My Life As A Hobby

    Ah, Thanksgiving - the holiday built around gratitude, family, and if we are being honest, food. I could add football to the list, but most games on Thanksgiving are so dull they just hasten the inevitable post-meal nap.      It’s definitely an American holiday that’s based on abundance.  Every November, families gather around dining room tables that groan under the weight of golden turkeys, dressing, spiral ham, buttery mashed potatoes, and assorted homemade casseroles.     But lurking among these beloved dishes, hiding beside your mom’s mac and cheese and grandma’s field peas, are a couple of culinary outliers, foods that inspire grimaces not gratitude. Of course, I’m talking about  fruitcake and green bean casserole. If a Pilgrim wife had brought a fruitcake and a green bean casserole to the first Thanksgiving feast, the Indians might’ve killed them all on the spot.     Although they may be served with the best intentions, th...

      I’m going to do something I haven’t done in a long time, in fact, it’s been years. And to be perfectly honest, I’m not looking forward to it. Apparently, the situation requires it, and I don’t have a choice.     I’m going to wear a suit and tie.     We received a last-minute invitation to a hoity-toity charity event that contained two words which chilled me to the bone: “cocktail attire.” So, after about ten years, it’s finally caught up with me: I must don a suit and tie. Until now, I’ve managed to get through funerals and all kinds of social events wearing  a blue blazer, casual  gray slacks, and a polo shirt. Occasionally, I have gotten by with  wearing jeans, a tweed jacket, a black T-shirt, and sneakers - that comedy look. But not this time.     As a result, I’m scrambling through my closet, digging through old pleated pants and paisley ties like a squirrel searching for a buried acorn.     When you begin r...

      I’ll remember that day for a while, especially how fast everything changed. It’s still hard to believe that one minute I was in nirvana , and in an instant, it became purgatory . Let me explain.        I was on a jet ski , cruising on a lake at 40 miles an hour without a care in the world. Nothing but me, smooth water, a life jacket, and the high-pitched drone of the motor. Million dollar homes zipped by like dollhouses. I saw cliffs and trees that belonged on The Nature Channel . My world was perfect.     And then, in an instant, my placid, peaceful world vanished, not with a bang, but a whimper. Without so much as a warning, the jet ski suddenly stopped dead in the middle of the lake. More importantly, it refused to start again.      I felt betrayed because I’ve been good to that ski. I’ve changed the oil and kept it tuned. I’ve babied it on the water. It spent winters in my warm garage after I washed and waxed it. ...

Sometimes you just get lucky.  Recently, I was  asked to speak to a group of senior citizens who were participating in an event called the State Master Games - it’s kind of a senior Olympics. It gave me a chance to share some of my thoughts with them about aging.   These are some excerpts from my talk.  Some are humorous, some are insightful, and hopefully all of them will be entertaining. Here we go:  …What people our age are good at is going to the doctor and describing it to everybody else. If talking about doctor visits was an Olympic sport, everybody in here would be a gold medalist.  …I know I’m officially old now because I’ve started paying attention to commercials that I used to make fun of.  Like that Life Alert advertisement where the lady says,” I’m falling and I can’t get up.” I bet you I wrote 100 jokes for Jay Leno about that -  but now, when I see that ad I go,”Heyyyyyy! Think I could use one of those.”  …I keep trying, though....

        Pop! BOOM! Ohhhhh!     That, my friends, is the sound of two very distinctive holidays: the Fourth of July and New Year’s Eve.     Sure, we’ve got  more important ones. Like Thanksgiving, that glorious holiday of food, football, and silently thinking, “how can I be related to these people?” The thing most of us are truly thankful for is the sight of their relatives backing out of the driveway.     And of course, there’s Christmas, which isn’t really a holiday so much as a season, the season of overspending. Fun fact: the day after Christmas is a holiday that is quietly celebrated at Amazon headquarters. That’s when all their executives hold hands and sing “What a Friend We Have in Jesus.”     However, the Fourth of July and New Year’s Eve stand alone because they’re the only holidays we celebrate with fireworks.     I was about 12 years old when I was allowed to light real fireworks. Not those sissy ...