Reflection

Reflection

It's getting' on to that time o' year again. I imagine it's a ritual for many people at this time o' year to reflect on the year that's passed, on their accomplishments, their failures, mistakes and other experiences. It's a good thing too. That way it's possible to figure out where you've been an' what you done in order to have some idea of where you're goin' next. Then, by the time the New Year comes around, yer ready to go at it hammer an' tong again.

Well, that's the theory anyways. That's the way I used to do it all the time an' I never run outa steam until about Easter. These days though it's a little different. When ya can't remember what day o' the week it is or whether ya actually had yer breakfast, rememberin' what happened throughout the year becomes a little bit befuddlin'. Actually I got that aced too. I use my skills as a storyteller to fill in the details o' what I done last year until it seems reasonable an' go from there. Of course, that leaves the future world to yer imagination. There's no tellin' what plans you can make for the New Year ahead. Mind you, it's better to pull the reins in a little bit when you're plannin' for the future.

Our friend John in the "Over the Hill Gang" had bought a ticket to go skydivin' on his eightieth birthday a few years back. We was all excited an' some of us was even willin' to join him. Talk about yer over-optomistic forecast. In the meantime, John has had a coupla strokes, an' fell in the bathtub an' broke his hip. So when his eightieth birthday rolled around, he was in physiotherapy instead of in a perfectly good airplane an' learnin' how to maneuver that walker contraption instead of a parachute. So you can see how skydivin' would complicate things in his future. Holy crackers! He fell down in the bathtub an' broke his hip. What would happen if he fell outta a airplane an' landed on his keyster in a field somewheres? He'd be nothin' but splinters by the time the dust had settled. Can you imagine the field full o' bone splinters if we'd all a joined him? Not somethin' I'd like to think about.

The long an' the short of it is that we should probably curb our enthusiasm about the future with a bit o' realism, but what the heck, we never get to do it anyways so it don't really matter one way or another. At least that's how it seems to me from up here on the top shelf.

Just Sayin'. 

Christmas

Christmas

It seems the Christmas spirit has been goin' on for a coupl'a months now if I think back on it. Not too long ago we was tryin' to decide whether to buy Halloween candy or Christmas candy. Christmas lights was startin' to twinkle on various balconies in our complex and people was squawkin' all over the social media to hold off until after Remembrance Day, or Thanksgivin' at least.

Well it ain't unusual in Manitoba to get out there in the cold to get the lights up even in October when the Saskatchewan dust is makin' it's annual migration across the prairie, followed closely by the falling leaves an' then the horizontal snow. The first nice day yer out there hangin' everythin' up an' getting' it over with before the weather gets downright miserable. Just ask my daughter who was hurryin' up one day to get the job done before it got dark. There she was, standin' up on an aluminum ladder with her string o' lights plugged in to make sure they worked before she stapled them to the facia. Well, you can just imagine her pickin' herself up off the ground after staplin' through a live electric wire. That's how those things go in Manitoba.

Of course with all this preparation, you gotta go to the store to get yer supplies. An' them people are quick as lightnin' to pick up on another reason to make a sale. First thing you know, there's lights up in the stores an' festive decorations an' Christmas music, an' soon everythin' else follows so as they don't miss a trick.

Of course, these days me an' the Missus like to wax nostalgic about the early years when ya hauled out a tree from the woods an' decorated it an' had real candles on it. Dad would read the Christmas story outa' the bible on Christmas Eve an' we'd blow out the candles before we burned the house down. The Missus had a little different experience in the old country, but generally it was in the same spirit.

The retail business unfortunately ruined it for her. Working Christmas Eve's an' Boxin' Days firmly entrenched the idea that Christmas stinks in her mind. I can't say I blame her. With all the months of caterwaulin' about the Christmas spirit, which ain't really the Christmas spirit, she has a point. It's only in the last ten years since she's retired that some of the joy of the grandchildren has recaptured her imagination. I guess it has to do with bein' put up there on the top shelf where you can look down, observe, an just enjoy, or at least that's how it seems to me form up here on the top shelf.

Just sayin'. 

Disaster and Devastation

Disaster and Devastation 

Man, them sucker punches are sure painful! Specially if you don't see 'em comin'. Well it ain't so much the sucker punch itself as the complete surprise at it's landin' on yer chin and then the pain o' hittin' the pavement. It seems to be a devastatin' disaster momentarily, until you pick yourself up an' figure out what the heck happened.

I'm speakin' figuratively o' course (cause I ain't never really been sucker punched). But I imagine the effect is exactly the same. It was four o'clock in the mornin' an' I had just written a short (practice) script for my You Tube movie to promote my acting career hobby. It was pretty good too, about me bein' held prisoner by a bunch o' hoodlums I'd come across beatin' up on a damsel in distress. Bullies they were. Of course I had to teach them a lesson, just like they do in the movies, with wise an' profound emotional language. Naturally, I had to emphasize my speech with throwin' a few things around. Well, for the practice run I'd got a few cardboard boxes to toss around so as not to do any damage in the apartment.

So, bein' excited about my new hobby, I launched into my speech, thunderin' obscenities at the top o' my lungs and kickin' at the cardboard boxes so they went flyin' helter-skelter across the room. Oh my, this felt great! I could already see my name up in lights. I don't think I ever told anybody off like that before! It seems I was lettin' go of eighty years o' pent up frustration! Not only is this a good hobby, but it's therapeutic too.

Suddenly, in the midst of my tirade, a dark shadow appears at my office door. "What in the H E Double hockey sticks do you think you're doin?" it says in a quiet icy whisper.

Holy crackers! It's the Missus! I'm so dumbfounded I'm momentarily speechless. One minute I'm raisin cane with a bunch o' hooligans an' the next I got to explain my actions to the Missus. "I - I'm practicing to make a movie." I stammer, feelin' totally deflated (or really sucker punched).

Well, I ain't goin' to go into it except to say I wish I'd recorded her speech to me. It would'a made a much better movie than the one I had written. I'm now convinced that the three hunnert people livin' in our apartment block don't need to hear a thriller movie at four o'clock in the mornin' (or any other time for that matter).

Well, them's the breaks. My Oscar dreams is quickly fadin' but as soon as I catch my breath I'll find somethin' quieter to do. At least that's how it seems to me from up here on the top shelf.

Just sayin'.

 

 

 

My New Hobby

My New Hobby 

It's not every day I admit to payin' attention to the Missus' suggestions, but I gotta admit that sometimes she just inspires me. You'll remember her tellin' me to get myself a new hobby. Well maybe you don't but take my word for it, she did. An' it wasn't only just once neither. I took that to be an urgent matter. So I started lookin' around an' thinkin' about what I'd like to learn until suddenly I hit on it!

I decided that I'M GONNA BE A ACTOR! Not only am I gonna be a actor, I'm gonna look like one too, an' I'm also gonna sound like one. I been studyin' them folks on the TV. It seems, every time they're showin' emotion, they gotta yell - loud. Well I can do that, especially in the mornin' when my voice is strongest. An' cussin? Listen, I can cuss with the best o' them. I learned that from my kids - an' their kids too, so I got that pretty well aced. In a pinch I can always ask them for ideas of how to pronounce some o' them cuss words they use these days. An' the only thing I'll have to consult with the Missus on is throwin' stuff around when I'm actin' upset an' yellin. They do that a lot in the movies but I'm not sure how it would go over here at home. Maybe I could incorporate it into the act of movin' things the way she likes to do, but it could mean a lot o' repairs. Them actors are sure sloppy when in comes to throwin' stuff around. There's got to be a lot o' breakage - which worries me some. Of course if we put out things she wants to get rid of anyways, that would help us with the downsizin'.

As far as appearance is concerned, I think I can hold my own with any of 'em. If I go without shavin' my face for a week or so, I can look as ugly as George Clooney any time. Well an' as far as my wardrobe is concerned, that could use a little upgradin'. I mean I got the nice suit jackets an' shirts, but I need to invest in a bunch o' dirty blue jeans an' maybe some o' them sneakers to complete the outfits.

That havin' been said, I can maybe get it all together an' do a You Tube presentation to show a new movie star to the world. There's no tellin' where this might take me, but I smell an Oscar in the works. At least that's how it seems to me from up here on the top shelf.

Just sayin'.

 

 

Getting Another Hobby

Getting Another Hobby

 

Well - who wants to hear my opinion on the state of the union on terrorism, global warming, the election and so on? Judging by previous reaction - NOBODY! Okay, I get it. My uncanny wisdom is not the only source of your inspiration after all. Besides, there's bigger fish to fry anyways. Like how the Missus says I need another hobby. I think SHE'S tired of the ones I got. It's understandable. The dining room table is always covered with whatever puzzle I'm workin' on, my desk is always covered in clay or a piece of somethin' I'm makin', an' my flute is never where it's supposed to be. An' now I'm tryin' to learn magic card tricks. Well, that's goin' to be messy too, given my shaky eighty-year old hands.

Oh NOW I get it! It's got nothin' to do with hobbies at all. An' it's got everythin' to do with bein' a little tidier. Well what in the H E Double hockey sticks am I supposed to do with my works in progress? I can't take the puzzle apart every time I quit workin' on it, an' molded clay don't go back in the box all that easy neither. Well okay, I'll try and remember to put the flute away in future.

But get another hobby? Forget about it. I got no more room to put stuff. Besides which, the Missus would just find another place to hide it away anyways. See, there's what I think to be a Dutch gene built into all people from the Netherlands. It's called the clean gene an' once it gets into yer system, it's impossible to remove. I was up at six this mornin' an' tonight's chili was already on the stove.  Her mother was like that too. When she vacationed with us from Holland, by the time we rolled outta bed in the mornin' she'd already been to the garden, gathering lettuce, radishes an' green onions - an' had the supper salad made. By now she was washing the windows, havin' already swept the deck.

Now I ain't complainin' about cleanliness an' bein' tidy. Much better that than the other way around. But somewheres there's gotta be a middle ground. I know darn well that if I take up another hobby, the other ones would vanish into thin air. No, I have to compromise. Suppose I take up interior decoratin'. Then I go around an' rearrange all her pictures on the wall an move the furniture all around. By the time she gets finished straightenin' it all out, my puzzles will be done an' so will my clay pottery. That is, unless she likes everythin' I done, in which case I'll need another hobby. At least that's how it seems to me from up here on the top shelf.

Just sayin'.

 

 

"Get Outta My Bank Account"

"Get Outta My Bank Account!" 

That's what the Missus said. Well, she actually said a whole lot more that's better left to the imagination. And no, it wasn't me what had his fingers in the till neither. She was yammerin' about the government blowin' millions o' dollars o' HER tax money on promotin' the Keystone XL pipeline they knew was doomed from the start. Well I didn't believe the numbers she was talkin' about, so I looked it up. Sure enough, that old Munroe calculator stored in her brain had it added up more or less right: thirty million here, thirty million there, another twenty-six million somewheres else, all WITHOUT HER APPROVAL! It's a good job she ain't the Revenue Minister or Stephen Harper would'a been walkin' around in the King's new clothes by now.

Before I joined the conversation the Missus was havin' with her friend, I sneaked off to the bathroom, checked my wallet to see how much was in there. There was enough (thank heavens) to last beyond this particular tirade. The main thing was that my name wasn't Harper an' I hadn't overspent. Well I should explain. See, the Missus is a Dutch girl. Well she's more of an old Dutch girl by now, but the speech she'd just delivered to her friend (an' to me in a 'take notice' sort'a way) sure proved she was very much from the Netherlands. I couldn't help but be reminded that the whole Spanish Armada had been swept off the sea by someone like her in the Dutch navy an' Harper should be kind'a glad for his own sake that she'd married me instead o' him. Well, he can only take so much abuse over his transgressions until you gotta feel sorry for him.

Well that sort'a leaves the plight o' them poor buggers whose incomes are directly affected by the oil business. I mean the workers in the oil patch, the suppliers o' services an' equipment an' so on. Most o' them don't have a hedge fund or government subsidies to draw on in hard times like their employers do. It's certainly understandable that they're upset. But they've been brainwashed to be in lock-step with their companies who don't give a rip about the wildlife they poison or the sacred ground they plow up for their pipelines, or the poisonous water they inject into the earth in their frackin' exercises. An' at the first sign of danger to the bottom line, they all get their pink slips, an' feel sorry for their poor employers. Give me a break! Them employers' pockets is deeper than the oil wells they drill. Now they're sayin on the news that the government will end the subsidies by 2020. SUBSIDIES? What subsidies? You mean to say the oil companies get subsidies too? Now I see where the Missus gets her BILLIONS o' dollars from. I thought she only meant millions. She makes that mistake sometimes. An THAT'S what she's is upset about, or at least it seems that way to me from up here on the top shelf.

Just sayin'.

Political Arithmetic

Political Arithmetic 

I was chucklin over Trudeau's promise to have an equal distribution of men an' women in his twenty-five member cabinet. Well, if you divide twenty-five in two, you end up with half a man an' half a woman in the mix. He must'a learned his arithmetic from that new method o' teachin' that they have in schools these days. As far as I know, ya can't split any odd number in two an' come up with two whole even numbers. Maybe he'd have to get two people under three feet tall an' combine them as one to share a portfolio an' make up the equal number that way. That was what struck my funny bone cause I noticed there wasn't any people that size elected to parliament.

Well, what do I know anyways? It turns out that the prime minister is the odd man out or even man in, in this case. That is to say, he is not only the Prime Minister, but he's also part of the cabinet (I guess). So he can have any odd number in the cabinet he wants an' still have half men an' half women. As for himself, he has his father's body an' his mother's hair, so I guess that counts for two o' somethin' too.

An' Trudeau's not the only one who can count politically neither. Angela Merkel is another one has her eye an' her numbers an' on the future. The seemingly unrestricted flow of migrants into Germany has citizens increasingly upset, but she's countin' the agin' number o' Germans who ain't makin' any young Germans nomore an' is wonderin' who's goin' to take over the work load a few years down the road. She's learned from the Chinese government what happens when the birthrate drops off significantly. Them people are busy findin' an' rescuin' older people with all kinds o' dementia every day an' bringin' them back home with nobody there to watch over 'em. So they have to do it all over again the very next day. It's a huge problem. Who's goin' to be left to push the wheelchairs in a few years? An' who's going to go to work to earn the money to buy the wheelchairs in the first place? I read that in certain places in Spain they ain't makin' any little Spaniards nomore neither. So it seems you need that special political arithmetic to balance the population an' the budget. We shouldn't ask too many questions an' sooner or later the budget will balance itself. At least that's how it seems to me from up here on the top shelf.

Just sayin'.