A heroic rescue

Day 2…..Crawling to the mail

Ocean Boulevard, Myrtle Beach…not Ok!

OK!!!!…Stop!!!!….This isn't fun anymore.  

I was born in upstate New York near the Canadian border.  I am used to snow and cold.   When I was growing up we played in the snow all the time.  I made snow forts, numerous snowmen, and occasional snow woman.  I was the proud owner of a flexible flyer.  Snow was fun.

Summer wasn't a season, it was a day.

I am so over that.

I woke up this morning thinking that things would return to normal today.  

Yesterday was a lousy weather day in Myrtle Beach.  A snowbird neighbor chuckled, "The storm of the decade is on its way."

That was yesterday.  This morning I saw him crawling through the parking lot, trying unsuccessfully to reach his mailbox.  Very icy.  I decided to go help him.  I am pretty good with ice.  I dressed appropriately.  I stuffed some tools into my toolbox for the task.  A word of advice for ice walkers.  You should never, ever put a ice pick in your front pants pocket.  We are talking major scrotum evisceration here.

We live near the beach.  Our property is on a dune line.  We are elevated from the beach and the road.  As I  stepped outside and put my foot on the sidewalk I became airborne instantly. I landed quite nicely.  This always amazes my wife.  She asked me how I can fall all the time and never get hurt?  "Practice."

I have fallen many times.  I could teach a class in falling.  Perhaps the local college will let me teach it this fall.  I wouldn't even need a classroom.  A parking lot and some bananas would be sufficient.

Anyway….back on topic, the rescue of my neighbor, the smug snowbird.   After I hit the ground,  I started to slide down the parking lot past the snowbird guy.   I couldn't help but remark to him, "Ha!..storm of the decade indeed. "  He answered weakly, "Help me."

"I will be with you soon.  I saw the mail girl crawl by our mailboxes about an hour ago."  I shimmied up the mailbox post, and opened it.  It was emptier than a politician promise.  I still had not received my inheritence from barrister Michael Okuwan from Lagos, Nigeria.

"Help me…….Help me please"  

"I will be there soon, Bucko!"  I prepared my tools for the rescue.  I took out my hammer and started hitting the ice with it until I reached Mr. Snowbird's whimpering carcass.

"You should have a rescue kit, Mr. Snowbird man." I advised. 

"What's in your rescue kit?", He wanted to know.

"Let me see!!!…I have a hammer, icepick, a space blanket, some nylon rope, tampons, 2 Starbuck coupons in case I fall in front of one of the numerous Starbucks in Myrtle Beach,  Mrs. Dash spicy Italian seasoning and 50 cents for tips at Starbucks."

"Wow! You are really prepared for disaster.  I have a few questions for you. Why Mrs. Dash seasoning? why tampons?  and why Starbucks?"

Ok….The Mrs. Dash is a salt substitute.  We do not use salt.  Too much sodium.  It should do just as good a job on ice as salt.  If it doesn't,  you have some pretty tasty ice.   The tampons?…that was a mistake.  I don't hear really well.  I thought they said tampons.  They actually said crampons.  An honest mistake.
Starbucks because I don't go to Dunkin Donuts.  DD carded me for proof when I was 68 years old.  That was a few years ago.  Mr. Snowbird eyes widened. "You're older than me.  Help us…Help us, please.  For God's  sake help two old men…Please…someone!"

I started thinking.  This guy is getting hysterical now.  Maybe I should not have mentioned my hearing problem and my Dunkin Donut issue.  Thank God, I did not mention my vision problem and my memory problem. I have to get him calm.  Perhaps I should slap him.  No, No,  A bad idea. My bad shoulder.

"Here!!!!!"
I handed him the hammer.  "This is the best way. Use the hammer to break the ice. Drag yourself home."  He just looked so pathetic when he again said, "Help me."

I used the ice pick to get myself home.  A tough 75 feet.  I look out the window occasionally to check on Mr Snowbird.  He seems to be making progress.  Hmmm…It's starting to rain again.  Freezing rain.
I hope he returns my hammer when he's done.

I think I see his lips moving as he removes the icicles hanging from his nose.  I think he is saying, "help me."
I could be wrong about this. My vision is not great. Or my eyesight.

Bullets in my head.

It was a dark and stormy night.  Yadda, yadda, yadda.  It was the best of times, it was the worst of times.

WHAT?????…..

Singers exercise their voice. They may yodel or do the scale.  Do re mi...whatever.  Runners will stretch the legs with various exercises.  I do my writing exercise by doing famous lines.  You wouldn’t want me to get writer’s cramp, would you??

My blog has not been very active last year.  My brain has been uploading new information in 2013.  At my age you lose a lot of brain cells every day and if you don’t keep your brain active, you forget things.

The little French ladies mosaic wall plaque.

I haven’t  written much this year.  The doctor told me if I don’t keep my brain active I will start forgetting things.   Hmmm…..That sounds familiar.  Anyway…Where was I?  The doctor told me…ummmm….What to hell did he tell me?

Seriously!!!!

Senior citizens: Exercise your mind and your body.  It helps.

What have we (Little French Lady and Hemlock) been doing?

• I have taken a course in memoir writing. 
• Mosaics class
• Geocaching
• walking on the beach
• reading
• being the servants, cooks, cleaner and play pal for our cat Madison.

RANTS, RAVES, OBSERVATIONS, OPINIONS, LINKS, LAUGHS

I just finished the book, "Unbroken" by Laura Hildenbrand.  It is about Louis Zamperini.

This a great story about an interesting guy.  The author has a fascinating story also.

I also read "The Power of Habit" by Charles Duhigg.  Why we do what we do in Life and in Business. Another interesting book.

Some senior citizen observations.  Some are mine.  Many of these were found on the internet.

"Sometimes I wonder if the world is being run by smart people who are putting us on, or by imbeciles who really mean it"

OOPPPSSSS!!!

Mark Twain

"Too bad all the people who know how to run the country are busy cutting hair or driving a cab."
George Burns

These things keep me awake at night…..!!!

• I'd kill for a Nobel Peace Prize.
• 99.7% of the lawyers give the rest a bad name.
• 41.8% of all statistic are made up on the spot.
• A conscience is what hurts when all your other parts feel so good.
• If a man with a split personality threatens to commit suicide, is it a hostage situation?
• An intellectual is someone who can listen to "The William Tell Overture"  without thinking of the Lone Ranger.

MORE SENIOR CITIZENS OBSERVATIONS:

• Some senior citizens are in the initial segment of their life: AARP, SSI, MD, DOA, RIP.
• Everything hurts, and what doesn't hurt doesn't work.
• The gleam in your eye is from the sun hitting your bifocals.
• You feel like the morning after and you haven't been anywhere.
• Your little black book contains names only ending in M.D.
• Your children begin to look middle age.
• You finally reach the top of the ladder and find it's leaning against the wrong wall.
• Your mind makes contracts your body can't keep.
• A dripping faucet causes and uncontrollable bladder urge.
• You look forward to a dull evening.
• Your favorite part of the newspaper is "40 Years Ago Today."
• You turn out the lights for economic reasons rather than romantic ones.
• You sit in the rocking chair and can't get it going.
• You knees buckle and your belt won't.
• You regret all those mistakes you made resisting tempation.
• You're 17 around the neck, 42 around the waist, and 96 around the golf course.
• Your back goes out more than you do.
• Your pacemaker makes the garage door open when you see a pretty girl.
• The little old grey haired lady you help across the street is your wife.
• You sink your teeth into a steak and they stay there.
• You have too much room in the house and not enough in the medicine cabinet.
• You know all the answers but nobody asks the questions.

Old pictures: In the early 1900's men always wore hats.  Theywore them properly;
apparently it became a lost art.  People now do not know how to wear hats. They have them on sideways , backwards, oversized, undersized, everything but right.

MEMORY LANE: YOU ARE OLD IF…

•  You chewed Blackjack or Teaberry gum.
•  You watched Howdy Doody.  (I wept shamelessly when it went off the air)
• You watched Justine Corelli and Bob Clayton dance on American Bandstand. (I wept shamelessly when they never married.)
• You snuck in to the movie theater. (I wept shamelessly when I was caught.)
• You played tableside jukeboxes. (COOL)
•  You played big Seeburg and Wurlitzer Jukeboxes.  3 songs for a quarter.
• You know whT 45 and 78 RPM records WERE.  scratchy sound.
• You remember staring at the test pattern on your TV.
• You remember a flat Annette Funicello (RIP).
• You can sing the Mickey Mouse Club Song.  
• You heard "Rock around the clock" for the first time when you saw the movie "Blackboard Jungle" .
• When you were growing up, swing club was a Friday night dance activity not a sexual event.
• People actually talked to each other.  Face to face!!!!!!
• You stopped weeping shamelessly.

A few interesting facts:

• Willard Scott was the original Ronald McDonald.
• Bob Keeshan, who was Captain Kangaroo, was also Clarabell the Clown on Howdy Doody.
• Julia Childs, Chef, worked for the OSS, which was a forerunner of the CIA.
• Martha Stewart, while in prison, would knit a key out of steel wool and leave the prison at night and steal things and give them to the prison staff for preferential treatment.  The warden now drives a Bentley and numerous guards have lovely centerpieces on their tables at home.
• One of the above statements is a lie.

I have found a very interesting site called "The Moth".   True stories told live.  It has some awesome stories.  Here is a link to a narration called " A dish best served cold"
You will love this.  I hope you enjoy the stories.

As they say in Ecuador "Au revoir." 
I get confused.  I was supposed to go to Ecuador.  I ended up in Quebec.
I'm done. 
Out of mojo and juju and a few other mysterious words.

I am done. No more bullets.

EH/JHemlock