DIG THEY MUST!

10-27-13-Holbrook

The good doctor is in the hard hat

You remember that slogan by I think it was Con ED? ‘DIG WE MUST’?

Well tomorrow I go for a colonoscopy! Collaborating with me will be the good doctor, Dr. E. X. Cavator, who I know just like Dr. Strangeglove, and Dr. Haveaheart will do a fine job. Dr. Cavator is no stranger to the territory and has been digging up there for years. It seems like jury duty, he is summoned every three years and does a fine job. I have cautioned him that if he leaves any tools up there, they are mine. The only surprise is that my eye doctor, Dr. Seemore doesn’t assist in the initial look!

Is there someone BEHIND me?

Dr. Seemore

Dr. Strangeglove

The worst part of the whole procedure is of course the day before. That is when they give you that gosh awful stuff to mix with water and you force yourself to drink it down with six gallons of water all at once. Then the day of the procedure you do it all over again.

You really must qualify!

If polops were money, I’d be a rich man, as every time Dr. Cavator digs he finds more! So every three years he likes to add to his collection.

An alternate procedure?

Actually once you take that poison they prescribe, being hungry is not so important as making sure the toilet is always available at a moments notice. I get my exercise in, feel flushed after a while and wish only for a happy death.

Fortunately there will be football on all day and even a World Series game to take my mind off my butt, and off the fact that I am hungry. I have stocked to Sunday newspapers so I have a lot to read and of course, there is always Facebook to read and contribute to. I might even write another blogue or two to contribute to world opinion.

You Dear Readers: are very lucky that I bring you this information as a public service. If you are over 50 and have never had a colonoscopy, it can save your life, and here is the best part, it doesn’t hurt, there are no side affects and you walk out after the procedure itself, having the best sleep of your life.

As for Dr. E. X. Cavator, he has traversed where no man has gone before!

MY DEAR, WATKINS?

Mr. Holmes

The Scottish author and physician, Sir Arthur Conan-Doyle had a much different picture of his fictional character Sherlock Holmes when he created the detective so many years ago. A favorite of mystery readers, Holmes, who first appeared in publication in 1887, was featured in four novels and 56 short stories! In all the stories, he analyzed the crime, weighted the clues and questioned the suspects with a plan, unassisted by anyone but his sidekick Watkins.

Where's his pipe?

Today, there is a show on CBS called Elementary, a successful show starring: Jonny Lee Miller and Lucy Liu. It is about a modern day Sherlock Holmes and his faithful partner Watkins. BOOOOOOOOO!

Having watched the show a few times, it has left me with sense of wanting more than they can come across with. It seems to me that reading the old verses watching the new, my imagination did a better job! It is the old problem of seeing it in my mind first then seeing it on the screen where I become disappointed. In my mind, I can relate a rainy day or fog, or even the streets of London having been there before.

That's better

On the TV version, they do what everyone else does, using the same confusing techniques and with a little sexual tension, a click or two and they have a data base, or report of some kind, and the assistance of the local and international police forces, and all their computers to find who the killer is. They use a team of forensic experts and the use of photography, fingerprinting and lab tests, along with the coroner’s office, a cell phone and don’t forget texting to help solve the crime.

Years ago, Holmes did it all by himself. One man and not a moment too late solved a crime. There was no sexual tension, and although Sherlock was full of himself, he deserved to be, he was a master.

WHATkins!

When you looked at Watkins, you saw a mustached gentleman in his sixties, a bowler’s hat capped askew on his head, waiting on Sherlock and his great probing and deductive reasoning mind. He was always stating the obvious or thinking within the limits of an ordinary mortal. And today’s Watkins? She is a beautiful Asian woman, with a name like Watkins! I think they should have called her Schneider or Feinstein instead.

Today, if the TV version of the detective were to approach the book version, he would be waiting all day in the book version’s waiting room, hoping for an appointment. Let’s face it, the TV version has all these writers sitting around putting this story together, when between patients, Dr. Conan-Doyle wrote by himself, alone, and without spell check!

Leave it alone!

My point is this: Why oh why do you need to take a classic like Sherlock Holmes, and think you are being clever by remaking it? I have yet to see a classic turned into a modern day version and think it was better than the original.

If you disagree with me, you can send your comments to the website for universal health care, just go to the tab marked Holmes and type in your complaint about all this and you can use a pull down menu to select a dirty filthy name to call me!

After all, it IS elementary!

MIGHT AS WELL JUST PACK IT IN

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There is nothing left for me. Nothing. This morning I was greeted by TLW (The Little Woman) and she had news for me.

“I got an email from Apple yesterday telling me there is an upgrade to the I-pad!”

Trying to find my way at the early hour, I continued to listen.

There she sits acting important on her I-pad!

“So I did it myself, you don’t need to worry about it. I went into settings. I was very easy, and I’m sure you can do it!”

Me: “Well if I can’t, I’ll call you.”

She then began to tell me how and what and why, all I needed was her to wipe my chin and I would be finished.

And so another thing in life of my self-importance is swept away.

So where do I go from here? What is left? Do I go and find a park bench with a cup of tea and watch the world go by? I’d go visit my 95-year old mother, but she has a boy toy, I could go for a walk, but I’m afraid someone will want to help me cross the street. Maybe I’ll take up smoking, say cigars. With a cigar I can wear a pinky ring and look important. Maybe I’ll even add a tie and really look the part. But of course if I look too important people might hit me up for money!

I still take out the garbage, that must count for something?

HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO MY BEAUTIFUL NEIGHBOR
 Allison Rothar-Ignelzi

IT’S A CAR, NOT MY SHORTS!

A young TLW

The other day TLW (The Little Woman) and I drove to have our ritualistic Sunday morning breakfast using my car. If anything TLW is astute and can immediately recognize a flaw or two of mine and point it out.

“You really ought to get this car cleaned at the car wash,” she said as I immediately felt bad, self-conscious and guilty, and it wasn’t even 7:15 am yet.

“Yup, I oughta, you want to use your car?”

“No, just saying. Good thing you didn’t drive using this car to Albany!”

“Why? No one would be riding outside the car, just in it!”

If there are two things TLW knows it is: shoes, her dad worked for Thom McAn Shoes and washing cars, her mom was the master at it. You see it wasn’t the results her mother got, no, and it wasn’t how long it took, no it was something else. It was how she did it!

A great storyteller!

My mother-in-law would never live in a desert or very dry area of the world because the rain was so important. Whenever it rained, my mother-in-law Helen would go out in the rain and wash her car. Her car was particularly clean in the spring around April and in the fall about October! Her theory was why go to a car wash or use a hose when the rain would do just as well, thank you!

Being how she was a popular lady, knowing all of East Islip, she would often be seen washing her car on the corner of Third Avenue and Union, a very busy thoroughfare! It seems that when she passed on, they had to close the local A&P because they all knew her, loved to talk to her and probably caused long lines at her checkout counter as she chatted with a Mrs. Flattery or Finnegan or Murphy or even O’Brien. If her children wanted to talk to her they had to buy something and get on line just like everyone else, including daddy!

So it was indeed a problem for TLW to know her dear sweet mom was in a raincoat washing her car in the rainstorm on a major corner for the world to see! It was one of life’s better lessons, one of frugality and economics.

My mother-in-law was a very smart woman, a social butterfly and always busy as a bee, she took nothing in life that wasn’t hers and yet could I imagine her giving it all away! I see a lot of TLW in her mother, and I know that her mom give her a lot of herself in so many ways, just not when it came to washing her car.

So like wives everywhere, she always wants her husband to have a clean car and clean underwear! One out of two ain’t so bad.

VEGETARIANS

The other night I made a really nice dinner of pork chops and a baked potato. The reason I mention that is because #2 Son happened to be around and is a vegetarian, and TLW (The Little Woman) likes to watch her weight, as do all women it seems.

The pork chop I made with a sherry that had a very nice taste to it that I have to reconstruct from memory, because I cook on the fly. I have been doing this for years. My feeling is after all these years of cooking, visiting restaurants and seeing cooking shows, your mind doesn’t really need recipes anymore, but common sense.

Anyway, back to the dinner and the family, I made this potato where I micro waved for 10 minutes 2 punctured Russet potatoes and then scooped out the potato but kept the shell of the skins. I added sour cream, about two healthy large spoon sized scoops, chopped scallions a little white pepper and some chopped black olives, mixing it all together after mashing with a fork the scooped out potato. I put the mixture back into the potato skins and then covered it with a healthy dose of Mexican four blend cheeses, and baked it in the oven at 350 degrees for about 15 to 20 minutes. Needless to say it was very tasty.

By this time as I sat down to eat with TLW, #2 son who never eats with us decides to sit and watch – our potatoes! TLW looks at #2 and says: You want half of my potato, and of course he says yes.

My potato is still sitting on my plate and is a thing of beauty, as I admire it’s size, textures and dreamy creamy taste it will soon demonstrate on my pallet, no one is getting this baby, no sir!

As I dig into the skin and scoop out a fork full of potato, it doesn’t disappoint, and I vow once more: no one is getting this baby, no sir!

#2 has by now emptied his plate and is casting occasional glances at my plate and the potato in particular. As I eat my pork chop I start to notice this, and the fact that no one is getting this baby but me, no sir!

I thought that when Happy my cocker spaniel died, there would be no more begging at the table, that I would be eating full meals once again. I can’t stand it anymore so I ask: You want the rest of this?

And so once again, along with my salad, goes my potato to the vegetarian. Thank God he is, that pork chop was going nowhere, no one was getting that baby, no sir!

But you never know.

UPSTATE NEW YORK VISION

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Recently I drove up to Albany New York and had the most enjoyable drive, watching the scenery turn from green to majestic colors such as: gold, orange yellow and even browns. It is the face of Mother Nature at her most beautiful.

It is also a trigger for the season ahead, as we come to autumn and the winter cold. Fortunately for me I love the changing seasons. And would not want to live in a Floridian climate all year long. The weather has an effect on me that changes my personality and attitude about life. It is the season when the trees and grass, plants and flowers all die: that I get reborn!

As a child into early adulthood, I would read about the early settlers and the lives of those early New Yorkers before we were a nation, and to see some of the towns I pass and it is thrilling to be in a sense: part of history.

One year I was in Niagara, staying in a hotel for a meeting scheduled for a long weekend and got up early. Being I couldn’t sleep and too early for breakfast, I decided to take a walk around the town and see some sights without hindrance of traffic or people.

As I found my way around, I came to this nicely manicured walkway along a stone building and realized it was a Catholic church. Curious and because both my mother and TLW (The Little Woman) would put a wooden spoon to my head if I didn’t know what church it was, I looked for a sign and found one. “Saint Mary of the Cataract” it said. I thought that perhaps the Catholic Church was exhausting ideas for names, since I know they already used up “Our Lady of the Snow” and my idea: The Church of the Holy Mackerel would probably not be used. Why would you be using someone’s eye issues and naming a church after it?

Walking back to the hotel, I noticed a sign in a store window about the cataract, and this was beginning to alarm me, as all I could picture was someone with a huge lump in their eye walking around bumping into people and we all needed to watch out for him! I wondered what the optometrists were getting in these parts of New York State?

Then like a vision (clear of cataracts) I must have been visited by who else but: St. Mary of the Cataract, enlightening me as to what a cataract really was! A waterfall, such as Niagara Falls, is a cataract. It now made sense since the main ballroom at the hotel was also named the Cataract Room, and thank God, not an examination room or special room for people with cataracts!!

TIS DA SEASON

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Yup, it is creeping up on me and will soon bite me on the ass!

It is the time of year when we close down the summer and fall and enter the Holiday Season, right before winter! There are five seasons, as you know: Winter, spring, summer, fall and holiday.

Immediate and in front of our nose is Halloween, the season that comes to via the witches, ghosts and retail. It is funny how the holiday will start out religious and end up in retail (See Halloween and Christmas)! Then there are the Government holidays of the 4^th of July, all followed by retail support, stores open until midnight. And who is the holiday you celebrate for? Why the retail stores that drag their workers in to work, and you to shop, creating stress for everyone who needs time off to celebrate, decorate and even plan a get together or two. Then how can we forget Memorial Day, it should be a solemn day of rememberance, instead we celebrate and shop once again, our capitalist culture taking over!

The latest thing is to decorate your home with a Halloween flag, to go with the lawn decorations. This also means you have to remember: get candy for the little monkeys that show up at the door, put up with the parents who interrupt your supper while they send their little brats to your door and stand watch waiting for you to comment on how cute they are in their costumes, and the costumes of the kids. They usually stand in the street with strollers, come in packs, people who I never saw before, all smoking while the kid knocks on my door and just stands there looking at me. If the kids are driving to my door themselves, as long as they don’t park on my lawn I will give them a treat, if not I reach into my candy bowl and quickly shove it into their little bags and pretend I gave them something. What I don’t give I save for myself!

There are two days I pray for rain: 4^th of July and Halloween. The harder it rains the better, why, so I’m not annoyed by the constant din of fireworks or interruptions of knocking on my door! Yes, I’m getting old and mean.

Besides, my parents never followed my older sister (much older) Tessie or me around when we trick or treated in Brooklyn. My costume was home made and I was usually armed with a chalky sock to fling against someone, especially if they wore black that day. When we yelled: Trick or treat, we meant it. Not only did we ring one doorbell, we rang them all, three stories of apartments needed to answer and respond kindly, or else! The one thing my older sister (much older) Tessie and the older kids taught me was to never ring a doorbell of someone you knew, because if they didn’t come across, and we tricked them, it would get back to our parents where the trick would be staying alive!

 

So I leave you with this: Have a happy holiday season as it starts soon, don’t get grouchy like me and if you are smart, don’t answer the door on Halloween, because

the kids of today won’t do anything, they don’t want their store bought costume to get dirty. This leaves you with more candy you can either eat or save for next year!

CAN I JOIN?

I recently got a text message from an Internet friend whom I never met before in person. It read: “Good morning! I’ve been thinking (don’t be alarmed it’s all good!) I want to start a Del Broccolo Fan Club! A place where all of us who read and look forward to more entries can join together. What do you think???”

The message was written by Linda K. Walker that you see pictured. Now Linda and I are friends on Facebook, because of a mutual friend we have.

Now many of you are thinking: Sure, that’s all he needs: encourage this nut. Maybe some of you are thinking: What was SHE thinking??? Maybe some think I wrote this myself. That was the immediate response I recieved from some of my associates in an Italian restaurant called Dominic’s on Arthur Avenue in Little Italy in the Bronx, when I first discovered it on my cell.

TLW (The Little Woman) returning from church where she prays for world peace, end of hunger and the saving my soul, all major improbable events, was greeted by this news. Looking at me like I have two heads and wondering why this would ever happen, then did the logical thing, she asked who and why.

I explained and then she followed up with another question: “What was your response?” I replied: “Gosh! Can I join?”

People, the time has come, why are you all so skeptical? Just think of it, like a colony of lepers you can take comfort in numbers. Now I don’t know what the number will be but I think it is all the way up to two, and if Mom had a computer and Facebook, maybe as high as three!

If anyone IS reading this and decides to respond, please keep it clean, I’m thinking of getting Mom a computer and a Facebook account. I need the numbers.

STRANGE IN THE NIGHT

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Twice a year I go up to Albany NY for a convention, meet other agencies and share information or strategies while dealing with the future and NY State. There is the Fall convention in late October and a Spring convention in late April. In the fall we stay at the former Crowne Plaza, now the Hilton Albany. This particular hotel has a rather nice large indoor pool and two of my associates from the Suffolk Chapter of the NYSARC umbrella organization will meet in the early morning before breakfast and take a dip in the pool.

There is Jim our president of the board, and Ken like myself a former president of the board, two guys I would do anything for because they are good people with the same passion I have, the agency and Arthur Avenue in the Bronx, or aka Little Italy.

However today’s story is focused on the life of these two gentlemen and swimming early in the morning which we all know is sick, crazy and not a good idea.

The day we arrived, the two gentlemen arranged to meet in the morning at 6:30 am to go for their swim.  They would meet at the pool, swim, then shower and come to breakfast. Very nice.

The next morning I having my priorities straight and in order am eating my breakfast, a rather nice affair of apple juice, buttered bagel, scrambled eggs and bacon with hash browns. Who shows up but Jim.

Good morning Jim, how was your swim?

You better ask Ken about that.

Why, did you lose your string in your bathing suit?

No.

Did Ken lose his?

No.

Who shows up next but Ken.

Good morning Ken, I heard you had quite a time swimming this morning.

You know DelBloggolo, you know this electronic stuff better than I do, you ought to come up to my room 218 and show me how to set the damned Timex clock!

Why?

Well, I set the clock for 6:20, the clock rang this morning and I jumped into my bathing suit and went to the pool saw a sign that said the pool wouldn’t open until 7:00 a.m.! So I called Jim and told him the pool wasn’t opening until seven.

Jim adds the fact that his phone rang at 4:20 am to hear Ken say the pool doesn’t open until seven, looked at his clock and said: “OK”.

Then Ken adds: Then I get on the elevator at 4:30 in the morning in a bathing suit and no shoes with a flight attendant. What was SHE thinking?

Good question Ken, what was she thinking????

OWWWWWWWW!

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I was perusing through Facebook one morning and came across the photo you see. It is of my great niece ALEXA MARIE, and as you can see she is a beautiful child with the greatest dimples you could probably have. She is the daughter of Sarah and Alex Pombano. It got me thinking way back.

Many years ago, when I use to visit my Aunt Tessie and Uncle Joe in Patchogue, my aunt always greeted me rather enthusiastically.  Apparently as a small child I had dimples and big puffy cheeks, and upon entering her doorway, I would always brace myself for the inevitable: a bite on the cheeks! God how I hated that!

Aunt Tessie was my mother’s sister and Uncle Joe was my father’s brother, and every once in a while we would go to Patchogue on a Sunday and visit them. I would enter and she would wait for when I wasn’t looking and pounce on her unsuspecting victim, taking her teeth right to the edge of removing a chunk of cheek, leaving a temporary impression that I could feel for a few moments after she did her work.

She was a loving person, who was always happy and laughing, she adored children and talked about 90 miles a minute. We actually have a successor to her in my bby sister Mary Ann, who can talk wallpaper off a wall, a statue off a pedestal and a body out of its grave! That too, was Aunt Tessie!

Although I always loved my aunt, I did hate her for a few moments of each greeting, and she would plan her attack deliberately and enthusiastically, devil may care, saliva and all!

And so, when I see little Alexa, I just may get my revenge on her, she sure has the cutes and the cheeks!

CAN FALL 2014 BE FAR BEHIND?

The other day I was watching the TV morning news, when suddenly it broke away for a commercial. Now this was October 15, so Halloween has not arrived yet, and what do I see, but the Rockettes of Radio City Music Hall. And what are they selling but the Christmas show! I have seen the boxes of Christmas and Holiday cards in Wal-Mart back in August as they were planning their space for the holiday rush.

I can’t blame anyone for getting excited about the holidays, especially when there is such terrible news all the time. The guns killing, the rapists and the politicians, all spewing their evil as they do all year long, we can all use some joy in our lives.

As a child, growing up in Brooklyn the holidays meant Christmas. All I knew was that I was going to get a present, that I needed to express out loud that desire and it would become a reality brought to me by the unreal Santa Clause. For all you adults reading who believe in Santa, disregard the last sentience.

 

The whole world was transformed immediately after eating the last morsels of Thanksgiving dinner. It started on the radio with the playing of Christmas songs on the Arthur Godfrey show, and continued throughout the day with a jaunt on Broadway under the el where the stores would decorate, toy stores in particular with a train set that my mother had difficulty pulling me away from as I dreamed against the glass partition that separated me from the dream.

In Our Lady of Lourdes School, the pastor: Father Lacey would visit each classroom and give a little talk not more than 5 minutes and distribute a box of candy, hard sugar candy that had a little white string on it and was gaily decorated with red and white striped candy inside. This was a traditional occurrence.

Perhaps the best memory was when Mom shopped for the Christmas dinner. In those days there were not too many supermarkets and everything was sold in a mom and pop store. Vegetables by Sloppy John or Louise, butcher shops and bakeries all were the source of our food supplies and helped foster the spirit of the holiday. Coming in from the cold and into a bakery, with the bread fresh out of the ovens, or standing in the cold picking over the vegetables and fruit, we had brown paper bags filled with the goods that meant the holidays were here.

The anticipated fish dinner of Christmas Eve and the get together of family heightened the excitement of it all. Then came Christmas Day, and my older sister Tessie (much older) and I would be up at the crack of midnight, (we weren’t waiting for dawn with our presents in the house) chased back to bed by Mom as she returned form mid-night mass and then her giving up even trying.

Of course the Church had a hand in it too. Yes, they pulled me away from my stuff and made me sit in church for an hour when all I wanted to do was be home and playing. Getting all dressed up for Mass, we trudged off to church in the cold wintry morning, the sun out but not helping much and into the huge church going to our assigned area and sitting through the rituals that made it all possible, but for a 7 year-old, unappreciated.

I’M ANDROIDABLE

It must be a cloudy night!

Androidable
That's what I are,
Unavoidable
Tho' near or far.
Like a phone of love that rings on me,
How the thought of it does things to me.
Never before
Has something been more...
Androidable
In every way,
And forever more
That's how I'll stay.
That's why, darling, it's incredible
That something so unavoidable
Thinks that I am
Androidable, too.
[interlude]
Androidable
In every way,
And forever more
That's how I'll stay.
That's why, darling, it's incredible
That something so unavoidable
Thinks that I am
Androidable, too.

Please allow me to give you some background.

My cell phone is on a mission along with my GPS AND my laptop, I-pad and Kindle to put me in an early grave or have me committed!

The Macaroni Man

I got a text message from my nephew, the Macaroni Man and in the message was a photo of two newspaper headlines 4 years apart saying the same thing. “A STAR IS BORN” it reads about a past NY Jets quarterback and the current NY Jets quarterback. I answer it in kind with sarcasm.

Then a few hours later I get another text with the same thing. This time it is from #1 Son (Anthony).  I think nothing of it and continue on my way.

#1 Son

Another text comes to me and it is asking me what I’m doing on this day and I answer that I’m going to a wedding. Who’s wedding is the next question to me. I think it strange why the Macaroni Man would want to know that, but I don’t answer right away.

Another text and this one says: “Why are you keeping me in suspense?” I decide to answer, even though I’m thinking it’s none of the Macaroni Man’s business. I write: We are going to a wedding for one of Aunt Ellen’s friends from work” I get one more text, and this time it says: “Why are you calling my Mom Aunt Ellen?”

Yes folks, I was answering the wrong person with two identical text streams to me, mistakenly thinking one was the other. As I told my son, I’m getting too old for these fancy new gadgets!

THE BOW TIE MAN TIES THE KNOT

Mr. and Mrs. Paredi

When their ship pulls in and docks, they will have returned from their honeymoon, a cruise to celebrate their recent union. They will be Mr. and Mrs. Bow Tie! Lenny (The Bow Tie Man) and his newly minted lovely wife Danielle, begin life as one.

I witnessed their dying minutes of being single, and the immediate chaos of being just married. After a ceremony at the church where B.T. ushers on Sunday, off they went to have their pictures taken and then a celebratory reception at the Mediterranean Manor in Patchogue.

If you read my June 18, 2013 Blogue about the production ‘Spelling Bee’ then you know Matthew Paredi, Lenny’s younger brother, who filled another roll in the wedding party just as he is on stage: Best Man.

The reception had to be one of the most pleasant receptions I attended in a while for someone other than family. Together with Corinne and Doug, Pat (The Princess of Foxwoods Points), her husband Bill, Toots II  (Lois) and of course; TLW (The Little Woman) representing the Wanna-Be-Bank & Truss Company, we enjoyed the cocktail hour and the reception amid some craziness and laughs. I think it is a fun group, and I always enjoy myself when they are around.

Aside from the fact that we were at our own table, and having too much fun, the food was very good, and so was the music, as Lenny The Bow Tie Man has taste in music that ranges from dead people’s music to the latest steps in R&R in today’s young population. His family is very warm and friendly enjoy and love each other and seem to have a knack for entertaining their guest.

I had only one complaint, and went to the source of my unhappiness, The Bow Tie Man.

I walked toward the happy couples table as they were enjoying their evening, and tapped the groom on the shoulder.

“I have a complaint!”

Looking up at me like he just spotted rainclouds at a picnic, he asked what the matter was.

“The pasta was not bow ties!”

“Will this go in your blogue?”

“I’m sorry.”

And so, a wonderful Sunday afternoon was spent at the expense of someone else’s freedom, a lovely loving couple and their families. The reception was done in very good taste, fun and a beautiful hand-painted glass was a gift for each couple, executed by the bride, the lovely Danielle!

ANOTHER BITES THE DUST!

The rate of attrition for single men is very high, as TLW (The Little Woman) got my suit back from the taxidermist (She’s pre-paying my funeral) and told me I have to wear it today for another wedding. I actually like to go to weddings, I find them amusing, and usually the food is good to great, I get to dance with my favorite gal and see family and or friends.

Many years ago weddings were a little different, especially if you were Italian and poor. I know you have all heard of Italian Football Weddings, and I remember only one but it was interesting.

A Gombah (friend from my grandmother’s home town) from Hull Street, Brooklyn had a daughter who married this fellow and I was chosen as their flower boy. This meant they got me a white tuxedo and made me go down the aisle with a flower girl. This was un-nerving since I was mistakenly led to believe it was my wedding, and although the flower girl was pretty, I didn’t know her name, and thought for sure my mother was looking to get rid of me at 5 years of age.

The bride was absolutely beautiful, and a sweet woman who always greeted me kindly. It was a particularly nice family, with her 2 brothers and great parents. The groom scared me, since he was the first person I ever saw with a moustache!

I remember the wedding band, a rather elaborate large grouping of about 10 men, all dressed up like me and their trumpets blaring with little hats to modulate the music being played. It got my interest up as I stood in front of them and watched with fascination. Then the dancing started and I first heard the Tarantello Napolitan as the bride in her long flowing gown without the train danced across the floor, sparkling with her new husband.

But the best memory was of the stacks of sandwiches, all wrapped in white paper, maybe 50 to 100 of them on two or three trays, and someone tossing them to someone else. Don’t forget I was 5: so much of it is sketchy now. I do remember that you had choices of sandwich but what the choices were I don’t remember.

After the wedding, I would go to the mother and father’s apartment, ringing the doorbell on a Sunday morning and announcing in half English and half Italian that I was here for some parsley. They lived 2 flights up, so I would ring the doorbell and they would answer from their open apartment door, laugh at me and invite me up. Once in the kitchen, I had to eat a meatball before I could go home with the parsley! But I would always go and ask if I could see the wedding picture they had on their dresser in their bedroom. They’d say sure and off I’d go, and staring at the picture of me with that flower girl!

And so today, October 13^th, I am off to a wedding of one of my blogue readers Bow Tie Man and co-worker of TLW from the Wanna-Be-Bank & Truss Co., and his bride Danielle as he walks the last mile as a  free man.

AM I WRONG?

OK, they spend a fortune to get elected, we send them to Congress, and they shut down the government. Am I wrong but weren’t they supposed to run the government as representatives of the people?

I hate politics and Congress in particular, not found of the occupants of the White House, but don’t feel they are doing a terrible job. I decided long ago that branding myself a Conservative or Liberal will only trap me into other’s beliefs and then having to support some issues I don’t agree with.

The shutdown we experience every time there are disagreements near budget times is basically our own fault. We put these same jerks back into the same positions and after a while, they feel they know what is best for you and me, not what we want or need.

Holding services hostage is outrageous, taking away functions of government is criminal, withholding pay of government workers is sinful. Who is really doing this? Is it the Republicans or is it the Democrats. Depending on your alignment, you blame one or the other. I think that is wrong, it is our fault! We are holding the government hostage, we are all accepting of the idiocy of our elected representatives. These are the same people that insist of spending beyond the means of reality, that support guns in the face of senseless murder by crazies who get the guns, it is the fault of we the people.

What we need is a movement that demands better from those who run. They should be paid enough money to pay bills and raise a family and nothing more. Those that do get elected should be dedicated to service, accountable and their terms limited to one three year term only. Maybe with these kinds of rules, there won’t be any more politicians, and then we have what we have now, without the cost or aggravation that comes with these bastards.

Might be the man!

PLAYING ON CONCRETE

Recently, the US Postal Service was about to issue a postage stamp, which was in conjunction with the First Lady’s campaign to get kids to exercise more. The stamp depicted a girl swinging a bat and a boy doing a handstand, with bare hands! One boy is on a skateboard wearing a helmet, but no knee pads, and a girl stretching on a rock. Apparently the rock looks slippery.

Un-named members of the President’s Council on Fitness, Sports and Nutrition raised an alarm with the Postal Service about the issue of no gloves, slippery rocks and no kneepads. The US Postal Service immediately pulled the stamps from distribution!

America is becoming sissified, and the parents of today are the reason. Overly sensitized schools are banning baseball or football or hockey playing of any kind on school grounds because the ball or puck is too hard, someone might get hurt!

I was 5 years of age when my mother turned me loose on the world and said to go out and play. Where did my friends and I play? Right in front of my house: on the concrete sidewalk. Mom wasn’t waiting by the door with a band-aid, Dad wasn’t drawing up legal papers to sue the city if I scrapped myself, which I did everyday, more than once on some days.

All my play clothes had rips in the knees, blood on the shirt and dirt everywhere, but not once did I go crying to ‘mommy’ to fix me. No, instead I got up, said ‘ouch’ and went on playing. Things healed so new scars could be made. Today I sit here in one piece, fully healed and can accept pain with ease.

I arranged my own play dates, found my own friends and did my own fighting, and once again: today I am in one piece!

In my school, corporal punishment was not too removed from capital punishment, and mom and dad often reminded me that if I needed it in school, I would be receiving the rest when I got home! Today the teacher taps you: off to court we go, thank you mommy and daddy.

Today the parents, schools and even the laws have become ‘sensitive’ politically correct and bending over backwards to be what they call politically correct. There was no such thing back in the 1950’s, insensitivity came with the scrapes and scars of childhood, the threats of corporal punishment and the worst thing that could happen would be your friends laughing at you because mommy came along to protect you! I was called everything in the book, and returned in kind those same racial monikers and slurs, but in site of it all: no one went home crying to mommy, and if you did, don’t ever go out on the streets again! We learned what the real world had in store for us, and how to cope with pain.