short story

funny, stories

(from two weeks ago)

Moving in the landlord showing me around opens up this huge industrial freezer in the shed, opens it up and I see vacuum packed salmon fillets it’s filled with vacuum packed salmon fillets. Feel free to help yourself, I mean don’t eat all of it, but the wife and I definitely won’t go through all of it, we won’t be here much of the winter.

Today I woke up late, nine-thirty, ate breakfast at ten-thirty, early afternoon snack of a few crackers and peanut butter. Weeks of living on ramen and beans and bread, I finally go to the huge industrial freezer in the shed. Realization at this moment: not salmon fillets. These are HUGE salmon fillets. One is like three. This made me pretty happy.

Huge salmon fillet on the counter at noon, thawed out at five. Which was good because at five the hunger came, and it came raging. Burner on high olive oil and garlic and salt in the pan, hot, in with the huge fillet sizzle crackle sizzle, put the glass lid on to keep it moist, potato in the microwave, five minutes later flip the huge fillet other side and bit more oil and garlic and salt and more sizzling and the kitchen smells so good, potato done and steaming and buttered and salmon done and crispy and up out of the pan and onto the plate with the potato.

Epilogue
Woulda been better with a good beer. Dear first paycheck, please come soon. And it woulda been even oh so much better shared, but I’m not sure how to get that done; the paycheck doesn’t help much. Oh wait actually, doesn’t match.com charge money? Hmm.

funny, other

shining brilliant awesome as always. From the back of one of Newman’s cartons…

LEGEND:

The marathon in Africa…I’m halfway out and barely chugging. Mountain coming! Liquid needed! What’s around? Water’s bitter! Beer’s flat! Gator, blah blah!…Fading fast. Then a vision – sweet Joanna! – Tempting me with pale gold nectar…Lemon is it? Yes, by golly! Lemonade? No, Lemon aid!… Power added! Asphalt churning!… Cruising home to victory! Hail Joanna! Filched the nectar (shameless hustler) – in the market – Newman’s Own.

From the back of a  Pink Virgin Lemonade carton, to be exact. Is that not shining brilliant awesome? I actually think, if I could be paid to do stuff like writing things like that, I would be down for a career in marketing..maybe. Maybe for little while.

funny, stories

That’s my new (and likely semi-permanent) favorite phrase.

This how it came about. We were sitting eating hamburgers and salads, and I was reading the backside label on the bottle of Newman’s own Light Honey Mustard dressing.

It went like this:

The Great Salad Dressing Balloon Race. An armada of balloons loaded with Light Honey Mustard. The starters gun – Bazoombah! They all rise majestically into the air. Newman’s Own Balloon, with fewer calories, more taste, and secretly propelled by charity, flies faster than Kraft and further than Wishbone. First across. First on the ground. El Piloto quaffs much quaffs of Newman’s Own Light Honey Mustard in victory. A medium light Italian starlet, daughter of Butch Cassidini, named Bitch Cassidini, leaps into the balloon basked, kisses Piloto, her lips smeared with Newman’s Own Light, she murmurs, “You taste of Sicily, of Vesuvius, of Naples, baby,” and patting his fanny she whispers, “and no fat.”

–the ingredients list is after that, followed by the nutrition information. That is nuts! It’s slightly vulgar and very odd. It’s seriously gutsy and awesome marketing. Naturally I then read the backside label on the bottle of Newman’s Own Ranch Dressing:

LEGEND: When Butch Cassidy got zapped in Bolivia circa 1911 by the local cavalry, he had a revolver in his hand, six peso in his pocket, and a recipe for Ranch Dressing in his safe deposit box which was later given to me in reverence of the motion picture and in return for a percentage of the gross. On the back of this recipe in Butch’s own hand was writ: This stuff is so good it ought to be outlawed.

Again, awesome marketing.

After a bit of talk and laughing and some mild  arguing, this happened:

David (me): “and that marketing director had to stamp it off, and be like ‘yeah, put that on a label-
Jason (my brother) finished the sentence: -baby.”
And so it was made: put that on a label, baby.

That’s my new line; I think I’m going to keep it for a while too.

Paul Newman and Newman's Own
funny, stories

Something was amiss. My boxers were not right. Wallace must’ve felt something like this in The Wrong Trousers.

I had dressed hurriedly after my morning shower, grabbing just-dried clothes out of the drier and jumping into them like I was flying madly to catch a bus–which I was. Being late to class is not a way to impress the girl who’s always on time…more on that in a moment. I made my bus, barely, and now sat in my regular spot. In the mad bus-catching routine I hadn’t noticed it, but now I did.

My boxers were not right; they were scrunched, and it was bad.

I tried the butt-shift to straighten out this miscreant pair of boxers. It’s definitely the static, I thought. Just-dried cargo shorts (warm and comfy!) + just-dried boxers = static. Duh. I couldn’t get them in order though, not with the mere butt-shift…this case called for more intensive remediation.

I stepped off the bus–this route runs through campus and drops me off right by the building of my first class; I did not have much time or distance. Boxer-wearers out there, I’m sure you all know this move: the slight-leg-shake-step. If you wear boxers and don’t know it, then you should; it’s inconspicuous and useful. You can fix your undergarment while simply looking like you’re shaking out your leg muscles, as if cramped or sore from the previous day’s strenuous workout. Brilliant. I took two steps with this move, opting for the left leg. It didn’t work. My boxers refused to get their act together; they actually seemed even more scrunched about. Not cool.

Double-slight-leg-shake (i.e. both left and right, one after the other) for four steps. This one’s less inconspicuous, but much more effective. It didn’t work.

Oh hi Sally Jane!
(Name changed for privacy’s sake. Let’s just say that Sally Jane is a very nice and very pretty girl who I may or may not have wanted to impress at the time)

Say what? Oh that? Haha, I’m actually OK, just trying to shake out my quads and calves–I did my regular hill running workout yesterday;  I’m just trying to be a bit quicker on the pitch so I can stuff a few more goals in the net before the season is up.

Oh, you play soccer too? Right on! What position do you play? Oh you’re a forward too? That’s so cool! We should go kick it around someti–

–two things happened:

1. I became aware that my boxers were not scrunched about. It was a sock! A miscreant sock had clung tightly to my boxers. This distracted me, so I stopped talking.

2. This sock, for some reason I will never know, suddenly renounced it’s allegiance to static cling and decended gracefully out of my cargo shorts. It landed square between my feet.

(Ah..well, to be honest #1 happened as #2 happened)

But I’m better than that. In the twinkling of a moment, without missing even a fraction of a beat, I deftly and casually shifted my footing  to cover the sock with my fancy running shoe. With a confident air I glanced back up and began to ask about her weekend.

So how was–

She was looking at my feet. I looked at my feet. I’d missed, and the sock was sticking out from under my shoe.

The End.

Disclaimer:
This may or may not have actually happened. I say this because if it did happen, I’d like you to think it didn’t (no duh), and if it didn’t I’d like to not ruin the fun by having you think it didn’t. Your call.

funny, stories

Number One

In anticipation of June lemonade stands

I was pedaling slowly up the hill from Magnuson park on my good old road bike. Just taking my time I told myself, but I think not having my strong biking legs from when I rode more had a bigger part to play in it than the relaxed morning. Regardless, as I puttered up the hill, a fellow of about my age cranked past me on an old beat up mountain bike. My word, he was hoofing it.

I made it up the hill to right near Roosevelt High School, locked up my bike and walked around the area, thinking, not thinking, averting-a-potential-mugging, and looking for and occasionally taking photos.  Then I saw him again. He was, with a relaxed a lazy-summer pace, riding back to where he’d come from, towards the hill down to the lake. Dangling off his handlebars was a newly-acquired sack of three yellow lemons from the farm-market-store across the street.

I thought, thought and then smiled.

Warming-springtime lemonade.

Number Two

An inner tube’s fate

I was riding along on the sidewalk of 15th, north of 55th, enjoying the blue sky. Again, I was taking my time meandering along, so I was not terribly paying attention to the walk in front of me. For a moment I did pay attention, just in time to see all the shattered glass as I rode over it. Ah crap I thought–but maybe I’ll get lucky.

I wasn’t wearing gloves, so I had to use my foot to clean my tires as I rode. This is a fine art–too little pressure, and you risk not sufficiently cleaning off the tire. Too much and the tire grabs your shoe, yanking it toward the frame, where it will wedge between the frame and tire, and then you crash in a very awkward position. Not cool.

Naturally I gave this task a lot of attention. I was trying very hard to make sure my foot didn’t get sucked between the frame and tire. So it was that I didn’t see coming the pothole that gave my rear tire a pinch flat.

It’s safe to conclude that today was that inner tube’s day to go.

ideas, stories

Definitely one of my favorite short stories–also a true story, which makes it all the better.

Old Horse was the algebra instructor at the school where I teach. I don’t remember his real name anymore. But he had a long face with a big, square teeth, and so the students called him “Old Horse.”

Perhaps they would have liked him more if he hadn’t been so sarcastic. With his cutting remarks, Old Horse could force the most brazen student to stare at the floor in silence. Even the faculty had a healthy respect for his sharp tongue.

One day a boy named Jenkins flared back at Old Horse, “But I don’t understand this,” pointing to a part of the problem on the board.

“I’m doing the best I can considering the material I have to work with,” said Old Horse.

“You’re trying to make a jackass out of me,” said Jenkins, his face turning red.

“But, Jenkins, you make it so easy for me,” said Old Horse—and Jenkin’s eyes retreated to the floor.

Old Horse retired shortly after I came. Something went wrong with his liver or stomach and so he left. No one heard from him again.

One day, however, not too long before Old Horse left, a new boy came to school. Because he had buck teeth and a hare lip, everybody called him Rabbit. No one seemed to like Rabbit either. Most of the time he stood by himself chewing his fingernails.

Since Rabbit came to school in the middle of October, he had make-up work to do in algebra every day after school. Old Horse was surprisingly patient during these sessions. He would explain anything Rabbit asked. Rabbit in turn always did his homework. In fact, he came early to class, if he could manage it. Then, after the lesson, he would walk with Old Horse to the parking lot. One Friday, because of a faculty meeting, Old Horse didn’t meet with Rabbit. This afternoon I walked with Old Horse. We were passing the athletic field when suddenly he stopped and pointed. “What’s the matter with that one?” he asked. He was referring to Rabbit, standing alone, chewing his fingernails, while watching some boys pass a football.

“What do you mean?” I asked.

“Why doesn’t he play ball, too?” Old Horse demanded.

“Oh, you know how it is. He came in later than the others, and besides—“

“Besides what?”

“Well, he’s different, you know? He’ll fit in sooner or later.”

“No, no, no. That won’t do. They mustn’t leave him out like that.”

“Then we had to break off our conversation because Rabbit had hurried over to join with us. With a smile, he walked beside his teacher, asking him questions.

Suddenly, one of the boys from the athletic field called out, “Yea, Old Horse! Yea, Old Horse!”, and then he threw back his head and went, “Wheeeeeeeee!” like a horse’s whinny. Rabbit’s face reddened with embarrassment. Old Horse tossed his head, but said nothing.

The next day the students from my fifth hour class came to my room awfully excited. Old Horse had gone too far, they said. He ought to be fired. When I asked what had happened, the said he had picked on Rabbit. He had called on Rabbit first thing and deliberately made him look ridiculous.

Apparently Rabbit had gone to the board with confidence. But when he began to put down some numbers, Old horse said that they looked like animal tracks in the snow. Everyone snickered, and Rabbit got nervous.

Then Old Horse taunted him for a mistake in arithmetic. “No, no, no. Can’t you multiply now? Even a rabbit can do that.”

Everyone laughed, although they were surprised. They thought Rabbit was Old Horse’s pet. By now, Rabbit was so mixed up he just stood there, chewing his fingernails.

“Don’t nibble!” Old Horse shouted. “Those are your fingers, boy, not carrots!”

At that, Rabbit took his seat without being told and put his red face in his hands. But the class wasn’t laughing any more. They were silent with anger at Old Horse.

I went in to see Old Horse after my last class. I found him looking out the window.

“Now listen here—,“ I began, but he waved me into silence.

“Now, now, now, look at that. See?” He pointed to Rabbit walking to the athletic field with one of the boys who had complained about how mean Old Horse had been.

“Doesn’t he have special class with you now?” I asked after a moment.

“He doesn’t need that class anymore,” said Old Horse.

That afternoon I walked with Old Horse to the parking lot. He was in one of his impatient moods, so I didn’t try to say much. Suddenly, from the players on the athletic field, a wild chorus broke out. “Yea, Old Horse! Yea, Old Horse!” And then Rabbit, who was with them, stretched his long neck and screamed, “Wheeeeeeeee!”

Old Horse tossed his head as if a large fly were bothering him. But he said nothing.