a beaut?!” He has coffee breath, which would have been fine; you do too. But he has the talent to expertly aim his directly up your nose by leaning in so close to you when he speaks that you’d be doing well to squeeze a quarter in between you sideways. You’ll notice the need to apply the lunatic smile of a comic book villain with him as well if you don’t want to seem rude. There will also be a lot of head nodding on your part and the uttering of words like, “Mmm Hmm” and “Uhh Huh”. I like to toss in a sarcastically laced, “Yeppers!”

The “If I Sit In This Corner Quietly, No One Will Know I’m Kind Of A Leper” Introvert – I feel for them. They are probably not a leper. They probably simply have a cold, high blood pressure, or the flesh-eating bacteria I mentioned. The cute thing is they thought that by sitting in the furthest corner from the front desk and becoming as small as they possibly could that they might avoid detection. Sorry, but that won’t happen. This one was a younger woman who was being addressed way too closely by someone who wants to show her a nasty bunion and the look on her face was priceless. Poor girl. I suppose I could've created a diversion like a gentleman and got the close talker to come over to me by saying something like, “Man oh man, have I ever wanted to get a gander at a nasty bunion!” But I’m afraid I couldn’t. She kept the close talker busy and he wasn't bothering me, soooooo ......

The “Isn’t It Cute The Way My Small Child Runs Around Like A Rabid Gazelle?” Giggle Parent – There’s always at least one. You can’t blame the kid. Children run around like rabid gazelles. But as parents, our job is to keep that activity to the appropriate times and places. The waiting room of a doctor’s office doesn’t feel to me like the best place for that since nearly everyone in there isn’t feeling well and tends to be irritable. Honestly, I’ve never once witnessed a patient lash out at a child or a parent in this situation, but I know what I’ve thought behind the dark, snot curtains of my mind. The problem isn’t even a parent who is there for their own care but couldn’t get a babysitter and barely has the strength to chase their child. It’s the parent that thinks it’s funny and simply laughs when your foot - you know, the one wrapped up like a mummy that you’re there getting seen about - gets stepped on over and over again as the sweet thing circles your chair screaming, “I da indian, loo da cowboy!” So here’s a disclaimer: It Ain’t Cute! Your kid is cute, yes. As far as being a small human person with adorable little legs that move in blur-speed and tiny hands covered in peanut butter and spit, they’re swell. But your not doing anything to tame them in this environment when you could, but obviously don’t want to, well …. I hope the darling is twice as “cute” once you’re trapped with him in the insanely small room that will be your cell for the next seven hours while you wait for the doctor to come in.

The Old Person Who Has The Answers To The World’s Problems – I'll reference these people in the next story, but they deserve a mention here because there’s always one of them waiting to see their physician unless the waiting room is just one of their stops on the daily agenda designed to gather intel about who may or may not be about to die. They're also loud and proud with their opinions and usually have a great deal to say, aimed in the direction of the nurse’s desk, about the state of things in the medical and pharmaceutical industries and the way it used to be done in the Days of Good Ol'.

As for me, I fall into the Just Leave Me Alone And We’ll Get Along Fine category, but as I sat waiting for my name to be called, there was little girl in bows next to me who was adorable – and wouldn't stop looking at me.

Guess what, little girl, you just made my list.

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One of the most often asked questions I get is how I find the time to write. Another biggie is where do I get my ideas? The answer to both of these questions is: The public, man – the public. Unfortunately, even then, there are times when ...

I Can’t Work Under These Conditions

One of the most difficult problems one runs into when trying to keep consistent content is finding a good place to create it. Ideally, the perfect place would be a quiet spot where the artist may shut off from the world around him and bask in sweet, sweet concentration. It’s a dream place devoid of to-do lists and needy toddlers and angst riddled teenagers. It’s a cave of darkness with only a desk, a computer, and a lamp – nothing else; no means of communication for the duration of the time allotted for good, honest creation. That’s the place that would be best, but it’s a place that does not exist for most of us.

So what’s the solution? Ask any guru and they’ll tell you that concentration and being able to be left alone to create is paramount to being at your absolute best. Unfortunately, all the artists I know are in the same boat with me. We don’t have a home large enough to dedicate the room that I've described. We don’t have careers that allow for that time unless we get up earlier than the birds. And although I’ve tried the early to rise technique, I have the aforementioned teenager and toddler that make getting to bed at a decent enough hour for that a near impossibility. What we’re left with is keeping our creative materials handy at all times and taking the opportunities when and where they present themselves.

I find myself many mornings at a table in a fast food restaurant typing away to keep up with the demands of having a consistently released blog. And it gets hard because old people gather at fast food restaurants to gossip. To be clear, I love old people and am on a fast track to that description, myself. But they're hard of hearing most of the time, so their conversations are delivered so that the hearing impaired are able to understand what's being said. That means I get to hear it, whether I want to concentrate or not.

It’s all around me. They sip their coffees and one by one they enter, taking the seat they’re accustomed to sitting in every morning.

The problem is that I get distracted listening to them because they can be so darn entertaining. A typical conversation will go something like this: (I’ll give the example in a play script style because it’s kinda my thing)

OM1 (Old Man 1) enters slowly, holding a cup of coffee, and sits at a small table with four chairs. He blows on his coffee and carefully takes a sip as OM2 (Old Man 2) enters from the same direction, also holding a cup of coffee.

OM2. COLD OUT THAYAH, AIN’T IT?

(I should interrupt to address the fact that since I am from the deep south, all dialogue will be bent toward a southern dialect, as it is the truest experience I can convey. Let us continue.)

OM1. S’POSED-TA BE THAT WAY FOR A GOOD PIECE.

OM2. WAD’N ALWAYS THATTA WAY.

OM1. NOW DON’T START IN ON THAT GLOBAL WARMIN’ HOCKEY.

(I should interrupt to explain that “hockey” is one of the words old southerners use instead of the “S” word. Lots of others do use the “S” word, but this is family oriented content. Moving on.)

OM2. I AIN’T SAYIN’ THAT, IT’S JUST COLD. MY HIP’S LOCKIN’ UP LIKE A DANG STUBBURN OL' MULE.

OL1 (Old Lady 1) enters with a cup of coffee and sits at a table adjacent to OM1 and OM2.

OL1. YOUR HIP WOULDN’T LOCK UP LIKE THAT IF YOU’D GO GIT YOURSELF WUN'NIM CORDA-ZONE SHOTS.

OM2. I DON’T NEED NO SHOT. IT’LL WORK OUT IN A MINUTE.

OL1. I’M JUST SAYIN’ IT AIN’T GONNA FEEL NO BETTUH TILL YA DO. STARTIN’ TO BE COLDER THAN I REMEMBER IT EVUH BEIN’. BRRR!

OM1. NOW DON’T START IN ON THAT GLOBAL WARMIN’ HOCKEY!

OL1 waves a dismissive hand towards OM1 and tries to carefully sip her coffee. OL2 (Old Lady 2) enters with a tray holding coffee and a biscuit. She sits across the table from OL1.

OL2. YOU KNOW WHO BELIEVES THAT GLOBAL WARMIN’?

OM1. AIN’T NOBODY GOT ANY SENSE BELIEVES INNAT!

OM2. PROPPERGANDER!

OL2. THAT SMITH GIRL AT THE BANK. SHE AIN’T BEEN GOIN’ TO CHURCH, I HEAR.

OM1. YOU KNOW WHO ELSE AIN’T BEEN T’CHURCH LATELY?

OL1. I KNOW THE PASTOR’S WIFE OVER TO TH’FIRST BETHEL CHURCH OF THE NAZARINE OF GOD’S BEEN SKIPPIN’ OUT ON THE GOOD SERVICE AN’ GOIN TO THAT EARLY SERVICE.

OM2. THEY CALL THAT CONTEMP’RY.

OL2. THEY DON’T HAVE DINNERS MUCH AT THAT CONTEMP’RY SERVICE. PROB’LY SHOULDN’T NEITHER. ETHEL SNITFRENCH STARTED GOIN' TO THAT SERVICE AND NOW SHE BAKES THE AWFULLEST COBBLERS. GOT STUFF LIKE APRICOTS IN ‘EM. (Shakes her head – disgusted) I COULDN’T STOMACH IT.

OL1. NOW, I ALWAYS SAID IT AIN’T RIGHT TO BAKE A COBBLER WITH WEIRD FRUIT. KEEP IT TO APPLE, BLACKBERRY, OR PEACH. JESUS LIKES A PEACH COBBLER.

OM2. I NEED A COBBLER. MIGHT HEP M’HIP.

OL2. HOW’S A COBBLER GONE HEP Y’HIP?

OM2. IF M’SHOES FIT ME BETTUH.

OL1. THAT AIN’T WHAT WE’RE TALKIN’ ABOUT.

OM2. DON’T MATTER. AIN’T NO COBBLERS AROUND NO MORE ANYHOW.

OL2. AIN’T NOTHIN’ GOOD ANYMORE. WORLD’S GONE TO HELL IN A HANDBASKET SINCE THEY STARTED THEM CONTEMP’RY SERVICES OVER TO TH’CHURCH. THAT’S THE ONE THE PREACHER’S WIFE’S BEEN GOIN’ TO, Y’KNOW.

OL1. AND THEY KEEP IT S'COLD IN THERE SUNDAY MORNIN’S, TOO!

OM2. WELL YA BETTUH GIT USED TO IT. THEY SAY IT’S GONE BE COLD FER APIECE. WADD’N ALWAYS THATTAWAY.

OM1. NOW DON’T START IN ON THAT GLOBAL WARMIN’ HOCKEY!

How am I supposed to get anything done with all that going on in the background? I suppose I could put in some ear buds and write to the tranquil sound of a trickling brook or the soothing melodies of Pat Boone singing jazz versions of heavy metal music (it exists), but I’d still get interrupted somehow. There’s a lot to be said in favor of a man-cave, but unless someone puts me in their will and leaves me the keys to a manor with a secret dungeon behind a bookcase, I’ll likely never have one.

And after all, there is something sort of special about sitting at a table across the room from people who have amazing stories to tell and would probably be glad to share them if I asked. Perhaps one day I will get up the courage, but until then I’ll sit here and drink a cup of coffee as I try to piece together something that makes sense between the next jab at anything “new-fangled” and the complaints about the weather.

It is kind of chilly out there today, but it’s nothing out of the ordinary. And I’d have to be nuts to mention anything about the global warming theory … I mean “hockey.”

The way the world is nowadays, you have to be careful if you're gonna do any people watching, but I'm gonna draw the line at being careful. I won't stop because it gives me too much great material. And if I get a fork in my eye socket, I'll just apologize and walk away, leaving a trail of blood behind me.

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Shenanigans is defined by Webster's dictionary as tricky or questionable practices or conduct; also, high-spirited or mischievous activity. It's a word I never used until I became an old fogy. Now it rolls off my tongue like a good set of dentures secured by a bad squeeze of Fixadent. I can't remember what we called shenanigans when I was growing up, but we sure knew when we were up to them. I can tell you that I've been up to my share and it doesn't seem that over my forty plus years I've learned lessons very well because I still tend to enjoy engaging in shenaniganly activities, as you'll see in two of these three stories.

My name is Michael Blackston and you're about to step right into a big pile of my funny, messy life.

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My mama still shakes her head at stuff I say and do. There's usually at least a little smile behind the shame, but I imagine a voice inside her head asking, Where did I go wrong? It's okay, Mama. I turned out pretty relatively enough alright-ish in the end and we should probably thank God I didn't end up worse than that. After all ...

I Was A Stupid Kid Who Did Stupidly Stupid Stuff

As my oldest approaches manhood and the age when I have to trust him outside of my supervision, I cringe to think of what must be going through that head of his. I remember being his age and while the details are effectively buried under an avalanche of adult stuff that happened starting twenty years ago, stuff that includes bad eating habits, lack of exercise, tons of debt, two decades of happy marriage, a foot or ten I stuck in my mouth, and a toe fungus that seemed like it would never go away, there’s still a vapor of youth stank seeping through to the surface. It could be whatever ungodly manifestation is under my son's bed creating that odor, I suppose. I'm afraid to look. But as deep as the tiny details may remain at the bottom of my own life's heap, I do have some solid nuggets to remind me that if I don’t keep a close eye on my child, I’m likely to be removing layers of his skin from concrete and/or roofing materials before too long.

The memories that evoke that sort of worry in my mind are tattooed there for eternity. We laugh about them now when we’re gathered around the dinner table and begin to reminisce about the Days of Good Ol’, but in truth, they still hurt a little, they still embarrass, or they still scare the crap out of me.

I was stupid. We did stupidly stupid things and I wasn’t alone.

I had my cousin by my side for much of it, but some things are mine and mine alone to take ownership of. So which were which and what did we or I do? Here are a few instances of stupid, all true stories, from my childhood.

Collecting Money From Neighbors For "The Functionally Illiterate" To Actually Buy Cigarettes

Stupid Rating: EVIL

My cousin and I liked to smoke when we were about my son’s age. We thought we were cool and back in the Days Of Good Ol’, you could purchase cigarettes “for your aunt” if you were three years old. Tell the clerk they were for an adult family member and it was all good. We had one particular old man who worked the counter of a local convenience store that never asked questions and so we patronized his store often. Most of the time, we could come up with a couple of dollars for a pack of menthols with no problem, but on this occasion we had lots of daylight left and there was nothing we could get our hands on, money wise. I don’t remember who’s idea it was, but together we decided to grab a small crystal candy dish from my cousin’s coffee table and work the neighborhood going door to door asking for money until we’d collected enough to buy a pack. Most of the neighbors gave us a few nickels and sent us on our way. It wasn’t until one of them cocked an eyebrow and started asking questions that I had to improvise and came up with a story that turned into what we thought was a gold mine. I think it's important to mention that my cousin hid in the bushes while I knocked on the doors. The neighbor asked what charity we were collecting for and I hesitated only for a second. I had recently heard someone on the radio talking about helping those who couldn’t read and I said, “The functionally illiterate.” She asked what that meant and after I told her accurately, she gave me something like a dollar in quarters. I thanked her and calmly walked to the bush where my cousin was crouching and laughing. After it was all said and done, I think we collected enough for several packs of cigarettes and by the end of the day, we probably smelled like the Marlboro man after a stressful night. I’ve always felt an awful sense of regret and shame for doing that and as a result, I tend to give a little more than I normally would to the Santa that rings the bell.

Yes, we laugh, but we also understand the depth of the“butt whoopin’” we should have taken after a stunt like that. And before you shout, “Where were your parents?!”, you have to realize that we went to great lengths to ensure they thought we were on our best behavior and right outside in the back yard.

Swinging On A Rickety Cable Over A Rocky Creek

Stupid Rating: DUMMY

Again, my cousin was there, but I can’t blame him for my injuries. In the woods close to his house, there was a large oak tree that overhung a ten-foot ravine with a small, very rocky creek at the bottom. From a thick branch was tied a metal cable and at the end of the cable, a stick was tied into a loop so you could hold on. My cousin and his friend had found it and spent hours enjoying the bliss of swinging from the edge and out over the creek. He couldn’t wait to show me and we planned on a day of it the very next time I was over. That time came on a Sunday; I remember that. Mom was not easy about letting me spend the day out of her sight with friends, but she was trying to let me be a boy and gave me her trust. It didn’t help that I'd told her what we were planning to do.

“Absolutely NOT! You'll kill yourself!” she yelled and I promised we’d find something else to entertain ourselves. My eyes would have been shifty during that promise and I probably had fingers crossed behind my back because as we all know, that makes it a clever deception, not a lie - which is not a sin.

When we got to the tree, completely disobeying my mother, my cousin and his friend each took turns showing me how it was done. They pulled the cable in, took hold of the stick in both hands, pulled it tight, swung out over the ravine and back. Glee and laughter and cries of, “WEEEEEEE!” filled the spring day. It was my turn and it looked easy enough. I pulled the cable to myself just as they had. I grabbed the stick in both hands just as they had. I jumped straight out from the bank over the ravine just as they HAD NOT. I wasn’t the best at paying close attention and the pull it tight and swing part had escaped my notice. There is a big difference between pulling a cable tight and swinging over a ten-foot ravine with a rocky creek at the bottom and jumping straight into the air over the ravine so that there is quite a lot of slack in the cable, until that is, gravity takes effect moments later and the slack lets out violently. I knew it as soon as my feet left the safety of the bank, but there was nothing I could do. The cable snapped straight and I wasn't strong enough to hold on.

I fell the ten feet face first.

On my way down, I managed to protect my face with my left arm and break my fall with my right, which snapped both bones of my right arm cleanly.

My injuries could have been much worse, but I was lucky to walk away with a broken arm and a severely bruised face. There was no hiding it from mom, of course, so I gave her the details … I had slipped on some mud while walking by the creek and tumbled down the embankment.

I Was A Teenage Ninja Mercenary

Stupid Rating: IDIOT

I was fourteen when we moved to not only a new house, but also to a new state. Rambo was all the rage at the movies and so were ninja films. I was totally convinced that I would be a great military weapon for my country and also, I had seen First Blood more than 8,000 times. I was already qualified to be considered a master at sneakery. On top of that, I had a black ninja suit complete with hood and boots, so win/win. I decided that one of the first nights in our new house would be dedicated to sneaking out and wandering the neighborhood to engage in a little surveillance. After all, I’d seen Invasion USA, where Chuck Norris had to tackle a terror cell in what seemed like a normal, quiet nook of suburbia, so it was best to be prepared in the event that bazooka fire erupted in our back yard.

When the opportunity came, I suited up and soft-stepped through the house, backing against the walls and doing that quick around-the-corner peek all the expert silent assassins employ, although I knew my mom and step-dad were in their bedroom asleep. I opened the door and smelled the crisp night air. From a bush at the front, I scanned my surroundings and picked my route of covert ninja sweetness. I would cross the front yard fleetly of foot, making no sound and take my next cover behind a tree in the side yard of the house across the street. From the safety of those shadows, I would plan my next move of bold, swift execution.

It was late (or early) and there were no cars. Nevertheless, there was need for stealth and I took off across the yard like a panther. I made no sound; left no shadow. I was a breeze for all anyone but me could tell and I could see the tree in the side yard of the house across the street getting closer. The focus on my destination was sharp – too sharp – and so I didn’t see the chain-link fence between me and the tree. I hadn't noticed it before when we were moving in and, in the black of night, I did not notice it then.

I caught the thick metal top bar of the fence with my face, right in the middle of my upper lip. Dazed, I put a ninja glove to the point of impact and it stung like a mother. Then I noticed great droplets of blood speckling the pavement as I limped back toward my house. I carefully removed the ninja gear and hid it in my room, then went to my mother and explained how I had slipped on something in my bedroom and planted my lip into the corner of my wrought iron bed. She had no reason not to believe me as apparently, I was prone to slip on things.

So why do I cringe when I think that my son is coming into the fearless days of his life? I think you know the answer to that. History tends to repeat itself, so I need to be extra vigilant. I wish I had the time to regale you with every story like this I can think of and maybe one day I’ll tell some more. For right now, though, I think it’s all I can stomach. Although … Yeah, as bloody and painful as they may have been, sometimes I do still long to revisit those Days Of Good Ol’.

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Wow, you say. This guy is lucky to be alive or at the very least, lucky not to be somebody's girlfriend in a maximum security prison. And I'll say to you, I know … I know. Someone was watching over me. I imagine God has assigned me some pretty awesome guardian angels over the years and I also reckon there's been a lot of turn-over at that position with angelic voices screaming, I can't take it anymore! Well, this next story will show you that shenanigans are still a part of my life. I submit to you now a tale of ...

Hotel Shenanigans

Since I travel so much, I’d expect that my readers and listeners will be treated to stories that center around hotels every now and again. One of the hardest things about consistently releasing content is figuring out what to write about. It probably wouldn’t be as tough if I were blogging about how to better yourself, make money online, or decorate the garage you’re renovating for your mother to move into by using trash you stole from your neighbor’s bin.

I, however, am making a valiant attempt at comedy and that ain’t so easy a task. I will say that it doesn’t make it any easier trying to type with fried chicken grease on your fingers because you’re on your lunch break and the buffet at Olde Town Café in Walterboro, SC has been calling to you since you drove by this morning.

Fortunately, I had an idea last night that helps in this area. I was bored while I waited in line at the front desk of my hotel to check in and I began thinking of ways I could up the entertainment ante of trips away from home.

When I first started traveling, the novelty of staying in hotel rooms was enough. I could go out to any of the restaurants that surrounded me, then see what was happening in whatever town I was working in at the moment. Afterward, what little night was left would be spent in the comfort of a room that would be magically clean and tidy when I returned after work that day. It didn’t take long, though, to become bored with all of the exploration and even the eating out. Soon my evenings began to consist of picking up a rotisserie chicken from Walmart and going straight to my room to den up like an old, decrepit bear with bad teeth and worn down claws. Had I any lawn in front of my hotel rooms, I would have screamed at children to, “Stay off it, by thunder!”

So as I stood in line behind every person who ever retired to Florida, I started thinking of fun ways to prank people in the hotel. I would never have to venture far from my room and still find entertainment that may be considered in poor taste, cruel, even evil, but would help me to pass the time with a smile.

Here are some things you might consider attempting the next time you’re in a hotel and have the proper tools at your disposal:

The little girl at the end of the hall

We’ve all seen the imagery in one movie or another. There is nothing creepier than a little girl standing silent and alone in a place she shouldn’t be. The very end of the hall in a hotel is the perfect place and the stringier her hair, the better. Let her locks fall with reckless abandon in front of her face and if you can swing it, have her hold a teddy bear by the leg loosely at her side. This could be your daughter or your niece. Have her stand there in silence, staring straight ahead so that when people get off the elevator, they see her just standing at the end of the hall. When they approach (IF they approach), have her remain silent or softly whisper something like, “I’m sorry I was bad, mommy, but they told me to do it. Now it's your turn.” She can repeat that same line over and over or maybe just raise her finger to point at whoever comes off the elevator. If you’re a real sicko and have identical twins, station them at each end of the hall dressed exactly alike and with the same props you’ve decided on, with one twin out of sight. When the unsuspecting traveler approaches the first twin, have the one behind them speak from the other end of the hall. When the traveler turns, they see the exact same girl behind them. They will inevitably turn to look for the first girl, but she is gone; hidden around the corner. When they turn back, the second girl is gone and the first one behind them steps back into view and speaks the creepy line of dialogue. This can go on and on until the traveler either gets it and laughs at your cleverness or passes out and dies from a heart attack.

Elevator Mind Games

I have to be honest, I’m not the first to think of playing pranks on an elevator by far. But if you have the guts to put yourself in an awkward position and make others very uncomfortable so that you may enjoy a thumping good time at another’s expense, an elevator is one of the best places to do it. There are always the classics, like facing the corner as if being punished while everyone else is enjoying the aggressive silence that permeates all elevators and looking blankly ahead. You might wait till the door shuts on a crowded elevator and ask, “So I suppose you all know why I’ve asked you here.” But I say kick it up a notch. After all, you have a captive audience and the old saying applies, Go big or go home!

When someone new gets on and chooses a floor, why not whisper under your breath, but loudly enough to be heard, “They’re pushing my buttons … They’re pushing my BUTTONS!”? Or perhaps you invite everyone to a pantie raid in your room later. If someone looks nervous, comfort them by saying something like, “Don’t worry. It shouldn’t get stuck for hours … again.”

Phoning The Front Desk

There is no law against asking questions and the front desk clerk is there to help you.

Start easy. Make it something reasonable to lull them into a sense of pride in their top-notch customer service.

“Hello, front desk? This is Mike in room 326. Can I get a copy of my receipt when I check out in the morning?”

The clerk will show the utmost in customer service and never give a hint that while they understand your question to be legitimate, they also believe you to be an idiot for not already knowing you can get a copy of your receipt at check out. Then you move into phase two.

“Hello, front desk? This is Mike again in room 326. Can I get that receipt in Braille?”

“I’m sorry,” they’ll smile from the other end of the phone. If you could see them, you’d notice the stink-face they are giving you. “I’m afraid we can’t print a receipt in braille. I didn’t realize you were sight impaired.”

“I’m not.”

“Oh. Well is there anything else we can do for you?”

“You can print my receipt in braille.”

Click.

Now you’ve properly irritated them and the game is on …

“Hello, front desk? This is Mike in room 326. Sorry to bother you again, but could you send up some soap made out of baby tears? The stuff in this bathroom smells like it was made with old man sweat.”

“What are you talking about?” They may or may not still be attempting to keep an air of hospitality, but probably not.

Now you raise your voice as if their incomprehension is due to the volume of the call.

“I SAID, CAN YOU SEND ME UP SOME SOAP MADE OUT OF BABY TEARS …”

They will interrupt. “This isn’t funny, sir. Please make no more calls to the front desk.” Click.

Now the apology … in a different accent.

“Hello? Theees eees Miguel een room Three Tweeeenty Seeeex. (Make sure to roll your R sounds.) Let me apologice for de rudeness uff my preeevious calls. One final quesschon.”

There will be a sigh from the other end. “Yes?”

“Dun you thin it would be nice to give blind peoples a receipt they can read?” You should be prepared to be asked to leave.

If you’re creative and don’t mind being called all manner of offensive names, you can definitely make your next hotel stay interesting. Just do me a favor, don’t tell them I put you up to it.

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The Stuff Wings Are Made Of

You might think this will be an article about either angels, spicy bar foods, or colorful cartoon ponies with tattoos on their butts. It’s possible you’re thinking it might have something to do with birds or flying comic book hero demi-gods, but you would be wrong. This article is about the very bestest, most super-duper experience a human being could ever have.

It’s about live theatre and the crap that goes on behind the scenes … IN THE WINGS!

It’s the stuff wings are made of and I have a long list of shows under my belt to pull examples from.

When I was a young’n, only knee-high to a grass hopper, my mama taught me how to perform for an audience. As a child, I was in the casts of shows like Oliver, The Music Man, Annie Get Your Gun, and a local kids troupe production of Hansel And Gretel in which I donned the costume of an enormous cupcake made of sponge foam. But as puberty reared its ugly white head in the form of, well … white heads, I became uninterested in stagecraft. There was a dark time in my early teenage-hood-dom when I yearned to ride around in a pickup truck while my life’s soundtrack blared into the wind, sung by Hank Williams, Jr. I hunted and fished and felt I needed to prove that I was a country boy who could survive. And no, there’s nothing wrong with hunting and fishing in my opinion, but it’s not the person I’ve proudly become. I left that behind me after seeing my first show on Broadway. I traded my fishing rod for the face mic I’d dropped at the foot of the stage door a few years before when I lost interest. I picked that mic back up, fixed it to my cheek with medical tape and haven’t looked back. Now my fondest of memories take place at the theatre. Some are tales of onstage moments, but some of the best are the things that happened offstage and in the wings.

People who have never been a part of the magic that is putting together a live stage show frequently wonder what it is that makes us "theatre people" so darn crazy about it. And they wonder why, when the run is over, our eyes fill with tears and we weep like babies that are being ripped away from the one that gave them life. Just in case you’re one of those people who wonder, it’s because we’re babies being ripped away from something that gave us life!

Theatre is a lifeline to most of us. It’s where we take our deepest breaths, even when the choreographer has danced our feet into nubs that feel like they’re crusted with push pins and our lungs are filled with glass. Even when the director has made us run the same scene eight hundred times because someone got the giggles and now the whole cast has the giggles and the director thinks there’s nothing at all funny about it. We hurt and we laugh until we can’t breathe and to us, it’s still the best air we could ever take in.

But once the show is ready, or nearly ready, and costumed characters are flitting about the area just beyond the curtain legs at stages right and left, it becomes a whole new deal.

The wings during a show is a world all its own. It’s a dark and crowded land floating somewhere between the reality of the world outside and the fantasy playing out just steps away across the sight lines on the stage.

We have our instructions and they’re almost always the same for every show. One of them is "Stay behind the sight lines." That’s the painted or taped line on the floor that marks the boundary that separates the stage the audience can see from the mystery of the wings. If you cross it, someone in the audience can see you and that’s a no-no. If you do so, it's possible that the ghost of Thespus, the man credited as being the first actor to deliver a monologue, may curse you with fumble fingers and you'll spend the rest of your life dropping your props onstage. Many times I’ve toyed with the stage manager as I awaited an entrance and teased them with a toe pushed vicariously close to the line. Stage managers reserve the right to rip your limbs from your body if you cross the line or break a rule and they usually don’t care for my monkey-like shenanigans in the wings. I can’t help it, though. I become a kid again when the show’s going on. It’s like Christmas morning and every reaction from the audience is a gift under the tree.

Once, when I and my cast mates were about to open the first act of Into The Woods, which is done by raising the lights on a stage full of frozen characters who come to life, section by section, as the narrator introduces them, I turned to the actress playing my wife just before we were to take the stage.

“Did I ever tell you about the time I peed on my leg?”

She started laughing and was nearly roaring by the time the story was all told, just in time for the call of, “places.” We opened the curtain and she was doing everything she could to stifle her laughter. But that wasn’t enough. Several years later, I was directing my own production of Into The Woods and the same actress was reprising her role as The Baker’s Wife. I was not The Baker this time, but imagine her surprise when one night I, as the director, sidled up to her just before the curtain opened and whispered in her ear, “Did I ever tell you about the time I peed on my leg?”

I got a good elbow in the gut for that one, but there was still a grin at the corners of her mouth.

By the way, now it’s a tradition of mine to ask someone that question at least once right before they go on, no matter what show we’re doing.

Anyone who haunts the wings during a show will tell you that at some point another actor waiting in the wings all the way across the stage will catch your eye and do something stupid. I like to aggressively lip sing whatever musical number is happening onstage like I’m a rocker screaming out my hit ballad at a concert. If I happen to be holding a prop (It was my fencing sword during a recent production of The Addams Family – The Musical. I was Gomez), I’ll wield it like a guitar and accessorize my performance from the wings with a sweet air guitar solo. The best application of this particular shenanigan is when there is a group of people watching from across the way and your entrance is so close that you have to immediately jump from the shenanigan to your character and enter the scene onstage without so much as a pause. That kind of timing takes practice and a level of experience best left to veterans.

There’s always the high note in passing. Allow me to set the stage for this one. (See what I did there?)

You have a few minutes before your next scene. You have to pee and you don’t want to create a funny story to tell people just before they go out onstage. Or maybe you’re making the trek from the dressing rooms to the stage for the pre-show sound check. Whatever the reason, there is a journey you are taking among the corridors of the facility and you see up ahead that you are about to pass a fellow cast or crew member. What are you supposed to do in regards to greeting as you meet? There is only one thing you can do. You both open your mouths wide in the most comically exaggerated way as possible and let out a soprano’s “AHHHHHH!” high note. You don’t have to be a soprano. You don’t even have to be able to sing. It’s just something you do and I’ll bet more actors than not have at least once in their lives participated in this literal right of passage. It’s most effective when both are in full costume and makeup.

There’s the poke on the shoulder of the unsuspecting actor waiting to enter the scene. You poke and quickly turn away as if a phantom pokester is afoot. They almost never fall for it and will probably employ the, Oh you! stare.

I love backstage tomfoolery, as long as it doesn’t affect the show going on. There are plenty of other examples to tell and I’m sure I will because I love this stuff.

Shenanigans are simply a part of life for some people and I'm one of those. After a while, I finally gave up on acting responsible and have accepted that there will always be a little impish influence in me that enjoys a good, unhurtful prank.

Annnnnnnnd BLACKOUT!

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Parents.

If you're not one, there's a good chance you had one or maybe even two at some point. As a child I wasn't as much like so many of my peers – always thinking about growing up and becoming a blushing groom; having babies and keeping myself barefoot and … drunk.

No, my childhood was spent in deep thought about how much mud pie I could eat without throwing up or if those orange coals in the fireplace would produce the delicious flow of juice it seemed they would if I dared to reach in and an squeeze one. (True story. I contemplated that frequently when I was a toddler during that growth era that biologists call, “The Stupid Phase”. It tends to last about 25 years for females and, sadly, the entire lifespan of the male.)

But then I woke up one morning and there was a four year old in my bed between me and an adult woman, digging her feet into my back far enough that I'm pretty sure her toes touched my belly button. And there was a thirteen year old male looming over me, saying, “Dad, I'm hungry.”

I'm Michael Blackston and you're about to get a glimpse into my funny, messy, life.

Dad. How did that word ever come to apply to me? While I try to figure that out, here are some stories that prove ...

Kids Equal Insanity.

I don't know if you've ever tried to speak rationally with a precious two and a half year old girl who has her heart set on something that can't be delivered at the moment, but if you have, you've experienced my horror. This story is called,

When My Daughter Cries (A Tale Of Trauma And Tragedy)

This is an account of the events that transpired on the morning of January 30, 2016

I think it would have been easier to spank her.

Now, regardless of your feelings on the whole spanking thing, you can rest easy in the knowledge that my two year old daughter, the apple of my eye - well, one of them -, did not receive a spanking. I think that in her eyes, the punishment she did receive was far worse. In the real world tick of the clock, the passage of the moment was swift, like the gazelle bounding happily along the savannah or the days between realizing you need to start shopping and Christmas Eve. But relative to the mind of a two and a half year old in pigtails, the hands of the clock stood still and eternity was at hand. My sweet, precious, screaming daughter was put in …

TIME OUT!

Perhaps we ought to step back into the past and let me recount the details.

It was a bright, sunny morning. Birds were chirping and the wind was singing a merry song through the empty limbs of the winter trees. Somewhere gazelles were bounding in the savannah and I had a slight inkling that it might be time to start developing a Christmas list, it being late January and all. It was the perfect day. That’s why she woke up earlier than we wanted her to. It was our idea that maybe, because she so very much despises waking to the weekly morning routine that takes her to daycare, she'd enjoy a little “sleep in” today. It is, after all, Saturday and people all over the world have been known to enjoy a few extra winks.

Being a phenomenal husband who deserves awesome Father’s Day gifts, kudos, pats on the back, and a Mustang convertible my wife lovingly tells me to “keep dreaming about”, I agreed to be the watcher of our daughter should she decide it was time to get up before my wife did. I would allow my bride to sleep in unencumbered. The usual routine is that we'll wake and do chores on Saturday mornings until the young one decides she'll be needy. At that point, my wife assumes the “HOOOOOOLLLLLDD MMMEEEEEE!” position, which allows me to continue with chores. It’s an efficient agreement and almost always works.

But this morning, upon rising like the sun – the hot, fiery, blazing, angry sun – our darling child desired cheese balls. Not only was she dead set on those crunchy, bite-sized pebbles of deliciousness covered in 100 percent natural processed cheese food powder, but she wanted them on her plush toddler couch, right in front of the TV in our bedroom. As you can see, this would throw a wrench into the whole leave mother alone to sleep in peace thing.

So, like the good father that I am, who deserves mom’s taco pie, a crossbow with laser arrows, and amazing pectoral muscles, I attempted to reason with the child.

“Your mother is trying to sleep in the bedroom. Let’s watch TV in the living room.”

The young one engaged in a sort of debate.

“NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO! MOMMY!”

“Mommy’s sleeping. We need to watch TV in the living room.”

“NOOOO HO HO HOOOO! I DON’T WANT TOOOOOO! I WANT MOMMY! I WANT MY CHEESE BAAAAAALLS!”

“I’ll give you the cheese balls, but you need to sit at the table.”

At this point, she employed the Shrill Screech Of Doom offense followed by throwing herself violently onto the floor and slamming her feet up and down repeatedly.

I made the bold decision to simply say, “Fine. No cheese balls; no TV.”

It was now necessary to find something to drown out the sound of the anger-squeals that were emanating from the lungs of my angel. If there were no cotton balls, perhaps something along the lines of rage metal played at the highest volume possible. (Eleven; one higher than ten.) Unfortunately, I don’t own any rage metal, so unless there were cotton balls, I was quite sure I would be shoving pointy sticks into my ears to deafen me permanently. At least that’s what a few of the neighborhood dogs I could see outside my window were attempting to do.

The beast had been told “no” and it was not pleased. I started to understand why I kept seeing a guy on the sidewalk across the street from the daycare wearing a trench coat loaded down with earplugs for a mere 20 dollars a set.

The problem with my sugar-pie-honey-bun-cherub-face is that once she has decided life has treated her unkindly, no amount of accommodation will work to ease her temper. I try not to spoil her, but as any present or former parent of a two year old will agree, they don’t understand logic yet. You can’t bargain and there's only so much you can do to assert your authority in a way that they'll get the picture and learn a lesson. I tried holding her and rocking her and humming the sweet melodies of Barry Manilow in her ear. None of that worked to soothe her. She was angry and desired only to make the local canines intentionally run into traffic. Our poor dog, Nessa, is fenced in our back yard, so she had nowhere to get away from the screams. I could only assume that the howls I heard from her direction were to be interpreted as something close to, “FOR THE LOVE OF ALL THAT IS HOLY, MAKE IT STOOOOOOPPPPPPP!”

I had no other recourse but to deliver the ultimate punishment for a child of two.

TIME OUT!

It involves a room adjacent to the kitchen, a single chair, denial of the opportunity to move from said chair for a period of time, and lots of ear piercing screams. I think I should've at least recorded it. I imagine a production company would love to have the soundtrack for horror movie projects.

It’s not just hard for the child, though. I hate the feeling I get when she begs and pleads to be relieved from her cell. She calls for daddy and I want to swoosh in like a superhero in a worn out t-shirt and those soft, comfy pajama pants too many people wear into Walmart.

But I can’t do that. I have to show resolve and dedication to her future behavior, no matter how much she cries.

Eventually the sobs turned to sniffles and the sniffles to silence. As I looked into the room at my dainty-sweetness-cutesy-teddy-bear-head, I could tell she still wasn't happy, but had given all she had to the cause and could scream no more. Tears still drizzled down her tiny pink cheeks and her bottom lip poked out and she clutched a decapitated Barbie doll tightly in one hand while the other hand held the severed head by the hair.

She’s so precious.

I asked her if she was ready to be a good girl and anticipated the adorable affirmation in a soft, tender voice that accepted me finally as the Alpha of the house.

That sweet voice simply replied, “No.”

Oh well, at least she’s not attempting a new world’s record for vocally produced decibel levels.

“Are you ready to get up from time out?”

She nodded yes and held up her arms. Barbie’s lifeless body dropped to the floor without a thought.

Yes, I melted and picked her up, hugging her tight and smelling her hair and tears and everything that’s great about a daughter still small enough to hold.

I kissed her cheek and whispered, “I love you.”

She took my face in the softest, most amazing little hands and replied in a likewise whisper, “I want cheese balls on my couch.”

Dear Lord, please help me.

The mind is a strong piece of equipment for some, while serving as little more than something squishy that rattles around inside the skulls of others. Sometimes a person may begin their adulthood as the former, but once children get involved, the squishyness starts to take over.

This is what I call ...

The Toddler Influence

I always knew that having children would change things. I always understood that my perception of reality might become altered because of my children based on the influences they would introduce into my life. But I never expected the degree to which this life alteration would occur and how it could impact my life so fully and insanely.

Any parent of a toddler will tell you that themes from children’s entertainment will invade your mind and will become part of your everyday life – earworms that don't just wiggle, but that burrow and nest in your brain like … well … worms. It’s a non-stop barrage of singing puppets and adults wearing costumes you just know they cast off at the end of the day in exchange for a bottle of something that promises anything but the expectation of counting to 10 with unbridled excitement.

I think, however, that maybe I’m an extreme case.

So as I mention the following moments that cross the line from the safe harbors of adulthood into turbulent waters where lie monsters – fuzzy ones with googly eyes who love cookies and want to be tickled, - ask yourself if you've ever been there too.

If I Had A Hammer…

My house has a junk drawer. Yours does too, you just might not call it that. It’s the drawer that holds everything you could need at a moment’s notice and everything you don’t know where else to place. Mine is a treasure trove that I frequently intend to finally organize but once I get in there, I say things like, “That’s where that went!” and suddenly I'm on a new adventure. It’s a hoarder’s gateway.

Mine happens to also be where I like to keep the hammer because people in the house use the hammer to hammer things that ought to be hammered. And the other day, I needed desperately to hammer a thing, so I went to find the hammer in its natural habitat, but it wasn’t there.

I break in to answer the question you might have in your mind right now, which is, “Why not keep the hammer in the tool cabinet in your utility room?”

I would first reply by shining a light in your eyes and asking what you were doing in my home and where did you hide the cameras. Secondly, I would point and laugh at you for such an absurd suggestion. The hammer all cozied up to the power tools, indeed!

Once I found the hammer to be missing from the junk drawer, I began my investigation in a calm and calculated manner. “WHO TOOK THE STINKIN’ HAMMER AND DIDN’T PUT IT BACK!?”

Unfortunately, no one else was in the house to answer my query, so I started a search using my powers of deduction. I looked all the places my wife might have used a hammer - her closet, her bathroom, the oven. No luck. Then I looked in all the places my son would have been: the Xbox. Not there.

I decided to take your advice and have a look-see in the cabinet where I store hardware and such. Just as I thought, you were wrong. It wasn’t in there.

I had one choice left. There was only one option that I could bring to mind that always seems to work when something needs to be done and you’re baffled. I opened my mouth and yelled …

“Oh TOOOOODLES!”

Nothing. I don’t know what I thought would happen. Certainly a person in his right mind shouldn’t expect a flying ball with mouse ears to swoop in to the rescue and open up to reveal a ball of twine, a balloon with a picture of a monkey on it, my hammer, and the Mystery Mousketool. There were no ears; therefore, I could not say cheers.

I gave up and banged the nail for my picture frame into the wall with the heel of one of my wife’s shoes.

That’s not the way it works, Einstein!

I was in Atlanta traffic one morning on my commute toward work in Alabama and I'd left too late to avoid the rush hour. Anyone who’s ever driven in Atlanta rush hour traffic knows that it can negatively affect your better senses anyway, so it should come as no surprise that having had to watch episode after episode of my 2 year old daughter’s favorite shows would be an issue.

It was the wrong time to have the issue as travelers on interstate 85 South at 7 am do not think you're cute when they want you to go because the traffic is finally moving and instead of pressing the gas, you begin hitting your thighs with the palms of your hands, saying, “Pat Pat Pat Pat Pat Pat Pat” faster and faster. It took a few seconds to realize that the horns blowing around me weren't the notes of a famous concerto and the gestures coming from the conductors in the other cars were not intended to lead the band.

I Math Not So Good

I’ve learned all the best places to stop and get stuff on my commutes, especially in the food area. I know the best places to stop for Philly Cheese Steak sandwiches whether I’m coming into Atlanta from Chattanooga or from Birmingham. I know great ice cream stops all over the southeast. I can tell you where to find the best Fettuccini Alfredo in the world made from scratch by an Italian immigrant; it’s in a small town in North Carolina. And from time to time, I want a doughnut. Or four.

I was just outside of Florence, South Carolina and I was tempted not only by the thought of Boston Crème, but I could also see up ahead that the light was ON! (If you don’t understand that reference, you’re not American and we can’t be friends. Not really, but ask and I’ll tell you and we’ll both be hungry for doughnuts immediately after.)

As I stood at the counter - you know, the one with all the doughnuts arranged with true artistry under thick curved glass (I assume the glass is so thick to keep people from being able to just bite right though and attack the donuts like rabid honey badgers), the attendant asked what I’d like. Because I haven’t been in a classroom for a long time now, because my son’s sixth grade mathematical nonsense is too out there for me to comprehend, and because I use only the artistic side of my brain to the point where the analytical side is rotten and smells like chitlins cooked the wrong way, I resorted to counting down my order like a purple vampire.

“ONE! ONE Boston Crème … AH AH AH!"

"TWO! TWO Raspberry filled … AH AH AH!"

"THREE! THREE REGULAR GLAZED … AH AH AH AH AH!!!!”

The clerk looked at me funny, but I returned her stare as if nothing were out of line.

“That’s only half a dozen,” she said through lips that had silver bars poking out of them. “For a couple dollars more, you can get a whole dozen.”

I didn’t know what to say. What a deal! I looked at the attendant, smiled, and exclaimed in a high-pitched voice ...

“Elmo LOVES a whole dozen!”

I joke to my mother that she chained me to the piano once a day and forced me to sing as she played. I tell her that's how I became an adequate singer. She didn't really do that, though. It was probably only every other day. Still, it built in me an insatiable thirst for an audience. So whatever you think of me after this next story, you have to understand that,

If Breaking Out In Song Is Wrong,

I Don't Wanna Be Right

Disclaimer: The teacher in this narrative was actually very kind and offered chairs that fit our butts perfectly. Also, no kittens or bunnies were harmed in the events that take place in this story.

During the intermission of a recent production I was awesome in, a few members of the cast were chewing the fat just behind the closed curtain. That’s just a figure of speech, of course, but since I live in the U.S. deep south, it wouldn’t surprise me in the least to find someone dressed as a birch tree chewing on a big ol’ slab of fatback in the wings. We happened to be only talking though, and someone brought up the subject of humorous things their kids used to do.

Being the kind of courteous listener who can’t wait for you to get finished so I can entertain you with my story, I interrupted some silly tale that probably included a toddler, a puppy, and kittens snuggling with bunnies. You can see that eighty times an hour on Facebook. AmIright or amIright?

For the betterment of the conversation, I turned the attention to an anecdote about meeeeeee … or, at least, about my son. In my defense, it was nearing the end of intermission, so there wasn't much time before the curtain opened. I could tell because the birch tree was licking his branch fingers over in the corner, which is usually the prelude to the Stage Manager saying, “Places, everyone.”

When my son was in first grade, the reality that there were lessons to be had in school set in and he decided he didn’t need no larnin’. At least, that’s the way we figured he saw it. In the eyes of his parents, our son must be slacking when he would come home and tell us he’d gotten in trouble again and had to move his monkey up to red.

“That boy is a no-goodnick!” I would shout in my best New Jersey old guy voice with my fist held high.

My wife was a little easier on him at first, but eventually saw things my way. “Ew does e fink e is, that uuuurchin?” she’d scream in a slum-cockney and shove him in the cellar with no second helping of gruel.

Oh wait … that’s just silly. I seem to have reverted to the script from Oliver. Back to MEEEEEE!

Actually, we pinned his daily reports to our mental corkboards under the He’s Just A Good Ol’ Boy, Never Meanin’ No Harm section.

But one afternoon, my wife received an email from his teacher, a lovely woman who was full of youth and vigor and breathless anticipation of the depth of good she would do for the minds of the children. That was until she met my son. The email requested a meeting between the three of us so we might discuss my son’s classroom interruptions.

Once more, I imagined my boy being somewhat of a scofflaw and I raged at the thought and turned from one side with my long, flowing hair cascading down my back to the other side, throwing my head forward and causing that same hair to tumble all messy around my face, a maniacal flare alight in my eyes.

Oops … Sorry. That’s David Hasselhoff in Jeckyl & Hyde.

Anyway, my wife came to me and told me about the meeting and I groaned like a kid who's just been made to come in for the night and all that’s waiting on his plate is broccoli. But we made the appointment and a couple of days later I found myself attempting to squeeze my butt into a chair the size of a shot glass. I assumed the teacher was making a power play as she sat back in her throne of cushiony comfort behind her desk.

She looked at me and my wife without blinking and asked, “So do you know why I asked you here?”

Now I was nervous and I shifted in my tiny chair. But because my butt was made for an adult sized seat, it popped off and went careening across the room toward a cage that held kittens snuggling with bunnies. I stood as fast as I could and jammed my hands in my pockets as if to say, See what I do to tiny chairs? The teacher was not intimidated, so I went to plan B.

“No. Why are we here?”

“Two things: First, Your son has been disrupting the class a lot lately and no matter what I try to discourage it, he just keeps doing it.”

“He’s been telling us about getting yelled at, but we figured it wasn’t a big deal if you weren’t contacting us.”

“Well now I've contacted you, haven’t I?”

I thought my wife might jump over the desk, I gave her the old clearing my throat sound and pointed two fingers from my eyes to hers, as if to say, I’m watching you.

She looked back at me and mouthed, “Whose side are you on?”

I asked the teacher what exactly he'd been doing.

“Singing,” she told us.

I wasn’t sure I’d heard her right. “Excuse me, singing? Did you say he’s singing?”

“Yes. We’ll be doing our busy work and there is to be no talking during that time. I'll be as quiet as a mouse in here when all of a sudden, he starts belting out a song.”

My wife and I looked at each other, then turned back to the teacher and asked simultaneously, “Is he on pitch?!”

She just stared through us.

“What kind of songs does he sing?”

“Showtunes.”

We smiled. We told her we’d have a talk with him and make sure he understood that he couldn't sing showtunes in class. We also explained that he got it honest and that by growing up with two parents who engage in arguments by acting out The Confrontation from Les Miserables, he’s just gonna break into song from time to time.

Before we left, I cleaned up the mess from the chair that went sailing across the room and my wife took a photo of the snuggling kittens and bunnies to put on her Facebook page.

As we were walking out, I turned back to the teacher.

“What was the second thing?”

“Oh yeah. He smells like fatback.”

“Theatre,” my wife and I sang in perfect harmony and waved goodbye with jazz hands.

As we stood behind the curtain waiting for the beginning of the second act and rolling what I’d just converyed around in our mouths to savor the delicacy of my story telling, no one said a word. I had dropped the microphone on our conversation just in time to hear the stage manager hiss at us, “30 SECONDS!”

I nodded and took my place in the wings at stage right to await my cue. My son was in the audience and I had to show him that it was okay to be someone who can’t hold in the music.

The curtain opened on Act Two and I was – no, we – were awesome.

I remember everything now about how I became a dad. I mean, I know HOW I became a dad, but I'm starting to think that sip of Rock and Rye I took for my cough just before bed may have been a little more than a sip. I'm not a drinker at all, other than medicinally, so it stands to reason that my tolerance for alcohol might be limited and, therefore, the reason that for a moment, I didn't remember anything between now and 1985.