Survival seems to be a popular topic nowadays. TV shows like Extreme Preppers show how people are preparing for the upcoming apocalypse by storing food, building shelters, and amassing ammunition. Other shows like Survivor are merely games where contestants must outlast each other to become the sole survivor and the winner of one million dollars. This week, survival was at the forefront again with two TV shows that baffled my mind.

First, we witnessed Nik Wallenda “survive” a tightrope walk across the Grand Canyon. Nik was not harnessed or tethered to the wire so one misstep could have sent him plummeting 1500 feet into the river below. Had this happened, it is doubtful that Nik would have survived, but ratings of the replay would have gone through the roof.

Nik’s adventure was a combination of courage, a need for attention, and a religious revival meeting. As he embarked on his 22 minute journey, Nik spent the entire time talking to Jesus who must have been watching the show on the Discovery Channel. This fact alone should make for great promo for the channel. “Jesus watches Discovery, shouldn’t you?”

Apparently the Lord was listening to Nik because he made it across safely even though there were very windy conditions and angry Navajo Indians who claimed Nik was trespassing on their land. After completing his walk, Nik said that his next challenge will be to walk a high wire between the Chrysler Building and the Empire State Building in New York City. This will be even more dangerous because if he falls there, he could land in a garbage filled dumpster or on a hot dog wagon, either one capable of leaving him with an indelible stink.

The point I am trying to make is that Nik survived his walk and had viewers riveted. He had me so involved that I continued to watch Discovery for the program that followed entitled Naked and Afraid.

In this broadcasting gem, two people, a man and a woman, are dropped off in the Costa Rican jungle completely naked for 21 days. All they were equipped with was a machete and a crude map, with the goal of not dying. So many things were wrong with this show that I am not sure where to start.

First, I’ll have to admit, that I was drawn to the show by the “naked” aspect. I mean, who doesn’t want to look at naked people in the jungle? Unfortunately for us prurient voyeurs, Discovery blurred out all camera shots of the naughty bits on the people so all we got were occasional shots of bare asses walking through the woods. (note: If you Google Naked and Afraid, you will get some pictures from the show and a lot that definitely aren’t. Be warned)

Then we watched them struggle to build a shelter and hunt for food while remaining naked. If I was naked in the jungle, the first thing I’d want to do was to fashion a pair of pants and some shoes out of the available materials. Heck, even Adam and Eve used fig leaves to their advantage. Eventually, the woman made a jaunty top and bottom for herself but the guy preferred to dangle. At this point the show went from a survival epic to a giant “Eew” as we tried to imagine how disgusting it must have actually been.

I have to assume that the couple survived because I did not survive the end of the show…which it turns out is a new series. That means every week two new nudies will be released into the wild and we are expected to follow their adventures. Apparently Discovery will do anything for ratings, and if that’s so, here’s an idea they can have for free. Have Nik Wallenda cross between New York skyscrapers while naked. It’s the best (worst) of both possible shows.

Follow

Share on Tumblr

I have a problem, ironically, with the people who tell me, “no problem.” When someone does me a favor such as open a door, hold an elevator, or help me pick up something I dropped, I always make it a point to say, “thank you.” to which the expected response is “You’re welcome” but instead I get the response of “No problem.” I have a problem with that.

It particularly bothers me when I am in line at a retail store. When I pay for my merchandise and hand the clerk my cash, I wait patiently for my change. When it is given to me (sometimes counted into my hand and sometimes just handed to me in bulk) my response is “Thank you for giving me change from the money I gave you to buy merchandise in your store which I hope was not a problem for you” which I usually trim down to “Thank you.”

For as long as I have been speaking English, which is most of my life after evolving from Gibberish, the anticipated answer to the statement “Thank you” is “You’re welcome” occasionally augmented to become “You’re certainly welcome” or “You’re very welcome”. It should never be “No problem” which implies that sometimes there is a problem and what do they do when that happens? For this reason, I wish to have the phrase “No problem” stricken from the vernacular just as I want the phrase “Have a good one” stricken.

I am a huge advocate of accuracy and think that the more accuracy we have in our lives, the less mistakes will be made. “Have a good one” has no accuracy. Have a good WHAT? Have a good day? Have a good week? Have a good time? Have a good lunch? Have a good sleep? Have a good life? Just tell me what you are wishing I have a good one of, that’s all I’m asking.

So please join me in my crusade to stamp out senseless idioms. From here on in, promise to never take “No problem” as an answer. Tell the offender that you know there’s no problem because you are doing your job and if you are doing your job and if you have a problem with it, you had better come up with alternative employment.

Don’t let anybody tell you to “Have a good one” either. Insist that they be more specific in what they wish. It’s not hard to do and it makes your greeting so much more personal like when somebody calls you by your name instead of saying “Hey pal”.

I’m thinking of calling my group Idioms Really Stink or IRS. You’re invited to the next convention. BYOSTU, Bring Your Own Star Trek Uniform.

Follow

Share on Tumblr

I enjoy gardening more than any of my other hobbies including sloth and lethargy.

Gardening is the only thing a homeowner can do that gives him a reward. If you paint your house, what is your reward? Your house looks nice, even though nobody else will tell you that. What about plumbing? If you unclog the toilet, what is your reward? Your payback is that you don’t have to go down to the gas station to use the can and that seems more of a threat than a reward.

With gardening, the reward is FOOD. You get to eat your hobby, and in the case  of zucchini all of your friends, relatives, and unsuspecting neighbors can eat your hobby too.

There is a lot of maintenance involved in gardening, but if you are considering growing your own crops this year, follow my 10 Step Plan, it’s as easy as ABD.

Dale’s 10 Step Gardening Plan

Step one – First, turn the soil; till the acreage, or as I did and hire a guy named Billy Jim to Roto-till my garden plot.

Step two – is a beer, as a reward for having completed step one.

Step three – is planting. Planting involves placing either seeds or baby plants in the soil so they can grow. It is long, tedious, back breaking work that leads directly to step four.to step four.

Step four is another beer for completing step three.

Step five, is watering. Edibles need a great deal of water to grow. This is because they are primarily made of water. A banana is 74% water. The human body on the other hand is only 60% water. So don’t go thinking you’re better than a banana.

Steps six through ten. From here on in, your work is all maintenance. There’s weed pulling, plant thinning, composting, mulching, more weed pulling, anti-rabbit fence installing, fertilizing, weed pulling, and of course, beer drinking. This is a lot of work, but there’s food on the other end, and the best part is that you only have to grow the stuff you like.

There’s no seed packet for mixed vegetables, you only grow what you like. There are no beets in my garden. This year I put in a crop of soybeans. I hear that soy milk is quite healthy and after you milk ‘em you can turn them into tofu. It’s a win-win. And, given the size of my plot, I should pull in well over a bushel of soybeans, maybe two.

It’s got to work out better than last year when I tried to grow pork-n-beans.

Follow

Share on Tumblr

Today is April 15th, commonly known as tax day, the day when you, as a citizen of the U.S. of A, must file and pay your income taxes for money earned in 2012. You have until midnight today to do that and I say, “Why didn’t somebody warn me that this was coming?”

Now that I look back, it makes some sense that I was seeing Uncle Sam or the Statue of Liberty on every street corner waving me into an H&R Block office. They were trying to tell me to get my taxes done but I didn’t catch the hint and now and I have only a few hours left. At least I have an idea this year.

I am going to fill out my tax form with numbers I selected at random from last night’s lottery. Then I will place these numbers on the tax form and add a couple of zeroes to make it look legit. I will also include a check for $75 to cover taxes owed. My theory is thus; when the IRS person opens the envelope and sees the check, he or she will be so happy that somebody actually sent them money that they will be overjoyed and not even bother to look at my return.

If they do examine my return and claim that I was fraudulent, I will simply say that, “I was just joking. I have an overactive funny bone and since funny-bone-icitis is not covered by ObamaCare, there is nothing I can do about it. Oh sure, I try to sadden up by watching Cubs games or weather reports from the midwest but I just can’t do it. My funny bone keeps interrupting and making me do crazy stuff. I apologize for the mistake and will redo my tax return with a more serious bent next year. In the mean time, you can keep the $75 on my account.”

I’m hoping that excuse will buy me a little time but it will probably buy me a lot of time, like 10 to 20 years. Time to file for an extension so I can think up a better excuse.

Follow

Share on Tumblr

I recently learned that April is National Stress Awareness Month, as if we are not aware of stress the other 11 months of the year. We have always had stress but recently it seems to surround us like some kind of killer fog. It’s everywhere and we need to get rid of it.

While I have always been a proponent of stress reduction, I never really had a plan to reduce my own stress. For years, I have been speaking about the stress relieving benefits of laughter but making yourself laugh is a lot harder. You can’t even tickle yourself to make yourself laugh. Go ahead, try it.

In my ongoing effort to lower my stress, I have decided to try meditation. Granted, I don’t know anything about meditation other than what I read in a book but that was enough to get me started. So far, my regimen consists of a breathing exercise followed by a period of  muttering nonsense and focusing out of my third eye. This is the part I don’t really get.

According to the book, I am supposed to sit cross legged, with my hands resting on my knees, and I am supposed to repeat the word “Om”. I am more likely to repeat the word WTF than I am Om, because I find Om to be one of the dumbest things a person could say.

Plus, I looked up in the dictionary and they don’t even spell it right. Om is spelled o-h-m and it is a unit of electrical resistance. Now it makes even less sense. Why would I want to concentrate on electrical resistance when I am trying to eliminate stress. Electricity has always given me stress, even static electricity. Let’s face it, a shock is a shock and it doesn’t calm me down.

So I decided to use my own meditation word. Something that means more to me than ohm. After hearing about (but not yet seeing) the movie the Life of Pi, I decided to choose pi as my meditative word. Of course, I once again had to correct the spelling to p-i-e which is a word that means the world to me.

I love pie. It is my favorite dessert and I don’t really care what kind of pie it is. In fact, I have never met a pie I didn’t like…except for mincemeat pie, Shepherds pie, and steak & kidney pie, all of which are not pies as much as they are the organs and dangly bits of animals served with a crust on top. This is not pie.

Real pie has a succulent filling of fruit, or pudding, or custard, or something else that does not come from an animal’s insides. Apple pie, berry pie, pumpkin pie, cherry pie, banana cream pie, even strawberry-rhubarb pie, a tasty pastry that contains fruit AND a vegetable.

So I meditate by concentrating on pie and it seems to be working. In just one week I have noticed that my stress is lower and I’ve gained three pounds. Mmmmmm. Pie.

Follow

Share on Tumblr