Sunday, December 29, 2013
by Bob Niles
by Bob Niles
Oh Tannenbaum!
"If you're not doing anything! (and here, if I'm sitting in my underwear watching TV, I'm doing something) We had better do something about that 8 foot tree in the den, Honey!" My wife says as she heads out the door to work.
Now, focusing my superior intellect in what was just stated I surmise, that the 8 foot tree, is ole tannenbaum , and when she says we, she means me.
The very same tree that in years past we have gone to three different places for, before the right one was found. The tree we decorated, illuminated, irrigated and allocated so much time on, and for, has now become a burden, an unwanted eyesore, taking up room in what was once its place of honor. We...Me....I, have to get it out of the house! This visual stench, of what was once Christmas, evergreen splendor.
As a child, the tree was taken down every New Years Day. My parents, and here I mean my Mom, would de-decorate the tree, bobble by bobble. Painstakingly removing the tinsel, one by one, saving each piece for the next Christmas Tree. 'Waste not want not' She'd say, carefully placing each bright, limp, slender ribbon of silver over a cardboard card, which was then slid into its festive holiday box. My older brother told me that before I was born they would just have grandpa sneeze on the tree in place of tinsel. But, that it was proven to be unsatisfactory as soon as the Christmas lights on the tree began to heat up.
Once the tree was stripped of its holiday splendor, Dad would throw it in the trunk of the car, drive down the road and chuck it on the front lawn of the first neighbor that wasn't home. Problem solved! TA-DA
My problem at hand, I asked my neighbor with the pickup truck (thinking he might offer to take my unwanted prickly fire hazard) what he did with ole tannenbaum. As he cracked a beer he informed me his tree stayed up till Fathers Day. "Yup" Glug glug glug, "Leave er there till all the needles is gone. Then"...glug glug glug belch "Take er out back and save it for a fence post."
It was then I noticed that what he said was true. What remained of the few rotten four by four fenced posts, Christmas Tree stubs, in all their unholy splendor had intermingled their somewhat vertical lines to give a suggestion of horizontalness to its ten inch unpainted cedar slats.
"Make a day of it "Cranch! As he crushes the can, then tosses it into the back of the pickup. "Then if the weathers nice, every year the kids shave Dads back. Tradition! Get ready for the Summer. Don't want to gross people out now, do we?"
He then went on to talk of trucks that were monsters that were coming to town and something about other things as I stared at his fence posts wondering why I haven't noticed this earlier. I came to when something about crushing trucks.....no, trees, down near Steveston somewhere, "Thats what a lot of people do with their holiday fence posts." So, Steveston it is.
Now I thought I'd surprise the wife this year and have it done before she gets home. Before she climbs up on her box and announces "The holidays are over!" "You'd better get use to it!" "And don't you dare prove my mother right!" speech.
First, it's off with the lights that gave such a festive, warm glow to the room.
Then, the handed down bobbles of spun glass I lovingly remember as a kid. The ornaments the kids made so long ago in school are next. Memory after memory carefully placed in cardboard boxes that were never suppose to last this long. The once glorious tree, decked out in more bling than an MTV rapper, now stands naked as the day it pushed its slender stalk, through the rich dark soil of its mountain home. It's now garbage!
I throw the tree on the roof of the car. Tie it down with string that might not make it there without dissolving. All this then held together with knots placed here and there of equal inadequacy. "Who cares! " The tree fell off the car and rolled into someone's front yard. "OOOOOH!" Bit of the old man in me.
Well doggone it! The tree made it all the way there, to the 'How Much Wood Would A Woodchip Chip If A Woodchip Could Chip Christmas Tree Holiday Extravaganza'. Okay the title's made up, but it's fun to say.
I give the guy ten bucks, adding on to the ever growing price of a cut tree. He takes the tree and as fast as you can say Kris Kringle 'Brammmmp Ching Tinnngle' It's gone!
Wire, plastic and tiny bits of wood fly out the back end of the Log-O-Matic 3000 like they've been shot from a cannon
Surprise and anger alternate across both our faces. He starts off by yelling "How can you be so stupid!" And here when he says 'You' he means 'We'.Cause 'We', have just chipped to death one $300, 8ft. Blue Mountain Fir from Costco into shrapnel . "Can't you tell the difference between real and fake!"
"No 'We' can't," I counter, as I try to blend back into the crowd of curious onlookers that have come to see just what caused that noise.
"Did we .....FIND TIME......to take the tree down?" the front door says before my wife walks around it.
"Oh it's down alright honey." And when I say honey, I'm referring to a woman who is going to be a self made widow come next December when the truth be known about ole tannenbaum.
Bob Niles
bobby did this
Oh Tannenbaum!
"If you're not doing anything! (and here, if I'm sitting in my underwear watching TV, I'm doing something) We had better do something about that 8 foot tree in the den, Honey!" My wife says as she heads out the door to work.
Now, focusing my superior intellect in what was just stated I surmise, that the 8 foot tree, is ole tannenbaum , and when she says we, she means me.
The very same tree that in years past we have gone to three different places for, before the right one was found. The tree we decorated, illuminated, irrigated and allocated so much time on, and for, has now become a burden, an unwanted eyesore, taking up room in what was once its place of honor. We...Me....I, have to get it out of the house! This visual stench, of what was once Christmas, evergreen splendor.
As a child, the tree was taken down every New Years Day. My parents, and here I mean my Mom, would de-decorate the tree, bobble by bobble. Painstakingly removing the tinsel, one by one, saving each piece for the next Christmas Tree. 'Waste not want not' She'd say, carefully placing each bright, limp, slender ribbon of silver over a cardboard card, which was then slid into its festive holiday box. My older brother told me that before I was born they would just have grandpa sneeze on the tree in place of tinsel. But, that it was proven to be unsatisfactory as soon as the Christmas lights on the tree began to heat up.
Once the tree was stripped of its holiday splendor, Dad would throw it in the trunk of the car, drive down the road and chuck it on the front lawn of the first neighbor that wasn't home. Problem solved! TA-DA
My problem at hand, I asked my neighbor with the pickup truck (thinking he might offer to take my unwanted prickly fire hazard) what he did with ole tannenbaum. As he cracked a beer he informed me his tree stayed up till Fathers Day. "Yup" Glug glug glug, "Leave er there till all the needles is gone. Then"...glug glug glug belch "Take er out back and save it for a fence post."
It was then I noticed that what he said was true. What remained of the few rotten four by four fenced posts, Christmas Tree stubs, in all their unholy splendor had intermingled their somewhat vertical lines to give a suggestion of horizontalness to its ten inch unpainted cedar slats.
"Make a day of it "Cranch! As he crushes the can, then tosses it into the back of the pickup. "Then if the weathers nice, every year the kids shave Dads back. Tradition! Get ready for the Summer. Don't want to gross people out now, do we?"
He then went on to talk of trucks that were monsters that were coming to town and something about other things as I stared at his fence posts wondering why I haven't noticed this earlier. I came to when something about crushing trucks.....no, trees, down near Steveston somewhere, "Thats what a lot of people do with their holiday fence posts." So, Steveston it is.
Now I thought I'd surprise the wife this year and have it done before she gets home. Before she climbs up on her box and announces "The holidays are over!" "You'd better get use to it!" "And don't you dare prove my mother right!" speech.
First, it's off with the lights that gave such a festive, warm glow to the room.
Then, the handed down bobbles of spun glass I lovingly remember as a kid. The ornaments the kids made so long ago in school are next. Memory after memory carefully placed in cardboard boxes that were never suppose to last this long. The once glorious tree, decked out in more bling than an MTV rapper, now stands naked as the day it pushed its slender stalk, through the rich dark soil of its mountain home. It's now garbage!
I throw the tree on the roof of the car. Tie it down with string that might not make it there without dissolving. All this then held together with knots placed here and there of equal inadequacy. "Who cares! " The tree fell off the car and rolled into someone's front yard. "OOOOOH!" Bit of the old man in me.
Well doggone it! The tree made it all the way there, to the 'How Much Wood Would A Woodchip Chip If A Woodchip Could Chip Christmas Tree Holiday Extravaganza'. Okay the title's made up, but it's fun to say.
I give the guy ten bucks, adding on to the ever growing price of a cut tree. He takes the tree and as fast as you can say Kris Kringle 'Brammmmp Ching Tinnngle' It's gone!
Wire, plastic and tiny bits of wood fly out the back end of the Log-O-Matic 3000 like they've been shot from a cannon
Surprise and anger alternate across both our faces. He starts off by yelling "How can you be so stupid!" And here when he says 'You' he means 'We'.Cause 'We', have just chipped to death one $300, 8ft. Blue Mountain Fir from Costco into shrapnel . "Can't you tell the difference between real and fake!"
"No 'We' can't," I counter, as I try to blend back into the crowd of curious onlookers that have come to see just what caused that noise.
"Did we .....FIND TIME......to take the tree down?" the front door says before my wife walks around it.
"Oh it's down alright honey." And when I say honey, I'm referring to a woman who is going to be a self made widow come next December when the truth be known about ole tannenbaum.
Bob Niles
bobby did this
Thursday, December 19, 2013
It's Great to be a Guy!
It's Great to be a Guy!
HappppyNewwwwYearrrrr fills the entire room and what little gray matter I have left between my ears. All three hands on the clock incriminate 12 as the reason for all the hoopla.
The start of a new year, the chance to start anew. January the oneth.
Two minutes later I break my wifes new years resolution (for me) as I trace a line with my belt buckle all around the first three inches of the midnight Buffett. She decided one of my new year resolutions was to cut down on my calorie intake. Lose 30 pounds (if you speak metric it's like getting in the car and doing 50 kph which is 30 mph then just switch it to weight) she decided it would be one of my resolution for this year. I countered by promising never to eat more than I can lift at any one time, which my plate, at his very point in time is challenging me with.
Plate piled high, but moveable, veins in my forearms and forehead protruding, I carefully navigate toward a feeding area and trip over a sleeping grand kid. Second new year resolution breaks as I attempt to stay upright and verbally express my disappointment and shock as my first broken resolution, and grandmas, now broken, country estate pattern hit the floor. And then, the once sleeping angelic cherub, turns on me and announces that another Loonie was to occupy the potty mouth jar.
In my defense, it wasn't an adult swear word. I just happened to mention an immovable object that holds back water as my, not one, but three chins and midnight snack were hitting the floor. But, it's a word the grand kids had started to use as an adjective a little too often. Sometimes three to a sentence. So it came to be that Loonies would suffer in an air tight jar at the top of the shelf every time that word and certain other words were used.
Two new year resolutions down and the hands in the clock were closer together than my thumb and index finger. How many more resolutions would end on this night? How many we're there? She had made me a list but I had left it at home. That in itself could be a violation of a resolution.
I have come to believe that new year resolutions are a womens thing. Let's face it ladies if it were up to us guys we would just keep going wayward in all our bad habits.
We could be 30 lbs (again refer to my driving analogy) overweight, walk naked past a full length mirror, suck in our gut and with two fingers pointed at our reflection, like the bartender from The Love Boat, make a clicking sound between our teeth and gums and pity the poor woman who could refuse this.
If a guy ever starts to feel like he might be getting a bit too excessive in any one bad habit we just look for an example worse than ourselves and find comfort that we aren't as bad as 'that guy.'
And it doesn't even have to be the same fault! When a woman perceives herself overweight she is always jealous of skinnier women and will set goals to loose weight. With guys if, let's say, he's 30 lbs ( you've figured it out by now) overweight and might somehow feel less than perfect, he doesn't look at a healthier male as a goal but rather finds fault in his choice of vehicles to better his self image. "Phffft the guy drives a 64 split window Corvette. Thing has a huge blind spot!"
So what if you've gone from eye candy to eye broccoli!
Happy happy happy is the couple where the wife has dropped that girlfriend promise they all make to each other. "I'm going to change him"
You know that promise all you women make when you announce to your friends of your intended betrothed. "If he asks me to marry I'll say yes. Oh I know he's always kidding around, he's overweight, has no sense of style and his hair is a disaster but I promise you once were married I'll change him into the man I've always wanted."
And with the start of each new year you revisit that challenge you've placed on yourself by encouraging him to look inward and make a resolution to do better.
Or you take a more proactive approach and make him a list. It seems like the only day of the year it's appropriate. Oh sure you think a change is needed every time you look at him as he watches his Scooby-Doo cartoons. All in his sweat pants finery, with his matching ripped tee-shirt. That once crazy head of hair now all wispy and thin as it clings on, fights the good fight to remain on his head. And it's not like he can't grow hair cause now his back, ears and nose all support some sort of exotic growth. Well at least he doesn't laugh so much anymore. Life sorta solved that problem.
So ladies as you enter your 'Stop-n-Start' season, we on the sidelines wish you well. As you stop the many things you perceive in your life as wrong or bad, and start to do better in mind, body and soul go forth knowing we are somewhere behind you. We might notice your hair is cut different, or you've lost a few pounds or you've adopted a favorite frock rather than buy a new one.
We might.....Then again, we might not. But please forgive us we're men. This is a rough season for us as you go about trying to better with your life and us along with it. You go girl! Do your thing! But we're happy minding the small things that somehow take up our time.
Men take comfort as you watch the wife and her girlfriend power walk out of the driveway. They and many women like them all walking and jogging around the neighborhood while you with coffee and doughnut in hand survey their struggles from the comfort of your domain. To us January the oneth is college football, not a day to get all excited about changing things all around. Relax. Turn up the thermostat...oh poop! It's metric. Excuse me I've got to go to the car.
Bob Niles
bobby did this
HappppyNewwwwYearrrrr fills the entire room and what little gray matter I have left between my ears. All three hands on the clock incriminate 12 as the reason for all the hoopla.
The start of a new year, the chance to start anew. January the oneth.
Two minutes later I break my wifes new years resolution (for me) as I trace a line with my belt buckle all around the first three inches of the midnight Buffett. She decided one of my new year resolutions was to cut down on my calorie intake. Lose 30 pounds (if you speak metric it's like getting in the car and doing 50 kph which is 30 mph then just switch it to weight) she decided it would be one of my resolution for this year. I countered by promising never to eat more than I can lift at any one time, which my plate, at his very point in time is challenging me with.
Plate piled high, but moveable, veins in my forearms and forehead protruding, I carefully navigate toward a feeding area and trip over a sleeping grand kid. Second new year resolution breaks as I attempt to stay upright and verbally express my disappointment and shock as my first broken resolution, and grandmas, now broken, country estate pattern hit the floor. And then, the once sleeping angelic cherub, turns on me and announces that another Loonie was to occupy the potty mouth jar.
In my defense, it wasn't an adult swear word. I just happened to mention an immovable object that holds back water as my, not one, but three chins and midnight snack were hitting the floor. But, it's a word the grand kids had started to use as an adjective a little too often. Sometimes three to a sentence. So it came to be that Loonies would suffer in an air tight jar at the top of the shelf every time that word and certain other words were used.
Two new year resolutions down and the hands in the clock were closer together than my thumb and index finger. How many more resolutions would end on this night? How many we're there? She had made me a list but I had left it at home. That in itself could be a violation of a resolution.
I have come to believe that new year resolutions are a womens thing. Let's face it ladies if it were up to us guys we would just keep going wayward in all our bad habits.
We could be 30 lbs (again refer to my driving analogy) overweight, walk naked past a full length mirror, suck in our gut and with two fingers pointed at our reflection, like the bartender from The Love Boat, make a clicking sound between our teeth and gums and pity the poor woman who could refuse this.
If a guy ever starts to feel like he might be getting a bit too excessive in any one bad habit we just look for an example worse than ourselves and find comfort that we aren't as bad as 'that guy.'
And it doesn't even have to be the same fault! When a woman perceives herself overweight she is always jealous of skinnier women and will set goals to loose weight. With guys if, let's say, he's 30 lbs ( you've figured it out by now) overweight and might somehow feel less than perfect, he doesn't look at a healthier male as a goal but rather finds fault in his choice of vehicles to better his self image. "Phffft the guy drives a 64 split window Corvette. Thing has a huge blind spot!"
So what if you've gone from eye candy to eye broccoli!
Happy happy happy is the couple where the wife has dropped that girlfriend promise they all make to each other. "I'm going to change him"
You know that promise all you women make when you announce to your friends of your intended betrothed. "If he asks me to marry I'll say yes. Oh I know he's always kidding around, he's overweight, has no sense of style and his hair is a disaster but I promise you once were married I'll change him into the man I've always wanted."
And with the start of each new year you revisit that challenge you've placed on yourself by encouraging him to look inward and make a resolution to do better.
Or you take a more proactive approach and make him a list. It seems like the only day of the year it's appropriate. Oh sure you think a change is needed every time you look at him as he watches his Scooby-Doo cartoons. All in his sweat pants finery, with his matching ripped tee-shirt. That once crazy head of hair now all wispy and thin as it clings on, fights the good fight to remain on his head. And it's not like he can't grow hair cause now his back, ears and nose all support some sort of exotic growth. Well at least he doesn't laugh so much anymore. Life sorta solved that problem.
So ladies as you enter your 'Stop-n-Start' season, we on the sidelines wish you well. As you stop the many things you perceive in your life as wrong or bad, and start to do better in mind, body and soul go forth knowing we are somewhere behind you. We might notice your hair is cut different, or you've lost a few pounds or you've adopted a favorite frock rather than buy a new one.
We might.....Then again, we might not. But please forgive us we're men. This is a rough season for us as you go about trying to better with your life and us along with it. You go girl! Do your thing! But we're happy minding the small things that somehow take up our time.
Men take comfort as you watch the wife and her girlfriend power walk out of the driveway. They and many women like them all walking and jogging around the neighborhood while you with coffee and doughnut in hand survey their struggles from the comfort of your domain. To us January the oneth is college football, not a day to get all excited about changing things all around. Relax. Turn up the thermostat...oh poop! It's metric. Excuse me I've got to go to the car.
Bob Niles
bobby did this
Friday, December 6, 2013
Thursday, December 5, 2013
How Cold Is It?
How Cold Is It?
I've concluded my extensive scientific survey on how people are dealing with, or what they've experienced during this cold snap. When asked 'How cold is it?' I have found people to be very resourceful, observant and inventive in their pursuit of internal warmth.
The following are my observations.
It's So Cold.....
Religious leaders are worried. Congregation feels some things said about Hell are not really that bad.
Hitchhikers are holding up picture of thumb.
A flasher ran up to old Mrs Ferguson and described himself.
City Halls approval rating has spiked! From52% to 85% once the wind chill is factored in.
Teddy bears are being shoved from beds in favor of electric appliances.
Kids are playing outside only as far as electric cord will go.
I'm wearing so many clothes that when I slipped on the ice and fell over I had to wait for someone to roll me back home.
I eat all the wrong foods with the hope of heartburn.
I'm kissing people with the flu virus with the hope of coming down with a fever.
My grand kids thought I grew a goatee. Turned out to be frozen drool.
Groping on city busses is now accepted as long as your wearing woolly mitts.
Bedbugs promise not to bite as long as you let them cuddle in your jammies
Smokey the Bear grabbed a box of matches and ran into the forest.
Silly Putty turned serious!
P Diddy while visiting our fair city changed his name to Frozen P.
It's no longer the finger...I got the mitt while driving.
I went to shower....I got hail.
Firemen can't get to burning buildings. It seems crowds want to hang around someplace warm.
I won't drive my grand kids to school any more. I've decided they don't need an education.
I don't use my seatbelt in the car anymore. Who needs a belt when you're frozen to the seat!
I've found sitting on a smoldering compost heap is not that bad.
All the ornaments I've hung on the Christmas Tree have all crowed around the top to get warm from the glow off he star!
It's been so cold even Rob Ford's not blowing hot air!
Bob Niles
I've concluded my extensive scientific survey on how people are dealing with, or what they've experienced during this cold snap. When asked 'How cold is it?' I have found people to be very resourceful, observant and inventive in their pursuit of internal warmth.
The following are my observations.
It's So Cold.....
Religious leaders are worried. Congregation feels some things said about Hell are not really that bad.
Hitchhikers are holding up picture of thumb.
A flasher ran up to old Mrs Ferguson and described himself.
City Halls approval rating has spiked! From52% to 85% once the wind chill is factored in.
Teddy bears are being shoved from beds in favor of electric appliances.
Kids are playing outside only as far as electric cord will go.
I'm wearing so many clothes that when I slipped on the ice and fell over I had to wait for someone to roll me back home.
I eat all the wrong foods with the hope of heartburn.
I'm kissing people with the flu virus with the hope of coming down with a fever.
My grand kids thought I grew a goatee. Turned out to be frozen drool.
Groping on city busses is now accepted as long as your wearing woolly mitts.
Bedbugs promise not to bite as long as you let them cuddle in your jammies
Smokey the Bear grabbed a box of matches and ran into the forest.
Silly Putty turned serious!
P Diddy while visiting our fair city changed his name to Frozen P.
It's no longer the finger...I got the mitt while driving.
I went to shower....I got hail.
Firemen can't get to burning buildings. It seems crowds want to hang around someplace warm.
I won't drive my grand kids to school any more. I've decided they don't need an education.
I don't use my seatbelt in the car anymore. Who needs a belt when you're frozen to the seat!
I've found sitting on a smoldering compost heap is not that bad.
All the ornaments I've hung on the Christmas Tree have all crowed around the top to get warm from the glow off he star!
It's been so cold even Rob Ford's not blowing hot air!
Bob Niles
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