Good Night

Thank you for dropping in here on my podcast, because I can use some friendly company. It looks like I've become an adult. When did that happen? And how can I make it stop? I'm sitting here in my big, manly, comfortable black leather poppa chair in my living room, hiding from another birthday. In my book Staying Happy Healthy And Hot, Big Louie, the head guy of the Louie Louie Generation says, "There are 3 ages of mankind. Youth, middle age, and "My you look good." So now I have to look good on an every-day basis?

I really can't complain I suppose, because I know I asked for it. Last time I saw Dr. Charles about the aches and pains he said, "I can't make you any younger you know." I told him, "I'm not interested in being younger. I want to get older." So here I am. Thank heavens they haven't discontinued my blood type yet. I find I'm relying more and more on Big Louie's advice. "Age and treachery will always defeat youth and skill," he says. That's encouraging. And of course I always keep his biggie in mind. "If you have any moving parts left, for crying out loud, MOVE 'EM." He says, "The fountain of youth is between your ears." I like that too, because over the years, my body has basically become a transportation system for getting my head from one place to another.

I guess it's appropriate that I put my old body in an old car. And my car is old. It's insured against fire, theft, and King George's men. Any time I'm driving I check to see that I've got my license, my registration, and the bus schedule. Seriously for a moment, I want to thank so many of you who sent me email happy birthday wishes. It was kind of neat.

I am sitting here in my big, comfortable, manly, black leather poppa chair in my living room, thawing out from the trip I just took to the mailbox. It's cold. No I mean COLD. That's because it's February. And as I told you in my book, Staying Happy Healthy And Hot (available at Amazon.com) the word is FebRUary. Not Feb-YOU-ary. Think about this please: If you, a priest, a rabbi, and a minister walked into a bar and the bartender asked if you wanted some b-YOU-skis you, the priest, the rabbi and the minister would all figure it was some kind of joke. It's bREW-skis. And it's FebRUary. February and brew-skis are both cold.

I took my hot cup of coffee with me to keep my hands warm when I went up to the mailbox just now, and by the time I got back to the house, I had a large lump of coffee rattling around in the cup. My next door neighbor Randy was out getting his mail too. I said "Hello", and it was so cold, the "lo" froze, hit the ground and broke before he could hear it. He thought I was just saying "Hell" and he said thanks for the warm wishes. He was wearing his hunting camo, so I didn't actually see him. But I knew where he was because I could follow the sound of his teeth chattering.

It was so cold this morning, you could freeze an egg on the sidewalk. In fact I'll bet hens were laying eggs from a standing position. Male dogs were getting stuck on the fire hydrants in embarrassing ways. Flashers were just describing themselves. The forecast was for six inches of snow, but look...there's miles and miles of it. One good thing...when it snows my lawn looks just as good as Randy's.

You've got to be a little crazy to fall in love, because if you're not a little crazy in love you're not really in love. It's complicated. Especially for guys. The only way a guy can find out if a woman is feeling romantic is by puckering up and trying for a kiss. Sometimes that works, and sometimes she just turns her head, and rolls her eyes out loud, which leaves you kind of licking her ear. But Louie Louie Generation lads and ladies have been around long enough to know that love is like a bathing suit. It all depends what you put into it. So you've got to go all in.

I read a magazine article about it yesterday. The article said a modern woman really likes it when a guy makes dinner for her. I am not good at making dinner. But I have learned a couple of things about it from trying. Let me pass them along to you guys. For example stuff you cook on the stove should be cooked on the medium setting till just before it boils over. Stuff in the little room under the stove...which is called an oven...should also be cooked on medium, and should be removed from the oven at the first sign of black smoke. Rule of thumb, where there's smoke there's toast...unless it's something you put in the oven. And be careful. If you decide to make French toast be careful you don't get your tongue stuck in the toaster.

In my book, Big Louie, the head guy of the Louie Louie generation has lots of important household hints like that for guys. For example, he always says "Guys who think a woman's place is in the kitchen forget that the kitchen is where the knives are kept." And "Never tell a woman she's too good for you. Let it come as a surprise."

I like Valentine's day. You get to tell somebody, "I love you," or at least, "I like you." It means baseball's Spring Training is about to start. And it's a day when the thought really is more important than the gift. In fact, I have found that if you can get the right kind of thought going, Louie-Louie Generation ladies like my Lady Wonder Wench generally really get into the spirit of giving...so to speak. And if you are a Louie-Louie Lad like I am you will certainly put to good use the power of warm words...aural sex...and of course you will follow Big Louie's advice having to do with any of your remaining moving parts. If you've got em...move em.

Has it ever occurred to you that the smartest guys think in opposites. For example take the guy who packaged the batteries I just bought on line. They're totally encased in plastic so thick that I had to cut if with a pair of wire cutters. It was essentially a plastic battery chastity belt. But when I dug the batteries out and put them in the flashlight, they didn't work. I wanted to send them back, but the invoice from the guy who sold them says, "All returns must be in original packaging." Smart guy. He thinks in opposites. And thinking in opposites made me change my mind about the guy at the drug store who sold me a bottle of cotton with a few Tylenol pills in the bottom. Hey, think in opposites...maybe I could make a nice warm winter coat out of that big ball of cotton, then I wouldn't catch cold, and I wouldn't have to buy any more Tylenol.

I've got to learn to think in opposites. For example, will everything east of the San Andreas fault eventually plunge into the Atlantic Ocean? Does every silver lining have to have a cloud? And if a picture is worth 1000 words how come there are no pictures of the Gettysburg Address? And maybe the sooner you fall behind, the more time you'll have to catch up. Think in opposites. I think it was a guy who learned to think in opposites who invented telemarketing. I think he got one too many voice mail recordings that said, "All our specialists are busy helping other customers. Your call is very important to us, and it will be answered by next Easter." And suddenly, something that said "Hey...think in opposites" went "BLING" in his head. He figured instead his being annoyed by the person at the other end of his phone call, he turned it around. He got to be the ANNOYING guy instead of being the ANNOYED guy. Much more satisfying, and probably somewhat profitable.

All the smart guys are telling us, "We are doomed. Run and hide." Stephen Hawking the famous scientist says, "We are doomed because the artificial intelligence we are creating will take over and kill us, or we will be wiped out by a giant asteroid." Lots of politicians are telling us "We are doomed because the terrorists are coming to get us." Other politicians are telling us "Our coastal cities are doomed because of climate change."It seems like most TV shows are about murder and blood, and the commercials in them tell us we are doomed if we don't take their pills with names I can't pronounce. Lots of holy people tell us we are doomed because we have been mighty naughty. But I say, "Fear not faithful friends. As Big Louie, the head guy of the Louie Louie Generation says in my book Staying Happy Healthy And Hot (available at Amazon.com) and I quote: "Hey Smart Guys...B.S." And I agree.

In my book Staying Happy Healthy And Hot, Big Louie, the head guy of the Louie Louie Generation says "Most of the time we have two reasons for doing anything. A good reason, and the real reason." And I guess he's right. I'm sitting here in my big, manly, comfortable black leather poppa chair in my living room, fondling a new toy that I have wanted for a while, but I couldn't bring myself to get it until I figured out a good reason for buying it.

Look, it's like the first guy who said an apple a day keeps the doctor away, because he liked apples...even though he certainly knew that one onion would do the job very nicely for a week. His good reason was keeping the doctor away. His real reason was that he really just liked apples. We do lots of things like that. That's why you figure it's ok to leave your kid with a baby sitter so you can take a break from your being a parent routine at a night school class that you really enjoy, but you feel terrible and guilty if you leave your kid with a baby sitter to go to a movie you really want to see. Big Louie is right. Most of the time we have to have two reasons for doing anything.

Whilst sitting here in my big, manly, comfortable black leather poppa chair in my living room I just saw a startling statistic. By the way how do you like that fast use of the word whilst? I haven't whilst-ed anybody in a long time. It feels good. But back to the statistic. 38% of New Year's resolutions have to do with losing weight... which can be translated to losing fat. If that was your New Year's resolution STOP. WAIT. THINK.

Remember what Big Louie says in my book Staying Happy Healthy And Hot. He says, "Fat is lost first from areas of high desirability." You want fat in some areas. Especially ladies. Think Dolly Parton. We saw Dolly Parton shortly after the Janet Jackson "wardrobe malfunction" a few years ago. She bounced out on stage and said, "Don't worry. I won't have a wardrobe malfunction. If I did, I'd wipe out the first four rows." Gotta think before you make important resolutions.

I have a couple of New Years wishes for you. New Year's wish #1 is "May your troubles this year last as long as your last year's New Year's resolutions." Lots of troubles are caused by simple confusion. For example, I was asking a woman on the phone about the status of an order from Amazon. She was taking a while and she said, "Please bear with me." I was shocked. I said, "I can't bare with YOU...I'm a happily married man." Confusion. I was using my credit card at a drug store, and the machine said "Swipe card." I didn't have to swipe a card, I already had one. More confusion. I saw an ad for a British web site that was selling land on Mars and Venus for 29 Pounds/ acre. They are now probably trying to get the rights to selling the Brooklyn Bridge. Confusion.

A bunch of very bad guys are getting us very confused right now about much more serious stuff. Big Louie, the head guy of the Louie Louie Generation says, "Always speak up, even if your voice is shaking." It's in my book Staying Happy Healthy and Hot. Lots of folks are speaking up to our politicians right now, and their voices are shaking... with fear. Fear creates confusion. The bad guys are making so many people so afraid that they're suffering a confusion contusion. They are so afraid, they don't know what to do. And some of the politicians love it. But Big Louie also says, "What happens isn't as important as what you do about what happens." So at the end of this podcast, I'm going to tell you what I think is the first step about what I think we should do about this confusion contusion.

I've been doing this podcast sitting here in my big, comfortable, manly, black leather poppa chair in my living room for quite a while now. Not long enough to call it a "once upon a time-time," but it has been a long time. You think about things like that when a New Year pops up on the calendar. "Once upon a time." To lots of people it was a long ago "once upon a time" that the numbers on our years started with a one instead of a two.

When you think "What's today's date?" do you sometimes still come up with a 19 something? I think most of us in the Louie Louie Generation stumble on that one once in a while. The last time it really was a 1900 something was 1999 of course, which was the year today's high school 16 year old kids were born. How did you get along all the way back then without your smart phone, or your car GPS, or your email, your texting, or your Netflix? Did you like your video tape recorder, and your fax machine, and how hard was it to learn to use Windows 98?

One of the stories I remember best from all the way back in 1999 was how everybody was scared that our computers wouldn't be able to handle the year 2000. Bill Clinton was impeached in 1999, and Wayne Gretzy retired...and Boris Yeltzen did too. That was the year Putin took over in Russia. And there was a nasty war going on in Kosovo. We're pretty far along in the 2000s now... and we're adding a new number now, a big, glistening 16. Starting a brand New Year...a brand new chapter in the story of our lives. What kind of an ending will this chapter have for you? What will happen to you? Big Louie says, "Better yet, what will you make happen?" And he also says, "You never know when something wonderful is going to happen." He's always saying that. If you don't know about Big Louie yet, please look up my book Staying Happy Healthy And Hot on Amazon.com. He also says, "Some magic you have to see to believe, and some magic you have to believe first to see."