QOTD, and Lessons, and Women, and Cover Up, and Childhood...

LESSONS...

"Time to Get Life in Order"...

"I woke up this morning, and this summer's gone," is more than the a play on words of a classic rock song from Boston. It is the change of seasons, the change from the carefree days of summer (at least here in the Northern Hemisphere), the change from camp to School, the change from beaches and mountains back to the city and suburbs, and the change from Off Season back to season.

But the biggest change is psychological. There is a hidden energy, barely perceptible, that comes with Labor Day and the beginning of Fall. It's the energy of creativity, of building, of learning. As we move from the summer reading of entertaining beach novels to self-help books, we energetically move from relaxed mode to growth mode. This is the way things were deliberately created, as seasons have different divinely given energies.

So now is the time for all of us to take stock of our lives, and re-energize ourselves for the growth and building ahead. Don't just let the Fall season come and go without taking the 40,000 foot view of your life. Take a long hard look at your life and focus on where you would like to be in 3 months, in 6 months, and in a year.

Don't sit back and expect things to just happen. Make them happen. Whether it is going back to school, taking an adult-ed class, really getting in shape, meeting new people, growing spiritually, learning how to actually use a computer, finishing up your building project that is 3 years old, taking care of your already extended tax filings or dealing with an annoying medical condition, the time to act is today. So get a pad of paper - sit down and write down what you will do, and come back in 3 months, and see how you did.

This is TheOldGuy, reminding you that every day you delay in starting to grow, is one less day you get to experience the clarity and joy of having grown.

Only Women Can Understand...

When you have to visit a public toilet, you usually find a line of women, so you smile politely and take your place. Once it's your turn, you check for feet under the stall doors. Every stall is occupied. Finally, a door opens and you dash in, nearly knocking down the woman leaving the stall.

You get in to find the door won't latch. It doesn't matter, the wait has been so long you are about to wet your pants! The dispenser for the modern 'seat covers' (invented by someone's Mum, no doubt) is handy, but empty. You would hang your bag on the door hook, if there was one, but there isn't - so you carefully, but quickly drape it around your neck, (Mum would turn over in her grave if you put it on the FLOOR!), yank down your pants, and assume ' The Stance.'

In this position your aging, toneless thigh muscles begin to shake. You'd love to sit down, but you certainly hadn't taken time to wipe the seat or lay toilet paper on it, so you hold 'The Stance.'

To take your mind off your trembling thighs, you reach for what you discover to be the empty toilet paper dispenser. In your mind, you can hear your mother's voice saying, 'Honey, if you had tried to clean the seat, you would have KNOWN there was no toilet paper!' Your thighs shake more.

You remember the tiny tissue that you blew your nose on yesterday - the one that's still in your bag. (Oh yeah, the bag around your neck, that now, you have to hold up trying not to strangle yourself at the same time).. That would have to do. You crumple it in the puffiest way possible. It's still smaller than your thumbnail.

Someone pushes your door open because the latch doesn't work. The door hits your bag, which is hanging around your neck in front of your chest, and you and your bag topple backward against the tank of the toilet. 'Occupied!' you scream, as you reach for the door, dropping your precious, tiny, crumpled tissue in a puddle on the floor, lose your footing altogether, and slide down directly onto the TOILET SEAT. It is wet of course.

You bolt up, knowing all too well that it's too late. Your bare bottom has made contact with every imaginable germ and life form on the uncovered seat because YOU never laid down toilet paper - not that there was any, even if you had taken time to try. You know that your mother would be utterly appalled if she knew, because, you're certain her bare bottom never touched a public toilet seat because, frankly, dear, 'You just don't KNOW what kind of diseases you could get.'

By this time, the automatic sensor on the back of the toilet is so confused that it flushes, propelling a stream of water like a fire hose against the inside of the bowl that sprays a fine mist of water that covers your butt and runs down your legs and into your shoes. The flush somehow sucks everything down with such force that you grab onto the empty toilet paper dispenser for fear of being dragged in too.

At this point, you give up. You're soaked by the spewing water and the wet toilet seat. You're exhausted. You try to wipe with a gum wrapper you found in your pocket and then slink out inconspicuously to the sinks. You can't figure out how to operate the faucets with the automatic sensors, so you wipe your hands with spit and a dry paper towel and walk past the line of women still waiting.

You are no longer able to smile politely to them. A kind soul at the very end of the line points out a piece of toilet paper trailing from your shoe. (Where was that when you NEEDED it??) You yank the paper from your shoe, plunk it in the woman's hand and tell her warmly, 'Here, you just might need this.' As you exit, you spot your hubby, who has long since entered, used, and left the men's toilet. Annoyed, he asks, 'What took you so long, and why is your bag hanging around your neck?'

This is dedicated to women everywhere who deal with a public rest rooms/toilets (rest??? You've GOT to be kidding!!). It finally explains to the men what really does take us so long. It also answers their other commonly asked questions about why women go to the restroom/toilets in pairs. It's so the other gal can hold the door, hang onto your bag and hand you Kleenex under the door!

"The Cover Up Is Worse Than The Crime"...

A man from New York City vacationed several times up in the state of Maine. He liked it it so well up there that he sold out in New York and bought a home in Maine to live there for the rest of his life. He liked the honest lifestyle and the clean air etc.

He noticed his neighbor raised rabbits for a living. The man had several dozen hutches full of rabbits. One day shortly after the move to the new home the former New Yorker looked out his window in time to his dog carrying a rabbit in its mouth. Horrified, he ran out to save the rabbit, only to find it was too late.

Mortified and embarrassed, he went to the neighbor with the dead bunny. The neighbor was very nice about the incident and told him not worry about it. Sometime later the rabbit man needed to go on a visit to see his son in a distant state for two weeks. The New Yorker, hearing about this, thought he could redeem himself, and volunteered to clean and feed and water the rabbits for the man.

The two weeks went without incident until about an hour before the neighbor was to return home. The dog again was trotting across the yard with a rabbit in his mouth. The New Yorker ran out again to save the poor animal, but it was too late! The animal was dirty and beyond help.

This time, to save embarrassment, the New Yorker filled up his sink with hot water and put in some Woolite. The rabbit washed clean and the wife blow dried it with her electric blow dryer. The New Yorker quickly put the rabbit in a cage and went home.

About an hour later he got a phone call from the rabbit man asking if he saw any thing unusual about the rabbits. The New Yorker acted mystified and said no. He went on to say that if anything happened, it happened after he fed the animals that morning. "Funny thing," the rabbit man said. "I have a dead rabbit, and it looks just like the one I buried just before I left for my trip."

This is TheOldGuy, reminding you, that almost always it is best to be honest (exceptions are “Do I look fat in this?” and other white lies). Dishonesty has a way of coming back to bite you.